Hard Target

by Alan Jacobson

  HAVING MADE HIS WAY BACK through the tunnel, Uzi closed the floor panel and gave one final pass around the interior. After he shut off his flashlight, two long squelches blurted from the radio: he was out of time. He fumbled with the brass pins to get the door lined up and restored to its original state, then took off in a sprint, less concerned now with the motion sensors. He figured—hoped—that at this point everyone on the compound would be dealing with the Black Hawk.

  But he was wrong.

  TWENTY OR THIRTY SMALLER BOXES emblazoned with Cyrillic letters stared back at DeSantos. He pulled one out, stuck his thumb under the edge of the flap, and pried it open.

  Egg crate packaging separated and protected the three-inch Russian rounds. Match-grade ammo—the kind used by snipers for accuracy. He removed one, bagged it, and shoved it into an inside pocket of his underwear. Positioned properly, despite his skintight outfit, it might pass as a part of his anatomy. He hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

  He rummaged through his backpack for the roll of packaging tape. He resealed the box, restoring it to the condition in which he’d found it, and rotated it to the bottom of the stack.

  As he packed himself up to leave, two squelches puffed over his radio transceiver. Time to go. He grabbed hold of the dangling rope and pulled himself up toward the roof.

  UZI WAS NEARING the rendezvous point when he stepped in a camouflaged hole and went down hard, smashing his head and right shoulder into a sawed-off tree trunk. Sharp pain shot through his face and neck. He tried to pull himself to his knees but lacked traction on the wet leaves and slippery pine needles.

  A flashlight beam hit him in the face.

  “Who the fuck are you?” the voice behind the light said.

  Uzi raised his left hand as a shield—his right was pinned behind him, preventing him from reaching his knife—and tried to make out the silhouetted figure against the glare. Is he armed?

  “I said, ‘Who the fuck are you?’”

  “I was out hiking and got lost. You know how I can get out of here?” Uzi knew it was a bullshit excuse, but he figured it would buy him some time while he sorted out his jumbled thoughts and tried to reason a way out of the jam. Keep the captor talking and you had a chance. If he made you lay down and tied you up, the guy was a pro and you were in deep shit.

  The man lowered his flashlight a bit, but still kept it pointed at Uzi’s face. Dimly lit by the penumbra of the beam’s errant light, his face sported sharp features and thin lips. Combined with military-short hair, dark stubble, and pseudomilitary accouterments, he fit Uzi’s image of GI Joe.

  “Take off your glasses and mask,” Joe said. He waved his light as if underscoring his words.

  It was an expected request. See your adversary, watch the language of his face. People inadvertently give away a lot about themselves and their motives by the simple involuntary ticks, creases, squints, and frowns woven into subtle facial expressions. Uzi was going to try to do the same with Joe.

  “Now! Take ’em off!”

  Uzi reached up with his left hand and complied. Joe took a step forward, his head creeping forward and tilting slightly, studying Uzi’s face as if he recognized him from somewhere. If Joe was one of the ARM members who’d seen him on one of his prior visits, Uzi was in for a rough time. Uzi again thought of the knife and began moving slowly in an effort to free his right arm.

  “Do you know how I can get out of here?” Uzi asked again.

  Joe tilted his head left, then, with his eyes locked on Uzi’s, lifted his chin toward Uzi’s right.

  Was he showing him the way out? Letting him go? Or was he toying with him, planning to shoot him in the back when he turned to leave?

  But before Uzi could test the veracity of his new friend’s offer, DeSantos appeared at Joe’s side, his knife drawn, the rough tooth-edged blade jammed up against the man’s neck.

  “Down!” DeSantos said into his ear.

  Joe complied, the sharp edge being most persuasive. He lay prone on the ground, remaining completely still while Uzi did a quick search of his body and removed his weapons and radio. Joe obviously knew the drill. He had figured out that they had control of the situation, and the best thing he could do now was to comply and wait for an opportunity to bolt. DeSantos was making every effort to ensure that never happened.

  Uzi emptied the ammo and then dumped the rounds into the camouflaged hole while DeSantos, with his left knee squarely in Joe’s back, loosely fastened flexcuffs to their captive’s ankles and wrists.

  That done, he motioned to Uzi to follow him toward the fence. Joe’s bindings weren’t permanent, but would last long enough for them to make their escape. The man would then be able to free himself before anyone got to him. Partly out of embarrassment and partly out of a desire not to admit he had failed at his job, Joe would never speak of his adventure—unless it had been caught on video. Uzi hoped that was not the case.

  As they stood in front of the fence, they pulled their homemade clawhooks from their backpacks, uncovered the fiber mat, and went to work.

  RODMAN’S PARASOLDIER ADVERSARIES were getting restless. He knew the feeling. He wished he would get some indication from either DeSantos or Uzi that they were free of the compound so he could lift off.

  But his radio remained quiet.

  Rodman tapped his foot, perspiration continuing to pour from his face. But his hands tightened on the controls when he saw the ARM team leader tug at his shoulder mike. Something was happening. Rodman watched with rapt attention as the men simultaneously touched their earpieces as if straining to hear their orders.

  A few moved first, then the others got the idea and followed suit. They charged the chopper en masse and slammed the butts of their weapons against the doors and windows.

  “Goddamnit!” The chopper rocked violently from the angry mob’s fury. “Do not engage,” Rodman said. “Bravo, give me more fog!”

  Thick black smoke again poured from the chopper’s rear jets. Rodman couldn’t see their response, but he knew the men had to be choking pretty well about now. The banging slowed, then stopped.

  Rodman accelerated the rotors, as he would normally do in preparation for liftoff. The mob instinctively recoiled, some abandoning their weapons as they ducked and ran a haphazard retreat.

  They had waited as long as feasible. Rodman needed to get airborne. He switched the frequency on his radio, then squeezed off two long squelches. They blew some last coughs of smoke out the tail, then the chopper lifted off, banking sharply and paralleling the periphery of ARM’s boundaries.

  10:50 PM

  63 hours 10 minutes remaining

  While in the car on the way to Tim Meadows’s home in Alexandria, Uzi and DeSantos inventoried their ill-gotten goods. This “evidence” could not find its way onto FBI grounds, or it could mean the end of their careers with a fanfare from which the Bureau itself might never recover.

  “I like the pen idea,” DeSantos said.

  “Works well unless the person who interrogates you tries writing with it.” After a moment’s reflection on what had happened with the militia guard, Uzi asked, “Why do you think that guy was gonna let me go?”

  “It was all in your head. You thought he nodded at the fence. But it was dark, man. Maybe he heard me coming and tilted his head, but couldn’t place the noise.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Lucky for me, you saved my ass.”

  They turned on King and Uzi quickly located Meadows’s street.

  As DeSantos pulled against the curb, he said, “Basement light’s on.”

  Meadows, a night owl by nature, took the materials without asking where they had come from, but Uzi told him they were never to be brought onto Federal property, nor would he acknowledge ever having given them to him.

  “You’re putting me in a tough spot,” Meadows said. They were standing on his porch, the tech dressed in a pair of threadbare jeans and an FBI sweatshirt with a pair of Wal-Mart reading glasses hanging from his neck on a gray pull-chain nec
klace. “What’s the deal with this stuff?”

  “You don’t want to ask that question,” Uzi said. He gestured at the light in the basement window. “How’s your project going?”

  Meadows folded his arms across his chest. “Don’t change the subject on me, Uzi.”

  “You can have the oysters, okay? Two orders.”

  Meadows arched backward. “Two appetizers?”

  “Maybe that way you won’t order an entrée.”

  Meadows took the package. “Don’t count on it.” He nodded at Uzi’s car, where DeSantos was seated, leaning back against the headrest, staring at them with glazed, disinterested eyes.

  “What’s wrong with your partner?”

  “Tough night,” Uzi said. In truth, DeSantos had told Uzi his presence might give Meadows pause before agreeing to take part in a federal offense. Uzi felt a pang of guilt over asking his friend to jeopardize his career, but if it all came apart and Knox did his thing to shield him and DeSantos, he’d make sure Meadows somehow got the same immunity.

  Meadows eyed Uzi cautiously, then looked at the thick envelope before moving to open it.

  Uzi held out a hand. “Not here.”

  Meadows frowned. “What do you want me to do?”

  “One item is self-explanatory. I need it matched to the evidence you examined from the Bishop murder.”

  Meadows nodded knowingly. “Okay.”

  “The other thing is less clear cut. Give me the works—prints, DNA, cryptanalysis, alternative light source, spectrometer, and anything else you can think of.”

  “Looking for...?”

  “I don’t know. Something.”

  “That’s damn helpful, Uzi.”

  Uzi shrugged. “What can I say?”

  “How about, ‘I know this is an impossible job that’ll dominate your evenings for the next week, but I really appreciate it.’”

  “Here’s the thing. You don’t have a week. You’ve got two days.”

  “Two days? Two days, Uzi?”

  Uzi held up his hands in mock surrender. “How about this: Thanks, man, I owe you.”

  Meadows grunted. “If I had a ten spot for every time I’ve heard that...”

  DAY SEVEN

  8:09 AM

  53 hours 51 minutes remaining

  With less than five hours’ sleep under his belt, Uzi reported to the task force’s new base of operations: the suite used by the standing Counterterrorism Task Force, a once-woefully small group of experts that, after 9/11, expanded faster than a filling helium balloon. Caught off-guard, the FBI revamped their thinking on terrorist groups. They reorganized with serious manpower and—something that had been lacking—budgetary support.

  Uzi was there to receive status reports. At this point, he could not rally the troops behind an investigative assault on ARM; he would have to tread lightly in view of Coulter’s orders to back off—despite Knox’s covert orders to the contrary. Of more concern was that if Meadows found something suspicious in the materials he was examining, Uzi and DeSantos would have to find a legal reason for returning to the compound with a properly executed search warrant. And with the attorney general in the way, with no way of disclosing what they’d found, that would be difficult, if not impossible.

  And knocking around his thoughts was that there were only two days remaining before he had to finger a suspect and report to the president. He felt something stir deep down in his stomach. He used to thrive on pressure-packed missions like these. The ARM incursion definitely rekindled a spark inside him, the pinch of spice that had gone missing in his stir fry of a life.

  As Uzi left the task force meeting, he was handed a message that Marshall Shepard wanted to see him. He winced; he had known there would come a time when he’d be forced to face his boss. He’d just hoped it would be later rather than sooner.

  He made eye contact with Shepard’s secretary and got the nod to continue into the ASAC’s suite. When he entered, Shepard was standing at the large window behind his desk, his back to Uzi.

  Uzi took a seat, and for the first time he could remember, was nervous about seeing his friend. He unwrapped a toothpick and stuck it in his mouth as he waited for Shepard to acknowledge his presence. In the meantime, he would play it as cool as he could, hoping Shepard’s reason for wanting to see him had nothing to do with his circumventing Coulter’s direct orders.

  “You were told to stay away from ARM,” Shepard finally said. Still facing the bright window, his large form was silhouetted against the glare of a gray Washington December morning. “You were told to stay away not just by me, Uzi, but by the fucking attorney general.”

  “Shep, what gives? What are you talking about?”

  “I have reason to believe you didn’t drop it like the AG told you to do. You didn’t drop it.”

  “Look, we’re conducting an investigation. You know how that goes. It’s hard doing stuff from a distance. But if that’s what we have to do, that’s what we have to do. You hear what I’m saying?” Uzi wasn’t sure he understood what he was saying. Shepard must have been confused as well, because he turned around. But the window glare prevented Uzi from seeing his boss’s face.

  “Uzi, you’re talking in circles and when you talk in circles it’s because there’s something going on. Tell me there’s nothing going on, because I sure as hell don’t want to find out about it from the director or AG. I fucked up once. My ass is on the line. And I like it here. I like my job. Now you wouldn’t be doing anything to put me in a bad way, would you?”

  Uzi swallowed hard, but tried to disguise it by shifting the toothpick around in his mouth. “Shep, your friendship means everything to me. I want you here for as long as I’m here.” Given the covert raid of ARM’s compound, he wondered how long that would be.

  “Better fucking be telling the truth, ’cause I heard things. I heard that something went down at ARM last night, and that you were involved. I just wanna know that it’s all bullshit. That you’re clean. Are you? Clean?”

  Uzi couldn’t stand it anymore. He hated lying; it was something he hadn’t had to do since his black ops days with Mossad. Worst of all, he had to lie to his close friend. And he had to do it by placing his complete faith in Douglas Knox, a man he did not trust.

  But he also knew that telling the truth would have dire consequences. Uzi looked his boss in the eyes, squared his shoulders, and said, “Clean, Shep.” He wondered if he had been successful at maintaining a poker face.

  Shepard turned back toward the window. “I sure hope so, Uzi. Sure hope so.” A few seconds passed in silence. Finally, Shepard said, “We’re done here.”

  Uzi chomped hard on the toothpick, then pushed himself from the chair and turned to leave. He stopped in the doorway, wondering if he should tell Shepard what had happened last night. Could he be trusted? Would he keep a lid on it? Would Knox really stand by him, defend him, shield him from Coulter’s inquiry? Was Knox as powerful as DeSantos seemed to think—enough to deflect Coulter? If not, Uzi’s career was over—including those who had participated knowingly—and unknowingly. But Knox had not given him a choice. For the time being, it was best to keep it to himself. Even if it meant lying to his friend.

  Uzi bit the toothpick in half, then walked out, leaving Shepard staring out the window.

  12:22 PM

  49 hours 38 minutes remaining

  “Tango is on the move again.”

  Echo Charlie was standing in front of a street vendor’s cart, ordering up a hot dog and Coke, the Sat phone pressed against his ear, his bodyguards scanning the area with trained eyes.

  Charlie held up a hand. “No mustard.”

  “What?” Alpha Zulu asked.

  “Nothing.” Charlie switched ears as he handed the man a five dollar bill. “How are you able to still keep tabs on our man without the...device?”

  “We’re doing it. That’s all you need to know.”

  “Then why are we talking?”

  “I need some help understanding where he’s
been. I need the big picture.”

  Charlie tucked the handset between his shoulder and ear, then took his food from the vendor. It was a brisk day, and steam from the juicy, sauerkraut-smothered frank was fluttering away on the breeze. He wished his comrade would make it quick—before his hot dog was no longer true to its name. “What places?”

  “Private house off King Street, Alexandria. Five-twelve Jasper. But the one that had us most concerned was a location just outside Vienna.”

  That caught Zulu’s attention. “Vienna?”

  “Yes, but our residents there don’t know anything about it.”

  “I don’t like that.” Charlie started toward his bodyguards. “I’ll check on both.”

  “He could be getting too close. You know what’s at stake.”

  Charlie motioned one of his men to take the Coke from him. He shifted the phone back to his hand and turned away. “Then we need to throw him off. But be smart about it. If Tango...disappears now, it’ll bring problems that we don’t need. Even though he’s only a thorn, if we cut it off, suddenly the whole bush will be in our face.”

  “Not if we do it right.”

  Charlie ground his teeth. “Let me dig around. Need be, we’ll erase the trail. That works, our problem may be solved. If not, we can take it a step further. I’ll be in touch.”

  Before Zulu could object, Charlie ended the call. He took a large bite of his hot dog, and then dumped the rest in the garbage. “Gentlemen,” he said as he chewed, “let’s get moving.”

  1:01 PM

  48 hours 59 minutes remaining

  Uzi headed down to his car. He needed to see DeSantos, find out how Shepard knew about their visit to ARM. Was Knox playing both sides of the fence? He wouldn’t put it past him.

  Would DeSantos tell him the truth even if he knew it? What if DeSantos was the leak? Uzi dismissed the thought, feeling that DeSantos wouldn’t place his team in jeopardy. But the bond between Knox and OPSIG was inseparable, and even if Knox wouldn’t keep his promise to defend Uzi, he would go to war to protect DeSantos and his men.