Project Cyclops Part 73

Since Launch is a muck-up now, our best bet is to keep Ramirez off guard for a while and go ahead and take down Command. Immediately, before they realize what's going on. With any luck, maybe they won't be expecting it." He looked around. "Make a three-point entry, flash-bangs and tear gas. Just blow out the place." He paused to let the words sink. "Well," he continued finally, "does anybody disagree?"

There were nervous frowns, but n.o.body did. Instead, they began silently collecting their gear.

11:59 P.M.

Hansen had returned to the bas.e.m.e.nt Situation Room, where maps and operation plans cluttered the teakwood table and littered meal trays, grease encrusting on the white china, were piled up in the corner. No stewards were allowed in the room, and n.o.body else was going to clean up. He had not slept for a day and a half, and he was now showing a ragged shadow of beard. Ted Brock had heard some of his aides upstairs commenting to each other _sotto voce_ that he had never seemed older.

"All right," he said. "I've called off the a.s.sault and given the b.a.s.t.a.r.d six hours to clear out. I've also released the money, had it wired to the account he wanted. So maybe now he'll leave quietly. Our deal is that he frees the hostages unharmed, disarms the bombs, and gets the h.e.l.l out of there. But I'll tell you something else: he's not going to live to spend a dime. The minute he's airborne, his a.s.s is ours. I want him shot out of the sky, and the h.e.l.l with the consequences."

"He'll probably take some civilians along with him," Briggs said.

"Hostages. We could be looking at some dicey press."

"All right, then, so we won't shoot him down; we'll just force him down, the way we handled that Libyan pa.s.senger jet with terrorists aboard. There was official flack for a week or so from the usual quarters, but off the record everybody was applauding. When you do the right thing, the world makes allowances for how you manage it."

Briggs remained skeptical, but he kept his thoughts to himself. He wanted to have as little to do with the operation as possible. Sooner or later there would be loss of life, he was sure of it, and the chances were the losses would be ma.s.sive. He had no interest in making the history books as the author of a civilian ma.s.sacre, terrorists or no terrorists.

"All right, Mr. President, I'll tell the Deltas to keep their powder dry until we play this one out." He had already heard from General Max Austin, who said Nichols was fit to be tied, eating his cigars instead of smoking them. Who could blame him? To have a Commander-in-Chief micromanaging an anti-terrorist op violated every known canon of military strategy. There might be a more surefire recipe for disaster, but it was hard to conjure one offhand.

Hansen, for his own part, recognized the pitfalls of giving the terrorists more time. However, he hoped it would end up being the rope-- make that false confidence--that would hang them.

He had wired the "ransom" money to the numbered account at Banco Ambrosiano, as requested. There, his intelligence on the ground was reporting, the eight hundred million had been split and transferred to several other accounts. Then portions of it had been immediately wired out--to a destination not yet known, though it d.a.m.ned well would be.

What, he wondered, was that all about? Were the terrorists in the process of s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g each other? It was a possibility. Everything was a possibility. But it also was smart, because it made recovering the funds that much more difficult. They were, in effect, laundering it even before they had made their getaway. These characters, whoever they were, were taking no chances.

7:03 A.M.

"Load it on now," Ramirez was saying. "We're taking it with us." He flashed a smile from behind his aviator shades. "You never know when you'll need a nuke."

Abdoullah couldn't believe his luck. He had been sure that Number One intended to try and kill him. But now it turned out to be the others, the ones he'd sent over to Command, that he planned to leave in the lurch.

Dawn was breaking, but there still was enough early fog to mask their movements partially. It was definitely time to get the show on the road. One of the bombs had been installed on the VX-1 vehicle and a countdown was under way. When that bomb devastated Souda Bay, n.o.body was going to be worrying about a lone chopper somewhere over the Med.

And with the other weapon still in their hands, the whole operation was going like clockwork. The money was in place --he was now rich--and they were packing to leave.

The bomb they were now loading actually made him think. Maybe, he mused fleetingly, he could just kill Number One and return it. It would be the final revenge for what the b.a.s.t.a.r.d did to Rais.

No, that was stupid. Better to just take the money and run. Lose the heroics. In fact, given how things had gone so far, the whole thing was almost too good to be true. In fact, that bothered him a little. More than a little. He had seen too much double-dealing already to believe anything Number One said or did.

He trusted Dore Peretz even less. The Israeli, he was sure, had a private agenda of his own. He always seemed to. Maybe he was planning to divert the bomb and take out Tel Aviv. He was crazy enough.

But who cared? They were getting out. Better still, Number One had indicated he intended to take the old professor, the Jew, with them.

With him on board, Number One had declared, there was no danger that the U.S. President would order the chopper shot down. The old guy made a perfect pa.s.sport.

But with Souda Bay being incinerated as they made their egress, it hardly seemed to matter. . . .

He grasped the lever on the forklift and, aided by Shujat, hoisted the bomb through the cargo hatch, guiding the edges of the crate. It weighed almost as much as they did together, but by now they were used to managing it. Interestingly, it still was wired to its radio- controlled detonator, with the explosive charges intact. He had the momentary thought that it should be disconnected, but now there was no time. That was something that should be done with extreme care. Maybe he would take care of it after takeoff, when they were airborne.

"Be careful," Ramirez went on. "But don't waste time. The vehicle is going up, and then we're going to be out of here. In less than an hour."

7:08 A.M.

"Team Two CQ," came Hans' voice on the walkie-talkie. He and Marcel were in the overhead ventilation duct above Command, which had been depicted in great detail in the blueprints. Hugo Voorst had been left to fend for himself, while Willem had split off with Dimitri Spiros, forming Team Three.

"Team Three CQ," Willem reported next. "Ingress looks like a go." He and Dimitri were at the rear exit, which pa.s.sed through Bill Bates'

office. They had entered through the tunnel that connected Bates'

office and the living quarters. The door had been set with C-4 and was ready to blow.

"Copy. Team One CQ," Armont whispered into his own radio. He and Reginald Hall were now in the outer lobby, and just ahead of them stood the doors that led into Command. Together the teams formed a three- p.r.o.nged attack that would seal off all egress. "Take down anybody with anything in their hands. And watch out for Michael. I don't think he's in there, but you never can tell."

"If he is," Willem Voorst's voice said, "he'll know what to do."

As they waited, Reggie gazed around Reception in disgust. The deserted guard desk looked as though it had been strafed by an automatic, almost as if the terrorists intentionally were wreaking as much destruction as possible.

"Cheeky b.a.s.t.a.r.ds," he muttered under his breath. "Why do these terrorist blokes always think they've got to trash a place?"

"Reggie," Armont whispered back, "these gentlemen did not attend Eton.

You have to learn to make allowances. And right now they appear to be trying to deliver an atomic bomb into somebody's backyard, which would tend to suggest they're not model citizens. One has to expect a disheartening want of tidiness in such an element." He checked his watch. "All right, get ready."

Ahead of them the doors to Command were closed--who knew if they were locked or even b.o.o.by-trapped? But it didn't matter. The C-4 had already been attached around the frame. Exploding it and the other door opposite would serve as a diversion, drawing the first fire and giving Hans and Marcel the moment they needed to make their own ingress, rappelling in under cover of flash grenades and mopping up.

That was the plan, at any rate. A three-point entry, with flash grenades and tear gas. It usually worked.

Armont clicked on his walkie-talkie again and checked his watch. "All teams alert. a.s.sault begins in three-zero seconds. Starting now."

7:09 A.M.

Peering down into the room through the overhead grating, Hans felt his palms grow sweaty. This was the moment he always hated. Even after all his years with the a.s.sault squads, Spezialen-satztrupp, in GSG-9, he had never gotten over this moment of soul-searching panic.

Twenty seconds.

He glanced up from his watch, then tested the rope he and Marcel would use to rappel down into the room. Finally he adjusted the hood of his balaclava one last time in an attempt to quell his nerves. It never worked, of course, and it wasn't working now. Still, he always did it.

More helpful was checking the clip on his MP5. He had a spare taped to the one now loaded, making it possible to just flip them over. A third was taped to his wrist. It should be enough. Ten seconds.

That was the moment--it always happened--when he felt his mouth go dry.

Bone dry.