Escape from Baghdad! (42 page)

The Lion could take a hit. Hamid had to give him that.

“In the old days, they would have charged us,” the Lion said.

“They don't need to,” Hamid tapped toward the opposite roof, where the fat man had set up shop. “He's bringing up heavy armaments. They'll just blow us out of the sky.”

“We should get out of here then.”

“It might be a bit late for that,” Hamid said. “Can you still move?”

“I've been known to recover from mortal wounds,” the Lion said. “Do you think the others still live?”

“I think we'll see a big explosion when they die,” Hamid said.

“I gave the watch back to Dagr,” the Lion said.

Hamid stared at him.

“I want him to look after it if he survives.”

“What, you're retiring?” Hamid asked. “No more grand quest?”

“Let someone else do it. I used to think Avicenna was the devil, but nowadays, the whole world seems to be like him. It seems he's multiplied and I've reduced.”

“Yeah, now he probably wouldn't even make the first deck.”

“What?”

“You know, the cards the Americans made for the top villains.”

The Lion laughed, startled with the irreverence of the image. For a moment, he felt completely carefree.

“Shall we get on then?”

“Toward the fat man or the imam?” the Lion asked.

“You want to flip a coin?”

Hassan Salemi saw them hurtling toward him, jumping the gap between roofs amid a cacophony of bullets. It did not faze him. He had faced down countless men with the same cold courage. He pushed his soldiers forward and let them take the brunt of the attack. The larger
man was swinging his rifle like a mallet, flattening skulls, mowing men down with brutal strength. The other one was
shooting while in the air.

With the phlegmatic nerves typical of the imam, Salemi allowed them to approach, dropped to one knee, and shot the giant three times at point blank range. He staggered and incredibly kept on moving.
What manner of devil is this?
He let the giant pass him and then shot him again, spraying his back with bullets, until the man went down from sheer volume of fire. The hammer of his gun, having exhausted its store, continued to click for several minutes before he could lift his finger.

He felt a shadow over him and turned. The infidel torturer burst through his guards to reach him. He was grinning, a crazed bloodstained mirth that Salemi could not understand. He was almost dead.
Almost.
He was on fire, hands dripping napalm, touching everything like a demon child, screaming defiance and heat in that tight space. Even as bullets pounded into him, he spun into Salemi and grabbed hold in a tight lover's embrace until they were cheek to cheek and spinning across the roof.

Salemi felt hard round bars pressing into his chest:
explosives. There were explosives tied to the man's vest.
He tried to struggle out of that iron grip, felt the burning man laughing against him, a terrible, haunting sound, a slow-pitched whine that leached the strength from his limbs. Then there was a great noise and the world turned red.

“He's dead then?” Avicenna could scarcely hide the eagerness in his old voice.

Behruse stood over the mutilated body of Afzal Taha, the last disciple of Al-Hakim, as it still stirred with the stubborn remnant of life.

“Not quite. It's remarkable,” Behruse shouted into his walkie talkie. His ears and nose still bled from the explosions. “He's been shot eight times, so much that he looks like a beggar's sock. He's also
been blown up, burnt to a crisp, and then tossed down eight stories. Yet his body still moves.”

“Cut his head off!” Avicenna screamed.

“I am doing so now,” Behruse said. He was, indeed, sawing through the neck of the Lion. “God, his spine is massive.”

“At last, the devil is dead.”

Behruse hoisted up the head and looked around at the carnage. Hardly any of Salemi's men had survived: The explosives had destroyed the entire roof, besides flinging the Lion's body to the ground. Salemi himself was gone, vaporized along with Col. Hamid, formerly of the Republican Guard. Still, it was over. They could leave this place now, and his master would once again fade into obscurity for the next hundred years.

“Are you holding up his head?”

“Yes,” Behruse said. “His blood is dripping down my elbow.”

There were noises of glass and drink. “I am now drinking to your health, with this cognac that comes from the stores of Napoleon himself.”

“Well thanks, boss, but I'd rather have the drink myself,” Behruse said.

Just then their communicators cracked to life on the secure channel, and a torrent of panic burst forth.

“Raptor 4 to Bear 1! Blue 4 to Bear 1!”

“What? What? This is Behruse!”

“Abort! Abort!”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Behruse shouted. “Where is Blue Raptor 2?”

“Dead! Dead, everyone here is dead!”

“What?”

“Blue Raptor 2 is down! Blue Raptor 3 has disappeared! I repeat. They're all down! He's killing everyone. Even civilians. These buildings are full of dead people. It's a fucking mausoleum!”

“Blue Raptor 4! This is the Mountain,” Avicenna said. “Listen to me. All hostiles in other quadrants are down. I repeat. All other
hostiles are down. We are sending reinforcements. I command you to track the assassin in the eastern quadrant.”

“No, no, this place is full of hostiles,” Blue Raptor 4 moaned. “It can't be just one man. It's barbaric. I'm not staying here.”

“How many men do you have?” Avicenna snapped across the line.

“No one. They're all gone. He's killed
everyone.
”

“Raptor 4!” Behruse said. “Get your ass back there!”

“Fuck you, Behruse. I'm not dying here for your fat ass. I'm getting outta. Aargghh leavemealoneIwasleavingIsurrender! Isurrenderaaaahhhhh…”

“Behruse, what the fuck just happened?” Avicenna asked.

“Er…”

“Hello?” A new voice, breathing hard.

“Hello!” Behruse said. “Who the fuck are you? What have you done to Blue Raptor 4?”

“Blue
Raptor
? Is that what you call him? Really?”

“Who is this?” Behruse asked. “Listen to me. You're the arms dealer, right? Kinza, is it?”

“Yes.”

“Well your boss the Lion is dead,” Behruse said. “I've cut his fucking head off.”

“Oh?”

“And the other fucker with him is dead too,” Behruse said.

“How did he die?”

“He blew himself up.”

“Alone?”

“He got Salemi,” Behruse said. “Listen, you had beef with Salemi, right? Salemi is dead. He's rain in the gutters. You couldn't pick him up with a teaspoon. This is over. You're surrounded. Just come in and we can talk.”

“Yes, I'm coming.”

“So you're going to lay down arms?” Behruse asked, dubious.

“Not quite.”

“What the fuck do you want? You want to walk? Go ahead.”

“Not really, no.”

“We have no fight with you. Just walk away, man.”

“You're the fat man Behruse, right? I'll be seeing you.”

“No, I'm Ahmed! Ahmed!”

“He's hung up, you fat coward,” Avicenna said after a minute.

“What the hell does that guy want?”

“He wants to kill us, you moron!” Avicenna said. “Round up your men and get back here! And don't forget to bring the head.”

The Lion tried to move, and the searing pain from every nerve ending told him that this was not possible. Things were broken, things pierced, skin destroyed, charred black into a sludge, mixed with the debris of the other fallen, hiding him in masonry and mangled flesh. Ayn Sawfar flashed through his mind, when the Druze had fallen in thousands to Janissary guns, and he had hidden in a hillock of corpses, in the peculiar claustrophobic space between life and death until the immortal clockwork had pulled his body back from the brink.

He saw the fat man looming near him and shut his eyes for the coup de grace, yet the fool moved on, rummaging around some other destroyed body. The machete glinted, blood sprayed from disgusting hacking noises, the thwack of a butcher's blade beating bone, and the fat man stood up triumphant, holding up the wrong head.

The Lion started to wheeze with hysterical laughter.

The gunship hovered in the air like a hesitant moth, the two passengers bickering in the back while the pilot repeatedly thumbed the red trigger button, almost lasciviously, hoping he would finally be permitted to unleash the hellfires. Sabeen and her men were across the street, firing a variety of ineffective long range weapons at them. It was a stalemate of sorts. The Apache had withdrawn somewhat, but
the looming shadow of its black form still discouraged Sabeen from charging.

“We just have to soften her up a bit,” Hoffman said.

Mother Davala snorted. “Clearly, your time in confinement has broken you. Were you raped by the dog boy? You are completely delusional about this woman.”