UNSEEN FORCES: SKY WILDER (BOOK ONE)

by Ed Kovacs

  “It is true that we have many opposing religions, animist and charismatic cults, clan rivalries, conflicting political ideologies, language barriers. Myanmar is a very complex cultural stew. Still, there are decent people here, innocent people who need help. The Rangoon generals, in order to escape economic sanctions, have pretended to embrace a limited democracy, but what we really have is a system like China: totalitarianism meets capitalism, with very few human rights for the people.”

  “Zou,” Diana asked, “who did this to your village?”

  “DDSI. There is a Burmese secret police assassination unit roaming the area, and I have been on their hit list for years. By paying an opium tax to the tatmadaw, I was downgraded on the list. Our last crop failed, so I missed the payment and kept the money for the village. The generals would rather receive the tax than kill me, so this attack today was done as a punishment and a reminder of what they can do. If I miss another payment, they’ll be sure to come back when I’m here.”

  “Where is here? What’s the name of this place?” Sky said, exhaling, calmed by the tobacco.

  “This village has never had a name. Years ago it was destroyed by the Wa in a dispute over opium. The Wa were headhunters then and decapitated the elders and the Shamans. Fifteen years ago we repopulated with remnants of Khun Sa’s resistance, a few stray Karenni whose families were wiped out, and people like myself. Like the last residents, we decided not to name the village, in the hope we draw less attention to ourselves. I am forty-five years old and am the headman and elder. If the poppy crop this fall is not strong, my reign will end.”

  ###

  No roosters remained alive to crow in the mistiness of dawn, but Wilder awoke anyway, surprised that he had an arm around Diana. She stirred and looked at him through bleary eyes as they sat up together. Everyone else slept. “Let’s check the baby,” he whispered.

  They carefully crawled a few feet over to where Zou’s babies lay ensconced. The boy baby was dead. Did he have a name or was he like this village, a transitory unknown, a brief flicker seen by few and destined to be forgotten? There would be no autopsy, no death certificate. The cause of death was life in Burma. No fine casket would comprise an eternal cradle. No obituary in a newspaper would alert mourners where to send flowers. The child had been spared a life of poverty and disease and war, but as Sky touched the tiny fingers, now cold and bluing, he could only think of how precious was the gift of life, any life, and he could not staunch the tears that flowed down his cheeks.

  Diana wept openly; her blood in the child’s veins had not been enough. Then they heard the whistling chirps of a family of thrushes outside the hut. The Burmese army hadn’t killed all the animal life after all. Just as they would never be able to truly unify their country with guns. Unity can’t be forced. Controls can be imposed, territory conquered, rebel armies defanged. The Chinese communists succeeded in this way, ruling with the iron fist, but in the long run they, like the Rangoon generals, were doomed to failure, no matter how many are uprooted or relocated, no matter how many are murdered or maimed. Their corrupt, illegitimate regime would someday fall, whether the world was watching or not.

  The birds woke others now, people trained to sleep lightly since danger always lurked nearby. Zou’s gaze met Sky’s, and the tears told him the news of his son. Wilder turned away, embarrassed and deeply sorry he hadn’t saved the boy. He put his arm around Diana and pulled her to him as Zou cradled his tiny son close to his breast in a final good-bye; no tears flowed from this grad student cum drug warlord cum village headman. No tears remained in a life full of anguish.

  CHAPTER 19

  An unforgiving late-morning sun bore down as Wilder, Diana, Dang, and Ping readied to depart from the hamlet. Sky insisted on gifting the village with a mule and sacks of rice, salt and lentils the animal had carried to provide their cover as traders. He also pressed four one-baht units of Thai gold, about two ounces, into Zou’s hand. “Spend it wisely.”

  Zou stood humbled by the generosity of the gifts. “I shall. But you must allow me to send some men with you for your protection.”

  “That’s not necessary.”

  “Please do not insult me by refusing this.”

  “We’ll be fine, your men are needed here,” said Sky.

  “Do you know where the land mines are located?”

  This got everyone’s attention.

  “Mines?” asked Diana.

  “Yes, the path you were taking has two mined areas. Two that we know about. My men will show you.”

  “Thank you, Zou. We appreciate that,” said Sky.

  Dang couldn’t help but smile and approached Sky. “You very right. Sometime, best way... go slow.”

  So the caravan set off with a heavily-armed six-man escort. Four hours later the party cleared the second mined area. No one knew who had planted the mines. No one knew how long they had been there, for years or for decades. The Burmese army and the insurgent groups didn’t keep precise charts of mine fields. The fighting shifted locales, units rotated in and out, but the mines remained, cocooned, patiently waiting for the slightest pressure to engage their deadly germination, an instant blossom of shrapnel that often killed or maimed children or farmers; a bitter harvest sometimes reaped generations later.

  Good-byes were exchanged with Zou's escort squad. After handshakes, Dang spoke to the squad leader for several minutes as the leader nervously looked over to Wilder, Diana, and Ping.

  “What’s he saying, Ping?” Sky asked quietly.

  “I don’t speak Chinese,” said Ping.

  Diana spoke softly so only Sky could hear. “He seems to be giving them instructions, as if he’s asking the leader to repeat what he’s saying so he won’t forget.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Intuition,” she said, cryptically.

  Dang finally finished and gave the leader two packs of Marlboros from his day pack, which was an impressive gift in these hills. The young squad leader smiled and bowed his head, then the men turned back toward their village and the rebuilding that awaited.

  “What was that all about?” asked Diana, smiling.

  “Say thank you. Ask other thing, maybe for do business.”

  Wilder didn’t think anything of it. Diana didn't trust Dang and he couldn't change that.

  They set off once again and after another hour on the trail, broke to the west along what was little more than a goat path. The jungle ranged thick all around and the group retrieved machetes from the mules to hack at intruding creepers and sharp-tooth palm fronds that tore at their clothing. Snakes slithered off the path and Sky stayed mindful of any cobras having the idea of dropping down from above.

  GPS use wasn’t reliable under the thick jungle canopy and the light grew dimmer in the green maze with dusk only a couple of hours off. They’d need to find a clearing to make camp, so they took no meal stop. Faintly, they heard a rumble in the distance, an incessant dull roar.

  Sky stopped the caravan, sweat dripping from his chin, clothes thoroughly soaked, and cocked his head. “Everybody hear that?”

  “Rapids?” Diana wondered.

  Sky shrugged. “Nothing on the maps indicate anything here. Has to be close though.”

  Each few steps seemed to ratchet the roar up another decibel level. Rich, sweet whiffs of ozone caressed them as the air grew even heavier with moisture. Then suddenly, like switching on a light, they stepped into a clearing at the edge of a pool near the base of a waterfall.

  Misty white sheets of water cascaded into a murky green collecting pool. The falls were two-tiered, about five meters across. The lower set stood ten meters high, the upper tier a good fifteen meters, with the water shooting out of the tree-blanketed karst as if the mountain gods had forgotten to turn off the spigot. Gentle currents eddied about the pool before draining off via a stream to the southwest.

  “This must be a small tributary to the Salween River, but it's not on the map.”

  “I sense a bath coming
on.” Diana couldn’t wait to try the water. She needed the cleansing, especially after the village experience.

  “Watch out for snakes.”

  Her smile dimmed at this admonition.

  Dang pressed close to Sky. “You lost? You sure we right place?”

  “We’re close. My guess is tomorrow,” whispered Sky.

  They made camp, each getting their own pop-up tent. Diana opted for a bra-and-panties sponge bath. As Ping tended the mules, Sky couldn’t help sneaking a peek at her luxuriating at the lagoon. He liked her, and needed her help for the success of this journey. But while she looked great standing there wet in the twilight, he could only relate to her as a slick intelligence operative who would soon be off chasing dragons elsewhere. Assuming they made it out alive.

  ###

  Dinner consisted of more vacuum-sealed dehydrated food packs. Wilder and the others sat clustered in the clearing adjacent to the waterfall, finishing their meal.

  “Maybe make radio check now, Mister Sky.” Dang sucked his teeth as he tossed his empty MRE pouch to the ground.

  “It’s not time for a radio check,” he softly intoned, barely audible above the incessant rush of the falls. “Tasnee isn't expecting us to make contact right now.”

  “How you know radio not broken? Maybe get damage, so many rough trail. Then check time come and maybe no work.”

  Feigning disinterest in the conversation, Diana took a deep breath of the rich, sweet oxygen and gazed at the water, as Ping lit up a smoke.

  “Whether the radio’s working or not, we still have to walk into the site tomorrow.”

  Dang snorted, dropping the subject. “Okay I take first watch?”

  Sky looked to Diana, who nodded and checked her watch. “We each take two and a half hours,” she said, setting her alarm. “Dang first, then Ping is on at twenty-three-hundred hours. Sky, you’ve got zero-one-thirty till four.”

  “How kind of you,” he teased.

  With dinner over, they doused themselves with DEET as blackness descended. Ping retired to his tent, Dang wandered over near the mules.

  “Join me for a drink?”

  Wilder was taken aback by her invitation. “Sure, what are you pouring?”

  “I’m pouring whatever you have in your flask.”

  “That would be a nice single malt scotch.”

  “With a river water chaser.”

  Diana’s tent could sleep two comfortably, and Sky quickly zipped up the netting after they crawled in. He handed her the flask and she poured two fingers of scotch into their canteen cups, then they toasted.

  “To... staying alive.” They drank, then fell silent for a moment. They could hear Dang walking about the camp, so they kept their voices low.

  “Why would Dang ask you to do a radio check?” she asked.

  “Because he’s afraid. Afraid it might be impossible to escape without the cavalry coming to the rescue. No radio, no rescue.”

  “But I thought he’s made these trading trips into Burma before.”

  “We’re not on a trading trip. We’re walking into the unknown.” Sky took another sip. “Look, I thought it was a strange question, too. The radio check is scheduled for tomorrow morning.”

  “Can you make sure he can’t use the radio while we’re asleep?”

  “No one can. I’ve got the battery pack.”

  Diana nodded, then, “When we said good bye to our escorts today, it’s possible he gave them a message.”

  “A message. Saying what? And to whom? I mean, where would they take a message? It’s a four-hour walk to their village where there’s no running water, much less a phone.”

  “Maybe they’ll walk to another village, where there’s some kind of communications. Dang could be reporting our location. He could be one of Forte’s assets.”

  “‘Maybe’ this, ‘could be’ that. I thought I was suspicious. I mean, at some point, you just have to let it go.”

  “Did you let it go with me? No. You engineered a test.”

  “It’s a little late to test them. I figure we’re a half-day’s hard march away from the site.”

  “Then we should go in alone. At least without Dang.”

  He swirled the last of his scotch in the canteen cup, breathing in the peaty spice, then knocked it back. “Let me sleep on it.” He moved to leave and she touched his arm.

  “I can’t tell you how I know it, but I’m telling you, Dang isn’t on our side. He doesn’t need a radio to do his job. Once we’ve got the tablet, all he needs to do is slit our throats while we sleep or shoot us in the back. I want him gone.” A smoldering insistence shone from her gun metal-blue eyes.

  Wilder said nothing. As he locked gazes with her, he flashed on scenes from Treasure of the Sierra Madre, except he didn’t know who represented the Humphrey Bogart character, Diana or himself.

  “Since you’re going paranoid, explain to me how a general can hand over two hundred thousand dollars in cash to the likes of you and me, and then say ‘good luck, you’re on your own, spend it as you will.’ You can’t tell me that’s standard procedure, even for secret units like Delta Force.”

  She bit at her lower lip. “I don’t know what procedures Delta uses.”

  “Don’t get evasive with me, we’re in too deep together.”

  “Okay then, I thought it was highly unusual.”

  “The three tablets of Hui, and by extension, the Book of Spells had been in the protection of a secret society called the WOR, the Warriors of the Rose for over two thousand years. In nineteen forty-three, a Gestapo colonel, a member of SW, Schwarze Wahrheit almost got the tablet’s locations. Klaymen said Simon Forte is SW, he owns the library I broke into. So SW has clearly been on the hunt for a long time. Which leads me to believe General Klaymen is very possibly—”

  “WOR,” she said, not looking surprised. “Warriors of the Rose.”

  “Exactly. I suspect we’re either bait or we’re being set-up. We're definitely expendable.”

  “I don’t believe Klaymen is setting us up.”

  “The notion of an elixir for immortality is like gold fever. It changes people. Perfectly reasonable, rationale people become obsessed, priorities skew, illegal behavior becomes justified. You heard him on the houseboat. He’s just as consumed with getting the tablets as Forte. But not for the reasons he told us.”

  “What he said was true, but he didn’t tell us everything. That’s the way it is in the intelligence game, and it doesn’t really alter my involvement.”

  “But you don’t even know who you’re working for! I mean, are you here on behalf of the American government, or the WOR, or—”

  “I’m here for me.”

  ###

  Back in his own tent, Wilder checked to ensure the radio batteries were still in his day pack. He wondered why Diana was so afraid of Forte. How powerful could one man be? They had taken so many precautions, and the chance that Dang was somehow affiliated with Forte’s organization had to be infinitesimal. But then there was the issue of Klaymen, a “results oriented” soldier not bothered by legalities, who threw money around like a mob boss. Sky shook his head, took another draft of scotch and stretched out, but he could not fall asleep easily.

  ###

  Dang waited until 10:30 to open the metal case that had a custom-fitted foam interior protecting the burst transmission digital radio. He had briefly checked out on the device back in Mae Hong Son in case a backup operator was needed, and had actually used similar instruments before. Working silently, he became distressed he couldn’t power-up. He checked the battery compartment and found it empty.

  He searched the rest of the case, making very little sound. He knew Sky would have the battery, probably in his pack. Dang reached into his knapsack, retrieved the proper battery pack that he had brought for just such a scenario, powered up the sophisticated radio, quickly keyboarded, then quietly sent the burst transmission off into the ethers.

  CHAPTER 20

  They broke camp early afte
r Wilder’s radio check and walked half a kilometer along the stream before finding a place to ford. Ping swam across, then ropes were strung from bank to bank. Sky and Diana pulled off their boots and tied the footwear and other gear onto the mules to stay dry. The simple ford took forty-five minutes. Dang's job was to untie the ropes at the crossing point and then to swim across and join the others. But before he could do that, Sky surprised him by crossing back over holding a pack aloft. Dang's pack.

  Sky dropped the backpack at Dang’s feet. “Khun Dang, I’ve got new orders for you.”

  With Diana watching from across the stream, Dang squinted and nodded twice as he listened to Sky’s instructions. Sky patted him on the back, then Dang hoisted his pack, cast a stern look in Diana’s direction, and walked off into the jungle. Wilder swam across, checked for leeches, then sat down to dry his feet and put his socks and boots back on.

  “Khun Dang not come?” Ordinarily Ping would have kept quiet, since it wasn’t his place to ask, but this being the third day of rough travel in unfriendly territory, decorum frayed.

  “Change of plans. We’ll be fine, Ping, don’t worry about that.”

  But Ping shook his head, clearly unhappy with this turn of events, and shuffled up to the mules to unload weapons and day packs they would carry themselves.

  Diana sat next to Sky. “What did you tell him?”

  “For the record, I don’t think it was the right decision. We lost an extra body that we’re going to need. But you’re in charge of security, so he’s gone.” He felt a little aggravated, at himself as much as at her. He stood up, retrieved his shotgun and pack, and looked for a way to get over the next ridge.

  Six sweaty hours later, they paused on a promontory looking down onto a small mountain valley covered with teak, bamboo, palm and fern. An etheric white mist clung to the valley floor and played among the trees, drifting on an unseen wind. The eerie brume held a secret, Sky suspected, and the tableau reminded him of a stock shot from a 1930s Republic Pictures Dracula movie. Being on this elevated point enabled him to check the GPS, and although he said nothing, he knew the site waited patiently below him here in this valley, within two kilometers.