by Brad Thor
When he was finished recounting his tale, the room was completely silent. After a moment, Dr. Trawick let out a long whistle.
“You know how lucky you are to be alive, boy?” he asked.
“Yeah, I know.”
“I worry, though, about the short-term memory loss. I don’t know how much is gone.”
“Like you said, Skip. It’s just like the old days. I got whacked in the head and I’m a little fuzzy…on some utterly unimportant stuff, I might add, but it’ll come back.”
“I’m sure it will, but at some point I am going to need to run some tests on you, nonetheless.”
Scot ignored Skip and turned to Hollenbeck and asked, “What’s the status on the others? The president, Harp, Maxwell?”
Hollenbeck inhaled deeply before he responded. “At this point, there is no status. The radios are still down, and you and Amanda are the only ones we have recovered.”
Scot couldn’t believe his ears. “No status? That’s ridiculous. Nothing from the CAT or JAR teams? Nothing off the Smocks? You can’t even get his five cents’ worth?” Five cents’ worth referred to the homing device that every president was provided with by the Secret Service. It was an Indian head nickel containing a transmitter that operated on a special frequency that could deliver GPS coordinates. The president always carried this coin on his person and referred to it as his “good luck piece.” Although tonight, it didn’t seem to be bringing anyone any good luck.
“The Motorolas, the Smocks, everything was intermittent throughout the day. Because it was across the entire communications platform, we wrote it off to weather or mountain shadow anomalies. It wasn’t until we were down for several minutes that we raised the alarm. So, in answer to your question, we have no status.”
“What about search-and-rescue?”
“All available agents have been sent to Death Chute with some of the ski patrol and sheriff’s department S-and-R guys. Agent Palmer is leading a civilian team back where we picked you and Goldilocks up. I think Palmer’s team is going to have better luck.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You were picked up in the bowl. The bowl is easily accessible. We’ve already got some construction lamps and related equipment en route. I must have personally spoken with every construction company within a hundred-mile radius. Any and all heavy earthmoving equipment that exists is trying to make its way there right now.”
“But what about the president and Sam?”
“You tell me, Scot. You’ve skied Death Chute. You were the one who was in charge of securing it. What kind of equipment do you think we could get onto a nearly vertical drop face?”
“Choppers.”
“Grounded.”
“Not our stuff. Not those Marine pilots.”
“Yes, even our stuff and even our guys. When you feel up to it, take a peek out the window. You can’t even see your hand in front of your face. It’s a complete whiteout. What’s more, we can’t get lights up where we need them, and we certainly can’t get any cranes or bulldozers in there because the area is so inaccessible.”
As the severity of the situation began to sink in, Harvath pressed his palms against his forehead.
“What we do have going for us,” Hollenbeck continued, “is that you saw the president’s detail make it to the first plateau around the treed area. The CAT team waiting at the bottom never saw them come out, so we have a general idea of where they might be.”
“But that snow came roaring down the mountain. They could have been totally swept past the CAT team.”
“I don’t think so. If you really did see Ahern and Houchins wipe out by the trees, then the rest of the detail would have held up for them. I am going to assume that they heard and interpreted the avalanche the same way you did and went into the trees. We’ve got over fifty people up there right now with dogs. We have to hope for the best. The mushers will work the pups, and the rest will link and sink.” Link and sink was a search-and-rescue technique in which a line of people moved forward side by side, as if linked by an invisible chain, sinking long aluminum poles into the snow every foot, in an effort to feel something or someone underneath.
Scot looked up at Hollenbeck. “Have you called Washington yet?”
“Yeah. They told me we’re authorized for anything we need.”
Dr. Trawick cleared his throat, indicating that he was through with his examination. Scot and Agent Hollenbeck both turned to look at him.
“There’s no question that you took quite a beating. I am still amazed that, all things considered, you didn’t break anything. In light of what happened, your injuries are relatively minor.”
“Good, then I can—”
“Hold on a second. I’m not finished. When I say your injuries are minor, that doesn’t mean they aren’t serious. While nothing appears to be broken, you may have a few cracked ribs. I want to wrap you with an Ace, ice the bruised areas, and then get you into my office for some X rays and probably a CT scan. Until then, you are to stay in bed. I am going to keep you on the IV for another twelve hours and monitor you. What I am most concerned about is your head trauma. So, for the time being, you are staying put.”
“Thanks all the same, Doc, but I plan on going back out there to help in the search. They need every live body they can get.”
“You’re welcome all the same, but you’re not going anywhere. Your body is of no use to anyone in this condition. You go out there like this and they’ll end up having to waste time carrying you right back in again.”
“I doubt that—”
“And, beyond the total fatigue and exhaustion you have suffered, there’s also some frostbite and mild hypothermia. Any average person probably would have died out there. Your survival says a lot about your training and will to live. I repeat, you are one lucky S.O.B.”
“Are you finished now, because I’ve got stuff I’ve gotta do?” said Scot as he tried to raise himself off the bed.
“Lie down,” barked Hollenbeck. “That’s an order! Harvath, why do you insist on being such a jackass sometimes?”
“Tom, with all due respect, I was head of the advance team. The safety of the presidential party as well as my fellow agents was and is my responsibility. You need my help.”
“Not in this condition I don’t. Forget it.”
“I’m not going to debate this with you, Tom.”
“You’re damn right you’re not. You are staying in that bed until Dr. Trawick or Dr. Paulos says otherwise. You got me?”
“C’mon, Tom. Be realistic.”
A crackle, followed by Hollenbeck’s call sign over the CB radio clipped to his belt, prevented him from arguing any further with Scot, and he raised his hand for silence.
“This is Birdhouse. Over.”
“Birdhouse, this is Hermes. We’ve got something. Over.”
“Copy, Hermes. What’s the situation? Over.”
Despite the effort, Scot sat straight up to listen to the exchange.
“Birdhouse, it appears as if we have recovered two agents from Hat Trick’s detail. They are extricating them as we speak.”
Thank God, Hollenbeck thought to himself. “What’s their condition? Over.”
“Still extracting, hold on a sec…I’m moving over to get a better view.”
“Roger that. Birdhouse is holding.”
Several seconds passed.
“Birdhouse! Birdhouse! Hat Trick’s agents are down! Unnatural causes. I repeat, unnatural causes.”
Hollenbeck couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Scot strained forward to take in every piece of information. He knew that there was absolute pandemonium on the face of Death Chute right now. All of the agents would have their guns drawn, feeling vulnerable in the dark, not knowing if the threat was still present or long since gone.
“Hermes, this is Birdhouse. Tell your team to sweep and reap. I repeat, your team is to sweep and reap. Do you copy? Over.” Sweep and reap was the command to scour the immediate area for hostile ta
rgets. If any were encountered, the threat was to be neutralized by taking the perpetrators into custody or by punching their tickets as quickly as possible.
“Roger, Birdhouse. Hermes’s team will sweep and reap. Over.”
Hollenbeck had four CAT teams outside, and he got on the radio and mobilized them next. Two headed off toward Death Chute, and the other two took defensive positions around the house. As he completed his commands, he turned back to see Scot trying to get out of bed. This was more than he needed to handle. He turned to Dr. Trawick. “Sedate him. Now.”
“We can’t do that. Not in his condition.”
“Fine. I want a guard on this door tonight. He doesn’t leave.”
Harvath was only able to squeeze out a couple words of protest before Hollenbeck grabbed his parka and ran out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Scot knew he was licked, at least for now.
15
Miner once again looked at his watch. Everything was still going according to schedule. Every phase of the operation brought with it new challenges and potential pitfalls. The greatest risk Miner and his team were running right now was in transporting their precious cargo, but even in that, he had plotted for every eventuality.
Wasatch Front Ambulance Service had a fleet of fifteen vehicles that, in one of the fastest growing counties in America, were always in demand. Drivers performed routine inspections of their rigs, as they called them, before each shift. With them driving so many steeply graded mountain passes every week, their brakes were of the utmost importance to them. When the driver of ambulance 17 had come on duty yesterday and found brake fluid pooled on the ground beneath his rig, he immediately notified the dispatcher.
As Wasatch’s mechanic was overwhelmed with a string of mysterious problems on four other rigs, the dispatcher called to have the rig towed to a local garage, where it could be repaired by an outside mechanic.
When the tow truck arrived and picked up ambulance 17, the groundsman had been waiting across the street in a nondescript gold Ford Taurus to take down the name, address, and telephone number of the mechanic’s shop stenciled in bright green letters on the side of the tow truck. A simple call from his cell phone to Grunnah Automotive verified what Miner had told him to expect in the land of Utah. After closing early on Saturday, the garage would not open again until Monday.
The alarm system at Grunnah Automotive was more for show than anything else. The groundsman had it deactivated in no time. He spent the next half hour repairing the ambulance and helping himself to Cokes from the refrigerator in Mr. Grunnah’s office. He then slipped into dark blue trousers and a dark blue shirt with official-looking patches on it, drove the ambulance out of the garage, being careful to close the roll-down door behind him, and rendezvoused with the Deseret Industries eighteen-wheeler, into which he loaded the ambulance.
Eighteen hours later, as the stolen ambulance rocketed down Provo Canyon, passing the Sundance Resort, Miner phoned the pilot of his chartered MediJet plane.
He spoke with the urgency of a doctor transporting a patient in very serious condition. The wail of the sirens and the clipped British accent he affected dovetailed perfectly with what the MediJet crew had been led to believe was their assignment.
The refinery fire in Magna, Utah, two weeks prior had been one of the worst the industry had ever seen. The blaze had burned uncontrollably for several days, and the smoke had been so thick that it had shut down all but two runways at Salt Lake City International Airport. Before the flames had been extinguished, environmentalists from several groups had flocked to the scene with their banners, decrying the continued pollution of the environment by big business, particularly the oil and gas industries. Several media outlets had run stories about the mounting toll oil and gas disasters were taking on the planet. On television, scenes of the Kuwaiti oil fields aflame during the Gulf War competed for time alongside images of dead oil-soaked seabirds being plucked from the shores of Alaska following the Exxon Valdez disaster. The Magna refinery fire was worldwide news.
“And we will be able to take off?” Miner asked into his cell phone from inside the bumpy ambulance.
“Yes, sir, Doctor. As far as we can tell from the weather reports and our information from the tower, this window should hold for about forty-five more minutes.”
“Good, and you have informed the tower of our need for priority slotting for takeoff?”
“Yes, sir. From the looks of it now, we’re the only ones that’ll be leaving, but as a medical emergency we have priority anyway.”
“Good. How is the air traffic in general throughout the area?”
“This is typical mountain weather. The snow and wind have tapered off some down here in the valley, but it’s pounding the higher elevations up in the mountains. Salt Lake International is experiencing stack-ups both in and out. Even with a medical emergency, we still would have had our work cut out for us getting off the ground out of SLC.”
Miner had arranged for the MediJet to await his team at the Provo Municipal Airport in Orem, forty miles south of Salt Lake City, for precisely these very reasons. First, he could count on the weather being less severe at the lower-elevation airport than at the one up by Deer Valley, and second, with a medical emergency out of Provo Municipal, Miner knew that he could call all of the shots. The runway would be plowed and the jet deiced by the time he got there. All he needed to do was load his “patient” and they would immediately be cleared for takeoff.
The fact that the private airfield would ask few questions and their security was lax to nonexistent had been another plus.
The pilot spoke again over Miner’s cell phone. “What is the patient’s condition?”
“He’s stable but still critical.”
“Confirmed. Per your instructions, Doctor, we have added the extra equipment you asked for.”
“Excellent. And you are sure that there will be no problem with the stretcher and its oxygen tent fitting in the plane?”
“Absolutely not. Normally, we would transfer the patient from the ambulance stretcher to our own, but when you explained that the tent’s seal couldn’t be breached because of the risk of infection, we just off-loaded our stretcher. As long as yours has the dimensions you indicated, our clamps will be able to secure it in place. I just hope he’ll be comfortable. It’s quite a long flight to Stansted.”
“I appreciate your concern. He’s pretty heavily sedated, as you can imagine.”
“I would imagine. It is such a tragedy. I think everyone was moved by the Magna fire.”
“Indeed, this gentleman is lucky to be alive, but we’re just not sure for how much longer. Have you made the arrangements for us with British customs?”
“Yes, just as you asked. I have alerted our London office, and they have been in contact with the authorities at Stansted Airport. If you provide me with all of your passports on the plane, including the patient’s, we’ll have you cleared before you have him in your transport.”
“And your office is aware of the severity of this man’s injuries? Third-degree burns over ninety-five percent of his body, including his face?”
“Yes, Doctor. The authorities will also be made aware of that fact, as well as the issue of the tent not being breached. To tell you the truth, I don’t think you are going to run into any problems at all. Like I said, there doesn’t seem to be anyone who wasn’t touched by this story. Plus, the patient is British, correct?”
“Yes, he is.”
“Well, I’ve found that always helps. I mean here this poor—what was his occupation?”
“A chemist for Fawcett Petroleum.”
“Right, a chemist. Here this poor chemist is burned in a terrible fire, and all he wants to do is be repatriated so he can die on his own soil surrounded by his family. If there is even the slightest hiccup with the immigration folks at Stansted, they’re going to have to deal with me, personally.”
“Thank you, Captain. I am counting on that. Our ETA is fifteen minutes. Please contact
the tower for your clearance and have the jet ready for takeoff.”
“Roger.”
As Miner pushed the end button on his cell phone, he turned to the groundsman working next to him. “How are we doing?”
The groundsman, not only a master assassin but also a master of disguise, sat back and invited Miner to admire his handiwork.
“Excellent,” commented Miner as they sealed the oxygen tent above the stretcher.
Through an ingenious use of latex and special-effects makeup, the president of the United States had been hideously transformed. One look at him, along with a mention of the Magna refinery fire, would be all they needed to turn even the most difficult and hard-hearted customs official to jelly. The unbreachable oxygen tent, complete with a patient who in no way could match his photo in the false passport Miner carried for him, would get them waived right through the security of Stansted Airport. Of that Miner was sure. The officials might even offer him a motorcade, which of course, he would be forced to decline.
16
When Harvath awoke, he had no idea how long he’d been sleeping. His eyes focused and he saw he was in the same room he had been brought to last night. At least he hoped it had been last night. It must have been. There was no way he could have been out for more than six hours, eight tops.
Even though the curtains were drawn, he could tell that it was early morning. The snow was still falling, but not as hard as before. He decided from the pressure on his bladder that he had gotten more than enough fluids, and so he reached over and pulled the IV from his arm.
Across the room to his left was the open door to a bathroom. Dr. Skip would be pissed, no pun intended, that he hadn’t saved his urine for him to examine, but that was life.
Scot’s stomach muscles contracted as he crunched painfully upward and used his arms as buttresses to keep himself from falling backward onto his pillow. The pain not only was still in his back and shoulders, but had found new places to set up shop.