A Dubious Artifact (A Colton Banyon Mystery Book 6)

by Gerald J Kubicki

  “Greg, we have big trouble heading our way,” Loni exclaimed as she turned the corner and intended to interrupt the meeting. Suddenly, she saw Banyon standing with his back to her and gesturing wildly with his arms as he talked hurriedly to Agent Gamble. He stopped talking when he heard her. When he turned, she suddenly became more frightened. She had never seen the look of terror that he displayed.

  “The Chinese and some Tong gang members are on their way here. They expect to kill everyone and take the artifact,” she blurted out.

  “Colt was just telling me that,” Agent Gamble confessed. “Did you get that from the prisoner?”

  “She’s a hell of an interrogator,” Eric acknowledged and punched her playfully in the arm. “You should have seen her, really.”

  “They’re all Tong and are armed with Chinese AK-47s,” Banyon added. “They will hit this location in one hour.”

  “We’ll be fine, right?” Loni said uncertainly. Loni was hopeful the powerful FBI had plans for any attack on the safe house.

  “We can stop them,” Agent Gamble said a little too defensively

  “But there’re also thirty white supremacists right behind them. They want Dr. Behl and the artifact. They are both going to hit the safe house at the same time.”

  Loni put her hand to her mouth. “We can’t stop them too, can we?”

  “But one doesn’t know about the other,” Banyon quickly filled in. “We can use that to our advantage. It’ll be a three sided battle.”

  “God-damn-it,” Agent Gamble roared. “We’re in for a fight this time. I don’t know if reinforcements can get here within an hour.”

  Dr. Behl sat on the couch with her hand over her mouth and shaking. “Oh, no, they are after me. We all are going to die because of me. How could I have been so stupid to think I could leave the Effort? One day and they have found me already.” She buried her head in her hands and started to cry.

  “Tom, you need to look at a Homeland Security agent named Robert Boyd,” Banyon continued.

  “Why?” Tom suspiciously asked.

  “He staged a raid on a Chicago weapons dealer this morning to attempt to get guns for the Effort supremacists headed here.”

  “And how do you know all this?” a very suspicious Tom asked Banyon. It seemed odd to him that no one ever questioned Banyon when he brought news.

  Not wanting to deal with the whole Wolf thing, Banyon simply replied. “A little bird told me. Can we at least mount a defense?”

  “We sure can,” Agent Gamble slapped his knee as he replied. “Joe Gersch, get in here pronto,” he yelled.

  The communications agent came running. He was dressed in jeans and a white tee shirt and appeared very fit. He was also very tall, well over six foot five. “What’s up boss?” he asked. The Patel sisters had heard Agent Gamble yell and quickly glided into the living room.

  “We got about fifty hostiles that will be here within hour. We’ll need to develop a defensive strategy and get weapons to these people.”

  Joe didn’t panic like the rest of the group. He smiled and said. “Finally, all that training will come to good use. Don’t worry, we can hold off an army. We have a few tricks up our sleeves,” he grinned at everyone.

  “Get the snipers in here. Let’s have a strategy meeting in ten minutes,” Agent Gamble ordered. He then flipped open his phone and dialed a number. “I’ll get some reinforcements on the way right now.”

  Joe ran off to the communications room. Like many men who fight for a living, he appeared to accept danger like a joy ride — fun but dangerous.

  The three Patel sisters looked at each other; they were all dressed in loose fitting dresses. “We’d better change into fighting clothes,” Pramilla declared. They immediately headed for the stairs.

  Tom addressed Loni. “You had better secure that Chinese spy. He could be a problem when his buddies arrive.”

  “I don’t think he will be talking for a couple of weeks. I crushed his windpipe. There is no way for him to get free and leave the room,” she replied. “He will not be a problem.”

  “Loni we need to secure the artifact. Get your cloth bag and keep it with you until this is over,” Banyon ordered her. She burst from the room in search of the bag and grabbed the artifact off of the table on the way.

  Tom was suddenly on the phone to his wife. All he got was voice mail. “Pull the records on a Robert Boyd, he is a field agent,” he spoke into the phone. “Oh, and I won’t be home of dinner tonight.” He then dialed another number as he walked from the room.

  That left only Banyon and Eric with nothing to do at the moment. “We need some bigger weapons,” Eric reasoned. “The hand guns from last night aren’t going to be effective at long range.”

  “Once they get near the house, it will be hard to defend,” Banyon add. “Look at all these big windows,” he pointed.

  Former Gunnery Sergeant Joe Gersch was suddenly alongside them. “Don’t worry! We have an exceptional defensive strategy to keep everyone safe. I will show you guys all of it, after we get some fire power. Follow me and learn our secrets.”

  The men followed Joe into the kitchen and watched him open a door. It looked like a regular pantry with shelves and food stacked in wire baskets. Joe then hit a small button on the inside of one of the baskets. The back wall opened outward revealing a set of metal stairs. They hurried down the steps and into a cavernous basement. It contained the usual equipment like a water heater, furnace and even a laundry room. Joe jogged right passed them and stopped in front of a concrete wall.

  “This is the bunker,” The Gunny pointed out. “It has five-foot thick concrete walls. Cameras watch the entrance 24/7, but you will never find them. There are monitors on the inside and the power plant for the entire house is located in the bunker. If something happens, head to the bunker, only a guided missile could penetrate it.”

  “Way cool,” Eric said.

  “Here, you are going to need these to get into the bunker.” Joe handed both men a small keychain device. “Agent Gamble has one too.” Joe pushed the green button and an audible click sounded. A five foot concrete door quietly slid open. The men stepped through the entrance. The space was a ten foot square and had various cabinets hung from the wall. There was also a bunk bed and a small kitchenette. Joe didn’t stop to point things out; he went directly to a floor to ceiling metal cabinet that was as wide as the bunker. He threw open the doors and revealed shelves full of guns, ammunition and protective gear.

  “Whoa,” Eric shouted. “This is a serious weapons cache,” he exclaimed as he began to look at the different types and brands. To Banyon he seemed giddy from seeing all the firepower.

  “Grab body armor for everyone, Colt,” Joe ordered. “Also take that case of ammunition. There are thirty magazines with forty rounds each — already loaded. We will need them.

  “I want to shoot this one,” Eric said as he pulled down one gun.

  “Good choice, that’s the Heckler-Koch HK MP 7A1,” Joe pointed out. “Many law enforcement people use them.”

  “I know,” Eric replied. “It’s light weight, the rate of fire is 950 rounds per minute, and it’s effective for about a hundred and fifty yards. It holds a 40 round clip. You can even add a silencer. Do you have any, by the way?”

  “We won’t need them today,” Joe replied deadpan. “You do know your guns though. Bring ten of them upstairs.” Joe then filled an empty case with a mixture of handgun and shotgun shells. He pulled down two shotguns for close fire. He threw six hand grenades and five smoke canisters into the box.

  “Are you sure that we have enough firepower?” Banyon asked.

  “If we need more, one of us can come back down and get it. We also will have three snipers deployed in the sniper boxes, and I’ll be manning a fifty caliber machine gun on the roof. It’s going to be very hard for anyone to get near the house.” Eric and Joe both seemed excited and happy to be going into battle. Banyon was very scared — especially considering what Wolf had recentl
y told him.

  “Wait, what about the escape route?” Banyon said as he struggled with his load of equipment.

  “Right,” Joe ran to a side wall in the bunker and showed them a ring that appeared to be hanging on the wall. He turned the ring and pulled open a two inch thick metal door. Behind the door Banyon could see a five-foot tall tunnel leading off into blackness.

  “I don’t like tunnels,” Banyon muttered as he remembered his first mystery. He had met a ghost in that tunnel.

  “You can lock the door from the inside,” Joe offered as he ignored Banyon’s statement, and pointed to the inside lock. “It will stop anyone chasing you for enough time to make a getaway.

  “No lights?” Banyon asked.

  “Flashlight rack on the left wall,” Joe said. “The batteries are changed every two months, they are good to go.”

  “What happens when we reach the end?” Banyon wondered out loud.

  “The tunnel actually ends in a small boat house down by the lake. When you come out of the wall there will be two outboard motor boats ready to go.”

  “Where do we go?”

  “If you only need one boat, unhook the gas tank from the second boat and take it with you,” Joe continued like he was reading a script. “There is one more thing, when you reach the end of the tunnel, you will see a red alarm box. You must flip the handle.”

  “Why?”

  “It will notify the police that you are crossing the lake. They will meet you at the dock on the other side.”

  “Once we are on the water, where do we head?” Banyon was unfamiliar with the lake. “I mean is there a marker or something on the shore?”

  “Good question,” Joe replied. “Head the boat straight across the lake. It should only take you about twenty minutes. The dock will be clearly visible and before you get there you will see a black and white, with its flashers on. That will be the Albany police. They will take you to safety.”

  “But if we are spotted, can’t the bad guys just drive around the lake and get there before we do?” Eric suddenly inquired.

  “That is not possible. There is only one road to get to the other side and it takes more than an hour to drive it. You will have plenty of time to escape.”

  “But there’s more, isn’t there?” Eric said with a grin.

  “Yes,” Joe said. “If the bad guys try to drive to the other side, the police will ambush them. There is a section of the road that runs along a small cliff. They will disable the vehicles with road spikes and snipers and capture anyone left.”

  “Seems like you have thought of everything,” Banyon said with satisfaction.

  “But remember, we only have this set up if things go bad here in the house. Let’s get back upstairs so I can show you the rest of our defenses.”

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Everyone was now standing in the great room. Banyon was busy handing out Kevlar vests and helping to hook people up. Eric was handing out the machine guns and giving tips on how to best use them. And Agent Gamble was busy passing out earpieces. The three snipers stood imposingly in the middle of the room. They were dressed in all black SWAT gear with helmets. Their big sniper guns were slung over their backs. They looked very fit and lethal.

  After the men had returned to the great room there was still five minutes left before the strategy meeting. “Follow me,” Joe said. He then sprinted up the stairs. When he reached the landing he went to a small door in the hallway and took out a key from his pocket. He opened the door and proceeded up a set of metal spiral stairs. Both Eric and Banyon followed.

  At the top of the stairs was a .50 millimeter Browning machine gun on a mount with a seat for the shooter.

  “Wow!” was all Eric could muster.

  “Climb on,” Joe motioned for the men to jump onto the platform. There was a small keypad attached to the seat. Joe pressed a green button and suddenly, the platform began to rise through the now open roof. When it stopped, Banyon could see the surrounding open meadow around the house. Only the last ten feet closest to the deck around the log cabin was out of view. Banyon knew that the fifty caliber gun could discharge an awesome amount of lead.

  “This is our second line of defense,” Joe noted as he held up two fingers.

  Banyon looked at the meadow, “But aren’t you a sitting duck up here?”

  Joe pointed to a Plexiglas shield mounted in front of him. “It is next to impossible to hit me from anywhere in the meadow.”

  “I assume the snipers are the first line?” Eric said with enthusiasm.

  “You are correct. The snipers will take out the first bad guys as they leave the woods. Once the shooting starts, if they can identify the leaders, they will eliminate them too. The sightlines from the three sniper boxes overlap each other so they should be able to keep the bad guys confined to the woods and keep us out of range for most guns.”

  “Colt, I’ve been in one of the sniper boxes. They are impregnable,” Eric said.

  “They have proven to be a very good first-line of defense,” Joe agreed.

  “How many bad guys can the snipers take out?”

  “They are trained to take one shot per minute. They rarely miss,” Joe added. “However, they will be under fire so I’m guessing one shot every two minutes.”

  “And if too many bad guys charge at once, then you open up, right?” Eric asked.

  “This entire platform swivels, so that I can cover three hundred and sixty degrees of the open area. This baby is very accurate.”

  “Didn’t I read someplace that a NATO sniper shot a Taliban raghead from something like 2,600 hundred yards with one of these?” Eric said.

  “He was actually a Canadian Corporal and it was 2,657 yards — about a mile and a half,” Joe confirmed. “I’ve had the same training.”

  “Wow, I can’t even see that far,” Banyon quipped.

  As he pressed the red button the platform retreated back into the roof. “Now, let’s get to the meeting and let me show you the rest of the defenses,” Joe beamed proudly.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  Agent Gamble started the meeting auspiciously. “The good news is that we have highly trained men to defend you. We also have a multi-layer defense strategy and an excellent exit plan, if needed.”

  “Why do I get the feeling there is bad news coming?” Banyon spoke up.

  “I have been on the phone,” Agent Gamble said as he paced the floor. “We have obtained a field to land helicopters about a quarter of a mile from here. There will be seventy-five SWAT team men arriving there and coming to our rescue.” Agent Gamble said confidently.

  “How soon will they be here?” Loni asked as she looked at her watch. It read eleven-ten in the morning. “We know the bad guys intend to attack at noon.”

  “Well, that’s the bad news,” Agent Gamble said in his drawl while shacking his head. “They won’t get here until about twelve-thirty. We are going to have to hold the bad guys off for about a half hour or a little more. I’m not going to kid you; a half hour during a gun battle is a long time.”

  “Maybe we should use the exit plan now,” Previne chided in. “I mean why fight when we don’t have to? Why don’t we just leave the house empty and take it back when the SWAT teams get here?”

  “Headquarters says we have a better chance of survival if we stay here,” Agent Gamble said sheepishly. “If we are caught on open ground, it will be a massacre. They don’t want to risk it.”

  “But it’s our lives that are in jeopardy here,” Previne yelled at him. “Not some bureaucrat sitting in his office overlooking the lake.”

  “Calm down Previne. We haven’t shown you all our defenses yet,” Agent Gamble used his hands like he was pressing on a table. “We just have to keep the bad guys busy for a half hour or so.”

  “What if they get past the snipers and Joe’s gun jams of something,” Previne asked. “I’m sure the windows are all bullet proof, but under heavy fire, I’m pretty sure that they won’t last.”

  Ag
ent Gamble turned to Joe who stood, itching to show off his toys. “Show them our third defense.” Joe went to the wall separating the kitchen from the great room and threw open a wooden panel. Everybody could see the switches. Joe pushed the green one and in seconds the entire room was dark. Metal shutters had rolled down and all the openings were covered completely. Suddenly lights came on in the house.

  “The shutters can withstand machine gun fire for a long time,” Joe told them. “We won’t deploy the third defense until we are sure that they have breached the parameter of the first two defenses. If they are coming in, we want them to get close.”

  “I don’t understand?” Previne threw her hands open.

  “Because then we can implement our fourth defense,” Agent Gamble explained to the confused woman. He then nodded for Joe to continue.

  Joe pressed the next button and everyone heard a swooshing sound. Around the room several shooter slots appeared about eight feet up on the walls of the great room. The ceiling was open and ended in a triangle some thirty feet above the floor, so there was plenty of head room. He pressed the last button and a mesh metal walkway slid out from the wall. It was two feet wide. Anyone on the catwalk could run up and down it shooting through the holes and could cover a lot of area.

  “At that height, we will be shooting down on the bad guys,” Joe explained. “The chances of a bad guy putting a bullet through the high slots are very small, especially when one of us will be firing on them.”

  “Wow,” Eric was clearly in awe of the whole set up and the defense strategy. “This is very impressive,” he exclaimed.

  Agent Gamble instructed Joe to make the slots and shelf disappear and to open the window shutters. “We use this only if they breakthrough our first two defenses. We don’t want the bad guys to know our capabilities.”