“The XO will have to give you the door code, sir,” Vasquez said as she punched into the numerical key pad on the side of the door. There was a loud beep and with great effort Vasquez slowly swung the door wide.
“Air pressure makes it real hard to open in the mornings,” she added as they stepped inside and the door swung shut on its own.
A tunnel painted pale green stretched ahead for more than a hundred feet. Vasquez led the way past wall lockers and turned right at the first set of double metal doors. A larger tunnel beckoned at a right angle to the first one. This tunnel was thirty feet across and the ceiling was curved, over twenty feet’ high at its peak. Desks were scattered about and the far end was walled off with glass, curtains hiding whatever was on the other side of the door in the center of the glass.
The home of the 4th TASOSC consisted of three main, parallel tunnels.
Boomer was currently in the first. It housed the TASOSC’s S-1 section (administrative and personnel), executive officer, and in the far end of the tunnel, separated from the others by the thick glass wall and curtains, the TASOSC commander. The middle tunnel held the TASOSC sergeant major, the communication’s console, and at the far end, again walled off with glass, the TASOSC conference room. The third and most distant tunnel contained the Operations (S-3) and Intelligence (S-2) staffs. All the tunnels were connected by two side tunnels — one along the base, leading in from the vault door, and the other in the center, splitting each tunnel in half.
Vasquez led the way to a desk strewn with various papers and folders.
“Sir, I got the major,” she announced.
A lieutenant colonel peered up above the stacks of paper.
He was small, with leathery skin stretched tight over his bones. A thin, gray crew cut gave him the indeterminate appearance of man somewhere between an old forty and a young sixty.
“George Falk,” he announced sticking his hand out, “but you can call me’ sir” a genuine smile indicating that he did not take the remark too seriously.
Boomer smiled in return.
“Boomer Watson, sir.”
“Glad to have you. Boomer. Grab a seat and I’ll get you tuned in to our operation.”
“See you around, sir,” Vasquez said, spinning on the heel of her spit-shined jump boots and heading off to a side tunnel.
“I see you’ve met our resident body-builder,” Falk said.
“What?” Boomer asked.
“Vasquez — she competes in body building contests,” Falk said.
Boomer twisted in his seat and watched the sergeant disappear with interest. That helped explain the way she handled his duffle bag.
Boomer settled down into the beat-up gray chair and returned his attention to Lieutenant Colonel Falk. Boomer watched as he rustled through a stack of papers.
“Damn, I had a copy of your orders here somewhere.
Got them faxed in from Bragg this morning.”
Boomer slipped a copy of his orders out of the file folder he was carrying.
“Here you go, sir.” They were fill-in-the blank orders, assigning him to the 4th TASOSC until further notice. Typical orders for Delta Force personnel who were often sent to strange locations to do strange jobs without much notice.
“Thanks,” Falk said, glancing at them.
“You’re going to be with us for a while?” he asked.
“I don’t know, sir.”
Falk pursed his lips.
“Hmm. I got a call from Jim Porster on the secure line yesterday afternoon. He asked me to take care of you. Jim and I go back a long ways.”
Boomer could tell Falk was fishing for information, but he figured he couldn’t tell the man anything more than Forster had.
“You’re going to have to get your hair cut,” Falk added.
“We’re not that high speed and we get quite a bit of rank coming through the tunnel. A lot of people around here get their nose out of joint about important things like haircuts and shined boots and all that,” Falk said, his own disdain for the regular Army clear.
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. Well, glad you’re here. We need the help. Forster told me to let you take it kind of easy, so I don’t want to overload you. What’s your area of expertise?” Falk looked at Boomer’s uniform, making the size-up all Army people did upon meeting, noting badges the way a dog would sniff another upon first meeting.
“My primary is Eighteen,” Boomer said.
“My secondary is Thirty-nine — Operations.”
Falk looked at Boomer with more interest.
“Who were you with before going behind the fence?” he asked, using the euphemism among those in the know for people who went into Delta Force.
The original Delta Compound at Bragg had been surrounded by a chain link fence with green strips of metal sown through it to provide some degree of protection from surveillance — thus the term that had developed for people going to work there. The new compound was bigger and had a correspondingly higher fence in a more remote area of the Fort Bragg reservation.
“I was originally branched Infantry then went S-F in’ eighty-four. I was with 10th Group at Fort Devens, team leader and Battalion S-3 for a while; then the Advanced Course then I went to 1st of the 10th at Bad Tolz in Germany, where I had another team before heading back to Bragg.”
“Good, good,” Falk said.
The door at the far end of the tunnel opened and a major exited. A squeaky voice calling for Colonel Falk echoed over the major’s shoulder.
“Excuse me,” Falk said as he quickly walked away and entered the office, shutting the door behind.
Boomer recognized the other major as a man he had gone through the Special Forces Qualification Course with, Frank Wilkerson. He looked none-too-happy at the moment.
“Frank, how’s it going?”
Wilkerson looked at’ Boomer long hair and glanced at his nametag. He tried in vain to crack a smile of greeting.
“Boomer Watson, long time no-see.”
The beret stuffed in Wilkerson’s pants cargo pocket had a yellow tab sewn behind the gold major’s leaf — another message that could be read by those in the fraternity.
“Where are you assigned in 1st Group?” Boomer asked.
“Fort Lewis or Okinawa?”
“Okie,” Wilkerson said shortly.
“Or perhaps it’s better to say I was.”
“What do you do?” Boomer asked.
Wilkerson’s jaw tightened.
“I was the commander of A Company, 1st Battalion.”
“You just changed command?” Boomer asked innocently.
“No, I was just relieved two days ago.”
Boomer had regretted his-question as soon as he had asked it.
Wilkerson’s entire demeanor and tone had suggested bad news. Relief from command was an instant career-killer — about the worst thing that could happen to an officer short of death in combat, and there were many that probably would prefer the latter — at least it was honorable.
Boomer was surprised: Wilkerson had been a squared-away and conscientious officer at the Q Course. To get relieved of command in peacetime usually required some gross violation of military regulations.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
Wilkerson jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the office he had just left.
“It’s bad enough I have to go back to Fort Lewis and get reamed out by the Group Commander when I get there, but this shithead has to have me come through here and stick his two cents in and he’s not even in the chain of command.”
“Who’s that?” Boomer asked.
“The CO here — Colonel Coulder. He’s a class-one prima donna. Thinks he’s actually in charge of something instead of simply being a beans and bullets guy.” Wilkerson slumped down in the chair Boomer had just vacated.