Tom Clancy's op-centre_ mirror image - Tom Clancy [103]
"I understand."
"Extraction time is at the bridge I told you about earlier," Rodgers said. "Pickup is exactly at midnight. You'll have eight minutes before the extraction craft leaves, so make sure you get there. The Congressional Intelligence Committee wouldn't give us any more time than that."
"We'll be there, sir."
Rodgers said, "I've got some serious reservations about this one, Charlie, but there doesn't seem to be any alternative. If it were up to me, I'd've hit the train from the air-- but for some reason, Congress frowns on killing enemy soldiers. It's better to risk our own."
"It's the job we signed up for, sir," Squires said. "And you know me, General. It's the kind of job I like."
"I know," Rodgers said. "But the officer in charge of the train, a junior lieutenant named Nikita Orlov, isn't one of those kids who joined the Army for a regular meal. According to what little we have on file about him, he's a fighter. The son of a hero cosmonaut who has something to prove."
"Good," Squires said. "I'd hate coming all this way just to walk through a mission, sir."
"Colonel, it's me," Rodgers said sternly. "Save the bravura for the troops. More than wanting the train stopped, I want my Strikers back. Do you understand?"
"I understand, sir," Squires said.
After wishing him good luck, Rodgers hung up and Squires handed the phone back to Ishi Honda. The Radio Officer returned to his seat and Squires looked at his watch, which he hadn't bothered to reset as they zipped through the time zones.
Another eight hours, he thought. Folding his hands on his belt, he extended his legs and shut his eyes. Before joining Striker just seven months before, he'd spent time at the Army's Natick Research and Development Center outside of Boston. There, he'd taken part in experiments designed to produce a uniform that instantly mimicked its surroundings like a chameleon. He'd worn uniforms with light-sensitive sensors that adjusted the light output of the cloth. He'd sat around while chemists toyed with the silk gene to create a synthetic fiber that changed color automatically. He'd tried to move in a comparatively bulky but remarkable EPS-- electrophoresis suit-- that had liquid dye poured between layers of plastic fabric, electrically charged particles coloring one or the other fabrics depending upon where and how strongly an electric field was applied. He remembered thinking at the time that before the century was out, camouflage suits, invisible Stealth tanks, and robot probes could make it possible for the United States to wage virtually bloodless wars. How the scientists would become the heroes, and not the soldiers.
He was surprised to find that that thought had saddened him, for while no soldier wanted to die, part of what drove all the fighters he ever knew was the desire to test themselves, to be willing to risk their lives for their country or their comrades. Without that danger, that price, that hard-fought victory, he wondered if anyone would cherish their freedoms as much.
With that thought on his mind, and Rodgers's voice still resonant in his ears, Squires drifted asleep thinking that at least there would always be chicken fights in the base pool, his son on his shoulders, and Private George falling backward, a look of surprise on his face
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Tuesday, 2:06 P.M., St. Petersburg
Several hours before reaching the coast of Russia, Peggy James and David George got twenty seven minutes to taste the clean morning air of the Gulf of Finland. Then they reentered the mini-sub and undertook the second half of their journey. It was less than Peggy had wanted, but enough to keep her going.
An hour before reaching the coast of Russia, Captain Rydman lowered himself from his perch in the con and squatted in the narrow space between the hull and his passengers. Both Peggy and George had already checked their gear in the waterproof rucksacks and were struggling into their