“No misses in fourteen-point-four-three seconds, with hostage taker eliminated,” noted the official scorekeeper.
“Hoo-ah!” roared the audience from the bleachers.
“Hoo-ah!” repeated Thomas, genuinely impressed by the demonstration he had just witnessed.
A group of soldiers wearing rucksacks emerged on foot from the direction of the gravel road. Ted Callahan caught the attention of the lead figure in this column, and beckoned him over to join them.
“Sergeant Reed,” greeted Callahan.
“I was beginning to think you were going to forfeit the competition.”
Sergeant Sam Reed snapped off a sharp salute and replied, “I’m sorry we’re late. Colonel. Our truck broke down and we had to hike in this last klick.”
“Sergeant Reed is an instructor in our Sapper Leader course,” said Callahan to Thomas.
“He’s about to take on Captain Christian’s MPs in an action-shooting competition. But before the good Sergeant can show Christian’s men why Army engineers lead the way, I’d like you to listen while he shares a little incident he was involved in last night that’s indirectly responsible for your presence here this afternoon.”
After being properly introduced, Thomas listened while Reed painfully revealed the armed robbery that he and his nine-man Sapper class had been the recent victims of. The incident took place a little over twelve hours ago, in a hollow less than three miles from this very spot. Since Reed was a career soldier who obviously took his duty seriously, Thomas could understand his discomfort as he described the moment when the group of camouflaged strangers emerged from the forest and ordered them to drop their weapons.
When Reed’s associate instructor had dared to question this command, he received a shotgun wound in the shoulder for his petulance. Only then did Reed realize the seriousness of their predicament, and he reluctantly instructed his men to do as ordered.
The thieves got away with a virtual smorgasbord of weaponry, and Thomas didn’t have to hear any more to know why Ted Callahan had asked for his services. Included in this haul was an M60 machine gun, a pair of M249 Squad Automatic Weapons, two M4 carbines with M203 grenade launchers attached, four M16A2 assault rifles, twenty pounds of C-4, a box of detonators, a roll of detonation cord, three tactical radios, four AN/PVS-7D advanced Night Vision Goggles, and an assortment of flares and artillery projectile ground-burst simulators.
Sergeant Reed’s voice was cracking with embarrassment upon describing the final act of humiliation that the thieves inflicted on them. For as they gathered up the weapons, they ordered the Sappers to remove their BDUs, and the engineers soon found themselves stripped to their underwear and bound up with duct tape.
“And chances are that we’d still be out there at the mercy of the mosquitoes if it hadn’t been for one of my men driving out there two hours later in the water truck,” bitterly concluded the senior enlisted man, who waited until Thomas ended a perfunctory question session before discreetly putting a pinch of chewing tobacco behind his lower lip.
Poor lighting conditions and heavy camouflage face paint kept Reed and his men from being able to further describe their assailants.
And the last they saw of them was as they silently disappeared back into the tree line, with both their weapons and their BDUs in tow.
Before Ted Callahan excused Reed, Thomas was able to schedule a proper interrogation session with the Sapper Leader course instructor for later in the afternoon, in the CID field office.
As they watched him join his men beside the first shooting box, Ted revealed that both CID and a squad of MPs were currently combing the woods where the robbery took place for evidence.
He also offered to personally convey Thomas to the site.
Storm clouds were gathering in the western sky, and Thomas accepted this invitation on the condition that they proceed out there at once, before the threatening thunder showers washed away any promising clues. It was while rummaging through a carton of MREs for a field lunch that Thomas vented something that had been bothering him.
“} can appreciate the Army’s desire to nail the thieves, Ted, but why do you need my help specifically? And why call you out from D.C.?”
“Because last night’s robbery wasn’t the first to strike Port Leonard Wood with the same MO.”
Callahan sniffed at the tuna and noodle pack he’d been stuck with, while Thomas had dug out the only spaghetti. He continued his story while leading Thomas to his HUMVEE to eat.
“I was originally called out here last week, after a group of Special Forces engineers were robbed in almost exactly the same manner when working the Demo range. The take was over a hundred pounds of C-4, more detonators, and several cases of
Eastern Bloc mines that had been confiscated in Bosnia and were being detonated to see how they functioned.”
“Mines?” repeated Thomas, his expression tightening in horror.
“Tell me about it. Special Agent. I realize that we in the CID and the ATP have enough on our hands tracking down all the automatic weapons, ammo, and high explosives being lost from our bases. But mines bring us into a shadowy new area, almost too terrifying to even think about.
“The devices included in the heist were fully armed and equipped with fuses, detonators, and explosives. They included toe poppers, claymores, antipersonnel, frags, trip wires, and anti armor — a full gamut of mine hardware that could wreak unimaginable havoc if they were to get in the wrong hands.”
“And you really think the same individuals are responsible for both robberies, Ted?”
Callahan halted at the driver’s door of the HUMVEE.
“Like last night’s robbery, the mine heist took place at night, with our Special Forces squad caught totally off guard. They too were ordered to take off their clothes by a group of heavily camouflaged assailants, who subsequently tied our Green Berets up with duct tape. And because it was all taking place in a driving thunderstorm, the clues were all but washed away by the time CID got out there late the next day.”
“Could it be an inside job?” questioned Thomas.
“I mean, who better than another soldier to sneak up and rob a group of Green Berets?”
“Whoever it was had muchos ca jones and a thorough knowledge of these woods and the approaches that lead into them.”
“How about the locals?” Thomas continued.
“Any recent militia activity in the area?”
Callahan snickered.
“This is the heart of the Ozarks, Thomas.
I don’t have to remind you, of all people, that some of the most virulent antigovernment groups in the country are based in these parts. Remember a few years back, when we traced down that stolen crate of Browning Automatic Weapons to our old friends in the Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord? We found them buried in the Mark Twain National Forest, just south of here.”
The muted boom of thunder rumbled in the distance, and
Thomas found his attention drawn back to the shooting range, where Captain Christian was approaching them at a full sprint.
“Colonel Callahan!” he shouted between heaving breaths.
“The post has just gone on full strategic alert, and the CG wants you down in the Emergency Operations Center on the double, sir!”
The red command flags hanging outside Hoge Hall in the Maneuver Support Center indicated three general officers in the building — a pair of one-star Brigadier Generals, and the two stars belonging to Major General Levering Atwater, the post CG.
Thomas followed Ted Callahan inside, past a pair of smartly attired MPs armed with bolstered side arms. Yet another MP, this one an attractive female, was stationed beside the reception desk, and she greeted them with a crisp salute.