“No, that’s absurd,” suggested Charles Baker as he considered the possibility that Russell would have perpetrated such an action.
“Yes, you’re right,” agreed Agent Clark shaking her head. “So tell me about this brother of yours?” she asked keen to change the subject.
“Sam? Well, I’ve not seen him in almost three years,” Baker pondered, considering a question he’d not been asked in many years. “He’s seven years younger than me. I may be older, have the education and position but he’s the brains in the family.”
Clark turned to look at one of the most powerful men in America who was renowned for his intellect and considered the revelation that the younger brother was the brighter of the two.
“I’m not talking here about knowledge you pick up reading books, I’m talking about raw intelligence, the type that makes you compute and see things faster and quicker than anyone else. Solving problems, seeing solutions, that’s what Sam does, he solves problems and avoids creating more problems in the process.”
Sorry, I’m not really following you. What kind of problems do you mean?”
“Sam never started fights but he was always the guy that finished them. He joined the air force to see the world and trained as a pilot but after a crash killed his navigator and almost himself, he retrained and became a Pararescueman, a PJ as they’re called.”
“Never heard of them. A P what?”
“Pararescue Jumper, they’re trained to go into enemy territory and rescue downed pilots and servicemen. One of them saved his life after his plane went down. He doesn’t talk about it much but this guy impressed him so much he gave up flying and joined the PJs.”
“OK, he rescues people, so why the hell was a Russian assassin trying to kill him?”
“He did rescue people but you have to understand my brother. He never does anything by half. PJs go into battle zones to rescue people. They’re trained for just about any eventuality and are considered members of the special forces. They fight their way to wherever they have to get to. Sam joined the forces during the cold war. There weren’t many battle zones that US troops were going into but training opportunities were aplenty. He signed up for just about every course he could. He learnt to scuba with the SEALs, he completed combat courses with Delta Force commandos, he tracked and observed with Marine recon, he was like a sponge. He was even signing up for training courses with the Allies, the SBS, SAS in the UK, jungle training with the Ghurkhas. You name it, he did it. Before he knew it, he was on secret ops deep in the heart of Afghanistan, helping the CIA fight their secret war against the Russians. When shit hit the fan and Special Forces or the CIA needed assistance, it was Sam that would go in to rescue their guys.”
“Can’t believe I’ve never heard of these guys.”
“Only those in the military really know about them. They’re the original unsung heroes. Mind you, if you’re a PJ and you walk into a bar with servicemen, you’ll never buy a drink. Because every guy in there knows that you’re the guy that’s gonna get them out when everybody else has given up.”
“I just don’t get how rescuing people in Afghanistan leads to being targeted by an assassin 20 years later.”
“Ah, well. It turned out that after a few years of rescuing their people from God alone knows what, Sam made a bit of a name for himself. He was the guy everybody wanted backing them up. If you were in trouble and needed help, Sam Baker was the guy you wanted. Whoever was in charge of the CIA’s Special Operations Group at the time began to take a keen interest. Sam’s name kept popping up in reports, injured agents owing their life to the Pararescue guy who had appeared from nowhere, popped a couple of Russians and then carried them to a safe extraction point. Sam’s additional training it seemed had really paid off. Particularly in Afghanistan, his time with the Ghurkhas in jungles and mountains had made Sam quite a specialist. Anyway, Sam was nearing the end of his tour when he received a call-out. An agent was injured deep in the heart of Russian occupied country. Sam was dropped as close as the helicopter dared and then proceeded on foot for the final few miles. He came across the camp where the agent was supposed to be and found it empty. He tracked the trail in the darkness, deep into the mountains and by this time was over three miles behind enemy lines. He found the new camp, took out six Russians and reported back to the extraction point, devastated to report that the injured agent had simply disappeared. He was no longer at the camp and Sam could only assume had been killed at some point and discarded off a cliff face, as there was absolutely no sign of any further tracks leading to anywhere else.”
“Oh God that’s awful, I can only imagine what they would have done to the agent.”
“Don’t worry, there was no agent. As Sam finished his report to his officer, a man walked into the room and dismissed Sam’s officer with a flick of the head. Sam was then face to face with, his words “the coldest bastard I have ever met in my life, I swear to God the temperature dropped when he entered the room.” He informed Sam that there was no agent, the Russians were a Spetsnaz team that had always managed to evade the CIA and Mujahedeen and had been causing untold havoc. Of course Sam took one look at the smug look on the guy’s face and shot a punch straight to his chin. The guy never saw it coming and was knocked to the floor. He never retaliated, he just stood up and welcomed Sam to the CIA’s Special Operations Group, handing Sam a letter signed by the President asking Sam to move across as his skills would save far more lives if he were the one leading the operation, rather than the one mopping up. Sam could not refuse a request from his President and so spent the rest of the war doing what he does best.”
“Saving people’s lives?” asked a confused Clark.
“No,” the Senator said shaking his head. “Ending them!”
“Oh!”
“Sam worked for the CIA up until three years ago. Right up until the nuclear bomb exploded in Texas.”
Clark read between the lines. “Was he there?”
The Senator looked around the carriage, delaying any answer as he pondered what he should tell Clark. He decided on the truth.
“Sam was there. Sam was the guy who could have saved the day. Sam was the guy that was told not to shoot the terrorist four hours before he detonated the bomb.”
Clark just stared at the Senator. The revelation that the government could have stopped the atrocity left her speechless.
“Sam had tracked the terrorists for months. He had many opportunities to kill them but every time, he was stopped by his bosses. They wanted to know where the target of the attack was. It was the one thing nobody could uncover.
“But I thought it was Washington.”
“That’s the story but Sam says not a chance. The terrorists knew the bomb would set off every alarm we’ve got. That bomb was not ever going to get near Washington. Sam told everybody that they had to be stopped before they got to America but they just ignored him.”
“Oh my God. So what did he do?”
“After he was stood down, an assassin tried to kill him and very nearly did. Sam’s not sure who hired him, it could have been the terrorists or any number of people. Andriev was a gun for hire. Anyway, after everything that had happened, Sam decided to quit. He sent a picture of himself looking dead to the assassin’s contact, burnt Andriev’s body and left his own ID next to it. The Mexicans didn’t waste time checking. They just declared the body as Sam Baker and as nobody local claimed him, they buried it in a pauper’s grave. Sam used Andriev’s tickets and travelled back to the US.”
“My God,” Clark could hardly believe what she was hearing, “So, what did he do then?” she prompted, keen to hear everything.
“We talked, he told me what had happened and that he would be going away. He’d contact me when he could. In the meantime, he gave me instructions on what to do if I needed him. The bomb going off hit him hard. He wandered for a while before he found North Haven and settled down. He was happy for the first time in a long time.”
“Until today?”
“Until today,” repeated Baker, “I’ve not seen Sam for over three years. Not since he saved the CNN journalists, just before the bombings in Israel…”
Clark turned to look at Baker as his voice dropped. She was expecting to see a tear in his eye but instead saw a look of horror.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, looking down the carriage towards where the Senator was staring blankly.
“I’ve just shivered all over, it’s like somebody walked over my grave,” he said quietly. “Something very bad has just happened.”