by Ben Coes
“Where the fuck were you?” Goodale asked. “Five more minutes and I would’ve DQ’d you.”
Millar didn’t know his opponent, but he knew of him. Tim Goodale was a brash American and reigning club champion. At Yale, he’d won two NCAA championships. Everyone knew he was the best player at Bath & Racquets. Everyone, that is, but Millar.
Millar had learned to play squash in Karachi, winning the Pakistan ten-and-unders at age seven, eight, and nine, before he and his father moved to Chicago. He’d played through high school, dropped it in college, and when he was assigned to London, he’d picked the game back up.
Millar and Goodale were supposed to have started their match at four. It was the semifinals of the Bath & Racquets annual club championship. Goodale was the heavy favorite. Millar was unknown, but en route to the semis, he had dispatched a former British Open champion. A lot of people at the club were wondering who the quiet American with the nasty backhand was.
“Nice to meet you too,” said Millar, placing his racquet cover and warm-up jacket in the front corner of the court.
Goodale moved to the left and snapped a shot to the forehand court, which Millar hit back.
“Look, I wouldn’t be such a dick except I have dinner with a lingerie model,” said Goodale, pounding the ball back to Millar. “I’m going to have to drop you in three so I’m not late. Don’t take it personally.”
The two players hit the ball back and forth for the next five minutes, getting warmed up. The small white ball was a blur; Goodale and Millar moved in rhythm, anticipating each other’s next hit and rallying in a series of perfectly executed shots. By the time they started practicing serves, a crowd of more than twenty people had gathered in the gallery to watch.
“I heard you beat Bern,” said Goodale.
Millar didn’t respond.
“Thanks for doing that. He actually made me work for the cup last year. I might not have to break a sweat this year. You warmed up?”
“Yeah,” said Millar.
Goodale served first. From the forehand court, he hit a high, soft lob that landed in the back corner and didn’t bounce so much as a foot.
Goodale 1, Millar 0.
“Nice serve,” said Millar.
“Get used to it.”
Goodale swatted a serve from the left, hard, into the forehand court. Millar caught it behind the tee and put the ball high and right, into the back corner. Goodale caught it near the back wall and hit a crushing shot into the front left corner an inch above the tin, which Millar anticipated and met halfway between the tee and the front wall; he snapped it into the corner, where it died.
Goodale 1, Millar 1.
The first game lasted half an hour, with long rallies, as two athletes in prime condition played as if their lives depended on the outcome. Goodale took the first game 9–6. Millar took the next two, 9–7, 9–4.
The crowd had grown to more than fifty people, and with every point, a small eruption of clapping or cheering arose from the crowded gallery. Goodale took the fourth game 14–12. After a long water break, the two players caught their breath near the front of the court before beginning the deciding fifth game.
“I take back what I said,” said Goodale, drenched in sweat, leaning over and stretching out.
“Which part?”
“The part about Bern. The part about dropping you in three.”
“No worries.”
“I gotta ask, though: who the fuck are you?”
“No one.”
“No one? Where’d you go to school? What do you do?”
“West Point,” said Millar. “I work for Boeing.” His London cover.
Goodale studied the tough-looking American. “Boeing? Yeah, right.”
Millar shot Goodale a look. His laughter stopped as he registered the threat in Millar’s eyes.
“I meant, awesome,” said Goodale. “Great planes.”
Millar shook his head, then laughed.
By halfway through the fifth game, every point was greeted by raucous cheers from the crowd, which was now beyond capacity. With the score tied at 5–5, an insistent beeping noise rang out from Millar’s cell phone in the front corner of the court. He walked to his racquet case, pulled out the phone, and read the message:
6:22 PIA 177 to ISL
Millar looked at his watch. It was 5:50.
“What is it?” asked Goodale.
“I have to be at Heathrow in thirty-two minutes.”
“Sucks for you.”
“No, actually, it sucks for you. I need a ride.”
* * *
DORI RIVER
KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN
Rob Iverheart lay on top of a long, flat rock on a bluff above the Dori River, southeast of the U.S. Kandahar Airfield. In front of him, resting on an adjustable bipod, was an Accuracy International AX .338 long-range rifle.
Iverheart waited. He’d been waiting now since before midnight.
He and five other Deltas had been on their patrol for two days now. Iverheart and his team were working off a piece of intelligence suggesting that two high-ranking officials from the Haqqani network, insurgents closely aligned with the Taliban, were in the area east of the village of Arghistan.
The Delta team had picked up fresh boot tracks the previous afternoon on the west side of the Arghistan River. Moving several miles downriver toward Pakistan, where the Arghistan turns into the Dori, they had found cigarette ashes put out on the side of a rock. Likely, the Haqqanis had drifted back into the mountains to the south, toward Pakistan. Nevertheless, Iverheart and his team hoped that the Haqqanis were simply waiting them out.
Iverheart was on a bluff, as was another Delta sharpshooter a half mile to his left. The four other members of the team had crossed the Dori the night before and worked their way behind the insurgents. The goal was for the four forward Deltas to find and kill the insurgents, or else push them back to the Dori, where Iverheart and the other shooter were waiting.
At a few minutes after noon, one of the Deltas on the far side of the Dori spoke:
“I’m coming north at position longitude four-nine. I got something about two hundred yards in front of me.”
Doyle, his teammate, was describing a location to his right, on the south side of the river. Iverheart studied the landscape with his binoculars.
“Should you fire a few rounds?” asked Iverheart. “Flush him out.”
“Let me get closer. He might be coming your way anyway.”
Iverheart adjusted his position. He checked the weapon, then resumed studying the land behind the riverbanks. The area Doyle was describing was more than a half mile away.
After more than twenty minutes of silence, Iverheart saw a flash of movement.
“Where are you, D?” asked Iverheart.
“Moving north.”
“Did I just see you or did I see one of these Haqqani fuckers?”
“Not me. I’m out of sight.”
Iverheart put the binoculars down and lay behind the rifle, adjusting the Schmidt & Bender telescopic sight. He quickly found the area where, with the binoculars, he’d just seen movement.
“I want a confirm from each of you,” said Iverheart, adjusting the bipod ever so slightly as he continued to pore through the telescopic sight. “Is everyone out of my firing line?”
“Yes,” said Doyle. The other Deltas all confirmed they were out of sight.
“Okay,” said Iverheart. “Hold your positions.”
Iverheart studied the small steppe upon which he’d seen movement.
“Iverheart, this is Colonel Field back at Firebase Gecko,” said the voice on his earbud.
“Yes, sir,” said Iverheart. He steadied his head upon the rifle’s cheek piece, watching the landscape through the sight, looking for more movement, multitasking.
“You’re to get back five clicks. You’ll be picked up by a chopper. You’re going up to Bagram. They’ll brief you en route.”
“What about my team?” asked Iverheart.<
br />
Iverheart saw something flash in the scope. He adjusted the sight focus. There. Two figures, just the head of one on the right, the entire body of the other, dressed in tribal garb, on the left holding a rifle. They were crouched behind a rock. At this distance, they looked like specks of dust.
“Just you, Robbie,” said Field.
“I’ve got two targets,” said Iverheart. “Everyone stay low.”
Iverheart moved his finger to the trigger. He pumped it. Dust shot out from the rock to the left of the first insurgent’s head. Before the man realized he was being shot at, Iverheart fired again. This .338 caliber slug hit him in the head, dropping him to the ground. The other figure moved his head around in a panic, not knowing what had happened. Iverheart triggered the weapon again. His bullet hit the insurgent in the chest; Iverheart could see a red splash of blood on the rock as the body tumbled to the ground.
“Bull’s-eye,” said Iverheart. “Gotta go, fellas.”
38
IN THE AIR
Polk gave Dewey a tour of the AWACS. The windowless cabin looked like the inside of a submarine. The walls were lined with large plasma screens displaying a dizzying array of images: the Kashmir battle theater, Fox, CNN, Al Jazeera, BBC, state news feeds from New Delhi and Islamabad.
In the middle of the cabin, spreading for more than a hundred feet and occupying a substantial rectangular block of the cabin’s space, eight large workstations were abuzz with activity. Each workstation had multiple plasma screens tiered on the walls and was staffed by a CIA analyst wearing a headset.
“The key to all of this is information,” said Polk. “Knowing precisely where your target is. That’s what this team is here for. You’re the surgeon, Dewey. This E-3 is your X-ray machine.”
Dewey glanced at Polk. He liked him. He was no doubt smart. And yes it was like surgery. But Polk was going to be in the relative comfort of a plane flying thirty-five thousand feet above the ground while he was going to be up to his eyeballs in alligators. Dewey wished he could fast-forward an hour or two. He wanted to get going.
At the first workstation a male analyst was seated before two large plasma screens that showed a black limousine, from different angles overhead, moving quickly through a crowded city street.
“That’s Karreff.” Polk pointed at the screens.
A pair of screens displayed live drone feeds taken from the sky showing Karreff’s limousine, in remarkable detail, moving along a crowded street. A different screen displayed the technical GPS details of Karreff’s movement in longitudinal and latitudinal detail, green and blue isobars on black screen. The CIA analyst’s eyes stayed glued to his screen; he spoke every few moments into his headset.
“He’s online with the UAV pilot, who’s somewhere in Iowa, and with an agent we have on the ground in Islamabad following Karreff,” said Polk. “Someone at Langley is probably on there too. DoD and NSA too. Each one of these guys is hooked into between four and a dozen other people. Network effect. We don’t want to miss anything and we don’t want anyone else to miss anything that will end up inadvertently fucking up the mission or costing you your life.”
At the next workstation, a female analyst was chattering rapidly into a headset. Her words were in Hindi. Dewey counted seven screens in front of her. Most of the screens displayed news channels from inside India, which she was monitoring. Another screen displayed a middle-aged Indian male to whom she was talking rapid-fire.
“This is our India desk,” said Polk. “She’s interfacing with CIA New Delhi as well as with RAW, India Defense Ministry, Army, CIB, and a few others. Langley and the Pentagon are on there too. We’ll keep track, in real time, of President Ghandra and the New Delhi war cabinet, making sure they don’t launch a nuclear counterstrike either ahead of time or before you’re out of there. You’ll be COMMed into her feed.”
Dewey nodded. The woman, who was in her thirties, with red hair and glasses, smiled politely then turned back to the screen.
At the third workstation, another female analyst, this one in her forties, with blond hair, sat in front of four screens with a rotating series of images. One screen looked like a checkerboard, with round objects in red and black, spread in tiny dots across the screen. Another screen looked like satellite photos of green and brown terrain, a yellow line running across the screen.
“Here we’re tracking Pakistan’s nukes and their borders,” said Polk. “Those screens are being shared in real time by a team at the Pentagon and Langley. We want to know if Pakistan makes another move. Right now, we’re working to pinpoint and track as many Pakistani nuclear devices as we can through radiological imprint. Once we do that—once we have a nuclear bomb identified and located—we can monitor for any sudden movements. The fact is, if the Pakistanis drop another device, all bets are off, and India will move to obliterate the country. If we see Pakistan moving any bombs, you’ll know before New Delhi.”
At the next station, a young Asian male sat in front of a wall of screens, speaking rapidly into his headset. The screens showed detailed images of what appeared to be mountainous topography, with snowcapped mountains and stretches of green and brown valley. Dewey leaned forward and could see movement, illuminated in red, like bugs.
“China desk,” said Polk. “We’re watching troop activity along the Chinese border with Kashmir. The Chinese have moved more than half a million soldiers to the border. We want to know if they increase that number or if they start to move troops across the border into Kashmir.”
Dewey followed Polk to the next workstation. There, the screens displayed satellite images of mountainous terrain.
“This is the infiltration route,” said Polk. “After we chopper you into Gerdi, we’ll keep a steady eye on you down the Khyber Pass, through Peshawar, to Rawalpindi. We’ll have a Reaper overhead. If we have to, we can take out anything we’re worried about from overhead, though, of course, we’d prefer not to. Technically, we’re not supposed to be in their airspace. Over the cities, they can detect us. Over the Qu’ush, their systems are simply not good enough and we take advantage of it.”
They stepped to the next workstation. A young, pretty woman with long brown hair was speaking into a headset. She turned and smiled, mouthed the word “Hello,” then turned back to a wall of plasma screens. Two of the screens showed a satellite feed, from two different angles, of a small white building in amazing detail. It looked like a cement hut. Dewey watched for a few seconds as a man walked out onto what appeared to be a deck off the hut; he could make out the dark outline of a machine gun.
“Here we’re watching Field Marshal Bolin,” said Polk. “Like a hawk. It’s her job to keep track of where he is, in real time.”
Another screen displayed green and red isobars on black: a GPS tracking protocol on Bolin to match the visual feed.
“Where is he now?” asked Dewey.
“Drass,” said the analyst. “A town in India-controlled Kashmir. Bolin has set up a temporary war command in the foothills. I’ll figure out the best route for you and your team to approach, that is, if Bolin is still there.”
Bradstreet came over from the conference table.
“We’re thirty minutes out,” he said. “Let’s nail down the last details.”
At Bradstreet’s words, Dewey felt a sudden spike of anxiety. The plane made a slight starboard arc. He glanced around the cabin and realized that everyone was not only working for him, they were also watching him. He stayed cool, hiding from all the simple fact that he was beginning to worry.
The words, from training so long ago, came to him then: Break the mission up into minutes and miles. Don’t get overwhelmed. Act like you’ve been there before.
Dewey took a deep breath and followed Polk back to the conference table.
“Iverheart is at Kandahar Airfield,” said Bradstreet. “I’ll get him up to Bagram for meet-up. He’s fully briefed. Millar’s on a PIA flight to Rawalpindi from Heathrow.”
Bradstreet typed into a keyboard. A map pop
ped up onto the plasma screen.
“Let me run through the details of the operation, Dewey,” said Bradstreet.
“Okay,” said Dewey. He took a sip of coffee.
“You and Rob’ll be stowed in the back of a semi,” said Bradstreet, pointing to the map displayed on the screen. “You’ll ride to the capital through Peshawar, about three hours. South of Peshawar, you should be safe. You’ll be incommunicado until you get to Rawalpindi, but we’ll be tracking you. The truck might get searched but they won’t discover the trapdoor, and even if they do, you’ll be armed. Do whatever you can to avoid being captured. If the Pakistani Army captures you, you’re going to be locked up for a long time and you should expect some rough treatment. If regular Taliban find you, you’re dead. It’s that simple. So be ready.”
“What weapons can we bring on the trip?” asked Dewey.
“Handguns. That’s it. You’ll get what you need in Rawalpindi.”
“Okay. Keep going.”
“Once you’re in Rawalpindi, you’ll be dropped off at a warehouse about a mile east of the train station, which is in a neighborhood called Saddar. Meet-up is a bar called Al-Magreb. It’s in kind of a slum, owned by a guy who we pay to keep his mouth shut. It’s a real dump. You’ll know it because the door is bright yellow. Meet-up is after nine P.M. That’s when Millar should be there.”
“Got it.”
“Outside of Al-Magreb, you’ll exit, take a right, walk three blocks, then take your third left, here.” Bradstreet used a pointer to illuminate a place on the map. “Memorize the route. You’ll be looking for a woman in a burka. She’ll approach you. Her name is Margaret Jasper. She’s American. The clear word is ‘whisper.’ Margaret’ll say it to you. Remember, you won’t have communications yet. You need to listen to her. She’ll be your first contact with us in at least five or six hours. A lot could change.”
“So she says ‘whisper,’ what next?” asked Dewey.
“If she says ‘whisper,’ you’re operational,” said Bradstreet. “It means everything is cool. Follow Margaret. She has the weapons, communications, transportation, money, a little food and drink, everything. Once you go live on COMM, we’ll be back in touch, obviously.
