Revamp the signal intercept schedule.
Stretch everyone to their breaking point.
Impossible.
“Yes, of course we can do it,” Rubens said.
Bib slid over his pad. Rubens had to squint to decipher the words, and even then it was tough going. Bib had filled the page with chicken scratch that would make a doctor’s prescription look like forty-eight-point block letters.
“Bear Hug will execute at my command only,” said Marcke. “George, I want you at the command center to keep me updated. We’ll use the dedicated line.”
“Excuse me, Mr. President,” interrupted Rubens, rising. “The units we’ve been watching are on the move. I would estimate the action will begin in forty-eight hours, or less.”
38
Karr clicked through the different magnifications of the photographs, though he was no longer paying any real attention to them. Most of the vehicles that had been at the base yesterday were gone, which probably meant that the bulk of the troops that had been located there had left with them. The question was, Had Martin?
There seemed like only one way to find out—go in and look. But that wasn’t going to be easy.
The bug that had heard Martin had landed between two low-slung buildings near the northwestern perimeter of the base. Two guard posts were situated within fifty feet of the buildings along the fence line. Even if there was no surveillance equipment to supplement them, their sight lines not only overlapped but also were visible from another set of posts farther away. Because of the way the buildings were arranged, Karr doubted there were mines between them and the fence—but since the satellite archives showed there were minefields just to the south, it would be difficult to be sure without checking.
Less than a hundred yards from the buildings sat a small airstrip, probably intended solely for helicopters. Six Helix and two Hip choppers were dispersed around it. The strip was heavily guarded. A pair of ZSU-23 antiaircraft guns were set up in shallow revetments at either end of the field; there were at least two other netted areas south of the helicopters where 23mm guns might also be hiding. Mounted on tank chassis, the weapons were primitive but deadly, and not just against aircraft. Farther to the south, just off the main road into and through the complex, was an SA-6 missile launcher with its associated vans and radar. The air defenses could hold off a pair of F-16s, let alone the Hind.
A bit of a knot, but probably doable.
“So what do you think, kid?” asked Charlie Dean, leaning in the truck window. He smelled of the rotgut he’d been pretending to drink.
“I think we need a clandestine insertion, a major diversion, and a Marine division.”
“No high-tech miracle force multipliers?”
“Actually, all we need is a pair of pliers.” Karr pondered the image, then clicked the handheld’s keys and had the computer conjure a simple outline from the photo. He knew they could get in; the plan to do it was hovering somewhere in the back of his brain but just hadn’t come forward yet.
“We’re not getting in,” said Dean.
“Sure we are,” said Karr. Something in Dean’s sarcasm finally coaxed the idea into the conscious part of Karr’s head. “We slip across here, come right over the road, then find our guy. We need a serious diversion down on this end at first. Then again at the end.”
Dean looked at him as if he were insane. “This looks like a minefield.”
“That’s because it is.”
“How do we get across it?”
“Fly,” Karr joked.
“The chopper will be a sitting duck.”
“I’m kidding, Charlie Dean. Man, you’re a lot of fun, but sometimes you’re way too serious.”
“I’m always serious where my life’s concerned.”
Karr laughed. “Listen, I want you to come in with me. We’re going to need Princess out here in case we get nailed, and besides, watching her butt while you’re getting through a minefield is extremely distracting.”
“You’re out of your fuckin’ mind.”
“That’s what they tell me.” Karr gave him a fist to the shoulder. He liked the geezer; working with him kept him on his toes. “Let’s go find some food. All this thinking makes me hungry.”
On the one hand, Dean agreed that they had to rescue their man, no matter the odds. He admired that; it was, after all, the Marine Corps way. On the other hand, what Karr had sketched out barely deserved to be called a plan.
They’d been ambushed at the junkyard because they put too much stock in their high-tech gizmos, but at least that plan could be defended based on the available intelligence. This one couldn’t. Forget the satellite photos. Even just driving around it told Dean it wasn’t going to be infiltrated. Best to go in there with a couple of companies and serious firepower.
As in six or seven tanks.
They drove back to the gypsy camp, Karr bopping up and down to some tune only he could hear, Dean trying to come up with some kind of alternative plan.
There weren’t any.
Nor were the gypsies or whatever they were at the building. Instead, a black car sat in front of the building ruins, a man in a suit sitting with his arm out the window, smoking a cigarette. Karr kept a steady pace as they passed.
“What’s up?” asked Dean.
“Looks like the police pushed them on,” said Karr. “So much for a cheap meal.”
“It cost me a decent pistol,” said Dean.
“Lia’ll bring you another; don’t worry. Couple of nice little hideaways in the S-1 pack—these little Glocks.”
“Plastic.”
“Strong and light.”
“Still plastic.”
“You only like six-guns, right, Wyatt Earp?”
“I’m not against technology. When it’s appropriate.” Dean leaned against the dashboard as he turned toward Karr, bending his head so that it was almost in his face. “You don’t really think we’re going to get in and get out alive, do you?” he asked. “Even if most of the soldiers are gone, the perimeter is well protected.”
“Nah. That minefield’s wide open.”
“How do we get across it?”
“Pogo sticks.”
“Very funny. You’re going to have to lay it out for me, step by step. Otherwise I’m not coming.”
Karr turned to look at him. The look that crossed over his face combined disgust, anger, derision—and fear. Then it dissolved in a laugh so hard the truck shook.
“You’re a lot of fun, Charlie Dean. Truly.”
39
Even Malachi balked at the plan when they conferenced in the Art Room with the Desk Three team. The team needed to get by an SA-6 missile battery with a helicopter—not an easy prospect without eliminating the battery, but doing so seemed almost impossible from the ground.
“So let’s get it from the air,” said Tommy Karr cheerfully.
“Can we?” Telach asked Malachi, who was sitting in the Art Room for the conference.
There was no time to get an F-47C into position, let alone the larger A-7 space plane. That left the Space Platforms’ Vessels.
Which weren’t armed.
He could put one through the radar van. Smack through the side with the processing gear—all he’d have to do is fry a transistor or two and the unit would be dead.
Shit, yeah.
“I can take out the SA-6 with a Vessel,” he told them.
“How?” asked Telach. Pacing in front of the blank screen at the front of the room, she looked exactly like his third-grade teacher, Mrs. Woods.
Malachi tried to ignore that. He’d had a bad experience with Mrs. Woods.
“I’ll put one of the Vessels through the radar van,” said Malachi. “Sizzle-boom, it’s gone.”
“What about the ZSU-23s?” said Rockman.
“What, the guns?” asked Karr. “Screw ’em. Fashona’ll nail the closest suckers with missiles off the Hind when he comes in.”
“Timing’s going to be tight,” said Rockman. “Yo
u have to take out the SA-6 just before the helicopter pops up to clear the fence, then get the guns.”
“You’re telling me the helicopter’s going to be on the radar screen at six feet?” asked Karr.
“The fence is twenty,” said Rockman. “And they have a second dish outside to cover just this contingency.”
“Ah, the SA-6 can’t hit shit under a hundred and fifty feet,” said Karr. “We just stay under that.”
“I can take out the processing van,” said Malachi. “Tell me the time and it’s gone.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” said Karr.
“Yeah, but what about the guns?” insisted Rockman.
“Those Zeus suckers?” asked Karr. “If the helo comes in right, they won’t be a problem. They don’t have a good line of fire, and besides, Fashona’ll splash them.”
“That’s not entirely true,” said Rockman. “There’s about ten seconds’ worth of exposure in and out.”
“Ah, what’s ten seconds?” said Karr.
“You know how much lead that translates into?” asked Telach.
“Enough for a coffin,” said Karr cheerfully.
Malachi leaned back in his seat, sipping his strawberry milk. A diversion in the air outside the fence, opposite the direction of the helicopter, would divert the gunners long enough for the Hind to wax them. He could self-destruct a Vessel out there, but there wouldn’t be much of a bang—the whole idea of the process was to be as unobtrusive as possible.
What if he crashed two together?
Still not much of a bang. Unless he had the boosters on them.
“I got it,” said Malachi. “Rather than using one Vessel and self-destructing, we fly two down, then have them crash into each other. Should cause some sparks.”
“How much?” asked Karr.
Malachi wasn’t sure. “I’m going to have to talk to the design people,” he told her. “May run some sims, too, see where the best impact would be and—”
“Run what you want,” said Karr. “Just as long as it happens in two hours.”
“Two hours—that’s tight, dude.” Malachi turned to the screen where he’d punched up a course earlier. “Two hours—I’d have to launch within five minutes.”
“Sounds good to me,” said Karr. “We’ll look for the bang. Update us on times when you’re ready.”
40
Dean and Karr rendezvoused with the Hind in a deserted field about five miles north of their target area. Fashona had had to scrape his belly against the ground for nearly ten miles to be sure of missing the SA-6’s radar and was in a foul mood, not even helping them unload the gear.
Dean remained dubious. The key to the plan was getting across the minefield using a scanning device attached to the handheld. The problem, though, was that it wasn’t designed to find mines, just explosives.
“Works like the sniffers at airports,” Karr said. “Nothing to worry about.”
“I heard those things don’t work,” said Dean.
“Ah, sure they do, baby-sitter. The only problem is I have to calibrate it for one explosive at a time, say C-4 or gunpowder, or what have you. Not a problem, though, because the Commies only have one kind of mine.”
“Bullshit,” said Dean, who’d dealt with mines in Vietnam. “And these guys aren’t the Commies.”
“You’ve been hanging around with Lia too long,” Karr told him. “You’re getting very negative.”
Lia, carrying a duffel bag of gear from the Hind, snorted in derision. Dean glanced momentarily at her sleek, muscled body, her sweaty T-shirt clinging tightly to her breasts. Then he turned back to Karr.
“How do we get from the minefield to the buildings?” asked Dean.
“We cross the road.”
“Real funny,” said Dean.
“He’s a riot, isn’t he?” put in Lia.
“A comedian.”
“We just duck the patrol, that’s all.”
“We going to time it?” asked Dean.
“Nah. Take too long, and besides, you can’t count on these guys. Their watches are always off. Cheap Commie workmanship,” said Karr. “We’ll watch them and go when they’re not there.”
“How?”
“The Bagel, baby-sitter. The Bagel.”
The Bagel looked like a kid’s hovercraft toy. Round with a hole in the middle—hence its name—it had two engines on either side and a long twin-rudder tail. It carried five kilograms of fuel and could fly for about an hour and a half, feeding its video to a receiver in Karr’s backpack. Though very slow, it was extremely quiet, and once in hover would stay at its designated spot even in gale-force winds.
Dean looked at the thing doubtfully. Even its rotors were plastic. The front had a small clear panel; the rear featured a thick set of baffles where the exhaust was muffled.
“Georgia uses these for traffic control,” said Karr. “Check out accidents, that sort of thing. They get better endurance because they don’t worry about the noise.”
Karr took the Bagel and put it into the back of the truck. It didn’t quite fit and he had to angle it.
“Lia and Fashona can strap the weapons on the Hind. You and I have to get going,” said Karr, looking back to the helicopter. “Long walk ahead of us. Get your vest, headset, gun, knife, the works.”
“I’m not a kindergartner, kid,” said Dean, picking up the lightweight armor.
“Sorry, graybeard.” Karr laughed and walked over to Lia near the cargo door to the helicopter. When he leaned down to kiss her on the cheek, Dean felt a twinge of envy.
…
An hour later, Dean lay prone on the dirt above the embankment that led down to the fenced area, just out of view of the observation post. The boxy A-2 machine gun was in his right hand. His pockets were stuffed with small grenades; on his back over the protective armor was a wide but narrow rucksack. Inside were extra clips for the boxy gun and his two pistols, a backup com device, flares, rope, and a kind of sling made of rope they’d use to carry Martin out if he was hurt. He also carried a .22-caliber Ruger Mark II with a sonic suppressor—aka silencer—strapped in a holster at his chest.
In Dean’s opinion, the gun would be almost useless unless placed right on a victim’s head, assassination-style. Although it was admittedly an excellent weapon in its proper application, its small and relatively slow bullets wouldn’t so much as bruise someone wearing body armor.
Far better, Dean thought, to have MP-5Ns with suppressors—at least you’d have a chance of putting down the person who heard you.
A good quiet crossbow—there was a weapon these high-tech junkies should look into.
“Thirty seconds, baby-sitter,” Karr hissed in his ear. He sounded like he was hyperventilating already.
Dean’s doubts flooded into his veins, replacing his blood with fear. It was a suicidal plan.
He’d done crazy things before. The whole reason he was here—the whole reason he was working for Hadash, if he was still working for Hadash—was a crazy foolish plan.
One that had paid off handsomely.
That didn’t make this one any less ridiculous.
Karr leaped up. Dean followed, nearly tripping as they started down the embankment that led to the fence. A twenty-foot- wide swath had been bulldozed around the fence, both as a perimeter road and to make it easier to see and shoot anyone there. Just as they reached it, Karr pushed a button on his handheld, igniting a C-4 bomb he had set amid the gas cans in the back of the pickup, which they had parked on the northwestern flank of the fence.
Dean pushed himself sideways, got up and reached the fence, then fell through the hole Karr had already cut. He put the fencing back as carefully as he could, using the tape Karr had left to get it back into place well enough to withstand a cursory glance.
Meanwhile, gunfire, cannons, tracers ripped into the blackness. Even the ZSU-23s fired, their four-barreled volleys sounding like the pounding of a giant tin drum. There were sirens and flares, shouts in the distance. Dean pu
shed toward the supports for the guard tower on his right. Lights were switched on, searchlights—they were playing on the area in front of the fence, the embankment they’d just come down. Dean moved toward the black hole Karr had disappeared into, knowing he could count on only a few more seconds.
Bare seconds—but where the hell was Karr?
He could feel the lights coming, one playing across the interior of the yard errantly, another more purposefully. There was a second explosion, this one in the woods beyond the embankment where they had come down. Automatic weapons began to bark from the guard towers.
Dean felt the skin in the soft spot behind his jaw prickle with electricity. He ran forward at full speed, forgetting for a second that he was running into a minefield. He saw a shadow on his left that had to be Karr, began to dart toward it, then suddenly felt himself upended, flying in the air. He crashed against hard ground, cowering instinctively, sure the next thing he felt would be oblivion.
“Don’t get ahead of me, baby-sitter,” said Karr, who’d reached out and upended him. “We’re real close to the mines.”
The guards stopped shooting. They concentrated their lights outside the fence, where the truck continued to burn.
“Sucker’s still going,” said Karr. “Guess we’ll have to walk if the chopper goes down, huh?”
“More likely fly to heaven,” said Dean.
“Hey, speak for yourself,” said Karr. “I’m going to the other place. Reservation’s all set.”
He knelt down, holding what looked like a miniature boom mike out in front of him. A thick wire ran to his back.
“First mine’s two feet in front of you. Then there’s one, um, on the left—shit, these guys are not fucking around. I’ve seen checkerboards that were in a looser pattern.”
It took nearly twenty minutes for Karr to pick through the minefield. By then, things had calmed down to the point where the guards weren’t firing randomly and they weren’t shooting off flares willy-nilly. Sooner or later, there would be a thorough perimeter check. A careful look would find the hole in the fence. They needed to be in the building by then.
Karr waited next to a four-foot Cyclone fence for Dean to catch up as he cleared the end of the minefield. Just beyond the fence was the main road in. About fifty or seventy yards to the right was a row of buildings that would block off the view of the guards inside the gate, but with time getting tight Karr decided they’d have to take a shot at crossing the road and not being seen. The Bagel’s infrared or IR camera showed that there were only two guards at the gate and another two between them and the target buildings. Get past them, and they could get into the buildings without a problem.
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