Usman understood the physical facts of his orders, if not the reason for them, though if he had to guess he figured this move tonight was only one of many similar operations across the country in response to the terrorist attacks. But this was desperate. Like leaping off a tall cliff into the raging ocean because a tiger was at your back. And he felt naked because he wasn’t wearing a uniform—only big-city blue jeans and a T-shirt.
The CT returned almost immediately. “You’re late. The group captain is at headquarters waiting for you. Do you know the way, or will you require an escort, sir?”
“I can find it,” Usman said.
The CT stepped back and motioned for the barrier to be raised. He looked green in the harsh lights.
* * *
Group Captain Kabir Paracha, at forty-seven, was an unlikely military officer. His desert camos were a mess, he’d forgotten his hat, and his sleeves were rolled up to just below the elbows, the straps that were meant to hold them higher poking out. But he was the correct man for the job because his primary training had been as a nuclear engineer at the Dr. A. Q. Khan Research Laboratory. He understood the nature of the devices he was meant to guard. Especially the consequences if they ever had to be used.
He was waiting next to his Hummer, a driver behind the wheel.
“You’re late,” he said as Usman got out of his SUV. “And in civilian clothes.”
“Pardon me, sir, but there were only three lightly armed men at Post One. This place should be crawling with patrols.”
“We are told that the problems are confined to the north. I was ordered to maintain a low profile. And your trip makes no sense. It’s insanity.”
“Do you mean to disobey orders?” Usman demanded.
The GC’s face fell and he looked away for just a moment. “No. But I will send two of my people with you. For the weapons—the mated weapons. Do you completely understand the sheer folly?”
Usman could guess. Almost all of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons were stored in the unmated configuration: the trigger circuitry was stored in one spot, while the Pit—the physics packages that contained either highly enriched uranium or plutonium fissile cores plus the tritium accelerators that greatly increased a nuclear weapon’s explosive power—were stored elsewhere. The procedure was for safety’s sake, and it was something that the leadership assured the Americans was standard.
“I agree with you, sir. But I too must follow orders. These are difficult times.”
“Indeed,” Paracha said. “Follow me.”
Usman followed the group captain across the base to a series of low concrete bunkers inside a triple barrier of tall, razor-wire-topped electric fences. Guard towers were located at fifty-meter intervals, and from the moment they approached the main gate, they were illuminated by several strong searchlights.
All of it was wrong. Anyone watching the bunkers and the high-security perimeter had to know what was here. And now the lights and the two vehicles were nothing short of an invitation. Insanity. Paracha was right: what was happening here and across the country was sheer folly.
Once they were passed through the triple fences, a thick steel door leading inside one of the bunkers rumbled open with a loud screech of metal on metal that had to be audible for miles.
Four heavily armed soldiers, one of them a flight lieutenant, motioned for Usman to drive inside what appeared to be a loading area about thirty or forty meters on a side. At the rear was a large freight elevator, its steel mesh gates open.
A small tug towing a cart on which were strapped four small nuclear weapons shaped like missile nose cones emerged from the elevator and the driver came around to the rear of Usman’s SUV.
Paracha spoke to the four armed guards, then came over to where Usman had gotten out of his vehicle and opened the tailgate with shaking hands.
“Do you recognize what these are?” he asked.
“Nuclear weapons meant to be carried by rockets.”
“Plutonium bombs for the Haft IX missiles. And do you know the significance of that fact? The exact meaning of the thing?”
Usman only had his orders to pick up four weapons, drive them to the airport at Delbandin, a small town three hundred kilometers to the south, and deliver them to a Flight Lieutenant Gopang, who would load them aboard a small transport aircraft and fly away. Once the delivery was made he was to return to Islamabad.
“No, sir,” Usman said, his voice quiet. He was suddenly in the presence of something so overwhelmingly powerful that all of his certainty had evaporated.
“These missiles have a range of less than one hundred kilometers. Does this mean something to you?”
Usman shook his head.
“These weapons were not meant to be launched against India or against anywhere else outside of Pakistan. They have been designed to kill any force threatening us from inside. They are meant to be used against our own people.”
“The Taliban. Enemies of the state.”
“Save me the propaganda, Lieutenant. These people were once our allies.”
“And now they are our enemies,” Usman said. And the fault rested entirely with the ISI. Just as the CIA was at least partly to blame for bin Laden. The Americans had funded the fundamentalists in Afghanistan, who drove the Russians away, and when the war was over the same Stinger missiles had been turned against Americans, which in turn had finally led to the attacks on New York and Washington. The events of the last two weeks were Pakistan’s 9/11, and nothing short of a miracle would stop Islamabad from falling.
“I won’t push the button, I only helped design the things and now I’m in charge of guarding them,” Paracha said. “You won’t push the button either, you’ll merely deliver them somewhere.”
Usman had nothing to say.
Paracha stepped closer. “Are our hands clean, Lieutenant?” he asked. He shook his head. “We’ll never be clean.”
DAVID HAGBERG is a former U.S. Air Force cryptographer who has traveled extensively in Europe, the Arctic, and the Caribbean, and has spoken at CIA functions. He has published more than seventy novels of suspense, including Castro’s Daughter, Blood Pact, and Retribution. He makes his home in Sarasota, Florida. You can sign up for email updates here.
TOR AND FORGE BOOKS BY DAVID HAGBERG
Kirk McGarvey Series
CIA agent Kirk McGarvey fights terrorism, espionage, and all the biggest threats to the United States.
Without Honor
Countdown
Crossfire
Desert Fire
Critical Mass
High Flight
Assassin
White House
Joshua’s Hammer
The Kill Zone
Soldier of God
Allah’s Scorpion
Dance with the Dragon
The Expediter
The Cabal
Abyss
Castro’s Daughter
Blood Pact
Retribution
The Fourth Horseman
“Breaking Point” (short story)
The Shadowmen (novella)
Other Fiction
Last Come the Children
Heartland
Heroes
Eden’s Gate
By Dawn’s Early Light
Burned
The Capsule
“V5” (short story)
Novels with Byron L. Dorgan
Harrowing, near-future thrillers about energy, the United States, and those bent on using one to destroy the other.
Blowout
Gridlock
Nonfiction
Mutiny: The True Events That Inspired the Hunt for Red October
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Epigraph
Earlier
First Strike
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Thirty-six Hours Later
A Preview of David Hagberg’s The Fourth Horseman
About the Author
Tor and Forge Books by David Hagberg
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novella are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THE SHADOWMEN
Copyright © 2016 by David Hagberg
All rights reserved.
Cover art © Getty Images
A Forge Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
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e-ISBN 9780765386267
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First Edition: January 2016