by Toby Neal
“No!” I pushed his weapon down. “We fire something, we might as well take out a neon sign telling where we are. We’re making enough racket as it is.” I took that moment to scan around us with the headlight, and the numbers of glowing animal eyes surrounding us were not reassuring. “Move out.”
I stepped forward and got a nasty surprise as some sort of snake wriggled out from under my boot, lashing back to bite. Fortunately it sank its teeth into my pants, and I was able to hit it away from me with the butt of the M16.
“Everyone find some kind of stick to fend off snakes. Many here are poisonous, so take a minute to tuck your pants into your boots.” I got no argument as I bent and pulled my heavy, filthy socks all the way up, wrapping my pants around my legs and tucking them into the tops of the hiking boots I’d slid my feet into on a day that seemed like a year ago.
I felt exhaustion dragging at me. Trembling racked my body. I’d tapped my resources tonight for sure. And there was no way out but through.
Fortunately, everyone but Carrigan had opted to wear the uniforms we’d been issued and some sort of boots. Only my roommate, Falconer, had been wearing a sleeveless black tank shirt when we were captured. Even with the heat of this place, it was better to be covered up.
The men found sturdy sticks nearby with the aid of my light, and I gestured for them to gather around. “My plan is to get us to the main river in this area, the Río Coco.”
Falconer was standing next to me, and he nodded. His skin was so dark that he disappeared without the light on him, the gleam of his eyes the only giveaway of his position.
“I know a little of the geography of the area.” His voice was a low rumble. “We can get to Nicaragua by crossing the river.”
“That’s what I was thinking. They won’t pursue us to that side, hopefully, and if we can make contact with some other people, we can get the hell out of here. I’ve been navigating with this.” I held out the compass-hilted knife for Falconer to see, suppressing a flash memory of the guard’s warm blood pumping over the plastic grip and my hand.
Falconer gave a brief nod of assent, and I turned away and forged forward, the headlamp holding back the darkness, the chain of men behind me a weight of trust.
Chapter Ten
Lei burst out of the heavy jungle underbrush at the edge of the river, stumbling over a noose of vine. The narrow two-lane road was just ahead, and her truck, pulled over on the shoulder, an oasis of safety.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
Lei threw herself facedown to the ground behind a rock as the report of a shot was accompanied by the hiss and thunk of the round hitting a tree nearby. She smacked her shin on a protruding stone, scraped her cheek on the rough bark of a tree, and nearly knocked the wind out of herself. Rallying, the sound of pursuit unmistakable, Lei belly crawled behind the nearest cover, a large boulder surrounded by heavy undergrowth. Her breath tore through her lungs in ragged gulps as she tried to stay hidden but see where the threat was coming from.
Her only visual window was toward the road.
“Come out, cop!” A harsh bawl from the area of the stream. “Come out, and let’s make a deal!”
“Yeah, right,” Lei muttered under her breath. She was surrounded by heavy undergrowth and currently hidden, but it couldn’t last long if they decided to beat through the bushes. The road was a nearby promise of escape—but also dangerous. The hundred or so feet across the open asphalt to her vehicle looked miles away. She ejected the clip from her weapon and checked—she had thirteen rounds.
“That your truck, cop?” The harsh voice she was sure belonged to Boss Man had drawn closer. Lei very slowly pulled her limbs in tighter behind the protective shield of the rock. The smell of moss and damp stone filled her nostrils.
A sudden burst of automatic gunfire made Lei jerk into an even smaller ball behind the rock. She lifted her head and peered out to look when it ended, and terror and rage dried her mouth—the growers had shot up her truck, blanketing the silver Tacoma with a fusillade of bullets. The alarm went off in feeble protest. The broken lights flashed and the vehicle pulsed in strangled tones, exactly like a creature dying. Another burst of gunfire, this time from the front, firing into the truck’s hood, ended the alarm with a wheezing, sad little bleep.
There was a second shooter on the other side of her. Both had automatic weapons.
The growers must have a path through the jungle on the other side of her—she knew there was nothing alongside the stream. She was pinned down between them, and her means of escape was gone.
“Shit.” Lei tried to calm her pounding heart and slow her breathing. Panicking wasn’t going to help. Unless these perps were going to beat their way through every foot of the natural cover she was embedded in, she was safe for the moment. She heard the rumble of a car’s engine coming down the road and held her breath, terrified for the unsuspecting commuters along the famous, picturesque Hana Highway.
The car, a bright red rental, meandered slowly past, a string of other cars and a van-style tour bus bringing up the rear. She could jump up and wave down a vehicle, but with the level of violence these growers were showing—what was to stop them from mowing down an innocent tourist in their effort to eliminate her? She couldn’t put anyone else in danger with the armed shooters right there in the bushes.
Surely someone would notice the bullet holes riddling her vehicle and call in? Please God. Please have someone call it in.
The train of cars passed on, with no visible decrease in speed or change of behavior in response to her battered truck, as if they drove past shot-up vehicles every day.
When the road was clear, the shooters came out onto the open road. One was the big man she’d nicknamed Boss Man. He was carrying an army-issued M16, and she spotted the handgun still in the back of his pants.
The other shooter, who’d come from the jungle on the other side, was no more than a teenager. “She’s not getting away now.” Lei’s throat closed at the excitement in the kid’s demeanor. “We’ll get her.”
“We have to get her,” Boss Man said. “Or she’ll go straight back and bring in the narcos for a raid. We’re on a schedule now.”
The two of them stood with their backs to the truck, scanning up and down the road as if Lei were going to be crazy enough to come out. She stayed perfectly still, grateful for her army-green pants and camouflage-patterned vest. She raised her weapon, steadying it on the rock, and drew a bead on Boss Man.
Lei was a decent shot, but not great, and the distance was significant. She’d need to get him in the head or chest to keep him from firing that automatic weapon all over the area. And then she’d need to nail the kid, just as permanently. She loosened her finger on the trigger.
There had to be another way out of this.
“If she hadn’t shot Killah, he’d find her for us,” Boss Man said. “I’ll kill that bitch myself just for that.” He hooked a radio off his belt. “Eddie, get everyone out harvesting the bud. If we don’t find that cop, we need to bring in everything we can and burn the rest.” A long pause as “Eddie” vented, the words too garbled by static and distance to make out. Boss Man nodded. “Yeah. Pull the plug. You know what that means. And send Akira out with the rest of the ammo. We might still be able to find her.”
Boss Man had begun walking down the road as he was speaking, heading for the hidden trail opening the teenager had come out of.
Lei pulled her phone out, thumbed it on. Still no bars.
“What should we do, Uncle?” the teen asked. The kid was slender, his wifebeater tank shirt hanging on a hollow-chested frame. He swung the machine gun around, his finger alarmingly loose on the trigger. “You want I should just fire all around the area? We’d probably hit her.”
“Nah,” Boss Man said. “I saw where she dove into the bushes. When Akira gets here, we’ll grid off and search for her.”
Lei’s heart hammered. She had a limited amount of time to get out before she was discovered.
Staying flat on
her belly, she backed stealthily into the heavy undergrowth, giving up her visibility window onto the growers. She’d run out of options now that she’d decided not to risk shooting them. She needed to get far enough away into the jungle that she could approach the road again, and flag down a car when it was safe.
As if in answer to this thought, she heard the sound of approaching cars and a muffled curse from Boss Man. He and the teen ducked out of sight.
This was Lei’s chance, while they were distracted by the passing vehicles. She rose to a crouch, the Glock ready, and moved as quickly and quietly as she could, deeper into the jungle.
Chapter Eleven
I stumbled over something as we moved through the dark jungle at a trot. I never saw what it was, but I went down with a muffled curse, and the headlamp fell off and went out. The black was instant and total.
“Shit! You okay, LT?” K-Man had lost his grip on my belt as I went down, and I heard the rustling and muttering of the men behind him.
I rose to my hands and knees. “Hold up. I’ll find the light.” I patted the ground around where I’d tripped, feeling twigs under my hands. Leaves. The stiff, poky sensation of some broken branch. Something unpleasantly damp and spongy, probably a lichen of some kind. I tried not to think of the vicious smack of the snake hitting my pants as it tried to bite.
“It’s got to be right here,” I panted. “K-Man, can you help?”
“My name’s Tim Kerry, LT,” the young man who’d been my best helper said. “But K-Man is okay.” I heard by the change of his voice that he’d dropped down to squat beside me.
“Let’s get side by side and search a square pattern,” I said. Kerry got close beside me, and we swept and patted the ground, making sure no more than a few inches separated us.
“I found it!” Kerry exclaimed. I heard him fumbling with something in the dark. My eyes had adjusted more, and now I could see the faintest gray of sky behind the lacy patterns of the leaves of the jungle far above. The moon was up, somewhere out there.
“It’s not turning on, LT,” the young man said, and he thrust the light to me.
I felt the unit all over, and sure enough, it was no longer turning on with the touch of a button.
“Maybe it’s damaged or the battery got knocked out. Everyone, take a break.” I heard by the rustling that the men had dropped where they stood. Everyone was waiting for me to get the damn headlight working.
Using touch, I located the notch in the back cover and fumbled it open with a fingernail. It seemed to be a AAA battery. I slid it out, rubbed it on my pants, reinserted it, slid the little door back up, and pressed the button.
Nothing. “Damn it. I think we’re going to have to quit for tonight. We can’t get anywhere without a light. Unless someone has matches, a lighter?”
“Naw, LT. They searched us and took anything that could be useful,” Kerry said.
“Okay, then. Might as well get some rest. Stay close together, though, and keep your weapons handy. There could be predators out here, and not just the human kind. Let’s set a watch by turns. Falconer, can you take the first round?” I trusted the competency of the big black man.
“You got it,” he rumbled from beside me. I’d never heard him advance to my position.
Rustling and murmuring followed as our little group settled into the damp tree litter and underbrush where we’d halted. I lay down, curling on my side. Sleep fell over me, a thick blanket of oblivion brought on by exhaustion.
The Maui jungle growth was thick. A combination of saplings, ferns, wild ginger, and other bushes choked the bases of java plum, mountain apple, and other bushy growth as Lei pushed forward, scanning and listening. All she could hear was the distant breeze in the tops of the trees, a swish of movement. Mynah birds did their conversational chattering, doves cooed, cardinals chirped, and there was the sound of her movement: the crack of a twig under her shoe, the whisk of wet jeans, the soft thud of her feet as she bore to the right, hoping to parallel the road.
Lei crossed the trail that led into the growers’ secret valley after a quick check that it was clear, and kept going.
She wasn’t sure how far to go before heading back toward the road, but the question was answered for her by an abrupt rise in the ground as she hit one of the steep valley walls.
She looked at the ridge. She’d have to go relatively straight up, at least a couple of hundred yards of climbing, and then descend the other side.
Better to go back to the road and see if she could flag down a car. She turned in the direction of the road and hurried through the underbrush as quietly as she could.
“Stop!” The teenager’s reedy voice steadied as he yelled again. “Stop! I’ve got you!”
Lei froze. Her weapon was in her hand, held in the low ready position.
“Drop your weapon! I can’t miss!” The kid’s volume increased, and so did his aggression.
They were going to kill her if they captured her. There was no doubt in her mind. But right now she had her back turned to a trigger-happy kid with an automatic rifle. She had to buy time.
“Okay, okay.” She dropped the pistol right in front of her.
“Get on your knees!”
She did. But he didn’t say to put her hands up, so she kept them down at her sides, ready for action. She heard him crunching through the leaves, talking into his handheld radio.
“I got her, Uncle.”
“Good. Hold her until I get there. If she moves, shoot her.”
“Ten-four.” He must be putting the radio back on his belt. Lei could imagine the automatic in his hands, pointed toward her, his finger itchy on the trigger, amped up by adrenaline and eager to prove himself. Scared to kill a cop, but determined to do what his boss wanted. Part of him not wanting to kill, the other eager to. Neither part really understood what it meant to take a human life.
Lei understood it too well.
Time slowed down, those seconds right before action unwinding one by one, sliding by like beads on a string, every sense hyperaware.
The rustle of leaves as the kid approached.
The smell of damp and mold thick in her nostrils.
Wetness as the mulch she knelt on soaked her pants and penetrated to her skin.
Shush of the wind, high overhead.
Pale, gray-streaked bark, nubby as a hand-knit sweater covering the java plum tree directly in front of her. On the left, a rising, steep tree- and debris-covered slope of the ridge. On the right, more jungle and forest.
Right behind her, a very dangerous kid.
“I’ve got you now.” The boy’s voice was gloating. Lei felt the barrel of the automatic press into the notch between her neck and skull. She drew a deep breath and coiled all her muscles tight, drawing on core strength. She’d practiced a jump from knees to feet both in the gym and on a surfboard, but this was the first time she’d tried it with a gun to her head.
Lei bounced to her feet and spun, grabbing the barrel of the automatic and tearing it out of the kid’s hands. The strap caught on his shoulder and head, and he gave an inarticulate cry. She didn’t have it totally free because of that, but hit him with all the leverage she could with the butt end of the rifle, nailing him in the chin.
The boy’s hand scrabbled for the radio as Lei wrenched the strap off over his head and used the butt end of the rifle to whack him again, from the other direction. The kid yelped, twisting sideways. He got the radio into his hand this time, but now she had some room to maneuver. She swung the rifle with all her strength.
He dropped like an anchor. Blood streamed from his nose.
Lei took a second to scan and see if Boss Man had appeared yet, then looked at the slender, crumpled form at her feet. At least the little bastard was still alive. She hoped he deserved the break she was giving him.
She reached down to search the kid’s pockets. She found a cell phone and a knife in a scabbard. No ID or wallet, but stuck out in the valley as they were, he probably had no use for those. She unbuc
kled his belt, flipped him, and used it to bind his legs. She put her cuffs on him behind his back, and gagged him with his T-shirt.
The whole operation had taken five minutes, and that was five minutes too long. Slipping the automatic’s strap over her head, she retrieved her Glock and broke into a run through the trees, heading for the road.
Chapter Twelve
Falconer woke me with a squeeze on my shoulder. “Sun’s up, Stevens.”
“Barely.” I sat up and dusted leaves off of my clothing, looking around at the deep gray shadows around us. “But enough for us to move.” We woke the rest of the men and got moving quickly.
The twittering, keening, and shrieking of birds and animals brought the jungle to life around us and increased our sense of urgency. I rationed out the packet of sugar cookies I’d taken off the guard, and we each ate one and sipped water off the canteens as we walked. With enough light to see a little distance, and that light brightening by the minute, I set as fast a pace as I could in my weakened state.
I was glad we’d stopped where we had, because we had hardly gone another hundred yards before we encountered some sort of wetland slough. The tall forest gave way abruptly to shorter, bushy trees, bunchy clumps of sharp grasses—and swampy, sinking mud that dragged at our boots.
“I’m hoping this means the river’s ahead.” I took another compass reading. North was straight into the wetland.
“I saw some maps of the area.” Falconer joined me, assessing. “The camp organizers said to watch out for the areas around the riverbanks. Snakes and pockets of quicksand.”
“Do you remember how far that stretch went? Is the river right on the other side of this?” I swiped the sweat pearling on my forehead with a muddy forearm.
“I was planning the infiltration training, and I was going to do a section in this environment, but I was working on more traditional obstacle courses as a warm-up,” Falconer said. “We need to go slow if we’re going to try to get through here. Probe the ground with sticks and clear any wildlife.”