“Not that I can find. It looks clear.”
“Good enough for me,” DeLuca said. “Preacher, I saw an aluminum ladder in the men’s dungeon. Send one of your men to get it, then show him where the trapdoor is and set it up. Your other man is going to need to carry the king up the ladder fireman style. Dan, we’re taking the president’s helicopter. You’re going to have to fly it.”
“I might as well just join the Air Force,” Sykes said. “I hope all the buttons are in the same locations.”
“Get Captain Evans back on the horn and tell him to stand by,” DeLuca said calmly. He studied his CIM for the latest falcon view of the castle, showing him where Bo’s men were positioned. He clicked over to a graphic view of the structure, showing him the layout, the doors, the exits, ramparts, towers, and barbicans. “I think it’s fair to guess the president keeps his helicopter ready to go at a moment’s notice.”
The SEAL’s torch cut through the last part of the lock. He shook it a moment, and then the cage door swung free. Paul Asabo stepped out as Lieutenant Riley and the third SEAL entered the cell to help the elder Asabo to his feet, wobbly as a newborn calf.
“Hoolie,” DeLuca said, flipping his NVGs down, “on my signal, kill the generator. It’s time we enjoyed our American God-given right to technological superiority.”
DeLuca allowed the others to go up the ladder ahead of him, then gave the signal to Hoolie. The castle lights went out. Hoolie ran to the ladder in the pitch black and climbed up behind DeLuca, in whose NVGs the place seemed bright as day.
Climbing up through the trapdoor was stepping back into the seventeenth century. The governor’s quarters were part of the Ligerian Historical Museum, and featured the original furniture, wall decorations, and historical details, a pair of men’s slippers beside the bed, a Bible opened on the end table. The bed was a large four-poster, and there were marks that clearly indicated where chains had been used to fasten someone to it.
They moved aside the velvet rope and crossed to the hall, which opened onto a small balcony overlooking a courtyard below, where DeLuca saw four iron balls, each the size of a basketball, to which, Johnson explained, prisoners had once been chained as punishment, or to simply die in the sun for the viewing pleasure of the occupying powers. The courtyard was also where prisoners were occasionally drawn and quartered.
Beyond the balcony was a hall leading to the administrative offices, opening onto the castle’s main courtyard. DeLuca saw a black Chinook, guarded by a pair of soldiers, and beyond that, the main castle keep where the Historical Museum’s large exhibit hall was located. DeLuca saw candles being lit in the exhibit hall, where Bo’s Presidential Guard had taken positions, men gesticulating and shouting. He saw soldiers manning machine guns in the towers and at the parapets facing town.
He checked his CIM again, zooming out for a larger view. Rebel forces appeared to have the castle surrounded, but there was something of a lull in the fighting. He clicked for the location of John Dari and found him nearby, moving approximately from City Hall toward the castle gate.
“Scottie,” DeLuca said. “What’s going on outside the gates?”
“See for yourself,” Scott said. “I’m patching through a live feed. This is Al Jazeera.”
DeLuca saw the captured digital imagery in real time, the streets of Port Ivory awash in rebel troops who seemed to have taken full control of the city.
“How many UAVs do we have right now?” DeLuca asked.
“All five,” Scott said. “Locked and loaded. You crashed the other one.”
“I’m going to need some shock and awe,” DeLuca said. “Can you put something somewhere where the collateral damage will be minimal? Maybe between the outer and inner walls?”
“I can do that,” Scott said.
DeLuca turned to Paul Asabo.
“Paul, I want you and your father to wait here until we come to get you,” DeLuca said. “Lieutenant Riley, you’re free to take your men back out the way we came if you want. It’s your call.”
“And miss all the fun?” Riley said. “I’ve never done a mission with CI before. Usually, SEALs like to think things through first.”
“It’s all a state of mind, Lieutenant,” DeLuca said.
“Preacher,” DeLuca said. “Have you got a plan to take out the guards?”
“Oh,” Johnson said. “I’m sorry. Did you want me to wait?”
DeLuca looked out at the courtyard again, where Johnson’s men had subdued the guards and were dragging them off to the sea wall. A moment later, Johnson’s men had taken the guards’ place, donning their helmets and flak jackets.
“No, I guess not,” DeLuca said. “Dan—how long does it take to get one of those things ready to go, from cold start to liftoff?”
“Why are you asking me?” Sykes said. “I keep telling you, I’m not a pilot.”
“Oh, come on, Dan,” DeLuca said, smiling. “Be all that you can be.”
“About three minutes,” DeLuca heard Captain Evans tell him on his headset. “According to our thermals, the APU is hot.”
“Any time you’re ready, Scott.”
“Firing,” Scott replied.
DeLuca counted in his head, a thousand one, a thousand two.
On four, the night was split by the sound of a Hellfire slamming into the castle’s inner bailey, and a moment later, a second missile hit. The Presidential Guards in the towers opened up with their machine guns, firing on the city below.
DeLuca led the way, crouching low and crossing to the helicopter. They’d gotten halfway there, in the open and completely exposed, when the courtyard was lit by the light of a flare fired from the castle keep. DeLuca saw men running into the courtyard, soldiers as well as men dressed in suits and ties. He straightened from his crouch and walked briskly toward them.
“Plan B,” he said into his radio.
“Which is?”
“I’m not sure yet,” DeLuca said. “Scottie, a couple more if you will.”
DeLuca walked toward President Bo and his party as if he belonged there. He debated, briefly, telling Bo he was going to have to confiscate his helicopter in the name of the United States Army, when he had what he hoped was a better idea.
“President Bo,” DeLuca called out, coming to attention and snapping off his snappiest salute. Sykes, Vasquez, Riley, and Johnson did the same. “General David DeLuca, United States Army. This is Colonel Johnson, Major Riley, Captain Sykes, and Captain Vasquez.” He was trusting that no one noticed they’d come in sterile without any identifying insignia on their uniforms to indicate rank. “Ambassador Ellis sends his warmest regards, as does the president of the United States.”
“What are you doing here?” President Bo asked. He was shorter than DeLuca had expected, dressed in a black suit, white shirt, and red tie, the Kevlar helmet on his head making him look something like a dictatorial bobble- head doll.
“Your situation is untenable,” DeLuca said. “Let me show you.”
A third missile struck the castle walls, a harmless but impressive display of pyrotechnics. Scottie had heard DeLuca’s words, “Let me show you,” and was following his father’s play. When DeLuca showed the Ligerian president his CIM, Scottie filled the screen with as many blinking red dots and swooping green arrows as he could. DeLuca saw where, at one point, Scottie even layered in the weather forecast.
“As you can see. you really shouldn’t stay, sir. My pilot will take you and whoever you want to bring with you to our carrier offshore.”
“I’m General Ngwema,” a tall man said, stepping forward and saluting. “I will stay here.”
“Not a good idea, General,” DeLuca said, trying to sound crabby and wise, like a general should. “We’ve got sixty-four B2 bombers that flew all the way here from Missouri, and they’re set to arrive and drop their payloads in about ten minutes, accompanied by Tomahawks and JDAMs and JSOWs and you name it—we’re going to flatten this place for you and then bring you back to pick up the pieces. No charge,
compliments of the United States military.”
He showed Ngwema the CIM. Scottie quickly added small airplane icons to the display.
“I will come back afterward,” Ngwema said. “Our work here is not finished.”
“My pilot will take you,” DeLuca said, gesturing to Dan Sykes.
“I have my own pilot,” President Bo said. DeLuca looked at Sykes, who nodded vigorously.
“All right then,” DeLuca said. “This place is going to fall apart—you have to leave now. We’ll follow you in our own chopper.”
He pulled his men aside and circled them together in conference. A fourth missile slammed the castle for effect.
“What are we doing?” Hoolie asked.
“I don’t know,” DeLuca said. “Look important.”
“What next?” Preacher Johnson asked, pointing vehemently to his SATphone, as if there were something important about it.
“We’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?” DeLuca said.
“I thought there were too many RPGs and shoulder-fireds to fly helicopters out of here,” Lieutenant Riley said.
“I heard that, too,” DeLuca said. “In all things, there’s an element of risk.”
DeLuca watched as President Bo loaded two suitcases, filled with cash, no doubt, or diamonds, into the helicopter and told two of his wives or mistresses they could come with him, telling the other two they had to stay. The women left behind didn’t seem to like it much. DeLuca and the others saluted as the big black Chinook carrying Bo, General Ngwema, Bo’s cabinet members, and as many of his guards as the aircraft could carry rose and flew over the seawall, staying low as it cruised above the open water, heading out to sea.
Soon it was far offshore and safe.
“Don’t you wish we could have done that to the Clinton administration?” Sykes said.
“Scottie, you wanna tell the LBJ to get their guest quarters ready?” DeLuca said.
“It’s under discussion,” Scott said. “People here in Washington aren’t quite as quick on their feet as you are. The view from here seems to be that there are no vacancies on the carrier.”
“Well hey,” DeLuca said. “Don’t look at me. I just suggested they take off. They don’t have to land if they don’t want to.”
In the exhibit hall, he saw, by the light of the candles that had been lit there, three of Bo’s Presidential Guards changing into civilian clothes. The men ran off in their boxer shorts when they saw they weren’t alone. DeLuca saw piles of uniforms and weapons elsewhere, where other guards had done the same. The machine guns atop the towers had been abandoned as well. On his CIM, DeLuca saw images of men slipping over the wall by the service entrance and running from the castle. In the hall, DeLuca saw that the stuffed lion had been removed from its pedestal, and someone had cut the ivory tusks off the elephant. A glass case containing examples of Da goldsmithing had been looted, as had a case containing the royal crown and scepter, but the Royal Sun Robe was intact. When he turned, he saw that Paul Asabo had come to the hall with his father, who walked stiffly and slowly now but under his own power.
“John and I took a class together at Mill River Academy,” Asabo said, looking at the Royal Sun Robe, “on the meaning and uses of symbolism. I remember telling the teacher that Africans don’t separate symbol from meaning. That’s what animism is. The spirit, the meaning, literally inhabits the thing. It was hard to make him understand.”
Throngs of people pressed at the gate, where music played. A television crew was filming in the crowd, their lights bright in the night. When DeLuca’s SATphone rang, the internal caller ID told him it was John Dari, who was, according to DeLuca’s handheld, just outside the gates.
“You might want to take this,” he told Paul Asabo, handing him the telephone. “I think it’s for you.”
Chapter Thirteen
MXNews.com INTERACTIVE NEWS NOW
• Liger Falls
Liger has a new government. President Bo flees. Asabo and Dari announce copresidency. Elections promised.
◊ In a surprise move, a new government was formed peacefully last night in the war-torn West African nation of Liger. Rebel factions (more →→)
◊ Ex-Liger president Bo flees to Libya and seeks asylum when USS Johnson refuses landing (more →→)
◊ Asabo president, Dari vice-president. Former high school friends to lead nation. “This is not the monarchy…” (more →→)
◊ Instead of expected violence, Port Ivory sees joy, dancing in the streets (more →→)
◊ Nation lays down arms as rebel leader throws weapons into sea through “Door of No Return.” Widespread disarmament (more →→)
◊ Free elections in six months, monitored by the UN, ECOMAG, and AU (more →→)
◊ Celebration (see pix →→)
◊ Royal robe (see pix →→)
Related stories: * Oil prices fall; * Relief floods into country as U.S. troops, aid workers assist; Asabo’s father freed; * Evidence of atrocities as Adu flees; * Adu caught in firefight?
DELUCA WAS STANDING WITH SYKES WHEN HIS SATphone rang. It was Scottie, telling him he needed to check his CIM. On the screen, DeLuca saw a red H2 Hummer leaving town as part of a caravan of trucks and SUVs. It was confirmed that the H2 contained Samuel Adu.
He consulted briefly with Asabo, who requested any assistance the U.S. could give. DeLuca said he needed transportation. Dari summoned his number two in command, a man he introduced as Captain Oscar Kudzimtuku, and told him to give DeLuca whatever he needed.
It took a while to clear the crowds still thronging the castle, and a while to pass along the streets where the citizens of Port Ivory were celebrating, dancing, holding signs, Christians and Muslims alike, playing loud music and drinking beer, now that the war was over. DeLuca watched a real-time data feed of video footage from the UAV flying above Samuel Adu’s caravan, clicking between that and a map showing the road Adu was on and where it led. When Adu turned north onto the Baku Da’al highway, DeLuca saw a shortcut and showed it to Captain Kudzimtuku, who got on his radio and told two of his trucks to take the shortcut and set up a roadblock. The two leaders watched the real-time feed as, fifteen minutes later, Adu’s red H2 stopped short of the roadblock, where a firefight broke out. They watched as Adu’s driver wheeled the H2 around and sped toward a cinderblock building, just as DeLuca and the remainder of the SJD forces arrived. Scott told his father that a biometrics analysis confirmed that Samuel Adu had fled the H2 and had taken refuge in the cinderblock building, an abandoned warehouse, Scott said, perhaps twenty by thirty feet, not large. Inside it, thermal imaging revealed, were perhaps fifteen or sixteen men. The terrain was flat, with little to take shelter behind, forcing Kudzimtuku’s men to find cover at a greater than desired distance, but at least Adu wasn’t going anywhere, with SJD troops surrounding the building. Adu’s men fired from the windows, and SJD forces fired back. Adu was trapped, and he knew he was trapped.
DeLuca phoned General LeDoux, who said he’d call Washington and get right back. When LeDoux called back, DeLuca listened, then got Scott on the line. Scott said he had the scene from the UAV but wanted to know the situation on the ground.
“It’s a standoff,” DeLuca said.
“Well then,” Scott said. “You going to turn it over to the locals or stick around?”
“Washington thinks it’s best if we finish it. I’m sorry to have to ask you to do this, Scott,” DeLuca said. “We need to take the building down. We might take casualties if we do it from ground.”
There was a pause. DeLuca knew what he was asking his son to do, pull the trigger on a man who wasn’t going anywhere and was, if not defenseless, and hardly innocent, then more or less a sitting duck. This was not an American court of law, where a person was presumed innocent until proven guilty. This was war, where threats were assessed, and then countermeasures were taken. Sometimes, one arrived at a “gray area” where the distinctions between right and wrong were blurred, at which point men could exemp
t themselves from responsibility or recuse themselves from living in a moral universe and say they were just following orders, and then, like Captain Ernie Tibbets and the crew of the Enola Gay, the airplane that dropped the first atom bomb on Nagasaki, or any number of military men in similar but less notorious roles, a man could do harm in the name of preventing greater harm and live with a clear conscience for the rest of his life. Yet every officer knew how difficult it was to tell someone to kill someone else. It just was, despite the adrenaline rush of combat, or the obvious need to protect one’s friends, or one’s country, or the idea of freedom itself. Even if Scott was sitting at a computer screen five thousand miles away, DeLuca was still asking his own son to kill someone, to “lose his cherry,” as some said. It was why DeLuca had been less than overjoyed when Scottie told him he’d been promoted. He’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this. Samuel Adu was as bad as they come—there was no gray area there. Samuel Adu had literally butchered people in Sierra Leone and in Liger, and he’d commanded parents to eat their own children—it was as black and white as it got, and still it was hard.
“Not a problem,” Scott said. “Bringing the bird around. What’s he doing now?”
As Scott spoke, Adu emerged from the building with his shirt off, a machete in his right hand, which he held high above his head as he danced in a circle and sang. Captain Kudzimtuku told his men to hold their fire.
“I’m going to kill you all!” Adu shouted, laughing. He was clearly insane, DeLuca realized. “I’m going to fuck your wives and eat your babies. I am Samuel Adu…”
DeLuca had seen it before. In police parlance, it was called “SBC” or “suicide by cop,” behavior some criminal suspects exhibited when they realized they were surrounded with no way out, one last fantasy about going down in a blaze of glory, in hopes of becoming famous in death if not in life, or, sometimes, in hopes of taking somebody else with them.
“I will slaughter you all,” Adu said, dancing, laughing. Were it a betting matter, DeLuca would have bet money Adu was high on something. “Man, I the baddest killer you ever seen! I am…”
Mission Liberty Page 27
