The Powers That Be r5-1

by Cliff Ryder

  “Close your mouth—the flies will get in.”

  They both gazed at the luxury yacht that Jonas would be using for his cover while in Miami. The Deep Water was a custom-built, 180-foot yacht with a plush interior that could comfortably sleep ten passengers. The quad-deck design featured a gymnasium, sun deck, hot tub, Jet Skis, Wave Runners and Windsurfers. It carried a crew of eleven, plus the captain. With a top speed of twenty-one knots, the ship’s clean white hull and aerodynamic lines made it look as if it were cutting through the water even while at anchor.

  “Unfortunately, you will not be accompanying me on it, as getting you to your destination will mean relying on speed and hopefully stealth, not opulent luxury,” Jonas said.

  “Too bad, I’ve always wondered what the interior of one of those looked like.”

  “Make division head, and you’ll find out.”

  “Yeah, speaking of, that does bring up a question, sir—

  just why are you overseeing this operation?” Marcus asked.

  Jonas stared at him from behind his sunglasses. The kid’s not just charm and good looks, he thought. “Our superiors felt that I was the right person to handle this op, and that’s all you need to know. Now, come on, let’s get you ready for your insertion.”

  FIVE HOURS LATER, Marcus called out, “This is more like it.”

  They were riding in the cockpit of a Tiara 4200 Open yacht as it knifed through the calm Atlantic Ocean at thirty knots. Twin Caterpillar C-12 diesel engines rumbled behind them, propelling the pleasure craft through the darkness toward Cuba.

  “I thought we’d be using a cigarette boat for this, you know, something more Miami Vice. ” Marcus wriggled into his one-piece, black, three-quarter wet suit.

  “It’s bad enough that I’m dropping you off as it is, but just how much attention do you want to attract?” Jonas sat at the helm, dressed in khaki shorts, a short-sleeved shirt and a light windbreaker. His face was lit in a greenish tinge by the radar array and control board. “This way, I can claim to be just another European tourist lost at sea.”

  “Yeah, if they don’t nab you on suspicion of ferrying illegals.” Marcus checked the regulator of his scuba tank, then measured his weights out. Nearby was his water-proofed package of gear, along with the small, battery-powered underwater sled that would carry him to shore.

  Jonas reached under the console to reveal the butt of a HK P-30 V1 9 mm pistol. “I’m ready to repel boarders.

  Besides, current military reports say the majority of Cuban patrol boats are inoperable.”

  “Now who’s looking to draw attention?” Marcus asked with a grin. “It’s not the regular patrol boats you should be worried about, but the confiscated ones they’ve been using against the smugglers.” He peered out at the darkness, searching for the island he’d be stepping on for the first time in his life—his homeland. “Thousands of people try to flee every year. Only in this job would I actually be trying to get into Cuba.”

  “Don’t worry about it—you’ll do fine.” Jonas checked his watch. “ETA to drop point twenty minutes. You’re sure you can handle the insert?”

  “Ranger training made us swim for hours carrying full gear. With the sled, this won’t even count as exercise.”

  The two men fell silent for the next few minutes, each concentrating on the job he had to do. For Marcus, a water incursion was simple enough, although he’d have preferred a HALO drop over the island—less risk to everyone. However, if Mr. Heinemann was as adept at nautical excursions as he had been at ordering his wardrobe at the tailor, then he could more than handle himself. He glanced over the older German, who sat at the yacht’s controls like a steady stone pillar, making minute adjustments to their course.

  Marcus thought he had a good idea why their handlers had chosen him—the man looked as if he’d seen it all, but could still handle anything the covert life threw at him. And the ease with which he handled navigating down to Cuba made Marcus suspect he’d been there before.

  “Hey,” he called as he slung the air tank and vest on his back. “Sorry about the third degree earlier.”

  Jonas’s eyebrow rose as he glanced over. “Accepted, but unnecessary. Were our positions reversed, I would have wondered the same thing myself.”

  “But…?” Marcus waited for more.

  The corner of Jonas’s mouth crooked up in a half smile.

  “But I would have left it at just wondering.”

  “Touché.” Marcus put on his weight belt, adjusted it, then tested his regulator again. He spit in his mask and rinsed it out with water. Next he checked his fins, making sure they were snug and comfortable on his feet.

  “Ten minutes to insertion point.” Just as he said that, Jonas saw a flash of light from the southwest, which rapidly grew larger. “You weren’t kidding—they are patrolling tonight.” Although they had chosen an area that should have been deserted, the boat approaching proved otherwise.

  “Damn, must be Cuban Border Patrol. No one else would have lights on out here.” Marcus crouched down as the spotlight played over the pleasure boat. “Looks like I get off here.”

  “No, we’re too far out. The currents could sweep you completely past the island. Let me go a bit closer. Get on the port side and stay as low as you can,” Jonas said.

  The boat was much closer now, and was a similar style to what Jonas was piloting, although about fifteen feet shorter. Three men dressed in olive fatigues stood in the cockpit, one piloting the boat, one next to him holding an AK-47 rifle and the third with a megaphone to his lips.

  “¡Pare el barco!” he shouted.

  Jonas held his hand to his ear and shrugged.

  “These guys don’t have any compunction about shooting suspected smugglers, you know,” Marcus hissed.

  “Just a few more seconds—go when I turn hard to port.”

  “Are you sure—it’s three to one—”

  “Go on my mark. That’s an order.”

  Marcus dropped his mask and gave Jonas the thumbs-up.

  “¡Pare el barco inmediatamente!” To punctuate the request, the armed Cuban fired a short burst across the pleasure yacht’s bow.

  Nodding his head vigorously, Jonas waited another five seconds, bringing Marcus a hundred yards closer to the island, then spun the wheel hard left, making the forty-four-foot craft gracefully turn away. “Go,” he whispered.

  As soon as he felt the yacht lean, Marcus popped up and out, following his gear into the warm water.

  “He’s dead in the water. Second agent is away from the craft.”

  “You know, I would appreciate it if you didn’t use phrases like that at this exact moment.” Kate steepled her hands, keeping them still while giving her something to do. This was a part of the job she despised: sitting safe and sound while watching operatives risk their lives in real time, and knowing if something happened, she would be absolutely powerless to help.

  “Yes, ma’am,” KeyWiz said. He was a cyberjock, not a fool. Recognizing the clipped tone in Kate’s voice, he dialed down a bit.

  “Show us who’s interdicting,” Kate said.

  KeyWiz tapped his namesake, and the picture on the large holographic screen zoomed in closer on the region, with the peninsula of Florida jutting down from the north and the curved island of Cuba arcing through the tropical water like a lethal serpent.

  This could claim two operatives before it’s all over. Kate shook off the foreboding thought. She had no doubt that Jonas could handle himself—the man probably had more experience in covert ops than any two of her people. In fact, the more she had thought about it, the happier she was that he was overseeing the mission—it freed up Denny to concentrate on the myriad threats Room 59 was keeping tabs on in the States. Also, Jonas could be counted on to make sure that the operation didn’t turn wet until absolutely necessary. Even now, as they were being boarded by potential hostiles, Marcus had left the boat and was executing his assignment. Which is great, except that leaves Jonas alone against three�
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  “I’ve got it.” NiteMaster had used the satellite’s imaging capability to zoom on the two boats bobbing in the middle of a watery nowhere.

  The detail was so good Kate could make out four figures, the one in the larger boat rising from his chair, keeping his hands in plain sight. Three men in uniforms and billed caps, one holding what was obviously an assault rifle, came on board.

  “Looks like Cuban Border Patrol—must have spotted them coming in,” NiteMaster said.

  “I knew we should have gone complete stealth on this.”

  Kate kept her eyes glued to the screen, but her gaze wavered when she heard a snort from KeyWiz, who had pulled up a composite photo of Jonas and had matched him to a severe, official-looking photo.

  “Are you kidding? Have you read this guy’s jacket? A founding member of GSG-9, served thirty years before retirement, plus he’s a sniper with seventy-plus confirmed kills. He’s done things I only role-play. If you gave him a Swiss Army knife, a can of SPAM and dropped him in there by himself in just his underwear, he could probably bring back Castro’s head on a plate, gift wrapped.”

  “Less talking, more stalking, Key.” Judy appeared on-screen beside Kate. “Couldn’t sleep, either, eh?” she asked.

  “No, and before you say it, I do know the old intelligence saying, the more people watching an operation—”

  “The quicker it goes to hell. I think they meant the eyes-on-the-ground kind of watching. I doubt those young men—

  or that older one—have any idea who’s keeping tabs on them in America,” Judy said.

  “Something’s going down,” NiteMaster interrupted, and all eyes in the room watched what unfolded next in complete silence.

  JONAS FINISHED the 180-degree turn, then pulled the throttles back, dropping the diesels from a roar to a whispering idle before cutting them completely. He rose, keeping his hands at shoulder level as he turned to face the three Cubans, who’d brought their boat alongside and made it fast to his.

  A flick of his eyes to the stern showed no obvious trace of Marcus’s entry into the water—the yacht’s wake had already broken up any ripples.

  “Um —Buenas noches, señors. Wie sagen Sie—¿Hay un problema? ” Knowing there was a good chance one of the men might speak English, Jonas mixed clumsy Spanish with his native German.

  “¡No muévase!” Without asking permission, the three men came aboard, the man with the rifle covering him, motioning for him to step away from the captain’s chair and sit in the passenger’s seat, which Jonas did. He eyed the distance to the hidden pistol, then calculated his odds of disarming the officer and holding him hostage. Even though the man was about six feet away, Jonas was confident he could do it in less than two seconds.

  The man with the bullhorn stood in front of him, while the third one went belowdecks presumably to search the cabin.

  “What are you doing in Cuban territorial waters?”

  Jonas let his features go slack in bafflement. “You mean—that is not Florida?” He gestured at the island and the scant lights in the distance.

  The officer frowned. “No, you are within our sovereign waters now. Let me see your passport and registration papers.”

  Jonas handed over his fake German passport, listing him as one Werner Buehler. His cover for the drop was that of a businessman on vacation, and he played it to the hilt. “Ach du Lieber, my wife will be so upset that I won’t get back in time to meet her tonight. We were supposed to go to the Miami Beach for drinks, and now she will be very angry indeed.”

  He kept wringing his hands and rambling like a worried husband as the third man came up from the galley and reported. “No contraband or stowaways aboard.”

  “You own such a magnificent vessel?” the officer asked.

  “Yes, here are my papers.” Jonas forced a smile, knowing the man’s interest was anything but recreational. “I come to the U.S. every year to fish and sail on the water.”

  The officer glanced at Jonas, then around at the boat, addressing his men in rapid Spanish. “This is a wonderful powerboat—it would be very useful against the smugglers.”

  One of his men smiled. “Yes, and we could trade up from that piece of shit we’re using now.”

  “Then we are agreed.” The third soldier’s eyes flicked to Jonas, who kept an uncertain smile on his face as though he couldn’t understand what was being said. “The only question is what happens to him?”

  The officer shrugged. “Too many questions for our leader if we bring in another foreigner to prison. Better that he just have an accident, and then we say we found the abandoned boat out here.”

  The officer turned back to Jonas, papers extended. “Well, Mr. Buehler, you are free to go. However, there is the small matter of a fine for crossing into our waters—”

  Jonas smiled and nodded so hard he thought his head would fall off. “Ja—sí, sí, I pay, I pay. One moment, please.”

  He reached out for the sheaf of registration papers, taking them from the officer’s hand, but let them slip through his fingers to the deck. “Ach, I am sorry, so clumsy—”

  With a thin smile, the officer leaned over to snatch the papers off the deck. As soon as he bent forward, Jonas brought up his knee, smashing it into the man’s face, feeling the man’s nose pulp under the blow and sending him reeling back, clapping his hands to his ruined features.

  Jonas immediately turned to the second soldier, who had been bringing his AK-47 down from a sloppy port arms hold. He tried to bring his weapon to bear, but Jonas was already too close and grabbed the barrel, pulling it down even farther. Surprised, the soldier tightened up on the weapon, trying to pull it back to him. As soon as he did that, Jonas lunged forward, striking the bridge of the soldier’s nose with his forehead. The man doggedly clung to his weapon and squeezed the trigger, spraying a long burst of bullets into the night. Jonas butted him in the nose again, breaking it and forcing him to release the rifle. He then jabbed the butt at the soldier’s forehead, dropping him to the deck.

  Jonas was about to whirl to take out the third attacker when he felt strong arms clamp around his chest, pinning his own to his sides. Still gripping the rifle, Jonas arced his head back, smashing his skull into the man’s face while kicking back with his heel into the Cuban’s left shin. The dual attack made the soldier release him, and the operative immediately spun and slammed the AK-47’s butt into the man’s solar plexus, staggering him back against the captain’s chair, howling in dismay.

  The soldier clawed the Makarov 9 mm pistol out of its holster as Jonas stepped forward and lashed out again, shattering his cheekbone and rendering him unconscious.

  Jonas looked around, his hands tight on the assault rifle.

  His pulse pounded in his ears as adrenaline coursed through his system. Two soldiers were down and out, but the leader had recovered enough to try for his side arm, making soft, whuffling noises as he bled on the deck.

  Stepping over, Jonas brought the butt of the rifle down hard on the man’s head, silencing him. He looked at all three of the Cubans bleeding on his deck and sighed, then grabbed the leader and dragged him on to the other boat, disabling its engine while he was there. He transferred the other two soldiers, then untied the boat and pushed it off.

  When the watercraft had floated far enough away, he started his yacht’s engines and pushed the throttle forward until it danced across the waves.

  Several miles away, he pitched the AK-47 overboard, then stopped the boat and got out the cleaning supplies.

  Before he began cleaning up the mess the three men had left behind, he called in.

  “It could have been worse,” he grumbled to himself as he waited for the connection. “At least there are no bullet holes to explain.”

  “Wow.”

  The simple exclamation, uttered by a slack-jawed El Supremo, summarized everyone’s thoughts. In mere seconds, they had all watched Jonas disable three armed men without getting a scratch. The trio of cyberjocks chattered among themselv
es while Kate and Judy watched in the background.

  “The man certainly can get the job done,” Judy said, her tone pure admiration.

  “He wouldn’t be working for us if he couldn’t.” Kate glanced at the three hackers still staring at their screens.

  “Gentlemen, give me a status report on our two operatives in the next ten seconds.”

  They stopped reviewing Jonas’s moves on a high-definition digital file, and each turned to their separate keyboards.

  KeyWiz informed them, “Alpha is heading toward target insertion point at approximately 305 miles per hour. Estimated time of arrival fifty minutes, twenty minutes later than our original estimate, due to being dropped off farther away from destination than planned.”

  NiteMaster chimed in next. “Beta has transferred hostiles to their boat and is about to leave the area. Do you wish to transmit any operational orders?”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Kate replied.

  NiteMaster was really asking if she had wanted to change the operation in any way, including termination of the three men. If Jonas didn’t think he needed to kill them, she wasn’t going to argue. Operatives in the field made split-second, razor’s-edge decisions all the time, and knowing a director was breathing down their neck who would second-guess their every step wouldn’t help anyone.

  NiteMaster continued his report. “Beta is proceeding due north at approximately thirty knots per hour. He will most likely make landfall in two hours, fifty minutes, unless detained again.”

  “That won’t be nearly as much of an issue,” Kate said. She knew that Jonas wouldn’t get picked up by the Coast Guard, and even if he attracted their attention, he’d be able to slip out of their grasp with ease. They watched the two dots grow farther apart, the operatives heading their separate ways.

  Judy cleared her throat. “Waiting for the incident report?” she asked.

  “Of course. Aren’t you?” Kate replied.

  “I’m still here, aren’t I? If you’d like, I can have a summary ready for you later this morning.”

  “Thanks, Judy, but I’ll take it now, if you don’t mind. I imagine it won’t be long before he calls.”