"The guy who plucked me out of the trees said he'd been a PJ," Guerrin noted.

"D'Allaird, the crew-chief," Nielson said. "Hewas a PJ once upon a time. Burned in on a jump and got too banged up. He transitioned to flight engineer in the Air Force and then, for some reason, jumped to the Marines in rank. Spent the rest of his career as a Marine avionics guy."

"Well, he seemed to know his s.h.i.t," Guerrin said.

"While there are some that are learning the trade," Nielson said, looking fondly at the young lady at the computer, "we only hire people who 'know their s.h.i.t.' There's a fairly tight job market for such people at the moment, admittedly. But there are perks to this job that working in the sandbox doesn't afford.

Among other things,Georgia is just a prettier country thanIraq orAfghanistan . And you haven't had a chance to sample the beer, yet, but you're in for a treat."

"Sounds good," Guerrin, wondering, again, how one got a job working for the "Kildar." "What's up?"

"I thought we'd go over the local area and where you might want to operate in a bit more detail," Nielson said. "And I thought you should get oriented to where the TOC resided. I don't know if you're planning on going out with your patrols or controlling from here. We can maintain commo pretty solidly. Our top commo guy is, unfortunately, 'out of town' but we've got a distributed network for the area that we can hook your teams into. For backup I'd say sat phones for each of your platoon leaders. We have plenty available. And I take it you brought your own commo."

"Yes, sir," Guerrin replied. "I'm planning on leaving Third Platoon in place and deploying First and Second. I'll centralize our heavy unit where they can move to support either team. And, yes, I'll probably stay here until there's contact. I'd like to move forward if we get in contact or if we have to support the retreat of the Keldara."

"That may depend on a.s.sets," Nielson said. "We've only the two choppers and two pilots. They are probably going to be in support of the Keldara. On the other hand, I could see them capable of dropping you on or near your units on the way by. We'll have to take that one on the fly. There's a road, vehicle capable, that runs to quite close to where I antic.i.p.ate the Kildar retreating. Again, that part is going to depend upon enemy reaction. I would suggest, however, that you bring in your platoon leaders and such and brief them in sometime this evening."

"Yes, sir," Guerrin said. "1700?"

"Fine," the colonel replied. "Then we can repair to the bar toreally discuss the mission."

"Gentlemen, welcome once again to the valley of the Keldara," Nielson said.

The Ranger officers and NCOs had been brought down to the headquarters room for their briefing and were looking around in interest.

"Sir, if I may," First Sergeant Kwan said, "when they said we were going to be aggressing against some Georgian mountain infantry, this wasn't exactly what I expected."

"The commander is an American," Nielson said. "What he was prior to ending up here you don't have the need to know. Frankly, I don't know the whole story. But when he moved here, he decided that he needed a militia. The Chechens had been using this area as their personal fiefdom and he chose to change that. Since he knew what good equipment, and training, could do for a militia, especially if they had the basic instinct to make good soldiers, he didn't stint on spending. As it turns out, the Keldara very muchdo have that special trait, in spades. Any of you gentlemen history majors?"

"Here, sir," First Lt. Mund, the third platoon leader replied.

"The Keldara are a remnant of the Varangian Guard, Lieutenant," Nielson said with a grin. "Ring a bell?"

"Viking bodyguards of the Byzantine Emperors?" Mund said with a furrowed brow. "What are they doing up here?"

"Long story," Nielson said. "For the rest of you gentlemen, understand that the Keldara are mountain fighters fromway back. And they've kept the tradition even while being farmers. They are...fierce. Like the Ghurkas or the Kurds they are warriors first and farmers a distant second. Not that they're bad farmers. However, you're likely to not deal with them at all. What you are doing is covering their back andacting as if you're fighting them. Captain Guerrin?"

"This is theGuerrmoPa.s.s ," Guerrin said, pointing to the map on the wall. "While Third Platoon stays in place with the Keldara, First and Second will move to this region and perform patrolling, carefully staying onthis side of the pa.s.s. The other side is serious Injun country.

"As previously mentioned, they should take both blank and live ammo. From time to time they can act as if they have raided or ambushed someone using blanks. However, they should only load blanks, fire, then reload with live ammo. For that reason, don't actually have anyone in the kill-zone. Just play act. We're supposedly aggressing against the Keldara. The impression is that we're an American unit which has taken a hostile town while the muj types ran to the hills. We're trying to comb them out. The reality is that the Chechens still, occasionally, try to penetrate the area. So keep your units hot at all times unless you're performing one of the deception missions. I'll give you each written op orders detailing your area of patrol. Third."

"Here," Lt. Pope replied.

"The Keldara women handle fixed defenses," J.P. said. "So your guys are going to have to interact with them. Rules on that are no male is to be present with less than two women at any time. Preferably work in groups at all times. But part of the defenses are bunkers and there are only so many who can fit in them. Make sure there's no hanky-panky and brief your men that if there are any complaints, they are automatically considered to be in error if there was any way therecould be a complaint. Understood?"

"Yes, sir," Pope said.

"Full op order," J.P. said, tossing sealed manila envelopes on the table. "In those is a sealed envelope containing secondary missions and communications details. If you're told to open them, do so. In the event that you are in a position to be captured or killed, ensure the destruction of the contents. In the event that the carrier goes down, brief your personnel that destruction is paramount, even over survival.

Clear?"

"Yes, sir," the group chorused.

"Yes, we're here as a deception mission," Guerrin said. "But in the event that the deception fails we have a secondary mission. You get briefed on that only if it goes off. For now, just go play in the hills. The weather should be great for it."

Chapter Twenty-Eight.

The weather was preparing to suck.

The mountains were really steepening up. They'd gotten out of anything that couldn't be called "low" at this point and were well into the "high-up."

Between that and the decreased O2, Mike had slowed the pace. They weren't quite going at "mountain speed" yet, but close.

It was coming on towards dawn and what he hadn't seen, yet, was a good hide point. Hiding twenty people, above the woodline, was a ch.o.r.e. But they were going to have to go to ground. Soon. Like vampires, they couldn't be out in the light.

They were moving up a narrow defile with an ice and boulder-choked stream running down the middle.

He could just have them disperse to the sides of the canyon in their bivvies, but he didn't like the looks of the weather. He also hadn't been able to check his BFT gear recently. There was a storm coming in, but it wasn't supposed to hit until late in the day. The way the clouds were building, it was going to be sooner. Given the storm, they might have to hunker down well into the night. The supply drop was going to be problematic.

They also hadn't changed into their really heavy alpine gear, yet. The weather was still a bit too warm.

The heavy alpine gear was for temperatures near or below zero Fahrenheit. Currently it was just a tad above freezing and the standard fleece jackets were plenty. Probably too much, he was sweating a bit.

But the temperature usually climbed just a bit before a big storm. It would drop as it hit and drop more as it pa.s.sed. Changing gear was going to be a pain in the a.s.s, but necessary.

Finding a good hide site was even more necessary.

The stream had petered out and they were really scrambling, now. The slope was about sixty degrees, not quite vertical but close. Easier to negotiate on all fours, even with the ruck on his back. The line of Keldara struggled up the slope to just below the crest while the lead poked his head up. After a moment the lead turned and looked at Mike, pointing to his eyes.

Mike scrambled the rest of the way up the slope and cautiously poked his head up, turning it to the side to reduce the silhouette. Then he looked at the lead, Mikhail Ferani, and nodded, smiling.

Down below was a large cl.u.s.ter of boulders, probably dropped by the glacier they were headed for in its retreat. The teams could snuggle into the area, about an acre in size, easily.

The point had already made it up the next ridgeline but the trail was looking back and as Mike looked at him he pointed to the boulders. Mike gave a thumb's up then turned to the lead and pointed at the boulders.

Their day-hide was in sight.

There wasn't af.u.c.king place to hide.

Adamsdidn't want to push the movement much more. They were running along the side of a ridge, getting pretty close to the snow-line and not having a great time of it. The d.a.m.ned trails were slick with ice in places.

And there wasn't a f.u.c.king place to hide. Mountains reared in every direction and he felt like an ant on a floor.Anybody could f.u.c.king see them as soon as the sun came up and it was already starting to get light.

The only choice was going to be to hunker down in their bivvies with netting over them and hope like h.e.l.l n.o.body noticed them. It wasn't good tactics atall .

The point had already crested the ridge and getting him back was going to be a pain in the a.s.s. And the weather was closing in; the upper summits had already disappeared in clouds. It was about to either rain or snow, or maybe both, like a b.i.t.c.h.

Which would at least reduce visibility.

Finally he called a halt and signaled for the lead to go up and pull in the point. The d.a.m.ned sun was just about up and it was time to try to hide in plain sight.

He gestured for the team to spread out and then opened up his rucksack, pulling out his sleeping bag which was already encased by a bivvy sack. Short for "bivouac" the bivvy sack was a waterproof covering that could have a slight stiffener emplaced to keep it off the face.Adams hated the d.a.m.ned stiffeners so he always left his behind.

He rolled the bivvy out and secured it to the thin soil of the hillside then yanked out a ghillie net and covered the sack. Last he slid his rucksack under the net and climbed into the sack.

Dafyd Shaynav, the a.s.sistant team leader, had followed his lead but now paused and made the gesture for "sentry."

Adamsshook his head and gestured to get in the sack and freeze. Then he pointed to the sky.

Dafyd nodded then laid out his gear as the Master Chief had. But instead of immediately getting in the sack he began circulating, making sure everyone else was secure and camouflaged. That was his job.

Adamszipped the bivvy up, slid his hand out to pull up the net, then closed the bag all the way. He'd get out and look around in a minute, right now he wanted to check the weather.

He slid out of his jacket, got his weapon to one side and then pulled out the BFT.

The Marconi V-9 Blue Force Tracker was a bleeding edge system for keeping up with battle-s.p.a.ce.

Capable of multiple tasks related to intelligence dissemination, conditions and unit tracking, not to mention keeping up with your own location and various possible add-on programs, it was Mike's equivalent of a battle PDA and not much larger than one. It was set to receive only but he could do a weather check.

Sure enough, the storm was moving faster than predicted. The satellite view showed it already raining at their location. This was so gonna suck.

When the sound of the Keldara getting into position died away he stuck his head out of the bag and looked around. It wasn't full light, yet, so he slid out and walked up the hill.

It wasn't as bad as he'd feared. Since heknew what he was looking for he could tell where the bivvies were. But the netting reallydid break up the outline. They didn't look like much of anything. From the mountainsides around them they were probably invisible. And even close up they were going to be hard to spot.

He slid back in his sack but kept the top off his face. The lead and the point still weren't back. He wouldn't really settle in until they were.

A snowflake hit his face and he winced. They'd better f.u.c.king hurry.

Danes Devlich shook his head.

"They were rightthere ," he said, pointing to the hillside which was rapidly disappearing in the snow. The snow was falling straight down, now, but he could tell by the taste of the air that it was soon going to be storming.

"There's a hot-spot," Jachin Ferani, the point leader, said shaking his head. "But... Oh, now I see it," he added.

The sun was already up and they knew they were supposed to be out of sight. But they also didn't want to lose their team. Not with a storm coming.

"Where?" Tomas Kulcyanov asked. All three of the team were down on their bellies, just below the crest of the ridge. Jachin was thermal imaging binoculars that could be switched for normal vision while Tomas and Dafyd were peering through standard range-finding binos.

"Right where Dafyd was pointing,' Jachin said, chuckling. "In bivvies with their nets over them."

"d.a.m.n," Dafyd said after a moment. "That is weird. I was looking right at them..."

"We can make it down in about five minutes," Tomas said.

"If we hurry," Jachin pointed out. "We're not going to hurry. We're going to do the same thing. Right here."

It had been nearly an hour since the team had bedded down whenAdams heard a double click in his headphones. The point was, presumably, nearby but not coming in. Okay, he could live with that. They probably didn't want to move in the light. He clicked once in reply. As he did, the wind started to pick up and the bivvy started flapping, hard.

"Well, this is gonna totally suck," Adams whispered as the blizzard descended in earnest.

"Well, I think that Mr. Jenkins would say that this 'sucks'," Colonel Chechnik said, his jaw working as he read the report.

Russia's intelligence agency did not have the technology or funds of its American equivalents. It made up for both by being, in many cases, far better.

The fall of the Soviet Union had released flood of information related to the "spy war" between theUS and the Soviets going back to the 1930s and the returns were pretty much in: The Soviets had hammered theUS .

The Russians had moles in most of the major defense and intelligence agencies not only in theUS but in all of the West. They had penetrated almost every communications department, most secure research and regularly had people with access to the White House. They'd managed so many disinformation operations that straightening out fact from fiction was taking careful work by historians.

After the Fall, they'd had a hard time maintaining those links. But they had managed to retain very good Humint in other areas.

NotablyChechnya .

While, as with theUS , it wasn't really helping them win the war, they often knew of movements before the Chechen high command. And when the High Command knew...well...

Chechnik looked at the doc.u.ment and sighed. He had placed a mid-level request in place related to the general area of the Keldara mission. And this was the result.

He looked at the phone, then the doc.u.ment then the phone. Finally, grimacing, he picked it up.

"I need to speak to the President."

"You wanted to speak to me?" Nielson said, looking up.

Kacey and Tammie were in their new Keldara uniforms rather than flight suits since, given the hairy-a.s.s missions of the last couple of days, they were taking a well-earned rest day.

"Colonel," Kacey said, shifting uncomfortably in her new digi-cam. "Missions went fine. Clean in and out. How're the teams?"

"Now we're in blackout," Nielson said, shrugging. "h.e.l.l of a storm on the way in. If they get into serious trouble they'll call. But that's likely to blow the mission. You know the orders the Keldara have on casualties?"

"No, sir," Tammie answered.