The Bourne Dominion (Jason Bourne 9)

The upper floors were no problem—everyone was on the ground floor overseeing the loading of the war matériel. As yet, there was no sign of Semid Abdul-Qahhar, but Bourne was sure he wouldn’t be far away. This shipment was much too valuable for him to leave its transit to subordinates.

He met the first guard one flight above floor level. The guard nodded to him, but as Bourne brushed past him, he reached for Bourne’s left arm

“Where is your weapon?” he said.

“Right here,” Bourne replied as he slammed the guard’s head back against the wall. The guard’s eyes rolled up in his head as he slid down. Bourne took the AK-74 and continued on his way down. Judging by the pace of loading, he calculated he had ten minutes at the outside to set the SIMs in place and get out of the building before he sent the electronic signal that would blow the place sky-high.

The second guard stood just to one side of the bottom of the staircase. He nodded disinterestedly as Bourne came down off the last step. Bourne took one step past him, swiveled, and buried the butt of the AK-74 into the guard’s belly. He doubled over and Bourne slammed the butt into the back of his neck. After dragging the body back into the shadows, he set off on a route that would take him quickly to the two stacks of spiked FN SCAR-M, Mark 20s.

He spent a precious minute blending into the swarm of men, directing a group away from Don Fernando’s crates to a stack of wooden boxes on the other side of the poured concrete floor. He had twelve cloned SIM cards, one for each crate. Don Fernando had been quite specific as to where Bourne should place the SIMs on the side of each crate. The tiny cards had sticky backs. All Bourne had to do was peel off the covering film and slap them into place. He had affixed six of them when a commanding voice called out, “You there, guard! What are you doing?”

Bourne turned to see a man who looked like Semid Abdul-Qahhar. He had stepped out from behind a wall of crates that were apparently not slated for departure tonight.

Semid’s eyes narrowed as he beckoned Bourne over. “You are unfamiliar to me.”

“I was assigned to the warehouse this morning.”

Semid nodded to two men who had come up behind Bourne. They stuck the muzzles of their AK-74s into the small of his back and marched him behind the wall of crates.

“No one was reassigned to El-Gabal this morning,” Semid said, “or any day this week.” He stepped closer as one of his men stripped Bourne of his weapon. “Who are you? More importantly, how did you infiltrate the building?” When Bourne made no reply, he smiled. “Well, we’ll deal with you the moment the loading is complete.”

Bourne grabbed the arm of the guard on his right and swiveled from the waist, taking the man off his feet. Bourne chopped down on the other guard’s wrist and, with his trigger hand clearly numb, ripped the AK-74 out of his grip and clubbed him over the head. The first guard, having reared back, charged Bourne with his head down. His face connected with Bourne’s right knee, something cracked, and he collapsed.

Bourne turned right into the muzzle of a Makarov, which Semid pushed against his teeth. Bourne was close enough to see the tiny spasm at the corner of his right eye.

“Don’t move,” Semid said softly and fiercely, “or I’ll blow the back of your head off.” He patted Bourne down with great precision and expertise. “Hands at your sides.” Finding nothing, he leaned in so that his nose was almost touching Bourne’s. The overpowering scent of cloves filled Bourne’s nose. “There is nothing more for you to do here. Five minutes from now this place will be deserted, except for the dead, which will include you.”

Time was rapidly running out. It was now or never. Bourne laughed, one hand creeping into his pocket.

“What are you doing? Take your hand out of there.” Semid Abdul-Qahhar waved the Makarov in Bourne’s face. “Slowly.”

Bourne did as he was asked.

“Open your hand.”

Bourne did so. As Semid Abdul-Qahhar grabbed his hand, he leaned in to take a closer look, the Makarov wavered a little, and Bourne shoved one of the false teeth he had been carrying between Semid’s teeth. At almost the same instant he slammed the flat of his hand into the bottom of the other man’s chin, forcing his teeth together. The false tooth cracked and the hydrogen cyanide flooded Semid Abdul-Qahhar’s mouth. Semid swallowed convulsively in order not to choke. Instantly his eyes opened wide and he brought the Makarov to bear. Bourne was ready for him, knocking the handgun away. Semid tried to grab a handful of Bourne’s uniform to steady himself, but he slid to his knees. Bourne unknotted his fingers. A blue froth appeared at the corners of Semid’s mouth. He made sounds without words, the stuff of nightmares. Then his eyes clouded over, and Bourne kicked him, dragging him back behind a niche in the wall.

Emerging from behind the wall of crates, he affixed the last six SIM cards in place. A contingent of four men were coming in his direction. Bourne pressed 666 on the cell’s keypad. Three minutes until the building and everyone in it would be blown to atoms.

“These need to be taken onto the truck,” Bourne said to the men.

The lead man frowned. “I thought they were to stay here.”

“Change of plan,” Bourne said in the clipped voice of authority all soldiers automatically obeyed. “Orders from Semid Abdul-Qahhar himself.”

The man shrugged and beckoned to his men. They bypassed Don Fernando’s crates and started on the ones behind. Bourne was now faced with a crucial decision. If he walked out onto the loading dock, past the guards, and into the back street, he would be leaving Rebeka behind, and he could not do that.

As soon as the men hefted the first crate, Bourne turned on his heel and retraced his steps, across the floor, up the stairs, and out onto the open hallway that led to the supply room with its ladder up to the roof and the longer but preferable route to safety.

He opened the door and stepped into the room, right into a small, silver-plated .22 Beretta aimed at him. It appeared identical to the gun Viveka Norén had aimed at him in Frequencies, the Stockholm disco, years ago. Holding it was a beautiful woman with blond hair and Viveka’s light eyes. She looked exactly like Kaja, but from her formidable expression and the way she held herself he knew it couldn’t be Kaja. It was her twin sister, the dangerous multiple-personality Skara.

33

FRACTURED LIGHT FELL like daggers through the skylight, piercing the shadows, illuminating sections of her face—cheek, nose, a triangle of forehead.

“Skara.”

She frowned. “Who are you?”

“I’ve met your sister,” Bourne said. “Kaja.”

“Kaja.” She traced her oval lips with the tip of her tongue, as if tasting the name. “Isn’t she dead?”

Two minutes left. “Skara, we have to get out of here.”

“I am getting out of here. Abdul-Qahhar and I together, leaving this hellhole of a country far behind.”

She cocked her head to one side. “Hear that?” The roaring of rotors overhead. Lights played crazily across her face. Her eyes glittered. “It’s the sound of the copter landing.” She smiled viciously, baring her teeth. “It’s also the sound of your death.”

A heavy thump above their heads caused her attention to flicker, and Bourne leapt at her. She fired the Beretta, and he felt a small flame in his left shoulder. Then he had her. He tried to snatch the .22 away from her, but she was quicker and more tenacious than he expected, and she re-trained her grip on the handgun, trying to bring it to bear on his chest. He strode into her, pushing her back with his superior weight and strength so that the handgun was trapped between their bodies. The backs of her calves struck a box, and she stumbled backward. He made another grab for the .22, twisting it.

As they struggled for control of the Beretta her eyes were fierce in the dimness. There was something different about them, something familiar. “Kill me,” she cried. “Kill me now and end this.”

He tried to wrest the .22 away, but she resisted, the Beretta turned awkwardly, and her finger pulled the trigger twi

ce in rapid succession. Blood fountained out of her, the bullets rupturing major arteries, including her aorta.

“Skara,” Bourne called as he pulled her back toward him, but she was already beyond it hearing him or anyone else.

The sleek black Sikorsky S-76C++ helicopter was waiting on the center of the target, its rotors spinning, whipping up a baleful wind. Bourne saw the pilot, but no one else inside. He ran, hunched over, to where Rebeka sat, her back against the rear parapet. Her eyes were closed and for a moment he thought she was dead, but when he lifted her in his arms her eyes fluttered open.

She was shivering. “You came back.” Her words were ripped away like sheets of paper by the roaring of the helicopter. Her teeth chattered.

Bourne ran, bent over, his upper body protecting her. It seemed as if she hadn’t lost much more blood. The pilot leaned over and opened the door, but as soon as he saw they weren’t his expected passengers, he drew his sidearm. Before he could aim it, Bourne shot him between the eyes with Viveka Norén’s silver-plated .22.

After placing Rebeka in the passenger’s seat, he wrapped her in a cashmere blanket he found in the back and strapped her in. He ran around and, opening the pilot’s-side door, hauled him out and climbed in, slamming the door behind him. At that moment a slew of guards erupted out of the rooftop hatch. Semid or one of the dead guards must have been discovered. The men began firing at the helicopter.

Working the controls, Bourne took off, banking toward the west. Enough adrenaline was still pumping that he didn’t yet feel any pain in his left shoulder.

High in the sky, he turned and saw the fireball erupt, blotting out the buildings behind it, as the entire El-Gabal complex was obliterated. The shock wave manhandled the shuddering Sikorsky, which dipped and spun, but Bourne managed to regain control. He flew as low as he dared. He knew within minutes Syrian fighter jets would be screaming toward the explosion, along with fire, police, army, and emergency vehicles.

Rebeka stirred and said something he couldn’t hear over the roar of the engines. Holding the steering oval steady between his knees, he leaned over, slipped a pair of headphones over her head identical to the pair he wore, then adjusted the attached microphone. Now they could speak to each other through the com center.

“Is Semid dead?” Even in pain and severely weakened by loss of blood, she had a one-track mind.

“Yes.”

“You’re sure it was him?”

“I saw the tic.”

A sigh of contentment escaped her.

He saw the pilot’s flight plan taped above his head and he stuck to it until the last minute, then headed due west.

She stirred beside him. “Where are we going?”

“Lebanon.”

“Thirty-three, thirty-two, fifty-five, sixty-four north by thirty-six, oh-two, oh-four, fifty east.”

She was giving him specific map coordinates. He punched them in and the helicopter banked left, then flew straight on.

“Radar,” she said. Her voice was thin and reedy.

“I’m going in as low as possible,” Bourne said. In the pearly light of dawn, he could make out the snaking line of barbed wire with the periodic signs warning of land mines. “Close now.”

Overhead a silver flash drew his attention. The plane was too high to see whether it was a commercial flight or a Syrian army fighter. He flew on. Only several thousand yards now. The silver flash grew in his vision as the plane commenced a steep dive. It was a Syrian army jet.

Even before he heard the first volleys of machine-gun fire, he put the helicopter into a series of daredevil evasive maneuvers. The Syrian jet was coming fast, but now the barbed wire of the border was below him. The jet sent one last volley, hoping to set off one of the land mines, and then they were through. The jet veered off, climbing steeply until it vanished into the sunrise.

“We’re in Lebanon.” Bourne glanced over. Her head was lolling.

“Rebeka?”

Her eyes opened and she drew a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m tired.”

“Rebeka, we’ve crossed over.”

A sphinx-like smile spread across her lips. “The Red Sea has parted.” Momentarily revived, she peered out through the Perspex at the arid landscape, shimmering like copper. “Head southwest. Make for Dahr El Ahmar.” She gave him the new coordinates.

Bourne saw pinpricks of blood seeping through the blanket. She must have been shaken up during his violent maneuvering. “Hold on,” he said, making the course correction. “I’ll have you down in no time.”

She started to laugh, and when Bourne looked at her, she said, “You come to the end of your life and who are you with, a virtual stranger who has saved your mission.” Her cough was thick and phlegmy, and she almost choked. “Don’t you think that’s funny?”

“You’re not going to die, Rebeka.”

“From your mouth to God’s ear.”

“I have enough experience to know. You need blood and a good surgeon.”

“We’ll find them both in Dahr. We have a field unit there. Your shoulder will be as good as new.”

He was surprised that she had had the presence of mind to notice. “My shoulder is fine.”

“Nevertheless…”

“Nevertheless what?”

“I have an obligation to see you restored to health.”

“That works both ways.”

Her sphinx-like smile reappeared, flickering like a guttering candle.

They flew on. Bourne could see the first outbuildings of Dahr El Ahmar, looking like sugar cubes in the morning’s strong, slanted sunlight. They passed over clumps of sentinel palm trees, their fronds, like tongues, set wagging in the helicopter’s backwash. Soon they would be down. His shoulder was on fire.

“El-Gabal.” Rebeka shivered. “That felt like the end of the world.”

Bourne put his hand over hers. “We survived.”

Her eyes were half closed and she looked very pale. Her dark hair lay damp against her cheek. “In the long history of my people, that’s the important thing.”

“It’s the only thing,” he said.

Epilogue

IT WAS SNOWING in Stockholm, just as it had been the last time he had been there. Bourne, shoulders hunched against the wind-driven snow, crossed Stureplan, the crowded square that was the hub of Stockholm nightlife.

He had flown into Stockholm that morning in response to a brief but telling text that had shown up on his cell phone three days before:

Back home after 13 yrs. @ Frequencies evry nite from 9 till u come.

Kaja. The small package he had sent on ahead was waiting for him when he checked into the small family-run hotel in Gamla Stan, the island between Stockholm proper and Södermalm. He had the contents of the package tucked in the inside pocket of his fur-lined greatcoat as he crossed the busy street and stepped into the entrance of Frequencies. The electronic music hit him with the force of a jackhammer. Lights blazed across the ceiling, the dance floor was jammed with bodies bobbing to the trance-like beat that seemed to rise up from the floor, the shimmering air thick with sweat and perfume.

The long, underlit bar was three- and four-deep with guys trying to score and girls checking them out. It was a mystery how Bourne saw her amid all the throbbing mob and pinballing energy, but there she was, her mother’s eyes shining. Her hair was its natural blond color and her tan was completely gone. She was standing near one end of the bar, a glass in one hand, slightly detached from the mingling crowd. As Bourne approached her, someone asked her to dance and she declined. She had seen Bourne by this time, handing her glass to the bewildered guy and moving toward Bourne. She was dressed in umber: snow boots, a three-quarter-length leather skirt, and a wool cable-knit turtleneck.

They met in a small, briefly calm space amid the swirl. There was no point in having a conversation amid the earsplitting noise. She took his hand and led him around the periphery of the club to the bathrooms. Inside the door marked DAMER, no one batted an eye when she l

ed him across the tiled floor. The young women were too busy snorting coke and telling one another war stories about the guys out on the dance floor.

She opened one of the stall doors and they went in, the door closing behind them.

“Kaja,” he said, “I have something for you.” He took out the silver-plated .22 that had belonged to her mother and handed it over.

She studied it briefly, then looked up at him. There was something subtly different about her, but maybe it was her blond hair or how much she resembled Viveka Norén. Or maybe it had something to do with where they were, the Beretta between them.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “Why are you giving this to me?”

“It belonged to your mother, Kaja. She tried to shoot me with it.”

“I’m not Kaja,” she said. “I’m Skara.”

For a moment time seemed to stand still, the throbbing noise from outside seemed to fade, and Bourne’s mind ran in circles. “You must be Kaja,” he said. “Skara was in Damascus with Semid Abdul-Qahhar.”

“Kaja died in the destruction of El-Gabal,” the woman said. “It was my sister, Kaja, you met there.”

Kaja. Skara. One of them was lying, but which one? “Skara has dissociative identity disorder,” he said, “which fits with the sister I confronted in Damascus.”

“Well, that seals it, doesn’t it? Kaja was the one with dissociative identity disorder.”

Bourne felt as if the ground had fallen away under him.

As if divining his confusion, she said, “Let’s go somewhere less charged.”

She took him to a small café in Gamla Stan. It was filled with teenagers and twenty-somethings, which would include her, if Bourne’s calculations were correct. The two remaining sisters had fled Stockholm when they were fifteen. They had been away for thirteen years. That made the woman sitting across from him twenty-eight.