There was a knock at his door, before it opened and a gray haired woman poked her head inside. “They are here, Director,” she said.
“Well, send them in Martha,” Ian said with a wave of his hand.
“Yes, sir,” Martha replied and then stepped inside opening the door wide, moving out of the way for Tom to enter followed by Axel.
“Sit down gentlemen, sit down,” Ian said excitedly. He glanced up at his secretary. “That will be all, Martha. Thank you.”
Martha smiled as she closed the door.
Ian took a sip of scotch and then looked at Tom and then at Axel. “Where is your brother?” Ian asked Axel.
Axel jerked his thumb toward the door. “Martha’s keeping him company,” Axel said. “You make him nervous.”
“I make him…” Ian began as his smile turned into a frown. “Axel, we have just received our first actual mission. Did Thomas tell you that?”
“Yes, sir,” Axel said.
“Your brother may have to go up against Soviet agents, or secret police, or some other such,” Ian said. “How is he going to handle that if I make him nervous?”
Axel glanced at Tom who shrugged and then back at Ian. “He’ll just smash their heads in, sir,” Axel said. “He’s never scared of something once he’s smashed its head in.” Ian sat back in his chair slightly alarmed. Axel picked up on that. “Don’t worry, sir, he knows not to smash your head in. That’s why you make him so nervous, because he’s not allowed to smash your head in.”
Ian’s eyes narrowed on Axel before he broke into a giant smile. “You’re pulling my leg, aren’t you?” Axel only shrugged, but Ian waved the concern away to focus on the more immediate. “Alright let’s quit clowning around and get serious.” Ian leaned forward, placing his elbows onto the desk and interlacing his fingers just below his chin. “As you both know, the CSOS has been around for nearly twenty years, but has yet to have an actual, real world mission. We’ve been forced to rely on the CIA for everything.” Axel and Tom nodded. “Well, we finally have one. It’s a big one too,” Ian smiled. “I guess your little demonstration earlier finally convinced the right people that we are ready. Plus, I think the President has finally tired of the CIA’s continuous bumbling of every mission they’ve ever undertaken and decided to let us screw up our own missions ourselves instead of relying on the CIA to do it,” Ian said with a chuckle.
“What’s the mission, sir?” Tom asked in an attempt to draw the director’s attention back to the matter at hand.
“A Soviet defector,” Ian said. “We are to get him out and safely to the States.”
“What does that have to do with the CSOS?” Axel asked, slightly confused.
“He works for the Russian version of CSOS in Moscow. He should have extensive knowledge of the Soviet’s scientific advancements.”
“Moscow?” Axel asked, a trace of concern evident in his voice.
“What is the plan, sir?” Tom asked.
“Well, we know it will be next to impossible to get him out of the Soviet Union. It wouldn’t be much easier to get him out of one of the Eastern block countries.” Tom and Axel stared at the Director expectantly. “So, our best chance comes in a week.”
“What happens in a week?” Tom asked.
“He travels to Cuba. That’s why I interrupted your evenings. We’ve got a lot to do and little time to do it. We’re starting to work on this one straight away.”
Tom and Axel looked at each other then back at the Director. Ian smiled at them. “Gentlemen, this is our opportunity to show the President and Congress exactly what we can do. I do not intend to waste it because we may not get another.”
Tom and Axel glanced at one another. They understood what this opportunity meant and how important the mission was. They understood that if they succeeded the world would open up for them. However, they also understood that if they failed, they might never get another opportunity. In fact, they could be killed or captured. Both were ready. They smiled, confident and as excited about the mission as Ian.
“Do we have a plan, sir?” Tom asked as he leaned forward, closer to Ian’s desk.
Chapter 6
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba
Axel stepped through the door of the airplane and into the blazing hot sun of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The heat slammed into him like a brick wall and he felt as though he were going to be knocked back onto the airplane. He took a hot breath and then began his descent to the ground, glad Tom had suggested they not wear suits on the plane as the sweat was already beginning to soak through his red golf shirt. Axel stepped onto the pavement and turned to see Tom descending after him, looking equally uncomfortable in the Caribbean heat.
Axel watched Rolf poke his head out of the door and glance about, clearly pondering how to fit through. “Come out like you got in, Rolf,” Axel shouted to his twin brother. Rolf stared at him quizzically. “Duck down and turn to the side,” Axel shouted. Rolf nodded with a smile and then followed his brother’s instructions.
“Are we sure he’s ready for this?” Tom asked by leaning over and whispering into Axel’s ear.
Axel took a deep breath as he stared at his brother. “Nope,” Axel replied as he watched Rolf lumber down the steps, panting like a dog. The truth was Axel and Tom both had very strong reservations about Rolf accompanying them on the mission. They kept their concerns from Ian because Ian would pull Rolf immediately if he felt Tom and Axel were not one hundred percent on board with him. Neither wanted the decision left up to a nervous director. Before they left, Tom had cornered Axel and told him he did not think Rolf was ready. Axel, however, convinced Tom to allow Rolf to fly down to Guantanamo Bay with them. Rolf was part of the team and to be left behind, alone in Washington would have broken his heart. The more Axel thought about it though, the more he knew Tom was right and did not want Rolf going to Havana. However, he didn’t want to tell his brother that. Instead, he hoped to come up with a plan to make Rolf still feel needed—to feel like he was still an essential element of team Blitzkrieg.
Rolf came to a halt beside them and shook his head. “It’s hot,” he said.
Axel patted him on the arm. “That it is Rolf, that it is.” Then he heard tires on the concrete and turned to see a green jeep pulling up beside them. A man in a tan Navy officer’s uniform stepped out of the driver’s side and walked around the front.
“Welcome to Gitmo, gentlemen,” he said. “I’m Ensign Waters, Naval Intelligence.”
“Afternoon, Ensign,” Tom said as Axel nodded to the officer and Rolf stared into nothing, wiping the sweat from his brow, still obsessed with the heat.
Waters waved a jeep full of sailors behind him toward the plane. “The men will take care of your gear if you gentlemen will come with me,” he said.
“Certainly,” Tom said. “Thank you.”
Ensign Waters walked back around the front of the jeep and climbed into the driver’s seat while Tom sat beside him in the passenger seat. Axel climbed into the back and, after some prodding, convinced Rolf to do so as well. The giant of a man squeezed into the seat, pushing his brother tightly against the other side.
Ensign Waters drove the jeep down the hill to the ferry that would take them across Guantanamo Bay to the windward side of the island. About an hour later, the men sat in a briefing room sipping glasses of cool water while being sheltered from the heat.
They did not have to wait long before the door opened and a group of military officers entered. Tom, Axel, and Rolf stood, shaking hands with each of the men. The officers were introduced as Captain Cook, commander of the Naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Colonel Harley, commander of the Marine Barracks, Commander Jones, head of naval intelligence for GTMO, and Captain Austin of the Coast Guard cutter Persistence. Everyone sat around the large conference table.
Captain Cook glanced around at the other military officers and then back at Axel, Tom, and Rolf, before speaking. “Well, gentlemen,” he began, “we aren’t really sure what you’re down here to do, but we
received orders to provide you with whatever you needed.” He let that hang in the air for a moment. “So, what do you need?”
Tom smiled.
***
The plan was a simple one. Sail the USCGC Persistence north from Guantanamo Bay to a location off the coast of Cuba, just south of Havana. From there Axel, Tom, and Rolf would take a small craft to the beach, landing under cover of dark, and rendezvous with an anti-Castro Cuban who would lead them into Havana and return them to their boat once they had the defector. They would then take the boat back to the Coast Guard cutter and sail to Florida. Tom had insisted that they come up with a fall back, in case they could not make it back to their boat. They had devised a secondary escape plan which involved traveling the length of Cuba to Guantanamo City and from there crossing over into the U.S. Naval base. Colonel Harley escorted Tom, Axel, and Rolf out to the fence line that separated the base from the rest of Cuba to determine the feasibility of that plan. He had tried to explain to them that it would be much too dangerous, but Tom insisted that they have a look for themselves.
Axel and Tom stood atop an observation post situated on the shore of the Guantanamo River, on the leeward side of the bay. Colonel Harley and two Marine sentries stood just behind them. From their vantage point they had a clear line of sight into Guantanamo City, which appeared to be a couple of miles away. Guantanamo City was a small workers town, the primary industry being a food processing plant. There was very little else surrounding the city other than military outposts watching the Americans.
“So if we had to, we could travel down from Havana to Gitmo City and then cut across to the fence line?” Axel asked.
The Colonel chuckled. “Not if you value your life,” Colonel Harley said before spitting a stream of brown liquid from his mouth over the side of the observation tower. He waved his hand over the open area between the city and the fence line. “We call that the Cactus Curtain,” he smiled, clearly amused by the name. “Cuban asylum seekers kept fleeing Castro’s regime by coming into Gitmo, so the Cuban military planted cacti to dissuade them.” He spit another stream of brown juice before smiling broadly at Tom and Axel. “But it ain’t the cacti that is the problem. It’s the minefield. There are rows and rows of land mines between us and them.” Tom and Axel looked at each other and then out over the minefield.
“Is it possible to navigate through the minefield?” Tom asked.
“It is certainly possible to traverse the minefield. It has been done before, but I wouldn’t advise trying. Hell, even the Cuban army doesn’t know where all their mines are. They just laid them out haphazardly, without any kind of diagram or plans.”
Axel peeked out over the side of the post down into the Gitmo River. He saw something large swimming past. “Hey, what is that?” he asked. The Marines quickly joined him and looked down into the water.
“It’s a manatee,” said a large lance corporal named Green in his thick Georgia accent. “We see ‘em all the time. Them, sharks, and of course the Gitmo beast…just about everything swims up this river.”
Tom smiled and slapped the young lance corporal on the back. “And they can, because it’s not mined.” He then turned to the Colonel. “We can take a boat down the river.”
Colonel Harley laughed as he shook his head at the audacity of these men. “Sure, you can take a boat down the river, and stay free of the mines. Of course, first you gotta find a boat.”
“That shouldn’t be hard,” Tom said. “I’ve never seen a rural town near a body of water that did not have numerous boats ready and waiting,”
The Colonel nodded. “Alright, well let’s say you do commandeer a craft,” he said. “The Cubans watch the river as closely as we do and might be a bit suspicious of any boat high-tailing it to the American side.”
Tom laid a hand on the Marine commander’s shoulder. “Colonel, if we are high-tailing it down the river to the base, we’ve already raised plenty of suspicion and at that point will be simply trying to survive.”
After reviewing the plan, the Colonel led the way down the long winding set of stairs to the ground below. There they found Rolf exploring a bunker with the young Corporal who drove them out to the fence line. Rolf looked like a kid playing war.
“Hey Axel, check this out,” he said excitedly. “This is a real bunker, just like in the movies.” Rolf stepped back inside crouching low to fit through the door and then his face reappeared in the small firing port as he pretended to fire a machine gun at assaulting Cubans.
Tom leaned over and whispered into Axel’s ear, “I’m going to have to put my foot down, Axel. Rolf is not ready for this mission. He would be a severe liability and might get all of us killed or captured.”
Axel nodded. He knew Tom was right. They were going undercover in Havana, posing as German tourists, and Rolf would already call a lot of attention to them simply based on his size. Despite what he had told the director, Axel had known deep in his heart that Rolf was not ready, but there was the other side of the coin. Rolf wanted to be on the mission. He was part of the team, always had been, and was just as excited as Tom and Axel to get a real world mission, a chance to put all of his training to use. To deny Rolf this opportunity would break his heart.
Axel watched as Rolf laughed and played in the bunker like a child. He was having so much fun, they were probably going to have to tear him away from here. Then Axel had an idea. “Hey Colonel, are there always Marines stationed at this post?” he asked.
Colonel Harley nodded. “Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred and sixty-five days a year. No matter the weather. Marines stand post during hurricanes. Of course in that case, they would be in the bunker instead of the tower.”
Axel nodded. “How would you feel about Rolf staying out here in the bunker while we’re in Havana?”
Harley glanced at Rolf and then back to Axel. He lowered his voice to ensure Rolf could not hear him. “No disrespect, but can he handle it? He seems to be a bit…” He didn’t finish his sentence, but instead touched his head with his pointer finger clearly indicating what he meant.
“He’s well trained, Colonel. He’s jumped out of planes, navigated jungles…” Tom said allowing his words to trail off.
“Well,” the Colonel said as he rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Aren’t the Marines here under orders to help in any way we need?” Axel asked.
The Colonel nodded. “I suppose it’ll be alright,” he said. “But if something happens to him, or if he does something to hurt someone else, that’s on you, not me.”
Axel and Tom both nodded. “Fair enough, Colonel,” Tom said.
“Rolf,” Axel said and watched as his brother stepped back out of the bunker, still smiling happily.
“Yeah?” Rolf asked.
“How would you like to stay out here in the bunker and stand post just like a real Marine?” Axel asked.
Rolf’s eyes widened as he nodded his head up and down. “That would be so cool,” he said.
“Alright then, you can stay here while we go to Havana.”
The smiled disappeared from Rolf’s face. “Wait, that means I’d miss the mission,” he said and began shaking his head from side to side. “No, I want to go on the mission. You guys need me.”
Axel glanced back over the fence and then back at his brother. “It is part of the mission,” he said.
“Really?” Rolf asked. He trusted his brother completely, but it was difficult to understand how sitting in a Marine bunker could be part of a mission to Havana.
“Yeah,” Axel replied. “You see this river,” Axel asked as he pointed to the water flowing by. Rolf nodded. “We might be bringing the Russian down this river and if that happens, the Cubans are going to be chasing us.” Rolf’s eyes widened. “We need you to wait for us here. As we’re coming down the river, you’ll have to help us fight the Cubans. Think you can do that?”
Rolf nodded. “Yeah, I can fight the Cubans.” He stepped over to the fence line, placing bot
h hands against the chain link and staring through menacingly. “I’ll crush ‘em.”
Tom smiled at Axel proudly. The crisis had been averted for now. When they returned to D.C. they could decide what they needed to do with Rolf. For now, he’d be safe on the naval base yet still feel as though he contributed to the overall mission. Now it was time to ready for their insertion into Havana.
Chapter 7
Axel felt the cool spray of the salty sea mist upon his face as the inflatable boat bounced up and down on the waves. They had set off from the Coast Guard cutter Persistence several miles from the Cuban coast. Tom was acting as coxswain of the small craft and Axel was navigating. It was dark, the shoreline was impossible to see and they were navigating completely by compass. Axel prayed to God that he was not leading them further out to sea where they would die of thirst and exposure.
After a long night of bouncing in the waves, they were relieved when the shoreline finally came into view. They sailed parallel to the shore—a few thousand yards out—until they reached the point both agreed was the landing spot. Tom motored them in until they were about a hundred yards out. He then cut the engine and they paddled the rest of the way, allowing the waves to carry them to shore. When the water was shallow enough, Tom and Axel climbed over the sides of the boat, splashing into the cool ocean and pulling the boat ashore.
They dragged the heavy boat up onto the beach and knelt down on the sand. Both men looked about the beach expectantly, and just as Axel was about to ask Tom if he had a back-up plan in case their Cuban contact was not here, they heard a whistle that sounded remarkably like a man attempting to sound like a bird. They watched as four dark, man-shaped shadows rose up in the black and dashed over to them.
Origins of the Prime Page 6