Don Pendleton - Terror Trail

“I’m not all that pleased with the idea myself,” David McCarter added.

“Nobody said it was perfect,” Calvin James pointed out, “but since no one can come up with a better idea, I say we go with it.”

“Cal, I hate to bring this up again, but you could be putting yourself in harm’s way,” Brognola said.

“I understand. Look, every time we head out on a mission we’re doing just that. Risk is what we live with. Five or one, it makes no difference.”

“In a team you have backup, close and personal,” Rafael Encizo argued.

“I know that. And a bullet could still find me with all you guys around.”

“Still a risk,” Barbara Price said. “A big risk.”

“What’s the alternative?” James said. “Go in like the heavy mob and blow the chance of picking up the intel we need? We need pinpoint information. Shaia Kerim is the only name we have belonging to Hand of Allah. He’s the point man. The only other detail that’s come to light is they have a working plan to put their people on U.S. streets. Right now, according to Behin Jahir, Hand of Allah is somewhere in the Yemeni desert. A training camp. We need to locate it because that’s where this planned strike is being masterminded. Rest of the information is so skinny you can see through it. So we need someone to get close to harden up our knowledge. That’s me.”

This was their third roundtable meeting on James’s proposed undercover mission, and the concern of his Phoenix Force teammates was the reason for the ongoing discussion.

“Remind me again why you?” Aaron Kurtzman asked from his wheelchair on the opposite side of the conference table. He was directly across from James, his intense gaze centered on the Phoenix Force warrior. “Why not any of the others?”

“One, I’m black and thus more likely to be accepted by the Muslim community. I also speak French. We know Kerim speaks the language, so we have something in common.” James paused. “And face it, brother, I’m the only one around this table who is really cool.”

McCarter raised his hands in surrender. “Well, that bloody does it for me. He’s cocky enough to pull this off.” The Brit leaned over and slapped James on the shoulder. “Be nice to the rest of us and maybe we’ll be around to cover your back.”

“No question there,” Brognola said. “You guys will be ready to jump in once Cal blows the time-out whistle.”

“You’ve got that,” Hawkins said.

“Aaron, can you push on with that character file for Cal? Give him a life so that if anyone does some electronic trawling he’ll exist,” McCarter said.

* * *

STONY MAN WANTED Shaia Kerim to believe he was safe, that his association with Hand of Allah was not known by anyone outside the group. The fact he was an active member had been carefully guarded, and he continued to operate under a false sense of security because the Stony Man team had decided to allow it to happen while they built their case, infiltrating Hand of Allah so they could take the group down. Stony Man accepted that simply removing Kerim would be a hollow victory. One man down would not destroy the entire cell. They needed a show of force that would remove Hand of Allah’s power base and neutralize its command structure. They needed information on other members of the organization and ultimately the reclusive figure who headed the group.

The identity of this shadowy figure was important. His whereabouts remained a secret even from active members of Hand of Allah. His exposure and removal from power would deal a devastating blow to the cell. Cutting off the head of the snake would hopefully destroy the body.

The members of Stony Man’s cyber team, under Aaron Kurtzman’s direction, were giving all their assistance to the combat teams. They were also working around the clock, using every skill they possessed and searching electronically for any clue, small as it might be, that could point them in the direction of the man overseeing Hand of Allah.

Kurtzman was fully aware of the importance of the operation. He always gave one hundred percent to any Stony Man search. Without any kind of overt command he made it clear to his team how he expected them to push even harder than usual. It was to Kurtzman’s credit that his people responded without exception, pushing themselves as hard as he did himself.

Stony Man had an unwritten declaration that came with the territory, and it was behind everything they did; for all of them it was to give everything they had to every assignment. Their missions were always on the edge, looking into the abyss. Failure would lead to deadly results. Their scope of operations was endless because the enemies they faced were legion. Stony Man undertook missions that were beyond the reach of regular security agencies due to rules of engagement, interagency overlaps and even information leaks.

Stony Man, through Phoenix Force, Able Team and even Mack Bolan, had no agency connections. The SOG was responsible, on a daily basis, to Hal Brognola. Above Brognola was the single figure of the SOG’s commander—the President of the United States. They deferred to him alone. In essence they were his last line of defense—his ultrasecret weapon—charged with stepping in when there was nowhere else for the Man to go.

Since its inception, Stony Man had been under the cloak of the presidency. With each new Commander in Chief, the baton had been passed along. Each new President had been told by his predecessor of the SOG’s existence, and the mantle of responsibility had been transferred. Given the state of the world, the existing threats and the possible future threats to the nation, each newcomer to the Oval Office had acknowledged the need for such a group. As each new President settled into his office and was updated by Brognola, it soon became clear to the man in charge that Stony Man was a vital weapon in America’s fight to survive. Although the President was at a distance from the Stony Man teams, he realized just how much they put into their missions, how many times they risked their lives and how many times they pulled the country back from the brink. All arguments aside, the President’s covert teams had a place in the ongoing struggle to maintain America’s security. And that struggle required, on occasion, that they fight down and dirty when the enemy dictated the terms of combat.

Aaron Kurtzman and his team were more than aware of the need to get down to ground level in order to assist the teams. Kurtzman would sanction anything to gain information. He had no qualms when it came to breaching other security agencies for intel. He understood the paranoia that gripped these agencies when they were in possession of data they claimed as their own, refusing to pass it along to sister agencies because it might weaken their own dominance. Interagency rivalry became paramount. Career building and personal grandstanding could withhold vital information, and the bickering that was tied to these matters often blocked progress.

Aaron Kurtzman used the cyber team’s combined skills to override these failings. His people were the best of the best. Unchallenged experts in the use of cyber tactics, they could, and would, bypass firewalls and encrypted systems to reach in and filter out data. Kurtzman and Akira Tokaido, the young systems wizard, devised and perfected the most intrusive programs in existence. They used them to worm their way through the most sophisticated computer shields to take what they needed, all without the knowledge of the breached systems.

Deeply immersed in the cyber universe, Kurtzman’s personnel increased their knowledge with every mission. Kurtzman understood the complexities of the electronic war he was fighting—and a war it was—and he devoted his waking hours to overcoming the challenges thrown Stony Man’s way. His cyber team’s reach extended across the globe, using any and all databases they breached. Electronic chatter filled cyberspace with a continuous flow. It never stopped. Day or night, filling the void with talk and information, the ceaseless river of human verbiage was there for the taking. It required specialized equipment and trained people to filter out the small snatches of useful information. Stony Man’s team were such people. In their hands such snippets of information could open up a channel that might provide the link they needed to bring them closer to a current enemy.