Kathleen remained stony-faced.
"I saw you smile when I came in," said Rheiman. He paused and then continued almost sadly. "For me? I think not. But you have a most beautiful smile, Kathleen. It melts my heart when I see you like this. I really do want us to be friends."
Kathleen swore silently. She was almost sure that she had shown no expression when she had guessed that the sound was the chair, but her damn body was letting her down.
"I used to work for a man named George Bull," said Rheiman. "He was a genius — way ahead of his time — and I hated him. Quite a few people did. People generally don't like people who are that smart.
"I loathed Bull's guts because he was attractive to women in a way that I was not. On the scientific side, I could more than give Bull a run for his money. I'm proving it now. am building what he only dreamed about — but my installation is way superior.
"The secret, you must know, is in the use of hydrogen as a propellant. Bull, you know, used a form of gunpowder. An odd choice for such a progressive man. Apart from being technologically less efficient, it is not the kind of thing that you can buy by the ton without attracting unwelcome attention. Hydrogen, on the other hand, is used for activities as innocent as children's balloons, and you can make it from ordinary water."
Kathleen knew she had a decision to make. She could maintain her silent resistance or switch tactics. Rheiman was dangling information in front of her as an incentive to speak. And if she did speak she could begin to guide the conversation and perhaps learn something that would help her escape. On the other hand, if she did break her silence, it could be seen as a sign of weakness.
But what counted was not so much what they thought but how she felt inside. I am strong and I know!
She made her decision.
"I don't — don't understand," she said slowly. Her throat was dry, and speech did not come easily.
"I'm sorry," said Rheiman. "I should have realized how you felt." She heard the sound of water pouring, and then her hands were being folded around a cup and steered gently toward her lips.
Water. It meant more than she could ever express. She was kept permanently thirsty. She felt a rush of gratitude toward Rheiman, and then her defense mechanisms cut in. Don't be fooled, Kathleen. This is a trick. This man is the enemy. Use him. Do not weaken.
"Feel better?" said Rheiman.
"A little," said Kathleen. Follow up an advantage. "It would be easier if I could see you, Mr. Rheiman. It's difficult to talk when you cannot see the other person."
There was silence. "I — I'm sorry," said Rheiman. "You're right, of course, but there are limits to what I can do. How they're treating you is barbaric, but you are Oshima's prisoner. She is not someone one defies lightly. Do you know who she is?"
Kathleen nodded. "I know who she is," she said with feeling. "And what she is." She looked toward where Rheiman was sitting. There was an opportunity here, a sensitivity to exploit. She would use his first name. "And you're working for her, Edgar?"
There was another long pause. "I — I... there are reasons, Kathleen."
"Tell me about them, Edgar," said Kathleen, her blindfolded face facing his, her voice soft. "Tell me about them."
She heard the metal frame of his chair rasp against the stone of the floor, then hurried footsteps. For long seconds there was silence as he paused by the door, and then it was opened and closed quietly.
She had pushed too hard and had alienated her one potential ally. Despair seized her, but then she fought back. She remembered a story Fitzduane had once told her.
"A man owned a valuable mule," he had said, "not just any old mule but a valuable, fine, upstanding animal with a glossy coat and clear eyes. Unfortunately, the mule would not do what it was told. To put it mildly, it was a bloody-minded beast.
"The mule owner, nor unreasonably, was frustrated by this recalcitrant animal. He tried various techniques and a whole raft of different mule tamers, but to no avail. The mule remained uncooperative.
"The mule owner was a rich man, and he was determined this animal would not beat him. He put out the word, and eventually he heard of a mule tamer who never failed. The man was expensive but, so said everyone, he always succeeded. Where mules were concerned, he knew what to do and when to do it.
"The mule owner contacted the mule tamer and, after much haggling, procured his services. The man arrived and, being quite famous, a crowd assembled to see him practice his art. What would he do? How would he operate?
"The mule tamer walked around the mule. The animal tossed his head and bared his teeth and tried his various tricks. The tamer, being an experienced man, was unscathed, but it was a close-run thing. This was one mean mule.
"The tamer had brought a well-worn leather bag. It was quite a long affair, similar in a way to a modern sports bag. He carried it slung over one shoulder.
"The mule tamer opened the bag and removed a sledgehammer. He then closed the bag — he was a neat man — and, carrying the hammer, walked back towards the mule.
"The mule owner was alarmed. ‘What are you doing?’ he cried. ‘This is one valuable mule.’
"The mule tamer did not reply. He stood directly in front of the mule as if daring it to bite him, and then, as it lunged, he swing the hammer in a mighty blow and hit the mule smack on top of his head.
"Everyone could hear the dreadful sound of the hammer hitting the mule.
Thunk!
"The mule collapsed. It went straight down just like that and lay on the ground motionless. Not even a quiver.
"There was an awed group intake of breath from the crowd, and then silence. Too surprised to say anything at first, but then words came sputtering out. ‘What — what did you do that for? I hired you to tame the animal.’
"The mule tamer looked at the rich mule owner with a clear, steady gaze. ‘First,’ he said, ‘I had to get the mule's attention.’"
Kathleen smiled as she remembered. It was one of Fitzduane's favorite stories. Despite her chains and thirst, she drifted into sleep content.
Rheiman had been deeply upset. But she was now convinced she had his attention.
* * * * *
There were six rooms divided by a central corridor in terrorist killing house.
The object was to clear the house of fourteen terrorists while preserving two hostages. The location of the hostages was not known in advance.
Initial exercises were carried out with silenced 9mm Calico submachine guns firing live ammunition and using electronic targets, with each assault team member going through alone. When hit, the human-shaped targets registered the accuracy of fire by individual round on a computer and, in addition, each assault was timed, videoed from several angles, and observed by umpires. The final score was a matrix of time and accuracy. Including gaining access, all were within two and a half minutes.
At the end of five run-throughs by each team member, the top three shooters were Chifune Tanabu, Al Lonsdale, and Peter Harty of the Irish Rangers.
Fitzduane came in a politically acceptable fifth. In his opinion, he had done at least as well as he deserved, given his recent lack of regular firearms training, but his competitive nature still urged him to do better. It was not going to be easy. The standard was high.
Changing magazines or clearing stoppages too place so fast, it was scarcely possible to see the action except on slow-motion video. Neither remedial action should have been necessary given that the Calico could take a hundred-round magazine that functioned near flawlessly given the right ammunition, but Fitzduane wanted the shooters to start off working for a living. For initial training, magazine capacity was limited to thirty rounds, and two dud rounds were placed at random in each shooter's loads.
The result of years of expensive investment in the training and equipment of top-quality Western counterterrorist forces could be observed. These were people who typically shot more rounds in a week than most regular soldiers did in a couple of years — and it showed. They moved through the gri
m business of killing with a sureness and elegance that was stunning to watch.
Fitzduane then changed the exercise. Whereas before each shooter was using live ammunition on targets, now they would use Simmunition against their peers.
Simmunition was real ammunition that was powerful enough to cycle the weapon and allow full automatic fire but fired projectiles made of a special material that stung and left a visible red mark but were otherwise harmless.
The prospect of being hit — and being rated accordingly — caused behavior to change.
The true combat shooters started to surface. The league table changed slightly. Fitzduane moved up from fifth to second place. Chifune still remained the top shooter.
The final series of exercises involved each unit member clearing the killing house against fourteen armed occupants who were spread throughout the rooms and not dug in but engaged in normal nighttime off-duty activities. The killing house was blacked out and the attacker had the advantage of surprise, night-vision goggles, and a silenced Calico now equipped with a hundred-round magazine and a laser sight that could only be seen by the person wearing the specially filtered goggles.
Fitzduane was encouraged to find that eleven out of his little force, now fully in the rhythm, were able to make a silent entrance and kill everyone inside without being hit in under ninety seconds.
Such clinically precise killing was frightening to behold, but it gave him hope.
* * * * *
Fitzduane contemplated the screen of his notebook computer.
Whom to choose? Some choices were obvious. On the margin it was not so clear-cut.
He had fourteen slots to fill in addition to himself, and nineteen people to pick from. For security and resource reasons, he did not really like training anybody who was not going on the mission, but training accidents were a fact of life and one had to be prepared.
He had originally planned on three alternates as an adequate safety margin, but then Lee Cochrane had made his case and finally Maury had volunteered. It was just as well that Dan Warner was still in Mexico, or doubtless he would have volunteered also. As it was, he was going to be faced with four unhappy people.
Why did human beings in good health volunteer so readily to get killed?
He switched focus to consider the mission training. He had been tempted to carry out the initial training in the Ranger facility on his island back in Ireland. Most of the facilities of the special-forces trade were located there, and it would have had the advantage that he was intimately familiar with the resources available.
He had rejected the Irish option with regret. There would have been logistical difficulties given the distances involved, and anyway, rain-sodden Ireland was not really the right environment in which to train for Mexico, even if you had a better-than-average sense of humor.
Kilmara had quipped that if he was going to use Ireland he would need twice as many people — the extra hands to hold umbrellas for the assault team.
Fitzduane had settled in the end for operating from Lamar's Son Tay estate in Virginia — form which they could easily access the Aberdeen Proving Grounds — and then a final intensive session at the U.S. Army's National Training Center in the Mojave Desert, a particularly godforsaken part of California.
The NTC was hot and dry and dusty and generally miserable, and as close to the terrain in Tecuno as would make no difference. Also, the NTC had a resident opposing force equipped with Russian armor whose sole purpose in life was to give the U.S. Army units training there a hard time. Sine they knew the terrain intimately and had the luxury of being there all the time instead of only a couple of weeks, the resident opposition were horrible people to go up against. To make matter worse, they normally won.
But you learned fast. The damn place was equipped with pop-up targets and laser simulators and concealed video cameras and all kinds of toys to monitor progress. Fitzduane could not think of a better place to hone the unit in dealing with the kind of opposition that Tecuno could muster. The concept of a heavily armed but unarmored fast attack vehicle like the Guntrack being able to combat traditional tanks was a theory. Fitzduane had never actually seen it in practice. At the NTC they would have a chance to find out. Of course, what he would do if his theories didn't pan out in practice was another matter.
However the war games turned out, there was one immutable as far as Fitzduane was concerned. The mission was not going to be aborted.
There was a knock on the door.
As mission commander, he had a hut to himself. There was accommodation in plenty. It made Fitzduane wonder what Grant Lamar got up to from time to time. Lamar, the evidence would appear to indicate, was a man with complex interests.
He blanked the screen and checked his watch. It was near midnight. When this was all over he was going to sleep for a week. Maybe longer. One thing was certain: The military did not sleep enough.
"Come in!"
A fatigues-clad Lee Cochrane stood in the doorway. Fitzduane waved him to a chair. There was a perceptible odor of propellant and gun oil off him. The unit was training for sixteen hours a day, but Cochrane still put in two more hours in the killing house or on the range. He had not done so well in the initial killing-house exercises and was grimly determined to succeed.
Cochrane found taking orders from Fitzduane difficult. He had been chief of staff for a long time and absolute ruler of his little congressional kingdom. Being another grunt in the woods was something that did not come easy. And in the background was the thought that he was still the chief of staff.
"A beer, Lee?" said Fitzduane. Serious drinking was not encouraged, but a couple of cans at the end of a long sweaty workday — or night — could help. This looked like such a situation. Cochrane was decidedly strung out. He was just in control, but the joins were showing.
Cochrane shook his head. Fitzduane threw him a can anyway and poured himself one. A little sociability might not go amiss.
Cochrane pulled the ring of his can, took a long pull, and stared at him. "Fitzduane, you're a head case. We're camped in the woods and you're using a fucking glass."
Fitzduane picked up his glass and sipped a little beer.
"My ancestors have been fighting for some cause or another for about eight hundred years that I know of," he said, "which translates into a whole lot of camping. One thing they have learned: Any fool can be uncomfortable."
Cochrane glared at him. His eyes were bloodshot from fatigue and cordite fumes, and his face was covered with a thin sheen of sweat.
"Damn you, Fitzduane," he said quietly.
Fitzduane felt a stirring of anger. It was too late and he was too tired to just sit there and be abused by some asshole. On the other hand, Cochrane had been fighting for a good cause for some time and had earned the right to be cut some slack.
"What's on your mind, Lee?" said Fitzduane agreeably.
Cochrane suddenly flung his head back and chugalugged his beer. He wiped his mouth with his hand. His face was flushed, and his fatigues were spotted where the froth had overflowed.
"I need to know," he said. "Am I going to be picked for the assault group? I've got to be on it!"
Fitzduane took his time in replying. "As you well know, Lee, people are picked for assignments such as this because of their very special qualifications. It's not personal. It's a matter of whether you are right for the job."
"You haven't answered my question," said Cochrane.
"You were a good soldier, Lee," said Fitzduane, "and you've kept yourself in exceptional shape. But your military days were a long time ago and military skills atrophy without practice. Your shooting was not good for the first couple of days because you were rusty as hell. Now, because you've worked yourself to the bone, it is vastly improved, but it is still not Delta or SAS or Ranger standard. Perhaps it could be over time, but we don't have that luxury. People are going to be trying to kill us very shortly, and the difference of a fraction of a second is going to make the difference between life and de
ath. This is serious shit, Lee. So, as matters stand, I am not going to pick you."
Cochrane was silent, stunned. It was one thing to expect the worst. It was another to hear it.
Eventually he looked up at Fitzduane and shrugged. "I guess I'd better pack my kit and go home. I could say shooting isn't the only thing. I could give you quite an argument. I could say I deserve to go. But I get the impression whatever I say won't make much difference."
"My comments about your shooting skills are merely an illustration, Lee," said Fitzduane. "I could move on to communications, heavy weapons, the whole enchilada. And remember one thing — you asked."
Cochrane laughed bitterly. "Never get yourself into a situation where the other party is forced to say no. Basic negotiations skills. You'd think I would have learned more on the Hill. So what now?"
Fitzduane tossed Cochrane two more cans of beer. "We get a little drunk. We sleep not quite enough. And we go back to work."
Lee looked bemused. "I thought you said you weren’t picking me."
"We've got enough people to fight without fighting each other," said Fitzduane. "So shut up and drink and listen. I've got an idea."
15
Kilmara followed the maneuvers intently.
For the purpose of this preliminary exercise the five Guntracks were not camouflaged, which made his job a whole lot easier. Also, it was daylight. Movement during the Tecuno mission was planned to take place entirely at night under stealth conditions. No talking, no lights, camouflaged, silenced exhausts, thermal signatures minimized, radio silence, anything and everything that could make a noise muffled, slow speed to keep down dust.
A helicopter suddenly appeared flying low, and then a second behind it and to the right. A classic hunter-killer team.
Two Guntracks halted and then shot into reverse before halting again. Thick smoke filled the air and obscured them. The remaining three, also trailing thick smoke, raced in different directions before looping back to hide in the smoke. The speed of the Guntrack reactions was extraordinary.
Fitzduane 03 - Devil's Footprint, The Page 23
