The Last Man

Chapter 13
THE assassin had killed eighty-seven of his fellow human beings. At least that was how many he had specifically tallied. There were likely a few more, bodyguards and such, who died later from injuries suffered at his hands. So he reasoned the number could be as high as one hundred, but the official tally stood at eighty-seven. Many of those kills he was proud of, nasty people who were creating pain and destruction in their lust for power or profit. There were also more than a few that he knew he'd answer to his maker for. Most of those came early in his career before he'd honed his skills and become more selective. Some were mistakes, and some were a simple lack of experience. He'd used his hands, wires, knives, and poison, but most often he used a gun or a rifle. There were a few regrettable times when he'd employed explosives, which were extremely effective, but unruly in the sense that the odds for collateral damage increased dramatically.

He was good at killing. Too good, really, and that was what brought about his near downfall. You didn't get good in this line of work from a lack of confidence, but you could definitely end up dead from an overabundance of belief in your abilities. After thirteen years in the business he learned that there were certain times when you needed to say no - sometimes for no reason other than the fact that you'd said yes too many times. The challenge to test your abilities and the money were incredible motivators, and he'd found himself competing to be the best. Increasingly, he needed to take the most difficult jobs, so he could prove to himself that he had no peer. It was stupid, really, as if there would one day be an awards ceremony for the greatest assassin of the last decade.

Eventually his ego and an extremely big payday put him on a collision course with mortality. That one job had changed everything. It had made him wiser. He was still confident, but he was also keenly aware of his weaknesses and the fact there were others out there who were every bit as talented as he was, and even a few who were better. The last and final piece was perhaps the most difficult to judge. By necessity, he never met his employers. He didn't want them to know what he looked like, and if they had any brains they knew it was best not to reveal themselves to a world-class killer. This type of arrangement necessitated a middleman who was able to negotiate contracts and make sure that payments were made on time. He had used three such individuals over the years. The first two were dead - one of natural causes, the other from a bullet to the back of the head while he was taking a leisurely stroll through El Retiro Park in Madrid. The Spaniard, it turned out, didn't fully embrace the confidential aspect of their work, and it didn't help that he was stealing money from him.

His agent for the last two-plus years had been a Russian, and up until this point things had gone smoothly. This current contract was beginning to take on the stench of a job that he should have declined. Separate the most obvious problem, which was the target, and he was left with a bevy of red flags. Chief among them, his employer was showing himself to be a control freak. Just in the last few hours the anonymous employer had provided information that left him to wonder who he might be. It was natural to wonder such things in this line of work, but more often than not, there was a simple motivation. This one was beginning to feel different. The mystery man was feeding him with information that could be provided only by someone on the inside. In the assassin's mind, that distinctly raised the possibility that he was being watched. The anonymous employer was now calling the shots at a level the assassin did not like. This employer was a puppet master who thought he needed to pull the assassin's strings, as if the assassin was an amateur. After revealing that the target was none other than Mitch Rapp, a bellman delivered a large manila envelope that contained an address, a map, a key, and specific instructions on when and how he was to take the shot. The assassin was at first offended. He was the professional, after all. If this employer was so good at this, he should come and take the shot himself.

The assassin checked his ego, however, and for the moment was willing to explore what was increasingly feeling like a contract that fell outside his normal risk parameters. One voice inside his head, the one that was ruled by common sense, was telling him to go to the airport and leave the country immediately. If he was being watched, though, this could cause a problem. The other voice inside his head, the one that could sometimes get him to overextend himself, was telling him this was far too exciting to walk away from. For the moment, curiosity and the large payday got the best of him.

He retrieved his alias passport from the hotel safe with a matching credit card and cash as well as other worn forms of ID that any seasoned customs agent would expect to find in a fortyish man's wallet. He donned a pair of cargo pants, hiking boots, field shirt, and light gray North Face vest. Into the left cargo pocket of his pants he slid a Kershaw Black Blur folding knife in the event that he needed to discreetly kill someone.

Next came what he considered his lifeline, should things go drastically bad. He laid his specially designed backpack down on the bed and went over his gear. Inside was an FNH 5.7 single-action, auto-loading pistol. He'd fired virtually every handgun known to man, and in the hands of a trained marksman there was no better pistol to carry into a gunfight, for three reasons: The first was the low recoil of the weapon, the second was the twenty-round magazine capacity, and the third was its unique 5.7x28mm round, which was capable of defeating all but the best body armor. The pistol had a short suppressor attached to the end and three extra magazines. The pack also contained two M84 stun grenades with timers, which he'd learned could come in very handy should he need a distraction to complete his job.

The backpack itself was the most impressive piece of equipment. It was made out of ballistic fabric and with the quick pull of a zipper and the yank of a handle he could pull half of the backpack over his head, where it would rest on his chest. With a few swift moves that took no longer than two seconds, the backpack became a bulletproof tactical vest with his pistol and his other much-needed tools readily available on his chest. He hooked a fanny pack around his waist. Inside was a second lens for his digital camera and a subcompact 9mm Beretta with a two-inch suppressor on the end.

The rest of his gear was thrown into a generic black carry-on bag. He was always careful about what he touched, so it didn't take more than five minutes to wipe down the room. The hotel was filled with security cameras, and he wouldn't be surprised if the embassy had real-time access to those cameras. There was absolutely no doubt that his image would be captured, and as much as he didn't like it, there wasn't a thing he could do to prevent it from happening.

So he slung his Canon EOS 5D Mark II camera around his neck to complete his cover as a freelance photographer and headed for the lobby. He kept the two key cards, one in his backpack and the other in his wallet, in case he needed to return to the hotel, but past experience told him he would not be coming back. In fact it was extremely likely he would be making a hasty exit from the country. He smiled for all of the digital cameras in the lobby and then asked the doorman for a taxi. The man asked him if he was checking out and he told him no even though it was likely he was doing just that.

The assassin had been to virtually every major city on every continent with the exception of Antarctica. He had a very good grasp of how standards of living fluctuated from one country to another. Even with all of the money that the Americans and their coalition partners had used to build up the city's infrastructure, Kabul was still basically a hellhole. Garbage was plastered against the curbs of virtually every pothole-strewn street, and if the city owned a street sweeper there was no evidence of it. The relative high altitude and lack of rain helped cover everything with a film of dirt. Beyond that, the city's inhabitants seemed to embrace throwing their garbage wherever they liked, almost as if it were a national pastime.

The driver was a talkative fellow, which the assassin didn't like, but things were coming to a head so quickly that there was no time to be picky. Normally he would have changed cabs at least three times, but he was more interested in checking out the location where he had been told to kill Rapp. That was the part that was grating on his nerves more than anything else. He was a professional and was used to picking a time and place of his own choosing. This entire thing was becoming a little too orchestrated.

The office building was a half block off the Kabul River, a muddy morass of refuse that in the late spring and early summer was bursting at the banks from all the snowmelt from the mountains, but in the fall it slowed to a trickle and again revealed that the inhabitants of Kabul thought of the river as a garbage dump. Even though the office was only a few miles from the hotel the drive took nearly fifteen minutes. The lack of traffic lights and the heavy noontime traffic made the going slow. His Arabic was basic enough to find out that the driver spoke English, which made things much easier. After some haggling they agreed on what it would cost to hire him for the next few hours. The assassin directed him to the location where he wanted him to wait and then tore a hundred-dollar bill in half. The driver didn't like that one bit. After some cursing, the assassin explained to him that he'd get the other half when he came back and a fresh hundred-dollar bill as well. This seemed to calm the man a bit. The two exchanged mobile numbers and then the assassin left the taxi along with the roller bag in the trunk.

He circled the block, snapping photos as he went, but in reality he was taking a digital recording of everything. It was a mixed business-residential district with a good number of two- and three-story buildings. By European standards the place was a dump, but here in Kabul it was considered upper class. Vendors lined both sides of the streets selling everything from the popular vests that most men wore to brightly colored plastic chairs and tables to tea, with a surprisingly varied selection. There were fruit and produce vendors of almost all imaginable kinds. These merchants, the assassin knew, would have their finger on the pulse of this street where they lived six days a week from sunrise to sundown. Anything out of the ordinary and they would seem a bit agitated.

He was careful to not appear to be taking any direct shots of any particular people, as it could make them jumpy. Rather he made it look as if he was taking long-distance shots of faraway objects. The veterinary hospital was near the end of the block with a park next door that was adjacent to the side door of the hospital. The office building he was supposed to take his shot from was across the street and about 80 meters down the block. At first glance the location was perfect.

The assassin took a final casual look around and then entered the building. There really wasn't a lobby, just a small landing for the stairs that led to the second floor. He did a quick walk-through of the first floor and was alarmed to see that there was no secondary exit. That was reason enough to pull the plug on the assignment, but he had some time to spare, and curiosity drove him to take the steps to the second floor. It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the poor lighting. He walked past the office that was in his instructions and went to the end of the hall, where he was relieved to find a ladder that led to the roof. Going back to the office, he unzipped the fanny pack and slid his right hand around the grip of the Beretta should he need it. The key slid into the lock easily enough.

The assassin stayed behind the doorframe and pushed the door open. The office was a simple fifteen-by-fifteen-foot space with dirty, cracked walls and carpeting that was worn in the places where the previous tenant's desk had sat. Underneath the window someone had set up a folding table and chair. On top of the table sat a rectangular tan nylon bag that he had seen many times. He closed and locked the door and approached the bag as if it might bite him. After hesitating for a moment, he retrieved a pair of latex gloves from his fanny pack and snapped them on each hand. He ran the zipper all the way along the perimeter and carefully folded the top over to reveal a shiny new Heckler & Koch HK 416. A soft whistle of admiration rolled past the assassin's lips. The H&K 416 was the most advanced M-4 carbine available. The weapon was outfitted with the top-of-the-line optics that in the hands of the assassin would make it lethal out to six hundred meters. At eighty meters a headshot would be a snap. The short-stroke, gas-piston operating system delivered the round with incredible accuracy, and more important, the weapon rarely jammed.

He lifted the weapon from its case and turned it over in his hands. The suppressor was tucked in a separate compartment. The carbine was a fine piece of craftsmanship. His thumb pressed the magazine release and he inspected the rounds. As per his request the magazine was loaded with Remington's revolutionary 300BLK subsonic round, which had significantly more punch than the standard 5.56. He seated the magazine back into the weapon, turned on the EOTech sight, and brought the weapon up to his right shoulder. Standing five feet back from the window he sighted in the front door of the clinic. With both eyes open, the red dot balanced perfectly on the door handle. At this short distance there would be no need for a tripod or shooting stick. At this distance he wouldn't need the 3x magnifier, but he flipped it into place nonetheless. He wanted to see if there was anyone out there watching him. He started to his left and searched for a likely sniper position.

After five minutes of carefully probing he was left with no evidence that he was being watched, but he knew the absence of such evidence meant nothing. If the person was good, it was a simple thing to conceal a position that was one thousand meters away. After placing the H&K 416 back in the case he picked up a manila envelope and dumped the contents on the table. There was a handmade map that showed the location of the rooftop access and a line of exfiltration across several rooftops to a ladder that would lead to the street. He set it off to the side and picked up a photo of Rapp. This caused him to frown. His employer had already provided the same photo via text. He grabbed his lighter and burned both map and photo, dropping them to the floor and stamping them into the carpet when they were nothing more than a few fragments.

He grabbed his digital camera and began going through the footage he'd taken. He was roughly three minutes in and had picked out two interesting individuals who seemed to pay him a little too much attention. They were also conveniently located at each end of the block.

The assassin was about to explore this further when a text arrived informing him that Mr. Rapp was on the way. Estimated time of arrival was six minutes. He felt his heart begin to quicken - something that hadn't happened in a long time. The assassin took in several deep breaths and then shook his arms loose to try to let out some of the tension. Why put two watchers on the street if they already had eyes on the target? The answer was unfortunately obvious. They were not here to keep an eye on Rapp. They were standing at their posts doing one of two things. The first was simple enough. His success or failure would be reported in near real time to his employer. No real harm, but another sign that his employer had some serious assets at his disposal. The second possibility was more ominous - his employer planned on killing him as soon as Rapp had been taken care of.