Page 138 of Player

Finn

In the wee hours of the morning Armageddon strikes. I’m half-asleep on a bottom bunk bed in a large, sparse room set up for workers. Resting rather than like the other fellas, who are asleep like babies. I’ve more at risk, don’t you know?

Shouts and gunfire startle everyone awake. But I’m already on me feet and sprinting for the main warehouse floor. I’m nearing what’s left of the uranium crates when the South Africans bust open the warehouse door. Diving, I land on me stomach then crawl to the nearest crate, tucking me body behind it then carefully taking a gander at the unexpected visitors.

Vindictive. That’s how the South Africans described Mrs. Ogdenhayer. But we all, the lads, O’Brien, yours truly, believed she’d go away quietly. Underestimating her, and her temperament. I’ve got to say this ambush is truer to character.

Her men file into the dark space. She sent the lot of them, and I count nearly twenty fellas. A bleeding battle, is what this is going to be. I scratch my neck, deciding how to best position myself.

And it’s then that I notice something even more unexpected— a shimmer of light reflected off metal. It comes from between the two broken slats of a crate. Disappears just as fast, where I’m scratching me head and wondering if I’m seeing things.

Not a chance. Some poor bugger is holed up inside the crate closest to the entrance, dead center from where the South Africans are entering. With a gun that caught the light so?

Or a camera?

Christ’s sake. She can’t leave well enough alone. I’ve done everything to protect her. She shouldn’t be here, and feckin’ filming the shiteshow underway.

I rise to me knees, desperate to act.

“Back room,” someone bellows. The South Africans swarm forward. In a matter of seconds, O’Brien’s crew will spill into the warehouse, guns blazing.

I haul arse the other way, my heart in me throat as I sprint to the opposite side of the warehouse. Behind me, the battle begins but my focus is on what’s ahead. I turn the corner at a dead run.Get to the crate, Finn. Get to the motherfeckin’ crate.

In my business, panic is beat out of you in Hell Camp. Calm. Cool. Collected. That’s all you can ever be. So it’s a foreign feeling that’s come over me. A blind panic that rolls over the senses and interferes with common sense.

Which is why it occurs to me too late that these South Africans most likely have military training. That the lot of them might be charging up the center isle of the warehouse yet a few may have scattered out to flank the steel stacks on both sides. The thought barely crosses me noggin before I go barreling into one of them.

And who’s the lucky fella?

Vidal.

Hard to say who’s more surprised.

Quick-like, I punch him square in the nose.

He staggers back, his half-raised semi-automatic rifle going off. A bullet scrapes the side of my thigh, ripping my favorite pair of baggy sweats.

“You,” he hisses. He kicks me in the thigh, directly on the wound. You bet I saw it coming but didn’t block it. Information comes first, and I’m already launching myself at him. I tackle him to the ground and slam a fist into him, dislocating his shoulder.

He screams bloody murder while struggling beneath me, naively believing he has any chance against me. I knock the gun he’s still grasping away and then knee him in the groin, waiting for the message to finally sink in, that the one punch I delivered to his jaw was an act of kindness from a killer like me.

I grab him by the throat and squeeze. “Where’s the mine?”

My fingers relax, offering him a chance to respond.

He doesn’t, and I give him another taste, this time hard enough his eyes bulge. “Die a quick death or I can cut you to bits and pieces. Ogdenhayer’s uranium mine. Where is it?”

“Fuck you.”

“Had to be difficult, didn’t you?” I press my Glock into his side and shoot him. He’ll be dead in minutes. Sooner, if he wants me to be merciful. Do I pity him? No, this is kill or be killed, right? Like him, that’s what I’m trained to do. That, and how to quickly collect information.

“Is the mine located in South Africa?”

His expression is answer enough. No.

I try a different approach. “A deal for a deal. Tell me, and I’ll make sure O’Brien doesn’t feed yer corpse to the dogs.”

He stiffens. Message received. “Central Africa. North of Malawi.”