22. Kian
KIAN
T he whole team was assembling in Kian's office again. Once everyone was settled around the conference table, Turner consulted his notes for a brief moment, then set his yellow pad down and looked at Kian, waiting for the go-signal.
"We are all eager to hear your plan," Kian said.
Turner nodded. "I assume all of you agree that we need to eliminate whoever is threatening Losham's position."
"Do we?" Toven asked. "I'm sure the list is extensive. How are we supposed to do that?"
"At the minimum, the list includes all of the junior brothers and senior commanders who were passed over for Bertram.
Following our instructions, Losham nominated Bertram as general of the Brotherhood's army, and we hope he is loyal, or as loyal as anyone in that nest of vipers is to anyone other than Navuh.
That's good for Losham, but bad for everyone who believed that position would go to them.
Now they have to answer to a chief of staff whom none of them had considered a candidate until Losham selected him.
The junior brothers feel that their rights have been subverted and they are not happy. "
Turner glanced at Lokan and Kalugal. "Am I right so far?"
The question had been presented more out of courtesy than Turner actually needing Kalugal and Lokan's confirmation of his assessment.
Lokan nodded. "With the seniors gone, the juniors expected to be promoted, and some of them were, but others were not, and the most important position went to an outsider. I have no doubt they are plotting to get rid of Losham."
"Therefore, the need to eliminate them," Turner said. "And the plan is simple. We get the juniors who pose a threat and all other commanders that Losham indicates as adversarial in one spot, and we terminate them in one fell swoop."
"I'm sure it's perfectly clear in your head," Kalugal said. "But us simpletons need a more detailed explanation."
Kian chuckled. Kalugal was the last person he would think of as a simpleton, but perhaps that was why he felt confident to call himself that.
Turner leaned back in his chair. "Step one of the plan: Losham summons Bertram to his office on the resort side. In person."
"The tunnel's still down," Kalugal said.
"That's the point. Bertram will have to travel overland, mostly using unpaved tracks.
It's a doable but unpleasant journey that will take him a long time to complete.
Step two of the plan is Losham commanding Bertram to convene the troublesome commanders and junior brothers for a video conference with him.
He can call it a strategy session, a loyalty summit, or whatever pretext he can come up with that will sound legit and not raise suspicions. "
Kian smiled. "Then we attack and blow that location to kingdom come?"
"That's right," Turner said. "Losham gives us the coordinates of the building ahead of time, we program them into the guided missiles, just as we did with the connecting tunnel, and the munitions navigate to that location with a maximal possible error of plus or minus three meters.
The only thing we will need to confirm before we launch them is that everyone we intend to target is indeed present in the room.
Losham can do that while he is hosting the call, as he will have a live visual feed on everyone in attendance.
That will leave only the question of how much ordnance we'll need directed at the structure to assure none of the immortals in that room will be able to regenerate after the explosion. "
Onegus crossed his arms over his chest. "We will need to know how deep underground that conference room is.
The Brotherhood's military headquarters are located mostly below ground, but not deep.
They built them like that not to withstand a bombing but to hide the infrastructure from passing ships, and later, from overhead air traffic. Cooling was also a consideration."
Turner nodded. "We need information on the fortifications of the structure as well, and Losham can provide that."
"A partial collapse, or even a total collapse, may not be sufficient to kill them all," Lokan said. "You bring a building down on immortals, and all you've done is put them in stasis under the rubble. The bombing needs to be massive."
"Correct." Turner tapped his pad. "The typical kinetic force needed will not suffice here. We're not trying to crush them. We're trying to disintegrate them, and preferably to incinerate the remains to nothing. We will calculate the ordnance needed for the task."
"The structure itself should not present a unique challenge," Kalugal said. "It's not built as a fortified bunker. It's just a well-built underground facility, and a rather shallow underground facility at that."
Turner nodded. "That's close to ideal for us because the earth overhead traps everything in.
If we breach the roof and then put an incendiary or thermobaric payload into a sealed underground room, the heat and pressure have nowhere to go.
It becomes a high-pressure oven. Everything inside cooks, and keeps cooking, at temperatures nothing organic survives.
The very thing that makes their headquarters invisible from the air is what will turn the room into a death trap. "
Turner looked at Kian. "We need structural details from Losham.
How far down the chamber sits, what it's built from, and how thick the overhead layer is.
Educated guesses, if conservative enough, will suffice, as my plan is to exceed what we will reasonably need by a wide margin in terms of firepower. "
"I assume that we will need large drones for this kind of firepower," Kian said. "Can you get them?"
Turner rewarded him with one of his rare smiles. "I can. I spoke with my supplier, and once you approve the number, he will procure the drones. He can get them to us in less than a month."
Kian frowned. "How did you find someone willing to sell us military-grade drones in the middle of a worldwide shortage? Everyone's buying, nobody's selling, and the ones that do sell go to governments who ordered them two years ago."
He had a feeling that Turner's supplier was fencing equipment from the military, which was highly illegal and could put Turner in trouble.
"I have my sources," Turner said.
"I don't want you to take unnecessary risks by sourcing equipment from actors that may turn on us."
Turner arched a brow. "Most of my suppliers are unsavory. Who do you think is dealing in that kind of stuff? But I can vouch for their reliability in terms of discretion and secrecy."
"Some are shadier than others." Kian crossed his arms over his chest. "I don't want this to bite you or us in the ass later."
"Don't worry." Turner waved a hand in dismissal.
"We are all professionals in this business.
The drones are used, and they will be on loan to us.
As you said, no one is selling. They are operational, capable of carrying what we need, and there's no paper trail because those deals are made inside a trusted network of players who operate on an honor system. "
Kian held his gaze a moment longer, then let it go. Turner's grey-market arrangements were keeping the clan supplied, and he trusted him. "How much do they want for the lease?"
Turner pointed to a number on his yellow pad. "It's steep, but not outrageous given the shortages. Beggars and choosers and all that. I won't find a better offer. The number below is for the munitions."
Kian's breath caught for a moment. That number dwarfed the one the supplier was asking for leasing them the drones. Kian wasn't a stranger to spending big amounts, but that was a hard pill to swallow.
"That's a lot of money to secure Losham's position. The clan's money. To justify such expense, I need to make sure that the clan benefits from this operation."
They had just spent a small fortune on the EMP and on leasing a submarine and several boats. The clan had resources, but they weren't unlimited.
"I'll cover the expense," Toven offered.
"I'm sure the clan will benefit from eliminating as many of the Brotherhood's top commanders as possible, so Losham can reshape the army based on what we will dictate.
" He smiled. "Perhaps we will turn them into a global force fighting trafficking.
With that many immortal warriors at our disposal, we could eliminate that scourge once and for all. "
The stunned silence that followed reflected Kian's own double-take. "You can't be serious."
Toven chuckled. "I wish I was, but no, I know it's not possible. Not right now, anyway. I was just using the most extreme future positive result to demonstrate what's possible."
Toven was probably the richest person on the face of the planet, but no one knew that because his fortune was all in gold and hidden in various depositories under a long list of names.
Still, it was very generous of him to offer, and even though Kian's pride urged him to decline and say that the clan could handle it, he knew he shouldn't.
"Thank you." Kian dipped his head. "Your help is deeply appreciated."
"You're welcome." Toven inclined his head in return.
"So, do I give my supplier the go ahead?" Turner asked.
"Yes," Kian said. "There is one more issue we need to address, and that's how we hide the fact that the drones lift off from Safe Harbor. We can't let the Brotherhood figure out where we are located. Do we deploy another EMP?"
Turner shook his head. "We don't need an EMP, and I wouldn't waste one.
Their air-search radar is almost certainly not restored yet.
Radar arrays are among the most EMP-sensitive equipment, and they need spare parts and skilled crews to bring them back online, neither of which Losham has had the time and resources to address.
He's busy keeping the lights and air-conditioning on in the resort and the air systems going in the harem. "
"For now," Kian said. "But we won't be ready for another month, and by then he might have addressed the radar."