Cursed Days

by J. M. LeDuc

  CHAPTER 11

  The morning came quick and everyone gathered at headquarters for a briefing by the colonel. “Everyone knows their assignments and I expect them to be followed to the tee. I don’t care how farfetched it might seem that Palm Cove could come under a terrorist attack. Religious zealots tend to be much more radical than any other type of terrorists. They will use any means to an end. We all know that. Is there anyone not clear on their assignment?”

  “No, Sir,” everyone answered in unison.

  Stone faced, Brent looked each squad member in the eye as well as the rest of the SIA personnel.

  When he was satisfied in what he saw, he lowered his glance and in barely a whisper he said, “Done.” Raising his voice again, he concluded, “Now if you would all excuse me, I’d like to say goodbye to my family, as would Seven and the Bishop.”

  Everyone quickly went about their business while Brent wrapped his arms around his wife’s waist.

  “You better enjoy getting your arms around me while you still can,” Chloe said, smiling. She had promised herself that she would not get emotional while saying goodbye, but her hormones got the best of her and tears started to fall. “Now see what you have done. You better just get out of here before I make a fool out of myself.”

  Brent kissed his wife and said, “If all goes as planned, we’ll be home in seven to ten days. If not, we will abandon the search in order to make it home before Christmas.”

  Chloe pulled Brent’s face towards hers and kissed him passionately, “And men don’t ever break their promise, do they?”

  “No, they don’t.”

  Brent nudged Seven to finish saying goodbye to Maddie. Bishop Jessup had already finished saying goodbye to his mother as well as reiterating the directions on how to run the homeless shelter for the umpteenth time. Everyone broke off from their families.

  “We don’t want to keep Q waiting, let’s move out,” Brent ordered.

  “Not before saying a prayer, we don’t,” interjected Bishop Jessup.

  The six of them gathered in a circle and joined hands, bowed their heads and waited for the Bishop to lead them. “Heavenly Father, we ask for a safe and quick completion of the task in which You send us. We pray for the safety of everyone in Palm Cove, but most of all, we pray for Your will to be done and not our own. Amen.”

  “Amen.”

  “Let’s move,” Brent said, breaking the circle.

  As the three men entered The Endowment tunnel system, Chloe’s words played over and over in his head. And men don’t break their promises, do they? kept ringing in his ears.

  “A six and a half minute per mile clip will get us to the airstrip just on time to watch Q drop that bird out of the sky,” Brent said. “Seven, you take post and I’ll be in the rear. Move it, time’s wasting.”

  Forty minutes later, the three men exited the tunnel just in time to hear the jet engine’s high pitched whine as it descended a dark sky. Without lights to guide him, Q made a pin point landing on the tarmac.

  “What is that he is flying?” Bishop Jessup asked. “It looks like a Leer jet but sounds like a fighter jet.”

  “Close enough,” Brent smiled. “I had the pentagon make some vital changes to the bird you’re looking at. The skin may be that of a Leer, but for all practical purposes it is a B1-B.”

  “Damn,” was all Seven said as he packed his lower lip full of tobacco. “The B1-B, padre, is the world’s most advanced long range bomber, and I have no idea how Q just landed that monster on this airfield.”

  As the B-1 came to a stop, Brent nudged the men forward. “And why do we need a Bomber to transport us to Israel?” Bishop Jessup nervously asked.

  “Because,” Brent yelled over the whine of the jets. “It’s putting us down close to the Gaza strip and there has been a lot of fighting going on there lately. It’s just a precaution. Besides, not only will it get us there quicker, but in its current disguise, we’ll be less likely to draw unnecessary attention. The quicker we get there, the quicker we get home. Now let’s not be rude and keep our host waiting.”

  Q quickly exited the aircraft, handing the three men their jump suits. “Put these on fast,” he said. “The local fibbies have been monitoring my flight. I give them ten minutes max before they’re here asking all sorts of questions we don’t have answers to.” Climbing back up into the craft, he yelled, “I plan on being out of here five minutes before they arrive.”

  “I’m not having a good feeling about this,” Bishop Jessup said as he fumbled into his flight suit.

  Spitting out a healthy amount of tobacco juice, Seven smiled and said, “It only gets better, padre. Wait until we break mach 1. You’ll probably lose your breakfast.”

  “That’s comforting.” The Bishop turned to Brent for support, but only got a half smile and a shaking of his head in reply.

  “Climb up, boys. I’m not in the mood for explanations,” Brent said.

  Three minutes later, the B-1B seemingly shot straight up into the sky with all four men tightly belted into their seats. About four hours into the flight, the three passengers heard Q’s voice come through their helmets. “We’ll be rendezvousing with a fuel craft in about twenty minutes. So if you hear or feel a thud, it’s just the coupling taking place. Sit back and relax. We’ll be flying at just over the fifty-thousand foot ceiling until we get close to the final destination. I’ll then drop this baby to just over fifteen-hundred feet and slow her down to a mere five-hundred miles per hour in order to ready for disembarking.”

  The Bishop yelled over the roar of the engines. “Disembark at fifteen-hundred feet, what does that mean?”

  “Relax, Bishop,” Brent said. “It means that we cannot be seen entering the country. If my intel is correct, and it is, all the air and seaports are being watched by someone who doesn’t want us there. So, I’m afraid we’ll be using another method of entrance.”

  “Which is? God, please tell me I’m wrong.”

  “We’re going to drop in, out of the sky in the middle of the night. They can’t catch what they don’t see.”

  Bishop Jessup blessed himself repeatedly with the sign of the cross and repeated, “This can’t be happening.”

  “I recommend that we all get a little sleep. I can’t promise the next time we’ll have a chance,” Brent said.

  At o-three-hundred hours, the boys were awakened by Q’s voice. “Fifteen minutes until drop. Rise and shine.”

  “Seven, you hear that?”

  “Loud and clear, Colonel.”

  “Bishop, how about you? Are you awake?”

  “I’m not sure if I even slept.”

  “Too late now,” the Colonel said, speaking through the helmet microphone. “I need you to listen up and do exactly as I tell you. This bird is far from showroom ready. It’s been equipped per my specifications for squad and SIA use only. Q is going to drop quickly from our flying altitude to a basement of fifteen-hundred feet. It’s going to feel like your intestines are in your throat, but don’t worry, it won’t last long. As soon as he hits the bottom floor, Q is going to push a button opening the bottom of the fuselage directly below us. Five seconds later, the seat that you’re in will no longer be part of this aircraft. Seconds after that at a just above nine-hundred feet, your chute will open. All in all, you’ll be on the ground in about a minute and a half.”

  Brent waited for a response, but only heard labored breathing. “Soldier,” Brent yelled, “this is your commanding officer speaking, do you read?”

  “Hah, um yeah, I read, I was just praying. . . and crying a little.”

  “This is serious business, Bishop. From here on out, you will only respond to me as sir or Colonel. When speaking by radio, you’ll refer to me as One, Seven as Two and you will be Three. Is this all understood?’

  Bishop Jessup swallowed hard, reminding himself that he was doing God’s w
ork. “Yes, One, understood.”

  “Good, now try and stay relaxed and enjoy the ride. It will be a short one.”

  Suddenly the bomber dropped out of the sky as if Newton’s Law of Gravity no longer exited. “Twenty seconds and counting,” Seven said.

  “Roger. See you boys on the ground,” Brent responded.

  In the time it took for that conversation to take place, Bishop Jessup’s world changed forever. The bottom of the jet suddenly disappeared and before he had time to think about it, he was falling. Plummeting toward earth, seat and all. In what seemed like an eternity, but in what was actually seconds, he felt a tug on the back of his seat and felt his parachute open to the early morning sky.

  The Bishop looked up and saw his chute completely unfurled and breathed a momentary sigh of relief. Suddenly the cockpit which he was attached struck terra-firma. It wasn’t the soft fluffy landing he imagined. The rough landing jarred him hard enough to knock the wind out of him, sending a lightning bolt of electricity up his entire spine. Before he was able to catch his breath, his ‘brothers’ were at his side.

  Gasping for air, he laid on his side, still strapped into his seat. “I think the padre got a little more of a shock than he expected. Didn’t you explain to him how to land?” Seven asked.

  “Not enough time and it would have caused him to tighten up. I couldn’t risk his injuring himself,” Brent replied.

  “What, heeh, do, heeh, you call this,” Bishop Jessup gasped.

  “A safe landing,” Brent said, “No more talking. Seven, let’s get him unstrapped and hide the landing gear. We have a ten mile hike to maneuver in the next two and a half hours if we are to meet our connection at the rendezvous point.”

  Getting his wind back a little, the Bishop asked, “What connection, what rendezvous?”

  “A Knight of the Endowment.”

  CHAPTER 12

  After running/hiking for two and a half hours, the Bishop was elated when Brent put his arm up to signify stopping. He pointed to what looked like an abandoned building two-hundred feet up the road and motioned for the others to put their facemasks on. Bishop Jessup removed it from his backpack only to find that there were no eye holes. In fact, there were no holes at all. Tapping Brent on the arm to gain his attention, he made his questioning apparent. Brent just shook his head and put his own on.

  Not quite understanding, the Bishop went ahead and placed the mask over his head. Once on, he understood. Although no one could see in due to the lack of holes, somehow he was able to see perfectly well through the material. Brent looked at both men and nodded.

  Moving with the quiet grace of a ninja, Seven and the Colonel made their way to the building. Once in place, Brent radioed the Bishop to join him. He motioned Seven around to the back of the building, while he took the Bishop with him to the front. Without any type of verbal or nonverbal communication, the Bishop watched as both the colonel and Seven barged through the front and rear entrances in complete synchronization.

  Bishop Jessup peered into the opening of what was the front door just in time to see both of them roll into the abandoned building. They rolled to their perspective right sides, causing them to end up on opposite sides of the room. With speed and agility that he’d only witnessed once before—when Brent was in mortal combat against Satan’s pawn—they both sprung to their feet, handgun’s cocked and pointed at a shadow in the far left hand corner of the building.

  “For my sake,” came the voice in a heavy Israeli accent, “I pray to Hashem that you are the envoy sent by the Ambassador?”

  “You have ten seconds to state the code phrase before I start shooting,” Seven said in a thick French accent.

  With trembling voice, the man said, “Genesis 9:9 ‘I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you’.”

  Seven lowered his Glock 9mm handgun. “I apologize for our entrance and for frightening you. But we cannot be too careful.”

  “I accept your apology, but please don’t do it again. I don’t think my heart could take it.” As Caleb continued to talk, Seven and Brent removed their masks. Bishop Jessup quickly followed. “Am I to assume that I am speaking to the Ambassador,” Caleb asked, directing his question towards Seven.

  “You are to assume nothing, Caleb. Like you, we are merely players in a much bigger game.”

  “Ah, you speak with eloquence,” Caleb nodded, “but I’m afraid I was not born yesterday. Your French accent, though very good, is not all that convincing. If I am expected to trust the three of you, don’t you think you owe me the same amount of respect?”

  “You speak with much eloquence yourself there, Caleb,” Seven said in his thick southern drawl. “But as you know, the identity of The Ambassador must remain secret. It’s for your own safety.”

  Caleb shrugged his shoulders and said, “Eh, it was worth a try. And by the way, I think I liked your French accent better than the one you are speaking with now.”

  Brent, who had been quiet up until this point, moved towards their contact. As he approached, he put his arm out to shake his hand. When Caleb took his hand in welcome, Brent twisted it with such force that Caleb was quickly on his knees. Before the Bishop or Seven could react, Brent had his weapon drawn, cocked and pointed at Caleb’s temple. “There are two men outside keeping watch. One is approximately fifty yards away, in the bombed out building to your right and the other is making his way to the front entrance.

  “I find your idea of trust lacking the virtue from which it is derived. I know that you are wired and I know that they can hear me. If both of your friends are not standing in the middle of this room in thirty seconds, you will be dead. Do I make myself clear?”

  Sweat pouring off his brow, Caleb nodded his agreement. In his native Hebrew tongue, he spoke into a Bluetooth wireless device and told the other two men to do exactly what Brent had instructed. Without taking his eyes off of Caleb for even a second, he motioned Seven to the back entrance and Bishop Jessup to the front.

  “I think this would be a good time to draw your weapon, padre,” Seven drawled as he packed his lip full of tobacco.

  Seconds later the first man entered the front entrance with his arms up over his head.

  “With one finger on that pistol, hand it to the gentleman next to you,” Brent said. “If I see more than one finger even close to touching that firearm, you will be attending a funeral later today.” The man, dressed in an Israeli military uniform did as he was told. “Very nice,” Brent said. “Now, get flat on your stomach, hands behind your back.

  “Padre, cuff him. . . tightly, using these,” Brent let go of Caleb and reached into his front pocket and removed a pair of plastic handcuffs. He watched as the man’s hands were bound. “Good, now pull up his right pant leg and take his secondary weapon out of the calf holster.” The Bishop quickly did as instructed, all the time wondering how the colonel knew where to find the second hand gun. “Now roll him on his left side and remove the knife from the waist band of his pants.”

  As the Bishop was doing this, Seven grabbed the second man who came running in through the back entrance. This one was no more than a boy. Seven had him in a choke hold and removed the automatic weapon strapped to his shoulder.

  “Please,” Caleb said, “he is my nephew. If someone is to be blamed for this, it is me, he is innocent. I beg of you not to hurt him.”

  “Seven, let the boy go,” Brent said.

  When he did, the boy of no more than twelve went running to the man who was laid out at the Bishop’s feet and threw his arms around his waist.

  “Now,” Brent said, backing away a bit, would you like to tell me what this was all about?”

  “I know I did not follow strict instructions from the Ambassador, but as you said yourself, one cannot be too careful. I am just a merchant, not a soldier. I was scared to come alone.”

  Looking in Caleb’s eyes, B
rent sensed distrust, but went along with what was said. “Weapons down,” he ordered. Seven and Bishop Jessup holstered their guns. “I know you are who you say you are,” Brent said, “but for future reference, no improvising.”

  “I understand,” Caleb said. “Now if you would like, my wife has made a meal in your honor. I just ask that you untie my cousin, Ira.”

  Brent smiled for the first time since landing in Israel and nodded to Seven. With a flick of a knife, he cut the cuffs off of Ira. In a gesture of good faith, he returned his knife and guns, sans the ammo.

  Five minutes later, they were in the middle of a bustling marketplace. “Even before the sun rises, the market is very crowded,” Caleb explained. “The freshest of vegetables will be gone before the sun crests the eastern sky. Come,” he said, “my home is right behind this building.”

  CHAPTER 13

  The men showered and were well fed. Caleb’s wife, Alana, had been the perfect hostess. Now, she decided it was her time to speak.

  “Would you mind if I asked you some questions?” She asked to no one specific.

  Caleb tried to stop her. “Alana, please, these are very important people. They don’t have time for your foolishness.”

  She just shooed him away with a wave of her hand.

  “After all the food you prepared for us and your hospitality, you have earned the right to ask whatever you’d like,” Seven said.

  Looking at Brent, she said, “You are not what you seem, so I’d like to address my questions to you.”

  Brent smirked, swept his long hair away from his face, and said, “How’s that, Alana? How am I not what I seem?”

  “You have the face and the body of a man, but your eyes tell me something different. They are not just used for seeing. They are a window to God.”

  “And—that means what?” Brent asked.

  Alana pulled her chair over and sat directly in front of Brent. She swept her thick, black hair back away from her face revealing how beautiful she truly was. Brent stared at her smooth olive skin, big brown eyes and full red lips. He was taken by her beauty. She saw his expression change to one which seemed vulnerable and took it as a sign to proceed.