A War of Shadows

SEVENTEEN

Twelve people sat in a small tent watching the instructor, six males and six females. For the last two weeks they’d lived together, trained together, practically showered together and washed behind each other’s ears. But, aside from Sam and Suzy, none knew the names of the others.

“In two days,” the political officer, who seemed to be an Arab told them, “you will leave Camp Liberty. You will travel independently, although if you wish a pair can go together. No more. You will be provided with all of the identification and background you will need to pass routine muster, but you will not be able to withstand a detailed check. Basically, you are all in the U.S. Army, all of you will have military IDs, uniforms, and orders. Act military, think military, and use their system to get you where you are going.”

Suzy, who’d given up smoking anything but dope while at the camp, was back on the weeds now. They were foul-smelling, a Middle Eastern brand with Arabic writing on the pack. She lit one, then looked up at the instructor. Sam stared at her; he knew that manner, that gleam in her eyes. The old Suzy was back now, back in action, and she was loving every minute of it.

“Okay, so where are we going?” she asked.

The instructor nodded at a projectionist in the rear, the battery-powered lighting went out, and a slide projector came on.

“On August twenty-seventh you will be dropped at various points up to six hundred miles apart up and down the Atlantic Coast, far enough from each other to minimize suspicion of so many independent personnel going to an obscure place. Your orders will state that you are reporting for duty at Catoctin Station, the alternate Pentagon in the Catoctin Mountains just north of Frederick, Maryland, about a hundred kilometers from Washington, D.C., or Baltimore, Maryland. You won’t be going there, though. Instead, you’ll be heading here.”

The slide, which had showed Maryland, then Frederick County, flipped again to show a closeup of the Catoctin area. The instructor walked to the screen and pointed to a spot just to the right and slightly south of Catoctin National Park. It was still parkland, and there seemed to be a lake there.

“At this recreation area,” the instructor continued, “you will use the pay phone to call a number we will give you. You will call it, say your Camp Liberty number, and hang up. You won’t be noticed—the place is currently off limits for tourists, and is used entirely by military personnel in the area to take days off. Relax and do the same. Someone will contact you there after they’ve looked you over and determined that you are indeed you. They will bring you to an old farmhouse we have prepared for you, and there you will wait until our people get to you and tell you where your weapons are.”

That intrigued another_ of the team. “Weapons?” The instructor nodded. “Standard pistols, rifles, and other equipment will await you in the farmhouse, of course. However, you will have to troop through some woodlands to get your share of blue cylinders.”

They understood what that meant. They had practiced with mockups.

“You will, sorry, have to carry them back to your base, check them out, and store them. A supply of antidote and a large supply of syringes will be included as well for that particular strain, although, as you now know, the antidote is only effective for three to five days. That is enough, of course, but don’t take it too early and feel protected. After you are set up, we will again contact you with your target, date, and equipment you will need to carry out our task. Please rest assured that we will provide material to effectively paint and disguise the cylinders. Anyone walking in the U.S. right now with a blue sprayer of any kind would get hung on the spot by locals. We had to place the caches before the military emergency ever was declared, though, so blue and exposed they will be when you carry them back to base. Remember that!”

“What happens then?” Sam asked.

“Huh?” The instructor was taken aback by the question, and didn’t seem to know quite what was on the big man’s mind.

“After we accomplish the mission,” Cornish said. “Then what?”

“Why, you get the hell out of there and back to base, and then your target gets very sick, that’s what,” the political officer replied, still puzzled.

“No, no,” the big man pressed. “After that. Then what happens to us?”

“You’ll have to stay underground for quite some time,” the instructor said. “After all, when all of the teams strike all over the nation at the same time, there will be all hell breaking loose.” That was true enough. “After that, we will have other work for you. I have already told you as much as I dare. One or more of you could get picked up, you know.”

The briefing ended abruptly at that point, and they walked back to their quarters. Suzy was silent for a little while, then turned to him. “What’s the matter? Why did you press him like that?”

He frowned. “I don’t like it. There’s something wrong here, something smelly. You don’t feel it?”

She shook her head. “I think you’ve just got the willies.”

“It’s more than that,” he insisted. “Well, like, for instance, why did he tell us about the farmhouse? If any of us were picked up, the pigs could sweep every farmhouse in that county and the others on all sides, looking for one with a new group of tenants who roughly fit descriptions they’d have.”

“You’re crazy,” she said. “Ten to one they’ve had it established for quite a while, with people who look kind of like us. You worry too much.” She reached up, kissed him, then swatted him one in the behind. It didn’t shake him out of it.

“Maybe you don’t worry enough,” he said softly, wondering if in fact she ever worried at all.