Lethal Misconduct

by C. G. Cooper

  “Thanks for saving some for us,” he said.

  Daniel didn’t stop his search.

  “I’ve got one over there. I think he’s their leader,” said Daniel without looking up.

  Cal moved to where Daniel pointed, finding a paunchy guy in a stretched pinstriped button down and a patch over one eye. He looked like an overweight pirate. Cal nudged him with his boot. The man stirred, his eyes fluttering open.

  Fat pirate went to grab his weapon that was no longer in his grasp.

  “Don’t move,” said Cal, his pistol aimed at the man’s face. “Gaucho, come talk to this guy.”

  Once he saw how completely his force had been decimated, the fat pirate started talking. The order had been passed down from his boss much like any other mission. They’d killed the villagers and lain in wait for a follow-on force. Ordered to stay in place for at least two days, the mercenaries were told that bringing back some alive would earn them a bonus, but that killing them was all that was needed.

  The guy didn’t have a clue why they were doing it, just that they’d get paid. He relaxed more and more, realizing that Cal and his men were not cold blooded murderers and that they were probably some kind of soldiers. Soldiers, especially American soldiers, drew the line at killing captives. By the end of the story the man was talking to Gaucho like an old friend, smiling like an idiot.

  “Tell him he’s coming with us,” said Cal.

  Gaucho delivered the news while Cal talked to Daniel and MSgt Trent. “I wanna get out of here fast. There’s nothing we can do.”

  Just then Dr. Price walked up to the group, still looking a bit shaken. “But we need to find what we came for.”

  “No way, Doc. Too dangerous. It’s getting dark and I’m not sticking around this shithole any longer than I have to.”

  “Give me a couple minutes to look around the shaman’s hut,” pleaded Price.

  “Fine. You’ve got five minutes then we go.”

  They couldn’t find anything of use in the old man’s hut. Price begged for more time, but Cal denied the request. “We’ve got the coordinates from our GPS. Once we get things settled back home you can come down here with a bigger party and search for as long as you want.” Cal started toward the path.

  “But—”

  Cal whirled around. “Our mission was to find the medicine man, not to get in a firefight with a drug lord’s troops. I’ve got six men who need medical attention. Feel free to stay out here if you want, but we’re heading out.”

  Price was torn. “Okay.” He slipped in behind one of the wounded men and followed the extraction the way they’d come.

  The team had almost reached the village when Daniel signaled for a halt. His inner alarm clanged. There was someone watching them.

  Cal moved up to join him. “What’s up?”

  Daniel gestured with a circular motion. “We’re being watched.”

  As the last word came out of Daniel’s mouth, a diminutive native stepped out of the jungle without a sound, carrying a crude spear sharpened at one end. He stood in the middle of the path. Daniel lowered his weapon and motioned for the others to do the same.

  “Hey, Doc, you wanna come up here?” said Cal.

  Dr. Price made his way to the front of the formation.

  “Is he alone?” asked Price.

  “There’s more in the tree line,” said Daniel.

  “Has he—”

  Before Price could finish his question, the tiny man stepped up to the doctor and put his right hand against Price’s chest. Price returned the greeting solemnly. As if on cue, more natives stepped out on the path, ten in all, each carrying some kind of primitive weapon, none looking menacingly at the foreigners.

  “What do they want, Price?” asked Cal.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Are they the same tribe?”

  “Yeah. I recognize the leader. I’ll bet they were out when the Colombians attacked.”

  The leader of the small band stepped around Price and moved amidst Cal’s men, making his way to the middle of their hasty grouping. Everyone watched as the tiny man reached their captive and pointed a dirty finger at the squirming pirate.

  “I think he wants him, boss,” said Gaucho.

  “No. No, please! Keep here!” said the prisoner, trying to back away but held in place by the immovable Trent.

  “Let him go, Top,” ordered Cal.

  Trent nodded and released the man’s restraints. Eyes wide, the man tried to flee. Quicker than Cal would’ve imagined, the tribal warrior made some clicking sound and two of his men sprinted after the Colombian, pouncing on the man’s back and pinning him to the ground.

  “Quick little dudes,” admired Cal.

  “Aren’t we going to take him with us?” asked Dr. Price.

  “I think these guys deserve to have him more than we do. Anyone have a problem with that?” Cal asked his men.

  No one did.

  “Let’s go.”

  Daniel led the way as the dying screams of their former captive faded in the distance.

  Chapter 20

  The White House

  Washington, D.C.

  6:55pm, April 8th

  President Zimmer yawned into his hand and he tried to focus on yet another piece of proposed legislation. It had something to do with wetland preservation in the Everglades. He yawned again and set the report down.

  Travis Haden stepped in the door just as the president was rising from behind his desk. The former SEAL was in PT gear and looked to have just finished his daily workout.

  “You got a minute?” asked Travis.

  “Sure. I was just wrapping up.”

  “I just got off the phone with Cal. They’re on their way home.”

  “Everything go as planned?”

  “Not really.”

  The president sighed. While he loved Cal Stokes like a brother, and trusted the Marine like few others, there always seemed to be some level of ‘fun’ associated with his missions.

  “What happened?”

  Travis filled him in on what Cal had found, including the men who’d been wounded.

  “Is everyone going to be okay?” asked Zimmer.

  “They’re fine. Just a few scratches.”

  Zimmer knew that probably meant Cal’s men had been shot. A scratch to his elite warriors was a major trauma event for the average citizen.

  “Anything we can do?”

  “I asked and he said they’re fine. Apparently this Dr. Price is pretty good at patching people up,” said Travis.

  “Good. What else?”

  Travis crossed his arms. “I just heard back from my sources.”

  “Cromwell?”

  Travis nodded. “I couldn’t get anything concrete, but the guys I talked to described the colonel kinda like a kid describes the boogey man. They say he’s bad news.”

  The number of nefarious characters hiding in plain sight under the auspices of the United States government never ceased to amaze the young president.

  “What’s he into?”

  “We know he’s got ties to the NIH and the CDC. I’ve pulled his file and it looks like your normal run of the mill Army career. He’s hit all the wickets.”

  “But you don’t buy it,” said Zimmer.

  “It’s too clean. His record shows some short deployments to Africa, but he’s been with the NIH for a while.”

  “Did you tell Cal?”

  “I did.”

  “And what does he want to do?”

  “He’s gonna have Neil do some digging and asked me to do the same. He says we might want to ask General McMillan for a favor.” Marine General McMillan was the current chairman of the Joint Chiefs and a trusted advisor to the president. It didn’t hurt that he admired Daniel Briggs for his past exploits and had offered his assistance should they ever need it.

  “Good idea. Why don’t you see if the general has time in his schedule tomorrow. You don’t mind running over to the Pentagon?”

  �
��It’s not my favorite place, but I don’t mind,” said Travis.

  “Great. Let me know what you find out.”

  +++

  Charlottesville, Virginia

  After making sure his wounded were being cared for, courtesy of Dr. Price, Cal sauntered down to the kitchen to make himself a much needed nightcap. Their trip back from Colombia had been uneventful, but it had given him time to think about what the hell was going on. Clearly someone had anticipated their trip, but how could they have known?

  As he sipped his Famous Grouse over ice, Cal mulled over his options. Travis was getting help from Gen. McMillan and Neil was doing his thing, hacking into whatever databases he could in order to find out more information on Cromwell.

  What worried Cal was that Cromwell couldn’t be acting alone. He had to have backers. No matter how ruthless the guy might be, it was virtually impossible for a relatively lowly Army colonel to have that much power.

  No. There was someone else pulling the strings. But who were they and what were they trying to do?

  +++

  Alexandria, Virginia

  Col. Cromwell re-read the email he’d received from his Colombian contact. There’d been no contact with the group the cartel had sent to ambush any follow-on force. He should’ve had Malik Vespers stay there after searching the village.

  But the former Secret Service agent was too valuable to Cromwell. Even now the mute was off on another errand, shoring up a vital part of Cromwell’s plan.

  He could feel the attack coming, had been in the business too long not to protect himself. Well, let them come. He’d take care of anyone who thought they could get in his way.

  Cromwell closed his laptop and headed to bed, his conscience clear.

  +++

  Hoboken, New Jersey

  The security system reengaged as Malik Vespers completed the code on the keypad. The beep of the alarm echoed up into the rafters of the high ceilinged warehouse.

  Another mission complete. His boss would be happy and that made Vespers happy.

  The former Secret Service agent derived pleasure from serving his master, the man who’d saved his life years ago.

  As a young agent assigned to the Secret Service’s advanced party, he was tasked with ensuring the safety of an area that the president would soon visit. Vespers had excelled in his duties. Smart, capable and unwavering in his patriotism, the astute pupil was tagged as an up and comer, an agent who would soon be moved to the glamorous post on the president’s personal security detail.

  But that hadn’t happened. After a particularly busy month on duty, Vespers and his team had arrived in Nigeria ahead of another stop in the president’s world tour. Everything had gone according to plan until the night the agent in charge had given his men a much needed night off.

  Normally not one to indulge in vices, Vespers accepted his colleagues’ invitation to join them for a night on the town. They moved from bar to bar and soon found themselves in a high end brothel that served visiting dignitaries. The rest of the evening was a blur for the inebriated Vespers, but he’d woken up the next morning on the crude dirt floor of a prison cell.

  Days passed and no one came for him. Not his team leader. Not his fellow agents.

  On the fourth day, a gap-toothed hulk in faded utilities visited him. It was the first face he’d seen since being interred. The man had calmly explained in broken English that Vespers was now property of Mohammed Yusuf, the leader of the fledgling group of Islamic fanatics who would later be called Boko Haram.

  The man told Vespers that he was being charged with crimes ranging from rape to overindulgence. Vespers pleaded with the man to get a hold of American authorities, but the requests were ignored.

  After being beaten into submission, he was blindfolded and subjected to a ride in the back of a blacked out extended cab pickup truck. He didn’t know it at the time, but Vespers soon found himself in the northeastern city of Maiduguri, the center of his captors’ burgeoning empire.

  He was brought before a gathering of elders, who swiftly condemned the American, the translator telling Vespers that he would be ritually mutilated then dismembered starting with his tongue. The translator calmly explained that his tongue would go first so that the foreigner could no longer spread his evil throughout the world.

  They’d done it with a rusted blade heated over an open fire. The tip of his tongue held by a pair of pliers, his head strapped to a wooden post. Oh, how they’d howled with glee at his pain.

  They left him tied to a wooden post, each passersby spitting on him and throwing stones. Kicks and hits with the butts of rifles. He’d prayed for death, once even trying to hang himself with the rope that held him to the post.

  It hadn’t been God who’d answered. It was a human avenging angel who’d come to his rescue.

  Vespers would never forget the day he’d first seen Col. Cromwell, striding into the compound behind his raid force. They’d finally found him, and it was Cromwell, who’d been in the area on a relief mission, who had insisted on leading the rescue.

  Cromwell had ordered his men to untie Vespers and had given him his own canteen to drink from. Vespers often thought of that moment, how the water had run over his swollen stump of a tongue, the cleansing coolness gifted by his savior.

  “You’re going to be okay, son,” Cromwell had said.

  And he was, for the most part.

  Vespers contracted numerous inflictions due to his captivity and the fact that his captors made him eat his own feces as they stood back and laughed. Hepatitis. Giardia. But the most damaging effect was to contract a never-before-discovered strain of congenital analgia. In its most common form, the disease is typically discovered at birth and precludes the infected from feeling pain or even hot and cold. The majority of those with congenital analgia never live past their twenties. But while the traditional disease puts the afflicted at risk due to the inability to realize they’re hurt, Vespers experienced a muted form.

  Instead of not feeling pain, the sensation normally associated with pain was merely dulled. During his rehabilitation, he found he could push himself further than before. Cromwell said he’d been given a gift, a new superpower. Vespers believed him.

  So when the Secret Service terminated his employment and denied any sort of compensation due to the scandal he and his comrades had started in Nigeria (three others were forced to resign along with the advanced team leader), it was Col. Cromwell who’d been there for him. He’d offered him a job, citing a need for someone who knew the ins and outs of security.

  Vespers didn’t hesitate. He accepted on the spot. From that day on he was Cromwell’s man. Much like the Luca Brasi character was to Don Corleone in The Godfather, Vespers became a pillar in Cromwell’s empire. A loyal companion. A ruthless enforcer. An unquestioning sentinel at his master’s side.

  Vespers smiled as he got into his rented Toyota Camry. Another successful mission. His master would be happy.

  Chapter 21

  Washington, D.C.

  8:27am, April 9th

  Senator Thompson’s good mood was gone. He’d spent the previous night with his son. They’d begun with a movie and then moved on to dinner and drinks at one of Michael’s favorite hangouts. Thompson had watched as his son kidded with friends and just looked…alive. He’d found it hard not to stop from crying, so great was his relief. If only his wife could have shared that moment with them.

  But now everything was starting to unravel. Cromwell reported that Price had somehow made it down to Colombia with a team of unknown operatives and miraculously escaped the ambush. Cromwell’s competence was waning in Thompson’s eyes, but the senator had to be careful. The crafty colonel knew too much, had his fingers on too many strings.

  Not that he, Senator Mac Thompson, would admit to it. He was the senator, not Cromwell.

  Things had moved too fast after Price’s discovery. There hadn’t been time to insulate himself with the layers needed to escape possible culpability. He’d have to
be careful. There had to be a way he could outmaneuver all sides and come out on top. It’s what he did. It’s what he’d always done.

  He stared at the picture of him and his son on his desk. Luckily Michael would never have to know, would never have to make the same sacrifices his father had. At least he’d have a chance at a normal life. If all went to plan, their life would be set. Michael would never have to work. Sen. Thompson had even considered retiring from public office and traveling the world with his boy.

  But deep down something told him that wouldn’t happen. He loved the game too much. Thompson played politics just as he had baseball, with a great deal of skill and smattering of self-induced luck. Well, at least he’d come out on top. He’d never won a World Series ring, but he was convinced that the White House was not out of the question.

  +++

  Col. Cromwell marched into Sen. Thompson’s office like he was on the parade deck, standing centered two feet from the front of the politician’s desk.

  “What do you have to say for yourself, Colonel?” asked Thompson, not looking up from his work.

  “What would you like me to say, Senator?”

  Cromwell wasn’t going to give the senator an inch, but he would let him believe that he was the one with all the power. It’s what all politicians wanted, to be the person controlling the rest of the room.

  “How about you tell me why on God’s green Earth we don’t have Dr. Price in custody yet?”

  “I won’t give you excuses, Senator. You’ve heard everything we’ve done to find him. If that isn’t enough, I’d be happy to submit my resignation.”

  Thompson looked up from his papers. Cromwell kept his eyes locked on the wall straight ahead.

  “Would you cut that soldier bullshit. Sit down, dammit.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Cromwell sat in one of the two leather armchairs facing the senator.

  “Now, what are we going to tell our friends?” asked Thompson.