“Cute,” he replied with a twist of his lips, “but I’ve really never seen him before. He didn’t say anything the entire time we were fighting, and the only identifying thing he had on him was this.”
She glanced over at him, eyes widening as she saw him draw out the large kukri blade. “You stole evidence?!”
“Yup. The guy tried to gut me with it, but I gutted him with my dive knife instead.” Masters shrugged calmly. “I figure it’s the spoils of war.”
“It’s evidence!” she snapped.
“Relax, I’ll probably be dead before Biggs gets his investigation moving anyway.”
She let out an annoyed sigh. “Why do you keep talking like that?”
“Because I know something you don’t,” he told her, then added a belated, “ma’am.”
They drove the rest of the way to their assigned center of operations in silence.
Admiral Karson pinched his nose as he read the report out of California, wondering what the hell was going on with Masters. One day back in Coronado and someone had already tried to kill him in his own base housing? He tacked a note to the report, informing NCIS that Masters was indeed working on a project vital to national security, and sent it back up the line.
The question he had to ask now, however, was why?
It was possible that Masters had developed his own enemies over the years he’d been absent from the government radar. Certainly the man’s home in Montana seemed to indicate something along those lines; however, it did seem odd that someone would actually go to the trouble of infiltrating a military base in an attempt to assassinate him.
So did it have something to do with the project?
That, more than anything, was gnawing at the admiral. If it was related to the project, then they had a security leak already. He was going to have to talk to Masters, Karson decided. Get a read on the man, probably face to face.
He had too much on the line now, including the president’s attention among other things, not to put some serious focus on keeping things from falling apart and coming down on his head. If this was a personal enemy of Masters, well, maybe he could use that as leverage to get the man to open up about what the hell he’d found.
If it was project related…
Well, Karson would have some serious work to do to plug any leaks in the case. Even if he had to cut them out and sew up the holes with his own bare hands.
“Jane?” he spoke up, thumbing the intercom.
“Yes, Admiral?”
“Book me a flight to California. I need to make a visit to Coronado.”
“Yes, sir.”
CHAPTER 5
The aging C-130 transport was clearly one of the most venerable platforms still in use, but it was also one of the most versatile. The one that was currently carrying sixty National Guard reservists and state police officers had been specifically modified to survive the extreme conditions that existed in northern Alaska.
For the reservists, more so than the state troopers, this current mission was something to be nervous about, and their silence on descent showed that none of them was in a joking mood. They trained for some combat and a fair bit more in terms of disaster relief, but as a rule, riot suppression of American citizens wasn’t high on their list. Only those with the appropriate training had been tapped for this run, of course, but there wasn’t a single man or woman among them who was looking forward to it.
“All right, listen to me and listen well,” Master Sergeant Gregory Kell growled as he walked between the rows of Spartan seats. “Keep your damn weapons on safe unless ordered otherwise, and listen to your officers and the state troopers. Hopefully this little ‘riot’ will have died down, and we won’t have to do anything more than clean up, but we don’t know what caused it, so keep your eyes wide and ears open.”
The men nodded as he passed, and Kell didn’t bother waiting for any acknowledgment.
“Our job is to support the troopers in restoring the peace or, failing that, clear the road for the emergency relief, fire suppression, and medical teams that are on their way,” he said. “I don’t want any hero bullshit out of you dumb pricks. Do your jobs, don’t kill anyone, and for God’s sake, don’t get yourselves killed. I don’t need that paperwork.”
A few people chuckled, but a death glare sent their way by the sergeant made it clear that he wasn’t joking around.
The lights in the transport changed, green bulbs coming to life as the pilot signaled their descent, and no one spoke as the big plane came around and put its nose in the wind to come down on runway nine.
The town of Barrow had only a single small airport, with one strip that ran east to west, so picking their approach had been dead simple despite the fact that they’d still received no response from the local control tower. Luckily, there wasn’t any traffic on the field either, so the C-130 had no difficulty setting down and coming to a stop at the far end of the strip, well clear of any and all buildings.
They dropped the ramp, the first few men and women from the guard stomping out first, their weapons displayed clearly and prominently just like their camo-green. If they managed to make anyone think twice about screwing with the plane or the people, they’d have done their job well. That was the theory, at least. In practice, there was no one within sight despite the fact that the town of Barrow was practically glued right on the airstrip to the north of them.
“Creepy,” Corporal Jenner mumbled as he stood guard outside the plane, eyes glued on the flickering glow of fires that brightened up the night to their north.
“You don’t want to look south, then.”
Of course, the first thing he did when he heard his fellow corporal speak was lean around the plane and glance south. More like southwest, to be honest, but it didn’t matter. There was an evil glow in that direction, and it didn’t take much time for him to identify them as the well fires from the briefings.
“Lord, the environmentalists are going to have a field day with this one,” he muttered, shifting back into position.
“Five bucks says one of those eco-nuts caused it,” Corporal Merrin offered.
“You’re on,” Jenner told him. “I say this whole mess was caused by the oil company’s incompetence and ‘cost cutting.’ ”
“Sucker’s bet,” Merrin scoffed. “You think it’s a coincidence those started burning just when a riot kicked off?”
“Maybe it’s what caused the riot?” Jenner offered with a shrug.
“Both of you, shut the hell up,” Sergeant Kell growled as he supervised the rest of the unloading. “Keep your eyes open and make sure we don’t have any company here while our balls are hanging out in this goddamn wind.”
“Yes, Sergeant!” they both said as one, returning their focus to their surroundings.
The darkness was pretty deep by now, but it didn’t matter a whole lot. They were packing decent-generation night optical devices, which lit up the terrain with an eerie green glow. The NODs showed that there was no movement between them and the airport buildings, but that was about the limit of their range, so they couldn’t see much of anything beyond that.
“Creepy,” Jenner mumbled again, now looking at the world through the green-tinted NODs.
“You said it.”
This time the sergeant just ignored them as he continued to oversee the unloading and organization of the reservists. He kept an eye on the state troopers as he worked, but they weren’t his concern really. They had a better idea of what they were doing — this was their jurisdiction after all. He and the rest of the reservists were here to back them up and provide disaster relief, and that was the extent of it.