by A. J Tata
“Daddy back?” she asked.
“We might be able to get him back,” he said, thinking he understood what she was asking him.
McCarthy had found Misha some old clothes from his youngest daughter’s room—a pair of dungarees, a T-shirt, and a hoodie sweatshirt, with some old running shoes. She looked more appropriate for tonight’s mission in this attire than in her muddy Walmart clothes.
“Here,” she said. Misha turned so that he could untie the safety cord he had put around the retaining strap of her glasses. She then removed the glasses and gave them to him with the special cable that he could plug into the USB port of a computer.
They gathered around the monitor and fast-forwarded through several aspects of the video on Misha’s glasses and paused when they saw her escaping from her eco-pod and breaking into the northern door of the R & D building. Misha took them on a virtual tour of the facility, showing a crash-test wall at the east end with a driver’s track down the middle. Mahegan could see the groove where they would hook the autonomous car by the chassis and then slam it at different speeds into the immovable wall fifty yards away. Some crash-test dummies were sitting in the corner, like workers taking a break. They saw the lockers, the stairwell through which she had entered, and her exit out the other door in her race to get back into her eco-pod.
This was a brave young lady.
Based on what Mahegan saw on Misha’s glasses, he led the group for the next two hours, from two to three in the morning, as they made a plan.
Because he gambled on fantasy football, McCarthy had a whiteboard in his safe room, which, Mahegan presumed, doubled as a man cave for him. He erased the players’ names and some diagrams with x’s and o’s that looked like football plays.
“I’m leading right now,” he said. “And I already took a picture of it, so have at it,” McCarthy said.
Mahegan appreciated McCarthy’s sense of humor during tense times.
The plan was simple in concept. Breach the research and development facility with Misha in tow, get her to the computer, and have her shut down the attack, which he believed was imminent. During the planning session, which included Mahegan drawing a rough map on the whiteboard, Patch called and reported that there were dozens of spot reports from citizens about groupings of four to six Cefiro cars, some white, some red. These had to be the ones off-loaded from the car carriers that had followed the rules and had checked in at the weigh station, as if they were just moving the cars to a dealership.
McCarthy offered a variety of weapons, spotting scopes, and high-tech tracking gear, some of which would be useful. He also had collapsible tree stands and boats that they integrated into the plan.
Tess Hallowell was opposed to any involvement by Misha, but Misha argued her case effectively and essentially pushed Tess into a neutral corner. As her psychiatrist, Tess could not condone Misha’s involvement in any way, but she professionally stated her objections for the record, which were duly noted by all in the room.
Detective Patterson was still in shock over the fact that Roger Constance was apparently alive. He had his doubts still. That video could have been from a week ago, or it could have been a real-time feed. It could have been one of Misha’s actors from the Deep Web, or it could have been Roger Constance, brutally beaten and kidnapped by Franco as blackmail not to alter the code and desynchronize the attack. Franco had to know Mirza’s reputation and had to be aware that his own life depended on the success of the Cuban contribution.
Regardless, Mahegan figured that unless they went and snared Roger Constance, he wasn’t coming back alive.
Casey Livingstone was all in, as he knew she would be. While not an expert on weapons, she had taken some defense courses and was a good athlete. If she could do a three-hundred-sixty-degree air off a Biarritz five-foot right-hand wave, then with that same athleticism and creativity, she could also handle the tunnels and potential trapdoors of the Cefiro R & D compound.
“So, here’s the deal,” he said. “Tess, obviously, you need to stay here with Layne.”
Tess nodded her agreement, still wanting nothing to do with what he was going to do with Misha. Instead, she went to the kitchen off the safe room and came back with bottles of Gatorade and Clif bars, which everyone began devouring. Mahegan watched her sit down in a recliner and cross her arms and legs in apparent defiance.
He turned to the white board and drew a box for McCarthy’s house on the left side of the whiteboard, using a black marker he found in the tray. He drew a T and an L for Tess and Layne. He used a blue marker to draw the Masonboro Sound Area and Channel leading to Snow’s Cut and the Cape Fear River. Then he switched to the black marker for the Cefiro compound. He used the red marker to show the tunnel into the grounds of the R & D facility; the mounds where he suspected Roger Constance was being held captive, if indeed he was; and the interior of the R & D compound, where, presumably, the command center resided.
“Steve, we need you to get us to Snow’s Cut and maybe even the middle island in the river,” Mahegan said. “I swam it the other night, and it’s only about two hundred yards from the island to the bank where the pier and tunnel lead into the objective area, assuming they haven’t shut it down. I have to believe it is guarded, though.”
“How on earth is Misha going to swim two hundred yards?” Tess demanded.
“His back,” Misha said. She was intently listening to the plan, as Mahegan suspected she would. He was going over all this mostly for her, so that she would program every move in that wired mind of hers. She pointed at him as she spoke, and then she began softly rocking again.
Tess shook her head and looked away.
“She’s done it before,” Mahegan continued. “Casey, Misha and I will get into the tunnel and come up into the grounds. There are about fifty yards of flat, open ground to cover, so we need a diversion or a screen of some sort to give us cover.”
“I’ve got an M-thirty-two nonlethal riot gun,” McCarthy said. “Never used it other than on the range. It’s got smoke rounds and tear gas, maybe even some pepper-spray rounds. Won it in a bet with a general.”
“That’s perfect,” Mahegan said. “One of you can drive the boat, and the other can pump smoke and chem rounds into the compound, preferably on the roof, if you can reach. Each corner has a spotter, and they are armed. But that was when they had thirty to forty soldiers. I think we’ve at least cut that number in half. And they’re gunning up for the big show, so we might get lucky.”
“Need anything from us?” Detective Patterson asked.
“I assumed you two would want in on the action. The hard-boiled detective hanging tough with the case and bringing Roger Constance home. You’ll be a hero.”
“I couldn’t give a rat’s ass about being a hero,” said Patterson. “I want to stay alive.”
“You’ll be fine, Paul. I’ve got your back,” McCarthy said. “This will be the most fun we’ve had since we climbed the water tower in high school and couldn’t get down, so the helicopter had to pick us up.”
“Which brings me to my next point,” Mahegan said. “I saw some pictures of you parachuting, Steve. How many do you have?”
“Man, you don’t play,” McCarthy said. “I’ve got two. Recently rigged and inspected. My last jump was about a month ago.”
“Two will work,” Mahegan said. “But I need some rope.”
“I think we’ve given you enough rope, Mr. Mahegan,” Tess said. “You’re devising a dangerous scheme to complete an impossible task, while risking not only the lives of three adults, including yours, but also that of a child. I just cannot assent to this.”
“Tess, this is how we do it. And I haven’t even talked about what’s going to happen at the ports. Right now we suspect there are ships steaming up the Cape Fear River with containers housing ten commandos apiece. The average ship can carry between two thousand and five thousand containers. They probably have traded people for equipment in a thousand of those containers. So let’s assume, best cas
e, that they have ten thousand troops and hundreds of tanks, personnel carriers, and rocket launchers, and the logistics support for this type of endeavor. If even a hundred of those commandos get off one ship, then it’s all over. Remember what eight guys with guns did in Paris over a year ago?”
“How do we stop that?” Casey asked. She was with him on the plan to get inside the compound, but this truly confused her, and him.
“I think Misha,” he said.
“Misha?”
Misha looked toward the room with her mother and swayed back and forth, making a subtle rocking motion. Her face was pinched again, her lips were scrunched together, and she typed.
I can do what you want.
Mahegan looked at the phone she had handed him, then laid out the rest of the plan to include extraction, and then they spent an hour gathering and inspecting gear. McCarthy brought in a portable deer stand and several big game rifles.
“If we have snipers on the roof, I can deal with them,” he said. “I’ve got thermal and night-vision scopes.”
“That would be helpful. If they’ve got four up top, that would leave fewer than ten inside, including their commander, Darius Mirza.”
“Mirza?” Patterson asked. “I’ve heard that name before.”
“You’ll hear it again in a few hours. Just be ready to take credit for Roger Constance once we get him back,” Mahegan said.
He looked at Misha. She continued to alternate between staring at her mother’s room and the floor. She had thoroughly computed the plan. She was seeing problems and pitfalls. She was seeing opportunities and advantages.
She stopped swaying, looked up at the ceiling and then at him. “Can work,” she said.
“I agree,” Mahegan said.
Casey wrapped the parachutes in thick trash bags so that the nylon would survive the swim and be usable when needed. They then moved outside to McCarthy’s boat and boarded the craft. Tess Hallowell watched from the boathouse pier, her arms folded. Mahegan, Misha, Casey, Patterson, and McCarthy began cruising through the dark morning along the Intracoastal Waterway through Masonboro Sound and Myrtle Grove Sound toward Snow’s Cut, which would feed them into the Cape Fear River. It was 4:00 a.m., and the sun was two hours from rising, which meant they had to move fast.
They remained quiet, McCarthy in the console of his Grady-White. Mahegan and McCarthy had carted four full kit bags out to the boat.
Passing through Snow’s Cut, Mahegan actually saw his Jeep Cherokee still parked in the veterans park gravel parking lot from when he first swam to the R & D location two days ago, which was followed by their escape and evasion activity when a Cefiro car had detonated on the bridge, cratering one side.
McCarthy’s boat was quiet, and they slid into the deep and murky waters of the Cape Fear River, leaving behind the brackish water of Masonboro Sound. Mahegan could hear the hoots of owls communicating during their nightly hunt. Fish smacked the surface of the water. Four deer were grazing at the west end of Carolina Beach State Park. They looked up at them with suspicious eyes but didn’t run. Mahegan thought the deer understood that McCarthy was their enemy. No doubt he would probably shoot them right now if they didn’t have a mission.
As they approached the first island, Mahegan thought McCarthy did a good job of keeping them behind the thickest section of forest until they had to move around the north end. From there, they quietly churned to the second island, where McCarthy and Patterson would disembark and take up support-by-fire positions as Mahegan, Misha, and Casey swam in the river.
McCarthy fought the current a little bit but nudged the boat into some soft clay and then handed Mahegan an anchor as he jumped overboard, hanging on to the gunwale. He landed in knee-deep water and walked the anchor onto the island, where he placed it behind a fallen tree.
Mahegan helped Casey and Misha off the boat, and they walked to the western side of the island. They knelt behind some deadfall and watched the compound from about 250 yards away. Mahegan pointed out the dark cavern.
“That’s our objective,” he said.
“Current seems pretty swift,” Casey remarked.
“There have been some heavy rains upriver. Swim at a forty-five-degree angle and we should be fine. Just be ready to use your weapon.”
She nodded. “Always.”
“We should get going,” he said.
As he crawled forward to slide into the water, he saw McCarthy securing his deer stand to an oak tree. It was impossible to tell if the roof of the R & D building was fully or just partially manned.
They would find out soon enough.
CHAPTER 30
THEY SLIPPED OFF THE NORTH END OF THE SECOND ISLAND INTO the Cape Fear River. The late September morning had cooled, and the water felt relatively warm to Mahegan. He was worried about Misha’s body temperature. Water would be splashing up on her torso as she rode on his back. McCarthy had a seventeen-year-old daughter in boarding school, and he had managed to find one of her old wet suits for Misha, but it was big on her and would slow her down. Nonetheless, she wore it with the sleeves and ankles rolled up.
Casey and Mahegan both wore wet suits. He carried two pistols in his wet suit’s specialized pouch, his trusty Tribal for himself, and a Beretta for Casey. McCarthy had come through with plenty of nine millimeter Parabellum ammunition. Perhaps unwittingly, Tess’s idea to escape to McCarthy’s house had served them well. It had given them a base of operations and was a veritable logistics depot.
They angled about forty-five degrees to the north on their swim, as the river current felt stronger than even a day before. Mahegan’s reasoning for using the same entrance he had used previously was that the Iranians had to know about both tunnels by now. One they actively used for moving ammunition, and the other he had used to rescue Misha. Those, he considered, would be blocked. The Iranians were operating with about a third of their manpower by his calculations, and from what he knew of Mirza, the man had an egomaniacal, aggressive, and reckless style. But he was a solid tactician. He would probably have active patrols along the wire, perhaps two men still searching for them, and six or so running active patrols inside and outside the building. The old adage “If you defend everywhere, you defend nowhere” was what he was counting on this morning. Mirza’s men would be tired from continuous operations and eager to turn over lodgment duties to the inbound ship.
Like a silent, massive monster, a merchant ship to their left was heading directly toward them. Its presence masked by the darkness still shrouding them, the ship’s bow hovered above them like a guillotine. He felt Misha’s legs tighten around him and her grip on the zipper of his wet suit strengthened, as if she were reining in a horse. He needed to speed up, though, or this vessel, which appeared longer than two football fields, would plow them under.
“Hurry,” he said to Casey in between strokes. Mahegan saw her turn her head and see the ship and then double down on her stroke, as did he. She was pulling the equipment bag, which she had double-wrapped in big green lawn bags and then tied off with some nylon climbing rope around her waist. The drag from that had to be greater than what he was feeling from Misha. The bow of the ship came within twenty yards of them, which meant they were still in danger of being hit by the steel hull at its widest part of the beam. They continued to swim, splashing perhaps more than was tactically sound. He felt a push from the wake of the ship, which slipped past them with only a few feet to spare. He checked Casey and saw that the ship had knocked the equipment bag under. Casey had gone with it.
He treaded water for a few seconds, until she reappeared, towline in hand.
“We need to hurry. This thing is going to get waterlogged before long,” she said, gasping for air.
Mahegan appreciated her tenacity and sense of mission. She was the perfect partner for a mission like this. They picked up their rhythm and closed the distance to the shoreline.
Patch had told him about the four ships they were tracking. This would be the second one, as the first was most lik
ely making harbor soon at the port. Just like in the warehouse during the initial raid, commandos would spill out of the containers quickly once they were off-loaded. Hopefully, McCarthy who was a member of the Ports Authority board, had been able to influence the operations of the port for a few hours. He needed the port not to off-load a single container.
The swell from the ship, which was going too fast up the Cape Fear River now, helped push them toward the western bank. They landed, in fact, about fifty yards north of the tunnel entrance, which was good.
He knelt on the soft mud as Casey helped Misha off of his back. She had been holding on tight, silent, as he’d expected. She stood on the bank, looking at him. He wasn’t sure whether her eyes were looking inward or outward.
He changed her out of the wet suit, which she would not be needing anymore, and into McCarthy’s daughter’s pair of dungarees, T-shirt, and sweatshirt, which were too big for her but manageable. He checked her glasses and tied them off through a hole he cut in the fabric below the collar of the sweatshirt.
He opened the kit bag and retrieved the equipment, which was stored in two rucksacks. He and Casey shouldered the packs on their backs, and he led them to the tunnel mouth.
Mahegan knew this was where synchronization would be tricky. They had only phones for texting and calling, so they were vulnerable to monitoring and dependent on the quality of phone coverage in some remote areas. He had securely packed the phones inside the double-wrapped kit bag, and upon initial inspection, they appeared to have survived. Using Casey’s phone, he texted McCarthy, whom he visualized sitting in his tree stand on the second island peering through his thermal night vision scope in the early morning darkness.
Status?
Two up top. Two walking at ground level. Nothing down below.
McCarthy’s report meant that two men were on the roof, two were patrolling the grounds, and no one was on their level near the pier. While there was a chance that communications could be intercepted, using Casey’s iPhone and the iMessage function was as secure as they were going to get. He shared the Zebra app with no one, regardless of the mission.