SEAL Team 666: A Novel

They were waiting for an agency jet. The initial infiltration plan had been High Altitude/High Opening—HAHO. They’d switched that to High Altitude/Low Opening—HALO. They’d changed it yet again to Low Altitude/Low Opening—LALO. The plan was for the jet to cruise in just above the jungle canopy east of the Thaton airport. SEAL Team 666 would jump out the back and land before anyone noticed their exit.

It was a simple plan.

But there were problems with it.

The United States had no diplomatic relations with the government of Myanmar. Among other things, this meant that no U.S. citizens or their conveyances were allowed into or around the country. Additionally, the government had made it known that they were pretty pissed at the posture of the United States against their regime and in support of the Nobel Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. In fact, a high-level minister was quoted as saying that he “wouldn’t spit into the mouth of an American, even if he was dying of thirst”—translated, of course. The bottom line was that they were not wanted and the Myanmar government would be on the lookout for any sort of American intervention into their internal politics.

Another problem was that neither Yaya nor Walker had ever done a LALO jump—a jump of less than nine hundred feet. Since it took three hundred feet for the chute to deploy, that left six hundred feet to steer the chute to safety.

They also had the wrong parachutes. The MC-4s were designed for free fall. They were highly maneuverable and agile, because the parachute canopies were relatively small. After all, it had more than thirty thousand feet to scoop air. But now they had less than nine hundred feet. They needed a much larger canopy. They also needed something they could leave behind that wouldn’t identify them as American.

The final decision had been to pair Chinese cargo chutes with drag chutes. The drag chutes would be deployed from an open air ramp. The wind would rip these back, thus drawing out the yards of material that composed the cargo chutes. Without the drag chutes, the cargo chutes wouldn’t have enough time to open. But with them, opening of the cargo chutes would be simultaneous to the SEALs’ exiting the aircraft. And when the cargo chutes deployed, they’d reduce their speed to almost nothing.

Then they’d flutter gently to the ground like a feather from the ass of an eagle.

Simple, Laws had said.

Piece of cake, Ruiz had said.

Deal with it, Holmes had said.

Walker watched Hoover play for a while. It was going to be toughest on the dog. Walker hoped the pooch was going to be okay. He had a feeling they’d need her before it was all over.

The sound of an aircraft reached him. He craned his neck and looked for it in the sky. Finally he spied it and tracked its approach.

Laws came up to join him. “You look nervous.”

Walker shrugged. “Always nervous before an op.”

“All the changes don’t help, either.”

“It is what it is,” Walker said flatly. He knew he was nervous. Talking about it would only make him more so.

Laws seemed to realize this, because he shut up until the plane was coming in for a landing.

It was a big cargo jet, painted yellow with red stripes and letters. Walker recognized the logo. DSL—WE DELIVER WORLDWIDE. He chuckled and shook his head. Count on the agency to find the sort of plane that would be able to land at an airport in a country that despised Americans. Not only was DSL not an American-owned company, it was essentially the mail, and even the most backwater, right-wing dictatorships liked to get packages filled with sleek Western merchandise. It landed and taxied to a stop near the Starlifter.

“Okay, SEALs. Get your gear and load up. We got a delivery to make.”

Walker did a double take. It appeared as if their fearless leader had just made a joke.

And you know what? It was almost funny.

47

KADWAN. TWO WEEKS EARLIER.

The city was theirs. Their power was unimaginable. No one could stand against them. They rose as one, two souls within one body, and stood amid the ruins of what had once been a church, a ridiculous symbol to one of the angry gods the meek insisted upon worshipping. A dead priest lay at his feet, unable to comprehend the reality of Chi Long even when he’d met him face-to-face.

A thrall came to them. He wore the suit of a policeman, but he was a Karen, one of their people. The thrall leaned back his head and knelt. “My lord, they are ready.”

“Have they prepared themselves?”

“They have, my lord.”

“You have done well.” Chi Long reached out with jagged nails and sliced the man’s neck from ear to ear. The man sighed and seemed to smile beatifically, then collapsed as his body bled out.