“Scorpion, this is Mother Hen.”
Jonathan pressed the mike button on his vest. “Hi, Mom,” he said. The three of them walked in single file up a hill that seemed to have no end, Jonathan in the lead and Boxers taking up the rear. In near total darkness, the night glowed green and bright thanks to the enhancement of their night-vision goggles. Their GPS showed that they’d hiked about two miles since leaving the village, and for every step, Jonathan had kept his fist lightly wrapped around the grip of his battle-slung M4, his finger outside the trigger guard, but poised for action with an instant’s notice.
“I’ve got good news from Alaska,” Venice said. “Wolverine came through. Our friends are airborne with special transportation arranged through channels. Word is that everyone is safe and they hit a home run.”
Jonathan smiled. “I’m sure that will be a story worth hearing.”
“I’ve heard some of it,” Venice said, “and you have no idea how right you are.”
“Looking forward to it. Got any good news for us jungle jockeys?”
“I do,” she said. “I think I have a final location for the precious cargo,” Venice said. “He’s in Building Golf. It looks like it might be some sort of a dormitory, judging from the number of people who filed in.”
Without referencing his map or his computer, Jonathan knew that she was referring to the third hut down the eastern edge of the compound. He stopped and let the others catch up. Boxers and Harvey were both equipped with the same communications gear, but as commander, Jonathan was the lone voice back to Fisherman’s Cove. “How sure are you?” he asked.
“I’m one hundred percent certain I saw him enter Building Golf. After that, reliability drops,” Venice said. “I’ll monitor for people exiting the building, but if that happens, we’ll have no way of knowing who it is.”
“Roger that,” Jonathan said. “I show us two miles out. Do you concur?”
“I do,” she said. “But I’ve got some troubling news. They’ve got the compound lit up like daytime. I compared that to images from SkysEye last night, and the floodlights appear to be new.”
“That means they’re expecting us,” Boxers whispered. “Fuckin’ Josie.”
“It means they’re expecting something,” Jonathan corrected. He keyed his mike. “Have you found the generator?”
“I believe so,” Venice said. “I’ve got a heat signature in the five hundred-degree range, consistent with the burning temperature of gasoline, along the western margin of the main building. Problem is, it appears to be in the wash of the light that it’s creating. You’re not going to be able to get to it.”
“Take it out with a sniper shot?” Harvey asked.
Jonathan shook his head. “We’re firing five-five-six millimeter, and you’re firing nines. They’re not reliable for that.” He cursed himself for not having spec’d out a 7.62-millimeter rifle to Josie. There was nothing like the proper application of M60 fire to raise havoc with electrical generators.
“We’ll just have to plant a second charge,” Boxers said.
Jonathan always got a kick out of how easy the Big Guy made complex operations sound. He was right, of course. “That one will be mine,” Jonathan said. He turned to Harvey. “That’ll put a lot more pressure on you as the sole cover. Are you up to it?”
Harvey cocked his head and smirked. “If I say no, do you have a replacement?”
It was a point well made in response to a stupid question.
“Don’t worry about me,” Harvey said. “I’m falling back into the habit. Since I haven’t shot a gun in a while, I might not have the most accurate aim, but I can pull the trigger enough to make the barrel hot.”
The radio crackled, “Hey, are you still there?”
“Sorry, Mom,” Jonathan said. “We were just doing a little strategizing.”
“Well, strategize this: I show two people leaving the compound and heading your way. They’re carrying flashlights, and from their posture, I’d say they’re holding rifles, too.”
Boxers snorted out a laugh. “Way to be stealthy,” he said on the radio.
Jonathan took comfort from the use of artificial light. It put the enemy at a double disadvantage. Not only were they visible before the fight began, but they’d likely be blind afterward because their night vision would be shot. That’s what he was hoping, anyway. Not counting on it, for sure, but hoping very hard.
“Are you sure they’re heading our way?” Jonathan asked.
“I know that they’re heading down the trail that leads to you,” Venice said. “Time will tell if you’re the ultimate target. I’m guessing no.”
“I’m guessing no, too,” Jonathan said. “If they know we’re coming, the last thing they’ll want to do is engage us in anything less than strength.”
“I think they’re setting traps,” Boxers said offline.
Jonathan thought that, too. “Mother Hen, keep an eye on them. If they stop for any length of time, note the location for us on the GPS.”
“I’ll try, but remember the four-minute delay.”
“I understand. Do your best to keep us informed. Now let’s clear the channel for a while.”
Venice was unsurpassed in her skills and her commitment to mission, but left to her own devices she could get very damn chatty on the radio. Sometimes you just had to cut her off early, before she could develop an unmanageable head of steam.
“I’ve got a question,” Harvey said after a couple of minutes had passed in silence. “In The Sandbox, we had a problem with Hadjis faking shit for the satellite coverage. They knew we were watching, so they’d put on a show. Any chance that our bad guys are doing that?”
“Impossible,” Boxers said with hesitation.
“How can you be so sure?”
Jonathan took that one. “Because Josie never knew about the satellite imagery. We kept that just for us. If he didn’t know it, then he couldn’t have told anyone.”
There’d been an argument between the guards as it came time to herd the boys into their sleeping huts, but Evan had no idea what it was about until Charlie explained it to him after the fact. “Some of the guardia think it’s a mistake to put you and me in the same hut. They worry that we can make plans that no one else can understand.”
Evan shrugged. “Well… yeah.” When he said it, “yeah” had two syllables.
The argument had lasted long enough for them to be the last to enter. Charlie’s feet had barely cleared the jamb when the wooden door slammed shut and something heavy slid across the opening. After the bolt or whatever it was slid into place, Evan heard a heavy rattle that sounded like a lock being snapped closed.
The hut held ten army-style cots, arranged in two ranks down either side of the rectangular interior, but with everybody inside, Evan counted only nine occupants, including himself. The heat and stench of the place were off- the-chart awful. Ten seconds in, he was seriously thinking about vomiting; but then the puking plan was derailed when one of the hut’s residents threw a pair of flip-flops at Charlie, beaning him on the forehead with the first one, and missing with the second, which sailed into the corner near the shit can. The rest of the kids cheered at that, and then there was a long string of angry Spanish, punctuated with pointing and derisive laughter.
The kid who threw the shoe jutted out his neck and made a move on Charlie, his shoulders and arms set for battle. As the distance closed, the fight seemed inevitable, so Evan stepped out to help his new friend. He met the attacker with a football-style forearm block to his chest, and the force of the collision knocked the other kid to the ground. His eyes hot and angry, the attacker tried to stand, but Evan knocked him down again. On the far end of the hut, the other boys started to shout, and they surged forward.
Evan didn’t care. Every one of them was smaller than he, and he was tired of being pushed around. If they wanted a fight, he’d give them one. He needed to hit someone, to break something. If it had to be noses and teeth, that was fine. God knew it wouldn’t be his first time.
The boy he’d knocked down crab-walked backward toward the others, who helped him to his feet. The war was on. Shit was going to fly.
Amid all the shouting, he never heard Charlie yelling at him to stop. He was surprised as hell, then, when arms clamped across his chest from behind and swirled him away from the fight. “Stop it!” Charlie yelled.
Evan was appalled. “Stop? Are you kidding? That kid just threw shoes at you!”
“It doesn’t matter,” Charlie said.
Behind them, the door to the hut flew open, and three guards stormed in, rifles at the ready.
