Read Online Last Man Standing by David Baldacci - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: David Baldacci
Ads: Link
down the main hallway and lingered in front of the photo displays of past HRT operations. Here there were visual
images of many stunning successes. The credo of hostage rescue was, “Speed, surprise and violence of action,” and HRT put
big-time action to those words. Web looked at a photo of a terrorist on the most-wanted list who had been plucked from international
waters (“grabs,” they called them) like an unsuspecting crab taken from a sand hole and whisked away to stand trial with a
lifelong prison term to follow. There were photos of a joint international task force operation on a drug farm in a Latin
American country. And finally there was a picture of a very tense hostage situation in a high-rise government building in
Chicago. The result was all hostages were saved, with three of the five hostage-takers dead. Unfortunately, it didn’t always
work that way.
He walked outside the admin building and observed the lone tree there. It was a species of the state tree of Kansas, planted
there in memory of the HRT operator who had been killed in a training accident and who had hailed from there. Each time Web
had passed that tree he had said a silent prayer that it would be the only one they would ever have to plant. So much for
answered prayers. Soon they’d have a damn forest here.
Web really needed to be doing something, anything that would make him not feel like a total failure. He went to the equipment
cage, snagged a .308 snipe rifle and some ammo and headed back out. He needed to calm down and, ironically, firing guns did
that for him, as it required a precision and focus that would block out all other thoughts, however troubling.
He passed the HRT’s original headquarters building, which was narrow and tall and looked like a glorified grain silo instead
of home for an elite law enforcement unit. Then he stood and looked out at the sheered-off hillside where one of the shooting
ranges was situated. There was a new thousand-yard rifle range, and work crews were in the process of leveling an adjacent
forest in order to add to the HRT’s ever-growing complex, which also included a new indoor shooting range facility. Behind
the outdoor shooting range, the trees were leafy green. It had always seemed an odd juxtaposition to Web: nature’s beautiful
colors serving as a backdrop to where he had stood for so many years learning better ways to kill. Yet he was the good guy,
and that made it all right. At least that’s what the bill of goods that came with the badge had very strongly implied.
He set up his targets. Web was going to play a game of sniper’s poker. The cards were slightly fanned out across the target
holder such that only the tiniest portion of each card, other than the front card, was visible. The goal was to build a winning
hand. The trick was you could only count a card that you hit cleanly. If your round even nicked another card, you couldn’t
claim the card you were shooting at. And you only got five shots. The margin of error was impossibly tiny. It was just the
sort of nerve-wracking task to relax a person, if that person happened to be an HRT grunt.
Web set himself up a hundred yards away from the targets. Lying flat on the ground, he placed a small beanbag under the .308’s
stock to support his upper body weight as he settled in. He aligned his body with the recoil path to minimize muzzle jump;
his hips were flat against the ground, his knees spread shoulder-width and ankles flat to the ground to shrink his target
profile in case someone was aiming at him. Web dialed the proper settings on the scope’s calibration wheel and figured in
wind too. The humidity was high, so he added an extra half-minute click. As a sniper, every shot he had ever fired during
a mission had been recorded in his log. It was a very valuable record of environmental effects on bullets fired and also might
explain why a sniper had missed a target, which was
images of many stunning successes. The credo of hostage rescue was, “Speed, surprise and violence of action,” and HRT put
big-time action to those words. Web looked at a photo of a terrorist on the most-wanted list who had been plucked from international
waters (“grabs,” they called them) like an unsuspecting crab taken from a sand hole and whisked away to stand trial with a
lifelong prison term to follow. There were photos of a joint international task force operation on a drug farm in a Latin
American country. And finally there was a picture of a very tense hostage situation in a high-rise government building in
Chicago. The result was all hostages were saved, with three of the five hostage-takers dead. Unfortunately, it didn’t always
work that way.
He walked outside the admin building and observed the lone tree there. It was a species of the state tree of Kansas, planted
there in memory of the HRT operator who had been killed in a training accident and who had hailed from there. Each time Web
had passed that tree he had said a silent prayer that it would be the only one they would ever have to plant. So much for
answered prayers. Soon they’d have a damn forest here.
Web really needed to be doing something, anything that would make him not feel like a total failure. He went to the equipment
cage, snagged a .308 snipe rifle and some ammo and headed back out. He needed to calm down and, ironically, firing guns did
that for him, as it required a precision and focus that would block out all other thoughts, however troubling.
He passed the HRT’s original headquarters building, which was narrow and tall and looked like a glorified grain silo instead
of home for an elite law enforcement unit. Then he stood and looked out at the sheered-off hillside where one of the shooting
ranges was situated. There was a new thousand-yard rifle range, and work crews were in the process of leveling an adjacent
forest in order to add to the HRT’s ever-growing complex, which also included a new indoor shooting range facility. Behind
the outdoor shooting range, the trees were leafy green. It had always seemed an odd juxtaposition to Web: nature’s beautiful
colors serving as a backdrop to where he had stood for so many years learning better ways to kill. Yet he was the good guy,
and that made it all right. At least that’s what the bill of goods that came with the badge had very strongly implied.
He set up his targets. Web was going to play a game of sniper’s poker. The cards were slightly fanned out across the target
holder such that only the tiniest portion of each card, other than the front card, was visible. The goal was to build a winning
hand. The trick was you could only count a card that you hit cleanly. If your round even nicked another card, you couldn’t
claim the card you were shooting at. And you only got five shots. The margin of error was impossibly tiny. It was just the
sort of nerve-wracking task to relax a person, if that person happened to be an HRT grunt.
Web set himself up a hundred yards away from the targets. Lying flat on the ground, he placed a small beanbag under the .308’s
stock to support his upper body weight as he settled in. He aligned his body with the recoil path to minimize muzzle jump;
his hips were flat against the ground, his knees spread shoulder-width and ankles flat to the ground to shrink his target
profile in case someone was aiming at him. Web dialed the proper settings on the scope’s calibration wheel and figured in
wind too. The humidity was high, so he added an extra half-minute click. As a sniper, every shot he had ever fired during
a mission had been recorded in his log. It was a very valuable record of environmental effects on bullets fired and also might
explain why a sniper had missed a target, which was
Similar Books
