Crystal Clear

by Serena Zane

  “It’s what keeps me alive.” With that she grinned and grabbed her pack. She stashed it in the bow of the raft making sure it was secure. Smiling at Patrick, she cocked her head to the side, “You going to help me shove off?”

  Patrick flashed back a boyish grin, “Sure. We have gone over the checklist, have fun, and remember all the things we talked about. Be safe.” He leaned over and grabbed the sides of the raft and shoved it onto the river. “Remember to get out after the fourth set of rapids. You don’t want to take the waterfall.”

  “No worries. I’ll see you in a few days.” Cindy shoved the paddles into the fast moving water and dug in. The rise and fall of smaller rapids began to move the raft through the water.

  The first set of rapids came up quickly. Cindy remembered what Patrick had told her about digging into the water with her oars. Her muscles strained as she took the first set. The raft tossed about, and dipped into the swirling water, but remained on course.

  This was a lot easier when Jackson was with me, she thought.

  Cindy let out her breath as she maneuvered past the first challenge. The current tugged and the raft drifted into calmer waters for a moment.

  She could hear the sound of the approaching Bull Rider rapids. Patrick had joked with her about going to the front of the raft and riding her way through. Cindy didn’t think that would be such a great idea.

  As she rounded the corner they came into view. A deep churn of wave Cindy saw made her breath hitch. Her feet braced deep underneath the bench in front, her hands griped the oars. She forced herself to take a deep breath.

  The raft dove through the first dip and the front rose almost vertically as a wave took her forward. Cindy laughed aloud as the raft slammed down on the other side and water splashed up onto her body. She was drenched.

  Cindy tried to guide herself over to calmer water as Patrick advised. Her raft bounced off the rock wall on the right. She pushed off with her oar, and righted the craft. It drifted into the still water. She lifted her oars and enjoyed life for a moment. Around her, Cindy enjoyed the dichotomy of the silence in nature surrounding her on the left and the right. The sound of the rapids before and behind her rushed in her ears. From what Patrick had told her, she had about fifteen minutes to relax before taking the next set of rapids.

  Cindy rested her head back and took a moment to breathe. It wasn’t often she got out into nature. She did love camping, just not the dirt and grim that came with it, her job normally took her to more lush locales which provided more comfort and convenience. It was either that or the seedy motel room when they were on stake out.

  A grimace crossed her face as she remembered as a picture of their last job came into her head. She’d spent hours in a cramped van with six guys waiting for the right words to come across a tap, not her idea of fun. She liked tracking down blueprints, and mapping out courses for the teams to follow.

  She was always the one in the background, which was one reason why she was perfect for this mission. No one really noticed her.

  The sound of approaching rapids reached her ears.

  Here we go.

  Cindy pushed against the starboard wall of the raft. She felt the side give, and pushed again. The raft had definitely lost air. There was no time to row to the side before the next set. Gritting her teeth, she pulled her oars into place. She could do this.

  The craft hit the rapids and turned sideways. Her feet slid out from their holding place. Waves took her over the side of her small craft. Current rushed up on her like a gale force wind and she tried not to panic.

  Stay calm and go with the current, hearing the mantra in her head as she was swept along. She forced her body to relax and flow with the currents around her. Feeling the rocks grab at her, she couldn’t find a hold. She was on the wrong side of the river to swim out. The noise of the coming waterfall crashed in her ears.

  God, I hope you’re with me; Cindy took another deep breath as she surfaced for a moment. She noticed her raft float by and mentally cursed Killroy for sending her on this mission.

  Easy my ass.

  As the sound of the falls grew louder Cindy figured she wouldn’t come out of this unharmed, she just hoped the fall wouldn’t kill her outright. She said a silent prayer as she waited for the drop. She didn’t have to wait long.

  Suddenly, Cindy flung into the air hanging suspended for a fraction of a second before plunging downwards toward the river below. She twisted around and positioned herself so she would go in feet first.

  Won’t do any good if I pass out, she thought.

  It seemed to take an eternity before she slammed into the water. It felt as though a hundred knives passed through her legs and swallowed her whole.

  Cindy surfaced in a pool of calmer water. She forced her arms to swim over to the muddy embankment. Glancing further downstream she noticed her raft float away.

  Damn, there goes my ride. Cindy pulled herself out of the water and looked down at herself. As she took in a glance at her clothes, they were shredded in several places from hitting rocks, logs, or floating debris. She looked pretty torn up.

  Cindy tried to rise to her feet, and cursed again when sharp pains went up her right leg. She bent over and tested the injured area.

  Just what I need, she thought wincing when she hit the sprained muscle in her foot.

  Great! Just Great!

  In the middle of the wilderness with a sprained foot, no transport, and of all things the water had ruined her cell phone.

  At least I still have my backup. She reached for the waist pack Montgomery had talked her into.

  The survival kit Cindy packed before coming on this mission had the bare essentials, a Snickers bar, beef jerky, a first aid kit, waterproof matches, and her hunting knife. Cindy pulled off her pack and opened the zipper silently thanking her best friend for thinking of getting a waterproof kit. She pulled out the items.

  Cindy lifted out the pint-sized first aid kit and noticed a Ziploc bag with another cell phone inside. All their phones were set up as a TAC just for these emergency situations, and could receive a signal from bouncing reception off any satellite. So, it didn’t matter that she was in the middle of nowhere.

  “Thank you Luce. Oh God, thank you!” Cindy cried out for joy, she wasn’t stranded after all. Dialing, she pulled herself to the nearest tree and leaned back.

  “Agent Halverson, who’s speaking?” The voice on the other end of the line was brisk and business like.

  “This is Agent Hawke, I’m down. I repeat, I’m down. Location unknown at this time. Track this call. I’ll remain on the line.” Her head felt light.

  “Right, hang in there Hawke, I believe we have someone in the area. Just stay put.” She almost laughed, if her leg didn’t hurt quite so bad she would have.

  Stay put, right. Got it. Not going anywhere with this damn leg right now anyway.

  She rested her head on the tree behind her, and waited. It would take a few minutes, but Agent Halverson would come thru for her. He may be an ass, but he would come thru.

  Cindy wasn’t going to pull out, but she needed help. The mission had definitely become more complicated. She sighed and reached into her survival kit. Right now what she needed was that Snickers bar.

  Chapter 7The incessant ringing of the TAC phone interrupted Jack as his mouth closed over another bite of trout he caught earlier in the afternoon. He debated between answering the line, and taking another mouthful of the delicious pan fried trout. His sense of duty caved and he sighed as he picked up, “Yes, Wilde here.”

  A paused silence met his ear, and then person on the other end answered. “This is Commander Alex Quade.”

  “What’s going on Sir?” Jack waited in anticipation until the man explained.

  “We’re calling you up. There’s an agent down. She’ll be found somewhere near your location. Help her finish the mission. It
’s become more dangerous than originally planned. You’ll find the information in the file we’re faxing to you.”

  Jack rubbed the stubble growing on his chin as he thought.

  “Where’s her backup?” Jack's curiosity got the better of him as to what kind of organization would send a single agent in without any cover. His fax machine started to hum with an incoming fax.

  Commander Quade spoke, “Her backup’s on the way, but will be delayed for several hours. His plane grounded due to weather, you're the best option. You’re close, and capable. He should be able to arrive in about three to four hours.”

  Jack walked over to the fax and watched as the pages came through. The damn machine had a bad habit of spitting pages on the floor.

  “Sounds like she got in deeper than planned.” Picking up the file he started to flip through the file. He sat down at the table and spread out the pages.

  “Her organization got some bad info and didn’t anticipate the enemy to be in the area. She went down on the river and according to the tracking should be found at the base of the falls. Her name’s Cindy Hawke. She works for F.I.U.W.”

  He’d heard of F.I.U.W. through some of the other SEAL teams, but he hadn’t worked with them directly.

  Commander Quade continued, “They’re currently working in cooperation with the US and other governments to take out the Jaguar organization. Find the agent, retrieve the info, time’s of the essence. ”

  “Yes Sir. Thank you Sir.” Jack cast a longing glance at the trout still uneaten on the table and moved to gather the pack he always kept ready in case something like this happened. He looked over the pages in front of him. Everything Commander Quade told him was outlined in the report.

  He flipped to the last few pages and read a quick summary of Agent Hawke. When he came to a page with her picture Jack sucked in a deep breath. She was gorgeous, her hair was pulled back in a severe bun and she dressed in a strict professional-looking business suit, but he definitely liked the look of her petite frame and her intelligent hazel eyes which held a bit of mischief in them. He felt himself swell, and took a breath at the unexpected reaction he had from looking at her photo.

  It had been a while since he’d been with a woman, and he chalked it down to that. Jack stashed the papers in a manila envelope and placed them in his pack. They gave him clearance authorization as well. He assumed because she would ask about it.

  He threw on his shoulder harness, complete with clips and his .45.

  Once a SEAL always a SEAL, they didn’t want to let all his training go to waste so he’d agreed to stay on as a reserve remote in the Bend area. Restless energy poured over him as he started to move. He’d missed the thrill of the chase.

  “Come on Copper. We have an Agent to find.” Jack opened the door to the cabin and let the dog out.

  “Falls Boy, to the falls--”

  Copper bounded off in front of Jack, eager for the hunt. If she had gone over the falls, she would be in pretty bad shape. The agent was lucky she didn’t die.

  Copper started moving quickly upstream, Jack followed at a more sedate pace. The dog wove his way through underbrush making a path through trees and over the rocky shoreline.

  It wasn’t often that hikers made it out this far, they usually stopped at the top of the waterfall. That was one reason he liked the area, the forest wasn’t too polluted with tourists.

  Copper barked not too far ahead as Jack moved closer to the river. He wasn’t sure what his dog found, one couldn’t be too careful. Jack pulled the gun out of the holster as he moved forward toward the area his dog waited; old habits were hard to break. His training prepared him to be ready at all times.

  Copper had stopped a short distance from an outcropping of rocks, a grey raft floated like a dead body in the water. The edge caught on a branch which stuck out into the water four or five feet. There was a pack tied onto the bow end that floated not far from the bank.

  Jack rushed over and pulled the craft ashore. If this was hers then she had to have taken quite a spill. It was a two person raft, but could carry one if they wanted to solo the rapids. He looked around the immediate area, but didn’t see anyone.

  “Good boy Copper.”

  Copper whined, and nosed Jack in the leg.

  As Jack opened the pack he found several items of interest. The most interesting to him, the .22 caliber packed in a Ziploc bag. Contained in another waterproof holder was a small personalized laptop. Not something you would carry on a regular hiking trip.

  “Looks like we found some of our agent’s gear,” Jack mumbled as he went back over to the raft and searched the flattened side compartment. A small hole perforated the side.

  “Trouble.” He followed the line and found three other holes went through the other side of the compartment through the front section. “Yep, definitely trouble. Let’s go boy.”

  Jack shouldered her gear and set off towards the base of the falls. If the agent rafting survived, that was where she’d likely end up. And according to Quade, that’s where she was located. If she hadn’t already been discovered by whoever sabotaged her raft.

  Carefully moving his way through the underbrush; Jack strode onward with determined steps. No trails lined the immediate area, which made hiking difficult. It was about a half a mile up around the base of the falls, and darkness fast approached. The late afternoon sun splinted through the trees, making a curtain of light across the mossy ground of the forest.

  This was Jack’s favorite time of day. He stepped eagerly forward full of adrenalin, and ready to face anyone who dared to threaten the sanctity of his space. His knee wasn’t causing him any pain, and he passed it out of his mind.

  It didn’t matter why the enemy was here. The mission parameters stated Jaguar, a terrorist organization, threatened the peace he treasured when he came to the cabin-- just one more reason to see this mission through. He didn’t really have strong feelings one way or another about fanatics, but he didn’t want them anywhere near his space.

  Glad to have the assignment, it got him out and would help to cure some of the restlessness he felt lately. His stomach growled, and he thought about the trout waiting for him on the table back at the cabin. Jack gave a little sigh. He never did get a chance to finish dinner.

  Jack took less than sixty minutes to hike to the base of the falls, it was about a mile from his cabin, but the sun had already sunk behind the hills. Unless the sky cleared, the trek back would be dark.

  Jack just cleared the trees, when Copper took off barking. He followed at a more reserved pace not knowing what to expect. His gun felt comfortable in his palm and he scanned the area prepared for anything.

  It was likely Jaguar would have someone looking for the agent’s body and they would be armed. You couldn’t do the kind of work he did and not have a paranoid streak. Copper had stopped barking, and stood facing a tree off to the side of the clearing.

  Jack paused. Beyond his dog sat a woman slumped against the tree. A Snickers candy bar wrapper had fallen out of her hand, most likely when she passed out. She looked banged up, probably from the fall over the rapids. Her hair was a wild dark brown mass around her almost pixie-like face, and her clothes were torn. He noticed the pack sitting next to her, and another .22 which matched the one he found sitting on her lap.

  Yep, trouble. Jack wasn’t sure about the best way to proceed. If he woke her, she might start and shoot at him. She was a trained agent, despite the fact that she looked like a wayward pixie. He knew she would to take out any threat to her or the mission.

  Copper looked back at him and whined. Jack held a finger to his lips and motioned the dog to be silent. Copper obeyed, and returned to watching the woman.

  Chapter 8Cindy didn’t know what to do. She had heard the dog and man enter the area. Her finger itched next to the gun in her lap. She had fallen asleep after eating the Snickers bar. She knew sleeping
wasn’t the wisest course of action, but she had to rest before continuing on and trying to make her way to the satellite. She had a mission to finish, and she wasn’t about to let the sharp pains in her foot stop her. She heard the dog whine close to her, and slid her hand up to the gun in her lap. Cindy raised her lids, and looked at the dog first, then the man behind him.

  He was large, but definitely something out of her most vivid imagination. She had to stop herself from shaking her head to see if she still dreamed. His sculpted features reminded her of the jagged terrain nearby, and his eyes held the most striking shade of chocolate brown. But she didn’t know him, and had not seen his photo anywhere in the database as far as she could remember.

  She tried not to give herself away, but closed her hand over the gun and began a stretch. Stopping midway, she pretended to notice the intruders for the first time.

  She took aim, “Who the hell are you?”

  Jack already had his gun trained on her. “I’d ask you the same question, but I can see you’ve run into a bit of trouble and I wouldn’t want to be rude.” Her eyes widened at his gall, “I assume you’re Agent Hawke. Why don’t we both put our weapons aside, and talk like reasonable people.”

  He made a gesture like he would lay his gun down. Cindy eyed him warily, caution still in her eyes, she relaxed her pose.

  “Now,” he said, “I’m Jack Wilde; I have a cabin not far from here. The government called me in to help you, as I’m sure you’ve been apprised.” He nodded toward to phone on the ground next to her. “Copper caught sight of your raft. It snagged on a fallen tree not far from here.” He moved in a little closer, slowly, so she would barely tell he moved. “Would you care to tell me why bullet holes are in it?”

  Cindy’s breath hitched a little, if he wasn’t watching her so closely, he might not have noticed. She quickly recovered.

  “Do you have clearance?” She waited.