Stephen Mertz: The Korean Intercept

Fleming was the youngest of the president's advisors and the most dynamic. "Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. President, but we just got word. One of our spy boats in the Sea of Japan picked up a Mayday from Liberty. It looks like they went down."

"Dear God, not another Columbia…"

"We don't think so, sir. The Columbia broke up upon reentry. Liberty, we think, has crash-landed."

"That could be good news or bad news."

"We haven't pinpointed an exact location as yet," said Fleming, "but it looks to be somewhere on the Manchurian border with North Korea."

The president boarded a golf cart. "I want a full linkup with Houston and with Space Defense Command. Then we're heading back to Washington."

Things had just gotten worse.

Trev Galt broke the water's surface fifteen feet beneath the bow of the yacht. The murky waters of the Potomac sparkled in the sunlight like polished dark glass. The 125-foot pleasure craft stood at anchor, her bow pointing upriver, at a point where the river widened to slightly over a mile, one mile south of Mount Vernon. The sweeping banks along here were lined with the trees and shrubs of farms and country homes. There were no other boats in the vicinity. Somewhere overhead a gull cawed, and the mooing of a herd of cows in a nearby pasture drifted across the water. Galt tried to ignore the ache in his muscles from swimming against the current. He wrapped his hands and ankles around the chain of the boat's anchor line and began hoisting himself upward, toward the deck. The faint dripping of water was the only sound he made.

He was a big man, well-proportioned, ruggedly built, with thick, black hair that was just beginning to turn gray at the temples. The slit pockets of his skintight wetsuit carried stilettos and garrotes. A 9mm Beretta rode snugly in a snap-sealed waterproof holster at his left shoulder. A full complement of stun grenades was kept dry in a pouch at his right hip. He moved with grace, with the confidence and economy of movement of a trained athlete, of a professional fighting man. He dropped onto the boat's deck. Twenty feet separated him from a sentry who stood with an automatic assault rifle in front of a companionway that led below deck. Galt sailed in from the side and downed the man with a judo chop almost before the sentry realized he was under attack. Galt turned to the companionway. Another guard emerged from a side hatch in the main cabin. This one's eyes and nostrils flared in alarm and his rifle tracked toward the intruder. Galt's right arm flashed outward and the sentry took a stiletto high in the chest. He collapsed next to the first guard with barely a sound.

Galt stepped over their prone bodies and drew his Beretta. He cocked back his right foot and sent the door to the companionway slamming inward with a powerful kick, entering low and fast, his left hand unhooking one of the stun grenades. The narrow companionway was carpeted and wood paneled.

Three men, each sporting a sidearm and an automatic rifle, stood conversing next to a closed door. Their rifles swung as one in Galt's direction. But he had already pulled the grenade's pin. He tossed the grenade and covered his eyes with his left arm. There was a blinding white flash. The blast was loud, but he wore ear plugs to deal with that. The three men caught the full effect of the flash and were kicked backward against the walls. Galt emotionlessly squeezed off three well-placed rounds, one at each flailing figure. Then he hurried toward the door they'd been guarding.

He executed another kick that sent this door inward off its hinges. He hurled himself through the doorway. He hit the floor with his left shoulder in a fast roll that took him in well below any possible line of fire that might come at him from inside, steadying himself out of the roll and onto one knee, the Beretta held in a two-handed grip, ready to select targets. His deep-set eyes were narrowed, dark and dangerous.

General Clayton Tuttle rose from the armchair where he sat waiting. He clicked off the stopwatch he held.

Tuttle had served in a succession of important military positions, after a key command role in the first Gulf War, before serving as national security advisor for a former president. He was presently a ranking officer in the Pentagon's Covert Operations Command. A man in his late fifties, Tuttle was of short stature, sturdy and compact.

He snorted irritably. "Thirty-four seconds, going up against five of my best men. Damn it, Trey those twelve months behind a desk in the White House haven't slowed you down one damn bit. Son, I sure wish you were still on my team, working in the field where you belong."

Galt straightened, holstering the Beretta. His hard, dangerous look faded, replaced by an easy-going, friendly warming of the eyes and an infectious, almost boyish, smile. "That makes two of us, General. But these training workouts are going to have to be it for awhile."

"Training, hell. I'd call what you just put my guys through an endurance test, not a training exercise."

Galt glanced out at the "sentries," who were sluggishly struggling to their feet in the companionway, tugging loose their earplugs, wiping away the red dye left by the "bullets" fired from the Beretta, waiting for their full vision to return after the flash of the stun grenade. The sentries from outside appeared, one removing the stiletto from his Kevlar protective vest and assisting the man Galt had judo chopped. There was much grumbling among them.

Galt felt a twinge of guilt at the damage he had inflicted, however temporary, upon these men of the Central Intelligence Agency. He said to Tuttle, "You did tell me not to go easy."

"And you didn't. Damn. You're a one-man tornado. I don't think my boys are likely to forget what they've learned here today. But if you'd care to stick around for a debriefing and analysis-"

"Thanks, General, but I think your boys may have had enough of me for one day. And just between you and me, I'm not supposed to be here. I'm playing hooky."

"What?" Tuttle bellowed a hearty laugh and shook his head. "You haven't lost your balls either, have you, son? As a matter of fact, you did fail to mention that you'd be AWOL for this little exercise. In that case, I suggest you haul your ass back to sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue ASAP before you land us both in a sling. And, uh, thanks again, Trev, for teaching my guys just how much they still have to learn."

Galt chuckled ruefully, running his fingers through his wet thatch of hair, and-even armed, even in a dripping combat wetsuit-he gave the impression of a big, amiable bear. "I was testing myself too. I'm afraid I'm getting rusty, sitting behind a desk."

"Not you, son. You'll never lose your edge."

"Hope not. Be seeing you, General. And thanks."

Tuttle watched the best damn field agent and covert ops specialist he'd ever known exit though a separate doorway.

He thought, a military man with the training, experience and sixth sense of a born spy… It rankled him no end that such a man should be yanked from the field and assigned to the White House staff, even if Galt's job for the National Security Council-implementing and overseeing the administration's covert operations around the world-was a vital one. Galt's reputation was legendary across all ranks of the military and the U.S. espionage establishment, even though many of his assignments, certainly the ones Turtle had been responsible for handing him, had never seen the light of day. But what was known about Galt, to those in government service and to the general public as well, was impressive enough.

Trevor Galt III-sole surviving heir to the Galt Electronics fortune, fluent in six languages, with a master's in economics from Yale-had long ago renounced the monied comfort that was his birthright, choosing instead a life of personal challenge, sacrifice and commitment that could be found for him only in the service of his country. This had led to combat experience in Vietnam, Grenada, Panama and the Gulf, before being handed his own Army Ranger unit assigned to black ops, which was when Turtle had first encountered him. Turtle was seven months away from retirement. He'd been a desk jockey for twelve years and he still missed the action. He understood how being trapped in a basement office could fray the nerves of a man of action. The army had been Galt's home for most of his adult life. Now, still in his prime, Trev was faced with the prospect of shuffling papers for the rest of his career. Sure, Turtle understood. And he'd heard the rumors of Trev's drinking, though he also had it on good authority that the drinking in no way interfered with the performance of Galt's duties. And there was Trev's wife, Kate, one of the astronauts aboard the space shuttle Liberty. The media had made quite a deal about Kate Daniels.