“You boys gonna stand there lollygagging all night or you gonna take these here peckerwoods off my hands,” rEBEL, their driver said, turning on his thick Cajun accent. He was one of the smartest and sexiest operators she had. “They’re stinking my truck up to high heaven.”
“Hold your horses, farm boy. Six prisoners tonight, huh?” a lanky blond man said, an AK-102 at his side. His moustache was so ratty that it made Camille feel pretty good about hers, at least until he lowered his head and started studying her face more closely.
REBEL tried to distract him away from Camille. “So you boys ever get to watch girls going after one another like in all of them prison movies? I bet it’s nonstop lezzie action in there.”
The young guy looked over at him and laughed. “Yeah, that’s all we do all night in there, watch chicks getting it on with other chicks. It’s a rough job, but somebody’s got to do it.” He pulled out a scuffed, off-the-shelf Motorola walkie-talkie. “Open up, Milford. I want back in before the girls hit the showers.”
The steel door buzzed open and the guards shoved Camille, GENGHIS and the other four operators inside. She was sweating from the plastic-wrapped C-4 taped to her belly to help conceal her breasts. A USP Tactical pistol was stashed in an ankle holster under her dishdashah. They all had weapons and night vision equipment stashed under their Arab dresses. The insider was supposed to ensure that the walk-through metal detector was broken. In case he didn’t come through, she was ready to draw at the first sign of problems.
The lock clanked shut behind her and it echoed in her head. Then it was drowned out by radio chatter from their driver. “TIN MAN this is RUBY SLIPPER. SCARECROW has entered the WITCH’S TOWER.”
“Copy that,” Iggy’s smooth voice said over the earpiece.
“TIN MAN, RUBY SLIPPER again. The MUNCHKINS have returned and report everything in place for POPPY FIELDS,” the driver’s voice said over the radio. The advance team was now safely back inside the SUV and the explosive charges were set.
The Rubicon jailers stopped the prisoners outside a set of bars through which Camille could see the main cell block. The cells were stacked two high and they were packed with Iraqi men. Two guards pointed AK-102s at them while the big jailor’s walkie-talkie squealed. She didn’t know which one was their insider. She didn’t want to.
“Bobby,” the voice said over the walkie-talkie. “The john’s flooding us out again. Get up here now!”
“Do it yourself.” The obese guard talked out of the side of his mouth as he spoke into the radio. “I’ve got some prisoners to strip search.”
“No way. Get your fat ass up here. Someone else can do it or throw them in the intake for a few minutes and come on up. The water’s almost to the fridge.” The voice crackled. “Oh, gross. There’s something floating. I’m climbing on the desk.”
“Coming.” The big guard turned to the other two. “You guys want to do me a favor and check their asses for me?”
“No way. You’re the fudge packer,” the lanky kid said. The other shook his head. “You heard Milford, we can lock them up in intake and hold them there until you’re back.”
“Man, I have to do everything around here. Hurry up. Rack the A-sliders.” He knocked his fist against the sliding barred door and the young jailor shoved an oversized prism-shaped key into the lock and opened it.
Camille felt sorry for Bobby. She recognized his type from school-the fat kid who would do anything to be liked, but whom everyone picked on. She knew in her gut that Bobby was their insider. She hoped to god he managed to hustle to the prison office to fix the overflow before POPPY FIELDS went down. Even though she had complete faith that Iggy knew what he was doing, she still didn’t want to kill their informant.
Since taking the prison over from Saddam, Rubicon had done nothing to renovate it-or clean it. Camille felt the grimy walls closing in on her as she shuffled through the bars. The place reeked from nearly fifty years of sweat, feces and urine. She looked for the nearest security cameras, but there were none. Rubicon was cheap and smart enough not to tape whatever their guards did there. The bars slammed shut with a metallic thud which she could barely hear over the thousands of prisoners catcalling to the new guys-to them. She stood at the end of Broadway, the main thoroughfare between the stacks of cells. It was the middle of the night, but the fluorescent lights glowed brightly and everyone seemed to be up. Scores of men pressed against the bars of each cell, watching and smoking. Over one hundred prisoners were squeezed into each cell. Saddam himself couldn’t have packed them in much tighter.
Iggy’s voice came over her earpiece. “TIN MAN to all units. Standby for POPPY FIELDS in ten seconds.” The order POPPY FIELDS couldn’t come fast enough for Camille. Her heart was racing and she was drenched with sweat. Captivity did not become her. She calmed herself with the knowledge that in a few seconds, she would be freeing herself from the plastic cuffs and getting down to work before the guards understood it wasn’t an ordinary blackout. She only wished that Bobby would hurry it up and get the hell away from them before it was too late for him. But for some reason he seemed to be waiting until they were secured.
The young guard shoved a key in the holding cell lock, but couldn’t get it to turn. Camille and the other five operators stood at the end of Broadway with their hands and feet in plastic ties, waiting on the young kid to find the right key to the temporary holding cell. Camille could see the floor inside. It was black from blood and grime.
“TIN MAN to all units.” Camille knew what was coming and she took a deep breath to focus herself and shut out the roar of the prisoners. Iggy continued, “Standby for POPPY FIELDS in five, four…”
The guards’ walkie-talkies squealed. “Bobby, haul ass, man. I’m in turd soup up here.”
Iggy’s voice continued, “Two, one-stand by. All units hold position and stand by.”
What the hell?
The operators volleyed glances at one another as they tried to make sense of the disruption.
Radio silence.
Dammit, Bobby, get the fuck out of here.
The guard fumbled with the dozens of keys on his extendable key ring attached to his belt, but didn’t seem to be able to find the right one. Bobby shoved him aside.
“You’re going to have to learn how to do these things yourself. You know Big Bobby’s not always going to be here.”
Iggy was taking forever, then Camille heard someone key a mike and she steeled herself. “TIN MAN to all units. LIONS, TIGERS AND BEARS. Repeat to all units: LIONS, TIGERS AND BEARS.”
Abort.
Part Three: Secret Wars
The C.I.A. is awash in money as a result of post-9/11 budget increases. But because of the general uncertainty over the future, it faces a long delay before it can recruit, train and develop a new generation of spies and analysts. So for now it is building up its staff by turning to the “intelligence-industrial complex.”
– The New York Times, June 13, 2005,
op-ed contribution by James Bamford
[T]he contracting boom continuing unchecked…means, says [John] Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, that America’s spy network could soon resemble NASA’s mission control room in Houston. “Most people, when they see that room, think they’re looking at a bunch of NASA people,” Pike notes. “But it’s 90 percent contractors.”
– Mother Jones, January/February 2005,
as reported by Tim Shorrock
Chapter Sixty
Camp Tsunami, Abu Ghraib Prison
“LIONS, TIGERS AND BEARS.” Iggy’s abort command echoed inside Camille’s head. She doubled over and let out a loud moan to distract the guards, hating herself for what she was about to do. All that mattered now was getting her team out alive. She twisted her wrists and spread her ankles apart. The zip cuffs broke away. She reached for her USP Tactical, slapped the trigger twice and fired two rounds into the middle of Bobby’s forehead at the same moment GENGHIS did the same. Blood splattered onto the stained walls, the freshest strokes on the Abu Ghraib mural.