Текст книги "Ghost recon : Combat ops"

Автор книги: David Michaels

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kins, Hume, and Brown, and I’d told Brown in private

that because Joey wasn’t feeling good I wanted him to

look after the sergeant. He said he would.

I kept Smith and Nolan close, and as we approached

the first cave entrance after about sixty minutes of rug-

ged and slow climbing, I sent off Bravo team to the sec-

ond entrance, about a quarter kilometer west of ours

and located about two hundred meters higher up the

mountain. The caves and adjoining tunnels were roughly

shaped like two letter Ys attached at their bases, with

pairs of entrances on either side of the mountain. When

my team got into the first tunnel and reached the cave

area where Warris had been cut off, our lights revealed a

fresh passage dug through the debris.

“Ghost Lead, this is Treehorn. I’m in position, over.”

“Roger that. What do you got out there?”

“Nothing. Not even any guards. Weird.”

“All right, hang on.”

I gestured for Smith and Nolan to start planting the

first set of charges, while I crept off farther down the

tunnel, toward the starlight at the end of the jagged

seam in the rock. I paused at the edge and stole a look

214 GH OS T RE CON

into the valley below. Sangsar lay in the distance, a few

lights flickering, the majority of the homes blanketed in

deep shadows.

Warris was down there, somewhere, perhaps in some

dank basement, being questioned, having battery cables

attached to his genitalia, having insects shoved in his

ears. Was he man enough to keep his mouth shut? Was

he willing to die for his country? Had I taught him

enough?

I grinned over a strange thought. Maybe his hatred

for me would help keep him alive. He’d tell himself, I

need to survive this so I can burn the bastard responsible. I

accepted that. And even wondered, were I to rescue

him, if he would change his mind, keep quiet, tell me

that was his thank-you for pulling him out of hell. But

no, the world was hardly that simple, and Warris’s moral

high ground was pretty damned high. Rescue or not,

he’d want to hang me.

“Ghost Lead, this is Blue Six, in position, over.”

“Roger that, Blue Six, stand by,” I told the Bradley

commander. Harruck had come through and our ride

home was waiting.

I slipped just outside the cave and pulled up the satel-

lite imagery in my HUD. The monocle covering one of

my eyes flashed as the data came through.

Glowing yellow lines that represented the series of caves

and tunnels moved through a wireframe image of the

mountain chain. The diamonds indicating Bravo team

flickered on and off, and the signal grew weaker the

deeper they moved. That I even got some signal was

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215

surprising. So far, no red diamonds within the moun-

tain or outside.

Had Zahed just called back all of his guards? Were

they all just tired? Why had they left the tunnels com-

pletely unprotected?

My hackles began to rise, and that smell I detected

was not the dampness of the tunnel but an ambush.

“Ghost Team, this is Ghost Lead. I don’t like this.

No defenses here. Plant your charges and let’s get the

hell out as fast as we can.”

“Roger that,” said Ramirez.

I was beginning to lose my breath. Something was

wrong, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I ran down the

tunnel, back to where Smith and Nolan were working.

“Are we set?”

Nolan looked up at me. “Remotes good to go. Need

to finish up at the entrance where you just were.”

“All right, let’s go,” I said.

“Ghost Lead, this is Ramirez! I just got out of my

tunnel. Scanning the village now. They got mortar

teams setting up just outside the wall. They got tipped

off again!”

Just as we reached our exit, a shell hit the mountain

just above us, the roar deafening, a landslide of rock and

dirt beginning to plummet. “Back inside! Ghost Team!

Fall back! Fall back!”

Two more shells struck the mountainside, the ground

quaking beneath our feet, the ceiling cracking here and

there. The bastards would seal up the caves for us—but

their plan was, of course, to bury us alive.

216 GH OS T RE CON

“Ghost Lead, this is Treehorn! The Bradley has come

under attack. I don’t know where they came from! They

might’ve been buried in the sand the entire time! They

got at least twenty guys down there! More in the moun-

tains coming down. Should I engage?”

“Negative, negative! Don’t give up your position yet!”

I cried.

He’d said more were coming down from the moun-

tains. Why hadn’t the satellite picked them up and fed

that data into my Cross-Com? Was it just interference

from the terrain?

I gritted my teeth and led Nolan and Smith back to

the main tunnel and exit. As we neared the intersection

where the cave-in had occurred, shouting echoed, and I

threw myself against the side wall, with the guys just

behind me, then rolled to the left, my rifle at the ready,

as two Taliban fighters came through the newly dug

passage through the cave-in. I gunned both of them

down before I could finish taking a breath.

They hit the ground—and so did a grenade tossed at

us from their comrades on the other side.

As I turned back, I raised my palm, screaming for the

guys to hit the deck. We all started toward the floor as

the grenade exploded behind us, the concussion echo-

ing, and what sounded like a million tiny rock fragments

pelted my clothes—

Just as I crashed onto my belly.

The terrible and expected ringing in my ears came on

suddenly, and when I looked up, I couldn’t see anything.

I lost my breath. I thought maybe I’d died, but then I

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217

realized my turban had fallen down across my face. I

shoved it up, rose, and found hands pulling me to

my feet.

“You okay?” Smith asked, his angular face creased deeply

with worry. I couldn’t hear him; I’d just read his lips.

I indicated that my ears were ringing. He nodded and

mouthed the same thing. Nolan was next to him, wav-

ing us onward as he drew a grenade from the web gear

hidden beneath his shirt. He tossed the grenade down

the intersecting hall, and we all bolted ahead as the sec-

onds ticked by and the grenade exploded, just as we

neared the more narrow exit.

And two Taliban fighters rolled toward us, rushing in

from outside.

Nolan was on point and opened up on them, but

they’d started firing as well, their rounds ricocheting off

the ceiling just past us. Smith and I, caught in the back,

had no choice but to drop away. We couldn’t fire with

Nolan in our way.

The gunfire was strangely muffled but growing

louder as my hearing began to return.

With arms flailing, the two fighters fell on top of each

other.

Nolan turned back to me, his eyes wide.

Then he just collapsed himself.

“Cover us!” I shouted to Smith, then rose and rushed

to Nolan. I slowly rolled him over onto his back. He

looked okay. I began to pull back his shirt, and then I

spotted them, one near his shoulder, and one much

lower, near his heart. Nolan’s trademark spectacles had

218 GH OS T RE CON

been knocked to the side of his head, and he was blink-

ing hard, trying to see.

The blood was gushing now as he struggled for

breath, and I struggled to get past his web gear.

“In my pack, I got some big four-by-four gauze,” he

said between gasps.

I ripped off my shemaghand shoved it beneath the

web gear and applied pressure. My first instinct was to

get on the Cross-Com and shout, “Nolan, got a man

down!”

“Captain, tell John not to feel bad. Tell ’em we’re

buddies forever. Okay?”

“I will, Alex,” I said, applying more pressure as he

began to shiver violently.

Nolan was referring to John Hume; they’d become

best friends, fighting hard and playing hard. Guys would

tease them about being “too close,” but they were more

like brothers. I knew losing Nolan would crush Hume.

Crush him.

Smith, who was up near the exit, suddenly ducked

back inside as gunfire ripped across the stone where he’d

been standing. “We are so pinned down here.”

I was about to answer when another mortar round

struck far down the tunnel, and the ground shook.

Somewhere back there, another cave-in was happening,

the rocks and dirt streaming and hissing, and not five

seconds later a wall of thick dust rolled through the tun-

nel toward us.

When I looked down again, Nolan was not moving. I

checked his neck for a pulse. That round had, indeed,

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219

struck his heart, and when I checked the side of his

shirt, it was soaked thick with blood.

Footfalls resounded up the tunnel, and suddenly

through the dust came a figure. I snatched up my rifle,

took aim, and held my breath.

“Hold fire!” came a familiar voice. The figure tugged

down his shemagh. Ramirez. He glanced over his shoul-

der. “Come on! We’ve linked up with the Captain!”

As the others rushed up behind him, Hume spotted

Nolan lying at my side and rushed to him.

“Alex!”

“He’s gone,” I said evenly.

“Aw, no,” Hume cried. “No, no, no.”

For just a moment—perhaps only three seconds—we

all stood there, frozen, staring down at Hume and

Nolan, no sound, no movement, just the burning image

of our fallen brother, and then—

“Ghost Lead, this is Treehorn, they got RPGs mov-

ing in on the Bradley. Permission to open fire!”

I shuddered back to reality. “Negative, hold fire! Do

not give up your position.” I switched channels to speak

to the Bradley commander. “Blue Six, this is Ghost

Lead, over.”

I waited, called again, nothing. Couldn’t even warn

the guy and his squad. The vehicle’s big machine gun

was already drumming as several more booms struck

and silenced it.

“They got the gunner!” shouted Treehorn. “They

got the gunner! They’re swarming the Bradley. Swarm-

ing it now!”

220 GH OS T RE CON

Two more shells struck the mountain, and the ceiling

began to crack right near my head.

“I’m taking him out of here,” said Hume, his eyes

already burning.

“You got it,” I answered. “Treehorn? Get set! We’re

coming out!”

T WENTY-ONE

Alex Nolan was a smart-aleck kid from the streets of

Boston who’d become a senior medical sergeant with

the Ghosts. He often looked like a geek, but when he

opened his mouth, wow, he was all attitude fueled by an

insatiable curiosity and great intellect. He was even a

Mensa member. Still, there were times when he could

throw a switch and be the most caring and sympathetic

operator on our team. The last time we were in Afghan-

istan, I’d seen him spend hours with sick villagers. He’d

always ask the same question: “Are your animals sick,

too?” When you operated in third-world countries and

people became ill, you could sometimes trace the prob-

lem back to their livestock.

With the letter to Matt Beasley’s family still fresh on

222 GH OS T RE CON

my mind, I couldn’t believe I had to write another one.

I wasn’t used to losing operators, especially two on a

single mission.

We’d been all over the world, working on operations

far more taxing than this one. And while they kept tell-

ing me this situation was complicated, on the surface it

seemed much safer when compared to the operation I’d

run in China, penetrating deep into the heart of the

country to take out a cabal of rogue generals. Hell, we’d

had a hundred chances to be captured or killed and had

slipped past every one of them.

Now we’d been charged with nabbing one fat-ass ter-

rorist, and I’d already lost two good men, some of the

most valuable personnel in the U.S. Army. I was already

feeling burned out, like a has-been operator who’d got-

ten his men killed.

With my own eyes burning, we rushed outside the

tunnel and I ordered the guys to set off the charges.

Thumbs went down on wireless detonators, and the mul-

tiple booms echoed, as though someone were kicking

over a massive drum set that clattered and crashed off a

giant stage. I could only hope our charges had swallowed

some of the insurgents inside.

I led Alpha team along a rocky path that descended

sharply to our left. Ramirez and his team would take the

path to the right. I didn’t want us together in case the

guys on this side of the mountains had mortars, too.

And to be perfectly honest, it was convenient to have

Ramirez away so I didn’t need to watch my back.

RPG fire arced like fleeing fireflies, and two cone-shaped

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223

denotations rose skyward as though the Taliban had

ignited a massive bonfire to celebrate their victory over

the infidels.

“All right, Treehorn, cut it loose!” I ordered.

The sniper’s gun boomed, and his rounds came down

like God’s hammer, decisive, deadly, dismembering all

in their path.

But the Taliban were quick to answer.

Gunfire cut a line so close to Hume that he tripped

and fell forward with Nolan’s body draped over his back.

We rushed to help him back to his feet, and that was

when muzzles flashed from the ridgeline about fifty

meters above.

I raised my rifle as the red diamonds appeared in my

HUD to help me lock onto the four targets.

The camera automatically zoomed in on one fighter

raising a HER F gun toward me—and that was when my

HUD went dead.

I might’ve cursed. Either way, the HER F blast was

my cue to open fire, and Smith joined me. We drilled

those bastards back toward the wall, while Hume got

Nolan down onto the lower portion of the path. I wasn’t

sure if we’d hit any of them, but we’d bought some time.

Smith ceased fire, tugged free a smoke grenade, then

tossed it up there a second before we both double-timed

after Hume.

Treehorn’s gun spoke again. And then again. He was

the reaper. His words were thunder.

About twenty meters east of the now-burning Brad-

ley, an insurgent lay on his belly, directing machine gun

224 GH OS T RE CON

fire up near Treehorn, who returned fire, hitting the guy.

The gun went silent—but only for a few seconds as that

fighter was replaced by another, who quickly resumed

showering Treehorn.

“Cover Hume. Get down the rocks and hold there,”

I ordered Smith. He nodded and hustled off.

I jogged back up the path toward Treehorn’s perch

much higher along the ridge.

He took one last shot, then bolted up and joined me.

I waved him back along the path, and then . . . off to my

left, about twenty meters up . . . a curious sight: another

tunnel entrance. It must’ve been covered up by the Tal-

iban because the rocks nearby appeared freshly shaken

free by the mortars and our C-4 charges.

As we came under a vicious wave of gunfire that

seemed certain to hit us, I rushed up toward the tunnel

and practically threw myself inside.

Treehorn was a second behind me, breathless, curs-

ing, literally foaming at the mouth with exertion.

AK-47 and machine gun fire stitched along the entrance,

daring us to sneak back out and return fire. That was one

dare I would not take. The machine gunner seemed to be

chiseling his initials on the rock face.

I got on the regular radio, found it dead, and realized

that maybe this time the HERF gun had managed to fry it,

too. But then I also noticed the microphone had taken a hit.

I was one lucky man—very close call. That bullet would’ve

caught my side, perhaps even penetrated my spine.

Treehorn directed his light to the tunnel behind us.

“Whoa . . .”

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225

His surprise was not unwarranted.

The uneven intestine of rock swept outward and

curved slowly down. It appeared to go much longer and

deeper than any of the others we’d seen, and I was sud-

denly torn between venturing down to see where it went

and making a break back outside to link up with the

others. The machine gun fire had just died off. The sec-

ond rally point would be just past the Bradley’s position,

along an old dried-up riverbed. Everyone knew it. I

assumed Ramirez would be taking Bravo team there.

But I’d left Smith to look after Hume, who was carry-

ing Nolan on his back, and those guys would need help.

“What do you want to do, Captain?”

I pulled out a brick of C-4 from my pack. “Man, we

need to see where this goes, but we can’t do it right now.

Let’s seal it up behind us and get back outside.”

“Wait a second. Listen,” he said.

Faint cries echoed up toward us.

I pricked up my ears again. “Sounds like . . . a kid . . .”

“I know. What the hell?”

I remembered the girl we’d found during our first

night raid. And though I couldn’t bear the thought of

more children being tortured, we had to leave.

Something flashed behind us, and as I turned, my

arm went up reflexively against the blast. The air whooshed

past us, and only then did I realize I was being cata-

pulted back into the tunnel. The entrance had been

struck dead-on by an RPG. The starlight shining beyond

went black, and I slammed into the floor, shielding my

face from the rocks and dirt dropping all around me.

226 GH OS T RE CON

Then, a strange silence, the sifting of sand, my breath-

ing, the dull echo in my head—

Suddenly the cave roof a few meters ahead came down,

as though a massive boot had stomped on us. I scrambled

backward like a crab and bumped into Treehorn, who had

just turned on his penlight, the beam struggling to pen-

etrate the thick cloud of dust. I winced and blinked.

“You okay, boss?” cried Treehorn.

“I’m good.”

“They blew the goddamned exit!”

“Plan B,” I finally gasped out. “Back on our feet.

Come on, buddy . . .” I began choking and coughing on

the dust.

We got to our feet, his light shining down the tunnel,

mine joining his a few seconds later.

I stole a look back. The tunnel behind us had com-

pletely collapsed. It would take a half a day or more for

us to dig ourselves out.

I tried to stifle my coughing and gestured for Tree-

horn to keep his light low and to move slowly, quietly.

Our shadows shifted across the cool brown stone,

and a faint glimmer seemed to join our light, the flicker-

ing of candles or a lantern, not a flashlight, I knew.

Treehorn paused, looked back, put a finger to his lips.

We killed our lights and listened.

For a moment, I think I held my breath.

The cries we’d heard earlier were gone, replaced now

by footsteps, barely discernible but there. I cocked a

thumb, motioning for Treehorn to get behind me. I gin-

gerly slipped free the bowie knife from my calf sheath.

CO MB AT O P S

227

Seeing that, he did likewise, his own blade coated

black so as not to reflect any light. We held our position,

unmoving, but our curious tunnel guest still seemed

drawn to us.

As he rounded the corner, I slid behind him, grabbed

his mouth with one hand and, with a reverse grip,

plunged my blade deep into his heart. I felt his grimace

beneath my fingers, the hair of his thick beard scratch-

ing like a steel wool pad. The forefinger and thumb on

my knife hand grew damp, and after a moment more he

struggled, then finally grew limp. I lowered him to the

floor. The guy had been holding a penlight, and Tree-

horn picked it up, shined it into the guy’s face.

He was no one. Just another Taliban guy, wrong place,

wrong time. We took his rifle, ammo, and light, then moved

on, the tunnel growing slightly wider, the floor heavily traf-

ficked by boot prints. Voices grew louder ahead, and I froze.

The language was not Pashto but Chinese.

We hunkered down, edged forward toward where the

tunnel opened up into a wider cave illuminated by at

least one lantern I could see sitting on the floor near the

wall. Behind the lantern was a waist-high stack of opium

bricks, with presumably many more behind it.

A depression in the wall gave us a little cover, and we

watched as ahead, Chinese men dressed like Taliban

hurriedly loaded the bricks into packs they threw over

their shoulders. So Bronco’s Chinese connection was a

fact, and I wasn’t very surprised by that; however, to find

the Chinese themselves taking part in the grunt work of

smuggling was interesting.

228 GH OS T RE CON

There were three of them, their backpacks bulging as

they left the cave, their flashlights dancing across the

floor until the exit tunnel darkened.

We waited a moment more, then followed, shifting

past stacks of empty wooden crates within which the

bricks had been stored.

Treehorn was right at my shoulder, panting, and once

we started farther into the adjoining tunnel, I flicked on

my flashlight because it’d grown so dark my eyes could

no longer adjust.

Somewhere in the distance came the continued rattle

of gunfire, but the heavy mortars had ceased. We reached

a T-shaped intersection. To the left another long tunnel.

To the right a shorter one with a wooden ladder leaning

against the wall. I raised my chin to Treehorn, pointed.

He shifted in front of me, rifle at the ready. I pushed

the penlight close to my hip, darkening most of the

beam.

We neared the ladder. I was holding my breath again.

Treehorn took another step farther, looked up—

And then he whirled back, his face creased tightly in

alarm as a salvo of gunfire rained straight down and he

pushed me backward, knocking me onto my rump. We

both went down as yet another volley dug deeply into

the earth.

I imagined a grenade dropping to the foot of the lad-

der, and my imagination drove me onto my feet, and

Treehorn clambered up behind me. I stole a look back

and saw the ladder being hoisted up and away. We raced

back to the intersection and moved into the other tunnel.

CO MB AT O P S

229

I kept hearing an explosion in my head, that imaginary

grenade going off over and over.

The beam of my penlight was jittering across the

walls and the floor until I slowed and aimed it directly

ahead.

Still darkness. No end to the tunnel in sight.

I stopped, held up my palm to Treehorn. “This could

be one of the biggest tunnel networks in the entire

country,” I whispered.

“Yeah,” he said. “Goes all the way to China.”

I grinned crookedly at his quip, then started on once

more, turning a slight bend, then eating my words.

The tunnel abruptly dead-ended. Unfinished. In fact,

the Taliban still had excavation tools lining the walls:

shovels, pickaxes, wheelbarrows . . .

I looked at Treehorn.

“Well, Iain’t digging us out of here,” he groaned.

I put my finger to my lips. Footsteps. Growing closer.

T WENTY-T WO

Working as a team leader in an ever-changing environ-

ment with ever-changing rules and restrictions becomes,

as my father once put it, “an abrasive on the soul.” Hav-

ing toiled many years in the GM plant and enjoyed as

many years out in his woodshop, Dad was a man who

celebrated predictability. He did repetitive work at the

plant, and when he created his custom pieces of furni-

ture, he most often worked from a blueprint and fol-

lowed it to the letter. He felt at peace with a plan he

could follow. He always taught me that practice makes

perfect, that repetition is not boring and can make you

an expert, and that people who say they just “wing it”

are hardly as successful as those who plan their work and

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231

work their plan. He told me he could never do what I

did, though, because he would never find satisfaction in

it. He needed something tangible to hold on to, sit on,

photograph, admire . . . and he needed a plan that would

not change. My father was a curmudgeon to be sure.

We’d argue about this a lot. But when I slipped off

into my own little woodshop to produce projects for my

friends and fellow operators, I understood what Dad was

trying to tell me. You cannot replace the satisfaction of

working alone, of listening to that voice in your head as

it guides you through a piece of furniture. There was

great beauty in solitude, and I sometimes wondered

whether I should’ve become a sniper instead of a team

leader. The exquisite artistry of making a perfect shot

from a mile out deeply intrigued me.

Oddly enough, I was pondering that idea while Tree-

horn and I stood in that tunnel, completely cut off. I

wished I’d had the luxury of only worrying about myself

instead of feeling wholly responsible for him. When I

was a sergeant, my CO would tell me that I’d get used to

leadership but it would never get any easier. I doubted

him. I assumed I’d find a comfort zone. But there isn’t

one. Not for me. There’s a happy place of denial that I

go to when things go south, but I can only visit there for

short periods before they kick me out.

Thus, the big sniper was at my shoulder, in my charge,

and I swore to myself I would not get him killed.

A figure materialized from the darkness.

I shifted reflexively in front of Treehorn as the figure’s

232 GH OS T RE CON

light came up and a second person shifted up behind the

first. I was blinded for a second, about to pull the trigger,

when the shout came:

“Captain! Hold fire!”

I recognized the voice. Ramirez. His light came

down.

I sighed. My beating heart threatened to crack a rib.

“Joey, how the hell did you get in here?”

“We saw you get pinned down. So we came back up,

pushed through a couple of rocks. It looks a lot worse

than it is. It caved in, but up near the top of the pile we

found a way in.”

“You all right?” Brown asked, moving up behind

Ramirez.

“We’re good. I want C-4 at the intersection. What’s

going on outside?”

“Rest of the team’s at the rally point,” Ramirez said.

“A couple more Bradleys came up. They put some seri-

ous fire on the mountains, so those bastards have fallen

back. I think we’re clear to exit.”

I looked hard at Ramirez. “Thanks for coming back.”

He averted his gaze.

That reaction made me wonder if he’d come back

only because Brown had spotted us and left him no

choice. Or maybe he was trying to get past what had

happened and show me he still had my back; I just didn’t

know.

I shook off the thought, and we got to work. Within

two minutes we had the charges ready.

“You sure about this?” Treehorn asked. “Still got that

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233

other tunnel down there where they had the ladder . . .

who knows what’s up there . . .”

“We can’t leave this open. We need to make it harder

for them to cross over without being seen.”

“You’re the boss,” he said. “Bet there’s another exit

we haven’t found, anyway. If we get back up here, we

can search for that one, too.”

I nodded. “I bet we’ll get our chance.”

We left the intersection and reached the towering

wall of dirt and rock, noting the fresh exit created by

Ramirez and Brown, just a narrow, two-meter-long tun-

nel near the ceiling. We’d crawl on our hands and knees

to exit. I was concerned about all the rock and dirt

between us and the charges, so I gave Brown the order

to detonate before we left. He clicked his remote. Noth-

ing. I knew it. We’d gone too far off for the signal to

reach through the rock.

But then I wondered if maybe his remote detonator

had been damaged by the HER F guns. I’d forgotten

about that. We all had.

“I’ll do it,” said Ramirez, removing the detonator

from Brown’s hand.

“And I’ll come with you,” said Brown, hardening his

tone. “Could go with a regular fuse.”

“I’ll be right back.” Ramirez took off running.

“Go after him,” I ordered Brown. I had visions of

Ramirez blowing himself up. “The detonator might not

work.”

“Like I said, I’ve got some old-school fuses. We’ll

light it up.”

234 GH OS T RE CON

Treehorn began pushing his way through the exit hole.

It was just wide enough for the big guy, and he moaned

and groaned till he reached the other side.

Then he called back to me, “Hey, boss, why don’t

you come out? We’ll wait for them on the other side.”

“You watch the entrance,” I told him. “We’ll all be

out in a minute. You scared to be alone?”

He snorted. “Not me . . .”

From far off down the tunnel came the shuffling of

boots, a shout of “Hey!” from Brown. Aw, hell, I needed

to know what was happening. “Treehorn, if we’re not

back in five, you go! You hear me?”

“Roger that, sir! What’s going on?”

I let his question hang and charged back down the

tunnel. When I reached the intersection, I found Ramirez

shoving one of the Chinese guys toward me. The guy’s

wrists were zipper-cuffed behind his back, and Brown

was shouldering the guy’s backpack while he lit the fuse

on the C-4.

“Look what we found,” Ramirez quipped. “They

dropped a ladder over there, and he came down here for

something.”

The Chinese guy suddenly tore free from Ramirez

and bolted past us, back into the dead-end tunnel.

Ramirez started after him.

“Fuse is lit,” shouted Brown.

“It’s a dead end, Joey!” I told him.

“Good! He’s a valuable prisoner,” Ramirez screamed

back.

Brown cursed, removed his knife, and hacked off the

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235

sparking fuse. “I want to blow something up,” he said.

“I haven’t got all night.”

I made a face. No kidding.

The unexpected report of Treehorn’s rifle stole my

attention. He screamed from the other side of the cave-

in: “Got a few stragglers coming up! Let’s go! Let’s go!”

I ran after Ramirez, and I found him at the dead end.

The Chinese guy was lying on his back, straddled by

Ramirez, and my colleague was pummeling the prisoner

relentlessly in the face.

Although the image was shocking, I understood very

well where Ramirez was coming from. He needed a

punching bag, and unfortunately he’d found one. I won-

dered if he’d kill the guy if I didn’t intervene. I gasped,

grabbed Ramirez’s wrist, and held back his next blow.

The prisoner’s face was already swollen hamburger, his

nose bleeding.

“What’re you doing?” I yelled.

Ramirez just looked at me, eyes ablaze, drool spilling

from his lips. “He wouldn’t come. Now he will.”

I cursed under my breath. “Let’s get out of here.”

We dragged the prisoner to his feet and shifted him

forward, and then suddenly the Chinese guy spat blood,

looked at me, and said, “I’m an American, you assholes!”

The left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.

My father used to say that all the time when referring to

middle and upper management and to Washington and

politicians. I was no stranger to decentralization, to being

236 GH OS T RE CON

on a mission and realizing only after the fact that hey,

someone else has the same mission. That my commanders

were often not made privy to CIA and NSA operations in

the area was a given; that spook operations would interfere

with our ability to complete our mission was also a given.

That a Chinese guy we captured in the tunnel would

give up his identity was damned surprising.

“I’m CIA!” he added, spitting out more blood. “I

needed to bail on my mission.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Because I know who you are. I can smell you a mile

away. Special Forces meatheads. I’m not at liberty to

speak to you monkeys.”

I snickered. “Then why are you talking now?”

“Look at my face, asshole!”