Pavel had watched the rain fall onto the same leaves.
The waterproof jacket kept out the persistent rain but did little to keep out the cold of the night. He had been hidden here in the bushes that encircled this huge farmer’s field on the outskirts of the small town of Langenwang for the past few hours. His only comfort was the constant checking of his watch as he counted down the minutes until the helicopter was due to arrive.
The helicopter would be his freedom, his final escape from the covert world. The only thing he was unsure of was whether it would be a journey he would be making on his own, or would his sister be with him, would his handler be with him or any of the SCALPEL team?
He didn’t know. He just had to trust that the pilot knew the location of the Landing Zone and the time and that if a tall, slightly dishevelled Czech scientist emerged from the bushes on his own, that the pilot wouldn’t tell him to get lost straight away! That one he would just have to play by ear.
Finding the den had been relatively easy, getting the BMW scrambler up and running and finding the route to the LZ had been no problem. Even hiding the bike and picking a discreet hideout here in the bushes had also not been beyond his comfort zone... but now that he had time to sit and wait and think…
The fear and the doubts were once more overtaking him and in the background, like a tumour infecting his brain, was the final look on Luca’s face as he had walked away. Pavel didn’t think he had ever known anyone braver than the Italian SCALPEL agent.
Once more, he checked his watch and he knew that the allotted time was drawing near. It was minutes now rather than hours.
And then, as planned if not expected, he heard the engine of the vehicles in the distance and the hushed whispers and the cautious press of footsteps through the woods.
Wolf had the driver’s seat and was throwing the Lexus through tight bends and corners in order to get to the LZ. Twice he had almost crashed into oncoming traffic, even at this hour of the morning, and had to swerve to avoid it. But he didn’t slow down and he didn’t stop.
In the back of the car Lyth and Sabina sat. The whole car reeked of tension, fear and anxiety.
“You are cut,” she said in the darkness.
“So are you,” he said, nodding his head towards her wounded hand. “Mine is nothing, but you… you were incredibly brave. I…”
“I don’t want to hear it. I just want my brother and to get as far away from you as possible,” she said. But there was no venom in her voice, only a weary acceptance.
Tom Lyth nodded, not even sure if she saw him conceding the point.
The car began to slow and the headlights flashed across a rural lane. Two more sweeps of the road and the Lexus pulled in and stopped in a small forest clearing.
“This is it,” said Wolf. “We are here.”
The helicopter pilot’s name was Emerson, Ernie to his buddies. Not that too many of them were left. They were either killed in some far-off smuggling job, or captured and in jail. The illegal mercenary transport industry was a risky business; always had been and always would be.
That was unless you managed to get yourself a rich benefactor, like Mr Bloch.
Emerson had been in business with the American for a little over two years. He still wasn’t quite sure what the American’s actual business was – he thought diamond smuggling, guessed at drugs and surmised he was some kind of spook – but really he didn’t know and didn’t care. The American, Mr Bloch, paid well, was professional and was undoubtedly dangerous. That was all the information Emerson needed.
So far, their business relationship had worked out well – picking up the odd piece of covert cargo, sometimes a person, sometimes the American himself to be dropped at a random location in Europe, Asia or the Middle East. The money was great and just occasionally Emerson got the sweetener of getting to fly something a bit unusual, like he was today.
The ‘Bird’ was sweet. It was a variant of the EC135 Eurocopter and it handled like a dream for quick in and out jobs like this. As usual, the cover, in the random chance that he was caught crossing borders illegally, was first rate and provided by the mysterious Mr Bloch. For this incursion, he was the pilot of an international Medical Emergency Transport team that was flying heart transport couriers to a life or death operation in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
Mr Bloch always provided a backstop and so far he had never let Emerson down. It was a pleasure doing business with a professional like Mr Bloch.
The EC135 was entering its final approach to the Landing Zone, coming in as low as possible, skirting through the tree line. On the console, the signal from the GPS tracker was flashing and the numbers were getting lower and lower. Emerson pressed a power switch on the side of his Night-Vision goggles and the grey-black of the night was replaced with the eerie glow of green.
It was like he was back with his old unit the 160th, the Night Stalkers, flying in low at dead of night to extract some of the D-boys from Somalia or the ‘Stan. They were good times.
He turned his head towards the farmer’s field and lowered the controls to bring the bird down. Already, he could see the standing figures around the landing zone, some armed and some holding each other.
The Fisherman watched as the brother and the sister made themselves known to one another, shyly at first and then with confidence. They ran towards each other like they were in an old Hollywood movie. Pavel, the taller of the two, caught her in his arms. They hugged and they talked and they cried, but it was not a conversation that he, the outsider, could hear or be allowed into. They were family and they had earned their private moments.
He walked over to them, the interloper who had used them and who was now trying to help them escape. Behind him, he heard Wolf and Tanner and Jax forming a protective circle around the Landing Zone.
Their faces, when he approached Sabina and Pavel, were a confusion of anger, loyalty and lost love. In other times, he would have held them close to him, pledged himself to them and offered his apologies and love. But now was not that time. Now was a time of cold calculation, no matter how much he cared for these people. He went in hard.
“You need to listen to me because we only have a few moments left. The pilot you can trust. His name is Emerson. He answers to me, so you can trust him. He’ll get you over the border into Slovenia and take you to a private airfield. He’ll give you a package when you land. It has passports, new ID for the next leg of your journey and money. At the airfield, you’ll be met by a woman and her bodyguards; the woman is blind and she is the one who will take care of you from here on out,” he said, with all the emotion of a dead fish.
“But what about you? You and the rest of the team?” asked Sabina, her mind catching up with what she knew and what she didn’t. The breakneck speed car journey to the Landing Zone had told her very little about what had gone on in her absence.
“We get out through a different route. It’s safer that way,” said the Fisherman, his eyes watching as the helicopter began to descend.
“Will we see you again?” asked Pavel.
“Yes. I don’t know… I hope so.”
The helicopter was nearly here, its features now more clearly defined in the grey of the early morning dawn.
“The blind woman is the person I work for. Tell her everything, don’t hold anything back. It’s her and her people who will go over the information that you gave us. Only she can be trusted,” said the Fisherman.
Pavel nodded. “I will.”
“And one more thing, I need you to give this to her,” said the spymaster, pulling out the mangled smart-phone that Jax had retrieved from the remains of Azrael on the train track. Its case was cracked and it was slimy with half congealed blood and tissue. “This is important; give it only to the blind woman. To no one else! Make sure no one sees you passing it to her. Do you understand?”
They both nodded, standing before him like children listening to their father. The Fisherman offered the piece of evidence and Sabina slipped it into her jacket for safekeeping. “Good. Tell her it came from our enemy. She’ll know its value. You have to go now.”
He pushed them forward, shouting for them to keep their heads low as they moved towards the helicopter. They ran forward slowly, cautious of the noise and the power of the machine. The door was already open for them, waiting. He saw them both climb up into the rear seats – Sabina first, and then, protective as ever, her brother Pavel.
The door slammed, there was a momentary pause and then the engines of the helicopter kicked in and lifted up. They were gone.
The SCALPEL team, or what remained of them, stood around like survivors of a long-forgotten war, watching as the helicopter grew smaller and smaller in the grey of the early morning sky.
Each of them had survived in their own way, but for these covert professionals it was one more job, one more task that they had accomplished as part of a bigger war. They had lost team mates, comrades, but knew that the next time they met it would be for another mission with other people and that they would risk other losses. It was the price of the future war.
Jax came up to Lyth. “So that’s it, it’s done. It’s time to bug out, boss.”
Tom Lyth turned and looked down at his tame killer. “Almost. There is just one more thing to do before they are safe,” he said.
He took out his phone and composed a brief message: SAILFISH IS SAFE: OPERATION IS A GO! Then attached it to two separate email addresses and pressed the ‘send’ button. Within seconds, the message would be transported to the other side of Europe, one to the Warmaster and one to the Codex, and then the final part of the Sailfish operation would commence.