Page 61 of Soul on Fire
“Could be smugglers. I think—”
Static broke over the radio, followed by Carla’s voice, louder than before. “All stations, we’re taking fire!” Gunshots snapped behind her, heavy impacts of metal shredding metal.
Carter’s voice came next, ice cold. “What’s your location?”
“South end of the airport on the flight line! Jim is down!”
“We’re nine minutes away. Moving to you now.”
That was an eternity while taking fire. Elliot grabbed the transmitter. “We’re available for backup as well.”
“Negative, remain on station,” Carla shouted over the gunshots. “We need you to—”
The detonation slammed into him like a sledgehammer, throwing him back and down as the floor heaved and the walls blasted apart and the windows shattered, a billion shards of glass flying in every direction. The kerosene lanterns burst, liquid fuel spraying and soaking the room.
Concrete chunks rained on him as he curled into a ball. Something crashed from above, fragments of cinderblocks and snapped rebar and shattered pipes slamming down around Elliot. Weight pushed on his back, a heavy pressure forcing him into the buckling, fractured ground.
“Ikolo!” Elliot shouted. His ears rang, a gong going off in his head. Clouds of dust and smoke filled the destroyed room, and he blinked, trying to see through the haze. His eyes weren’t working right. Everything was in triplicate and shimmering in front of him. Something hot and wet ran down his temple, his cheek, and he tasted blood in his mouth.
Heat brushed against his side, a whip-like lick of fire. He grabbed the cracked concrete floor in front of him andheaved, dragging himself inch by inch until he was free. He tucked his legs and spun as soon as his hips were clear of the weight pushing him down. Behind him, a tripod of shattered ceiling, snapped rebar, and fractured cinderblock bricks teetered and collapsed in the space he’d escaped.
Flames crawled over the debris, spreading along the kerosene-soaked rubble.
“Elliot!” Ikolo’s voice, rasping, coughing, called to him.
“Where are you?” Elliot bellowed. “Talk to me, Ikolo!”
“By the table—” His voice broke off in a hacking cough. “Fire,” he choked out. “I’m trapped!”
Elliot scrambled, crawling over piles of creaking rubble. The smoke grew thicker and filled the room in an oily black haze. It was nearly impossible to see, the world a smear of lead and shadow. Fire crackled in every direction. The remnants of the station groaned, the walls shuddering against the collapse and the spreading flames.
Fire had consumed half the room, up to the table where Carla, Jim, and Riley worked the night before, and where Ikolo had been reviewing their logs.No. “Ikolo!”
Coughing, heavy and wet. “Here!” His voice was close, but Elliot couldn’t see him.
A hand grabbed his arm as he searched blind in the smoke, but slipped off, smearing through the sweat, dust, and blood on his skin. He groped for Ikolo, black smoke slipping into his mouth and up his nose and sliding down his throat. His eyes stung as his throat seized, a choking fit strangling the breath out of him. “Ikolo,” he croaked.
Ikolo grasped his forearm again, and this time, Elliot got his hand locked on Ikolo’s elbow. He pulled, straining, and felt the rubble shift around them. The whole building was going to collapse at any moment.
Roaring, Elliot grabbed Ikolo’s arm with both hands and gave it his all. Ikolo squirmed, trying to help, and finally his hips slid from beneath the angle of the collapsed table wedged against fallen chunks of ceiling and the remnants of the bedrooms upstairs. A sleeping bag burned, draped over the tabletop next to a charred laptop and fire-laced cables twitching like snakes.
They stumbled over the wreckage, getting as low as they could. Sunlight streamed from the broken roof, twisting into the smoke. Groans rumbled from the destroyed station, creaks that swayed the walls, the collapsed ceiling and bedrooms spilling onto the main floor. Elliot’s palms stung. Shards of glass sliced his skin. He ignored the pain. Bloody handprints trailed behind him.
Something collapsed, a boom that shook Elliot’s bones as another part of the ceiling gave way with a roar. He flattened, hands over his head and went still. Black smoke, hot as a furnace, rolled over them both.
“Crawl!” He moved forward on his belly, fingernails digging into the broken ground as he dragged himself forward. Tears ran rivers down his cheeks as his eyes tried to clear the smoke away, a flood so thick he could barely see.
They had to get out, had to escape. Somehow the station was compromised. Carla and Jim were under attack and their safehouse bombed. How? Who?
Twenty-four hours until your meeting. You’ll be able to complete their test before?
Majambu. The ADF. Missions that would bring glory to their names, capture the world’s attention. Bombing American targets was a favorite of terrorists the world over. The Beirut barracks bombings, the Khobar Towers bombing. The embassy bombs in Tanzania and Kenya.
And now a CIA station in Kisangani.
Elliot’s palms slipped, blood smearing on the ragged ground. Dust glittered in the air, stuck to his sweat-and-blood-soaked skin. His fingernails cracked as he dug his hands in and dragged himself forward.
The station officers had locked the barred doors behind them, barricading both Elliot and Ikolo inside, but the blast had blown the doors out of the frame and there was enough room to slide over the rubble and between the twisted bars, wrenched like a mangled spring.
