by Mark Donovan
As they drove away Dave turned and faced the entrance to the small terminal that housed the FBO. He looked to his left before entering the building and saw that his airplane was still tied down on the ramp. Well I may not have wheels anymore, but at least I still have my wings, thought Dave to himself. He proceeded to enter the building and went directly to the men’s rest room to clean himself up before anyone else saw him.
Fortunately the bathroom was empty, most likely on account of the fact that general aviation was fairly limited in Bulgaria. He stared at himself in the mirror. He looked like he had been through Hell and back. His face and hair were matted with dried blood, his hands not much better. Thankfully the sink faucet had a long neck and the sink was relatively deep. He washed the blood from his face, hands and hair as best he could by ducking them underneath the faucet repeatedly.
After he looked somewhat reasonable he walked out of the bathroom in the direction of the FBO office, passing the Hertz rental car agency along the way. He decided there was no point in letting them know the status of their SUV. They would learn soon enough and he did not have time to deal with it. He needed to get out to his plane and contact Ron immediately. While cleaning himself up in the bathroom he had decided he had only one card left to play if he ever hoped to see Dana alive again.
As Dave walked by the FBO office he gave a slight wave of his hand to the male attendant behind the counter. He kept his head down and slightly turned away to avoid eye contact with him, and to hide from view the large knot and cut on his forehead. He continued through the general aviation terminal waiting area to the exterior door that led to the airport terminal ramp. From there he proceeded directly out to his Cirrus SR22T. He removed the tie down ropes from the aircraft, along with the Pitot tube cover and engine cowl plugs, and placed them inside the aircraft’s rear storage cargo area.
After getting himself situated into the left seat of the cockpit, his aching left shoulder complicating the process, he powered up the General Dynamics PRC-155 radio sitting next to him. He punched in Ron’s cell phone number into the radio’s keypad and a few seconds later Ron’s voice boomed over the radio.
“Did you get her back?” asked Ron in an excited voice.
Dave held his hand over his throbbing head and looked in the direction of the terminal building. “No I didn’t,” responded Dave quietly.
“What happened? Did you miss them?”
“No, no, I saw them. They actually passed me on the motorway southeast of Sophia.”
“Then what happened?”
“I nearly got myself killed, or more accurately, Spencer almost killed me.”
“How?” asked Ron.
“Well, I attempted to run their vehicle off the road to stop them, but Spencer got the best of me and ended up running me off instead.”
“Jesus, are you all right? And what about Dana? Did you see her?”
“Yes, I am alright, and yes I saw Dana, but only for a brief second. She was lying low in the backseat of the car, a black E-class Mercedes sedan. Spencer was driving it. The other man, Abdul, did not seem to be with him. At least I saw no sign of him in the car.”
“So what do you want to do next?” asked Ron. “Try to fly ahead of them again and make another attempt at rescuing her on the road?”
“No, it’s unlikely I would have any better success. I don’t have a weapon and the next closest city with a large enough airport that would be sure to have car rentals is Istanbul, Turkey. Flying into Turkey, and landing at a major airport like Ataturk without a filed flight plan would probably lead to me being arrested and locked up as soon as I opened my cockpit doors.”
“So what do you want to do?” asked Ron.
“I need you to contact John Bates for me and have him get in touch with CIA Director John Cote. Find out if they can possibly extract me out of Turkey, at a remote airfield or desert strip.”
“Roger that, I will call Bates right away.”
“I am not done,” interrupted Dave. “I also want you to ask them to transport me to Tehran and imbed me in with their CIA deep cell agents that are searching for Aref Zarin. I am convinced, after my run-in with Spencer today, that he is indeed taking Dana to Aref, probably to use her as a propaganda tool, and inevitability to kill her.”
“Okay, I will call Bates immediately and will get back to you,” responded Ron with a clear determination and sense of urgency in his voice. “But what about yourself in the meantime?”
“I am going to continue on to Turkey, assuming the CIA will respond favorably to my requests. If they don’t, then I will land somewhere in Turkey and figure it out from there. One way or the other, I will make it to Tehran and find Dana.”
Dave hesitated a moment before continuing, formulating a plan in his head, and coming up with a flight plan.
“I will parallel the northern coast of Turkey, flying out low over the Black Sea. When I hear back from you, I will modify my heading towards the coordinates you provide. I had the tanks filled here in Sophia, so I should have sufficient fuel onboard to make it to as far east as the Turkey/Georgia border.”
“Alright, I will call you back as soon as I hear a response from Bates. Good luck, and Dave, I know we will recover her alive. Don’t worry.”
“Thank you Ron. I pray that you’re right. I don’t want to lose her.”
Dave terminated the connection and began sequencing through the Cirrus SR22T engine-start checklist. Ten minutes later he was wheels up and headed southeast, in the direction of the Black Sea coastline on the Bulgaria/Turkey border.
Chapter 31 (April 17, Sunday 1:00pm, Istanbul, Turkey)
Ahmad turned the Mercedes into an empty parking lot and drove up to a chain link fence gate. The fence stood eight feet high and was topped with eighteen inch razor tape wire. A man dressed in desert camouflaged sand fatigues, and an automatic rifle slung over his shoulder, stood guard at the gate. On the other side of the gate was a hangar, and beyond that, Ahmad could see the runway. He breathed a sigh of accomplishment. He had finally made it to his destination, at the isolated airfield thirty kilometers due west of Istanbul, Turkey where he had been instructed to drive to. He looked back at the hangar. Inside of it should be one of Aref Zarin’s personal business jets that would fly him to Tehran.
Spencer flashed his high beams three times, the signal that Aref had instructed him to give when he had arrived at the gate. The guard immediately responded by punching an access code into a digital key lock box that stood adjacent to the gate. A second later the gate started to slide to the left. The guard waved him forward when the gate fully opened. Ahmad gently depressed the Mercedes’ gas pedal and moved forward, passing through the gate and onto the secure airfield. As he proceeded past the guard, the guard motioned with his hand for him to drive to the front of the hangar, the side nearest the runway.
Ahmad pulled up to the right side of the hangar, put the vehicle in park, and shut off the ignition. Two guards, again wearing desert camo sand fatigues with automatic weapons slung over their shoulders, walked out of the hangar and approached the Mercedes. As they did, Ahmad briefly turned his head and looked into the back seat of the car. She was still there and breathing he reassured himself again. She had not spoken a word, and had remained in a quasi-catatonic state since their incident with Henson nearly six hours earlier. At one point, Ahmad had become so concerned with Dana’s lack of movement and total silence that he had pulled over and checked on her. Delivering her dead body to Aref would not have been well received.
“Dana, it’s time for us to move,” he said to her in a commanding tone, hoping to shake her from her stone-like trance. There was no movement from the backseat. “We need to get on an airplane. There is someone who is very much interested in meeting you.”
Again, still no movement.
Ahmad opened the car door and stepped out of the Mercedes. The two guards greeted him, speaking in broken English.
“It looks like I will need some assitance with my passenger,
” he said to the two men.
Ahmad opened the driver’s side back passenger door and one of the guards, a giant of a man, bent down and dragged Dana from the car, legs first. Just before her entire body fell out of the car, Ahmad reached out and grabbed her arms to prevent her head from hitting the concrete ramp.
Once she had been completely extracted from the Mercedes the huge boorish paramilitary looking man lifted Dana’s limp body up, as if it was a sack of rice, and tossed her over his shoulder. He then proceeded to walk to the hanger, the other guard and Spencer following in his footsteps.
Inside, standing alone in the center of the hangar, sat a white Gulfstream G550 business jet. The large guard carrying Dana walked directly to the aircraft and proceeded up the forward bulkhead cabin stairs. Though a monster of a man, he gently placed Dana in one of the luxurious leather reclining seats, midway back in the aircraft. Ahmad trailed directly behind the guard and sat down in another recliner seat across from Dana. He looked over at her and saw that she simply sat staring straight ahead, her eyes unfocused on anything in particular. The guard said goodbye to him and exited the aircraft. Ahead, in the cockpit, Ahmad could see two pilots. One was running through a checklist, while another spoke on the radio.
“Good afternoon sir. Is there anything I can get for you?” asked a young woman’s voice from behind. Ahmad jerked his head around, caught off guard by the woman’s voice. He had not seen her when he boarded the plane. The large guard’s body must have blocked his view of her.
The woman was wearing tight designer jeans and a bright loose fitting long sleeve blouse. A small scarf adorned the top of her head, but her long dark hair and blemish free olive skinned face were exposed. Ahmad hesitated in his response as he took in the sight of the woman.
“Yes, yes, I would like some water please,” said Ahmad with a touch of uneasiness in his voice.
“And anything to eat?”
Ahmad thought for a moment. “Yes, a sandwich of any kind would be fine please.” Ahmad shifted his eyes from the flight attendant to Dana. “Also, bring her water and a sandwich as well. Thank you.”
The flight attendant nodded her head slightly in acknowledgement and walked back towards the aft of the aircraft.
One of the pilots stepped from the cockpit. As he did, the forward bulkhead cabin door rose up, the pilot meeting it just as it closed. He pulled on a lever to lock the door into place, and then proceeded aft towards Ahmad.
“Good afternoon sir. The flight will be about two and one half hours,” said the pilot dryly, no expression in his voice. “We should arrive at the Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport by three thirty local time. There will be someone there to pick you up when we arrive.”
“Thank you,” responded Ahmad.
The pilot dipped his head slightly in acknowledgement before turning to walk back to the cockpit. Ahmad felt a slight jolt as an airtug jerked the Gulfstream forward. He looked out the window beside him and saw that they were being towed out of the hangar and onto the ramp.
Once outside the shade of the hanger and underneath the blazing sun, the tug was disconnected from the aircraft’s nose wheel by the huge guard that had carried Dana onboard the aircraft. Ahmad then heard the engines spool up, first one and then the other. Shortly thereafter he began to feel cool air blowing gently across his face as the air conditioning system powered on. It felt soothing on his tired body.
After he ate, he would get some much needed sleep he thought to himself. He was so exhausted he could no longer remember when he last slept. He glanced over at Dana. She’d be going nowhere he told himself. Her hands were bound, and they would soon be flying seven miles above the earth. Plus, there was a flight attendant behind him that he was sure came with more skills than just serving drinks and food.
The aircraft taxied directly out onto the runway, the engines throttling up to full power simultaneously. Ahmad felt himself being pushed backwards into his seat as the aircraft accelerated forward. Twenty seconds later they were airborne heading east. A few minutes later, once the aircraft had begun to level off in its ascent, the woman flight attendant returned with two bottles of water and sandwiches. Ahmad gratefully reached out to her and took a bottle of water and a sandwich from her. However, for Dana who had not flinched since being dumped into her seat, the flight attendant placed them on a console tray next to her.
Ahmad, extremely hungry from the long drive, consumed the sandwich in about five bites, and proceeded to wash it down with the entire bottle of water. He then unbuckled his seatbelt, stood up, and walked to the rear of the plane to visit the lavatory. After relieving himself and cleaning up a bit, he returned to his seat, pulled down the window shade next to him, and slouched down for a much needed two hour nap. He started to close his eyes, and then suddenly opened them once more to take a last look at Dana. She was still sitting flopped in the seat beside him, her eyes staring vacuously ahead of her. She was going nowhere. He closed his eyes and drifted off.
Chapter 32 (April 17, Sunday 5:00am, McCall, Idaho)
Barak stepped out from behind the driver’s wheel of the van and into the frigid early morning air of McCall, Idaho. Three other young men, all of Middle Eastern descent, also got out of the van and moved immediately to the back of it to open the vehicle’s rear doors. All of them were dressed in black clothing and had dark full face ski masks pulled down over their heads.
Besides cold, Barak was also exhausted. He had caught the last flight from Boston to Minneapolis-St. Paul, International airport just ten hours earlier. From there, he had taken a regional flight to Boise, Idaho. It was in Boise where he had met up with his three colleagues. Colleagues that were now assisting him in his first tactical mission. After speaking with Aref, he had called each one individually to enlist their help. Like him, they had flown in from various other distant locations in the United States.
Barak zipped up his coat and pulled up the collar around his neck to fight back the chill that ran through his bones, a chill not caused just from the brisk morning air. He looked east and could see the outline of the large building standing out against the twilight night sky. He was standing in a vacant commercial building lot a couple of hundred meters from NSurv headquarters.
The three men pulled from the back of the van four military grade transport cases and placed them on the ground next to Barak. They then knelt down next to the cases, switched on their head mounted flashlights, and began to open them. In each case was a Draganflyer X4-P drone, a four rotor Carbon fiber constructed helicopter, approximately three feet in diameter when unfolded. Accompanying each drone was a line-of-sight handheld controller, flight pack batteries, and a three axis stabilized gimbal with a camera payload mount. The X4-P drone was capable of carrying a payload of up to nearly two pounds, had a maximum ceiling height of twenty five hundred meters and a lateral range of five hundred meters. Instead of a camera payload, however, these particular drones had been custom modified to support a much different type of payload. Attached to each of the gimbal mounts was a one and one half pound package of C4 explosive, along with a remote controlled electronic detonator.
The men pulled the drones from their respective cases, unfolded them, and placed them on the ground next to the cases. They then attached the flight pack batteries and gimbal mounts carrying their special payloads.
Barak watched pensively as the men finished assembling the drones. He was about to commit himself to a new level in the jihad against the great Satan of the West, a level that he had been reluctant to ascend to in the past. Even now, as he watched the assembly of these simple, yet high tech weapons, he had his misgivings. But he knew he was beyond choosing at this point. The men beside him, men who he had personally contacted for the mission on very short notice, were ruthless killers. If he were to hesitate now, they would either immediately terminate him, or contact others that would track him down and eventually do the same. He had no alternative, he had moved beyond making his own choices. He was a tool for Aref, an i
mplement for carrying out the work of Allah. At least that is what he kept telling himself as the men beside him readied their remote controlled flying bombs.
A few moments later the man nearest Barak switched off his head mounted flashlight and stood up.
He walked up to Barak. “We are ready,” said the man tersely.
Barak checked his watch and noted that sunrise was not far off. He took another look at the NSurv building, its outline now clearly more visible than it was just minutes earlier due to the lightening of the eastern skyline.
“Okay, let’s get this done,” replied Barak, confidence lacking in his voice.
The two other men turned off their head mounted flashlights, stood up and approached Barak and the other man.
“I will land my drone on the roof above the main entrance,” said Barak. “Diyan, you will place yours on the roof ten meters to the west of mine and three meters in from the edge of the building. Faisal, you will place yours ten meters further west of Diyan and again the same distance in from the edge of the building. Hud, land yours ten meters further west of Faisal’s.”
Barak looked at each man. “Are there any questions?” All shook their heads indicating the plan was clear to them. “Excellent, May Allah be with us.”
The men separated, each moving to their designated drone and activating the radio controlled detonators on the C4 packets. With the handheld controllers they then activated their respective drones. A large hum filled the early morning air as sixteen rotor blades spun up.
Barak was the first to lift his off the ground. He thumbed the two joy sticks on the controller and raised the drone to fifteen meters above the ground, high enough to clear the scrub trees between the vacant lot and the NSurv building, but low enough so that he could still clearly see the drone in the early morning light. He then moved one of the joystick knobs slightly to the right and the drone helicopter began to fly off towards the east, its explosive payload hanging visibly from its belly. Diyan repeated Barak’s steps and piloted his drone twenty meters behind Barak’s, with Faisal and Hud’s following in close pursuit.