Task Force

by Brian Falkner

Price wasn’t really angry with Monster for backing them up. Chisnall could sense that. She was just making noise to cover for the fact that Chisnall should have jumped in and hadn’t.

  Price started to say more but stopped as Wilton appeared at the rear door, dripping with water.

  “Did you find the equipment pods?” Chisnall asked, grateful for the interruption.

  “Yes, both,” Wilton said. “Both Oscar Kilo. They’re on the stern deck.” He looked around. “Everything all right?”

  “Just Sergeant Price and Monster having a lover’s tiff,” Barnard said.

  “Get puked,” Price said.

  Varmint stuck his head back through the door. “See ya, kiddies. Try not to hurt yourselves playing with the big boys’ toys.”

  “Get going,” Chisnall said. “The task force will be at the river mouth in less than an hour.”

  “Only if you do your job,” Varmint said.

  “I think we’ll cope,” Chisnall said. “Get out of here.”

  “Have fun, boys,” Price said. “Try not to blow your nuts off. Oh, too late.”

  A single-finger salute came back through the doorway as Varmint disappeared.

  “Exactly how will we ‘cope’?” Barnard asked.

  “We’ve missed the shift change,” the Tsar said. “The next one is not for four hours.”

  “How will we even get to the island?” Wilton asked. “Most of the barracudas are out of action or missing. Those that are still working are damaged. They’d hear us coming a mile away.”

  Chisnall was silent. He had no answer. They called him Lieutenant Lucky, but good luck had been in short supply so far on this mission.

  He walked to the rear of the room and out onto the stern deck. The lights of the island were so close, but so far out of their reach. The wind gusted again, rocking the ship, still powerless and at the mercy of the waves.

  The Demons were unhooking the Zodiac from the winch cables, and as he watched, the motor started, the bow lifted, and the Demons ducked beneath a spray of water as the boat powered away.

  “Even if we get to the island, the Pukes won’t be expecting another shift change.” Price’s voice sounded softly right behind him. “We’d have to fight our way in. There’s no way.”

  Chisnall didn’t look around but kept his eyes on the island.

  “There’ll be a way,” he said, wishing he felt more confident that that was true.

  “I don’t see how—” Price said.

  Chisnall cut her off, aware that his voice was rising but unable to help himself. “Neither do I, Sergeant Price, but I do see that if we can’t make this happen, then the mission is cactus. The Bzadians are sitting in the White House by Valentine’s Day, and by the end of the year the human race is gone the way of the dinosaurs. So no, I don’t see how either, but we’re going to do it anyway.”

  He turned and saw she was not alone. The rest of the team had emerged from the cabin and was standing alongside Price. There was an uncomfortable silence, and he realized it was the first time he had raised his voice to his team like that. The silence grew, and he wanted to fill it, to apologize, but a leader could not do that. It would seem weak.

  “I have an idea,” Barnard said.

  “Let’s hear it,” Chisnall said.

  “Let’s go and knock on the front door,” Barnard said, smiling. “They won’t be expecting that.”

  Chisnall found himself staring at the German girl. So were the others. There was something different about her. It took him a moment to realize that it was the first time he had seen her smile. She had done it deliberately, he felt, a calculated move to defuse the tension.

  “How are we even going to get to the front door?” Wilton asked.

  “You’re standing on it,” Barnard said. “We take the ship. Tell them we’re in trouble and need to put into their wharf for repairs.”

  “Might work.” Chisnall looked at Monster. “Can you get her started?”

  Monster nodded. “Think so.”

  “Show me,” Chisnall said. “Price, you come too. You other guys find some rags and tape and gag the Pukes. The last thing we need is for them to start yelling and screaming when we get to the island.”

  He followed Monster to the bridge, broken glass crunching under their feet. Monster pressed a few buttons and the engine roared before settling into a quiet rumble.

  “You seem to know what you’re doing,” Chisnall said.

  Monster grinned.

  “He should. His father was a ship’s captain,” Price said.

  “In Hungary? I thought it was landlocked,” Chisnall said, wondering how Price knew that and he didn’t.

  “There is a little river called Danube,” Monster said. “Perhaps you have heard of it.”

  “Okay, smart-ass,” Chisnall said. “Just drive the boat.”

  Monster grinned. He pointed to the controls. “Engines and steering fine. Deck gun seem to be working, although we won’t know for sure unless we fire. Radar, she is broken, but radio is working.”

  Right on cue, the radio crackled back to life.

  “QW-67, this is Coastal Defense Command. What is your status?”

  Chisnall ignored it and lowered the volume. He turned his comm off and stared at the other two.

  Price went off comm also. “Feel the need to talk, LT?” she asked.

  Monster switched his comm off as well.

  “You hear what Varmint said?” Chisnall asked.

  “About the barracudas?” Monster asked. “You think could be true? We have traitor?”

  “You guys and Wilton, I trust,” Chisnall said. “Barnard and the Tsar …”

  “Barnard scares the doo-doo out of me,” Monster said.

  Chisnall almost laughed at the idea of anything scaring the doo-doo out of Monster but stopped himself. He knew exactly what Monster meant.

  “She’s not the one you should be afraid of,” Price said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t like her either,” Price said. “But when the brown stuff hits the fan, I’d trust her to watch my back.”

  “But not the Tsar?” Chisnall asked.

  “The Hero of Hokkaido?” Price snorted. “Not so much.”

  “Any reason?” Chisnall asked.

  “Not really. He’s loud and obnoxious, and I bet he never met a mirror he didn’t like, but I’m just not sure that what we’re seeing is what we’re getting.”

  “That’s no basis to call him a traitor,” Chisnall said. “And he has as much reason as any of us to hate the Pukes.”

  “Are you sure about that?” Price said.

  “His family are Bzadian slaves,” Chisnall said.

  “Or maybe they’re bargaining chips,” Price said.

  “Bargaining chips?” Chisnall asked.

  “If the Pukes have somehow identified the Tsar as a member of Angel Team, they could be holding his family hostage.”

  “Angel Team is top secret,” Monster said. “Pukes don’t know who we are or who our families are.”

  “Who knows how much they really know,” Price said. “Who knows if there are other moles like Brogan.”

  It took a great effort for Chisnall not to wince at the mention of her name.

  “Maybe Demon sonar really was just faulty,” Monster said.

  “Yeah, and maybe that ship just happened to be in the bay tonight,” Price said. “Or maybe someone doesn’t want the mission to succeed.”

  “Okay, so the Tsar is a suspect,” Chisnall said. “But I’m not sure Barnard is quite who she says she is either. There’s not enough evidence to convict either of them, so from now on keep a close eye on them both.”

  He stopped for a moment, thinking, then said, “Send Barnard up. I want to hear more about this idea of hers.”

  “Coastal Defense Command, this is QW-67,” Chisnall said in Bzadian, and released the mike switch.

  The island was a large mass ahead of them. Monster was driving the ship and seemed to be doing a goo
d job.

  The radio was answered after a few seconds.

  “QW-67, what is your status?” It was the same female voice as before.

  “An accident with the thunderclap launcher,” Chisnall said. “One of the charges jammed on the cradle and exploded on the deck.”

  “We heard that from here. Thought the whole ship had exploded. Casualties?”

  “A few burst eardrums and concussions, nothing more. It knocked out a bit of equipment, though. It’s taken us this long to get systems back up and running.” Chisnall paused, then said, “We have only just got the radio working.”

  “QW-67, who is speaking?”

  “First Officer Gkuzhin,” Chisnall replied. He had taken the name from the ID of one of the Bzadian crew.

  “Where is Captain u’Zout?”

  “He was injured in the blast,” Chisnall replied. “He is being attended to by the medical officer.”

  There was a brief silence on the radio, then: “Please proceed immediately to the port at Brisbane.”

  “Negative. We are heading for St. Helena Island. It’s pitch-black out here. We have no working lights or navigation systems, and they have the nearest wharf. We will assess damage there and proceed to the port at first light.”

  “Affirmative, QW-67. We will advise the SONRAD station that you’re coming.”

  “Knock-knock,” Chisnall murmured without keying the radio. That earned a brief smile from Barnard.

  “What is the status of the soldiers you picked up from the water?” Coastal Command asked.

  “They are down in the main cabin,” Chisnall said, guessing where this was going. “They are secured.”

  “We have checked with all operational units in the area, and none are conducting a training exercise tonight.”

  Chisnall held his breath, trying to work out what to say next.

  Barnard said, “Ask her what she thinks.”

  Chisnall nodded. That was a smart move. “What is your assessment of the situation, Coastal Command?” he asked.

  “We are still working on that,” came the reply.

  “Now plant the idea that they could be Fezerker,” Barnard said.

  Chisnall looked at her. Evaluating her. They had told him she was smart. They just hadn’t told him how smart. That in itself was a worry. She was certainly smart enough to fool him. As Brogan had been.

  To Coastal Command, he said, “One of my crew thinks they may be Fezerker.” The Fezerker units, almost a Bzadian equivalent of Recon Team Angel, were so ultrasecret that their existence had not been confirmed until Uluru. That had worked to the Angels’ advantage then, and it might again now. The Fezerkers’ operations were so clandestine that not even the Coastal Defense Command would know their movements.

  He got the reaction he wanted from Coastal Command.

  “Fezerker.” The voice sounded hushed, as if she did not want to be heard.

  “Can you find out anything?” Chisnall asked.

  “I will try,” she said. “The SONRAD station picked up your Zodiac a while ago, heading into port.”

  “Spare parts,” Barnard murmured.

  “They have gone to find some spare parts for our repairs,” Chisnall said.

  “Understood,” the voice said.

  Chisnall hung the microphone back on the hook by the steering controls. “You think they fell for it?” he asked.

  “We’ll know when we get to the island,” Barnard said.

  “How’s she handling, Monster?” Chisnall asked.

  “The ship, she is doing fine,” Monster said.

  “Do you think you’ll be able to dock her cleanly at the wharf?” Chisnall asked. “It will make the Pukes a bit suspicious if we ram the boat into the wharf when we try to dock.”

  “Monster will do his best,” he said.

  Chisnall nodded. No matter what the situation, Monster’s best would always be good enough.

  He turned his attention to the large video screens that were mounted on the ceiling, showing the view from outside in every direction. He focused on the weapons station. The ship’s only gun was an M242 Bushmaster, a twenty-five-millimeter chain-fed autocannon mounted on the front deck.

  He sat down and examined the unit. A series of cables ran into the top of a metal console. In the center was a screen that showed a view from the gun barrel. A thin cross indicated the aiming point. Buttons and lights to the left of the screen indicated the status of the Rafael Typhoon gun mount, while similar buttons to the right of the screen showed the status of the weapon itself. The firing controls appeared to be triggers on twin joysticks below the screen.

  After a short time playing around with the controls, he was able to preselect targets and lock them in. The automatic fire control would register the visual signature of each target and automatically acquire them again at the press of a button.

  The gun was on the bow of the vessel, in front of the superstructure, and was very close to the depth-charge launcher where the blast had happened. Chisnall was surprised that it had come through unscathed but was happy that it seemed to be working. Just in case.

  “Where on the island is the wharf?” he asked.

  “To west, at the end of spit,” Monster said, glancing at a chart laid out in the center of the bridge.

  “Head to the east side. We’ll circle around the island counterclockwise,” Chisnall said.

  “What you are thinking?” Monster asked.

  “I’m going to be prepared,” Chisnall said. “I’m going to send in the Phantom.”

  Monster grinned. “God help the Bzadians.”

  6. KRIZ

  [2325 hours Local time]

  [Bzadian Coastal Defense Command, Brisbane, New Bzadia]

  MAJOR ZARA KRIZ WAS NERVOUS, ALTHOUGH THERE was no clear reason to be. She stroked the soft new skin of her forearm and stared at the notes she had written on the electronic log in front of her.

  She was the ranking duty officer, responsible for a staff of four junior officers, all of whom had been on the job much longer than she had.

  She had been there for two months, assigned to the command center while she was recovering in the hospital, but most of that time she had been learning, training. Only in the last week had she been entrusted with the duty officer role.

  She stroked her forearm again. She did that when she was nervous, running her fingers across the scar where the newly grown baby skin of her forearm met the older, coarser skin of her upper arm.

  The patrol ship, QW-67, had been investigating a strange pinging reported by the SONRAD station on St. Helena Island. The commander of the ship had taken it upon himself to depth-charge the contact, but a depth charge had malfunctioned, damaging equipment and injuring the ship’s crew. Worse, the contact appeared to be a military unit—Bzadian, not human—probably on some kind of exercise. That made it a “friendly fire” incident, which meant a full investigation.

  Was that the reason for her nervousness? Or was it the possibility that there was more to this than met the eye?

  She had been at Uluru when the audacious scumbugz attack had taken place, right in the heart of New Bzadia.

  A firestorm of missiles had pounded the biggest Bzadian military base on the planet. She had been in a rotorcraft with the rest of her squad. They had just taken off when they were hit.

  She was the only survivor.

  Doctors had rebuilt her shattered body and regrown her burned skin, but after that day nothing on this planet—or any other—could persuade her to get back onto a rotorcraft. They had to sedate her to transport her between hospitals.

  A soldier who’s afraid to fly was of no use to the military, so she was now stuck behind a desk.

  But she remembered Uluru. If humans had once been prepared to launch an attack inside New Bzadia, they might be prepared to do so again.

  Of course, there was no evidence of that. Was there? Merely a training exercise gone wrong and a malfunctioning bomb.

  So why was her hand endlessly rubbing
the new skin?

  Better to err on the side of caution, she decided.

  She tapped her video screen to bring it to life and punched in a code.

  A face appeared on the screen almost immediately. A young man in the uniform of a plant operator.

  “SONRAD communications,” he said. “I am Hez.”

  7. THE LONGEST NIGHT

  [2335 hours local time]

  [St. Helena Island, Moreton Bay, New Bzadia]

  PRICE SLITHERED FORWARD IN THE LIGHTLY BREAKING waves on the east side of the island, her eyeline just above water. She bobbed her head up and down with the waves, ducking down in the troughs to minimize her profile in case there were any watchers.

  As far as she could tell, there were none.

  She eased herself out of the water, almost invisible in her black wet suit, and snaked across the beach. The dark, muddy sand quickly healed itself, erasing the marks of her passage. Above her, on the highest points of the island, one to the north and one to the south, luminous geodesic spheres, like massive soccer balls, hid the spinning radar antennas.

  She liked the taste of the salt water on her lips, the feel of the mud between her fingers. Here, she was in her element. On her own, operating in shards of darkness where no one would think to look. Dependent on no one. Responsible for no one. From her youngest days this had been her best defense and her most powerful weapon. If you didn’t get noticed, you didn’t get hurt.

  To the north, the lights of the ship were heading toward the point. She checked the time. Less than fifteen minutes.

  Price crawled forward and pulled up the waterproof equipment bag she had attached by a cord to her ankle. It contained a Bzadian security guard’s uniform, night-vision goggles, a pistol, and a can of Puke spray.

  The beach gave way to a sticky mangrove swamp that provided good cover, although the mud sucked at her arms and legs as she crawled through it in the blackness. Clouds of insects rose around her. The thought of snakes crossed her mind, but she pushed the image away. She wouldn’t see one until she crawled on top of it, even with the aid of the NV goggles.

  Thirteen minutes.

  Chisnall checked the time on his wrist computer. It was going to be tight. They were taking the long way around to give Price as much time as possible, but she still had to slip onto the island, get inside the complex, and take out the power before the ship got to the wharf. If anyone could do it, it was the Phantom, but there was so little time.