Page 93 of Clive Cussler Ghost Soldier

The Polish twins arrived at the airstrip tower hardly breaking a sweat. They were the youngest and fittest of the unit. They smashed through the tower’s locked door with ease and took up positions for overwatch at the windows as the rest of the team came thundering in.

Fifteen minutes later, everyone was gathered on the first floor. Most were huffing and drenched in sweat, especially Linc.

“Okay, Plata. You’ve got us here. Now what?” the Brit asked.

“Nobody locks me in a cage,” Plata said, seething. “We’re going to kill that man.”

“How? He’s holed up in a cement fortress behind a moat of land mines. Even if we had metal detectors or even ground-penetrating radar, he can set them off remotely while we’re digging ’em up.”

“Seems to me we have three options,” the Irishman McGuire began. “Take out the Vendor—which is nigh unto impossible. Take out Rahul, or grab the ten flags as quickly as we can.”

“Flags or not, in the end, we kill the Vendor,” Plata said.

“We kill him, we don’t get the money,” the Nigerian said.

“Once I begin to separate his eyes from their sockets, he’ll give us the money, I promise you that.”

“We should take out Rahul,” Juan said. “Kill him, and we’ll be plucking up flags like daffodils.”

“That’s idiotic,” Plata said. “How do we even find him? We have less than forty-eight hours. It might take us a week to locate him. If we pick up all the flags, the game is over—no need to kill him. But as soon as we do get those flags, we’re going after thisengañador‘Vendor.’ ”

“You don’t think Rahul is out there waiting to ambush us?” Linc said. “All he has to do is keep us from one flag and we lose.”

“He doesn’t know where the flags are, remember?” The Frenchman held up his wrist map and tapped it. “We have these. He doesn’t. He must find the flags on his own. That gives us an advantage.”

“I bet he’s already setting up some kind of electronic surveillance,” Linc said. “And when he does, we’ll be walking into his traps.”

“We should stay together,” the Turk said. “If he’s set up an ambush at one location, we can overwhelm him.”

“Ridiculous,” the German said. “We should split up. He sees us all together and—boom!” He mimicked an explosion with his gloved hands.

“Should we wait until nightfall?” McGuire asked. “I brought these.” He held up a pair of night vision goggles. “There are more back at the armory.”

“Wait around twelve hours for him to scout the island and set ambushes for us? Are you stupid?” the Frenchman asked. “We have to act fast. The clock is ticking.”

“I hate playing defense,” the Brit said. “I say we take the fight to the muppet. We outnumber him thirteen to one.”

“It used to be fourteen to one, remember?” Osipenko said. “Until your ‘wet noodle’ set the Syrian on fire.”

“Al-Mawas was locked in a cage without a weapon,” Plata said. “Let’s see Rahul try his tricks against heavily armed commandos in a fair fight.”

“If you think that little stunt with the fire-breathing bug was his best trick, you’re insane,” Juan said. “The whole point of this ‘game’ is to pit thirteen trained fighters against one man. Did you see those spectators? They looked like military types. This is a weapons test. The Vendor sells weapons. Those were prospective buyers. The Vendor must be trying to sell Rahul and his spider-machine to them and the proof of concept is us—all thirteen of us. Do not underestimate this man.”

“Don’t underestimate these men, either,” Dragu? said. “They’ve already proven themselves.”

“Against what, paper targets?” Linc said.

“I’m not afraid of a mechanical insect,” the Turk said.

“Use your head,” Juan said. “That trick with the fire? That was meant to terrorize us. It’s only a short-range weapon. There’s no way for one man to take out thirteen men at close quarters. He must have long-range weapons in his arsenal.”

“What kinds of weapons?” McGuire asked.

Juan shrugged. “Whatever he can operate at a distance, probably remotely.”

“Missiles? Mortars? Drones?” Osipenko asked.

“All of them, some of them. A combination, most likely. And like Davis said, he’ll tie them into some kind of surveillance capability.”