Don Pendleton - Drawpoint

“We almost ready?” Brognola asked.

“Bringing up Able now,” Price said. She tapped a few more keys. A second plasma screen came alive with the out-of-focus image of a beefy palm. Price raised an eyebrow again, then shook her head with a smile as the hand was withdrawn. The image resolved itself into that of a very irritated Carl Lyons, obviously staring down into a Web cam of some kind. Schwarz and Blancanales crowded in next to him, their heads almost touching as they verified they were present for the meeting. Lyons shrugged them off, leaving only parts of their shoulders and torsos in view as he glared down at the camera.

“This,” he said tersely, “is really annoying.”

“You’ll live,” Price said evenly. “Can you hear us and see us okay?”

Lyons grunted. “Yes.”

“Wideband scattering-noise projectors in place,” Schwarz said, his face not visible. Price nodded; this would thwart electronic eavesdropping on their location, including directional microphones.

The door to the War Room opened again. Several men entered. Price watched them take seats around the conference table and nod to the images of Brognola and Able Team in turn. The new arrivals were Phoenix Force, the second counterterrorist team run by the Farm, responsible primarily for international operations. The greater scope of their turf was reflected in the larger size of the team—five for Able’s three.

Slouching into his seat, nursing a can of Coke and appearing deceptively casual, was David McCarter, Phoenix Force’s leader. The lean, fox-faced Briton had always been something of a hothead, which had brought him into conflict with Brognola more than once. He had proved a capable leader, however, through countless missions with Phoenix. The former SAS operative smelled strongly of cigarette smoke. Price assumed he’d just finished one before the briefing.

Next to McCarter, making a show of waving away the fumes, was the stockier, more heavily muscled Rafael Encizo. The Cuban-born guerrilla expert was a much squatter, blockier man, but his appearance, Price knew, concealed catlike reflexes.

Demolitions expert Gary Manning, sat on the other side of McCarter, sipping what Price assumed was coffee.

Tall and graceful, Calvin James slipped into a chair next to Manning. The lanky black man, who’d grown up on Chicago’s South Side, was the team’s medic and former Navy SEAL who was also very talented with a knife.

Bringing up the rear was T. J. Hawkins. The youngest member of the team, Hawkins was a former Army Ranger. The Georgia-born southerner’s easy manner and lilting drawl concealed a keen mind and viciously fast fighting abilities.

“All accounted for, Hal,” Price said finally.

“All right,” Brognola said. “Let’s get started.” Price took this as her cue and pressed a button on her laptop, bringing up a map of India.

“Bloody hell,” McCarter muttered.

“Just under forty-eight hours ago,” Brognola said, ignoring McCarter, “an armed raid was staged on a mining facility in the Meghalaya hills, north of Bangladesh, not far from the West Khasi Hills district headquarters, Nongstoin. The facility is jointly owned by UVC Limited and the Indian government.”

“UVC?” Schwarz asked, his head still cut off on screen.

“Uranium-Vanadium Consortium, Limited,” Brognola said.

“I thought India was relatively uranium-poor,” Manning put in.

“Not anymore,” Brognola said. “I don’t yet have all the details, nor are they necessarily relevant, but UVC is using a new sonic-based technology to find and exploit previously untapped reserves of ore, including uranium. The deal they cut with the Indian government apparently stems to long before the ore was actually found in Meghalaya. Their surveyors gambled and construction began on an experimental laser enrichment plant well in advance of the actual mining operation.”

“So just how large-scale is this?”

“Large enough to make India a much bigger player in the nuclear club,” Brognola said. “The Indian government has long maintained a high level of secrecy regarding its nuclear power and weapons programs, but we all know they have nuclear weapons and have had them since the 1970s. A steady source of uranium ore and a steady production of enriched fuel will simply advance their program or programs, and significantly.”

“So the issue is the standoff with Pakistan?” James asked.

“No,” Brognola said. “That would almost be preferable. The issue is that the UVC facility in Meghalaya was relieved of several insulated drums of enriched, weapons-grade fuel. That itself is enough to get us involved. But that’s just the beginning of the problem.”

Price tapped a key on her notebook again. The image of a dark-skinned man appeared, a mugshot from an international criminal database. It was juxtaposed with a second image—that of the same man, eyes closed in death, lying on a slab in a morgue.

“This is Nilambar Chakraborty,” Brognola said.

“It was, you mean,” McCarter muttered.

Brognola spared McCarter a baleful gaze through his camera before continuing. “Chakraborty is a known member of the Purba Banglar Sarbahara Party, a terrorist group operating in Bangladesh. They’ve broadened their territory lately, moving farther and farther north into India and surrounding areas. The PBSP is a vicious, well-financed, anti-capitalist revolutionary group whose ideological origins stem from sympathy for the Chinese Communist movement. Their ultimate aims are vague, but coherent enough. They seek to bring about worldwide socialism, starting with their part of the world, through force of arms.”

“These blokes have been around for years,” McCarter put in. “Starting with opposition to the new Bangladeshi state. And last I knew, they spent most of their time and energy splintering off from one another to form different opposed sub-groups.”

“That was true until perhaps two years ago,” Brognola nodded. “The PBSP has since experienced a surge in growth, tied to global resurgence of various Communist and socialist groups.”

“The political pendulum is swinging around the world,” Encizo said sourly. “As it does, as people foolishly throw in with totalitarian ideologies, the fortunes of terrorist and agitator groups like these go up.”

Price watched Encizo thoughtfully. As a native Cuban he was naturally sensitive to the evil that communist governments could wreak.

The door of the War Room opened. Akira Tokaido entered quietly, carrying what appeared to be a personal data device, and took a seat.

“But wait,” Blancanales said off-camera, imitating a game-show host, “there’s more.”

“Indeed there is,” Brognola said. “Akira?”

“This,” Tokaido said, holding up the electronic device, “was recovered by a security guard who survived the attack on the UVC plant. The device was given to executives at Sugar Rapids Security, who forwarded it through channels to the U.S. Government almost immediately. We got word of and intercepted it before it could disappear into a Washington warehouse somewhere, crated up next to the Ark of the Covenant.”

“Chakraborty was carrying that device,” Brognola explained.

“And this,” Schwarz chimed in, holding up a PDA-size device of his own, “is an identical unit, recovered from the now deceased director of the Illinois chapter of the World Workers United Party.”

McCarter looked from the screen to the device in Tokaido’s hands, then back. “Bloody hell,” he said again.

Tokaido removed the earbud headphones attached to his MP-3 player. Heavy metal noise could be heard through the speakers, even from across the table. The young Asian blushed slightly and switched off the player. He pointed at the device recovered in India.