The Last Man

Chapter 36

Operating in the field always presented a unique set of problems, but a good number of them were predictable. There was a mark that they were all aware of, or at least were supposed to be aware of it-seventy-two hours into any crisis, the effectiveness of the team dropped off considerably. The Agency wasn’t the only group that had studied the issue. Every branch of the military looked into the issue with a need to understand combat effectiveness. Battlefield commanders needed to know how long they could keep a unit in the fight without sleep, with food and water and without food and water. The FBI, CIA, and any other federal agencies that dealt with crisis or catastrophe all conducted their own studies and they all pretty much found the same thing-seventy-two hours was the limit. After that, your people became almost worthless. Cognitive skills were drastically reduced, hallucination set in, and the body began to shut down. As with everything, of course, there were a few exceptions.

Elite warriors, like the ones produced by Delta Force and the SEAL teams, could push beyond the seventy-two-hour mark in extreme circumstances, but not much further. They taught their men to grab an hour or two of sleep whenever they could-even during a prolonged firefight. If the manpower was available, it was crucial to rotate teams. Three teams were ideal, each one working an eight-hour shift, but Kennedy didn’t have that luxury. As it was, the Go Team that had been assembled was barely sufficient to operate in two twelve-hour shifts, and that was to handle the Rickman crisis. That team was weakened when she pulled people off it to start looking for Hubbard. Then she had to deal with the aftermath of the police shooting and now with the release of Rickman’s interrogation, more of her attention was put into damage control. It was no longer just about Joe Rickman.

Even though it felt like it, Kennedy knew from the start that it had always been about more than just Rickman. Rickman’s brain possessed hundreds of names and those names represented real people who were assets of the CIA. Some of them were Americans, deepcover operatives who were operating in foreign countries without the aid of diplomatic cover. If these people were exposed, the likelihood was that they’d be killed. And then there were the agents-the men and women who worked for foreign governments. They came in every stripe from politicians, to bureaucrats, to scientists, to financiers, to military personnel, to intelligence operatives and janitors and secretaries.

More than any satellite or listening device, these men and women were the eyes and ears of the CIA. They offered snippets of information that when pieced together aided Kennedy and her people in understanding the intent of their foes and sometimes, when needed, the ability to predict their next move. These assets were the lifeblood of the CIA. Without them, the Agency would cease to become an effective intelligence agency. If Rickman continued to crack, Kennedy would have no choice but to begin pulling out her network of spies. It would take at least a decade to rebuild the network, possibly longer.

Despite the urgency Kennedy knew what had to be done. Hayek looked tired. They all looked tired. They understood what was at stake, so they were all eager to prove the doctors wrong and push past the seventy-two-hour mark. Kennedy held up her palm and stopped Hayek’s rambling apology. “When was the last time you slept?”

The question caught her off guard and she took an unfocused look at nothing and tried to recall the last time she’d closed her eyes for more than a few seconds. “I think I got an hour or two last night.”

Kennedy looked at Coleman and asked the same question. “As much as possible, I’ve stuck to a schedule. Ten on and two off.” Kennedy thought of Coleman’s six-man team. “Starting when?” “From the very beginning. I made sure everyone grabbed at least four hours on the flight over.” He shrugged. “There wasn’t much for us to do until we landed.”

Leave it up to the retired SEAL to maintain discipline in the midst of chaos. He’d done this countless times. Kennedy was embarrassed that she hadn’t maintained better discipline over the schedules.

“I’ll be honest,” Coleman said, “I could use some sleep. I’ve been up for thirty-plus hours straight. With everything that went down two days ago and losing Reavers, that put me down one man and I didn’t bother to reshuffle the schedule.”

Kennedy placed a hand on his arm but looked at Hayek. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. We were understaffed to start with and then the shootout with the police threw us all for a loop. We have another twenty-six people due to land in about three hours. Once they’re in position, I don’t want anyone working more than a sixteen-hour shift. Scott, keep an eye on Wilson until he’s in the air and then stand down your whole team. Don’t set any alarms, just sleep. We’re going to need you at some point and you guys need to be fresh.”

Kennedy considered her own schedule for a second. She’d been able to grab four hours of sleep overnight and all things considered, felt pretty good. She had a staff meeting in fifteen minutes and then after that, the working group back at Langley was to give her a full report on the potential extent of the damage that could be caused by the Rickman affair. Then she had a meeting with Nadeem Ashan from the Pakistani Intelligence Service. She liked Ashan and hoped that he was here to offer some information and assistance, but knowing the ISI, his motives lay more in self-preservation.

“This police officer,” Kennedy said to Hayek, “I’m not sure I understand his relevance.”

Coleman answered for Hayek. “We ran into him at the safe house. He’s one of Darren’s reintegration projects. Abdul Siraj Zahir… a real piece of shit. Long story short, he barges into the safe house and starts making threats, Mitch pulls on him.” Coleman looked quickly over both shoulders to make sure no one else could hear him and then added, “ Mitch tells the guy he’s going to blow his head off. ”

Kennedy shook her head ever so slightly and frowned.

“I know it doesn’t sound good but when it happened it didn’t seem so bad. At any rate there’s some back and forth and then Mitch decides he’ll let this guy live if he works for us and finds out what happened to Rick.” Despite not wanting to, Coleman decided he needed to give her the full context. “Mitch gave the guy forty-eight hours to come through with some information or he was going to put a five-hundredthousand-dollar bounty on the guy’s head.”

“And Mitch asked me to put a trace on his phone,” Hayek quickly added. “Langley has been recording his calls and following his moves for the past two days. Only, I forgot about it until about fifteen minutes ago.”

“And?” Kennedy asked.

“He’s been trying to get hold of Mitch. He’s left him five messages since last night.”

“Saying?”

“Basically, ‘Don’t kill me. I have some information for you.’ The guy sounds scared.”

“Well, if the guy has information, call him.”

Hayek shook her head. “I think Mitch needs to make the call. If I or anyone else calls, he’s going to want to renegotiate.”

“I agree.”

“Does Mitch even remember the guy?”

“I don’t know,” Coleman said, “but I could probably talk him through it.”

Kennedy thought about her other problems. “And Wilson?”

“I have two people on him.”

“All right. Brief Mitch and make the call. If anything important comes out of it, call me.”

Rapp didn’t remember Zahir at first. But after Coleman described the man’s shoe-polish-black beard and his snug gray-blue police uniform, he got the visual. The context of their meeting was a little more complicated. The previous night Coleman had explained to Rapp why they were in Afghanistan. Rapp had only a vague recollection of Rickman. When Coleman explained to Rapp how he had threatened the local police commander, Rapp’s eyes got big. “I said that?”

Coleman laughed. “You sure did.”

“Do I speak this way to people very often?”

“When they happen to be,” Coleman said, “scumbags like Zahir, the answer is yes.”

It seemed as if each hour Rapp was learning more about his past, and by association, himself. He had a basic overview of who he was but the details were always a little shocking. It was eerie coming to grips with the stark reality that he had murdered people. There were no, oh-my-god-I’m-a-monster type moments. It was more or less, that’s who I am, I need to keep filling in this puzzle and when it’s done I can sit back and judge my actions in their totality, or not. That was the other abnormal thing about this process of getting to know himself again: The second time around you saw things that you might have missed on the first go round.

“So I threatened to put a five-hundred-K bounty on this guy’s head.”

“Yes… and you threatened to stick a Tomahawk missile up his ass as well.” Grinning, Coleman added, “I know it sounds harsh, but it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. He’s a real piece of shit. I think you made that pretty clear to him as well.”

“So I call him back and find out what he has.”

“Yes, but you’re probably going to have to be a bit of a prick. Do you think you’re up to it?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“All right. We have him marked in Jalalabad.” Coleman looked over Hayek’s shoulder at the blinking red light. “Hmm…”

“What?” Rapp asked.

“It looks like he’s just a block away from the safe house.” He tapped Hayek on the shoulder. “Everything ready to go?”

“In a second.” All of Rapp’s clothes had been cut off him when he arrived at the hospital, and his personal possessions, such as his phones and fake ID’s and credit cards, had been placed in a bag and kept in a storage room. It was just another thing that was overlooked in the chaos. Hayek was now syncing Rapp’s phone via Bluetooth to her laptop, so they could record and monitor the call. When it was ready to go, she plugged in two sets of headphones, handing one to Coleman and keeping the other for herself.

“The number’s already punched in,” she said as she handed Rapp the phone, “just hit send.”

“You said we have people back at Langley monitoring all of his calls.”

“That’s right.”

“And if they record me threatening to kill him on the phone?”

Coleman jumped in. “We’re not the FBI. We’re supposed to threaten people like Zahir. When we’re done, we’ll make sure all the recordings are erased.”

“Fine.” Rapp hit Send and tried to put himself in the proper mind-set.