In the shadows :the path of lucas

The middle man

The most horrifying moment of human history isn't when nukes get detonated, or war, or famine or even massacres, it happens when the strong grow weak, when the prey becomes the predator to hunt down those who once oppressed them, like desmond Erasmus once said

”man is to man either god or wolf"

sometimes, even the most tactical gets compromised, even the best strategist makes flaws to certain degrees.

The old man sat motionless on his chair at the roof, on his left finger an engagement ring, quite worn out, the gold almost completely faded, his right index finger holding a magnificent ring, made of pure silver, with an eagle crested at it's top, made from pure jade, the globally recognized symbol of the “Khizanat Aliaikhtifa',( “the vanishing cabinet,) an organisation that was first established as a last line of defence and networking should in case the world ever stopped working, for what ever reason, dumb as the motive may seem, the organisation commands twenty five percent of global economy, having multiple operation stations and safehouses scattered all across the world, in every continent, every nation, and every major city on the globe all the way down to Antarctica commanding at least a trillion Kuwait dinar worth of assets at the click of a finger, as lucas stood watching the old man, he couldn't help but wonder, all that power, and yet you die anyway, he shook his head, what a pity, he thought.

The man seemed deep in thought , his head buried in his palms, when he pulled out, his hands were shaky, his face wrinkled and he looked older than when last he had seen him about two years ago, the old man had rescued him back in Mali, and a half dozen times, twice in Russia when he went to imprint his bios into the Russian samat launch code,the U. S Geostorm satellite in america,they had helped him bug it and twice in China, Beijing to be precise, he had plugged out the main processor in the mother board of china's class 005 destroyer nanchang and bugged in an NIA configuration data chip, the move was never discovered and the Chinese never retaliated.

I want something also in return my dear boy, said the old man, with a fragile voice lucas thought he would break

My health fails under these excessive struggles and eternal labours, in all probability I am not capable any longer to oversee the organization as I should, you are a valiant man, a reputable soldier, a survivor and fighter, one who stands his ground even when the odds are against him, always in the path of good,

where is all this headed, old man?

you will never truly be alone after this, the shadows from your past will hunt you even unto death, I need an enforcer by my side,

Lucas's face grew pale, what if you're wrong?

am hardly wrong, the old man said, my only mistake was letting bello live long enough to light this fire, but they say there's light at the end of the tunnel, only this time, its a high speed train, question is, what side of the tracks would you be on?

He stole his way into the apartment as always, this time, mira wasn't home, he checked the fridge and kitchen for something solid to eat, nothing, he turned on the gas cooker, put a pot of water on the flames and tossed a few spaghetti sticks, two packs actually, on another burner he placed a keg of water for coffee, he was going to be awake all night, no point falling asleep in the middle of urgent business, the kettle gave out a low whistle,he grabbed the coffee pot and offloaded the contents of the kettle into it, the steam that shot forth made him know the coffee would definitely scald his tongue, typical of Africans and Nigerians to be precise, he added cold water and a handful of ice cubes, the result was an almost catastrophe, the coffee was too watery, so he added a little more coffee and doubled the sugar dosage then filled up the thermo flask to the brim, he was gonna need a lot of caffeine, the spaghetti was almost done, he packed the flask into an overnighter back pack, tossed a few biscuits and some banana bread into a corner of it, an extra spoon and cup, a change of clothes, the spaghetti went in inside a mighty aluninium food flask, a satellite phone, Bluetooth devices and every other crap he could place his hands on, his phone binged a notification just as he got out of the shower, the SMS was from an international contact, he downloaded the file and opened it still half naked with nothing but a towel draped around his waist, a series of maps and coordinates appeared on the phone screen, home address, office complex, assets, transaction histories and the whole bunch, lucas allowed himself a smile that didn't reach either his eyes nor lips , life was a game of chess, you play by strategy not expertise, you depend on skill and you are toast.

He took another bite of the banana bread and sipped the coffee, staring at the tall glass tower a few blocks down the street,he checked the silver rolex on his wrist, a quarter past ten, a little longer, he told himself, this might take a while, he had been sitting duck, watching for the past two hours, apparently his soon to be buddy moved around a lot, he had stalked the gentle man from Alexandria to Marsha matruh, which brought back some memories, down to the siwa oasis before heading for Cairo which he seriously hoped was the last destination for the day, the car rovic so generously donated to him for a reasonable fee also ran on Compressed Natural Gas(CNG) and a handful of batteries, the best part is the radar detection and survelliance mechanism that can pick up anything within a ten mile radius and trace them fifty miles on the run, thanks to the baby, he didn't have to follow them too close, he even lost them twice in traffic, once when he pulled over to refuel and a second time when they seemed to be driving in circles, the monitor had detected their circular movement and he was forced to stall a little longer.

His eyes never left the sleek black Mercedes parked around the building, possibly a getaway car, he was down on the second flask of thermos and his fourth banana bread when the porcupine of a man left the building, followed closely by two others who he immediately named slanky and grumpy because the former was slender and taciturn while the later carried a grumpy and seemingly aggressive nature, slanky immediately opened the car door for the client and dashed in immediately while grumpy provided cover with his right hand in his suit jacket

Well, what do you have there, lucas questioned to no one in particular, zooming in the binoculars to take a closer look,

The Sig p226 scorpion, it was tougher, more accurate, and more finely tuned with many more features and much more attention to detail out of the box, that sort of weaponry in skilled hands could prove a formidable opposition, and grumpy looked like no amateur, the car rolled out, headed for Alexandria, just as he had hoped, the time read twelve, the road would be lonely and easier for him to be spotted, he hit the desert, cruising past the sand dunes , he kept tabs on the radar, marking the Mercedes with a red mark, a secondary vehicle appeared as the Mercedes left Cairo, clever thought, the punk brought backup, which was to be expected, he was a near four hour drive from alexandria, caution should be their priority, he zoomed in the scanner and picked a rather interesting figure, nearly five hundred degrees of body heat, at least twelve persons we're in transit via the backup vehicle, they sure were prepared, but the million dollar question was , are they prepared to take the risk.

The toyota hiace yielded as contact from a 50BM 12.75mm bullet rammed into its middle at lightning speed fired at close range from a Barrett M82A1 50 calibre, the impact and accuracy of the bullet coupled with the near heart bleeding speed of the bus made it go off the highway in a deadly sumersault that was an eye sore to watch just as the chamber hit recoil, a second charge exploded, a direct hit to the Mercedes, despite its armored coating and bullet proof glass, the windshield glass was almost shattered as the bullet met it with impounding force, a third took the radiator with it, the car verred off the road and plunged into the sand dunes, he screwed in the thermal optics and waited, blood showed red, but living beings we're colored differently, he saw someone crawl out, gun in hand, he switched optics to night cam,it will be a waste to plug a 50 calibre bullet into the mans skull, not when he hadn't out lived his usefulness, grumpy already had his gun out, looking for something to shoot, as he took cover away from the crashed vehicle, clever move, lucas thought, he would have been caught by surprise if he hadn't seen right through the plot and taken the other way around, coming up behind them, grumpy almost blending into the sand dunes and slanky trying to spot where the rifle fire had come from, he screwed in the silencers, this shouldn't take long he said to himself, he double tapped amd they were gone, the asset made for the gun but was stopped short when a high velocity bullet whizzed into the space right in front of him, that was a risk he wasn't willing to take, the man looked up at lucas, terrified but calm,

You don't know what you've gotten yourself into , who the hell do you think you are, am an emissary of... Uh..

The butt of the gun crashed into his skull as lucas shot a dose of Benzodiazepine into the base of the neck and felt the body go numb in an instant, the fight died immediately ,he checked his watch

five minutes

A dimly lit bulb hanged overhead casting a dull shadow across the room he squinted his eyes trying to adjust to the surrounding environment, unkept walls and broken plasters filled his vision , a broken mirror and sink stood at a corner, at the middle, a few meters from him was a long desk with a dark material covered over it, he tried to speak but couldn't produce words as something seemed to be stuck in his throat, his brain was foggy, he tried to process everything that transpired, he remembered getting into the car at Cairo and with his two guards , the backup convoy had met them at the outskirts of the city, a flash of light, something came in contact with his head and he fell numb,

Look who finally woke up, said lucas, emerging from a concealed doorway in dull grey coveralls, holding a med kit in his left hand , he ditched the kit on the table, examined his captive for a brief second in absolute silence before dragging the iron chair from a corner of the room to the middle, the sound of steel on the concrete floor for emphasis, he stopped short of the man at the other side of the table strapped to his chair with iron binds, he pulled out a file from the kit and positioned it in front of his captive, visible enough to be seen, he cleared his throat and began a long oration stating the benefits of a peaceful dialogue and suggesting the primary consequences of going contrary to the peace treaty.