Desert Fire

by David Hagberg

  “Have you checked them?”

  “Only to the first floor. There’s a steel fire door. Not wired. I’d say it probably opens on the reactor room main floor. In full view of the control room above.”

  “They’re threatening to blow the reactor at any minute,” Roemer said. “Which means we’re going to have to do this right the first time.”

  72

  AN AMBULANCE HAD drawn up to the helicopter bearing the body of Roemer’s father.

  Whalpol looked out the back of the communications truck as a white-shrouded bundle was unloaded from the helicopter. He shuddered.

  Colonel Faulkner had been listening on the walkie-talkie. He nodded to Whalpol. “They’re inside, but it’s taking longer than we thought it would.”

  It was past midnight. Whalpol was tired. But it would be over with, one way or the other, very soon. “We give them Lotti Roemer now. It’ll distract them for a few minutes.”

  “What about the evacuation?”

  “Keep it going. Lieutenant Manning knows the drill.”

  “The media people are raising hell.”

  “Let them,” Whalpol said.

  The ambulance pulled away from the helicopter and drove slowly over to the communications truck.

  Whalpol instructed the radioman to raise the R&D building.

  Colonel Habash came back immediately: “You’re running out of time.”

  “We have Lotti Roemer’s body, Colonel Habash.”

  The radio was silent for a moment. Habash would be checking with the general.

  “What about the son?” Habash radioed.

  “He is on the operating table.”

  “How soon can you have him here?” Habash radioed. “Alive and awake.”

  “Three hours.”

  “You have thirty minutes, Major Whalpol.”

  “We’ll try,” he radioed.

  “We want the body brought to within fifty meters of our gate, uncovered so we can see the face, and we want your ambulance to withdraw.”

  Faulkner looked at Whalpol.

  “We’re waiting,” Habash radioed.

  “We’ll do as you say,” Whalpol answered. “In the meantime we’re evacuating all civilian personnel from the area.”

  “No.”

  “Oh, yes, you crazy bastard. If you want Lotti Roemer’s body and Walther Roemer, you’re going to have to give us this. Otherwise just go ahead and pull the fucking pin!”

  Whalpol threw the microphone down in disgust. He felt dirty. He couldn’t help thinking of Sarah Razmarah. Sherif may have killed her, but he himself had led her to Germany to her death.

  At the back of the truck he passed Habash’s instructions to the ambulance driver. “Just get it over with.”

  “Yes, mein Herr,”the driver said. He drove off toward the break in the barricade.

  Whalpol watched through binoculars. The ambulance drove slowly through the barricade and swung around to a halt about fifty meters from the gate. The driver and the medic opened the rear doors and pulled out a wheeled stretcher, on which Lotti Roemer’s body was strapped, and rolled it clear. Finally the medic pulled the shroud back, exposing the dead man’s head.

  They drove away in the ambulance, leaving the body lying out in the open.

  A technician called from the truck. “Colonel Habash, sir. They say for us to keep our heads down, they’re going to open fire.”

  “God in heaven.” Whalpol brought the binoculars up to his eyes.

  The night air was shattered by gunfire from the roofline of the R&D building.

  The body came alive, dancing and jerking as bullets slammed into it. The wheeled stretcher tipped over, but still the firing went on and on.

  Whalpol lowered his binoculars as he tried to control his nausea.

  73

  LEILA KAHLED HID in the woods near the KwU van from which she’d just stolen the radiation suit. She had started up toward the ponds when she heard voices. Plant engineer Trautman and two technicians emerged from the woods and crossed the grassy slope to the van. She had also stolen a police hand radio from the administration building and monitored the exchange between Whalpol and Colonel Habash.

  Whalpol’s lie about Walther being wounded was understandable. Habash’s demand that Lotti Roemer’s body be placed out in full view was insane.

  Sounds of gunfire drifted over the hill on the light breeze. The firing went on for a long time, then stopped just as abruptly as it had begun.

  Leila’s heart hammered. The radio was silent, but she knew what had happened. Allah guide her, this was all insane.

  Things her father had said and done in the months before they’d come here on this project made sense now. He had been adamantly against the reactor at first, but suddenly he had reversed himself and insisted that he be included.

  It came to her, finally, that her father had planned this very operation all along. But why? Even crazy people have reasons for what they do.

  Trautman and the others drove off in the van.

  Leila picked up the bulky radiation suit and the walkie-talkie and headed up the hill toward the holding ponds. At the fence, she wrapped the walkie-talkie in the radiation suit and heaved the bundle over. The oxygen pack went next.

  She took off her coat and, holding it under her arm, scrambled up the fence. At the top she laid the coat on top of the razor wire, then climbed over it and dropped down the other side.

  She crouched. There were no alarms. She was alone here.

  Scooping up the suit and gear, she hurried across the top of the earthwork dam to the ladder, where again she stopped a moment to listen. They probably were looking for her. If Trautman spotted her car a few hundred meters up the Autobahn, they might put two and two together and try to stop her. But she would be inside by then.

  She pulled on the radiation suit, the walkie-talkie inside. She opened the air supply control and pulled on the hood, sealing it.

  She carefully climbed down the ladder and maneuvered into the pipe. A narrow trickle of water dribbled over the edge down into the pond. She crouched just within the pipe, staring into the impenetrable darkness. She wasn’t particularly claustrophobic, but she did not relish the idea of burying herself so far underground in such a narrow passageway.

  Getting a tight grip on herself, she started forward, her hands touching the sides of the pipe for guidance. Quickly she was in blackness, and she had to force down a rising panic as she hurried faster and faster.

  74

  KILLING THE GUARD would be risky. The man stood at the head of the stairs in plain view of the control room that overlooked the reactor floor.

  Roemer ducked back around the corner where Wadud and the others waited. “There’s enough machinery noise to cover a silenced shot. But if someone happens to be looking down when it happens, we’ll be in trouble.”

  “What do you think, Jacob?” Roemer asked the Iraqi detective.

  “One shot to the head,” Wadud said. “With luck, no blood will get on the front of his uniform.”

  “I wish there was another way,” Roemer muttered. He had no stomach for killing.

  “So do I,” Wadud whispered. “There are good men in there.”

  “We’re going to have to make sure no one in the control room is watching,” Roemer said. He turned to Salman, the Iraqi agent. “Go up the back stairs to the reactor room doorway. Check it and check the control room windows. When it’s clear, click your walkie-talkie switch. When we hear it, Jacob will take out the guard.”

  Salman hurried off down the corridor. Wadud eased himself to the edge of the stairwell.

  Bouchiki unstrapped his equipment belt and started to get undressed. The moment the guard was down he would change into his clothes and get back into view of the control room.

  Roemer looked back down the corridor. Salman should be in position now. Roemer held his walkie-talkie up to his ear.

  It seemed to take forever. Roemer was about to send Brecht back to check on Salman when his walkie
-talkie clicked.

  “Now,” he whispered to Wadud.

  The Iraqi detective stepped around the corner and fired two quick shots, the dull plopping sounds lost to the machinery noises.

  The guard tumbled down the stairs.

  Wadud leaped forward, Roemer right behind him. The right side of the guard’s neck was blown away, but he was still alive. He clawed at the wound. Wadud smashed the butt of his pistol between the man’s eyes, knocking him unconscious. A second later the man shuddered and was still.

  Wadud looked up, pure hate in his eyes.

  75

  IRAQI AGENT HANI Bouchiki, wearing the dead soldier’s combat fatigues and carrying his Kalashnikov slung over a shoulder, stepped into view on the reactor room floor, then nonchalantly leaned against the wall.

  Their only problem now would come if anybody recognized Bouchiki as an impostor.

  Menzel and Brecht came up with their demolitions-disarming kits. They were dressed in black. As soon as Bouchiki gave them the all-clear, they would make their way up the stairs and across the reactor room floor, where they could work around the Harwell spent-fuel element pool unobserved from above. Trautman suspected that the charges would be suspended within the pool itself, the wires leading out of the water, across the reactor room floor up to the control room.

  Bouchiki held out three fingers behind his back—three of General Sherif’s men were in the control room.

  Roemer stepped back around the corner. “Three,” he said.

  Wadud looked up from the body and grabbed Roemer’s arm, his grip like a vise. “Promise me we’ll do everything within our power not to kill any more of those boys.”

  “I don’t like this any better than you do.”

  “Insha’ Allah,” Wadud said softly.

  Roemer looked at him for a long time. “Do you want me to take the control room ceiling? You can go after the hostages?”

  “I’ll be all right.”

  “You may have to … kill the general.”

  Wadud handed his silenced Hessler-and-Koch and a spare magazine to Roemer. “Here, take my gun. I’ll use yours. If I have to shoot, silence won’t matter.”

  Roemer took Wadud’s weapon and handed the Iraqi detective his PPK automatic and extra magazine.

  “Clear,” Menzel said from the foot of the stairs.

  Bouchiki was waving them up.

  “All right,” Roemer said. “As soon as you have the charges disconnected, give us the Situation Three code.”

  Menzel and Brecht scurried up the stairs and out of sight.

  Roemer held his breath for several long seconds. Bouchiki gave the all-clear.

  Wadud headed down the corridor toward the stairs at the opposite end of the building. Roemer followed him. They silently started up. On the first floor Salman was waiting for them, his gun drawn.

  “Did Menzel and Brecht get into position?” Roemer asked.

  “Yes, sir. They’re behind some equipment next to the pool.”

  Roemer eased the door open a crack. An eerie blue glow from the spent-element pool illuminated the large room. Above the back wall were the tall glass windows of the control room. A man in battle fatigues had his back to the window; he was talking to someone. Below, crouched behind a computer console, Menzel and Brecht were pulling tools out of their kits.

  Roemer could not see any wires leading from the pool. It was possible that the explosives were equipped with a radio-controlled firing device. Then their only hope would be Wadud’s ability to keep General Sherif and his men from actually pushing the button.

  Roemer closed the door and stepped back.

  “What’s going on?” Salman asked.

  “You and I are going after the hostages,” Roemer said. “Jacob will take the control room ceiling. I don’t want to make any big moves until we have the hostages secured, Jacob. When that happens I’ll radio ‘All clear.’ Salman and I will try to join you. When you’re in position, say ‘Here.’”

  They started up the stairs, keeping low and silent.

  At the next level, the control room floor, they paused by the door. Salman wanted to open it, but Roemer held him back.

  “He may have guards posted,” Roemer whispered.

  Wadud started up the next flight of stairs. Salman and Roemer followed him.

  There were two floors above the control room. The first level contained offices for the engineers and scientists and a large drafting room. The floor in that room, according to the architectural drawings Trautman had shown them, was segmented in one-meter squares that could easily be lifted out of place, designed for access to the cable runs over the control room.

  Wadud eased the fire door open and looked down the empty corridor, then stepped through. “I can make it from here on my own.”

  “Good luck,” Roemer whispered.

  Roemer looked up the final flight of stairs. The top floor contained the chief engineer’s office as well as the executive cafeteria. From the cafeteria kitchen, there was access to the roof.

  Whalpol and Colonel Faulkner had agreed that General Sherif would have at least four men on the roof, one to cover each direction. Someone would have to be nearby watching the five men and two women hostages supposedly being held. They were the only KwU staff unaccounted for. There was a good chance that the hostages were being kept in the cafeteria.

  There were no sounds from above. Roemer took out Wadud’s silenced pistol; Salman took out his fifteen-shot, nine-millimeter SigSauer. They started up the stairs slowly, stopping several times to listen.

  Roemer eased the door open. Halfway down the hallway was the cafeteria, but Roemer could see only the corner of one table inside.

  They flattened themselves against the corridor wall and slowly worked their way to the cafeteria’s open doors.

  Someone inside coughed. Roemer heard an indistinct voice, a man speaking in German.

  “No talking, I said,” someone ordered just inside the door.

  It was one of General Sherif’s troops, just on the other side of the wall. How many others were in the cafeteria?

  Roemer’s walkie-talkie clicked and Menzel’s voice came through, low but clear. “Situation Three impossible. Situation Three impossible.”

  The Iraqi suddenly appeared in the doorway. He fumbled to pull his Kalashnikov off his shoulder.

  Roemer shot him twice in the chest at point-blank range, driving the soldier backward. He crashed against a table.

  “Oh, God,” a woman cried.

  Roemer leaped into the room, low, sweeping his weapon around for another target as he ducked behind a table.

  Salman slid behind a stack of chairs.

  The hostages, one of them with a bandage around his head, were seated together at one table near the stainless-steel serving counter. They looked terrified.

  Someone shouted in Arabic from the stairwell in the kitchen.

  Roemer frantically motioned for Salman to answer.

  Salman hesitated a moment, then called out something in Arabic. There was silence. Salman sagged with relief.

  Roemer held his weapon in both hands, aiming it at the door to the kitchen.

  “It’s all right,” Salman whispered, moving closer. “He wanted to know what all the racket was about. I told him I tripped over my clumsy feet.”

  Roemer lowered his gun. The hostages watched them silently, not moving.

  “Get them out of here,” Roemer told Salman. “Menzel has evidently run into trouble disarming the explosives. Take them out through the pipeline. There have to be other radiation suits down there. Suit them up and get them the hell out of here.”

  “Yes, sir.” Salman hurried over to where the hostages were waiting.

  “God bless you,” one of the women said.

  There had been no Iraqi technicians working in the facility when General Sherif’s people had taken over. For that, at least, Roemer was grateful. He went through the kitchen door. A narrow corridor led to the stairway that went up to the roof. The
re were at least four of them up there, he figured. It would be impossible for him alone to take them all out. If one of them happened to come downstairs and discover that the hostages were gone, the alarm would be sounded.

  Roemer raised his walkie-talkie. Whalpol was monitoring this channel, so he must know that Menzel was having trouble. Roemer hoped that the BND major would be sharp enough to pick up the hint in his message, that they needed a diversion to hold the soldiers on the roof.

  “Unit One, Unit One, something is going on up on the roof,” he radioed. “You’d better get someone here right away.”

  “We understand,” Whalpol’s voice came over.

  Roemer clipped his walkie-talkie back on his belt. He hoped like hell that Whalpol had understood and would be able to do something to help.

  76

  LEILA APPROACHED THE opening of the pipeline with extreme caution. She had sealed her gun inside her suit, so she was unarmed until she could get through decontamination.

  Carefully, she peered up through the hole, out across the pump room. No one was there.

  She pulled herself through the opening and hurried down the long room to the decontamination chamber. She emerged a couple of minutes later with the green light. She peeled off her suit, tossed it on the pile with the others and went back across the pump room to the corridor. She’d been in this building many times, of course, but never down here.

  She took out her Beretta. To the left, just before the stairwell, was a body, blood down its back. The dead man was clothed only in his underwear. What had happened here?

  She recognized him as one of her father’s troops.

  She approached the dead soldier and bent down to touch his cheek. It was still warm.

  She flattened herself against the wall and edged over to the stairwell. She caught a glimpse of a man in battle fatigues, blood down his back, at the head of the stairs.

  He had to be the one who had come in with Roemer and Jacob Wadud. They had killed one of her father’s men and taken his uniform. Colonel Faulkner’s demolitions crew was probably on the reactor room floor at this moment. Their next step would be to find the hostages.