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ABOUT THE FIFTH TIME a goat stumbled into her lap, Jackie gave up and let it stay. Sure-footed, they maintained their balance well around the tight curves and cratered road.
They stank, an earthy musk soon lost under the fumes of burning oil and the cloud created by a ruined muffler. Jackie knew she smelled just as bad. Their attention was welcome for their soft fur which held back the biting wind. Ubaid had been right about that.
She hadn't been as brave as Danger who'd left his perch and invaded the goat's territory. He slumped, asleep, with his back to the cab and the other goat munching contentedly on his boot laces.
If she needed any better sign they'd have an uneventful journey, that should've been it. Danger, sleeping. Hound remained sprawled against the tailgate, his own head nodding. She'd gotten used to many things soldiers could do. The whole sleeping on the move, sleeping under the most adverse conditions, hadn't fully come to her.
They passed a cluster of people and a few cars, stopped incredulously in this no man's land of sheer cliff faces and dizzying drops. The men and women clenched their clothes in grief, their faces red, drawn into open cries of anguish. Jackie slipped her battery from the charger which she'd been filling using the scant rays of sunlight. Camera raised, she took several shots as they passed.
It wasn't until they'd wound their way up and above the scene that an unspoiled view of the gorge told the rest of the story. A vehicle burned below. Blackened and perforated by flames licking from a row of windows, the small bus could've held a dozen people, maybe more.
Jackie lowered her camera, unable to fit the entire story of grief and loss into a single frame. Hound twisted around to look and wagged his head. She searched the sky, the peak framed emptiness. Somewhere out there, a guy, a kid, in a flying armored suit imbued with superhuman strength, followed.
Had he seen the wreck? Even tried to do anything about it?
"Hard to say what could've gone wrong," said Hound.
Jackie stroked the shaggy goat stretched across her lap. She and Hound watched each other for a while, neither having much to say. Their driver continued up the snaking road.
As night fell, they began the long descent. Jackie was thankful for the darkness. Watching the headlights race toward jagged corners and disappear into an empty, unforgiving blackness, she didn't want to know what lay ahead. The truck seemed to hurtle into nothingness and squeal like a runaway mine car as it shimmied around tight corners and switchbacks. Even the steady goats had given up trying to stand.
Jackie used to ride a roller coaster at the tiny local amusement park. On days her father had held a job long enough to want to celebrate, they'd go. They'd head for the Blackout, a small roller coaster which seemed enormous to her. The twists and turns and stomach-yanking drops all took place inside a darkened warehouse.
"Pretending you can fly again?" he always shouted sometime around the second curve.
He didn't need to see her to ask, she'd have her arms spread like wings, one pressed to his chest. "Pretending to be her," she'd say.
But even the rickety roller coaster had been gentler than their current ride. Her ass hurt. Her leg muscles cramped from constantly having to brace herself to avoid skipping across the bed of the truck. Hound had mastered this by using his arms as support while Danger seemed oddly stable in the depths of his sleep.
She felt relieved when the truck pulled off the road. Darkness had swallowed them, and the trench of night sky above had tapered into a thin band between tall treetops.
The driver's door swung open. Jackie straightened her hijab and half rose, so she could climb down and greet him. She couldn't tell much about him. He was stocky, or perhaps it was the extra coat piled on top of his vest and tunic. He ignored her and spoke to Hound.
Men's backs. She'd gotten used to seeing those. Behind a platoon of soldiers or a gathering of tribal elders doing their best to pretend she wasn't there. She cracked her neck and bit back an angry demand.
"We're letting the brakes cool off," the driver said, speaking in his native tongue. With the backwash from the tail lights, she could clearly see he was a broad man wearing an old Soviet army jacket. "The border, it is ahead," the man made a lazy gesture up the road, keeping his eyes off Jackie as she hopped to the ground.
"Best tell her," Hound replied, in his own Pashto weighed heavily by his American accent. "She's the reporter. We're just her muscle."
Whether Hound was simply sticking to a cover story or genuinely wanted to make the guy acknowledge her, Jackie couldn't tell, but she was thankful.
The man waited and turned to eye her suspiciously. "American?"
"Chinese," she said, in Arabic, hoping he understood and hoping her own accent wasn't too obvious. "They...they might be American. Mercenaries, I don't care where from."
This seemed to satisfy the man. He still wouldn’t look her in the eye. "This is as far as we go. We don't want any trouble at the border."
"Thank you," she said. She searched her pocket for the roll of bills and pulled several free. "For your trouble."
The man took the money with barely a nod and returned to the cab. Danger gathered his gear and leapt to the ground. Not bothering with the tailgate, Hound stepped over to the rear fender and hopped before lugging his pack out after him. He'd barely cleared the gate when the driver pulled away.
"Think he'll squeal at the border?" asked Hound.
Danger shook his head, staring after the tail lights. "Naw, he ain't a problem."
Hound's brow furrowed, and he tilted his head to direct an ear into the open night. Whatever he sensed raised his eyebrows. "Let's get off the road."
"How do you not let this go to your head?" she said aloud. "Both of you can do so much more than a normal person, and you guys aren't even top tier Augments, if you don't mind me saying."
"Powers or no powers, none of that bullshit matters," Hound said, motioning her toward the trees. "All about doin' with what you got. Come on."
She wasn't sure why they fled into the trees, but she followed. A still night, there was only a slight rustle in the trees. Once they were deeper into the whipping boughs and soft ground made deceptively treacherous by deadfall, she heard the rustling increase, then amplify.
She heard the whir of a helicopter rotor. Jackie knew this must be what had grabbed Hound's attention from however many miles away and had made Danger uneasy as well.
They picked up their pace, and above them, the trees clamored. The shadow of the chopper blotted out stars as it beat past. Hound's radio chirped to life.
"You guys got company. Want me to ground it? Don't think they've seen me." It was the Black Beetle.
Hound struggled to peel away the layers of clothes he'd hidden the radio underneath. "Hold your horses. We don't yet know who they are."
"Do we care?" asked the Black Beetle.
"Of course we care," muttered Jackie through rapid breaths. Barely a whisper, Hound acknowledged her with a concerned twitch of his own.
One low pass and the helicopter continued. Hound put his hand up for a halt, and they crouched under the dense tree cover. She hadn't been able to make out if it was civilian or military.
"They're headed my way." The Black Beetle called out once more. Over the open comms, she heard another voice say, "Target locked" in a half droning, half oozing sort of way which made her skin crawl. "It's a Russian military helo. Mi-17 or some bullshit. I think it's coming straight at me. Going dark." The transmission cut off behind a faded shout of commands.
"Spencer, goddamnit, we don't need a light show four clicks off the Paki border." The channel remained silent. Hound let the mike head swing loose on the cord.
"Hello? You guys there?"
This was a different voice, and one Jackie didn't recognize at all. The request sounded youthful, timid even. Not the voice of a Russian helicopter pilot. Hound's eyes suddenly reflected more light than there was beneath the trees. He met Danger's gaze, and even the prescient Augment seemed surprised.
"Eric, get that bird down before yer friend turns ya inside out!"
"Friend? Who?"
Hound gritted his teeth and looked sideways at Jackie. "Beetle."
"Oh, fuck! Don't tell him I'm here, yet! Jesus!"
A frantic conversation carried on over the open mike. More voices shared the space, barely audible over the background hum of rotors. Shouts sounded in what could've been Pashto. Then she heard a woman's voice, maybe two. The speaker popped and crackled with movement and errant collisions. Hound grimaced and dialed down the volume.
"Just what we need," he grumbled.
"Who is it?"
"Eric. Let's go make sure he doesn't get himself killed before ya meet him," Hound said.
For fuck sake.
What kind of sideshow had she gotten involved in? How had this Eric person even found them? Once again, she was putting her trust in these two Augments. They seemed solid enough, but her ability to trust in their judgment wavered with every hour. What she wouldn't give to be completing this little mission of hers with Jacobs and his men.
Jackie had connections in Islamabad, hundreds of miles away, though it was along the route to Kashmir. Without all the interference she could've maybe talked her way over the border and found another ride.
The noise of the helicopter had trailed into the distance then held at a steady whir. As they grew closer, the noise increased only to wind down. This newcomer had landed somewhere ahead.
Danger kept moving. Hound, however, noticed she was no longer in his footsteps.
"You comin'?"
"Where's this lab? Tell me."
He scratched his beard, irritated. "I'm not tryin' to hide nothin'."
"I want to know."
"Srinagar, smack dab in the middle, near the hospital. If I give you the address, you gonna head your own way?"
"Maybe."
He hung his head and walked toward her. "I understand. This isn't how you want this to happen. The next few days, weeks, could be real important to ya. But put up with us for a bit longer. Maybe it'll help ease ya into knowin' her. You think we're tough to handle? She's a whole 'nother level."
She'd grown to appreciate the old soldier's bluntness. Now she was floored by it. She felt exposed in that chilly air, unwilling to acknowledge just how right he was.
"Besides," Hound continued. "We might just have us another ride over that next hill. Beats walkin' through tribal Pak, if ya know what I mean."
She did. As a woman, traveling alone, she couldn't think of any less hospitable place. She could find her way, she was sure of it, but that would take time and probably money she didn't have. And if Hound were right, if this helicopter were piloted by some other ally of theirs, she'd just be picking through the wreckage of the lab by the time she arrived.
All her life, she'd lived in the shadow of an Augment who wasn't even there. Close to her now, she'd had to tag along with even more Augments to get there. She wanted to be through with trailing other people, recording their stories. She wanted to write her own.