by Ann Heathman
“No way,” Arianna said. “The name recognition will be a big boost to my career, and I’m willing to share some of my story, but my journey can’t be allowed to overshadow the real story of women under the rule of the Taliban. This film will air two days before International Women’s Day. The emphasis has to be on the plight of these women.”
“I agree,” Harold said. “But don’t be too modest. This is excellent exposure for you. Take advantage of it, kiddo.” He reached across the desk and gave her a high five. “I’ll let you know the time and the location for tomorrow’s meeting.”
The COS flashed his credentials to the guard on post who waved them on into the naval air station at Sigonella. Zach, followed by Tony, Juan, and Clare, exited the van when it pulled up in front of an airport hangar. Upon entering the building, their attention was immediately drawn to a large, black cylindrical object sitting on a platform.
“Man, look at this thing,” Juan said, walking all around what he recognized as a mini sub.
“Gather round folks,” Eric said, pointing to a man on the platform. “Everyone, this is Hopper.”
“G’day, mates,” the guy said, a big grin plastered on his face. “Let me introduce you to this little beaut. This is a d- r- y submersible, mini-submarine.” He patted its side. “I reckon you’d be pretty familiar with the wet submersible from your spec op days. Well, this baby is goin’ to give you a nice dry ride, all the way into Libya, and I’m the bloke who’s goin’ to teach ya how to drive the bloody thing or at least crash it with style.”
Zach stood looking on, his arms folded across his chest. Is this guy for real?
“Okay, thank you, Hopper, for that enlightening introduction,” Eric said. “This thirty-one foot sub can carry as many as six people. We’ll be taking the four of you plus two more operators on this mission. The two extra men are going to guard the vessel while the four of you get the transmitter to its destination in Tripoli.”
Tony stepped over to where Zach was standing. “Don’t mean to play on the negative, but this op is fucked up. First we have the surprise female agent, and now we got two more operators we know nothing about. This is messed up, man.”
Juan, overhearing the comment, agreed. “Too many unknowns for my liking.”
Zach nodded. He had additional people in his own team he could have called up for this operation. People he knew and trusted with his life. He didn’t like all the ‘unknowns’ surrounding this mission either.
“One of our ships is going to drop you outside Libyan territorial waters,” Eric continued, “where you will proceed, undetected, to the Libyan coast. You will need a few days practice, learning how to operate the sub before you deploy. Hopper’s your instructor. He has a flare for the dramatic, but not to worry. He’s the best at what he does.”
“What two men?” Zach asked. “Who are the two additional men that are going with us?”
“They’re arriving tonight. You’ll meet them at dinner. Good guys. Special operators like yourself.”
“I’d like to use my own people if you don’t mind, sir. I can have two of my own men here within twenty-four hours. All I have to do is make a call.”
Eric paused. “Uh, maybe. Let me take this up the line and see what they say. I’ll get back to you on that.”
“Come join me,” Hopper said, beckoning Zach and his team to join him on the platform.
The group made its way up the steps to the entrance of the sub.
“Here ya go, Zach. Hop right on into the pilot’s seat.” Hopper pointed to the captain’s chair. “Tony, you’ve got first mate duty. If Zach decides to go on a walkabout and wander off course, you jump in there and straighten him out.” He smiled and gave Zach a friendly poke.
Zach was not amused.
“Tony and Clare, I have some reserved seating for you two kids in the back of the bus where you’ll be handling some extra-curricular duties.”
The two of them squeezed their way to the back portion of the sub.
“Tony, you’re going to be monitoring the Doppler sonar velocity log. This instrument bounces a signal off the bottom of the ocean giving you mission-relevant location information… info that’ll keep your boss there from wandering off course.
“And Clare seeing as you’re the bees knees at communications, you’ll be running comms with the mother-ship. Should be an easy task for you. The two other operators will be behind you, and the cargo will ride snug as a bug in a rug right here in the center.”
Everyone took a seat and looked around.
“You’ll be cruising at an amazing five knots,” Hopper continued, “approximately fifty feet below the waves. Should be a nice smooth ride, mates.”
Zach looked down at the instrumentation and what amounted to an Xbox joy stick for navigation. This sub was more sophisticated than the wet submersibles he’d trained on in the SEALs. Those were a bitch. You rode in open sea water, wearing scuba gear and arrived on target, cold and fatigued. This was much better, but the team would have to get up to speed on the operation of this new, dry sub.
“Okay, so here’s the deal.” Hopper invited everyone to exit. “We got tight quarters, so we’ll be working with you one at a time, helping each of you learn your role. I think it shouldn’t take more than a few days in this simulator to become proficient at your job. Then we go for a dry, or more correctly, a wet run, meaning we go for a spin in the Med just to make sure you know how to drive this thing. Once you all graj ee ate, you’re off on the real deal. Any questions, mates?”
Zach shook his head. “Let’s do this.”
“Okay, my man. Zach we’ll start with you. The rest of you can go have a bit of lunch, and I’ll see you back here this afternoon.”
LATER BACK at the villa, Zach sat eating a late lunch and going over his navigator’s manual while he waited for Tony and Juan to finish their training sessions. He glanced down at his phone and was tempted to call Arianna. She had not tried to reach him since that first day of his deployment, and though he desperately wanted to talk to her, he knew he would never call. He missed her, for sure, but quickly checked his emotions. Letting your emotions distract you in the middle of an operation could be a warrior’s downfall. Carlos would contact him if there was an emergency, so no news was good news. He hoped she was busy producing and preparing for the debut of her documentary… too busy to miss him.
Clare approached the table where he was sitting. “Mind if I join you?” she asked.
He looked up a moment and motioned for her to have a seat.
“How was your training today?” She set her tray of food down and took a seat.
“Decent. Just need some more study and practice.”
“Running comms in the sub seems pretty routine. You’ve got the major role of navigating us to our destination.”
“Everyone’s got an important role. Don’t think mine’s any more important than yours.”
She cut her sandwich in half and spread some mayo on it. “Can I ask you something?”
He looked up and nodded.
“I was thinking, since we’re going to be spending a lot of time together, it’s important we get along. Hopper said we might have some weather moving in. If so, this whole op may be delayed by several days. We could be spending even more time together than we planned.”
Zach shrugged. “Could be.”
“Well, I know we got off to a rocky start. I’m not surprised. Your reaction when meeting me was pretty typical. Once a team finds out there’s going to be a female agent on the mission, they push back. I try not to take it personally, but it’s hard being a female in a man’s world.”
“What are you trying to say?” he asked.
She sighed and pushed her food away. “I’d like to apologize for being a little testy with you when we first met. It’s my way of covering up hurt feelings. That’s not the real me. Could we maybe press the reset button and start over?” She reached across the table and extended her hand. “Truce?”
He th
ought he understood what she was saying, and he’d heard the slight hitch in her voice revealing the raw emotion behind the words. He knew guys who would have flat out refused to go on an op with a female, so he could sympathize with her position. Also, he was the team leader, and she was right. It was important for the sake of the mission there be harmony in the team, so he accepted her conciliatory handshake.
“Fair enough. My men and I harbor no ill-will against you. The only thing we care about is completing the mission safely. Truce.”
She exhaled deeply. “Thank you.” She smiled and shook his hand, holding it probably longer than necessary. “Glad that’s resolved.”
“No problem,” Zach said, pulling his hand away and moving over to the side bar to fix himself a cup of coffee.
“You been doing this for a long time?” she asked when he returned to the table.
“A while.”
“So are you married? Any kids? A girlfriend maybe?”
He looked at her, not answering. He hated small talk. He hated personal small talk even more. Time for him to find a nice quiet place to study. He gathered his material and started to leave.
“Oh, wait.” Clare gently grabbed his arm causing him to pause a moment. “I’m sorry. That was bad. I was just trying to get to know you a bit. I didn’t mean to offend you by asking personal questions.”
He grimaced, not sure how he felt about her holding his arm. “No offense. The answers are no, no and yes. Anything else you want to know?”
“No, bad judgement on my part. I was just thinking since we’re going to be spending lots of time in tight quarters, we might try to get to know each other better. Sorry. I misjudged the situation.”
Yes, she had. He wasn’t here to make friends. He had a job to do and right now his only thought was to do it and go home. But she looked a bit forlorn, so in order to placate her and in keeping with his desire to have harmony on the team, he changed his tone.
“No, problem, but I need to go study. Please tell Tony and Juan I’m in my room when they return. If you’ll excuse me then, I’ll see you at dinner.”
“Sure. I’ll tell them,” she said with a smile.
SHE WATCHED as he left the room. Zach Acevedo was gorgeous. She’d been smitten from the moment she first laid eyes on his totally hot guy. It had been a mistake to come off so brash in the beginning, but she thought she’d repaired their bad start today. At least she hoped so.
But boy, he was a tough one. She felt sorry for his girlfriend, trying to break through that steely exterior of his. If the girlfriend could do it however, she knew she could as well. She’d been told she was attractive numerous times. Her deep auburn hair, sparkling hazel eyes, and well-rounded figure had captured the attention of many men before. She felt she could give the girlfriend a real run for her money.
Today was the first step in breaking the ice. She intended to get to know him much better before this mission was over. So bring on the bad weather. The longer she was holed up with him in Sigonella, or anywhere for that matter, the better her chances for completing her own personal mission.
Eighteen. Nineteen. Twenty.
“Whew!” Arianna gasped and fell back on the mat, feeling exhausted. That was the last sit-up of her work-out. She lay there resting for a moment before finally grabbing a towel and moving toward the fitness room door.
“I’ll wait for you over by the exit,” she mouthed and signaled to Lisa as she passed her on the treadmill.
Lisa nodded and slipped her headphones off. “Just a couple more minutes of cool-down, and I’ll be there.”
“No rush. Take your time.”
“Did you have a nice work-out?” Raul asked Arianna when she met him at the door.
She leaned against the wall to stretch her calves. “Yeah, I really miss my daily run on the beach with Ebony, but this fitness center is well-equipped.”
“Boy, my legs feel like jello,” Lisa said, joining the group. “Now that we’ve burned off all these calories, it’s time to go hydrate. I think a tall gin and tonic might do the trick.”
Arianna laughed. “You’re incorrigible. Somewhere along the line, I think you missed the object of working out.”
“What? Tonic is water,” Lisa said, pushing the call button of the elevator that would return them to their hotel suite. “Hydration is hydration. Don’t pretend you’re not going to be joining me.”
“Okay, guilty. But first, I’m going to hit the shower,” she said when they entered the suite, “and then, we can figure out what we’re doing for dinner.”
“Oh, yeah. Me too. Need that shower,” Lisa chorused. “I’m in the mood for Italian if you’re taking votes.”
Arianna went into her bedroom, stripped off her wet, sweaty clothes, and turned on the shower. Zach had been gone almost two weeks with no word from him. She had immersed herself in completing her documentary which was due to air in a couple of weeks. Her personal journey, in and out of Afghanistan, had been taped, and she thought it had gone really well. The only thing missing in her life right now, sadly, was Zach.
The water in the shower had finally reached the right temperature, and she was just ready to step in, when she noticed a light blinking on her phone. A text message had arrived. She anxiously picked up the phone, hoping at long last, it might be a message from Zach. She swiped the phone open and hit the text app. The waiting message said,
what u r saying about Islam is unacceptable. we r coming to get u soon bitch.
Fear struck her heart. She had dismissed the threatening note found on the office door a week ago, thinking it was possibly a prank. Also there’d been nothing since, so she had hoped the note was an isolated incident. Evidently not, and now, this text made it personal. This threat had arrived on her very own phone. For the first time, she felt a real pang of fear.
She stared down at the message, trying to figure out what to do… who to tell, or more importantly maybe, who not to tell. She had promised Harold and Kevin, if there were any more threats, she would make Raul aware of the situation as well as other appropriate authorities.
She needed time to think about this. She stepped into the shower and let the warm water pour over her as she shampooed her hair and washed away all traces of her work-out. Don’t rush into anything, she mumbled to herself. Raul was already protecting her. If she told him of the threat, what more could he do that he wasn’t already doing? She thought she knew the answer to that… shut the documentary down, put her on a plane, and hide her away back at Zach’s secure mansion in Costa Luna. And she felt pretty sure he would do that very thing even if he had to physically carry her onto the plane. Short of filing a kidnapping charge, which of course she could, but probably would never do, she didn’t think there’d be any way of stopping him.
She was not going to let any of that happen however. In for a penny, in for a pound as the saying went. She was all in concerning filming this story and getting it on air. She would stay the course for the moment, even realizing this may no longer be just a prank by some nut job.
She stepped out of the shower and checked her phone one more time to re-read the message, but it was gone. At first she couldn’t believe it, thinking she must have imagined seeing the text, but then she remembered. Zach had set a burn notice of one hour for all incoming texts. Time was up and all evidence of the threat had been wiped clean from her phone.
For the first time, she was actually glad she had a bodyguard. She could safely go about her business, knowing he would protect her should these threats be real. She made the decision to carry on as if nothing had happened.
SITTING IN Harold’s office the next morning, she sipped on her coffee and discussed the final edits that needed to be made to their film. She was adamant about keeping a particular portion of the interview of the Afghan woman, Turilla. Kevin thought part of it should be cut, and neither one of them seemed willing to concede their position.
“Look. It’s all good stuff, but the film’s too long,” Harold said, acting
as referee. “Something has to be cut, kids. You guys either come to some agreement, damn it, or I’m going to flip a coin and decide for you.”
Kevin and Arianna stared at each other. Who would be the first to blink, rhetorically speaking? She didn’t want to cut anything, but knew it had to be done. You had only so much air time, and the film was too long. Something had to go.
She idly checked the messages on her phone, stalling for time, but also checking to see if any more threatening texts had arrived. She saw no new texts, but of course, with a burn notice of an hour, she’d need to check her phone frequently or else something could come and go and she’d never see it.
“Okay, Kevin,” she said, letting out a sigh of resignation. “Let’s go have another look at this footage and see what we can cut.” She got up to leave. “This is killing me, you know.”
“Awe, now that’s a good little sis,” he said teasing her. “Glad you came to your senses.”
She slugged him in the arm and then trudged along behind him as he led the way down the hall to the cutting room floor.
THEY WORKED all morning and managed to agree on the footage that would be removed from the story.
“Buck up, Arianna. We can use this deleted footage somewhere else,” Kevin said, seeing her dejected look. “It’s not like it’s gone forever.”
“Well, it’s done now. Let’s move on.” She stood and stretched. “Time for lunch. Your turn to buy.”
As they walked to the front of the building, Harold stepped out of his office and beckoned her to come inside.
“I’m going to hit the john, then, I’ll meet you at the car,” Kevin said. “I vote for Firehouse Subs.”
“Uh, Kevin. Maybe you should come in, too.” Harold signaled him into the office, as well.
“Okay, chap.” He followed Arianna into the office. “What is it, Harold? You look like you’ve lost your best friend.”