Fourteen years earlier
“Zulu…come in Zulu.”
“Zulu here…Alpha, are you in position?”
“Yes and the targets have arrived…I repeat, the targets have arrived.”
“Roger that Alpha…the targets have arrived. Confirm final location before pulling out… Zulu out.”
“Roger…Alpha out.”
Zulu switched off the radio and looked at his team — Bravo, Charlie and Delta. They were all highly skilled and experienced ex-special forces personnel, with only one allegiance: money. Of course, those were not their real names. Only Zulu, the Team Leader, knew everybody’s real name. He liked to keep things on a need-to-know basis and his team didn’t need to know. They didn’t need to know about the client and they most definitely did not need to know that they would all soon be dead. Zulu picked up the satellite phone next to the radio and dialled his client. The phone rang once.
“What?!” barked the client.
“The targets are in position. We will attack in 9 hours, at exactly 04.00 hours.”
“Excellent. And remember, I do not tolerate failure.”
“Nor do I,” replied Zulu.
“Good and don’t forget, no loose ends.”
Zulu thought about arguing the point once again but decided not to. The idea of killing his team after they had completed the mission did not sit well with him but whatever the client wanted, Zulu would deliver.
“ARE WE CLEAR??!!” shouted the client, impatient at Zulu’s silence.
“Of course,” replied Zulu quickly.
“Good. Call me when it’s done.” The client hung up, no goodbyes, no pleasantries.
After a few seconds, Zulu lowered the phone and considered whether he should opt out of the mission. From the first contact, Zulu’s mysterious client had unnerved him, a feeling so alien to Zulu that he wasn’t sure how to deal with it.
He walked back to his doomed team and ran through the plan again. Alpha arrived half way through the briefing but rather than risk any confusion, Zulu started the briefing again. The team listened to their instructions intently. They were all terrified of Zulu.
Zulu was an imposing figure. He was six foot four, made of solid muscle and almost as broad as he was tall. Despite his massive stature, his most imposing features were his eyes. Anyone who had ever met him and was fortunate enough to live to tell the tale, remembered his eyes above everything else. They stared relentlessly, unblinkingly at anything that crossed their path, boring into the soul and threatening imminent death. Anyone caught by their mesmerising gaze would swear they had looked into the eyes of the devil himself. Hence Zulu’s real name, Reaper.
As the briefing ended and the men started to filter away to check their equipment, Zulu called Alpha over to him.
“Anything else to report?” asked Zulu, suspiciously.
Alpha was certain he had told him everything but as Zulu’s eyes burned into him he began to doubt himself. Zulu had shadowed other members of the team over the last few days and had picked up on a number of errors and omissions from their reports. Although Alpha was certain Zulu hadn’t shadowed him, he couldn’t be certain.
“Hmm, I don’t’ believe so.”
Zulu just stared at him unblinkingly for a few seconds. When he was sure Alpha had not missed anything, he produced a photo and pointed to the bride and groom in the wedding photo.
“And it was definitely them?”
“Yes, one hundred and ten percent, Sir”
“Good. Dismissed,” barked Zulu, his gaze returning to the photo. Only he knew who they were. He’d spotted the headline in the papers a few weeks before. ‘Billionaire Businessman to wed his childhood sweetheart.’ He’d thought nothing of it at the time but when the photo came through from the client, a few hours earlier, he immediately remembered the headline. Zulu never forgot a face. Up until the photo arrived, all he knew was that the targets were scheduled to arrive at the small guesthouse located on the edge of the jungle in Sabah, a Malaysian province located on the island of Borneo in the South China Sea.
Zulu wondered what Donald Kennedy had done to upset the client but only out of interest; a job was a job and this was an exceptionally well paid one. Whatever he had done, the whizz kid businessman, destined to be the richest man in the world, was soon to be one of the deadest. And there was nothing anyone could do about it. The first night of the Kennedys’ honeymoon was also going to be their last. Zulu looked again at the picture. It was a shame. The wife was very beautiful, a doctor, a paediatrician named Rachel, if he remembered correctly. Brains and beauty.
Zulu turned as he heard footsteps approaching.
“Sir, there was one thing, I’ve just remembered. Probably totally unnecessary,” stammered Alpha nervously. “But another couple arrived at the same time as the targets. I think they were locals but I’m not really sure. They might have looked a bit more Japanese, come to think of it. Anyway, the local woman was pregnant and the female target was helping her.”
“But the targets checked into their room OK?”
“Yes, Sir, just as I reported. I just hadn’t mentioned the pregnant woman as I thought it was irrelevant but that I guess is for you to decide.”
“No, that’s fine,” responded Zulu calmly, much to Alpha’s relief. Zulu thought it was quite natural for a doctor to help a pregnant woman. Everything would proceed as planned.