Drone Strike: A Dreamland Thriller (Dale Brown's Dreamland)

by Dale Brown

  He could deal with that, if it turned out to be the case. It would be far easier to explain than letting saboteurs get away.

  The colonel continued his circuit around the vehicle. He’d been on his way to the destroyed lab when the report of the stolen school bus was relayed to him. Khorasani had decided to follow a hunch, joining the investigation personally. It was risky on many counts. But it did allow him to say he was pursuing his leads with vigor.

  And vigor was the word he would have to use for the pilot: he had followed his orders well. The vehicle had been utterly demolished.

  Good, perhaps, if there were questions.

  “A phone,” said Private Navid, pulling at a brick of melted plastic and metal that had melted to one of the bodies. “Or a radio.”

  It was tangled with other material—cloth and hair, skin and a bone that snapped as easily as if it had been a brittle twig. Navid handed it to him.

  The phone would have fit easily in Khorasani’s hand, but the debris that had melted to it was two or three times as large. Khorasani turned it over, unable to discern anything from it.

  A satellite phone, maybe? An Israeli would have one.

  Or a cell phone, which a member of the Guard would have. The remains were too mangled to tell.

  “Colonel, the ayatollah wishes to speak.” Khorasani’s communications aide had walked up unobtrusively. He handed him the secure sat phone.

  It was twice the size of the one in the wreck. Khorasani handed the melted mess back to Navid and told him to put it in his staff car.

  “Reverence,” he said, putting the phone to his ear.

  “What progress have you made?” asked the ayatollah.

  “We have found the men who stole the bus. They are dead.”

  “All of them?”

  “Yes, your excellency.”

  “They were responsible for the explosion?”

  Khorasani hesitated. Saying yes would simplify things for him, but it could also come back to haunt him as well.

  “I have no evidence yet. The Israelis are very clever and would do much to disguise themselves.”

  “But you are sure they were responsible.”

  Khorasani considered what to say.

  “Be honest,” the ayatollah reminded him before he made up his mind.

  “I have no indication that any outsides were near the facility,” confessed Khorasani. “I am only starting my investigation. This seemed like a good lead, but to be frank, I see nothing at the moment that connects it. And my aides—the preliminary inquiries would suggest an accident. Everything we have seen suggests no one was aboveground when the explosion occurred.”

  “You are saying it could have been a quake.”

  “I’ve been told that is . . . unlikely.”

  The ayatollah, who was a member of the ruling council, had undoubtedly been told the same. He let the matter drop. “Have you spoken to the pilot who shot down the plane?” he asked instead. “Find out what he saw. Perhaps it was a B-2.”

  “That is on my agenda, your excellency.” The wreckage had been recovered; it was a light plane, flown by a man tentatively identified as an Iranian. Perhaps he was a spy, but more likely an unfortunate smuggler bound for Iraq. Considerable money could be earned ferrying certain people and items from the country. But pointing that out would not be useful at the moment.

  “Report to me. Speak to no one else.”

  The line went dead. Khorasani handed the phone back to his aide. “Tell Major Milanian that I wish to speak to him as quickly as possible. He will need to investigate this site. It would be best if he could get here before it is much darker.”

  “Yes, Colonel.”

  “The pilot—the one who shot the plane down last night. Find out where he is stationed. I wish to speak to him.”

  “I believe it is the same squadron that responded to the vehicle,” said the aide.

  “Really?”

  “They were given responsibility for this area.”

  “Excellent. Find his name,” said Khorasani, walking to his vehicle.

  4

  Washington, D.C.

  “SENATOR, HE INSISTS IT’S PERSONAL. HE’S NOT HERE for funding, or legislation. He really emphasized that.”

  Zen frowned at the intercom. It was his own fault, though; wanting to get Rodriguez off the phone when he’d been at the baseball game, he invited him to come in person whenever he wanted.

  Even that would have been acceptable had the Nationals not proceeded to give up six runs in the top of the first.

  “All right. Send him in.” Zen wheeled out from behind the desk. By the time Cheryl knocked and opened the door, he was sitting a few feet from the door.

  “Senator.” Rodriguez, visibly nervous, extended his hand.

  “Gerry. How are you?” Zen shook his hand. The night before, he thought he vaguely remembered Rodriguez. Now he couldn’t place him at all. “It’s been too long.”

  He nearly bit his tongue. He hated being a BS artist—it was the normal political crap: beentoolong, howareya, goodtaseeya, wereallymustgettogethermoreoften.

  Trivial phrases, meaningless, expected, but using them made him feel like a phony.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d remember me,” said Rodriguez.

  “I don’t,” admitted Zen. “Not well, anyway. Dreamland seems like a million years ago.”

  “I know. It was, um, well, the experiments didn’t go that well. So, um . . . I guess I’ve changed quite a lot.”

  Rodriguez—the friendly junior doctor who’d worked out with him pre-experiment?

  Yes.

  “Sure—you jogged with me while I used my chair, right? Or maybe it was a fast walk.”

  “Definitely a jog,” said the scientist. “If not a run.”

  “You’ve gained a little weight, Jersey,” said Zen, suddenly remembering Rodriguez’s nickname. “You’re not running anymore, I’m guessing.”

  “I do, but a lot less than I should. And, uh, a hernia operation a couple of years ago slowed me down.” He gently patted his stomach. “Put on about twenty pounds I haven’t been able to get rid of.”

  More like thirty or forty, thought Zen, but now that he knew who Rodriguez was, he felt more comfortable. “So what have you been up to?”

  “Well, I left Nevada for a few years, to work at Stanford. Then I came back with the Spinal Cell Clinic. I, uh, well, I helped start it. I’m one of the partners.” Rodriguez shifted in the chair. “I—we’ve been doing very interesting, very important work over the past few years. I guess, well maybe you saw the piece on 60 Minutes the other night on Mark Huntington.” Rodriguez sat.

  “He was one of your cases?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact. As you saw, he can walk now.”

  “I met him,” said Zen. “I met him right after his accident at the bowl game. And I saw him again a few weeks ago. You’re right. He can walk. It’s a phenomenal story.”

  “There’s a lot of hope for the procedure.”

  Zen glanced quickly at his watch. It wasn’t a dodge; the Iranian “earthquake” had greatly complicated his schedule. “Doc, I have a lot of things I have to do today, including getting down to the floor in ten minutes. You’ve sold me. You have my backing. Tell Cheryl what you need. To the extent that I can help—”

  “I’m not looking for backing. Or money. We’re funded through the next decade. And, to be honest, the patents—we may actually, um, stand to make a considerable amount of money.”

  “Well, why are you here?”

  “We want to try the process on someone who was injured at least ten years ago. Someone in good shape, willing to put the time in. Someone we already had a lot of baseline information on. You’d be the perfect candidate.”

  5

  Washington, D.C.

  ONCE UPON A TIME, MAR
K STONER HAD BEEN A CIA paramilitary officer. He had been a good one. Even exceptional. Paras, as they were often called, were all highly accomplished, but Stoner stood out as a man of great skill, courage, and flexibility. He had worked with some of the best operators in the Agency’s clandestine service, and in other agencies as well, including the secret Air Force units that operated out of Dreamland.

  Stoner had no memory of any of that. He had seen all of the records of his missions, scant as they were; none were familiar. On the bad days he could feel the echo of long-ago wounds he’d suffered. But he could make no link between the aches and pains and whatever had caused them.

  His mind was a blank when it came to his past. He had no retained memory of anything beyond the past few months. He couldn’t remember his elementary school days, his high school years, college. He didn’t know the names of his teachers or the faces of his best friends. He could close his eyes and think of his childhood home and it wouldn’t be there. He couldn’t remember the faces of his mother and father—long dead, he was told—not even with the help of photographs.

  The doctors who treated him sometimes said it would be better that way.

  Stoner had been through an extremely rough time. Captured after a horrendous crash in Eastern Europe, he had become a human experiment. Designer drugs and steroids were pumped into his body to rebuild his muscles and erase his will. He’d been made into an assassin, controlled by a criminal organization in the dark recesses of the old Soviet empire.

  Better not to know, said the doctors. Even his friend Zen Stockard agreed.

  Stoner didn’t have an opinion, particularly. Opinions belonged to a realm beyond him, housed in a metaphysical building some towns away. The only thing he cared about now were his present surroundings—a gym on a quiet campus of a federal prison. Stoner wasn’t a prisoner, exactly; he just had no other place to go, at least not where the government could keep an eye on him.

  For his own protection, the doctors said.

  Stoner looked at the boxing gloves on his hands, checking the tape. Then he began hitting the weighted bag. It gave slightly with each punch, though never so much that he felt as if he were a superman.

  Jab-jab-punch. He danced left, jabbed some more, then moved right. He wasn’t a boxer. He could box, but he wasn’t a boxer. He just hit the bag for something to do.

  “Hey, Mark. How’s it going?”

  Stoner stopped in mid-jab and looked behind him. Danny Freah was standing near the door next to two of Stoner’s doctors—Dr. Peralso and Dr. Rosen. Rosen was the case doctor; Peralso was the head of the psychiatric section responsible for him.

  Both men were afraid of Stoner. It was obvious from the way their eyes darted when he approached.

  Danny wasn’t afraid. He was a friend. But his eyes betrayed a different emotion: pity.

  Stoner greatly preferred fear.

  “Danny, hi.” He turned back and began pounding the bag again.

  As he continued to wail away, he heard the three men walking across the large gymnasium floor toward him. His senses of hearing and sight were greatly improved, thanks to the ordeal he couldn’t remember. Or so the doctors said.

  Stoner slammed his fists against the thick canvas. It didn’t really feel good, but it didn’t feel bad. It just was.

  Finally, he turned toward Danny.

  “Business?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” Danny nodded. “A couple of weeks ago you told me you wanted something to do. Well I have something. It’s not easy. Actually, the odds are against success.”

  Stoner shrugged. “Sounds good.”

  DANNY FOLLOWED STONER AND THE DOCTORS DOWN the long hallway. His friend’s reaction was exactly what he had expected. There’d be no joy or disappointment, no excitement, and no fear. He wondered if Stoner really understood.

  The doctors, though they didn’t know the actual outlines of the mission, clearly suspected it was suicidal, because they began peppering Stoner with objections from the moment he agreed. They were still at it now, talking about “treatment modalities” and “long-term rest.”

  Stoner ignored them, continuing to his room. He pressed his index finger against the reader at the lock, then raised his head so the laser reader embedded above the door could measure his face. The biometric check took only a few seconds. The door snapped open as the security system recognized him.

  The room was as spare as a Buddhist monk’s. A bed covered with a single sheet sat in the middle of the room. There were no blankets, no pillows. An orange vinyl chair sat in the corner. Stoner’s clothes, the few he had, were closeted behind a set of folding doors opposite the bed. Having removed his gloves while walking down the hall, he pulled the last bit of tape from them and dropped it in a nearby wastepaper basket. He put the gloves on one of the shelves, then started to change.

  “Do you want privacy?” Danny asked.

  “Why?”

  Danny backed out of the room anyway. The doctors stayed. He guessed they were continuing to argue with Stoner about not going.

  Danny didn’t mind. Part of him agreed with them.

  Stoner emerged from the room, dressed in jeans and a black T-shirt.

  “Is that all you’re taking?” Danny asked.

  “Do I need anything else?”

  “No. I guess not.”

  Stoner glanced at the two doctors, who had fallen silent.

  “I don’t know when I’ll be back,” he told them.

  They walked together to Danny’s car, neither man talking. Danny got in, but hesitated before turning the key to the ignition.

  “This may be a suicide mission,” he said, staring straight out the front window. “Assuming it’s authorized, you’ll be dropped into Iran. It’s doubtful they’d keep you alive if you are captured.”

  “OK.”

  “You have to locate someone,” added Danny. “An American. He may be in custody by the time the mission is approved. If so, the mission will continue.”

  “OK.”

  “He can’t be allowed to tell the Iranians anything.”

  “OK.”

  Danny turned to look at Stoner. The former CIA officer was looking straight ahead, as if he were watching a movie. It would have to be a boring movie, as his face was expressionless.

  “You’ll have to leave promptly.”

  “Sure.”

  “Immediately.”

  “Yes.”

  “You can say no,” Danny told him.

  “Understood. Let’s go.”

  6

  Iran

  THEY HID THE CAR ABOUT THREE MILES FROM THE CAVE that would be their sanctuary, parking it behind a ramshackle cottage off Highway 81 that the advance team had scouted a few weeks before. Grease arranged some threads on the seat as markers to tell them if it had been disturbed—the last of their surveillance devices had been destroyed with the truck—and then ran to join Turk and Gorud in the pickup. Grease suggested he’d drive, but Gorud insisted on staying at the wheel. He was better with the language.

  Turk, exhausted, slumped in the middle, giving way to fatigue. He drifted into a vague sleep. Li was there, walking with him, talking. They were in Sicily, though not anywhere that he could remember being, even though it felt very familiar.

  The beach was made of rocks rather than sand. Surf frothed up, running over their shoes and pants—he was in his dress uniform; Li was wearing shorts and a T-shirt that clung between her breasts.

  A truck careened down on the beach. It was the military vehicle the team had been driving when they first met.

  Dread was at the wheel, eyes fixed on some destination beyond them, in the water. When the truck drew near, Grease leapt from the back. The truck burst into flames as it reached the water’s edge.

  It exploded. Li ran. Turk turned and saw Grease coming at him, an AK-47 aimed at his skull—r />
  “Hey, come on. You’re too damn heavy to carry.”

  Turk bolted from the dream back into reality. Grease was standing outside the truck, leaning in and shaking him. They were in the cave.

  Turk shook his head, as if that might shake off the horrible image that lingered.

  “You’re drooling,” said Grease. “I hope she was worth it.”

  Turk wiped his mouth as he got out. There was a faint bluish glow to his right. He walked toward it, cautious at first, worried that he was still in the dream.

  He found a turn and was nearly blinded by the flood of late afternoon sun. Gorud, an AK-47 cradled in his arms, knelt on one knee behind some rocks ahead. The mouth of the cave was another fifty feet away, up a gentle slope.

  “How long did I sleep?” Turk asked the CIA officer.

  “A bit.”

  “I don’t remember getting here.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “This place is bigger than I thought it would be.”

  Gorud said nothing. A pair of binoculars sat on the rock right in front of him.

  “Mind if I take a look?” asked Turk, reaching for them. Gorud didn’t stop him.

  From their vantage point they had a good view of the countryside, speckled with more green than the area they were in the day before. A wide expanse of concrete sat in the distance; he focused the binoculars, moved them around, then finally satisfied himself that he was looking at a runway. He couldn’t see any planes, except for the glowing white carcasses of two old trainers—Texans, he thought, though from this distance it was impossible to tell.

  “That’s an airport?” he asked Gorud.

  “Was. They only use it to fly equipment and VIPs in and out now,” said the CIA officer.

  “We could use it to get out.”

  “There are no planes there. The standing orders direct that any air force plane attempting to land there be shot down. If the pilot survives, he’s to be shot summarily. We thought of using it,” added Gorud. “Too risky getting in with anything smaller than two full companies. Didn’t work.”