Once the gear had been checked and double checked, once Kimball reexamined Shari’s combat gear for fit and maneuverability, the Vatican Knights set forth with Kimball on the point and Shari in the rear.
They would start at the wrought-iron fence.
The Master lock was new, as well as the chain that held together the gates leading to the rear of the depository.
Removing a canister from his cargo pocket, Kimball sprayed a corrosive acid on the links, the chain bubbling and boiling until the metal gave way. After removing the chain as if it was a delicate rope of garland, he opened the gate just wide enough to allow his team passage. Quietly, they maneuvered their way to the rear of the compound where they found the military transport truck hidden under a bevy of heavy boughs.
Using hand motions to communicate, Kimball balled his fist and pulled down like a trucker blowing a horn, pointed to his eyes, then at the truck — a signal to Leviticus to scout the vehicle while the Vatican Knights held back.
Leviticus moved in, prudently, his head and weapon on a swivel. After he scouted the truck, he offered a closed-fisted gesture indicating ‘all clear.’ The Vatican Knights moved quietly ahead.
Behind the depository was a dirt lot bearing weeds as tall as a man’s waist, a good spot to hunker close to the three-story building without being seen. From their vantage point they could see the windows of the first level filled with brick and mortar. Also in view was a fire escape that hung tenuously from rusted bolts, its stability absent and too dangerous to mount. The windows on the second and third level were boarded over with sheets of plywood or planks, leaving the fire door on the first level a possible entryway. But the area surrounding the door was refurbished with new building blocks, meaning the area had been reinforced with steel rods before being re-bricked.
That left the roof.
Kimball withdrew into a wild tangle of bushes for cover and motioned his team close for conference.
“Isaiah and Micah, you got the rooftop. One enters from the south, the other from the north. Once done, descend and converge until you locate the pope. Then report back with his pinpointed position. Questions?” There were none. “Go.”
Isaiah and Micah moved swiftly across the drive and stood at the base of the building looking skyward toward the roof. Inside of Isaiah’s backpack was a pneumatic launcher geared to fire pitons. And after Isaiah locked and loaded a piton into the tube with an attached line, he aimed and shot the weapon so the piton embedded itself firmly into the wall about a foot below the edge of the roof. He then tested the hold of the line by pulling himself up the cord a couple of feet and suspended himself, the piton unyielding in its grip. Confident in the piton‘s ability to hold, they climbed the cable until they reached the rooftop, then disappeared over the edge.
After giving the rooftop unit enough time to find a breach to enter the building, Kimball loaded his grenade launcher and took position with Leviticus standing alongside him with his HK XM8 directed at the target point. There would be no mistaking that their knock on the door was going to be noisy, since their intention was to cause enough of a distraction to drive the Force Elite to a single point of defense, while Isaiah and Micah converged in flank maneuver to hem them in. Since the site was fortified, there was no other option. The Force Elite had chosen well.
Kimball directed the grenade launcher to the left of the fire door where the brick was old and aged, the weakest point, rather than to take on the newly reinforced area.
“I’ll go in first to neutralize any immediate threat,” Kimball said to Shari. “Then Leviticus will follow and sweep the premise. After the area has been secured, I need you to stay behind and maintain a secure position to ensure that we didn’t miss anyone. Leviticus and I will move against any hostile attack from the upper levels. By that time the rooftop units should be moving into position to flank the hostiles. Questions?”
“You want me to lag behind?”
He stared directly into her eyes. “You‘re not trained for this, Shari, and you know it. Leave this to those who’ve been there and done that. I need you to take the rear and look for those we may have missed. Leviticus and I are going to draw the attention from the upper levels. And I’d like to do that without worrying that somebody is flanking us from behind.”
She cocked her head. Kimball was right; this type of tactical work was way above her.
“Good. Glad to see that everyone understands,” he said. Then, “Does everybody know their game plan?”
Shari and Leviticus nodded. Their expected actions were clear.
“Okay, people, this is what it’s all about.” Kimball aimed the launcher and pulled the trigger. To the left of the door the wall disseminated into carnage that sent shattered rock, brick and mortar in all directions, and then boiling plumes of smoke and dust exploded outward and upward, rendering visibility to zero.
After loading a second grenade, Kimball moved in and disappeared into the smoke.
The explosion shook the whole building, galvanizing the Force Elite into combat mode. Each man grabbed his assault weapon and seated a bullet into its chamber as they took position along the third floor corridor. Diamondback manned the monitors, watching the dense smoke and dust on all screens. “We have a breach!” he hollered.
“How many?”
“Unknown!”
Kodiak, Boa and King Snake took position along the top of the stairwell and aimed their weapons into the mushroom cloud boiling up at them at a furious pace. In a hail of gunfire hundreds of rounds were fired into the cloud, the bullets ripping out chunks of brick from the walls of the stairwell and sent them scattering into the billowing smoke cloud that roiled up the stairs like a geyser. In the time it took them to reload their weapons in the aftermath of the first volley, a second explosion rocked the building.
Kimball Hayden was making a statement.
Team Leader moved like the wind down the corridor, his Glock tightly within his grasp. When he reached the bank of monitors he shoved Diamondback aside in order to position himself in front of the viewing screens. Managing the joy stick, Team Leader directed the remote camera lens toward a position where dust and smoke were minimal, and noted a large man enter swiftly through a hole in the wall on the first-floor level. Watching the figure load another grenade into the launcher, Team Leader zoomed in on the man’s features.
Although the commando’s head gear included a tinted face shield, it did not cover the man’s face totally. Team Leader thought he saw the man’s lips curl into a sardonic grin before aiming the launcher at the camera, then pulling the trigger.
The second explosion was far more brutal than the first.
After hearing the explosions, Metro’s Assault Teams were immediately deployed as backup units. They dispersed from the cube vans and closed the perimeter until the depository was absolutely the epicenter of all activity.
With the noose drawing tighter, even a cockroach would have had difficulty breaking through the column unseen.
After the first explosion, Micah and Isaiah entered the building from opposite ends through holes in the poorly maintained roof. On the south end Isaiah lowered himself onto a rickety header beam, the wood groaning under his weight as he dangled from the girder, then let go, his body landing with natural grace on the hardwood floor of a corridor leading to a stairwell.
Directing his HK XM8 in front of him, he scoped the area for hostiles and noted the south stairwell had collapsed to rubble all the way down to the first level.