by Bob Mayer
Today he was a bit disappointed. The flight route chosen for the B-2, the crew that was locked in a simulator at Wheeler Air Force Base “flying” the plane, and the intelligence used to plan the mission were all top-notch and working perfectly. Foster was tempted to throw a curve in, one of a dozen he had prepared. Perhaps an engine malfunction on the airplane, or a North Korean antiaircraft missile being moved into the flight path, or even the National Command Authority that had authorized the mission canceling it at the last minute. But he knew the probabilities of any of those happening were very low and it wouldn’t be fair, although what was fair in warfare, no one had been able to pin down.
So the red dot reached the blue triangle without being spotted, dropped its bombs “destroying” the nuclear facility, and made its escape without incident, much to the delight of the military men in the room. After they had all filed out on their way to celebrate at the Fort Shafter Officers’ Club, Foster sat alone in the Sim-Center, preparing the after-action review, which would be disseminated to the various commands involved.
Successful AARs were always harder for him to write, because there was little he could comment on. There were a few minor suggestions, but otherwise it was a pathetically thin report. And the problem with thin reports was that people then began to question the value of the Sim-Center. It was a Catch-22 that Foster had been fighting for over eight years.
The secure phone on his desk rang, and he frowned. It almost never rang unless a simulation was running. He stared at it through four rings, then reluctantly picked it up. “Foster.”
“Gambit Six.”
The phone went dead, but Foster remained perfectly still, holding the receiver to his ear as if the voice would come back and retrieve the two words. They were words he had hoped to never hear.
CHAPTER 3
The Philippines
The hammer came down on the Delta survivors draped with the thin velvet sheen of secrecy. It didn’t soften the blow, just kept anyone other than the team from being aware of it. They were to get the hell out of the Philippines without anyone knowing they had left, just as no one had known they’d arrived. Vaughn found it ludicrous, because the world certainly knew they’d been here. But he kept his mouth shut, said “Yes sir,” and, with his gear in hand, climbed into the back of the deuce-and-a-half covered truck that had backed up to the door of their isolation facility.
It wasn’t fancy transportation to the airfield, and he suspected that if the military had them available, the team would be put on a World War II era DC-3 cargo plane to fly them back to the States. And the hope would be the aircraft would fall out of the sky and everyone would disappear. But that damned video wouldn’t disappear. Vaughn had to wonder about that. Who had shot it? The filming began even before the missile impacted, which disturbed him greatly.
Had the Abu Sayef been that ready? Having a camera continually running to cover themselves in case of attack? But if they had been that ready, the defense would have been stronger than it was. If the LLDS had not malfunctioned, Vaughn was confident they could have rescued the hostages.
He was concentrating on these questions because it helped keep his mind from darker thoughts and emotions. Somewhat. The vision of Jenkins wouldn’t go away. His sister had to have heard by now. He had written her a letter, including the photograph, but had no guarantee that the officer he’d handed it to would make sure it was delivered. He knew when he got back to the States that he had to visit her, which made him none too anxious to be returning home.
The truck lurched to a stop, almost throwing the men off the wooden bench they were seated on and tossing their gear about. Then the gears screeched as the truck reversed. Vaughn knew the drill. They were backing up to either a C-130 or C-141 cargo plane’s back ramp. They would be off-loaded quickly, straight from truck to plane without touching the ground, the ramp closed, and then be in the air as soon as possible. Just like cargo, except now they were cargo no one wanted. He could pick up the familiar stench of JP-4 fuel burning, and the engines on the plane were already whining with power.
The canvas cover over the back of the truck was pulled aside by an Air Force crew chief. As expected, the back ramp of a C-130 cargo plane was waiting for them. As they got up to grab their gear, the crew chief held up a hand. “Just the major,” he said, pointing at Vaughn. “The rest of you will be taken to another plane.”
Vaughn frowned. He tossed his gear onto the ramp, said his good-byes to his teammates, then hopped onto the ramp. Even as his feet touched the metal, the crew chief was closing it. The truck pulled away with a belch of diesel exhaust, mixing with the exhaust from the C-130’s four turboprop engines. The back ramp closed and Vaughn turned to the interior of the plane. The cargo bay was empty except for his gear, which the crew chief was stuffing into a bundle, the type used for an air drop.
“What are you doing?” he asked, shouting to be heard above the sound of the four turboprop engines revving up to taxiing speed.
The crew chief pointed at a parachute strapped down on the red webbing seating that ran along the outer bulkhead of the airplane. “You got two hours until the drop zone, so you figure out when you want to rig.”
“Where am I jumping? What the hell is going on?”
The crew chief shrugged. “You’re jumping onto Okinawa. Why, they don’t bother to tell me those things. We got orders, we follow ‘em.” He looked at Vaughn. “You must be pretty damn important to get a whole plane just to drop you.”
Vaughn didn’t bother to tell the crew chief it was notoriety, not importance. He sat down on the red web seat as the plane lurched forward. He felt the absence of his teammates with the emptiness of the large cargo bay. The crew chief had finished rigging the bundle and gone up front to the cockpit.
Vaughn stood up and walked to the front of the cargo bay, then back to the ramp. Then back again. He paused at the right rear door and peered out the small circular window. The plane was roaring down the runway, and he had to grab hold to keep from falling as the nose lifted and they were airborne. He spotted the deuce-and-a-half truck backed up to a C-141 cargo plane—a larger aircraft with jet engines, not turboprop. That indicated the rest of the team was going back to the States, since the 141 was a more logical choice for that long journey. Then he spotted the ambulance waiting its turn to deposit its cargo in the plane. Vaughn knew what was on that ambulance: the bodies of his lost teammates in flag-draped coffins.
He raised his hand, half in salute, half in farewell, and twisted his head, keeping it in sight as long as possible.
Jolo Island, Philippines
“Bring him in,” Rogelio Abayon ordered the guard, his voice filtered by the speaker system. The old Filipino’s wheelchair was in a room that was part of a tunnel system, the rock walls of the room semicircular from floor to ceiling, the room running straight and narrow, with doors set in steel walls on either end. Bisecting Abayon’s desk and the room was a sheet of bulletproof glass, a speaker and microphone on either side to relay conversation. The glass was pitted in places, as if its strength had been tested sometime in the past and it had weathered the storm.
On the other side of the glass the guard swung open the steel door opposite Abayon and gestured. A middle-age Japanese man in a stained and rumpled black suit stepped in. Over the suit, the man wore a canvas vest with deep pockets. In those pockets were small charges of C-4 explosive with blasting caps stuck in them. The wires led from the blasting caps to a detonator set on a chain looped over the man’s head. A blinking red light on the detonator indicated that it was armed. The man looked decidedly unhappy.
The guard immediately went back out the door, shutting it behind him, leaving Abayon alone with the visitor, albeit separated by the glass.
“Is this necessary?” the man asked in Japanese, indicating the vest.
Abayon nodded and replied in the same language, “Yes, it is.” He lifted his hand from the right arm of his wheelchair, revealing a red button. “I press down on that, you e
xplode. My men will be upset if I have to do that, because then they will have to hose out the room where you are standing, so you do not want to force me to do it.” He placed his hand back over the button, and the Japanese took a step back, fighting to keep from showing his fear, working on his anger to replace it.
“I am an envoy and should not be treated this way.”
“Who made that rule?” Abayon asked. He did not wait for an answer. “What were the rules for Unit 731?” This time he did wait, but the envoy was not to be drawn into such talk.
“You know who I represent—” he began.
But Abayon cut him off. “Do you know who you really represent?”
In reply, the envoy held up his right hand, fingers extended, showing that the pinkie on that hand was missing. “I am the right hand of the head of the Black Wind Society. He sent me here to negotiate with you.”
“And who does he work for?” Abayon demanded.
“My master works for no one.”
“You’re a fool. Which means he’s a fool to have you as his right hand.”
The envoy’s face tightened as anger made him forget about the vest he wore and where he was. “You had me blindfolded, stuffed in the bottom of a boat, dragged here—wherever this stinkhole is—and have treated me with no respect. My master will not—”
“Your master is a puppet whose strings are being pulled,” Abayon said. “And your people built this place you call a stinkhole.”
The envoy looked about, trying to understand that last comment.
Abayon sighed. “Give me your message.”
“My master wants you to return what you stole from our country. He wants the Golden Lily back.”
“You don’t even know what the Golden Lily is,” Abayon said. “It is not a thing, it was an event involving things. And stealing from a thief is not stealing. What does your master offer in return for what he wants so badly?”
“In return, he will use his connections in the government to pressure the Americans to remove all their military aid from these islands.”
Abayon stared through the glass at the Yakuza envoy as he processed what this offer really meant.
Taking the hesitation as a negative, the envoy laid his next card on the table. “If you refuse, my master also told me to inform you that he will bring all his considerable resources to bear on destroying you and your organization.”
“You should have stopped at the offer,” Abayon said, “ridiculous as it was. You’ve given me the message you were meant to, even though you don’t know what it was.”
The envoy frowned. “What is your answer to my master’s offer?”
“You were not sent here to ask me anything. You were sent here to tell me something, and I have heard you. However, I suppose I should respond.” Abayon gestured with his left hand, and the video camera in the corner of the room behind him picked up the gesture. The door behind the envoy swung open. The guard walked in with a stool and a small tray on which were a syringe, a rubber piece of tubing, and an alcohol swab. He placed the stool down, the tray on top of it, and then left, shutting the door solidly behind him, the sound echoing into an ominous silence.
“What do you think you’re doing?” the envoy finally demanded, eyeing the syringe suspiciously.
“I want you to take that needle and inject yourself with the contents.”
“You’re crazy.”
“You either do that,” Abayon said, “or I do this.” He indicated the red button.
“What’s in the syringe?” the envoy demanded.
“Something that will make you sleep while my men take you back to the main island. If I wanted to kill you, I could do it quite easily right now.”
That made a weird sort of logic to the envoy as he worked it over in his mind. “But what of your answer?”
“Your master will know it, don’t worry.”
Reluctantly the envoy rolled up his left sleeve. He picked up the rubber tube and, using his right hand and teeth, tied it around his upper arm. Then he took the syringe and held the needle over his tattooed arm. He paused with the point pressed against his skin. He looked through the glass at Abayon. The Abu Sayef commander waved his wrinkled right hand ever so slightly above the red button.
The envoy slid the needle into his vein and pressed the plunger, pushing the clear fluid in the syringe into his veins. Then he removed the needle and pressed the alcohol swab against the small hole. Abayon gestured once more and the guard reappeared.
“Be very still while he gets that off you,” Abayon advised.
The envoy was a statue while the guard turned off the detonator and carefully removed the vest.
Abayon gestured. “Go.”
“But—”
“Go.”
When the envoy and guard were gone, Abayon turned his chair around as the door behind him opened. The man who had run the video camera the other evening was waiting for him. The taper got behind the wheelchair and pushed Abayon along a corridor cut out of stone. At places the walls were natural rock, indicating that portions of the tunnel had been there before men had entered the cave complex. They went on for five minutes, passing several other steel doors and side passages, a sign of how extensive this labyrinth was, until they came to a room where there was a dialysis machine.
A nurse was waiting, and she efficiently set about hooking Abayon up to the machine while the taper moved a video monitor to a position where Abayon could see it. Displayed on it was a small open field cut out of the jungle with a six-foot-high wooden stake set upright in the ground.
As the dialysis machine began its work, several figures appeared on screen. The Yakuza envoy was struggling between the grips of two guards. They slammed him against the pole while another guard quickly secured the envoy to the pole by wrapping rope around his body. The envoy’s mouth was moving, obviously screaming protests and threats, but the feed was video only, which Abayon appreciated.
“It will take a while. A couple of days at least,” Abayon said.
“I’m using time stoppage settings,” the taper said. “I’ll be able to get the entire thing on one DVD.”
“Very good. Let me know when the message is done.”
Okinawa
The back ramp of the C-130 Hercules transport plane opened once more. This time, though, the plane was at 1,500 feet altitude and air swirled into the cargo bay, buffeting Vaughn as he stood just in front of the hinge for the ramp. He had a parachute rigged on his back, and the static line was hooked to the cable that ran the length of the plane on the right side. On the left side was another cable, to which the bundle holding his gear was hooked. The loadmaster had one hand on the bundle and was holding onto the hydraulic arm that lowered the ramp with the other.
Vaughn moved forward as the loadmaster briefly let go of the plane and held up one finger, indicating one minute until the drop zone. Getting near the edge of the ramp, Vaughn could see blue ocean directly below. He checked the waves and didn’t see any whitecaps, which meant the wind wasn’t too strong.
He got down on one knee and stuck his head out to the side into the 140 mile an hour slipstream. He could see the familiar outline of Okinawa Island very close, directly ahead. He’d jumped this drop zone before when he had done some work with the First Battalion of the First Special Forces Group, which was stationed on the island.
He spotted the clear field that was the drop zone along the track of the aircraft and got back to his feet, facing to the rear, his eyes on the set of lights high up in the tail section of the plane. The red light glowed, holding him in place. Land appeared beneath the aircraft, the coast of Okinawa that Marines had stormed so many years ago.
The strangeness of the situation was not lost on him. Why someone wanted him to jump and the airplane not to land, he had no clue, other than it seemed a secure way of getting him onto the island without anyone being aware—other than whoever was waiting on the drop zone.
It had crossed his mind that the parachute was rigged t
o malfunction. He’d checked it as best he could, along with the reserve. He figured if someone wanted him dead, this was a rather elaborate way to go about it. And it wasn’t as if he had any other choice. Staying on the plane and not jumping would only delay whatever was awaiting him. He preferred to face it head on.
The green light went on and the loadmaster let go of the bundle. It slid off the ramp, the static line for its parachute playing out. Vaughn followed right after it, as he’d been trained. Stepping off the ramp, he free-fell for three seconds as his static line played out, pulling the deployment bag out and off the parachute, which opened with a snap. Vaughn had assumed a tight body position upon exiting the aircraft, hands wrapped around the edges of the reserve, chin tucked down to his chest, legs tightly together. The opening shock vibrated through the harness and his body.
He had done the routine so many times, he wasn’t even aware as he looked up, checked to make sure his canopy was fully deployed and functioning, then reached up and took the toggle on each riser in hand, gaining control of the chute. He’d stopped counting his jumps once he reached three figures and earned his master parachutist wings. He’d never understood civilians who jumped for fun. To him it was always a part of his job. He jumped for mission or pay. It was too dangerous a thing to do for fun.
He looked down, spotted the bundle floating toward the ground, and turned the chute so he was chasing it. This was what the Airborne called a Hollywood jump—no rucksack, no weapon. The easiest kind to do.
He looked past the bundle to see if he could spot anyone on the drop zone. There was a black Land Rover moving across the open field; like him, chasing the bundle. He turned his attention back to what he was doing—even if it was a Hollywood jump, he was still going to make contact with the ground hard. Military parachutes were not designed for soft landings. One did not want to float slowly to the ground when there was a chance of getting shot at.
