Clear and Present Danger

'What do you think happened?'

'From what I see, the druggies got real lucky,' he said lightly.

Sandy knew what her husband thought of druggies, and why. Everyone had a pet hate. That was his - and hers; she'd been a nurse too long, had too often seen the results of substance abuse, to think otherwise. It was the one thing he'd lectured the girls on, and though they were as rebellious as any pair of healthy adolescents, it was one line they didn't approach, much less cross.

'The President sounds angry.'

'How would you feel? The FBI Director was his friend - as far as a politician has friends.' Clark felt the need to qualify the statement. He was wary of political figures, even the ones he'd voted for.

'What is he going to do about it?'

'I don't know, Sandy.' I haven't quite figured it out yet . 'Where are the kids?'

'They went to Busch Gardens with their friends. There's a new coaster, and they're probably screaming their brains out.'

'Do I have time to shower? I've been traveling all day.'

'Dinner in thirty minutes.'

'Fine.' He kissed her again and headed for the bedroom with his bag. Before entering the bathroom, he emptied his dirty laundry into the hamper. Clark would give himself one restful day with the family before starting on his mission planning. There wasn't that much of a hurry. For missions of this sort, haste made death. He hoped the politicians would understand that.

Of course, they wouldn't, he told himself on the way to the shower. They never did.

'Don't feel bad,' Moira told him. 'You're tired. I'm sorry I've worn you out.' She cradled his face to her chest. A man was not a machine, after all, and five times in just over one day's time... what could she fairly expect of her lover? He had to sleep, had to rest. As did she, Moira realized, drifting off herself.

Within minutes, Cortez gently disengaged himself, watching her slow, steady breathing, a dreamy smile on her placid face while he wondered what the hell he could do. If anything. Place a phone call - risk everything for a brief conversation on a non-secure line? The Colombian police or the Americans, or somebody had to have taps on all those phones. No, that was more dangerous than doing nothing at all.

His professionalism told him that the safest course of action was to do nothing. Cortez looked down at himself. Nothing was precisely what he had just accomplished. It was the first time that had happened in a very long time.

Team KNIFE, of course, was completely - if not blissfully - unaware of what had transpired the previous day. The jungle had no news service, and their radio was for official use only. That made the new message all the more surprising. Chavez and Vega were again on duty at the observation post, enduring the muggy heat that followed a violent thunderstorm. There had been two inches of rain in the previous hour, and their observation point was now a shallow puddle, and there would be more rain in the afternoon before things cleared off.

Captain Ramirez appeared, without much in the way of warning this time, even to Chavez, whose woodcraft skills were a matter of considerable pride. He rationalized to himself that the captain had learned from watching him.

'Hey, Cap'n,' Vega greeted their officer.

'Anything going on?' Ramirez asked.

Chavez answered from behind his binoculars. 'Well, our two friends are enjoying their morning siesta.' There would be another in the afternoon, of course. He was pulled away from the lenses by the captain's next statement.

'I hope they like it. It's their last one.'

'Say again, Cap'n?' Vega asked.

'The chopper's coming in to pick us up tonight. That's the LZ right there, troops.' Ramirez pointed to the airstrip. 'We waste this place before we leave.'

Chavez evaluated that statement briefly. He'd never liked druggies. Having to sit here and watch the lazy bastards go about their business as matter-of-factly as a man on a golf course hadn't mitigated his feelings a dot.

Ding nodded. 'Okay, Cap'n. How we gonna do it, sir?'

'Soon as it's dark, you and me circle around the north side. Rest of the squad forms up in two fire teams to provide fire support in case we need it. Vega, you and your SAW stay here. The other one goes down about four hundred meters. After we do the two guards, we booby-trap the fuel drums in the shack, just as a farewell present. The chopper'll pick us up at the far end at twenty-three hundred. We bring the bodies out with us, probably dump 'em at sea.'

Well, how about that , Chavez thought. 'We'll need like thirty-forty minutes to get around to them, just to play it safe and all, but the way those two fuckers been actin', no sweat, sir.' The sergeant knew that the killing would be his job. He had the silenced weapon.

'You're supposed to ask me if this is for-real,' Captain Ramirez pointed out. He had done just that over the satellite radio.

'Sir, you say do it, I figure it's for-real. It don't bother me none,' Staff Sergeant Domingo Chavez assured his commander.

'Okay - we'll move out as soon as it's dark.'

'Yes, sir.'

The captain patted both men on the shoulder and withdrew to the rally point. Chavez watched him leave, then pulled out his canteen. He unscrewed the plastic top and took a long pull before looking over at Vega.

' Fuck! ' the machine-gunner observed quietly.

'Whoever's runnin' this party musta grown a pair o' balls,' Ding agreed.

'Be nice to get back to a place with showers and air conditioning,' Vega said next. That two people would have to die to make that possible was, once it was decided, a matter of small consequence. It bemused both men somewhat that after years of uniformed service they were finally being told to do the very thing for which they'd trained endlessly. The moral issue never occurred to them. They were soldiers of their country. Their country had decided that those two dozing men a few hundred meters away were enemies worthy of death. That was that, though both men wondered what it would actually be like to do it.

'Let's plan this one out,' Chavez said, getting back to his binoculars. 'I want you to be careful with that SAW, Oso .'

Vega considered the situation. 'I won't fire to the left of the shack unless you call in.'

'Yeah, okay. I'll come in from the direction of that big-ass tree. Shouldn't be no big deal,' he thought aloud.

'Nah, shouldn't be.'

Except that this time it was all real. Chavez stayed on the glasses, examining the men whom he would kill in a few hours.

Colonel Johns got his stand-to order at roughly the same time as all of the field teams, along with a whole new set of tactical maps that were for further study. He and Captain Willis went over the plan for this night in the privacy of their room. There was a snatch-and-grab tonight. The troops they'd inserted were coming back out far earlier than scheduled. PJ suspected that he knew why. Part of it, anyway.

'Right on the airfields?' the captain wondered.

'Yeah, well, either all four were dry holes, or our friends are going to have to secure them before we land for the snatch-and-grab.'

'Oh.' Captain Willis understood after a moment's thought.

'Get ahold of Buck and have him check the miniguns out again. He'll get the message from that. I want to take a look at the weather for tonight.'

'Pickup order reverse from the drop-off?'

'Yeah - we'll tank fifty miles off the beach and then again after we make the pickup.'

'Right.' Willis walked out to find Sergeant Zimmer. PJ went in the opposite direction, heading for the base meteorological office. The weather for tonight was disappointing: light winds, clear skies, and a crescent moon. Perfect flying weather for everyone else, it was not what special-ops people hoped for. Well, there wasn't much you could do about that.