Our bird was powercell driven to reduce noise. Silver dropped it in a sweep, ran up the drive, batted several bugs from the air, both real and recon, until it was identified. One of Alrab’s guards frowned in disgust rather than fear, but they hurried the man into his car.
“They’re killing the bugs and birds, but I still have our media cams,” she said.
“Good.”
So, now I needed to watch his car.
All the supplicants came out, each into their respective motorcades. Could Randall be staff in one of those? Hired on to some other entourage? Given the backwardness of this place, entirely possible. There were so many liveried and unliveried retainers running around, I could have walked out there with the right jacket and attitude. I watched Alrab’s car, looking for someone to place a charge. I zoomed back and looked for someone to shoot. We had sonar and radar ready to track any shots.
Then I’d be on him like a fly on a fresh steamer.
The vehicles were not an official convoy, but they were in line and left pretty much in order, the drivers queuing up and pacing for both security and comfort, and then into a showy formation, each one sweeping the long drive and out onto the road. I relaxed slightly. Moving targets are a harder shot, and the drones were probably out of the equation. We’d compromised everyone when ours was seen.
Maybe he was safe.
I watched Alrab’s car turn onto the main boulevard, and relaxed a little more. That vehicle was armored, and now in motion.
Then a car in the fourth entourage back erupted into the air, flipped over in three large pieces like a broken omelet, and crashed in a burning heap.
Naturally, he’d gone for a car bomb, because they were so common here who would question it? He may even have had several set up.
I snapped, “Get a residue trace!” but Silver was already out the door with a camera and a scarf.
I found a channel that showed the route, captured the vid and ran it several times. I couldn’t be sure at this resolution, but it looked awfully like a painted gel. Simple enough. Have a street department truck roll through and lay down gel platter charges, coat with road surface material so it looks like a minor repair, move on. No one would question it. I hadn’t questioned it, because I’d driven past that “construction site” during two recons. The dogfucker.
Only who was the victim? Were we wrong or had he missed?
I watched the news. The fourth vehicle was UN Bureau of Progressive Investment chairman of the Mtali Development Fund, Arman Lee.
Twenty minutes later, Silver was back, with a vial we could hopefully test.
“I will be fucked,” I said.
“Dan?”
“It actually was a faction matter. He was favoring the Amala, who are poor and starving and would be better off dead. The Shia don’t like that. At all. Nor the Sunni for that matter. Either way, one of them decided he was a bigger hassle than Alrab.”
“Trif,” she said. “What now?”
“Got anything?”
“Plenty of trace on the explosive.”
“Confirm. We’re close and hot enough we might get a lead.” I hoped.
“Our drones are down; so are everyone else’s.”
“The caches are all clandestine purchase, usually local. Can’t be traced to us. And the drone swarm was also to ID us. Or at least we have to assume it turned out that way.”
“Is he stalking us now, then?”
“I hope so. That’ll make it a lot easier. More likely, he’ll take any opportunity he gets, but won’t want to reveal the compromise. We might get lucky, though. Keep in mind I trained for this for most of a decade. I trained him for one mission. A very deep mission, but a single approach.”
He was gone. I suspected we’d seen the last of the chameleons, though. The gimmick was compromised and he knew it.
Silver was agitated, lip trembling. It didn’t look like fear. It looked a lot like anger or frustration.
“We keep catching the tail end and missing him,” she complained. “Failure every time.”
“Not failure,” I said. “We’re getting closer. We IDed the wrong target this time, and still got close enough for good intel. That’s a positive.”
“In the meantime, people keep dying.”
She reminded me of myself when younger. Such things had made me furious. They violated good order.
What would she say about my position that most of the victims were assbags who deserved it? I objected to Randall making the moral call on people’s deaths, and I understood the risk he generated for the rest of the community, but I had no sorrow for high-ranking politicians and their friends, all of them corrupt, becoming the centerpieces of elaborate funerals.