The First Casualty (17 page)

36

City of Pecos

Reeves County, West Texas

6:27 p.m. Local Time

The Next Day

Day 5

Jason slowed the rented Ford to exit I-20. He had picked the car up at Midland International Airport, an hour and twenty-five minutes northeast. He had arrived there by an unremarkable and indistinguishable series of airports from San Juan to Miami to Dallas. A dawn-to-dark day of surly airline staff, tasteless airline food, and schedules far more hopeful than accurate. Contemporary air travel might be efficient­, but it was anything but enjoyable.

He noted he was on South Cedar Street. The downtown could have been any one of thousands across the United States: one- and two-story storefronts with the usual tenants. Connie's Cuts and Curls: If your hair doesn't become you, you should be coming to us. Chat and Chew: Texas breakfast $5.95 starting at 5:30. Pecos Feed & Seed.

There was also the usual empty windows induced by the Walmart he had passed on the way into town.

Following the signs, he made his way to a two-story brick building, a former hotel and now the site of the West of the Pecos Museum. At this hour, the parking lot was empty except for a gritty Dodge Ram truck under the security lights. It could have been black, blue, or dark green. Hard to tell under its coat of dust.

Jason stopped just before the parking lot's entrance and blinked his headlights once, counted to three and did it again. The truck came to life, its modified engine rumbling as headlights came on as though it were opening its eyes. Jason waited for it to pass him before pulling in behind.

Within a few minutes, the outskirts of Pecos were gone. Although darkness reigned outside the cones of their headlights, Jason got the impression there was no living soul within miles of the Ford and the truck, only the occasional ball of tumbleweed rolling across the road like an escaping child's toy. More to keep awake than for entertainment, he turned on the radio. His first sound was a high decibel plea to come to Jesus and, on the way, send a few dollars to the Cornerstone Church of San Antonio. A twist of the dial filled the car with the adenoidal twang of a man wronged by his woman. Jason switched the radio off.

What had he expected in West Texas, the London Symphony Orchestra?

Jason's inability to sleep on airplanes was catching up with him. The steady drone of tires on asphalt and the lack of anything of visual interest were tugging at his eyelids like lead weights.

This morning seemed like a week ago. He and Maria had met the charter, a single turbo-charged engine Piper Meridian with STOL capabilities to handle Saint Barts' less than generous runway. The four-person, pressurized, club-seating cabin had been quiet, too quiet. Maria had occupied herself with a women's magazine, a type Jason had never seen her read. After one or two efforts at conversation met with brief and frosty replies, Jason concluded that his participation in last night's fracas was suspected, if not proven. It was almost a relief when they parted in San Juan with a kiss that might have been shared by siblings rather than lovers. She took an American flight to New York to change planes and head back to Indonesia by routing that made Jason's head swim. An hour later, his Delta flight departed for Miami and the subsequent transfers that had brought him to Texas.

The truck up ahead was signaling for a right turn. Only seconds before Jason's Ford left the paved surface could he see the faint trace of twin tracks in the dirt. He had seen no sign or other indication of where to make the turn.

The truck was in the belly of a cloud of dust, its taillights only marginally visible. Dirt and pebbles scratched at Jason's windshield as though seeking admission. An occasional impact from below noted this path was better suited to a high-riding vehicle than a normal sedan.

After several minutes, the truck stopped. Jason could see its headlights reflecting from a gate in a fence that must have been fifteen feet high topped with razor wire. Although too far away to read, the lightning bolts and skull-and-crossbones on the adjacent sign made the
posted
and
keep out
notices redundant. In case a potential intruder still didn't get the message, surveillance cameras moved back and forth atop the gate posts. This was not some ranch fence erected as deterrent to straying cattle.

Somehow, the name over the gate seemed more ironic than informative:
peace and plenty ranch
. Jason knew this place represented neither.

Jason got his first view of the truck's occupant as he stood beside the open gate, motioning Jason through. Tall, with a broad-brimmed ten-gallon pulled low over his forehead. Leather vest and faded jeans stuffed into cowboy boots. All that was missing between this man and a B-grade western film was a six-shooter in a low-slung holster.

Jason waited for the man to climb back in the truck and lead the way. Minutes later, the two vehicles topped a slight rise. Below was a collection of single-story buildings that could have been bunkhouses from the same B-grade western. What no western, B-grade or otherwise, boasted was the mile-long runway Jason knew was on no aeronautical chart, or the collection of limousines that filled what would have been a real ranch's coral but here was a cement skid pad. In the widely scattered lights, the buildings, the cars, everything took on an ephemeral, almost ghostlike appearance.

But this was not a real ranch, nor, for that matter, did it pretend to be, despite the rustic appearance given to the casual observer, had one been allowed within a half mile of the place. It was a school of sorts, a place of learning things taught in no university. It was where the world's most skilled bodyguards came to perfect their craft. Its alumni included members of the security staff of the house of Saud, Bahrain, and a number of the other Emirates, as well as several countries where coups and assassinations played a significant role in the political process. From time to time, the U.S. Treasury Department contracted to send aspirants to the Secret Service's presidential detail there for training superior to their own. The CIA also sent an occasional honor graduate of The Farm, its own facility, there, although to what purpose was never made clear.

“He's in the laboratory,” Jason's escort said from outside the car. “And he's expecting you.”

Jason didn't reply that, had he not been expected, he would never have gotten there.

Instead, he got out of the Ford, noting the air had taken a decidedly chilly turn. He could see his breath as he asked, “Which building is that? They all look alike to me.”

“The one with no number.”

Jason squinted, unable in the dark to see numbers on any of the structures, and turned to ask the man to point it out for him, but he was gone, disappeared into the night. Only the sound of the truck's ignition proved he had been here at all.

Jason started down the slope, planting each foot with deliberation. This was not the time to suffer a debilitating fall. He yelped in surprise at an explosion of motion literally under his feet. Chagrinned at how easily he had been spooked, he listened to a buzz of wingbeats fading into the night. He had disturbed some prairie chicken's slumber. Oh well, be glad it wasn't a rattlesnake.

He was nearly startled into another exclamation when a voice came out of the dark. “Goddam, Artiste, you're the only person I know can wander around open country and make more noise than a punk rocker playing bagpipes! Louder than a pair of skeletons getting it on on a tin roof! You been in hostile territory, you'd be KIA.”

A quick glance told Jason the speaker had somehow left the buildings and come up behind him without a sound. “Didn't know I was in hostile territory,” Jason replied mildly. “How goes it, Chief?”

The shadow in front of him came closer. A tall man, long white hair in a braid. A hard, chiseled face that would have been at home on a buffalo nickel. And with good reason: James Whitefoot Andrews, Lieutenant Commander, USN (Ret.) was full-blooded Cheyenne. He traced his ancestry to Chief Black Kettle, who, unsuccessful in making peace with the white man through no fault of his own, was massacred by Custer at the Indians' camp along the Washita River, along with dozens of women, children, and the elderly.

Fortunately, Lieutenant Commander Andrews, or Chief, as he preferred to be called, held no grudges.

Andrews extended a hand which Jason took. “It goes well, Artiste.” He started down the rest of the slope. “C'mon down to my laboratory, and I'll get you a decent cup of coffee. I doubt you had one on the plane.”

Chief was either clairvoyant or had recently flown commercially.

37

Strait of Malacca

Indonesian Waters

1997

Then U.S. Navy Lieutenant Andrews had come up with a proposal involving minimum military or political risk to end piracy in the Malacca Strait, a problem that was a precursor to the troubles off the Somalian coast some years later. A rescued tramp freighter ready for the salvage yard, a month of ingenious retrofitting, and a squad ten Delta Force men under then First Lieutenant Jason Peters.

The nearly weeklong trip to the eastern entrance to the Strait of Malacca provided ample time to learn the singular attributes of the refitted ship. At the single refueling stop, a small corner of the massive port of Klang, Malaysia, the civilian-dressed crew enjoyed shore leave. The country, roughly half Moslem and half Christian, had reached a unique accommodation: Alcohol was forbidden to Moslems while freely available to Christians. If there were Islamic souls aboard the
Muriel
, they kept their religion to themselves as the crew en masse descended on those sleazy bars that line almost every large commercial harbor in the world. The local beer became a lubricant to tongues as the crew made acquaintance with the easy ladies who inhabit such places. The word changed from rumor to truth overnight: The ship was carrying a small but valuable cargo the exact nature of which was unknown to the crew, so valuable its composition was a deliberately kept secret between shipper and the ship's owners, who, in turn were unknown. An impartial observer might have wondered if an attack by pirates was being invited. Whether braggadocio or sheer stupidity were to blame, the value of the cargo was firmly established in the bars at well more than $500 million USD.

“You always carry a spare canvas and paint box?” Andrews asked, arms akimbo, as he looked over Jason's shoulder at the rendition of sky, water, and land. Andrews took a step closer. “Say, that isn't bad the way you do sunlight on water.”

“You sound surprised.”

“Guess I didn't expect talent like than in a ground pounder.”

Jason grinned, “You have a discerning eye, Lieutenant.”

Andrews took a deep drag and tossed a cigar butt overboard. “Let's hope so, Artiste. We may need it.”

And they did in the later hours of that evening. It was two bells into the first watch by the Navy's arcane timekeeping system, or right at 11:00 by Jason's wristwatch. He was asleep in a bunk that seemed to never completely dry out, a fact he had accepted as part of naval life.

“Huh?”

In the dim glow of the night light, he could see Andrews's unmistakable profile. “It's time, Artiste.”

“Time for what?'

“Time for you snake eaters to earn your keep. Radar has three craft approaching, all from different directions. Classic attack pattern.”

Jason was instantly awake. Slipping his feet into a pair of deck shoes, he stuffed a denim shirt into the dungarees in which he had been sleeping. He had long ago learned the seconds required to fully dress could be the difference between just in time and too late.

Above and around him, members of his squad were silently rolling out of boxlike bunks that looked all too much like stacks of coffins. In the dim red of the combat lighting, the men reminded Jason of imps from hell. At the foot of the companionway leading up to the main deck, each man paused long enough to take a predetermined weapon from a rack: The new Colt M4 carbine with its collapsible stock and PAQ-4 infrared laser designator, some with the bulky new M-203 40-millimeter grenade launcher. The last man to leave the mess hall that also served as bunking area, Jason lifted down the chest containing his M24 Sniper Weapon System that represented the U.S. Army's return to bolt-action sniper rifles. Because of the weapon's inability to take the abuse to which most military rifles were subjected, it had been stored not in an open rack, but in a metal container.

He was carefully sliding the Leupold M3A scope into place along the track on the top of the barrel when Andrews appeared at his elbow. “Best get on it, Artiste. That long gun of yours won't be any help tomorrow morning.”

Jason slowly hand tightened the securing screws. “Won't be any help tonight, I knock this scope off half a centimeter. At eight hundred yards, that would be a miss of over a foot. I . . .”

He realized he was talking to the space vacated by the lieutenant. Andrews was already halfway up the stairs.

Jason arrived on deck just in time to witness the last of organized confusion. Though the moonless night was too dark to see more than a few feet, the clink of metal on metal told him Delta Force men had taken pre-assigned positions along both the little ship's gunwales. Jason's post was atop the fo'c'sle just aft of the anchor wench.

He set the rifle on its two-legged stand underneath the barrel, uncapped the scope, and took a preliminary peek. Nothing but darkness. He opened the breach and jacked a shell into the chamber. There were four others in the clip, but only the first would really count. Either it struck home or the ambush was exposed. Although he had practiced his part in tonight's drama, he lacked the self-confidence for which the men of Delta Force were known. A shot over open sights or even the optically confined infrared scopes, yeah, sure. But a precisely placed bullet fired from a heaving ship with a wind that changed direction and velocity by the second? And, of course, there would be no time to correct the scope if the distance were far off that promised by Andrews.

He was spared further insecurity as events unfolded faster than he could follow.

First, a rocket screamed into the air from the bridge where Andrews had supposedly allowed the approaching craft to reach a point on the radar screen precisely 500 meters directly off the bow. Then night disappeared, stabbed by half a dozen high-intensity searchlights. Pinned to the black water like an insect in a viewing box, a steel motorized dhow churned toward the ship. At the bow stood a barefoot and shirtless man holding what Jason guessed was an old AK-74 with stubby under barrel GP-25 grenade launcher.

That would be consistent with what the Delta Force men had been told about the method of pirate attack: A warning shot fired to intimidate the victim vessel into heaving to, stopping, or risking a more damaging second shot.

Jason tried to ignore the yawing motion of his platform, to concentrate only on the man who filled his scope. Time went into slow motion, the fractions of seconds filling minutes as Jason made minute adjustments. Obviously surprised by the sudden light, the pirate at the bow hesitated a second too long.

In what seemed to take forever but actually occupied one or two seconds, Jason centered the crosshairs on the man's chest. A sure-kill head or heart shot would be pure luck from the swaying deck. Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in . . .

Through the scope it seemed the crack of the rifle itself knocked the man over backward, his AK-74 flying into space with a life of its own.

Not that it mattered. Behind him, Jason heard the groan of heavy metal. The much enlarged loading doors of the hold swung open. A Boeing AH-64 Apache helicopter rose from the depths, hovering over the deck for a second like a large, malevolent dragonfly. The spotlights seemed to slow its rotors as they spun in and out of darkness.

The chopper rose a few feet above the deck and rotated to face the dhow closest to the ship, the one from which the man with the grenade launcher had threatened. A couple of shots came up from the dhow before there was a
whoosh
as the Apache released the first of the four Hellfire missiles mounted between its main landing gear. The dhow simply vanished as though struck by a bolt from Olympus to be replaced by a light shower of parts, both mechanical and human, that dimpled the water where she had been.

As if by mutual agreement, the surviving pirates went overboard, several thrashing in the water as they remembered they could not swim. The remaining two pirate ships turned and fled. It took several repeated orders at the top of Andrews's voice before the ship's crew stopped shooting those helpless in the water.

“Goddammit,” Andrews raged later. “The whole point was to have survivors, not shoot fish in a barrel.”

Jason looked at him, a question on his face. “I thought the point of the exercise was to rid the strait of pirates.”

“We can't kill 'em all, but we can sure scare the shit out of them. I want every boy along the strait to hear about the old rust bucket that turned around and bit them in the ass.”

Jason was fascinated. “So, it was your idea to make a fighting vessel out of this old tub?”

“Yep. Not an easy sell to the brass, I admit. But I do have a reputation as a tinkerer. I was in charge of retrofitting this old tub.”

The two were silent as Andrews produced a bottle of amber liquid, and two glasses. He filled each halfway. “Single-malt scotch?”

Jason reached for the one nearest. “I thought spirits were forbidden on U.S. naval vessels.”

Andrews raised his glass in salute and nodded. “For medicinal purposes only. Fortunately, I am a very sick man.”