The pre-dawn birdsong started and Mac felt Jessica snoring on his chest. The first grey light snuck in through the barred window at the top of the cell wall, illuminating Bongo, who was pacing beside the door, mumbling.
‘What’s up?’ whispered Mac, as Bongo raised his hand for silence.
Bongo’s mumbled conversations had started up each time they’d heard footfalls in the stockade outside their cell door. The base stockade was staffed by soldiers of the 1635 Regiment, and Bongo was conversing with them in Tetum, the native dialect of East Timor.
‘He says one of the white people will be found in a helicopter, after the spraying,’ said Bongo. ‘The others will be found in the rubble of the base – they’re dynamiting the whole place.’
Their first plan had been to turn Haryono against Simon, which had worked too well. Simon was dead, and the rest of them – with Jessica along for the ride – now looked like being the fall guys for Operasi Boa. The Indonesian Army would find their bodies, connect them with the SARS deaths and the helicopters, and the story would hit the newspapers. Mac already knew what part he’d play – he was connected with Shareholder Services under his Don Jeffries alias, and he had no doubt he’d be ‘found’ in a downed helo belonging to Pik Berger’s company, filled with the SARS bio-weapon. He’d be just another greedy Aussie mercenary, and the papers would love it.
‘These local soldiers don’t care what’s being sprayed on their own families?’ asked Jim, annoyed.
‘I didn’t say that,’ said Bongo, sliding down the concrete wall to take a seat on the floor. ‘They don’t understand what I’m talking about. Spraying a disease onto a village is something they don’t comprehend – they think it’s a joke.’
Stirring, Jessica pushed herself off Mac’s chest and yawned. She was filthy, her face drawn, eyes puffy from fatigue and from crying; she’d been overwhelmed by Simon’s shooting.
‘Where are we?’ she asked.
‘Jail,’ said Mac. ‘But I have to ask – where were you?’
‘Would you believe Kota Baru barracks?’ she said sheepishly.
‘Kota Baru?!’ said Mac. ‘That’s in East Timor. Are you crazy? I thought you were heading back to California?’
‘I was, but a very nice woman at Larrakeyah Army Base told me that Dad was seen at Kota Baru,’ said Jessica, looking pointedly at Mac and then Bongo.
‘Really?’ asked Mac, thinking that Gillian Baddely should keep her scheming female mind to herself.
‘Yeah, so I decided to go up there and see if I could make a deal and they arrested me,’ she said, shrugging. ‘Next thing I know, I’m taken to an airfield and this crazy American is telling me what a genius he is.’
‘Jesus,’ said Mac. ‘You drove up to the Kota Baru barracks to cut a deal with Kopassus?’
‘Don’t mess with me, buster!’ said Jessica, sitting up. ‘What was that finely tuned operation in the mess? And by the way, I guess I’m now calling you McQueen? And Manny – you’re Bongo, right?
‘Sure,’ said Bongo. ‘You okay?’
‘Yeah, I’ll live,’ she said. ‘This happened before, in Guatemala.’
‘Guatemala?’ asked Mac, surprised.
‘I was doing charity work through BruinCorps, building schools and stuff, and I got caught by the local Marxists,’ said Jessica, matter-of-fact.
‘And?’ asked Mac.
‘We talked about their grievances and they let me go,’ she said.
‘But – hang on,’ said Mac. ‘Guatemala? What were you doing down there?’
‘Remember I told you Dad paid my college fees?’ said Jessica.
‘Yep,’ said Mac.
‘He said I had to do a week of community service each year – he didn’t want me to become a spoiled brat.’
‘A brat?’ said Mac, chuckling.
‘It was a drag at first,’ said Jessica. ‘But in my second year at UCLA, I started spending most of the summer vacation down there.’
‘You hear that?’ asked Bongo, laughing and kicking at Mac’s foot.
‘Yeah, I heard it,’ said Mac, avoiding Jessica’s gaze.
‘So, you guys soldiers, spies – something like that?’ asked Jessica, sitting cross-legged.
‘Nothing like that,’ said Mac.
‘And you two?’ asked Jessica, turning to Jim and Tommy, who just smiled noncommittally.
‘So what is this place?’ asked Jessica.
‘See the helicopters?’ asked Mac. ‘And those tanks, and the booms that attach to the underside of the helos?’
‘Yes, I did,’ said Jessica.
‘They spray a bio-weapon,’ said Mac, so tired he could barely keep his eyelids from dropping.
‘Bio-weapon?’ asked Jessica. ‘You mean like anthrax or something?’
‘Like that,’ said Jim. ‘But this one won’t kill most people.’
‘So -’
‘It gives most people a bad cold,’ said Jim, sounding resigned. ‘But Melanesian – and perhaps Polynesian – people contract a powerful pneumonia and die within forty-eight hours.’
‘Oh my God,’ said Jessica, looking from Mac to Bongo to make sure no one was pulling her leg. ‘It’s racially selective?’
‘No,’ said Jim. ‘It affects everyone, but it will kill the local Maubere people that it’s dropped on today. They have no immunity. It’s called an “Ethno-Bomb”.’
‘It even has a name?!’ said Jessica, amazed. ‘That’s disgusting! Why pick on people who already have so little?’
The four men sighed and looked away – nothing left to say. They’d done what they could and been caught in an historical no-man’s-land, unable to move militarily on Lombok AgriCorp for fear of disrupting the democratic process, yet unable to act within democratic norms because the Indonesian military still ran East Timor. They held a terrible secret yet were unable to do anything about it. Even the US Defense Department, when faced with a rogue from DIA, wanted the embarrassment minimised rather than Operasi Boa shut down. Mac wondered what the East Timorese had done to deserve their lot.
Grimacing in pain, Jessica fished in her pocket, pulled out a pocket knife and threw it to Bongo.
‘I forgot to give it back in Suai,’ said Jessica. ‘Although I guess you have no use for it now.’
Eyes glowing as he picked it up, Bongo opened the blade and then a series of long steel picks.
‘Farrier’s pocket knife,’ said Bongo, standing. ‘The most useless tool known to man – unless he owns a horse…’
‘Or is locked in a cell,’ said Mac, joining Bongo at the door.
Bongo removed the back-plate from the door and tumbled the last barrel in the old lock in less than five minutes.
‘I think the best we can do is disable the choppers and get out of here,’ whispered Jim. ‘I don’t know how to destroy that bio-weapon safely.’
Bongo spoke Tetum through the door and there was no reply, so he pulled back on the cell door and moved into the stockade corridor.
‘Okay,’ he mouthed, and the rest followed him through.
At the end of the hallway a fire axe was mounted on the wall, above a red pail. Grabbing the axe, Mac moved in behind Bongo, holding Jessica by the hand.
Pausing at the vestibule that led into the provost’s office, Bongo peeked through the door and indicated two guards to Mac. Unclasping the long blade of the farrier’s pocket knife, Bongo showed that he’d go right, leaving the left guard for Mac.
The bile rising in his throat, Mac watched Bongo count down from three and then they were through the door, the pale light before dawn gently caressing the sleepy young guard’s face as Mac brought the axe to his throat and held it there.
Waking with a start in his chair, the youngster from the 1635 Regiment tried to yell but Mac had a hand over his mouth. Grabbing the guards’ keys, Mac picked up their M16s and led them to a cell, threw them in and locked the door.
Joining the other four back at the guard’s station, Mac listened to Bongo spell it out: there were no other officers in this part of the building, and the other two guards were down the end of the building.
‘Look at this, McQueen,’ whispered Jim.
Following the American’s finger, Mac saw for the first time how close they were to the unmarked helicopters that would be doing the spraying. They were not thirty metres away, the large tanks obvious in their load space and the big spray booms attached to the undercarriage making them look like giant insects.
‘That true about your ability with aircraft?’ said Jim to Bongo. ‘That extend to Black Hawks?’
‘Not specifically,’ said Bongo, eyes scanning the ground in front of him.
‘Helicopters generally?’ asked Jim.
‘Not lately,’ said Bongo. ‘I say we aim for the hangars, get behind them so we’re shielded from the sentry posts at the gate, run around the length of the hangars, come out at the end. Take that last helo, okay?’
‘Sounds good,’ said Mac.
‘Can you fly us out of here?’ asked Jim, annoyed.
‘I have the ability, yes,’ said Bongo. ‘But we need some explosives.’
Searching the stockade, they found a locked room and opened it with the confiscated keys. It was a small armoury and, hitting the lights, Mac and Bongo found a box of phosphorous grenades – perfect for sabotage – and loaded them into a small canvas carry bag.
Flagging them through like a traffic warden, Bongo brought up the rear as they ran silently behind the first hangar.
Pausing for breath in the lee of the steel-clad building, Mac looked back at the camp. No one had stirred. They ran the length of the hangars, jumping over piles of airfield junk, and arrived at the far end as the sun touched the horizon. Jessica stayed close to Mac – she was scared but composed, noticed Mac.
‘Now or never,’ said Bongo. ‘Guard changes soon.’
Panting for breath, they scanned for unfriendlies.
‘Want to check the helo?’ asked Mac, wondering if Bongo needed a key or something.
‘We’re all in the helo,’ snarled Bongo. ‘Or none of us are. No one gets left behind. I need Jim in the front with me. McQueen, you’re in the back, with Tommy and Jessica. You guys are the shooters, okay?’
Tommy nodded as Bongo handed over his M16 and, falling in behind the Filipino, they stealthed to the last Black Hawk.
The side door creaked slightly as Mac pulled it back and realised the rear load space was almost entirely filled with a tank of the bio-weapon. Moving forward, he slid back the jump-seat door that sat between the pilot’s hatch and the main door. Helping Jessica up into the jump-seat, he shut the small door and squeezed into the small area in front of the tank, and then pulled Tommy up alongside.
Mac and Tommy checked their weapons as Bongo and Jim clambered into their places in the cockpit.
Tension rising, Mac looked Tommy in the eye. ‘Done this before?’
‘No,’ said Tommy, gulping down the stress. ‘But I was a baseball player in Brooklyn – I’m prepped for anything.’
‘Just wait for the action, make sure you get a good shoulder behind your rifle, and don’t get out of the aircraft, okay?’ asked Mac.
‘Sure,’ said Tommy.
The sounds of Bongo powering up the avionics and muttering his instrument checks to Jim were muted but audible as Mac crouched in the back of the helo, watching through the glass of the side door to clock when the camp was alerted to their escape.
Unlatching the door, Mac made a small gap to make it faster to remount the helo after his sabotage run was over. The situation seemed more hopeless the longer they waited. The sun was lighting the camp and Mac doubted that he’d have the time to grenade nine helicopters and leap into the one on the end of the line before being shot. It was long odds.
‘Okay,’ said Bongo, raising his voice from the cockpit. ‘When you throw the first grenade, I’ll spark the engine – then we see what we’re made of, right?’
Slinging the canvas bag over one shoulder and the M16 over the other, Mac made to leap out of the Black Hawk when a hand grabbed him.
Looking in Jessica’s eye, Mac felt almost breathless, as if he could float above the ground.
‘My note,’ said Jessica. ‘The love note?’
‘Yeah,’ said Mac, aware of Tommy being able to hear.
You did read it, didn’t you? I left it on your bag.’
‘Um, well,’ said Mac, his mind elsewhere.
‘You didn’t read it,’ said Jessica, her face dropping. ‘Oh my God.’
‘I didn’t, I couldn’t,’ said Mac, trailing off as whining sounds started in the Black Hawk’s electrical systems.
‘It said that I think your parents did a really good job with you, McQueen, and if I ever have kids, I’d love to know their secret.’
‘Thank you,’ said Mac, but no sound came out. She kissed him and Mac leapt off the rear load space onto the lime dust of the runway, and ran through the spooky light of early morning to the helo closest to the camp.
Opening the pilot’s door as he caught his breath, he fished out a grenade, pulled the pin, dumped it on the pilot’s seat and ran for the next helo, forty metres away, where he repeated the action. As he ran for the third helo, the first grenade detonated and ripped apart the flight deck of the helo. Trying to keep his composure as the grenades flashed and sent concussion waves and debris along the runway, Mac dumped his sixth grenade, just as the first shots were fired from a military police jeep that accelerated away from the sentry post at the gate. Turning, Mac watched the last helo’s rotors spinning faster and faster and heard the telltale whining of the turbine spinning to its peak RPM. Running around the back of the seventh helo, he dumped a grenade into the rear load space beside the bio-weapon tank. As he ran the bullets hailed into the helo and the hangar as the belt-fed machine-gun on the jeep opened up.
Mac crossed the open ground to the eighth helo, bringing the M16 up to his shoulder and waiting for the jeep to come parallel before popping the driver with a three-shot burst and then the machine-gunner. Careening out of control, the vehicle swerved out into the runway as the third soldier tried to grab the wheel.
Grabbing his eighth grenade, Mac threw it into the cockpit as the grenade in the seventh helo tore the front section apart in a shuddering burst of white heat. Falling to the ground as he escaped the blast, Mac struggled to crawl around the corner of the ninth and final helo as the previous helo now blew up. Gasping for breath, he realised his left leg was bleeding – he’d been hit by a piece of flying debris. Needing the last helo for cover, Mac limped to its nose, looked out to the camp, saw a silver LandCruiser approaching him at high speed, and pulled back to the load space. Behind him, he could hear Tommy and Jim screaming at him from the powered-up Black Hawk.
Sliding back the large door of the ninth helo, Mac fished for the grenade, primed it and threw it in front of the tank.
His left calf muscle now feeling like it was on fire, Mac turned and tried to run but resigned himself to not making Bongo’s helicopter. He couldn’t fend off the approaching shooters in the LandCruiser and also run for his ride. He’d have to make a choice. Feeling hopeless, yet also strangely powerful, Mac ran in a limp towards the hangar rather than Bongo’s helo. Stopping behind a wall, Mac looked around and fired two bursts of three-shot at the Cruiser, which veered into another hangar as its windscreen shattered.
Turning to look at Jim, who gestured for Mac to get in the helo, Mac waved them away and turned back to face the shooters who now stealthed towards Mac – not Indonesian Kopassus, but Saffas and Aussies from Berger’s crew.
The window smashed above Jim’s head and he ducked, and Bongo pulled the Black Hawk into the air as the steel cladding on the wall Mac was hiding behind was torn apart by bullets. Putting out more rounds at a soldier who ran around the flames from a helo, Mac dived behind a stack of oil drums as the final grenade made the Black Hawk rupture from the inside out.
Mac tried to move back along the burning helo to where he now thought the shooters would be coming from. Ducking down, he looked under the burning aircraft and saw three sets of ankles about forty metres away, and one set of pale blue eyes below a head bandage that wrapped across the forehead.
Shit, thought Mac, locking eyes with Pik Berger.
The South African’s Steyr spewed rounds at Mac as he dived to the side. Landing, Mac aimed up and shot at one set of ankles which was quickly followed by a soldier falling to the ground and clutching his leg in agony. Then he aimed at Berger’s ankles as he ran into the hangar. Mac got off one round and the rifle clicked – out of rounds.
Cursing, Mac looked back and waved away Bongo’s helo which was now hovering a metre above the runway, throwing lime dust and fine gravel for a hundred metres.
Pulling his last grenade from his bag, Mac pulled the pin and threw it towards the hangar Berger had disappeared into. As the grenade exploded, Mac, losing blood, was vaguely aware of another helo coming in to land. And then Bongo’s helo was gone and, through the smoke and dust, Mac heard the soldiers approaching, their panicked commands clearly audible over the roar of fire, and Mac was running, but as in a dream, unable to reach top speed. He ran along the runway until he collapsed into the lime dust.
Pushing himself onto his elbows and then his knees, Mac turned and saw Berger, Sudarto and a posse of the mercenaries – mostly in underwear and T-shirts – approaching out of the smoke and the dust. As Mac put his weight on his right leg and slowly stood, Pik Berger fixed him with a glare and screamed at the men not to shoot.
‘He’s mine,’ said the South African, handing his Steyr to a subordinate and approaching Mac like a big cat.
In the periphery of his vision, Mac was aware of Bongo’s helo pulling away into the sky, but another helicopter alighting on the airfield.
‘So, it’s Mr Jeffries – our kaffir-lover,’ said Berger, bare-chested and half of his face smeared with shave soap.
‘Actually, I’m a fighter not a lover,’ said Mac, as Berger kicked him in the solar plexus and followed with an elbow to the jaw.
Teetering on his good, right leg, Mac stayed upright as Berger kneed him in the balls. Doubling over, Mac thought ‘what the heck?’ and launched a flying head-butt at the Saffa’s face.
Turning slightly, Berger took a glancing blow on the cheek-bone and Mac lurched forward, hopelessly off balance.
Swinging a fast right hook, Berger connected with Mac’s left jaw bone, instantly dropping him to his knees. Instinctively, Mac raised his arm in defence but Berger’s boot came through with such force that it connected with Mac’s chin. Feeling his teeth move in their gums, Mac’s head snapped back and he hit the ground face-first.
Lying back, Mac tried to breathe as he felt unconsciousness beckoning. And then Pik Berger was kicking him in the ribs from one side and Amir Sudarto looked down from the other.
‘Next time you come at me, kaffir-lover, you’d better put me in the grave,’ said Berger, chest heaving.
‘Consider it done,’ said Mac, pushing himself into a sitting position.
‘Still the smart lip – our Kakatua,’ said Sudarto, using the Bahasa Indonesia term for the cockatoo.
‘That bandage suits you, Amy,’ said Mac, nodding at the Indonesian’s broken nose. ‘Might be more where that came from, you play it right.’
Sudarto lashed out with a kick and turning his head slightly, Mac took it on the ear and fell sideways.
Waiting for death, Mac thought about a good life, a loving family and a lot of luck. He thought about the chances he’d had to show courage and how many times he’d failed, but also the times he’d prevailed – like the time he’d rescued a junior boy from the dorm bullies, the Lenihan brothers, at Nudgee College; how he’d been expected to back down to their threats like everyone else, but for some reason he’d found himself in the middle of a fight with both of them. He’d lost, busting his nose in the process, but that episode had seen him capped in the 1st XV as a fifteen-year-old. Not bad for a leaguey from Rockie, said his dad, Frank.
‘I’d do it all again, boys,’ said Mac, as Sudarto’s SIG levelled at Mac’s eyes. ‘Fuck youse all.’
The SIG cocked but then Haryono’s voice was shouting. ‘Leave him, leave him,’ said the major-general, as the other helo depowered behind them.
Suddenly, as Mac retched, they were surrounded by a mob of soldiers in darker greens – the 1635. Then, in his delirium, Mac thought Sudarto, Haryono and Berger were lifting their hands and dropping their weapons.
Sitting up while reeling for balance, Mac saw the mess of his left calf and the burning trail of destruction leading back to the camp. A familiar-looking man with captain rank in the 1635, stepped forward and ordered the men arrested.
‘Under whose authority?’ demanded Haryono, who Mac noticed had not dropped his SIG.
‘By mine,’ came a voice from behind Haryono.
Spinning, the major-general’s face dropped and he allowed a 1635 soldier to take his handgun.
‘Well, sir, this is a surprise,’ said Haryono. ‘But this is out of your jurisdiction – this is a Kopassus command.’
Mac turned his head to see who was pulling rank.
‘Actually, Major-General,’ said General Bambang Subianto, fully dressed in his As and fruit salad, ‘this is an army base and I’m an army general. You’ll get a fair trial by court martial, but for now I order you to stand down your men and allow yourself to be taken into detention; Lieutenant Sudarto, too, and whoever these mercenaries are.’
As the soldiers from the 1635 Regiment moved in to make the arrests, Mac took the hand offered by the 1635 captain.
‘Thanks, General,’ said Mac, standing up but not sure he’d be able to keep his balance.
‘Don’t thank me,’ said Subianto. ‘Thank Captain Setbal, here.’
‘Call me Mattias,’ said the captain, who shook Mac’s hand.
‘What’s up?’ said Mac, trying to shake out the wooziness.
‘The captain contacted me last night,’ said Subianto. ‘Seems your friend Mr Morales made quite an impression on the local soldiers while in the stockade. When Captain Setbal told me he wanted to lead an officers’ mutiny but needed the legal support, I decided I couldn’t sit in Singapore forever, doing nothing.’
‘Shit,’ said Mac, massaging his temples. ‘Glad you made it when you did.’
Laughing, Subianto slapped Mac on the shoulder. ‘No – I’m glad you found me when you did. You reminded me who I am.’
‘And you,’ said Mac to Mattias. ‘Don’t I know you?’
‘Perhaps my brother,’ said Mattias, his facial features now clearer to Mac. ‘He sends his regards – just don’t ask where you going, or say where you been.’
Joao! Mattias was Joao’s brother.
‘Wise words,’ said Mac, tears escaping as he tried to smile, ‘from a wise man.’