Sliding on a backpack, Bolan checked over his weapons, then started climbing up the steep hillside. The footing was tricky because of the deep carpeting of loose leaves and the many snakes hidden beneath them. After a few miles, Bolan’s EM scanner had yet to find a single live microphone hidden in the trees, a land mine or even a proximity sensor. Could he be wrong? Had the rebels moved to another location? It was possible. Perhaps the real reason the secret police had never found the Ghost Jaguars was because they had disbanded or...
Bolan froze as the needle of the EM scanner jerked wildly. Straight ahead of him was a land mine. No, a field of land mines, spread out in every direction. Dozens...hundreds. His intel had been right—this was the place. Now, it was just a matter of cutting a deal with people who disliked outsiders, had no reason whatsoever to trust him and hated most Americans.
Warily, Bolan moved through the maze of high-explosive death traps, keeping a constant watch on the flickering indicator. If the needle ever swung into the red, it would be too late. Red would mean the mines were about to explode. But there was no other way to reach the rebel camp.
Edging steadily closer, Bolan caught a glimpse of a massive wall of upright logs hammered into the dark soil. The jungle grew right up to the wall, helping to mask its presence. The logs were at least a foot thick, patched with concrete, draped in camouflage netting and topped with concertina wire.
The razor blades shone with fresh oil—much-needed protection from the constant mist and dampness. Nothing was visible over the top of the wall, but Bolan saw crude birds’ nests here and there. That’s where the video cameras would be hidden. Most likely. He needed to get over that damn fence in spite of them.
Holding his breath, Bolan listened intently to the soft sounds of the jungle—the wind through the trees, the rustle of snakes, the chirps of various insects. Oddly, no noise seemed to be coming from his left, so he carefully headed in that direction. He soon discovered the source of the unnatural silence. A pair of jaguars was chained to the base of a large tree, their dappled fur helping them blend into the shadows.
As the animals turned to face him, Bolan pulled out a pneumatic air gun and fired several times. The tiny darts disappeared completely into the thick, spotted hides of the huge animals, and they paused, wobbled slightly, then lay down clumsily.
Just to be sure, Bolan gave them a couple of extra minutes to pass out. Jaguars were smart and often only pretended to be dead, or asleep, to lure their prey in closer. Which was probably why the rebels had chosen them as their symbol—smart and deadly. A good combination.
Once he was satisfied the jungle killers were well and truly unconscious, Bolan approached the tree. He pulled a pair of slim knives out of his belt, then kicked the sides of his boots, releasing their climbing spurs.
The ascent into the tree was easy, but every leaf seemed to hold a gallon of water, and by the time he reached the top, Bolan was soaked to the skin. Ignoring the minor inconvenience, he extracted a pair of compact binoculars and looked over the base.
It was impressive. He saw a dozen log cabins and several large tents, everything draped with camouflage netting. He counted ten armed trucks, a dozen mountain bikes and two large canvas lumps. From the angle and positions, his best guess was that the lumps were missiles, probably surface-to-air. He also spotted what sure as hell resembled an old howitzer situated directly before the front gate.
Designed for lobbing colossal shells a great distance, the blast of the 155 mm caliber cannon would be devastating to anything at such a short range. The gunnery crew could probably only get off one shot, maybe two, if they were really good. But the first government tank rumbling into the base would have a hot reception.
The rebels themselves were men and women of all ages, some seeming too old to march, whereas others didn’t look old enough to shave. Everyone carried a gun and a machete. Nobody had any insignia of rank. Bolan assumed this was a small, tight group—if you were not personally known, you’d be killed on the spot. Brutal, but good tactics.
An old switchback road snaked down the side of the mountain, and the base was located at the edge of a crumbling cliff that overlooked the ocean. The height was extreme—ten, maybe fifteen miles. But a brave man with a parachute might make it down to the coastline alive. An escape maneuver that most invading troops would not be able to duplicate.
Easing his way back to the ground, Bolan moved to a small clearing where he could see the front gate. Bolan pulled out a small transceiver, thumbed aside the protective cover, waited for the green light, then pressed the arming button twice.
Ten miles away, the stacked boxes of cargo in the rear of the jeep cut loose in a prolonged display of thermite, dynamite, white phosphorous and cheap fireworks.
Within seconds, the front gate of the base was throw open, and a ragged convoy of trucks and motorcycles charged out of the enclosure.
As the defenders disappeared quickly down the dirt road, the gate slamming shut behind them, Bolan sprinted to the opposite edge of the compound and used his pneumatic air gun to launch a grappling over the stockade wall. Going up was easy, down even more so, and Bolan hit the ground in a crouch, reloading the air gun with darts again.
He’d landed right across from a small wooden shack that looked to be an outhouse. As if on cue, the door pushed outward and a rebel exited, zipping up his pants. Spotting Bolan, the rebel cried out, clawing for a holstered pistol on his hip. Bolan put two tranquilizer darts in his chest and moved onward.
Six more guards fell under the gentle assault of the tranquilizer darts, and soon Bolan was standing inside a battered old canvas tent. There was nothing special about the tent, from the outside, but its position was the logical location for the commander.
A fast glance around the interior told Bolan that he was correct. He spied a weapons cabinet containing advanced armament—an Atchisson auto-shotgun, a Milkor grenade launcher, several 66 mm LAW rocket launchers, five or six Neostead shotguns and enough spare ammunition and assorted grenades to punch a hole in the moon. Whatever else they were, these rebels weren’t poor. A small bookcase next to the cabinet was filled with assorted legal volumes dealing with international law, war crimes and joining the UN. These folks thought big. Bolan liked that.
A large folding table was covered with detailed maps of the capital city, Montevideo, the president’s palace and the complex sewer system underneath. It looked as if a sortie was being planned, possibly an assassination. Then Bolan spied an old, battered medical case. A quick glance inside showed only surgical instruments, mostly dental. Apparently, the rebels also believed in torture.
Off in the far corner, a folding cot stood near a small wood-burning stove, and on a worktable were boxes of camouflage paint sticks, a hairbrush and several tampons. Bolan had no idea what the military function of the tampons might be. He’d heard tales of wounded soldiers in battle jamming a tampon into a deep bullet hole to act as a crude blood stop, but he’d always considered it an army legend. Maybe the trick really did work.
Suddenly, there came the sound of multiple engines. Bolan quickly grabbed a pair of M35 anti-personnel grenades from his pack, pulled the pins and held tightly to the arming levers. He listened to the shouting over the discovery of the unconscious guards, running, cursing in several different languages, a few wild bursts from assault rifles.... Then the tent flap was pulled aside.
Six armed people stood in the opening, their faces registering shock and then raw hatred.
“Filthy dog!” a rebel snarled, swinging up the barrel of his AK-47.
“Stop that, Jose!” snapped a woman, slapping the weapon aside. “Did you not see the grenades?”
“Live, I assure you,” Bolan said, beaming a friendly smile.
“I assumed,” she said, cocking back the hammer on the Colt Commander semi-automatic pistol in her grip. The weapon looked very old, but it was spotles
sly clean and shone with fresh oil.
She was a beautiful woman, and not even the long jagged scar bisecting her face could affect that. Her figure was tight and firm, as befitting a leader of combat soldiers. Her camouflage-pattern uniform was patched, the boots old, but everything was clean.
More important, she stood with the calm assurance of a leader. Clearly, this was the person in charge of the operation. The government called her Sergeant Gato, Spanish for “cat.” But giving your enemy a silly nickname to make them sound weak was one of the oldest tricks in the book.
“What do you want here?” the woman demanded, the pitted barrel of the handgun never wavering.
“You,” Bolan replied. “You, your men and that warship you’ve been secretly building for the past ten years.”
A collective gasp from the rebels told Bolan he’d made a direct hit.
A burly man with a large black mustache frowned. “How did you find us?”
Bolan gave a small shrug. “A friend of a friend.”
“I want names, gringo! Names!” the man demanded.
“Look, amigo. If I wanted you dead, I would have sold the information to the government,” Bolan said bluntly. “And right now, this base would be getting firebombed out of existence from what the president laughingly calls an air force.”
That yielded a small chuckle from the soldiers, but none of the weapons shifted direction, and the woman did not respond.
“We can leave and shoot you through the tent walls,” she said. “Use one grenade, or two.... But you would die, and we would simply be out a tent.”
“Absolutely true,” Bolan said. “But I’m here to cut a deal. Shoot if you want, but it’s a good deal.”
“Amnesty?” sneered a rake-thin teenager, his hands nervously twisting on the wooden grip of an old Browning automatic rifle, now topped with a state-of-the-art Zeiss long-range sniper scope. A bandolier of shells crossed his chest, and an optical range finder was tucked into a shirt pocket.
A fellow sniper? Good to know. “Fuck amnesty,” Bolan said. “I’m talking about missiles.”
“Missiles?”
“Missiles. Carl Gustav, LAW, Sidewinders, Redeye, Loki, Javelin—a truckload of them. Enough to tip the fight in your favor.”
“And what is the cost of this largesse?” asked the woman coolly, her eyes narrowing.
“Your rebellion is not going very well,” Bolan said, choosing his words carefully. “For more than five years, you’ve been doing a major overhaul on an old Mexican cargo freighter, formerly a Canadian steel freighter.”
Nobody said a word, but nervous glances were exchanged.
“You’ve added firewalls and armor below decks, modified the engines, reinforced the main deck, tacked on torpedo tubes and missile launchers.” Bolan smiled. “All of which is carefully out of sight.”
“Supposing what you say is true,” Sergeant Gato said slowly.
“It is.” Bolan interrupted.
She scowled. “Supposing so, you wish to do what, exchange your imaginary stockpile of missiles if we give you this vessel?”
“Oh, hell no. I merely want to rent it for a while. Maybe a few weeks, possibly longer.”
“Rent?” A young girl laughed. “You wish to rent the...” She closed her mouth with a snap.
“I never could find out the name, much less the location,” Bolan admitted. “You security is good. Damn good.” He proffered the grenades. “That’s why I had to go to such an extreme measure.”
“Rent.” The burly man shook his head in disbelief. “You have cojones, I’ll give you that, dead man.”
“I’ll pay with a hundred missiles...and a name.”
“What did you just say?” The man gaped.
“In exchange for renting the warship, I will pay you one hundred missiles per month, until the end of my mission.”
“Per month?”
“Or twenty-five a week. Whichever you prefer.”
“Madre mia,” a bald man exhaled. “With such ordnance....” Abruptly, his face took on a terrible expression. “Bah, it’s a trick! Just more lies from the president, eh? Everybody out of the tent. I will handle this pig personally.”
“Thank you, Miguel, but not this time,” the commander said, lowering her weapon. Her actions were slow but deliberate. “There is no fear in the eyes of this man, and his words carry the ring of truth.”
“But—”
“Let him talk for a little more,” she said, dragging over a folding canvas chair. “Let us see if the strength of his words equals the strength of his hands.”
“Sure as hell hope so,” Bolan said.
Leaning forward, she rested both elbows on her knees. “A hundred missiles per month, you said?”
“Plus a name. The name of a traitor in your organization. A paid police spy.”
“Davido?”
That caught Bolan by surprise. “Yes, Davido Sanchez.”
She shrugged. “Killed him last week.” Then she smiled. “But nobody knows that yet.”
A tense minute passed in silence, then another.
“So, my intel was good,” said Bolan.
“Good, but late. Still, I like that you offered his name without a price,” Sergeant Gato said. “And a hundred missiles seems a fair price for the....”
Bolan waited.
“The Constitution,” she finished.
“Good name,” Bolan said. But remember, you get the warship back afterward.”
“Perhaps. And if we do not? If it sinks or is stolen or damaged beyond repair?”
“Then I help steal you another. But I want the Constitution.”
“Why, if you can so easily steal another warship? Probably something even better than what we have.”
“Because your ship will not look dangerous,” Bolan stated bluntly. “But it actually will be. I’ll need that to get close to my target.”
“A covert attack?”
“Exactly.”
“I see,” the commander said, leaning back in the chair. “So, we each have something the other wants. But can we trust each other?”
“No.”
“Good answer. Let me think on this,” she said, pulling out a cigarette pack. She tapped it on the bottom and one jumped up. She caught it between her lips then offered the pack to Bolan.
“Thanks, but I quit years ago,” he said. She shrugged, lit a match on the sole of her boot and inhaled. The rest of the rebels just stood there, watching him intently, waiting for the next order from their commander.
The muscles in his arms were starting to become warm, but Bolan was no longer likely to let go of the grenades. There was still plenty of time to negotiate. The rebels were poor but proud. They never would have accepted charity, or even a gift, naturally assuming there would be strings attached. But a deal, a trade, this they could accept. Besides, he would need a crew, and who better than the people who knew every nut and bolt in the vessel?
“What is your name, Yankee?” she asked out of the blue.
“Colonel Brandon Stone. And I am addressing...?”
“Major Esmeralda Cortez.”
Bolan nodded. “Major.”
“Colonel,” she replied in kind. “So, do you have a crew for our ship?”
“Nope.”
She paused. “Us? You also want us?”
“Who better than the people who built it?”
Major Cortez took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. “That would require additional funding.”
“I expected as much. More missiles?”
“No, assault rifles. AK-47s with grenade launchers. And ammunition.”
“Not a problem. But the new model AK-101 is much better. Longer range, less ride-up, easier to clean.”
�
�Easier to clean.” She laughed. “Yes, you are a soldier. Politicians talk about firepower. Soldiers talking about keeping their weapons clean.”
“Damn straight.”
Major Cortez took another long, slow drag, then dropped the smoldering cigarette butt to the ground, crushing it under a boot heel. “You will be watched, and closely.” She rose from the chair. “At the first hint of treachery, you will be killed.”
“Accepted.”
“Then we have a deal.”
“Good.”
“Who is it you wish to kill? This enemy that you must get close to using...guile?”
“Captain Ravid Narmada, the leader of a pirate fleet that usually operates somewhere in the Atlantic.”
“Somewhere?” the balding rebel laughed scornfully. “Usually?”
Bolan shrugged.
“So you will draw him to you using the Constitution as bait,” Major Cortez said.
“Exactly.”
“This is intolerable,” one of the soldiers began with a worried expression.
“Jose, with the profit from selling half of the missiles delivered to us—”
“If they exist!”
The major gave a curt nod. “Yes, if they exist. But if they do, we could soon buy a second warship. The Russians are selling off their old diesel submarines very cheaply these days.”
“A submarine!” the burly rebel exclaimed.
Major Cortez gave a feral smile. “Imagine the surprise, Lieutenant Esteele, when a submarine rises from the middle of the Bay of Montevideo and uses its torpedoes to pave the way for the big gun of the Constitution, eh?”
From the expressions on the faces of the rebels, Bolan could see they liked the idea a lot.
“Two warships,” Major Cortez replied, using her fingers to brush back a loose strand of ebony hair. “A lion and a lamb. For the sake of the nation, I am willing to accept this risk.”
“Done,” Bolan said.
“Lieutenant Esteele,” the major said, “your new duties include watching Colonel Stone day and night. Guard him from harm, but one wrong move on his part, and you have my full permission to blow off his head—anywhere, anytime.”
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