by Vince Milam
“Colombian smuggler. Member of FARC.” The terrorist group FARC, long established in Colombia, knew every back road and mountainous trail.
“Could be handy, although the Mexicans have usurped the need for a great number of Colombian dealings. That said, I’ll accept.”
I slid the index card to her; she clacked a few abacus balls—my discount.
“Southeast Asia pirate.”
“Straits of Malacca?” she asked. The narrow 500-mile stretch of water between Malaysia and the Indonesian island of Sumatra had been a pirate haven for centuries. Insider information on the pirate bands proved notoriously difficult to come by. They were as clannish as the Mafia.
“Yes.”
“Recent?” She wanted to ascertain the freshness of the information.
“Three months.”
“How nice, dear. Yes, that would be wonderful to have.”
I passed the card, and the abacus clicked. I ran through my other index cards, and she dismissed all but one.
“Chinese embassy staffer in Brazil. Loves drugs and girls. Lots of both. Benjamins speak loudly with this gentleman.” Much of the world’s sordid low-level activities revolved around $100 bills.
“How less than inscrutable. I’ll accept.”
Her fingers flew across the abacus, adding and subtracting. “Three thousand, five hundred.”
Neither I nor anyone else allowed access to the Clubhouse had the foggiest notion whether the abacus clacks were bullshit or real. It didn’t matter. Three and a half large for Suriname insights and contacts was cheap. I unfolded the $100 bills and handed them to Jules.
“One last thing,” she said as the dollars disappeared into another drawer. “The unknown out-of-country insertion suspected to be female? Watch your back with that one.”
“Okay.”
“Whatever is going down in Suriname smells of high stakes. Very high stakes, dear. Do not get sucked into the mundane—economics, corporate interests, or any other such folderol.”
“Okay, again.”
The AC hummed. She cast a hard, hooded eye.
“Head down, nose to the wind, my boy. And do be prepared to run like hell.”
“Always am. Thanks, Jules. Sincerely.”
“No, you’re not. Running is not in your nature.”
I stood and shrugged.
“I do so wish you were more prone to graceful, albeit hasty, exits. But you’re not. Be extra cautious. Whatever is happening in that unfortunate place is most certainly not worth dying for.”
I turned to the door, and she pressed a hidden button to unlock it. Prior to my exit, I added, “Nine lives, Jules. Nine lives.”
“And you’ve used up eight of them, dear.”
Chapter 6
A poisonous cottonmouth snake swam an S shape through the water, head raised, seeking. The Ace sent it diving as we edged a cautious path through the bald cypress trees in three feet of water. The Dismal Swamp—gloomy even on such a bright day—offered few viable routes for watery navigation.
I’d contacted Bo Dickerson after leaving the Clubhouse. He, too, had a satellite phone. He answered after two rings.
“Amos and Sons.”
Code speak—known to fewer than five people—allowed Bo to filter any misplaced communications.
“You still squatting on federal land?” I asked. The Great Dismal Swamp consisted of several hundred thousand acres of wildlife refuge and protected wetlands.
“Squatting is precisely correct, cracker boy. A bowel movement. A moment of quiet and solitude, interrupted by a sorry-ass Georgian calling me. How you, Case?”
His voice bridged memories good and bad, based on a foundation of trust and brotherhood. As former members of Delta Force, we shared a rich past. Narrow misses with death, covering each other’s backs. Leaps into stacked-odds situations with absolute assuredness we’d each give our life for the other. A rare bond; precious.
“I’m tight and fine. The question before us is whether you can multitask. Your current activity plus a phone conversation. I know how you like to focus on the effort at hand. Should I call back?”
“No. This borders on pleasant. I may squat longer than intended.”
“I’m heading your way. ETA three hours. You all right with that?”
Any friendly incursion into someone’s home required approval. It made for common courtesy, even if home consisted of many square miles of swamp. Approval was especially important for a visit to Bo. There would be trip wires and booby traps around his current anchorage in the middle of the Dismal Swamp.
“Area B. Arrive before dark so you can avoid unpleasantness. I’ll burn some venison steaks, and we’ll sing of love lost.”
Bo had three swamp hiding spots—A, B, and T. The illogical alphabetic progression made sense only if you knew Bo. The unpleasantness he referred to were explosive traps, triggered with near-invisible fishing line. I knew the location of his three anchorages, but not the whereabouts of his security explosives. He tended to move those with regularity.
“Venison? Must be deer season already.” Bo didn’t have refrigeration, so dinner would be fresh meat.
“This concept of a defined deer-hunting season. One established for less than expansive minds.”
I explained my travel plans and asked to borrow his truck the following day, leaving it at the Norfolk Airport for a week or so.
“No worries. Hasten onward, you cretinous goober. I await. Ciao, au revoir, vaya con Dios.”
I continued to steer with caution and reminisced on our time together in Special Forces. Delta Force did not officially exist. The US government didn’t acknowledge the organization. Unlike Seal Team Six, who carried positive publicity, Delta worked the shadows. The men of Delta rarely even used the name, designating their collection of warriors as the Unit. We referred to each other as operators. Sent in hard and fast, we took care of business and left. Every insertion was considered a hot-fire situation, and operators accomplished the Unit’s missions with deadly efficiency. Then back to the obscure, the shadows.
The Unit’s operators were masters at the covert art of counterterrorism, excelled at hostage rescue, the elimination of terrorist forces, and intelligence gathering of terrorist threats. Experts at close-quarters combat, sniping, covert entry, and explosives. Our enemies recognized, and feared, Seal Team Six. But they feared us as much, if not more. The most skilled warriors on the planet, operating in obscurity.
The individuals in our Delta Force team had specific roles, duties, and strengths. Marcus Johnson, team leader, established the mission, the plan. He stayed in the middle of the action, directing. Angel kept to the edges, covered our flanks. Catch eliminated surprise threats, the unforeseen. I was charged with ensuring tactical goals were accomplished, and followed the lead warrior.
Bo Dickerson—lead warrior. The first to engage. Occupy the enemy’s focus, draw their firepower, become the target of their ire. He’d go after them in unexpected ways, utilizing surprise and a touch of insanity. There were none better.
***
A mission in Yemen had personified Bo’s approach to battle. The city of Al Mukalla, a seaport on the coast of Yemen, served as Al Qaeda’s headquarters for the region. The terrorist group had carried out the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole, the 2008 American embassy attack in Yemen, and several attacks against foreign tourists. They had expanded operations and struck in other parts of Yemen as well as Djibouti and Somalia, spreading terror, horror. Suicide bombings, mass killing, the capture and rape of women.
Western intelligence sources had identified a small building as their prime gathering spot. But these guys were smart, and the two-story structure nestled against a hospital on one side and an orphanage on the other. Drone strikes were ruled out as collateral damage was guaranteed. Hello, Delta Force.
The key to success was on-the-ground intelligence to alert us when the leaders were assembled. So the reliable, ancient, tried-and-true tactic of bribery kicked in. Money, paid to a tax
i driver in Al Mukalla, initiated by me. I spoke Arabic, and it didn’t take long after a night insertion via inflatable motorized raft to find an amenable partner. In addition to money, the taxi driver was handed a small radio for communications. Then the five of us operators waited on a US Navy LCS—littoral combat ship—off the coast.
Six days of standby, and the consensus grew of a taxi driver laughing all the way to the bank. Then the radio call. An assembly of Al Qaeda leaders, now, in the early evening. We boarded our combat raiding craft, a small inflatable boat equipped with a muffled 55 HP outboard engine. We headed for a landing spot several miles outside of the city. There was a risk of being spotted, a risk of word relayed to Al Qaeda fighters. And a risk of being attacked before we reached our objective. It didn’t matter. We were going in.
The taxi driver met us with a borrowed van and drove our team through the darkening streets of Al Mukalla. It could have been a setup, a drive to our demise. Marcus held a pistol to the neck of our driver while I explained our concern to him. He understood.
The driver pulled into an abandoned cinder-block garage, got out—accompanied by Marcus—and closed the double doors. He covered his own butt and delivered us out of sight. Understandable. Catch cracked open the back door and extended a handheld GPS. Ten seconds later, we knew exactly where we were. One block away from the Al Qaeda assembly building.
We’d studied the layout until blue in the face and understood we would be surrounded by Al Qaeda supporters, all armed. The mission: strike hard, fast, and take out the terrorist leaders. Then exit ASAP. A white-hot insertion and exit. Our escape plan abandoned the inflatable craft and entailed a mad dash for a nearby soccer field where a Pave Hawk helicopter, deployed from the offshore ship, would pick us up. All while being chased and shot at by Al Qaeda fighters. Another day at the office, Delta style. We lived for these opportunities.
We sprinted the city block to the target building, Bo in the lead. No hiding or sneaking. Full frontal, counting on speed, surprise, and ferocity. Bo ran down the narrow space between the two-story building and the orphanage, disappeared from sight. The rest of us took up positions, anticipated his engagement. Angel circled to the opposite side of the building, along the narrow alley separating it from the hospital. Catch stepped back to the middle of the street, bold as brass, prepared to take on interfering force. No one would mistake him for a street vendor. Marcus and I waited at the heavy front door. Salt air, aromas of food being prepared, dusty, ancient street smells. A mother called to her child, out of sight.
It didn’t take long. In less than twenty seconds, the rattle of Bo’s Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine gun sounded from the second floor. He’d clearly scaled the back wall to a second-floor window and unleashed hell. Marcus hand-signaled Catch that we were entering, and I’d begun to push through the front door when a hand grenade exploded in the entryway. The concussion slammed the thick door shut.
A second attempt to push the door open and enter was greeted by a quick glimpse of another grenade flying through the air toward the large entryway area. This time, I slammed the door shut and waited for the explosion. Bo’s weapon continued to fire short bursts as screams and yells and return fire filled the interior of the building.
Marcus shot me a “Get your ass in there!” look, and I opened the front door for the third time. The entry area held several dead bodies and three men firing up the stairs. I entered, took the three out, then backed into Marcus as another grenade floated over the upstairs stone bannister and headed our way. Marcus and I made it to the doorway entrance and plastered against a protective wall as the grenade exploded.
Our crazy redheaded brother had clearly opted to take care of the whole rat’s nest himself. Bo continued to fire controlled bursts from above while casually lobbing grenades downstairs at regular intervals.
“Wait for a flash-bang!” Marcus hissed, still pressed against the wall.
Up to this point, Bo had been tossing fragment grenades, meant to kill. He’d run out of those soon enough. Then he’d be reduced to tossing a stun grenade—flash-bang—in our direction. This device was used to temporarily disorient an enemy’s senses. At least one of those wouldn’t kill us.
It came quickly, and the concussive explosion filled the lower floor of the building. Our protective spot helped shield us, and in the aftermath of the explosion, Marcus and I rushed past the stairs and into the lower-floor rooms, all the while yelling, “Lower floor! Lower floor!” in the hope it would stem the tide of raining grenades. It did.
We encountered four more Al Qaeda leaders in lower-floor rooms. My H&K weapon barked and dispatched two of them. Marcus followed rapid suit, his fire deadly. A final round of submachine gunfire echoed from above. A short burst of fire from outside indicated either Angel or Catch had stopped an escaping Al Qaeda member. Exit time.
Marcus and I ran toward the front door, yelling, “Clear! Clear!” to let the team know this little soiree was officially over. A movement on the wide stairs caught my eye, and I brought my weapon to aim, finger squeezing the trigger.
Bo Dickerson, wearing a big smile and splatters of blood on his face, slid down the bannister toward us. Slid. Down the bannister. “Ho, ho, ho!” his entry cry. What a piece of work.
The Pave Hawk helicopter hovered outside of town, and we radioed for pickup. Catch cut loose on a half dozen AK-47-wielding fighters who had rushed our direction. Time to haul ass.
Our sixty-second dash to the soccer field coincided with the chopper’s touchdown, waiting for us to scramble on board. A large neighborhood greeting committee had assembled by then, and AK-47 bullets whined past us as we dove into the chopper and lifted off.
“Anyone hit?” Marcus yelled.
“Good,” came back four times. The entire hot-fire operation, from exiting the garage to entering the helicopter, had taken less than six minutes.
On the helicopter ride back to the naval vessel, Bo leaned into my face and asked, “You ever read Camus?”
“No.”
“Man is the only creature that refuses to be what he is.”
“Okay, Bo. Okay.”
What a piece of work.
***
Bo hailed from Tulsa, Oklahoma. His mom had worked at a tire store until breast cancer took her. His dad, a master welder, had worked the oil fields until his death in a car accident. No siblings. Fellow operators were his family. When we’d all retired from the Unit, Marcus first, it was Bo we worried about most. It was an unfounded concern—he’d picked a zone in the universe where happiness resided. A mental, physical, spiritual place unique to him.
I’d left Chesapeake, cruised west along Deep Creek for several miles, and entered the old lock at the head of the Great Dismal Swamp canal. One other boat waited—a large fiberglass cruiser—and I joined stern-to-bow until the lock operator closed the gate, lifted both vessels, and sent us on our way south down the forty-mile canal.
George Washington had been a lead instigator of the canal’s creation to provide a route between Chesapeake Bay and North Carolina’s Albemarle Sound. Thick cypress, tupelo, maple, and pine hid Highway 17 to the east. To the west: miles of cypress swamp inhabited by birds, black bear, deer. Alligators, otters, snakes. And Bo Dickerson. It was illegal to live there, but enforcement was nonexistent as no one in his right mind would consider it. A valid assertion and applicable to my wild friend.
I let the large expensive cruiser pull away and ensured no traffic of any sort would see the Ace as we made a sharp right turn into the swamp, meandering between cypress trees and islands of dry land. The speed cut to a sedate walking pace, I maneuvered with caution. The Ace drew two and a half feet of water, leaving little room for error and lots of opportunities for a cypress knee to damage the hull. After an hour of vigilant travel, a subtle rock cairn on a hummock of dry land marked a sharp turn to the right.
Alligators viewed my passage with periscope eyes, performing a languid descent when the Ace passed too close. An animal crashed through brush
on a sliver of island, and the air was redolent with the thick decay of an ancient swamp. Several minutes later, I threw the Ace into reverse and brought us to a dead stop. The late day’s rays peeked through the thick trees and glinted off a thin string of fishing line stretched across my watery path. An act of the explosive kind would have been triggered if we’d pushed against the near-invisible line.
“Scaramouch! Scaramouch!”
The singsongy voice came from the right. I cut the engine and left the small wheelhouse. He was perched on a large cypress stump twenty yards away. The low sun highlighted wild strands of red hair as a halo around his head, a wide smile and crazed eyes aimed my way.
“I’d have damn sure done the fandango if we’d tripped that wire. Claymore?” The business end of the booby trap had either a claymore mine or plastic explosive or a flash-bang grenade—each dependent upon whether Bo wished to kill, maim, or scare.
“A mystery, old son, and one best left alone.” His smile widened. Man, it was good to see him again. “Back your tub and squeeze between those two trees.” He pointed toward safe passage.
Bo leaped on board as I maneuvered. He came into the open-window wheelhouse to hug me from behind and bumped his forehead against the back of my head several times. His untrimmed beard scratched the back of my neck. He smelled of swamp and pine and rich, dark earth. A half dozen light rabbit punches to my lower back had me squirming and laughing and delivering declarations of an imminent ass whipping if he didn’t stop. Bo placed a hand on my head as if to bless me.
“An auspicious return, prodigal son. Timing solid and right.”
“How’s that?”
“Part of the plan. Ebb and flow,” he said, and left the wheelhouse to position himself in the foredeck recliner and provide navigational directions. Life presented few sureties, but one indisputable fact sat before me—they’d broken the mold after Bo Dickerson’s creation.