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“Gamboa thrived when it acted as a township under the old Panama Canal Zone,” Price continued, “but with the return of its resources to Panama officials, the departure of U.S. citizens and servicemen living there turned the place into a virtual ghost town.”
“I don’t get it,” James said. “If this wasn’t about drugs and these were actual terrorists, al Qaeda or otherwise, what the hell was the point? They didn’t blow anything up other than one small patrol boat, and they obviously didn’t stick around very long. What gives?”
“I think that’s what we’re going down there to find out,” McCarter replied.
“Exactly,” Price said. “Your local contact will be a Panamanian official from the First VP’s office. A CIA operative from the embassy in Panama City will also meet you in Gamboa.”
“Why’s the Company involved?” James asked suspiciously.
“They’re not,” Brognola replied. “This guy’s merely on an intelligence-gathering mission for the official reports. He’s been advised of your arrival. Both of these men have been told to give you their full cooperation, so it’s your show. All the way.”
“Dandy,” McCarter said with a grin. “Just the way I like it.”
CHAPTER TWO
U.S.-Mexican Border
Rosario “The Politician” Blancanales had known better days. Huge droplets of sweat rolled off his head and slid slowly down his neck and along his spine like globules of oil. His body ached, his shirt was soaked at waist and armpits and he had hunger pangs such as he’d never before experienced. The temperature had already reached nearly one hundred degrees with about ninety percent humidity, and it wasn’t even noon yet. He’d consumed nearly an entire canteen of water and a couple of salt tablets and still his tongue felt like 20-grade sandpaper. Blancanales removed his utility cap, wiped at the sweat on his forehead and behind his ears with an OD green hanky and then replaced his cover.
Squinting in the bright sun, the Able Team warrior studied the profile of the muscular man who stood next to him talking on a cell phone. The man’s frosty blue eyes stared with moderate interest at the work in progress in front of them. Some might have called this man a work in progress, but Blancanales knew better. Time and the brutal reality of urban combat had hardened and shaped this guy into the most rock-steady man it had ever been Blancanales’s pleasure to know.
“Yeah, I understand. Out, here,” Carl “Ironman” Lyons said, and then disconnected the call.
“Hal?” Blancanales inquired.
Lyons nodded. “Yeah. Says they just sent Phoenix down to Panama. Some kind of major shit hit the fan down there. Naturally, they took Jack, and Charlie’s somewhere with Mack.”
“So no dedicated wings for the ride home.”
“Nope,” Lyons said. “Says once we’re finished to give them a call and they’ll get us on the first MAC flight out of Fort Bliss.”
“Why so grumpy, Carl?” Blancanales asked. “Lighten up some and put on a happy face.”
“This is my happy face,” Lyons said with a sideways glance at his friend. He nodded toward another man working with the group near a ten-foot-high wall fifty yards from their position and added, “When’s Gadgets going to be finished with these eggheads already?”
Hermann Schwarz, whose wizardry and expertise in electronic surveillance and countersurveillance had earned him the “Gadgets” moniker, stopped to look at his two friends as if he had somehow read Lyons’s mind. He held up one hand in the “gimme five more minutes” sign and Lyons returned the gesture with a nod, although the look on the Able Team leader’s face said he was none too happy about having to continue waiting.
Lyons hadn’t been keen on taking the assignment to start with, Blancanales knew, but when in the service of an organization like Stony Man they didn’t get to pick and choose their assignments. And to some degree, each of them possessed some significant expertise in this particular endeavor. Lyons, of course, had a background as an LAPD cop dealing with illegal immigrants from Mexico on practically a daily basis and Blancanales, a man raised in East L.A., knew just about everything there was to know about border crossings. Finally, Schwarz had the greatest impact on this mission because of his significant expertise in electronic surveillance measures.
The End Zone Project was the baby of numerous computer scientists at Sandia Laboratories in New Mexico. Designed around two integral technologies—Forward Area Alerting Radar and Low-Altitude Navigation and Targeting for Night—End Zone had the ability to not only detect when someone attempted to cross the border illegally, but further could deliver several neutralizing mechanisms to stun and immobilize the subject until Border Patrol units could arrive and take custody. End Zone had passed its final trials in time for implementation into the new border wall under construction by the U.S. Army’s Corps of Engineers.
The President had stressed the importance of the success of the project, not just because of its political and social ramifications, but also due to the increased violence resulting from unrest between the various special-interest groups keeping the topic of immigration hot.
“Mostly, we just want you to keep the peace and ensure domestic tranquillity,” Brognola had concluded in their mission briefing.
“Marvelous,” had been Lyons’s reply.
Now as they stood and watched their friend at work, Blancanales said with a smirk, “See there, the look on Gadgets’s face? See how happy you’ve made him?”
Lyons shook his head. “Whatever gets you through the day.”
The pair turned and ascended the steps that led into the Tactical Operations Center, a trailer-mounted facility that looked like a rail car, and the only air-conditioned building for miles. The place was relatively cool compared to the blistering heat outside. A small refrigerator in one corner contained shelves of soft drinks and bottled water.
Blancanales made a show of shuddering and said, “Brrr, it’s downright chilly in here.”
Lyons didn’t bother to reply, instead moving over to the refrigerator and grabbing a bottle of water before taking up a stance to look over the shoulder of one of the controllers. The man wore a subdued three-up, one-down chevron on the collars of his desert camouflage uniform blouse: a staff sergeant.
“We online there yet, Sarge?” Lyons asked casually.
“No, sir.”
“How much longer you think?” Lyons asked.
“Almost there now, sir. We’ve rebooted the servers and we should be online…right…now.”
The trio of LCD screens in front of the controller came to life simultaneously and displayed different camera angles on Schwarz and the team members huddled around him near the wall. The pictures were displayed in high-definition format and rendered with full sharpness and opacity, and neither Blancanales nor Lyons could admit they weren’t somewhat impressed.
The pair continued to watch with interest as the controller talked with Schwarz over a headset. The two discussed a few techie-tech things and then Schwarz concluded the conversation with a thumbs-up to the camera before he stepped out of viewing range. A minute later Schwarz entered the TOC. His face beamed with pride and as soon as Blancanales saw it he looked knowingly at Lyons, who chose only to return the look with an exaggerated smile.
“Well, boys,” Schwarz said as he removed his work gloves and slapped at the make-believe dust on his uniform trousers. “It looks like that’s that. I’d have to say End Zone is a complete success.”
Lyons visibly brightened. “Great! Does that mean we can leave now?”
Blancanales mocked him with a stunned expression. “But, Ironman, this is just where the real fun begins.”
Lyons groaned and Schwarz held up a hand to placate him. “Don’t worry, buddy. We only have a few tests we have to run through tonight. But if those pan out, I’d say we’ll probably be able to head out first thing in the morning. So you can call Jack.”
“No go,” Blancanales said. He looked in the direction of the controller and then added, “He’s busy.”
Schwarz nodded, but before anyone could say another word the controller called for their attention. Able Team gathered around as the guy pointed toward one of the screens. It now displayed a different set of cameras that Blancanales recognized from having worked in that location two days prior. The group watched with fascination as two figures climbed over the top of the wall and dropped down onto the U.S. side.
“What’s going on?” Lyons demanded.
“Sergeant, do we have some kind of live exercise scheduled for that area today?” Schwarz asked.
The controller grabbed a nearby clipboard and flipped through several sheets until he came to the one he sought and let his finger trace down an itemized list.
“That’s a negative, sir.”
“Holy crap,” Blancanales said. “We got ourselves a couple real-life border crossers.”
“Where is that, Sergeant?” Lyons demanded.
The controller punched it up on another computer. “Those are the systems mounted at Pitchfork Point.”
“I remember that area,” Schwarz said, exchanging glances with his comrades. “It’s about twenty miles east of the Columbus, New Mexico, port of entry.”
Lyons looked at his watch. “At least an hour away.”
“Shit, sir!” The controller pointed at the cameras and Able Team noticed his face had gone white as a sheet. “What the hell is that?”
The pair who had vaulted the wall a moment earlier suddenly danced around like a pair of marionettes as red splotches appeared along their upper torsos. All the men of Able Team recognized the kind of destructive force that could only have come from automatic weapons.
“Let’s go!” Lyons snapped.
“T HAT’S RIGHT, YEAH !” Lyons barked into his cell phone for the third time in the past two minutes. “Pitchfork Point, that’s what I just said! What, you don’t speak English?”
“Tell them they need to get out of town first,” Schwarz said.
After another moment of silence, Lyons said, “Fine!” He clicked off and muttered, “Morons.”
“They know where they’re going now?” Blancanales inquired from behind the wheel of their Ford Expedition.
“Doubtful.” Lyons twisted in the passenger seat to look at Schwarz, who had his laptop open and was typing furiously at it. “What are you doing?”
“Working with Bear on a direct feed to my laptop. I just talked to Ricchio back at the TOC. He told me right after that pair got shot to shit that a whole gaggle of illegals came over that wall. This time, though, they didn’t shoot them.”
“Do we even know who they are?” Lyons asked.
“What’s a gaggle?” Blancanales asked to lighten the mood.
“Okay, the feed’s coming up now,” Schwarz announced.
They rode in silence for the next minute, each man in his own thoughts about what might lie ahead.
Finally, Schwarz whispered, “Good God…”
“What is it?” Lyons asked.
Schwarz turned the laptop so Lyons could see for himself. It replayed the shooting of the first two men who came over the wall and then displayed the mass of a dozen or so more who followed a minute thereafter. The last thing they saw astonished all of them. Four Border Patrol agents armed with M-16s stepped into view. Each pair grabbed one of the deceased men they had gunned down and dragged them off camera.
“Impossible,” Blancanales said through clenched teeth.
Lyons shook his head. “It’s unthinkable, I’ll agree.”
“Two things are evident here right off,” Schwarz interjected. “First, those two weren’t wasted by Minutemen. Anywhere the wall’s been completed is strictly off-limits to all but authorized personnel. Second, what about the fact they made entry here in the sight of a newly constructed surveillance system in broad daylight?”
“It signifies an act of desperation,” Blancanales replied.
“Exactly,” Lyons added. “There are plenty of easier places to cross the border. Proved places with fewer obstacles and way more running room. That point couldn’t be more than—what?—maybe half a mile from the access road off Route 9.”
“Something stinks to high heaven, no doubt about it.”
In a drifting, almost contemplative tone, Schwarz said, “It’s almost as if they wanted us to see it, to make us believe the Border Patrol gunned down two crossers and then dragged away the evidence.”
“Okay, but what about the rest of the group?” Lyons said. “Why gun down just those two?”
“I don’t know,” Schwarz replied. “But I’m running the feed again. See if I can pick up something else.”
“Well, we’re not just going to sit here on our asses,” Lyons replied. He engaged the speakerphone and dialed in the specially coded number to Stony Man Farm. The line rang twice and was then picked up by Brognola. “Hal, you getting this?”
“We’re watching it right now,” the Stony Man chief replied. “What the hell is going on down there? Border Patrol officers killing illegal immigrants?”
“We’re as surprised as you, boss,” Blancanales replied.
“Well, I have Aaron and his team checking out every inch of the footage we captured. We also talked to this Sergeant Ricchio while we were working on the wireless uplink. He says they lost the feed less than thirty seconds after the segment we recorded there.”
“Lost it how?” Schwarz inquired.
“I wish we knew. All Ricchio could tell us was that they believe the feeds were cut at the source.”
“So they destroyed the cameras,” Lyons said.
“Impossible,” Schwarz said. “Those things are housed inside boxes made of inch-thick titanium alloy plating. It’d take nothing short of a grenade or missile to destroy them. The only other way they could interfere with the transmission at the source would be through the use of a Wi-Fi jammer or severing the hardwired fusible links providing power. And to do that, they’d need some decent insider information.”
“Whatever the explanation,” Lyons said, “this changes the name of the game, Hal.”
“Agreed,” Brognola replied. His voice faded a moment as he asked, “What’s that?” Another tense moment of silence, then, “Bear’s people just came up with something hot. If you replay the footage of the large group coming over the wall, about the third or fourth player over you’ll see his hand rest on top of the wall as he climbs down. The tunic he was wearing is pulled back some and it exposed a tattoo on his forearm, just above the wrist.”
“Can you make it out?” Lyons asked.
“We’re checking the linguistic database now,” Brognola said. “But what we know for sure is it’s an Arabic symbol of some kind. We’ll send more intelligence along as soon as we have something definite.”
“Not good,” Blancanales said matter-of-factly.
“Definitely not good.”
“This could be a lot more serious than you might think,” Brognola continued. “Like I said earlier, David and Phoenix are in Panama. There was an incident down there two days ago. It hasn’t hit the press up here yet, but I’m sure it will shortly. It seems the Panamanian government may have traded shots with a submarine. We think it might have been sent by our al Qaeda friends.”
“You’re just full of good news today, aren’t you?” Lyons retorted.
“You started it.”
“I assume we’re clear to do whatever we have to on this one?” Lyons asked.
“Unequivocally,” Brognola said. “Find out what’s going on and act appropriately, but be as judicious as you can. We don’t need any bloodbaths down there if we can avoid it.”
“They started it,” Lyons said, and disconnected.
“Now what?” Blancanales asked.
“I guess we won’t really know until we get there,” Lyons replied. “See if we can find some clues from whatever pieces they left behind to pick up.”
“You think those were terrorists crossing onto U.S. soil?”
“I’d wager my next paycheck on it,” Lyons replied.
He turned to Schwarz. “How we fixed for armament, Gadgets?”
