The Perfect Weapon Chapter 2007: Part 3 Section 4 of 4
Chapter 2007: Part 3 Section 4 of 4
Dave lifted his head slowly and carefully to avoid the woozy, hot darkness behind his eyes and cursed the darkness before his eyes. He could hear nothing.
“Hello!”
He called as loudly as he could, hearing only the sound of his own voice echoing back to him, reverberating off of the walls of the cave until it hurt his ears.
“What the hell...” Dave frowned. He looked down where he imagined his arms were. It was so dark he couldn’t even see his own hands, but he lifted them and no, they weren’t chained.
He cautiously felt along his legs, avoiding the pulsing throb of his knee cap. “Or what used to be my knee cap,” he muttered and slumped back down, the brief effort costing him rivers of sweat. “If Jack hasn’t killed you yet, I get first dibs...” he panted and forced himself to take slow breaths as he assessed the situation.
No chains. No one around. He should really try for another escape. Just to amuse himself and annoy his friends the guards, since clearly he couldn’t make it anywhere on his own. He tried to sit up again and fell back a moment later as the brief jostling of his knee caused a pain he only wished were numbing. No, he wouldn’t try to get up. There was stubborn and then there was stupid, after all. “Where is everyone?” he asked faintly before succumbing to the slowly-turning darkness interspersed with tiny bursts of light that provided a respite from pain.
“It’s a twister!” The children shrieked in unison as they once again twirled around and around, just three times, before stopping.
“And then Dorothy floated away-“ Sydney guessed.
“Yes. Into a galaxy far, far away,” a girl said and nodded. “But Dorothy left behind...”
“She left her daughter, the princess behind,” Irina said softly. She waited nervously as the children digested her words, which must have been somewhat different from Dave’s and then looked at each other and nodded. Close enough, she decided in relief until the children made their next, predetermined move. As one, they all put their hands up to their faces and pretended to cry in loud, gusty sobs.
“Dave really knows how to push buttons,” Dixon muttered to Sark as they watched Irina wince.
“They said he was manipulative,” Sark responded, staring at the fleeting look of regret that passed across Irina’s face, his eyes flicking to this Yasmina watching Irina. Yasmina, who must be the gatekeeper. Gatekeeper...He knew that. Jack and Irina had been his gatekeeper for the protocol.
“Soraya!” The children chorused, pointing at Sydney. “Left behind. As was...” They stopped and said nothing, just stared at Irina.
“Also left behind was...the king?” Irina asked slowly, delaying the inevitable. What would Dave have instructed these children to do... ? She braced herself.
Watching the children put their hands over their hearts, then motion as if their hearts were ripped out before assuming a pose reminiscent of the Tin Man as Dorothy had found him, she bit her lip. ‘Thanks, Dave,’ she muttered to herself. “I understand the point...’
She suddenly realized that Dave had expected that she would be here. He had expected her or...perhaps he had merely hoped, had faith.
Just as suddenly, she knew that there was nothing ‘mere’ about hope or faith. It required, perhaps, more strength than cynicism. And certainly, hope and strength and...love required more strength than fear.
Jack took a deep breath, counseling himself to just a few more minutes of patience. He started when he felt a hand on his back and looked over his shoulder to see Zamir looking at him. “We’ll find him, Zamir.”
“This, I know. Here.” Zamir tapped his chest.
Yasmina tapped her foot. This was taking too long and not going in the strict order Daoud had given. She did not like it when plans went awry. And where was Arezou? To say nothing of... Making a decision, she snapped out, “But there was also a prince. Who--”
“Carried a message?” Irina asked. Damn Dave. He had mixed Star Wars and the Wizard of Oz and the story he had made up for Sydney... So who was R2D2 or...
Sydney spoke up. “And was his name Julian?”
“No.”
Without a second thought, Sark pulled off his burka. “His name was Justin Case. Wasn’t it?”
The women gasped and pulled veils across the face as the woman was revealed to be a man. The children pointed at his blonde hair, blue eyes. One little girl shrieked. “Justin Case! Him!” The children rushed toward Sark, who looked horrified.
Jack froze as a slight figure in robes, the same slight figure that had been creeping along the caves, came toward them and stopped abruptly. Then, her young face alight with curiosity, she stepped forward and looked at Jack, Zamir and his brother one by one. Jack put his hand inside his tunic for his tranq gun.
She held up her hands. “Do not shoot,” she said in English with a clipped British accent. “I am Arezou. I will take you to Dave.”
“You will?” Jack asked. That easy? There must be a trap. “You were expecting us?”
“Of course,” Arezou lowered her hands. “Dave told us you would come one day. He had faith in his friends, his brother of the heart.”
Jack kept his eyes open even as he remembered Judy calling out to him, challenging him to have faith instead of fear. It was when he had chosen faith, chosen it again, that his life had begun to change for the better. Hearing the commotion from inside the tent that had something to do with Sark, seeing the innocent trust in the face of the young woman before him before his eyes went up to the caves, Jack felt the power of faith.
“Which one of you is Jack Bristow?” Arezou asked.
Jack shrugged and held up his hand. “I am.”
“Welcome...” Arezou bent her head down until the bare nape of her neck shone before them in the bright sunlight. “Honored guests. Brother to David. Beloved of us all.” She raised her head.
“Yes. He is,” Jack said softly. Forcing himself to patience, he began the formal process of negotiation, “I would very much appreciate it if you would take us to him. You would have our deepest gratitude and we would be more than willing to provide you with whatever you wish in return-“
“Good.” Arezou said it briskly, surprising them all. She was supposed to demur and protest and only accept payment after refusing it several times. They all looked at each other and waited. She had broken the protocol of her culture. What next? In a second she told them with a nod and a bossiness that made Jack and Zamir smile, “Now, I will go in and retrieve my mother. The story must be done by now.” Thinking of the unhealthy heat of Daoud’s skin, Arezou said firmly, “If not, it will be.”
“You know the story?” Jack asked.
“Yes. It is a...what do you say? Doubleplay?”
“A doubleplay?” Zamir asked. “To foretell and what else?”
“Yes. Daoud - Dave, I mean. Dave tells us story, the story...” Arezou frowned. In her excitement, her words were getting away from her. “To teach the children English. And to use the story as a distraction. You know---” Arezou nodded at them all. She began to walk away and then stopped. Smiling, she opened the flap wider and looked back at them, before stepping inside. “Ah. We have been waiting for you for a long time. Justin Case.”
TBC at
Yasmina’s voice sliced through the chaos pinning Sark in place, just as Daoud had predicted. “But where is Jack?” she demanded of the young woman who had entered, stunning her listeners into momentary immobility.
“Jack?” Nia said in a heavy accent imitating the other woman.
“Yes, Jack,” the child said in a whisper. “We were to watch for him today.”
“You...were? Who told you this?”
“Arezou.” The children pointed to the young woman.
“Who told her?”
“Yasmina.” Fingers pointed in her direction.
“Who told her?”
“Daoud.” They all looked in the direction of the caves.
“He set us up, he set us up!” Irina cried out. The damn story... The process was less important than the ending. “JACK!”
“Yes.” Yasmina folded her arms across her chest, the movement sending up small puffs of dust from her robes. “Where is Jack?”
Jack immediately stepped toward the flap of the tent and stepped inside. “Here. I am Jack.”
“AH!” A loud chorus of voices cried out as the women of the camp stepped backward, confused. Their benefactor had warned them all of this Jack, but Daoud had said he was to be trusted. Talking amongst themselves, they decided that Daoud's word was to be trusted, not the other's and moved forward again.
“Do you wish to take your brother Daoud home?” Yasmina asked, moving toward him, staring at him intently. Yes, the eyes were as Daoud had described.
“Yes, but...” Jack scanned the interior, looking for the trap. Surely, it could not be this easy.
“All you had to do was ask,” Yasmina smiled, revealing one chipped tooth. She ignored Irina’s indrawn hiss of annoyance. “Daoud said you would understand the meaning of that.”
“Guess Dave read the manual too,” Weiss said to Vaughn as they stood outside the tent, guarding.
“Given that whole bit about Dave’s night of debauchery, it’s my bet that Dave might have written the unpublished preface to that manual,” Vaughn whispered back.
“I am asking,” Jack said quietly. “Please take us to Dave.”
“First...” Yasmina pointed toward Nia, Sydney and Irina. “The gold.” The gold meant a difference in their children’s futures Daoud had promised it to them. Even still, she watched in amazement as the women divested themselves of a fortune as if it meant nothing. And perhaps it did not, Yasmina decided, looking into Jack’s eyes that held the depths of a man who had been to the bottom of a valley and crawled his way back out again.
“This story... “ Jack said as he curbed his impatience waiting for the gold to pile up. “How did it end?”
“All of the versions ended with you,” Arezou told him quietly. “In every version you came to take your brother of the heart home.”
“I am here. And now?” Jack asked. He needed to move. His patience was at an end. He could hear the damn stories’ endings later. Now, he had an ending that needed to come to conclusion. Now.
“And now,” Yasmina pointed toward the flap in the tent. “Now, we will take you to Daoud. Let us go.”
Sark’s mouth fell open slightly. He blinked rapidly as the children pulled and tugged him forward, toward the caves as the others grabbed the medical supplies from the horses’ packs. “We’re in some story?” he called out to Jack, who was looking up at a cave to which Yasmina was pointing.
“You are Justin Case!” one little girl giggled. “We know all about you!”
“You do?” Sark’s head snapped to look at the children with more interest. What did they know?
“You are him, aren’t you?” the teenage boy who had helped with the horses asked.
Suddenly, Sark realized that all of the children spoke English with different accents. How much time had that required? Sark looked at the endless expanse of horizon as he debated the odds of escaping. Then again, Dave had had nothing but time.
“I...am,” Sark answered, still confused. “How do you know?”
“Uncle Daoud!” the children chorused.
“Do you know the song?” Sark asked quickly, drawing Sydney’s attention.
“The song?” a few children asked and then shrugged as their mothers tugged them forward.
A girl pointed at him. “I saw you the last time. It was night time when you left the cave. I had to go. Why were you with the other man?”
“I....” Sark was at a loss for words. All these children, pulling and tugging. He forgot what question he had wanted to ask. This, these munchkins. It was like... He rubbed his temple.
“You are bigger than Uncle Daoud said!” a little boy poked at Sark.
“I said that!” The girl who had seen him, said indignantly. “I told you that. I told you all that he was big.”
“And you were with the wrong person!” Another little boy poked at him too. Sark shook out his robes and glared at the boy. He was going to keep these bloody robes on if the children were going to poke and prod at him like this.
“You were supposed to be with Irina.” A girl said.
“Or Grace.” A boy who looked about ten years old noted with a suspicious look.
“Or Jack. Not with the rat man!” Another child called out as once again the children formed a circle around him.
Sark swallowed and looked around, panicked. All of these children were trapping him. He could not escape...His shoulders slumped. Dave had done this too.
A pair of clapping hands silenced the children. A soft voice called out, “Enough! Can you not see that Justin looks -“
“I am fine,” Sark said with rigid dignity, looking for the owner of the voice. It sounded like that young woman who...
“Of course you are,” Arezou said. “You are a man. You would never be upset by so much noise and confusion, would you? But perhaps...it hurt your ears?” she suggested.
“Yes, of course, that is it.” Sark agreed, giving silent thanks that she had allowed him to save face, even as he wondered why her mother gave her a look of pride.
“Would you like a waterskin?” Arezou held out her hand. The boy was pale. He needed more time in the sun. Or perhaps a good meal of goat meat.
“Yes. Thank you.” Sark smiled automatically at her as he took the water.
“Sark.” Dixon barked the name out. “Come over here. Now.”
Sark nodded his head at the lovely young woman who had handed him a waterskin and moved toward Dixon. “Yes?” he asked sullenly.
“Do not, do not do anything or say anything to that girl. She is an innocent and-“
“What could I say or do in this short walk to the caves?” Sark asked, gesturing as the children fell into position around him. “Dave apparently trained them to encircle me.”
“Smart man,” Dixon said shortly.
“Rat man?” Sydney asked a child trotting next to her as they all moved hastily toward the caves.
“Yes. The man who gives us money to take care of Daoud until his family could come get him,” one earnest little girl told Sydney, her eyes wide.
“Why do you call him the rat man?” Dixon asked.
“Because he always sniffs like this...” The girl wrinkled up her nose and sniffed rapidly and loudly. “As if something smells. And we are as clean as can be!”
“I think he smells himself,” Sydney told the little girl with her dusty face, but bright eyes. “Inside, he is...rotten.”
An older girl nodded. “Ah. Like a piece of meat that looks good from one side. Then you turn it over and you see maggots.”
“Like that!” Sydney agreed, forcing a smile as she walked faster to keep up with her father, the one little girl tagging in her wake, pulling on her robe. “What is it?” Sydney asked, bending down to give the little girl her hand for a moment.
“It is you! Soraya Sydney!” The little girl pointed up at her in a wonder that was not surprised, but rather, fufilled expectations. She pointed then at Sark. “And Justin Case! And Jack Bristow! And his wife, who has many names... She is your mother?”
“Yes. She is my mother.”
“She went away?” The little girl asked, already knowing the answer. “My mother did too.”
“Did she?”
“Yes. After the last baby, she got very hot and died.” The girl frowned, then smiled. “Uncle Daoud told me of the story of the moon and the stars, the one he told you, he said. On the-“
Sydney almost stopped in her tracks. “The glider.” She took a deep breath and pressed her temple.
Jack looked over his shoulder at her tone of voice and then glanced at Sark, who was closest to Sydney. Without thinking, Sark lunged out and grabbed her sleeve to pull her forward, recognizing the signs of someone regaining a memory. Vaughn glared at him.
Irina glanced from Vaughn to Sark and looked thoughtful. Hmm. Her idea was better than thinking about what story Dave had told Sydney after her own loss. Not now, she told herself, lengthening her strides to catch up to Nia. Tomorrow. When with any grace, Dave would be well enough to yell at her himself. She had a feeling of dread as they approached those damn caves.
“That story, Soraya? Do you remember that one?” the little girl asked hopefully.
Sydney nodded. “Yes. It was...” She pointed upwards where the stars would appear in a cloudless sky in a few hours. “About how our loved ones are always out there.”
“Yes. Waiting for us. As Uncle Daoud was waiting for you and his family. Now I see you and I know here...” The little girl touched her chest. “That he tells the truth. I always knew it, but now I-“
“Know it,” Sydney agreed, touching her own chest and looking at her father’s back as he sped forward up the incline toward the caves. “The story is true. Our loved ones are with us, even if we cannot see them. If they are gone or lost or merely...waiting.”
Suddenly, Yasmina knew the answer to the question she had so often asked. Why had Daoud so steadfastly believed in the ability to control one’s own destiny? She knew. He had created a story and had helped it come true. Her eyes locked on her daughter’s slight form as she led the way, moving over to tug on Justin Case, toward the caves. Kismet, Daoud had said, was something one made. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps she needed to go ahead with her idea. She hurried to catch up to the little one, Nia. The other women were giants.
Nia smiled apologetically at Yasmina as she pointed toward the inert forms of the guards piled in a shady overhang of the caves. “They are alive. But is one of the guards your husband? We regret any-“
Yasmina snorted. “Do not trouble yourself. He has a hard head. This I know.” She fingered the hilt of her knife.
Nia nodded. “Typical husband. I love my husband, but sometimes, I’d like to...” She pretended to smack the side of her head.
Dixon rolled his eyes at Zamir's brother. "Women can always bond over male stupidity, can't they?"
“I, too. It...” Yasmina paused. This woman seemed approachable. She spoke their language with a perfect accent. Was here with her father, her family, as she should be. She looked at Arezou once again. Should she ask this one? Wanting, needing to ask the question, but afraid of the answer she wanted, she stalled. “It was an arranged marriage. Was yours?”
“Not really.” Nia smiled fondly at her father. Speaking in slow, clear tones, she told Yasmina, “My father merely found him, made certain he was acceptable..” She looked at Irina squarely who nodded understandingly. Nia’s husband had been subjected to a thorough background check to make sure any “Laura Bristow” situations did not happen again. “And introduced us with enough disinterest that I thought he didn’t care one way or the other, so...” Nia shook her head. He had manipulated her. But she had forgiven him the first time her husband had kissed her.
“So, he arranged it, yes?” Yasmina smiled at the look of love Nia sent her father. “A good father, then. And you...Irina...Was your marriage to Jack arranged?”
“Yes. Mine...” Irina cleared her throat. “Mine was an arranged marriage.”
“And you were lucky enough to find love. That is the gift, perhaps, that Daoud says...” Yasmina broke off at the look of chagrin that flew across Irina’s face, followed by one of obvious possessiveness toward her husband. “And you gave the gift back.” Yasmina shook her head. “This, I do not understand. In my...world, one can not refuse a gift. Which is why...”
“Why?” Nia prompted as their feet ate up the hard-packed ground between the camp and the caves. She looked over her shoulder as Irina did the same, seeing a small stream of women and children following them. Sydney was nearly running to catch up with them.
“Daoud was our prisoner, originally. Some of us did not want to do this, hold a man captive. Then we knew him. And we knew we were wise not to refuse him entrance. Because he became our gift. Our blessing. Our beloved blessing.”
“The people we love should be gifts,” Sydney said thoughtfully as she looked toward Vaughn. Did he see her as a blessing or a curse?
“You will miss him,” Irina said quietly as she looked into the unexpected complexity of the eyes of this woman living the simplest life of bare existence. And yet, Yasmina had stated truths that she with all her knowledge and sophistication and languages had taken most of her life to understand. And until she had, she had exiled herself away from home, away from her loved ones. Perhaps... what was most important was not intellectual capacity, or courage or even heart, but all three? “I...understand. You will miss him as we have missed him these many years.”
“Our tears will form a river. A river on which he can float back to his home. It is necessary. The will of Allah.” Yasmina stopped and waved on her companions to watch the progress of the rest of the camp. They would all want to have their chance to say Inshallah to Daoud.
“Is it?” Sydney asked.
Nia put her hand on Sydney’s arm as she nodded. “Yes. Is it karma or kismet, destiny or fate? Is it?”
“Or merely the bone-deep intransigent stubbornness of a man who refused to relinquish his faith?” Jack asked, as they drew within a few feet of the cave entrance.
“Perhaps that was his gift,” Zamir suggested. Or another one, beyond manipulation.
“What? Faith or stubbornness?” Jack asked.
“Both. The combination.” Zamir told him.
“Speaking of locks and combinations...” Jack nodded absently and motioned with his hand. “Sark. It’s your turn. Lead us in.”
Sark stepped forward slowly until Jack grabbed him and hauled him forward. “Quite!” he squawked as Arezou bent to light lamps and hand one to him. Sark took a long look at Jack. Then putting one hand on the car in his pocket, he nodded as well. It was time to make a choice. Or at least this choice. It wasn’t the rest of his life, after all. Was it? Forward he walked, toward his past and his future.
Into the dark, tight, twisted passage, the team went, followed by a straggling line of children and women trailing dusty robes. Their lights bobbing, casting shadows on the walls, which went from dry to damp, they pressed on, listening to Julian Sark or Justin Case - depending on which story one believed - count the steps. The walls went from grey to brown to black where dampness trickled down them, the sound of the dripping water seeming to mimic the rhythm of the shuffling steps of so many people walking, endlessly, it seemed to Jack. Endlessly. Would they never reach--
Her chest tight with the damp and she admitted, anxiety, Irina looked up at Jack. This was claustrophobic even for her; she couldn’t imagine how he was... He was just ignoring it, concentrating on the prize ahead, she decided as she watched him tear the turban from his head and leave it at a crossroads in the tunnel.
Jack concentrated on not pushing Sark to the ground and running ahead blindly into the darkness. Forcing his breathing to stay calm and steady, he told himself over and over:
There is no substitute for preparation
There is no substitute for preparation
There is no substitute for preparation
Out of the corner of his eye he saw the other men follow his lead and also leave their turbans at turning points as they went left and right and then.. Sark slowed. Jack took a deep breath and focused on the light in Sark’s hand, on his voice counting confidently until he stopped dead. Jack lifted his own lamp and saw Sark’s hands in the pocket of his robe and realized the boy was spinning the wheels of the little car. “What?” Jack barked.
“We’re here,” Sark said softly. “We’re here. This is the alcove-“
“Is this it, Arezou?” Jack asked, his hand tightening on the lamp.
“Yes!” Arezou called out, several people back. Daoud had been correct. She was his just in case girl. Jack didn’t fully trust the Justin Case boy, she could tell. She would need to remember that. “Just two paces, perhaps three, ahead, there is a small opening. You will have to bend down, much, Jack Bristow.”
“Why hasn’t he called out?” Sydney asked her mother, her voice wavery with fear. “Dave must hear us, why hasn’t he called out?”
Irina bit her lip and reached up to tear the beard off Jack’s face. He hadn’t even noticed, she realized as she began to apologize, “Sorry, but he won’t recognize you with that. Now-“ Her words were spoken to empty air as Jack gave took a few steps forward.
Jack located the embrasure, small and tight, leading into - if possible - even deeper darkness. He took a deep breath and held up his lamp as he squeezed his way into the black, airless room that would hold his greatest hope or his greatest fear. “Dave?” He asked, leading the way with the lamp. “Dave!”
There was a moment of silence. Then those waiting outside heard Jack’s voice bouncing off of the walls.
“Oh, my god!”
TBC Chapter 2007: Part 4