Black Dragon, page 21
A Master Jumper with almost one hundred jumps to his name, Mitchell was a rookie compared to Jackson, who had been jumping from planes when he was still in high school. A fact that he rubbed in every chance that he could.
With seconds to go, Mitchell took a deep breath and waited until he was a couple of meters from the rooftop. He pulled down on both toggles, and felt his forward movement stall. A second later, his feet touched down. He ran forward for a couple of meters before coming to a complete stop. He turned about and quickly pulled in his parachute harness toward him, collapsing his parachute. Mitchell looked about and was relieved to see that aside from himself, the rooftop was empty.
With the practiced skill of an accomplished jumper, Jackson stalled his chute and touched down on the roof as easily as if he had been stepping down off the last rung of a ladder. Like Mitchell, he collapsed his chute and hurried to pack it away. Removing his parachute harness, Jackson jammed his parachute back into his backpack.
Mitchell drew his Styr tactical machine pistol from its holster and quickly screwed on a suppressor. He was hoping to avoid firing on anyone, but if he had to, he didn’t want the whole world to know. He keyed his throat-mic. “Package has arrived.” Mitchell let Yuri know that they had landed. Acknowledging the call, Yuri headed farther out into the night to find a safe place to land and wait for further instructions from Mitchell.
“Okay, I have their signal,” said Jackson barely above a whisper. In his hand was a small, portable tracking device.
“Come on, let’s get to work,” replied Mitchell as he led Jackson to a closed doorway on the side of the roof.
Mitchell wasn’t surprised to find it locked.
Jackson dug out a skeleton key from his pocket. Within a couple of seconds, the door was unlocked. Peering inside, Jackson saw a couple of beat-up old lockers resting beside a set of stairs that led down. Quickly pulling his NVGs off his head, Jackson, with his machine pistol held straight out, stepped inside. He took a quick look over the railing and saw that they were alone.
Mitchell pulled open one of the lockers. It was partially filled with cleaning supplies.
“In here,” said Mitchell to Jackson as he jammed his parachute harness and NVGs into the locker.
With a grunt on his lips, Jackson threw his gear inside and forced the locker door closed.
Mitchell dug out a ball cap from his pocket and placed it on his head. “How do I look?”
“Like a tall, white guy in a blue uniform,” replied Jackson.
“Well, then we’ll both stand out as I doubt there are too many non-Mongolians on the payroll.”
Mitchell was hoping that anyone they ran into would see the uniform first before they realized that the man wearing it didn’t belong there. It was that split-second hesitation that he was relying on to help them gain the upper hand.
“I’ll lead. You tell me where to go,” said Mitchell as he began to climb down the stairs.
As they moved down the stairwell, Mitchell and Jackson weren’t surprised to see that the complex descended well below the ground. They had expected a basement floor or two but were taken aback when the stairs seemed to go on forever into the dark and changed from newly installed metal ones to much older cement ones.
“I think we just stumbled on an old Soviet installation,” said Mitchell over his shoulder. “It doesn’t look like they use these older floors very much.”
“Well, that’s where we have to go. The signal is getting stronger. As long as we can take the elevator back up, I say we push on.”
“We may have to take the elevator. We have no idea what shape Sam or Gordon are going to be in when we find them.”
“Let’s just hope that they’re okay.”
With that, they continued down the stairs until Jackson reached over and tapped Mitchell on the shoulder. He pointed at the nearest door and quietly said, “Ten meters that way.”
The adrenaline began to pump into Mitchell’s veins. Taking a deep breath, he slowly reached over and cracked opened the door. Peering down the long, darkened hallway, he smiled to himself.
The corridor was empty.
With his machine pistol at the ready, Mitchell walked down the poorly lit corridor until he came to a closed door.
With a tap on his shoulder from Jackson, Mitchell braced himself. Moving to one side, he waited. A second later, Jackson reached over and tried the doorknob. The door was unlocked. Mitchell waited a split-second before dropping to one knee as Jackson flung the door open.
Aside from a wooden table in the middle of the room, the room was empty.
Mitchell carefully stepped inside, aiming his weapon as he advanced. He clenched his jaw when he saw Sam and Cardinal’s boots laying there on the table with their heels cut open and the tracking devices resting beside them. His heart felt heavy. Had they arrived too late?
“Damn,” muttered Jackson over Mitchell’s shoulder.
Lowering his weapon, Mitchell reached down and picked up the tracking device from beside one of Sam’s boots. Looking at the small emitter in his hand, his blood began to boil. Someone had to answer for this.
From behind, a Mongolian guard stepped into the room and nearly ran straight into Jackson’s back. Before he could say a word, Jackson spun around on his heels and grabbed the stunned guard by the neck. He lifted him up off the ground and angrily slammed the guard into the far wall.
With a pained moan on his lips, the guard slid to the floor.
Jackson took a quick look up and down the hall and saw that the guard was on his own. He closed the door behind him and strode over to the injured guard.
Mitchell pulled the guard’s pistol from its holster as he hauled him up onto his feet.
“I hope you speak English,” said Jackson, his voice cold and menacing.
The young guard, his eyes wide with fear, shook his head from side to side.
“I don’t think he understands what you’re saying,” said Mitchell.
“Wonderful. Now what do we do?”
“Let me try something.” With that, Mitchell switched into Russian and asked the guard if he understood.
With a terrified nod, the guard muttered that he did.
“Where are the people who belong in these clothes?” asked Mitchell.
“Next floor down,” stammered the guard.
“Where exactly?”
“They are in the middle rooms. That’s all I know.”
Mitchell smiled and passed on what the guard had said to Jackson.
“He’s one lucky SOB. I was ready to break him in two if Sam and Gordon were dead,” said Jackson.
Mitchell had no doubt that his friend meant every word.
“What do we do with this one?” asked Jackson.
“Knock him out and tie him up.”
With a smile, Jackson sent his right fist flying into the guard’s jaw.
Using the guard’s clothes to tie him up, Jackson pulled off one of the guard’s socks and jammed it as hard as he could into the man’s mouth to keep him quiet.
Mitchell moved to the door, took a quick look about and then stepped out into the hallway closely followed by Jackson, who, for good measure, snapped off the doorknob.
Sam fought back the tears as she placed a damp cloth on Cardinal’s forehead and then looked down at the new cuts and bruises on his face. For the past couple of days, the guards had been taking Cardinal to a room across the hallway to beat him senseless. Like a caged animal, she snarled at them as they dragged him away. If the guards didn’t have weapons trained on her and Cardinal, she would have attacked and torn them apart with her bare hands. What she couldn’t understand was that they never asked him any questions. They just took turns pummeling him until he blacked out.
A weak moan escaped Cardinal’s purple, swollen lips.
She gently reached down and pulled Cardinal close to her chest. With a weak smile on her face, she delicately kissed Cardinal’s forehead and told him that everything was going to be all right and that their friends would come for them. It was getting harder for her to believe that with every passing day. She began to prepare herself for the inevitable. She had already decided that she would go down on her feet and take as many of the bastards as she could with her when they tired of Cardinal and came for her.
Voices grew loud in the hallway.
Sam’s heart began to race in her chest. They had beaten Cardinal within an inch of his life earlier in the evening. They never came back until the next day to continue their sadistic routine.
The door swung open and three Mongolian guards stepped inside.
“What do you want?” said Sam defiantly.
The oldest one in the group with a disgusting leer on his face pointed at her. “Leave him. You are to come with us.”
Sam knew they weren’t going to beat her; they intended to rape her. This was the end. She would die rather than allow any one of them to defile her.
“Now!” snapped the guard.
Sam kissed Cardinal one last time. She delicately laid his head down on a pillow before standing up so she could look at her attackers in the eye. She quickly sized up her opposition. They were all musclebound men who looked to be in peak condition. She didn’t doubt that she could take out one or two of the guards before the last one got a shot off. If that was her fate, so be it.
The nearest guard stepped forward and reached over to grab Sam’s arm.
Like a steel trap going off, Sam attacked, gabbing the man’s outstretched arm. She twisted it hard over and then launched her right foot straight into his groin.
With a muffled groan, the man doubled over and dropped to his knees.
She let go of the wounded man’s arm and spun about on her heels as another guard dove at her.
Sam turned her hip into the guard, grabbed the man and flipped him over her and onto the hard concrete floor. Still holding onto the man’s right arm, she jammed her foot into his armpit and twisted his arm as hard as she could. With a sickening pop, Sam dislocated the man’s arm from its socket.
A shot rang out.
Sam saw the older guard standing there with a pistol aimed straight at her head.
“Move back,” ordered the guard, his voice cold and deadly.
Sam stepped aside, her breathing heavy and ragged.
“Now strip.”
“Over my dead body,” said Sam, keeping her head held high.
The guard smiled. “Have it your way, bitch.”
Sam gritted her teeth. She was not going to close her eyes or beg for her life at the end.
Without warning, blood appeared on the front of the guard’s shirt.
Startled, Sam stepped back slightly as the guard’s body tumbled to the floor. Sam almost leapt for joy when she saw Mitchell enter the room, his weapon trained on the lifeless body.
A moan escaped the lips of the man at her feet. Something snapped in Sam’s mind. A blinding, white-hot rage surged through her body. Walking over, she ripped Mitchell’s silenced machine pistol from his hands and coldly fired off a shot into each of the injured guards’ skulls, killing them. She stared down at the dead bodies. Sam felt nothing for the men she had just killed. In her heart, she knew that they intended to rape and then kill her. They got what they deserved, as far as she was concerned.
“It’s over,” said Mitchell as he laid a hand on Sam’s shoulder.
Sam looked into Mitchell’s blue-gray eyes. She could not believe it. The nightmare was over. Like a dam bursting, all of the pent-up feelings of fear pushed deep inside her came flooding to the surface. With tears streaming down her face, Sam threw herself into Mitchell’s arms.
“It’s okay. We’re here to take you home,” said Mitchell, holding Sam close.
Jackson moved past them and checked on Cardinal. His face grimaced when he saw how bad Cardinal had been beaten. Shaking his head in anger, Jackson moved back to the door to keep watch.
Sam wiped the tears from her face and smiled at Mitchell. She slowly let go of him. “Ryan, I don’t know what you’ve got planned, but Gordon can’t walk.”
“I’ll carry him,” said Jackson firmly.
“Okay, then. We’ll take the nearest elevator and head up to the roof where Yuri can pick us up,” said Mitchell.
With Cardinal in his arms, Jackson handed Sam his machine pistol and fell into line behind Mitchell and Sam as they made their way down the long hallway. They only needed a few minutes, and they would be home free.
28
Cypher Factory Complex
Gobi Desert, Mongolia
With a puzzled look on his aged face, the late-night janitor held up the night-vision gear he had found in his cleaning locker. He had been looking for a fresh jug of wax to polish the floors with when he stumbled upon Mitchell and Jackson’s stowed equipment. The old man had no real idea what he was looking at. Thinking it was something that belonged to the security people, he decided that it was nothing to trouble himself with. With a bored shrug, he was about to walk away when he decided to check his other locker for some wax and found the parachutes. With a look of disbelief on his face, he knew that something was wrong. He hurriedly made his way down the stairs and found a phone. Struggling to catch his breath, he made a call to the complex’s security office.
Atsuko was restless.
Cypher was sitting at his desk, busy on a laptop checking his stock portfolio while she waited for him in bed. She couldn’t understand why a man who was already a multi-millionaire would even bother worrying about how much money they had made from one stock or another.
“Come to bed, Gabriel. You can worry about your stocks in the morning,” said Atsuko, trying her best to sound alluring and wanting.
“Just one more minute, my love,” replied Cypher. “I just want to see how things went in New York earlier today.”
Love. Atsuko wished it were true. She knew that it was only a word that Cypher threw around to keep her interested. Still, she liked the sound of it, genuine or not.
Suddenly, a loud klaxon alarm blared in their bedroom, startling Atsuko so much that she screamed in fright.
The phone beside Cypher rang. He picked it up and listened for a few seconds before hanging up.
“What’s going on?” yelled Atsuko, trying to be heard over the shrieking alarm.
“We have intruders,” replied Cypher as he opened a drawer on his desk and pulled out a pistol. He jammed home a loaded magazine, and pulled back on the action, loading a round into the chamber. Grabbing his red silk housecoat, he quickly dressed. Cypher picked up a remote and turned on all of the wall-mounted screens in his room. He changed the channels until the security monitors showed what he was looking for. Cypher grinned when he saw his prisoners and two other men get into an elevator. So, they had come after all. He was beginning to doubt that someone would ever come for his prisoners. With a growing smile on his face, he realized that the man leading them matched the description given to him by Tara, his favorite assassin, after her failed attempt to kill Atsuko’s father.
“I know that man,” said Atsuko as she hurriedly dressed.
“You do?”
“Yes, his name is Ryan Mitchell. He was the one assigned to guard me at the unveiling in Washington.”
Cypher was stunned. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“He’s the man the woman said would come for her and the Canadian.”
“He’s also very dangerous, Gabriel . . . I’d be careful if I were you.”
Cypher stared at Mitchell with hate in his eyes.
“What are you going to do?”
He picked up his phone and dialed a number. The instant the line was answered, he said, “Stop the number two elevator and then send a squad of men to detain the people trapped inside.”
With a jarring halt, the elevator stopped moving.
“They’re on to us,” said Sam, calmly looking up at the camera mounted in the roof of the elevator.
Furiously smashing it with his machine pistol, Mitchell said, “Okay, everyone, up and out.”
“I’ll never fit through that,” moaned Jackson as he looked up at the small escape hatch on the roof of the elevator.
“You’re welcome to stay here and greet the guards when they arrive.”
“Out of my way,” muttered Sam. Using Jackson as a ladder, she climbed up and pushed open the trap door. A couple of seconds later, she was standing on top of the elevator.
“Pass up Gordon,” said Sam as she reached down from above.
As soon as Cardinal was out of the elevator, Mitchell jumped up and hauled himself up through the hatch.
“Damn it,” muttered Jackson to himself as he stripped down to his underwear.
Mitchell lay face down on the top of the elevator and hung his arms down. “Come on, sexy.”
“You cannot tell anyone what happened here,” said Jackson as he tossed his clothes up and then took hold of Mitchell’s arms.
“Jesus, Nate. Lose a few pounds, would you?” said Mitchell as he strained to pull his friend up.
From behind, Sam grabbed Mitchell’s shoulders. Together they pulled for all they were worth.
Grunting and groaning as if he were in labor, Jackson slowly inched his way up and out of the elevator. A few seconds later, covered in sweat, he lay on top of the elevator, gasping for air.
“Don’t say it. I know I need to go on a diet. When I get back I promise to lose a few pounds,” said Jackson.
“I’ve heard that one before. Now hurry up and get dressed; we have to get out of here,” said Mitchell, looking up the near-pitch-black elevator shaft.
Cracking open a glow stick from his pants pocket, Mitchell shook it for a second. A bright green light filled the elevator shaft. Looking around, Mitchell cursed himself when he saw that they were about a meter short of the next floor. He reached up with his hands, jammed them in-between the closed doors and then tried pulling them apart.
