“Could make Jamal more talkative if he sees she’s at risk.”
“Okay. Get her on board and let’s get the hell out of Dodge.”
They clamored aboard the craft as it lifted off.
As soon as they were on board they unwrapped the sheet revealing Salinda, Jamal saw her. He was shocked, but his situational awareness clicked in. He looked to his right and saw the open door of the chopper. He bolted up, jumped on Salinda, and grabbed her in his wire-tied hands, rolling with her out of the open door. Their bodies fell more than 200 feet and broke on a rocky ledge below.
“Ah, shit!” a disgusted Ross said as he tossed the severed pinky out of the same door.
“They got him.”
A small smattering of applause broke out around the Sitch Room following the Captain’s announcement.
“Casualties?” the President said quieting the room.
“Two leg wounds, non-life threatening.”
“Thank God. Enemy killed?”
“Sir, give us some time to debrief first,” the Chairman of the Joints Chiefs said. “It will all be in a report in the morning.”
“Thank you all. Good work. Hank, I think those men earned some shiny hardware tonight.”
“Roger that, sir.”
?§?
After-action jitters were a phenomenon that most battle-hardened commanders had seen. The adrenaline rush of combat and intense mental alertness often had residual effects once the nervous system calmed down. So Jonesy vomiting into his helmet was to be expected. He took some ribbing for it, but not from three of the men who were also looking a little green around the gills. Within two minutes, four troopers upchucked their guts into their Kevlars and were lying on the floor of the chopper.
Realizing that something else had to be going on here, the commander keyed his tactical radio. “Oasis this is
The Squad commander then checked all of his men on the copter. He heard
Hiccock’s phone rang. “William, get on SCIAD now!” the voice on the other end said.
Hiccock scanned his eye and opened the network from his desktop. The voice on the phone was Quan Li, a research scientist out of Cal Tech on assignment in Diego Garcia. He was stationed at a listening station for Pave Paw West, a launch detection satellite in geo-synchronous orbit over the Indian Ocean. He was an Element member of SCIAD because he had led the way on critical mass research in heavy water reactors and held the highest clearance.
To: n
From: #E: Li
Re: Huge spike in Egyptian desert.
17:32 GMT Sensor readings of › 10.5 and ‹ 14.2 rads/meter recorded from source at 34 lat 134 long….
That’s all Hiccock had to read. He printed the document, picked up the phone, and pressed “POTUS.” But the President of the United States was not behind his desk. The switchboard picked up.
“Yes, Doctor Hiccock.”
“Chief of Staff, please.”
“Hold on.”
“Reynolds.”
“Ray, it’s Bill. I got something hot here and I need to inform the president.”
“Come down.”
Bill was out the door grabbing the printout on the way. He ran to the elevator and agents surrounded him.
“I need to get to the boss and Ray immediately.”
Two agents went onto the elevator with him and spoke to the agent on station near the President. Receiving an affirmative, they stepped out of the way when the elevator opened in the basement.
“We are at the end of a top secret mission here, Bill. Where’s the fire?” Reynolds asked.
“Sir, in the desert of Egypt about 135 miles west of Cairo.”
“General, Ray, I am clearing Hiccock for this operation,” the President said. “Ray, brief him.”
When Ray finished filling in Bill, Bill got to tell him what he knew.
The President was shocked, “Are you sure?”
“Li is not a reckless man. And I think, in short order, other sources will start chiming in. Meanwhile, General, can you verify that these coordinates are the same as your target?” Hiccock handed the printout to the Chairman.
“What do we do?” the President asked.
“Turn the copters around.” Hiccock said. “You have to get someone in there to control the situation.”
“But they are not prepared for this!” the General protested.
“Sir, with all due respect, those men have already been exposed. They are the only ones who can get there now and report back.”
“You’re saying they are already dead,” the General said.
“Some, not all, may be badly irradiated. But they might even be able to stop this thing from getting out of hand.”
“Do it!” the President said.
“Captain, order Foxtrots Alpha and Bravo back to target alpha!” the Chairman ordered.
“They’ll need refueling to get back, sir,” the Captain said.
“Dispatch refueling ships and get me the Sultan Air Base commander on the double!” the Chairman ordered.
The President turned to Hiccock, “I hope you are wrong, Bill.”
“I hope you are right, Sir.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Do what?” the squad commander yelled back over the interphone to the pilot who had received his orders and was already turning back. “Don’t they know that we have sick men here? And besides, that LZ is going to be crawling by now. What are we supposed to do if we engage bad guys?”
Here’s what never happens — some field grade commander in the thick of it gets a secure call from the Commander-in-Chief. So both squad chiefs were shocked to hear over their tac radios, “Gentlemen this is the President. I am joined here by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. What I am about to ask you to do is not easy for me. That’s why I had to have you hear it directly from me. During your raid, a large amount of radiation was released from the facility you stormed. This was significant and unprecedented. My staff tells me that many of you may already show symptoms of radiation poisoning. Here’s the tough part: we don’t know what could cause this. But trust me; there are no comforting answers to the question. You are the only force within hours of the target. You have to ascertain what the source of the radiation is, then secure the area until reinforcements arrive. I know what I am asking you men to do. All I can tell you is that America, and possibly the entire planet, is depending on you. I know you will not fail us. God speed, men.”
The President nodded to the Captain and the communications officer killed the circuit. He remained still,
