Reload

by David McCaleb

  The door hinges squealed and he jumped down. He marched toward the building’s front entry, only a short distance. Glancing back, he thought he caught a shadow of movement slipping into the woods.

  The building’s gray exterior was well kept, as if it’d been recently washed. The path from it to the statue would be an hour’s work, but he’d been told to move back to the truck quickly once he saw other vehicles approaching the gate. Jellyfish had said if he tried to leave, he’d be shot. The commando had also warned, “Some men are going to die. Then the buildings will burn.” Somehow, all of this would only take a few minutes. Ko had asked how they were getting away, but Jellyfish had only sneered. It has to be on a boat, he thought, if they meant to keep him alive at all.

  Anger and fear swelled his gut. These men, they could kill Ko, his daughter and sister, and could still escape. How helpless he was, a sailboat in seas without a rudder. Would he be any better off with these commandos? No, he reassured himself. He’d made his decision and would not relent. He couldn’t change his mind now even if he wanted. Ever since he left his cold house with Eun Hee in tow, he’d given up choice. He was still a slave, but to a different master.

  As he bent his back and tried to force the shovel beneath packed ice, it struck a rock and sparked. The flash recalled a boy with scraps of fabric tied to his feet. Ko had given him an implement with a broken handle just like this one, to clear a path between a sawmill and the debarker. There’d been at least twenty of his classmates there, working with hoes and shovels and hands. But for no reason he knew, the image of this one boy had always remained clear in his mind. Cleanse your sins through work, the guards had always told them. But the boy had died from exposure, still a teenager. Even if Ko labored his entire life, it could never wash his sins of torture and treason.

  * * * *

  Red’s cold, numb calves started to shiver. He planked on his elbows and toes, rocking forward and back to keep warm. The less the contact with frozen earth, the slower heat was drawn from his body. With every sway, he resisted the urge to launch toward the office building, down the ridge, and across the open meadow. The data center needed to be completely destroyed if Lori and the kids would ever enjoy a day without worrying about someone wanting to harm them. He’d tried to work other forms of ingress that would have allowed them to carry enough C4 to take down the entire building and reduce it to a smoldering heap. But at each turn, the team was limited to a small, light unit. Could five men accomplish such a mission? Would sufficient flammable accelerant be stored in the printing warehouse? Taking down buildings was not an easy task, let alone two of them.

  On the locator screen, Lanyard’s tag had just moved out of the printing warehouse back to a position opposite the parking lot. Red rolled to one elbow and pressed his comm. “Report.”

  Lanyard’s voice was raspy, pausing every few seconds for breath, “Press looks unguarded. I cracked a door. An entire corner is filled with ink barrels.”

  The CIA said the ink was combustible, like diesel. Counterfeit samples confirmed it. The team had humped in heat charges, just enough boom to diffuse the stuff across the warehouse, and enough heat to ignite it. The result should be a complete meltdown of the structure.

  The office building was another story. Solid block. No intel on the inside, so they couldn’t say how much would burn. The data center was on the second floor, around the middle. That was what Gae had just checked out.

  “Computer room, two guards. No get close. After kill parking lot, we no problem. Puel truck this side.”

  What the hell? He got the part about the computer room having two guards posted but was still trying to make sense of the rest. Why had he assigned the data center, the most important target, to a psycho South Korean commando? Of course, at the time of mission planning, he had no idea of Gae’s impulsiveness. The man’s mastery of the language and a stolen uniform was supposed to allow him to get close enough to the data center guards to take them out without a firefight. But other members were ready to move in the event he failed.

  Lanyard commed, “Fuel truck looks about a thousand gallons. I tapped on the tank. Sounds half-full. There’s a big generator this side, behind the office building. Got a tank next to it as well. We could use the fuel truck to get the office building fired up.”

  The original plan had been for the team to get two of the fifty-five-gallon drums of ink from the warehouse into the office building, using them as fire accelerant. Gae would place his charges in the floors above the data center, blowing a chimney all the way through to the roof. They’d open lower windows and the entire building would act as huge furnace. The fuel truck would make it faster. Maybe their luck was finally starting to turn.

  Headlights appeared around the ridgeline, moving slowly. Another set followed, till three in all ambled along the roadway. Red zoomed in with the blazer, but could only make out what appeared to be a Mercedes sedan, a van, and a jeep-like vehicle. They turned off toward the valley.

  “They’re here. Four minutes to showtime.”

  * * * *

  Lights flashed onto the high walls of the office building. Ko straightened and turned toward the guard shack. Several vehicles approached it, one low and dark, the other a high van. Unibrow stepped from her stall.

  Ko rubbed his back, trying to look casual, then strode toward the dump truck. His heart, already pounding from chipping ice, throbbed in anticipation of when the shooting might start. He ducked behind the bed and pulled himself over the gate, pushing his head below the tarp.

  “You still OK?” he whispered.

  He could barely make the seal-shaped form of both women huddled toward the front. “Yes, Father.” The coat shook as the pair shivered.

  “There’s going to be some rifles firing soon. Don’t be frightened. Then they’ll burn the building, but we’re staying here till it’s over. I’ll be up front, in the cab.”

  He dropped down and pretended to fiddle with a cracked brake light, sneaking a glance at the visitors. From his angle, three pair of lights shone now. The last one must’ve been hidden behind the large van earlier. The dark sedan crept forward. He moved around to the plow truck’s passenger side, opened the door, and ducked low as he slid across the bench seat. The windows were frosted now, the moonlight glinting off crystals spread upon the glass like poplar leaves pressed in a book. He put two fingers against it near the bottom seal, melting peepholes, then put his face to it.

  The vehicles parked one next to each other, like in a practiced parade, directly in front of the Great Leader’s outstretched hand. The statue had seemed a distance away when Ko had first arrived, but now he realized he was close enough to recognize the black sedan’s three-pointed star. A Mercedes.

  Doors opened and one, two...seven men in all stepped from the vehicles. Not good odds for the Americans. And at least two looked to be MSS bodyguards, judging from their size and the intent way they glared around the parking lot. He’d seen their kind before when MSS high officers inspected Hwasong.

  Damn it. He hadn’t considered what would happen if the Americans didn’t know what they were doing. Arrogant whoremongers. How could five of them, one only a doctor, capture seven MSS, several of them trained bodyguards? MSS knew everything. They might even know the Americans were waiting to ambush them.

  A woman stepped from the passenger side of the black sedan. Tall, with long blond hair hanging below a fur cap, just like James Bond’s Russian girlfriend in his illegal video of Dr. No. A tight, dark skirt stopped above her knees. Long, smooth, flawless calves glowed the milky white of birch bark. No way to dress in this cold. An angular blue shape, the edge of a neck tattoo, rose past her collar. She gripped a briefcase in one hand. No one steadied her elbow as she stepped gingerly onto the icy walk that Ko’s shovel hadn’t yet reached. One of the men stomped ahead toward the building. Another smiled at the lady and pointed after him. She followed, the whole group picking
up speed once they hit the shoveled path.

  Where were the Americans? Where was Jellyfish?

  The group was almost to the portico when the lead guard’s head exploded silently, as if there were a bomb inside it. Remnants sprayed the lady’s face and she stopped, watching the body fall before her. Erupting quick as a string of firecrackers, chunks of other heads burst across dirty snow, one sprinkling the golden statue. A small chunk of skull clinked onto the hood of the dump truck. Only after a few bodies dropped did a rapid booming, as if by distant artillery, echo through the valley.

  An arm flew off at the shoulder. With his remaining hand, the MSS guard grabbed a pistol from his belt. But that shoulder ruptured crimson as well, though it remained attached. The man dropped to his knees, and his neck spewed open. The body fell facedown into snow.

  Ko stared in shock. How had they all been killed so quickly? Where were the Americans? It was as if shots had come from the sky. No rush of men. No hand-to-hand combat.

  A blur ran toward the office building. The woman—she hadn’t been hit. She disappeared inside and the door closed behind.

  Ko glanced toward the distant entry guard shack. The sentinel stood next to the door, apparently still unaware of what was happening. Ko rolled down the window and lifted cupped hands to his mouth like a bullhorn. He drew a deep breath, about to yell a warning, when she fell backward upon the road, followed by a distant crack.

  They didn’t need to kill her. Were they going to shoot everyone? What about Eun Hee and Soo Jin?

  A dark figure sprinted past the dump truck. Startled, Ko drew his pistol and aimed it after a man running toward the office building’s front door. Peering over the frost line in the windshield, it looked like one of the commandos. Probably Jellyfish.

  No, he thought. If they were going to kill them, they would have already done it. He glanced at the pistol in his hand and wondered if they could see him holding it. He quickly slid the gun back into its holster and raised his fingers toward his face. They shook, but not from the cold. He reached behind the seat and tapped the first three notes of “Old Mr. Turtle.”

  The next three notes echoed back.

  Chapter 33 – Mule Neck

  Red’s jugular thumped against his throat as he lay prone, stretching his neck to eye the approaching vehicles through a blazer. Sergio had hurried back to the dump truck when the three autos arrived. The Mercedes stopped in front of the guard shack and Red zoomed in. Tinted windows obscured everyone except a black-coated driver who lowered a window to pass papers to the guard.

  Red flipped down the monocular and zoomed in as far as it could go. Hard to tell, but two blurred forms suggested warm bodies in the rear seat. Only the driver was visible in the van, plus two others in the jeep. “I count six targets. Unknown how many in the van. Lanyard, you’ve got the driver of the Mercedes. Gae, van. Cooley, jeep. I’ll take whoever comes out next. Call the rest in turn as you terminate your target. On my count.”

  The Mercedes parked directly in front of the gold statue, the others next to it. Red switched his eye back to the blazer. The barrel of his MP5 was propped upon a rock. He’d never shoot his weapon this way, but the crude rest served well enough to steady the high-powered optics. He took a breath and held it, crosshairs oscillating a few inches with each heartbeat. He exhaled slowly and the bead steadied.

  A short man with a wide face stepped from the rear of the Mercedes, pulling a blue parka down around his waist. The passenger-side door opened and a woman stepped from the vehicle. Tall, high waisted with long, delicate arms. Definitely not Korean. Had to be the mole. Stupid bitch wore a pencil skirt in the frigid temps. She closed the door, then turned slowly, as if searching the valley perimeter for something. Red zoomed in further. When she turned his direction his breath froze in his throat. Lori? It looked just like her, even at such distance.

  The bell from the distant buoy clanged faintly.

  What the hell? The mission was clear. Destroy the press, the data center, and kill everyone present. The CIA had emphasized the requirement to eliminate the mole. But Lori was no more a mole than Marksman. His friend’s dying words haunted him: She’s not the enemy. Maybe the CIA had just mistaken her for the mole. Grace had said not even Mr. Steele had known about the mission till after it’d begun. And Lori’s unit...investigations could use bait. A good decoy could look like the real thing.

  He stared but she stepped without a limp. She strode quickly, calves flashing too fast to make out any residual bruising. Even with a healthy dose of pain meds it’d be difficult for the wound to not affect her gait...but Lori was tough as nails. Maybe she was the mole. Maybe this was why Higher had been so adamant Red not be on this mission.

  This all stank like shit. Too much of a coincidence. It had to be her. The Det had been played.

  “I’ve got the girl,” said Cooley.

  The team was already calling secondary targets. “Negative. I’ve got the girl,” Red commed. That would make her his own primary. But what now? Training and duty necessitated the plan be followed. Execute it. Others already had done the background research. Don’t second-guess. But this was his wife!

  The group was halfway to the portico. He had to decide quickly.

  “Why’d you keep on flying, Grandpa?” a ten-year-old Red had asked the old man one Christmas. He’d been holding the black-and-white picture, yellowed with age, of a tired-eyed younger grandpa in front of a B-17 with his crew, Mae West slung over one shoulder. “The Germans had so many fighters. Why’d you keep going?”

  His grandpa had smiled, eyes looking puffy then, too, though not with fatigue. “No choice, son. Duty, I suppose. It’s in the training. No matter what it takes, you complete the mission.”

  Red’s finger rested upon the blazer’s trigger. Complete the mission. She’s not the enemy.

  She’s my wife, for crying out loud.

  “Sir?” said Richards.

  To hell with it. “Fire!”

  The .50 cal boomed in rapid succession. Lori froze in place when the guard in front of her went down.

  Go, damn it! Run!

  But she just stood there, unlike the night of the hit. Back then, she’d taken off like a dog after a squirrel.

  Red pointed the blazer at a column on the portico just ahead of her and bumped the trigger three times. The projectiles struck, chipping deep into concrete. She glanced at the pockmarks, then sprinted into the building.

  “Reloading,” Richards commed. The bolt slapped shut and the weapon boomed again.

  Red jumped to his feet and ran down the ridge toward the office building. “Cooley, get the gate guard. Mole’s on foot. I’m pursuing inside. Everything else, go as planned.”

  The valley floor rose rapidly as Red jumped from rock to rock, snow cushioning landings. What he would do right now for a pair of skis. Reaching out to steady himself, his hand fell upon a palm-sized stone beneath the snow. He scooped it up and slammed it against the casing of the blazer. That should throw off the calibration enough to excuse him missing his primary target.

  A few more shots boomed overhead. Cooley taking out the electrical and telephone wires. Lanyard would’ve already activated the communications suppression system, muffling any radio chatter from the valley. But a facility like this had hard lines below ground. Some communication would get out for certain. They just had to be away from the area before any response team arrived.

  He hit the meadow and sprinted across, gulping air in deep draws. The snow in the open was only a few inches deep, so he kept up a full gallop. Rangefinder had said it was a thousand meters to the office. He’d done that distance in three minutes once upon a time. But running down the ridge had slowed him, so Lori would have a good head start. Gae and Lanyard would be detonating charges in ten minutes. How could he find her quickly enough? Throat numbing with cold, he tried to send out a sixth sense, to feel her presence. He’d done
it before but now came up empty. No time to concentrate.

  One boot sank deep into a hole and he sprawled, hitting the ground in a full belly flop, skidding to a halt. He pushed himself back up and glanced at the locator on his belt. That could find her. Lori had an implant. She was a tag. But his locator was only programmed for the Det, for his team. Previously he’d been given a security key to view CIA tags. He resumed his sprint, straining his mind to remember it. How it looked after he punched the characters in. That was the only way he could pass basic anatomy class back at USAFA, envisioning entire pages from his book.

  With two hundred meters to go, Red’s knee stabbed pain up the inside of his groin.

  “In buil-jing. Go-jing up su-tairs.”

  So little time. Gae would be setting charges before Red was even through the front door. He pushed harder. His vision started to close in like a tunnel. He ran through the portico, past the concrete column pocked two inches deep where his bullets had struck. All the targets lay fallen to one side of the path, as if directed by a murderous choreographer, snow inked in red splashes.

  The heavy wood entry doors had recessed panels. He raised his weapon, lowered a shoulder, and bounded through, into a dark corner hallway. One passage led down the front of the building, the other to the side. A single florescent dimly lit each. Ten meters away one branched off and a pair of black boots stuck out past the corner, as if their owner were lying down in the adjoining corridor, asleep.

  Red ducked behind a table with a bouquet of yellow daisies and purple chrysanthemums bound by an orange string in a china vase. He fingered Uniform, Mike, Niner, Foxtrot, Yankee into his locator. The screen flashed and five tags lit the display. He’d remembered it! One tag glowed green, unvalidated. That one had to be Lori. The image was moving now toward the printing warehouse, down the hallway with the boots.

  Red raised his weapon and glanced in both directions. No movement. He sprinted toward the boots, stopped short of the corner, held his breath, and listened. Only the tidal pull and shush of blood in his veins. He angled his weapon around the corner. Two spent casings lay on polished concrete across from a fallen guard in green uniform. Red took a step closer, one boot stamping crimson prints onto the flat tan surface. He rolled the body facedown. An elbow bent unnaturally beneath it. The head flopped too lazily. The neck was broken. Maybe Gae had—but no, the Korean wouldn’t have come this way.