Fenix (36 page)

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T
he Gulfstream-III aircraft landed gingerly on the concrete runway, creating puffs of smoke from the landing gear tires. As the nose wheel pitched down and touched the runway, the two engines roared and the aircraft slowed. Within seconds it had rotated off the busy runway and moved on to the taxiway which would take it to the tarmac meant for aircraft operated by the
RAW
under the ludicrously generic title “Aviation Research Centre”, or
ARC
.

This particular aircraft specialized in signals-intelligence or
SIGINT
. As such, the aircraft was outfitted with a mass of specialized electronic signals collection and processing equipment. The aircraft was flown by former air-force pilots, but during wartime, all
ARC
aircraft were integrated into the air-force surveillance network.
Nobody
operated alone on the modern battlefield. The days of daring and freelancing
ARC
missions were long over.

Even so, the
ARC
maintained a remarkable amount of independence and flexibility. This aircraft was no different. While official military-intelligence units were collaborating resources on collecting data on the enemy, this aircraft and its crew were on a different and secretive tasking. All that the pilot of this aircraft had said to the airborne-radar operators was their operational and flight requirements. The air-force crews on the
AWACS
hadn’t asked any more questions; they were ordered not to. And that had preceded yet another six-hour mission monitoring enemy signals whilst flying over enemy airspace. It takes special courage to fly unarmed, modified business jets over enemy airspace during wartime. But the
ARC
crews were no novices. Both pilots on this aircraft were former wing-commanders in the air-force with thousands of hours of military flying experience between them.

As they switched off equipment on board and the engines wound down, the crew in the cabin behind them were rubbing their eyes and stretching their arms and legs. These long missions could take their toll and fatigue level was high. The
ARC
didn’t have dual crews for each surveillance aircraft like the air-force. After all, the
ARC
was not the air-force. It wasn’t meant to fly continuous combat missions. But as with each war in history, this one was different. And they had been requisitioned.

A small, gray van, painted to look like a standard air-force crew-transport vehicle, pulled up alongside the aircraft just as the crew began walking out in their green overalls and small personal bags. The tiredness in their eyes was apparent. They wouldn’t be flying again for the rest of the day today, they hoped.

Other vehicles were already pulling up to refuel the aircraft, remove the massive amount of data onboard and take it to the
ARC
data-processing center. While the crew went to bed, the
RAW
data-analysts would get to work. And their work would lead to a new mission later that night.

              The departing crew noticed the speed with which their data was being collected by the analysts.
Well, that made sense
…they reasoned. After all, their aircraft
had
been airborne south of Lahore just
before
the nuclear explosion.

              But what the crews didn’t know was that their data was being used to determine the whereabouts of someone very special to
RAW
. And if that someone had gotten on the Pak army communication networks during the time this aircraft had been aloft, his whereabouts might just be hidden in the data. Like a needle in the proverbial haystack…

A
nsari followed his civilian escort as they made their way through the building to the underground floors. This section of the
RAW
operations-center was almost always hidden from the outside world. Ansari momentarily paused to look over the sudden change in the architecture in this section of the building. The interiors in here were far more modern and contrasted heavily with the colonial design of government buildings just one floor above. The lighting changed to slight blue-white, hidden in the ceilings. Sliding glass-doors designed for acoustic and electronic signal suppression replaced the wooden doors. And centralized air conditioning compensated for lack of windows.

Ansari was led by the civilian escort so that Basu could meet him in here rather than in his office upstairs. That office is
all
that Ansari had seen in this building during the secretive Tibetan operations. He hadn’t seen this even in the weeks past when he had been running mayhem against the jihadists in Kashmir. He could only imagine what other secrets Basu kept close to his chest.

“Here we are.” His escort turned a corner and reached a frosted-glass door that had the word ‘operations’ engraved on it. There were two heavily-armed police guards outside, standing on each side of the door. Another man sat behind a desk, waiting to grant them access. As Ansari handed his
ID
papers to the officer behind the desk, he glanced at the two armed guards. Not military, he surmised. Police or para-military personnel or simply
RAW
’s own security force?

“You are cleared,” the man behind the desk said. The two doors parted aside. Ansari took his papers and entered.   

The internal room was much larger than the corridors had suggested. There were large screens on the walls and a large conference room segregated by the rest of the room through glass doors. A couple-dozen people were moving back and forth between the conference room and the row of secure comms and other computer equipment. Ansari stood there, admiring the impressive setup. He was the only one in army fatigues here…

“Ansari, over here!”

Ansari turned to see Basu waving him into the conference room. He walked over to find the diminutive
RAW
man in a brown suit standing near the table as younger members of his team leaned over maps and paper printouts of what looked like transcripts. Ansari smiled:
RAW
doing what it did best.

“You made it,” Basu offered his hand, “good.”

“Quite a setup you have here,” Ansari exhaled. The
RAW
man smiled in that typical schoolmaster way of his. It  irritated Ansari to no end.

“All new, my friend.” Basu replied, still shaking Ansari’s hand. “They gave us all this last year. The government felt we needed to have a more centralized setup for us to work smoother and more efficiently. But for old-timers like me, this is over the top. These younger men here,” he gestured to his staff, “they will be able to make
far
better use of all this when I am retired…or dead.” He winked.

“So, why am I here?” Ansari couldn’t hold his curiosity any longer. It wasn’t every day that Basu had him flown to this holiest-of-holy places for an idle chit-chat. Especially not when a war was raging outside.

Basu waved the man over and pointed to the map on the table centralized around Lahore: “we have a possible location for you.”

“Haider?” Ansari asked as he leaned over the maps.

“Haider.” Basu nodded. “Our aircraft intercepted chatter from what we
believe
is his current headquarters, north of Lahore. Near this place called Muridke.”

“The bastard escaped before he nuked the city, didn’t he?” Ansari asked, his voice teeming in contempt. He had read the file on Haider many times.

Basu nodded. “Indeed he did. True to his character. And now he has made his way here,” Basu pointed to the location marked Muridke. “Northwest of Lahore but well outside of the blast radius.”

“What is he doing?” Ansari glanced at the transcripts.

“We don’t know,” Basu conceded. “His conversations suggest that he might be trying to marshal his remaining jihadist forces. Or he might simply be waiting for orders from Hussein. Perhaps even waiting to wrangle some excuse to head west before we all start nuking each other.” 

“That bad, eh?” Ansari asked. He had seen the news on his way here.

Basu crossed his arms: “we may only have hours before Hussein feels he cannot hold off a defeat. Our ground forces have secured large tracts of Pakistani land in the desert and near Punjab and have cut off the strategic highway in the desert. It is all over local Pakistani media and panic is everywhere. Their cities are on the verge of breakdown with no power, jihadist rallies in the streets and our jets thundering in the skies above. The navy has cut off all sea access and Hussein knows this. They nuked Lahore as a backhanded way to get us to back off…and also as a way to cry victim.”

“But why Lahore?” Ansari asked. “The city’s value to the Paki Punjabis is immense, symbolically and otherwise. Why not lash out in the desert somewhere? Or in Kashmir?”

“Because it
had
to be a city,” Basu noted. “With the rapid successes of our military forces on all fronts except for Lahore, there would be no way to sell this as an Indian strike to the world. No one would buy it. It would make no sense. But Lahore, a city held stubbornly and bitterly by jihadists and Pak forces? An Indian strike to break that resistance makes sense. Couple that with the equality that our own people impose between us and the Pakistanis, and the world is able to believe that we struck Lahore as retaliation for Mumbai. Only later will the contents of the nuclear explosion reveal their source. But the Pakistanis will make sure no one gets any access over there. Ever.”

“And even if they do,” Ansari said as he tossed the papers on to the table, “it will be far too late by then.”

“Exactly.”

“So we are still going after Haider?” Ansari asked.

“We are.” Basu replied. “If we can take him alive, we can put that bastard on trial. Maybe even get him to confess everything.”

“Will he?” Ansari asked dubiously.

“He is intelligent. He knows when his cards are gone. He will fold to prevent himself any harm.”

“And what if we can’t take him alive?”

Basu’s face turned grim: “then he will answer to Allah, and
we
will take him off our target list and move on to the next one above him.”

A
nsari unbuckled his seatbelt and got up just as the other passengers did the same. The whining noise from the four turboprop engines outside became visibly lower and changed pitch as they wound down. The air-force warrant-officer walked past them wearing his headphone. Towards the rear of the cabin he activated the controls and the hydraulics went into action, lowering the ramp. Ansari was the first one outside as he jumped off and hoisted his personal baggage over the shoulders.

He smiled as he saw Gephel walking over from his parked Axe vehicle:               “how long have you been waiting?”

He had to shout over the noise of the C-130J. The background chaos of Chandigarh airbase didn’t help either. All aircraft were flying without their navigation lights. The airbase was shrouded in darkness except for whatever lights the ground vehicles had on.

              “Not long,” Gephel shouted just as an IL-76 lifted off the runway and disappeared into the darkness. “we arrived an hour back. The other birds landed fifteen minutes ago and are being offloaded. We should be ready to leave in another half-hour.”

              “Excellent.” Ansari replied as Gephel waved him to the parked vehicle. “I want us up and away as soon as we can arrange it. We are extremely time critical on this one.” He hoisted his baggage into the vehicle and jumped in the rear. Gephel took the seat next to the driver, who took the cue and drove on.

              “Where are we going?” Ansari asked.

              “Other end of the airbase, next to those C-17s over there,” Gephel pointed. Ansari looked through the front glass and saw two parked C-17s with a lot of activity around them. He made out the silhouettes of two
LCH
gunships being offloaded. Two other helicopters were parked behind the aircraft and ground crews were busy installing their main rotor blades and stub wings. Ansari also saw several parked Dhruv utility helicopters in the grass beyond the tarmac.

              “Those are our guys?” Ansari pointed at the choppers.

              Gephel nodded: “Jagat and his panther boys. Our ride from here back to our forward operations center.”

              “Who’s leading the gunships?”

              “Our old friends,” Gephel smiled. “Group-captain Dutt. They just got airlifted in from Leh.”

              “What?” Ansari blurted out as the driver brought the vehicle to a stop some distance away from the nearest C-17. “Why are
they
being airlifted in? Aren’t they needed for Ladakh? What if the Chinese step in?”

              “Didn’t you hear?” Gephel asked as they disembarked the vehicle. “Our boys are clobbering the Pakis on the Siachen glacier. They always held dominant positions there and don’t need much help. The reasoning is that if the Chinese
do
step in, Dutt and his crews will get airlifted back. The twenty-odd Apaches and the two-dozen
LCH
s we have are stretched
far
too thin. This was the only way.”