Desert Pursuit.

by Chris Ryan.

ONE.

The jerboa stopped in the sand-burrow entrance and peered out across the moonlit dune. It was summer in the Sahara Desert, when daytime temperatures above ground could reach a blistering fifty degrees Celsius, and the little rodent had slept away the hottest hours in the darkness of its burrow. Now, in the relative cool of the desert night, it was awake and hungry.

A beetle scuttled across the sand towards the burrow. The jerboa held still, waiting until the insect was within striking distance before springing forward with a powerful thrust of its long hind legs. It s.n.a.t.c.hed up the beetle, bit off the snapping jaws and then settled back on its haunches to enjoy the meal. In common with most desert dwellers, the jerboa required very little water and the juicy innards of the beetle would provide all the fluid it needed.

Suddenly the jerboa stopped eating in mid-bite and sat upright, using its tufted tail for balance. It had heard something. Under its snout, the beetle's legs waved feebly, like a wind-blown moustache, but the jerboa remained frozen in place, listening intently. There were other things hunting in the dunes that night and survival meant staying alert. The sand began to vibrate as the sound grew louder, turning into a hum, then a high-pitched drone that seemed to come from everywhere at once.

The jerboa sprang for the safety of its burrow just as three quad bikes, each carrying two riders and pulling a small trailer, blasted over the crest of the dune. The combined engine noise briefly changed to a higher, whining note as the quads soared into the air, then gravity took over and the squat machines. .h.i.t the downward slope with their heavily loaded trailers jouncing along behind them. The quads fish-tailed until the fat tyres got a grip, then they roared on down the dune slope in a shallow V formation, leaving three clouds of swirling sand in their wake. Alpha Force was in action.

They were travelling at night and off-road for a reason. Their mission was covert. They were in Western Sahara, a skinny little country wedged in next to Morocco on the Atlantic coast of north-western Africa. Western Sahara's recent history had been full of violence. Morocco had invaded, claiming that the country belonged to them, and the land had become a war zone as the people of Western Sahara, known as Sahawaris, fought a long, fierce guerrilla battle against the might of the Moroccan army. Now, many years after an uneasy ceasefire had been declared, some areas of Western Sahara were still dangerous. Morocco remained in control of the little country while, just over the border in Algeria, thousands of displaced Sahawaris lived in huge refugee camps.

Earlier that evening Alpha Force had slipped across the border from Algeria and now they were pushing further and further into territory that was patrolled by Moroccan troops. If they were discovered by the soldiers, their mission would be blown. To help them to remain invisible, the headlights of the three quad bikes were covered by infra-red filters. The drivers wore night-vision goggles and the lenses glowed like green insect eyes in the moonlight.

Paulo, the most experienced off-roader of them all, was in the lead. He had been riding quad bikes since he was eight years old. Back in Argentina, on his family cattle ranch, horses, 4x4s or quads were the only way to cross the huge expanses of rough ground in order to check on the stock. He had never driven in desert conditions before but he was learning fast and his face was set in a fierce grin as he reached the base of the dune and sent the quad bike leaping forward over the open ground ahead.

Alex was on Paulo's left flank. His shoulders were hunched and his thick, fair hair was dark with sweat as he struggled to match the speed of the lead quad. He had spent a few summers helping with the harvest on a farm near his home village in Northumberland, so he had some experience with tractors and quads, but he was nowhere near as expert as Paulo. They had been travelling for a good ten hours and his muscles were aching from the effort of keeping the quad on a steady course over the uneven ground, but the South American handled his machine with a casual ease, as though it were a part of him.

As he watched Paulo roar ahead, Alex clenched his jaw at the thought of coaxing even more speed out of his quad. Night-driving in the Sahara was tough on the nerves. The moonlight cast harsh, black shadows which played tricks with perspective. A shallow rut in the sand could look like a deep creva.s.se, but an axle-breaking trench might not show up until the last second. The night-vision goggles helped a lot, but Alex was still half-expecting to crash down into a hidden dry creek bed, known locally as a wadi, at any moment.

He sighed and took a firmer grip on the handlebars of the quad, preparing to go for maximum speed. He knew Paulo was right to set such a demanding pace. There were only two hours left before dawn and Alpha Force had to reach their target zone before the sun was up. The sigh turned into a grunt as his pa.s.senger jabbed him sharply in the ribs.

'We're losing them, you idiot!' yelled Amber, her mouth five centimetres from his ear. 'C'mon! Put the pedal to the metal!'

Alex did the opposite. He slowed the quad to a stop, flipped up his night-vision goggles and turned to glare at Amber. His grey eyes were steely with annoyance but Amber did not flinch. She simply stared back, looking down her nose at him in her usual arrogant fashion as though he were an unsatisfactory chauffeur. Amber was in the habit of giving orders and usually they were obeyed. She was a beautiful black American girl, the sole heir to a fortune which had come from a software empire worth billions of dollars. Her parents had died in a plane crash two years earlier and she now spent most of her days surrounded by people who were paid to look after her.

Alex was not one of those people. He and the rest of Alpha Force never allowed Amber to get away with rich-girl behaviour when she was with them.

'You think you can drive this thing faster than me?' asked Alex.

'h.e.l.l, yeah,' sniffed Amber.

'All right, then. You take over.'

Amber blinked in shock. She knew how to operate the quad, but she was uneasy around anything that had an engine. Yachts or horses were much more her style. 'I can't drive!' she spluttered. 'I I mean, I'm the navigator. I have to keep track of our route on the GPS system-'

'Then why don't you do that,' grated Alex, slamming the night-vision goggles back down over his eyes. 'And leave the driving to me?'

Amber looked solemnly into the round, green lenses of his goggles. 'OK, Kermit.'

Alex grinned despite himself, and Amber grinned back. Then the smile left her face as she glanced over Alex's shoulder. 'Quick!' she warned. 'They're changing direction!'

Alex turned to see the other two quads swinging right, towards a formation of dunes on the horizon. He realized that if he cut diagonally across the flat expanse of pebbly desert, he could gain some ground and catch up with them. Gritting his teeth, he opened up the throttle and the quad bike shot forward again.

It was Khalid who had told Paulo to turn east. Khalid was a twelve-year-old Sahawari boy from the refugee camp in Algeria, where they were based. He was acting as a guide for the mission and was riding behind Paulo on the lead quad. As soon as the dunes came into sight on the eastern horizon, he had tapped Paulo on the shoulder and indicated that they should head towards them. Paulo nodded to show that he understood and glanced over at the right-flanking quad to make sure Li had seen the signal too.

Li gave a thumbs-up sign, then peeled away in a turn so tight, it made her quad bike tip up on to the two right-side wheels. Smoothly, Li rose to her feet and leaned out to the left to provide counterbalance. Her long black hair feathered out behind her as she held the quad poised on two wheels, the trailer bouncing crazily along behind. Hex, her pa.s.senger and the fifth member of Alpha Force, grabbed at the edges of his seat and hung on grimly.

'What the h.e.l.l, Li!' he yelled.

'Dios,' muttered Paulo, watching Li's acrobatics with a mixture of worry and pride. He was more fond of the lively Anglo-Chinese girl than he cared to admit. This was her first time off-roading but she had taken to it like a natural. Years of training in martial arts and free climbing had given her a wiry strength, snake-fast reactions and a superb sense of balance, all of which came in very handy when driving a quad at full speed through the desert. On the down side, Li was also an adrenalin junkie, always looking for the next fix of excitement and with a bad habit of acting first and thinking later. If the quad bike tipped over, both she and Hex could be crushed under the heavy machine. Paulo turned his own quad and drew alongside her, shaking his head. Li grinned and deliberately kept her quad precariously balanced for a few more seconds before letting it settle back on to all four wheels.

As soon as the quad was stable again, Hex turned to make sure that a vital piece of equipment was still inside the trailer in its padded, hard-sh.e.l.led case. He had wedged it in securely enough when they were loading up, but Li's extreme driving could dislodge an elephant. He spotted a corner of the polished steel container poking out under the covering tarpaulin and gave a relieved sigh. That piece of equipment was his responsibility and without it, the whole mission would fail.

Hex settled back into his seat and automatically checked the soft leather pouch that was strapped across his chest, inside his shirt. Tucked into the pouch was a hand-sized portable PC so technologically advanced it was not yet available on the open market. Hex grinned as he patted the leather pouch. Having a software billionaire as a friend did have some advantages. Hex was an expert hacker and code-breaker and the tiny PC was precious to him. After all, it contained most of his life. He lived in London, but the Net was his real home, and other hackers from the furthest corners of the world were closer to him than his own family.

As Hex felt the familiar shape of the palmtop under his hand, his fingers started jumping, tapping imaginary keys. When he was not on a.s.signment with Alpha Force, Hex spent most of his spare time on the Net and now he was suffering withdrawal symptoms. His green eyes narrowed into disgusted slits as he scanned the Saharan landscape. Other people saw a stark beauty in the desert but Hex saw only millions of grains of sand, any one of which might work its gritty way into his state-of-the-art palmtop and cripple the delicate electronics. Hex was no couch potato his body was firm and muscled as a result of regular trips to the gym but he had never understood why some people loved the great outdoors.

'I hate it,' he said, without realizing he had spoken aloud.

'What?' called Li over her shoulder.

'Outside,' shouted Hex, putting a protective hand over his palmtop as Alex and Amber caught up and cut across their path, sending a stinging spray of pebbly grit into the air. 'I hate it!'

Alex took up his original position on Paulo's left flank and Alpha Force continued on their way, speeding through the night, racing to beat the sun. Ahead of them loomed the black silhouettes of the dunes, their mission destination.

TWO.

The dune towered above Alpha Force as they stood in a tired huddle, stretching their aching muscles. They had reached the target zone. It had been a hard journey and they were glad to be off the quads at last. The machines and their trailers were parked neatly in a row at the base of the dune and the ticking of their cooling engines was loud in the silence of the desert.

Alex moved around the group, pouring water from the jerry can he had unloaded from one of the trailers. For a moment no-one spoke as they all drank thirstily and then held out their beakers for refills. Travelling at night meant that they had not been faced with the roasting desert sun, or the drying wind that always started up at sunrise. In fact, the night-time temperature had been a reasonable thirty degrees Celsius, but still they were all feeling dehydrated. They were dressed properly for the desert in gandourah and sirwal, and the flowing shirts and baggy trousers gave some protection against water loss through evaporation, but their bodies were still adapting to the arid conditions and at the end of the journey only Khalid had seemed unaffected by thirst. Alex shook his head in admiration as he remembered how the Sahawari boy had casually turned down the offered water before loping off into the darkness to scout the area.

'We made it,' sighed Paulo, once he had drained his second cup of water.

'Only just,' said Li, nodding at the sky. Behind the top of the dune, the first streaks of crimson were beginning to show in the east.

'Hex, how much light are you going to need for the next phase of the mission?' asked Alex.

'It has to be full daylight for the best results,' said Hex.

'That's still a few hours away,' judged Li.

'Until then, we shall be well hidden here, yes?' asked Paulo.

Amber nodded. 'Khalid told me the army patrols keep to the road unless they see anything suspicious. As long as we stay on the western side of the dune, we're out of sight of the road.'

'We should still pitch the camouflage awnings,' said Alex. 'Just in case they have helicopters or something. The awnings'll give us shade, too. This hollow is going to turn into an oven once the sun climbs above the dune.'

He glanced around at the others, waiting for their agreement. In the red light of dawn, they looked as tired as he felt and he knew they must be tempted to simply curl up in the warm sand and go to sleep. He certainly was. His muscles felt as though they had been put through a shredding machine and his head was still full of the whining drone of quad engines.

'You survival experts. So So boring,' sighed Li, sending Alex a mischievous sideways glance from her uptilted eyes. 'Do this. Do that. Always planning ahead. Can't you, just for once, live in the moment?' boring,' sighed Li, sending Alex a mischievous sideways glance from her uptilted eyes. 'Do this. Do that. Always planning ahead. Can't you, just for once, live in the moment?'

'If you want to survive-' began Alex.

'-you have to be prepared,' finished Li, crossing her eyes comically.

Paulo laughed at Li, then raked his dark curls back from his forehead and a.s.sumed a serious expression. 'The four elements of survival are-'

'-shelter, water, food, fire,' recited Amber, Li, Paulo and Hex in perfect unison.

'Well, they are!' said Alex, trying to look offended. 'But not necessarily in that order. The thing is,' he continued, in a deadpan, lecturing tone, 'you have to take account of your environment-'

He broke off as the others scattered, heading for the trailers and leaving him standing on his own.

'No, listen,' he continued as he followed them. 'This is really interesting...'

Four plastic beakers flew through the air, aimed directly at his head. Alex dodged them easily, then began helping to unload the trailers with a broad grin on his face. He had hardly seen the others since Christmas, when they had spent a couple of weeks on Paulo's ranch after completing a successful mission in Ecuador, and it felt good to be part of a team again.

They worked well together, moving quietly and efficiently to erect the awnings over the quads and trailers. The desert camouflage colours would hide the machines from all but the closest inspection. The awnings had a skeleton of fibregla.s.s poles which, once a.s.sembled, kept them rigid and anch.o.r.ed. Within fifteen minutes the quads and trailers were hidden under the awnings and there was enough s.p.a.ce around the machines for six people to stretch out in the shade.

Once the trailers were unloaded and the awnings in place, the team split up. Paulo overhauled the quads, checking oil and water and topping up the fuel. The machines had to be primed and ready in case a quick escape was needed.

Alex and Li set up the stove and started preparing a meal. It was against all Alex's instincts to use the stove. He would much prefer to light a fire. He had his survival tin in his belt pouch, with his knife in a sheath beside it. Normally, that was all he ever needed, but fuel was scarce in the desert and, at least with the stove, there would be no tell-tale smoke to give away their position.

Hex sat down with his palmtop. His task was to send a progress report back to their base in Algeria. The flat aerial in the lid of the palmtop meant that he could connect with the nearest communications satellite and then surf the Net from anywhere in the world.

Amber unclipped the three GPS units from the handlebars of the quads and sat down cross-legged on the sand with the small black boxes laid out in front of her. They looked a bit like calculators with oversized display panels, but they were a lot more sophisticated than that. The initials GPS stood for global positioning systems, which meant that the units used satellite technology to navigate with pinpoint accuracy anywhere in the world.

There had been very few landmarks along the route they had taken that night, but every time Amber had spotted one she had carefully stored it as a waypoint in the memory of her quad's GPS unit. Now she needed to key the same information into the other two GPS units. That way, if the quads became separated for any reason, the drivers would each be able to find their way back over the border into Algeria by using the GPS backtracking facility.

Amber switched on all three GPS units, then sat back to wait while they locked on to the NAVSTAR system, a network of twenty-four satellites owned and operated by the US military. Once the units were receiving signals from three or four of the satellites, then they would be ready to give an accurate position, but it usually took a couple of minutes to get a fix. While she waited, Amber looked across at Hex. He was hunched over his palmtop and his fingers were flying across the keys at such a speed, they were only a blur. Her face creased into an affectionate smile. As a rule, she would rather die than let Hex see her looking at him with anything but disdain, but once he was on the Net he was lost to the world. A herd of stampeding camels could race through the camp and he would not even glance up from the screen.

'You like him?' said a soft voice behind her.

Amber jumped and twisted round in the sand, her eyes wide with shock. She was holding one of the GPS units in her hand and, in the green light thrown out from the little screen, a face from a horror movie loomed into view. The lips were pulled back in a lopsided grimace and the whole of one side of the face, from chin to brow, was a ma.s.s of shiny, puckered scar tissue. The ear was a shrivelled stump and the scalp surrounding it was hairless and pulled tight against the skull.

Amber gave a low, frightened scream and dropped the GPS unit. As soon as the green light from the screen was gone, the horror mask rearranged itself into the familiar, scarred features of Khalid, their young guide. He had made his way back into the camp so silently, no-one had heard him arrive. Instantly, Amber regretted her scream, but Khalid's lopsided grin remained in place. He was not at all self-conscious about his mangled face. It had been with him since he was a baby, strapped to his mother's back as she and his father cleared the ground around their date palms. They had returned to their home in Western Sahara after the ceasefire had been declared and had begun to reclaim the overgrown oasis, but they had disturbed a buried landmine. Khalid's father and mother had both been killed. He had been protected from the blast by his mother's body, except for the left half of his face, which had been peeping over her shoulder as she bent to her work. This was partly why thousands of Sahawari refugees remained in the camps in Algeria, despite the ceasefire. Their homeland was sown with thousands upon thousands of landmines.

It was also the reason why Alpha Force was in Western Sahara that night.

'Khalid! Don't creep up on me like that!' hissed Amber, putting her hand to her heart. 'You scared me.'

'You like him?' repeated Khalid teasingly, in the broken English he had picked up from the foreign aid workers in the refugee camp. Like most Arabs living in Algeria, French was his second language, but he preferred to practise his English when he had the chance.

'Hex? Are you kidding? Perlease...'

'I think answer is yes,' grinned Khalid.

Amber could feel a blush spreading across her face and frantically searched around for something to say. Alex, Paulo and Li were already listening with amused interest. She had to change the subject before Hex tuned into the conversation.

'So, is it all quiet out there?' she asked, busying herself with the GPS units.

'All is quiet,' said Khalid.

'In that case,' said Alex, casually getting to his feet, 'I'm just going to have a quick look up top.'

'Not further than top,' warned Khalid. 'Is danger further.'

'Not further,' promised Alex. He looked over at Hex, but Hex was still lost on the Net. He shrugged and looked over at Paulo. 'Coming?'

Paulo nodded and grabbed two sets of night-vision goggles from the quads. He handed one pair to Alex and they made their way over to the base of the dune.

'Ready?' asked Paulo.

Alex nodded. 'Let's get it over with.'

THREE.

Hex hardly glanced up from his palmtop as they started to climb, but Li, Amber and Khalid all stopped what they were doing to watch. Their faces were serious as they followed Alex and Paulo's slow progress up the steep slope. They all knew what was waiting on the other side of the dune.

When Alex and Paulo reached the top, they went down on to their bellies and crawled the last couple of metres. Khalid had said it was all quiet, but that was no reason to carelessly skyline themselves. Once they were in position, they both lowered the night-vision goggles over their eyes. They lay there in silence for a few minutes, taking in the scene below, then Alex tapped Paulo on the shoulder and they wriggled down the slope until it was safe to stand again. Their faces were grim as they flipped up the goggles and shared a look before turning to begin the trek back down.

'Still there?' asked Li, when Alex and Paulo arrived back at the base of the dune.

'Still there,' said Alex briefly, heading for the stove to check on the progress of the boil-in-the bag meals he and Li were preparing. Paulo took the night-vision goggles back to the quads and began stowing away the jerry cans of fuel, oil and water he had been using. Amber watched them both for a moment, but neither of them said any more. She looked at their grim faces and bit back the questions she wanted to ask. They would talk when they were ready.

She returned to her work on the GPS units and Khalid settled down to watch her. He was fascinated with them, but Amber was more impressed with Khalid's navigational skills. She considered herself to be a pretty expert navigator, but Khalid's ability to find his way through almost featureless desert without a map or compa.s.s was way beyond her capabilities.

'Tell me how you found your way here tonight, Khalid,' she said.

'The stars,' said Khalid.

'Yeah, yeah, that's fine as a basic direction finder, but how do you find your way right to this particular dune? They all look the same to me.'

'We leave, how you say, signs?'

'Markers?'