Brad Thor - State Of The Union

“What the hell did they do to you?” asked Harvath, more to himself than to Gary.

Lawlor tried to speak, but Scot told him to be quiet. He was gurgling as if blood was in his lungs.

Harvath tore Gary’s shirt open to the waist and tried to wipe away some of the blood from around the entry wound. This was what you always worried about in a hostage situation-that the hostage takers might go down swinging, starting with a defenseless hostage. It was every counterterrorism operative’s nightmare-not getting there in time.

As Harvath assessed Lawlor’s injuries, the man tried to push his hands away. He was rasping again in his fluid filled whisper, which Harvath couldn’t understand. When Herman began to make his way back over to them, Gary became even more insistent.

“Gary,” commanded Harvath, “calm down. You’ve been shot. I need to look at this wound. Now quit fighting me.”

Lawlor’s strength amazed Harvath as he continued to try to resist. It didn’t make any sense. The closer Herman got, the harder Gary began to thrash.

Finally, Lawlor gave one last push that was strong enough to topple Harvath over and grabbed his gun. Before Harvath could stop him, Gary had pulled the trigger three times and fired at another figure that had been creeping toward them.

“Is he dead?” whispered Lawlor, as Harvath stared at the body.

When Harvath didn’t respond, Lawlor repeated with more emphasis, “Is he dead?”

“Yes,” said Scot.

“Make sure.”

“Gary, he’s dead.”

“Make sure, goddamn it!”

Harvath went over and felt for Überhof’s pulse. There was none. “He’s definitely dead.”

Lawlor said something that sounded like, “good,” before dropping the pistol and collapsing into unconsciousness.

I thought for sure he was trying to kill me,” said Herman, as he and Harvath sat just outside the operating room where Gary Lawlor was still being worked on. He had been in surgery for more than nine hours. When they had finally climbed out of the U-Bahn system and bundled Lawlor into an ambulance, it was well past ten o’clock in the morning.

Lawlor had lost a lot of blood, and getting him out of theGeisterbanhöfe had been a nightmare. Herman had managed to find an old stretcher in the bunker, but between his bad leg and Harvath’s bruised ribs, it had taken forever for them to retrace their steps back to the functioning Friedrichstrasse station where they could call for help.

A team of Sebastian’s men came back to theGeisterbanhöfe and after securing the empty rooms, used shape charges to blow open the locked doors markedBetriebsraum. Harvath had been right. TheBetriebsraum was indeed a mechanical room, complete with generators and an air filtration system, but there was also something else-a concealed passageway with a circular metal staircase, leading all the way up to the Russian Embassy. Once Sebastian’s men realized what they had discovered, they wisely backed off. They had enough explaining to do to their superiors already, especially with one of their team members dead. Besides, even if they had wanted to breach the Russian Embassy, which several of them were eager to do, it was considered sovereign territory and could have created a serious international incident.

Instead, Sebastian’s men secured the body of Karl Überhof, who, beneath his jacket, had concealed a small caliber sniper weapons system with full metal jacket nine-millimeter rounds. The mystery of who had been shooting at them from across the street of the Goltzstrasse safe house seemed at least partially solved. The remaining two questions were who the hell was Überhof and who had he been working for?

Sebastian had spent the rest of the day trying to keep his own ass, as well as those of his men, out of the proverbial fire. He had had no choice but to come clean with his superiors. Well,relatively clean at least. Out of respect, he had left Harvath’s name out of it. He told his commander that they had been operating on a tip from an informant. Though the story wasn’t going to hold forever, he hoped at least it would buy Harvath a little bit of time. It was the least he felt he could do for him. The phone call about Überhof’s sniper rifle and the hidden stairwell leading to the Russian Embassy had come in just moments ago and was the last “favor” Sebastian had said he could do for Harvath. He and his men were being watched too closely now.

“I thought he was trying to kill you too,” answered Scot, turning back to Herman and continuing their conversation, “until I saw Überhof coming up behind you.”

“Thank God, Gary saw him or we’d both be dead now.”

Harvath just nodded his head as he reflected on what the past couple of days must have been like for Gary. The doctors said it was a wonder he was still alive at all. No one could understand how he had survived. No one, except for Scot Harvath. Gary was a fighter, a survivor. It was something they shared in common.

“What about our other guys?” asked Herman, trying to respect Harvath’s silence, but wanting to connect some of the dots. “The ones that got away. Who do you think they are?”

Herman brought Scot’s attention back to the present. “Taking into consideration that the bullet pulled out of Gary was a 7.62 Soviet M30, along with the VIP access to the Russian Embassy these guys had, I think it’s pretty safe to rule out the possibility that they are of Norwegian descent.”

“You think the Russians are involved?” asked Herman. “What possible connection there could be between terrorists targeting the United States and the Russian Federation?”

“A bigger connection than you may think.”

“You’re joking, right? When you said you were dealing with terrorists, in this day and age I automatically assumed you were talking about Islamic terrorists. Now you’re saying the Russian Federation is behind the threat against America?”

“Herman, we have very little to go on here.”

“All of a sudden, I don’t think so. We have Karl Überhof-a deceased German national obviously schooled in tradecraft who was able to take out a highly trained MEK operative, and our Soviet ammunition-firing tunnel rat who scampered away with a friend up into the Russian embassy. I want you to look me in the face and tell me that you don’t see any connection.”

Harvath set his chair back down on the ground and looked directly at Herman. It was time he told him the whole truth. “Several days ago, we discovered an enhanced suitcase nuke just outside one of our major cities.”

Herman was shocked and it took him several moments to compose himself. “What do you mean byenhanced?” he finally asked.

“Capable of a much larger yield than is normally associated with man-portable nuclear devices.”

“My God,” said Herman. “And this is what the terrorists have planned?”

“At this point we are confirming nineteen out of a possible twenty-five devices inside the United States.”

“And the balance may be in cities of America’s Western allies?”

“Yes.”

“Where’d these devices come from?”

“Where do you think?” replied Harvath.

“Russia?”

“Bingo.”

“But I don’t understand,” said Herman, leaning forward in his chair toward Harvath. “What about mutually assured destruction?”

“Suffice it to say, the Russians have found a way around that.”

“How is that possible?”

“They have developed some sort of air defense system that is impregnable.”

“And now what? They want to take over the United States?”

“Just about. They want us off the world stage so they can fill the void and be the world’s predominant superpower.”

Herman was floored. It was all too much. He had watched the Berlin Wall fall. In fact, he had even been there. He and several of his teammates had traveled to Berlin with sledgehammers and had spent hours cracking away at the enormous barrier, handing out pieces to anyone who wanted them. He had watched as people streamed across the no-man’s-land known as thedeath strip to be reunited with friends and loved ones in the West. Then the Soviet Union itself came tumbling down. At the time, it had all seemed beyond belief, but everyone had eventually gotten used to it. But what Harvath was telling him now, was absolutely beyond comprehension. “Is there more?” he asked, stunned.