SOIKOS: Valley of Hinnom

[x-dominion.livejournal.com]

Kane joins the Yamam team to rescue Neramani, but things do not go as planned.



“Mefake'ah Zerach. What’s going on?” Kane said, stepping out of the car that had collected him from the hotel. He was dressed in a dark suit, and one of the Yamam agents handed him a windbreaker not dissimilar to the ones the FBI uses, with Hebrew across the back in pale letters. The big Yamam inspector was talking on a tactical radio and made a shushing motion at Kane while he spoke rapid-fire to his team. After a moment, he lowered the radio and nodded at Garrison.

“Good evening, Agent Kane. Looks like our investigations were a little more accurate than you initially thought. One of our border guards tipped off a van coming over from Jordan. We had men following it and the trail on the passport used by the two men to cross. They are almost perfect, except for the serial used on the hologram. It’s a minor detail that isn’t run when the passport is checked, but it is recorded in the scan. Turns out it matches our list of holograms the Iranian foreign ministry uses for their own passports.”

“What did they turn up?”

“One of the men met with Alberto de Vasco, an Argentinean polygot in Middle Eastern languages, who works for the church. Or more specifically, the Opus Dei. We have tentatively identified him as an advance man for the cult. The other man rented a car under a differently named credit card and picked up three men from the bus station.”

“Five Lashker in the team, prepping for a meeting. Do they have Calysee?”

“See for yourself.” Yaakov motioned him inside the building and up a set of stairs. The apartment had been carefully prepared for them to observe the building opposite without risking detection. The other building was a garage of some type, single story with a large loading bay in the back. Kane peered into the telescope trained on the window, and he could vaguely make out a couple of men, and something in the corner. He flipped over to the thermo-imaging, and the shape in the corner revealed itself to be a seated person, and based on the position and posture, it had to be tied up.

“Hostage in the corner.” Kane muttered.

“Certainly female, fits the approximate height and shape of Neramani. We’re going to get a scope closer, see if we can get some better images before we move.”

“How well is your team trained?”

“The American HRT occasionally asks us to consult.”

“So they know their shit. Got it, shutting up now.”

“He can be taught.” Zerach scratched the back of his head. “We’re locking down the perimeter now. We want to wait until the Opus Dei contact gets to the garage before we move. He could lead us back to the rest of his cell, and explain what they intended all along.”

“So we’re waiting.”

“Coffee’s on the table.”

“Heh. Pistachios.”

“What?”

“Pistachios.” Kane pointed to the bag that one of the agents occasionally dipped into for a handful of nuts. “First stake out I ever did, the lead agent sat eating pistachios for three hours.”

“Police work doesn’t change between countries, Agent Kane. Only the language and the definition of reasonable force.”

***

“Movement.” It was said quietly over the radio, but everyone snapped alert as if an alarm had gone off.

“There’s our boy. And it looks like he brought a friend.” Zerach peered into the monitor as the two men entered the garage. “Suit up, people. Now that we have the buyer, we’re going in.”

Kane paused Yaakov has the man pulled a vest over his vast chest. “What can I do?”

“Observe.” He paused. “Agent Kane, I spoke with Sabra at the Mossad when you came over and I know you’ve got certain… talents. But right now, your biggest value is that you can tell what happened as a third party. Your presence will make it clear that Israel had no involvement in this kidnapping, and defuse some of the traps that these bastards have tried to craft for us bringing her here. Stay back until we secure the building, and then come in.”

Garrison held his tongue and nodded. He wanted to be in the forefront of the team, and he could tell that Zerach wanted him there too. But the risk was too great, and he settled for taking his position in the rear.

They began the countdown in Hebrew, as three men teams covered the two other entrances and affixed Primacord to them. On Zerach’s signal, the charges where detonated, and the doors buckled inward with the explotions. Flashbangs rolled through the openings a second later, and the high intensity bursts of light scoured the interior. The Yamam teams were right on the heels of the explosions, weapons ready, and the sounds of short, mostly silenced bursts reached Kane as he followed the backup team in.
The main area of the former garage was strewn with debris from the blasts, and two men lay dead from precise doubletaps to the head. The others had dropped their weapons, and were being roughly searched and secured against the far wall. Zerach turned back to give Kane a tight smile as he walked towards the figure now cowering on her makeshift seat on a crate.

“Get that Hindi speaker in here. If she’s in shock, we might not get through to her in English.” Zerach barked as he approached. At the opposite end of the room, Kane paused, looking at the men against the wall, and he noticed the one that had followed the Lashker casting venomous looks not at the police but at the other terrorists. One of them, an older man, met his look squarely, and then craned to look over his shoulder.

Kane watched him smile.

“Yaakov, wait!”

As Zerach shifted the woman to reached her bounds, the faintest sound of a tiny cord snapping reached him; a pindrop of perfect clarity. Zearch had only a fraction of a second to realize the entire thing had been a trap before the crate full of C4 detonated under the woman, and took the garage, terrorists and Yamam force with it.

***

There was glass driven into his shoulder and the right side of his face. He could feel it, but couldn’t open that eye. Kane pulled himself painfully over the pavement, trying to edge away from the heat that was scorching him. Only his preternatural reflexes and his omni-skin had saved him, and even those weren’t enough to prevent him from being burnt and cut in a dozen places as the blast threw him through a heavy window like the blow from an angry god. He couldn’t hear anything past a sharp ringing in his ears, and his vision keep blurring. Concussion, part of his brain told him. Hearing gone from the proximity to the blast. Body going into shock.

“What should we do with him?” Kane didn’t hear the words, but peered up at the figure who was standing over him, talking to another. He could dimly make out two others, one in a suit and the other a woman who stood staring sightlessly into space, as if nothing around her registered.

“Killing him might be best.” The man paused, pursed his lips. “Maybe not. This is the one the FBI sent over. He might know something. I don’t think we can take the chance of just killing him if it turns out Israeli intelligence or the fucking Bureau got lucky and turned something up we didn’t leave for them to find. Take him.”

Kane groaned as he was lifted up by his arms, and dragged to a vehicle. He could hear the sirens of emergency vehicles closing in, but within a moment, they were moving in the opposite direction. He tried to speak, to do anything, but his body wouldn’t respond, and he could only watch helplessly as a needle was plunged into his arm and darkness flowed up to envelope him.