Phantom

Fifty

The Ram Citadel

The setting sun stained the frothy seas red. The last curtains of evening were about to fall. There was no moon, and the coming night would be pitch-black. The commandeered patrol boat proceeded up the citadel’s narrow marina channel slowly, doing about five knots. Hawke’s team, visible on deck and in the wheelhouse, were all wearing the IRGC uniforms borrowed from the dead Iranian sailors killed in the firefight. Hawke and his men would be first ashore, do a recon, and signal the SEAL team when they’d secured a beachhead.

Hawke eyed an armed guard positioned at the end of the jetty. He snapped to attention and saluted as the big patrol boat slid into the harbor, the Iranian flag snapping in the ever-freshening wind.

Hawke, at the helm, returned the man’s salute. Then he sent Ascarus, wearing the late captain’s uniform, out to the stern rail to shout out a greeting and tell the man that they needed to take on fuel. He’d seen a fuel dock in one of the sat photos. That fuel dock had been the genesis of Operation Trojan Horse, his idea for getting his men inside the massive walls of the citadel aboard a captured patrol boat.

“Damn,” Stoke, who was standing next to Hawke at the helm, said, “man’s got himself a big-ass yacht for a terrorist.”

“Mine’s bigger,” Hawke said under his breath, intently studying the three-hundred-foot white-hulled yacht. She was moored at the end of a long steel pier. The name, Cygnus, was painted in gold leaf on her wide transom. No hailing port. There was something odd about the boat that Hawke couldn’t quite put his finger on. He slowed the patrol boat so he could get a closer look.

“Stoke, something’s wrong with that boat. What is it?”

“Yeah, I was thinking that. That’s one very old yacht. Looks like a design from the 1950s, right?”

“Right.”

“But it looks brand spanking new. Like it’s never left the dock.”

“That’s it. Exactly. Google the yacht Cygnus on your mobile, see what you come up with.”

“Gimme a sec… yeah, here it is. Her original name was Star of Persia. Her first owner was the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi. Sold or donated in 1978. Cygnus is now owned by another entity, something called Perseus Corporation, LLC.”

“Perseus,” Hawke said. “Our intel is good, Stoke. I think we’ve found our man.”

“Why’s that?” Harry Brock, eavesdropping, asked.

“Darius Saffari was a scientist at Stanford. His AI involvement there was with a research program called the Perseus Project.”

Hawke told the Red Team, his crew of “IRGC sailors,” to get the mooring lines ready. They would tie up at the fuel dock, take on gas, and assess the situation ashore through powerful binoculars before committing to direct action. The SEALs, or Blue Team, dressed in their distinctive black assault gear, would remain out of sight until the fortress had been breached. Their immediate responsibility was to neutralize enemy forces inside the compound and then do a house-to-house search for the “machine” and locate a very large two-story building that had been identified by CIA analysts at Langley as a possible bioengineering lab.

Hawke’s team would attack the residence and take out Darius Saffari.

Hawke slowed to idle speed, then eased the patrol boat alongside the dock where the pumps were located. He was surprised to see a large number of pirate scows moored together at the finger piers opposite the fuel dock. They were the longboats, narrow of beam, huge outboard motors hung on the sterns, the ones used by pirates to venture far offshore to take prizes. He hadn’t realized the Iranians and the Somalis had become such bosom buddies. But of course it made sense. Kidnap Western tankers and crewmen, use the ransom monies to buy weapons for al-Qaeda, Hamas, whoever. One big happy family.

While crew fore and aft heaved lines ashore and began to secure the boat, Hawke grabbed his binoculars and went out onto the stern deck to size up the shorefront situation. This was a critical phase in the operation. It could all go to hell right here, in a heartbeat.

It was an absolutely pitch-black night. No distinction could be seen between sky and water-the horizon simply didn’t exist. All around him was a cold, damp, murky greyness, broken only by the white water boiling at his stern. Abdul Dakkon, the brave fellow who’d saved his life in the mountains of the Hindu Kush, had given him a striped kaffiyeh as a farewell present. He wound it tightly around his neck to keep the chill night air out. He also wore it for luck.

Hawke knew they were expected. But, he hoped, the recent action at sea had gone undetected by the omnipresent, all-knowing “machine.” The Iranian vessel and the Red Team’s IRGC uniforms might still give them the element of surprise. He raised the infrared binoculars, studied the situation ashore with intense concentration, and finally spoke into his Falcon battle radio.

“Laddie, heads up. I see silhouettes of enemy sharpshooters atop the compound wall. Searchlights atop the towers at the corners. The shooters are posted about every fifty yards. Order your two snipers to take up concealed positions on the topmost deck. Now. When I give the order to fire they need to start picking these bastards up there off as rapidly as humanly possible. We’ll be exposed all the way in. If we take fire from that elevation, we don’t stand a chance of getting inside.”

“Aye-aye, sir, consider it done.”

At that moment, klieg lights atop the high towers lit up the world. Darkness was no longer an advantage. Only the stolen camo of their uniforms would save them now.

Hawke said calmly, “There’s a gate in the wall, end of this pier and to the right about five hundred yards. Three guards are giving us the evil eye. Ascarus and I will deal with them.”

“Good hunting, sir. Over.”

On the dock and standing with his team beside the fuel pumps, Hawke said, “Stoke, check out the three guards standing at the marina’s gate. You and Brock remain here and top off the fuel tanks. Ascarus and I will go have a friendly chat with those gentlemen. Keep an eye on us. If we manage to get that gate in the wall opened, that’s your signal. We move to infiltration and every last man aboard goes ashore firing at anything that moves.”

“Got it, boss.”

To Ascarus, he said, “Okay, here we go. We approach those three slowly, smiling and chatting. You identify yourself as IRGC Captain Ascarus here to take on fuel. You also have orders from Tehran to speak to Dr. Saffari about the possibility of a naval showdown with the Americans in these waters and you require his assistance. It is urgent that you speak with him immediately. Please open the gate.”

“If he refuses?”

“Tell him the IRGC officer standing to your left has a pistol aimed at his head and is one second away from blowing his brains out. Open the damn gate.”

“Right.”

They started walking toward the gate together. Hawke was eyeing the enormous celestial observatory that surmounted the entire citadel. Few universities in the world had anything to rival it. He could only imagine how a superintelligent machine might make use of such a formidable piece of optics. But he had no doubt that it did.

“They’ve snapped to attention,” Hawke whispered to Ascarus. “Maybe this will be easier than we thought.”

“IRGC uniforms strike fear into the heart of every sane Iranian.”

“Good. Maybe they’ll behave.”

“Don’t count on it.”

Hawke said, “Navy Blue, this is Big Red One.”

“Go ahead, Big Red.”

“Approaching the gate. We get through it alive, that’s your signal. On my order, snipers fire, take out the sharpshooters up on the wall, over.”

“Roger that, over.”

“Navy Blue, confirm SEAL squads aboard are go when the wall is secure and the gate is open.”

“Affirmative. Go when entry is secure, roger.”

“Big Red One over.”

Smiling, and chatting casually, Hawke and Ascarus approached the heavy steel gate. It was set into the massively thick stone wall, just one of three such entrances to Saffari’s kingdom. The guards looked wary, but respectful of their uniforms and Hawke’s newly acquired black beard. Hawke had his SIG in his right hand, hidden in the folds of his blousy trousers. They reached the gate, paused, and he stood to one side as Ascarus addressed the captain of the guards.

“What did he say?” Hawke whispered quietly.

“He said he has to clear any entrance with his commander.”

“Tell him about the gun.”

Hawke witnessed the man’s eyes go saucer-wide as he saw Hawke’s gun go up, aimed at his head. These were clearly guards who’d pulled easy duty. They’d likely never had a gun pointed at them before. Ascarus pulled his weapon and covered the other two, and Hawke was pleased to see them lower their automatic weapons.

“Tell him he has one second to decide.”

Ascarus barked and the steel-barred gates parted and slid back inside the thick stone wall.

Hawke and his companion stepped through quickly and purposefully. After five yards, they wheeled about and dropped the three guards with double-tap head shots before they could reclose the gate. Then Hawke told Stoke to destroy the gate’s locks with a fragmentation grenade. He didn’t want his exit blocked should he return in rather a hurry.

The two men ducked inside the long tunnel.

“Snipers, commence firing,” Hawke said into his radio. He heard the crack of the SEAL M110 sniper rifles split the air. Immediately, the tunnel echoed with the sound of heavy AK-47 return fire coming from the wall above their heads as well as fire from the men pouring off the patrol boat and racing toward the now opened gate.

He looked at his watch. He and Ascarus now had a two-minute wait until the entire assault team arrived at the gate. He started a check of his equipment, weapons, and ammo, the frag grenades hanging from his webbed belt. Then he moved quickly to the far end of the tunnel and did a recon of the citadel’s interior. In the distance, above a morass of oddly shaped rooftops, he saw his immediate destination, the white marble residence, to his left. To his right was a maze of buildings of every shape and size. In one of those buildings the Blue Team would, he hoped, locate and destroy that bloody machine.

His whole body was thrumming.

Alex Hawke was in his familiar zone, white-hot with life, seething with a red-hot desire for revenge.