Afghan Storm (Nick Woods Book 3) (18 page)

Chapter 51

Nick had intended to storm
out of the base hospital mad as hell. But the presence of several blisters on
his feet, which he hadn’t actually noticed until now, demanded that his stomp be
downgraded into more of a pathetic shuffle with a limp.

It was more than just the
blisters and the fatigue, though. Nick didn’t fully understand what had
happened back with the doctor. He knew that he had been an inexcusable jerk,
and deep down he was slightly ashamed of his behavior. But at the same time,
from the moment she’d walked into the room, he’d felt like she was somehow
manipulating him. He’d felt vulnerable and stupid, ultimately like he was the
victim of some cruel joke.

He didn’t know how or why,
but some instinctive defense mechanism had been tripped. And sure it didn’t
make any damned sense, but Nick honestly just wasn’t in the mood for an
emotional riddle right now.

So Nick trudged back to
his room, determined to shut his mind off and enjoy a much needed shower, as
well as the clean, air-conditioned room that awaited him.

Nick sat on his bed, his
body now showered and very much ready to slip into a deep, long sleep. But as
so very often happened whenever Nick finally found calm and quiet, his mind
refused to get on board with the concept.

Knowing the drill, Nick
figured he might as well put his hands to use while his brain ran its course.
So he stretched out to grab his nearby Dragunov rifle and give it a quick
cleaning.

His mind started off by
replaying the past eleven days and nights. The miles and miles of walking. The
attack by the villagers on the side of the hill. The night assault on
al-Habshi’s compound. And as the movie reel raced through his mind, various
frames stood out. Men he’d shot. The sight picture just prior to the rifle
firing. The bodies he’d seen afterward, frozen in grotesque positions.

Those wouldn’t be going
away for a while. But, it wasn’t just the memories of the past mission that had
Nick’s mind racing. He and his men had endured the day-after-day march through
hell not for Ahmud al-Habshi, but for Rasool Deraz.

And now only Deraz
occupied his mind. The man propped up the entire infrastructure of the Taliban,
and in truth, he affected and inspired more than just the Taliban and its
supporters. Probably three-quarters of those opposing the government of
Afghanistan -- villagers, town leaders, and drug runners -- followed the lead
of Deraz. The revered leader pushed, prodded, and rallied the entire resistance
movement.

And it was crucial that
the men of Shield, Safeguard, and Shelter end the man’s reign. Nick wondered
what the wizened leader was doing now. Probably not sitting on his duff
over-analyzing everything, Nick thought. He focused on the Dragunov he was
cleaning. It had served him well, but he looked forward to stowing it away for
good and going back to his American-made M4, which he was far more comfortable
with. Or he’d be carrying his bigger caliber M14 if the range warranted.

As Nick worked his brush
on the Soviet-made sniper rifle, his mind wandered from Deraz and the thoughts
of combat. In the comfort of his safe room, his thoughts ultimately drifted
back to the events earlier with the doctor. His brain tried numerous times to
replay the scene and force him to reconsider his opinion of her by highlighting
her many positive traits, both physical and nonphysical. But mostly the
physical traits, because, like most men, his brain was a back-stabbing pervert.
So Nick repeatedly shut the memory down until it stopped playing altogether and
all that remained was a raw and ragged anger.

Pretty or not, Nick would
not waste one more thought on her or what had happened. He had work to do, and
it didn’t matter if she, or anyone else for that matter, thought he was an
asshole. Besides, being an asshole was what he was good at. And it was probably
one of the characteristics that made him so damned good at his job. Point blank
and period, Nick was what he was. Everybody else would just have to get over it.

And so with his identity
secure and his mind thoroughly exhausted from its spinning, Nick set aside his
rifle and climbed beneath the sheets. The last thought that passed through his
head was that of reassurance: Once this is all over, he thought, at least he
would never, ever have to see that woman again.

Chapter 52

Nick slept hard for
fourteen hours. His exhaustion kept his nightmares mostly at a distance, and he
awoke only a couple of times with a start and soaked in sweat.

Ignoring even the wound on
his shoulder, Nick hurt all over. His feet were a mangled mess of bloody
blisters, hot spots, and cracked skin. His back felt as if he’d been run over,
and a crushing headache topped it off. He shook his head and realized the
headache was from dehydration.

Oh, yeah, he thought
somewhat regrettably, as he remembered the poor orderly who came to give him
his IV. Nick had chased him out of his room and then a good bit down the hall
too. The terrified man had bolted so suddenly that he’d ran right into the
rolling IV stand and knocked it over. And instead of stopping to stand it back
up, the desperate bastard just kept running, leaving the IV stand, bag and all,
to drag behind him like an anchor.

Nick dragged himself from
the cot and reached for his canteen. He guzzled about half of it, let the water
settle in his stomach, then swallowed down the rest of it. Just like boot camp,
he thought, where screaming drill instructors forced frightened recruits to
gulp down an entire canteen at a time.

He reached for his shower
kit and towel, heading for the bathroom. No question about it, he felt like
shit and figured it might take three days for him and his team to get ready to
go back out.

It actually took four days
for him and his team to fully recover, but by day three, still lethargic, sore,
and slow, the four members who took part in the deep mission into Pakistan
trudged out to the range with the rest of S3’s Primary Strike Team. The Primary
Strike Team was a squad of the most elite and veteran roster of shooters in S3.

Everyone in S3 wanted to
be on the Primary Strike Team, but it was highly competitive and difficult to
land a spot on the squad. The Primary Strike Team had six members on it, same
as the other squads in S3, but it handled the most dangerous missions,
breaches, raids, etc.

Nick and the Primary
Strike Team fired five hundred rounds through their rifles and two hundred and
fifty through their pistols. Nick participated, but avoided the quick reload
drills. He needed to take it easy so he wouldn’t reopen his wound.

He avoided re-injuring it
but ended the day disappointed with what he had seen. Despite being some of the
most skilled shooters in the world, Nick could see the target groups of his
three shooters who had gone on the deep-strike mission were more ragged than
usual. And morale looked rough.

Red wasn’t talking shit. Truck
wasn’t bitching. Marcus wasn’t motivating.

Frankly, Nick felt like
hell, too. On the bright side, his other two Primary Strike Team members looked
sharp. Bullet holes lay centered and tight throughout their targets.

“Nice job, Lana and
Preacher,” Nick said, nodding to both of them.

His command had grown from
its time in Mexico. These days, S3 had five squads of six. There was the
Primary Strike Team, three supporting squads, and a sniper squad, which had
three teams of two scout snipers.

Five squads of badasses.
Plus, additional personnel who handled security, logistics, and intel.

The original Primary
Strike Team in Mexico had lost a SEAL who went by the name of Bulldog. He had
been wounded too badly in Mexico to remain on the team. And Lizard, the quiet
Puerto Rican Marine, had died from a gunshot wound to the neck. That left only
Nick, Marcus, Red, Truck, and Preacher, who had recovered nicely from his
combat wound in Mexico.

Preacher
was the most religious
man on Nick’s team. His parents had been missionaries, and the 5’10” man had
felt “called” to join the Marines. Nick didn’t know about being called, but
Preacher had done four hard tours, two of them with MARSOC.

One man short of the six
needed for the Primary Strike Team, Nick and Marcus selected an unexpected
candidate to fill the final roster spot. They looked past some incredible
options who were men -- Navy SEALs, Delta, Marines -- and picked a woman. And
not just a woman, but also a Muslim. She was college educated, to boot, making
her the only college educated member on the team. (Nick and Marcus weren’t real
keen on bringing in some know-it-all prior officer.)

But Lana Haider defied
about every standard Nick held prior to meeting her. He had gone into the
selection, which included physical tryouts and shooting contests, wanting a
knuckle-dragging shooter. But it didn’t take long to focus on Lana, one of only
two women to make the final twenty prospects.

Marcus had argued prior to
the tryouts that a woman would aid S3 in its undercover work, especially in the
area of surveillance. Nick agreed, but made clear he wouldn’t lower the
standard simply to make it happen.

He hadn’t needed to with
Lana.

She shot well. Certainly
not as good as some of the best from Delta and the SEALs, who worked on it
daily for hours. But Lana brought a ton to the table that the Delta, SEALs, and
Marine shooters didn’t bring.

Lana had been born in
Saudi Arabia. And like most young girls, she was raised under a father who was
a strict disciplinarian and ardent believer of Islam. He also frequently abused
her mother. Unbeknownst to him, his wife worked hard behind the scenes as part
of a movement to grant women more rights in Saudi Arabia, including the right
to drive.

Unfortunately, Lana’s
mother was eventually discovered, so she fled to America with her daughter to
seek asylum. Lana was raised in America from the age of eleven. Following in
the footsteps of her mother’s perseverance and drive, Lana received an
abundance of scholarships, and after attending the finest private schools, she
graduated with honors from Harvard.

She mastered several
languages used mostly by Muslim fanatics -- no accident -- and made it her
life-long mission to fight the radicals perverting the religion of Islam.

After school, she did a
stint with the CIA as an analyst before convincing them to put her in the
field. Her background in basketball and volleyball as an athlete growing up had
conditioned her body and toughened her for the training she endured, all of
which she accepted without complaint.

She thrived in fieldwork
for the CIA but rebelled with the rest of it all. The bureaucracy. The
politics. The paperwork. The lack of trust and routine polygraphs.

Consequently, when word
spread among those in the know about a new group called S3, she inquired
further. Once she confirmed it was a legit organization doing serious work for
the CIA, she pursued joining the group with an admirable tenacity. And this was
even prior to the openings that occurred following the nasty fighting in
Mexico.

But it wasn’t until Nick
and Marcus saw her in action that they pushed her to the head of the line. That
seemed like so long ago, but only a few months had passed. The eleven-day long
mission had wrecked Nick’s sense of time.

He helped his Primary
Strike Team pick up their brass after they finished shooting. Once they were
done, he called them into a huddle.

“Guys, I’m not saying
anything you don’t already know, but we looked like hell out here today,” Nick
said, specifically looking at Marcus, Red, and Truck. “Thankfully, Lana and
Preacher showed us how it’s supposed to be done, but we need to get our shit
together. And fast.”

Nick removed his helmet
and adjusted his heavy armor to remove some pressure off his shoulder.

“Marcus, you heard
anything from intel?”

“They’re saying it’ll be a
couple more days before they have anything off of al-Habshi’s computer,” he
said.

“We clearly need it,” Nick
said, a bit relieved. “And while we’ll have some free time in the next couple
of days, let’s not get crazy. Red, no fighting. Truck, take it easy on the
beer.”

Both men grinned at each
other.

“Let’s go get some damn
chow,” Nick said, and the group walked back toward their rooms.

Chapter 53

While the Primary Strike
Team of Shield, Safeguard, and Shelter recharged and primed themselves for the
next mission, a team of analysts dove into the treasure trove of equipment
brought back from the mission into Pakistan. These men and women were non-S3
members, and Nick and Marcus were glad they didn’t have to oversee this part of
the operation.

The CIA had deployed
several technology specialists and IT experts to
Bagram
Airfield after Nick and his team pushed off for Pakistan. The thinking behind
the move was that if, by some near-miracle, the team pulled off their mission,
the intelligence gathered would be absolutely time critical.

The Taliban would quickly
learn that loads of valuable information had been seized, and they wouldn’t
hesitate to relocate key leaders, munitions, and safe houses. Consequently, the
analysts were completely prepared to tear into the computer and servers the
moment they arrived at
Bagram Airfield.

A special
room had been built that had several additional generators for increased
electrical capacity, and the computer team had brought in more than two hundred
pounds of various computer parts (older and newer), as well as wiring
configurations. No one knew whether the Taliban was using ratty computers ten
or twenty years old, or brand-new, top-of-the-line equipment. And the IT
specialists wanted to be prepared for either option without any delay of trying
to track down some hard-to-find part in Afghanistan.

Having to
wait for some special part to be flown in from America or China wasn’t an
option, so they had spent hours and hours debating what all should be brought
as they prepped and packed for the mission. It turned out the equipment was
modern and in pretty fair condition, giving the jostling it had received and a
couple of bullet impacts. The impacts were to non-critical areas, so quite
quickly the team had a data link set up by satellite to load thousands and
thousands worth of terabytes to language and cultural experts waiting back at
Langley, Virginia.

Additional
translators from the Department of Defense had been brought in, and the intel
was torn into with a ferocity not seen since the post 9/11 frenzy following its
aftermath. The analysts focused primarily on emails and documents, setting
aside videos (and non-published videos) for later. Tracking down new faces and
locations recorded on these video clips would take place after the initial
urgency ended.

And while
all this work took place, Nick and the Primary Strike Team rested, began
running again, and practiced their shooting skills and immediate action drills.
S3 would be ready to rock and roll once the word arrived on where to strike
next.