Drone Strike

“Getting spasms?” asked Dome.

“Yeah.”

“You oughta do yoga. Helps.”

“Really?”

“Shit, yeah. Every morning. Dread’s got some muscle relaxers if you need ’em,” he added. “Tell him.”

“Who’s Dread?”

“Petey Rusco.”

“How come he’s named Dread?”

Dome shrugged. “Not sure. Just is.”

“How come you’re Dome?”

“I used to shave my head. Plus my first name is Dom—Dominick Sorentino. Turk’s your real name?”

“Yup.”

“I thought all you Air Force guys had names like Macho and Quicksilver Hotshot and like that.”

Turk smiled. “Turk’s enough.”

“Yeah,” said Dome. “Call me anything. Just as long as it’s not asshole.”

CAMP WAS A SMALL FARM IN THE SIDE OF A HILL SOME twenty miles south of where they had landed. Two soldiers met them near the road and guided the driver as he backed into a ramshackle barn. Dome introduced Turk around, then got him some food.

The team consisted of seven men. All but one was a member of Delta Force, though they never identified themselves as such. It was obvious from their easy camaraderie that they’d trained and operated together for some time; Turk knew they’d been in Iran for several weeks.

The seventh man, Shahin Gorud, didn’t a

“You speak Russian?” asked Gorud warily when they were introduced.

“Yes,” said Turk. “A little. My mother was from Russia.”

Gorud said something quickly; it sounded like, Where did she come from?

“Moscow.”

“Say it in Russian.”

Turk did so, then added, in slightly hesitant Russian, that he didn’t remember much of the language.

“You’ll do. You know more than the Iranians. Just keep your mouth shut unless I say to talk.”

“How did you know I spoke Russian?”

Gorud smirked.

Green was the father figure of the team, and while not technically the highest in rank, was the de facto leader, the first one the others would look to for direction. The officer in charge, Captain Thomas Granderson, was surprisingly young, just a year or two older than Turk. He spoke Farsi and Arabic fluently, though a notch less smoothly than Gorud and Grease. Dread—Petey Rusco—was one of two advanced combat medics on the team. The other was Tiny—Sergeant Chris Diya—who in time-honored style was the exact opposite of “tiny” at six-eight, even taller than Grease. While in a pinch all of the men were capable of doubling as medics, Dread and Tiny could have done duty as doctors in any emergency room on the planet.

Red—the truck driver, whose hair (now dyed black) gave him the nickname—was a sergeant from Macon, Georgia, and sounded like it, too, at least when he spoke English rather than Farsi. The last member of the team, Staff Sergeant Varg Dharr, was a pudgy soldier who did much of the cooking, and was responsible for the spiced goat that Turk devoured after arriving. All of the men looked at least vaguely Iranian, and all but two had Middle Eastern roots on at least one side of their family.

After he’d eaten, Turk got rid of his jumpsuit, then checked his personal gear. There wasn’t much: aside from a change of underwear and socks, he had an off-the-shelf GPS unit, water, and first aid essentials. Most important was a satcom unit that looked like a standard Iridium satellite phone but was programmed with a more advanced encryption set. He shouldn’t need much more: the reason he was here was the larger rucksack he kept close at hand, which contained the control unit, its ante

Turk took out the control unit and ran it through its diagnostics, making sure it hadn’t suffered during the trip. The controls consisted of three pieces—a nineteen-inch flat screen, a sending unit, and a panel that held the actual flight controls. This looked like a miniature version of a Flighthawk, with a few extra joysticks attached to either side. A standard keyboard sat in the middle; at the top was a double row of function keys, whose purpose changed depending on the situation and the program. Two touch pads sat at the bottom; these were similar to the touch pads on a standard laptop. Dedicated keys on the right controlled the general flight patterns and swarm commands; three extender keys on the left changed the function of each. The joysticks were flightsticks or throttles, as designated by the user. In theory, up to eight nano-UAVs could be directly guided at any one time, though it was impractical to override the computer for more than a few moments if you were flying more than two.

Even one was difficult to work at all but the slowest speeds. If he had to take over, Turk knew he would designate the course and allow the computer to fly the plane along it. Assuming, of course, there was time.

Granderson and Gorud squatted down on the floor next to him as he finished his tests.

“You’re ready?” asked Gorud.

“Yes.”

“They want us to go into action tomorrow night,” said Granderson. “There are two windows, one starting at eleven, the other at three. I’d like the eleven. Gives us a lot more room to maneuver. But the schedule will be tighter getting to the airport where we’ll meet your ride. We’ll have to travel while it’s still daylight. Just for an hour or so, but still.”

“It’s not a problem,” replied Turk. “Not for me.”

“Good.”

The “windows” were times when an X-37B delivery vehicle would be in the vicinity overhead and in range to launch the nano-UAVs. The X-37B was an unma

“So where’s my helicopter?” he asked.

“We’re meeting it in Birjand,” said Gorud. He took a piece of paper from his pocket, unfolding it stiffly. The paper was thick and stiff, treated with a waxy substance that would make it burn quickly. The map printed on it was a hybrid of a satellite image and a more traditional road map.

“Why?” asked Turk.

Gorud gave him a look that told Turk he was not used to being questioned. Turk had seen that look before, from Nuri Abaajmed Lupo, the lead CIA officer on the Whiplash team. It must be common to all CIA employees, he thought, implanted when they got their IDs.

“Because it’s convenient,” said Gorud. “The security there is also nonexistent. It’s close enough to where we have to go that we won’t stretch fuel reserves. And it’s the way I drew it up. Enough reasons for you?”

“Do they teach that look in the Agency?” retorted Turk.

“What?”

“I asked a simple question. You don’t have to get all shitty about it.”

Grease clamped his hand on Turk’s shoulder, attempting to calm him. Turk brushed it away.

“It’s already arranged,” said Granderson quietly. “The helicopter’s going to be waiting.”

“What is it?” asked Turk.

“A Russian Mi-8. It’s leased to a Russian company. It will fit with your cover story, if that’s ever needed.”

“How far is it from Birjand to the target?” He looked at the map. Turk wasn’t a helicopter pilot, and far from an expert on Russian helicopters like the Mi-8, an old workhorse that came in dozens of variations. But he knew helicopters in general, and he knew that the distance between Birjand and the target area would test the chopper’s range.