Jack Ryan 10 - Rainbow Six by Tom Clancy

as their personal sidearms, along with the Hechler & Koch MP-10 submachine gun, the new version of the venerable MP-5, chambered instead for the 10-mm Smith & Wesson cartridge developed in the 1980s for the American FBI. Without saying anything, Ding picked up his weapon, donned his earprotectors, and started going for the silhouette targets, set five meters away. There, he saw, all eight holes in the head. But Dieter Weber, next to him, had grouped his shots in one ragged hole, and Paddy Connolly had made what appeared to be one not-so-ragged hole less than an inch across, all between the target's eyes, without touching the eyes themselves. Like most American shooters, Chavez had believed that Europeans didn't know pistols worth a damn. Evidently, training corrected that, he saw.
    Next, people picked up their H&Ks, which just about anyone could shoot well because of the superb diopter sights. Ding walked along the firing line, watching his people engage pop-up steel plates the size and shape of human heads. Driven up by compressed air, they fell back down instantly with a metallic clang. Ding ended up behind First Sergeant Vega, who finished his magazine and turned.
    “Told you they were good, Ding.”
    “How long they been here?”
    “Oh, 'bout a week. Used to running five miles, sir.”
Julio added with a smile. “Remember the summer camp we went to in Colorado?”
    Most important of all, Ding thought, was the steady aim despite the run, which was supposed to get people pumped up, and simulate the stress of a real combat situation. But these bastards were as steady as fucking bronze statues. Formerly a squad leader in the Seventh Light Infantry Division, he'd once been one of the toughest, fittest, and most effective soldiers in his country's uniform, which was why John Clark had tapped him for a job in the Agency - and in that capacity he'd pulled off some tense and tough missions in the field. It had been a very long time indeed since Domingo Chavez had felt the least bit inadequate about anything. But now quiet voices were speaking into his ear.
    “Who's the toughest?” he asked Vega.
    “Weber. I heard stories about the German mountain school. Well, they be true, 'mano. Dieter isn't entirely human. Good in hand-to-hand, good pistol, damned good with a rifle, and I think he could run a deer down if he had to, then rip it apart barehanded.” Chavez had to remind himself that being called “good” in a combat kill by a graduate of Ranger school and Fort Bragg's special-operations schools wasn't quite the same as from guy in a corner bar. Julio was about as tough as they came.
    “The smartest?”
    “Connolly. All those SAS guys are tops. Us Americans have to play a little catchup ball. But we will,” Vega assured him. “Don't sweat it, Ding. You'll keep up with us, after a week or so. Just like it was in Colorado.”
    Chavez didn't really want to be reminded of that job. Too many friends lost in the mountains of Colombia, doing a job that their country had never acknowledged. Watching his men finish off their training rounds told him much about them. If anyone had missed a single shot, he failed to notice it. Every man fired off exactly a hundred rounds, the standard daily regimen for men who fired five hundred per working week on routine training, as opposed to more carefully directed drill. That would start tomorrow.
    “Okay,” John concluded. “we'll have a staff meeting every morning at eight-fifteen for routine matters, and a more formal one every Friday afternoon. My door is always open-including the one at home. People, if you need me, there's a phone next to my shower. Now, I want to get out and see the shooters. Anything else? Good. We stand adjourned.” Everyone stood and shuffled out the door. Stanley remained.
    “That went well,” Alistair observed, pouring himself another cup of tea. “Especially for one not accustomed to bureaucratic life.”
    “Shows, eh?” Clark asked with a