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The IV catheter ripped away from his arm and blood gushed from the vein. He grabbed for anything and latched onto a bar. Struggling to hold his legs up above the fast-moving ground, he reached for the bar on the opposite side. His muscles strained and blood was everywhere.

The bottom half of the airstairs was folding down on top of him, threatening to squeeze him to death. Bullets cracked through the air around him and he wished to god one of them would hit him. Dying in combat was supposed to be G
ENGHIS
' fate, not being smashed in stairs. He became dizzier and dizzier as blood drained away and the ground streaked beneath him.

G
ENGHIS
let out a scream and pulled as hard as he could just as everything faded to black.

 

Iggy climbed out on the airstairs, gripped the chrome with his artificial hand, trusting the microprocessors wouldn't fail him now because he couldn't feel if he had a good grip or if the contraption had let go. Only if the suction broke and the artificial limb pulled off his body would he feel anything and by then it would be too late.

The ground was a blur as he leaned out of the plane. He reached under G
ENGHIS
' arm and pulled as hard as he could, leveraging the force of his own body weight, and yanked G
ENGHIS
back inside. Blood smeared on him as the aircraft lifted into the sky.

Kyzyl Kum Desert, Uzbekistan

Camille searched for landmarks along the route, but all she saw were endless sand dunes, mounds of tailings. After fifteen minutes, the ground opened up into the largest open mine pit she had seen in her life. All of Baghdad, Ramadi and Fallujah could've fit inside with room to spare. It dropped down four to five hundred feet in wide terraced steps. She couldn't see any equipment and some of the benches seemed to have collapsed down to the next level. When she thought they had finally passed it, it opened up again into a smaller pit, partially separated from the larger one by a high ridge of solid rock.

There was no mining equipment in the second pit and she thought it was completely abandoned until something flapping in the high winds caught her eye.

Camouflage netting.

 

The pickup turned down a switchback road and began its descent into the mine. A dozen structures were clustered along the north wall of the crater on the wide upper bench. Most of them were oversized tents being whipped by the high winds, but there were five buildings and more were under construction. They looked like they were made of plywood and had scrap metal for roofs. Beyond the building sites, a firing range was set up on the far side of the compound and she could see obstacle courses with coils of barbed wire.

She was being taken into a terrorist training camp—into S
HANGRI-LA
.

Paradise had never looked so hellish.

Above the Kyzyl Kum Desert, Uzbekistan

G
ENGHIS
lay on the cabin floor, bleeding and breathing rapidly. He was barely conscious and slipping. Iggy dragged him partially into the galley so he'd have room to work. G
ENGHIS
was covered with so much blood, it was impossible to be sure where it was all coming from. Using his combat knife, Iggy sliced open his prison coveralls to search for worst bleeders. He kept the knife close in case he needed to use it against Ashland.

G
ENGHIS
seemed to be bleeding only from the earlier gunshot wound and from the vein where an IV had been. Chunks of QuikClot had popped out of the wound and the dressing was soaked with blood. Keeping Ashland in his sight at all times, he pressed against the wound with his bio-hand and used his mechanical one to stop the blood loss from where the IV catheter had been ripped out.

“Where the hell are we going?” Hunter yelled through the open cockpit door.

“Got a man down. Stand by,” Iggy then made eye contact with Ashland. “Get me an IV now!”

Ashland plowed through a medic kit and held out the IV to Iggy.

“You know how to spike a vein?”

“In theory.”

“Forget it. Press here and here.”

Ashland wrinkled his face.

“Do it now you motherfucker or I'll kill you.”

Ashland kneeled down and gingerly placed his fingers over Iggy's.

“Harder,” Iggy said as he moved his bloody fingers away.

In seconds, Iggy inserted the IV into one of G
ENGHIS'
veins and started the saline flowing. To hold it into place he slapped duct tape on it. He took over the bleeders from Ashland and ordered him to find blankets. Ashland had the bleeding from the vein under control, so Iggy quickly put a pressure bandage over it.

“Hey, it's your captain here. I'm taking destination requests,” Hunter said from the flight deck. “I've got to head somewhere.”

“Fuel status?” Iggy said, then spoke to G
ENGHIS, “
Come on, come on, buddy. Hang with me.”

“We're in good shape,” Hunter said.

“Then circle the area and keep an eye out for anything that looks like a tango training camp. I couldn't get overheads so this is going to be the only look we get.”

Ashland covered G
ENGHIS
with several blankets, carefully tucking them under his legs.

Iggy took out scissors and a set of prepared sutures from the medic kit. He cut away the old soaked dressing, pulled out a big dark clump of QuikClot and several smaller ones and threw them onto the floor. He picked up a needle with his left hand and he stared at it. In the four years since he'd lost his right hand, his left had grown much more adept at everyday tasks, but the needle felt awkward. It was better than using his artificial one that lacked the fine motor coordination and the tactile feedback. He hated himself for not anticipating the need for one-handed sewing and practicing it along with the billion other simple tasks which he had to master all over again. Asking for help wasn't something he did easily, but he wouldn't let his pride endanger a teammate. “Ashland, any chance you have experience tying off arteries?” He knew the answer before the question had left his mouth.

“A button pops off my shirt, I donate it to charity.”

“Then get your ass up front and help Stone search for the tango camp.” Iggy snarled at him. Stone could now take his turn babysitting him. “Find a camera. I want pictures.”

“One of the guards was taking pictures on the flight over here,” Ashland said as he ruffled through a bag stowed in an overhead bin. “Here.”

“Great. We'll need all the shots you can get. Hurry it up,” Iggy said in a normal voice, as he checked on his sidearm. He then turned toward the flight deck and shouted. “Stone, how are you at suturing? I can do it left-handed if I have to, but I'd rather not.”

“Can you fly?” Hunter said.

“You don't want that,” Iggy said. “Can't you put it on autopilot?”

“You don't get it,” Hunter said. “I'm winging it here, trying to keep it between the ditches. This bird's light years beyond anything I've ever flown before. I haven't even figured out how to turn the autopilot on.”

 

“Have a seat.” Hunter glared at Ashland as he walked onto the flight deck. The first officer's body was pale, but it hadn't abandoned its post. “Think you better pile him in the back. Take the captain, too, while you're at it.”

Hunter scanned the ground below while Ashland dragged the bodies away. He wanted to work him over, but knew he had to concentrate on keeping them in the air. Ashland returned with a blanket that he spread out over the bloody seat before he sat down on it.

“You're the son of a bitch who started this whole mess for me. Anything you want to say for yourself?” Hunter turned the yoke, awkardly coordinating the foot pedals. The plane banked to the left. He still didn't know what the important information about Rubicon was that he'd unearthed. He hoped to finally find out.

“You recognized me. I was afraid you were going to blow my cover. I've been investigating Rubicon for nearly two years and I didn't want to take any chances,” Ashland craned his neck to look out the window. He held a digital camera.

“That's it?” Hunter turned toward him, his mouth agape. “You're saying I didn't come across some great Rubicon secret? Shit. That can't be all there is to this goat fuck.”

“I'm sorry. I was the secret.” Ashland shrugged his shoulders. “I set things in motion so that Rubicon and the CIA and even your Force Zulu all believed that you were a threat that had to be neutralized. It was the only way I could protect my cover.”

“You son of a bitch.”

“Nothing personal.”

“Right. I'm just a pawn in the Agency's battle with the Pentagon. So the OGA's now willing to take out a Force Zulu operator to protect its agents.”

“They're willing to do it. But I don't work for the CIA.”

“Who the fuck do you work for then?”

“France.”

“No fucking way. I got screwed by a goddamn French spy?”

Iggy yelled from the cabin. “Believe it, Stone. You got French kissed.”

Hunter shook his head in disbelief. “So what the hell were you doing on the torture express?”

“My cover was blown.” Ashland looked at Hunter and flashed a smile. “But not by you.”

Hunter wanted to take him out, but he didn't dare let go of the controls for that long until he figured out the autopilot. He had thought of himself as a new breed of super-spy/warrior, believing he had discovered one of the most important secrets of the War on Terror. That had made it worth risking his life. Now it seemed he was a minor player in an unremarkable skirmish. Then he thought of Stella and what she must be going through. He seethed with anger. “If anything happens to Camille Black, I will kill you.”

“Stone! Enough!” Iggy shouted from the back. “No time to explain. Right now I need you to find that tango camp.”

 

A few minutes earlier, Iggy had opened a clear plastic case of pre-threaded needles, then pulled on a pair of latex gloves. His head turned as he watched Ashland drag a corpse from the cockpit to the back of the plane. He said to G
ENGHIS
, “You still with me, buddy?”

“You sure you can do it?” G
ENGHIS
mumbled.

“Better than I can fly this plane. Hang on. It's going to hurt.” Iggy stuck his fingers in the bullet hole and pushed around until he found something that felt like an earthworm. He grabbed it and held it while he used gauze to soak up blood until he could actually see what he was working with. He held his breath as he pinched it together with his real hand while his smart hand tied a loop around it, cutting off the wound. He repeated the procedure a couple of times for good measure, then sopped up the remaining blood to make sure he had stopped all the bleeding. In less than a minute he closed the wound with stitching his mother would've been proud of.

The Agency had been wrong not to take him back to the frontlines. Even with only one arm and one leg, Manuel Ignatius was still an operator.

 

“I think we've got something,” Stone shouted from the flight deck as Iggy felt the plane descend. “A cluster of structures inside a quarry.”

“On my way,” Iggy said as he removed his leg and brushed the sand off the stump. A couple of blisters were already forming. Whenever he was alone at home, he usually went without the prosthetic leg because it was a relief not to have it rubbing against the stump. Not since Walter Reed Hospital had he let anyone see him without it—until now. He grabbed a pair of binoculars from a pile of gear on a seat, then hopped into the cockpit. Gripping the back of the copilot's seat with his artificial hand, he steadied himself.

Stone changed the flap settings and pushed down on the yoke, then he banked the aircraft into a tight circle above the compound and pointed. “Look over there. This mine's abandoned. All the others all have buildings and equipment around them.”

“Yeah, looks abandoned to me. So?” Iggy said.

“Right there. Along the north wall of the ridge between the two pits.”

“Son of a bitch. That's a familiar footprint.” Iggy studied the area through his binoculars. “I saw several of these in Afghanistan before the invasion. There's even camouflage netting flapping around. The high winds today must've ripped it.”

“S
HANGRI-LA
,” Ashland said.

“Yeah, S
HANGRI-LA
—right there in the pit of hell. Who would've thunk it?” Iggy pointed at the scattering of buildings nestled in the first level in the smaller of two adjoining terraced craters. Together the pits were some thirty kilometers long and between five and ten kilometers wide. Where the camp was situated on the upper level, the terraced benches were at least a football field wide. “Look at that. It's fucking brilliant to stick it in an old open pit mine in the middle of a desert wasteland—a fortress on a shoestring. They don't need to guard the perimeter—no one could rappelle down those walls because the sand would crumble into an avalanche. Looks like the main road is the only way in.” Iggy turned to Ashland. “Go in the back and get as many shots as you can—close ups and wide ones. Let us know when you've filled the camera and we'll get out of here.”

Ashland exited the flight deck.

“You think Stella's down there?” Stone said while he played with the digital controls, apparently familiarizing himself.

“Stella?” Iggy chuckled. “Haven't heard her called that in a long time.” He lowered himself into the copilot's seat. He reached into the pocket of his 5.11s and pulled out a booklet. Camille had told him that Stone was fluent in spoken Arabic and he hoped he could read it, too. “If this says what I think it does, I'd bet my good hand on it.”

“What is it?” Stone reached for it.

“Someone dropped it when they nabbed Cam. I was picking it up when the shooting started.”

Stone flipped through it. “It's a cleric ranting about returning to the roots of the true al Qaeda.”

“Al-Zahrani?”

“How'd you know? What's all this got to do with Rubicon?”

“His name's come up a lot lately,” Iggy said. “Can you take us a little lower? I need a good long look. Someone bought up all the commercial satellite pictures for the next several years.”

“Rubicon?”

“You bet—one of their front companies.” Iggy studied the compound, looking for the best avenues of approach. “I'd give one of my right arms for recon on the deck, but I'm afraid a bird's-eye view is all we're gonna get.”

“I ran into some tangos outside of Ramadi who trained here in an al-Zahrani camp. They were the ones who kidnapped the geologist Jackie Nelson. I also know Rubicon has a lot of business here.”

“Yeah, like supporting the frickin' terrorist camp. Obviously, they have a prison here, too. Camille said there's a former KGB facility built out of an old gold mine. She said there are underground mineshafts in the hills around here. Our guess is that's where they were taking you. Now I'm starting to think they're also using it to keep tabs on the al-Zahrani camp.” Iggy lowered the binoculars and looked at the virtual gauges, but didn't really understand what he was seeing. “How's your fuel?”

“Twenty-nine thousand and two hundred-some pounds—enough to take us anywhere in Western Europe with leftovers.”

“I only want to get to Bagram, to Black Management's Camp Obsidian. It's our nearest Afghan ops center.”

“It'll take us about an hour to get there.”

“Beautiful.”

“Not really. It takes us too far away from Stella, uh, Camille. I'd rather find what we need locally and go back. And if you're thinking of returning with helicopters, you're asking for some extreme flying.”

“We have to stage from where we have our assets and that's Bagram.” Iggy scratched his face and felt a couple days' stubble.

“I think we should go somewhere here in-country, get gear on the black market and come back tonight.”

“Would never work. I don't know how to contact Cam's local suppliers who outfitted us and it would be just you and me. Ashland's not an operator, G
ENGHIS
is down and that airstrip we used is now out of the question.”

“I don't want to leave Uzbekistan without her. I speak some Russian. You have to have some spooks on staff with old KGB ties who can set us up, wire us some money. The Uzbeks will sell anything for the right price. We can probably even pick up a few old Spetsnaz mercs in Tashkent.”

“I'm not saying it can't be done, but it would take too much time to orchestrate. As it is, with all the assets we have in place in Afghanistan, it'll be all I can do to pull something together for tonight.”