War Tactic

Lyons eyed the two Blackstar men hard as Able Team passed between them. The trio of counterterror operatives emerged in the lobby of RhemCorp. It was an unremarkable space, not overlarge. The building itself was similarly nondescript. Able Team had seen some pretty lavish and indulgent office structures in their time working on United States soil. Whatever sort of power-broker Rhemsen was, he wasn’t the kind of man given to ostentatious displays of wealth.

Lyons, with his teammates close behind, strode up to the reception desk. The receptionist was an older woman, her face lined and haggard. Blancanales watched as Lyons tried and did not quite succeed in hiding his reaction when she looked up from paperwork in front of her.

“Yes? May I help you?” she asked. Her voice was piercing and nasal. It was the kind of voice television comedians put on for a laugh. Evidently this was the one she’d been born with.

“Agents Perry, Tyler and Hamilton,” said Lyons. “We’re with the Justice Department.” He flashed her the Justice credentials Brognola’s office had issued to Able Team. Lyons had no idea what names were actually written on the credentials. In situations such as this he just offered the first three names that came to mind. He could always disclaim these as cover identities if someone started to ask questions and demanded to closely examine the identification cards. The badge contained in the ID holder was completely legitimate. Able Team’s operatives were, for all legal purposes, fully authorized operatives of the United States Justice Department. Brognola would back them up on that, no matter what.

“Do you have an appointment?” asked the receptionist.

“No,” Lyons answered. “It’s a matter of national security. Have Mr. Rhemsen greet us in the lobby. We need to speak to him privately.”

“I’ll see if he’s in,” she said, reaching for the telephone on her desk. The big former cop reached out and laid a heavy paw on the handset in its cradle.

“He’s in,” Lyons said. “No runarounds. No excuses. No meetings that can’t be interrupted. Get him down here. Now.”

Something in Lyons’s expression caused the receptionist’s already pale face to turn gray. She looked at the handset, waited for Lyons to release it and picked up the phone. She pushed only a single button, waited a moment and then said, “Sir. You had better come down. Right away.”

Moments later the single elevator in the lobby chimed. When the doors slid open, the man who slithered out was wearing a suit that was probably worth as much as Able Team’s SUV. Blancanales was momentarily taken aback. Rhemsen’s face was a ghastly mask of too-smooth flesh stretched across his skull in a way that made him look like a snake. His eyes, under hooded lids, were very blue—too blue to be natural. He was obviously wearing colored contacts.

“Gentlemen,” Rhemsen said, showing a thousand-watt smile full of capped and brilliantly white teeth. “I understand there’s a rather urgent matter that demands my attention.”

“You might say that,” Lyons said. “Justice Department. We need to talk to you about some weapons systems RhemCorp manufactures.”

“I can’t imagine you would have anything else to talk to me about,” said Rhemsen. “Come with me, gentlemen. We’ll go straight to my office.” He gestured for them to follow him to the elevator.

Able Team stepped in with Rhemsen in the lead. There were several security guards milling around in the lobby, and as Rhemsen put his hand in front of the electric eye of the elevator, two of the goons started to walk over.

“Nope,” Lyons said. “Your Blackstar Bunnies can wait in the lobby.”

The shadow of something unpleasant passed across Rhemsen’s plastic face, but he managed to hide it right away. “Of course, gentlemen,” he said smoothly. At a hand motion from him, the guards suddenly discovered very interesting and invisible things to occupy them on either side of the elevator doors.

Rhemsen took his hand away and looked at Schwarz, who was standing closest to the control panel.

“Uh…floor?” Schwarz asked, looking glib.

“The one labeled ‘P’ for ‘Penthouse,’” said Rhemsen.

Schwarz pushed the button. The elevator began to move, silently and swiftly. Quiet saxophone music began to filter in through the elevator speakers.

“I’ve never heard an elevator version of ‘Soul Finger’ before,” Schwarz commented.

“You still haven’t. I think that’s ‘Girl from Ipanema,’” Blancanales said.

Lyons glared daggers at them both. The elevator reached its destination.

“I assume this has something to do with my Thorn missile systems,” said Rhemsen. “I assure you, gentlemen, I am the victim of a smuggling ring. I’m very aware of export controls and other regulations that the government puts on restricted hardware.”

The doors opened. Blancanales was amazed to see that Rhemsen’s office was oval in shape. It was, in fact, a reasonably accurate replica of the office of the President of the United States. Framed on the wall were, not the paintings of the President and the Vice President, or even the President and the First Lady, but Harold Rhemsen dressed as some kind of Napoleonic general. On the desk, which was itself a replica of the President’s, was a gold placard. It read, The Buck Stops At My Bank Account. To say it was all a little megalomaniacal would be an understatement.

Rhemsen seated himself at his desk and opened a desktop humidor. “Cuban cigar, gentlemen?” He grinned that electric smile again. “Apologies. A bad joke. Cuban cigars are, of course, illegal to import. These are, somewhat regrettably, Honduran, but I assure you they are of fine quality.”

The members of Able Team looked at each other.

“Will you have a seat, gentlemen?” Rhemsen gestured to the quartet of leather-upholstered chairs arrayed in front of his desk. Apparently he was accustomed to entertaining visitors.

The Stony Man operatives sat. Lyons produced a sheaf of papers from inside his bomber jacket. “These are the particulars,” he said. “They detail the items recovered and what we’ve been able to determine about the provenance of the missile systems. They’re not counterfeit, before you suggest it,” Lyons said. “We’ve run into that excuse before. These are verifiably your gear, Rhemsen.”

“You don’t look like government agents,” Rhemsen said, still smiling. Something in his body language shifted. Blancanales didn’t like it. He saw Lyons tense and, next to him, Schwarz sat straighter.

“What makes you say that?” Lyons said. His hand began to inch toward his chest.

“Government agents wear suits,” Rhemsen said. “They also understand how to be polite. How to follow the rules. Obey the forms. You gentlemen…well. You’re not gentlemen at all, are you? You’re…thugs.”

“Now just a minute, pal,” Lyons said. He started to rise in his chair. Blancanales knew the action was intended to cover the draw from his shoulder holster.

“I wouldn’t,” Rhemsen warned. He pointed to the mirror on the wall behind them. When he spoke next, his voice was raised. “Lower it,” he said.

The pane of glass slid down on electric motors. Four of Rhemsen’s Blackstar guards were standing there, their tricked-out submachine guns pointed at Able Team. The green dots of laser targeting systems danced across Able Team’s foreheads.

“I’m going to have to owe you that twenty,” Schwarz said quietly to Lyons.

“Son of a bitch,” Carl Lyons said.

CHAPTER THREE

At The Edge of Puerto Galera, South China Sea

The retrofitted Sikorsky S-61R, mounting 7.62 mm belt-fed M-240 machine guns and a Mark 19 automatic belt-fed 40mm grenade launcher, had extra fuel pods, giving it longer range. At the stick, Stony Man ace pilot Jack Grimaldi held the combat-ready troop helicopter low over the waves. Through the open door of the fuselage, the members of Phoenix Force watched their target.

David McCarter held a high-tech monocular to one eye and adjusted the magnification. “Bloody hell. I hate waiting,” he muttered.

That drew some muffled snickers from the other members of the team. McCarter shot Calvin James a squint-eyed glare before returning to the monocular.

“Why do I get the stink eye?” James asked.

“You were closest,” McCarter replied without looking back at him.

“Figures,” James said.

Through the monocular, McCarter watched the Filipino naval vessel. It was relatively small as patrol craft went, but still more than large enough that a marauder would have to be insane to try to take it down. Yet the Filipino navy had lost two ships just like it to what was either pirate activity or, frankly, the covert action of the Chinese military, which of course was the source of all the tensions in the region. It was Phoenix Force’s job to figure out which…while putting a stop to all the fun and games in the South China Sea. At least, that’s what the Phoenix Force leader had taken away from the briefing. Sometimes the nuances were lost on him…mostly because he chose to ignore stupid nuances in favor of getting the mission done.

That was all part of leadership. Nobody had told him that; he’d had to figure it out on his own, ever since taking over for Katz. It wasn’t about the orders you executed. Any idiot could follow orders to the letter. Leading Phoenix Force was about knowing when judgment calls were needed in the field. Things changed and the best-laid plans of mice and morons went awry, or some such tripe. He didn’t dwell on it too much. He had too much work to do to be dwelling on such things. And then, too, there were the men whose lives he was ultimately responsible for.

“You think they know we’re out here?” T. J. Hawkins asked. His drawl made the question seem more casual than it really was. “If I was the captain of that boat I’d want to know what we were doing, shadowing them all day.”

“Hal has squared it with the Filipino authorities,” Grimaldi put in from the cockpit. Given the noise of the helicopter, none of them would be able to hear each other under normal circumstances. Grimaldi had patched in to the wireless frequency connected to the team’s earbud transceivers, tiny radios that sat in their ears like hearing aids. Through these, the team members could hear each other and also Grimaldi as clear as day. The transceivers were “smart,” too; they had noise-canceling software built into them that cut the noise from gunfire and other ambient sounds.

“Squared it how?” Manning asked. The big Canadian rarely took things at face value. He frequently acted as McCarter’s sounding board.

“You know,” Grimaldi said. “Did that thing he does.”

“That thing?” Hawkins asked.

“Vague promises of assistance and threats of reprisal,” James answered. “Followed by assurances that the government of the United States will remain within their territory for no longer than it takes to get the job done. And, of course, the implied threat that if they don’t cooperate, things might get a hell of a lot worse when whatever big bad force we’ve come to deal with gets out of hand.”

McCarter looked at James. He opened his mouth to say something.

“I mean I’ve heard,” James added.

In the distance, a pair of fast motor launches hove into view. They were swift enough, their engines powerful enough, that they threw up great sprays of seawater as they punched through the waves.

“That’s it, lads,” McCarter said. “Those are our targets.”

“Those dinky things?” Hawkins said. “That Filipino navy ship will tear them apart—”

Plumes of smoke erupted from the launches. The shoulder-fired missiles surged from the smaller craft to level the deck of the Filipino ship, tearing holes in whatever structures they encountered.

“Bloody hell,” McCarter muttered. “Jack! Get us in there, now!”

“Roger.” The Sikorsky roared as Grimaldi squeezed all available speed from the mighty craft, sending the nose dipping as the chopper threw itself toward the ship.

“T.J., Rafe, on the guns!” McCarter ordered. “Gary, get on that grenade launcher and stand by. Calvin, with me!”

There were grunts of assent from the others. McCarter rushed to connect his drop harness and made sure James had done the same. As the chopper picked up speed, the Briton could hear the pop of automatic gunfire from the targets below.

“In range,” Grimaldi announced.

“Hit them, lads!” McCarter shouted.

Vibration traveled from the deck up through McCarter’s boots as the M-240 machine guns opened up. Manning looked at McCarter expectantly.

“Wait for it, Gary,” McCarter promised.

The Sikorsky swooped low, like a hawk plucking a field mouse from the ground. The first of the two motor launches erupted in fire as the machine guns touched off something on the deck. McCarter waited for the arc of the chopper’s travel to take them over the smoking, flaming deck of the Filipino ship. Then he pushed off, signaling James to follow.

The line caught him and jerked him up a few feet short of the deck. The Briton hit his quick-release lever and landed on the deck, hard, rolling out and bringing up the Tavor rifle attached to his single-point harness. Every member of Phoenix Force had been equipped with one of the high-tech Israeli assault weapons. The bullpup-configured rifle fired NATO-standard 5.56 mm ammunition and was modular, configurable for different missions. Manning’s Tavor had a 4.0mm grenade launcher affixed, while all the rifles had close-quarters red-dot optics.

Each man also carried a 9 mm Glock handgun. At least, that was the plan John Kissinger, the Stony Man armorer, had had when he’d outfitted Phoenix Force for the mission. Kissinger had also seen to it that each man had a full-size, drop-point combat, fixed-blade knife to mount on his gear. But McCarter, as he usually did, had insisted on his beloved Browning Hi-Power. Kissinger had known better than to argue the point.

Outfitting the team with foreign weapons was part of the drill. In the shadowy world of politics and plausible deniability, everybody knew what was going on, but everybody pretended they didn’t. That was one of the reasons even allies routinely spied on each other. There would be no doubt, if Phoenix Force was captured or killed, that they were likely a Western commando team. But as long as there was no concrete proof, they could operate outside established international laws. The very notion was ridiculous to McCarter. There were no international laws that were not enforced behind the barrels of guns. Like the one he held now.

The deck of the Filipino ship was on fire. The crew was doing what they could to douse the flames. McCarter threw them a salute, hoping they would understand he was on their side. They regarded him suspiciously if they noticed him at all; for the most part, they were too worried about survival to spare him much time. He immediately went to a section of the railing that was clear of debris, braced his Tavor and started tracking the second motor launch.

The first of the two fast-attack boats was trailing a thick plume of black smoke. As McCarter watched, the Sikorsky flew past, turned and lined up the grenade launcher.

“Now, Gary! Now!” McCarter said.

Manning made no reply. He did not need to. The automatic grenade launcher began spewing 40 mm death at the already crippled motor launch. The grenades blew the little boat to cinders, biting off great chunks of it, as if the vessel were being devoured from stern to bow. The flaming bodies that were thrown into the sea bore horrible testament to the destruction being wrought. McCarter turned his attention back to the boat that was still moving.

Grimaldi did the same. While the second boat, the moving boat, was out of position, he had pursued the wounded first vessel, but his strategy was a sound one. He was harrying the motor launches to keep them from targeting the Filipino ship again with their handheld rockets. From what McCarter could see of the men on the decks, they did not look military. At least, they did not wear uniforms. But there was something more to it. Military men had a certain bearing and, from what little he could see through the smoke of the carnage on the water, the sailors on the motor launch didn’t have it. They were casual. That meant they were pirates, or at least, civilian contractors. But how would such men get their hands on the latest high-tech weapons from America, weapons that were strictly controlled when it came to export to foreign powers? Either RhemCorp was careless or RhemCorp was dirty. But they did not yet know which.

McCarter let the red dot of his Tavor optics fall on the moving motor launch. It continued to fly through the water, making widening circles around the Filipino ship. The crew, around McCarter, was starting to bring the fire under control. James took up a protective position at McCarter’s back, looking in toward the deck, and started shooing sailors away from his position with a collection of hand gestures and dirty looks. The sailors seemed content to give the two Phoenix Force members plenty of room, especially when McCarter started firing on the pirate launch still rolling through the waves.

“David, this is G-Force,” said Grimaldi over the transceiver frequency. Phoenix Force typically used first names as code names for missions like this. Surnames could be tracked, but first names and nicknames would yield little if overheard.

“Go ahead,” said McCarter. He did his best to lead the speeding motor launch and started squeezing off short bursts with the Tavor, knowing he had little chance of hitting any of the men on the deck of the small, fast-moving craft from this distance.

“From up here,” said Grimaldi, “it looks like their circuits are getting wider. They’re going to try to break off at some point, once they think they’ve got enough range not to get cut apart when they give us their backside.”

“You’re right about that,” McCarter said. “Keep them moving. Our friends here have had enough Thorn rockets for one day.”

“Roger that,” Grimaldi said. “What do you want me to do once they start running?”

“Let’s follow them back to wherever they’re going,” McCarter said. “Small ships like that, they’re going to have another, bigger craft somewhere around here. Plenty of ships in these waters. It will make it easier if we know precisely which one we’re looking for. Have the Farm do some serious real-time imaging of what’s moving, too. If we lose them, maybe they can sleuth out what we’re hoping to find.”

It was the Farm’s satellite imaging technology that had given them the priority target list they now had. Kurtzman and his team of computer jockeys had found a crazy kind of pattern to the pirate strikes, or whatever they were, and had accurately predicted the assault on the Filipino ship. McCarter wondered what other wizardry the Farm’s personnel might come up with once they had some actual combat data to work with.

“David?” Grimaldi’s voice sounded again in McCarter’s ear. “Something’s up. I’ve got unusual activity on the deck of that ship. They’re dumping something into the water.”

Something white under the churning waves caught McCarter’s eye.

“Calvin!” McCarter called over his shoulder. “What do you make of that?” He pointed.

“Oh, hell, no,” James said. He looked at McCarter.

The Briton swore, grabbed James and threw them both to the deck. The action came none too soon. Whatever was in the water struck the side of the Filipino ship and exploded, shaking the vessel and throwing shrapnel up over the railing. McCarter flinched as something burned his cheek.

Some kind of klaxon began to sound belowdecks on the Filipino ship. The sailors trying to put out the fire on the deck became even more agitated, several of them disappearing below.

“What the hell was that?” James asked. “Some kind of torpedo?”

“We’ll figure that out later,” said McCarter. “Right now we’ve got to keep them off us. G-Force, did you copy that explosion? They’re using some kind of submerged hardware to target us. We may be going down. Do what you can to keep them off us.”

“On it,” Grimaldi said. “G-Force, out!” The Sikorsky immediately took a more aggressive posture, driving the motor launch farther and farther out.

McCarter didn’t know what kind of range the submersible weapons had, or whether the enemy had more of them, but when no more came spinning through the waves, he figured they were doing okay.

Grimaldi finally reported that the motor launch was heading off and asked for orders. “Should I follow as planned?” the pilot asked.

“Negative,” McCarter answered. He and James were making their way below now. Their weapons hung on their slings. The Filipino sailors looked at them strangely but seemed to understand that these men in combat fatigues without insignia were somehow on their side. If nothing else, the fact that McCarter had fired on the pirates had established that. Eventually, the two men encountered a man directing a work crew. Water was rushing in through a rupture in the hull, but the crew was moving fast to patch it. The man overseeing the action wore the uniform of a captain in the Filipino navy.

“Captain!” McCarter called. “English?”

The captain whirled and fixed them with a wide-eyed look. “I speak,” he said. “Who are you?”

“Friends, Captain,” McCarter said. “I’m with a regional counter-piracy force. Your government was told we would be in the area.”

“Chopper?” the captain asked. He pointed above his head, as if Grimaldi’s bird could be seen through the bulkheads.

“Yes,” McCarter said. “That was us. We’re here to help. Tell us what to do.”

The sailors were struggling to manhandle metal plates into position, which the other members of the work crew were bolting down. The captain gave up on finding the words and simply pointed. McCarter and James joined the Filipinos and began heaving metal plates from one side of the compartment to the other, fighting against the rising waters already swamping their boots.

“This is G-Force,” announced Grimaldi’s voice in McCarter’s ear. “The pirate craft has withdrawn. Repeat. The enemy vessel has withdrawn. I am flying standby cover to make sure nothing else creeps up on us. I’ve also alerted Filipino naval command that one of their ships is in distress, although I suspect the folks aboard her have already done that. I’m told help is on the way.”

“Good,” McCarter said. “Get ready to touch down on the deck if it looks like we can’t keep this thing afloat. We didn’t see any wounded, but if they’ve got them, we need to be prepared to evac.”

“Roger,” Grimaldi acknowledged. “Wait. Wait, I have contact again. The launch—”

A burst of static made McCarter grab his ear in pain. He tapped the transceiver as suddenly there was nothing on the line.

James looked at McCarter and pointed to his ear. “Do you have anything?” he asked before going back to helping the Filipinos mount another metal plate.

“Nothing,” McCarter said. “G-Force? Come in, G-Force!”

The klaxon, which had been quiet, started up again. Red lights mounted in protective steel cages began to blink above the compartment hatchway.

“Captain?” James asked. “What is it?”

“Pirates!” the Filipino shouted. “Pirates come back!”

Another explosion, somewhere under the water and near the hull, caused the entire beleaguered ship to tremble beneath their feet.

“Oh, man,” said James. “I do not like the sound of that.”

“Captain!” McCarter called.

“We die now,” the captain said.

CHAPTER FOUR

“You owe me twenty bucks, Gadgets,” Lyons growled.

“I’m pretty sure,” Blancanales said, “that you two established that.”

The members of Able Team were zip-tied by wrist and ankle to straight-backed wooden chairs. They sat in a storage room on the basement level of Rhemsen’s headquarters. There was no other furniture in the locked room. The walls were bare cinder block. The only light was a bare energy-saver compact fluorescent bulb plugged into a light socket hanging by its wire from the ceiling.