The Seventh Angel

ice.”

Gunny nodded again. The report matched his own assessment.

“No signs of any anti-tamper devices,” Myers said. “I didn’t spot any proximity detectors, no motion sensors, no tripwires. Nothing.” He shrugged. “I don’t want to jinx anything, but I think our render-safe procedure is going to be pretty simple. I say we take out the initiator with the PAN, and use Niffers to cut all six pairs of firing wires simultaneously.”

The PAN, short for Percussion-Actuated Non-electric Disrupter, was a specialty tool of the EOD trade. Consisting of a long stainless steel barrel attached to an adjustable metal frame, the PAN used blank 12-gauge shotgun shells to fire specially-designed slugs into bomb components, destroying key circuits or mechanisms, and making the bomb inoperative.

Niffer was the common pronunciation of the abbreviation NFR, which stood for Nonvolatile Fast-Response Wire Cutter. A Niffer was a tube-shaped device — about the size of a fountain pen — that could be attached to a small bundle of electrical wires, and sever them on command. Unlike the PAN, which had been invented specifically for Explosive Ordnance Disposal, Niffers had been adapted from the American movie industry, where special effects technicians used them to remotely control pyrotechnic charges for action films.

“Good plan,” Gunny said. “That’s about what I was thinking. But I want to take out that Kevlar cable at the same time.” He jerked a thumb in the direction of the device. “Odds are, that cable leads to a remote trigger. We’d probably be okay if we left it in place. But I don’t want to gamble if we don’t have to. So we take it out of the equation, just to be on the safe side.”

Staff Sergeant Myers nodded. “Understood. How do you want to cut the cable? It’s too heavy for the Niffers, and we’re already using the PAN to disrupt the initiator package.”

“Let’s pop it with detonating cord,” Gunny said. “The cable is Kevlar, so it’s going to be resistant, but a couple of loops of det. cord ought to do the trick.”

“Roger,” Myers said. “I should have thought of that.”

Gunny Armstrong slapped him on the shoulder. “You will next time.”

Myers gave him a thumbs-up, his hand almost cartoonishly large in the thick cold weather glove. “Roger that,” he said.

The Staff Sergeant looked out across the grubby surface of the ice, in the direction of the device. “Is it just me? Or is this turning out to be too easy?”

“Don’t count your chickens,” Gunny said. “When we’ve finished the render-safe procedure on this site and the second site, you can tell me all about how easy this all was while we’re riding home in that raggedy-ass chopper. Until then, make sure you keep eyes in the back of your head, Marine.”

Myers nodded. “Will do, Gunny.” He turned and walked toward the team’s pile of equipment, to select the gear they’d need to safe the explosives.

Gunny Armstrong watched the younger Marine go without speaking. He was feeling it too: the nagging suspicion that this mission was proceeding just a little too smoothly. EOD jobs never went this easily, not even in training exercises.

He kept wondering if they had forgotten something, if all four members of his team had overlooked some critical detail. But as hard as he wracked his brain, he couldn’t think of a thing.

Then again, maybe it wasn’t something they’d missed. Maybe it was a premonition.

The idea brought a grunt of disdain. Gunnery Sergeant Thomas Armstrong did not believe in premonitions. That crap was for the Psychic Hotline; dial 1-800-Mystic-Bullshit.

He shook his head. It was just a case of the heebie-jeebies. His best bet of getting out of this in one piece was to forget about premonitions and focus on doing the job safely and correctly.

He picked his way across the ice, toward the spot where Staff Sergeant Myers was breaking out the gear. Gunny spoke to himself as he walked, his voice swallowed up by the whistling wind. It was an unconscious thing; he wasn’t even aware that he was doing it. “This ain’t gonna work,” he said to himself. “It ain’t gonna fucking work.”

* * *

But it did work. Despite Gunny Armstrong’s growing sense of foreboding, his team rigged their equipment without incident. When everything was set, they all pulled back to a safe distance, and he gave Myers the go signal.

Myers flipped up the protective cover on the remote trigger, and gave the button three quick squeezes. On the third squeeze, the disrupters all triggered at once. All six of the Niffers rammed their metal pistons home, shearing six pairs of firing wires with a noise like the slamming of several car doors. At the same instant, the long- barreled PAN fired a ceramic-tipped steel slug into the center of the initiator package, punching through the insulated housing to shatter the modules of electrical circuitry inside. The det cord ignited simultaneously, the little knot of chemical explosive parting the Kevlar cable with a bang not much louder than a firecracker.

In an instant, the job was done. The small quantities of smoke from the PAN disrupter and the det cord were snatched away by the brisk Siberian wind, and the single echo bounced off the face of the ice and faded to silence.

Gunny felt his unease relax half a notch. One job down, and everybody still had their fingers and toes. If the second device went as smoothly as this one, they might make it home after all.

He glanced at Myers. “We’ll start packing up the gear,” he said. “You get on short-comm and inform the chopper that Response Element Two has completed Site Charlie, and we’re standing by for transport to Site Delta.”

Staff Sergeant Myers acknowledged the order, and began digging in the side pocket of his parka for the new hand-held battlefield phone known as short-comm.

Gunny Armstrong turned toward the other two Marines, and he was getting ready to issue further instructions when he caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye. He looked up and saw a helicopter flying toward his team, keeping low to the ice and moving fast. For a couple of seconds, it flew in apparent silence, and then he began to hear the throp of the rotors: barely audible at first, but quickly growing louder as the chopper closed on their position.

Gunny’s brain processed three thoughts in rapid succession. First … The helicopter shouldn’t be here yet. It was supposed to stand off to the south until the team called for it, which Myers hadn’t done yet. Second … It was the wrong kind of helicopter. And third … He was watching the evidence of his premonition brought to life.

He didn’t know what he’d been expecting. An accident, maybe, or a misstep, or a booby trap. But not this.

He pursed his lips and whistled sharply, to grab instant attention. “Hit the deck!” he yelled. “That’s not our chopper!”

As the words left his mouth, he threw himself forward, hitting the ice hard, his body plowing through several inches of grubby snow. The impact with the ice knocked the breath out of him, but there was no time to worry about that. He reached behind him, his hands scrabbling to find the M-4 carbine slung barrel-down across his back.

His right hand made contact with the collapsible stock of the rifle, gloved fingers groping for purchase on the smooth carbon plastic of the butt. He got a hold on his weapon and hauled it around into a two-handed shooting grip.

The helicopter was still getting closer, the sound of its rotors growing from a rumble to rhythmic thunder.

Out of the sides of his eyes, Gunny took inventory of his men. They had followed his lead. They were all prone on the ice, with weapons drawn and tracking the inbound chopper.

Hopefully, hitting the deck made them smaller targets, but it damned sure didn’t hide them. The greens and browns of their woodland camouflage were a sharp visual contrast to the dirty whites and grays of the ice.

Bulldozer in a fucking bathtub, Gunny thought again.

He was getting a better look at the helicopter now. The bulbous nose of the aircraft had two bubble-shaped cockpits, one atop the other and set slightly aft. Angled weapons pylons stuck out from the right and left sides of the fuselage, like stubby wings. Gunny recognized it as a Russian HIND-D. A gunship, well armored against small