Blowback

NINETY-TWO

As Kalachka’s lifeless body fell forward over the railing, the remote detonator dropped from his hand and clattered onto the platform next to Prince Hamal, who was clutching his legs and writhing in pain. Death was surely better than what awaited him at the hands of his father. He knew the Crown Prince well enough to know that the only reason Harvath hadn’t killed him was that his father had wanted to do it himself.

Forcing his hands from his bloody kneecaps, Hamal reached for the detonator, only to have Harvath fire two rounds into the back of his left leg. Running up the staircase to the observation platform, Harvath yelled, “If you move even a millimeter more, the next one goes into your testicles.”

Hamal didn’t care. His life was over anyway. Stretching his hand out, he reached for the detonator, expecting to feel the fierce pain of the American’s bullets piercing his groin, but the shots never came. Instead, he felt a heavy weight land upon his back.

Grabbing Hamal’s wrist, Harvath slammed it repeatedly onto the metal grating until he let go of the detonator. Rolling the prince onto his back, Harvath grabbed him by the throat and said, “I promised your father I wouldn’t kill you, but other than that, the field is wide open. How do you plan on killing the Wahhabi leadership?”

Hamal forced a laugh and then spat in Harvath’s face.

Wiping his cheek on his shoulder, Harvath placed the barrel of the MP5 against Hamal’s left index finger and then asked his question again, “How will they die?”

Hamal spat again, and Harvath pulled the trigger, blowing the prince’s finger off.

As the man screamed, Harvath moved the gun to the index finger of his right hand and said, “I have more bullets than you have body parts, Hamal. We could be here all day, and believe me, I’ll make sure that I keep my word to your father and keep you alive, but you’re going to wish you were dead.”

Hamal spat at him again, but Harvath held back from firing. Instead, he said, “We know your men are posing as National Guardsmen. It’s only a matter of time before we catch them. Everyone at the palace is looking for them. The minute one of them gets anywhere near any of the leadership, it will be all over.”

Hamal, his teeth gritted in pain, managed to smile. “You have no idea what we have planned. We have no need to get near any of the leaders.”

“What are you talking about?” demanded Harvath. “Tell me, or I’ll blow another finger off right now.”

“It’s too late. It is out of anyone’s control.”

Harvath was about to pull the trigger when he heard movement on the floor of the bottling plant. The local security forces had discovered the tunnel and were now coming up through the trapdoor. Hamal seemed to know he was saved. He looked at Harvath and through his pain managed another laugh. Harvath raised his MP5 and brought it crashing down into the man’s face, knocking out several teeth and rendering him unconscious just as the first of the security forces appeared beneath the platform.

“Prince Hamal is up here,” he yelled in Arabic. “He needs medical attention, and then Prince Abdullah wants him detained.”

Two security forces operatives ran up the stairs, and Harvath used one of their radios to contact an officer at the compound and have him send Jillian through the tunnel.

When she arrived, she was amazed at the extent of what she found. Tens of millions of dollars had been spent creating a sophisticated, meticulously sealed laboratory complete with full decontamination stations. Whoever had built it obviously knew that they were dealing with something extremely lethal.

After putting one of the lab’s full biohazard suits on and clicking her hose into the supply of fresh oxygen, Jillian made her way through the sets of airlocks until she was inside the main lab itself. Harvath waited for her on the other side of the glass, and they communicated via the intercom system rigged to her suit.

It didn’t take her long to find what she was looking for. Close to a hundred crudely fashioned black vials sat on the shelves of one of the lab’s refrigerators, while nearly ten times that many in purple crowded the shelves of another fridge. They were made from some sort of alloy Jillian had never seen before, and all of them would have fit perfectly in the intricately carved box they had discovered in the depths of the Col de la Traversette.

Upon closer inspection, she saw that the black vials had all been stamped with the same menacing rabid dog’s head with entwined vipers, while the purple ones bore the impression of an odd plant or herb, which she assumed must have been part of the inoculation-antidote combination.

Based on the diagrams taped to the lab’s rear wall, Jillian was able to figure out that both the illness and the inoculation were extremely potent and required only small amounts to do their work. What’s more, the water Hamal was bottling and selling wasn’t from any secret spring but rather the Mecca municipal waterworks.

Harvath knew it would take the U.S. at least a day or more before they could get a specialized team on site to help contain the facility, and his thoughts immediately went to Nick Kampos. Kampos could be on site in a matter of hours, and with his experience with the DEA’s Clandestine Labs Unit, he could help Jillian secure the antidote until the cavalry arrived. Getting hold of Kampos to help out, though, would have to wait.

Rushing back through the tunnel, Harvath arrived at Hamal’s bullet-riddled compound just in time to help Reynolds aboard the CH-47D Chinook helicopter that had been sent to transport the wounded back to the Al Hada hospital adjacent to the King Fahad Air Base.

Once they had lifted off, Harvath used one of the headsets to radio the palace. All of the National Guard troops had been accounted for. There were no signs of the missing militants, and the summit was in the process of wrapping up. Soon it would be all over. Though no attempt had been made on the Wahhabi leadership, Harvath was feeling more nervous about things than he had all day. Removing the headset, he leaned over and shared his concern with Reynolds.

“You think it’s safe leaving her back there?” he yelled above the roar of the rotors, referring to Jillian.

“She’ll be okay. I’m more concerned at this point with the Wahhabi leadership. We know Kalachka’s plan was to kill them during the summit and to have it look like the Royal Family was responsible. But if their men are nowhere near the palace, how the hell do they plan on pulling it off?”

“There’s a motorcade,” replied Reynolds. “Maybe they’re planning on hitting that.”

“Two guys plus the deputy intelligence minister? It’s possible, but Abdullah’s got exceptional security. I think they stole the uniforms so they could get up close to do whatever they’re going to do.”

“Maybe they’ve got more than three guys. Who the hell knows? They could have recruited a hundred people and that uniform box we found in the warehouse was only one out of ten others just like it.”

There was something about that that made sense. There was also a gnawing at the back of Harvath’s mind, as if the answer was already there, just waiting to be teased out. Why did the militants need the uniforms? If they weren’t going to launch their attack from inside the palace, where else would they launch it from? What purpose did the uniforms serve? What would they help them get close to? The most obvious answer was the Wahhabi leadership, but was there another answer?

Approaching King Fahad Air Base, Harvath saw a long motorcade speeding across the airport from the direction of the Crown Prince’s palace. The meeting had obviously been concluded, and the motorcade was carrying the Wahhabi leadership back to their aircraft. Soon it would all be over, thought Harvath. If the militants were going to make their move, it would have to be now, but how?

As the motorcade began closing in on a solitary Dessault Falcon 50 Business Jet, Harvath noticed the soldiers scattered across the base, some at attention, some at ease, and he was once again reminded of Andrews Air Force Base and Air Force One. Why did he keep coming back to Andrews and the president’s aircraft? Then it hit him. Air Force One was at its most vulnerable when it was on the ground.

Suddenly, Harvath knew what the uniforms were for. They weren’t for getting close to the Wahhabis — they were for getting close to their airplane. Faruq was a genius with explosives, Kalachka had said. The Saudi Royal Family had refused to meet in Riyadh. They had insisted the Wahhabi leaders come to them, and it was the Royal Family who had not only provided the plane, but was responsible for its safety. Now, the picture was clear. Whatever happened, the Wahhabi leadership couldn’t be allowed to board or get anywhere near that airplane.

Grabbing the headset, Harvath yelled to the pilot, “We have to stop that motorcade.”

“What are you talking about?” the pilot responded.

“The plane they are headed for has a bomb on it.”

“But I’ve got wounded men on board who have to get to the hospital.”

“They can wait,” commanded Harvath.

“I have my orders.”

“Your orders have just changed,” said Reynolds as he painfully leaned into the cockpit and pressed his 1911 against the pilot’s head. “Do what the man says.”

As Harvath relieved both the pilot and copilot of their sidearms, the pilot replied, “Okay, you’re in charge. What do you want me to do?”

Harvath knew there wasn’t enough time to radio the tower and have them try to make contact with the motorcade, and so he ordered, “Put us down in front of the motorcade, right now.”

“Right in front of them? Are you crazy?”

“Do it,” commanded Harvath.

Swinging the huge Chinook around, the pilot pushed it full throttle, coming in low and amazingly fast over the top of the speeding motorcade. One hundred yards out, the pilot pulled up and set the Chinook down onto the tarmac, blocking the motorcade’s access to the airplane meant to carry the Wahhabi leadership back to Riyadh.

By the lack of reaction on the part of the motorcade, you would have thought they couldn’t see the enormous fifty-foot-long helicopter with its twin sixty-foot rotor spans, but Harvath knew what they were doing. Every security person in that motorcade had been warned about the plot to assassinate the Wahhabi leadership. They had no intention of slowing down. In fact, inside those cars they would be readying their weapons, preparing for a showdown.

“Call the tower,” Harvath instructed the pilot. “Tell them there’s a bomb on that plane and the motorcade needs to turn around and get the hell out of here.”

Over his headset, Harvath could hear the pilot radioing his instructions to the control tower. In the meantime, the motorcade was still closing. They were less than fifty yards away. Harvath considered his options and realized he had no choice.

Grabbing the spade grips of the Chinook’s door-mounted M60D 7.62mm air-cooled machine gun, he made sure the belt-fed ammo was ready to roll, flicked off the safety, and began firing.

The heavy rounds tore huge pieces of asphalt from the tarmac in front of the motorcade. Though he kept firing, it wasn’t until he took out the radiator of the lead Suburban that the armored column came to a halt. The moment it did, doors flew open and security personnel positioned themselves to fire.

At 550 spm, or shots per minute, Harvath’s weapon outgunned anything that the security personnel were carrying. Throwing another wall of lead in their direction, yet safely above their heads, Harvath yelled into his headset, “What’s going on with the tower?”

“They’re still trying to reach the motorcade,” replied the pilot.

“Tell them to hurry up!” he ordered as he raked another series of rounds over the top of the motorcade. “These guys think we’re trying to take them out.”

Just as Harvath finished his thought, he saw the sunroof of the second Suburban slide back. Seconds later the unmistakable housing of an FIM-92A Stinger Weapons System was slid through the roof, followed by a resolute-looking man who was balancing the entire thing on his shoulder. His eyes pinned on the helicopter, he obviously had no intention of losing anyone on his protective detail, not today.

Harvath had no intention of losing anyone either. “Launch your countermeasures now!” he yelled.

“What?” replied the pilot. “Why?”

“Do it!” screamed the copilot, able to see what his colleague couldn’t. “Do it now!”

The pilot launched the countermeasures. Bright flares and flaming pieces of chaff spewed in all directions, showering the motorcade with hot debris and forcing the security personnel not only to shut themselves back inside their vehicles, but also to throw them in reverse and back as far away from the Chinook as possible.

As Harvath prepared himself for a second run, the voice of the pilot came over his headset and said, “The tower has made contact with the motorcade. They are pulling back. I repeat, they are pulling back. Bomb technicians are on their way to examine the aircraft.”

Letting go of the grips of the M60, Harvath fell back onto one of the seats and wondered where the hell he could find a beer in this country.