by Jack Du Brul
“So I gathered.” Mercer sensed this wasn’t what Sykes wanted to say.
“The boys are calling you Snow White.”
Mercer grinned wryly. “I’ve been called worse.”
“Yeah, I bet. Anyway, I’ve been with Delta for eight years now. I’ve lost a few men during that time. A good guy named Tom Hazen in Colombia, a heck of a sharpshooter in Pakistan, a gunny who got killed when his chute didn’t open at Bragg. A couple of others.
“These guys died doing their job. It’s part of the risk we take. But the thing is we take that risk. It isn’t given to us. Some ugly pops an ambush we’re too stupid to see, we deserve to get killed. That gunny packed his parachute wrong, he deserved not to have it open. You following me?”
Mercer knew where Booker was headed, but remained silent, knowing it needed to be said.
“Admiral Lasko tells me you’ve been in some real hairballs over the past few years and with some pretty good operators too. SEALs in Alaska, Force Recon in Africa. Some army spec dogs down in Panama last year. Don’t take this the wrong way, hell, there ain’t no right way, I guess, but I don’t want you thinking all that earned you a place here.”
“I never thought it did,” Mercer replied softly.
“I like you. I think you’ll do okay up there, but you have to understand my mission is about getting certain information back to the admiral. It’s not about protecting Miss Nguyen and it’s not about protecting you. If at some point you become a liability to that mission, or if you put one of my men at risk, don’t think I won’t drop you myself.”
“I’m taking this in the spirit it’s given. It’s not personal, I know.”
“It’s not, but this whole thing has my hackles up. We’ve never had a Snow White tagging along with the team before and that has me spooked.”
“You love them, don’t you?”
In the distance Grumpy was chewing out Sleepy, the marginally laziest man on the team. “Not them as individuals,” Sykes answered, “but the ideal of what they are. Faces come and go, but the team is still the same. Am I making any sense?”
“It’s the old saying about hating the president but loving the presidency. Only you’re talking about respect and honor, much truer feelings, ones that are harder to develop and sustain. You’ve felt this way for years now. It’s as much a part of you as the color of your skin. I’m not a member of your team, never could be, and you’re afraid that my going in with you will affect the balance somehow.”
Sykes nodded. “Something like that, I guess. I don’t mind being dropped out of a bomber in nothing more than a high-tech coffin or facing overwhelming enemy forces. I just like to know everyone who’s at my back.”
“There’s nothing I can say that’ll put you at ease so I’ll keep my mouth shut.”
They looked each other in the eye, a silent current of understanding flashing between them.
For the twelve hours the Delta team was slated for sleep, inside the hangar was a flurry of activity to prepare the B-2 and the eight MMUs. As Sykes had said, he and his men were only responsible for getting information out of Rinpoche-La. Mercer had been given the additional job of finding a way of turning that information into a practical plan. In an office off the barracks where the team snored away, he sat hunched over a laptop staring at the latest geologic reports coming out of La Palma.
The news wasn’t good. The numerous fumaroles, gas-emitting vents that dotted the volcano, were pumping out deadly aerosols with the force of jet engines. The discharge rate of noxious elements such as carbon dioxide and sulfur was rising exponentially. Rain as caustic as sulfuric acid was falling on parts of the island.
While the eastern side of the mountain was showing signs of displacement, the western, and more dangerous, flank hadn’t begun to slip. Yet each passing minute raised the temperature of the water trapped inside the volcano. It was only a matter of time before the increased pressure cracked the rock and the half-trillion-ton slab went crashing into the sea.
The president had hoped to keep the news of the potential eruption to a minimum, and it appeared for the time being his wishes were coming true. There weren’t any dramatic pictures for the media to focus on and the few so-called experts being interviewed downplayed the potential of a massive eruption because La Palma’s last jolt in 1971 hadn’t affected the fault. Instead, the press was focused on a Hollywood corruption scandal that was ruining the careers of several top-ranked actors. Mercer blessed the American fascination with fame and the misguided belief that the oceans still afforded isolation from the rest of the world.
Ever since he’d been asked to find a way to minimize the effects of a La Palma eruption, Mercer had spent countless hours examining the problem. He came at it from every direction, dissecting and discarding each scenario that occurred to him. Feasibility and practicality didn’t factor in his thinking. All he wanted were options. And as he’d known since the president first asked him to try to deflect a volcanic blast, there wasn’t a whole lot to be done except hope the other scientists working on the project were more inspired than he was.
Dawn found him asleep on the cradle of his arms.
The morning was spent in a locked room, where Sykes went over operational details. From the satellite photographs, a detailed model of the monastery and its environs had been constructed. The model maker had gone so far as to include a flock of sheep from a children’s toy farm.
The plan was simplicity itself. The back of the monastery hung precariously over a hundred-foot-tall wall of dressed stone that divided the valley into an upper and lower section. The wall, as substantial as that protecting any castle, spanned the width of the valley, and had doubtlessly deterred generations of soldiers from attempting an assault from the rear. The surety of the wall’s impenetrability made it less likely to be guarded and thus the logical choice for Sykes’s team. Under the cover of a moonless night, the MMUs would be directed to land in the lower valley at the base of the wall. There weren’t any discernible trails from the meadow to the upper valley so Bashful and Happy would free-climb the wall, anchoring ropes for the rest of the team as they ascended. From there it would be up to improvisation and luck to infiltrate the building and find Tisa. As a precaution, each man carried his own satellite phone to broadcast the eruption date once they’d gotten it from her.
Two hours before the afternoon takeoff, the team members began to don their gear. Maybe it was because Harry’s jokes about Prince Charming storming a castle had remained fresh in his mind, but to Mercer it seemed the process was like knights suiting up in their armor. Meticulous care was given to every detail. The weapons had all been cleaned and test fired the day before. Ammunition magazines were checked for the stiffness of their springs. Batteries for their comm gear and the sat phones were fully charged. If there was even minor wear on any piece of equipment it was discarded for another.
As the men were doing this, technicians swarmed the bomber and monkey bombs doing their last-minute checks. The two pilots performed their walk-around and were ready to board through the bottom hatch.
A blacked-out van took the commandos from their barracks to the hangar. Once inside with the door closed, the men piled out of the vehicle and assembled under the enormous flying wing. The large bomb bay doors were open. Although the air force had given this plane the name Spirit of Wyoming, the crew had added a nickname. Painted on one of the barnlike bomb doors was a fluffy cloud. Extending from it was a downward-pointing hand with its index finger extended. The drawing was vague as it emerged from the cloud but grew more detailed closer to the fingertip, as though its presence was becoming more real. The bomber’s name was written underneath. Invisible Touch.
As was tradition during the preflight for this flight crew, a portable cassette deck pounded out the Phil Collins song by the same name.
Mercer eyed the MMUs. Sykes was right. They did look like coffins, especially with their lids open. The foam lining was covered in a microfiber that had the sheen of casket sa
tin. Great.
The team stowed their gear in compartments built into the bombs, making sure straps were cinched tight and nothing rattled. Once they were set, the pilots shook hands with each commando and climbed into the B-2’s belly.
At the side of one of the monkey bombs, Sykes called his group for one last pep talk. “For the next six hours we’re nothing more than passengers who” — he glanced into the open capsule — “have about the same amount of room as folks who get stuck in coach.”
There were a few nervous chuckles.
“We’ve been working with this system for a couple of months now. We’ve all taken a tethered drop from the twenty-foot tower and know how to handle a landing. The only thing we have to worry about is the chute opening. And that’s something we face every time we go so that means there’s no difference in this op from any other we’ve ever done. We don’t have to sweat it. Once we’re on the ground we know what to do.”
“Rules of engagement?” Bashful asked.
“Take down anyone with a gun or anyone threatening you. The only person we care about is Tisa Nguyen. Snow White’s given us a pretty good idea what she looks like, but don’t take chances. Any woman under the age of say, forty, is off limits.”
Bashful raised his hand. “Even if they’re coming after us, Doc?”
“Ain’t no chica coming after you, man,” Grumpy retorted and the men laughed.
“Anything to add, Snow?”
Mercer looked around at the confident faces. “Just that these guys blew a hole in a ferryboat in Greece two weeks ago to stop Tisa from talking to me. They killed almost fifty people. Take Doc Sykes’s advice. They won’t give quarter so don’t offer it. And if one of you tags a big bastard who dyes his hair like Elvis, you earned yourself two weeks on the Caribbean island of your choice with the woman of your choice.”
“Hoo-yah!”
“Except for Bashful,” Mercer added. “You monkeys will have to get him the girl.”
With that the meeting was over. It was time.
Two air force technicians helped Mercer into his MMU. Harnesses went around his legs and waist and over his shoulders. He was asked to unbutton the fly of his black fatigues and was given an appropriately sized sleeve for the relief tube. From down the length of the hangar he heard Dopey complaining that even their biggest one was too tight.
“You don’t put it over your mouth,” Sneezy joked back.
Mercer’s helmet was jacked into a communications console and the closed-circuit television was tested. The camera was placed on the bottom of the pod and on the four-inch flat screen he saw workers bent over the other capsules like something out of a sci-fi movie. He was shown the climate controls and ventilators and the mouthpiece for a specially concocted fruit beverage full of electrolytes and minerals. Two hours from the launch, he would draw from another tube. This brew contained stimulants and natural painkillers plus something to counter the effects of altitude sickness. Sykes warned Mercer that after drinking the potion it would be best if he didn’t submit to a drug test for a month or two.
“How do you feel, sir,” the tech asked, his hand on the lid ready to close Mercer in.
“Like I’m about to be interred.”
“Then you’re good to go.”
The lid came down and a vacuum system engaged to seal the MMU. Mercer cracked his jaw to adjust to the slight change in air pressure. The television screen was four inches over his face. The lighting inside the MMU was subtle and warm, a concession to the men who had to endure them for long flights.
A minute later Mercer’s pod rattled as the special cargo lift that had come with the team on the C-17 hoisted the MMU from its cradle and trundled over to the B-2. Clamps on the bomber’s rotary launcher clasped the capsule and drew it up into the bomb bay. No sooner had Mercer gotten comfortable again than another MMU was attached and the launcher spun. It was like being a bullet as it was loaded into a revolver. The launcher was designed to carry eight nuclear bombs and had been modified to carry four MMUs. The first four went into Mercer’s side of the aircraft, and the remaining were fed into the stealth bomber’s second bay.
External power cables were attached, as were the supplemental communications lines so the men could converse during the flight. After making each man call out his status, Sykes notified the pilots on the flight deck that the men were ready.
“Status board in the green, Doc. Taxi truck’s coming now. ATC gives us priority and there isn’t a recon satellite pass for another seventeen minutes. We’ll be cruising at a classified speed and at a classified altitude. Our flight time to target is also classified. So lay back and relax. We here at Cloak and Dagger Airways wish you a pleasant journey.”
The jagged winged aircraft was drawn from its revetment and pulled to a parking slot adjacent to the main runway. A ground crewman unhitched the tow tractor, snapped the pilot a crisp salute and motored away.
Deep in the B-2’s hull the first engine spun to life, followed seconds later by the other three. Although the powerful turbofans straddled the bomb bay, the noise level inside the soundproofed MMU was only slightly louder than what passengers experienced on an airliner.
The pilot performed one final test of the aircraft’s complicated control surfaces. Satisfied, he ran up the engines and the menacing plane began to roll under its own power.
In front of the aircraft, the end of the runway vanished in the wavering curtains of a heat mirage. Behind the plane, hot exhaust created the same effect so the bomber looked like a wraith enveloped in a chimera. Even on the ground the B-2 was otherworldly, like no aircraft ever built.
The engines’ roar turned into a scream as the Spirit picked up speed. Using less than a third of the runway, the B-2’s nose lifted and she took to the sky. The landing gear snapped closed as the bomber began climbing for the safety of the upper troposphere, high above commercial traffic.
From inside the bomb bay, the ascent felt smooth. The men made a few bad jokes and bantered for a while, but soon grew quiet as they settled in for the six hours of being locked in the MMUs with their thoughts and fears. After a while Mercer was able to forget where he was and what they were about to attempt. His mind drifted through countless random thoughts, and while he knew he should be thinking about the impending eruption on La Palma, he found himself focusing on Tisa.
Just one day and night with her had created a deeper impression on him than any woman he’d ever been with. He sought justifications and rationales for his thoughts and admitted that this wasn’t something he had conscious control over. He’d strayed from the path of what was logical and crossed into an emotional realm he seldom approached. The answer to the fundamental question of if he loved her wasn’t clear yet, but he did face the truth that he wanted to.
Mercer had earned the reputation as one of the best mining engineers and prospecting geologists in the world by making deliberate calculations and expertly assessing risk versus reward. Like so many other driven men he’d used those same analytical skills on his personal life as well. The result was a string of short but intense relationships that he ultimately cut short. The reasons were varied but underlying all the breakups was his belief that the affair would ultimately fail anyway and it was better for the women to have it end quickly. For the first time he got a sense that it was his own fear of getting hurt that made him end those other relationships. He wasn’t doing it to protect the women. He was doing it to protect himself. By breaking up quickly, he shielded himself from the risk of possible rejection and the associated doubts that came with it.
“Goddamned strange place for an epiphany,” he muttered as the plane streaked across the Indian Ocean.
And also for the first time, he believed in risking that kind of pain for the opportunity to be with Tisa. He had always been comfortable gambling with his life. That was part of any miner’s job. Now he was growing comfortable with risking his lifestyle too. He drifted to sleep with that thought foremost in his mind.
Hours later
, the internal intercom squawked to life. “Gentlemen, this is the flight deck. We’re about an hour from the border with Tibet. Not that we expected they would, but Indian civilian and military radars have failed to pick us up. However we’re approaching the Chinese air defense net. Once we get closer to the border we’ll be dropping to the deck and may be forced to find a route where their radar coverage is thinnest. There’s nothing to worry about, but you guys may get tossed around down there.” He clicked off, returned a second later, and quipped, “Oh, and depending on conditions we might have to dodge a mountain or two.”
The strategic bomber’s flight path had kept it over the ocean for as long as possible, allowing her to top her tanks with an aerial refueling from a KC-10 tanker over the Arabian Sea. The plane made landfall north of Bombay and headed in a northwesterly diagonal across India toward Nepal. Cruising at forty-five thousand feet, too high for anyone on the ground to see or hear, the B-2 still skirted all the major population centers as extra insurance.
Now that they were nearing the Himalayan foothills it was time to drop closer to the ground and employ the aircraft’s sophisticated terrain following/terrain avoidance (TA/FA) system. One of the one hundred sixty-two onboard computers would take control of the plane, mapping out and following a route through the mountains while at the same time keeping clear of Chinese radar installations. Even though the stealth’s shape and skin gave it the radar cross section of a bird, the classified radar-detection system made certain that even that small of a picture wouldn’t appear on an enemy’s scopes.
The final piece of stealth gear to be employed was perhaps the most classified on the aircraft. Because of its unusual shape and mission needs, the B-2 flew below the speed of sound. Had it been able to travel faster than the thunder of its own engines, like the B-1b Lancer, acoustical detection wouldn’t have been a concern. Even with the engines shielded within the hull to deaden some sound, the Spirit flew within an envelope of noise generated by its four turbofans and could be heard coming miles off at low level. To counter this, the design team created an antinoise generator, a device that matched the frequency of the sound waves and produced waves of its own at the exact opposite amplitude. While consuming an enormous amount of fuel, the top secret apparatus effectively canceled out the jet’s bellowing roar. With the device in operation and at five hundred knots, the B-2 sounded barely louder than a well-tuned Harley-Davidson.