Full Assault Mode (6 page)

Shaft was from Boston, Massachusetts, where two things were preordained even for those born in the Back Bay neighborhood: One, the hot summers of a boy’s formidable years were spent pretending to slug walk-off grand slams over the Green Monster in left field of Fenway Park, home to the Boston Red Sox. The Red Sox were heroes the equal of the mythical Odysseus or venerable Zeus around all parts Boston. But it was largely seasonal devotion.

Two, as soon as the pennant race ended and the World Series was decided, the ball bats and gloves were traded for hockey sticks and pucks. And if things didn’t go the Red Sox’s way, the Garden, home to hockey’s Boston Bruins, was conveniently set up with beer maids, testosterone tests, and fellow fans that placed a premium on yelling until hoarse and on generally making complete asses out of themselves. For some reason, even when the Sox had a banner year, things inside the Garden never changed when “the Bs” cut the ice.

Several members of Bravo Team now lounging in their tent could practically kiss Shaft for giving up his hockey dreams as a kid. Instead of slashing and cross-checking to inflict as much pain as possible on an opposing player, the urge to heal his fellow man became irresistible. He was better at baseball, anyway, and because he was a black boy, albeit a light-skinned one, growing up in the Northeast, the neighborhood troublemakers tagged him as Shaft. The early-70s action-hero film about a New York private eye seemed to fit just right. The nickname stuck. And, like any code name in Delta Force, it’s never a personal choice.

When Slapshot took a 7.62 mm round through his right hand in Syria while aiding the Free Syrian Army in early 2011, it was Shaft’s quick thinking and care that doctors ultimately credited for saving the limb. Sure, the world-class pistol shooter had to switch shooting hands, which he had bitched about, of course, but the hand stayed.

Just a few months later, back in Afghanistan, the team was on a quick-reaction mission to rescue a compromised Canadian reconnaissance patrol when the helicopter was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade as it searched for the embattled troops. The helicopter was forced into a controlled crash-landing, and Shaft went to work

The helicopter pilots had few good choices for where to put her down and tried to stick a landing in between some high rocks on a rocky ridgeline. A flying piece of a main rotor blade sliced a crew chief’s left leg clean off above the knee. Had Shaft not immediately noticed, the young sergeant would have bled out within a minute.

Today, however, while the others recovered from their firefight on a chilly mountain in northern Afghanistan, Shaft’s medical skills were in high demand 123 miles away in a remote village nestled in the deep bowels of the Goshai Valley in Pakistan. It would take another twenty-four hours, though, for the villagers to realize they’d need him.

“To be honest, I’m not convinced the admiral should give us the green light,” Stitch said suddenly. “Ghafour doesn’t rate in my book.”

The comment wasn’t entirely unexpected from one of the operators in the tent. Nor was it exclusive to Stitch. And that last point certainly wasn’t lost on Kolt Raynor. Kolt knew to let it go, chalking it up to the valued and time-tested uniqueness of the Delta selection process. Everyone, regardless of rank, was required to think, to contribute, to excel. They were also required to both speak their mind and maintain thick skin.

“It’s just another HVI, fellas, no better or worse than the hundreds before him. We roll till our tour is up and we pop Ambien on the freedom bird back to CONUS,” Kolt said, keen to not single out Stitch, but sure to let his men know he was still pushing the optempo even on what seemed like their hundredth deployment to the badlands.

HVIs, high-value individuals, was JSOC’s way of saying “most wanted.” In a way, Stitch was right. Delta was trained to go deep, go dark, and terminate the very baddest of the bad. But not to kill and tell. At the moment, the fact that Haji Mohammad Ghafour topped that list didn’t impress Stitch. Ghafour’s position there was remarkable, since he had been an unknown person to the CIA or even inside the SCIF at Joint Special Operations Command in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, just a few weeks before.

Along with roughly eight hundred other residents, Haji Ghafour called the deep Goshai Valley home. Located in the upper stretches of the North-West Frontier Province, almost eleven miles due east of the very northern tip of the notorious Konar Province in neighboring Afghanistan, it wasn’t exactly a hot vacation spot featured in the latest edition of
National Geographic
.

Transportation was limited. Locals rode donkeys or walked. American commandos might choose the same or take their chances inside a helicopter. But the vast rugged terrain, similar to that in the mountains of neighboring Afghanistan, offered few flat and level landing spots larger than the size of a living room rug. Naturally, nobody was pushing the idea of infiltrating by parachuting in.

It took a few days to flush out the tactical plan. Sure, Kolt and the boys could be wheels up on an air-assault raid within thirty minutes if the intelligence was good enough. But a mission to build that intelligence packet required covert reconnaissance and thus more delicate handling and a great deal of patience.

Shaft was the obvious choice. The color of his skin didn’t hurt either. Under the cover of darkness, a helicopter inserted the seasoned operator high in the snow-covered mountains roughly three miles northwest of that godforsaken and forgotten village known by mapmakers as Drosh, Pakistan. From the JOC back at J-bad, Kolt was following his progress as best he could on the terminating end of Shaft’s daily updates when they were available. Kolt was impressed that Shaft had successfully walked to Drosh and presented a letter signed four months earlier by Haji Ghafour himself. The meat of the letter was a request for humanitarian assistance for the villages up and down his valley. In a major coup, the CIA had intercepted the letter a week ago. It provided a solid cover for Shaft, and everyone back at the JOC, except Admiral Mason most definitely, knew he could pull it off successfully.

Traveling solo and masquerading as a non–government agency doctor, Shaft had packed accordingly. From his helicopter insertion point, Shaft humped a large civilian backpack filled with basic medical supplies, a wad of rupees, a small Glock 26 9mm, a single hand grenade, a small digital camera, an infrared pointer, a Thuraya cell phone with spare battery, and an iPad 4.

Now, three days into the operation, Shaft was making sufficient progress—just enough to keep everyone on their toes back at J-bad. From the JOC, the J-staff was able to monitor Shaft’s exact location via a satellite link to the iPad 4 in Shaft’s bag. The technology is similar to the conventional military’s Blue Force Tracking system, but the GPS module is embedded in a new highly secretive program known as Raptor X, the U.S. government’s version of GIS mapping capability with multilayer application capability. If Google Earth was classified and on steroids, it would be called Raptor X. And that logic module was fully embedded in Shaft’s iPad 4, allowing Kolt to at least track the iPad 4 down to ten meters’ accuracy, as long as it was powered on and registering, which would be enormously valuable if they had to launch an in extremis rescue of his man on the scene. If something got ugly for Shaft, as long as he kept the iPad 4 with him, Murphy’s Law could be managed.

Although unsuccessful in obtaining pack mules or porters to accompany him to the target valley, he linked up with a few armed locals who offered to escort him to Haji Ghafour. Allah may provide a cure for every disease, but everyone loves a medicine man.

Kolt’s cell phone rang. The ringtone was the theme to
Shaft.

“Everyone shut up!” Kolt shouted, grabbing the Thuraya cell phone and pushing the little green button to answer. The team crowded around him.

“Hello?”

“Steak and lobster tonight, isn’t it?” Shaft asked with his typical ice-cold demeanor and quirky sense of humor.

Kolt smiled wide. “Ha! Not till the night after tomorrow, bro, but it’s good to hear you have things under control.” Kolt knew Shaft wouldn’t be wisecracking unless he did.

“Yeah, well I’m sure the rest of the team is already standing in the chow line.”

Kolt smiled and nodded in agreement but ignored the comment. “Status?”

“My friends and I have reached the mouth of the valley,” Shaft said, passing the official word that all was well and on track.

Kolt figured he must have caught one of those overloaded but colorful Jenga trucks on the Chitral-Dir road. The ride would have been backbreaking, but it would deliver him to the mouth of the Goshai Valley. From there, however, the next five miles to Ghafour’s village was all on foot.

“Yeah, we have a positive track on you. That was quick!” Kolt stated, letting Shaft know that the iPad 4 location was pinging just fine.

“Saddle sore?” Kolt asked.

“Nope, the public transportation out here works smoother than New York City. You don’t even have to tip the driver.”

Kolt smiled. “Good to hear. Save your juice. Talk to you tomorrow at seventeen hundred hours,” Kolt answered as he made eye contact and bumped fists with the team members standing around him.

“Enjoy the steak!” Shaft shot back as Kolt removed the phone from his ear and mashed the red
END CALL
button.

Fayetteville, North Carolina

Sergeant Cindy “Hawk” Bird was becoming paranoid. So she thought, anyway. She was certain she had seen the black four-door Mercury Grand Marquis three times now while she had run some errands on the military base and hopscotched Fayetteville while shopping. The gorgeous day was much welcomed, one of her few days off over the last several months. After three weeks of mind-boggling TDY in Rockville, Maryland, home of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, where she reviewed pressurized and boiling water reactors, the fission process, and what exactly were the key components that Delta would need to take out should POTUS order a covert attack on Iran’s nuclear program, she hoped for a long weekend to unwind and snuggle up with a good love story around the fire.

With the ongoing conflict in Syria escalating for Delta, she, along with a select team of fellow unit members, was swamped. This was exacerbated because of her formal military training as a chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear specialist. The sarin-gas issue ensured she would be knee-deep in the mission analysis. She wasn’t bitching—she knew part of the deal with the unit was maintaining her quals in everything nuke or internationally banned chemical weapons. Truth be told, though, she yearned to be overseas in Afghanistan doing something to help with the war effort. She didn’t know what exactly that would be. There wasn’t a lot of operational or tactical necessity for someone with her skill set or looks, but she figured she’d learn something new just the same.

Thumbing her iPhone 5 as she passed through the food court before exiting the main entrance, she marveled at how glorious a day it had become. If the sun held, she thought she might take in an hour or so poolside to even out her farmer’s tan after hours of flat-range pistol work at the secret Delta compound located in the upper left quadrant of the sprawling nineteen square miles of Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Nothing bugged her more than the distinct tan line separating her biceps from her wide, muscular shoulders. But that would have to wait for much warmer days because, even though the sun was strong enough to make her slide the white Costa Hammerhead sunglasses off her head to protect her eyes, February in Fayetteville usually floated between a frosty 33 to a cool 47 degrees.

The vehicle seemed a little out of place in the Bragg main-exchange parking lot, where she first noticed it. Late-morning Wednesdays weren’t a busy time for the exchange, which typically meant the parking lot was fairly empty. The vehicles usually seen there at that time of the week were dated pickup trucks, complete with prominent black-and-white stickers of U.S. Army Airborne wings, or the red, white, and blue AA stickers showing they were a proud former member of the famed 82nd Airborne Division. Retired military personnel who chose to remain in the Fayetteville area liked to represent. Besides retirees, military spouses driving family-focused minivans, with some of the better-off spouses tooling around in a full-size Chevy Tahoe or GMC Yukon, populated the parking lot before the normal lunch crowd.

She hadn’t been able to get a look at the occupants, though, since the Mercury’s windows were tinted, but the not-so-discrete government license plate gave her pause. When she first saw the Mercury, she had been more concerned with finding her keys in her loaded purse and with checking for a text message about lunch from her Green Beret boyfriend. But it was only about five minutes until she had spotted the same black Marquis a second time. Heading south along Bragg Boulevard, she slowed her vehicle to let the Marquis pass. Hawk watched in her rearview mirror as it slowed its pace as well, maintaining four to five car lengths behind but in the fast center lane. She checked her speedometer, making sure she wasn’t getting too crazy and offering an easy speeding ticket to a bored Fayetteville police officer. Her gas gauge was showing just over a quarter tank, so she gunned it through the yellow caution light to cross two lanes of traffic and took a hard right into the Citco station on Shaw Road. She looked back toward Bragg Boulevard and watched the black Marquis continue south and out of view.

As she squeezed the pump handle and filled her tank, she zipped up the front of her pink sport fleece to take the chill off her neck. She brought her shoulders up toward her ears to further protect her from the strong winds coming from the east over Bragg Boulevard. Settling the gas pump back in its cradle, she realized she was missing something important.

“Shit! The damn bracelet,” she said, not caring if anyone heard her. “Troy’s gonna freak!”

Her 5th Special Forces boyfriend Troy was a gear Nazi and dedicated prepper, always good for a story of how the world is coming to an end and how it’s important to be ready. Sure, the end of the world one day is a possibility, she reasoned, but she figured worrying more about her obstacle-course times and getting her Mozambique drill time under a respectable eight seconds were more pressing and realistic problems.