"Bring her down," he said again. "I'll take the heat if anything goes wrong."
The two Army pilots just looked at each other. It did seem stupid just to keep circling. And they were as anxious to get the show on the road as anyone. So they nodded and told Smitz to tell the Marines to get ready. Then they leaned on the controls and the big chopper began falling out of the sky.
Smitz scrambled to the back and gave the high sign to the Marines, but they already knew they were going in. They were crouched in their ready positions, weapons up, helmet visors down, tension and excitement very thick in the air.
Smitz checked his own weapon; it was a standard-issue rather boring-looking M-16 that he had never fired. His plan for the next half minute was very simple: wait for the chopper to land and then get the hell out of the way as the Marines exited the aircraft and did their thing.
And that was just what happened. The big chopper landed with a tremendous thud. The downwash from its huge rotors caused the interior of the cabin to fill with smoke and exhaust, but this did nothing to dampen the Marines' verve. No sooner had the chopper stopped rolling when the big rear doors opened up and the Marines went running out. The copter's engines were still screaming, and Smitz was sure he heard gunfire as soon as the Marines hit the ground. He checked the clip in his own gun a second time, noted the time, took a deep smoky breath, then ran out of the copter's tail. This would be first time he'd ever been in combat.
He tripped coming down the ramp, of course, landing ass over teacup and sending his Fritz helmet flying off his head. Now came a bizarre piece of business as the Halo's rotor wash started blowing his helmet down the runway, away from the airplane, which was sitting about fifty yards away in the opposite direction.
It was weird because Smitz's first instinct was to chase his helmet—and that was what he did. But the damn thing was traveling faster than he could run. Still, he pursued it, not wanting to be without it when the bullets were flying, and not thinking that he was presenting himself as a very easy target to the hundreds of gunmen who could be hiding anywhere.
So he ran and tripped and got up and scrambled in a crouch some more, until he finally caught up with the helmet. Snatching the damn thing by its strap, he slammed it back down on his head. Then he turned around and focused his attention back to the matter at hand.
But something very odd was happening here. He was sure he would see the Marines storming the ArcLight airplane, and maybe hear the sounds of a fierce gun- fight in progress. But when he turned back to the action he was surprised to see that the Marines were more or less . . . standing around.
This wasn't right.
Smitz got back to his feet and began running towards the airplane. He met one of the platoon leaders running for him in the opposite direction.
"What the fuck is happening?" Smitz yelled at him over the roar of the waiting chopper.
"It's the wrong airplane!" the Marine yelled back.
Smitz stopped dead in his tracks. He grabbed the Marine by his collar.
"It's
what
!?"
"It's the wrong airplane," the Marine yelled again. "It's not the gunship."
Smitz let the Marine go and together they ran up to the aircraft. The other team members had stripped off the tarpaulin covering, and Smitz could see the plane was definitely a C-130. And it was painted just like the ArcLight aircraft, or at least the same as the pictures he'd seen of the rogue gunship. But the numbers on the side of the fuselage and the tail appeared to be very crudely painted on. And many of the cockpit windows were either smashed or gone completely.
Smitz's heart sank to his feet. He climbed inside the airplane and saw it was completely empty. No guns. No computers. No nothing. Just an empty cargo bay.
"Jessuz, did you check the numbers up front?" he asked the Marine.
The soldier nodded. "They don't match," he replied. "Nothing does. This plane doesn't even have portholes for any guns. See?"
Smitz felt the air just go right out of him. He couldn't believe it.
They had come all this way . . . for the
wrong
airplane?
*****
There were tears in the eyes of the Marines when Smitz arrived at the prison building.
When he scrambled through the blasted-away front door, the first thing he saw was a bunch of Team 66 men hunched over, turned away from each other, silently crying.
Smitz passed by them slowly—his first thought was that many of their comrades had been killed in the attack. But when he reached the area where everyone else was gathered, he took one look at the nine bodies and knew this was a different horror they had to face. It was unreal for a second or two. No one was talking. No one acknowledged his presence. Everyone was just milling about. And the nine dead Americans didn't look dead at all. They looked like they were asleep. All lined up in a perfect row. With small parts of their skulls blown off. And tiny trickles of blood flowing out. Some with eyes open. Some with smiles frozen on their faces. It was almost as if they had been expecting what had killed them—yet did not resist.
How strange a thought was
that
?
Smitz staggered back for a moment, catching himself just as he was about to fall over. It was starting to sink in now. All those long days. All the stress. All the training. All the bullshit. And for what? To come after the
wrong
airplane? To be fooled by a dupe set up to foil them? And to get nine countrymen they were supposed to rescue killed in the process?
No wonder the Marines were crying.
Smitz felt a lump growing in his throat as well. His eyes were glued on the nine corpses as a very distinct fear gurgled up from his stomach. How could he ever sleep again after this? And what dreams would come to him if he did?
He finally sucked it up and cleared his throat to speak.
"Have . . . have you checked this place for booby traps?" he asked Chou.
The stoic Marine officer just nodded once. "It's clean as far as we can tell. Plus, I dispatched three antiambush teams to watch the outside. But I believe we are the only fools at this place. Live fools, that is."
Smitz then told the others about the decoy airplane. No one was surprised to hear it. It had been just too easy from the beginning, they were mumbling now. Getting into Iraq undetected. Finding this place on the first try. Happening upon it while the AC-130 was supposedly on the ground. Things just didn't go that smoothly in combat. Usually, if there was any luck floating around, it was bad luck.
And now the unit had a ton of it.
"Yeah," Smitz heard Norton whisper to no one in particular. "Someone
definitely
knew we were coming. . . ."
*****
Smitz and Norton stayed with the video man.
They wanted to make sure every inch of the prison was caught on tape. Delaney stayed with the doctor. He supervised getting the dead airmen loaded into body bags. As the grim process began, the vibes inside the prison building began to change. Shock and sadness were turning into anger and fury. Team 66 had been in tight spots before, but never had they been compromised. And never had they had such a failure. But to be fooled so completely—the whole unit had to share the blame. What really twisted the gut was that the culprits had gotten away unscathed. That was why there were no enemy bodies anywhere. There
had
been no enemy. The Marines and the Hinds had done all the shooting. Whoever was responsible for the grand deception had left the hidden base before chopper unit arrived.
That was probably the worst of it. It was obvious the nine Americans had been dead for only a short while. After enduring ten long years of captivity, they had been killed when help was just minutes away.
Tragic heroes in all senses of the term.
Or so it seemed . . .
They loaded the nine bodies onto Truck One. Then Team 66 dynamited the prison building, the dupe C-130, and anything else they could find of value. Norton and Delaney climbed back into their choppers and were soon airborne. The Marine choppers took off and met Ricco and Gillis at 1500 feet. Per the alternate plan, each aircraft quickly took on fuel, then turned as one for the long ride back to the Bat Cave.
For the entire flight, in Norton's eyes, everything had turned a shade of red.
Maybe the oddest thing that happened to Norton that day occurred shortly after they returned to the Bat Cave.
Landing went as smoothly as could be expected. His Hind was the last to be pushed into the cavern before the fake vegetation was put back in place, sealing them in once again. All the important gear was promptly stowed away and the Marine pickets were quickly dispatched outside.
To say the mood inside the cave was somber wasn't close to capturing the right word. Everyone in the unit was walking around red-faced, with fists clenched, agitated. Restless.
Angry.
They had failed, miserably, and now living with that truth had begun.
Returning to the cavern itself was a source of contention, though not verbally. Shortly after leaving the hidden air base, Smitz told them they were now operating under orders contained in something called Contingency #2. Which said, if the first attempt at the raid proved unsuccessful, they were to return to the ingress site and evaluate the situation before pulling out completely.
Had it been put to a vote, it would have been unanimous that the unit just go home. But Smitz was following orders—and the orders said return to the Bat Cave, even if it meant using up the fuel they would need to get out of hostile territory. So that was what they did.
But even this prospect wasn't foremost on Norton's mind at the moment. Once his Hind had been stored away properly, he grabbed a blanket and simply lay down on the cavern's floor underneath the helicopter— and instantly fell asleep.
And for the first time in years, he actually dreamed.
In his dream, he traveled to a small American Midwest town. A place where the fifties never ended. Here, at a grocery store, he met the wife of the gunship's copilot, Mrs. Pete Jones. She was cuter than her photo and hadn't aged a day since it had been taken. Norton had sought her out to ask her a question: How had her husband and the three other remaining crewmen of the ArcLight aircraft avoided getting shot in the back of the head? Mrs. Jones replied that Norton must have been mistaken. Her husband had died ten years before, during the Gulf War, and she barely thought about him anymore. So Norton took her back to her house and slept with her. But when he opened his eyes the next morning, he could not wake Mrs. Jones. She was dead herself, a bullet in the back of
her
skull. She had lain like that all night, bleeding slowly on the bed right next to Norton.
That was when someone began shaking him.
Norton opened his eyes for real and saw one of the SEAL doctors looking down at him.
He was saying: "You want to see this or not?"
Norton stumbled to his feet. He wasn't quite awake yet. The lights in the cave seemed to be flickering. Everyone he saw seemed pale and drawn, moving like shadows away from him. A rotten smell drifted into his nostrils. He stared at his watch. It read 2350 hours. Could that be right? Had he really slept more than twelve hours?
He shuffled to the rear of the cave, trying to keep up with the SEAL doctor who had roused him. The unpleasant smell grew more intense the deeper he walked into the cavern. Finally he reached an area where the SEAL doctors had one of the nine dead Americans up on a makeshift operating table. They had opened up the man's body like a side of beef and were performing an on-the-spot autopsy. Delaney, Smitz, and Chou were standing nearby, hands to their noses, eyes watering.
Norton nearly threw up.
"You woke me . . . for
this
?' he barked at the SEALs.
"You're the senior military officer here," one replied. "There's something here you might want to know."
Norton had never seen a person gutted before, and it was not a pretty sight. The man was torn open from his groin up to the bottom of his rib cage. His stomach and large intestines had been removed and their contents placed inside plastic bags tied with string to the thighs just below his genitalia.
"This man was shot with an M-16," the doctor was saying, pointing to the man's slightly shattered skull. "The same type of weapon we were all carrying. Same ammo. Same bore. Same everything. All nine were killed that way."
Norton felt his stomach do a back flip.
"Now I'm not an expert at this," the SEAL continued. "But I believe I can tell you some of what this guy ate in the last eight hours or so."
Norton finally turned away. "I don't need to know that."
"Yes, you do," Smitz interjected.
The doctor had already started poking through the bag containing the contents of the dead man's stomach, trying to separate the bits of uneaten food from one another.
"Would you believe this guy had a steak about an hour before he died?" the doctor asked. "With some baked potato? Chocolate cake? And scotch?"
Norton gagged. But for the fact that he hadn't eaten in twenty-four hours himself, he would have lost it right then and there.
"What are you trying to say?" Norton heard himself ask. "That the Gomers fed their prisoners real good before they shot them?"
Smitz just shook his head in disgust. "For Christ's sakes, Norton, get with the program, will you?" he said angrily. "This guy wasn't a prisoner."
Norton protested, "Of course he was! What are you talking about?"
Smitz dragged him away from the autopsy and to the place where the unit's video man had set up his equipment. Delaney and Chou followed close behind.
"Wake up, will you? Look at this," Smitz said.
He pushed a button, and the small video setup started a tape rolling. The footage showed the inside of the prison building shortly after the raid.
"Look real close," Smitz said.
Norton did. The battered insides of the building were clear of smoke when the tape was shot. And it was peculiar, because even though Norton had been there at the time the video camera was capturing these very images, he was seeing many things for the first time. Like a
lot
of wrecked TVs. And a wrecked Bose stereo system. And many wrecked CD players. And a bunch of busted X-rated videotapes. And several destroyed air conditioners. And many cartons of empty Budweiser cans tipped over.
Now Norton's head began a slow spin.
At that moment, the SEAL doctor was suddenly beside him again. He was holding a plastic spoon in his hand. It was covered with a black gooey substance, which in turn was covered by a ghastly bloody coating.
"You know what that is?" he asked Norton, not waiting for an answer. "It's caviar. Caviar! This guy had eaten about a half pound of it about one hour before getting iced."
Norton reeled back from the horrible stuff.
What was happening here?
His stomach began to flip again. His lungs seemed to collapse. His knees turned to water.
Suddenly Delaney grabbed him.
"Hey, pards, let's get some air," Delaney suggested.
With Smitz in silent protest, they walked to the front of the cave, picked up two M-16's, then passed through the fake foliage and quickly out into the hot night. It was past midnight by now, and the wind blowing across the desert below was kicking up dozens of little sandstorms. To the east, the moon was on the rise. Strange animal noises could be heard echoing nearby.
They walked to the edge of the cliff and beyond where the Marine pickets could see them. They were now facing due east. It seemed as if the entire country of Iraq was spread out before them.
Norton took in a couple of deep breaths. His head began to clear—slowly.
"Something is very, very wrong, Slick," he was finally able to blurt out to Delaney.
"A grand understatement as usual," Delaney replied. He was looking a bit pale himself—and worried. This was not a good sign.
"What do you think is going down?" Norton asked him directly. "Tell me."
Delaney just shrugged. "Well, let's review," he began. "They gather us together from the four corners of the earth—to train for a mission none of us is qualified for. Then they give us aircraft we can't fly. Then they bust our balls to get us over here. Then we spot the target in one recon flight instead of a dozen. We pick out the plane. We land. But it's not the right plane— and three quarters of the guys we're supposed to rescue have been freshly killed. With guns and ammo just like ours.
And
now it appears these guys haven't exactly been eating bread and water for the last ten years."
They went silent for a long moment. The hot wind blew in on their faces.
"Man,
none
of this computes," Norton murmured.
"Ever think that you're being set up?" a third voice asked.
Norton and Delaney whipped around, their rifles up in a flash.
They were startled to find a man standing right behind them. It was no one from the cave. This person was wearing an all-white flight suit, white boots, white gloves, and a white helmet. The helmet's mirrored visor was pulled down and despite the darkness, Norton and Delaney could see the reflections of their own stunned expressions staring back at them.
Delaney nearly shot the guy. He'd raised his gun, aimed it at the man's throat, and slipped off the safety, all in the span of one second. It was only Norton pushing the rifle barrel away at the last moment that prevented Delaney from pulling the trigger. There was an awkward, chilling span of several seconds. Finally the guy raised his helmet visor and showed his face. Both pilots nearly fell off the mountain with astonishment.
It was Angel. The mysterious Nordic-looking guy they'd seen several times hanging around Seven Ghosts Key.
"How the fuck did you get here?"
Delaney hissed at him.
Angel just shook his head. "Can't tell you," he said with a relaxed smile. "If I did I'd have to kill you."
But Delaney was in no mood for such an old joke. He put his gun back up to the man's throat and asked him again.
Once more Norton intervened. "Hang on, Slick," he said, moving Delaney's gun again. "He's one of us. Or at least I think he is."
Another tense moment passed. Finally Delaney relaxed a bit. They both contemplated the man before them.
Obviously he had flown here—but how? And where was his aircraft? And why hadn't the Marine pickets seen his arrival?
But most important at the moment,
what
was he doing here?
"I don't want to see you guys get your asses hung out to dry," Angel replied, reading their minds.
"Is that right? Is that something that's going to happen?" Norton asked him.
"A distinct possibility," Angel said.
Norton finally lowered his rifle completely. Delaney did too.
"Really? Educate us then," Norton told him.
Angel just shrugged. "Well, look at the facts, like you were just doing," he said. "They send you over here to rescue a bunch of Americans who they said were being held prisoner. But those guys wind up dead ten minutes before you cruise in. What does that tell you?"
"Beats me," Delaney said. "What does it tell you?"
Angel just shrugged again. "If I had to guess, I'd say someone was making sure whatever those guys saw— or did—wouldn't get out."
Norton thought about this for a moment. "You mean like Iraqi atrocities, things like that?"
Angel laughed.
"Man, are you guys out of the loop!" he said. "You really still think those guys were imprisoned all this time?"
Both pilots looked back at him sternly.
"Are you saying they were . . .
in
on this?" Delaney asked him angrily.
But Angel just laughed again.
"You saw what they were eating, I assume? What they were entertaining themselves with?" he asked. "That sound like prison to you?"
"But that's insane," Norton said through gritted teeth. "There's got to be another explanation. Maybe the guards were plugged in to the TVs and CD players."
"And forcing gourmet meals down those guys' throats?" Angel asked. He paused a moment. A wild dog cried in the wilderness. A shooting star streaked overhead.
"Look," Angel went on. "Consider this: Suppose those nine dead guys
were
in on it, and the game was close to being up. What would happen? Maybe someone pulling the strings realizes there's a problem on just how to lose these people. Because people talk. Especially ones holding secrets. So they gather y'all together and send you in. But before you arrive they shoot nine of the crew, and make sure they do it with the same kind of guns you guys are carrying. In my mind that's setting you guys up. You wouldn't be the first patsies in the history of special ops. Or the last."
Another pause. Another cry on the wind.
"And it all looks like a rescue mission gone wrong," Angel concluded. "Just like all rescue missions go wrong. Or most of them anyway."
Norton and Delaney both collapsed, their rear ends hitting the hard cliff floor with two simultaneous thuds.
Norton was numb, his mind racing. By any stretch of the imagination, could this be true?
"But why?" he finally mumbled. "Why would they do this? And who is
they
to begin with?"