The Devil's Footprint (52 page)

There had been concern about motion sensors or beams, even though the notes
on Patricio Nicanor's plan had stated they were not being used.
 
The reconnaissance using sensors had shown he
was right.
 
A high-technology fence of
such dimensions would have been expensive and difficult to maintain in such a
location.
 
Further, motion sensors would
have been hard to coordinate with the jeep patrols and vulnerable to being set
off by wild animals.
 
Still, two fences,
the inner one electrified, separated by a patrolled strip and overlooked by a
blockhouse,
were
not insignificant.

"In sum," continued Fitzduane, "while Shadow Two is
infiltrating from behind to take out the blockhouse on the high ground, three
other teams are going to enter by the front gates.
 
After all, what are gates for?

"In
Salvador
,
the valley containing the mercenary garrison and the terrorists, the sentries
will be taken out with silenced weapons, and two teams, six people, Chifune
Shadow Three and Peter Harty's Shadow Five, will enter on foot and head
immediately for the Yaibo barracks building.
 
You will shut off the generator silently so it looks like a normal
breakdown.
 
You will also destroy the
radio room, which is on the first floor of the main building.
 
Then, again using silenced weapons, you will
kill — I repeat kill — all Yaibo inside and anyone else you encounter except
for the hostage.
 
In the ensuing
darkness, all of you will exfiltrate with the hostage and rejoin your vehicles,
which will be concealed in the scrub and rocks on the other side of the
perimeter road.
 
In all, I expect you to
be in the camp for no more than five to seven minutes — ten at the outside.

At precisely the same time as
Salvador
is being entered and the blockhouse being neutralized, Brick's team, Shadow
Four, will enter Dali, the supergun valley.
 
In this case, they will bring in their Guntrack when the internal opposition
has been neutralized.
 
Here, apart from
mercenaries at the entrance, you will have to deal with four Yaibo guarding the
supergun control bunker.
 
That done, you
can tame the supergun and check out what kind of warheads they have in
store.
 
No matter what you find, I expect
you to be inside for no more than fifteen minutes.

"All of this adds up to three synchronized assaults taking out
respectively the terrorists, the supergun, and the blockhouse that commands the
two valleys.
 
The watchwords are stealth,
speed, and silence.

"Although you know the enemy dispositions full well, I am going to
repeat that we are not just up against around fifty Yaibo terrorists.
 
On the left-hand side of the main camp,
Salvador, as you enter — that is the side opposite the Yaibo barracks — there
is tented accommodation for over six hundred Tecuno mercenary soldiers, and
just to make life more interesting, there are normally half a dozen tanks
laagered up in the middle, and there is a helicopter pad.
 
In short, tiptoes might be a good idea.
 
These guys are classified as
special forces
themselves, and though they may not be the
best in the world, even six hundred idiots can spray a lot of lead around, and
they have other unfriendly toys like heavy mortars and rocket launchers.

"To further encourage discretion, I would remind you that the twin
valleys,
Salvador
and
Dali, that
make up the Devil's Footprint are
bordered by a perimeter road that also circles the Madoa military airfield only
eight kilometers away.
 
Convoys of armor
patrol that perimeter road.
 
Finally, I
should mention that the Madoa airfield, apart from being the base for two
thousand more troops, boasts MiG-23s and armed helicopters.
 
So be discreet folks.
 
Keep the decibels down.

"The mercenaries — the battalion in the Devil's Footprint and the
brigade in the air base — are not on the menu unless we have no
alternative.
 
But if the shit does hit
the fan,
I want very serious destruction
.

"These people are not our friends.
 
They threaten our countries.
 
They
threaten our values.
 
They have already
killed many hundreds of our people.
 
So
do not pull back.
 
I can promise
you,
this is no time to be nice.
 
They won't kiss you back.
 
And I intend to go home no matter what is in
the way.
 
Fundamentally, like Lee here,
I'm a carpet slippers type."

There was laughter, and Steve Kent slapped Cochrane on the back.
 
The incident was a small thing, but Lee at
last felt part of the team.
 
It was a
strange feeling, as if a circuit had been closed.
 
He no longer had to prove anything.
 
He just had to perform better than he would
ever have thought possible.
 
By
himself
it could not be done.
 
With these people —
his people
— he would do it.
 
Unit pride?
 
It was more than that.
 
It was an
understanding; something very deep and very strong.
 
It was a higher level of commitment.
 
Beyond words.

It was a crazy feeling.
 
It was
probable that he was about to die.
 
But
he was happy.

Fitzduane had joined in the laughter.
 
Now he turned serious and held a hand up for silence.
 
"I have to talk about a sad event, the
death of a very brave man.
 
It behooves
us to pay attention.
 
What we are about
to witness could be any one of us.
 
This
is the face of our enemy.
 
It says
everything that needs to be said.

"The quality of our intelligence on the target has a great deal to
do with Koancho, the Japanese security service, and their agent in place, Hori-
san
.
 
Recently you memorized his photograph so that you would not kill him in
error.
 
The intention had been that
Chifune would go in in advance to remove her colleague from the line of
fire.
 
Now, I regret to say, it is
academic.
 
Yesterday the recce team
witnessed this."

A ruggedized television monitor had been set up to show the videos of the
target made by the reconnaissance team.
 
So far they had viewed the routine functioning of the camp both in
context and in close-up.
 
Now the
high-power telephoto lens of the miniaturized surveillance camera was focused
on the Yaibo compound in the
Salvador
valley.
 
It was wired off from the
general camp area.

It looked at first at if some game was being played.

There were two teams of roughly fifteen people, each side pulling at
opposite ends of a rope as if it were a tug-of-war.

But there was someone in the middle.
 
And his hands and feet were bound and the rope was looped in a slipknot
around his neck.

He was being executed.

The camera zoomed in, and they could see the man's face in close-up as
his face and body contorted and he was slowly — very slowly — strangled to
death.

Fitzduane froze the image.
 
"I
don't think we need to see any more.
 
The
whole think took over fifteen minutes and ended up with his decapitation by
rope.
 
That is Yaibo in action.
 
They have a tradition of purges.
 
Why?
 
Who knows?"

He looked at Chifune.
 
Her face was
expressionless, but he could feel a great grief.
 
There was no anger.
 
Instead there was a feeling of enormous
strength, of resolution.

Hori-
san
had died, but his
torch had been passed.
 
His sense of
purpose would live on.
 
Those who had
killed him would pay for their crime.
 
It
was a matter of justice, and it was certain.

"I am deeply sorry, Chifune," said Fitzduane.
 
"Sorry for what has happened and sorry
to have to show you the manner of his death."

Chifune lifted her eyes, and there were tears in them.
 
"It was necessary," she said.
 
"We all have to understand.
 
To know."

There was silence in the group.

Chifune looked back to the frozen image.
 
Her face was pale.
 
"It makes
me ashamed to be Japanese," she said quietly.
 
"Why do we produce people who could do
such things?
 
What are we doing that is
so wrong?"

"Nothing to be ashamed of Chifune," said Calvin.
 
"The man who died was Japanese too.
 
Every nation has good and bad.
 
That's just the way of it."

Chifune raised her hand and gently placed two fingers on the monitor
screen on the frozen scene of the dying man's face.
 
It was at once a gesture of affection and
farewell.

Fitzduane switched off the video and the screen went blank and there was
silence for a little time.
 
It seemed
appropriate.
 
No one had met the man who
had died, but he had been a colleague.
 
He deserved respect.

The group dispersed, but Calvin remained behind.

He cleared his throat.
 
"I'd
like to change the aviation plan.
 
I've
been thinking, and I can do more than fly top cover."

Fitzduane looked at him.
 
It was a
relief to be able to focus on a technical problem, and Calvin was normally
worth listening to.
 
"A little late
in the day, Calvin, don't you think?"

Calvin reminded him in a way of U.S. General Billy Mitchell.
 
Mitchell had pioneered the use of airpower in
warfare in the 1920s, against stubborn opposition, with such enthusiasm that he
had been court-martialed for his pains before the merit of his thinking had
been vindicated.

Calvin had the same zeal when it came to pushing the airborne role in
special-forces operations.
 
He was not
just a competent aviator.
 
He had a
definite vision of how air assets might be used, and he and Fitzduane had
talked at length on the subject.

Calvin nodded.
 
"I should have
spoken earlier, but I wanted to get the hang of the terrain first.
 
Now I'm sure I can do it, and it won't change
the ground assault plan."

"Do what?" said Fitzduane.

"Hit Madoa airfield," said Calvin.
 
"When we bug out after the assault, the
greatest threat is going to come from the
air,
and in
particular from helicopter gunships.
 
They are the ones that can hunt us down and counter the Guntracks' speed
and agility.
 
Sure, I know we've got air
defenses, but I think it makes more sense to take them out on the ground."

Fitzduane thought for a moment.
 
The microlight was a tiny machine and up to now it had been positioned
only for observation.
 
But maybe that was
blinkered thinking.

"When would you propose doing this, Calvin?
 
There is a balance here between alerting the
enemy flyboys and making the hit.
 
Throwing stones at a wasps' nest is not a good idea."

Calvin smiled.
 
"I'd suggest
striking after the ground attack on the Devil's Footprint," he said.
 
"That way Madoa airbase won't alert the
target before we are in, and at the same time when the target calls them
they'll be too busy with their own world of woe to respond."

"Do you really think you can do that much damage from the
SkyEye?" said Fitzduane.
 
"You
don't have much of a payload left after the FLIR."

"It's a two-seater even with the FLIR," said Calvin.
 
"That means I have up to about two
hundred pounds to play with.
 
That's ten
RAW projectiles, an Ultimax, and a forty-millimeter pump-action grenade-launcher
— with room to spare.
 
That is serious
grief from the sky, and the sat photos show aircraft parked out in the
open.
 
They have no hardened bunkers.
 
No need, they think.
 
There is supposed to be no threat around
here.
 
Only the devil walks in these parts,
and he's a friend."

Fitzduane smiled.
 
"Very droll, Calvin."

He considered the proposition and then called in the others for
discussion.
 
Since Calvin's arrival, the
team had become rather attached to their eye in the sky and were not sure they
wanted it put at risk.
 
On the other
hand, armed helicopters were not a pleasant prospect.