Kilo Option, page 11
“Mr. Lane, I presume.”
It was Isaacs. Lane recognized the voice from surveillance tapes he’d listened to. He willed himself to relax.
“Mikhail has gotten you into some deep shit this time, comrade,” he said in Russian. “No way out.”
“In this case it’s no way out for you or the two men who boarded the train with you,” Yernin replied in English. “You shouldn’t have come. Because of you even more people will get hurt tonight.”
“There’s no reason for it,” Lane said. The exit door on the left side was ajar. Isaacs had shot out the lock during the time Lane had been on the locomotive’s rear catwalk. “The countryside is crawling with cops looking for you. How far do you think you’ll get?”
“As far as need be, because all those policemen will be busy attending a train wreck.”
The train continued to decelerate. Either Isaacs had set a timer on the explosive charge somewhere aboard the diesels or he had a remote-control device. In either case, as soon as the train slowed enough for him to get off safely, he would jump. And he was right about one thing. Forced to deal with a train wreck, the police would have no choice except to abandon the search for a spy in favor of helping the victims.
“You won’t get off this train,” Lane said.
“I think I will.”
“You’re forgetting something.”
“What might that be?” Yernin said, with little or no concern. He was waiting for the right moment.
“We know about Mexico City—”
An explosion somewhere toward the rear of the train caused all the cars to lurch sharply forward against their couplings. Lane ducked away from the barrel pressed to his head and used the train’s momentum to slam his shoulder into Isaacs’s chest, shoving the man against the forward bulkhead with enough force to drive the air out of his lungs.
Isaacs’s pistol discharged. The bullet ricocheted off the floor, a fragment of the steel-jacketed shell hitting the side of Lane’s head. A billion stars burst in his brain, his legs momentarily buckling beneath him.
Yernin pushed away from the bulkhead, stepped to the side, and jammed the barrel of his pistol into Lane’s sternum.
“Spasiba,” he said. Thanks.
Lane grappled for Isaacs’s gun hand, jamming his thumb in front of the ejector slide, preventing it from firing as the Ukrainian pulled the trigger.
“You’re welcome, you son of a bitch,” Lane said. He smashed his right fist into Isaacs’s face, once, twice, and a third time, again forcing the man against the bulkhead.
Yernin was a man driven by purpose. He yanked his gun back and fired, the snap shot plucking at Lane’s coat collar.
The door to the forward passenger car slammed open as Lane batted Isaacs’s gun hand away and dropped a roundhouse right into the man’s rib cage.
Isaacs cried out in pain and rage as he dropped to his knees. He looked up as several men crowded through the doorway. “Help me,” he cried out. “He set another bomb!”
“Son of a bitch,” one of them shouted. They grabbed Lane and yanked him backward off his feet. Something hard smashed into the back of his head, forcing him to the floor; his gorge rose as his stomach did a slow roll.
Through a thin veil of haze he saw Isaacs grinning in triumph, and then they hit him in the back of the head again and everything momentarily went fuzzy.
For several long seconds he crouched in a kneeling position, his forehead resting on the dirty floor, his stomach turning over, his head spinning. There seemed to be a lot of noise and activity around him, and a sharply cold wind roared through the small compartment.
Isaacs had set the explosion at the back of the train, and a lot of people were probably hurt. Maybe Bishop or Rowse were in the middle of it.
Lane looked up. The exit door was open. Isaacs had jumped. That thought crystallized in his head. He pushed himself up and staggered to his feet. Someone grabbed him by the shoulders and slammed him roughly against the bulkhead.
“Where is it, you bastard?”
It was his worst nightmare: standing by while someone innocent was about to get hurt. His mother hadn’t been able to defend herself against his father. His father.
“The bomb! Where did you hide it?”
Lane focused on the bleary-eyed man holding him. He was very big, and he was angry and frightened.
“You son of a bitch!”
Lane shoved him aside with one hand and pulled the emergency cord with his other. “Get everybody out of the first two cars, and brace for an explosion,” he shouted thickly.
“What the fuck?”
“The diesels are set to blow! Now do it!” Lane shoved the man’s hand away and stumbled across the compartment and out the forward door.
If the train had been booby-trapped to jump the tracks, the explosives would have to be set over the engine’s wheels.
He staggered across to the diesel locomotive and dropped to the deck. Hanging over the edge, he grappled in the spaces above the wheels.
The train was slowing down, the wheels squealing, sparks flying from metal protesting against metal.
The explosives would have to blow at any second, before the train’s speed completely bled away, if they were to be effective.
Lane’s numb fingers brushed against a puttylike mass jammed up between the engine’s frame and a steel cross-member above the wheels. He pried it away, then scrambled to his knees and tossed it out into the darkness.
As he turned away to shield his face and eyes, a huge fireball blossomed behind them.
For a long time he remained crouched against the side of the diesel, his stomach still turning over, his head spinning.
“You okay?” someone shouted from behind.
Lane looked up. The bleary-eyed football fan from the connecting platform stood braced in the doorway, his eyes wide.
“I’ll take the Pack and give you six points for ten bucks,” Lane shouted. “Is it a deal?”
PART TWO
15
BANDAR-É EMN KHOMEINÍ
Strong lights bathed the four great submarines and the half-loaded missiles, as if dark, malevolent gods were watching over their machines of destruction. The Russian-built subs, each nearly as long as a soccer field, floated low in the black water, ready at a moment’s notice to submerge and go forth to rain destruction on the unsuspecting.
Very few people got this far, but those who did were awed by the potential for death waiting only for the orders to attack.
The sub pens had been evacuated, and all work had been halted after the incursion, except for cleaning up the battle debris. A tall, slender man dressed in plain army fatigues with no markings emerged from the shadows and moved slowly along the quay behind the submarines. A Glock 17 pistol was strapped to his hip. It was 1:30 in the morning.
He stopped at the stern of each warship and turned his black eyes to the markings on the sails. When these machines surfaced, there could be no doubt to which country they belonged. Rafsanjní’s people had insisted on painting the flag of Iran just below the bridge. It was a foolish act, he thought. Submarines were meant to be creatures of the depth, creatures of stealth and hiding, not ships that so openly advertised their countries of origin.
Their technicians had been in the process of loading a cruise missile aboard one of the boats. It hung in its chain fall directly over one of the hatches. The intruders had come this far. They’d seen this much.
He turned to look up at the catwalk twenty-five meters above. They’d seen the missile, but from that high vantage they would not have been able to tell what type of warhead it was equipped with, nuclear or high explosive. No way to determine which without a closer examination.
Amin Zahedi turned his gaze back to the poised missile. No secrets here for which to mount a suicide mission. Every intelligence service in the world knew about Iran’s submarines. And most knew that although Iran wanted nuclear weapons, she didn’t have them yet. But the attack was drawing the piranhas. Already the infidels were gathering.
“This is war,” General Mohammed es Sultaneh, director of SAVAK, Iran’s Secret Service, told him yesterday. “A jihad because we have enemies not only in the West, but here among us. Our own brothers.”
“They didn’t do any real physical damage,” Zahedi pointed out. “Beyond that they can cause us no lasting harm.”
“Except that this incident has once again focused attention on us,” General Sultaneh said. “Can you be sure of the results?”
“I’ll personally make sure the UN team sees only what we want them to see, General,” Zahedi replied, his thoughts at that moment elsewhere. The strike on the oil platforms was just a diversion. They knew that much, as they knew that the ground attack had involved only two men, one of whom had been killed above the sub pens. The other one had cleverly escaped, and he was probably trying to get … where?
The intruder had been to the sub pens and seen with his own eyes the cruise missile. The question was what conclusion he was drawing and what information he was trying to deliver to his masters. Did he believe that the missile was equipped with a nuclear weapon?
“Their aircraft’s radar codes were American,” the general said. “But there are no aircraft carriers in the northern Gulf at this moment, nor did the jets come from Saudi Arabia or Turkey.”
“Israel?” Zahedi asked.
The general spread his hands. “It is up to you to find out for us. Speedily and discreetly.”
And then what? Zahedi wondered.
Unlike many of his countrymen, he was not a fanatic, though he was a believer. He’d been educated at UCLA, so he’d lived among the infidels. They were not the Satans that His Holiness Grand Ayatollah Hajj Sayyed Rhollh Musavi Khomeini had claimed. But America was the strongest nation on earth, and unless Iran learned to deal in moderation with them it would be Iran, not the infidels, who would perish.
It was not a view he shared openly.
Now the UN Peacekeepers had invaded the sanctity of their borders again because of the Middle East General Accord on Peace.
Someone came out onto the catwalk and called his name. He looked up. It was his partner, Fazolleh Eghbal.
“The UN team is at the front gate, Amin.”
“Is there trouble?”
“Plenty,” Eghbal said, his voice echoing in the great hall.
“I’m coming up,” Zahedi said.
It was about power, he thought. The current struggle in the parliament was centered around control of this installation. At the moment the Islamic fundamentalists held the upper hand. The base commander was a mullah, a religious cleric, and his authority was strong. The division was tearing their country apart. The UN’s coming here wouldn’t help, especially if something happened to one or more of the team members while they were on Iranian soil.
Frances Shipley stood with Terrence Reilly beside the lead blue-and-white UN van trying as best she could to hold her anger in check. They were surrounded by at least fifty armed and nervous soldiers, young boys most of them, and four Muslim clerics in robes and head coverings. The others on the UN inspection team had returned to the two vans when the situation at the main gate began to get difficult.
Frances was requesting entry to the base in the name of the UN-administered MEGAP, while the mullahs, one in particular, were denying them permission. When Frances refused to turn back, demanding to speak with the base commander, more soldiers had materialized.
“How dare you refuse to let us pass,” Frances said, her hands on her hips. Like the others in the UN party, she wore combat fatigues, her trousers bloused in her boots. “You will open these gates immediately, or produce your commanding officer. We have passes signed by your Department of State in Tehran.” That part was a bluff. They’d been all but ignored in the capital city.
“This is not Tehran,” the lead mullah said, glowering at her. “Cover your hair, and don proper clothing before you come to me. Have you no respect for our faith?”
“Let me speak with your commander.”
“I am the commanding officer here,” the old cleric said.
Frances guessed he was about sixty, his long beard and thick eyebrows shot with gray. “This is a military installation, but you are a civilian,” she said. She turned to one of the soldiers, who had lieutenant’s bars on his collar. “Who is your commanding officer? We wish to speak with him.”
The young man glanced apologetically at the mullah. “Madame, the mullah is our commander. He is Ali Ghavan es Razmaregh, mullah of the mosque in town.”
“Since when does a cleric take charge of a submarine base?” Frances shot back, realizing as she spoke that she’d gone too far. Reilly took her arm and pulled her back.
“What do you know of this base, you harlot spy?” the mullah raged. “I’ll place all of you under arrest, and we shall see what respect you’ll show after three months in the darkness! The Koran has laws for trespass and spying, and for women who are nonbelievers! In sha’Allah.”
“Frances,” Reilly warned in her ear. “Sometimes retreat is a better part of valor, darlin’.”
The night was dark, the sky partially overcast, so the strong lights of the base obscured the countryside behind them. The Zagros Mountains to the north and even the town of Bandar Ma’shur, which had been renamed Bandar-é Emn Khomeiní, were lost in the haze. The navy installation was on full alert. Beyond the gates they could see hundreds of soldiers guarding buildings, and every intersection they could see was blocked by tanks. Machine-gun nests had been placed on many of the roofs, and sharpshooters were stationed behind sandbagged barriers all along the perimeter fence.
“We’re sorry, Excellency, but we have been ordered by the United Nations to find out who attacked you,” Reilly said politely. “If it was Saddam Hussein’s forces, as we expect it may have been, then sanctions will be tightened.”
The mullah turned on him. “We do not want you here,” he said angrily. “Leave now.”
A jeep pulled up inside the gate and two men dressed in plain army fatigues got out and started over.
“Perhaps if you would be so kind as to check with your superiors in Tehran, Excellency, this misunderstanding could be cleared up,” Reilly patiently suggested.
“By God and the Prophet, go back where you came from or we will blow you to hell! In sha’Allah.”
“That won’t be necessary, Commander,” the taller of the two men in fatigues said. “I will take full responsibility for our friends from the United Nations.”
“They do not belong here,” the mullah replied, sharply.
“They’re here to help, not to interfere. And they have been expected.” He turned to Frances and Reilly, a hint of amusement on his face. “Though not in the middle of the night.”
“We’re on a very tight schedule,” Frances said. He looked like a younger, slimmer version of Omar Sharif, his eyes were sparkling. The mullah, although dangerous, was nothing compared to this one, she thought. “We’d like to be back in Tehran within thirty-six hours.”
“Naturally I will do everything within my power to help you. I’m Colonel Amin Zahedi, chief investigator for the Department of Defense. This is my assistant, Lieutenant Eghbal.”
They shook hands.
“We don’t mean to cause you any trouble.”
“Very well. But I don’t think it’s such a good idea to inspect the damaged oil platforms in the dark. Morning would be better.”
“I agree,” Frances said. “Right now we’d like to inspect the base.”
“I forbid this,” the mullah roared.
Zahedi ignored him. “Why?”
“We have evidence that you were attacked,” Frances said.
“Yes? What evidence is this?” Zahedi asked, mildly surprised. The mullah was fuming.
“There was a power failure. The base was blacked out shortly after the attack began.” Lane’s message before they’d left New York had confirmed that the power station had been damaged, along with the telephone exchange and a back gate. The most stunning news of all, however, was that of the Ukrainian patrol boat that had apparently dropped off the ground attack forces. It definitely pointed toward Saddam Hussein.
“Two fighter aircraft came out of nowhere, so the power was shut down to make the base less of a target,” Zahedi said. “It was Mullah Razmaregh’s quick thinking that saved us.”
“No stray hits in the darkness?” Reilly asked.
“None that I’m aware of.” He turned to the cleric. “Your Excellency?”
“We suffered no damage,” the mullah replied dourly.
“In any event it would have been futile for them to have hit this base,” Zahedi said.
“How so?” Frances asked.
“You are aware of what is kept here?”
“Take care that you do not go too far, Colonel,” the mullah warned.
“Yes, we are,” Frances replied.
“Then perhaps you are aware of our security measures. The boats are kept in hardened enclosures. Quite impossible to inflict any serious damage on us from the air.”
The mullah said something to him in Farsi that Frances didn’t catch. Zahedi replied harshly, and waited for the cleric to respond. But the mullah turned away in disgust.
“From the air,” Frances prompted, looking for a reaction, but Zahedi kept a poker face.
“Yes, from the air.”
“But not from a ground attack,” Reilly said. “Perhaps you were infiltrated.”
Zahedi considered it. “I see. The jet attack as a diversion so that a force of commandos could fight their way onto the base. Perhaps down to the submarines to do—what? Plant bombs? Sabotage?”
“Something like that,” Frances said. The son of a bitch was more than dangerous, he was smooth.
“Would you like to see our submarines? All four of them are here at present.”
Again there was another rapid-fire exchange between Zahedi and the cleric. This time when it was over, the mullah turned on his heel and he and his three fellow clerics climbed into a staff car and drove back inside. The lieutenant and his troops, however, remained.
