Echo Six: Black Ops 7 - Tibetan Fury (17 page)

"It's not good," the Brit replied, "About two full clips for each of the assault rifles, and a part-used ammunition belt for each of the Minimis. Heinrich has eight grenades, which would be useful, and that's about it. If we run into anything more than a platoon, or God forbid, armor, we're finished."

They turned as Grace pushed in through the door. Her eyes found his, remembering what had been only a short time before.

"Problem number three," she announced, "That State Security officer, Major Xilong. He's threatened to execute all of the monks from Tenzin Davaika's monastery if Campbell isn't returned to their custody."

"Shit," he murmured reflexively, "I was about to say the next problem is we don't have a way out of here. But I guess we're not finished in this town." He looked at Brooks. "Admiral?"

He shrugged. "I was going to contact Garrick and force him to send those trucks, but I don't have any faith in the man. I'm not convinced they'll show up."

"I believe you're right."

Talley explained the theory he'd come to with Grace about a possible reason for Garrick's unexplained behavior. Brooks was thoughtful.

"If that's true, I'll hang him from the nearest yardarm when we get out of this place. But as you say, we're not finished here. We need to get Campbell out, but not at the cost of a massacre."

"We could locate this Major Xilong and put a bullet through his head," Guy suggested, "Stalin's old solution. When a man causes a problem, kill the man. Problem solved."

"You're not Stalin," Brooks growled.

Guy shrugged. "It would still work."

"We need to think of something else. Is there a train service around here?"

Grace coughed to cover her smile. "Er, no, Admiral. Well, there is a train, yes. It runs in the wrong direction, to China."

Brooks nodded. "That takes care of that idea. Commander Talley, any other ideas?” He chuckled, “Other than a magic carpet to fly us out of here.”

He was thoughtful.

A magic carpet, and why not? But first, Major Xilong. Guy’s right. The man needs a bullet through his head.

“Maybe.” He looked at Grace. “This Major Xilong, would his office be along the route to Lhasa International Airport?”

She looked puzzled. “No, Lhasa International is seventy kilometers from the city, but there is a small military airport five kilometers away. And his office is along the route. Why do you ask?”

The three men understood immediately.

Guy grinned. “Call me Stalin.”

He stared out of his office window at the shouting and bustling chaos in the vehicle park below. It was 1500 hours, and troops were piling into the trucks after a brief respite for food, ready to continue the hunt. Even General Chang hadn't been able to curtail their regulation meal break. He was irritated at the delay, but experienced enough to know hungry men would find any excuse to disappear into a local noodle shop. And the search for the bandits would suffer as a result.

His office phone rang, and he picked it up. "Yes!"

He heard Corporal Yip's voice, his orderly in the outer office. Yip was an obese chain-smoker, happy to be stuck behind a desk away from the freezing climate of the country.

"Call for you, Sir."

"Yip, I told you I'm not to be disturbed. I'm trying to conduct a hunt for foreign criminals, not waste my time chatting on the fucking phone. The security of the city is in danger, perhaps even the whole of Tibet! Leave me alone, so I can get on with my work. The next time you interrupt me, Corporal, I'll send you out to search the countryside. Alone, at night."

"It's the General, Sir."

"Fuck General Chang! He's already called several times to check on progress. He should know better. Tell him I'm too busy."

He was about to slam the phone down when he heard Yip say something more.

"What was that?"

"Not General Chang, Sir. The call is from Beijing. It's General Hu."

His stomach lurched. Hu was the man who ruled the entire Ministry of State Security apparatus from his fortress-like headquarters inside Beijing. Lieutenant-General Hu was related to Hu Jintao, the sixth and former President of the People's Republic of China. If he was calling to speak with a lowly major in an isolated Tibetan outpost, it was bad news, the worst possible news. He had a vision, a 7.62mm rifle bullet spinning through the air, aimed directly at his forehead.

"Put him through, man! What are you waiting for?"

He tried to control his panic, at the same time cursing Yip, whose voice was tinged with amusement at his superior's misfortune.

"Yes, Sir. At once."

Fuck you, Corporal Yip. When this is done, I'll put you to cleaning the shithouses.

He heard the harsh, heavy smoker's voice of the man who commanded the Ministry of State Security; a man with the power of life and death over most of China's citizens. A man who right now would be angry at the loss of an important prisoner, and his failure to capture the bandits.

"Xilong?"

"General, Sir. It's good of you to call. How can I help?"

"You can take out your pistol, put it to your stupid head, and blow your fucking brains out, Major! Unless you can clear up the mess you have allowed to happen in your area of responsibility. What the fuck was going through your head when you let that man escape? How many men have you lost, and how many of my security troops are dead or wounded because of your idiocy?"

"Sir, I can explain. I was betrayed."

"Betrayed?"

Xilong knew he was on the right track. In Communist China, treachery and betrayal were the two crimes most likely to cause a man to stop and think, two crimes that would result in arrest, torture, and death.

"Captain Lao, Sir. I think he must have sold us out to the enemy."

A pause. Xilong knew the General would be working out how it was that a lowly captain was responsible the screw-ups and failures.

"Do you have any proof?"

"I'm looking into it now, Sir. I hope to have evidence within twenty-four hours."

That would be long enough to manufacture something suitable, something that would point the finger to Captain Lao being a traitor.

"You'd better make sure you do. What about the American?"

"The American?"

"The American monk who escaped! Are you totally stupid? The man held under sentence of death, David Campbell. When will you report him back in our custody"

"I don't understand. The man's name is Tenzin Davaika, a Buddhist monk of American extraction."

"His name is David Campbell. I have it on good authority the man you allowed to escape is the stepson of the Chief of Staff to the President of the United States."

He felt a sharp pain in his chest, a pain that traveled down to his guts.

"The President of the United States?" he whispered, "You're sure, Sir?"

"He is the Chief of Staff's stepson, yes, of course I'm fucking sure. And you let him go."

"It was Lao, Sir. Captain Lao. I'll prove it to you."

"Perhaps." The General's voice sounded skeptical, "I'm hearing many strange whispers about your region, Major. Something's going on. You realize if you make a mess of this, it could impact on me. Or did you think my position was secure? There are people who would use the mess you created to discredit me and take over my post. Do you understand?"

"Of course, Sir."

"You'd better. You have forty-eight hours, Major Xilong. Clear up this mess, or you'll take Campbell's place in Prison Number 529, and on the execution platform. Clear?"

"Yes, General, I understand. Sir, the foreign bandits who broke him out of jail, they are very resourceful. I need more men at my disposal to capture them, transport, and helicopters, tanks if necessary. Do I have your permission?"

"Of course, this could be a disaster for all of us if you don't fix it. Whatever you need, use my name. And get that fucking prisoner back behind bars!"

Hu slammed the phone down before he could reply, and he replaced his own receiver. The fear he'd felt when Hu called had disappeared, and he was gripped with a rising sense of excitement. He would be in command of an enormous amount of weaponry and materiel, as well as a large number of troops. He felt almost dizzy, drunk with the awesome power that was now at his disposal.

He sobered for a moment. What about General Chang? Theoretically, the chain of command required Chang to be in charge of this operation, but Xilong had enough political savvy to understand why it had been dumped in his lap. The moment Chang came into possession of the truth about Tenzin Davaika, that he was much more than a monk, Chang would have contacted Hu in Beijing to ensure overall command was passed down to Xilong.

He didn't feel aggrieved or any sense of injustice. It was the way things worked in China. When you reached the heights of General Officer in the Ministry of State Security, you'd do everything in your power to keep that rank. And that included shifting responsibility down the chain of command to keep your hands clean.

However, he was certain he had little to worry about. With sufficient men, helicopter gunships, and even tanks, there was nothing he couldn't do. He'd tear the city of Lhasa apart brick-by-brick, until he found David Campbell and put him back in chains. As for the bandits who'd freed him, he'd boil them in oil when he caught them. It wouldn't be the first time.

He strode out of his office, and Yip jumped to attention.

"Call out the guard! I want all platoon and company commanders to report to the briefing room, five minutes and not a second more. This is top priority from Beijing. If anyone tries to make excuses, you may tell them any absentees will be shot. Move, man! We're going to take this place apart, brick-by-brick if necessary, until we find that prisoner. And if anyone gets in the way, they'll be shot on sight!"

He smiled as the tubby NCO sprinted out of the office.

Power! It’s better than sex and almost as good as money. Then again, the three usually go together
.

* * *

He checked his wristwatch yet again. 1730, another hour and it would be dark. Time to head for that military airfield. Guy was on watch at the front, and Kaz went up to replace him. When his number two appeared, his face was grim.

"I can see increased military activity, Boss. Place is crawling with troops, trucks, jeeps, APCs, and unless I'm mistaken, armor. I could swear I heard tracks chewing up the tarmac a couple of klicks away."

"Armor? You're certain?"

"It's not a sound I'd ever forget."

"I get you. We'll be leaving in an hour, just as soon as it's dark enough for us to move. But if they're tearing the city apart looking for us, it's going to be even tougher to get clear."

Guy nodded. "They're sure saturating the place with troops. There is one positive side to all this. They're likely to have pulled people away from the airfield, which could make it easier for us to get in there."

"Yeah, and that's just the beginning. It's what happens after that really worries me. We're about four hundred klicks from Kathmandu Airport in Nepal. That's about an hour's flying time in a standard military transport, assuming they don't have any Globemasters we can steal."

Guy chuckled. "It's likely to be one of those old Antonovs, the biplanes."

Talley grimaced. "We'll need something bigger than that if we're taking everyone with us."

David Campbell was sitting nearby, listening. He turned his head toward them.

"The place you're talking about is Tama Air Base. I can confirm they generally have aircraft larger than Antonov biplanes, the AN-2s. I sent a lot of data to CIA, so I can tell you exactly what they have on the base. There are several Xian Y-7s stationed there. Do you know the type?"

They shook their heads.

"It's almost an exact copy of the Antonov AN-24 military transport. Twin turboprops and built to carry around fifty passengers. They're always flying troops in and out of Tama, so it's certain there'll be at least a couple of the Y-7s on the ground. They're good for up to 500kms an hour, so you could make Kathmandu inside of an hour. If the Chinese Air Force lets you."

They looked at each other. That was the real crunch, the People's Liberation Army Air Force; whether they were blind or incompetent enough to allow them to steal a valuable transport aircraft and fly it out of the country. Everything Talley had heard suggested they were neither blind, nor incompetent.

Admiral Brooks was chatting to Rovere, and both officers moved to join them. Brooks looked thoughtful.

"You know that if we manage to get off the ground, and there's no guarantee of that, they'll throw everything they have at us. I wonder if we shouldn't try and get out some other way."

"Unless we can give them a good reason not to shoot us down," Guy mused.

"Like what?"

He looked at Campbell. "You know this place better than anyone. Who's the head honcho in Lhasa? The 'Dark Lord', the guy they'd shit themselves if anything happened to him."

The American smiled. "That's General Chang, no question. He's the man who commands the Ministry of State Security, the man who has power of life and death inside Tibet."

"Then let's take him along. That'll make them think twice about taking pot shots at us," the SAS man said, "Unless anyone has a better idea. I assume he'll be in the MSS Headquarters, along with Major Xilong?"

"He will, yes," Campbell replied, "but he'll also be well guarded. He's probably the most difficult man to get to in the whole of Tibet."

"Can it be done?" Talley asked him.

He shrugged. "If it is your fate to succeed, you will succeed, maybe. Otherwise…"

Rovere couldn't resist. "Our wills and fates do so contrary run, that our devices still are overthrown. Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own."

Guy looked at Talley and then at Brooks. The three men spoke as one.

"Shut up, Domenico."

David Campbell chuckled. "If your Italian friend meant what I think he meant, I'd agree with him. But on a more practical level, yes, it may be possible. Provided you can reach the MSS building. Provided you can get inside, locate, and kill Major Xilong. Provided you can locate and kidnap General Chang. And provided you can reach Tama Air Base, steal a Y-7, and take off with him aboard, yes, it could be done. It's a lot of ifs, and you only need one tiny part of the operation to go wrong, and you'll wind up dead."

He thought for a moment. "The nuns, we have to take them with us. After the bloodshed at the nunnery, they'll be targeted by State Security."

"They come with us," Talley acknowledged. He looked at Grace. "Will that be a problem?"

She shook her head. "They are resigned to leaving Tibet. They know they have no other choices, not any more."

"Very well. Make sure they're ready to leave."

Guy began getting the men ready to pull out. The plan involved driving in convoy in the four trucks. The nuns would ride in the two center vehicles like before, with Campbell in the cab of the second truck. Grace would ride in the leading truck with Talley. She knew the route and spoke the language. Rovere was allocated to the cab of the third vehicle, along with Abbess Dolma, and Guy at the back of the small convoy.

Each of the two trucks carrying the Echo Six troopers carried a Minimi apiece, as well as a sniper. It was all the heavy firepower they possessed, with the exception of Buchmann in the back of the leading truck. He still carried his launcher with the remaining eight grenades.