LITMIR.BIZ

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generators. Second team makes entry to the building and then sends two to retrieve the data while the rest deal with any human elements. Outer team will provide perimeter and egress security, as well as mission failsafe.”

      Cyrus nodded, impressed with his friend and colleague. “Excellent tactical plan, Major Braden. Exactly what I would’ve done. I’d say the decision’s been made.”

      “Thank you, Colonel.”

      “You’ll lead the inside team.”

      Braden looked surprised. “I don’t know the job.”

      “You know it as well as I do.”

      “Yes, sir, but I was trained to do it only in the event you could not.”

      “Nonsense. There’s no difference.”

      “Sir, with all due respect, I strongly suggest you reconsider.”

      Cyrus didn’t look at Braden as he responded in short fashion, “I already have, Major. It’s not a request. You will lead the primary team and you will accomplish the mission objectives as they’ve been given to us. Understood?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “Then let’s move out.”

      Braden nodded and turned to the team members he would now be leading on the mission. As he briefed them on the change in plans, Cyrus sighed. He’d considered sticking to the original mission parameters but he wanted his friend to take credit for what he knew would be another success. Their employer, who’d expressed reservations about bringing Riley Braden into the fold from the beginning, had to know that Braden had as much command ability and skill as Cyrus. This would be Braden’s chance to prove it without even being aware Cyrus was putting him to the test. Cyrus had learned long ago one mark of a good leader was to set up those in his command to succeed whenever possible. Not only did it boost morale but it also instilled confidence in self—not to mention what it did for unit cohesion.

      The teams automatically performed a last check of equipment and then broke into approach formation. Every man knew what to do, where to stage in relationship to every other man, and what their individual responsibilities. They’d trained for this dozens of times until they’d had it down like clockwork.

      The exterior team arrived first and two men went to work on the fence, cutting links with the marked precision of professionals. Cyrus knew they’d practiced, but his chest swelled with pride as he watched them in action. Within thirty seconds they’d made the ingress.

      With a nod from Cyrus, Braden gestured to his team and they moved through the hold. The two squad weapons men took point and then Braden. The remaining trio proceeded after him. They moved across the field at a breakneck clip and located the power boxes stationed on the exterior of the main building.

      Braden knelt and flicked his thumb twice at two of his team members. The demo guys went to work on the boxes, priming them with the charges. Braden risked a glance over his shoulder and saw Cyrus making his way through the fence in the same way Braden’s team had just a minute earlier.

      Once the charges were set, Braden and his men broke from their positions and headed toward the rear door where they’d planned to make their entry. They were nearly there when the charges blew the power boxes apart. Every interior light in the building went out, as well as power to a small external building. One of the men blew the lock off the door with a small roll of self-detonating plastic explosive and within seconds Braden’s team had gained access.

      “You have five minutes.” Cyrus’s voice resounded in Braden’s headset. “Mark T-minus five, starting now. Radio silence from this point.”

      “Copy,” Braden replied.

      The six men pushed up the darkened corridor, moving smoothly as one unit. They followed a standard fire-and-maneuver pattern, leap-frogging in pairs as they approached their objective.

      They reached the data room unmolested and Braden gestured for four of his men to fan out while the other would provide cover while he made his entry. The door proved no match for the pencil detonator that shot the bolt lock inward as if it had been fired from a potato gun. Braden eased the door open and snatched the red-lens flashlight from his equipment harness.

      He managed to get about three feet inside before bullets crashed into the chest of his comrade and drove the man into the door frame. Braden wondered how he managed to avoid a similar fate even as he threw himself the floor and a fresh volley burned the air where he’d stood a millisecond earlier.

      Braden brought his Steyr Aug Para into play and triggered a burst in the direction of the muzzle-flashes. The rounds bounced off a solid object marked by the sparks from their impact. It took Braden a moment to realize that he’d been firing into bulletproof glass.

      Braden rolled onto his back and yanked an HE grenade from his harness. He primed the hand bomb and tossed it overhead before jumping to his feet and rushing toward the door. He threw himself around the corner and landed on his belly just as the grenade blew. Red, yellow and orange flame whooshed through the open door.

      “We’re blown!” he shouted at his men. “Retreat!”

      None of them had to be told twice, two taking point and two more providing rear cover with Braden between them. The men dashed up the hallway at full sprint and exited the building in time to see a firefight had already ensued between Cyrus and his team.

      Braden and his men spread out and engaged whatever targets presented. The air came alive with reports from dozens of automatic weapons on both sides. To the observer it would’ve seemed as if a small war had erupted in the USDA’s “research facility” and it would’ve been a bizarre sight, at best.

      Braden managed to rendezvous with Cyrus, miraculously avoiding death in the process.

      “What happened?” Cyrus demanded during a lull in the shooting.

      “Ambush,” Braden replied as he sighted on an enemy gunner and squeezed the trigger. “They were waiting for us.”

      “Blown immediately? From the start?”

      “It would seem so,” Braden said through clenched teeth as he fired at another target, missing by a narrow margin.

      “You’ve ordered a retreat?”

      Braden nodded.

      “We can’t stay here,” Cyrus said.

      “You mean you want to leave them?”

      “They have their orders.”‘

      “Sir, we have to—”

      “Do it, Major. Just do it!”

      Braden didn’t hesitate, knowing orders were orders. He and Cyrus scrambled to their feet and fired a few extra short bursts to help cover their escape through the perimeter fence. They had a vehicle waiting in the woods, a late-model custom van. It was obvious they’d been expected, so the success of their getaway was by no means guaranteed. But one thing Cyrus and Braden agreed on as they made their way to the van, there would be a day of reckoning.

      There would be payback and it would be a revenge of the sweetest kind.

       CHAPTER THREE

      Stony Man Farm, Virginia

      The five battle-hardened warriors of Phoenix Force sat attentively as Harold Brognola, head of the most covert special operations agency in America, opened the briefing.

      “We’re long on intelligence and short on time, so let’s get right to it,” Brognola said. He looked at Barbara Price and nodded.

      Price, Stony Man’s mission controller, tapped the key on the table-top keyboard in front of her and the operations center conference room lights dimmed. A moment later the face of a young man with dirty-blond hair appeared on the 72-inch LED screen at one end of the

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