Choke Point

by Tom Clancy

  Torn once more, Pepper finally nodded and took off sprinting, adjusting his night-vision lens as he came over the mound where the collapse had occurred and followed the remaining section of the tunnel toward a ladder at the far end. He ascended and emerged into a hut filled with ammo crates, burst out the front door, and realized where he was. He looked toward the jungle where Hamid and Delgado had run and saw an APC blasting through the brush.

  He raised his rifle, took aim at one of the tires, fired. He wasn’t sure if he’d struck the tire or not. The vehicle cut hard to the right, behind a thicker section of palms, now well out of his reach.

  And they must’ve helped their injured colleague Valencia, because he, too, was gone.

  SIXTY-EIGHT

  Ross’s legs finally gave out before he could lower 30K to the ground. Instead, they both came down like boulders off a cliff. Boom. The shock waves of pain ripped through him.

  He hadn’t said anything to 30K, but shrapnel from that grenade had torn into his arms and legs, and there was even a small piece that had stung the back of his neck. He could still move all right, but the hot flashes of pain were increasing by the minute.

  As he gasped for air, Pepper’s report came over the radio, and he wanted to tear off his Cross-Com and smash it. But then he looked at 30K, rolling on to his back, coughing, blood leaking from his lips now. Saving this man was all that mattered now.

  And Pepper had been so right about this. What they did was sloppy work. The heroes didn’t always capture the bad guys.

  Then again, this was an island, and all Hamid had was an APC …

  Ross acknowledged Pepper, ordered him to go back for Kozak, then got on the horn to Mitchell. ‘I need the Stallion or the Seahawk to track and interdict that APC,’ he told the major.

  ‘Roger that,’ said Mitchell.

  Next, Ross called Captain Rugg. ‘Cannonball, corpsman up, my position, right now, over!’

  ‘You got it. On his way!’

  Ross slipped off his pack and wrenched out his first aid supplies, the gunfire still popping near the huts, the APCs on fire now. 30K had been shot in the arm, both legs, and there was blood at his waist and on his neck. He was a mess, but Ross fought against the tremors in his hands and decided that the wound on 30K’s side needed the most attention. He got out some big four-by-four bandages and some scissors, beginning to cut away the man’s shirt to expose his chest. 30K looked at him, licked his lips, and was about to say something when Ross shook his head and said, ‘Don’t talk, bro. Corpsman on the way.’

  30K nodded, blinked hard, then stared up at the canopy, and for a moment, Ross thought he’d lost him, but then he blinked again and coughed.

  Kozak must’ve dropped the remote during the cave-in, and he forced his head up and tried to peer through the darkness. His Cross-Com’s monocle had been shoved near his ear, and he couldn’t reach up to adjust it.

  He’d lied to Pepper. He didn’t want to be overly dramatic, but it felt like something very bad had crushed in his chest – ribs, spine, who knew? – and now it was painful to breathe and he could taste blood at the back of his throat.

  Well, wasn’t this ironic? Here he was, the team’s technophile, the proponent of all things electronic, the gadget master who often tried to convince his teammates that it wasn’t a competition between technology and instincts – it was the technology that enhanced your instincts –

  Or crushed you to death.

  Footfalls came hard and fast, and Kozak bit his lip and tensed. He tried reaching for a frag in his web gear, thinking maybe he could do himself in before they did. Nope. There wasn’t anything he could do if the enemy found him, save for closing his eyes and resigning to the inevitable.

  ‘Kozak? Buddy? I’m back,’ cried Pepper, allowing him to breathe once again. ‘Now where’s the remote? Come on, bro, it’s gotta be around here somewhere.’

  As Pepper leaned over to search near Kozak’s head, Kozak glanced past him and saw the two shadows flutter overhead. Those shadows materialized into men leaping into the hole.

  He opened his mouth, wanting to warn Pepper, but no words would come, just a half-strangled hiss and groan –

  But Pepper had heard them hit the ground, and in one fluid motion he drew the FN Five-seven pistol holstered at his waist and sighted the first of two FARC soldiers coming over the pile of dirt.

  Pepper, knowing that his first shot would give up his location and draw fire from one or both of the soldiers, changed his mind and threw himself behind the Warhound’s legs before he took that first shot – and that’s what saved his life.

  While one soldier took Pepper’s round in the head and lolled back, the second opened up, spraying rounds all over the hole until Pepper could steal a moment to pop up and drop him with a pair of rounds, one in the neck, the other to the shoulder, and that was good –

  Because two more men were rushing through the tunnel, having come from the opposite direction.

  He heard the grenade first as it bounced off the Warhound and struck the dirt a meter from his boots.

  Purely on reflex, Pepper jerked forward and kicked the grenade, sending it arcing away, then he dove back behind the Warhound once again as the frag exploded, showering them with dirt, the shrapnel chinking off the Warhound’s heavy armor.

  Now, with his hearing gone, replaced by an explosive hum, he rolled back toward the tunnel. He sighted the two soldiers, getting off two rounds before tugging free a frag of his own and letting it fly. He thought he’d shot one man before the frag exploded, consuming them both, and then, just as he raised his head, he spotted movement from the corner of his eye – more combatants jumping into the hole … three, four, five, maybe six in all.

  There were just too many of them.

  He tore free another grenade, shifted back toward Kozak, and thought, We go together, bro. Together …

  After leaving 30K in the hands of the Navy corpsman, who assured Ross he’d do everything he could to stabilize 30K, Ross took off running for the collapsed section of the tunnel. Were it not for the adrenaline coursing through him, he doubted he could have gone on.

  He’d spotted the squad of FARC troops leaping into the hole, rushing up behind Kozak and Pepper as they did so, and the moment they hit the ground, Ross lowered his HK into the pit and held down the trigger, dropping the unsuspecting bastards from behind, the last man rolling to face him, only to be hammered back into oblivion.

  ‘Pepper! Pepper!’ Ross cried.

  No reply.

  Ross winced and leaped on to the mound of dirt about two meters below, his wounded legs giving out as he made impact, sending him rolling down to the bottom. He rose to his hands and knees and saw Pepper trying to dig a furrow around Kozak, whose head appeared from beneath the Warhound.

  After Ross stumbled to his feet, Pepper craned his head, pointed to his pistol, then sighed and mouthed the words ‘Can’t hear you,’ as he gestured to his ear.

  In the dirt, just behind Pepper, and just barely visible, was the Warhound’s remote. Ross scooped it up and studied the display. If he could flex two of the UGV’s legs, he could raise its torso a quarter meter or so. After a deep breath, he fought to steady his hand and tap in the command. The Warhound creaked, servos whining, then rose – just as Kozak moaned and Pepper tugged him free.

  Kozak’s face was twisted in agony as Pepper assured him he’d be okay. Damning to hell medical protocol that dictated they immobilize the patient right there in the pit, they hauled him unsteadily to his feet, and he clutched his chest with one arm, the other draped over Pepper’s shoulder. They started down the tunnel, toward the ladder beneath the hut, and Ross dragged himself after them. The pain shooting up and down his legs came as electrified needles now, his arms growing heavier.

  He helped Pepper get Kozak up the ladder, and then as he climbed and neared the top, the night sky faded for a moment. His heart raced. Sweat poured from his temples. He clutched the ladder even tighter and fought against it. No, he would
not pass out. No.

  He took a long, deep breath, as Mitchell’s voice buzzed in his earpiece: ‘Delta Dragon, this is Guardian. The Seahawk has disabled the APC. I don’t see Valencia but assume he’s still inside. Hamid and Delgado look injured. They’re still trying to escape on foot. I’m tracking them now with your drone, over.’

  ‘Roger that, Guardian. They won’t get away.’

  SIXTY-NINE

  Hamid and Delgado were heading toward the fishing boat rental place on the north coast, and Ross called for the Seahawk to land on the beach. He and Pepper headed out to board the chopper.

  Meanwhile, Rugg called to say that his Marines had captured eleven men who’d surrendered and that the others were either wounded or dead. Sadly, he also mentioned that five of his Marines had been killed, while another fourteen had been wounded.

  ‘You sure you’re okay?’ Pepper shouted above the rotor wash as they climbed into the Seahawk.

  Ross gave him a vigorous nod and thumbs-up, and once they were off the ground and had donned their headsets, he issued his instructions to the pilot.

  Meanwhile, the wounded were being evacuated on to the Sea Stallion, and Rugg called to say he was making sure that Ross’s people were taken good care of for the trip back.

  ‘Guess it’s up to us old guys to finish this off, huh?’ asked Pepper.

  ‘Age and treachery,’ said Ross.

  Pepper smiled, thought a moment, then said, ‘Going back for 30K … that was something.’

  ‘You didn’t think I had it in me.’

  ‘I won’t lie.’

  ‘It’s okay. So now you know.’

  ‘Yeah. I sure as hell do.’

  Hamid was limping, and Delgado was clutching his left elbow with his rifle slung over his shoulder as they came out of the mangroves on the east side of the beach and stepped on to the rickety wooden pier leading out to the score of fishing boats.

  Their escape involved more than just stealing an old boat. Mitchell reported that a helicopter had landed on a tiny sand island less than a kilometer off Rupat’s northern coast, and surely Hamid and Delgado would fire up one of the outboards and race out to meet it.

  But before they reached the end of the pier, they froze and squinted in horror through the darkness –

  As the air shimmered and fluctuated to expose Ross and Pepper, rifles trained on them, eyes burning.

  ‘Don’t move, Hamid,’ Ross ordered in Arabic.

  ‘And you, too, Señor Delgado,’ Pepper said in Spanish.

  Hamid took a step forward and leaned toward Ross, straining to get a better look at him. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘That doesn’t matter. Why we’re here is more important.’

  Hamid contemplated that, his face stoic. He glanced back to Delgado. ‘Do you know who they are?’

  ‘Yes, he does,’ said Ross. ‘Don’t you remember us, little man? Back in that coke lab in Colombia? We saved your ass, and you told us you were a taxi driver.’

  Delgado’s gaze drifted past them, as though he were already searching for an escape route. ‘I don’t know you.’

  ‘All right, listen to me,’ Ross began. ‘Put your rifles on the dock. You do it right now; otherwise I’ll make the pain a lot worse.’

  Hamid kept his rifle trained on Ross.

  Standoff.

  ‘Well, I thought it was gonna be a gunfight,’ said Pepper, who slowly set his rifle on the pier. ‘I surrender.’

  ‘Sergeant, I wasn’t talking to you,’ Ross said in disbelief.

  Pepper raised his palms, looked at Ross, winked. ‘It’s okay.’

  And before Ross could react, Pepper charged toward Hamid, the man opening fire until Pepper reached him and tore the rifle out of his hands, bringing it around to clock him in the head with the AK’s heavy wooden stock –

  While at the same time, Delgado brought his rifle around and was about to fire, but Ross shot him in the hip, knocking him back into the water.

  ‘I got him,’ cried Pepper as Hamid crumpled on to the dock and Pepper reached into his web gear for a pair of zipper cuffs.

  Ross ripped off his pack, set down his rifle and jumped in the water after Delgado, whose head had barely broken the surface. Ross reached him, grabbed the back of his collar, and began a modified combat sidestroke back to the sandy shoreline, and once he could stand, he continued to drag Delgado all the way to the beach.

  The man was barely conscious, leg bleeding badly, as Ross got on the radio and called back the Seahawk for an immediate evac. Seeing that the little man wasn’t going anywhere, he crossed on to the dock and dragged himself over to Pepper, who was resting his back against Hamid and just breathing.

  ‘Chopper on the way?’ Pepper asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Good.’ Pepper grimaced and suddenly stiffened in pain. ‘He shot me up pretty good. Plates caught a few, but I got one in the shoulder, maybe the leg, too. Yeah, I can feel it …’

  ‘Dude, what were you thinking?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just got no patience for that shit.’

  Ross was so dumbfounded he had to laugh. ‘Next time you give me some warning.’

  Pepper was about to reply, but the Seahawk had swooped down toward the beach and landed.

  Ross leaned over and cried in his ear, ‘We got him, old man. We got him!’

  Pepper nodded and forced a smile as the crew chief, along with Rugg and two of his Marines, came jogging up the pier.

  SEVENTY

  A squad of Marines retrieved Valencia’s body from the disabled APC. He’d slowly bled out. He was a doctor unable to save himself, and this was justice served to a man who’d turned his back on his oath to save others.

  30K, the most seriously injured of the Ghosts, was stabilized back on board the LCS, as were Pepper and Kozak, the latter of whom had suffered some broken ribs and a punctured lung.

  During stabilization and triage, Wagner ordered the Sea Stallion to be reconfigured for medevac. The CH-53 was capable of carrying twenty-four stretchers, eight more than the number of wounded requiring critical trauma care. Singapore’s two trauma care centers, Gleneagles Hospital in Tanglin and nearby Mt Elizabeth Hospital in Orchard would split the casualties to reduce overload at either center.

  Ross stayed with his men, having been told that he’d need to have the shrapnel removed from his arms and legs. All Kozak could think about was whether or not the Warhound had been retrieved, and Ross assured him that yes, the big boy was back on the hangar deck, looking about as battle worn as they were.

  Pepper was resting easy, the morphine drip keeping him in a good place for now, and 30K was completely out, eyes slammed shut, face ashen.

  With a deep lump in his throat, Ross reached out and took 30K’s hand in his own. ‘You can be a real asshole, you know that? Yeah, I guess you do.’

  During the next few weeks, while he and the team recovered, Ross kept tabs on Hamid and Delgado, learning what he could through Mitchell and Diaz. For his part, Hamid would not talk no matter how many times he was interrogated and didn’t seem to care if he spent the rest of his life in prison.

  Delgado, on the other hand, knew the game all too well and was already working out his deal before federal prosecutors ever came to him with one.

  Because Hamid’s partner Amir Bahar had been seen on the island but not captured during the raid, those prosecutors wanted to locate him. They also wanted everything Delgado knew regarding Hamid’s operations with Bahar, and they wanted the truth about what Delgado had done after he’d been kidnapped. The little man spun quite a tale:

  Once he learned his cover was blown and ten years of work in Colombia as the Agency’s most valuable asset was shot to hell, he got desperate. He knew the Agency would punish him for his failure, assign him to a desk for the rest of his tenure, so he did something radical. He hacked into his personnel file and altered the photographs as part of a plan to go underground with some money he’d socked away. Unfortunately, the FARC caught up with him befo
re he could vanish, and it was Mitchell’s friend, Adamo, who’d learned of the kidnapping through his own contacts and called it in to the Agency.

  The FARC troops who captured Delgado and the cabdriver decided on their own that they’d make a switch in order to get paid twice: Hand over a cabdriver for some ransom money, then hand over the real guy, which was why they had dragged the cabbie out to the submarine.

  Ross’s team got caught up in that mess, Delgado escaped, and then, instead of going underground, he decided he’d go for broke. He struck a deal with Valencia and Hamid, who went for it because Delgado’s European drug contacts were valuable to them and Delgado threatened to expose the group if they didn’t take him under his wing. To ensure against any retaliation, Delgado proved that he had a partner who would blow the whistle on Hamid if he wound up getting killed. His partner was Tamer, whose family Delgado promised to take care of so long as the man remained loyal to him. Despite killing himself, Tamer knew that Delgado would keep his promise. Delgado was going to further open up the European drug markets for Hamid and Bahar, as well as tip them off to any known American intelligence assets. For this, he would be paid handsomely.

  Ross had never known a more opportunistic, conniving, treacherous son of a bitch, and to top it all off, Delgado said the Agency had driven him to this. They’d put too much pressure on him and made him risk his life for an insulting paycheck.

  He would spend the rest of his life in prison, but his deal kept the death penalty for treason and espionage off the table.

  Every military base had its local sports bar, and every sports bar had its regulars, which in the Liberator’s case included men whose work was never discussed. These were the Special Forces operators like Ross whose motto, ‘Liberate the oppressed,’ had given the bar its name. Their conversations ran the usual gamut from sports to beer to family and girlfriends.

  It’d been nearly eight weeks since Ross and the others had all been together, so this night out was a reunion of sorts. He sat at a long booth, realizing what a dork he was for showing up so early. Pepper finally arrived, giving him a hearty handshake and warm pat on the back.