1:32 A.M. Tehran Time, September 24th
The base camp
Iran
Major Farshid Hossein glanced at his watch, shading its luminous dial with his hand. It was time. They would come-now, when a man’s bodily functions were at their lowest ebb. They would be warriors of the night, the elite of their nation, highly-trained and motivated.
Their training would do them no good. They would be dead before they could even reach the ground. He and his men would kill any that survived.
The night air chilled him and he wrapped his uniform jacket tight around his body. All around him, mountains towered toward Paradise, some of them already capped with snow. Beyond them, to the northeast, the shores of the Caspian.
The pack of Marlboros was tucked securely in his shirt pocket. He wanted one, but didn’t dare. He knew from experience how far away the glowing ember of a cigarette could be seen, how it robbed a man of his night vision. He would need all of his faculties in the next few hours. He walked back to the TOR-M1. Its crew members were silhouetted in the pale glow of the late September moon.
“Anything?” he asked.
“ Nah,” the technician shook his head. Nothing.
Hossein clapped the man on the shoulder, moving on. “Keep watching.”
1:37 A.M.
The Huey
Iran
“You have the bird, Jeff.”
“Roger that, colonel. Taking over.” The co-pilot smiled, taking the controls into his hands.
Tancretti removed the night-vision goggles and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. Using the goggles was like looking down a pair of toilet-paper tubes covered with green foil. It shot his depth-perception to blazes, something not to be underestimated at the altitudes at which the Huey was flying. One wrong twitch of the control levers, and they would hit the ground. And yes, he had volunteered for this assignment.
“How far away is the LZ?” a voice behind them asked. Tancretti looked up to see the CIA team leader-Henderson, Nichols, whatever his name really was, standing over them.
“Forty klicks,” Luke replied, his words clipped and curt. “Your target is eight beyond that.”
The CIA man nodded quietly. “Thanks.”
4:43 P.M. Eastern Time, September 23rd
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
Bernard Kranemeyer had just checked his watch when the phone in his shirt pocket rang, its shrill buzz disturbing his thoughts. The strike team should be well on their way. The mission had been launched.
“Kranemeyer speaking.”
“Director, this is Daniel Lasker.” The twenty-eight-year-old Lasker was head of ClandOps tactical communications. “Sir, we’re getting the first real-time imaging from the NRO down here in the op-center.”
His habit of referring to Kranemeyer as “sir” was a perpetual source of annoyance. The DCS, who was proud of his five-year career as a Delta Force sergeant major, associated “sir” with the officer class. He’d worked for a living, thank you very much.
“It’s about time Sorenson got on that,” he snorted in disgust. “What’s it showing?”
“That’s why I called, sir. We have a problem.”
“Why?” Kranemeyer demanded, irritation showing in his tones. “What’s going on?”
“The Iranians have moved a SA-15 Gauntlet on-site,” Lasker replied. “Our team’s flying straight into a trap. I need your permission to break radio silence.”
“Do it ASAP,” was Kranemeyer’s curt order. “I’m coming down.”
“Right away, sir.”
1:45 A.M. Tehran Time, September 24th
The Huey
“Thirty klicks,” Tancretti announced grimly, replacing his NVGs. “I have the bird, Jeff.”
“Roger, sir. We should be there soon.”
“What is the maximum range of your radar?” Major Hossein asked, glancing at the missile crew. It was a question he regretted not asking before.
“Twenty-five kilometers, sir. Wait a moment!” the man exclaimed, typing something into the small computer in front of him. “We have a contact, just coming into our range.”
“Identification?”
“Nothing, yet. It will take a couple of moments for the system to analyze the threat.”
Hossein watched the screen intently, waiting as the blip grew larger. “How soon can you engage?”
“Once the target is within twelve kilometers. At that point, we will switch on our fire-control radar and take them out.”
“Get it done.”
“Eight klicks out,” Colonel Tancretti announced over the intercom. “Get ready for insertion.”
Harry nodded wordlessly, looking around at his team. They were ready. It was time to do their job. To say they did not fear what lay ahead-that would have been an error. They were all afraid. Any sane man would be. But this was what they were trained to do.
“Seven klicks…”
4:52 P.M. Eastern Time
NCS Operations Center
Langley, Virginia
Lasker was waiting for him when the elevator doors opened. “Sir, we just finished interfacing our comms with the Air Force network.”
Kranemeyer transfixed him with a hard glance. “What are you telling me for? Do it, for heaven’s sake.”
“Right, sir. Follow me.”
1:53 A.M. Tehran Time
The campsite
“Another kilometer, sir, and we can launch,” the technician informed him, glancing away from his screens.
Major Hossein nodded, impatient. This was it.
The Huey
Tancretti’s headset came alive suddenly, a burst of static over the hitherto silent radio network. “Colonel, this is Danny Lasker, communications coordinator for Operation TALON.”
What on earth?
“I’m ordering mission-abort, colonel. You’re flying into a trap.”
“Say again, sir?”
“Luke, we’ve got a problem,” the co-pilot exclaimed. “We’re being illuminated by fire-control radars, type ‘Scrum-Half’, I repeat, ‘Scrum Half.”
“Roger,” Tancretti acknowledged, his mind whirling. A narrow canyon appeared in front of him and he pulled back on the control levers, forcing the old helicopter up and over…
Two 9M331 missiles rose from their launcher, accelerating rapidly as they flashed across the desert, their burning tails like a meteor in the night sky.
Kill probability: ninety-five percent.
Harry heard the conversation in the front, heard the warning, felt the helicopter lurch upwards. The ground flashed past below him, only feet away. “Out! Out!”, he heard a voice scream, realizing a moment later that it was his own.
He grabbed Davood by the shoulders and shoved him toward the door, following a moment later. Harry hit the ground on his side, the impact driving the breath from his body, his AK-47 landing a few feet away.
Rolling over, he started to reach for it, groping blindly in the darkness. The next moment, the world exploded around him…
4:55 P.M. Eastern Time
NCS Op-Center
Langley, Virginia
Five thousand miles away, Daniel Lasker could hear the explosion over the open comm link.
“Colonel! Colonel!”
There was no response. Only the hoarse echo of his own voice in a suddenly still operations center. The comm specialist turned to face Kranemeyer, his face a ghostly white.
“They’re gone,” he whispered. “They’re all gone.”
1:57 A.M. Tehran Time
The campsite
The major could see the explosion off in the distance, hear it reverberate through the mountains. The technician looked up from his radar screen. “Target destroyed, sir,” he reported, making no attempt to conceal his excitement.
Hossein nodded. “Good. Corporal, I want you to get off a report to Tehran. I’m taking a detachment down there to check for survivors.”
The technician’s smile was barely visible in the darkness. “I don’t think you need to worry, major. There won’t be any survivors.”
Harry rolled over on his back, blinking against the fiery glare of the explosion. The Huey had struck the edge of the cliff and then cartwheeled into the canyon, disappearing from sight. He reached down, feeling for the NVGs that hung around his neck. His rifle was somewhere, in the darkness around him.
Whether anyone else had survived, he had no idea. And that wasn’t his chief concern at the moment. First he had to recover his primary weapon and prepare for battle.
Each man of the CIA team was trained to fight alone, if need be, as well as a part of the team. Alone, they were deadly. Together, they were almost unstoppable.
But someone had managed to stop them- all of them, Harry reflected grimly. Blown them out of the sky without warning. Without a chance.
His hand touched the folding metal stock of the Kalishnikov and he pulled it toward him, flicking the safety off with a practiced motion.
He dropped to one knee behind a rock, toggling his headset mike. “EAGLE SIX to all teams. Come in, come in.”
Their radios were the latest generation of encrypted technology, eight-kilometer range, a built-in jammer to prevent enemy direction-finders from locking in on their signal. “Come in, come in.”
“EAGLE SIX, this is LONGBOW.” Thomas.
“Check, LONGBOW. Situation report?”
“Down fine. Taking up overlook position.”
“Keep your eyes open. EAGLE SIX to all teams, come in, come in.”
“SWITCHBLADE, signing in.” Davood.
“Sitrep, SWITCHBLADE?”
“Lost my rifle in the landing.” There was uncertainty in the voice. Fear. “Looking for it now.”
“Roger. Where did you come down?”
“I think I can see you, EAGLE SIX,” the Iranian-American agent responded. “Raise your gun above your head.”
“Roger.” Harry shifted the AK in his hand, lifting it briefly in the air.
“About five meters to your right.”
“I’ll be with you momentarily. EAGLE SIX to all Teams, come in, come in.”
Nothing.
“GUNHAND, FULLBACK, come in.”
The silence was eerie, mocking him. “LONGBOW, SWITCHBLADE, we have two guys out there. Any sign of them?”
5:04 P.M. Eastern Time
NCS Operations Center
Langley, Virginia
“I’m not getting any response from the helicopter, sir.”
“Thank you,” Director Lay replied slowly. “Disconnect the comm.”
He looked over at the DCS. “Do we have another way of communicating with the teams, Barney?”
Kranemeyer nodded. “Nichols is carrying the TACSAT-10, a secure satellite phone made of sterile components. The phone was assembled in America, the encryption technology was developed up at Fort Meade, but everything else is European-manufactured. It-”
“All right, all right,” Lay interrupted, turning on Daniel Lasker. “Have you tried contacting him?”
“Yes, director. We have.”
“ And?”
“He’s not answering.”
Kranemeyer swore softly. “It’s what I was afraid of. From the moment I heard about the SA-15 being deployed at the campsite. The team’s gone.”
“Sir, all due respect, but perhaps Nichols is just too busy to take calls at the moment.” Lasker managed a smile. “He’s been known to ignore us in the past.”
Lay turned, heading for the door of the Communications Center. “Keep trying, Barney. And keep me posted. I need to get word up to the President.”
“Right.”
2:06 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
They were gone. It had been too much to ask that they would all survive the crash. Tex. Hamid.
Harry stared out into the darkness, his eyes hooded with sadness. They were both old friends. To count them among the missing.
The memories. He could remember his first meeting with the Iraqi agent- in Iraq, Tikrit to be exact. Hamid Zakiri had still been an Army Ranger back then, a tough, decisive NCO.
He’d been the one that had talked Hamid into joining the Agency when his hitch was up. And now he was gone…
“LONGBOW, SWITCHBLADE, what is the chopper’s status? Repeat, what is the situation at the crash site?”
“EAGLE SIX, LONGBOW. I can see the crash site from my current position. The missiles did not-repeat, did not hit the chopper. They slammed into the mountainside when Tancretti took evasive action.”
“Then what happened?”
“The Huey struck the edge of the canyon and went down. It’s at the bottom.”
“Status?”
“In flames, boss. I see no movement. Copy that?”
“I copy, LONGBOW,” Harry acknowledged slowly, reluctantly. “SWITCHBLADE, make your way down to the crash site and check for survivors. See if there’s any equipment you can salvage, but move it along. That sucker’s gonna blow any minute.”
“You see any way down the cliff?” Davood asked.
Harry scanned the ground ahead of him, the dark rocks appearing a strange fluorescent green through the filter of the night-vision goggles he wore.
“Approx eight meters in front of you. Get on it.”
Fire. Blood and fire. Searing pain. Tancretti’s eyes flickered open as he returned to consciousness, flames crackling in the background. He was still strapped in the seat of the Huey, pinned against the instrument panel. It took him a moment to realize where he was, to remember what had happened.
The pungent smell of gasoline filled his nostrils and suddenly everything came flooding back. The warning, the crash. The explosion. Fear gripped him suddenly and he struggled to get free, pushing his body against the instrument panel in an effort to wriggle out.
“Jeff!” he screamed, the heat of the flames searing his throat. “ Jeff!”
He turned his head, looking over to where his co-pilot had been seated only a few short moments before. The corpse still sat there, its head hanging at an obscene angle, a deep bloody gash in the neck. One of the rotor blades had sliced through the roof.
Tancretti closed his eyes, trying to shut out the vision, focusing on his own situation. He didn’t have much time left…
Thomas leaned forward against the rock, his hand cradling the barrel of the SV-98, squinting one eye as he swept the terrain with the scope of the sniper rifle. It had survived his jump intact, which was a miracle in and of itself.
A grimace crossed his face. The impact had jarred the scope. A target or two would be needed to sight it in. He chuckled wryly.
They would be forthcoming.
The Huey had nearly broken in half on impact, Davood realized as he hurried down into the canyon. He still hadn’t found his rifle. No time to worry about that.
Not now.
Flames were licking feverishly at the metal skin of the Huey, eating away at the helicopter. It couldn’t be long before the gasoline tank went up. He needed to hurry.
2:10 A.M.
There was something — ahead of them in the darkness. Major Hossein held up his hand for a stop, bringing the Kalishnikov up against his shoulder.
A figure advanced out of the night, dressed in camouflage. His hands were raised in the air, his only visible weapon a pistol strapped to his waist.
“ Salaam alaikum.”
“Who are you?” Hossein demanded, ignoring the salutation.
“They call me BEHDIN,” the figure responded quietly, switching from Arabic into perfect Farsi. “Does that mean anything to you?”
“ Baleh,” Hossein nodded. Yes. Behdin, a man of good religion. Of pure heart. More importantly, the code-name of the operative who had supplied their intelligence. The sleeper.
Oh, yes, it meant much to him.
“What do you bring me?”
“You’ll never find them unless you can track them.” The man gestured to his belt. “May I?”
“Of course,” the major replied. The man’s hands moved to his waist, unclipping a small camouflage case. A wire ran from the case to his ear. He handed both to Hossein.
“Take this radio,” he instructed. “The frequencies are set to the band used by the American team. The access code is Alpha-One-Tango-Niner. You can listen in.”
“And what will you tell them?”
The sleeper smiled briefly. “That it broke, and I lost it in the darkness.”
“Good.”
A glance over his shoulder. “I must go.”
“Allah go with you, BEHDIN.”
“He will. And if I should be forced to shoot any of your men, they will be ushered into Paradise.”
“ Khayli mamnoon,” Hossein replied, irony in his tones. Thank you very much. He adjusted the radio to his own ear as the sleeper vanished into the night, as his patrol moved forward.
So, there had been survivors. No matter. They would not live long. Thanks to one of the chosen…
2:13 A.M.
The Israeli C-130
“We are four kilometers from the drop zone, sir. Get your men ready to jump.”
Gideon nodded, his dark black eyes betraying no emotion. This was his job. This is what he had trained for. He bent low, leaving the plane’s cockpit. His team was already up and standing, ready for the moment when the green light would flash, the cargo door of the C-130 Hercules open wide.
The two patrol vehicles were positioned right by the door of the transport. Their parachutes would be activated by an onboard altimeter.
He walked down the line of men one last time, inspecting their gear, making sure they were prepared. Chaim Berkowitz would be the first to jump. His M24 sniper rifle was broken down and disassembled in his backpack. If they encountered hostiles upon landing, he would use the Uzi submachine gun slung across his chest. His eyes locked with Gideon’s for a moment and the lieutenant saw uncertainty there. This was new for all of them.
Yossi Eiland was enjoying a final cigarette before the jump. As Laner approached, Eiland crushed it out between thumb and forefinger, smiling at the momentary flash of pain.
“Ready?”
“Of course,” was the quick reply. Gideon smiled and slapped his second-in-command on the back before turning away. The man was a veteran.
The pilot’s voice came over the intercom. “One minute to jump. We’re coming up on the DZ.”
“Roger. One minute to jump.”
A light flickered in the corner of Gideon’s eye. Green.
“GO, GO, GO!”
2:15 A.M.
The crash site
Davood ran quickly toward the wreck, around the front. He could see the co-pilot’s body hanging limply, nearly beheaded by the rotor. It seemed strange. He had never learned the man’s name. Now he never would.
A shrill, discordant cry arrested his movements. He turned, trying to place the sound. And then he saw him. Tancretti. Pinned against the instrument panel.
He looked around. There was no time to get help. He dropped the Kalishnikov and ran toward the wreck, pulling his combat knife from its ankle sheath.
Perhaps he could cut him free…
“Sitrep, LONGBOW?”
“Overwatch position achieved, EAGLE SIX. No hostiles in sight. Acknowledge.”
“Roger that, LONGBOW. Copy no hostiles.”
Major Hossein smiled in the darkness. They were still unobserved. The radio chatter from the American team confirmed that. He glanced up around him at the hills. The overwatch mentioned could still be most anywhere. They wouldn’t know where until the bullets started flying.
The heat seared Davood’s face as he moved forward, smoke filling his lungs. The door of the Huey was jammed shut, its metal crumpled like paper from the force of the impact. Tancretti’s survival was a providence of Allah, nothing less. But time was running out.
He reached in through the broken window with his knife hand, extending it toward the pilot. No good.
“One moment,” Davood whispered, more to himself than to Tancretti, sweat streaming down his face as he wedged the combat knife in between the pilot’s chest and the seatbelt.
One moment…
5:17 P.M. Eastern Time
The White House
Washington, D.C.
“Very good, Director. Keep me posted on any further developments. Thank you.” President Hancock replaced the phone on his desk and stood, turning to gaze out the window of the Oval Office. The sun was sinking low in the western sky. In Iran, it would be pitch-black. A team of his countrymen would be fighting for their very lives.
Nothing this night had gone as planned. This had been meant as a political coup, decisive military action against a regime feared by the Jewish lobby and hated by the warmongers on the right. Both groups would have applauded a daring, Entebbe-style hostage rescue. And now the quicksand had opened beneath him.
He swore under his breath, eyeing the phone on the Resolute desk. Cahill hadn’t been cleared for TALON, and he wasn’t about to read him in now. This time he was going to have to run his own damage control.
5:18 P.M.
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
Director Lay left the elevator the very moment the doors opened onto the seventh floor, striding hurriedly toward his office. His secretary, Margaret Caudell, was bent over her desk, organizing paperwork in preparation to leave. A common sight.
She had already stayed twenty minutes over her time, which was also all too common. If she had learned nothing else in the seven years that the two of them had worked together, it was that there was no such thing as a fixed schedule.
“Good evening,” she smiled, glancing up at his entrance.
It wasn’t. “Get the secure line to the White House ready, Margaret. I need to talk to the President.”
2:20 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
His shoulder hurt like the devil, pain shooting through his body. He moved his fingers up the length of his right arm, gently massaging the flesh. It wasn’t broken, or at least he didn’t think so.
But it was dislocated, that was sure enough. And it was his gun arm. He was out of it.
He hadn’t heard from the team.
Tex raised himself from the hard ground where he had fallen, wincing at the pain. His head throbbed and when he reached up to check himself, his hand came away sticky with blood.
How long he had been unconscious, he had no idea. He moved his good arm down to his waist, checking for his radio. It was still intact. He adjusted the lip mike and went on the air…
Harry’s headset crackled suddenly. “GUNHAND to all team members. Come in, come in.”
“GUNHAND, this is EAGLE SIX. What happened to you?”
The voice that answered him was uncertain, almost groggy. Something had gone wrong. “Knocked myself out on landing, sir.”
“Status report?”
“I’m approx sixty meters north-northeast from the crash site. Feels like I dislocated my shoulder.”
“Are you combat ready, GUNHAND?”
“Negative, EAGLE SIX. I can defend myself. That’s max. It’s my right arm.”
“Copy that. Will move team to support you. EAGLE SIX to LONGBOW, stay put. Provide covering fire. Acknowledge.”
“Roger, EAGLE SIX,” Thomas replied. “I have covering position.”
“EAGLE SIX to SWITCHBLADE, status report? I repeat, SWITCHBLADE, have you reached BIRDMASTER?” Harry demanded, repeating Colonel Tancretti’s code name. There was no answer. Only the sound of his own voice. “Come in, SWITCHBLADE.”
No response.
“EAGLE SIX to all team members. I have lost contact with SWITCHBLADE. Do any of you have visual on the crash site?”
“That’s a negative, boss.”
5:22 P.M. Eastern Time
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
“I warned you, director. This operation was meant to reduce our exposure, not blow it wide open.”
There was a dangerous calm in the President’s voice. A part of Lay’s brain registered that fact as he stared across his office, fighting down the angry words that rose in his throat.
The selfishness of it all! “I trust it has occurred to you, Mr. President, that we have soldiers in harm’s way.”
“Soldiers?” Hancock asked, irony rich in his voice. “I prefer to reserve that term for those who proudly wear the uniform of this country.”
There could be no response equal to the bigotry of the comment, nothing that could be said without igniting a pointless debate. Lay held his tongue, staring bitterly at the wall as the President went on, apparently not expecting a response.
“The last thing this country needs is a hostage crisis, Lay. That’s why we launched this ‘op’ in the first place.”
The last thing your administration needs, the CIA director reflected. That was why the operation had been launched, and he had gone along with it, in hopes of proving the efficacy of the Clandestine Service to a man who had tried to eliminate their funding time and again. And now people were dead.
Dead. That’s the way it was out there on the edge. Out where mistakes meant lives ended, not political careers…
2:24 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
Davood shoved his combat knife back into its ankle sheath and reached through the window, wrapping both arms around Tancretti’s upper body. “Easy, colonel,” he whispered. “I’m going to get you out of there.”
The blood streaking down the Air Force colonel’s face glistened in the light of the flames, adding to the macabre aspect of the scene. His body refused to budge, the legs still pinned between the panel and the seat, and he screamed in pain as Davood tugged at him.
A jagged edge of plexiglass window cut into the agent’s hand as he struggled, gashing the flesh. “Come on, come on,” he whispered, ignoring the pain, his fingers wrapping themselves around Tancretti’s legs.
They started to slide out from underneath the instrument panel, slowly but surely. Almost. The fabric of the colonel’s uniform pants caught on the metal, holding him fast. For a moment Davood considered reaching for his knife again, cutting him loose.
There wasn’t time for that.
He circled his arms tight around the pilot’s torso, struggling to slow down his breathing, gather his reserves of strength for one final effort.
If he had any reserves. “Relax, colonel,” he whispered in Tancretti’s ear. “I need you to relax.”
If the man understood him, he showed no sign of it. Davood was going to have to do the whole job himself.
Tancretti screamed again as Davood pulled fiercely against him, pulling toward the window, toward safety. Tancretti’s pant leg ripped open, the metal that had held it cutting into his skin. His arms and upper body came through the window. He was held by one leg.
Flames licked toward them, consuming the helicopter. Another few moments and the fire would eat through the protective lining of the fuel tank. His time was almost gone.
Davood balanced the pilot’s torso on his shoulder, freeing his hand to reach through the window again. His fingers closed around the trapped ankle, pulling with all his remaining strength.
It came free suddenly and he staggered backward, losing his balance. The colonel landed on top of him, crying out as his leg struck the ground.
They lay there for a moment of time, heat washing over them. Tancretti opened his eyes, looking the CIA man in the face.
“Thanks,” he whispered, forcing the words out past cracked and bleeding lips.
Davood nodded wordlessly, rolling over and running his fingers quickly down the pilot’s legs. A grimace spread slowly across his face.
Both legs were broken below the knee. Tancretti was out of commission.
He leaned down and scooped up the colonel in his arms, staggering to his feet. Flames crackled behind them as he straightened, taking one last look behind him.
The Huey was almost consumed.
He took a step away from the wreck, toward safety. And then the night exploded behind them…
“Copy explosion at the crash site. LONGBOW, do you have visual?”
“Negative, boss. Line-of-sight blocked by the hill behind me.”
“GUNHAND?”
“Nothing clear, the fire’s messing with my NVGs.”
Major Hossein looked up from the map he was studying, shading his flashlight with his hand. He touched his corporal on the arm. “The American they call LONGBOW is somewhere in this area. Take five men and eliminate him.”
The man nodded briefly, rose up from behind the rock where they both crouched. Moved off into the night. Went to his death…
The American would not be taken easily, Hossein knew that. The men he had sent out would die, pawns in the game that had begun in these mountains. Their sacrifice would enable him to pinpoint the sniper’s location.
A means to an end.
“Any sign of FULLBACK?” Harry whispered into his lip mike, clutching his Kalishnikov in sweaty hands as he knelt behind a large boulder.
“Negative, EAGLE SIX.” It was Tex. His voice sounded strained.
“You’re sounding like a broken record, GUNHAND,” Harry replied, grinning for the first time that night. Their conversation was rudely interrupted.
“EAGLE SIX, I have targets.” It was Thomas. “Northwest of your position. Engaging.”
Thomas took quick aim down the scope of the SV-98, resting his cross-hairs on the chest of the point man. Center-of-mass.
That would have to do, until he could find out how badly his scope had been jarred in the landing.
His finger curled slowly around the trigger of the Russian-built sniper rifle, memories flooding back through his mind. Of missions past. Of the men he had killed. Of the last time he had used the SV-98. Azerbaijan…
The rifle’s report echoed through the night like the crack of a whip, a bullet speeding through the darkness. The corporal leading the patrol straightened suddenly, a red stain spreading across the stomach of his shirt.
He crumpled then, like a broken doll, his body sprawling across the sand and dirt. His men scattered, seeking whatever shelter they could find.
Thomas nearly took his eyes off the scope in surprise. He had expected the first shot to be a miss. Chalk one up …
He was shooting a little low, but there wasn’t time to correct that. He would just have to compensate for it.
The figures running for cover glowed pale green in his night-vision scope. A sharp click, the bolt-action sliding crisply into place as he racked another round into the chamber of the SV-98.
Another shot, another kill, another body collapsing into the dust. It was like a shooting gallery…
2:29 A.M.
The drop zone
“Lieutenant, the perimeter is clear. No hostiles. Copy?”
Gideon cupped his hand to his ear, listening to Chaim’s report. “Affirmative. I copy.”
He turned back to the FAV, spreading out a small cloth map on the hood of the vehicle. “We have thirty-two kilometers to go in the next half-hour. Yossi, I want you to take the lead vehicle to an overlook position-here,” he indicated, drawing a circle on the map with his index finger. “Chaim will go with you and prepare to snipe down into the camp. Nathan and I will take the second vehicle and go in the back way.”
He paused and looked around at his team members, their faces shadowed in the glow of his flashlight. “Intelligence indicates our target is inside this building here. We’ve got to hit that building fast, secure it, then escort SCHLIEMANN to the extraction zone. I’ll be sending him with you, Yossi. Understand?”
The small sergeant nodded briefly. “Right, chief.”
“What about the other archaeologists?”
It was Nathan Gur. Gideon glanced at him in the darkness, saw the look on the young man’s face. “We do not have room in the vehicles,” he replied brusquely. “They will be left behind.”
He folded up the map and replaced it in an inner pocket. “Let’s move out.”
2:33 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
Davood came back into the realm of the conscious feeling a hand touch his shoulder, a voice whispering to him, “Are you okay, my brother?”
It was Hamid.
Davood rolled over on his back, biting his lip as pain shot through his veins. Tancretti was nowhere to be seen. The explosion must have flung them apart, he thought numbly, the sound still ringing in his ears. He wondered how long he had been unconscious.
“BIRDMASTER?” he whispered, gazing up into Hamid’s face as the tall man bent over him. “Where is he?”
Hamid stood to his feet, glancing around them. Finally he spotted a figure stretched out in the sand about six feet away.
“There,” he said solemnly.
Davood raised himself up on his elbows, testing himself carefully. Nothing seemed to be broken. Just cut-and bruised. Hamid was looking at him again, his face looking strangely misshapen with the night-vision goggles covering his eyes. A giant bug-like creature from one of the American alien movies Davood had watched as a child.
“Do you need help?” he asked.
“No. I have to check the colonel,” was his reply, carefully rising to his feet.
“Very good,” Hamid retorted shortly, “I will report our situation to EAGLE SIX.” He paused. “Where is your radio?”
Davood’s hand went to his belt, searching for the small transmitter. He shook his head, a rueful smile crossing his face. “Must have lost it in the explosion.”
A curt nod. “EAGLE SIX, this is FULLBACK. Sitrep?”
12:36 A.M. Local Time
The personal residence of Avi ben Shoham
Overlooking Lake Galilee
Counting sheep had never worked for the Mossad chief. Neither had counting terrorists, for that matter. He knew them by heart, every last man who had struck Israel and was still living to boast about it. They didn’t help him sleep. He went back to his nightstand and closed the dossier on Ibrahim Quasim.
Case closed. Another body in a Palestinian morgue. Another terrorist dead.
His eyes flickered to the portrait of his wife hanging over the bed. It had been a long-time wish of hers. Painted when he had worked in the Israeli Embassy in Paris, it was the way he wanted to remember her. A beautiful woman in the prime of her life.
Not the way they had parted. Not the way she had died, bleeding to death in an ambush on the West Bank, her legs blown off by a roadside bomb, small-arms fire chattering noisily over their heads as he covered her with his body, as his protective detail fought back.
Tears coursing down his face, her blood on his hands, cursing in impotent rage at the utter futility of it all.
Ibrahim Quasim had died as he lived. In an explosion as fiery as the one with which he had killed Rachel Shoham.
It was justice. The general closed his eyes, willing the memories to go away as he tore the photograph of the dead terrorist leader into shreds, pieces fluttering to the floor like the snow that blanketed Mount Hermon.
The satellite phone beside the bed rang noisily, a jarring intrusion into the privacy of his thoughts. He came alert, reaching for it.
“Shoham here.”
“General, we are on scrambler.” It was the watch officer at Mossad Headquarters. Which wasn’t good. Something had happened.
“Copy scrambler. What’s going on?”
“We have PHOTINT indicating a military presence approximately twenty-five kilometers north-northeast of RAHAB’s last reported position. There’s a firefight going on.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive. We have muzzle flashes, looks like the Iranians are there in platoon strength or greater.”
“Dear God,” the general whispered. A military platoon against his four men. There might be a chance, but it was a slim one. “Any sign of the FAVs?”
“Nothing. However it looks like a helicopter crashed in a nearby canyon, sir,” the watch officer stated after a moment.
“A helicopter?” Shoham demanded in astonishment. “Where did that come from?”
“I have no idea, sir. There’s not enough left of it to establish make. Request permission to contact RAHAB.”
A long pause. “Permission granted. Find out what’s going on. And make it short.”
“Aye, sir.”
2:40 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
“Roger, FULLBACK. You stay and provide cover for BIRDMASTER. Tell SWITCHBLADE to join me. We will regroup on your position.”
“Copy that, sir.”
Major Hossein reached up and grasped the man beside him by the shoulder. “The Americans are moving. They will be spread out. We need to strike before they can regroup.”
The soldier nodded. Hossein flicked the safety off the Kalishnikov assault rifle he carried. “Here’s what I want you to do.”
“Harry wants you to join him,” Hamid stated calmly as Davood came up beside him. The young Iranian looked strange in the green glow of his night vision. “Immediately.”
Davood looked back toward the cave where he had placed Tancretti, its mouth hidden in the shadows of night.
“How is he?” Hamid asked.
“Not good. He needs an IV, but,” Davood gestured helplessly toward the wreckage of the Huey, “we don’t have any med supplies left.” His shoulders slumped in discouragement.
“Let Allah be your strength, my brother. Look to Him and place your faith in His power.” Hamid clapped his fellow agent on the back. “May He go with you. I will look after BIRDMASTER.”
Davood nodded, unholstering the Beretta from his hip as he moved toward the cliff path. Hamid watched him go…
5:43 P.M. Eastern Time
NCS Operations Center
Langley, Virginia
“Change of course, Carol,” Ron Carter announced, coming around the edge of the cubicles with a sheaf of printouts in his hand. “I need you in the Tehran intranet, and I need you in there yesterday.”
Carol Chambers looked up from her workstation, frowning at the head analyst. “Do you know the kind of time that will take?”
“Of course I do,” Carter shot back, cheerfully sweeping a space clear on her desk to deposit the printouts. “That’s why you’ve got two hours instead of one.”
Carol stared after him in disbelief as he disappeared. Two hours. Yeah, right.
She turned back her terminal, reminding herself for the hundredth time that she should have joined the NSA. The world’s biggest signals intelligence gatherer would have had the manpower to pull off what Carter wanted. Not just the manpower, but the processing power, which was more important. The computers that the Clandestine Service had control over, the only ones she was permitted to access for TALON, just didn’t measure up to the huge Crays.
Which once again begged the question. Why had she joined the CIA?
Carol sighed and reached back, sweeping her hair into a tight ponytail. Time to get to work.
Shoulder-length when worn down, her hair was a golden brown, dirty blond, as it was often called.
A smile crept across her face. Dirty, maybe, but not dumb. She hadn’t graduated from MIT at the top of her class, but she’d been a long way from the bottom. Yeah, forget the CIA and NSA, with her grades and other skills, she could have made a fortune in the private sector. After all, the government wasn’t the only entity that utilized hackers and espionage.
The familiar pulsing hum of the door scanner reached her ears and Carol looked up to see the figure of her father step onto the floor of the operations center.
His presence in the nerve center of the Clandestine Service was rare enough to be the rough equivalent of a divine visitation, and to have it happen twice in one night…
It had always been that way, ever since she’d been a little girl. Memories of those early days were few and distant, hazy shadows, a mirage to chase in one’s dreams. Nothing tangible. She only remembered the absence, the lack. A godlike father figure, distant, unapproachable. Someone whose very existence had to be accepted on faith. In many ways, God was the more approachable of the two.
Yet, deep down, she knew that he was the reason she was here and not a corporate firm. God had given her the strength to forgive the past and despite the awkwardness of their current relationship, she couldn’t have lived without it.
A voice interrupted her thoughts and she looked up to see their object standing before her.
“Good evening, Carol,” David Lay greeted softly, uncertainty in his tones. She looked into his eyes and saw the pain there. Whether grief for the unrecoverable past or the men he had lost this night, she had no way of knowing.
“I need you and Carter in Conference Room #2. Five minutes.”
And then he was gone as quick as he had arrived. As it always had been…
2:45 A.M. Tehran Time
The crash site
Darkness surrounded him, enrobing him in its folds. Tancretti tried to move again, searing pain shooting through him. His legs were broken. He was helpless. Helpless.
It wasn’t a familiar situation for the Air Force colonel. He had always been the one in charge, controlling his actions. Guiding his destiny.
He nearly blacked out again, biting his lip hard to keep from crying out. The metallic taste of blood seeped into his mouth, oozing from a cut lip.
From above him, around him, he could hear the sound of small-arms fire, the sound of men selling their lives as dearly as possible. He fumbled desperately for the service automatic at his belt, rolling over on one side to extract it from its holster. Fear seemed to rise in his throat, fear he had tried to suppress ever since the CIA agent had left. Ever since he had been alone.
The Beretta was a comforting bulk in his hand, fifteen 9mm rounds making him just as effective as any man with both his legs under him. Just as effective.
Suddenly, a figure loomed out of the darkness and Tancretti brought the pistol up in both hands, his voice trembling as he cried out a challenge.
“Easy,” the figure replied. English.
Relief washed over the colonel like a tidal wave. He couldn’t see the face in the darkness, but it must be one of the CIA men. He was saved.
The figure shifted and in that movement, Tancretti could see the gleam of a knife blade. He screamed and tried to roll away, knowing his legs could not move him. Knowing he was going to die. His fingers pressed the trigger reflexively, a single wild shot filling the cave with its echo.
It was too late. It changed nothing. His target moved as he fired, fingers reaching down to grasp the wrist of his gun hand.
The knife swung down in its long, curving arc, slicing across his throat. And it was over. All over…
5:48 A.M. Eastern Time
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
The walls of the conference room were soundproofed to shut out the sounds of the bustling operations center outside, the windows coated with a thin sheath of Teflon to dampen the vibration of voices against the glass. Even here in the heart of the Agency, the possibility of someone using a laser mic to record conversations could not be ruled out.
Lay looked up as the door opened and his daughter walked in. His may have been a prejudiced appraisal, but she was heart-achingly beautiful, her mother written there in every gesture, every smile, the light in those azure blue eyes. Trisha.
He pushed the vision aside with an effort and forced himself to focus on the task at hand.
“What is shared here,” he began, “stays here for reasons I’m sure I don’t need to explain to either of you. We are facing a crisis. As you both know, we are proceeding under the assumption that Alpha Team has been taken out. They were drawn into a carefully laid trap. Which means somehow, someway, the regime knew they were coming. While we will continue our efforts to reestablish contact with the team, we must move on to the next facet of the problem. How did they learn of our plans? Ron?”
The analyst shook his head. “Nothing, boss. Absolutely nothing. If someone got in, they’re a lot better than I am.”
“Probability?”
Carter smiled sheepishly. “Our security programs are ironclad and I’ve been working with computers since the Commodore. It’s not an impossibility, but it’s sure not probable.”
“Carol?”
“I concur with Ron,” his daughter responded. “The last serious attempt to hack our servers was the Chicom strike in the fall of 2011. We detected them within minutes and were able to repel them before they could reach anything sensitive.”
Lay considered the information for a moment, reviewing the options before him. None could be considered good.
“Well, if we weren’t hacked…” The DCIA hesitated before voicing the other option. It seemed like bad ju-ju, but they already knew what he was going to say.
“Then we’ve got a mole.”
2:49 A.M.
Project RAHAB
Moving north-northeast
Things had changed. The quick approach he had counted on no longer seemed viable. Everything was different.
“Copy that,” Gideon Laner replied into the transmitter. “RAHAB out.”
Nathan Gur looked up from his driving. “What’s going on, chief?”
“See anything of Yossi?”
The young man turned, his eyes scanning the desert as it flashed past under the wheels of their vehicle. “Affirmative. Ahead of us, hundred meters out.”
“Catch him,” Gideon ordered. “Latest orders. Radio transmissions are to be kept to a minimum.”
“Sir?”
“I said, step on it!”
2:50 A.M.
The crash site
“EAGLE SIX, this is FULLBACK.” It was Hamid’s voice over Harry’s headset, tense and out of breath. “We’ve got a problem.”
“Shoot,” Harry ordered tersely.
“Somebody nailed BIRDMASTER before I could get back to him. Slit his throat.” There was anger in the Iraqi’s voice. “He was helpless.”
“A soldier?”
“Looked like it, maybe more than one I heard a gunshot-looks like he got off a shot before they killed him.”
Harry went silent for a moment. If the Iranian soldiers were circling around them, their options were rapidly diminishing. They would have to extract quickly. “Can you rejoin our position, FULLBACK?”
“Roger. I can make it to you, Allah willing.”
“Leave Allah out of it,” Harry snapped, surprised at his own impatience with his old friend. “Can you E amp;E?”
“Affirmative.”
“Good. LONGBOW, I need you to stay behind and cover our retreat. You will extract at my signal. Copy?”
“I read you,” Thomas replied. “Horatius is my middle name.”
“Right now I’d settle for a decent imitation of Carlos Hathcock. EAGLE SIX to Alpha Team, break contact!”