The Enemy Within

They came out into a long corridor running the width of the chancery. Gunfire echoed in all directions as his troops began the ugly business of clearing the building room by room. Now where?

The sergeant major pointed to a painted sign in Farsi on the corridor wall. “The CP’s downstairs! Go left!”

Thorn nodded. It made perfect sense for Taleh and his top staff to set up shop in the building’s reinforced basement. Their primary concern would have been an American air raid not a commando attack.

Weapons ready, they moved down the corridor, looking for stairs leading down.

Auxiliary Command Post Three “Sir!”

Amir Taleh looked up from the maps he’d been studying and saw Kazemi’s agonized face. “Yes, Captain?”

“The Americans have broken through my defences. They are inside the building.” The young aide swallowed hard. “You and the others must leave this place before it is too late!”

“Agreed.” Taleh nodded, still staggered by the speed of the American attack. Who could have dreamed that they would demonstrate such audacity? Still, all was not yet lost. He could regain control over his invasion forces at another of the alternate command posts. He turned to his deputy. “Assemble the senior staff, Hashemi.”

Most were already prepared, clutching briefcases stuffed full of hastily gathered maps and documents. Surrounded by Taleh’s personal bodyguards, the group hurried toward the nearest staircase.

The Chancery Thorn crouched at the top of the stairs, watching Diaz get set. They’d heard the clatter of boots and the metallic clink of weapons drawing closer for the last several seconds. Whoever was coming up had almost reached the bend in the stairs.

He nodded sharply and his lips formed the unspoken command, “Now!”

The sergeant major yanked the pin out of the fragmentation grenade he was holding and tossed it down the stairwell.

Taleh heard something clattering down the stairs from above and froze. A small cylindrical shape bounced into view, rolling toward them. His eyes widened in shocked recognition.

Without hesitation, Captain Farhad Kazemi threw himself forward onto the grenade just before it went off.

WHUMMP. Thorn felt concussion punch into his lungs, and buried his face against his arms to shield his eyes from the smoke and debris billowing up out of the stairwell. Then he was on his feet, charging downward with Diaz at his side.

They rounded the bend.

Iranian officers and enlisted men jammed the staircase in a tangled knot. Some were bleeding. All of them were dazed. Only one, though, was dead the victim of his own sacrifice.

Thorn opened fire with his submachine gun, sweeping from left to right. Diaz took the other side. Each burst sent one or more Iranians tumbling down the stairs. It was a methodical, mechanical slaughter. Those who were armed were too closely crowded together to use their own weapons effectively.

He felt a single bullet tear a burning gash across his upper left arm and shot the man who’d winged him. His finger eased on the trigger. He couldn’t see any more targets any more men to kill.

Then Thorn spotted movement near Diaz out of the corner of his eye. He started to spin in that direction. He was too late. He was too slow.

A man in a blood-spattered uniform reared up from the stairs and fired a pistol into Roberto Diaz at point-blank range, aiming upward. The bullet caught the short, stocky sergeant major in the throat. He toppled backward with a surprised look frozen forever on his face.

“You son of a bitch!” Thorn squeezed off a burst that slammed the Iranian back against the wall.

“Oh, Jesus.” He knelt beside his friend, fumbling desperately for a field dressing. But TOW Diaz was beyond his help.

“Peter…”

Thorn spun back toward the man he’d shot toward the man who had once been another friend.

General Amir Taleh stared up at him, breathing heavily, bleeding from several wounds in the chest and stomach.

Thorn stared down in contempt. “You bastard! I trusted you. I looked up to you. I thought you were a man of honor not a god damned terrorist who would kill women and children!”

Taleh’s face twisted in sudden pain. “What I did to your country, Peter … You must understand. It was war.” “No, sir,” Thorn said coldly, “it was murder.” He raised his submachine gun, aimed carefully at Taleh’s head, and fired three more shots one after the other.

Over Tehran

Four UH-1N Hueys flew low across the Iranian capital, dodging over rooftops and around taller buildings to throw off any ground fire. They were heading south. A tiny, rocketarrned AH-6 gunship paced them, ready to pounce at the first sign of trouble.

Aboard the lead helicopter, Colonel Peter Thorn sat silently beside a covered stretcher. Unwilling to leave the Iranians anything to desecrate, the soldiers of the NEMESIS force had brought their dead out with them. He shivered and stared down at his shaking hands.