by Tom Clancy
“What about headphones?” asked Chopra.
Southland rolled his eyes. “Oh, we’ve tried…”
Once inside, Chopra winced at the booming and shouting coming from an upstairs bedroom. He wasn’t sure if they called it rap or hip-hop or had invented some new term, but the sounds were headache-producing, the language unabashed.
They moved into the kitchen area, where seated around the table were two men and a woman, again all of them middle-aged and familiar to Chopra. The leaner man and the woman were private tutors, and the other, more stocky man was one of the family’s personal bodyguards. Chopra had forgotten his name but remembered that he’d retired from the Saudi Ministry of Defense and Aviation.
He greeted them, but they were, in a word, cold, barely glancing up from their toast and cereal, which smelled wonderful since all he’d had was bitter airport coffee.
“I’m sorry,” said Southland. “We don’t quite agree with what’s happening here.”
“Why is that?” asked Chopra.
“Because he’s not ready for such responsibility,” said the woman.
Chopra glanced at her emphatically. “He’s sixteen. We all know the story of Sheikh Maktoum bin Buti.”
Southland snorted. “We’re living in much different times.”
“History repeats itself,” said Chopra. “He, too, will rise back to power.”
“Maktoum bin Buti was very young, yes, but he was courageous. Hussein is a product of the computer age, bloated with information and blinded by his own desires for stimulus and pleasure.”
This eloquent argument had come from the female teacher, and her surname finally came to Chopra: Werner. Mrs. Werner, a British college professor who’d been swept up out of graduate school to work exclusively with Hussein and his sisters.
“I didn’t come to debate this,” said Chopra. “I need to speak with him. I need to remind him of who he is and what I’ve been protecting for all these years.”
“You’re an idealist, Chopra,” Werner said, staring up at him over the rim of her glasses. “And I hope you’ve braced yourself for disappointment.”
“You’re making him out to be a monster. He’s a sixteen-year-old boy.”
The volume on the stereo upstairs suddenly spiked, and Southland lifted his voice like an irate father. “Hussein, that is much too loud!”
The volume increased further.
After a deep breath, Chopra headed for the staircase. He wound his way up to the first landing, and the music became so loud that he thought his eyes would begin to tear. He found the nearest bedroom door at the top and gave a loud knock.
No answer. He knocked again, much more loudly, and when the door swung open, Chopra took one look and remained there, aghast…
* * *
The Snow Maiden had just finished launching her own surveillance drone, which separated into four distinct modules, each sensor no larger than her thumb and attaching itself to the house. She’d just finished listening to Chopra speak to the boy’s staff, and she decided that she would move soon to catch them all in one place, when they were most vulnerable.
She was crouched behind Southland’s car as the man came outside to fetch the newspaper.
She took a deep breath and reached out with all of her senses.
If someone had been electronically monitoring her heart rate and respiration, the numbers would’ve barely risen. By the time she’d joined the GRU, she’d stopped counting the number of people she had killed. If you asked her, “Do you remember that night in Cairo when you had to take out that man just before he got in the cab?” she would squint into that memory. The kills had become routine — an ugly word when it came to death — but she hoped they’d remain that way. Without emotion or guilt to cloud her judgment or delay her performance, she could operate efficiently, robotically even. No drama — just the elimination of obstacles.
She got to work.
The neighbors would be heading out soon, and she scanned the doorways before acting.
Clear.
After a barely appreciable thump, Southland collapsed from a perfectly timed and executed head shot. She dragged his body behind the car and left it there, out of sight from the street or adjacent doorways. She fetched the newspaper and held it up in front of her face as she entered the side door.
“What the hell are they reporting on now?” came a man’s voice. Ah, yes, the bodyguard.
She lowered the paper, and in its place came her suppressed pistol. The bodyguard swallowed her first round. The teachers met her entrance with wide eyes and open mouths, as though they were hungry, too. She shrugged. Her gaze lifted to the ceiling. Indeed, the boy’s music helped muffle any sign of commotion.
Two more shots. The male teacher snapped back, then fell forward into his bowl of cereal. The other fell sideways off her chair. The Snow Maiden neared the table and snatched up a piece of the woman’s toast. Peach jam. Yummy.
Her phone vibrated. She checked the screen: a message from Patti. You’d better move. You’ve got trouble.
* * *
The missile struck the port-side engine, and the explosion sent the Sphinx banking hard and losing altitude. As the others swore and screamed, Brent thought, Well, all that worrying over my career was a waste of time. And the engineers who designed this contraption probably haven’t addressed the old autorotation issue that I’d been hearing about, so we’re dead.
But then the aircraft leveled off and the pilot got on the horn to say he had control.
That was the only good news.
In a voice tense and breathless he added that they were still coming down hard and fast and losing hydraulic fluid. Belly flopping like a five-hundred-pound man into an inflatable pool might be the best that he could do.
Brent checked one of the windows, a new addition to the Sphinx, and noted their angle of descent and the farmers’ fields splayed out before them. A pair of fighter jets raced by before he could identify them. He wanted to ask the pilot if he had any more information, but thought better of it. Let the guy focus on landing.
“Who’s praying with me?” cried Heston. “I’m not ready to meet Jesus, and I say we tell him that!”
“Get in crash positions,” ordered Brent. “Remember your training.”
As he listened to Heston’s prayer and leaned forward to place his head between his legs to, of course, kiss his butt good-bye, the Sphinx turned again, as though riding on broken rails like an old mining car. The shuddering began at the back of the aircraft and worked its way forward, as though a fault line were opening in the steel deck.
The pilot shouted something, his voice now burred by frustration. Brent strained to hear him, but the intercom cut off into static as the stench of jet fuel began filtering into the cabin. Oh, that was not good.
“Masks on!” Brent shouted above the din.
They fished out the O2 masks from their packs and slid them over their faces. These were not attached to the Sphinx but self-contained and man-portable units that Brent always carried when he flew the not-so-friendly skies. The oxygen flow came immediately and cleared the stench of fuel. Brent dug his fingers into his palms and kept seeing fireballs — a Corvette exploding, nuclear mushroom clouds rising, as Dennison’s voice came in a whisper, “It’s over. You’re finished.”
The Sphinx dropped as though hitting another air pocket, and the straps dug into Brent’s shoulders. His stomach now greeted his ears. The engines shifted pitch, whining now like lawn mowers burning pure alcohol. A sudden clunk from the deck indicated that the pilot was lowering the gear, but a redundant clunking alarmed Brent. He remembered that hydraulic leak. He chanced a quick look up at the window. The port engine was on fire, trailing smoke, but the drone suggested the rotor was still functional.
It would be fitting, Brent thought, if he died in a ball of flames as Villanueva had. His death would be the other bookend. Maybe that was his fate, and he was just walking toward the open door.
Another dip that made hi
m feel weightless, and the panic rose from his gut and burned. The Sphinx now sounded like a freight train that was derailing and plunging over a cliff.
Place your tray tables in the upright position.
And prepare for “landing.”
When drunks get in car accidents many of them walk away because at the time of impact, their bodies are fully relaxed. They take the hit and conform more naturally to the trauma. Those who tense up and have white-knuckled grips at the moment of impact tend to be the worst off. Brent knew that. He’d talked to medics, seen crash victims, been told about relaxing into an impact.
So part of him said, Clear your mind and let it happen, that if he could imagine himself as a rag doll he could better survive the impact.
His more logical side argued that he was about to die and a death grip on the seat or straps was the only response. Fight or flight. You can’t deny instinct, deny nature.
Brent’s ex-girlfriend had been right; he should have left the Army as she’d wanted. Somer had spent three years trying to convince him, while he’d fallen deeply in love with her. She was in love with him, too, but not in love with his career. He’d kept saying, “You knew this going in. If you couldn’t marry a soldier, why’d you get involved in the first place?”
“I got involved with a man who happened to be a soldier.”
And she’d just cried and wondered why she had.
Their three years together — really eighteen months since he’d spent the other half deployed — had taught Brent one sad and rather trite lesson: Don’t get involved. It wasn’t worth it. He admired those colleagues who could maintain families despite the challenges; he just wasn’t one of them because the time and distance turned him cold and he couldn’t switch on his feelings just like that. And if he’d just listened to Somer, he’d be at home in California, probably working some day job that didn’t thrill him, but he’d be with her; they’d have a small house or apartment, a couple of kids, and on the weekends they’d buy ice cream cones at the galleria. Was that such a terrible life?
Now he would die like a filthy dog, probably burned alive as the jet fuel washed over him and the flames licked their way up his spine.
Damn, why was he being such a pessimist? The team needed him now, despite the fact that their lives were in the hands of the pilots, and there wasn’t a damned thing they could do about that — except remain hopeful instead of resigning themselves to death.
He took a long breath, then shouted at the top of his lungs: “All right, everybody! We’re Ghost Recon! We don’t die in crashes! The runway comes to us!”
“Hoo-ah!” they cried, a bit halfheartedly.
“I can’t hear you!”
This time they shouted with everything they had, and just the sheer volume of their voices made it easier to pretend they were still in control.
* * *
Sheikh Hussein Al Maktoum glared at Chopra as he tossed his long, curly hair out of his eyes. Then the boy returned the baseball cap to his head and positioned it so the brim jutted cockily to one side.
The oversized black T-shirt that said GANG WARZ in purple text, the hoop earring in one ear, and the large gold necklaces he wore were not quite as surprising as the black tattoo of barbed wire running across the young man’s forearm.
He was a Muslim. Tattoos were forbidden, or at least Chopra understood that they were. Hopefully the tattoo was not real, a decal that would wash away.
“You’re not from Sandhurst,” Hussein hollered, his accent distinctly British.
“Turn down the music!” cried Chopra. “I need to speak with you! You don’t remember me?”
Hussein made a face, pushed open the door, and allowed Chopra to enter.
To say the boy was a pack rat wildly understated it.
Stacks of movies, books, and video games rose along nearly every wall, forming a mottled wainscot of spines and rising in testament to a young life spent consuming all that was commercial and, in Chopra’s humble opinion, all that was deplorable about society.
Framed posters on the wall depicted more of the boy’s thug heroes: shirtless men making obscene gestures while scantily clad women clutched their waists and knelt at their sides to pay homage. At least three flat-screen TVs hung from the upper walls, and every conceivable game console on the market sat on the floor below them: elaborate headsets encrusted with a spaghetti of wires along with high-tech gloves and a rug of some sort that was also wired to an antenna.
In the far corner of this teenager’s nest stood a small refrigerator beside which was a shelf loaded with junk food: chips, crackers, cookies, and assorted candy. Those dietary choices certainly accounted for the young sheikh’s puffy cheeks and the paunch he attempted to hide beneath his baggy shirt and jeans. Chopra also noted the boy’s expensive sneakers made in Vietnam of some space-age fluorescent material that shimmered like blue-green algae.
Now wearing a deeper frown, Hussein sauntered over to a tiny box on one shelf and suddenly lowered the music with a remote he snatched off the top, but even as he turned back to face Chopra, he was mouthing the words of the song.
“Hussein, you don’t remember me?” Chopra repeated.
“Maybe. Like maybe you worked with my father or something. What do you want, old man? Are you one of the new tutors? You don’t look like an officer.”
Chopra motioned to a pair of overstuffed leather recliners from where Hussein played his video games. “Please sit. We have a lot to discuss. You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”
“Frankly, I don’t care. I’m hungry. And the two dolts who tutor me will be here soon. I don’t have time for this. I’m hungry!”
“Hussein, listen to me. I hold the keys to helping you rebuild your country. But it’s up to you. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
He stood there a moment, scrutinizing Chopra. Then something occurred to him and he burst into laughter. “What the hell? Is Southy playing a joke on me?” He moved toward the door and lifted his voice. “Southy! What the hell is this?”
“Hussein, please sit down.”
The boy’s face screwed up into a knot. “Old man, I have no clue what you want, but this isn’t funny anymore. Get out of my room.” He cocked a thumb toward the doorway. “And tell those bastards downstairs they’d best have my breakfast ready!”
Chopra lowered his head and sighed deeply, and when he looked up, a woman stood behind the young sheikh—
The same woman Chopra had seen in the Seychelles. Short, dark hair. Lean, muscular. Penetrating eyes. Jeans and tight-fitting leather jacket.
Wearing a smug expression, she held a pistol with large suppressor to the back of the boy’s head.
“Hussein, don’t move,” gasped Chopra.
But the boy whirled to face the woman. “Who the hell are you?” He glanced at the gun. “And what is this? How dare you wave that piece in my face? How dare you!”
Chopra nearly fainted as Hussein slapped away the woman’s pistol and shouted, “Southy, what in bloody hell is going on here! Who are these freaks? You’re going to pay for this charade! I’m telling you right now! This is the last time you play a joke on me!”
But even as he finished, the woman seized him by the neck, slammed the door behind her, and forced him into the room and toward the recliner beside Chopra.
Though her weapon sent a chill through him, Chopra rose immediately from his chair and shouted, “You will not hurt him! Do you hear me?”
“You sit down!” she screamed.
Then she jammed her pistol into Hussein’s head and spoke between her teeth. “Now listen to me carefully, little boy. Your friends are all dead. And you’re going to do exactly as I say, if you want to stay alive.” She spoke English with a Russian accent, an accent that took Chopra’s breath away. God, the Russians were already on to them.
“This isn’t a joke?” Hussein asked, his voice cracking.
The woman widened her eyes. “Do I look like I’m joking?”
/> “Who are you? What do you want?” Chopra demanded.
Slowly, she removed her weapon from Hussein’s head, and then she suddenly backhanded Chopra, her leather glove dragging across his cheek. His glasses flew across the room and he groaned, his own palm going reflexively for the pain.
“Quiet, old man. I do all the talking now. You want to know who I am? Well, they call me the Snow Maiden.”
TEN
Joint Strike Force V8-99 Sphinx
En Route to London
The Sphinx jolted forward as the pilot decreased power to both engines and Brent began a mental countdown, believing he could estimate their altitude.
Who was he fooling? He was counting just to keep his mind off their impending doom. Smoke obscured all view through the window, but it seemed they would hit the ground at any second. They weren’t kidding when they said the waiting was the hardest part. Something buffeted the Sphinx, and he wondered if they’d just taken some fire or hit a downdraft.
Whether they had actually reached RAF Lakenheath remained to be seen. Any solid ground would do for now. He was rooting for the pilot the way he rooted for the Dodgers: with balled fists and pure fury, even when the team was down by ten runs and most fans had already left after the seventh inning. Brent would shove his fourth Dodger dog into his mouth, rise, and with a mouth full of mustard, relish, and hot dog, scream, “Come on, you bums, score a freaking run!”
Their forward momentum began to decrease as the bird pitched forward and descended even more. Brent thought of stealing one more glance through the window to see if the smoke had cleared, but that thought was lost on a terrific boom resounding from the cockpit.
The racket swept over the craft.
And Brent realized they’d struck the ground and were scraping forward because the gear had not fully lowered and locked into place.
That boom had been the gear snapping off.
They began to fishtail like a sports car driver accelerating too hard — and Brent was too familiar with that sensation.
Thrown right, then left, he tightened his grip on the seat rails as the fuselage floor buckled beneath his boots. The cacophony of the impact was muffled only by the sound of his panting into the oxygen mask.