Shadow Tyrants (Oregon Files 13)

“But we’ve put a crimp in his plans. He wasn’t expecting two ships.”

“He’ll want to get the nerve agent airborne. Maybe he already had a plan to do that.”

“Then why make a run for it and go into the ship? When I saw him . . .” Juan’s voice trailed off as he replayed the shoot-out in his mind.

“What?” Eddie asked.

“I only saw him for a split second, but I don’t think he was wearing gloves.”

“He wouldn’t have forgotten them.”

“I don’t know,” Juan said. “Maybe he had them in his pocket, but if he didn’t, he’ll need some replacements.”

“They can’t be just any old gloves. They’d have to be chemical-resistant.”

“Like rubber gloves. I can think of two possibilities. One is the mess, where they might have rubber gloves for cleaning. The other is that he’s circling back to take the ones from Keith Tao’s suit.”

“Split up?”

“It’s our best shot,” Juan said with a nod. He couldn’t check his watch, which was inside his suit. “We can’t have much more than seven minutes left.”

“I’ll take the mess,” Eddie said.

“I’ll check Tao. And remember, we need him alive.”

Eddie nodded and ran toward the mess.

As Juan sprinted back the way he’d come, he radioed Max the plan. Max told him that Raven, Linc, and MacD were suiting up and would be over to help out with the search as soon as they were ready. He also said they were down

to six and half minutes and still no contact with Diego Garcia to warn them of the approaching danger.

He decided to go around and between the row of containers. If Rasul had done the same, Juan would be coming up behind him.

When he got to the space between the containers, he could see the front door still ajar. Beyond it was Tao’s body.

The suit was bloody, but the gloves were still attached to it.

Juan moved forward with the submachine gun raised until he got to the end of the row and eased around the open door. Still no sign of Rasul.

He was about to consider this plan a bust when he heard a piece of metal clang inside the container. Juan poked his head around the corner and saw Rasul emerge from the decontamination chamber with gloves on that matched his suit.

Juan could have kicked himself for not checking the duffel. If the gloves were still inside, that was the only reason Rasul would have returned.

Rasul was holding a bucket with a rocket-powered line thrower. In a flash, Juan knew what he had in mind.

“Drop it, Rasul!” Juan yelled.

Rasul turned and looked at him in stunned disbelief, visible because he had a full-face mask instead of the goggles that Juan wore.

He didn’t hesitate. Despite Juan’s warning, he aimed the top of the bucket at the sky, and his hand reached for the trigger.

Juan fired a single round at Rasul’s shoulder. He needed him alive.

Rasul spun and collapsed onto his back, but he closed his finger on the trigger as he fell. The rocket launched past his head and into the decontamination chamber, where it ricocheted around until it ran out of fuel.

Juan ran forward. Rasul reached for a pistol in his belt, but the gloves were clumsy enough that Juan got to him first and stepped on his wrist.

“How do I send the self-destruct code to the missile?” Juan demanded with the P90 pointed at Rasul’s face.