Covenant Page 15
Ethan looked up to check his parachute one last time before his landing, and as he did so something caught his eye floating in the immense night above him. “Oh, for Christ’s sake.”
A thousand feet above, just visible in the glow from Gaza’s feeble streetlights, another parachute blossomed against the night sky.
Rachel, close the door!”
Safiya’s voice was snatched away on the howling wind as she saw Rachel yank a second parachute from its rack on the fuselage wall, strapping the harnesses over her shoulders in the same way that Ethan had done.
Safiya glimpsed Ethan’s parachute billow open behind the de Havilland as she scrambled between the cockpit seats and rushed toward Rachel, grabbing her by the shoulders and holding her back.
“Don’t be a fool, sadiqati! You can’t jump!”
Rachel strained to break free. “My daughter could be down there!”
Safiya wrapped one arm across Rachel’s chest, leaning back so that her weight would prevent Rachel from leaping out. “Yes she could, but what good will it do her if you go and get yourself kidnapped, or worse?”
Unexpectedly, Rachel backed away from the opening and turned to face Safiya, gently breaking her grasp.
“You know why Ethan became the way he is?” Rachel shouted above the wind. “He’s half a person, isn’t he? Nothing like he used to be. I don’t want to end up that way.”
Safiya stared at her for a long beat, desperately searching for a reply, but she could find nothing. Rachel turned and without further hesitation hurled herself from the aircraft and plunged into the void.
Safiya watched her vanish into the darkness before hauling the de Havilland’s door shut, cutting off the noise. She staggered back into the copilot’s seat.
“You sure you don’t want to go as well?” Aaron uttered. “I don’t know how the hell we’re going to explain this when we land.”
Safiya shook her head slowly, glancing at the helicopter’s lights flashing in the darkness off their starboard wing.
“We will tell the authorities that nobody boarded at Bar Yehuda, that it is all a mistake.”
“You think they’ll believe that?” Aaron snorted.
“They’re more likely to believe that than the truth.”
Ethan grabbed the guidance cords of his parachute, yanking them sideways as he aimed for a yawning chasm of pitch blackness near a tight knot of apartment buildings. A single, flickering streetlight intermittently illuminated what might once have been a school nearby, now obscured by rubble and litter and hemmed in by two buildings bearing the scars of artillery strikes. On the night air wafted the salty odor of the nearby ocean, tainted with the acrid stench of sewage that ran openly along the gutters of Gaza’s streets as dark, thick, and dangerous as the shadows that concealed it.
The inky blackness loomed up swiftly and Ethan braced himself for the impact, pulling down on the cords at the last moment to slow his descent as he belatedly considered the possibility that he could end up breaking either his legs or pelvis. The unforgiving concrete rushed past as his feet slammed into the ground. He managed to run a few paces and then rolled, hitting the ground hard amid a cloud of dust that clogged his throat.
The parachute fluttered down beside him as he struggled to his feet, unclipping his harness and hauling it in. He turned and looked up into the sky. The second parachute was drifting down toward him but clearly wasn’t going to hit the same spot. He could detect slight movements as the jumper tried desperately to control their descent.
Voices sounded in the darkness, a flourish of urgent Arabic closing in on him from nearby. Shouts echoed from the main road on the other side of the derelict buildings as a car screeched to a halt and its doors slammed. Heavy feet pounded the earth.
Ethan turned and dashed into the first alley he could see that would take him in the same direction as the parachute above him, his own still bundled under his arm. He plunged into the shadows, tossing the parachute through a shattered doorway as he ran through the darkness, praying he wouldn’t break a leg on some unseen obstacle. Something crashed into his shin and he cursed through gritted teeth, staggering onward through the darkness.
The end of the alley broke out into another, larger passage running between two skeletal buildings emaciated by the rigors of war. Ethan checked both ways before sprinting between them. The parachute passed directly overhead, visible barely a hundred feet up in the narrow strip of night sky above, swerving left and right as it plummeted downward.
Ethan ran hard and burst out onto the edge of a dusty wasteland of unused foundations filled with jagged chunks of masonry, razor wire, and abandoned, burned-out vehicles.
The parachute was twenty feet above the center of the clearing, and Ethan knew for sure that Rachel was the jumper. Without real control she would almost certainly break bones if she hit the rocks.
“Rachel! Pull hard on both handles, now!”
He could just make out Rachel’s head turn to look at him, her expression of surprise, and then she yanked down on both of the handles. The parachute slowed rapidly and Ethan heard a thump that made him wince as Rachel hit the ground. Behind him, a fresh chorus of angry Arabic erupted from the darkness.
They had heard him.
Ethan dodged between the ragged boulders of concrete, careful not to catch himself on dense webs of rusting steel braces poking out like lances in the darkness. Ahead, he saw Rachel’s parachute rippling to the ground and a body lying inert in the darkness.
Ethan sprinted the last few meters and skittered down alongside Rachel’s body. To his relief she lay sprawled in the center of a large patch of coarse-grain sand and gravel. She sat upright as Ethan yanked off her harness.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I think so,” she murmured as though waking from a dream, and she stared at the soft sand beneath her. “That was lucky, wasn’t it?”
The shouts behind them became louder, and Ethan glimpsed swiftly moving figures obscuring the streetlight filtering through the alleys nearby.
“I wouldn’t call this lucky,” he said urgently. “Can you walk?”
With Ethan’s help Rachel struggled to her feet, and he quickly led her away from the pursuing voices, dodging between the rubble and detritus clogging their way. He kept low and headed for the silhouettes of derelict buildings.
“Where are we going?”
“Anywhere but here,” Ethan replied. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“I told you, there is nothing that I won’t do to find Lucy.”
Ethan didn’t reply, running instead toward another narrow alleyway that cut between the shattered hulks of the buildings ahead. The voices behind them were calling out to one another, short bursts of Arabic flowing back and forth like gunfire through the night. Another flurry of excited exclamations heralded the discovery of Rachel’s discarded parachute.
“Who are they?” Rachel asked.
“I don’t know and I don’t want to.”
“I thought you said you knew people who lived here.”
“I don’t know everyone! Come on.”
They plunged into the safety of the nearest alley, the choking stench of feces overpowering them in the confined spaces and the splash of puddles beneath their feet echoing through the darkness until Ethan slowed. Ahead, a brightly lit road was filled with the sounds of voices. He could hear music playing in the distance from one of the thousands of cafés scattered across Gaza. The figures of people walked past, strangers silhouetted against streetlights.
Ethan turned to look behind. He could hear the voices of their pursuers crossing the open ground, closing in on them. They would reach the alleyway within moments. He turned to Rachel.
“We’re going to stand out like a sore thumb. Just walk behind me and try to look normal.”
Rachel shot him an uncertain look, but Ethan turned and with a deep breath walked out into the street and turned immediately right.
The street was narrow, with ancient,
battered cars and taxis parked haphazardly by the curbs. A cyclist rattled past and looked at them curiously as they made their way along the street, while a young boy sitting in a makeshift carriage being pulled by a mule stared openly at them as they passed. The music from a café on the opposite side of the street became louder, and Ethan could see from the periphery of his vision old men wearing traditional Arab garments sitting outside in the warm evening air smoking hookahs and drinking hot, sweet coffee. They stopped talking as Ethan and Rachel passed by on the other side of the street, watching them with intense gazes.
Ethan searched for a side alley that they could vanish into, and was rewarded with a dimly lit street twenty meters ahead and on the opposite side of the road.
“This way,” he motioned, crossing the street with purposeful strides, Rachel struggling to keep up behind him.
The music from the café behind them fell silent.
Ethan glimpsed a car pull into the street, headlights sweeping accusing beams toward them as they walked. The handful of people walking along the street suddenly disappeared in silence, drifting into houses as though obeying some unheard command. He glimpsed shutters on windows closing, saw the old men abandon their hookahs to vanish inside the café.
The car accelerated toward them with a squeal of scorched tires.
“Go, now!
Ethan shoved Rachel toward the alleyway, running after her as the car bore down on them, its screaming engine battering the night air. He looked over his shoulder to see the doors opening as it skidded to a halt ten meters away, men leaping from the vehicle with weapons in their hands. Hoods, boots, bandanas and balaclavas, dark and glowering eyes filled with hatred and anger.
Ethan plunged into the alley behind Rachel, running hard as they dashed between the narrow walls, dodging abandoned litter and leaping the rusting carcass of an old bicycle. Rachel burst out into another street, this one narrower still, looking left and then right as Ethan rushed out behind her.
Another café to their left stood with chairs abandoned outside on the pavement. A pram with a missing wheel lay on its side on the opposite side of the road, and somewhere above them a series of window shutters slammed shut. At both ends of the street, cars accelerated toward them.
Ethan turned and saw the shapes of men rushing toward them through the alley. He felt his guts twist deep inside him as panic fluttered through his chest. The cars screamed up to them, armed and masked men leaping from the interiors with assault rifles in their hands. Ethan moved closer to Rachel, and realized that he had failed to protect her.
“Game’s up,” he said.
In the abandoned street Ethan raised his hands, watching as a group of fifteen or so men poured out of the alley behind them, AK-47s in their hands and unimaginable thoughts running through their minds.
Within seconds Ethan and Rachel were surrounded by shouting Palestinians, several of whom began punching the air and firing loud staccato shots from their rifles into the night sky. Ethan placed a hand on Rachel’s forearm and squeezed it as reassuringly as he could.
“We’ll be okay,” he whispered.
From behind him, a gruff voice shouted out in broken English, “Get on the ground, hands on your head!”
“We’re American,” Ethan said, “and we’re looking for—”
Something hard cracked across the back of his legs and he collapsed, his knees smashing painfully on the unforgiving concrete. He had just enough time to see Rachel being grabbed by two men, and then a musty-smelling sack was shoved over his head.
Jerusalem
“We lost them.”
Spencer Malik stood behind a MACE technician operating a computer and two monitors, one of which was filled with the face of a helicopter pilot glowing in the light of his instruments.
“How the hell can you lose a damned airplane?”
“They bailed out,” the pilot explained. “Israeli air traffic control ordered us to cease jamming their signals. We saw two ’chutes go down somewhere in the Gaza Strip. We’re tracking them with cameras but they’ve been grabbed, probably by insurgents. We’re having trouble keeping them in sight outside of Gaza airspace.”
“Does air traffic know that anyone has bailed out?”
“Not yet. My guess is that whatever they’ve been up to, the pilots are not going to admit anything to the IDF. Best we’ll get is a detention and questioning, but we can’t prove a thing.”
Warner had the camera footage, Malik reasoned, and his priority was getting it back to Israel without MACE being able to intercept him. Now, Malik had to find the little bastard before he managed to get to any of the crossing points on the Gazan border. Byron Stone was due to arrive soon, and if Israel got hold of the footage, heads would roll. He had the distinct impression that his would be first.
“Let the aircraft go,” Malik said quickly, “stay on the refugees.”
Malik looked down at the technician.
“How soon can we have a Valkyrie drone over the Strip?”
“An hour,” the technician replied, “but it would have to be cleared by Israel first.”
Malik nodded, looking at the helicopter pilot. “Relay the camera’s tracking data here.”
The pilot said something over his intercom to a crew member in the rear of the helicopter. Instantly, a grainy image from a night-vision camera appeared, following a convoy of four cars through the streets of Gaza.
Malik watched the screen for several seconds before making his decision.
“Track them to their destination. Mark the coordinates and relay them here. I’ll organize clearance for the UAV.”
“Roger that.”
The helicopter pilot’s image vanished, and the technician turned to look up at Malik.
“Israel’s not going to give us UAV clearance over the Gaza Strip easily.”
Malik looked thoughtfully at the screen. Having a foreign-owned, built, and armed unmanned aerial vehicle marauding over Gaza wasn’t going to be a walkover, but Israel’s deeply ingrained xenophobia had served MACE well in the past.
“Get all of the video data downloaded to my workstation. All Israel needs to know is that we’re tracking terrorists who may pose a threat. Enhance anything that may give that impression from the footage and remove everything that suggests otherwise.”
EVANGELICAL COMMUNITY INSTITUTE
IVY CITY, WASHINGTON DC
Lucas Tyrell disliked most all medical institutions. But more than that he disliked the clinically insane who haunted them, those who had crossed the line between reality and oblivion. The fact that the Evangelical Institute reminded him of the hospital in which his brother had died so many years ago did nothing to comfort him.
The building was modern, smoked-glass windows stark against white paneled walls blazing in the midday sun, overlooking freshly mown lawns and quiet, shady gardens. He followed Nicola Lopez through a reinforced glass door into the interior of the hospital, more like a rest home than a refuge for the crazies. Gone were the days of iron bars and locks. A sign on a wall in flowing script caught his attention as he passed by.
We do not restrict or restrain. We rehabilitate.
“How many patients do you have here?” Lopez asked the female nurse who met them at the reception desk and led them down an immaculate white corridor.
“One hundred twenty-eight at the moment,” came the serene reply, as though even the staff were strung out on sedatives.
“No murderers or other felons?”
“No, although some of our clients are former convicts who suffered breakdowns in the prison system. We analyze them first to ensure they’re not playing the mental card to get onto the wards permanently.” She smiled. “Many find God while in our care.”
Tyrell glanced around as they walked, seeing frail-looking patients who were being guided gently along by orderlies. Soft instrumental music played through speakers concealed in the ceiling panels.
“What’s Daniel Neville’s history?” he asked the nurse.
“What’s his condition?” Lopez asked.
“Daniel Neville suffered oxygen starvation to the cerebral cortex as a result of heart failure brought on by his overdose. He has lost some motor function and suffers from various psychological and physical disorders.”
“What sort of medication is he on?” Tyrell pressed. “Can he be considered a suitable witness in a court case?”
The nurse frowned.
“Daniel is currently on a prescription of lithium to maintain the chemical balance in his brain, but his concepts of time, space, and judgment are severely distorted. His bouts of depression produce symptoms of mania and extreme paranoia that are difficult to control. I’d imagine most attorneys would reject any testimony from him.”
Lopez cast a doubtful glance at Tyrell.
“What blood group is Daniel?” Tyrell asked.
“O-negative, the rarest type.”
Tyrell and Lopez exchanged a look but said nothing more as they turned left into another corridor that led to a set of steel gates blocking their path to the corridor beyond. A tall, rangy man in a blue jumpsuit swabbed the floors as they walked past, his face hidden behind a mop of shaggy blond hair. Outside the gates stood a robust-looking man in a security guard’s outfit; he moved to meet them.
“These detectives are here to question Daniel Neville,” the nurse explained to the security guard.
The guard shook his head.
“I’m afraid Daniel Neville is required to remain in isolation,” he said politely.
“On whose orders?” the nurse asked, surprised.
“Chief medical officer,” the guard responded calmly. “Doctor and patient confidentiality.”