by Mel Odom
Before Delroy could block the man’s hand, it wrapped around his head, smothering him. He felt powerless in the impossible grip, listening to the evil, confident chuckle that sounded right in his ear.
“Go home, Chaplain,” the man said in a bestial snarl. “Go home and live in misery the way you have for the last five years. You’ll be more comfortable there.”
Shoved backward, off-balance, he fell. His head hit the carpeted floor hard enough to send black comets crashing through his vision.
When Delroy’s eyesight cleared, the man was gone. Shaking, nauseous, the chaplain pushed himself to his knees. For a moment he thought he was going to throw up. But he made himself stand and go to the pilot’s cabin. When he tried the door this time, the handle turned easily. He followed the door inside the cabin.
The two pilots looked back at him with curiosity. Both of them were men Delroy had seen earlier.
“Where is he?” Delroy demanded in a shaking and hoarse voice.
“Who?” the pilot asked.
“The other man,” Delroy said. “The other pilot. The one who came back to tell me about the seat belt.”
The pilots swapped looks. “Chaplain,” the pilot said in a deliberately calm and nonthreatening voice, “there are just us two. No other pilots. No one has gone back to notify you yet. We were about to.”
“I saw him,” Delroy said. He felt the man’s hand against his face, and this time he felt the slither of scales instead of flesh. His voice choked down. “I saw him.”
The copilot got up. “Let me help you back to your seat, Chaplain. If you ask me, you look about done in. Have you rested during this flight?”
Delroy looked at the two men. They were telling the truth.
“I haven’t rested enough,” he said. He looked at the pilot who had offered to help him to his seat. “I’m fine.”
The pilot hesitated. “All right, chaplain. But we’re going to be touching down in ten or fifteen minutes. As soon as the tower gives us clearance. We need you to get belted in.”
“All right.” Delroy turned and went, knowing that the two men would probably report this incident to Falkirk. And what would that report do to the captain’s faith?
Delroy returned to his seat and belted himself in. He stared out the window, feeling the C-9 sink into its final approach pattern only a few short minutes later. Smoke still curled from fires in the distance around the city.
Had he been struggling with his own personal demons, trapped in some warped nightmare of his own doubts? Or had it been something else? If all the believers had been taken from the world during the Rapture, did that mean that something else might have slipped back into the world? Something darker? Something evil? Or had that evil been here all along and only now was freed to rise up?
Delroy didn’t know. What he was certain of, though, was that he was scheduled to speak to the joint chiefs in the next hour—and he was in no shape for it.
Turkish-Syrian Border
40 Klicks South of Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 0101 Hours
The thrum of the generator only twenty yards away rattled through Cal Remington’s skull. His eyes felt like they were filled with broken glass as he stared at the notebook computer on the small folding desk he’d brought into the campsite along the ridge overlooking the border area.
His anger was still stoked from the confrontation with Goose and Captain Mkchian that had taken place hours ago. Goose ticked him off plenty. Over the years that they had been good friends, then gotten to be an effective captain and first sergeant team, he and Goose had experienced plenty of differences of opinion. Usually those differences of opinion had taken place over personnel, never over implementation of details of an operation—never over organization or timing or equipment. They’d always disagreed over people.
And those differences of opinion had never been publicly aired in any theater they’d been involved in.
Remington accepted some share of the blame. After all, he’d chosen to dress Goose down in front of the Rangers he’d brought with him. Getting the chance to do it in front of the Turkish captain had been a bonus.
That had backfired, though. Mkchian had taken Goose’s side, and that had been totally unexpected. Remington had believed the Turkish captain would be against Christian practices.
Since that mistake, Remington had made it a point to research Captain Tariq Mkchian’s file more thoroughly. He’d been surprised to learn that the Turkish captain was a Christian. In a country that was overwhelmingly Muslim, the odds were heavily against such an occurrence.
But that was how things were with Goose. He’d always been lucky, always in the right place at the right time. He’d always gotten to know the right people.
Remington knew for a fact that Goose had been recruited for OCS. Goose had turned it down, and Remington knew why. As an officer, Goose would end up dealing with paper more than he dealt with people.
Remington knew the names of every man in his company, but Goose knew each man. The first sergeant knew them through families, kids, sports, training, or church.
Remington had never wanted that kind of familiarity with the people he commanded. Familiarity bred contempt. Familiarity forced an officer to think of the unit he was about to sacrifice as human beings instead of numbers that got crunched in the final equation.
The notebook computer screen blinked for his attention. A popup menu floated up and let him know he had an incoming call.
Remington pulled on the headset and tapped the Open button. He made sure the button cam attached to the notebook monitor pointed at him. The picture at the other end wouldn’t be good because the light level inside the tent was low. The light inside couldn’t be seen from the outside at all because of the thick tarp.
When the screen cleared, Remington found he was looking at Captain Mark Falkirk. The connection was provided through a satphone managed by the Romanian communications company.
“Captain,” Remington greeted.
“I take it you’re at the front,” Falkirk said.
“Yes.”
“Intel has marked movement among the Syrian troops.”
The message had come in eighteen minutes ago. Remington wasn’t surprised that Wasp wasn’t quite up to speed in the sit-rep along the border. With her manpower cut drastically, Wasp been hard-pressed to get set up for the arrival of the Marine Harriers and Sea Cobra helicopter gunships. There were also more Sea Knights providing transportation for Marine troops into the area.
“We got our care package thirty-two minutes ago,” Falkirk said. “We’ll be sending it along in twenty minutes.”
Remington nodded. If the new Marine Wing departed Wasp in twenty minutes, they would arrive at the border at 0330 hours, thirty minutes ahead of the scheduled final retreat from the border.
“That’s good to hear,” Remington said.
“We’ve just got to hope that everybody’s timetable matches up.”
“The Syrians are more than likely just getting set up for the morning,” Remington said. “And we may have more to fear from the Russians. We’re still at DEFCON 2, and that care package you’re sending is big enough to attract attention.” Or to trigger an attack all by itself, the Ranger captain knew. But they had no choice. Without the reinforcements, they wouldn’t stand a chance of holding out against the Syrians when they decided to invade Turkey.
And that invasion was definitely coming. All that remained to be seen was how far into Turkey they came before they were stopped. It was possible that the combined forces of Rangers, Turkish army, and U.N. troops wouldn’t be able to hold Sanliurfa. They also wouldn’t be able to make Diyarbakir City before being overtaken. A number of the mountain roads were out from the SCUDs that morning.
Yesterday, Remington told himself harshly. Keep it straight.
One of the other sat-phones he had beeped for attention.
“I have a call coming in,” Remington said.
“I’ll hold,” Falkirk said. �
��I want to go over the backup LZs we’re building in.”
“I’ll be right back.” Remington tapped the mute function on the computer, then answered the sat-phone.
“Captain?” a man said.
“Go, Spotter,” Remington said.
Spotter was Nick Perrin, a young lieutenant skilled in urban undercover ops. Perrin was the kind of guy who could walk into a neighborhood, scope out the streets, and let his commanding officer know where potential targets were without ever being noticed.
When CIA Section Chief Alexander Cody had left the command post three hours ago, Remington already had Perrin and his team of hardcases en route to Sanliurfa. Cody had maintained an interest in the missing undercover CIA agent Goose and his team had rescued from the PKK terrorists yesterday morning before the SCUD attack.
“We found the Soupman easy,” Perrin said. Soupman was their tag for the CIA chief. “Followed him without him knowing. Just like you wanted, sir. He went to an address, a hotel here in the city, stayed inside for a couple minutes, then left.”
“Where is he?”
“We’ve still got him in sight, sir.”
“What about the address?”
“That’s where it gets interesting.”
“I’m listening,” Remington said.
Perrin paused a moment, and Remington knew the man was smoking. That was bad news. Perrin only smoked when he got tense.
“I went into the hotel, sir. Took a look around on the QT. There were two bodies in there.”
“Who were they?”
“Don’t know. We took digital pictures. Either they weren’t carrying any ID, or whoever killed them took it when he or she or they left.”
“You don’t know anything about that room?”
“I didn’t want to press outside our operating parameters on the mission, sir,” Perrin said. “Asking questions, drawing attention to ourselves, those were definitely out.”
Remington’s mind raced. Alexander Cody had come out of nowhere with an agent who may have been responsible for triggering the Syrian attack. The Ranger captain wanted to know more about the man.
“Find out who was in the room, Spotter,” Remington ordered.
“Yes, sir. How far do you want me to push it?”
Remington thought about that. Cody had an in with Nicolae Carpathia, who had just recently been elected president of his country, a man who was fabulously wealthy, and who looked to be on the fast track to becoming a player in world politics if his announced upcoming visit to the United Nations was any indication. Cody was also operating a loose leash on the man that could have been responsible for igniting the Syrian-Turkey confrontation.
And that man had chosen deliberately to run and hide during the confusion that had taken place at Glitter City. It remained to be seen if undercover agent Icarus had disappeared when all the other people had vanished.
“Push it all the way, Spotter,” Remington said.
Perrin hesitated just a moment. Both of them knew that when Remington set him free, someone might die. There had been deaths in the past, enemies who had posed a potential threat to Rangers or had escaped justice in other conflicts.
“Yes, sir,” Perrin said.
“Get back to me as soon as you know something.” Curiosity ate at Remington. He treasured secrets. Secrets held power. He couldn’t help wondering what Cody was hiding.
“Yes, sir,” Perrin responded.
Remington broke the connection and turned his attention back to Falkirk on the computer link.
Wasp’s captain was looking away when the video feed came back on. He talked with someone off-screen briefly, then tapped the key to open the audio. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right,” Remington said. “The LZs.”
“Right.” Falkirk looked distracted.
“Is something wrong?”
“Just got a disturbing communiqué on an away op I’ve got in play.”
Remington’s senses sharpened. “How will it affect us?” Anything that was going to cause fallout on his Rangers was within his domain.
“This doesn’t affect you,” Falkirk said. “I was hoping I’d found a way to roll the DEFCON 2 back.”
Remington shook his head. “Something like that, you’d need an act of God.”
“I know,” Falkirk said. “An act of God is what I thought I had in play.”
33
United States of America
The Pentagon, Washington D.C.
Local Time 6:42 P.M.
Delroy Harte sat outside General David Marsden’s office and felt the enormity of the mission he’d agreed to carry out for Captain Falkirk.
The fact that the Pentagon was up and running at nearly seven o’clock in the evening when it normally shut down at three-thirty in the afternoon was a prime indicator of how bad things were in the United States. Luckily, the trip in had prepared him for it. Abandoned and wrecked cars surrounded Dulles International. Bulldozers were still at work scraping smashed planes and jets away to free up more runways as the nation slowly reclaimed the air. This time, though, Delroy was certain people would be even less likely to trust air travel.
At 1:21 A.M., when the disappearances had taken place, there hadn’t been many flights in the air above Washington, but a hefty assortment of the ones that had been in a holding pattern above, taking off from, or landing at Dulles had come down spectacularly all around the city. The falling passenger jets at the airport had taken out hangars and other jets being serviced and fueled. According to the local news reports, fires had burned at the airport most of the night because emergency services had been even harder hit by the mysterious personnel depletion than the mean averages in the population as a whole so far indicated.
The Pentagon halls stayed busy, and while he waited, Delroy watched the people hustle through. Many messages were still being carried by hand throughout the building because not all of the phone lines were operational again. According to a pamphlet Delroy had found in the seat he’d been shown to by the young Marine lance corporal who had been assigned to him upon his entrance to the heavily secured building, the Pentagon had over one hundred thousand miles of phone lines. He had no idea how many miles weren’t working.
Thinking about phone lines made Delroy think again of calling his wife. Or ex-wife, as the case might be. She would have gotten in touch with him if she were going to end their marriage. Then again, he had stopped returning her calls and letters a long time ago. She didn’t owe him much courtesy after everything he hadn’t done, everything he hadn’t said, everything he hadn’t listened to her say.
Delroy held his hat in his hands. He was jet-lagged and worn.
And empty, he thought bitterly. The nightmare—he’d almost convinced himself that was what it had been even though he could still feel the man’s scaly hand pressed against his face—had beaten down most of whatever belief he had saved up while aboard Wasp. He thought about the way he had faced Donaldson while the Marine colonel had pressed his sidearm into his face. He had been so arrogant, so sure of himself. He didn’t feel that way now.
Delroy rubbed at his face. He’d shaved with the toiletries he’d been provided after landing, and he’d put on a fresh uniform that Falkirk had requisitioned. It fit him like it had been made for him. As tall as he was, he’d always had to have his pants altered. While he’d been living at home, his wife had taken care of that. The last few years he’d had the ship launderer take care of it for him.
He glanced up at the two young Marines standing outside General Marsden’s door. “I’m going to stretch my legs. I’ve been on a plane for the last fourteen and a half hours.”
“Yes, sir,” the lance corporal replied. “Please remain within our sight, Chaplain. If you’re found in the building without an escort, you’ll be locked down.”
Delroy nodded. “I’m not going far. Just to the window there and back.” He walked slowly, missing the feel of Wasp’s deck under his feet. He wished he were there now. Then he felt guilty fo
r that wish because he knew it was only because he wanted to crawl into a hole and lick his wounds.
He stood at the window and looked out. Darkness had fallen over the city. Evening still fell early in March. But the night was held at bay by the lights around the city. Searchlights strobed the sky and the light pollution washed away the stars.
Frantic voices whispered up and down the hallways. The pamphlet also said that the corridors measured seventeen and one-half miles long. Yet the farthest distance between any two places in the five-sided building could be easily walked in seven minutes.
The pamphlet was a font of information.
And what do you know? Delroy examined his reflection in the dark glass of the window. The crisp white uniform stood out sharply in the glass and looked like it held a bluish tint. His face, though, was another matter. How had he gotten so old, so worn and used up? He’d never seen that kind of age in his father’s face. He had outlived his father, and he had outlived his son.
But it’s not just the age, is it, Delroy? You never saw your father this old, but you also never saw him this false. Or this scared.
Fear ached within him, resonating through all six feet, six inches of his frame. He had never been so afraid. What had that nightmare aboard the Skytrain done? Had the nonexistent lieutenant been a figment of his own doubts, a result of the stress he was under, or a mental disorder that was only now manifesting itself?
Confronting Colonel Donaldson aboard Wasp wasn’t the act of a sane man. No wonder the Marine colonel had been afraid. He wasn’t afraid of God’s wrath or the Antichrist; Donaldson had been afraid of a madman.
“Go home, Chaplain.” The rough voice echoed in Delroy’s head. “Go home and live in misery the way you have for the last five years.”
The words beat into Delroy, ringing against the immense emptiness he felt inside himself. He wanted out of there. Truly, he did. Falkirk was wrong: he wasn’t the man for the job. He was just a deluded fool searching for some kind of meaning over the death of his son.
“Chaplain Harte.”
At first, Delroy thought he was hearing the man’s words again. Then he spotted the young Marine’s reflection moving toward him in the window. He turned toward the Marine.