Stephen Hunter - Soft target

“Reports here are still preliminary,” she said, “and we will be following developments as they occur and-”

“Nikki, Nikki, I’m getting word that the state police superintendent and incident commander Colonel Douglas Obobo is about to make a statement, we’re going live to Incident Command headquarters.”

She stared off into space, and, no monitor being available on board the WUSScopter, simply listened to the audio feed.

The colonel’s voice was calm and reassuring. “Less than an hour ago a man calling himself the commanding general of Brigade Mumbai communicated with us from within the mall where he and his colleagues hold approximately a thousand hostages at gunpoint, many of them hurt and in need of medical attention. He demanded immediate transfer of three brothers, Yusuf, Jaheel, and Khalid Kaafi from the state penitentiary, where they are imprisoned for bank robbery, to the airport, where they are to be put aboard an Air Saudi airliner bound for Yemen. He gave us an hour to begin compliance or he would begin to execute hostages. I have just received word that his demands will be implemented, that indeed the prisoners are en route to the airport.”

One of the cameramen poked Nikki, then held up one finger, signifying that she had it first, that she was number one, goddammit, and this was the scoop of all scoops. Didn’t matter that she was only ninety-odd seconds ahead of the announcement: she broke a worldwide story!

“When they have cleared American airspace, the hostage taker says, all hostages will be released unharmed. That is all I have for you at this time.”

Nikki heard a thousand questions launched and not a one of them answered, and imagined the pompous goat turning and exiting smartly stage left.

“Great work, Nikki. Baby, you own this story. You will be in New York before the week is over, I swear.”

“I just got lucky,” she said, “and in the long run it doesn’t mean-whoa!”

The chopper suddenly dipped sideways, falling about ten weightless feet, until Cap’n Tom got his two rotor blades back in synchronicity. At that same second, a black shape slid by, uncomfortably close, before it too leveled off.

“Bastard,” said Cap’n Tom. “Man, learn to fly before you come up here into crowded airspace.”

“WUSScopter almost got clipped!” said one of the cameramen, unsettled.

“You ought to report him, Tom,” said the other cameraman.

“Ah,” said Tom, “he’s just a traffic amateur, he’s not used to being in formation or a jammed area. Still, what a jerk.”

But Nikki had watched the craft slide by, so close, and her insides were still roiling. It occurred to her, Yes, you could die up here.

“Tom, really, someone’s going to get hurt. Call it in.”

“I’ll make a formal complaint tomorrow,” said Tom, meaning, of course, he wouldn’t.

But something else nipped at Nikki.

“I saw his emblem. He was from that all-traffic crowd, POP.”

“Like I said, an amateur. His idea of flying is holding stable over a highway.”

“But I thought they had run into hard times. I don’t know who told me, can’t remember, but I heard they were grounding their chopper and buying their traffic from a big outside vendor.”

“I heard that too,” said one of the cameramen.

“Maybe so,” said Tom. “Whatever, he’s gone now.”

And he was. Whoever POP was, he’d shot up high and she couldn’t pick him out in the dimly lit skies above.

The message came to Major Mike Jefferson, huddled with his surreptitiously collected shooters, in a parking lot near the entrance to the system of heating ducts that would eventually lead to the chamber beneath the amusement area concession stand. He had put this little operation together on the QT. Hanging around Command was only going to get him demoted. So he thought, I’ll just get some people and move into the area.

“Mike,” another major told him on the secure tactical radio channel, “the colonel wants you back here. He’s also pulling all the SWAT guys back and bringing in a fleet of buses.”

“What?” said Jefferson. “Are you nuts? What the fuck?”

“Hey, Mike,” said his colleague, “don’t blow at me. It’s the colonel’s decision. We’re going to let this thing play out. You heard, they’ve made demands, we’re acceding to those demands, and they’re going to let the hostages go, maybe within the hour. Any sign of offensive action against them and they could open up and take out dozens, maybe hundreds, of hostages. You’re to stand down, return to Incident Command, and return your shooters to their original units.”

“And what happens if after it’s all done, and the Kaafi assholes are on their way to freedom and glory, this motherfucker still opens up on the hostages? Only this time, we have no way to get to them in minutes and they just kill and kill and kill while we’re blowing doors?”

“It’s not our decision, Mike. It’s the colonel’s call and the consensus up and down the line is that it’s a good one. Media’s gone nuts about him. He’s their guy, he’s the hero, he’s the winner. That’s the narrative. Suppose you go in, set up underneath just in case, and one of your people drops a forty-five and it goes off, and the bad guys panic and start blasting.”

“These are trained men. Nobody is going to drop a forty-five. Plus, forty-fives don’t work like that. Plus, we all carry Glocks or Sigs.”

“Mike, just bring it back, okay? We’ll make a note of your objections, that’s the best I can do.”

Jefferson announced the decision to his all-star SWAT group and got from them what he had given to the other major: disbelief, anger, a sense of something important slipping away.

“If you let these guys get away with this,” somebody said, “it’s open season on America all over the world. We have to fight them now and kill them now. That’s our responsibility.”

“Are you suggesting a revolution?” said Mike. “You want us to go rogue? You realize what that means? End of all careers, for a start. Possible legal action because without formal authorization, we’re just vigilantes. I’m talking prosecution, fines, maybe prison time. You want to do hard time after all the skells you’ve busted? You wouldn’t last three nights in the showers and your ass would get royally fucked before your throat was cut.”

So that was it.

Walk back to their units, join the pullback, make way for the buses, hope that the colonel and all the heads on suits had made the right call, and if they hadn’t, go in afterward and supervise the forensics and the janitorial.

“Tell you what,” said Jefferson. “Let’s go real slow. Now obviously we’re not going in underground, but some of you guys have door-breaching rounds for your shotguns, right?”

There were a few yeses from the assembled crew of helmeted guys with MP5s, ARs, and Rem 870s.

“Okay, I’ll play for time. Meanwhile, I want you guys to chamber your breaching rounds. If it goes down, we’re only fifty yards from that set of doors”-he gestured to an entryway boasting the name NORTHEAST, where one township’s SWAT people were withdrawing-“and we can get to the doors, breach them fast, and get into the fight maybe not in five seconds but maybe in one minute.”

“Mike, I have a better idea.”

“Yeah?”

The man explained. Then he said, “And it’s not quite a revolution. More of a coup d’etat.”

“No,” said Mike, smiling, “it’s a coup de SWAT.”

McElroy had found him another target. Still on the second floor, Ray was rotating another corridor to the left, moving down the outer ring toward Hudson, when he heard the sound of the shots.

He recoiled, thought someone had seen him, was shooting at him, and rolled backward, slipping the rifle off his back, knowing he was behind the curve and would take one in the head soon. But the shots were ragged, not a volley, more spontaneous, and he realized that they were echoing down the hallways from the wide-open amusement park where the hostages were being held. Then he heard this other thing, this animal thing, he wasn’t sure what it was, some kind of crowd noise, a hubbub, a roar, a vibration. It communicated… joy. Well, excitement, maybe relief. It was, of course, the sound of a thousand people letting out their breaths involuntarily, as if they’d just gotten the good news. It was somehow the opposite of mass dread; it was mass undread.