Splinter Cell (2004)

Once I'm out of the compound, I breathe a little easier but I keep moving. I climb the hill overlooking the site, the one I had used early this morning, and figure this is as good a place to watch the main attraction as any.

I press the implant in my throat. "Colonel?"

"Sam? My God, where have you been?"

"Uh, a little tied up. But I'm out now. I can see the planes."

"Thank goodness. You had me worried. Get to the Famagusta docks. Captain Martin will meet you there in his patrol boat and take you back to Dhekelia. We have transportation to Israel all lined up for you."

"Thanks, Colonel. Any news on Sarah?"

"Not yet, Sam. But get going."

I sign off but linger a few moments to watch. I recognize two F/A-18E Super Hornets leading the formation--leave it to the U.S. to do so--followed by two British Sea Harrier F/A Mk 2s. It takes me a moment to identify the other two planes and then realize they're F-16s from the Turkish air force! I'm happy to see the Turks getting involved, which must have been a major diplomatic coup for Lambert.

The Super Hornets let loose a couple of Maverick ASMs, which score direct hits on the supergun. The explosions are immense, and I feel the heat wave all the way up here. The Harriers drop an array of bombs I don't recognize, but they produce magnificent blasts all over the complex. The Turks follow with another spread of bombs, but the smoke is way too thick for me to see what they are.

By now the entire shopping mall is engulfed in smoke and fire. The only thing I can see is the supergun's barrel poking out of the dark cloud. The six fighters circle around, bank, and head for the complex for another round of strikes.

Suddenly there's a huge boomand the entire earth around me shakes. It's like a sonic blast only it's right in front of me. My first thought is that I'm in the middle of a ten-point Richter-scale earthquake, but my second thought is even worse.

They've managed to fire the Babylon Phoenix!

I find I'm lying on my back, a bit stu

The supergun's payload is shooting up into the sky, soaring high above the fighters at a tremendous speed. My God, I think, it's all over. The bad guys win after all. But then I see the two Super Hornets veer off their courses and head up and in pursuit of the MOAB. I'm able to think to reach into my Osprey, grab my portable binoculars, and watch the drama unfold in the blue sky.

The MOAB is over the sea now, disappearing from view, and the two American fighters become tiny dots following it. Then I see two air-to-air missiles--no, fourAAMs--leave the fighters. They're probably AIM-120 AMRAAM Slammers, supersonic fire-and-forget missiles.

Holy shit! The sky over the sea bursts into a bright orange-and-red fireball, one that certainly engulfs the two fighters. I'm aware that I'm not breathing for a moment as I watch the flaming horror fall in slow motion to the Mediterranean. All I can think of is what heroes those men in the fighters are. They sacrificed themselves to take out the MOAB and succeeded against tremendous odds.

I get to my feet and watch the debris hit the water.

"Sam? What's happened? Talk to me!" Lambert calls.

I press the implant. "We lost our two fighters, but the guys are heroes. They shot the MOAB right out of the sky. It fell into the sea."

"Christ. What about Tarighian's complex?"

I turned back to look at the inferno below me. The remaining fighters had apparently suspended their attacks after the supergun fired. Now they swing back around and continue to bomb the shopping mall to smithereens. In fact, the supergun's barrel is no longer in view. It must have collapsed while my back was turned.

"You don't have to worry about it, Colonel," I say. "All gone."

I can see Lambert rubbing the top of his head and sighing with relief. The rest of the Third Echelon team is most likely pulling out the champagne.

"How did you get the Turks to cooperate?" I ask.

"Carly created a slideshow file that presented all the photos you took, backed with all the written evidence, and we sent it to the Turkish government. Needless to say, she did a convincing job."

"Of course she did."

"What about you? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Colonel. But now I have to get to the docks and catch a ride to save my daughter."

"Go for it, Sam."

39

I arrive in Tel Aviv that afternoon and have another twenty-four hours to acknowledge to Sarah's captors that I'm in Israel. Before making the call, though, I have a conversation with Captain Abraham Weiss of the Israel Security Forces in the back of an unmarked black Lexus. Captain Weiss met me at Ben-Gurion Airport, where I was whisked away as a government VIP without the rigmarole of Israel's tight security and Immigration checks.

"I've been in contact with your people," Weiss says as the car rolls out of the airport. "And we've been working around the clock to locate your daughter. I'm happy to say we know where she is. At least we think we do."

My heart nearly leaps out of my chest, for I was really sweating it out in the short plane ride from Cyprus. "Where?" I ask.

"We're nearly one hundred percent certain she's in an abandoned warehouse very near the small airport north of Jerusalem." Weiss speaks confident English with a heavy Israeli accent. I have a good feeling about him and did so from the moment we met. I have great respect for the Israelis' security perso

"We got lucky when we raided the Russian-Israeli Bank this morning," he continues. "At first it seemed as if the bank was completely legitimate and we'd hit a dead end until we began to examine real estate transactions. Most of them were perfectly reasonable, but then one of our analysts questioned the validity of a couple of buildings because of where they are located. One is this warehouse. The Russian-Israeli Bank owns it. However, our analyst happens to have performed some work in another building not far from this location, and he remembered that it's on a street full of derelict buildings. They're all due for demolition sometime next year. We made a leap of faith and posted a hidden surveillance team outside the warehouse. Within an hour Eli Horowitz was seen leaving the building. He returned almost an hour later. The surveillance team is certain there are others in the building with him, but it's not clear how many."

"I don't care how many assholes are in there," I say. "I'm going to wipe them clean."

Captain Weiss shrugged, not getting the poor attempt at humor. "I've been told by my superiors that this is really the U.S.'s show, although we'll be supplying you with a backup team. In other words, you're in charge. We'd like to arrest the men responsible for your daughter's kidnapping and for the murder of Rivka Cohen, but should an accident befall any of them, there would be no questions asked by our government."

That's his way of saying I'm free to do whatever the hell I want with the kidnappers. I probably have Lambert to thank for that.

"I want to go in tonight. Alone," I say.

"I assumed you would say that," Weiss says. "Let's meet your backup team first."

After a forty-minute drive we reach the northern outskirts of Jerusalem and stop at a staging point in front of an auto parts factory. We're in an industrial area, and the captain says the warehouse is two miles away. A team of ten Shin Bet Special Ops soldiers are here, equipped and ready to go. Shin Bet, or Shabak, is a branch of the ISF responsible for internal security. They spend a lot of time protecting government officials, preventing violent insurrection, gathering intelligence, pinpointing terrorist cells and dealing with them. Shin Bet's activities are always classified. Their job is a lot like mine, so I feel as if I'm with family.