Critical Mass (32 page)

Authors: David Hagberg

BOOK: Critical Mass

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THE SUDDEN CESSATION OF GUNFIRE SEEMED EVEN MORE ominous than its start. The first shots had echoed off the church walls nearly two minutes ago, but now there was nothing, no returning gunfire.

McGarvey and Schade pulled up just within the apse where the altar had once stood and looked out the narrow window into a broad courtyard area, what might have been the monastery's kitchen garden in ancient times.

Two men were hurriedly removing a camouflage tarp from a large helicopter with Greek markings. Their weapons, a pair of Kalashnikov assault rifles, were propped against a fuel drum eight or ten feet behind them.

So far as McGarvey could tell there were no others standing guard with them, but it was clear that they were in a big hurry to get out of here despite the rain and the strong winds which tore at the big sheet of canvas. Flying would be an iffy proposition at best.

“Could it have been your team doing the firing?” McGarvey asked.

Schade shook his head. “That was no M-16, sir. Maybe a Kalashnikov. Besides, we've got specific orders to conduct no operations on Greek soil.”

The helicopter looked like a stretched version of the old Bell Ranger. She would be capable of carrying a dozen people in addition to her pilot and copilot, and with luck and a skilled crew she'd make Athens, or almost any point along the nearly deserted Turkish coast to the northeast.

“If their lookouts are equipped with low-light optics they might have spotted the raft and opened fire,” Schade said.

McGarvey looked at him. “What would Lieutenant Lipton do in response?”

“That's hard to say.” Schade shrugged. “But I'd guess that he would probably go into the water and come ashore. At least I think he would.”

“If that's the case, this chopper is the only way out,” McGarvey said. “It'd be too bad if something happened to it.”

“It would probably upset them a whole lot.”

“Enough to kill us, if they get the chance. It's not your fight, kid.”

“It is now, sir,” Schade said. “I'll go right, you take left?”

McGarvey nodded. “Watch yourself.”

They slipped out of the church through a side door off the nave. The chopper was at least a hundred feet from them across the courtyard. The wind and rain continued to worsen, and the two men who were nearly finished removing the camo tarp were completely absorbed in their task.

Keeping low, Schade moved away from the church wall, angling around to the right, keeping his attention completely on the two men at the helicopter.

McGarvey started to the left, holding back against the wall until he got to a point directly behind the men, but his internal alarm system was going off like a fire bell. Something was wrong here. Some inner sense was telling him to pull Schade back.

Then he had it. The guard outside by the obelisk had looked back toward the church. Somebody was here. On an upper floor. With a clear sight line not only toward the path, but down here into the courtyard as well!

He was about warn Schade when a Kalashnikov opened fire from above and behind, exactly where he had just realized they were most vulnerable, and the young man went down in a heap, taking at least two hits.

The two men by the helicopter dropped what they were doing and spun around. They'd been well trained. Neither of
them hesitated for an instant. One sprinted for the weapons leaning against the fuel barrel, making himself a moving target, while the other dropped sideways, to present less of himself as a target, and dug into his shoulder holster for his pistol.

McGarvey shot him first, one round in the man's right hip, sending him sprawling off-balance with a cry, and the second in the side of his head, smashing his mouth so that he aspirated his shattered teeth.

Immediately switching his aim, McGarvey fired again, the bullet smacking into the second man's chest just as he was snatching up one of the Kalashnikovs. The force of the hit shoved him backwards, the bullet disintegrating inside his heart, killing him instantly.

Except for the wind the night fell silent.

McGarvey moved farther along the wall. The shooter would have spotted his approximate position.

Schade half rolled over and groaned.

“Stay where you are, Bob,” McGarvey called urgently, and Schade stopped moving. It was impossible to tell from here exactly how badly he was hurt, but McGarvey figured he couldn't be in very good shape. By rights with two hits he should have been dead.

“Come out into the open, Mr. McGarvey, or I will kill your friend,” someone said from above.

“Ernst Spranger?” McGarvey called, but he didn't think it was. The accent was German but the voice was different.

“Do as I say or I shall kill him.”

“In that case I would destroy your helicopter,” McGarvey shouted.

“You might damage the machine with a pistol, but repairs could be made,” the East German said. He had moved too. Now his voice came from directly overhead.

“You would be delayed.”

“That is of no consequence, Mr. McGarvey. You would be dead, and we would leave.”

“You're forgetting something,” McGarvey said, leaning out away from the wall in an effort to catch a glimpse of the
man above. But he was able only to see a section of open archway.

“It's you who are forgetting something. There is only you against all of us. In addition we have your wife and daughter.”

McGarvey said nothing. Instead he hurried back to the right to a spot just behind Schade. The younger man lay on his side, his gun hand stretched out ahead of him, his left hand clutched to his chest. He seemed to be saying something, but McGarvey couldn't make it out.

“Step out into the open, Mr. McGarvey, and I promise that your wife and daughter will not be harmed. We will have no further need of them once we have you.”

A door on the far side of the courtyard opened with a crash and a man carrying an assault rifle burst outside.

“Peter,” the man shouted at the same instant he spotted Schade, who had started to rise up on one elbow.

“Don't,” McGarvey shouted.

Schade had pulled something from inside his jumpsuit and was tossing it toward the helicopter with his left hand when the man above opened fire and the man across the courtyard started to fall back.

In the last possible instant, realizing what was about to happen, McGarvey threw himself against the church wall, burying his face in the dirt and covering his head with his arms.

A tremendous thunderclap burst in the courtyard, and McGarvey was lifted off the ground two feet by the force of the explosion, the night sky lighting up as if a thousand suns had suddenly switched on.

SPRANGER MANAGED TO FALL BACK INSIDE THE CORRIDOR AS the helicopter exploded. Nevertheless a spray of burning fuel burst through the open door, scorching his left arm to the shoulder, the sleeve of his nylon jumpsuit instantly melting, his skin turning an angry red and even black in big patches.

He howled in pure, blinding agony, the searing, white-hot pain rebounding inside his head, threatening to blow off the top of his skull.

Through the momentary haze that clouded his vision, making rational thought all but impossible, he focused on Liese and the others who'd followed him up here. They were bunched in a knot, staring in horrified fascination at him, waiting for him to collapse.

But he wouldn't give them the satisfaction of seeing that their general was human. He couldn't allow it, because if he did they would no longer follow him, especially not where he was leading them and the others when they got off this island.

For a flat-footed instant, standing in the church corridor, the heat from the burning helicopter making sweat pop out all over his body, he found himself wondering if he wasn't making a colossal mistake. He'd been married once, and had one child. But that seemed like another lifetime. They had fled to the West, leaving him to face his suspicious superiors and his contemptuous colleagues.

He had no explanation, he'd told them. But even if they had crossed to the West to trade secrets for their asylum there was nothing to worry about.

Arbeit macht frei.
Work makes one free. It had been the
inscription over the gates of the concentration camp at Auschwitz, and it had become the unofficial motto of the STASI.

Thirty-six hours after his wife and child had crossed the border into West Berlin, they were dead. It was winter, and the chimney of the heater in the apartment where they'd been temporarily housed by the West German authorities had backed up, deadly carbon monoxide quickly filling the rooms.

Spranger had never looked back. Never, until now, for just this moment.

He shook himself out of it, conscious that the lapse had lasted only an instant, and must have gone unnoticed by the others under the extreme circumstances. Now, because of the pain, his awareness had become almost preternatural.

“My God, Ernst, is it the helicopter?” Liese cried.

“Yes, it's gone,” Spranger croaked, his voice ragged. He struggled to control himself. “But it doesn't matter. McGarvey is dead.”

“Ernst, are you there?” DÃ¼renmatt's voice came from the walkie-talkie slung over Spranger's unburned shoulder.

With difficulty he pulled it around and keyed the talk button. “We're in the dormitory corridor across from you.” He pushed the transmit button.

“ â¦ thought you were dead. The fire â¦ it's everywhere. Did you see him?”

Spranger's gaze turned to his rifle which he had dropped when he'd been burned. Its stock was scorched. “What are you talking about, Peter? Where are you?”

“You don't know?” DÃ¼renmatt screamed. “It's McGarvey, he brought someone with him. He brought help.”

“Yes, I know this,” Spranger radioed, although he did not, although there had been a shout from across the courtyard, and not from the one who'd tossed the grenade. Two of them out there? The one by the helicopter had surely been incinerated in the explosion. But the other â¦ ?

“I'm on my way,” DÃ¼renmatt shouted breathlessly.

“We'll meet you in front. We'll have to slip out through Thira.”

“ â¦ stupid bastard! It's McGarvey! He's headed your way through the church!”

Down on the dock Bruno Lessing didn't know what to do. He'd heard the explosion, of course, and had monitored the transmissions between Spranger and DÃ¼renmatt, so he knew that escape by air would be impossible. But he was also convinced that someone or something was coming at them from the sea, although he couldn't make out a thing from where he huddled out of the rain just within the rock alcove.

He had seen something on the water, maybe a thousand yards out, more or less, and he had fired at it.

He played with the Kalashnikov's safety catch, switching it on and then off, the metallic snick barely registering in his ears.

But then what had looked to him like a small boat and several men had simply disappeared as if it had never existed. After Spranger had left, Lessing had searched the sea again with the starlight scope with no results.

“But it was there,” he muttered to himself, checking his watch again. The ten minutes were up. It was time to go, only now there was nowhere for them to go to. The chopper was no longer an option.

Spranger would get them out of this. He always had in the past, and this time would be no different. The man was nothing short of brilliant. Even though none of them had been able to figure out the real reason why they'd grabbed the two women or had brought them here, they were all equally convinced that the general knew what he was doing. With the Egk woman snapping at his heels, the man had no other choice.

Lessing grinned nervously thinking about her, and the nape of his neck prickled. She was gorgeous, but looking into her eyes was like looking through windows into hell. She might be worth a roll in the hay, but he suspected that an ordinary man would be driven absolutely mad by the experience.

He flicked the rifle's safety catch down, then up, no longer certain in which position the weapon was safetied.

East Berlin in the old daysâhell, barely five years agoâhad been simpler. There were safe havens. Even now they'd been offered the chance to come to Moscow, but no one was enticed. The Russians were having their problems. No safety there.

No safety anywhere, he thought glumly. Now they were even taking orders from the slant-eyed Japs. It was galling.

He caught a movement out of the corner of his eye, and he jerked to the left in time to see a man dressed all in black, water cascading from his head and shoulders, pulling himself onto the dock.

Lessing started to bring the Kalashnikov around when a noise to his right, like a walrus or a big fish flopping up onto the dock, made him jump nearly out of his skin, and he spun around.

The black-suited twin of the first man stood at the end of the stone dock, an M-16 rifle with a stainless steel wire stock in his hands.

Lessing was swinging the Kalashnikov to the right when a third figure dressed in black rose up onto the dock, a silenced pistol in his right hand.

A thunderclap burst in Lessing's head, and then nothing.

Smoke from the burning helicopter was obvious on the air even in the alcove behind the dock. And it was just as obvious to Lipton and his team that they were smelling burnt aviation gas.

About ten yards out they had surfaced long enough to spot the lone terrorist on the dock. Diving again to a depth of five feet, their oxygen rebreathers leaving no telltale bubbles, they'd split up; Tyrell left, Joslow right, and Lipton down the middle with Bryan Wasley and Tony Reid as backup. The sentry hadn't had a chance.

Tyrell was bent over the man, feeling for a carotid pulse. He'd taken three hits in the head from Lipton's suppressed .22, killing him instantly. The Kalashnikov's safety catch
was in the on position. Even if the terrorist had pulled the trigger, his weapon would not have fired.

Lipton and the others were hurriedly pulling off their wet suits and removing the rest of their weapons and equipment from waterproof carrying pouches. Reid and Joslow, weapons up, bracketed the narrow stairway that led steeply up through the cliff into the monastery. On signal Joslow rolled around the corner, his pistol sweeping upward in tight circles.

After a moment he shook his head and turned back. “Clear,” he called softly to Lipton. He seemed almost disappointed.

“This one is dead,” Tyrell said, straightening up from Lessing's body.

“There was no evidence of a landing strip at this end of the island on the survey maps and flyover shots I saw, which means what we're smelling is probably a chopper,” Lipton said.

“McGarvey and Bobby?” Tyrell asked.

“Probably. Which means the bad guys are caught between us, and they're not going to take that lightly.” Lipton quickly surveyed the landing dock. “We'll use this as our staging area as planned. We go for the hostages first. Everything else is secondary.”

None of his men said a thing.

“Once they're released, Tony and Jules will bring them down here, and depending upon the situation we'll either fetch the boat, or call for help. Commander Rheinholtz is standing by.”

“What if we run into heavy resistance and have to fight our way back here?” Tyrell asked quietly. They all wanted to be completely clear on their orders.

“Then that's what we'll do,” Lipton answered. “As I said, anything other than the hostages will be secondary. That includes McGarvey and Bobby. If we can get to them, we will. But the safety of the hostages comes first.” He looked at his men. “Questions?”

There were none.

“Toss that body over the side,” Lipton ordered, starting for
the stairs. “The scope and rifle too. I don't want to leave any evidence that we were here.”

The stairs were so steep and narrow that only one person could start up at a time. They led five hundred feet into a long, narrow vestibule that opened onto a broad corridor which ran through the main residence and living areas of the monastery.

Lipton silently crossed the corridor and halted at the doorway into the great hall. No one was here, and there were no sounds other than the wind and rain lashing against the thick, lead-glass windows. But the smoke was much thicker up here, and the smell of burning aviation gas was very strong.

“Nobody home, sir?” Wasley asked.

Lipton turned and shook his head. “Go with Reid and Joslow. Check everything to the end of the corridor.”

They hurried noiselessly off as Lipton entered the great hall, Tyrell right behind him. They spread out, left and right, and halted for a moment, listening, watching, every sense alert for a sign of trouble.

Somebody had been here recently. There were glasses with dregs of wine still in them on the table. Plates with scraps of food. The Paris, Berlin, Athens and New York newspapers spread out. A sweater tossed over one chair, a black nylon jumpsuit over another.

“They're dealing with the chopper,” Tyrell said softly.

Lipton nodded. “They wouldn't have taken the hostages.”

“This is a big place, Ed.”

Lipton looked at him. “They'll be isolated. Up high, away from everything else.”

Tyrell nodded his agreement, and the two of them hurried across the room to a corridor that ran at right angles to the first, deeper into the compound. Immediately to their right spiral stairs led upward.

“Get the others and follow me,” Lipton ordered. “But post Wasley down here.” He started up the stairs, keeping low and against the inner wall so that he would present less of a target to someone waiting above.

At the top, three stories above the level of the great hall, the stairs ended at a short, narrow corridor, three wooden doors on the right. Isolation cells.

He could hear the scuffle of soft-soled shoes coming up from below. Tyrell and the others. If anyone was up here, it would be the hostages, not the terrorists, he figured. But something felt odd to him. No matter what trouble the East Germans were having they wouldn't simply run off and leave the two women alone. They'd have to know that the hostages were their only real guarantee of success.

His pistol up, Lipton slipped into the corridor and put his ear to the first door. There were no sounds from within and he was about to pull away when he thought he heard something. A murmur, perhaps. A single word spoken, or whispered â¦ by a woman. A moment later another woman said something, her voice so low that the words were indistinct, but recognizable as a woman's voice nonetheless.

Tyrell and the others came up, and Lipton motioned for them to check the other two rooms, as he bolstered his pistol and gingerly inspected every square inch of the door and thick wooden frame around it for a wire, or any hint that there might be a pressure switch.

If the terrorists had left the woman here, they might have booby-trapped the room. But Lipton found nothing. And the other two rooms were empty.

“Cover the stairs,” Lipton ordered. Reid complied and Lipton turned back to the door. “Mrs. McGarvey,” he called.

There was no reply.

“Mrs. McGarvey, are you in there with your daughter? Are you all right?”

“Who's there?” A young woman asked softly.

Lipton exchanged relieved glances with Tyrell. “Elizabeth McGarvey?”

“Who is it?” Elizabeth demanded.