Operation Chaos

by Watkins, Richter

  No one on either boat had any chance of survival.

  Rainee was dumbstruck. Her uncle had committed suicide in a kamikaze attack to save them. She felt a horrible sickness rising into her chest.

  “Get out of here,” Keegan said calmly over their earpieces. “This place will be crawling with federales.”

  She had no time to react now as they struggled to get through the rocks and up on shore.

  Somehow they scrambled in among bigger rocks and into the shallows and finally onto the beach.

  Keegan said, “Anyone hurt?” They all checked themselves and announced in the negative, though Mora had blood on his head from the rocks but didn’t seem much fazed by the cuts.

  The crossed a sandbar and walked up the beach. It was stony and full of patches of seaweed.

  Duran and Keegan helped Mora, who suddenly appeared unsteady and may have suffered a mild concussion.

  Metzler wanted to take his gear, but Mora refused to surrender his backpack. “I’m good. Let’s get out of here.”

  They moved quickly up to the highway just as tiny headlights appeared to the north.

  They crossed the highway, went into the brush, and worked their way up into the hills.

  Stunned, incredulous by what had happened, Rainee moved up the hill in a daze. The sight of her uncle doing what he did, the violence of the explosion, his death—all of it was too shocking to absorb.

  She had to push it away, deal with it later. Bringing up the surgeon’s separation from emotion.

  45

  Highly agitated, Colonel Tessler paced on the deck of Doctor Hall’s uncle’s place and stared at the empty slip.

  He was furious that the tracking of the van had taken so long after they’d finally dug out the information from the men at the camp.

  Feeling the stress of having lost them again, he stared out at the docks, the lights of the houses, the world of Imperial Beach and the Silver Strand less than a mile from the border of Baja. Doctor Hall’s uncle was gone. His boat was gone. They were gone. But where?

  He glanced at his wrist monitor. The app kept a checkup on his heart, blood pressure, pulse. He wasn’t in “red” yet, but getting very close.

  One of the agents working with Tessler came out onto the dock, saying, “His name is Troy West. He’s a ’Nam vet. Riverine Force turned minor-league criminal. He’s been involved in smuggling, has a girlfriend in Peru. That’s where they might be heading.”

  Tessler took the news of the escape hard.

  Keegan, with every enhancement modern technology had achieved, and Metzler not far behind, were way too dangerous to be on the loose in South America. They’d make Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid look like high-school campers.

  Tessler turned to the agent. “Get every asset we have in play on the West Coast.”

  How this simple operation had gotten so out of control was mind-boggling. Tessler couldn’t understand what had happened. Had to be the chip set failing and now it had taken out Keegan. No other explanation for his having killed his assets and then the Blacksnake team.

  Tessler now regretted he’d been hesitant to give the kill order. That had backfired, gotten more people killed, and lost the target.

  They were standing there, in the throes of the mess, when Colonel Tessler got a call from one of his Mexican operatives about a boat crash and an explosion off the coast of Baja. The crash involved a very fast boat and a Mexican coast patrol. No identity.

  He doubted it was them so close to the coast, but if it was, maybe that was okay. He’d lose two of his very best, but it would put an end to Doctor Hall. Whatever the problem was with the Z-chips, Raab and Vereen would have to figure it out. Or bring somebody in who could.

  46

  With the heavy air, the steep climb, and the struggle to get out of the ocean, Rainee anticipated fatigue yet found only energy.

  As she moved with her commando team to the top of a low ridge, the horror of what had happened overwhelmed her.

  They hunkered down in the sand and bushes.

  Keegan knelt next to her. He scanned the road below. Listened. Then he said, “If our escape was called in, there’ll be one hell of a lot of vehicles and choppers headed this way. If that happens, we’ll have no choice but to head into Tijuana. I have some contacts there. But I’m not hearing anything.”

  “Mora and I both have relatives there,” Duran said.

  “Yeah, but mine aren’t in jail,” Mora said. Then he put a hand on Rainee’s arm. “I’m sorry.”

  Rainee nodded, her wet running pants and shirt clinging to her like duct tape, the weapon on her side suddenly heavy as she stared out at the road and beach below, her mind reeling with the shock of her uncle’s kamikaze death.

  The debris from the crash was still smoldering out in the rocks and the waves; the last flames licked at the water and died.

  That’s when, in the slim light of the moon, she saw her uncle’s two hawks slowly circling the debris below, like they were waiting for their papa and his boat, their home, to surface. The sight tightened her chest, and she had to force back tears.

  Keegan said, “It sounds like the boat your uncle took out was a Baja coast task force. They coordinate with Special Forces and our coastal patrols.”

  Metzler said, “We need to get out of here in case they got any radio traffic indicating somebody from the boat they were after made it to shore.”

  Just as they were about to leave, Keegan stopped them and they hunkered down.

  Moments later, coming south from TJ, three cars—two with bar lights—raced toward the scene.

  Keegan monitored transmissions. He said, “No indication they’re starting a hunt. The assumption seems to be everybody died in the boat crash.”

  Keegan turned to the north just as a chopper appeared. A powerful light came from it down to the debris in the ocean as the wrecked boats—what was left of them—were swept into the rocks.

  Rainee took the binoculars and looked at the crash site. She saw the hawks finally give up and leave, a new life about to begin for them.

  “Let’s move out,” Keegan said.

  Keegan took point; Metzler dropped back to the rear to make sure nothing came at them from behind.

  Rainee reminded herself that her uncle’s death was something she’d have to deal with later.

  Keegan stopped every ten minutes or so and had them hunker down while he listened and canvassed the area with his night glasses.

  Up in the hills there was faint music; well off in the distance, the thin glow of the southern part of TJ.

  She felt the swim and the climb had done very little to tire her. She felt the drug’s crazy power possessing her like no stimulant she’d ever experienced before.

  They climbed, dropped, climbed again over hillocks and around a tree line and down into a narrow little valley, drawing closer to the faint lights from the big compounds.

  She still couldn’t quite put away the horror of what had happened. Couldn’t believe what her uncle had done. Was he heroically suicidal? Troy’s mad last stand.

  She didn’t know how to deal with it. She’d gotten him involved, but he had been excited, willing. She’d offered him the option of just letting them take the boat and he had refused. He wanted to be involved.

  Later, dammit, she chastised herself. Be the surgeon, the detached doctor.

  Next to her, Mora, who seemed to know where she was emotionally, said, “Your uncle saved us, saved the mission. Maybe that was what he needed to do. Be the hero you always thought he was.”

  Rainee nodded. “Yes, that’s how I will look at it,” she said. “He was a warrior to the end.” She appreciated Mora. She appreciated all of them. Then she said, “We can’t let his sacrifice be in vain.”

  And he said, “We won’t.”

  Keegan gathered the group and told them how they would be approaching the compound where the doctor he wanted to grab lived.

  They moved on for another half hour before resting in the t
rees on a hillside.

  Keegan gathered them. “There’s no indication anyone knows we got out of L.A. and are in Baja, so we have maybe a very short window of time. All goes well, once inside, we grab Raab and as many computers, thumb drives, whatever is available, and we take his chopper, and him, and get out.”

  They worked their way past some enclaves of homes in the hills south of the city.

  They stopped in the trees on a hillock overlooking estates. Immediately in front of them was a barbed-wire fence that looked like pasture fencing.

  Keegan said the one directly below them was the target. It was well apart from any other compound and surrounded by high walls.

  Compounds dotted the hills and the ones on top had views of the ocean in the distance. There were parties at several compounds going strong, even this late.

  TJ was the richest of Mexican cities and they were in one of the elite areas. Most of the compounds were surrounded by high walls topped with barbed wire, and some with what looked like gun turrets.

  “This is also one of the really secure places in Mexico. No rival cartel bothers to attempt to get anywhere near here. Most of the people living here have their security provided by the Special Forces, who are hand in glove with the Baja cartel. They protect this place like it’s the king’s principle fiefdom because they now work for us.”

  “Our target, Doctor Vereen, is just ahead. He’s as cold-blooded as they come. He was the one who made the decisions on who was too damaged to live when things didn’t work well. He can get us in with face and DNA recognition.”

  He told each of them how they would approach. They checked their weapons. Keegan said, “Anyone needs to piss, do it now.”

  “I think we all pissed out pants in the ocean,” Mora said. He got dry chuckles of confirmation.

  They moved out.

  47

  Doctor Raab pushed his eye mask up on his forehead and stared at the ceiling. What had awakened him? After the previous miserable night, after the double dose, this was unacceptable. He needed his sleep.

  He looked at the clock. Jesus, it was 3:36 in the goddamn, sonofabitch morning. He hadn’t slept much over two hours.

  He stared into his frustration, angry at being awake, considered taking another powerful sleeping pill, when his phone chirped. That’s what had awakened him. It was Tessler, hopefully with some good news.

  It took him a moment to clear his mind enough to answer.

  “There’s been a boat explosion off the coast,” Colonel Tessler said. “We’re checking it out. It might be them.”

  Raab struggled to grasp what he was hearing. “Goddamnit, find out who was on the boat. Let me know immediately if it’s them.”

  Raab hung up. Was this how it would end? If it was them, it meant he’d lost her and the thought was crushing. Not only for her abilities to deal with whatever the problems they had with Z3, but she would be gone from him forever.

  He missed Rainee Hall terribly and wanted her dead at the same time. He had pictures of her on the wall. On his laptop, that a detective had taken for him over the past couple of years, were pictures of her running, working out, naked in her bedroom taken by a high-tech camera installed by a sophisticated radio wave that was developed by the NSA.

  Raab obsessed over her all the time and hated that. No matter how many whores he messed with, no matter if they were young girls or experienced prostitutes, he had never been able to give up his one great passion.

  He denied it at times. He hated her at times for her refusal to accept political reality, and her testimony, yet he couldn’t get over her.

  He sat for a moment staring at nothing. At his thoughts. He’d wanted her as he’d never wanted any woman and she’d denied him over and over. And now he might not get another opportunity. And he might not be able to stop the Z-chip meltdown in some of their top warfighters.

  He could only now wait. It was one of the most difficult moments of his life, given his lousy sleep the night before. So he decided he needed to take a double dose if he was to get any sleep.

  He took another round of pills downed with a strong belt of Scotch, pulled down his eye mask, and got comfortable. They’d knock him out in about ten minutes and keep him out for at least six hours.

  Goddamnit, by that time, the greatest goddamn manhunter in the universe better have solved the problem one way or another.

  But, with a great sadness, and anger, and confusion, he believed now she was dead. Gone.

  So, to compensate, Raab went into his nighttime fantasy of becoming the most powerful man in the world and what he would do with that great power to make things right, deal with internal enemies, and what countries needed to be destroyed by new superweapons. He would lecture the entire world as the spokesman for the new regime.

  It was once a pure fantasy that helped him get to sleep, but now it was very near a reality. It was the mental adrenalin that drove his entire existence and allowed him focus until the drugs took him under.

  48

  As they slipped down through the trees, the ground rocky with loose pine needles, music greeted them not from one but from several Mariachi bands, pulsating up the valley from parties in compounds.

  They reached a rusty barbed-wire fence. One at a time, they crawled under. Keegan and Metzler first, then holding the wire for the others.

  For a moment, when it was her turn, Rainee, still consumed by thoughts of her uncle’s death, lost concentration. She caught her small backpack on the wire, but a hand quickly freed her, and another pushed her through.

  When she stood and turned, she saw fireworks bursting in the sky from the celebration going on in one of the villas down the valley.

  On the far hillside, lights of homes across the valley shone like jewels. The residences of the rich of Mexico, a country now more or less under the control of American clandestine forces according to Keegan.

  Maybe we have more control of Mexico than our own country, she thought. But maybe that was about to change.

  They continued around the nape of the hill, passing above some very large estates, moving fast under the power of the pills.

  At one point, as they waited for Keegan to check out their path, she told Mora that, years ago, the latest and greatest energizer for the tired and stressed was mild electric brain stimulation.

  “You’re kidding. Electroshock?”

  “Yes. It was developed by the U.S. Air Force Human Effectiveness Directorate School of Aerospace Medicine.”

  “It work?”

  “With limitations. That was so long ago in scientific time. Nothing compared to what’s now at their disposal. The threat that these Energizer-bunny pills pose is that you don’t know when you’re pushing your body too hard, too long. That had been one of the challenges of enhancements, that they could outstrip the structures that housed them, masking stress and sometimes injuries. The danger in feeling more powerful than you, physiologically, are.”

  “Story of my life,” Mora said. “But what I appreciate the most is the lack of mental fatigue. It’s like the longer you go, the less sleep you get, the more cognitive faculties stay high. Which, in my case, is a good thing. I should always be on them.”

  Rainee smiled. “True. I feel right now like I could run a hundred-mile marathon and think great thoughts.”

  “You probably could.”

  She’d felt the power of the chemicals while swimming in the rocks, but while she had the energy, she didn’t have the strength against that violence.

  Right now, she should be totally exhausted, dead on her ass, but instead, she knew an energy and cognitive faculty that was astounding.

  They moved out for another few hundred yards before they stopped again. They were in some tall pines on the side of a shoulder of the hill.

  Keegan and Metzler went again and the two of them huddled and talked.

  Then Keegan went on ahead to check something out, moving with his usual smooth, cougar stealth, a shadow among shadows, a new-age, hardcore war
fighter in his element.

  The forests ahead lay thick on the tops, thin in the valleys. The sky on this clear night, “buckshot with stars,” as her father used to say.

  They moved again, curling around the hillock, the pace seeming almost in slow motion to her, yet she knew it was ridiculously fast.

  The next time they stopped, she could see below three large villas about a hundred yards apart from one another. One of the compounds had a big, loud party going on.

  Metzler came back and said their target had a party winding down. They might have to wait for the right time.

  They continued on, going wide around, through the trees, and headed across the hillock between two other compounds.

  It was a given that if they failed to get Doctor Vereen, there wasn’t a good “Plan B.” Just running. Living as hunted animals, trying somehow to get the media involved.

  Another party was going on at a huge compound maybe a quarter mile away on the hillside. More fireworks, music. At least it was good cover for them.

  In the compound where their target was, they watched as the party wound down. Cars were leaving. Headlights weaved through the turns and slashed at trees.

  She didn’t want to believe Keegan was going betray them in the end, but she couldn’t completely dismiss the idea either. Was he already in contact with forces? Were they waiting behind the walls of this doctor’s home?

  They moved at a slant down the hill through the trees and drew closer to the compound and their target. It was going to happen now, one way or another.

  An argument somewhere behind walls, a female cackle that sounded a bit sarcastic. Life at its fundamental everywhere.

  She watched Keegan and Metzler pass the night goggles back and forth as they studied the situation below.