Clear and Present Danger полностью

"Soon as it's dark, you and me circle around the north side. Rest of the squad forms up in two fire teams to provide fire support in case we need it. Vega, you and your SAW stay here. The other one goes down about four hundred meters. After we do the two guards, we booby-trap the fuel drums in the shack, just as a farewell present. The chopper'll pick us up at the far end at twenty-three hundred. We bring the bodies out with us, probably dump 'em at sea."

Well, how about that , Chavez thought. "We'll need like thirty-forty minutes to get around to them, just to play it safe and all, but the way those two fuckers been actin', no sweat, sir." The sergeant knew that the killing would be his job. He had the silenced weapon.

"You're supposed to ask me if this is for-real," Captain Ramirez pointed out. He had done just that over the satellite radio.

"Sir, you say do it, I figure it's for-real. It don't bother me none," Staff Sergeant Domingo Chavez assured his commander.

"Okay - we'll move out as soon as it's dark."

"Yes, sir."

The captain patted both men on the shoulder and withdrew to the rally point. Chavez watched him leave, then pulled out his canteen. He unscrewed the plastic top and took a long pull before looking over at Vega.

" Fuck! " the machine-gunner observed quietly.

"Whoever's runnin' this party musta grown a pair o' balls," Ding agreed.

"Be nice to get back to a place with showers and air conditioning," Vega said next. That two people would have to die to make that possible was, once it was decided, a matter of small consequence. It bemused both men somewhat that after years of uniformed service they were finally being told to do the very thing for which they'd trained endlessly. The moral issue never occurred to them. They were soldiers of their country. Their country had decided that those two dozing men a few hundred meters away were enemies worthy of death. That was that, though both men wondered what it would actually be like to do it.

"Let's plan this one out," Chavez said, getting back to his binoculars. "I want you to be careful with that SAW, Oso ."

Vega considered the situation. "I won't fire to the left of the shack unless you call in."

"Yeah, okay. I'll come in from the direction of that big-ass tree. Shouldn't be no big deal," he thought aloud.

"Nah, shouldn't be."

Except that this time it was all real. Chavez stayed on the glasses, examining the men whom he would kill in a few hours.

Colonel Johns got his stand-to order at roughly the same time as all of the field teams, along with a whole new set of tactical maps that were for further study. He and Captain Willis went over the plan for this night in the privacy of their room. There was a snatch-and-grab tonight. The troops they'd inserted were coming back out far earlier than scheduled. PJ suspected that he knew why. Part of it, anyway.

"Right on the airfields?" the captain wondered.

"Yeah, well, either all four were dry holes, or our friends are going to have to secure them before we land for the snatch-and-grab."

"Oh." Captain Willis understood after a moment's thought.

"Get ahold of Buck and have him check the miniguns out again. He'll get the message from that. I want to take a look at the weather for tonight."

"Pickup order reverse from the drop-off?"

"Yeah - we'll tank fifty miles off the beach and then again after we make the pickup."

"Right." Willis walked out to find Sergeant Zimmer. PJ went in the opposite direction, heading for the base meteorological office. The weather for tonight was disappointing: light winds, clear skies, and a crescent moon. Perfect flying weather for everyone else, it was not what special-ops people hoped for. Well, there wasn't much you could do about that.