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His angle of descent had placed him down on the southern side of the tip, since reconnaissance indicated that the hostages were concentrated along the other three walls. Several might be injured by the explosives he had come up here to set. Since all were seated away from the area where the blast’s effects would be centered, their chances of survival were considerably better than if left to the whims of the terrorists.
    Ready to go to work, Blaine pulled the piton gun from his vest and inserted a piton eye first into the barrel. Once fired, the sharp edge of the piton would be driven deep into the marble face six feet below the Monument’s tip. His biggest problem when he drew back to aim the piton gun was the wind, because it forced the chopper to bob slightly in the air, drawing him upward and keeping him from being able to steady the piton gun long enough to shoot it.
    Blaine shifted slightly to better his position. He got the piton gun level and aimed, ready to fire it, when the chopper jerked him upward again.
    Frustrated, Blaine settled back down against the smooth marble and unclasped the support line from his harness. He waved the Thunderhawk away as the line dangled free, leaving him clinging to the Monument’s south side with nothing to catch him if he fell.
    His left arm wrapped tightly around the tip above him, Blaine fired the piton into the Monument face even with his chest. After making sure it was secure, he jammed the piton gun into his harness and flipped the start of his climbing rope down from his shoulder. Taking it in his now free hand, he threaded the line into the piton’s exposed eye and then carefully ran it through a trio of carabiners on his harness. He held the line tight, testing it, and pushed off with his heels.
    Two more rappels left him a few yards above the top of the observation deck’s windows. Blaine shifted his backpack around to the front and then raised his legs as he lowered his head. Suspended upside down now, gazing down the long white band of the Monument to the dark abyss of the ground, he could feel the blood rushing to his head.
    Awkwardly, he put some more slack in the line, lowering himself until he could easily reach the top of the observation deck’s twin windows. Next Blaine pulled a rectangular mound of plastic explosives from inside his pack and wedged it in place over the left side of the first window. Then he shimmied sideways and repeated the same process on the right, wedging a second remote-controlled detonator into the mound. The charges had been packed to ensure that not only the windows but also enough of the marble over them would blow to create an accessible route in for the commandos.

    By the time McCracken reached the second window, his movements had turned graceful, confidence coming from practice. The third and fourth explosive mounds took to the marble as if slots had been tailored for them. Blaine jammed the final detonator in place and gave it a hard twist to the right.
    He regripped his line to ready his ascent back to the tip, flipping his feet and head again first. He felt better instantly, just dangled there while he waited for his blood to resettle.
    “Mission accomplished, Kirkland,” Blaine said into his headset. “Send your team in.”
    Less than two minutes later, after he had climbed to a safe distance above the charges, Blaine looked up at the sky and saw the Blackhawk soaring through the night, dead on line with the Monument. According to plan, he would hold here while the commandos finished the job, then join them in the observation deck.
    “Eighteen, seventeen, sixteen …”
    Kirkland’s thirty-second countdown filled Blaine’s ears until the approaching Blackhawk’s rotor wash stole it. The downwind pressure made the line threaded precariously through the piton vibrate madly. It felt to Blaine like the vibrations made by a dentist’s drill, the entire surface of the Monument seeming to tremble.
    He could see the six Hostage