The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 53

Ellie sat for a while thinking. Sameh was lying on her back in the shade, apparently asleep, and Joe was sitting a little way away from Ellie and Sameh, looking towards the compound, as Ellie was.

Joe still seemed quiet, after their earlier conversation about elderly people. Ellie wasn’t quite sure how upset he was, or whether she should do anything to cheer him up. She wondered for a while, then decided it wasn’t her business. He could say if he needed to talk, or wanted her to apologise for bringing it up, but otherwise she would leave him alone. Managing Joe’s mood wasn’t really the biggest problem she had right now.

The biggest problem was doing something about the missing kid.

Ellie sat and thought and glared at the compound. Sitting here wasn’t helping. Nothing was helping.

She decided they needed to act.

“Okay,” Ellie said, after a while. “This isn’t getting us anywhere. I think we need to just go down there and ask them if they’ve got the kid.”

Sameh sat up, and grinned, and suddenly seemed a lot more interested in what was happening.

“Are you insane?” Joe said.

Ellie looked at him.

“They’re a resistance militia,” Joe said. “That’s their base. You can’t just walk in and ask….”

Sameh kept grinning. Ellie did too.

“Shit, Joe,” Ellie said. “They’re only a bunch of debtors. Calm down.”

“Armed debtors.”

“But still debtors. So sort of by definition they’re too half-assedly disorganized to do anything right…”

Joe looked at her. “I don’t think…”

“Yeah, I know. Joke. I’m being silly. But still, they’re just debtors. That’s nothing scary.”

“Nasty debtors.”

“Not that nasty. Not nasty like her and me are used to.”

Joe didn’t seem convinced.

“We hunt insurgents in Pakistan and Afghanistan,” Ellie said. “In the old Tribal Territories. That’s nasty. This is just a bunch of sulky debtors in the middle of Měi-guó, and that isn’t nearly the same thing.”

“They might be worse than you think.”

“Maybe. But probably not.”

“They might be.”

Ellie shrugged. “Well, so are we.”

“There’s only two of you.”

“So?”

“You’ll be outnumbered.”

“Only if we deal with all of them at once. Which we won’t.”

Joe opened his mouth again.

“Stop it,” Ellie said, mildly. “We’re the best recon and hunt team a major corporation has. Her and me. We’re the best. So stop being difficult and arguing and just help us do this because I don’t want the bother of having to get a new driver right now.”

Joe hesitated. “Can I say one more thing?”

Ellie nodded.

“Why not have an assault team come in and do this properly?” Joe said.

“Because assault teams get the hostages killed half the time.”

“Not really half...”

Ellie shrugged. It was a point of pride for hunt and recon people, and she actually thought it was true as well. Crashing through gates and doors and throwing stun grenades everywhere made plenty of noise, but it also gave plenty of warning there was trouble coming. Especially to bad guys at the other end of a compound from where the assault team went in, who then had plenty of time to kill hostages and prepare ambushes. It was better to knock on doors politely and talk to people quietly and kill everyone you met. It was better to stay gentle and discreet and unobtrusive, like a hunt team would.

Like she and Sameh were going to do.

“No assault teams,” Ellie said. “We need to stay low-key. I don’t think the kid is actually in there, so we need to be a bit careful about what we do.”

“The kid isn’t in there?” Joe said.

“Nope.”

“So why are we…?”

“I think he was there, but he isn’t now. If he’s still alive, anyway. Because if I was some group of debtors living in shacks in the middle of nowhere and I took a Chinese tourist hostage, even if I didn’t know how valuable he was, I’d move him on quickly. I wouldn’t keep him in the nearest possible location to where he was taken, because that’s the first place everyone will go and look.”

“Yeah,” Joe said. “Okay. I suppose so.”

“I do too,” Ellie said. “So that means we need to go in and ask them where the kid is, but we need to do it quietly. Just in case there’s a camera pointed at this compound from out here somewhere, a kilometre away, a camera someone else has set up, one that we’ll never find, but which is enough for someone to notice when a swarm of drones and helicopters and tanks hit the place. And then start killing hostages and disappearing.”

“Oh.” Joe said. “Yeah.”

“Absolutely yeah. And also, we’re going because assault teams shoot the shit out of everything and get hostages killed. That too. This way is better.”

“All right,” Joe said. “Thank you. I understand. Can I come too?”

“Nope.”

“I’d like to. You might need…”

“Don’t start this again. Sameh and I work well together. We know what each other will do. It’s better if you aren’t helping. It’s safer or everyone if you aren’t.”

“If I’m not getting in the way?” Joe said, a little resentfully.

“Yep,” Ellie said, bluntly. “And also you don’t have tac armour. And I bet you haven’t been taking field meds either. Which we both have.”

“I don’t care…”

“I do,” Ellie said. “I’m not getting you killed because you weren’t properly prepared. And besides, they’re probably just the same as hajjis. If they see two women at the door they’ll think we’re not a threat, and they’ll keep thinking that even after we’re pointing guns at their faces, which gives us a second of them being surprised to put them down.”

Joe didn’t seem sure.

“We’re doing this,” Ellie said. “Thank you for your concern, but we are. So stop arguing.”

After a moment, Joe nodded, reluctantly. He seemed disappointed, but at least he’d stopped feeling guilty about what they did to old people here, Ellie thought, which was half of why she’d talked about this so long with him at all.

She stood up, and put her tablet away, and got ready to walk back through the trees to the SUV.