“Sure,” Noreen said.
“Do you remember what it felt like the first time you walked across the seal?”
He did not need to specify which seal.
For CIA case officers, there was only one.
In an organization rife with rituals, there was one tradition that was considered inviolable—until a CIA officer graduated from the Farm, he or she was not permitted to walk across the sixteen-foot-diameter granite seal embedded in the lobby floor of the original headquarters building. This was not so much a rite of passage as an homage to all the clandestine operatives past and present who’d gutted it through the CIA’s grueling school for spies at Camp Peary, an old naval training site located near Williamsburg, Virginia. For an organization built on secrecy, there were few ways to recognize the achievements of its most important employees.
Walking across the seal was one of them.
Of course, Noreen remembered the first time she’d strode across the seal after skirting it for so long.
She always would.
“Yes,” Noreen said.
“Me too. Want to feel that way again?”
With a final look at the bedroom, she answered.
CHAPTER 19
JALALABAD, AFGHANISTAN
SATURDAY, APRIL 30, 2011
SCOTT Coleman had mixed feelings as he surveyed Forward Operating Base, or FOB, Fenty.
On one hand, he couldn’t escape the fact that he was in foreign and mostly hostile territory. Even prior to the events of 9/11, Jalalabad had been an important city. With its proximity to the Pakistan border, large population, and agriculturally favorable climate, Jalalabad has served as the center of gravity for multiple military campaigns from medieval times to the present day.
But you wouldn’t know this by the state of the airfield that serviced the city. With a single runway, a decrepit control tower, and a few crumbling buildings, the facility made its austere cousin in downtown Kabul look metropolitan. FOB Fenty had sprung up around the airfield, adding much-needed infrastructure while attempting to modernize the aging facility, but the airport proper still had the look of a one-horse town.
This was not the case.
Located an hour southeast of Bagram Air Base by helicopter, Jalalabad was critical to the American efforts to subdue the Taliban and take control of the rugged mountains and treacherous terrain located in the no-man’s-land between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The first military units to occupy the airfield had set up tents and austere living arrangements not far from the runway.
Now the FOB boasted wooden B-huts, showers, and the all-important fully functioning dining facility. While Fenty was still a far cry from the Burger King– and Dairy Queen–equipped Bagram boardwalk, Jalalabad had a feeling of modernity. But as the guard towers, earth-filled Hesco barriers, and triple-strand concertina wire could attest, this was not Club Med. The Americans might be fully in control of the airfield, but the battle space on the far side of the earthen barriers ringing the FOB was another story.
The city’s population wasn’t as unruly as Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban, located almost four hundred miles to the southwest, but they weren’t exactly lining the streets with American flags either. The surrounding villages were filled with people who were indifferent to Americans at best and Taliban sympathizers at worst. Nearly ten years after the war on terror had begun in Afghanistan, the infrastructure in Jalalabad might have changed for the better, but Scott couldn’t say the same thing about the people.
This sentiment had been validated moments after the C-130 carrying Scott and his team of three operators had landed. As the men were exiting their aircraft, they’d been greeted by a volley of Taliban rocket fire that had sent everyone scrambling for the bunkers.
“Hell of a welcome, don’t you think?”
Scott turned from the bunker’s tiny window to the speaker.
Will Bentley was the newest member of Coleman’s team. The former Force Recon Marine was in his late twenties, and though his six-foot frame was a respectable one hundred and seventy pounds, Will looked like a beanpole next to his companion, the linebacker-sized Joe Maslick. The former Delta Force assaulter was a quiet guy who wasn’t much on trash-talking, but he was a close-quarters battle, or CQB, expert and one of Scott’s best men.
Little Charlie “Slick” Wicker rounded out the trio.
Slick’s diminutive five-foot-six frame was at odds with his more muscular counterparts, but the SEAL Team 6 sniper more than made up for his small stature with his ability to put steel on target from breathtaking distances.
Wicker was the best sniper in the free world.
“I kind of like the Taliban’s way of saying hello,” Scott said, pitching his voice loud enough for his entire team to hear. “Nothing says you’re not in Kansas anymore like watching the jihadis blow the shit out of a volleyball court.”
Chuckles greeted his words, but Scott knew the men had received the message. The Taliban’s aim had been off, and the rockets had impacted an empty section of the FOB, causing damage but no injuries. They’d been lucky.
This time.
But only a fool relied on luck in a war zone. To be fair, the three men with Coleman weren’t exactly combat novices. All had multiple tours of duty in Afghanistan, Iraq, or both under their belts. Though he’d once been the commander of SEAL Team 6, Scott had left active duty long ago, but his work for Rapp had taken him to those same places. When it came to combat, Coleman didn’t believe in playing fair. He stacked the deck by only choosing to work with the very best.
These three men more than met that qualification.
“Didn’t need a rocket barrage to remind me where I’m at,” Maslick said. “The display at the end of the flight line did the trick.”
Mas’s comment resonated with Scott.
While scrambling for the bunker, the operators had sprinted past a makeshift memorial to the Rangers killed in the recent Chinook shootdown. Seven tan berets rested atop seven rifles thrust muzzle-down into seven pairs of brown desert combat boots. According to scuttlebutt from troops on the C-130, another twelve Rangers had been injured during the crash sequence.
Like most members of the special operations community, Coleman had mixed feelings about the Chinook helicopters he and his fellow SEALs often rode into battle. On the one hand, the aircraft were fast and powerful enough to ascend to the high mountain passes favored by the Taliban. A Chinook’s cavernous crew compartment could deliver the same number of special operators in one trip that would require two Black Hawks or multiple MH Little Bird helicopters.
But the flying dump trucks also came with some negatives.
Though the 160th pilots who piloted the enormous aircraft were capable of astounding feats of airmanship, the massive helicopters would never be called nimble. Chinooks were huge targets, and their large passenger capacity often translated into a devastatingly high casualty list when the helicopters were brought down by enemy fire. In Iraq, Chinooks had been banned from flying during the daylight hours because of their propensity to draw enemy missiles. The recent shootdown was even more troubling from a tactical perspective since the aircraft had been brought down when Chinooks were generally considered invincible—at night.
“Do you know any of the casualties?” Coleman said.
