LONG TO FIND OUT HE’S ONE OF THE GUYS YOUR SPY GUY HAS GONE TO IN THE PAST. USUALLY FOR BLACK- BAG AND DIRTY-TRICKS ASSIGNMENTS. AND FOR ASSASSINATIONS.
Beside Danielle, Pete grimaced and cursed. “You know what? I didn’t think, given the fact that we’re getting bombed, that I could feel any worse. But this?” He shook his head. “Thinking these guys are still walking around out there gives me the willies.”
Danielle silently agreed.
Muckraker:›YOU’VE GOT EVIDENCE OF THIS?
She pulled some of the news stories up.
Mystic:›NO. I DON’T HAVE SOLID EVIDENCE. WHAT I HAVE WOULD NEVER MAKE A COURT CASE. BUT I DO HAVE SUBSTANTIVE. CONNECTING THE DOTS IS NO PROBLEM.
Danielle’s mind flew. If Goose was still alive, this man in the image- Marcus Allen, she thought, putting a name to the fear she felt-could still be alive also.
Mystic:›YOU NEED TO THINK ABOUT GETTING OUT OF THERE. THIS GUY MIGHT NOT BE THE ONLY ONE YOUR SECTION CHIEF HAS IN MOTION. I TRIPPED A FEW ALARMS GETTING THIS GUY’S INFO.
Muckraker:›NOT LIKE YOU TO BE LESS THAN GRACEFUL.
Mystic:›YOU CAN HAVE STEALTH OR YOU CAN HAVE SPEED WHEN IT COMES TO THESE THINGS. IT’S HARD TO ACHIEVE BOTH. SINCE THERE’S A BIG CHANCE THE SYRIAN ARMY IS GOING TO INVADE THAT CITY AT ANY MOMENT…
Muckraker:›UNDERSTOOD. CAN YOU KEEP WORKING WITH THIS NAME? MAYBE GET ME A LIST AND PIX OF KNOWN ASSOCIATES.
Mystic:›I CAN. I WILL. BUT IF THIS THING STARTS GETTING DICEY AGAIN, I’M ALL ABOUT DISCRETION BEING THE BETTER PART OF VALOR.
Muckraker:›I KNOW.
Someone had already tried to trace Mystic through Internet connections during an earlier investigation.
Muckraker:›TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF.
Mystic:›I ALWAYS DO. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?
Muckraker:›WHAT I CAN. SEE IF I CAN FIND THE SECTION CHIEF AND STIR UP TROUBLE. IF HE’S STILL IN THE CITY. HE’S GOT A HABIT OF DISAPPEARING WHEN THINGS GET REALLY DANGEROUS.
Mystic:›ACTUALLY I CAN HELP YOU WITH THAT TOO. I’VE BEEN TRACKING SOME INTERNET TRAFFIC COMING OUT OF SANLIURFA THAT’S NOT COMING OUT OF THE ESTABLISHED MIL-NET.
Muckraker:›MIL-NET?
Mystic:›MILITARY NETWORK. I’VE BEEN WATCHING SOME OF THE TRAFFIC GOING INTO AND OUT OF THE AREA THERE. FIGURED IF I COULD GIVE YOU SOME EARLY HEADS-UP WARNING, IT MIGHT HELP.
“Wow,” Pete said. “I’m even more impressed.”
“He’s an impressive guy.”
Muckraker:›THANKS FOR THAT. I’LL BE MONITORING YOU WHEN I CAN.
Mystic:›COOL. I’VE GOT A COUPLE OTHER PEOPLE THAT I’M SHEPHERDING IN THAT PART OF THE WORLD.
Danielle’s curiosity came to the forefront immediately.
Muckraker:›ANYONE I SHOULD KNOW ABOUT?
Mystic:›…
Mystic:›SORRY. I’M TIRED. TYPED THAT BEFORE I THOUGHT. FINGERS WORK FASTER THAN MY BRAIN SOMETIMES. I CAN’T TALK ABOUT THOSE PEOPLE.
Danielle cursed. For years, Mystic had been a ghost. He’d never asked for anything, but he’d aided her from time to time with key pieces of information. She’d have given a lot to find out more about him.
Muckraker:›YOU SAID YOU KNEW WHERE I COULD FIND MY GUY?
Mystic:›YEAH. HE’S HOLED UP AT A HOTEL THERE IN THE CITY. LET ME GIVE YOU THE ADDRESS.
35
United States 75th Army Rangers Temporary Post
Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 1318 Hours
Hell descended on Sanliurfa. The war, snarling and blistering hot, ravaged the city and sucked the marrow from its broken bones despite the pounding rain. A few of the SCUD missiles the Syrians were firing had gotten past the Patriot defensive systems, and Remington felt the explosions shake the earth and quiver through his boot soles.
He stood at parade rest in front of the ops board and kept the battlefield in view in his mind even when the satellite systems occasionally failed and the screens went dark. Fear came at him harder then. His dependence on technology left him crippled and floundering.
It’s not me, Remington told himself, struggling for a calm, clear head. It’s war the way it’s fought now. Battles these days move too fast for an unaided man to keep up with. No one could adequately track developing fronts and unit strength without computers.
Back when war had first been invented, generals had peered over a battlefield from a cliff or a hill, or they had led their troops from the front lines. They’d been able to see everything they needed to.
Remington had studied war, from the Chinese texts to the Romans to MOUT battles staged inside cities. In the beginning, war had started in communities as one faction inside a metropolitan area- no matter how large or how small-had fought to contain or destroy another. Then war had gotten too large and was waged outside the city, partly to make sure there was still something left standing for the victor to claim. From there war had spread to the struggles between the cities, where economies and religions threatened to conquer all.
War was still waged for the same reasons. Spin doctors simply tried to put different faces on it.
The Greek city-states had battled each other. The nations comprising the German confederacy had battled each other. The North had battled the South in the United States. Remington believed it was man’s nature to battle other men.
There could, in the end, be only one conqueror, one world leader.
He gazed at the ops board in disbelief. The Syrians seriously outgunned and outnumbered his troops. Sanliurfa had been under constant attack for almost three hours. The Syrian military and air force had settled into the ridges around the city and contented themselves with shelling and bombing the Turkish, American, and United Nations forces into submission. Time was on their side.
At least the rain that continued to fall slowed them. The huge tract of land in front of the city’s walls had become a lake of mud that jammed the Syrian cavalry units. A few of them that tried to cross the expanse became targets for Remington’s artillery squads. Those squads hadn’t hesitated about blowing tanks, APCs, and field artillery to pieces.
Remington knew that several Syrian units sat out there in smoking ruins. He took pride in those small successes. What he needed was a way to turn those into more and larger successes.
What he needed-though he was loath to admit it-was Goose. Whenever circumstances had threatened to get out of hand in the past, whether in Iraq or Bosnia or in one of the African countries where they’d fought for survival in the early years, Goose had always been by Remington’s side.
Don’t you think about him, Remington commanded himself. Goose is part of the problem these days. He’s picked up Baker’s slack and has split the attention of this army. These men need to stay worried about saving their butts, not their souls.
“Captain,” the com officer said. He was young and bright faced.
Remington looked at the man.
“I’ve got Doyle.”
Remington nodded, then reached up and switched his headset to the frequency he used for Corporal Raymond Doyle. “Go.”
“I found your bird.” Doyle’s voice carried the lilt of New Orleans in it. Before entering the army, he’d been a
