He waited a few seconds and then repeated. "Any station this net, this is Echo Oscar Five. Over."
"Echo Oscar Five, this is Hammer Base. Am I correct in your call sign? Are you the comm duty officer in Bogota? Where's Lantern? Over."
"Roger on my call sign. This is the duty officer. If by Lantern you mean Stevens, he left here about two hours ago. That's why I'm coming up on this net. It's been left unmonitored for that time period. Over."
Westland looked across the room at Pike. He had heard the last broadcast and the surprised look on his face echoed what Westland was feeling. "Where is Stevens? Over."
"I don't know. He received a phone call just before he left. Said he would be back in a little while. That was almost two hours ago. Over."
Westland keyed the mike. "Wait one. Over." She turned to Pike. "What do we do now?"
The general rubbed his hand over his chin. "I don't know. We can abort, but I'd hate to do that right now. They're already on their way in and have left the helicopter by now." A thought seemed to strike him. "Shit! We can't even contact them now anyway. They're in the water and won't come up on the SATCOM until they cross the beach and radio in their initial entry report."
Westland nodded. "Let's see if we can track down Stevens before then." She turned to the radio. "Echo Oscar Five, this is Hammer Base. Get Jameson. I want him on this net in five mikes. Over."
"Roger that. Jameson in five mikes. Over."
Pike grabbed his STU-III classified phone. "I'm going to get the gunship in the air now," he said as he dialed Panama.
Holding his rucksack, Riley fell backward off the side of the low-lying boat. Once in the water, he let go of the ruck and allowed it to float behind him on a six-foot line. Five of the members of Eyes Three gathered in the water and hooked together using a safety line and snap links. Powers was still on board. He turned all the valves in the boat to open, allowing air to pass between the five chambers. He then opened up a one-way bleed valve. Air rushed out of the boat as Powers slid overboard and joined the rest of the team.
The boat settled lower and lower in the water; finally the engine pulled it under and it sank. The only thing that remained where the boat had been was a small black float. It was attached to the Zodiac with a length of line and marked the boat's grave on the bottom, fifteen feet below the surface.
The safety line tied around Riley's waist tugged gently as the rest of the team floated behind him. Riley turned back seaward and tapped the man next to him, gesturing toward the shore. Holder nodded and, with Lane, unhooked from the safety line and started finning toward the shore, two hundred meters away.
Riley lost sight of the two men when they were only ten meters away. With just their masked heads above the surface of the water, the swimmers were virtually invisible. Riley patiently finned in place, using the silhouettes of the mountains behind the beach to judge his relative position. The run in had gone faster than expected. After the two-man security team had reconnoitered the landing site, they could move in.
Finally, after ten minutes, Riley spotted the brief flash of a green chem light coming from the wood line across from the beach. All clear. He tugged on the safety line and the remaining four members of Eyes Three started finning in toward the light.
Fifty meters from shore Riley turned over and started swimming slowly on his stomach, careful not to allow his fins to break the surface. Despite the security team's safe signal he was still cautious. When he felt the sand of the bottom come up he allowed the waves to slide him as far forward as they could onto the beach. The other three members beached themselves to his right. Riley slid back into the water and removed the fins from the man to his right, slipping the back loops over his wrist. He crawled forward and let that man do the same for him. Then Riley put his ruck on his back.
Carefully, Riley slid the hood down from around his head and listened to the night air. Nothing but the sounds of surf and the night creatures in the wood line ahead. Three hundred meters off to his left, he could see the small wooden dock that was the reference point. They had landed in the proper spot.
Riley received a nudge from the right telling him all were ready. With a careful glance each way down the beach, he stood up quickly and sprinted across the sand toward the wood line. The rest of the team followed. He broke into the trees and was immediately grabbed by Lane, one of the two security men who had swum in earlier. "We're clear to fifty meters. No sign of anything."
Riley nodded and quickly stuffed the fins into his backpack. He removed the night-vision goggles and his MP5 submachine gun from their waterproof wrappings, strapped on a shoulder holster, and replaced the .45 Colt automatic he had been carrying in his hand. He waited patiently as each man prepared his weapon. Powers was still carrying his trademark AK-47. Lane bolted together the massive Haskins .50-caliber sniper rifle. While they were doing this, the two security men had gone back out on the beach and obscured the trail across the sand.
All was ready. Riley checked the glowing dial of his watch: 2223. Another hour to target.
"I've got marines in civvies checking all the local places where Stevens could be. We're getting nothing out of the bartender from the Embassy Cafe where the girl Stevens was with works. He's saying nothing and we really can't put too much heat on him considering we're in his country. Over."
Westland stared at the radio in frustration. Jameson's words only reinforced the growing bad feeling she had in her stomach. "Where do you think Stevens is then? Over."
Westland could almost see Jameson shrug as the reply came back. "He probably went out to catch a quick snort and maybe a quick piece of ass, if you'll pardon the expression. Never should have had a goddamn alcoholic on this mission in the first place. Over."
Westland shook her head. She looked at Pike, who angrily gestured at the radio. "Tell them to find him."
She keyed the mike again. "Keep looking. We need to find him. You stay on this net and monitor for him. Out." She turned to Pike. "What do you suggest, General?"
Pike sighed. "I don't like it. We all knew Stevens had problems but I didn't think he'd do something like this. We abort. If it's nothing, we can try again later, but if it isn't, they're in big trouble."
Westland was relieved to find that Pike was thinking the same way she was. "I agree. As soon as we get their initial entry report, we'll tell them to abort."
Riley slowly edged forward through the dense vegetation, moving one stealthy step at a time toward the target, which should be just over the next piece of slightly higher ground. Since leaving the beach, their route had taken them through swampland interspersed with small areas of higher dry ground.
They moved another two hundred meters inland. Powers, acting as the point man, signaled a halt, and Riley crept forward to the team sergeant. In the glow of arc lights he could see their target. "Shit!" he muttered.
Activity and lots of it. Riley scanned the compound and felt worse the more he saw. At least thirty personnel were up and moving around. They were off-loading weapons from trucks and on-loading cocaine. Riley didn't need to be clairvoyant to realize what this meant.
"Keep an eye on it," he whispered to Powers as he slid back to where the rest of the team waited.
He crawled next to Marzan, who had just set out the SATCOM satellite minidisk antenna. "You set?" he whispered. Marzan nodded. Riley turned down the volume on the radio to minimum and picked up the handset.