CHAPTER TWO
“Tomahawk”
Otto gripped his Sig and set. Without sighting, he envisioned a triangle between gun, eyes and target and squeezed the trigger. His first four shots ripped through the sentry’s tunic and sent him sprawling. Hornbuckle was already through the door, gas mask on as he rolled a smoke bomb down the corridor. Their intel put Ghaddafi on the top floor in his “presidential suite.”
Otto pulled on his mask and followed Hornbuckle through a steel door into a cinder block corridor with vinyl floor and acoustic ceiling. Hornbuckle stood sentry as Otto planted the homing device at the juncture of floor and concrete pillar. On their signal, USN Corregidor would launch a Tomahawk missile from the Mediterranean. The Corregidor remained submerged waiting for their sixty-second window of opportunity.
Hornbuckle and Otto ran past an open door glimpsing hallucinatory marble floors and a big indoor swimming pool glowing cerulean from underwater lights. A wave of obscene moisture struck them as they passed. They heard muffled shots and men shouting in Arabic. Hornbuckle paused at the next door to roll a smoke grenade into the big room. He and Otto followed splitting left and right. Through smoke Otto saw a Libyan soldier, pistol drawn, leaping down the broad marble steps three at a time. Hornbuckle drilled him with a head shot. The stairs ascended around the polished bronze doors of an elevator. The elevator doors were open revealing a space that would not have been out of place in a Las Vegas hotel. Gilt-tinted mirrors above a brass rail. Parquet floor. Hornbuckle tossed an illumination grenade through the open doors and bolted. The grenade exploded with a dull whump, belching smoke and fire into the room.
Hornbuckle and Otto took the steps two at a time, Otto’s carbine banging against his side. The O’Hern-led ruse had succeeded in drawing the defenders to the north side of the building but Ghaddafi was never without his personal guard. They’d heard rumors that the Strong Man of Libya had hired lethal blond Belarus beauties whom he dressed in black leather outfits of his own design.
A hand grenade bounced merrily down the marble stairs and stopped at Otto’s feet. Without thinking, he scooped it up and hurled it as far as he could across the marble lobby, falling to the steps beneath the fluted balustrade. The grenade detonated with an ear-puncturing report, metal shards pinging off the walls onto the floor for several seconds. Otto’s earplugs protected him. He was up and following Hornbuckle as the staircase corkscrewed clockwise around the elevator shaft. Smoke rose with them, not all of it from the grenades.
They reached the fourth floor without resistance. Either they’d caught the guard napping or their intel was wrong and this was a skeleton crew. The intel could not be wrong. COC never would have signed off on the mission if he hadn’t known for a fact Ghaddafi was in the building. A broad marble corridor led the way to the Presidential suite, double red leather doors with gold buttons set in a bronze frame.
A soldier in desert khakis lay on the floor outside the door, crimson pool the size of a garbage can lid beneath his head. His black beret and been knocked off and he clutched a Makarov MP-71 in one hand. He’d blown off the top of his head through the roof of his mouth.
Hornbuckle paused five meters from the door, hand up to pause. It was not supposed to be this easy. Hornbuckle motioned Otto to the other side of the door. Otto examined the door and frame, got down on his hands and knees and peered under. The door was cracked open a quarter inch. From beneath the door he saw Persian rugs extending to a massive marble desk, a pair of black boots planted on the floor behind the desk. Otto could not see any higher. The feet repositioned themselves.
Otto signaled Hornbuckle that someone was in the room. His heart raced in anticipation.
Don’t anticipate, he told himself. Be the mission.
Hornbuckle stood on the other side of the door with his pistol in both hands. He stepped back and kicked the door, spiraling out of the way as soon as he made impact. The door swung back and smacked into its stopper. Hornbuckle rushed the room at an angle cutting away from the door. As soon as it was clear, Otto did the same going to the other side. They took position behind furniture and drew down on the figure behind the desk.
Not Ghaddafi.
The dark, thin, elegantly groomed young man smiled at them. It was Ghaddafi’s son Malik. Every member of the team knew the entire Ghaddafi family on sight. The room was decorated like the office of a successful but eccentric CEO. A copy of the Venus de Milo rested on a plinth. A gilt-framed poster of Anna Nicole Smith hung over a credenza topped with action figures including Conan the Barbarian. There were signed photographs of Michael Jackson and Snoop Dogg on the wall.
A big-screen TV, several generations old with a massive picture tube sat on a media stand. The east-facing windows showed the rising sun peeking over the horizon. A curving concave metal sheet mounted in native rock displayed an elegant Qalicheh. The room smelled of hashish and patchouli. There was a large brass hookah mounted on a delicately carved cedar table inlaid with mother of pearl. An open laptop faced Malik on the desk.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” Malik said. Like all the dictator’s children, Malik spoke perfect English.
“Where’s the colonel,” Hornbuckle snapped.
Malik spread his hands. “As you can see he’s not here. If you plan to shoot me, don’t delay. I embrace martyrdom as my destiny.”
A muffled explosion shook the floor. Shouts and gunfire grew louder. Hornbuckle stepped up to the desk, gun trained on Malik, and seized the laptop.
“Watch him. I’ll be right back.”
“Where you going?” Otto said.
“I need to check something with O’Hern.”
Hornbuckle left shutting the door behind him. The guard’s body was still there.
Otto had a moment of misgiving. Why hadn’t Hornbuckle used the radios? Did he fear they would be overheard? It was against protocol to leave a high-level figure like Malik with only one guard.
Otto walked counter-clockwise around the desk so that Malik came into full view.
“What do they pay you?” Malik said in a conversational voice.
“More than enough,” Otto said.
“I will pay for my freedom. If you’ll permit me to open this desk drawer.” Malik’s hand extended to the center drawer of the massive desk.
Otto motioned furiously with his gun for Malik to move back. “Don’t touch it! Stay in the chair. Push yourself into the corner.”
With Otto tracking his every move, the dictator’s son had no choice but to obey. He scooted backwards on the chair’s wheeled legs. Otto backed up to the desk drawer keeping a bead on Malik. He dare not turn away. Damn Hornbuckle for leaving!
Without looking, there was no way to tell if the drawer was booby-trapped.
Outside the wind howled and the sun turned bright orange, top lopped flat by the low-hanging clouds. He whipped his eyes back to Malik. The dictator’s son sat in the corner grinning like a fool. His eyes glowed orange--or maybe it was a trick of the light.
Otto took a step toward Malik.
Streams of vapor poured from Malik’s nostrils. He stood, smoke issuing from a corner of his mouth.
“Sit down!” Otto said.
Malik burst into flame.
Otto was momentarily frozen, awash in heat and the stink of burning flesh.
A flaming man?
Malik blossomed into a ball of white-hot phosphorus. A skillet of heat pressed down on every square centimeter of Otto’s exposed skin. Wallpaper curled from the corners and ignited. The chair on which Malik sat exploded. Otto backtracked and tried the door. Jammed shut. He put his shoulder to it and shoved with all his might. Did not budge.
He had to get out of there. The heat was setting his clothes on fire.
He raced to the window and that’s when he saw the Tomahawk.
***