Area 51

CHAPTER 2

“Sprechen Sie Deutsch?”

Mike Turcotte turned with a blank expression to the man who had spoken. “Excuse me?”

The other man chuckled. “I heard you came here from those high-speed counterterrorist boys in Germany, but I like that response. Don’t know nothing, didn’t come from nowhere. That’s good. You’ll fit in well here.”

The man’s name was Prague, at least that was how he had introduced himself to Turcotte earlier in the evening when they’d met at McCarren Airport. Upon meeting him Turcotte had immediately sized up the other man physically. Prague was a tall, lean man, with black eyes and a smooth, expressionless face. His build contrasted with Turcotte’s, which was average height, just shy of five feet ten inches. Turcotte’s physique was not one of bulging muscles but rather the solid, thick muscular physique some people are born with, not that he hadn’t maintained it over the years with a constant physical regime. His skin was dark, natural for his half-Canuck, half-Indian background. He’d grown up in the forests of northern Maine, where the major industries were lumber and hard drinking. His shot out of town had been a football scholarship to the University of Maine at Orono. That dream had been crunched during a game his sophomore year by a pair of defensive backs from the University of New Hampshire. His knee had been reconstructed, then his scholarship terminated.

Faced with the prospect of going back to the logging camps, Turcotte had enlisted the aid of the lieutenant colonel in charge of the small army ROTC program at the university. They’d found a friendly doctor to fudge on the physical and the army had picked up where the football team had fallen off. Turcotte had graduated with a degree in forestry and received a commission in the army. His first assignment had been with the infantry in the Tenth Mountain Division.

The pace at Fort Drum had proved too slow and first chance he had, Turcotte had volunteered for Special Forces training. The warrant officer giving him his Special Forces physical had looked at the scars on his knee and signed off on the paperwork with a wink, figuring anyone crazy enough to try Special Forces wasn’t going to let a little thing like a reconstructed knee stop him.

But it almost had. During the intense selection and assessment training the knee had stayed swollen, causing Turcotte intense pain. He’d walked on it nonetheless, finishing the long overland movements with heavy rucksack as quickly as he could, as his classmates fell by the wayside.

After starting with two hundred and forty men, at the end of training there were slightly over a hundred left and Turcotte was one of them.

Turcotte had loved the Special Forces and served in various assignments up until his last one, which had not turned out well in his view. Now he had been handpicked to be assigned to this unit, of which he knew nothing except it was highly classified and went by the designation of Delta Operations, which made Turcotte wonder if the name had been deliberately chosen to be confused with Delta Force, the elite counterterrorist force at Fort Bragg with whom he had worked occasionally when stationed with Detachment A in Berlin — a classified Special Forces unit responsible for terrorism control in Europe.

There wasn’t even any scuttlebutt about Delta Operations, which was rather amazing among the close-knit Special Operations community. It meant one of two things: either no one was ever reassigned out of Delta Operations and therefore no stories could be told, or those reassigned out of it kept their mouths completely sealed, which was more likely. Turcotte knew civilians found it difficult to credit, but most military men he had worked with believed in the oaths of secrecy they swore.

But the thing that concerned Turcotte was that there were two levels to this assignment. As far as Prague and Delta Operations knew he was just another new man with a security clearance and a background in Special Operations. But Turcotte had been verbally ordered by the DET-A commander to stop in Washington on his way from Europe to Nevada. He’d been met at the airport by a pair of Secret Service agents and escorted to a private room in the terminal. With the agents standing guard outside the door he’d been briefed by a woman who’d identified herself as the presidential science adviser to something called Majic-12, Dr. Lisa Duncan. She’d told him that his real job was to infiltrate Delta Operations, which provided security for Majic-12, and observe what was going on. He was given a phone number to call and relay what he saw.

To all of Turcotte’s questions Duncan had been evasive. She couldn’t tell him what he was supposed to be looking for. Since she was on the Majic-12 council, that made him suspicious. She had not even told him why he was being selected. Turcotte wondered if it had anything to do with what had just happened in Germany. Beyond that wondering, the naturally suspicious part of his mind, which years of work in Special Operations had cultivated, wondered if Lisa Duncan was who she said she was, regardless of her fancy ID card. This might be some sort of test of his loyalty set up by Delta Operations itself.

Duncan had told him he was not to inform anyone of his meeting with her, but that had immediately put him in a bind the minute he had met Prague at the Las Vegas airport. Withholding that information meant he was already in subtle conflict with his new organization, not a good way to start an assignment. What was real and what wasn’t, Turcotte didn’t know. He’d decided on the plane from Washington to Las Vegas to do what Duncan had said, keep his eyes and ears open, his mouth shut, and ride whatever roller coaster he had been put onto until he could make up his own mind.

Turcotte had expected to be driven straight out to Nellis Air Force Base from the airfield. That was the destination listed on his orders. To his surprise they had taken a cab downtown and checked into a hotel. Actually they hadn’t checked in, they’d walked right past the desk and taken an elevator directly up to the room, which had a numerical keypad instead of a traditional lock. Prague punched in the code.

Prague had shrugged at Turcotte’s concern about reporting in to Nellis, as they entered the lavishly furnished suite.

“Don’t sweat it. We’ll get you in tomorrow. And you’re not going to Nellis. You’ll find out, meat.”

“What’s with this room?” Turcotte asked, noting the meat comment. It was a term used for new replacements to combat units that had suffered high casualties. Certainly not the situation he was in now, at least he hoped not.

There was only one other way to decipher the phrase, as a slam. Turcotte didn’t know why Prague would do that except to test his tolerance levels, which was an accepted practice in elite units. Except it usually involved professional tests of physical or mental capabilities, not insults.

Of course, Turcotte knew there might be another reason for Prague’s attitude: maybe he knew about the meeting in Washington and it had been a test. Or, that Duncan was for real and Prague knew Turcotte was a plant. All this thinking about plots within plots gave Turcotte a headache.

Prague threw himself down on the sofa. “We have all these rooms on a permanent basis for R and R when we come into town. We get taken care of real well, as long as we don’t screw up. And no drinking. Even on R and R. We always have to be ready.”

“For what?” Turcotte asked, dropping his large kit bag and walking over to the window to look out at the neon display of Las Vegas.

“For whatever, meat,” Prague returned easily. “We fly out of McCarren on Janet tomorrow morning.”

“Janet?” Turcotte asked.

“A 737. Goes out every morning to the Area with the contract workers and us.”

“What exactly is my job and—” Turcotte paused as a loud chirping filled the air and Prague pulled a beeper off his belt. He turned off the noise and checked the small LED screen.

“Looks like you’re about to find out,” Prague said, standing. “Grab your gear. We’re going back to the airport now. Recall.”

“I wonder what their electric bill is?” Simmons muttered, staring out across the dry lake bed at the brilliantly lit complex nestled up against the base of the Groom Mountain Range. He put his binoculars to his eyes and took in the hangars, towers, and antennas all laid out alongside the extremely long runway.

“Looks like you might have come on a good night,” Franklin commented, sitting down with his back against a boulder. They’d arrived at the top of White Sides Mountain ten minutes earlier and settled in on the edge of the mountaintop, overlooking the lake bed.

“Might just be for the C-130’s,” Simmons commented.

The transport planes were parked near a particularly large hangar and there was some activity going on around them. He focused the glasses. “They’re not unloading,” he said. “They’re loading something onto the planes. Looks like a couple of helicopters.”

“Helicopters?” Franklin repeated. “Let me see.” He took the binoculars and looked for a few minutes. “I’ve seen one of those type of choppers before. Painted all black. The big one is a UH-60 Blackhawk. The two little ones I don’t know. They fly UH-60’s around here for security. I had one buzz my truck one day down on the mailbox road.”

“Where do you think they’re taking them?” Simmons asked, taking the binoculars back.

“I don’t know.”

“Something’s going on,” Simmons said.

The 737 had no markings on it other than a broad red band painted down the outside. It was parked behind a Cyclone fence with green stripping run through the chain links to discourage observers. Turcotte carried his kit bag right on board after Prague joked that they could carry any damn thing they wanted onto this flight — there was no baggage check.

Instead of a stewardess a hard-faced man in a three-piece suit was waiting inside the plane door, checking off personnel as they came in. “Who’s this?” he demanded, looking at Turcotte.

“Fresh meat,” Prague replied. “I picked him up this evening.”

“Let me see your ID,” the man demanded.

Turcotte pulled out his military ID card and the man scanned the picture. “Wait here.” He stepped back into what had been the forward galley and flipped open a small portable phone. He spoke into it for a minute, then flipped it shut. He came out. “Your orders check out. You’re cleared.”

Although his face showed no change of expression, Turcotte slowly relaxed his right hand and rubbed the fingers lightly over the scar tissue that was knotted over the palm of that hand.

The man held up a small device. “Blow.”

Turcotte glanced at Prague, who took the device and blew into it. The man checked the readout, quickly switched out the tube, and handed it to Turcotte, who did the same. After looking at the readout the man gestured with the phone toward the back of the plane.

Prague slapped Turcotte on the back and led him down the aisle. Turcotte glanced at the other men gathered on board. They all had the same look: hard, professional, and competent. It was the demeanor that all the men Turcotte had served with over the years in Special Operations had.

As Prague settled down next to him and the door to the plane shut, Turcotte decided to try to find out what was going on, especially since it now seemed they were on alert.

“Where are we headed?” he asked.

“Area 51,” Prague replied. “It’s an Air Force facility. Well, actually it’s on Air Force land, but it’s run by an organization called the National Reconnaissance Organization or NRO, which is responsible for all overhead imagery.”

Turcotte knew that the NRO was an extensive operation, overseeing all satellite and spy-plane operations with a budget in the billions. He’d been on several missions where he’d received support from the NRO.

“What exactly do we do?” Turcotte asked, pressing his hands against the seat back in front of him and pushing, relieving the tension in his shoulders. “Security,” Prague answered. “Air Force handles the outer perimeter but we do the inside stuff, since we all have the clearances. Actually,” he amended, “Delta Ops consists of two units. One is called Landscape and the other Nightscape. Landscape is responsible for on-the-ground security of the facilities at Area 51 and for keeping tabs on the people there. Nightscape, which you are now part of…” Prague paused. “Well, you’ll find out soon enough, meat.”

Turcotte had been in enough covert units to know when to stop asking questions, so he shut up and listened to the engines rumble as they made their way north toward his new assignment.

Simmons reached into his backpack and pulled out a plastic case and unsnapped it.

“What’s that?” Franklin asked.

“They’re night vision goggles,” Simmons replied.

“Really?” Franklin said. “I’ve seen pictures of them. The camo dudes here use them. They drive around wearing them, with all their lights out. They can scare the shit out of you when they roll up on you in the dark like that when you think you’re all alone on the road.”

Simmons turned the on-switch and the inside of the lens glowed bright green. He began scanning, keeping the goggles away from the bright lights of the facility itself, which would overload the computer enhancer built into them. He checked out the long landing strip. It was over fifteen thousand feet long and reputed to be the longest in the world, yet its very existence was denied by the government. Then he looked over the rest of the lake bed, trying to see if there was anything else of interest.

A small spark flickered in the eyepiece and Simmons twisted his head, trying to catch what had caused it. He looked down and to the right and was rewarded by another brief spark. A pair of four-wheel all-terrain vehicles were making their way along a switchback about four miles away. The spark was the reflection of moonlight off the darkened headlights. Each of the drivers had goggles strapped over the front of his helmet.

Simmons tapped Franklin and handed him the goggles.

“There. You see those two guys on the ATVs?”

Franklin looked and nodded. “Yeah, I see ’em.”

“Are they the ‘camo dudes’ you were telling me about?”

“I’ve never seen them on ATVs before,” Franklin said, “but, yeah, those are camo dudes. And, actually, I’ve never seen them on the inside of the mountain before. They always came up on us on the other side.” He handed the goggles back. “They can’t get up here on those things anyway. The closest they can get is maybe a mile away.”

“Have you ever pulled the road sensors before?” Simmons asked suddenly.

Franklin didn’t answer and Simmons took one more look at the two ATVs coming toward them, then turned off the goggles. “You’ve never played with the sensors before, right?”

Franklin reluctantly nodded. “Usually we get stopped down below by the outer security guys. The sheriff comes, confiscates our film. Then most of the time he lets us climb up.”

“Most of the time?” Simmons asked.

“Yeah. Sometimes, maybe three or four times, he told us to go home.” “I thought you said this was public land,” Simmons said.

“It is.”

“So why did you leave those times?”

Franklin looked very uncomfortable. “The sheriff told us he couldn’t be responsible for our safety if we continued on. It was like a code between him and me, man. I knew that was when I was supposed to go back to the mailbox and watch.”

“And what happened those nights?” Simmons asked. Franklin didn’t answer. “Those are the nights you spotted strange lights doing unexplainable maneuvers in the air on the other side of the mountaintop. This mountaintop,” Simmons said with a bit of heat in his voice.

“Yeah.”

“So this is the first time you’ve ever been up here and they didn’t know you were up here. This might be a night you were supposed to go back to the mailbox.”

“Yeah.”

That explained why Franklin was carrying the only camera, Simmons realized. Franklin was using him as a cover in case they were caught, probably hoping that Simmons’s status would help him with the authorities. Simmons took a deep breath as he considered the possibilities. It was dangerous, but there was a chance here for a big story. “I guess we’ll just have to see what happens, then.”

They both turned their heads as they again heard the whine of jet engines in the distance.

“That’s Janet,” Franklin said as the 737 descended over head to a landing on the airstrip. He sounded concerned.

“It’s early. It usually doesn’t come until five forty-five in the morning.” Simmons looked through the goggles. The two ATVs had turned around and were now heading away. He thought that even more strange than the 737 coming early.

The 737 came to a halt a quarter mile away from the two C-130’s. Turcotte followed Prague off and into a small building next to a hangar. Up against the base of a large mountain there was a cluster of buildings, several hangars, and what appeared to be a couple of barracks buildings, along with a control tower for the runway.

“Stow your kit bag there, meat,” Prague ordered.

The other men were opening wall lockers and pulling out black jumpsuits and putting them on. Prague led Turcotte over to a supply room and began tossing him pieces of equipment, a similar jumpsuit leading the way, followed by a combat vest, black balaclava, black aviator gloves, and a set of AN-PVS-9 night vision goggles — the hottest technology in the field.

Prague unlocked a large bin and pulled out a sophisticated-looking weapon. Turcotte nodded in appreciation. The NRO was supplying these guys with top-of-the-line gear. Turcotte took the weapon and checked it out. The gun was a 9mm Calico, with telescoping butt stock, built-in silencer, hundred-round cylindrical magazine, and mounted laser sight.

“It’s zeroed in on the laser out to one hundred meters, flat trajectory,” Prague informed him. “Out from there you raise about an inch per fifty meters.” Prague looked at him. “I assume you have your own personal sidearm?”

Turcotte nodded. “Browning High Power.”

“You can carry that, but only use it as a last resort. We like to stay silenced.” Prague also handed him a headset with boom mike. “Voice activated, it’s preset to my command frequency. Always have it on and powered,” he ordered. “If I can’t talk to you, you’d better be fucking dead, because you don’t want to see or hear me again.”

Turcotte nodded and slipped it over his head, sliding the main battery pack on a cord around his neck.

Prague slapped him on the shoulder, much harder than necessary. “Get changed and let’s roll.”

Turcotte zipped up the coveralls and tugged on the combat vest, filling the empty pockets with extra magazines for the Calico. He also appropriated a few flash-bang grenades, two high-explosive minigrenades, two CS grenades, and placed them in pockets. He took his Browning out of his kit bag and slid it into the thigh holster rigged below the vest. For good measure he added a few more items from his kit bag: a leather sheath holding three perfectly balanced and highly honed throwing knives handmade for him by a knifesmith back in Maine went inside the jumpsuit, strapped over his right shoulder; a coiled steel wire garrotte fitted inside one of the suit’s pockets; and a slim, double-edged commando knife with sheath slid down the outside of the top of his right boot. Feeling fully dressed for whatever might occur, Turcotte joined the other men by the doors to the hangar. There were twenty-two men and Prague was apparently in charge. He spotted Turcotte.

“You stay with me tonight, meat. Do what I tell you to do. Don’t do nothing you aren’t told to. You’re going to see some strange things. Don’t worry about anything. We got it all under control.”

If we have it all under control, Turcotte wondered, why do we need the guns? But he kept his mouth shut and looked out at what the other men were watching. A UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter, blades folded, had already been placed inside the first C-130. Two AH-6 attack helicopters—”little birds,” as the pilots referred to them — were also being loaded onto the second one. The AH-6 was a small, four-man helicopter with a minigun mounted on the right skid. The only unit that Turcotte knew of that flew the AH-6 was Task Force 160, the army’s classified helicopter unit.

“Alpha team, move out!” Prague ordered.

Four men with parachutes casually slung over their shoulders walked onto the tarmac toward a waiting V-22 Osprey that had been sitting in the dark, unnoticed until now in the lee of the large hangar. Another surprise.

Turcotte had heard that the government contract for the Osprey had been canceled, but this one looked very operational as each of its massive propellers began turning. They were on the end of the wings, which were rotated up — a position that allowed the plane to take off like a helicopter, then fly like a plane as the wings rotated forward. The Osprey was moving even before the back ramp finished closing, lifting into the sky.

Turcotte felt a surge of adrenaline. The smell of JP-4 fuel, the exhaust from the aircraft engines, the sounds, the weaponry, all touched his senses and brought back memories — some good, most bad, but all exciting.

“Let’s go!” Prague ordered, and Turcotte followed the other men on board the lead C-130. The interior could easily fit four cars end to end. Along each side of the plane facing inward was a row of red canvas jump seats. The skin of the aircraft wasn’t insulated and the roar of the four turboprop engines reverberated through the interior with a teeth-rattling drone. Several chest-height, small round portholes were the only windows to the outside world.

Turcotte noted several other pallets of gear strapped down along the center of the cargo bay. There were other groups of men already on board, some dressed in gray jumpsuits, others in traditional army green.

“The ones in gray are the eggheads!” Prague yelled in his ear. “We baby-sit them while they do their stuff. The green ones are the pilots for the choppers.”

The ramp of the C-130 slowly lifted and closed and the interior lights glowed red, allowing the people inside to maintain their natural night vision. Turcotte glanced out one of the small portholes at the airfield. He noted that the V-22 was out of sight. He wondered where the four men were jumping. Out of the corner of his eye something large and round was moving about thirty feet above the flight strip, between them and the mountain. Turcotte blinked.

“What the—”

“Keep your attention inboard,” Prague ordered, grabbing his shoulder. “Your gear good to go?”

Turcotte looked at his leader, then closed his eyes. The image of what he had just seen was still clear in his memory, but his mind was already beginning to question itself.

“Yes, sir.”

“All right. Like I said, just stick with me for this first one. And don’t let nothing you see surprise you.”

The plane shuddered as it began to slowly move.

Turcotte took the Calico submachine gun and placed it in his lap. He swiftly fieldstripped it down to its component parts, balancing them on his thighs. He lifted up the firing pin and checked to make sure the tip wasn’t filed down. He put the gun back together, carefully checking each part to make sure it was functional. When he was done, he slid the bolt back and put a round in the chamber, making sure the select lever was on safe.

“What do you think is going on?” Simmons asked nervously, wishing he had his camera. The first C-130 was moving ponderously toward the end of the runway. The other smaller plane had taken off like a helicopter and disappeared to the north.

“Holy shit!” Franklin exclaimed. “Do you see that!”

Simmons twisted and froze at the sight that greeted him. Franklin was up and running, stumbling over the rocks, heading back the way they had come. Simmons reached for the small Instamatic camera he had secreted inside his shirt when the night sky was brilliantly lit for a few seconds and then Simmons saw and felt no more.

Turcotte held on to the web seating along the inside skin of the aircraft as the nose lifted, and then they were airborne. He caught a glimpse of a bright light somewhere out in the mountains through the far portal. He glanced over at Prague, and the man was staring at him, his eyes black and flat.

Turcotte calmly met the gaze. He knew the type. Prague was a hard man among men who prided themselves on being tough. Turcotte imagined Prague’s stare intimidated less-experienced men, but Turcotte knew something that Prague knew: he knew the power of death. He knew the feeling of having that power in the crook of the finger, exercising it with a three-pound pull, and how easy it was. It didn’t matter how tough you pretended to be at that point.

Turcotte closed his eyes and tried to relax. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that he wasn’t going to get anything up front here. Wherever they were going, he’d find out when they got there. And whatever he was supposed to do when they got there, he’d find out when they told him. It was a hell of a way to run an operation. Either Prague was incompetent or he was deliberately keeping Turcotte in the dark. Turcotte knew it wasn’t the former.

The V-22 Osprey circled the south shore of Lewis and Clark Lake at ten thousand feet. In the rear the team leader listened on the headset of the satellite radio as he was fed the latest from the Cube.

“Phoenix Advance, this is Nightscape Six. Thermals read clear of humans in MSS. Proceed. Out.”

The team leader took off the headset and turned to the three members of his team. “Let’s go.” He gave a thumbs-up to the crew chief.

The back ramp slowly opened to the chill night sky. When it was completely open, the crew chief gestured. The team leader walked to the edge and stepped off, followed closely by the other men. He got stable, aims and legs akimbo, then quickly pulled his ripcord. The square chute blossomed above his head and he checked his canopy to make sure it was functioning properly. Then he slid the night vision goggles down over his crash helmet and switched them on. Glancing above, beyond his chute, he could see the other three members of his team hanging up above him, in perfect formation. Satisfied, the team leader looked down and oriented himself. The target area was easy to see. There was a long section of shoreline with no lights. As he descended, he checked the terrain through the glow of the goggles and started picking up more details. The abandoned ski lift was the most prominent feature he was looking for, and once he spotted it, he pulled on his toggles, aiming for the high terminus of the lift. There was a small open field there, where years ago beginning skiers had stumbled off as the chairs deposited them.

Pulling in on both toggles less than twenty feet above the ground, the team leader slowed his descent to the point that when his boots touched down it was no more of a jar than if he had stepped off a curb. The chute crumpled behind him as he unfastened his submachine gun. The other men landed, all within twenty feet. They secured their chutes, then took position underneath the top pylon of the ski lift, on the highest bit of ground within ten miles.

From there they could oversee the jumbled two miles of terrain lying between them and the lake.

The area was called Devil’s Nest and it was rumored that Jesse James had used it as a hideout over a century ago. The rolling plain of Nebraska abruptly dropped off into sharp hills and ridgelines, starting right where the men were and running up to the edge of the man-made lake — the result of the damming of the Missouri River ten miles downstream. A developer had tried to turn it into a resort area a decade ago — hence the ski lift — but the idea had failed miserably. The men weren’t interested in the rusting machinery, though. Their concern lay in the center of the area, running along the top of a ridgeline pointed directly at the lake.

The team leader took the handset his commo man offered him. “Nightscape Six Two, this is Phoenix Advance. Landing strip is clear. Area is clear. Over.” “This is Six Two. Roger. Phoenix main due in five mikes. Out.”

In the air Turcotte watched Prague speak into the satellite radio, the words lost in the loud roar of the engines. He could feel the change in air pressure as the C-130 descended. A glance out the window showed water, then shoreline. The wheels of the 130 touched earth and the plane began rolling. It stopped in an amazingly short distance for such a large aircraft and the back ramp opened, as the plane turned around, facing back down the runway.

“Let’s go!” Prague yelled. “Off-load everything.”

Turcotte lent a hand as they rolled the helicopter off and into the shelter of the nearby trees. He was impressed with the ability of the pilots. The runway was little more than a flat expanse of rough grass between dangerously close lines of trees on either side.

As soon as they had the helicopter and equipment out, the plane was heading back down the strip, the ramp not even fully closed as the plane lifted off into the night sky. Less than a minute later the second plane was landing and the process was repeated. In a few minutes they had all three helicopters and personnel on the ground.

As the sound of the second plane faded into the distance, Prague was all business. “I want camo nets up and everything under cover, ASAP. Let’s move, people!”