Ice War (9 page)

“How the hell should I know?” Price snapped.

“You’re the LT,” Wall said. “You’re supposed to have a plan.”

“What’s your problem, Wall?” The Tsar asked. “Can’t take the pressure?”

“Pressure I can handle, bro,” Wall said. “Incompetence, not so much.”

“Be careful,” Bernard said. “Or it may not be the Pukes that you have to worry about.”

“And I’m not your ‘bro’,” The Tsar said.

“Damn right you’re not,” Wall said. “Not even close.”

“Your brother was on Operation Magnum, wasn’t he?” Price asked softly.

“He was,” Wall said. “And he didn’t come home, thanks to that all-American hero, Ryan Chisnall.”

“Be very careful what you say,” The Tsar said. “Ryan was our friend.”

“What are you going to do?” Wall asked. “Come over here and beat me up? Have you noticed that you’re chained up like a dog?”

“Your brother’s death had nothing to do with Chisnall,” Barnard said.

“Right. I’ve heard that one before,” Wall said. “Chisnall did what he had to do.”

“No, I mean your brother …” Barnard began.

“Leave it, Barnard,” Price said. “Wall, Chisnall made some hard decisions on that mission. One day you might have to make some hard decisions of your own. You’ll find out it’s not easy.”

“I’ll be certain to make the right ones,” Wall said.

“Jeez, Price,” The Tsar said. “I don’t care about his brother. When we get out of here, I’m going to smack him one.”

“If we get out of here,” Wall said.

“Easy, everyone,” Price said. “Wall, you lost someone you loved. Do you think you’re the only one rowing that boat?”

Wall stared at her. Price lowered her eyes so he wouldn’t see the tears that were starting to form.

It was her fault. She had ordered Emile into something rash. Monster knew that. He could have, he should have, done nothing. But Monster would never leave a person in need. So her decision had sent them both to their deaths.

“Let’s concentrate on fighting the Pukes, not each other,” she said, in a barely controlled voice.

“Can’t fight them with our arms stuck around our necks,” Wall said.

“That’s my point,” Price said. “But we’re going to have to escape before the transport arrives to take us away. Otherwise it’s next stop some PGZ prison cell, and there’s no going home from that.”

[MISSION DAY 1, FEBRUARY 16, 2033. 1810 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

[OFFICE FC7001, THIRD LEVEL, WEST QUARTER, THE PENTAGON, VIRGINIA]

The time for the scheduled radio call had come and gone. Even if the Angels had been delayed in reaching the next checkpoint, they should have checked in by now.

Bilal had arrived in time for the call. He had shut the door behind him and the room felt like a tomb. He sat with Wilton in front of the silent screen.

Wilton was aware of his hands starting to shake, and he clenched them so Bilal wouldn’t notice.

“Perhaps they have broken their radio,” Wilton said. Soundproofing on all the walls sucked up his voice, giving his words a flat, dead sound.

“Perhaps,” Bilal said. “I believe we currently have satellite coverage of the area. Does that show anything?”

Wilton hooked into the satellite feed and examined the area the Angels had last reported in from. There was nothing visible. Many eyes would be watching this feed, he knew, and no one was reporting anything.
So where were the Angels?

“Tell me about your friends,” Bilal said.

“Tell you what, sir?” Wilton said.

“The team leader, Price, what is she like?”

“Tough as.” Wilton laughed, although the humour quickly faded as he thought again about the missed check-in. “I mean I think she had a tough childhood. Got beat up a bit. Made her hard.”

“So tell me something I can’t read in her personnel file,” Bilal asked.

“Like what?”

“Anything,” Bilal said. “I want to get to know these kids.”

“Confidentially?”

“Of course.”

“She’s going out … in a relationship with Monster.”

“Sergeant Panyoczki?”

“She thinks no one knows, but it’s pretty obvious,” Wilton said.

“Does it affect her work? Her decision making?”

“I doubt it, but I haven’t been on a mission with her since Magnum, so I can’t really say.”

“What about Panyoczki?” Bilal asked. “What’s he like?”

“Um …”

“Be honest,” Bilal said.

“Well, he’s this big, funny, crude dude. Loves life. Nothing fazes him. You feel it’d take a nuclear bomb to kill him. But …”

“But?”

“He went a bit loopy after Uluru. All touchy-feely, spouting about the universe and all sorts of New Age crap. I don’t really understand him any more.”

“What about Barnard?” Bilal asked.

“She scares the hell out of me.” Wilton laughed.

“Because?”

“She doesn’t think much of people who aren’t as smart as she is,” Wilton said. “And that’s basically everyone. I’m always afraid I’m going to say the wrong thing around her and she’s going to give me that look.” He stopped and stared at his hands.

“What look?” Bilal asked.

“This look,” Wilton said, and showed him.

“I think I know what you mean. How about Nikolaevna?”

“Who?”

“Dmitri Nikolaevna.”

“Oh, The Tsar,” Wilton said. “He’s fun to be around. I like him a lot. I didn’t always though.”

“Why not?” Bilal said.

Wilton had to think for a long time about that.

“I guess when he first came into our team he was kinda up himself. He’d been on some important mission in Japan and he was supposed to be a real hero.”

“Did you think he was a hero?” Bilal asked.

“Not really,” Wilton said. “He seemed to love himself a little too much. I thought Price was a hero for what she did at Uluru, and Chisnall was, well, Chisnall. But he came good, The Tsar. He fitted in all right.”

“Emile?” Bilal asked.

“Don’t really know him,” Wilton said. “He came on the team after I left. I mean I saw him at Fort Carson, but I didn’t get to spend much time with him.”

“So no reason to think that any of them might be playing for the other team?” Bilal asked.

“The other team?” Wilton asked.

“The Bzadians,” Bilal said.

Wilton was shocked. “No, sir. Not Price, Monster, Barnard or Tsar. Definitely not. And Wall’s brother was killed by the Pukes. He hates them more than anyone. I don’t know about Emile, but after the thing with Brogan I think they were real careful about who got to be an Angel.”

“I thought so,” Bilal said. “But I had to check. Something has gone wrong out there.”

“That doesn’t mean there’s a traitor. Perhaps they just can’t get reception,” Wilton said.

“I’d think that too, if it wasn’t for what happened to the two Seal teams,” Bilal said. “We’re going to have to face the fact that whatever has happened to the Seals, has happened to the Angels.” He shook his head in frustration. “This is going to be difficult to explain to ACOG, considering the Angels officially weren’t even there in the first place.”

Wilton stared at him.

“They were friends of mine,” Wilton said, then corrected himself. “They
are
friends of mine.”

Bilal evaluated him and Wilton felt uncomfortable under his gaze.

“You wish you were back with them?” Bilal asked.

Wilton shrugged. He did. But he wasn’t about to say that to a stranger. In any case, he sensed that this stranger already knew more about him, and the rest of the Angels, than he knew himself.

“I’m sorry about your friends,” Bilal said, and Wilton felt that he truly was. “Maybe they will get in contact. They have only missed one radio call.”

It was clear that he didn’t think this was likely.

“Stay here for the rest of the week, just in case,” Bilal continued. “Then we will return you to your unit. For now you can go back to your hotel, if you wish, but make sure the radio is routed to your phone.”

“I’d like to go to Kansas,” Wilton said. “If that’s okay.”

“Kansas?” Bilal asked.

“Fort Leavenworth,” Wilton said. “I want to visit Holly Brogan. Do you think you could arrange that?”

“Can I ask why?” Bilal asked.

“She was a Bzadian mole,” Wilton said. “If there are more like her, she might know about them.”

Bilal stared at him. Wilton again had the extremely uncomfortable feeling that his thoughts were like an open book to this man.

“You think one of the operators on Little Diomede is a traitor?” Bilal said.

“Both of them, for all I know,” Wilton said. “But I don’t really know anything. I’m just hoping that Brogan might be able to throw some light.”

“She has steadfastly refused to speak to anyone,” Bilal said. “What makes you think she’ll speak to you?”

“She might,” Wilton said. “We served together. It’s worth a try.”

“She’s in maximum security,” Bilal said. “I’ll have to arrange clearance. When do you want to go?”

“Today,” Wilton said. “I’ll route the radio through to my phone like you said. One more thing.”

“Yes?” Bilal asked.

“I want to show her photos of the staff on Little Diomede Island,” Wilton said.

“I’ll arrange access to their personnel files,” Bilal said.

It was later, on the plane, that Wilton realised something odd. Bilal had asked him directly about each member of the Angel team. Except one. Hayden Wall.

The ceiling was made of rough wood and caulked with something black and sticky, possibly tar. It was supported by crossbeams that were rough-hewn logs.

Propping up the crossbeams were huge bones, so large that they must have come from dinosaurs.

Whales. That was the thought that came to him. They were whale bones.

It was cold. Very cold. He was shivering uncontrollably.

Someone brought a ladle to his lips and a warm broth trickled into his mouth. It tasted of oil and fish, but he swallowed it greedily, for the warmth if nothing else.

Another ladle and again he sucked it down eagerly.

He felt warm skin against his own.

Then he slept.

[MISSION DAY 1, FEBRUARY 16, 2033. 2100 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

[UNITED STATES DISCIPLINARY BARRACKS, FORT LEAVENWORTH, KANSAS]

From the air, the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth is an odd collection of geometric shapes. It looks like a child’s puzzle waiting to be assembled. It is lined on two sides by dense forest and ringed by two separate security fences that even extend across the rooftop of the entrance building. At night, those fences are lit up like Christmas tree lights.

Wilton approached the main entrance with more than a little nervousness.

Getting in meant getting a high-level security clearance and doing that without setting off alarm bells meant going right to the top.

Fortunately, Bilal’s friends were connected in very high places. The guards even saluted. Wilton returned the salute lazily, as if he was a little bored by the whole thing, when in fact his heart was pounding as much as it had sliding down a rock in the Australian desert, or racing T-boards around the Brisbane River. Nobody questioned why a seventeen-year-old kid would have top-security access.

The visitors’ centre was part of the entrance building, with separate doors for visitors and inmates.

He was escorted by two guards and left to wait at a plain wooden table for over twenty minutes before a door on the other side of the room opened and the prisoner was shown in.

There were no bars. There were no armed guards inside the room. But nor did there need to be. He was separated from Brogan by a thick piece of bulletproof glass. It was not particularly clean and when he caught the light at the right angle, he could see palm prints, fingertips, even the imprint of lips.

He stood as she entered. “Hey, Brogan,” he said.

It was strange seeing her. Strange and unsettling. As though she was a pet dog that was wagging its tail but might turn vicious without provocation.

She wore a prison T-shirt and loose-fitting dark blue pants. Prison pyjamas. It was after nine, local time. She had been getting ready for bed. Her head still had the distinctive Bzadian bumps and her skin was still the same green-yellow shades. She was human, but appropriately for a traitor, had the appearance of an alien.

Her hair was cut short, in a buzz cut. Maybe that was a prison regulation. It looked hard. She looked hard. She said nothing, but crossed the room in three quick steps, coming right up to the glass and peering through it as if unsure that he was real.

She pressed a hand against the glass, and after a moment he did too, touching hands through three centimetres of glass.

When she moved away, she was crying, silently. The tears softened her.

“You okay?” he asked.

She nodded then shook her head. She remained standing close to the glass wall.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a friendly face,” she said. “I seldom get to see anyone. They keep me in solitary confinement.”

Solitary confinement. That was something they shared, but for different reasons. Since he’d left the Angels, his whole life felt like solitary confinement. He didn’t say so. His problems were pretty minor compared to hers.

He stared at her for a while then said, “I ain’t your friend, Holly.”

“In here, you’re as good as it gets,” Brogan said.

“You want to talk about friends?” Wilton asked. “Hunter was a friend of mine. Remember him? He was the one you killed. With a poisonous snake. A snake!”

“Hunter treated you like crap,” Brogan said. “Don’t delude yourself.”

“He didn’t mean any of it,” Wilton said. “We were friends.”

“Yeah, and some of those people you blew up inside Uluru, they were my friends,” Brogan said. “War’s a bitch.”

“You’re …” Wilton shut his mouth.

“I’m a bitch?” Brogan asked. “That what you were going to say, Wilton?”

Wilton forced himself to be calm. There was no point in being confrontational if he wanted her help. “Ryan would have done anything for you,” he said. “He didn’t deserve what you did to him.”

“So he can come here and tell me that himself,” Brogan said. “Instead of sending his boy.”