Page 106

Brett said, “Syria? How are we going to get in there? You think you can just land in Damascus and have us rent some vehicles like we did in Beirut?”

“No. I don’t think that will work.”

Knuckles looked at Brett, then at me. He said, “Soo... what are we doing?”

“We’re waiting on the geolocation of the bad guys. When we get it, you’re going to go find them.”

Brett said, “And how are we going to do that?”

Knuckles was the first one to realize what I was saying. “You’re shitting me. You want us to jump? Into an unknown drop zone inside a combat zone? Into Syria?”

Jennifer came forward in a rush, saying, “I have the geolocation. It’s right outside of Daraa, Syria. Out in the middle of the desert.”

I took the tablet, looked at the location, then told her to take it to the pilots. I said, “Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. We’re thirty minutes out right now. Get ready.”

Brett said, “You’re shitting me.”

I said, “I shit you not. You remember in Brazil, when you told me this bird was equipped for in-extremis free-fall operations? And I was the one who had to exit the bird? Now it’s your turn.”

He shook his head and said, “This is borderline crazy. You want me and Knuckles to free fall into Syria based on a grid from the NSA?”

I said, “I do. The smuggler was taking them to meet Hezbollah members for some sort of attack in Israel. I thought it would be in Lebanon, but it’s not. The Croatian guys are going to use whatever they find with the Hezbollah men to start a war. If they’re Katyusha rockets targeted at an Israeli city, it’ll be a bridge too far. I’m pretty sure they’ve already killed the Hezbollah contacts. We don’t know the target, but we do know where they’re being launched from. Stop them.”

Brett said, “You’re going to really owe me for this.”

I slapped his shoulder and he went to the back of the plane. He unscrewed two panels in the wall of the aircraft and started pulling out the free-fall rigs from their hiding place, Javelin parachutes that were extremely precise under canopy.

Knuckles said, “So we can get in, but what about exfiltration? How are we getting out?”

I said, “I honestly don’t know, but I’ll figure it out.”

He grinned and said, “You damn well better.”

I said, “There’s a lot of special mission unit activity in Syria now. Old friends. I’ll leverage them. You get this done, and I’ll get you a linkup to exfiltrate to Jordan. Just get in, kill them, and start your escape and evasion.”

He went back to the rear of the aircraft saying, “This is seriously seat-of-the-pants shit here.”

Unlike every other SEAL I knew, where a half of a plan was better than wasting time developing a whole one, Knuckles always preferred an operation to be wired tight before execution. This was probably driving him nuts, but I knew he was better than just about anyone in a fluid situation.

Jennifer came back and said, “Twenty minutes out.”

The time was speeding up, like it always did before a mission, with the seconds seeming to fly by faster and faster. Aaron and Shoshana helped the two with their parachute containers and rucksacks, Knuckles and Brett cramming in anything they could think of for the mission.

Knuckles loaded a GPS with the coordinates from the NSA phone track, then did the same for Brett’s GPS, both of them mounted on a board affixed to their waists. Knuckles said, “How high are we?”

I said, “Seventeen thousand feet. We can’t go any lower because of air defenses. Do you want O2?”

He said, “No. No time for that. If we get out quickly, it won’t be a problem. People go up Everest without oxygen, so I guess we can fall without it for a few seconds.”

At eight minutes out, acting as a jumpmaster, I helped them put on the harnesses, then cinched their SIG MCX weapons to their sides, finally clipping the small rucksacks between each of their legs.

I said, “Did you remember any food?”

Knuckles looked at Brett, and he shook his head. Knuckles said, “We’re going hungry if you don’t get us out.”

Jennifer ripped open an overhead bin, grabbed a bunch of PowerBars, and shoved them into their blouses, first Knuckles, then Brett, saying, “In case you have to eat on the run.”

I heard the pilot shout up front and glanced that way. He had on an oxygen mask, telling me he was going to depressurize the aircraft. I gave him a thumbs-up, felt my ears pop, and tapped Brett on the shoulder. He bent down and cranked a small handle at the back of the aircraft, retracting a plate on the floor, the wind racing through the cabin like a banshee and starting to buffet inside the plane.