by Pat Mullan
THIRTY-THREE
0100 Hours
Monday
The Millennium Covenant
Captain Dobson, the five lieutenants who commanded the RAT platoons, and Owen MacDara conferred before the assault.
"Give me a twenty minute head start before you move in", said MacDara.
"Lt. Johnson, you're going with Owen. Lt. Mullery will command his own platoon and yours. They're already in position for the main assault," said Captain Dobson. Then, just to confirm what they had already covered in their tactical planning, the Captain looked at the other three lieutenants:
"Jones and Garner, your platoons will flank the compound on the right and the left. Cossin, you and your platoon will move out when MacDara does. I want you in position at the north end of the compound before Lt. Mullery moves out. And remember, gentlemen, nobody gets careless. I will be with Lt. Mullery. Synchronize your watches. At 0200 hours we will commence the assault on the main compound. Owen, you've got an hour to neutralize the computer center. Good luck!"
Two guards were still in position at the main gate of the compound. The first was sitting in the guardhouse reading and the second was walking back and forth about ten yards in front of the gate. Lt. Johnson waited till he turned and then sneaked past and made the few yards to the guard box. At approximately the same time that Owen MacDara planted the hunting knife under the second guard's ribcage, Lt. Johnson broke the neck of the first guard.
Fifteen minutes later MacDara and Johnson had covered the mile to the main compound without encountering anyone. They waited. At least four guards were patrolling this part of the compound; two covering the perimeter to their left that circled the motor pool and passed the indoor firing range where MacDara had first met McNab; two covering the perimeter to their right that extended around the assembly area and the main entrance. MacDara decided to enter by the motorpool again; just as he did on his last 'visit'. They waited until the two guards met, exchanged greetings, and turned to cover the ground they'd just patrolled. MacDara and Johnson crouched and crawled till they reached the perimeter. The fence had been reinforced since last time. MacDara cut the two bottom rows of barbed wire and held it back until Johnson crawled through and then followed.
Lt. Cossin and his platoon moved fast. By the time that MacDara and Johnson had entered the motor pool, they were already beyond the compound, beyond the guarded perimeter fence and crossing the first rutted track that led into the densely forested terrain that MacDara had described so well. They continued north for another half-mile and stopped. Lt. Cossin split his platoon into teams of four men each, spread them two hundred yards apart, fanned out and turned back towards the compound. They halted two hundred yards north of the perimeter fence and held their position. Lt. Cossin checked his watch. It was 0140 hours.
At 0130 hours Captain Dobson and Lt. Mullery, with their two combined platoons, headed north through the main gate. The bodies of the two guards still lay where MacDara and Johnson had left them. At 0145 they were deployed in an arc stretching from the extreme left to the extreme right of the compound and one hundred and fifty yards south of the perimeter. Captain Dobson and Lt. Mullery had set up a command post in a cluster of trees fifty yards from the main entrance.
MacDara and Johnson double-timed from vehicle to vehicle in the motorpool until they reached the southern wall of the firing range. Everything was still. The night was clear, not even a breeze, with just enough moonlight to silhouette the buildings and throw shadows behind trees and bushes. MacDara and Johnson hugged their way, in shadow, north along the wall of the firing range until they reached the gap that separated them from the next building. They crossed the gap and flattened themselves against the gable end of that building. They waited and listened. Silence. By MacDara's reckoning the next building should be the computer center. It was. A long, rectangular building with rows of windows on one side; opaque glass, screened by wire mesh and covered with steel grilles. It would be a futility to try to penetrate such a place. MacDara had been in too many high-security data centers to realize that. But they hadn't come here to steal. They had come to destroy. If they were right this was the command center for the Infowar that McNab had started. MacDara took the east side of the building and Johnson the west. They each took three semtex packs with timed detonators from their backpacks and planted them at both ends and the middle of the building. The timers were set for fifteen minutes. It was now 0145 hours.
Captain Dobson broke silence on his radio. He confirmed positions with Lt. Jones, Lt. Garner and Lt. Cossin. He hadn't expected to hear from MacDara and Johnson. It was 0155 hours.
The explosions ripped the night air and shook the bed under George McNab. He always slept combat ready and only had to pull on his boots. He grabbed his forty-five and ran out the front door. Just in time to miss a mortar round that landed right in the center of the compound. He had enough time to see the flames leaping skyward from the computer center before he hit the ground. Pulling his radio from his belt, he started yelling orders:
"Black! Wainwright! Where the fuck are you? We're under attack! Get your men and move out. Black, take the armory and hold it! Wainwright, make every bullet count. I want the bastards dead! Do you hear me?"
His voice was drowned out by another mortar round hitting somewhere near the motorpool. Then the unmistakeable sound of automatic rifles seemed to be coming from everywhere, north, south, east and west. His people were piling out of buildings, some half-dressed. Most had been asleep. Some didn't make it far. They pitched face down into the gravel, stopped dead in their tracks. Others made it to cover. Firefights had broken out on all sides.
Pascarelli was gurgling in his throat. Bubbles of blood were forming at the corners of his lips. 'Doc', the platoon paramedic, had applied a pressure bandage to the wound in his chest but his lungs were filling with blood. Walls and Farley were providing fire cover. They looked at Doc again who was now trying to get an airway into Pascarelli. Doc simply shook his head. Firing to their immediate front had slackened; only one rifle shooting sporadically. Walls and Farley moved out towards it. Walls to the left, Farley to the right. Mortars were still landing in the compound and fighting to their right sounded intense. Garner's platoon was bogged down. Lt. Mullery started to move Johnson's platoon to reinforce Garner. But Walls and Farley were bent on avenging Pascarelli. Farley took a position about forty yards from the lone rifleman and kept up a steady stream of fire, pinning him down. Walls moved in on his left, crawling the last thirty yards, then rising and storming the position. Just as he did, explosion after explosion rocked the entire compound lighting the night sky and illuminating everything. The armory had been blown. Walls, at that moment, was naked and the bullet caught him in the throat exiting and blowing away the back of his skull. Farley didn't see Walls die. Lt. Mullery had moved to a crouch beside him, ordering him to move out. Captain Dobson would mop up and then reinforce Jones.
MacDara had seen Colonel McNab hit the ground and take cover just as the explosions ripped apart the computer center behind him. He crawled on his stomach, halfing the sixty yards between himself and McNab. He wanted to take the Colonel alive. A shot careened off the ground kicking dust and gravel into his face. He rolled away, taking cover behind some large shrubbery at the edge of the parade ground. When he looked again, the Colonel was gone. He reached the position where he last saw McNab but there was nothing to indicate where he went. But Owen MacDara wanted the Colonel badly. This was personal. Crawling and running and dodging, MacDara reached the perimeter of the compund, adjacent to the armory, and sighted his quarry. McNab was huddled with one of his Captains. He was barking orders like a maniac. Timing is everything. In this case, it certainly was on the side of McNab. Just as MacDara reached his position a mortar round came in. McNab hit the ground, twisting to his left, giving him a clear view of MacDara. He came up firing, oblivious to the incoming rounds. MacDara's aim was deadly accurate. His bullet caught McNab somewhere on the upper right shoulder, but he
kept on coming. Another mortar round came in and McNab hit the ground, losing his weapon as he did. The shoulder injury was taking effect. MacDara was now within twenty yards and he could smell the kill but he wanted McNab to suffer. Taking aim he moved steadily towards him, watching the Colonel, seeing only the image of a trapped animal. But McNab wasn't going away so easily. He suddenly rolled over and came to his knees, holding a hand-grenade in his left hand. MacDara could see the agony as he held it to his chest and pulled the pin with his bad right arm. MacDara fired again, hitting McNab and spinning him around. The grenade dropped at his feet but McNab summoned up enough energy to move like a man possessed by a demon. MacDara had immediately hit the ground when he saw McNab drop the hand-grenade. He didn't see the end. He didn't see McNab reach the shelter of the armory just as an incoming round hit it. McNab never had a chance. But he probably wouldn't have survived MacDara's bullets anyway. Colonel George McNab had fought a losing battle. But Owen MacDara still felt cheated.
Dawn was breaking through the trees and throwing dappled light on the gravel of the parade ground and on the huddle of men sitting in a circle. Other prisoners, in single files of twos and threes, hands in the air, arrived and joined the huddle. The battle was over. Only an occasional shot rang out as the RAT busters mopped up the last holdouts. Casualties were heavy. About one-hundred of the Millennium Covenanters had died; over half their numbers. Many more were seriously wounded. Some of them would not survive the evacuation. Twenty-three RAT busters had died, the equivalent of a full platoon. They had paid a heavy price.
Owen MacDara was weary. He declined the offer to join Captain Dobson for a debriefing until he personally watched Colonel George McNab's body removed to a litter and placed on board a waiting field ambulance. Only then did he accept the hot mug of coffee proffered to him by Lt. Mullery.
But he got no time to rest. Shields was looking for him. He'd left two urgent messages at Field Ops Command during the action. Fields Ops patched him through, on a secure line, to Shields as soon as Captain Dobson had ended his debriefing. Shields voice sounded gravelly, stressed. He didn't mince his words:
"Owen, we've got big trouble. Liz Russo is dead. New York subway. Under a train. They say she jumped. I don't believe it."
"Jesus! Liz wouldn't kill herself!"
"Owen, better get a grip on yourself. There's worse news. Kate is missing."
"What do you mean 'she's missing'?"
"Both of our agents are dead. Shot. On the beach at Dune Road. Kate's gone. We're assuming she's been kidnapped. Liz left a message on your answering machine. I think you'd better listen to it. I've got a plane waiting for you at Wilson Field. Get here as fast as you can."
MacDara dialled into his answering machine and listened to his messages. There were five. The cleaners called twice reminding him that his suit was ready. Doc Levin's office called to set up another appointment. The fourth message was Liz. She sounded rushed, anxious; the words came in short salvos:
"Owen, this is Liz.............listen, they're going to kidnap Kate........this is not a joke........they're planning to kill you.............Owen, I don't know what this is all about........Tony Thackeray wants you dead............I overheard him.....................I've got to go."
Confirmation came in that last message:
"MacDara, we've got your lady. If you want to see her again you will follow our instructions. Exactly! We will contact you in twenty-four hours."
MacDara was the only passenger on the Learjet as it took off from Wilson Field. Croissants and coffee awaited when he got on board. Daily papers and a selection of magazines had been provided. But he couldn't relax or concentrate enough to read. Kate was their captive. His mind ran through the full gamut of his fears and imaginings. His own recent captivity only enhanced those fears. Kate could be injured. Raped. Dead.
He told himself he had to regain control. He had to remain calm. Then the fear and imaginings ceased just as quickly as they had commenced. Now he didn't feel mad. Just cold and icy inside. He wanted Kate back safely but he wanted to see Thackeray dead. He wanted to exterminate him, just like a bug. This was a side of himself that rarely appeared. Owen knew it was there. He'd experienced it before. Something genetic, ancestral. A cold, dead feeling, unemotional and unexcitable. He was ready to kill.
THIRTY-FOUR
1800 Hours
Tuesday
Alligator Alley
Florida
Javier Uribe had been waiting at the layby on Alligator Alley for thirty minutes. He had been punctual as usual but there was still no sign of the Feds. Even though it was six o'clock in the evening the temperature was still in the nineties and the heat was oppressive. Alligator Alley, appropriately named, bisected Florida, joining the west coast with the east. The Feds had assembled at Fort Myers on the west coast and would be travelling south until they reached Naples where they'd make an almost right angled turn to their left and head directly east across the everglades. Uribe was sweating profusely. He had pulled his car into the layby but he couldn't keep the engine running constantly just to maintain the flow of cool air. He had closed his windows to block out the mosquitoes. They were big and ferocious here and congregated around discarded waste on these laybys. They also attacked in dense clusters, like locusts. If they ever got inside his car he'd have an entirely different war on his hands. As he contemplated hordes of black mosquitoes sucking his blood like leeches, an unmarked grey Ford Taurus pulled in beside him followed by two Greyhound tour buses. A stocky man in navy blue coveralls got out of the Taurus and walked over. Javier Uribe risked rolling down his window:
"I'm Special Agent Dan Bredin. Javier Uribe?"
"That's right. You got here in the nick of time!"
Preliminaries out of the way, Uribe joined Bredin and two other Feds in the Taurus to review the game plan for the assault on the Circle. Javier was a quick study. He'd been on many 'special assignments' for General Shields. His special target this time was the person who called himself the Chosen One. Take him alive, but take him, Shields had said. This should be a piece of cake, he thought.
An hour later, the combined force of eighty Feds, eighty-one counting Javier Uribe, had assembled a mile away from the El Habesh mosque in Dania. It was 1930 hours on Tuesday evening. Services at the mosque always commenced around 2000 hours on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. They were sure to net ninety percent of the cult. And the President didn't want a repeat of Waco. Special Agent Bredin had had that impressed upon him forcefully by Director Redington. Well, logistically, they couldn't repeat Waco if they tried. The Feds at Waco had stormed that compound with tanks and pumped the place full of CS gas. Bredin had CS gas with him but he certainly didn't have any tanks.
This was not going to be a 'megaphone' assault. Nobody would warn anyone in advance. There was no need for that. Redington and Bredin didn't want a media spectacle played out over the major networks. Quick and deadly, if necessary. That was Redington's directive. Bredin had split his force; thirty surrounding the mosque would play a rearguard action and close the net on any brethren who tried to escape. The remainder were divided into two teams; one team headed by Dan Bredin would enter the south door at the same time as the other team, accompanied by Javier Uribe, would enter through the north door. The place looked eerie from the outside. Amber lights, casting an almost phosphorescent glow, illuminated both entrances. Spotlights on the grounds cast halo-like beams around the dome, giving the entitre building a supernatural appearance.
Bredin and Uribe were unprepared for the sight that met their eyes. Two brothers, one on each side of the central chamber, were swinging incense burners just like automatons. White robed brethren lay side by side in two circles covering the entire floor of the chamber, their feet pointed towards the central altar. At first Javier Uribe thought he was witnessing a solemn ceremony. Until he saw the blood. Splashes of red everywhere on the white robes and the floor, almost as though it had been thrown there by some maniacal Pollock-like artist.
Bredin and Uribe's teams converged, in total silence, and stepped over the bodies, almost in slow motion, moving towards the central altar and that coiled red snake that looked as though it were poised to strike.
The first four Federal Officers died instantly. Maybe they were the lucky ones. No-one had noticed the two brothers exchange their incense burners for the Uzis secreted under their robes. The Feds returned fire, trying to seek cover behind the bodies on the floor as doors opened on the perimeter of the chamber and a dozen of the Inner Circle rushed them, firing as they ran. Javier Uribe, Dan Bredin and about twenty of their men sought shelter behind the altar. They didn't know that the altar had been booby trapped with enough high explosive to topple a ten story building.
The thirty Feds surrounding the mosque were blinded by the explosion and fire. The mosque seemed to disintegrate before their eyes with flames and smoke belching into the night air. Sparks and pieces of burning debris flew like shrapnel, setting fire to the hills of used tires stacked nearby.
