by Brad Thor
Amanda used her poles to push herself forward and picked up more speed. One of the agents skiing to the right of Scot shot him a look suggesting, Somebody’s cruisin’ for a bruisin’— and before Scot could return the look, Amanda caught an edge and tumbled down hard. First she lost a pole and then a ski, then the other pole and the other ski.
When she finally came to a stop, her gear was scattered across thirty feet of snow uphill from where she lay. Scot caught up to her as she stopped sliding.
“Impressive! If you’re gonna go, go big. That’s what I always say.”
Amanda was on the verge of tears, her pride hurting more than anything else.
“That’s not funny,” she said, sniffling.
“I’m sorry. You’re right; it’s not funny. Are you okay?”
“What do you care?” she said, wiping the snow from her face.
Scot started to laugh.
“It’s not funny, Scot. Cut it out!”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry, Mandie. You were really flying, though. You looked good. Right up until the point you biffed. You know, we should have tagged your gear before you decided to have a yard sale.”
“Stop it!” Amanda managed before breaking into a fit of laughter.
“Oh, so that was a mistake? There wasn’t supposed to be a yard sale today? Whoa, then I better gather up the merchandise before we upset any of the neighbors.”
He told Amanda to sit still and joined Secret Service agent Maxwell, who was uphill gathering her equipment. When Scot reached Maxwell, he saw that he was staring into the distance at the presidential party making their way down Death Chute.
“Glad I’m not on that detail,” said Maxwell as he handed Scot one of Amanda’s skis.
Scot dusted the snow out of the binding, checking for damage as he waited for the next ski. “Maxwell, the reason you’re not on that detail is that when it comes to skiing, you suck.”
“Fuck you, Harvath,” said Maxwell as he shoved the other ski at him, confident he was out of Amanda’s earshot.
“No, seriously. I heard that Warren Miller was looking to shoot a little footage of you for his next ski film. It’s going to be a spin-off of that movie Beastmaster, only worse. He’s going to call it Biffmaster. Nothing but your wipeouts—”
“Fuck you.”
“I’m not kidding. Nothing but three hours of wall-to-wall Maxwell face down in the snow.”
“Fuck you.”
“There’ll be some of those trademark Maxwell-fully-geared somersaults, some awesome face plants…I think you could be up for an Oscar, my friend.”
“Harvath, which part of fuck you do you not understand? I mean, I’m good to go on explaining either of the two words to you—”
Scot laughed as Maxwell lost his balance reaching over to pick up one of Amanda’s ski poles.
Looking off toward Death Chute, Scot, too, could see the president and his detail still making their way down. The detail was doing a good job of keeping up with him. Everybody was right on the money. As he turned to take Amanda’s gear back to her, he glanced once more at Death Chute, just in time to see the president’s group near the trees and two Secret Service agents wipe out.
Maxwell had already recovered and gone down to Amanda. He was handing over her poles when Scot skied up.
“Well, Maxwell, it looks like the heat will be off your skiing at dinner tonight.”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I think I just saw Ahern and Houchins bite it going into that part of the chute with the trees. But, with all the snow falling, it’s hard to tell.”
“At least I’m not the only one who bought it this afternoon,” said Amanda as she got to her feet and dusted the remaining snow off her jacket.
“I told you,” said Scot, “the end of the day is when most wipeouts happen. You’re more tired than you think, and some people push it a little too hard.”
Agent Maxwell took the skis from Scot and let Amanda lean on his shoulder for balance as she put them on. “I hope nobody hit a tree,” he said.
“That’s a good point,” responded Scot as he engaged his throat mike. “Sound, this is Norseman. Do we need to send the Saint Bernards and schnapps down for Ahern and Houchins? Over.”
Scot’s radio hissed and crackled. There was no response. He tried again.
“If either of them blew their knees, I’ve got a buddy here who’s a great surgeon. Tell Ahern and Houchins I’ll split the commission with them if they use my guy. Over.”
He waited longer this time, but there was still nothing but static.
“Sound, this is Norseman; we saw two agents go down. Can you give us a sit rep. Over?”
Sit rep was short for “situation report.” The president had probably pushed his guys just a little too far and just a little too fast for the end of the day. This really was the most common time for wipeouts. Ahern and Houchins were probably all right, but as head of the advance team, Scot felt responsible for every agent and wanted to know for sure.
“Sound, this is Norseman. Let’s have that sit rep. Over.”
Nothing.
Scot decided to change frequencies to the direct channel with the Secret Service command post. The blowing snow was beginning to pick up again. “Birdhouse, this is Norseman, come in. Over.”
“Scot, I’m getting cold,” said Amanda as she snapped into her bindings.
“Quiet a sec, Mandie.”
Scot pressed the earpiece further into his ear, but all he got was crackling static.
“Birdhouse, repeat, this is Norseman, come in. Over.” Scot waited.
“Birdhouse, repeat, this is Norseman. Can you read me? Over.”
More static.
Agent Maxwell looked at Scot, who shook his head to indicate he hadn’t made any contact.
“What do you think?” said Maxwell.
“I don’t know, and I don’t want to cry wolf to the rest of Goldilocks’s detail just yet. I’ll try my Deer Valley radio. If that doesn’t work, then we harden up.” Harden up was the Secret Service term for immediately closing ranks and body-shielding their assignment from any potential threat.
Scot tried three times to raise Deer Valley’s ski patrol and then tried Deer Valley’s operations station. There was no response. All of the radios were completely down. Scot let out a loud whistle, catching the attention of the rest of the detail agents, and gave the harden up command by waving his gloved index finger in a high circle the wagons motion above his head.
In a matter of seconds, Amanda’s protective detail had her completely surrounded. There was an incredible array of weaponry drawn, from Heckler & Koch MP5s to SIG-Sauer semiautomatics, and even a modified Benelli M1 tactical shotgun. The men’s eyes never stopped surveying the area as Scot explained that he had seen two of the president’s detail agents go down and all radio communication was dark.
There probably was a simple explanation. Ahern and Houchins could just have wiped out, and the radios had been acting up all day, with the weather the most likely culprit, but that was not how the Secret Service was trained to think.
Operating procedure dictated that they take the fastest and safest route back to the command center immediately. With the loss of radio contact, Birdhouse would already have scrambled intercept teams to recover both details as quickly as possible. But they were still a long way off. It was time to move.
Amanda saw her chance to break in and asked, “Scot, what’s going on?”
“Probably nothing, Mandie, but we need to get you back down to the house as quickly as possible,” said Scot. “You’ve done an awesome job today. I’m really proud of you. Your skiing is red-hot. Now, the normal way we go home would take us a bit too long. If we ski through the bowl, I can have you sipping hot chocolate by the fire with your dad in fifteen minutes. What do you say?”
“This is about him, isn’t it? Has something happened? Is he okay?”
“I’m sure he is, and the quicker we get back, the quicker you�
�ll see for yourself. Do you think you can do the bowl with me? I’ll be right next to you.”
“I don’t know. I think I can handle it.”
“Good girl.”
Scot smiled reassuringly at Amanda and gave the order to move out. The detail dropped over the icy lip into the steep bowl. The wind grew more fierce and sent sharp blasts of snow into their faces. Amanda was slow, but at least she was moving forward. It was terrifying for her, but to her credit, she was doing everything Scot had taught her—weight on the downhill ski in the turns, leaning forward into her boots, and keeping her hands out in front as if she were holding on to a tray.
Even though Amanda’s cautious skiing slowed them down, it looked as if they were going to make it without incident.
Then the detail heard what sounded like the crack of a rifle, followed by the low rumble of a thunderhead. Scot had been around mountains too long not to recognize that sound.
Avalanche.
3
Despite his formfitting winter assault fatigues lined with a revolutionary new weatherproof thermal composite, Hassan Useff lay in his coffin of snow and shivered. He had been one of the toughest kids growing up in his balmy, south Lebanon village and was now one of the Middle East’s finest snipers, but the cold and being buried alive beneath two feet of snow were beginning to get to him. When the hideous repetition of his own raspy breathing was finally interrupted by two squelch clicks over his earpiece, the fear and cold immediately disappeared, replaced by a rush of adrenaline surging through his stiff body.
Useff tensed and released his muscles several times to relieve some of the stiffness in his joints. Cradling the high-tech glare gun in his gloved hands, he heard an almost imperceptible whine as he powered the weapon up.
Two more clicks over the earpiece and he readied himself to spring from his snowy grave.
Buried completely from view in several more snowy crypts nearby, Gerhard Miner and five more of his “Lions” were about to undertake the most daring mission of their lives.
”Son of a bitch,” cursed Sam Harper to himself as his ski clipped the edge of another rock. He loved skiing, but hated having to follow the president down Death Chute. He had fallen a little bit behind and was glad that several of the younger guys on the detail were able to keep up with the commander in chief.
The biggest consolation of all was that Ahern and Houchins were behind him. At least he wouldn’t be the last one to ski up when the party rested in the flat area among the trees before tackling the final vertical drop.
When Harper reached the beginning of the trees, everything began to happen in what, had he survived, he would have described as a split-second flash.
Three final squelch clicks came over Hassan Useff’s earpiece, signaling that the last members of the president’s Secret Service detail were entering the heavily treed area. Springing from his icy hideaway, Useff began pulsing his glare gun as his fellow team member, Klaus Dryer, did the same twenty meters away.
The results were exactly as planned. Even with their UV-protective ski goggles, the entire protective detail, as well as the president, was dazzled.
The glare guns were Russian copies of the nonlethal weapon developed by the American Air Force’s Phillips Laboratory. First brought into action in Somalia in 1995, the purpose of the high-tech laser weapon was to temporarily blind and disorient an enemy.
Temporarily was all Miner’s team needed.
Useff and Dryer’s cross-pulsing in the narrow alley formed by the trees created a blinding laser funnel that the president’s team couldn’t escape. This included the members of the Secret Service countersniper unit, known as JAR, or Just Another Rifle, who were posted strategically throughout the trees along this leg of the president’s run.
Completely blinded and disoriented, several agents lost their balance and wiped out before they even had a chance to come to a complete stop. Those agents who had already been in the process of slowing down and could stop, instinctively drew their weapons, but they had one major problem. They couldn’t see a thing.
Not knowing where their fellow agents were or, more important, where the president was, every single agent, weapon drawn or not, had been rendered not only totally useless, but helpless as well.
Useff gave the go command over his lip mike as he shouldered the glare gun and switched off the safety of his silenced German-manufactured Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine gun. The pleasure of being able to freely kill so many agents of the Great Satan was almost unbearable. He had already shot two Secret Service agents before the rest of the team had fully sprung from their hiding places.
As the Lions’ silenced machine gun rounds drummed into the bodies of the defenseless Secret Service agents, Miner made his way toward where the president had fallen.
“Harp, Harp,” mumbled the president from where he lay in the snow, still blind and disoriented but alert enough to call out for the head of his protective detail as he tried to raise himself into a seated position.
Miner dropped to his knees next to him and removed the president’s gloves and jacket. As he helped him sit up, he placed a copy of USA Today on his chest, pulling the president’s hands in so he could feel it. Instinctively, the president grabbed hold of it. Miner shot several quick Polaroids and slipped the slowly developing pictures into his pocket. Then he took the paper away and, with a pair of trauma scissors, began to cut through the left sleeves of the president’s sweater and turtleneck.
“Toboggan! Where is that toboggan?” Miner yelled.
“Harper? What’s happening?” repeated the president.
“There’s been an accident, Mr. President,” responded Miner in perfectly American accented English. “You need to lie back now and remain still, while we start an IV.”
“Who are you? Where’s Harper? What’s happened to my eyes? I can’t see.”
“Please, Mr. President. You need to be completely quiet and completely still. My team is attending to the others. There you go. Let’s just lie back. Good.” Miner knew the effects of the glare gun would be wearing off soon. From his pack, he withdrew an insulated medical pouch, unzipped it, pulled out a bag of saline solution, and began an IV on the president, who continued to call for members of his protective detail and complain about his eyes.
Once the IV was in place, Miner filled a syringe with a strong sedative called Versed and piggybacked it into the IV line. The effect was almost instantaneous. The president’s eyes rolled back, closed, and his body went limp.
As one of Miner’s men rushed past, towing an all-white ski-patrol-style transport toboggan, Dryer made his way over to Hassan Useff.
Without even turning, Useff began speaking, knowing Dryer was behind him. “This is Sam Harper, head of the president’s protective detail, is it not?”
Though Harper was badly injured from his fall and couldn’t see who was standing above him speaking, he knew the Middle Eastern accent didn’t belong to anyone on his team. “Yeah, I’m Sam Harper, and whoever you are, you are in a lot of trouble. Give yourself up.”
“Typical American arrogance. Even in the face of death,” said Useff.
“Fuck you,” snarled Harper as he attempted to draw his weapon.
“Once again, typical. Is nothing original in this country?” asked Useff as he squeezed off a three-round burst into the career Secret Service agent and father of two’s head.
Ever since Dryer had recruited Useff for this assignment, he had marveled at the man’s hatred for the United States. That hate, coupled with the Lebanese man’s intense religious fervor, made him perfect for this job. Hassan Useff was the only non-Swiss on the team.
As he began walking away, Useff said, “Protecting the president, he should have been the best. A pity he won’t be remembered that way. The pathetic coward never even fired a shot.”
When Useff had his back completely turned, Dryer withdrew an empty Evian bottle from the pack he was carrying and picked up Harper’s SIG-Sauer P229. “I think the Americans might
beg to differ,” were the last words Hassan Useff heard before the .357 bullet, effectively muffled by being shot through the plastic bottle, ripped through the back of his skull, killing him instantly.
Dryer placed the SIG-Sauer in Harper’s dead hand. He then withdrew a model 68 Skorpion machine pistol with a silencer and fired indiscriminately into the bodies of the dead Secret Service agents lying around him. He blew through two more twenty-round magazines before placing the Skorpion on the ground next to Useff and shouldering the dead Muslim’s glare gun and H&K.
The waters were now sufficiently chummed.
4
“Sound, this is Birdhouse. Do you copy? Over. Norseman, this is Birdhouse, do you copy? Over.”
Secret Service agent Tom Hollenbeck, head of the command center for the president’s ski trip, had been trying to reach both details for the last seven minutes.
Communications had been sporadic throughout most of the day. The mountainous terrain, the secluded location of the command center just outside the home the president was staying in, and the terrible on-again, off-again weather, made things extremely difficult.
Hollenbeck called out to his assistant, Chris Longo. “Hey, Longo. Can’t we do anything at all to pump this up?”
“For Chrissake, Tom. What do you think I’ve been doing for the last five minutes?”
“All right, all right. No need to get pissy. Just fix it.”
“Hollenbeck, if I knew what was wrong, I would have fixed it already.”
“Hold on a second. We’ve got the Deer Valley radios. Have we tried those?”
“Yes. I already thought of that.”
“And?”
“They’ve also been having trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“Same as us. The radios just aren’t working.”