I swept my arm left, then right. The SEALs moved into the shadows. I moved forward, following the path Jew had left me, until I came to the chain-link fence. I found the slit he’d made, took my snips and enlarged it slightly, then puüed myself through.
Once on the other side I slipped behind some scrub, took out my night-vision glasses, and secured the strap tightly around the back of my head. I didn’t wear them all the time because they tend to narrow your field of vision when you’re moving. And they made me slightly top-heavy, but now, when I needed to see inside a darkened building, they’d give me a terrific advantage.
I had a look around. All clear. I moved out, the MP5 cradled in my arms as I scrunched across the ground, moving silently from tree to tree to take the best advantage I could of the natural cover. Scanned the perimeter. Clear — nothing.
No muzzles pointing from any of the roofs. No signs of life at all. I liked that.
Fifty feet from the warehouse I nicked the MP5’s safety downward to full fire, rose into a semicrouch and ran to the eander-block wall.
The building was perhaps a hundred and fifty feet by sixty, topped by corrugated metal roofing that sat on exposed metal trusses, which allowed air flow in the tropical heat. Back and front entrances were heavy, fifteen-foot-wide, sliding, segmented metal doors that sat in tracks. On the side was a twostep, roofed porch and a metal, windowed door that led to some sort of office. There was light inside. On each side of the door were windows. In the left-hand one a rusting air conditioner wheezed and dripped water slowly, steadily, into a sizable puddle. That told me it had been turned on for some time.
I worked my way around the back end of the warehouse and snuck a look. It was all clear,‘t-did a 360. Nothing. This was like stealing — no, this was better than stealing. I slowly edged up to the big, tracked door, moving a fraction of an inch at a time so as to make no noise. There was a small space between the segments, and sucking ground like a snail, I approached slowly, slowly, and had a look-see. For all I knew the Ts inside had NV glasses, too, and I didn’t want ’cm screwing with me.
I let my eyes get accustomed to the interior. It looked quiet enough. The place was empty except for some 50-gallon drums piled along the wall to my left, and what looked like a threequarter-ton Army truck parked close to the tracked doors opposite where I was. There was a scaffolding around the outer wall perhaps ten feet up, six or seven feet below the ventilation break where the walls stopped and the roof began.
Sitting on a wood pallet close to a door under which a crack of light escaped was a wooden crate about the same size a 2,000-pound bomb came packed in. That had to be the nuke.
Something was… not right. It was too quiet. I crushed my face into the hard ground to get a better look. It was impossible they’d leave the jewels unprotected, unless they didn’t know what they’d taken.
No way. It was a trap. Had to be a trap. I waited. Plotted.
Schemed. Laughed silently at these assholes. It was a game of patience. It all came down to patience; would I move first, or would they.
I knew they were in there. I could sense ‘em. Almost smell ’em. I controlled my breathing, slowed my whole system down the same way I’d done when I’d learned I could sit on the bottom of Norfolk harbor for three and a half minutes at a stretch during UDT training.
Oh, the fucking instructors — they loved me when I ran that game on ‘em.
During E&E — evade and escape — training, they’d make us play hide-and-seek. They’d dump us in the water and then put boats out to search for us. It was like shooting fish in a barrel — you can’t swim fast enough to get away from boats with lights, and you gotta surface to breathe. To make it more interesting (and to give us some added incentive), the instructors usually pounded the crap out of you when they caught you, and they were tough sons of bitches, too.
So I cheated. That’s what E&E’s supposed to be about, anyway. I lost ‘em by swimming like a bat out of hell until I was just off the slip of the Kiptopeake-Norfolk ferry — on the far side, so the ferry would come between them and me.
Timing was everything. I waited until the ferry got real close, then made a lot of noise in the water. When they caught me in the lights, I dove. I swam underwater about thirty yards to the slip and sucked mud while the ferryboat docked, sitting on the bottom holding on to a filthy, greasy piling with the big screw churning eight feet above my head chunka-chunkachunka. Then I came out of the water, checked to see if the instructors were anywhere close. They weren’t. So I chucked my mask and fins, climbed up over the port side of the stem onto the ferry, stole a set of mechanic’s overalls out of a locker, and walked right out onto the dock. Nobody noticed I was barefoot.
I studied them as they crisscrossed the harbor, searching for me for about half an hour. Then I ambled off the slip, bought a quart of beer with some change I found in the coveralls, came back, and drank almost all of it dockside. Then, when I was good and ready, I whistled and waved ‘em over.
I let them watch as I drained the last of the beer and tossed the bottle into the harbor. Oh, they loved me for that. I don’t know what made ‘em madder — that I got away, or that I bought beer and didn’t share it.
Something moved. Behind the drums. Something back there. I waited. Looked intently at the truck. Something there, too. One or two in the back, muzzles protruding just over the back gate. M16s probably. Combat-scoped? Maybe.
Just inside the door I heard a scrape-scraping. Just a little something — the shifting of a foot or a rifie butt on the door.
I froze. No breathing. Chunka-chunka-chunka. Wait the sons of bitches out.
Only after some minutes did I withdraw the way I’d come, silently, inch by inch, careful not to leave tracks behind. I made my way around the side of the warehouse, did another 360. It was still clear. I slid myself along the wall to the window with the air conditioner, went under it, around the two-step porch, removed my goggles, and let my eyes adjust to the night again. Then I peered inside.
A middle-aged man with dark skin, dressed in a bulky, short-sleeved sweatshirt and greasy, khaki trousers sat behind a desk facing me. He was wearing wraparound plastic shooter’s goggles — a giveaway that this was Memorex, not real— and he wrote intently in a spiral notebook with the stub of ‘ an old pencil, his thick lips moving as he formed the words.
A bottle of Bud sat sweating at his left elbow. A blue steel .45 automatic lay next to it. He looked up from the page, ran a hand over thinning, kinky, salt-and-pepper hair. A broad face. A nose that had been broken too many times. Slit, yellowed eyes. Maybe fifty-five or so. Powerful, workingman’s ‘ hands that were obviously uncomfortable with the pencil.
I dropped back down onto my haunches and withdrew to „. the underbrusb cover where I’d left the platoon. I briefed the squad leaders about the ambush. Everybody had night-vision equipment. They’d hit the doors simultaneously, working op‘ posing fields of fire so they wouldn’t shoot each other. One Squad would go left and high, working the truck and catwalk, the other would mirror — left and low, taking down the oil drums and opposite catwalk. I’d take down the guy in the office and come out by the nuke.
I pressed the Motorola’s remote transmit button that was cHpped to my vest. The radio could be used either in an onoff mode, or switched to continual transmission. “One set.”
I whispered.
I heard PV’s voice. “Two set.” The hostage snatch team was in position.
Cheeks checked in. “Three set.” Barracks sweepers were ready.
“Four set.” Jew’s blocking force was primed.
I looked at my watch. We’d been on the ground for fortyseven minutes. The operation was scheduled to last ninety, so our four choppers were already in the air, being refueled, and just under three-quarters of an hour away from touchdown. That gave us a shm, but acceptable, margin for error.
I turned the Motorola on. “Six minutes. Then go.” Plenty of time to set up.
I gave hand signals and wa
tched the squads move out. They knew their jobs. Each had become a superb shooter over the past five months. We didn’t train with regulation targets at SEAL Team Six. We used three-by-five-inch index cards pasted onto silhouettes. You had to be able to hit the card with a double-tap — that is, two shots in rapid succession— whether you were coming out of the water with the stainless Smith & Wesson .357 magnum pistol, or breaking through the hatch of a hijacked airplane with the Beretta.
Right-handed, left-handed, one-handed, two-handed, we shot in every conceivable manner. In fact, I didn’t care how my guys shot, just so long as they hit tight, man-killing groups every single time. No concentrating on fancy angles or head shots. Those techniques are what you see in movies, not Six.
We used heavy loads that would knock terrorisis down no matter where we hit them. Head, chest, arm, leg — it didn’t matter. In sniping — at ranges of six hundred and eight hundred yards — we were still a little behind the curve. But overall, my shooters were better than any in the world today, including Delta’s much publicized pistoleros.
I knew PV was in position. Six of his shooters would take out the bad guys holding the hostage; the others would clear any remaining terrorists. He had two medics with him in case the hostage was injured or hurt. Cheeks’ two squads would tiose the barracks if the tangos inside got restless. My guys bad a somewhat tougher job. They’d have to set up and blow die doors, then hit the ambushers in the dark, while I took out the guy in the office. After that we’d have to figure out a way to move the nuke back to the LZ — or render it unusable.
The digital timer on my watch was running. It showed one minute forty seconds elapsed. I was Just under the air conditioner now, cool water dripping onto my shoulder. It felt fpod. My mind’s eye had a picture of the tango behind the desk. I’d catch him in the chest. The Beretta was in my hand, ready. In my earpiece I could hear PV, Cheeks, and Indian-Jew’s breathing on the open lines. They could probably hear me,too.
A minute fifty. Four minutes, ten seconds to contact.
Suddenly automatic weapons fire broke out to the southwest. At the same time I heard PV’s voice: “Shit — early contact, early contact — everybody go.”
There was no time to lose. I rose, swiveled, and kicked the door just below the handle.
It burst inward. The dark man in the sweatshirt was already Standing, pistol in his hand, as I came through low, Beretta in a two-handed grip. Before he could react I hit him with half a dozen shots in the chest. I fired so quickly the 9mm sounded like a submachine gun.
The loads punched him back against the wall. His .45 went flying. A dark stain spread from the center of his chest. I ejected the clip and slapped a spare, from a mag-holder taped to my right wrist, into the Beretta’s rubber-clad grip.
I looked up as I heard two explosions in rapid succession behind the office. The other two squads had initiated.
I grabbed the spiral notebook and did a cursory search for documents. There were three manila files in a desk drawer and I took them, too, rolling them and stuffing them into the cargo pocket of my fatigues. I hit the office lights to get my eyes ready for the NV goggles. I took out the SATCOM and told JSOC we’d initiated contact early, and to expedite the snatch. Four minutes may not seem like a lot of time, but on a hot LZ it’s an eternity.
I strapped my NV on and slid through the door into the warehouse, Beretta in my right hand. In my earpiece came the sound of heavy automatic weapons fire, followed by Cheeks’ raspy voice, “Well, get the mothers, already!”
The front and back doors had been blown open, and smoke grenades were filling the warehouse with opaque, white fog.
I could hear my guys working the room and the staccato buzzsaw brrrrrp of return fire from M16s.
It was easy to tell who was who. The SEALs fired their MP5s in controlled, three-shot bursts. The bad guys were letting whole mags go at once.
I crawled to the pallet and reached left-handed into my vest for an atomic detection device. There was movement behind me, and it wasn’t one of us. I swiveled and fired at a shadow in the smoke, then rolled back toward the pallet.
The indicator told me whatever was in the crate was nuclear.
I heard PV’s voice in my ear. “Hostage clear. Alive and well.”
“Okay. Cheeks?”
“Call you back.”
“Jew?”
“A-okay.”
From my left I heard the Alpha squad leader, Fingers, shouting, “Alpha side clear.”
There was another long M16 burst from the far side of the warehouse, then six shots in rapid succession from a Beretta, then silence. Gold Dust Larry, Brave’s squad leader, called out, “Bravo side clear.”
I pulled off the night-vision goggles and stowed them.
“Anybody down?”
“Not us, boss.”
“pv?”
“Nope.”
“Cheeks?”
“No.”
“Jew?”
“Ain’t seen no action yet. Skipper.”
“You won’t be disappointed.” I looked at the timer. Seven minutes, ten seconds.
I pulled SATCOM from my vest. “Six — all sites clear. Hostage and package under control. Nobody down but bad guys.”
That was because we were all firing blanks — but even so, it was damned good work by my guys. I stood up and secured my Berelta, windmilling my arms in the opaque, white smoke that still obscured much of the warehouse. “Anybody see a fan to get this smoke outta here? Let’s get on it.” I slapped the wood crate and called over to Gold Dust Larry, “Somebody get the three-quarter started. Let’s get this goddamn thing loaded and moving.”
“Aye-aye, Skipper.”
“pv—”
“Boss?”
“ETA to the LZ?”
“The hostage is pretty shaky. We’re gonna have to carry him out. Tangos were working him over when we arrived— nothing serious, just harassment, but he’s not used to it. I’ll be ready to up and out in six, seven minutes.”
“Ten-four. Cheeks?”
“I’m getting some hostile action here. I’ll withdraw clean in four to five minutes. We got a shitload of intel, Skipper.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” I heard a satisfying roar as Gold Dust Larry revved the truck’s engine. “Gotta go. See you at the LZ.”
The smoke was finally clearing out of the warehouse.
“Somebody find a couple of two-by-fours or pieces of pipe.
Let’s get this thing moved.“
I checked the Casio again. Elapsed time: sixty-three minutes. Twenty-seven minutes until the choppers touched down.
God, how time flies when you’re having fun.
We slid three rails under the crate. Four men to a rail, and two to stand guard. I showed them the atomic particle counter. They watched as the indicator moved into the red zone. “This shit is radioactive, so any numb-nuts dumb enough to drop it is gonna suffer. On three, heave and up.”
It was like the weightpile, but easier. The average Six bench press was just under four hundred pounds. It wasn’t going to take twelve of us to lift a 2,500-pound container, but I wanted everyone to have a piece of the action.
I watched them load while I checked the recon photo in my pocket. I’d marked an escape route with crayon. That was a stupid thing to do. What if I ate a bullet and the bad guys pulled the map out of my pocket? I rubbed the photo on my fatigues until I’d obliterated the red line, I knew where the hell we were going.
Gold Dust Larry rolled the balaclava hood down onto his neck, revealing a crooked, gritty smile on his mustached face as he held the truck on course- I hung off the passenger-side running board and navigated. As we came to the gate, I saw Horserace, who’d just cut the locks. As he waved us through, I heard firing from the barracks area. “Just keep moving.”
It took us a little over ten minutes to make the LZ where we’d touched down. We parked the truck at the side of the old runway, set up a perimeter, and waited. About five minutes la
ter PVs platoon arrived, he and one of the petty officers supporting a thin, gray-haired man well past middle age, in a filthy white shirt and stained gray trousers, and a pair of heavy-framed eyeglasses worn with an elastic band to keep them on his head. I went over to him and shook his hand.
“You all right, sir?”
He nodded. “A bit shaky, Commander.”
The accent was pure Deutschland. I wondered where they’d found him. It didn’t matter. I role-played as if I didn’t know we were all following a script. “German?”
“Yes- Thank you for coming for me.”
I did an exaggerated Three Musketeers bow. “Commander Otto Von Piffle at your service,” I said in a passable Otto Preminger accent. “It vass mein pleasure to koming to der rescue because zay heff vays of making you talk, you know.”
The hostage’s eyes went wide.
PV spoke a burst of rapid-fire German. He’d learned the language during a 26-month stint with the Kampfschwimmerkompanie — the combat swimmers who were the West German equivalent of SEALs. The hostage laughed.
“What’d you tell him?”
“I told him, ‘What the commander meant to say,is that he’s glad you’re okay.’ Then I added that you’re not as stupid or ugly as you might appear at first sight.”
PVs two squads reinforced the perimeter. The watch said nine minutes until the choppers arrived. Cheeks and his two squads showed up moving at a trot. Four or five of the SEALs carried boxes on their shoulders.
“Intel goodies,” Cheeks said. “All sorts of stuff — plans, maps, receipts. And diagrams — bases in Puerto Rico and on the mainland, too. The DIA dip-dunks’ll have a field day with it all.”
I threw an exaggerated salute at Cheeks. “I do love it so when you make the dip-dunks happy, Lieutenant. It keeps ‘em off my back.”
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