Lion of God- The Complete Trilogy

by Stephen England

  “Is everything in order?” the driver, a heavyset Arab in Western clothes, demanded loudly as he leaned from the window of the heavy military truck—impatience written across the man’s face. “I was told that there would be no problem, and there—”

  “Your papers appear to be legitimate,” Farajat replied, handing them back to the man. Summoning up every reserve of courage for what he was about to say. What he had to say. “But I am afraid it makes no difference. There have been many smugglers caught here on the border in recent months and we must search your trucks. Step out of the vehicle.”

  “This is absurd,” the man exploded in protest, his face twisting with rage. “I was assured—”

  “Out of the vehicle,” the lieutenant cut him off, placing a hand on his holstered pistol for emphasis as he repeated the order. “Now. Yalla, yalla!”

  10:43 P.M.

  “Baton-One-Zero”, the lead C-130

  Syrian airspace

  “We just received a transmission from Incirlik,” Ariel announced, raising his voice so as to be heard by his team as he returned to his seat alongside the cargo hold of the C-130. “Our timeline has been moved up—the Palestinians are already at the border crossing.”

  He saw Ze’ev shake his head, a curse escaping the older man’s lips.

  “Is there any way we can get on the ground more quickly?” he heard Nadir ask, turning to see the dark face of the youngest member of the Kidon team.

  The one question that was truly out of all their hands.

  “Not much of one,” he conceded, catching the eye of the American, “but our friends up front are going to see just how much more they can get out of these engines. We cross into Iraqi airspace in twelve minutes.”

  10:47 P.M.

  Al-Karameh Border Crossing

  Jordan

  “If you do not let us proceed at once, there will be trouble,” the man protested, his hands spread across the hood of the military truck, his eyes flickering back to where Jordanian soldiers were still going through the back. “You are going to be finished. Finished! Do you hear me, you son of a—”

  “Quiet,” Lieutenant Farajat responded, the collar of the man’s shirt twisting around his hand as he shoved his face into the hood, the man’s curses mingled with a cry of pain. “I’ve heard enough from you.”

  This had been easier than he had feared, any misgivings he might have felt over the dangers he ran stopping the trucks melting away with the discovery of five Type 56 assault rifles—Chinese copies of the more easily recognizable AK-47—badly hidden in the back of the second truck. More than enough to justify the stop before his superiors, if it came to that. He—

  The sound of another vehicle approaching the border crossing interrupted his thoughts as he looked up to see a white BMW pull to a stop not ten meters away. A man in the uniform of a Royal Jordanian Army colonel emerging from the driver’s seat into the checkpoint lights.

  “What is going on here, lieutenant?” he demanded, striding up to Farajat even as the young officer brought his hand up in an instinctive, nervous salute. “What’s the meaning of this?”

  “Weapons, sir,” Farajat responded, feeling a sweat break out on his forehead as the colonel’s eyes bored into his own. An unrelenting gaze. “We caught these men trying to cross the border with arms, and they have no explanation for their possession of them. They—”

  “You will let them go, lieutenant,” the colonel replied, the tone of his voice brooking no opposition, “without further delay. Do it now.”

  10:54 P.M.

  Prince Sultan Air Base

  Al Kharj, Saudi Arabia

  “Palmetto One-One, this is Tower,” Capano heard the flight controller intone, the woman’s voice coming clearly through his headset as he adjusted the throttle, steering the F-15 toward the center of the runway. “Winds 260 at five knots, runway 35 left, heading 355. You are cleared for take-off.”

  Heading 355, aye, he thought, watching the indicator align as the aircraft turned toward the north, the horizon shrouded in darkness out there beyond the runway lights. “Winds 260 at five knots, runway 35 left. Cleared for take-off. Palmetto One-One.”

  “Good hunting.”

  Good hunting. Whatever that meant on this night.

  He shook his head, his eyes focused on the heads-up display as his gloved left hand closed around the throttle, pushing it steadily forward as the F-15 accelerated into a rolling take-off—light flaring suddenly behind him as the afterburners fired, their thunderous roar penetrating his helmet, enveloping him in sound.

  And then the ground seemed to drop away from beneath him, Garrison’s voice in his ear as the Strike Eagle rose into the night sky over Al Kharj, climbing rapidly to thirty thousand feet before turning to the northwest.

  Aimed toward the Iraq border, seven hundred miles away.

  Half an hour, give or take.

  9:56 P.M. Eastern European Time

  Incirlik Air Base

  Adana, Turkey

  “They’ve crossed the border,” Avi ben Shoham announced heavily as he replaced the phone in his shirt pocket, glancing at his wristwatch. “Our man couldn’t hold them back any longer.”

  The Israeli ploy had bought them time, Lay thought, staring at the radar screens. But was it enough?

  Only time would tell, and time still wasn’t something they had much of. Cutting it so very close.

  “Where are the planes?” Shoham asked, coming up behind him.

  “Just crossed over into Iraqi airspace a couple minutes ago,” the CIA officer responded, turning away from the screens. “Nine minutes from drop.”

  Nine minutes in which literally anything could go wrong. And if anything did. . .

  Lay swore softly, turning back to the map table and picking up his coffee. It would be an international incident like nothing in living memory.

  It wasn’t the first time he’d found himself wondering if his career was destined for a swift and ignominious end—there’d been many of those times in Berlin.

  But somehow, even in those darkest moments of the Cold War, the stakes had never seemed quite this high. The costs of potential failure so. . .total, not only to himself and his agents, but to the Agency as a whole.

  And the men he’d sent out there, into the darkness. Perhaps that was the problem, at the heart of it. To be the sender, no longer the sent.

  “It’s hard, isn’t it, David?” He heard Shoham ask, looking up to see the Israeli standing there a few feet away. A grim smile on his face.

  “What is?”

  “Letting go. Recognizing that at some point in your life, you have to step back and let others do what you once did so very well.” The Israeli leaned back against the table, every movement displaying the tension pervading his body. As though he was finding his own advice impossible to take. “We are no longer young men, you and I—the front lines of this. . .shadow war are no longer where we belong, no matter how much we might wish it otherwise. And we must trust that those who have come after us are every bit as good as we once were.”

  His dark eyes twinkled with the first flash of humor Lay had seen from him since his arrival. “Maybe even better.”

  True enough. If no easier to accept, for all that.

  He started to form a reply, but it died on his lips as an Air Force sergeant at the other end of the room suddenly ripped off his headphones, shock clearly written in the man’s eyes as he half-turned to face the intelligence officers.”

  “Sir, it—it’s the planes, they’ve broken radio silence. They’re getting lit up by fire-control radars.”

  11:01 P.M. Arabia Time

  “Baton-Two-Zero”, the second C-130

  Iraqi airspace

  “They’re tracking us,” Colonel Silbermann heard the American announce, his arm resting on the back of the co-pilot’s seat as he stared over the man’s shoulder at the screens. “Seconds away from lock.”

  The final step before missile launch, the Duvdevan commander thought, curs
ing silently. Infuriated by his own impotence. There weren’t supposed to be Iraqi surface-to-air units anywhere near their flight path. The gap between intelligence and reality never more apparent. Or more painful. “Is there anything you can do?”

  “We’ve got some chaff,” the co-pilot responded tersely, his eyes never leaving the screen. “A few flares, for all the good they’ll do. We—”

  His voice broke off suddenly, faltering ever so slightly as he announced, “They have lock-on.”

  “Baton-One-Zero”

  Four minutes to drop. If he closed his eyes, Ariel could almost hear the Iraqi radar in his imagination pinging off the hull of the Hercules transport, bouncing back to the mobile launchers far below.

  Signing their death warrants.

  There was no time to think about how their intelligence could have been so terribly wrong. No time for regret, for recrimination.

  There was only the mission, or what remained of it—as they flew into the very maw of the lion.

  “The moment—the very moment—we’re over the drop zone,” he said, raising his voice over the throbbing engines of the transport as he looked around at his team members, “we go out. Until then, find something to hang onto. It’s about to get rocky.”

  10:03 P.M. Eastern European Time

  Incirlik Airbase

  Adana, Turkey

  Tense silence reigned in the operations tent, all eyes focused on the radar screens, the pair of small, moving dots representing the transports. The dark, oppressive silence of a tomb.

  “Is there any way to take them out before they can launch?” Shoham asked finally, clearing his throat. “Your Southern Watch assets, perhaps?”

  If only. “They were sent a flash as soon as the launchers were first detected,” Lay responded, “but we’re not patched directly into their comms network. It’s going to take time to work its way through the chain of command.”

  Time, and far too much of it.

  “What about the F-15 from Prince Sultan?”

  “Still twenty minutes out.” Minutes, when seconds were what counted.

  All that counted.

  Shoham lapsed into silence once more, only for it to be broken moments later by an airman’s loud curse.

  The man’s eyes opening wide as he stared at the screen, two more tiny blips emerging on-screen near the transports.

  “We have missiles in the air.”

  11:04 P.M.

  “Baton-One-Zero”

  Ariel felt the plane lurch drunkenly as it banked suddenly hard right, wallowing like a large boat caught in a trough of the ocean—the fingers of his right hand entwined in the webbing as the maneuver threatened to pitch him across the aircraft.

  He heard the transport’s countermeasures fire, clouds of foil chaff from the dispensers filling the night sky around them. Enough to distract the missiles.

  If they were lucky.

  “A minute to drop,” the co-pilot’s strained voice in his earpiece informed him, even as the aircraft seemed to level out once more, the ramp slowly opening to reveal the cavernous abyss of the night beyond, the slipstream curling around their bodies. “SAMs eleven kilometers out and closing, heading one-five-five.”

  His eyes fixed on the red light over the ramp. Fifty-three seconds. . .

  Just hold on. He caught sight of Ze’ev standing on the other side of the hold, just inside the now-open ramp—and the older man nodded tightly.

  He’d lead the stick off the ramp, just as planned. Ariel remaining just behind to boot out anyone who hesitated.

  None of his people ever had. Thirteen seconds.

  “SAMs two kilometers out, heading one-two-nine.” He heard the copilot’s breath catch, immediately followed by a cry of exultation. “Trashed one!

  One missile down. Three. . .two. . .

  The light went green in that moment, his voice yelling hoarsely, “Go! Go! Go!” as Ze’ev threw himself from the ramp and into the night. Twenty thousand feet down.

  The American sergeant following immediately after—and then Tzipporah.

  “The SAM’s turning away,” Ariel heard in his ear, a sense of relief washing over him as he saw Nadir drop, pushing himself away from the webbing. “No longer tracking.”

  And then, even as he took his own final steps to the brink, hurling himself forward into the night—he heard and saw the explosion.

  11:05 P.M.

  The rendezvous point

  Al-Anbar Governate, Iraq

  “What was that?!?” Umar Hadi demanded, a distant crump assaulting his ears as he glanced up and toward the northern sky—way, way up—a brief flash of fire blossoming across his vision before disappearing entirely.

  Thamir shook his head, the look on the captain’s face clearly revealing concern. “I don’t know, sir.”

  Hadi swore loudly, glancing at his wristwatch. No sign of the Palestinians yet. And something was going wrong.

  “Get on the radio to that Iraqi Army unit north of us,” he ordered, “they have radar on those launchers. They should be able to tell us what’s going on, if anyone can.”

  “But, sir,” Thamir protested, “you have been very clear that we should not compromise our mission by any contact with—”

  “Just do it, Raffi,” he responded, turning to transfix his subordinate with a hard stare. “Do it now.”

  10:07 P.M. Eastern European Time

  Incirlik Air Base

  Adana, Turkey

  “. . .Baton-One-Zero, I say again, what is your status?” David Lay heard the Air Force sergeant demand, keying the microphone of his radio once more as he leaned forward, his body rigid. Filled with tension. “Baton-Two-Zero, how copy?”

  No answer. Nothing but static since the sound of the explosion. Lay swore quietly, his heart in his throat as he stared at the radar screens, both of the Baton Flight aircraft and the missiles themselves now obscured in the cloud of “noise” produced by the dispensed chaff.

  “I say again, Baton-Two-Zero, do you copy?”

  No. He glanced over to see Shoham standing there, the stricken look on the Israeli’s face mirroring his own. You always knew there was a risk, sending men out into the night. A risk they might not come back. The implicit bargain, ever-present in their work.

  Didn’t mean you ever expected it to happen. . .like this. So many good men.

  He nearly came out of his skin when the radio crackled once more with static, the shaken voice of one of the pilots announcing, “Control, this is Baton-One-Zero, we’ve made the drop. I say again, the drop has been made. We’re coming about for our return to base. How copy?”

  “Reading you loud and clear,” the Air Force sergeant responded. “Do you have contact with Baton-Two-Zero?”

  “They—”

  Another burst of static interrupted the transmission, another voice coming through. “. . .this is Baton-Two-Zero, we are aborting the mission. I say again, mission abort. Missile exploded a few hundred meters off our wing—we’ve lost power to No. 4 engine and No. 3 is on fire. We have to RTB, now.”

  Return to base. Lay traded a look with Shoham, reaching forward to pick up the microphone himself. “Baton-Two-Zero, this is Control. What is the status of the mission? Have you been able to complete the drop?”

  Priorities. They were cold and brutal things, but no less necessary. If only one of the teams had made it to the ground. . .

  “That’s a negative, Control,” the pilot’s voice responded after a long, agonizing moment. “They’re still with us.”

  “Can you make another pass over the DZ?” The CIA officer asked, wincing even as he did so. But it was a question he had to know the answer to.

  “Not possible, Control, we’re bleeding fuel from the right cell and struggling to keep this thing in the air on just two engines. We’re going to be lucky to make it back to Incirlik.”

  And if they didn’t. . .

  Lay shook his head. Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia—there was no good place for them to set down. No place t
hey could ditch the plane without completely compromising a mission already gone so far sideways as to be well-nigh irrecoverable.

  “Godspeed, captain,” he said finally, handing the microphone back to the Air Force sergeant. Shaking his head as he turned back toward Shoham.

  “We’ll get Southern Watch assets in there to neutralize the SAMs and clear the way for the helicopters, but your people. . .they’re on their own now.”

  It was going to have to be enough.

  Al-Anbar Governate, Iraq

  With a muffled sound, Ariel’s parachute billowed open above him, jerking him out of freefall.

  Five hundred feet from the ground.

  Glancing down and to his right, he could make out another pair of chutes drifting in the darkness a hundred feet or so below him. Tzipporah and Nadir, most likely. Ze’ev and Sergeant Black would be below them—or on the ground already, if they were lucky.

  His dark, painted face twisted into a grimace.

  Luck seemed to be something they were running short of this night, their plan—all of it—going out the window with the loss of Silbermann’s team.

  Now, he thought, looking up into the vastness of the desert night—they were going to have to make it up on the fly. Adapt. Improvise. And hit an enemy which might already suspect they were coming.

  11:13 P.M. Arabia Time

  The rendezvous point

  “. . .no, Major, you may not,” Umar Hadi responded brusquely, holding the field radio up against his ear as he listened to the regular Army officer. “You already know everything that you need to know. Hold your positions and remain vigilant—be sure to inform me of any developments as they arise. You’ve done good work tonight, I shall be sure to mention your name to the President.”

  Which he would most certainly not be doing, Hadi thought, letting out a heavy sigh as he signed off, replacing the radio inside the truck. But it had ensured that he got the man’s attention and that sufficed for his purposes.