by Scott Cook
There was a tap on the driver’s window and Garcia managed to lower it.
“General?” One of the men from the truck ahead asked. He’d gotten out and trotted back to see what had happened.
“Está bien, Diego,” Garcia said, still chuckling, “No problemo. Seguir moviéndose.”
The man frowned, gave the interior of the Jeep a once over and then walked back to his truck.
Garcia put the Jeep in gear and the forest began to roll past once again. After a few moments, he lowered the towel and glanced at himself in the rearview mirror. The bleeding seemed to have stopped but his nose was red and swollen. It might be broken, but she couldn’t tell. It seemed to be sitting on his face in its proper position, though.
“I didn’t think they made them like you in America,” he observed in a conversational tone.
She scoffed, “What would you know about American women?”
He grinned, “I went to college at Florida A and M. I worked on a cattle ranch in south central Florida for a year after that.”
“So that makes you an expert, huh?”
He shrugged, “I like Americanas… but I found them spoiled. I can’t tell you how much complaining I heard about such unimportant things… makeup, clothing, mothers and fathers… work. You Americans have never known suffering. No matter how bad you think things ever got… it’s nothing compared to Nicaragua. Here, suffering is a way of life. It has been since Cortez came ashore and brought a shipload of disease with him.”
She couldn’t argue that, “I was in the Peace Corps. I’ve traveled extensively and it was mostly to places where people suffered.”
He nodded appreciatively, “That makes sense. You are an exception.”
They rode in silence for some time. They were headed north, that was easy enough to determine by the bloated and angry red sun that hung off to their left. They took back roads that were often barely more than game trails. That made sense, too. These were rebel soldiers, for lack of a better term, and they couldn’t simply drive up and down the Pan American Highway for all to see.
Suddenly, they seemed to arrive at their destination. The caravan had turned off of a winding northerly track and onto a gravel road that seemed to run east / west. They weren’t’ on this for more than ten minutes when they pulled into what looked like a refugee camp.
There was just enough twilight left for Missy to make out a small tent city and several pre-fabricated structures. There were about a dozen Jeeps and a few pickup trucks as well, along with a school bus and what might have been an old Army M-5 two and a half ton six by six truck. A Deuce and a Half.
“Here is where the revolution will begin,” Garcia said proudly and with no small touch of reverence.
Missy wasn’t a soldier, but she’d married a Marine. She knew more than enough about armed conflict and military organization to give her the impression that what she was seeing was laughable. Of course, she didn’t say as much. She only nodded and drank in everything, trying to memorize every detail.
She also began to fear that both she and the kids would be thoroughly searched. She prayed that wasn’t so… or at least not all of them.
While it was possible she’d be frisked or even strip searched, it could be that the girls and especially Declan might avoid that. It was her one slim hope at the moment.
A tiny gambit that her son wouldn’t be too thoroughly gone over. Because hidden on him was her smart phone. And at that moment, a sailing app she’d downloaded was plotting an active track that would lead directly back to the campground.
Missy didn’t know how she’d use it, but it was, at least for the moment, a lifeline.
Chapter 10
The good news was that I made it to the trees without being seen. The bad news was that I was alone without a weapon and about to try and creep up on several armed men in broad daylight. That and I’d left my friend alone and exposed between two piles of logs. He was hidden for now but a cursory search by either of our enemy’s teams could change that very quickly.
Well, as the man… or woman…? once said, nothing worthwhile in life is easy.
As I crept around to position myself as much behind the southern Jeep as I could, I began to wonder exactly how I’d cross the open ground again. The vehicle was parked at least thirty yards from anything resembling cover. Sure, I could cross that in seconds, yet I couldn’t believe that somebody wouldn’t see me.
Now that I wasn’t talking and plotting, I began to perceive the distant sounds of gun fire down in the box canyon. It seemed sporadic, the occasional pop, pop, pop of an automatic weapon and then the returning fire. Not a full-on fusillade, but what sounded like a running battle where the combatants were using cover to take pot shots at each other.
It was distracting Rincon’s men, and I thought that was the point. It was giving these four assholes plenty of time to do whatever it was they were planning to do.
I couldn’t imagine that they were going to creep down into the canyon and try to raid a supply building or something. It was too light and the distance too far. They certainly couldn’t shoot their way into the greenhouses… so what was this all about?
I resigned myself to the fact that I’d find out sooner rather than later and in one form or another. Either they’d do something, I’d do something to make them spill the frijoles or they’d blow my brains out. Whichever it was, I probably wouldn’t be kept in suspense long.
I found a break in the foliage and peeked out. It was hard to see the further Jeep, but the one I was headed for was fairly clear. One man, the driver, stood next to his door holding a rifle. The passenger was moving toward the fire door to the greenhouse with something in his hands.
“Red, Blue,” Clay whispered to me over the comm. “Are you seeing this?”
“Blue, Red… I can only see my tangos. Second target is not visible.”
“Both are doing the same thing, Red. Two men moving from the Jeeps toward structure. Both carrying something.”
“I wish I was in Oahu now…” I said with over-exaggerated wistfulness.
There was a second’s delay as I switched frequencies. Clay and Miles chimed in with their code names.
“Green, I think you’re about to have company,” I stated.
“What do you mean?” Miles asked.
“Assess some kind of IED being brought to the doorway,” Clay reported.
“Roger that,” I said. “Need to move now… problem is that there’s too much open ground between me and my tango. He’s got plenty of time and room to site in on me when I run.”
“Red, Blue… understood. Standby.”
“Blue, Green… what does—“
Miles’ question was cut off when Clay, like the shit for brains he is, stood up, waved his arms and shouted, “Hey, fuck sticks! Mama mi laverga!”
“Jesus Christ, Blue!” I barked. “That’s the friggin’ Spanish you remember? And at a time like this?”
The diversion was quite successful, even if it did piss me off. Both drivers leveled their rifles on Clay’s position and began to spray rounds at him on full auto. I could only see part of the stack of logs from my position, but I could certainly hear rounds splintering wood and the clatter of the rifles as they burned through all thirty rounds in seconds.
“Red, Blue… when is there a better time to tell a couple of guys to suck your dick?”
“God dammit…” I muttered and shook my head.
I bit my lip and sprinted for all I was worth. The ground was mostly level, patched with knee-high grass and raw earth. As I ran, I heard the sound of a magazine being ejected and the snap of a new one being hastily shoved into the magazine well. My target charged his weapon just as I rounded the back corner of the Jeep.
I guess my target heard me too, because he spun around with viper-like speed and was raising the weapon to get a bead on me when I slammed into him and we both went sprawling to the valley floor.
The firing stopped… or rather did not resume. Instead, a
barrage of Spanish orders and curses filled the air.
“Red! Blue!” That was Miles.
I could hardly take the time to answer as I was busy wrestling a short, stocky man who writhed in my grip like a burlap sack full of serpents. We struggled for a long moment, neither one of us being able to get a good purchase on the other or get some solid ground under us.
A hard elbow lashed out and dug into my gut. It was a good hit, but not debilitating. I went limp and rolled away, managing to get my legs up under me.
My opponent was belly crawling toward the rifle. He just got a hand on it when I lunged and landed on his back.
I jerked him sideways and pounded my balled right fist into his jaw and nose repeatedly. He let out a wet, guttural cry as his jaw snapped and his nose exploded. Even as I flung him and myself away from the weapon, I felt his hand fumbling between us for something on his belt. I didn’t have to take too many guesses to figure out that he was trying to wrestle a clasp knife or a switch blade free.
“Cabron!” I hissed, “Stop fighting me or I’ll snap your goddamned neck!”
“Fuck ju… pinche gringo—“
I got my left arm around his neck and angled it so my forearm was hard against the right side of his face. Then I grabbed a handful of his curly hair in my right and yanked as I used my left arm to force his head to the left. His vertebrae snapping sounded like stepping on a handful of twigs. The sound brought bile into my throat and churned my stomach. I clenched my teeth, forced my revulsion down and shoved his body away.
It was me or him and possibly others. There had been no choice. That was what I had to keep telling myself.
It was one thing to shoot a man. There was… something impersonal about it. But up close, when it was just you and your opponent and you had to kill with your bare hands… well, there’s nothing quite like that. It’s just gritty and raw and nasty.
As I lunged for the rifle, I made the mistake of looking back at the man whose life I’d just violently cut short. He lay on his back, his immobilized body flat and his face staring straight up into the blue sky. His eyes blinked once and I saw the light go out of them.
I wished I hadn’t.
I picked up what looked like an AR-15 and shuffled back to the side of the Jeep. I peeked around the roll bar to see the two men who were more likely than not carrying explosives kneeling down near the fire door.
I lay prone on the ground, shouldered the weapon and used my left forearm as a support and set the weapon to single fire mode. I took careful aim using the iron sights as there was no scope.
I took a slow breath and squeezed off a shot, acquired my next target and fired again before exhaling. Both men yelped and pitched over, their work incomplete.
“Hector!” The other driver shouted.
Then my cover was hit with multiple rounds. The bullets clunked into the metal of the vehicle, burying themselves in the engine compartment and the cab. Both passenger-side tires popped and hissed as rounds tore the rubber open.
I got up and ran around the Jeep, staying low as I made my way to Clay, keeping the log pile between me and the other shooter.
“Red!” it was Clay this time.
“Incoming,” I shouted. “Three tangos down!”
I heard the distinct sound of a rifle dry firing, even from fifty yards away. I stood up straight and shouldered my own weapon. The other driver was standing behind his Jeep, reloading. Only about half of him was exposed, but from that distance, even with iron sights and a knock-off M-16, I could hit him easily. I set the weapon to burst, sighted in and let three rounds go. He danced for a second, as if he was a marionette and the puppeteer was jigging the strings. It seemed to take an absurdly long time before he pitched over into the dirt.
“Down!” I shouted.
Clay stood up and met me as I rounded the end of the logs near the building.
“I’m coming out,” Miles said into our ears.
“Negative!” Clay and I seemed to say in unison.
“Dammit—“ Miles protested.
“Not yet, Green!” Clay shouted as we took stock. “There are explosives outside the door and we don’t know how far they got. Standby!”
Miles grumbled an assent and Clay and I started toward the two men I’d shot first.
“What about your buddy over there?” Clay jerked his thumb toward the southern Jeep.
“Dead,” I said, setting my jaw.
Clay cocked an eyebrow at me, “How?”
I sighed, “His neck is broken.”
“Christ…” Clay breathed.
The two men both had small ditty bags still clutched in their cooling hands. Clay bent down and began carefully examining the bags with delicate touches.
“What do you think?” I asked.
“A few things in here,” Clay said as his fingers roamed over the shapes beneath the nylon. “I think remote detonators… some det cord… and two small blocks of some kind of plastic explosive. C4 I’d guess.”
“Okay,” I said, “I’m gonna frisk the Jeeps.”
“I’ll come,” Clay offered. “We’d better hurry, though.”
“Let’s switch back to the main channel,” I suggested and then activated my comm. “Green, do you copy? We’re going back to Maya.”
Miles acknowledged. Clay dumped out the bags and carefully separated the items he’d found. He was right. The two men had everything they’d needed to set up two pretty powerful plastique improvised explosive devices. Luckily, though, the clay-like C4 hadn’t been fitted with detonation caps, so it was harmless.
After that, we both trotted over to the Jeep I’d gone for. A quick search revealed another long gun, an AR-15 as well. In addition, there were four more magazines and two Sig Sauer 9mm pistols with two extra magazines. Other than that, the storage area of the Jeep held camping gear and bottled water and a little portable food now riddled with 5.56 rounds.
The other Jeep was the same. Its cargo was intact, however. The man I’d shot there was dead by the time we arrived as well.
“Well,” Clay said, “for what it’s worth, we’ve got a couple of assets here, if we need them.”
“Red, Blue… Green,” Miles broke in over the now far less chaotic chatter on the main channel. “Umberto wants to speak with you two.”
“Umberto?” I asked. “Are you there?”
A quick burst of static, “Si, señor Jarvis. I’m coming back up to the greenhouse. I have a report I think you’ll want to hear.”
“Come around to the back,” Clay added. “We’ve subdued the other half of the assault team. How about you?”
“Es Bueno,” He reported. “On my way.”
Miles stepped out from the fire door and strode over to where Clay and I were still rummaging through the northern Jeep. His face was set in a hard mask.
“You okay, Miles?” Clay asked.
“They killed one of Umberto’s men and a civilian,” Miles said gruffly. “A man on one of the diggers. Stray round… dammit. What the hell is she up to?”
“Who?” Clay asked in confusion. “Andrea? You really think she’s behind this?”
“Who else?’ He said angrily. “This project is critical. It’s just like you said, Scott. It’s a prototype community for tomorrow. A real life Epcot if you will.”
“Okay…” I said soothingly, “and being attacked by Nicaraguan rebels doesn’t negate that. Honestly, how does this effect—“
“Because we’re under tight budgetary and time constraints,” Miles declared, “and we’re here at the pleasure of the Costa Rican government. If we become a magnet for trouble…”
I sighed, “Yeah, I get it… But wouldn’t that hurt her, too? I mean if you get delayed and the government rescinds your permits or whatever, wouldn’t that hurt her?”
“Maybe not,” He admitted. “It just proves what an incompetent ass I am. How I can’t manage things without her, yadda, yadda… but this is way out of bounds! Three men are dead, now. One from before and two today.�
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“Seven men,” I said, waving my arm around to indicate our fallen foes.
Miles scoffed, “I don’t count them. To hell with them.”
Any further discussion was shelved for the moment when Umberto Rincon tore around the corner of the building in his electric cart and skidded to a stop near us. He jumped out of the cart with something in his hand and rushed over.
“Are you all right, Umberto?” Miles asked.
“Si… si,” He stated glumly.
“What happened?” I asked.
“They drove up and began shooting,” Umberto said. “It took a moment for my men to get mobilized, but we were able to respond and keep them pinned down. Two pickup trucks and four men. The trucks were empty except for the men’s own supplies… and something else.”
“What is it?” Miles asked, all of our eyes going to the white square in the security chief’s hand.
Umberto sighed, “Señor Clay… lo siento mucho, but I need to show you something.”
I don’t know why, but an icy finger of fear dragged its cold nail all the way up my spine. I saw Clay stiffen and I knew whatever it was, we weren’t going to like it.
Umberto handed him the square thing, which upon closer inspection a Polaroid photograph. Clay stared at it for a long, long time. His face was ashen and his hands trembled. Seemingly without conscious thought, his hands clenched into fists and crumpled the picture.
“Clay…?” Miles asked with evident concern.
Clay said nothing. He only stared at Umberto, although his eyes were unfocused and probably seeing something much further away.
I reached over and pried the picture out of his hands and smoothed it out. The instant photo was of what looked like a makeshift army camp. There were olive drab tents in the background along with what looked like some kind of corrugated metal structure off to the right. Yet it was what was in the foreground that had upset my friend so much.
The icy fear suddenly bloomed into a tight knot of nausea and something else. A flush of fury that filled me and set my jaws tight together.