"If not, we abort and try an alternate route." "Captain, that gap is barely." "I know, Sergeant, but I'm the only one small enough to fit. Hold position." She stripped off her combat vest, her gear, everything except her weapons and radio.
Even thin, even small, the gap looked impossible. But Park was trapped on the other side, and operators didn't leave operators behind. She squeezed into the gap, feeling sharp rock edges scrape her shoulders, her ribs, her hips. She exhaled completely, making herself as flat as possible, and inched forward. Rock pressed against her chest, her back, her skull.
For one claustrophobic moment, she was stuck, unable to move forward or back, just trapped in stone with the weight of the mountain above her. Then her fingers found purchase on the far side. She pulled, felt something give, pulled harder. The rock scraped skin from her shoulders, her back, but she was moving, moving forward. Her head emerged, then her shoulders, her torso.
She fell through onto the far side, landing hard on ancient stone, breathing in gasps. "Through," she reported into the radio. "Passage continues. We can widen the gap from this side. Standby."
She used explosive charges carefully placed and shaped to create maximum effect with minimum noise. The explosion was muffled and controlled. The gap widened to 30 inches. Her team came through one by one and they continued into the monastery's depths.
At 0507 hours, they reached the lower level where Park was holding position. Sarah used the agreed upon recognition signal. Three taps. Pause. Two taps.
The response came immediately. Two taps. Pause. Three taps. She opened the concealed door and found Park huddled in a maintenance alcove leg wrapped in makeshift bandages rifle covering the approach.
Eyes hollowed with exhaustion and pain. "Captain Chen." He sounded like he didn't believe what he was seeing. "They said you might come, but I didn't think. I mean, you're retired."
"You're" "I'm here, Lieutenant. Can you walk?" "Yes, ma'am. Legs bad, but mobile. I've got the intelligence."
"Everything they sent us to get." He held up a small encrypted drive. "12 operators died for this. I wasn't going to let it fall into the wrong hands."
"Good man. We're leaving now. Can you climb?" His face went pale.
"The cliff route, ma'am? With this leg?". "I didn't ask if it would be easy. I asked if you can do it." He met her eyes and saw the same determination she'd shown in that corridor 18 months ago.
"Yes, ma'am. I can do it." They moved through the monastery's passages. Park limping but keeping pace. Adrenaline and training overriding pain.
They reached the cave entrance as the sky was beginning to lighten. 0547 hours. 43 minutes until their extraction window closed. "We have to move faster," Sarah said.
"The climb took us 1 hour 45 on the way up. We have 43 minutes to get down. That means controlled descent, fast rappel wherever possible and absolutely no mistakes." They rigged the rope, secured Park in a special harness that would allow them to manage his descent and began dropping down the cliff face at speeds that would have horrified any safety conscious climbing instructor. 200 feet down, the dawn light revealed their position to a hostile patrol.