Edge of Battle

by Dale Brown

  FARM TO MARKET (FM) ROAD 293,

  JUST WEST OF PANHANDLE, TEXAS

  LATER THAT NIGHT

  “Rise and shine, Major.”

  Jason Richter found his vision blurry, his eyelids oily, his throat dry as dust. Cold rough hands grasped his shirt and pulled him to a sitting position, which made his head spin, then throb with pain. He ran the backs of his hands across his eyes to clear the grit and dirt away, then blinked to try to focus his eyes. When he could see again…

  …he was looking right into the face of Yegor Zakharov himself. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Major. I trust you had a good nap.”

  “Screw you, Zakharov,” Jason murmured. He could tell he was in a moving vehicle—it looked like a passenger van, although it was too dark to tell for sure. He was seated on the bench seat behind the driver, with several other persons seated very close to him.

  Zakharov motioned to one of the men, retrieved a plastic bottle of water, and tossed some water into Jason’s face; he lapped the welcome moisture up as fast as he could. The Russian terrorist was kneeling between the driver and front passenger seat, his sunglasses off, streaks of reddish-brown fluid dripping out of the empty eye socket and down his cheek. “Do not be cross with me, Jason. You are still alive, thanks to me.”

  “What did you do to me, Zakharov?”

  “Tiny amounts of thiopental sodium administered over the past several hours,” Zakharov said, smiling. “We have had several interesting and entertaining conversations about your Cybernetic Infantry Device. I have also learned much more than I ever wanted to know about your childhood, National Security Adviser Jefferson, your Oedipal conflict with one of your aunts, and your rather perverted sexual fantasies about Ariadna Vega.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Let us get down to business, Major,” Zakharov said, his smile gone. “We know all of the commands to use with the device except the most important one: the activation command. Apparently this is the only command that only the authorized pilot can give—according to you, anyone can pilot the robot once it is activated. That is why you are still alive. You will give the activation code once we are in position.”

  “I’m not giving you shit, Zakharov.”

  “You may want to reconsider, Major.” Zakharov reached over and grasped the face of the person sitting next to him, pulling her into Jason’s view. “Major, meet Marta. We found Marta playing in her front yard a few towns away, and we decided to bring her with us. She is ten or eleven years old, I do not really know. We also found a few others like Marta, another girl and a boy, who we also decided to bring along with us.”

  “You sick fucking bastard. Go to hell.”

  “Cooperate with me, Major, and you and the children will live,” Zakharov said. “Refuse me, and you will all die. It is as simple as that.”

  “There is no way I’m going to help you do anything.”

  “Then you will be responsible for their deaths,” Zakharov said matter-of-factly. “Do not try to be a hero now, Richter. You have no weapons, no robots, and no support. I have your robot and the hostages. You have lost this round, plain and simple—admit it and live. I am not a child killer, but I will slaughter them if you do not cooperate with me.” Jason did not reply. “Have a little faith in the system, Richter. You are only one man. You can save the lives of these children by giving me access to the robot. My men and I will be gone, and you can return these children to their homes and families—but more important, you will live to fight another day.”

  “How do I know you won’t kill us all after I give you control of the CID unit?”

  “My fight is against you and your government, Richter, not these children,” Zakharov said. “As I told you, I am not a child killer, but I am a soldier, and I will do whatever it takes to complete the mission. All I offer is my word, soldier to soldier. Give me access to the robot, and I will let you take these children home. Once they are safe, our battle resumes; but I promise you your life, and theirs, until then.” He exchanged words with the driver. “You have thirty seconds to decide, Richter, and then I will order the driver to pull over into a field, and I will start killing these children in front of you.”

  Jason’s mind spun. He looked at the children around him; all were on the verge of fearful crying as they heard Zakharov’s voice—they easily sensed the danger they were all in. Richter was no better. He was edgy and disconnected from the drugs still coursing through his body, but the sickness was quickly being replaced by pure mind-numbing fear. He wasn’t afraid to die, but he was afraid of others coming across his body and those of the children and blaming him for not protecting them.

  There was an entire superpower’s military and law enforcement standing ready to protect whatever Zakharov’s newest target was—but right now, there was only one man ready to protect these children. His choice was clear.

  The van slowed, and Jason heard the crunch of gravel and felt the bumps of a tractor-worn dirt road. “Well, Major?” Zakharov asked casually. “What is your answer?”

  He took a deep breath, then said, “I’ll do it, you sick bastard.”

  “Excellent choice, Richter.” The van stopped, and the side and rear panel doors opened. “I never doubted you for a second. You may be a genius, but you are not a heartless berserker.”

  They were in a dark field about a hundred yards off the paved road. Jason could see the glow of a town off on the horizon, perhaps three or four miles away, but he couldn’t tell in which direction. In the opposite direction was another, larger town, about equal distance away. A second van full of Zakharov’s commandos had pulled up behind them. Two men with assault rifles took up security positions, while the others assembled in the rear of the van, pulling the folded CID unit out of the back and setting it down on the ground.

  “Work your magic, Major,” Zakharov said.

  Jason gathered the children around him, gave Zakharov a glare, then spoke. “CID One, activate.” The children gave out a quiet combination of fear and delight as they watched the dark shape seemingly grow out of the field and appear before them.

  “Truly amazing technology, Major,” Zakharov said. “I commend you. Allow me.” He cleared his throat and dramatically said, “CID One, pilot up.” One of Zakharov’s men had to jump out of the way as the CID unit obediently crouched down, extended one leg behind itself, leveled its arms along each side of its back to act as handrails, and the entry hatch popped open in the middle of its back. “How delightful. I wish I was of the proper size to give it a ride, but unfortunately I will have to leave that honor to someone else.”

  Zakharov barked an order, and one of his men jumped up and slid inside the robot, with the Russian terrorist issuing instructions as he did so. A few moments later, the hatch closed, and the Cybernetic Infantry Device came to life. They watched in fascination as the commando experimentally made the robot jump, dodge, and dart around the field, finishing off with triumphantly upraised arms, like a superheavyweight boxer who had just won a world title.

  “It works! Excellent.” They tried their handheld radios—the man inside the robot had no trouble adjusting the radio scanner to pick up the handhelds’ frequency and making the connection. “It appears my missile attack had no ill effects. I am satisfied.” He pulled a pistol out of its holster. Jason felt a roaring in his ears as he realized that Zakharov had everything he wanted, and that sealed his fate. “And now, Major, as for you and the children…you are free to go.”

  “Wh…what…?”

  Zakharov grasped Richter by the shoulders, and, with Jason still protectively clutching the children, turned him around. “Walk in this direction, Major. Do not turn around, and do not try to head for the road—if my men or I see you on the road, we will gun you down. Stay together and do not allow the children to leave your side—if you do, our deal is off. Keep walking toward those lights. In about an hour, you should reach a farmhouse; if you miss it, in another hour or less you should reach the town. By then, my men and I sho
uld be long gone.” He issued more orders in Russian, and in an instant the CID unit ran off into the night and the commandos boarded the vans and drove away. Within moments, Richter and the children were alone.

  “¿Dónde iremos ahora, señor?” one of the children asked.

  Jason recognized the words “where” and “sir”—he guessed the rest. “Don’t worry, kids,” he said. “No problema. Help is on the way.”

  He led the children toward the lights of the town, carefully leading them across the furrows and ditches crisscrossing the fields. Soon his eyes had fully adjusted to the darkness, and he could make out stars. He found Polaris, the North Star, and realized he was walking east. He began to feel better—he didn’t know where he was at all, but at least he knew which way he was going.

  Although he remembered Zakharov’s warning, he needed to find help as quickly as possible, so as soon as he saw a truck on the highway, he decided to risk it and started angling toward it. About fifteen minutes later, he reached the edge of the field adjacent to the paved road. He instructed the children as best he could to stay in hiding, then crawled through the dirt until he reached the road. He couldn’t see anything nearby, but several yards away he spotted a road sign, and he decided to risk trying to pinpoint his location. Half-crawling, half-crouched, he dashed through the edge of the fields until he reached the sign. It was very dark, and the sign was weathered and hard to read; it was riddled with bullet holes, commonly found in rural signage, but soon he read…

  …and instantly, he knew what Zakharov’s real objective was.

  He had no choice: when he saw the next vehicle, a pickup truck, coming down the road, he flagged it down, forcing it to stop by practically throwing himself in front of it. Thankfully it was a farmer and not a terrorist. He talked fast, convinced the driver to help him, then gathered the children together and helped them into the cargo bed. He breathlessly used the farmer’s cell phone to call for help…

  PECOS EAST TRAINING AREA,

  CANNON AIR FORCE BASE, NEW MEXICO

  THAT SAME TIME

  Ariadna Vega threw open the office door and flipped on the light. “We got it!” she shouted.

  FBI Deputy Director Bruno Watts, asleep on the sofa in Jason Richter’s office at the Task Force TALON headquarters complex, blinked at the light but was instantly on his feet. The task force’s new commanding officer did not look like your typical “snake-eater” ex–Navy SEAL—he was shorter than average, wiry, and rather soft-spoken around others. As his hair thinned and grayed he decided to shave his head, so he could still intimidate even in an office or social setting, but otherwise no one would ever recognize him as one of the world’s most highly skilled and experienced experts in unconventional warfare and counterterrorist operations. “What is it?”

  “CID One’s locator beacon just went off,” Ariadna said breathlessly. “The unit’s been activated.”

  “Where?”

  “About twenty miles northeast of Amarillo, Texas.”

  “Amarillo…” Watts tried to think of the significance of that city, but nothing came immediately to mind. “What about Richter?”

  “No word from him, but he’s the only one who could have activated the CID unit.”

  “But it doesn’t mean he’s controlling it, right?” Since taking command of the unit, Watts had been taking a crash course in the Cybernetic Infantry Device—and the more he learned the more excited he got about employing this incredible high-tech weapon system.

  “He’s alive, I know it.”

  “If he is, he’s got some explaining to do,” Watts said. “Are we…?”

  “We’re getting ready to launch right now,” Ariadna said. “We’re only about a hundred miles away—less than fifteen minutes in the air.”

  “Good. You stay here and man the command post. Give me any updates you receive.” He pulled on a leather jacket and hurried out to a waiting helicopter that would take them to Cannon Air Force Base, where a jet was waiting to fly him to Amarillo.

  Just before touching down on the parking ramp, Watts suddenly slapped his hands together. “Shit!” he shouted, and he fumbled for the intercom control panel inside the helicopter. He dialed his microphone to “COM 2” and keyed the mike button: “Talon, this is Alpha.”

  “Go ahead, Alpha,” Ariadna responded from the task force command center.

  “Send an urgent message immediately to the FBI office in Amarillo and the Department of Energy. Whoever’s got the robot, I know what their target will be.”

  On FM Road 293 four miles west of where Richter and the hostages had been dropped off, the two vans encountered the first roving patrol, an armored Suburban belonging to a private security company. The men inside the Suburban radioed the two vans’ license plate numbers to their headquarters inside the plant; they in turn contacted the Texas Department of Public Safety. The response came back a few moments later: vans rented in Amarillo, not reported stolen or missing, rented to private individuals.

  A second request went out for the IDs of the renters. The data came back moments later: both vans rented to individuals from Mexico, no local address, no local destination. That got a lot of folks’ attention. The Carson County Sheriff’s Department was called and a request made to do a traffic stop and an ID and citizenship check, with the Potter and Armstrong County Sheriff’s Departments, alerted because the vehicles were so close to their jurisdictions. Although FM 293 was a public road, the Department of Energy had agreed to use the full force of the U.S. government to defend and indemnify the state, county, and local law enforcement agencies from any liability in conducting investigations requested by plant security.

  There was no question that whatever plant security wanted, they would get, for this was the Pantex Plant, America’s only facility dedicated to the assembly, disassembly, and disposal of nuclear weapons. Administered by the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (Defense Programs) and operated by a conglomerate of three nuclear engineering companies, Pantex’s mission was to assemble, disassemble, inspect, and store nuclear warheads.

  After contacting the sheriff’s department and requesting a traffic stop, the security patrol returned to its rounds and continued to monitor the perimeter security while long-range telescopic low-light TV cameras continued to track the vans. FM 293 was actually separated from the plant itself by over two and a half miles. In between the road and the plant were two explosive incineration pits where the high explosive parts of nuclear weapons were destroyed or where testing of new explosive materials could take place, and also by a one-mile-square storage facility, mostly abandoned. At one time nuclear warheads awaiting distribution to military facilities were stored there, but no new warheads had been produced for decades. The plant itself was one mile south of the storage facility.

  The vans were observed traveling west on FM 293 until it intersected Highway 136, where remote monitoring from the Pantex facility was terminated. The Potter County Sheriff’s Department was notified that the vans were now in their jurisdiction, and dispatchers put out a message on their units’ data terminals to be on the lookout for the vans and do a traffic stop and search if possible. But as soon as the request was handed off to multiple agencies, concern over the vans quickly waned. The vans hadn’t stopped or done anything suspicious; no laws had been broken. If Carson County hadn’t had probable cause to stop and search the vehicle, Potter County certainly didn’t. The request to stop the vans was relayed but largely ignored by the graveyard shift on patrol.

  But the assault was already underway.

  It took less than seventy seconds for the Cybernetic Infantry Device to carry two of Yegor Zakharov’s commandos and their backpacks full of weapons and gear the six tenths of a mile between FM 293 and the access road to Sheridan Drive west of the north end of the Pantex facility. The land was cleared and furrowed dirt, a simple buffer zone between the explosive incineration pits and the public road that looked like normal farmland—but the area was covered by
a network of laser “fences,” covering everything from one to ten feet aboveground, that would alert plant security if any of the beams were broken. But it was easy enough for the CID unit’s infrared sensor to see the laser beams, and even easier for the robot to jump over the fences, even loaded up with all of its “passengers” and their gear. The robot dropped off the men and their equipment at the intersection of Sheridan Drive and North Eleventh Street and ran off into the darkness.

  North Eleventh Street between the incineration pits and the weapon storage area was unlighted. They proceeded quickly down the road about a half-mile until they came to a single twelve-foot-high fence running eastward, with a security vehicle access road just outside the fence. At the end of the fence was a dirt and stone berm twenty feet high and a hundred and twenty feet thick, topped with another twelve-foot-high fence. There was a five-story guard tower at the corner of the berm. Floodlights erected every five hundred feet illuminated the top of the berm and the entire area beyond as brightly as daytime.

  Called Technical Zone Delta, or TZ-D, this was the weapons storage area. TZ-D had two main purposes: storage of plutonium “pits”—the hollow sphere of nuclear material that was the heart of a nuclear device, for eventual reuse or destruction—and storage of nuclear warheads, from the United States military as well as Russia and other nuclear nations, awaiting dismantling. TZ-D was divided into four Technical Areas, or TAs. TA-1 was the security, inspection, and classification area at the single entrance to the storage facility; TA-2 was the eleven igloos, or storage bunkers, set aside for nuclear weapon electronic components and triggers; TA-3 was the forty-two-pit storage igloos, each housing anywhere from two to four hundred pits; and TA-4 was the eight igloos set aside for storing warheads awaiting dismantling.

  TA-4 was the target.

  The two vans seen earlier on FM 293 were now spotted by Pantex security monitors heading east on Farm to Market Road 245. They had apparently left Highway 136 and were now approaching the weapons storage area at high speed. The tall guillotine gate at the entrance was closed, and the security detail on duty around the entire facility was placed on its highest state of alert.