Reprisal!- The Eagle's Challenge

by Cliff Roberts

  “Think it’s safe to go back to our villa?”

  “I don’t think Garza knows where we’re staying, but who knows?” Ron replied.

  “Well, we can’t exactly hop a plane tonight in our condition,” Mike pointed out.

  “Yeah, I’d be willing to bet that the Costa Ricans will have a few questions they’ll want answered if we even try to go to the hospital for treatment,” Pam added.

  “Okay, so we’ll need another plan. We can come up with one,” Ron stated confidently.

  “Well, we had better think of it fast, before Fast Eddie heads down to the local marina and rents a boat to come looking for us,” Tom added. Everyone understood then, if they didn’t already, the clock was running.

  “I think we should be able to go back to the villa as long as we avoid being seen,” Ron offered.

  “Yeah, but how do we get the boat to shore without Garza’s men finding it and us?” Alex asked.

  “I’m thinking. I’m thinking!” Ron barked.

  “Why not take the boat to a marina down the coast and then drive back?’ Mike asked.

  “How do we know we can rent a car—or better yet, a van—to transport everyone back to the villa?” Ron asked Mike with a sarcastic grin on his face, which drew a vulgar slur from Mike.

  “We don’t need to rent a vehicle. We use ours!” Pam interrupted the guys’ bickering. “We drop off Alex or Tom and have them go and get the van we already have and then drive down and get us.”

  “That might work, but where do we drop off Alex?” Ron asked.

  “You don’t have to drop me off. Just get me closer to shore, and I can swim in. Get me about a hundred yards from shore, and I’ll swim in from there. If you drop me by the eighteenth hole at Garza’s golf club, I can walk to the villa. It’s only two or three miles. Then I’ll meet you down at the marina in Caldera.” Alex explained.

  “That sounds like a plan,” Ron agreed.

  “Yeah, a great plan,” Tom sarcastically noted. “We better get going on it. We can’t sit out here the rest of our lives,” he added as he stared into the darkness around them.

  It took a little over an hour for Ron to bring the boat at a speed barely over idle in fairly close to the eighteenth hole at the golf club, allowing Alex to slip over the side and make his way to shore. Ron and the rest of the team floated away from the golf course for a half-hour and then started the engines, speeding off towards the town of Caldera down the coast.

  Alex swam to the beach and slowly creeped up to the rocks, taking several minutes to rest and to get his bearings. Twice, a black SUV drove past his location, and each time, they slowed down and used a spotlight to sweep the area before moving on. It was a good bet that they worked for Garza and were looking for anyone who might be with the group who invaded the villa. Alex was pretty sure that he fit the bill, since he was the only guy who was walking back towards town in wet black combat coveralls, carrying a silenced MP5. Yeah, he’d be the one they’d want to talk to, so he kept to the shadows.

  Once he reached the villa, he took the time to change his clothes, slipping out of the wet coveralls, leaving the MP5 behind in favor of a forty-cal Sig-Sauer with silencer instead. He then drove to Caldera and met up with the team just outside of town at an old gas station where they had taken refuge. They flagged him down using the comlink once he had gotten close enough to make contact.

  “We better hurry! Just as we left the marina, some of Garza’s guys showed up and started checking out the boats tied up there. Ron pulled Garza’s boat around behind a storage shed to hide it some, but it’ll be found soon enough,” Tom informed as they piled into the van with the Eco Tour sign on the side of it.

  As they pulled onto the main road heading north, two more of Garza’s SUVs passed them heading into Caldera. It was obvious that the boat had been found. Alex drove as fast as he dared, slowing only when he saw another vehicle heading south towards them. Out of the dozen vehicles that crossed their path, half of them were black SUVs, each one slowing way down and giving the van a hard look, but they saw only Alex in the driver’s seat. The rest of the team were lying as flat as possible in the back, reinforcing the appearance that Alex was just another local headed home from night out or from work.

  Each time Alex passed a black SUV, his nerves grew taught. If he had been them, he would have stopped him because a van was a good place to hide several people; but apparently Garza’s men never had that training at survival school since they just slowed, looked and took off.

  The next morning, Garza’s villa, which was damaged extensively, was a beehive of activity. Garza’s men were collecting items from the damaged structure, while the fire officials wandered about making notes. Primo spent the whole morning sifting through the charred ruins of what had been his second floor office. The fire had destroyed everything. The floppies and CDs he’d had stored in the shelving unit had melted from the heat into a mound of plastic without form or function. The computer was clearly a complete lost—even the cables had burned through. On the first floor, the computer there had also burned in the fire along with every scrap of paper.

  “Well?” Garza asked as Primo walked over to the large patio table that had been placed in the shade of one of the big trees for Garza to sit at.

  “The whole office has been burned up. All of the CDs and paper files appear to be melted or turned to ash. There’s no way to tell if any files were taken, but it doesn’t look like it,” Primo stated flatly as he took a seat at the table.

  “Fuck! They could have stolen anything! The fire has concealed any evidence of theft, and I want them found!” Garza slammed his fist down on the table.

  “Patrón, I have men looking. We found the boat in Caldera, but there was no one on board. However, there was a good amount of blood on the deck, which means some of them have been injured. A search of the town turned up nothing yet, but they are still searching,” Primo reported. “We have men at all of the hospitals and clinics for a hundred miles up and down the coast.” Then Primo added as an afterthought, “The computers are a complete loss. The fire burned them completely up.”

  “Primo, I tell you, someone has to pay for this! Find out who attacked me, and I want them killed!” Garza growled.

  “None of the other cartel members would dare attack you. They know what would happen if they failed to kill you in the attack, and these men didn’t even try to kill you. They were after information and used the fire to cover their attempt to gain access to the villa,” Primo explained.

  “How did the fire start?” Garza grunted as Primo poured himself a glass of orange juice and took a big swig.

  “The firemen say it started in the pantry. There was an accelerant used to start it. The large hole in the metal shelf is part of the evidence that an incendiary of some sort was used,” Primo explained, then took another large swing of the juice.

  “What information were they after?” Garza asked.

  “I cannot say, but they could have downloaded both computers and taken some of the disks and we would have no way of knowing,” Primo stated.

  “Shit! All of my personal files were on those computers, as well as our plans with the Arab. If they have those files, they would know everyone I have ever bribed, everyone I have had killed, how I launder my money and where the bank accounts are. They know exactly where and how we are to attack with the Arabs,” Garza lamented.

  “Could the Arab be behind this?” Primo asked.

  “I don’t trust him, but why would he do something like this, when our plan is about to become reality? He has too much to lose if I am exposed,” Garza thought out loud.

  “Maybe he was looking for some insurance that you will do as he says when he says to do it. Maybe he has found out that you planned to double-cross him,” Primo speculated. He then reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out several small items that looked like melted bits of plastic. “We found these stuck to some of the walls,” Primo stated as he held them out to Garza.

&nb
sp; “What are these things?” Garza asked as he picked up one of them and gave it closer inspection.

  “They appear to be bugs. Listening devices. The only people in the villa who are not part of our family were the Arab and his men. They could have planted them,” Primo speculated.

  “How is our GPS tracker on the Arab’s truck working?” Garza asked as he handed the bit of plastic back to Primo.

  “Luckily, my laptop can follow the tracking, and I had it with me last night, so it was not damaged by the fire or compromised. As of a half-hour ago, the truck was only one-third of the way to San Jose. In fact, that is where it has been since the Arab left here. Didn’t he say he had to be back in Panama City for another meeting the same night he left here?” Primo asked, trying to refresh his memory.

  “Yes, that asshole did say he had a meeting he couldn’t miss. Send four men to check out the truck and let them use the laptop if need be to find it. I want to know why his truck is still nearby,” Garza ordered.

  “I will see to it. I’ll send Anastas with them and make sure he knows to bring whoever they find back to you before he kills them,” Primo stated as he shoved back from the table, stood and then walked away to arrange for the men.

  From their villa, Tom and Ron were still only able to see the gate and a small open space where part of the villa’s roof used to be. The rest of the grounds still were hidden by the trees. They had watched the villa all morning and had witnessed the coming and going of several black SUVs, the police and the fire inspectors.

  They had also seen that Garza had brought in another two dozen men who ringed the compound. Each man was dressed in paramilitary uniforms and carrying a new AK-74. At both ends of the block sat two jeeps (old U.S. military issue) with four men in each, guarding the entrance to the street, keeping out the curious. Each jeep also supported a fifty-cal machine gun that was manned at all times.

  “Damn, it looks like Garza has called in a favor or two, and the Costa Rican National Police have taken over at least part of his security. There’s got to be three platoons hanging out down there. Hell, at each end of the block, they have fifty-cal guns mounted on Jeeps. Garza must be really rattled,” Tom blurted out as he scanned the area through the binoculars.

  “You better hope old Fast Eddie doesn’t figure out it was us who burned his place down. He’ll slowly chop us up for dog food if he catches us,” Ron added without his usual hint of sarcasm. “He is one very bad dude.”

  “You could have mentioned that a couple of days ago,” Mike deadpanned from the recliner where he sat drinking a beer.

  “I doubt he will ever know it was us. After all, he’s never seen us or even heard of us. I’m willing to bet Garza blames some other drug lord for the attack,” Tom ventured.

  “Hey, boss, I think you better check this out,” Alex called out quietly from across the main room where Mike and Pam were resting.

  “What have you got?” Tom stated, stepping quickly toward him.

  Alex stepped over to meet him halfway and whispered about what he had seen on both Mike and Pam’s soiled dressings, keeping out of earshot of the two team members. “We’re going to need antibiotics and soon. Both off them had clean wounds with the bullet traveling straight through without doing any major damage, but the wounds are now starting to get infected. All I have to put on them is some antibiotic cream, and that isn’t anywhere near strong enough. The jungle air here can be really detrimental to gunshot wounds,” Alex shared soberly.

  “They don’t have a regulated pharmacy system here, so we should be able to go to a store and get what we need. We’ll leave Ron to watch them and our friends down the hill,” Tom said as he turned and walked back over to where Ron had taken his place watching Garza’s villa through the binoculars and explained the situation.

  It was short trip across town to the pharmacy, and when Tom and Alex pulled up in front of the store, they easily noticed the six men that were hanging out in front and inside the store, looking at everything everyone purchased before letting them leave.

  “Shit! Garza must know some of us got hurt, and he’s got his guys checking for anyone who might be buying items that could be used to treat a gunshot wound. If we go in there, we’ll have to shoot our way out. We better drive down to the next town and see if Garza has got that one covered, as well,” Tom explained.

  “Why not just go down to Caldera?” Alex asked.

  “I’m pretty sure that he’ll have that one covered for sure. Remember, the boat was found down there,” Tom reminded him.

  The next town’s pharmacy was being watched, as well. In fact, Garza’s men were at the next three towns they checked. The men gave Tom and Alex very hard looks when they slowed down in front of the pharmacies, making it clear that Garza had cut off all chance of receiving medical supplies or treatment in Costa Rica.

  “I think we’ve got a problem,” Tom stated flatly as they drove away and headed back to the villa.

  “So, now what?” Alex asked.

  “I think we need to get them out the country quickly, so they can get proper treatment. Then we’ll need to do Fast Eddie and his top two guys as quickly as we can, then run like hell! Fast Eddie has too many contacts and too many people in high places for us to wait any longer. The boss will have to make do with what we have so far,” Tom stated matter-of-factly.

  Once Tom and Alex arrived back at the villa, Tom shared how Garza was quickly closing down the entire area and it was only a matter of time before the National Guard started going door to door. After several minutes, during which Tom and Ron sat quietly thinking, Ron reached for the encrypted sat phone and started to call the boss, but stopped.

  Then he turned to Tom and said, “I think we need to take Fast Eddie tomorrow on the golf course. I’ll use the Barrett fifty-cal with silencer to take him. Tonight, we need to find a spot about two thousand yards out that I can shoot from.”

  “We also need to change the logo on the sides of the van. Sooner or later, Garza’s guys will remember seeing it around Caldera last night and the pharmacies today and start looking for it,” Tom commented.

  “I agree. Have Alex help you peel it off while I call the boss and get these two a ride home.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Racing across the desert toward Riyadh at over a hundred and fifty kilometers an hour, Heyman al-Ghaz al-Fahd was safe in his convoy as he contemplated how the world would react when the third step of the Brotherhood’s plan was put into action. The Hamburg reaction had been all too predictable with America shouldering the lion’s share of the relief efforts despite their economic woes.

  The attack on Houston coupled with the Starks administration’s refusal to allow the rebuilding of the oil refineries without major environmental changes in their design, had the American economy headed downhill rapidly. It seemed the American consumer had simply stopped needing new cars, new televisions or recreational vehicles, and they had even reduced the amount of groceries they were buying. They had finally begun acting like the rest of the world and did their best not to spend money since the future was far too uncertain, especially with unemployment at an all-time high. Everyone in the American media and the government (except for Starks and his cronies) were predicting that the economy was only going to get worse.

  Then there was more good news! The Iranian agents for the Brotherhood had assured him that no one suspected a thing, and as an additional bonus, they informed him that no one in Iran had ever spoken to David Ashrawl and that they had not been the ones who had kidnapped and interrogated him. This news had confirmed for Heyman al-Ghaz al-Fahd that it was indeed the Americans who had kidnapped him; but what he could not understand was why no one was using the information. None of their American agents had heard or noticed anything to do with any of the information Ashrawl was privy to and must have passed on. The only information they could find about him was that he had been killed before he talked with anyone. So, who had kidnapped him and why? That was his main question and concern.
He wanted an answer, but for the first time in his life, he had no idea who to ask.

  The scramble phone rang, disturbing his train of thought. He let it ring several times as usual before he answered. “Yes?”

  “I have my report, Minister,” the voice stated calmly.

  “Yes, what is it?” he replied curtly.

  “Our ships for the initial stage have arrived as planned, and they are in their respective ports. The items of interest have been loaded on board and security procedures are in place awaiting the signal to sail,” the voice stated without any embellishment.

  “This is good news! What of our other ships?” the minister asked.

  “The six other ships are at sea awaiting the word to sail into the Gulf where they will be placed according to plan. They will be held in a holding pattern to the southwest of the Gulf in an area of the Arabian Sea that sees very little, if any, shipping. They will need twelve hours to sail and take up station at the rendezvous point, once the decision is made. They are waiting for your order to move.”

  “Yes, that will do. What of our men in Somalia?” the minister asked, although he knew they had been lost at sea; he just wanted to find out if his agent was making a full effort in his assigned duties.

  “Yes…” The man’s voice trailed off before he took a deep breath and continued, “The freighter on which they were traveling was lost off the coast of Yemen under suspicious circumstances. Although there is no record of any naval vessels other than the King Fahd being in the area at the time, there was a mysterious shadow spotted by a Russian satellite ten thousand yards away from the freighter, just prior to its sinking. The shadow was listed as a camera anomaly, but I asked my contacts in America anyway if they knew of any submarine assigned to a black op in the region, and they assured me that no American assets were within five hundred miles. I confirmed this through a second source at Norfolk Naval Command. It is my opinion that someone else is involved in the American war on terrorism. I’ve put several agents on the issue, and I hope to have something to report in a few days,” the voice stated.