Viper Team Seven (The Viper Team Seven Series Book 1) (25 page)

“What Mike is
trying to say is that he wants your team to go to Langley so you can look at
all the intel coming in, so that if BORTAC’s mission fails, you can know what
you are up against when you go in,” the VP explained.

“Yes,” Cummins
agreed. “We just want your team to know everything possible about these
terrorists. As your Marine Corps dictates, who, what, where, when, why.”

Parks was impressed
with the Director’s knowledge of the five Ws.

“But the minute
we receive word that BORTAC has failed – if they do – you’ll be sent in just as
normal,” Cummins confirmed.

Parks felt every
eye turn to him. He wanted to sink through the floor he was so self-conscious.
He felt like such a peon compared to these big-name National Security Council
members in the room. But he tried not to show his discomfort.

“If you have to
be sent in you’ll do a videoconference from Langley with us and we’ll nail down
the plan,” Anders spoke again. “But the important thing is that you get a first-hand
look at the intel coming in.”

Before Parks
could acknowledge the Vice President in any way, the President asked a
question. “Is your team gathered in the EEOB?”

“Yes sir, Mr.
President, they are.”

Winnfield
nodded. He admired Parks’ quiet, obedient mannerism. He didn’t ask a lot of
questions, he just listened and waited for answers. That was what the President
especially liked about Parks. He was not outspoken and his mouth didn’t get him
in trouble, from what Winnfield could tell anyway. The President was definitely
not regretting he’d chosen a Marine for this job, and right now, he doubted he
ever would.

“All right then,”
the President concluded, “you’re headed to Langley.”

Thursday, March 20
^th
– 0615 hours

Santa Teresa, New Mexico

Siraj knew that
if his team was going to move, now would be the time. The Border Patrol agent
had exited his vehicle and examined the ditch but had driven off without
further trouble. Siraj and his men had stayed low in the water for quite a
while and now he was assuming the coast was clear and they could resume their
run. Siraj decided that it was unnecessary to hole up in the safe house in
Santa Teresita since the Border Patrol was already swarming the neighborhood,
and instead planned to go straight to El Paso.

Just then,
another SUV could be heard coming down the road on the opposite bank. Siraj
again ducked down in the water and since he had goggles on, he opened his eyes
under the sludge and saw the others copying his move.

What could he do
now? There was an SUV on one bank, regularly patrolling, and now another on the
opposite side. There was no hope for them if they climbed out of this ditch and
tried to escape by land. The Border Patrol agents were seeing to that. So where
could they go?

Siraj felt his
lungs begin to ask for oxygen, then beg, then demand. But he was not going to
allow himself to come up for air until he was sure this Patrol vehicle had
passed. Suddenly, he could hold out no longer. Slowly and as quietly as he
could, he surfaced and gulped down as much air as he could. He scanned both
banks. Much to his delight, no one was there. Gently the others came up. Siraj
looked down the irrigation canal and then up it. He debated which way to go.
Both ways seemed to pose the same amount of risk. Then he made a discovery that
he hadn’t made during the heat of his escape. The water was moving. Slowly,
yes, but moving indeed. It was flowing down the canal. All he had to do was head
downstream, using the water for protection, and he would get away from the
Border Patrol. If they made it across the Rio Grande and into El Paso, everything
would be fine, and they could head for their sleeper’s house.
Of course,
he thought.
Yes, that makes sense
.

Siraj motioned
with his hand for his men to follow and he waded through the waist-deep water
to the side of the bank where numerous cattails were growing. They could swim
or wade next to the cattails and when a Border Patrol SUV came by, they could
easily duck down again in the water and the Patrol would never find them.

Siraj smiled at his brilliance. This was going to work better than he expected.

*          *          *

Parks flung open
his office door and only peeked his head inside. “Okay everyone,” he began,
“let’s hit the pavement.”

Solomon spun
around in Parks’ swivel chair, which he’d taken the liberty of occupying, and
asked the question on all of their minds. “What’s happening?”

“I’ll tell you
on the way to Langley. ICEBERG is outside, and we need to get going.”

“Langley?” Norse questioned in confusion. “Why on earth are we going there? CIA Headquarters?”

“I said I’ll
tell you on the way. Now let’s go,” Parks insisted.

The team began
to file out the door with Parks in the lead. They were all tired. It had been a
tough week and it was only going to get tougher. They were running off almost
no sleep and right now, sleep was most likely not on the “to-do” list for the
next twenty-four hours.

Parks exited the
EEOB and nodded to the Secret Service agents who were posted outside. Instantly
he spotted the white, military-style van parked out in front of the doorway,
and walked over to it.

Corporal Yahtzee
greeted Parks as he pulled open the passenger’s door and climbed in. He
extended his hand to Parks who shook it briefly and instantly applied
Germ-X
.
Yahtzee didn’t seem fazed in the least and Parks was glad for that. Most people
were offended. He didn’t do it to offend though; he did it to
defend
his
mostly germ-free hands.

Parks heard the
side door slam shut as Solomon pulled it closed. The van began to move. Once
again, he heard Yahtzee speak into his radio.

“ICEBERG to GOLDEN TOWER, the VIPER TEAM SEVEN is inbound. I repeat, the VIPER TEAM SEVEN is inbound.
Over.”

“ICEBERG, this
is GOLDEN TOWER. Copy that. Keep us up-to-date. Over and out.”

Yahtzee placed
the radio down and put both hands on the wheel. Obviously he had been informed
about where he was to go by the logistics officer. Parks was amazed at how on-the-ball
Bohn was.

A few seconds
later, Parks climbed into the backseat and did his best to explain to his men the
current situation, although he didn’t really have a good understanding of it
himself. When he was finished with his brief explanation, Corley spoke up.

“And why the Langley trip?” he wondered aloud.

“Well the D/CIA
wants us to see the intel his Intelligence Director has gathered,” Parks
informed him. “There’s a mountain of it and more is coming by the second,
although none of it is solid as of yet. He wants us to be physically there to sift
through it to get firsthand information and have an opportunity to ask
questions. If and when BORTAC fails to accomplish their mission, it will fall
to us. We will then do a videoconference with the President, Vice President,
National Security Advisor, and the Directors, and come up with a battle plan for
the best way to take out these terrorists.”

“Do you think
that BORTAC will fail?” Norse demanded in a cocky tone. “I mean come on,
they’re the best of the best with the Border Patrol.”

Parks was
beginning to tire of Norse’s know-it-all attitude. The guy clearly didn’t like
him and he obviously thought that a Marine was incapable of leading the team.
That was the part Parks hated the most about Norse. He was not even giving a
military man a chance just because he didn’t belong to the Central Intelligence
Agency or the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“I don’t think
you need to tell me about BORTAC,” Parks shot back to Norse. “I worked with
them for two years when I was stationed at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. I personally know the leader and I’d say I have at least
seen
each of the
team members. I’ve seen them in action; I’ve
been
with them during the
action. I even know what kind of plan they’re using right now because it would
be the same one I’d use. But all that doesn’t affect my orders one way or the
other. The President wants us to be prepared and that’s what we’re going to do.
Whether BORTAC fails or not.”

Norse had an
icy-cold glare on his face as he locked eyes with his leader. “Well if BORTAC
can’t do the job,” he began, “there is no way we’re going to be able to.”

Parks was about
to blast back but Lee had something to say. “Hold on, Greg. If our Major Parks
wants to play the role of a hero, let him. If he thinks he can do the job, let
him try. They’re his cards to play, let him play.”

The statement
had a little too much attitude for Parks’ liking, but it was true. Norse ultimately
had no say in what would go on. Everything rested on Parks’ shoulders, no one
else’s.

“Any questions?”
Parks asked, eager to diffuse a possible explosion.

There were none, so silence filled the van for quite some time until
Yahtzee yelled back at the team. “Here we are,” he said cheerfully. “Welcome to
Langley, Virginia, home of the Central Intelligence Agency.”

*          *          *

“Here,” Siraj
whispered to his men as he pointed at a large culvert.

They had finally
found their escape route. If they climbed into this culvert and began squirming
to the end, they would find themselves traveling underneath the Rio Grande. Siraj could hardly believe it had been this easy. After they crossed the Rio it wouldn’t be too hard to find the sleeper’s house, pick up the C4, and get on with
their operation. So while the Border Patrol was hunting for them back in that
thicket, they’d be across the Rio, in El Paso, heading for their sleeper
agent’s house.

“I’ll go first,”
Siraj stated as he pulled himself into the culvert, gun first.

His night-vision
goggles were working overtime in the pitch-black darkness. Even though he
figured the other side would be safe, he still held his pistol in front of him
just in case.

After quite a
while, his head stuck out of the culvert. He was almost completely out. El Paso was just outside. He looked back at his men and saw them piled up behind him, eager
to escape from the closing trap the Border Patrol had set.

Siraj emerged
from the culvert and entered a shallow irrigation canal. He looked around. It
seemed as though no one was nearby. Eager to move to a safe place where he
could make a plan, he gave a short order to his men. “Follow me. If anyone sees
anything, let everyone know about it and then duck down and stay down.”

Siraj broke into a fast but quiet swim. He wasn’t sure where he was going
but he knew what he was trying to find. Maybe if he stayed a jump ahead of the
Border Patrol, he could make it out of this mess alive.

*          *          *

“
They’re
what?
” Rule demanded to know.

Washington’s somewhat timid voice on the other end of the radio explained again. “We
searched this whole place, Mr. Rule, they’re not in here.”

Sure enough, the
BORTAC team was back at the temporary base camp set up just outside the thicket,
and they had negative results. Washington was trying desperately to calm Rule down
and tell him how much of a wild goose chase this had been. “They were in the
thicket, we have signs to prove that, but they’re not now. They could have
escaped anywhere from five minutes to two hours ago. We don’t know.”

“Do you know which
way they went? I need answers, Washington, not more problems.”

“We can’t tell,
sir,” the BORTAC team leader admitted. “For all we know...” Washington trailed
off and began to hold a conversation with someone nearby.

“Washington,” Rule said impatiently, “you’re on the radio with me, so talk to me, not to whoever’s
there.”

“Hold on.”

Rule was picking
up bits and pieces of the dialogue between the two agents but he couldn’t make
out everything and it was irritating him. “Washington...” Rule threatened.

“Sir, I might
have something here. Hold on please, just give me one minute.”

Rule
begrudgingly held on.

“Okay, we may
have a lead on the terrorists,” Washington said excitedly after a few moments.

“Go on.”

“This agent here
just talked to me and said he saw some movement on a dirt road that’s near
here. He said he couldn’t exactly make out what it was, and when he got out to
check there was nothing to point him anywhere. But he’s optimistic that it was
our targets.”

“
What are you
waiting for then, Washington? Get after them,
” Rule ordered.

“All right, all
right, we’re on our way. Over and out.”

The sector chief turned to Tee. “It seems like we are looking for a
needle in a haystack,” he admitted dejectedly. “We have to find them, we just
have to.”

*          *          *

CIA and FBI
badges were handed to the gate guard as ICEBERG attempted to come into CIA Headquarters.
The guard looked over the credentials, then at the people to whom they belonged,
and handed the badges back.

“And you two up
front are...?” the guard asked referring to Yahtzee and Parks.

“I’m a Marine,”
Parks answered. “And he’s a soldier – our driver.”

The guard
frowned. “You got a badge?” he questioned.

“No but we’ve
got an ID card, and I have a White House badge.”

“Let’s see the
badge then.”

Parks handed it
over and after much scrutiny he received it back.

“And you,” the
guard demanded while pointing to Yahtzee.

“I’ve got
nothing like that, just a military ID. I’m their driver.”

“Yeah, that’s
what your copilot said. Let me see your ID then.”

The same drill
occurred and then the guard declared, “The Deputy D/CIA called in and told me
about you guys coming and said for me to let you through. Your IDs match the
names he gave me so go ahead.” He waved them through.

Yahtzee parked
the van and shut off the engine. “I’ll be here for when you’re ready, sir,” he
told Parks.

Parks nodded his
approval and stepped out onto the pavement. The sun was up and the morning air
was cool. It looked as though it was going to be a wonderful day.
Too bad I
have to be stuck in a conference room all day,
Parks thought.
I’d rather
be taking out the terrorists in the great outdoors.

“Ever been to Langley?” Solomon interrupted as he walked up next to Parks.

“Yeah, once – when
I was in Expeditionary Warfare School.”

“You like it?”

“Sure, it was
pretty cool. I was only visiting though; now that I’ll actually be doing
something here I might notice some things I didn’t last time.”

“We’ve got some
interesting devices,” Solomon continued.

“When did you
stop working here and switch over to the EEOB?” Parks asked, trying to pass the
time as they walked up to a massive building.

“I’ve worked
here every day of my career up until a few days ago. I was promoted to the Director
of Counterterrorism Operations early this year, and then suddenly I was assigned
to be the deputy commander of a special counterterrorism team. That’s when I
moved to the EEOB. It was quite a change.”

“Wow, you must be
pretty good if you were the Director of CT Ops.”

“I don’t know
about that. To tell you the truth, I’d rather be lower on the totem pole and do
more hands-on operations. That’s part of the reason I was so thrilled to be
assigned to this team. I love to be in the front lines, not coordinate someone
else to do the harvesting.”

“I know what you
mean. I’d definitely rather do field work than sit in an office.”