Juggernaut

‘We risk our lives every day,’ said Amanda. ‘Sooner or later, our luck will run dry. You keep saying you’re sick of the life, you want to start over. Well, this is it. This is our shot. We could be home free.’

‘Three tons of gold. Can’t be hauled over sand dunes. We need choppers.’

‘Gaunt has a couple of Hueys.’

‘I don’t want to involve Gaunt,’ said Lucy. ‘The guy is bad news.’

‘Who else can we hire? A job like this has to be off the meter.’

‘I guess.’

‘This is our last war,’ said Amanda. ‘We need a retirement plan. We owe it to the guys. We can’t them send them home broke.’

‘Okay,’ said Lucy. ‘Let’s roll the dice.’

TOP SECRET SPECIAL HANDLING NO FORM

Central Intelligence Agency

Directorate of Operations, Near East Division

Doc ID: 575JD3

Page 01/1

08/21/05

MEMORANDUM TO: Project Lead, D.Ops

SUBJECT: Spektr

Colonel,

JABRIL JAMADI has made contact with a team of security contractors operating under the name VANGUARD RISK CONSULTANTS. We believe they are unaware of the SPEKTR project. They are currently seeking helicopter transport to carry them to the Western Desert. This presents an excellent opportunity to secure our objectives at the SPEKTR site. The region of desert between Al Qa’im and Al Hadr is remote and hostile terrain favoured by foreign Jihadists attempting to establish smuggling routes in-country for mortars and surface-to-air missiles. We have yet to determine the level of risk presented by the contamination zone itself. It would be preferable to utilise a deniable back-channel proxy squad, rather than dispatch an Agency fire team.

I respect your reservations regarding the scope of the SPEKTR project, but I would draw your attention to Presidential Directive 39 which instructs the agency to undertake ‘an aggressive programme of foreign intelligence collection, analysis and covert actions’ in our efforts to combat terrorism. The offensive potential of the SPEKTR battle-strain is incontrovertible, and gives us a firm legal mandate in our steps to secure the virus on behalf of the United States.

R. Koell

Field Officer

CA Special Proj, Baghdad Station

Gaunt

Jim Gaunt pulled back the hangar door. Open for business. No different from a neighbourhood grocer hosing down the sidewalk and laying out fruit boxes and flowers.

He sipped from a silver thermal mug with Marine wings.

Dawn. Reveille. A plaintive bugle call crackling from loudspeakers. The rain had cleared. Sky bluer than he’d ever known. Wet asphalt would soon burn dry.

The morning delivery. Raphael drove down the airstrip service road. He pulled up in a five-ton flatbed. Russian RGD-5 grenades under tarp.

Gaunt checked his clipboard. Three hundred crates, twenty-four grenades per case. Surplus ordinance shipped from Johannesburg, via the Emirates.

‘Como estas, baby?’

Raphael. Gaunt’s partner. Each night he slept on a canvas cot at the back of the hangar, shotgun by his side. Hair tied back into a ponytail. Thick moustache. Leather waistcoat. Torso covered in jailhouse tattoos faded lavender with age. He ripped the cellophane from a king-size Balmoral and lit up.

‘Absolutely fucking peachy,’ said Gaunt.

Raphael kept a Rottweiler chained by the door. Sasha. She sat with her blanket and bowl. He teased her with a hunk of jerky. She slavered. She snapped and lunged, pulled against her heavy neck-chain.

Baghdad International Airport.