Shock Warning

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

“There they are.” In the desert, near the launchpads.

The Viper could be used as a sniper rifle, and while Devlin didn’t have a sniper scope on this one, what he did have was powerful enough to let him draw a clear bead on the three figures in the distance.

He could put a bullet through Skorzeny’s head right now, and none the wiser.

At first Maryam wasn’t sure whether he was talking about the Shahabs or the hostages. Three people standing alone in the desert. Even from this distance, she recognized Amanda’s tall form, Mlle. Derrida, short and chic, and Skorzeny. She shuddered inwardly, and hoped it didn’t show.

“I should kill them all now, save us time and trouble,” Devlin said.

“Don’t you trust your friend?” She wasn’t sure which name he was going by for this operation and could not ask.

“Don Barker. That’s his name. Don Barker.”

“Just like yours is Frank Ross.”

“It is to you — little Miss No Last Name.”

“Do you think we’ll ever trust each other?”

Devlin resighted. Pumpkin time: one, two, three… “Probably not.”

“Does it matter?”

“Probably not.” And then he heard it. Thwack thwack thwack… It was like the beating of wings.

Danny.

“I used to think that sound was angels,” she said.

“It is,” he said, up and sprinting now. “Black Angels.”

The sound was bringing out the soldiers, but that didn’t matter. Danny was here, right on schedule. The poison in the system of the Iranian nuclear program was working. The lasers were being retargeted. In a few minutes, if his aim held true and his nerve was steady and his luck held, they would all be on the chopper, heading for the rendezvous point at Desert One while the Super Hornets came in and bombed every single one of the Iranian nuclear-enrichment facilities. The Iranian air force would be no match for them, and with chaos breaking out all over the country as the miracle failed to appear, their pilots would be distracted. The mullahs would be the bride stripped bare by her bachelors, helpless against the rage of their people.

At last, the West was using the East’s most potent weapon against it — superstition.

Payback time.

The time of the Black Angels and the guardian angels. He had his and she had hers. For the first time, they were in together, going into action the way Branch 4 teammates should, going into battle with another of their own.

And they were all going home. Life would triumph over death. The end times, with all their apocalyptic carnage, would have to wait for another day, another year, another millennium, another eon. Back to the eternally receding future with you, O Legend. There was no need for ghosts here. Not among the living.

He started firing. The Viper was a fine piece of equipment and the soldiers fell one after another, toy soldiers dying for a cause they didn’t understand and couldn’t understand. Pop pop pop pop pop… he was firing on semiautomatic, setting them up and knocking them down. There was no use in putting it on full assault-rifle auto and wasting ammunition. In his experience, when you got to the full-auto part of the program you were already in big trouble, and big trouble was a place he did his damnedest to stay away from. Full-auto was Last Stand time. Full-auto was a marksman’s pathway to hell.

He was not ready for hell yet.

He kept firing and the men kept dropping. Two of the three figures in the desert had dropped to the ground, the women sheltering each other, Skorzeny trying to make a run for it.

Shoot him… shoot him now.

He took aim.

Thwack thwack thwack…

And then he saw — the first missile was starting to launch.

“Come on!” he shouted to Maryam.

The big Black Hawk was directly overhead now. Would Danny lower the ropes or would he try to land?

No time to ask. No time to worry. Danny would do what he had to do. And now he had to do what he had to do.

He charged, firing as he ran.

In the distance, he could see a phalanx of Jeeps, tearing out of the mountainside and streaming across the salt desert.

Twin M240 machine guns spat hot death. Nobody could shoot and fly like Danny. Two of the Jeeps flipped and burst into flames.

“Rockets, damn it, rockets!” he shouted.

On the launchpad, the first of the Israel-bound Shahabs was shuddering on the launch pad. No time… no time…

And Hellfire roared.

AGM-114s. The specially equipped Black Hawk had two of them. It needed both.

The missile was starting to lift off.

Covering fire was raking the Black Hawk, but Danny wasn’t going anywhere. He kept the bird steady, trying to get the second Hellfire into position for a kill shot on the Shahab. Kill it on the ground, strangle it in its cradle, before the demon bird could take flight and visit destruction a thousand miles away.

“Come on!”

One of the Jeeps had a .50-caliber gun and it was firing as it raced toward the launchpad. Danny couldn’t fight back — his attention was on the missile. He was going to stop the missile or die trying.

No need — the virus was already killing it. But he didn’t know that.

Devlin had to stop the Jeeps.

He was closer now, with a good bead on the Jeep. His first shot was a kill shot, right through the head of the gunner. The .50-caliber spun wildly, firing with a dead man’s hand on the trigger.

Devlin’s second shot took the man’s hand off, and the firing stopped.

His third shot penetrated the engine block and the fourth shot penetrated the driver’s skull. The Jeep careened, spun and flipped over.

Just as—

— the Shahab began to lift off and—

— the Black Hawk fired its second Hellfire.

Wobbling, the Shahab lifted into the air… and then started to gyrate wildly, spinning out of control. It was no longer going straight up but toppling… heading into the desert.

A burst of gunfire to his right. Maryam had the Kalashnikov and was peppering the other Jeeps, taking out the front tires of one and sending it head over heels.

Amanda was down, motionless, and Mlle. Derrida was screaming for the noise to stop as he passed the women. Skorzeny was up ahead, running into the missile field.

He followed him. This time, he would not get away. There was no bolt-hole for the bastard. At long last Emanuel Skorzeny was his.

Devlin closed the gap easily. Maryam and Danny could cover him.

Closer… closer…

And then the other missiles died.

Inside each lethal weapon, the guidance systems melted down, obeying the instructions of the poisoned NSA computer. His instructions. Delivered by none other than Emanuel Skorzeny.

Checkmate.

He tackled him on the fly.

He had his hands around his throat.

He was choking him to death.

“Die, you bastard,” he hissed. “Die. Die for everything you’ve done to me. Die for everything you’ve done to humanity. I don’t care what you die for, but die.”

Skorzeny was gurgling, turning purple. There was no sport in choking to death an old man, but he didn’t care. His blood was up, he was doing the thing he had been trained to do all his life, all his life since his mother had died in his arms in Rome, since his father caught the terrorists’ bullets to save him, since his parents had died because of this man, this Skorzeny, this beast, this animal, this monster.

“Stop!” cried Skorzeny. “You can’t kill me. I can’t die like this!”

“Why not?” In the distance, beyond his bloodlust, he could hear Maryam still firing. Something was wrong. Danny should have her by now. The fight should be over.

“Because it is not for you to kill me. You have not earned that right.”

“Try me.”

Something distracted him for just an instant, but an instant was all it ever took when you were parsing the line between life and death.

Somehow Skorzeny managed to squirm from his grasp. It was amazing what feats of strength a man was capable of, even an old man, when his life was on the line. That was the thing that always gave the lie to the nihilists and the atheists — that, when the chips were down and death was at the other end of the wire, every living creature struggled, nothing wanted to go gently into that doubleplusungood night, all fought for life, all pleaded, all begged.

A falling missile nearly brained him. Devlin rolled away as it came down, but in that same motion Skorzeny also rolled away, the two of them scrabbling for a foothold on a desert landscape that was suddenly undergoing something very much like a man-made earthquake. His earthquake.

The bastard was getting away.

Another missile toppled over. Whatever satisfaction he could take in their destruction was lessened by his chagrin at seeing his nemesis escape.

It was not going to happen.

A huge burst of fire from the Black Hawk. He looked up to see the rope ladder hovering just above his head. Maryam was firing from inside the chopper.

“Come on!” shouted Danny.

Devlin saw the others were already aboard. He could not hold up the mission. He had done his job. Almost.

Decide.

He decided.

He tugged twice on the ladder. “Go!” he shouted. “I’ll meet you at Desert One.”

Danny wouldn’t have to be told twice. He would take orders from the mission commander. He would leave him behind, to die if necessary. It was the chain of command, the only way a military operation could work. No time for feelings.

His last view was of her, looking down at him, the AK still in her hands, still firing at the new waves of Jeeps racing toward him.

Then the Black Hawk banked and climbed and was gone, disappearing into the night sky.

And then the Jeeps were upon him and he was alone, out there in the Iranian desert, with only his 1911 to keep him company.

He liked his odds.