Apocalypse Burning (40 page)

Goose outlined the call signs, then let the other sergeants handle their own squads while he tended to his.

Seven minutes after his arrival at the airfield, Goose was on the first Chinook with his team and Lieutenant Keller. The seating in the CH-47D ran along both sides so the troops sat facing each other. Talking was hard over the constant throb of the engines, so as soon as the helo lifted everyone stopped talking.

Seated by one of the few windows, Goose watched as the darkened ground dropped away beneath them. Gaping holes where Syrian artillery shells had landed pockmarked the airfield. One of the opposing army’s first plans of action had been to destroy the airfield so large supply and troop planes couldn’t land. For the most part, the Syrian’s efforts had been successful. Few lights gleamed in the darkness, and even those quickly dimmed so enemy aircraft couldn’t use them to find their target.

Goose leaned his head back and got as comfortable as he could in the foldout seat despite the helo’s constant vibration and noise. He tipped his helmet down to shade his eyes, even though the dim light inside the cargo area would have made a firefly’s tail look like a comet by comparison.

He thought about Megan and Joey. The phones in Sanliurfa still hadn’t come back online so he hadn’t been able to contact his wife to find out how they were doing. He prayed that they were doing well. And he thought about Chris as well. The ache in his chest wasn’t all about the coming battle. His loss was still there, a constant agony that he could ignore only when duty or sleep took all his attention. So it wasn’t surprising that, when he finally nodded off to sleep for a few minutes, he met his son in his dreams.

United States 75th Army Rangers Temporary Post
Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 0623 Hours

Captain Cal Remington stood in the command center and stared at the big wall screen that showed the flight paths of the two Chinook helicopters streaking toward the west. A readout in the upper left corner gave their altitude as 1,232 feet, well below the helo’s practical ceiling of 14,000 feet. Running nap-of-the-earth as they were, they looked like they were trying to avoid possible antiaircraft weapons. Still, they were on a straight route to Diyarbakir City with no sign of trouble so far. The readout also noted that they were moving at 223 kilometers per hour, near the copter’s max of 259 kph.

“They don’t look particularly threatening or suspicious, do they?”

Turning, Remington gazed at Felix Magureanu.

Despite the early hour, Felix looked well rested and bright eyed. He had on a dark silver suit that looked like it had just been pressed. The creases in his pants legs stood out sharp as razor blades. The burgundy turtleneck he wore beneath the unbuttoned jacket looked as dark as fresh blood but captured red highlights. He stroked his copper-colored goatee in self-satisfaction. The gesture made him look a bit like a cat. The wraparound sunglasses he wore, despite the low light in the command center, hid his eyes.

“No,” Remington answered, “they don’t look suspicious. They’re not supposed to.”

“If I were the Syrian army commander,” Felix said, “I’d believe you were trying to transport wounded to Diyarbakir City.”

“Good. That’s just what I want the Syrians to think.” Remington had put that particular rumor into circulation right after he’d given Goose and the two lieutenants their orders. Goose had been the only one he’d called to the command center for the briefing. Goose was also the one Remington most trusted to see the mission through to the bitter end. The others would give their lives if they had to, but Goose had always been able to come up with a little bit more than any normal soldier—or even any extraordinary sergeant, for that matter.

That was one of the reasons Remington had decided to take the OCS route, to break his constant competition with Goose that the other sergeant never even seemed to notice. To Goose, they were equals, brothers in arms. And Goose’s lack of recognition of the competition between them had been just as insulting in its own right as the fact that Remington often came up short. Goose was winning without even knowing he was in a race.

But once Remington had made officer, there was no more competition. Remington had won, had proven himself the better man by stepping into the ranks of the military’s power structure. Then he’d gotten attracted to the power of command, the attention officers got from each other as well as the media and the politicians.

Goose, though, remained an excellent sergeant, one of the best weapons in Remington’s arsenal.

“Still,” Felix went on, “as bloodthirsty as the Syrian army is apparently getting to be, what with dropping the bodies of your own dead among you, I’d think that two helicopters flying all alone and so close to the earth would be tempting targets.”

“Maybe, if it wasn’t raining.” For the first time, Remington noted that Felix’s suit was perfectly dry, even the trouser cuffs. How could he have gotten to the command center without getting soaked like the rest of them? But even as he noticed that, he decided that the detail didn’t matter. Only the fact that Felix was helping him mattered. His help was essential, in fact. They couldn’t do the job without it. And that was why Remington had granted the man the freedom to roam through the command center.

“I don’t know,” Felix said with a grin. “I think I’d still make a try for them.”

“I’m glad you’re not the Syrian commander then,” Remington said. “I’m hoping he’s paying no attention whatsoever. Is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Magureanu?” Remington remained polite. After all, the man had patched him into a network of satellites that essentially used much of Nicolae Carpathia’s system—though with deniability, in case it came to that. From the looks of things, Remington could tell that Carpathia was well on his way to sliding into the U.N. secretarygeneral’s seat. If other members of the world’s nations found out that Carpathia was shading the war between Syria and Turkey, the fact would cause him to stumble and possibly wreck his momentum.

“No, Captain Remington,” Felix said, “I don’t require anything. I just thought I’d come down to watch the festivities.”

“The real festivities won’t start for another fourteen hours,” Remington said. “That’s when Alpha and Bravo hit ground zero at the Syrian encampment.”

Felix checked his watch. “It will be dark again by then.”

“Yes.”

“Will you be able to see?”

That puzzled Remington. Obviously Felix didn’t understand everything about the satellite system’s capabilities. How had the man gotten access to them, when he didn’t even know what they could do? Unless he really was just an emissary for Nicolae Carpathia and not an equal at all.

“The satellites have thermographic and low-light capabilities,”

Remington said.

“You’ll be able to see in the dark.”

“Yes.”

“Wonderful.” Felix walked away then, scanning the other screens the computer intelligence teams kept watch over. Many of the screens were keyed in on the Syrian encampment on the Turkish side of the border. Very little movement showed there.

Still other screens displayed world news, especially from the stations reporting on Sanliurfa’s plight. The city and her defenders hadn’t exactly captured the eye of the world. The big news story was still the global disappearances and all the confusion that had ensued. But it seemed that a number of channels out there followed the war stories.

Remington glanced at his watch. Alpha and Bravo were due to deploy in two more minutes. He swept the nearby monitors and spotted a story currently being carried on the BBC. The news report bore the outline of the Turkish nation as well as the red flag with its crescent moon and single star.

The reporter’s name was Sid Wright. Remington recognized the man at once as one of the media personnel inside the city. He’d seen him a few times at press conferences and briefings.

Crossing the room, Remington picked up the headset that connected him to the audio portion of the broadcast. He glanced down at the private manning the computer. “Are you taping this?” Remington asked.

The private nodded. “Yes, sir. Anything coming out of Sanliurfa we download and burn to VCD for you.”

Remington sometimes reviewed the media stories in his private quarters, though he hadn’t been able to do that much lately.

“—claim that their brother, Abu Alam, was abducted at gunpoint by a group of American soldiers,” Sid Wright said.

The screen changed to the interior of a building that had evidently suffered bomb damage. Cracks splintered all the Sheetrock walls, and the windows were broken out.

“They came and got Abu,” the young man dressed in Bedouin robes said. Only his dark eyes showed on the screen. “Those men—those
Americans
—” he added something in his own language that could only be extremely derogatory—“they came to get my cousin. They killed three of my family. Then they took Abu.” He faced the camera. “When we find these men, Allah grant us the satisfaction, we will kill them like dogs.”

For a moment, the memory of Abu Alam in the basement pleading for his life haunted Remington. Nausea swirled in his stomach. Then he pushed that weakness away, telling himself he had to concentrate on the mission at hand.
That’s done,
he told himself grimly.
Blow it off and get on with the show. The guy was scum and deserved to die. And if he hadn’t died, your Rangers would never have had the chance they do out there now. You did the right thing.

But he couldn’t help thinking that if Felix had reached him a little earlier with the satellite information, then Abu Alam wouldn’t have had to die. The black-market chief had been captured, but he’d had no idea why, until Remington had shown him the map and started asking questions.

Fate,
Remington thought.
It was just meant to be, and it’s better it was Abu’s bad luck than ours. We’re trying to do something right in this world.

The on-screen scene shifted back to Sid Wright standing in front of one of the bombed-out buildings near Sanliurfa’s downtown.

“How much truth is there to this accusation, Sid?” the off-screen anchor asked.

“At this point, I don’t know. It’s a rather interesting story, and there appear to be many witnesses to back up these people’s claims. I’m going to follow up on it and will let you know.”

Remington made a mental note to talk to Hardin and find out what he’d done with Abu Alam’s body. Reporters sniffing around after the man changed things. The situation had changed from don’t-want-to-know to need-to-know.

He put the earpiece down and checked his watch. Less than a minute remained. He glanced at the wall screen, aware that Felix was roving around the command center and chatting with people manning the equipment. It seemed like the man had gotten to know everyone in just minutes.

The headset beeped for Remington’s attention.

“This had better be important,” Remington warned.

“Sir, I think it is, sir,” Corporal Donleavy of the security detail outside the command center announced. “I’ve got a man here, sir, who claims to be with the CIA. He says his name is Alexander Cody, sir.”

“I know Agent Cody,” Remington said. “What does he want?”

“To talk to you, sir.”

“Inform Agent Cody that at this juncture talking with me is impossible.” “Yes, sir.”

In the background, Cody raised his voice and said, “You tell Captain Remington that if he doesn’t talk to me, he’s going to be talking to his superior officers. No one manhandles my agents. You tell him that I’ll have his—”

“Corporal,” Remington interrupted, shocked. He’d taken no action against the CIA agents since returning Agent Winters to them the day before. Harsh words had been exchanged then, but Cody hadn’t seemed as agitated as he was now.

“—roasting on a fire three feet high, and I’ll take a knife to his—”

“Yes, sir,” Donleavy answered.

“—and pull it out through—”

“Send Agent Cody in,” Remington said. “With adequate supervision.”

“Yes, sir.”

Remington closed the headset frequency. He glanced at the wall screen again, counting down in his mind and knowing Goose would have his troops going by the numbers.

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six—