Transfer of Power

Bandar Abbas, Iran

FROM ATOP HIS perch down the street. Wicker was keeping a careful eye on the street and humming a Bob Marley tune to himself. Peering through his optic-green night-vision scope, he kept his breathing shallow and smooth. Suddenly, the door from the downstairs apartment opened, and a man wearing a pair of underpants appeared with an AK-47 gripped in his hands.

“Harry,” the sniper spoke into his mike, “you’ve got company.

The guy from the downstairs apartment just came outside.”

Wicker watched through his scope as the man walked over to the slumped guard and shook his shoulder. The dead guard rolled from the chair to the ground, and the man stepped back quickly, bringing his AK-47 up to the firing position.

Wicker didn’t have to think-from the moment the man had stepped outside, his head had never left the crosshairs of the scope. The SEAL squeezed the trigger of his rifle, the suppressor at the end of the barrel hissed with the expulsion of gases, and the bullet was away.

The heavy round hit the man in the side of the head and propelled him to the ground, his body tensing as it was thrown and his index finger compressing on the trigger of the AK-47.

A two-round burst of the loud rifle broke the predawn silence.

“Tango down,” stated a calm Wicker as he began a sweep for other targets. HARRIS WAS STANDING under Rapp, making sure he got up the ladder, when he heard what he instantly knew to be the distinctive sound of an AK-47 firing. There was a split-second pause, and then everybody kicked it into high gear. Harris stepped away from the ladder and listened as Wicker gave him an update. When he had heard enough, he yelled at Jordan and Tony, “Are you two almost done?”

Without looking up. Tony, the smaller of the two, said, “We’ll be right with you.”

Harris pulled the mike back down.

“Reavers, any sign of our bird?”

Reavers had crawled to the edge of the roof to see what was happening on the street. He was looking down at the two dead bodies beneath him when his boss asked about the choppers.

He looked up and scanned the horizon. The helicopters were nowhere in sight.

“That’s a negative. Harry,” replied Reavers.

“Is the strobe up and running?” asked Harris. The strobe Harris was referring to was an infrared strobe light that was invisible to the naked eye but glaringly visible to anyone wearing night-vision goggles.

From his perch down the block Wicker did a quick check with his night-vision scope and noted the flashing light atop the house.

“The strobe is active.”

Harris looked at his watch and turned back to his two men booby-trapping the stairs.

“That’s it, everyone on the roof. Lets go!”

The two men connected one last grenade and then scooted up the ladder.

Harris followed them up and rolled onto the dirty flat roof. With his MP-10 in one hand, he closed the hatch. Spinning to check where his men were, the commander grabbed his night-vision binoculars and looked to the northwest, scanning the sky for the choppers. As he searched the horizon, he heard Wicker call, “More Tangos on the move.” Wicker peered through his scope as two men, and then a third, appeared from the house across the street. All three were armed. Wicker maneuvered the scope and said, “Everyone stay down. I can handle it.” As the first man approached the bodies of the dead men on the street. Wicker centered in on the side of his head and squeezed off a round. He slid the Galil to the left just a touch and framed up the second man, who was now standing in shock while he watched the man in front of him crumple to the ground. Wicker squeezed the trigger again and moved on. The third man was backpedaling for the door, waving his arms and screaming. He never made it.

Harris dropped to his belly and quickly crawled to the edge of the flat roof. With his MP-10 up and ready, he looked over the edge at the bodies in the street. The SEALs were already deployed around the perimeter of the roof. Two covering the alley, and two covering the front. Rapp kneeled over the unconscious body of Harut and searched the sky for the helicopters.

“Boys,” barked Harris, “shoot anything that moves.”