by James Phelan
71
THE WHITE HOUSE
O’Keeffe crashed the White House the second he heard that there was an imminent terrorist threat. Everyone had to stay where they were in the building, all staff, no matter who. Uniformed and plain-clothed Secret Service agents covered all exits.
The presidential detail locked down the NSC in the Situation Room and the remainder of the Cabinet were still in the emergency operations bunker under the East Wing.
The grounds of the White House were no exception. The Secret Service SWAT team were outside, all in their tactical gear and packing serious firepower.
Snipers on the roof flicked off safeties. Others shouldered rocket launchers, ready to take down any approaching vehicles that proved a threat. Pictures of the terrorists were handed out to all security staff—Xeroxed mug-shots that were taped to gun stocks, wrists, thighs, anywhere in easy view. The agents who patrolled the entry points at the gates were refusing all entry, and DC police were arriving en masse along Pennsylvania Avenue and surrounding streets.
News crews set up real fast. Those who were already on breaks from the Press Room had been ushered outside the gates as well. There were already over two dozen cameras set up.
“Seamus,” McCorkell called out. “Find out how the press got here so fast.”
“On it,” O’Keeffe said. He looked at the security feed and picked up the internal line to the House’s Secret Service command centre and started talking, rapid fire.
“How the hell they get here already?” he asked the agent in the Press Room. “They told their news desks when? Right.”
He hung up.
“Fox News, CNN, BBC and others all got a tip-off four minutes ago to come and film the grounds,” O’Keeffe said. “That was just before I ordered the security crash of the House.”
“The tip-off’s from the terrorists,” McCorkell said. “They want this seen. Whatever’s coming, this is going to happen now.”
The agent only noticed the sedan as it clipped fenders with a DC police car and raced towards the north-east entrance. It slammed into the White House gate—pushed it up but got nowhere as it smashed against the massive steel crash-barrier and bounced back onto the road. Four Secret Service agents, two in uniform and two in assault gear, had weapons drawn at the single male occupant.
“Hands in the air!”
“Let me see ’em!”
“Don’t move!”
Inside the car.
“Allahu akbar…” was repeated for the third time.
Both his hands were on the steering wheel. Fingers were pressed against a wire trigger taped there. The circuit closed, the current travelled to the detonator in the boot.
CLAP—BOOM!
The sheet-metal sides of the Buick ruptured, the explosion swallowing up the glass and steel gatehouse, although the barrier held true.
The four Secret Service guys were vaporised. People within forty metres were struck with flying shrapnel: bolts and nails courtesy of a US hardware store had become subsonic weapons of terror.
All Secret Service agents to the southern end of the White House grounds had their attention on the bomb blast. None noticed the other man scale the fence sixty metres away. Once onto the lawn, the Afghan ran. As Secret Service and emergency crews raced to help at the bombing scene, the lone terrorist ran towards the White House south portico.
EMT sirens and screams filled the air as he ran faster and faster, the distance to the House longer than it seemed from the other side of the fence. He was running like a quarterback who’d just had his team-mate feign a pass to distract attention.
he’d made it over halfway to the House when he was spotted. A Secret Service agent on the lawn fifty metres to the east sprayed a full auto P90 clip his way—a round hit the terrorist’s ankle and shattered the bone. He dropped to his knees.
Secret Service radio calls were going frantic. There was the pop-pop of pistol fire.
The Afghan steadied on his knees, wired detonator in hand that traced back down inside his sleeve and into a bomb vest.
“Allahu—”
His head snapped back with a sharp whack. Then again.
Two snipers on the roof called in their kill.
The terrorist’s body somehow stayed upright, headless on his knees, in an image destined to be seen on news footage around the world countless times.
72
LAGOS, NIGERIA
Fox was in a kitchen that was exploding around him in a shower of tiles and glass, but he pressed on, fired fast, a security contractor blown back through a glass door—then he heard automatic gunfire coming from outside, to the front of the compound. A real pot-pourri of small-arms fire. Then the explosion of a 40 mm grenade.
He ejected the spent mag from the Glock and rammed home a full one, cocked the slide and heard, in the briefest of silence between the mixed gunfire, a tiny voice.
Coming from his Kevlar vest’s breast pocket—his cell phone. He lifted up the Velcro strap, looked at it. The battery symbol was flashing—it was down to its last bit of juice. The caller ID was GAMMALDI—the call from Al was still open, a good hour after they’d talked at the lookout.
“Al?”
“Lach! We’re out front!” Gammaldi shouted, ducking down behind the wall of the compound as bits of stone showered down on him. The cell phone was in his hand, held tight to his ear.
To his right, Javens was hunkered down behind the engine block of an armoured Range Rover, all his weight on his un-plastered leg. Gibbs and Sefreid were firing hard, with fast reloads.
To his left were the two battle-scarred Humvees of Captain Garth Nix. The Humvees had been through hell and back with stuff hanging off them everywhere: metal roofing, branches, fences; black burn marks from taking direct fire, windscreens too cracked to see into. The turret-gunners were both swaying the 7.62 mm M240Bs across the roof-line of the mansion.
“We’re here with some US Army boys—is Achebe in there?”
“Not sure!” Fox yelled back. “Mendes is, though. The garage, fire in the hole!”
“What?”
The two roller-doors of the garage that adjoined the house blew outwards and crashed against the stone wall to the front of the compound. Fire licked out as smaller secondary explosions kept rolling through the four cars inside.
Fox put the phone back in his pocket. He got up from behind the kitchen island bench and scanned the room down the sights of his Glock: no threats. The fire from the garage was starting to eat its way through the open doorway.
He went across the room, his damaged quad getting stiffer with every moment of stillness. He tied a kitchen towel off over the wound, and moved to the door that led into the entry foyer.
Nix ran ground-close over to Gammaldi. His Humvee turret-gunner was reloading another box of belt-fed ammo into his M240B. Top was providing cover fire with his M16A4, sharpshooting two targets through a pane-glass window of the first floor.
“Targets in there?”
“He’s checking!” Gammaldi said, fumbling with his cell phone as he reacted to close gunfire hitting around him.
“RPG!” Top shouted.
Gammaldi cowered lower to the ground, while Nix held him down for protection.
The rocket-propelled grenade struck the ground to the side of the lead Humvee, making the vehicle rock on its axles and the gunner spray an uncontrolled stream of bullets across the entire battlefield, lucky not to cause any blue-on-blue casualties.
Nix got off Gammaldi, fired a full clip from his M4 then ducked back down. In the brief pause Gammaldi noticed the Army captain’s decision-making process going on.
“Okay, I’m going in to confirm the targets,” Nix said into his helmet’s tactical mic. “Top, through the door with me. Sam, Jesse, cover-fire our approach with the 240s and call in the UAV’s approach run.”
Top ran over to join Nix. He handed over four 40 mm CS gas grenades in a webbing belt. CS wa
s a damn effective riot-control agent, non-lethal, good for evening out the odds. He handed a gas mask to Gammaldi.
“Ready to follow our lead?”
“Me?”
“You can ID your guy in there,” Nix said. “I’d hate to put a round between his eyes. Tell him we’re heading in with CS gas.”
“Targets—nine O’clock!” Gibbs yelled. “Need help!”
Nix’s Humvee gunner turned and engaged the four security-contractor vehicles racing towards them. One engine exploded under the fire, the hood soaring into the air. The other three vehicles pulled into cover and a good dozen guys raced to fire positions.
Nix and Top were fast on the defence, the captain launching a shell from his M4’s underslung M320 grenade launcher. It was next-generation from the M203, more accurate, lighter, quicker on the reload. The HELLHOUND High Explosive Dual Purpose round was able to pierce through nine centimetres of solid steel and then create a lethal fragmentary radius of ten metres. The vehicle it hit seemed to vaporise, with five, six combatants down.
“Firing CS!” Nix said, loading the 40 mm grenade and firing just forward of the attacking force. It skipped across the ground and thudded into a tree, the white gas belching out. In less than three seconds the area was blanketed in a cloud. The enemy fire petered out, figures stumbling about holding their faces.
Gammaldi put the clear face mask on; his breathing sounded like Darth Vader.
“Give that back, change of plan,” Nix said. He took the gas mask and CS grenades and crawled over to Javens. The Brit was propped against the side of his Range Rover, an MP5 empty on the ground next to him, firing his Walther at the targets in the house a hundred metres ahead. His fire did little other than keep the gunmen’s heads down. His leg prevented him from getting in a good cover-crouch.
“Take this,” Nix said. He passed over his M4 and the CS grenades and pointed down the road at the security-contractor force. “Launch another grenade at them every sixty seconds.”
Javens nodded in reply. He shouldered the M4 and cracked off a few rounds towards the advancing guys.
“We got them engaged,” Sefreid said over a burst of his P90. He and Gibbs were going through the stack of ammo between them fast. “Just get Fox the hell out of there!”
Nix was back over to Gammaldi. He said something into his mic that Gammaldi couldn’t make out, then one of his soldiers tossed over an M4, which Nix caught in the air. It had an M26 shotgun mounted under the barrel.
Gammaldi was ready to move, crouched like a sprinter.
Nix yelled into his ear:
“You follow us through the door, okay?”
Gammaldi gave the thumbs-up.
Fox was at the upstairs landing.
Gunfire sounded from all the front rooms of the mansion; there must be at least a dozen guys up there.
He backed into an empty bathroom.
A security guy ran past the doorway, right where Fox had just been. Fox moved out to the landing and put two rounds into his back. He was carrying an RPG, the rocket in the launcher. Fox winced and took cover in the bathroom as the weapon clattered to the ground—but it didn’t go off.
Fox reloaded the Glock with his last clip. He reached in his pocket for the cell phone—the battery was dead. He moved out and went down the hallway, his Glock double-handed leading the way. The screams of wounded men carried down the corridor. He stopped to listen carefully. The sound of—what? Kids crying?
Another target rushed in front of him. He fired two shots to the body. Blood splattered up the wall. Another shot to the head and he was out of the fight.
Fox took another step forward, an open door to his right. He turned to check—then back to the wall. Behind him, in the room, the click of a pistol cocking.
Click-clack. An assault rifle loaded now too.
Outgunned. Outnumbered.
Gammaldi was pressed up against the front wall near the door. The ground at his feet was exploding under rifle fire as gunners on the roof sprayed ammunition straight down. Nix and Top were on either side of the front door, ready to enter.
The facade of the old colonial was pounded to shit. The front door had taken two direct 40 mm Hellhound hits; it was now more a gaping, crumbling hole than a doorway.
BOOM! An RPG round went off close by, ringing in all their ears.
Gammaldi looked back towards the far Humvee—its turret was gone, the occupants of the vehicle tumbling out onto the street, smoke billowing out the open doors and a hole in the roof.
Brutus Achebe lay on the floor of his bedroom with his wife and two children next to him. The kids were crying. His wife was silent, too shocked to move. He held the heads of his children close into his stomach, hands over their ears. He rocked rhythmically as he prayed. The warmth of his breath caressed his children’s skin. Their fresh smell filled his nostrils. Tears for their souls were worn in his eyes.
Fox dashed past the room behind him, turned to make sure the two targets in there hadn’t seen him.
He was shot in the back and the Glock dropped from his hand. The force of the gunshot spun him around, wide-eyed in shock. There was instant, searing heat in his back under his Kevlar vest and T-shirt.
Mendes faced him, standing in the next doorway. Not two metres from him, a pistol pointed at Fox’s chest.
Fox pounced forward, but Mendes was quick on the trigger. The ex-CIA operator fired point-blank into Fox’s chest.
One, two shots in a second.
Then his pistol clicked empty.
Fox slammed up against Mendes, gripping both his wrists hard. He wrenched them back, squeezed. Both men were red in the face from the effort and Fox head-butted Mendes, connecting where Mendes’s nose met his forehead. There was a crunch and Mendes’s face erupted with warm blood.
Fox gave a final twist of the guy’s wrists, with every ounce of his strength. The pistol clacked to the floor. He saw it fall, noticed with total clarity the make. H&K UCP. Armour-piercing.
Gammaldi stood directly behind Top as the bulky sergeant was at the foot of the stairs, engaged in a firefight with two targets. Both went down hard.
Nix bumped in close and stood by them.
“What are the chances that your guy has already killed our HVT’s?” Nix asked Gammaldi.
“About 32.33 per cent,” Gammaldi said. “Repeating, of course.”
“All right, funny man,” Nix said. “Follow my lead. You ID your guy, I eyeball the targets, and we bug the hell out before the missiles rain in. Top, you stay here and cover the exit.”
“Hooah!”
Nix turned and ran up the stairs, Gammaldi close behind, the captain’s shotgun booming 00 buckshot as he cleared a path upstairs. On the way through Gammaldi took the pistol out of Top’s thigh holster, and ducked around the Sergeant who continued to fire, giving a guttural war-cry of his own as he charged up the stairs behind the Army captain.
Fox pushed Mendes through the open doorway, pinning him up against a wall. His forearm was up against his throat and he pushed with all his force. Mendes’s hands were trying to pry the force off, he was coughing hard for breath.
“Why’d you do it?!” Fox yelled into his face.
Mendes repeatedly kneed Fox, sending him reeling back. He rushed Fox, who was doubled over, sunk elbows into his back followed by a knee to the head, which Fox caught with his hands, using the upwards momentum to raise himself and his own elbow, which clipped Mendes under the chin.
Gammaldi and Nix were lying on the floor of the bathroom Fox had been in. The tiles all around them had turned into clouds of porcelain dust as the room was shredded with machine-gun fire, a 5.56 mm SAW of some sort.
“Top, we need help!” Nix called into his mic.
Fox powered through his pain, mind over matter. He ducked under a computer monitor that Mendes launched at him—it crashed through a window. This room was at the front of the house, and now gunfire from the US Army peppered through the smashed
-out window. Bits of books from the shelved walls exploded and rained throughout the room like confetti.
As he got up Fox reached behind himself onto the desk and picked up a stained-glass lamp. Mendes rushed at him and Fox brought the lamp up and smashed him across the face, slicing his cheek open.
They each took a step back, the smallest of breathers to gain a second of composure. Mendes’s face was now all blood. Fox’s breathing was laboured and he didn’t stop to think about why.
Mendes stood with knees slightly bent, his shoulders hunched over and forward. Jujitsu stance. He spat out blood from the hole in his cheek, and launched himself at Fox, pushing him up against the old roll-top desk, head first, punching him repeatedly in his stomach, his sternum, his sides. He hammered away at the bullet wounds in Fox’s chest.
Fox began convulsing under the pain. He couldn’t react or respond to the attack that had him stuck up on the desk and taking hell. Finally, after what might have been fifteen seconds, when Mendes’s assault was slowing, Fox’s hand responded and he brushed it around on the desk that he sat pinned on—paper, pencil—
He picked up the wooden pencil in his tight fist, lanced it into Mendes’s side, but it just snapped in his hand as it hit a rib. That spurred Mendes on, blood spraying from his mouth and cheek as he pummelled away at Fox.
Fox was down to his last. He blinked through the pain that waved within him. This was do or die. He could feel the bullet wounds in him now, like red-hot pokers pushing into him, two in the front, one in the back. On the desk, behind him to his right, he felt around. The papers, a plastic pen, something hard and cold. Metallic. A steel letter-opener? It felt like a fifteen-centimetre blade with a dull edge.