The delivery van, an open bed one used for transporting milk crates and groceries, lumbered up the hill to Owen Chau’s residence.
It groaned and wheezed on its shocks, the engine turning furiously, as it crested the height. The guards watched it, bored. There was nothing else to occupy their time.
Two men inside, indistinct in the dark of the night. It was ten pm. The city was quiet, but that neighborhood of Niavaran was even quieter.
One guard cracked a joke to the other as the driver yanked on the wheel furiously to straighten it. He oversteered and the vehicle lurched on the road, heading right at the gates.
The guards didn’t react. The fool would correct and the van would pass.
It didn’t. It kept coming at them, the driver’s face pale, his mouth open as he yelled something.
‘GET IT AWAY, YOU FOOL,’ one of the guards roared at him.
‘SOMETHING’S BROKEN,’ the driver yelled back, ‘IT’S NOT RESPONDING.’
He leaped out of the van, threw a scarf around his face while the passenger did the same. The two men fled from the scene even as the vehicle continued on its course.
‘WAIT. COME BACK,’ the guard shouted.
Too late.
Four tons of van smashed into the gates as the sentries dived out of the way. It teetered alarmingly and then tipped over spilling its contents on the driveway.
‘We’re screwed,’ the guard slapped his hand to his forehead as he stared at the mess on the approach road and the road beyond. A widening pool of milk, cracked eggs, groceries on the road, and the truck on its side, its wheels still turning.
Zeb threw his scarf away as he raced down the slope.
‘You good?’ he asked as Broker joined him.
‘Yeah.’
The two men were outfitted in their dark, skin-tight, combat suits. They pulled balaclava masks over their faces as they ran.
In the distance a pair of headlights approached.
‘We see you,’ Bwana, in their earpieces.
‘Go,’ Zeb commanded.
The approaching vehicle, a car, swerved suddenly and skidded to a stop, sideways on the road, blocking it entirely.
‘Our car’s in position too,’ Beth, crisp, cool, as she checked in.
Zeb looked down the road he had come. He couldn’t see them but knew the twins, Bear and Chloe would be approaching the compound wall after positioning their roadblock.
He could hear shouting in the distance as the guards raised the alarm. They’re not going to be happy, his lips creased in a smile.
He checked his rear. They weren’t visible from the gates. They were past the peak of the hill. Bwana and Roger, two dark shadows in the night, ahead of him.
‘Scale,’ he said and they turned as one towards the ten-foot wall.
It didn’t present any barrier as they ran it, jammed a foot each against it for leverage and sailed across the top.
‘No shooting unless required,’ he said as he landed on soft grass. ‘Subdue the guards. Chau’s our target.’
‘Gotchas,’ in his earpiece.
Wall could be alarmed and the cameras will have captured us. I’m betting that all attention is at the gates, though.
They could have jammed the cameras and phones with an EMP blast from the drones, but that would have given their break-in away as a sophisticated attack. Their breach had to look like the other home invasions in the city that were receiving wide coverage. Gangs blocked the road and entered luxury homes for a smash-and-grab.
The garden was well-lit, illuminating his way as he rushed towards the house, his friends, spread out around him. To his right were the twins and Chloe, Bear behind them. To his left, Broker and Roger strung out, Bwana at the far end, a mountain of muscle and lethal intent who moved easily despite his size.
Zeb was jumping across a flower bed when the front door opened and three guards raced out.
They stopped their burst towards the gates and stared at the intruders.
‘ATTACK!’ one of them warned.