“My Pakistani friend is, ah, well placed. For obvious reasons, he doesn’t need to know your names and you don’t need to know his. But he’ll take your sample to a military lab for evaluation. The scientists will never know of our involvement. If the sample is benign, we may try to replace it, but I’m told that tests could take a couple of days. If it’s hot, the security services will start looking for our suspect while you continue your own searches.
“Which reminds me.” Hardesty pulled a scribbled note from a pocket and handed it to Lee. “Khan called on the discreet line this evening. He thinks he’s on to something. Frank Leopole is organizing an op in the border region. He says he’ll go with the people he still has in Quetta, but you folks might want to hustle back there.”
Omar Mohammed found Padgett-Smith in the hangar. She was exercising when she heard his footsteps on the cement behind her. “We just heard from General Hardesty,” he said. “He wants you to call him right away.”
She straightened up, arching her back and stretching her arms over her head. Though a Muslim and happily married, Mohammed noted the muscular upper arms and slender torso. CPS had taken to exercising in the main hangar more often: she could dispense with bulky clothes and avoid unwanted attention. She caught his glance, knew its meaning, and accepted the tacit compliment.
“Roger that,” she quipped.
Mohammed rolled his eyes in exaggerated fashion. “Oh no. Not you tool” He grinned in appreciation of the humor.
“Well, I spend all day with Type A commandos. Apparently that’s the only kind there is. What should one expect?”
“I suppose it
She picked up her towel and headed toward the office. “It would be perfectly delicious, Omar. But I knew the lay of the land when I signed on.”
He paced beside her. “You know, the Soviet Spetsnaz were rumored to have twenty-five percent women. Many of them were Olympic athletes.”
CPS absorbed that information, processing it behind those violet eyes. “It makes a certain amount of sense. Undoubtedly there were covert missions that required disarming guile rather than force.”
“Oh. I didn’t talk to him. He just left a message asking you to call as soon as possible.”
“Maybe he has a report on the sample we took. It’s been a couple of days, and that’s probably long enough to have run the tests.”
Rustam Khan’s presentation was concise and professional. Leopole expected no less, but thought that the Pakistani probably felt some pressure to make a good impression on the Americans. Leopole already had addressed the usual waypoints along the well-traveled route of a mission briefing: objective, intelligence, communications, and support, plus command and control.
In his clipped accent, Khan ticked off the known or suspected hostile forces and their capabilities. “I should emphasize that my sources are varied and do not always agree in details. That is to be expected. Additionally, some of the information is at least a few days old. But there is enough similarity on locale and previous sightings to justify launching an operation against this cave complex.” He circled an area on the map, a five-kilometer area on the Afghan border.
Lee raised a hand in the front row. “How many caves are we looking at?”
Khan arched an eyebrow. “In that area, there could be dozens. But relatively few would be suitable for the terrorists’ purposes. I shall accompany you to evaluate each site. I am familiar with such things and I can save some time. Unless we encounter an unexpected situation, the search should take little more than a day.”
Mohammed opened the door at the rear of the room and got Leopole’s attention. The team leader waved him in.
“Excuse the intrusion,” Mohammed began. “But Dr. Padgett-Smith just talked with General Hardesty in Islamabad. The laboratory confirmed that the sample you found is in fact a filovirus. As yet it has not been identified, but the doctor believes we need look no further. Saeed Sharif is the man we want.”
“Well, where is he?” Foyte asked.
Leopole stood up. “Let’s hope he’s in one of those caves. Ruck up, gentlemen. We launch at 0430 tomorrow. Blue Team’s up front, White in reserve.”
After the briefing, Lee essayed a literary comparison for the benefit of those who read something besides
Delmore interjected. “Morlocks? You mean, like, the underground gooners in
“Oh, yeah,” Breezy exclaimed. “The ‘60s flick with that really cute blonde babe. Yvette whatshername.”
“Yvette Mimieux?” Bosco asked.
“I guess so. Little bitty gal.”
Lee gave an exaggerated sigh. “As I was saying… there’s a similarity between the terrorists and the Morlocks in the H.G. Wells novel.” He nodded toward Breezy. “From which the movie was made.”
“Uh; yessir.”
“The comparison is, the Morlocks lived underground where they mutated into semi-human form. They came to the surface to prey on the people up there. Er, well, up here…” He felt growing frustration at trying to educate some of his knuckle-dragging door kickers in the finer points of literary-cinematic comparisons with the current world situation.
Bosco, a science-fiction devotee, turned to his partner. “Major Lee is saying that the terrorists are like the Morlocks; they can’t stand the light of day so they dwell underground, like where we’re gonna look for ‘em in caves. They can’t win a stand-up fight so they seek helpless victims like the Eloi, who were unable to defend themselves. The difference, of course, is that H.G. Wells’ novel was set in a post-industrial world whereas we’re merely in the post-Cold War world.” He turned toward Lee, keeping a deadpan expression. He knew that he had just astonished the bejabbers out of the former Army officer.
“Boscombe, sometimes you freaking amaze me.”
“Yes, sir. Sometimes I amaze myself.”
17
Blue Team was deployed along a narrow crest overlooking the likely cave complex. It was chilly in the morning air at that elevation, but most of Dan Foyte’s operators were dressed for mobility rather than warmth. They knew they might have to move fast.
Foyte glassed the largest entrance from 450 meters out, then handed his optic to Khan. After a few moments, the Pakistani returned the binoculars. He nodded. “Yes, that is a good spot to begin.”
The scouts returned to the assembly area and Foyte called for a huddle. “Okay, here’s the drill.” He had checked off each item in his prebrief review though he knew the items cold.
“After we establish security and scout the area, we’ll make a go-no-go decision. If we go, the entry team will search as far in as possible.” He looked at the team leader, a former SEAL named Darryl Logue. “Darryl, keep me informed of your progress. We won’t know about radio reception until you get inside, but if we lose contact for more than a minute or so, come on out and we’ll reposition.”
Logue nodded, working on a stick of gum. “When will you want to bring Mrs… ah, Doctor Smith in?”
CPS shot a discreet grin at Foyte. She had long since accepted most Americans’ inability to grasp hyphenated names.
“We’ll do that only if there’s sign of recent activity. Otherwise, we won’t waste the time. We can start looking
