Pulse

THREE

Four invisible specters slid across the frozen sea. Concealed from head to toe in white, military-issue thermal armor, the Delta team moved toward their target — a terrorist training camp. The Aden-Abyan Islamic Army had opted for the deserted wasteland of Russia's Siberian north rather than the boiling deserts of their native Yemen. It was unknown how long the camp had existed or if Russia knew of its presence, but one thing was clear…

"It's time to blow this place sky fucking high," said Stan Tremblay, call sign "Rook," into his throat mike, which allowed the others to hear him despite the whipping arctic winds. "Talk about maximum shrinkage— it's so cold out here I might have to change my name to Susan."

The four prone figures shook slightly with laughter. From a distance they would be indiscernible from the surrounding snow and ice, of which there was an abundance surrounding the U-shaped island. Up close they'd look like nothing more than clumps of snow, disturbed by the wind. The only fault in their camouflage was the two one-inch slits in their antiglare snow goggles, but an enemy would have to be within five feet to see the aberration. By then it would be too late.

A dull roar from behind caused the group to become motionless once again. Shin Dae-jung, call sign "Knight," focused on the noise. A vehicle was approaching quickly across the ice, coming from behind and closing on their target. "Motion on our six," he said. "Heads down. Don't move."

The four Delta operators planted their faces in the snow, judging distance and speed from the whine of the engine and the vibrations in the ice beneath their bodies. It was going to pass by t hem — and close.

"Deep Blue, this is Knight. Do you see incoming target?"

After a faint hiss and click, the cool voice of a man they had never met, yet who watched out for them from above via satellite, came loud and clear through the team's specially modified AN/PRC-158 personal role radio. The radio, which could be used for both voice communication and data transmissions, contained GPS chips that allowed the team to be tracked around the world. The only catch was that there was a one-second delay. "Copy that, Knight. Zooming in on him now. Still one hundred yards out. Looks like two on a snowmobile. They're heading straight for you."

"Are they a problem?"

"Armed, but not looking for a fight…. Wait. Queen, you're about to become roadkill. Might want to roll to your right."

"Copy that," said a crisp, feminine voice. Zelda Baker, the lone female member of the team, call sign "Queen," waited motionless as the snowmobile and its two occupants barreled toward her.

"Two rolls to the right," Deep Blue said. "On my mark. Three…"

She tensed, waiting for the signal and hoping that Deep Blue took the one-second delay into account. The vibrations in the ice shook her jaw and the sound of the engine roared in her ears.

"Two… "

For a moment she wondered if she'd hear Deep Blue's signal over the racket, but then a voice came through, loud and clear, "Go!"

Queen rolled twice to the right, keeping her limbs tight and movement quick, she buried her face in the snow just as the snowmobile passed on her left, its track rolling over the edge of her sleeve. A moment later, the whine of the engine slowed and then idled.

"No one move," came the whispered voice of Deep Blue, as though the men on the snowmobile might hear him through the team's earpieces.

Twenty feet from the team, the two men turned around on their seat. They scrutinized the snow with squinted eyes. Their bodies were concealed behind thick layers of thermal garb and furs. Each had an AK-47 strapped to his back. As the engine idled one of the men stood and held his AK at the ready. He stepped toward the team, scanning the snow.

The voice of Deep Blue returned. "When I say your name, it means they're not looking at you and I want you to take the shot."

The heartbeats of the four Delta operators remained steady and strong, each waiting to be given the signal that would trigger the taking of two lives. Not that either man's death would weigh heavily on any of their consciences. These men were murderers and terrorists and the team's whole purpose for being here was to kill every last one of them. But the plan had been to catch them all inside the facility while they hid from the elements, and blow them to bits, not to engage them in an unnecessary firefight. Under normal circumstances a Tomahawk cruise missile strike would do the trick, but being on Russian soil, a missile attack would be interpreted as an act of war. Better to hit them from the ground and keep things off the radar… literally. By the time the Russians discovered the site, it would be nothing more than frozen ashes.

"Hold on," Deep Blue said. "You're clear."

None of the four heard the engine rev up or leave, but if Deep Blue said they were clear, they were clear. All four looked up just in time to see the closest man slump to the ground, a gurgle escaping his slit throat, which loosed gouts of blood onto the snow. Behind him stood a white wraith, staring at them through two thin slits.

"Miss me?"

"King, how in the hell did you get here?" Rook said as he stood.

Jack Sigler, call sign "King," cleaned his faithful seven-inch KA-BAR knife in the snow. Behind him, the second man was leaning on the snowmobile, a slow trickle of blood still draining from his neck. "Been here for five minutes. Wanted to see if you guys talked about me behind my back."

"Bullshit," Rook said, dusting the snow from his white, second-generation FN SCAR-L assault rifle with attached 40mm grenade launcher. Out of the five, he was most in love with his weapons, which also included two .50 caliber Magnum Desert Eagle handguns, one strapped to each hip beneath his snow gear. They were as children to him — very deadly children.

"Motion at the target site," Deep Blue said. "Looks like you've been made."

King lifted the head of the man who had died upon the snowmobile; his blood had already frozen in a pool around the vehicle. He opened the man's jacket revealing his slit throat and a throat mike. "Damnit. I'm getting really tired of these third-world jerks getting their hands on this kind of technology."

"It's the damn private sector," Rook said. "Highest bidder gets the tech. They don't give a rip who gets killed as a result. If they don't pull the trigger, innocent blood isn't on their hands."

King reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device with a touchpad and small screen. "Won't be any innocent blood spilled today." He began punching buttons as he spoke. "How many outside the complex?"

"None yet," Deep Blue said, "but you've got a Sno-Cat with five, maybe six unfriendlies on their way out."

"Copy that," King said as he finished pushing buttons. Behind him, the island transformed into a volcano as a plume of fire and smoke mushroomed into the air, accentuated by a resounding boom. A shock wave kicked up a wash of snow that momentarily obscured their vision. When the snow cleared, a smoldering island lay in the wake of the blast, with several secondary explosions from fuel supplies still erupting across the land. But at the center of it all, charging straight for them, was a white, t ank-treaded Sno-Cat. One man leaned from the window, taking aim with an AK-47, while two men on top brought their own AKs to bear. All three began firing.

The team dove to the snow, knowing they would disappear from view. "I've got this," Knight said, as he crawled up behind the snowmobile, using the vehicle and its lone, dead occupant as cover. He unslung his PSG-1 semiautomatic sniper rifle and took aim at the Sno-Cat. He knew the vehicle wasn't meant for a firefight, so it most likely didn't have bulletproof glass. Looking through the sight he found the driver's head. He could see the man shouting at the others.

Knight slowly squeezed the trigger and a single round burst from the weapon, its retort echoing across the open expanse and drowning out the popping AK-47s. He watched through the scope as the windshield held its own, denting inward slightly where the round struck. Bulletproof glass. Damn.

Knight took aim again, preparing to unleash a semiautomatic barrage of sniper rounds. The Sno-Cat was moving and jostling on the ice, which made the shot even more difficult, but few people on the planet were his equal with a sniper rifle. He held his breath and squeezed off fifteen rounds in rapid succession. The windshield became awash with white pockmarks, but the one in the middle grew wide as eight of the fifteen rounds found their mark, striking the same place as the first round and punching a hole in the bulletproof glass. Three rounds in all made it through the window, but only the first made contact. There wasn't a head left for the second two to strike.

Even without the driver, the Sno-Cat continued toward them. More than that, without the driver, the Sno-Cat wouldn't stop once it reached them. AK-47 fire continued to pepper the snow around the group, but as is so often the case with terror groups, they had atrocious aim and little self-control.

Rook looked down the sight of his assault rifle. "I have to do everything I s'pose. Bend over, ladies, here it comes." A dull pop signified the launching of a grenade. The two men on top saw it coming and leaped from the roof of the Cat. The others took the grenade's full force as it ripped through the Cat and turned their bodies into little more than Campbell's Chunky Soup.

The two survivors clambered to their feet, clutching their AK-47s, and beat a hasty retreat back toward the island's rocky shoreline in search of cover.

"My turn," Queen said.

As the two men made a beeline for the smoldering complex, they fired aimlessly over their shoulders, peppering the ice behind them and posing no real threat to the team.

Queen heaved the dead man off the snowmobile. A sheet of frozen blood lifted away with his body and shattered when he fell to the ice. She took his seat and said, "You'd think with a big secret training facility, these guys would be better shots."

"Blowing yourself up doesn't take much aim," King said.

She revved the snowmobile's engine. "Right." The snowmobile burst forward. She brought it around in a wide turn, building speed, and then was off like a bullet, streaking toward the fleeing men.

"Hey, King," Knight said, holding up a white Heckler & Koch UMP submachine gun.

King sighed. It was Queen's weapon. And he knew she hadn't forgotten it. The woman was the smallest member of the team, but like the savage wolverine — a terrier-sized weasel capable of taking down a moose — what she lacked in size she made up for in ferocity and brute strength. It wasn't always easy to see past her feminine face, but the woman was built like a powerhouse, so much so that no one on the team dared arm-wrestle her. It wasn't certain she'd win, but if she did, the loser would be cursed by a lifetime of taunting from the others.

Queen closed in on her targets. The men, now out of ammo, simply ran for their lives. If the men had conserved their ammo, she would be dead, but the men had as little sense as they did time to live. Queen was upon them.

The man closest to her — the one she intended to kill first — tripped and fell into a heap on the ice. He ruined her plan, but then she was always open to improvisation. She opened the throttle and plowed over the man just as he picked up his head. The front of the snowmobile struck the man's head with a sickening crunch. It was sloppier than she liked things to be, but she couldn't argue with its effectiveness. She returned her focus to the other man, whose frantic run carried him quickly across the ice.

Queen stood on the seat of the snowmobile as she prepared to attack. The man looked over his shoulder, his eyes wide with fear and confusion. It was obvious he'd expected to be gunned down. Upon seeing her charging toward him, no gun in sight, he stopped and stood his ground.

At least he's brave, she thought. And then, as she closed to within twenty feet she reached up and pulled back her white hood and goggles, letting her wavy blond hair flail in the wind like the tentacles of an enraged squid. She wanted him to know she was a woman.

When a smile crept onto the man's face, she knew her free hair had had the desired effect. He was underestimating her.

Queen leaped into the air and flew toward the man, arms outstretched and wearing a smile of her own. The man reached out to catch her, no doubt intending to squeeze the life out of her, but he'd never get the chance. As she collided with the man, she wrapped one of her thick arms around his neck, squeezed, and then used the impact of their bodies striking the ice to suddenly increase the pressure.

The result was a loud crack as the man's spine snapped. His brief encounter with Queen was akin to being hit by a bus. She stood, waltzed back to the snowmobile, and headed back toward the others. She glanced down at the man she'd run over as she past. His neck was bent back at an extreme angle.

"Piece of cake," Queen said as she rejoined the team after a quick drive past the burning Sno-Cat wreckage.

Knight held out her weapon. "Show-off."

She took it with a smile that, combined with her bright blue eyes and blond hair, could disarm most men — and terrorists — with a glance. She looked past Knight to the silent member of the team. He'd said nothing and moved little since the combat had begun. "Hey, Bishop, not in the mood today?"

Erik Somers, call sign "Bishop," shrugged. "Didn't see the need." He hoisted his belt-fed M240E6 machine gun onto his shoulder, while holding a chain of white bullets. The rapid-fire stopping force of his weapon alone would have been enough to stop the Sno-Cat and take out the men who'd fled, but he was a man of few words and reserved action.

Queen shook her head. She loved to see Bishop in action, and was always disappointed when he held back. He was a one-man wrecking crew. Still, she did enjoy taunting him when a mission finished without him firing a shot. "For such a big man you must have a pair of raisins between your legs, Bish," she said as she turned back toward the others, unaware that a speeding projectile was headed straight for her head.

When the snowball hit, Queen dove, rolled, and made ready with her submachine gun. But there was no enemy, just Bishop, whose chest shook with laughter.

Queen stifled a smile, dropped her weapon, and pounded toward the unmoving Bishop. "You lily shit bird…"

"Save it for later," Deep Blue's voice said over the headset. "That blast lit up the infrareds like the Fourth of July. If anyone had a bird over the area, they'll come looking. Hump it back to LZ Alpha double-time and come home."

Queen pointed a finger at Bishop. "You're lucky." She did her best to sound pissed, but the smirk on her lips revealed otherwise. Bishop remained still and silent.

Deep Blue spoke again. "And Queen, put your damn hood back up."

"You heard the man," King said. "Let's go home."

"King, I just got word that your two-week jaunt has been approved," Deep Blue said. "That means you're all getting some R and R. Enjoy it while it lasts."

"Where you off to?" Queen asked.

"Peru," King said. "An old friend needs my help."

"You going to see action?" Rook asked. "Should we come with?"

The four of them looked at King at once. He couldn't see their eyes through the small slits in their goggles, but he could tell they all wanted in… if there was action to be had.

"Thanks, but no," King said. "Should be a walk in the park."

"Bogies twenty miles out and closing," Deep Blue said. "ETA, five minutes."

"But now it's time to run," King said.

The group broke into a sprint toward the forested coastline where a still-classified UH-100S stealth Blackhawk transport heticopter, piloted by some boys from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, also known as the "Nightstalkers," stood ready to speed them away.

King took one last look over his shoulder. He'd counted seventy-five men and women in the camp. The explosives he'd planted had killed the majority of them. Two more had fallen to his knife. And yet the number of dead on his hands this day was a drop in the bloody bucket he'd filled during his ten years with Delta. For the briefest of moments he grew weary of the death and violence.

Then he remembered who these people were, what they had done, and what they would do if they weren't stopped. He had witnessed the horrors of war, the blood and havoc. Fellow soldiers had died in his arms on several occasions, some riddled with shrapnel, others missing limbs or simply sprayed down by bullets. War and its tragedy were familiar to him. But they paled in comparison to the horrors wreaked by terrorists. To kill a soldier in battle was something he could justify, something he could live with, but to slaughter innocents, to willfully infect the world's population with fear, was madness that served the needs of a few radicals.

In his line of work, civilian casualties were sometimes unavoidable, but he abhorred the news of innocents caught in the crossfire. It stood against everything he fought for. That the organizations he fought against served to inflict as many civilian casualties as possible, that they cheered and celebrated the deaths of innocents, infuriated him. He'd seen the remains of men, women, and children blown to pieces by suicide bombers who targeted cafes, markets, and schools. He could identify the glazed look in the eyes of a man willing to take his own life in order to spread fear and spark wars. He recognized the heart of his enemy as evil.

So he waged his war against terrorism as a member of Delta, never hesitating to pull the trigger if it meant saving innocents. It was gruesome work, but necessary. Noble even. As King forged across the ice he looked back one last time at the ruined island. Another terror network brought to its knees. With seventy-four potential suicide bombers inside the complex and the average number of deaths caused by each suicide attack placed at ninety-five, he'd just saved roughly seven thousand innocent lives.

"Checkmate," he whispered.