SULAIMAN MOUNTAINS. SOUTHERN AFGHANISTAN.
The mountain wind brought tears to Stark’s eyes, and as he inhaled, the chill seemed to squeeze his chest. But the air wasn’t just cold. It smelled of burned wood.
MP5A1 at the ready, he stepped out of the cave at the bottom of the stairs and onto a bed of singed pine needles, noticing the nearly circular pattern around the exit.
Monica extinguished the torch before exiting what had been a long and winding series of descents, sections of steps between long inclines cut in the rock. Ryan followed as the three of them stared out into dark wilderness.
Stark peered through the night vision scope mounted on the MP5A1. Monica and Ryan already had their night vision monoculars out and were scanning the scenery.
To his right, the mountainside slanted into green darkness at a shallower angle than the hill to their left. The dim silver moonlight filtering through the canopy showed that the hill led to the same gorge they had seen on the southern face, which had been lined with river rocks after a thousand-foot drop. But it wasn’t until he stood here that Stark got an appreciation for the strategic value of this place high up in the mountains, secretly bridging the country’s northern plains with the southern section of the Sulaimans skirting Kandahar and Lashkar Gah. It was the ideal route to run guns and soldiers between the northern and southern war theaters.
And who knows how many other passages like this one exist in these mountains.
Stark believed in his core that such secret compounds, mountain passes, and the tunnels that connected them all were the primary reason why the Taliban could never stay defeated. NATO could pound the hell out of it for months—just as the Soviets had in the 1980s—driving them out of a region or a town, but a month later the rebels were back in force.
Monica tossed the smoldering rags from the end of Hagen’s knife before wiping it against her pants, walking to the edge of the burned forest floor.
Kneeling, she loosened pine needles with the tip of the knife.
“What are you thinking, Cruz?” Stark asked, while Ryan took a knee next to her.
She lowered the monocular and pointed the Boker knife at the trail of crushed pine needles in the direction of the abyss. “Some went this way.”
Peering through his scope, Stark made out what looked like a goat trail disappearing into the chasm, likely leading to switchbacks down to the riverbed.
“And some went that way.” Ryan stretched a gloved finger at the hillside to his right.
Stark stood between them, scanning the woods with the sight on the Heckler & Koch submachine gun.
No one in sight.
“Bastards are long gone,” Monica said, reading his mind. “But which group has the bomb?”
“Sierra Echo One, Six Six Zulu. SitRep.”
Stark heard the marine contingent through the earpiece connected to his MBITR, as did Ryan and Monica, who stood up.
“Six Six Zulu, Echo One at northern egress.”
“Six Six Zulu is two miles northeast of your position. Negative enemy contact.”
“Roger,” Stark replied.
The rest of his team, as well as the Russians, joined him ten minutes later, and everyone gathered around Kira as she activated her receiver, which came to life with a series of beeps.
She paused, removing her helmet and turning the GPS screen over so everyone could see it. The location of the hidden transmitter was overlaid on a color GPS map.
“It is picking up the signal again,” she said, zooming in on the map.
“Makes sense,” Stark said. “The cave must have blocked it.”
“Da,” Kira said. “And it is moving … that way, one and a half miles from us.” She pointed in the direction of the gentle grade, away from the gorge.
“That’s the same direction Wright and his platoon are coming from. Chief, relay those coordinates to Six Six Zulu right away. The insurgents are just a half mile from them. Keep updating them every minute until they make contact.”
While Larson got on the horn with Wright and his marines, Stark divided the team into pairs to head downhill. Leaning over to Kira he asked, “What did your boss have to say?”
She shook her head. “He was busy, so I left a message with Anton.”
“Anton?”
“His boy.”
“Son?”
“No, Janki mishka. His aide, but a boy just the same. No hair on his yaytsas.”
“His what?”
“His balls.”
Before Stark could reply, Kira headed out.