Chapter Twenty-three
"How long until the first one touches down?" McKenzie asked.
"The Israeli one is from a sub in the Med. Tel Aviv will be a parking lot in twenty minutes."
"Good," McKenzie growled. He'd been paid a lot of money by several Arab leaders to launch that missile, money that had funded this entire operation and paid for the Canadians up front, but McKenzie would have launched that missile at the Israeli capital for free.
"When do our friends in the Pentagon get fried?'' he asked.
"Twenty-four minutes."
Bedlam broke out in the War Room as the launches were noted.
"Sir, we've got two launches. Two missiles up!"
"Put it on the screen," General Lowcraft ordered.
In the front of the War Room, two red lines in addition to the red dot showing the missile headed for the Omega Missile LCC appeared. The lines began moving toward their targets.
"Give me the targets," Lowcraft demanded, although it was apparent where they were headed.
"Tel Aviv." The officer paused, as if that wasn't bad enough.
"And?"
"And right here. First missile will touch down on Tel Aviv in nineteen minutes! We get hit in twenty- three!"
"Goddamnit!" Hill exclaimed. "I thought our people were in the LCC!"
"Major Parker and Captain Thorpe said—" Lowcraft began, but Hill silenced him.
"They're in on it," Hill exclaimed. "They're all in on it. You get that strike down on their heads right away. We are going to end this!"
The Nebraska launch was picked up by a U.S. Air Force J-STARR surveillance aircraft flying routine patrol over the Red Sea. The J-STARR was hooked in to the multinational peacekeeping force in the Sinai. As part of that agreement it was also linked to the Israeli Self-Defense Force headquarters.
Thus the first alert that the Israelis received that there was a U.S. nuclear missile inbound came from a U.S. plane.
Thorpe was leaning out the side of the Blackhawk, watching the river surface flashing by less than fifteen feet below. The pilots flew under a set of high-tension wires, narrowly missing them. He figured that McKenzie had a large lead on them, but the chopper was faster than any boat he might have.
The clock in the front of the room was down to sixteen minutes, but the missile heading her way wasn't the highest priority in Parker's mind. She rapidly typed a question for the computer:
How long until first missile strike?
Computer:
Eighteen minutes; Target Tel Aviv
Parker ran her fingers through her hair and then pounded her fists on the console.
"Damn you, Kilten! You didn't want it to turn out like this. You must have had a way into the computer."
Her mind went back to the conference room in Cheyenne Mountain and the mission into Israel that had preceded it.
Parker typed into the computer:
Sanchez
The computer screen dissolved, then two new words appeared:
password accepted
Inside the War Room the countdown was being called out as all eyes followed the red lines on the screen. "Sixteen minutes to touchdown Tel Aviv!"
One red line was over the eastern Mediterranean, approaching the shore of Israel. The other was in the Atlantic, heading toward Washington.
"How long do we have here?" Hill asked.
"Twenty minutes."
"And the LCC?"
"Four minutes until the B-2 strike."
The Israelis reacted promptly. The president happened to be in a meeting with his Self-Defense Force commander when an aide came sprinting in with the word of the inbound Trident missile.
The president sat stunned for a second, then turned to the SDF commander, General Ariel. "Implement the Samson option."
"Why would the Americans—" General Ariel began, but the president waved a hand to silence him.
"It does not matter why. Do as I order. We do not have time to discuss this. We must act."
Ariel pulled his secure cellular phone out.
Parker was reading the computer language, trying to sort through the hidden program. "OK, OK. I see what you did."
She began typing rapidly, trying to wrest control back from Kilten's laptop.
Hill was recovering from the shock of the missile launches. He stared at the screen and then it really came home to him. Tel Aviv.
"Oh my God," he exclaimed as he desperately dialed numbers into the red phone.
"What's wrong?" Lowcraft asked. "The Samson Option," Hill muttered as he pressed the phone to his ear. "The what?" Lowcraft asked.
Chapter Twenty-four
In Washington, the man who waited heard the tone screech and a red light flashed in the basement. He blinked, not believing after almost two years that the unthinkable had happened. He jumped off his cot and ran to the computer that was hooked to the satellite radio.
The decryption coding inside the computer was working on the incoming message. It didn't take long. The message was only two words:
activate immediately
The man, whose name was Isaac, turned to the metal casket that rested in the center of the floor. His fingers were shaking as he flipped up the lid, but his hands settled down as he ran through the routine he had memorized and practiced every day. His mind was detached. Two years of waiting and contemplating the possibility of doing exactly what he was doing now had formed a schism in Isaac's consciousness.
Two blocks away, in the abandoned firehouse, one of the men picked up a cellular phone. He listened to Hill's voice on the other end.
"Prairie Fire alert and execution!" he yelled and the men were grabbing weapons and running for the back ramp of the Abrams Fighting Vehicle.
Isaac knew about the men in the firehouse just as they knew about him. It was all a question of timing.
The Abrams smashed into the old wooden doors and splintered them apart. It roared down the street, shocking the few drivers passing by. A cabbie made the mistake of screeching to a halt in front of the Abrams. The treads rolled up on the taxi and crushed it as the driver desperately rolled out his door and away from the treads. The Abrams continued on its way.
Isaac had a row of green lights glowing on the control panel. He turned back to the computer screen. One by one numbers appeared.
The Abrams roared up to the front of the red house. Forty-mm rounds spewed out of the turret, blowing the front of the house to pieces. The drug dealers next door, thinking they were under attack by the police, opened fire with automatic weapons, the bullets bouncing off the armor harmlessly. The Abrams crunched up through the front of the house.
Isaac could hear the tank above his head. Six numbers glowed on the screen. He began entering them into the numeric keyboard in front of him.
The back ramp of the Abrams dropped and two men carrying a specially designed charge ran off. They slapped it onto the metal plate covering the stairs, then ducked for cover.
The charge blew a four-foot-wide hole in the metal.
The blast knocked Isaac down, but he quickly regained his place. He had one more number to enter. His finger poised above the final key, Isaac paused.
Black-suited figures dropped through the hole, firing, spraying the room with bullets. Isaac's body was slammed up against the bomb casing, then slid down to the floor.