Pandora's Grave (22 page)

The soldier’s eyes were wide as he handed the phone over. “It–it is the Supreme Leader himself…”

The major stiffened, his mouth suddenly dry. “Give it here,” he whispered. The Ayatollah Isfahani was the last person he had wanted to hear from this morning.

“Good morning, sir.”

“Is it?” the elderly voice on the other end of the phone asked skeptically. “Major Hossein, I need you to come to Qom immediately.”

Hossein paused, but only for a moment. Despite the rise to power of the IRGC and Mahmoud Shirazi, the Ayatollah was still a man to be feared. And obeyed. “Of course.”

“There is a Colonel Harun Larijani there at your base. I am authorizing you to requisition his helicopter for you to fly here.”

“Where do I meet you?”

“Fly directly to my home. You are to go dark, major. I want you to discuss this call with no one, is that understood? As far as anyone knows, you are flying to your execution.”

“Sir?”

“The Americans have escaped, major. The President will be looking for a scapegoat, and believe me when I say his gaze will not settle upon the incompetence of his nephew.”

“You mean—Larijani?”

The voice that replied was heavily laced with sarcasm. “Surely, major, you did not believe that he earned his rank through his skills as a tactician? Now, we must hurry—I will expect you at my residence by noon. Any questions?”

There were many, but none that Hossein believed diplomatic or safe to ask. “No.”

“Good. And remember, major, not a word to anyone. You’re a condemned man. Act the part.”

Hossein thumbed the “end” button on the phone and shook his head. Very little of what he had just been told made any sense. Or perhaps it did, in the twisted corridors of power that the Ayatollah inhabited. He would be there soon enough…

7:35 A.M. Local Time

Along the beach

Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel

The salt breeze rippled through Avi’s hair as he jogged along the nearly deserted beach. It was a morning ritual for the Mossad chief, an iron refusal to bow to the increasing demands of his aging body.

“So, what is the latest after-action report from RAHAB?” he asked of the aide panting at his side. Shoham suppressed a quiet smile as the young man struggled to catch his breath sufficiently to reply. He might be getting older, but he could still set a pace that would put young men to the test.

Some young men, he reflected, casting a critical eye on the bodyguard flanking him on his right, matching his stride effortlessly. There were a full score of Mossad agents spread along the narrow beach, deployed to ensure his safety.

“We–we’re getting the first daytime sat shots now,” the aide gasped out. “It would appear that the Iranians are still cleaning up the damage.”

“We knew that—any indication as to who caused it?”

“No. Another of our satellites picked up abnormal activity at the American base at Q-West late last night.”

“Such as?”

“An MH-53J took off from the airfield at approx twenty hundred hours local time last night, flying north, then turning west before disappearing off the edge of our sat coverage. It returned at a little over two hours later.”

Avi kept jogging, slowly turning over the information in his mind. The MH-53J was a Special Forces helicopter—but the Americans had a large Special Forces presence in Iraq, so that by itself was indicative of nothing.

“Did it show up elsewhere?” The aide ducked his head, gulping in air, then gasped a “no”.

“Th–there is one other thing, sir. SIGINT assets reported a spike in activity at the helicopter base south of the Iranian base camp at 2200 Tehran time, followed by more activity at the airfield in Tabriz.”

“What type of activity?” Shoham asked. SIGINT, which stood for SIGnals INTelligence, monitored Iranian communications.

“Units were being scrambled and sent airborne—gunships, fighters—our photoanalysts are trying to determine whether they may have even scrambled their F-14s.”

Avi chuckled in disbelief. Given to the Shah in the ‘70s by the American government, the once state-of-the-art F-14 “Tomcat” fighter planes were barely flyable now, shoddy maintenance and lack of replacement parts taking an inevitable toll. His mind returned to the matter at hand.

“They were reacting to a penetration of their airspace,” he observed coolly, slowing as he made the turn of the beach to head back to their SUV.

“The Americans?”

“Perhaps,” Shoham whispered, his mind occupied with other thoughts. If it
had
been the Americans, then perhaps they had rescued the remainder of the archaeological team. There was no certainty, but then again, there never was. The odds were good enough to bet on.

“We getting anything actionable from SCHLIEMANN?”

The aide shook his head. “No. Nothing at all.”

“I see,” was the Mossad chief’s only reply. Roll the dice…

9:47 A.M. Tehran Time

The PJAK camp

Northwestern Iran

Thomas blinked as the morning sun struck him full in the face. Sirvan stepped aside, leading him out of the mouth of what Thomas slowly realized had been a cave.

The PJAK camp was nestled in a valley of one sort or another, perhaps a mile in breadth at the widest point, clumps of trees and scrub brush breaking the monotony of the arid terrain. Steep, craggy mountains of sheer-faced rock towered on both sides of the valley, shielding them from effective aerial assault. At the foot of the cliff, off to his right, a small herd of six or seven donkeys were tethered to a leafy bush that they were in the process of devouring.

The smell of smoke reached his nostrils and Thomas turned to see a cooking fire not ten meters away.

“Good morning, Mr. Patterson.” It was Azad Badir, kneeling by the fire, a half-eaten plate of rice in his hands. He scooped the last few bites into his mouth and rose. “We march in fifteen minutes,” he announced, addressing Thomas. “Make sure you’re ready.”

A grin tugged at the corner of Thomas’s mouth. “I’m not sure I can do that, boss. Your men have left me with
so much
to pack.”

Azad Badir threw back his head and laughed, clapping Thomas on the shoulder. “A man with a sense of humor. I like you, Mr. Patterson—life leaves us with little to laugh at here in Kurdistan.”

Thomas’s eyebrows went up. “But I take it my likeability would not spare me should I choose to part company with your people at this point?”

Badir smiled. “That is correct. I will not demean you by binding your hands, but I must assure you that if you stray from the line of march, you will be shot out of hand. My people rarely miss.”

“A comforting thought.” Thomas’s gaze shifted, caught by an object resting beside a nearby fire. It was a British-made Parker-Hale M-85 sniper rifle. He hurried over to it before either man could stop him.

“Where did you get one of these?” he asked, picking up the rifle and looking back toward them. Neither one was smiling.

It seemed as though every eye in the camp was suddenly focused on him, the Kurds frozen in place, waiting for an order from their leader.

Finally, at a nod from Badir, Sirvan advanced to take the rifle from Thomas’s hands. “We have our friends in Europe, Mr. Patterson.”

“It’s a good weapon,” Thomas observed objectively. “I used one of them in Latin America a few years back. Who’s your sniper?”

“I am,” a voice announced before either man could respond. Thomas’s head swivelled to the left to see Estere standing there, tucking her long black hair beneath the camouflage ball cap she wore.

“Then may I compliment you on having such a fine weapon,” Thomas replied, adroitly concealing his surprise.

“You may,” she retorted, crossing the camp to take the rifle from Sirvan’s hands, “so long as you leave it alone. You might break it.”

Cradling the M-85 in her arms like one might a child, she turned her back on the men and went back to kneel beside her bedroll.

Thomas turned to find Azad Badir regarding him with an amused smile. “We march in ten minutes, Mr. Patterson. Don’t wander off.”

11:45 A.M.

The Residence of the Supreme Ayatollah

Qom, Iran

“Time?” The Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Yousef Mohaymen Isfahani, asked, turning to the attendant at his side.

“Fifteen minutes until noon,” the man replied, bowing deeply. Isfahani acknowledged his words with a nod, looking northward from the portico as though fancying he could see the approaching helicopter.

Failing in that, he turned away, placing both hands on the balustrade as he glanced into the courtyard beneath him. So much had changed in the last few years. And the world had barely noticed.

Gone was the theocracy that had ruled Iran for over three decades. Not truly gone, perhaps, but gutted of all true power. Men might still call him the Supreme Leader, but he was a figurehead, little more.

This meeting had the potential to change all that. A chill ran through his aging body, despite the pounding heat of the noonday sun. It was a terrible risk.

He smiled with a grim humor. The West was too consumed with its worsening economic troubles to keep track of events in Iran. And outwardly, little had changed in the years since a military cabal had seized power in Tehran. Led by then-general Mahmoud F’Azel Shirazi, the conspirators had succeeded in corrupting large numbers of the Revolutionary Guard and regular army to their cause. The revolt had been sudden and swift, leaving the ayatollahs with no time to react.

Those few Western press agencies that had taken notice had hailed the end of Iran’s theocracy in terms of the demise of radical Islam in Iran.

The Ayatollah’s lip curled upward in a sneer of disdain at the memory. The
fools
! Had they bothered to investigate Shirazi and his compatriots, their blood would have run cold. Despite his apparent interest in increased openness to the West, Mahmoud Shirazi was odds-on the most radical leader Iran had ever seen.

The twelfth imam. To some Iranians the concept was more figurative than literal, just as some in the Christian world regarded the revelations of John to be allegorical in nature.

Others saw him as their messiah, who would return in the midst of apocalypse to save true believers. And still others believed that they must bring about that apocalypse to usher in his return…

Isfahani sighed at the reflection. It was a theological debate that traced its roots back to the very foundations of the Islamic faith. The world of Islam had begun to fracture before the body of its Prophet had even cooled.

On the one hand, there were those who believed that in the absence of a directly appointed successor, one should be elected from among their ranks. Their name, Sunni, clearly indicated that they felt they had chosen the “Right Path”.

On the other hand, however, a minority faction of Mohammed’s close followers and kin put forth the idea that a close relative of the Prophet should succeed him and named Hazrat Ali, a cousin and son-in-law of Mohammed, as successor.

Looking back, the ayatollah thought, the debate seemed trite, but it had split Islam in two. In the midst of a bloody civil war, Hazrat Ali, the “Lion of God”, had been slain by Sunni assassins, who then replaced him with one of their own luminaries. The partisans of Ali withdrew in defeat, to become a persecuted minority, known as the Shiah, a name taken from the Arabic word for
partisan
.

But they had kept the bloodline pure, through the ravages of war, persecution, and assassination. Over the following two centuries, eleven men carried the title of imam in the Shiite world. Eleven men—warriors, scholars, and theologians. Descendants of Hazrat Ali and pure of both blood and faith.

And then there were twelve.

What mark this twelfth imam might have left on the world was unknown–or rather, as Shirazi and his followers believed, yet to be seen.

He had been a lad of four years old when he disappeared down a well in the year A.D. 874, never to be seen again. But what might have been written off as a tragic accident took a different shape in the Shiite mind. The twelfth, and last, of the imams had not fallen to his death. Nay, rather, he had been occultated or hidden away by Allah until his return at the end of the world, when he would return in a flaming vengeance to cleanse the earth of unbelievers.

He heard the helicopter before he saw it, the steady drumbeat of the rotor intruding itself upon his thoughts.

The old man’s eyes brightened. “That should be Major Hossein now,” he said, turning to his attendant. “Bring him to me as soon as he lands.”

10:20 A.M. Local Time

C-141 Starlifter

Final approach to Ramstein Airbase, Germany

The small knot of men in Air Force uniforms near the back of the Starlifter’s cargo hold bore no resemblance to the men that had just spent two days deep inside hostile territory.

Hostile territory, Harry mused, running a hand over his smooth-shaven chin. Completing the job had been necessary to once again pass himself off as an Air Force colonel, despite the lack of time.

With Rebecca Petras in the picture, he very much fancied himself still in hostile territory. Or at least less than friendly.

From the looks on the faces of his fellow team members, he knew they were thinking the same thing. Such was the world of an operator. Caught on the knife’s edge between the cold, hard facts of life in the field and the political maneuvering of bureaucratic desk jockeys more interested in advancing their own careers than protecting their country’s interests.

Not that it mattered in the end. Going in, they had known the score. They had done the job they had been given to do. Now the trick was to survive the fallout.

“What’s our play, boss?” Hamid asked.

Harry smiled. It was sometimes difficult to imagine the football-crazed Zakiri as a kid growing up in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. As with most of those who’ve learned English as a second language, Hamid’s speech was very proper and correct, but when slang slipped in, it was invariably sports-related.