Corp.
Dr. Tarasov, however, wasn’t under the watchful
eye of multiple international intelligence agencies only because of his employment
with the drug company. He had a friendship with key players in the Al-Jaazeez
terror network—an extremist group that had emerged out of Iran in the 1990s.
More recently, Dr. Tarasov’s friendship had
expanded from Al-Jaazeez to Dr. Haseem Adil. Dr. Adil was an Afghan scientist
associated with the Taliban, and who had participated in the mujahedeen’s asymmetrical
warfare against the invasion by the Soviets in the 1980s. Like Tarasov, Adil
was tall and thin, but those were the only commonalities of their appearances.
Adil was brown-skinned with brown eyes and Tarasov had brown hair and had a
pasty appearance.
Colleen spent another five hours shifting through
the rest of the documents in the file. While the connection between Richard
Henning and Dr. Tarasov was interesting it was still quite tenuous at best.
There was nothing to suggest that Dr. Adil was acquainted with Henning or
conspiring with him in any way.
Moreover, there wasn’t anything in the record to
imply that either party worked with the Haqqai network. Blowing out a
frustrated breath, Colleen got up from her sofa and went to take a shower. It
was past ten o’clock p.m. and she had a lot of moves to make tomorrow.
****
There really was nothing quite as liberating as
free falling down from the heavens and barreling toward the earth at 120 miles
per hour . Joshua pinned his arms to his side and plummeted downward
through the darkened sky.
Over the length of his career, he’d probably been
on over two hundred plane jumps. But Joshua enjoyed it every time. It was
currently around 2100 hours. He and his team were practicing HALO jumps under
the cover of darkness. Because of the covert nature of their operations,
nighttime was the most opportune time to catch their targets at their most
vulnerable moment.
Pulling the activation handle on his pullout pilot
chute to deploy the parachute, Joshua coasted in the air for forty seconds
before he made a running landing onto the grassy ground below.
Team Fourteen had spent the earlier part of the
day running through demolition exercises and hostage rescue courses. The Team
had been in Germany for four weeks since their rescue of former Congressman
Richard Henning. Per their usual practices, they would maintain a continual
schedule of practicing both plane jumps and rescue tactics until their CO gave
them the order to move out. They started every day out with a run and they
ended the day in the same way. In addition, throughout the day they did
various weight-training exercises.
“Pope!”
Joshua looked up from unhooking the parachute from
its harness, to see Luke heading toward him at a fast clip. Luke broke away
from the rest of the soldiers who had already finished their jumps and were
patiently waiting by their vehicles. Per usual, Luke’s unruly hair was
standing on ends as if he had had an electrostatic shock. Someone should
really bless him with the gift of a hair comb.
“Hey man, what’s up?” Joshua asked. Joshua and
his team had had an extremely long day of carrying out hostage rescue and
demolition exercises. Joshua wanted to do nothing more than to go home and
crash—hop into a nice cold shower and hit the sheets for ten straight hours.
However, they were in Germany, which was a real treat considering that many of
their assignments were to exotic desert locales ending in “Stan.” Most of the
guys wanted to hit the town hard tonight.
Luke liked to party with the best of them, and
that gleam in his eye told Joshua that he was going to see if Joshua wanted to
go out with the crew.
“We were all talking while you were up, and we
think that we’re going to head over to O’Malley’s later.”
O’Malley’s was, ironically, a local Irish pub.
The team had been there on
Dr. Tarasov, however, wasn’t under the watchful
eye of multiple international intelligence agencies only because of his employment
with the drug company. He had a friendship with key players in the Al-Jaazeez
terror network—an extremist group that had emerged out of Iran in the 1990s.
More recently, Dr. Tarasov’s friendship had
expanded from Al-Jaazeez to Dr. Haseem Adil. Dr. Adil was an Afghan scientist
associated with the Taliban, and who had participated in the mujahedeen’s asymmetrical
warfare against the invasion by the Soviets in the 1980s. Like Tarasov, Adil
was tall and thin, but those were the only commonalities of their appearances.
Adil was brown-skinned with brown eyes and Tarasov had brown hair and had a
pasty appearance.
Colleen spent another five hours shifting through
the rest of the documents in the file. While the connection between Richard
Henning and Dr. Tarasov was interesting it was still quite tenuous at best.
There was nothing to suggest that Dr. Adil was acquainted with Henning or
conspiring with him in any way.
Moreover, there wasn’t anything in the record to
imply that either party worked with the Haqqai network. Blowing out a
frustrated breath, Colleen got up from her sofa and went to take a shower. It
was past ten o’clock p.m. and she had a lot of moves to make tomorrow.
****
There really was nothing quite as liberating as
free falling down from the heavens and barreling toward the earth at 120 miles
per hour . Joshua pinned his arms to his side and plummeted downward
through the darkened sky.
Over the length of his career, he’d probably been
on over two hundred plane jumps. But Joshua enjoyed it every time. It was
currently around 2100 hours. He and his team were practicing HALO jumps under
the cover of darkness. Because of the covert nature of their operations,
nighttime was the most opportune time to catch their targets at their most
vulnerable moment.
Pulling the activation handle on his pullout pilot
chute to deploy the parachute, Joshua coasted in the air for forty seconds
before he made a running landing onto the grassy ground below.
Team Fourteen had spent the earlier part of the
day running through demolition exercises and hostage rescue courses. The Team
had been in Germany for four weeks since their rescue of former Congressman
Richard Henning. Per their usual practices, they would maintain a continual
schedule of practicing both plane jumps and rescue tactics until their CO gave
them the order to move out. They started every day out with a run and they
ended the day in the same way. In addition, throughout the day they did
various weight-training exercises.
“Pope!”
Joshua looked up from unhooking the parachute from
its harness, to see Luke heading toward him at a fast clip. Luke broke away
from the rest of the soldiers who had already finished their jumps and were
patiently waiting by their vehicles. Per usual, Luke’s unruly hair was
standing on ends as if he had had an electrostatic shock. Someone should
really bless him with the gift of a hair comb.
“Hey man, what’s up?” Joshua asked. Joshua and
his team had had an extremely long day of carrying out hostage rescue and
demolition exercises. Joshua wanted to do nothing more than to go home and
crash—hop into a nice cold shower and hit the sheets for ten straight hours.
However, they were in Germany, which was a real treat considering that many of
their assignments were to exotic desert locales ending in “Stan.” Most of the
guys wanted to hit the town hard tonight.
Luke liked to party with the best of them, and
that gleam in his eye told Joshua that he was going to see if Joshua wanted to
go out with the crew.
“We were all talking while you were up, and we
think that we’re going to head over to O’Malley’s later.”
O’Malley’s was, ironically, a local Irish pub.
The team had been there on
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