Wired

The man slowly crept closer. Closer. Closer.

Now! thought Desh, emerging from behind the tree and squeezing off a shot before the man could begin to react. The tranquilizer gun was as silent as a bow. The dart scored a direct hit to the soldier’s thigh, and he crumpled to the ground as the tranquilizer took immediate effect.

Desh didn’t waste another moment. The man’s colleagues were sure to be advancing from alternate flanks. Desh was racing toward the clearing when the word “Freeze!” thundered through the woods. He reached the tree line to see Connelly with his hands up and two men, mirror images of the man he had shot, emerging alertly from the woods on Connelly’s northern and western flanks, their weapons held expertly in front of them with two hands and pointing unerringly at the colonel’s forehead.

Desh fired! The soldier on Connelly’s northern flank collapsed to the ground.

Desh wheeled around the instant the shot was off and fired again at the last remaining commando, but the man had caught Desh’s motion and instinctively threw himself into a roll. Instead of hitting an appendage, Desh’s shot bounced harmlessly off his vest. The soldier came up firing but Desh had already darted back behind a tree.

Bark flew past Desh’s face as a bullet imbedded itself in the tree he was using for cover. The soldier was about to shoot again when his arm was blasted backwards and his gun clattered to the ground. A stunned expression came over his face as he realized he had been shot. Blood poured from his arm. Connelly rushed forward and kicked his gun away, and then retreated to a safe distance with his own weapon still trained on the wounded man. Connelly had known Desh was on his southern flank and had been primed to act once Desh had made his expected move.

Desh circled the clearing at the tree line, his gun drawn, looking for additional assailants. There were none. He returned to his original flank and motioned Griffin to leave his hiding place and join him in the clearing. They emerged from the woods and quickly joined Connelly. Desh was calm and alert while Griffin was pale and clammy, looking as if he had seen a ghost.

“All clear?” said Connelly.

“It looks that way,” replied Desh, “for the moment at least. Let’s question this guy and get the hell out of here.”

Connelly motioned to Griffin. “Is this your friend?” he asked.

Desh nodded. “He’s a computer expert I’ve been working with who got drawn in. I think we can trust him.” He paused. “Matt Griffin—Jim Connelly,” he said.

The men shook hands while Desh turned to the wounded soldier and stared at him intently. “Who are you working for?” he barked. “And what were your orders?”

The soldier remained silent.

“You’re obviously US military; ex-Special Forces. I’m guessing you’re working for a Black Ops group, am I right?” Once again there was no response. “Do you have any idea who it is you were attacking?” He gestured toward Connelly. “You’re looking at a highly decorated officer in the US Army Special Operations Command.”

The soldier’s expression suggested that he knew exactly who it was he was attacking but didn’t care.

Desh pocketed the tranquilizer gun, drew his .45, and pulled back on the slide to chamber a round. He pointed it at the prisoner’s kneecap suggestively. “I’m only going to ask one more time,” he growled. “Why are you after him?”

The soldier’s face remained stoic but he glanced from his kneecap to Desh’s fiery eyes and swallowed hard. “We were told he went off the reservation.”

Desh glanced at Connelly and raised his eyebrows. “How so?”

“We weren’t given details. We were just told he had gone rogue and was extremely dangerous. That he was working against the interests of the United States and had to be brought in. The orders came from high up the chain of command.”

“Brought in or executed?” said Connelly.

“Brought in.”

“But you weren’t told he had to be taken alive, correct?” said Desh.

The soldier didn’t respond, but the look on his face spoke volumes.

“Just as I thought,” said Desh. “So if you were able to bring him in without a fight to interrogate him, great, but if you had to kill him, no one would lose any sleep over it.”

The soldier glared at Connelly. “You sell out your country and you get what you deserve.”

Desh shook his head. “You’ve been lied to. The colonel hasn’t sold out his country. Whoever is ultimately giving the orders has, and is afraid the colonel is on the brink of finding out. So I’ll ask again, who gave you your ord—”

Desh jerked his head toward the sky in mid sentence as he detected the faint but unmistakable sound of helicopter blades overhead, his heart accelerating wildly. The chopper was already less than two hundred feet away and was closing fast.

Impossible!

Desh darted for the tree line as a muffled shot rang out from above, and an armorpiercing bullet screamed through Connelly’s vest and drilled a hole just below his left shoulder, sending his gun flying. Two soldiers in the helicopter tried to follow Desh’s sprinting form with their silenced rifles but held their fire as he entered the woods.

A helicopter was far too noisy to have made it so close undetected, thought Desh in alarm. But this one had. Which meant it was one of the few, next generation choppers designed to have a dramatically reduced acoustic and radar signature. Whoever was after them had access to the military’s most advanced equipment, which was extremely disconcerting.

The helicopter approached the clearing and four men, clutching automatic rifles and donned in commando gear, rappelled down a green rope that had unfurled like a streamer from the floor of the chopper. As soon as their boots hit the ground, two of them captured Griffin and Connelly, and two raced into the woods after Desh, fanning out. The helicopter gently settled onto the ground next to Connelly’s car as they did so. The man who had called himself Smith was at the controls.

Desh sprinted through the woods ahead of his pursuit, stopping abruptly to take up residence behind a particularly thick tree trunk. The two men approached cautiously, keeping to trees for cover, no doubt aware of Desh’s credentials. He was outnumbered, but they had the unenviable task of rooting him out, and he had access to any number of fortified positions. One of the men would circle around and they would coordinate an attack from opposite sides of him. That is if he remained stationary, which he had no intention of doing. Experience told him that he had a better than fifty-fifty chance of escape.

Smith killed the helicopter’s engine and entered the woods. “Stand down, Mr. Desh,” he bellowed into the trees. “It’s Smith,” he added, in case Desh failed to recognized his voice.

Desh said nothing.

Smith made several crisp hand signals and seconds later the two commando’s retreated back toward their commander. “I’m recalling my men,” yelled Smith in Desh’s general direction. “We have your two friends,” he continued. “Cooperate and they get treated like royalty. Help me get the girl and I’ll even let them go.” He paused. “Don’t cooperate and I’ll have them executed. Right here, right now,” he bellowed. “So how about it, Desh?”

Smith paused and waited for Desh’s response, which didn’t come. Desh wasn’t about to be goaded into giving away his position.

“Look, Desh, my men and I will be waiting in the clearing for you to come to your senses. Your friends’ lives are in your hands. You have three minutes!” he finished, his booming voice reverberating off the trees.

While Desh didn’t believe Smith would ever let Griffin and Connelly go, he did believe he would execute them if Desh didn’t play ball. He had already proven this by shooting the colonel. But as long as they were alive, there was a chance Desh could get them out of this mess. He had no other choice but to give himself up, and Smith knew it.

He approached the edge of the tree line. The colonel and the bearded giant were sitting on the ground next to Connelly’s car, their hands and feet bound, while Smith’s men were spread throughout the clearing. Desh was relieved to find Connelly still looking alert despite his gunshot wound.

Desh planned to announce himself before he broke from the woods in case any of the soldiers were trigger- happy. He opened his mouth to announce his presence but slammed it closed in shock as he heard something that