First Team

by Larry Bond

  “Will you take off my hood?” he asked.

  “Sorry,” Ferguson said. “I’m not going to do that. Give him a drink of water,” he told Conners.

  “No,” said Daruyev. “Shoot me.”

  Ferguson and Conners exchanged a glance.

  “Why?” asked Ferguson.

  “I’d rather die now than wait,” said the Chechen.

  “You’re not going to get killed,” said Ferg. “I told you I was taking you back.”

  “If the others find me, they’ll kill me.”

  “Don’t be such a pessimist.”

  “Mr. Ferguson, please.”

  “I’ll come back for you, Daruyev. I told you I would.”

  “Should’ve killed him, Ferg,” Conners said, as they crouched on the other side of the fence ten minutes later. “You coulda used the knife.”

  Ferguson changed the subject.

  “If we get over the fence there, we can walk south along the strip that borders the runway. From there, we can see the other side of the slope, find out if there’s a cave or something, then we can cross to the buildings.”

  “The post at the gate has a clear view of the runway. And God only knows what’s in front of the mountain.”

  “Yeah. What I think we have to do is cross here, that way we can see south around where the truck ought to be. Maybe I move down closer that way, get into the shadows, see if I have to climb over.”

  The top of the fence had three strands of barbed wire, but he could clip it down and get over fairly easily.

  “You get too close to that cave or whatever is over there, there’ll be guards,” said Conners.

  They discussed it for a while longer, Conners in general preaching a more conservative line, Ferguson plotting a considerably bolder course. At the end, Ferg told him he’d go in, cross the runway, and check the buildings. Conners would hang back, covering him at first, and then see what he could find out about the cave. They didn’t have their com devices, but they could communicate using the sat phones, which were set to vibrate rather than ring.

  “Can you climb over the fence with that grenade launcher on your back?” Ferguson asked.

  “If I have to.”

  “If it’s too heavy, leave it. Once you’re in, move down the ditch,” said Ferguson. “They’re not going to be watching the middle of the base. When you find the entrance, let me know. Your meter working?”

  “It claims it is,” said Conners, who had checked it at the perimeter.

  “Take the Prussian blue,” he told Conners, referring to the antiradiation sickness pills they carried. Though not a panacea, the drug helped ward off some effects of radiation sickness. “We get in there, we just get a general idea of what’s going on. We don’t have to collect autographs.”

  “I ain’t arguing with you. What should I do with Daruyev if you get nailed?” asked Conners.

  “I ain’t fucking getting nailed,” said Ferguson, starting away.

  Conners thought to himself that he was getting old and tired, confusing caution with wisdom. His body ached, and his eyes were stinging from the lack of sleep. Worse, he could feel the thirst for a beer in his mouth.

  He stood up, pushing away the fatigue as Ferg went over the fence.

  Ferguson slid down to the ground next to the fence, trying to make his body as compact as possible. Empty, rock-strewn fields dotted by nubs of thick grass lay on either side of the runway. It was several hundred yards across to the buildings. To his right, the mountainside jutted out and cut off whatever was there.

  He took out the rad meter, got nothing. The device had an audible alarm; he set it, put the earphone in his ear, then put it back in his pocket. He worked his legs beneath him into a crouch, then sprang across the dirt perimeter roadway, making it in two bounds. Slowly, he began to crawl toward the runway.

  After nearly ten minutes, much of it spent on his belly or all fours, he reached a set of runway lights near the edge of the concrete. There were lights in the metal jacket, though one of them had been broken. Ferguson huddled near the structure, listening—he could hear voices riding over the base from the buildings, but couldn’t see anyone. Nor did he have a sufficient angle on the cave entrance yet.

  Ferguson hunched down and ran to the nearby ditch. He crawled along it about ten yards, looking for a good spot to cross the runway, but of course he would be exposed no matter where he went. Finally, he just thought screw it all, hopped up out of the ditch, and ran for the other side.

  It took forever to get there, days out in the bright sun, exposed to the world. Finally, he landed in the other ditch, his heart thumping so loudly he wouldn’t have been surprised if the people in the buildings heard it beating.

  After catching his breath, he started crawling again, this time angling to his left. A light was on at the side of the building; its circle ended about twenty yards from the fence at a pile of rocks. He thought if he could get into the rocks, he’d be able to get around them, then work his way behind the building, maybe even right up to it.

  But to do that, he had to cross the edge of the field, exposed not only to the front of the buildings but the guard post at the gate. He was more worried about the guard post than the buildings, even though he was probably five times as far from it; there were definitely people there. Of course, their job was to look outside the base, not inside, but Ferguson wasn’t in a position to hand out demerits if they spotted him.

  He continued to crawl, the earth cold against his chest. Twice he stopped to make sure the earbud was still in place, surprised that he’d found no radiation yet.

  About ten yards from the flank of the building, he heard voices again. He froze, waiting for them to grow louder. When they didn’t, he began inching forward again, finally getting to what he had thought were rocks but turned out to be a collection of cut-up tires. Ferguson pulled himself behind them, caught his breath.

  There was another light at the back of the buildings; he’d have to walk through it to see inside.

  Ferguson brushed some of the dirt from his shirt and pants, then started out again.

  21

  OVER EASTERN TURKEY

  Van Buren decided that rather than waiting on the runway, they would launch the planes and fly to a point just across the border, waiting for word. The increase in risk and logistics problems—tanker time had to be coordinated like a complicated minuet—was well worth the decrease in the time to strike. As far as possible, the flight patterns were arranged to make it appear to anyone watching—which would include the Russians—that the mission was headed toward Iraq.

  Van Buren tried to fight off the adrenaline that built as his Herky Bird left the tarmac. Getting too keyed up, too hot for action, would blur his judgment. He had to be just south of the power line—just on the calm edge of the hurricane.

  “Ms. Alston for you, sir,” his communications specialist told him.

  Van Buren nodded, and his headset clicked on. She was aboard the MH-17, which was airborne to the west.

  “We’re still waiting for word from the ground,” she said.

  “Yes we are,” he said.

  “I’ve been speaking to Corrigan. The NSA has netted two intercepts with the Russians mentioning the base. At the moment they’re decrypting more material. They seem to think it’s something worth checking into as well. Still not proof,” she added.

  “That’s why we have the Team there,” said Van Buren.

  “Very good, Colonel. Break a leg.”

  “Break a leg?”

  “It’s a theater expression. It means good luck, which is supposed to be bad luck to say.”

  “Break a leg,” said Van Buren.

  22

  SOUTHERN CHECHNYA

  Ferguson leaned against the window, staring inside the large hangarlike building, trying to interpret the different shadows inside. He could see several trucks and a number of crates in the area to the left. Beyond that was a wall that seemed as if it blocked off another section of the bui
lding, maybe for use as offices or barracks.

  The only way to know what was going on inside was to climb in. The window was the casement kind; it worked by a crank. Ferguson put his knife in and pushed. As the blade threatened to bend, he backed off the pressure. The window squirted open about a quarter inch, just enough for him to put his fingers on the edge and pull.

  With the window open, Ferguson got a light click in his earbud: gamma radiation, though at a level barely above background.

  The window was so narrow he couldn’t fit through with his ruck and rifle, so he placed them against the wall where he could reach back for them and began squeezing through. He had one foot on the floor and was twisting his back to bring the other through the window when the lights went on.

  Conners had remained in the shadows by the fence as Ferguson worked his way across the field toward the buildings. He didn’t move until Ferguson was on the other side of the runway. Then he ran directly to the trench, his chest heaving as he slid feetfirst into the depression. One of the legs of the grenade launcher’s tripod poked him as he got down, but having come that far with the weapon, he wasn’t about to give it up.

  There was definitely activity at the cave or whatever it was at the mountain flank; he could hear machinery and people moving and see a whitish glow that had to be coming from floodlights. But the entrance was angled away; to see it he would have to go almost to the end of the runway.

  And so he began to crawl on his hands and knees.

  Ferguson let his body fall through the window to the floor, as if he were a sack of rice. He thumped loudly—but not quite as loudly as the cough of the truck motor turning over and catching about fifty feet away. He lay on his back for a moment, then turned over. Truck wheels moved on his right; another engine started up, the place smelled like exhaust. Ferguson drew himself to his knees and got up, moving quickly to his right to get behind more vehicles. There were voices, loud—he put his hand over the tailgate of a pickup and rolled over, sliding into the bed as a truck a few yards away started up. He heard the beeping of a backup signal echoing in the empty building.

  Then he realized it wasn’t a backup warning at all—it was his rad meter.

  The door to the pickup opened, and the truck shook as someone got in. Ferguson reached his hand down for his pistol: He could take out the driver, whoever was nearby, call Conners, get the assault started before they wasted him.

  Someone shouted something. Ferguson drew his gun up, ready.

  The door of the pickup slammed shut. There were footsteps nearby.

  Another truck started up. Ferguson leaned against the side of the pickup, waiting.

  More trucks, more exhaust. He felt himself starting to gag on the fumes.

  Then the terrorists were gone.

  Conners had gotten about fifty yards from the spot where he’d gone into the ditch when he heard the first truck back near the building. He stopped, staring in its direction.

  Where the hell was Ferguson, he wondered. He brought his gun up and began moving back in the direction he had come. Another truck appeared from the building, then another and another. They stopped in front of the second building; men came out from it and got into the vehicles. Then, with their headlights still off, they drove onto the dirt road that ran around the fence, heading toward the cave area.

  Knowing Ferguson, Conners thought, he’s in one of the damn trucks.

  He had just started to move along the ditch again when the sat phone began vibrating.

  “Yeah?” he whispered into it.

  “Pay dirt,” said Ferguson. His voice was only slightly lower than normal. “Gamma-wave generators around, trace stuff—they stored stuff here. The real shit must be over in the mountain.”

  “Where are you Ferg?”

  “Inside the north building. I’m calling Van in. You at the cave yet?”

  “No.”

  “Wait for me then. Once we have the layout psyched, we have to take out a van for them.”

  “You OK, Ferg?”

  “Never felt better. Well, except after sex.”

  23

  ABOARD SF COMMAND TRANSPORT 3, OVER TURKEY

  Corrine pushed the headset closer to her ear, having trouble hearing despite the fact that the volume was adjusted as loud as it would go.

  “Please repeat,” she told Van Buren.

  “We have material at the base,” he repeated. “Cesium in one of the buildings. Looks like medical waste. They’re checking out the possible work site now.”

  “How much material?”

  “We’re not sure yet.”

  “They weren’t transporting medical waste,” she said.

  “I understand that. They’re still doing the recce. There’s a possible cave at one end of the base where most of the waste may be.”

  Corrine pushed forward, leaning over the console in the jet. She had been looking for it all to tie into a neat bow, but that wasn’t going to happen.

  She had to make the call. Just her. And it wouldn’t be neat, no matter what she did.

  Suddenly, she realized why the president had sent her to Russia when she could have run the mission back home. Maybe the thing about proving herself was real, but more importantly, he wanted her to make the call on the mission—and not be pressured by the people around her at the CIA or Pentagon. If she were in the White House situation room, or the Tank, or anywhere, generals would be barking at her, cabinet members looking on, their underlings all taking notes.

  Here, it was pretty much her, with no one of enough rank to awe her.

  “Proceed with the mission, under my authorization.” She glanced at her watch to take note of the time for her log.

  24

  SOUTHERN CHECHNYA

  Once he’d climbed through the window back outside the building, Ferguson decided that since he’d be exposed to any patrol on the perimeter as well the guard post at the gate, his best bet was to walk with his rifle slung over his shoulder, as if he were one of the terrorists.

  Whether doing so fooled anyone or not, he made it to the field near the runway without being stopped or, as far as he could tell, seen. He slid down the shallow embankment, then began working south in Conners’s direction, which he had from the GPS reading on the phone. The glow from the mountain bunker had grown; he guessed the trucks had gone there, though he couldn’t see them or the opening itself.

  Working his way south, he came to a deeper part of the ditch, then found himself walking in half a foot of water. He tried to step to the side but slipped down deeper, falling into a foot of muddy, stagnant water. He crawled up out of the sludge like a primeval salamander. Clambering onto the runway, he decided that was as good a place as any to cross. He rose, and with his first step heard the sound of a pickup truck leaving the building behind him.

  With his second step, he saw the truck’s headlights come on and arc across the field in his direction.

  As Conners caught sight of Ferguson climbing from the ditch about twenty yards north of him, he saw the door to the north building open again and a truck emerge. But this time, the vehicle threw its lights on. Soldiers ran near the gate. Conners realized the man they’d lost earlier had finally reached the base and sounded the alarm.

  The lights swung across the field as Ferguson started to run. A moment later, a machine gun began barking, a PK of some sort mounted on the back of the truck.

  Conners threw the Russian grenade launcher off his back, setting it up to fire. As he did, Ferguson sprawled across the runway to his left, rolled back, and began firing his AK-74. The headlights on the pickup died, but the heavy machine continued to fire, chewing up the concrete just short of them.

  Before Conners could sight the weapon, Ferguson had managed to reach the ditch. He ran to the north, away from Conners, and fired again, this time raking the side and catching one of the spare jerry cans of fuel in the back of the vehicle. The can exploded, and flames shot up, cooking off machine gun ammo in a thunderous orgy.

  Co
nners let go of his weapon and took out the sat phone.

  “We have a hot LZ,” he said, warning the assault team to expect gunfire.

  Automatic fire stoked up again, this time from closer to the runway.

  Corrigan was on the line, and Van Buren. Conners told them they were taking fire, described the arms he’d seen, and gave the basic layout of the firefight.

  “We’ll be there as quickly as we can,” said Van Buren calmly.

  25

  BUILDING 24-442, SUBURBAN VIRGINIA

  Thomas found it at the bottom of a small slip of blue paper that held a summary of a translated message dating back nearly a year.

  Manila.

  One of Bin Saqr’s companies had rented a hangar at Manila airport. They had also bought fuel there.

  He secured his room and hurried down to tell Corrigan what he had discovered. His adrenaline was flowing and he felt light-headed as he waited to be cleared through the security and in to see Corrigan. But as he walked down the hall Debra intercepted him.

  “I got it, I got it, I got it,” he told her, waving the small blue paper madly.

  “Calm down, Thomas. Calm down,” she told him. “He’s really busy right now. The operation is under way.”

  “I have to tell him,” said Thomas, and he pushed her aside, overcome by his conviction that he was right. He marched into the situation room.

  As soon as he saw the analyst, Corrigan threw his hands up, trying to flag him to stop and be quiet. He was in the middle of a four-way conversation with Colonel Van Buren, Corrine Alston, and Conners. The Team had been discovered at the Chechen base.

  “Manila,” Thomas hissed. “They’re going to Manila, and then LA.”

  Corrine must have heard him, for she asked what was going on.