'Fast and dirty. We can give the Air Force a call, and they can drop a big smart rock that'll squash the Sons flat before they ever know it's coming. Army's got a few of those they'd be happy to use too. End of immediate problem. Of course, that could spread plutonium dust all over the surrounding countryside, which might upset the locals. The evening news would have a field day when they found out, and they likely would notice if the local goals started giving glow-in-the-dark milk.
'Unless they have another chunk of this stuff already, they aren't going to build a fission bomb. Even if they
'You don't see any possibility of negotiation here?'
'No, sir. We're talking everything from treason, to multiple murder, to a dozen other local, state, and federal felonies. They give up. they are all history, and they know it. Their manifesto is ‘Give me liberty or give me death.' They aren't going to give up, and we can't dick around long enough to let them think about things they might do with that heavy metal they borrowed.'
'I see.'
'It is possible they could have rigged the container with conventional explosives so if anybody comes after them, it would give us the same scenario as the Air Force attack. Our staff psychologist doesn't think this is likely. They are paranoid enough, but this is a big prize, and they won't be in a hurry to lose it. So he says.
'Our first pass with the locals indicate that the attack wasn't set up very well. They didn't notice anybody poking around until yesterday. This engagement does not appear to have been the result of a long-term, well-laid plan. This is consistent with Gridley's finding that the transmission of the intelligence was less than day and a half ago. They mounted this operation in a hurry, on the fly, and they were lucky to get away with one out of four tries.'
'And you don't think they've booby-trapped the container.'
'No, sir, I don't. This feels like a come-as-you-are party and they had to hit the ground running. They haven't had time to think about it much.
'I see an infantry-style assault in the dark as our best bet. Since these guys are gun nuts, they've probably got spookeyes and motion detectors, but we can get close enough to knock those out and be on top of them before they have time to figure out what's happening. PEE for the spookeyes, jammers for the motion sensors.'
'PEE?'
'They're new, sir. Photosensitive Epilepsy Emitters. Brainwave flashers. They cause seizures or nausea in a lot of people who see them. And at night, they are bright enough to blind a guy using starlight spookeyes anyhow. So the guards watching the dark are either having fits, puking, or bumping into the furniture.
'Jammers shut down the transmitters on wireless sensors. Unless they've got hardwired sensors, they won't know where we're coming from until it's too late. And even hardwired, knowing we're coming and being able to do anything about it is not the same thing. My troops'll be in SIPEsuits. The Sons' surplus AK-47's, M16's, and handgun fire won't get through the armor.'
'What if they have heavier weapons? Rockets, AP, like that?'
'We've got half-a-dozen jump troops who can use parasails well enough to hit a spot the size of a dinner plate from six thousand feet at night, using their spookeyes. I can put them inside to sap the fence before we hit it from outside. I've got green hats, black hats, SEALs, the best of the best on this team. These camo clowns won't know what hit ‘em no matter what they're shooting.'
Michaels nodded. 'So if uplevels gives us the job, you'll be ready to go when?'
'We're ready right now. Optimal time would be 0230 hours. Most of the terrorists will be asleep. I've run a dozen computer scenarios, and our numbers average about eighty-seven-percent success. Realistic range is from seventy-five to ninety-four percent.'
'You want this one, Colonel?'
Again the smile, larger this time. 'Yes, sir. You bet.'
'I'll call the director and see what the situation is.'
Howard watched as Michaels moved off to a quieter part of the tent to use his virgil to call the FBI's director. The colonel looked around at his men and women, confident they could do the job. They were all volunteers, nobody had to be here, and he would lead them into Hell to pull the Devil's tail, secure in the knowledge they would follow without batting an eyelash.
Did he want this operation? Sheeit, he couldn't imagine anything he could want more just at the moment. He could be home, sitting on the couch, digesting Christmas ham and listening to his mother-in-law give him a hard time. Storming a nest of terrorists who'd swiped a chunk of radioactive bomb material was easy duty compared to that…
'Sir, we got the second bird coming on-line, about to step on the location,' Fernandez said.
'Copy, Sergeant. Let's see it. Put it on the holoproj so we get a three-dee view.'
'As the colonel orders,' Fernandez said. 'Hey, Jeter! Three-dee!'
Howard moved toward a folding aluminum display table where the holographic projector had been focused. After a few seconds, the image appeared. It started out as a black-and-white. Then the computer furnished false colors so that it looked almost like a model.
'Give it to me from a hundred feet up and three hundred feet out,' Howard said to the tech.
'Sir,' Jeter said.
The image shifted viewpoints. The computer filled in the details based on images in its memory, but it was probably a pretty accurate representation of the place. A two-story ranch house sat in the middle of the compound, which was surrounded by a chain-link fence, probably ten feet high. There was also what looked like a wooden barn, plus a pole shed that was just a roof and half-a-dozen upright supports, and a smaller storage building behind the house. Four trucks, two cars, and a single-engine high-wing airplane were parked in front of the main house. There were two guards on the gate, and either the spysat's optics or the computer had decided they were both short- haired men in baseball caps, with rifles or carbines slung over their shoulders and holstered side arms. A third guard with a large dog patrolled the fence in the back. A fourth figure, a woman in a dress, stood in front of what appeared to be chickens, tossing feed to the birds. Optics weren't so good that they could see chicken feed from however many thousands of miles up in space, but they were good enough to guess that the woman had long black hair and fair skin. Amazing.
'We have any idea how many are in there, Julio?'
Fernandez drifted over and shook his head. 'No, sir. Most we've seen at a time's half a dozen — four men and two women. No children, thank God. They could have fifteen or twenty in there, given the number of vehicles. IR doesn't work real well through a roof. My guess is, they don't know we know where they are.' He glanced at his watch.
'Got an appointment, Sergeant?'
'I was supposed to call my mother after I got out of mass. I didn't get around to it.'
'Use one of the landlines and call her, Julio. I don't want your mama mad at me because I made you work on Christmas.'
Fernandez grinned. 'Sir. Thank you.'
Howard watched his best soldier — and probably his best friend in the world — amble toward the phone bank.
Michaels came back, clipping the virgil onto his belt, next to his taser.
Howard raised his eyebrows.
'It's ours, Colonel.'
Howard grinned, real big.
Michaels shook his head and sighed. 'I already had occasion today to remember the old saying ‘Be careful what you wish for, you might get it.' Colonel. You just got what you wanted. Merry Christmas. I hope it doesn't blow up in our faces.'
Chapter Sixteen
