by Marcus Wynne
“Mark my words.”
“So that’s what you’re doing? Tracking these guys?” Hunter said.
“That’s part of it, Hunter. A big part, but just part.”
“I got so many questions…”
“Hell, eat first, young gun,” Raven said as the waiter arrived with Hunter’s meal. “Charlie Tango is a hungry business!”
Hunter tore into his meal with enthusiasm, while Raven picked at the remains of his. The two occupied themselves with light conversation as a table of Germans was seated close nearby. When Hunter was done, Raven signaled for the check, and asked for a coffee.
“You want one? Hans makes great coffee…get a little shot of schnapps to go with, it’ll round out the meal.”
“I’ll do a dessert, too,” Hunter said. He ordered apple strudel with ice cream to go with his coffee, and polished it off in record time. Raven watched him eat, and shook his head in avuncular amusement.
“Christ, you eat like a fucking teenager,” Raven said. “Slow down, enjoy your coffee.”
Hunter nodded, though the truth be told, he found Raven’s faint paternal condescension grating at times. It was something he’d forgotten since the last time he’d seen Paul. Or maybe he’d grown in his competency, in his own self confidence since then? He didn’t know. But he put that feeling of irritation away to look at another time. He studied Raven across his coffee. Ever since the older man’s revelation about his family, Raven had seemed almost nervous; something Hunter had never imagined he’d see in the consummate operator.
He’s shown something of his true self to me, and it makes him uneasy. But in a way, it’s a compliment…because it’s clear that he doesn’t do that often -- or at all.
“How long have you been doing all this?” Hunter said.
Raven pursed his lips. “Forever.”
“Viet Nam?”
“First Laos. I worked with White Star, then got lifted by Lucien Conein for other things. Then Viet Nam.”
“Who’d you work for there?”
“Same people I work for now.”
“What did you do?”
“Phoenix.”
Hunter took a moment to take that in. The Phoenix Program. The CIA and Special Forces collaboration that focused on the identification and systematic assassination of the Viet Cong infrastructure in the south.
Assassins.
“What was that like?” Hunter said. He didn’t want to ask the obvious question: Were you one of the hitters? Did you lead the teams, do the work?
Raven stretched in his chair, and took a slow look around the room to ensure that no one was too close to overhear.
“It was one of those things that afterwards you think, how blindingly obvious,” Raven said. “It makes perfect sense on the tactical and strategic levels. It’s just that annoying hangover of political correctness and the leftist liberal media’s commentary that’s troublesome. Good intelligence leading to positive identification followed by targeted, surgical elimination of key personnel is the best way to take apart an organization, whether it’s law enforcement taking apart a narcotics operation, or, in our role there, taking apart a covert action network very similar to the terrorist networks we’re fighting today. That was the beginning of 4th generation warfare…4th generation warfare is primarily an Asian invention -- Sun Tzu, for example. Mao Tse Tung. Ho Chi Minh.
“It’s just so damn efficient. But politicians are troubled by the ethical implications…and it pisses me off. Still does. Blah blah blah let’s beat our breasts for the other guy and insist on fighting fair…even if that means that the cream of our youth die in bloody battles for a piece of ground that could have been prevented if we’d sent one man, with one bullet -- or a knife -- to take out the general on the other side. The best battles are those you win without firing a shot…the best fight is the one you win without fighting. It’s costly in terms of dollars and blood to mount a battle…why do it when if you take out the right person at the right time, the opponent’s battle falls apart? Why risk the lives of our people? It’s just efficient. But you got to get past the fucking weak sisters that bleat about, ‘Oh, that’s assassination,’ or ‘That’s against the Geneva Convention,’ or some other fucking thing.”
Raven’s voice, though low, became harsher.
“You think our opponents give a shit about conventions and humanitarian ideals? Hell no. Does that mean I think we should abandon our ideals? Hell no. But that’s what guys like you and me are for, Hunter. We go and do the dark things so that other people don’t have to. So young soldiers who’ve never tasted a legal beer or lain with a woman they love can have a chance to do that before they die. So soft college professors and the trophy wives of rich liberal lawyers can cry about our fucking injustice. You ever read Orwell?”
“Yeah, 1984, Animal Farm…”
“Orwell said this in an essay: ‘We only sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to do violence on our behalf.’ We’re those rough men, Hunter. You, me, all those like us. We do what we do so that everyone else can sleep soundly in their beds.”
“Do you sleep soundly in your bed, Paul?” Hunter said.
That stopped him for a moment. He regarded Hunter for a long moment.
“Do you?” he answered.
“Yes,” Hunter said.
“Then you haven’t done enough,” Raven said. “There’s a line you’ll come to, some day, Hunter. Like Nietzsche said, “If you stare into the abyss too long, you will find the abyss in you looking back.’ If you’re going to be a lord of Chaos, you’ll learn to live with that. That’s what we are, the lords of Chaos -- we go into Chaos and impose order on it, with a bullet or a blade or a radio calling in the tac air, that’s what we do…
He paused, and signaled to the waiter for another cup of coffee.
“There’s always a price to pay,” he said. “I’ve paid it, still pay it. And you have to. You sacrificed your marriage on the altar of service…that’s what we’re about, Hunter. Service. Plain and simple. There are plenty of those who turn up their nose at the concept, give a fashionable sneer, but those people -- they’re the first to run to us crying for help when something kicks off. Service. We serve.”
He laughed. “We serve up ass whippings and killing!”
Hunter grinned, said nothing, unwilling to interrupt Raven’s unprecedented flow.
“Killing,” Raven said. “You haven’t killed a man yet, Hunter…but you will. You’ll know what that’s like. I can see it in you…and you have some uncertainty about it, but you’ll do just fine. It’s normal, you know? To wonder if you can, to see if your training works in the real world. No matter how good the training, it’s still training till it hits the real world, that first kill.
“Nothing is the same afterwards. Nothing. You know, there’s all this crap, most of it coming out of the law enforcement world, all this talk about post shooting, and how you’ll feel so terrible about taking a life…that’s all bullshit. Useless, even harmful, talk. You know what you feel? What you should feel…good to be alive. Exhilarated, even. As you should be. It’s our job, it’s our task. That’s what we do. And you know what? It feels good to do our job. That’s like one of the secrets only the blooded know, Hunter…something you will know, mark my words…that the truth is, it’s kind of, fun to kill bad people…”
Raven laughed. “Wouldn’t the Hollywood liberals and the New York elite shudder to hear that? What the fuck do they know about the world in the shadows, real politics? They think it’s all weighty debate from overfed white men in expensive suits…they do want to think about what we do out here, where the rubber meets the road, where the real work gets done. They’ll sit around and pontificate, write checks, stick their faces in the backgrounds of the publicity shots…but will they put their own blood and sweat on the line?
“Hell no. Not until something shakes them up. You know what a new conservative is? A liberal who’s just been mugged. Or a liberal that’s lost a famil
y member or a friend to terrorism. There was a sea change in thinking when Pan Am 103 went down, I saw it happen -- these east coat liberals changed their thinking when it was their children laying dead in the fields around Lockerbie. Nothing like watching bodies fall from the sky to make people sit up and take notice.”
Raven’s laugh was cruel and hard, something Hunter hadn’t heard from him before.
“Oh, yeah. Nothing like the fear of falling to get people’s attention…”
“How do you last in your job, thinking like that?” Hunter said.
“Be better than anyone can imagine. Under promise and over deliver. The bureaucrats hate my fucking guts…and they can’t get their job done, their quotas filled, their favorable performance reviews without me. And a handful of guys like me. Just like your bosses can’t get things done without you.”
“They might not like me, but I don’t think they hate me.”
“That’s naiveté and idealism speaking, Hunter. Don’t think that for a minute. There’s nothing they hate more than a guy like you. Somebody who actually does what they only fantasize about, somebody they could never be, but who they rely on it completely for their petty little careers? Don’t fool yourself. They hate you because they fear you. Sometimes it’s good that they fear you…but you have to be careful. As long as you have value, as long as you’re giving them something they can’t get anywhere else, you have a modicum of safety…but if they see you slip, sense a moment of weakness, then they’re on you like a pack of hyenas on a sick lion.
“Fucking bastards.”
“Sounds like you’ve got a history with them,” Hunter said.
“All the way back, Hunter, all the way back. I’ve buried friends, watched allies and agents die when bureaucrats signed them off, been left out in the cold, abandoned for dead more than once. All you’ve got to count on is yourself and your brothers in arms. That’s it. That’s all you’ll ever have.”
“Why do you keep doing this, Paul? What are you getting out of all this?”
Raven gave him a long, searching look. “Because this is who I am. Because the only family I’ve ever had that stayed with me is the family I make in this business, in this world. Friends are the family you choose, Hunter, and the friends you huddle with under fire, those brothers, they’ll always be with you. Always stand by you. You know that, right?”
“I do.”
“You remind me a lot of me when I was young, Hunter. I just don’t want to see you go the same way I did…you can walk the warrior’s path, and dodge the bureaucrats…”
“Damn, man. All this time I thought you liked me for my body.”
Their raucous laughter drew the attention of the other diners for a moment.
“So you want to get out of here? Go for a walk? The smoke is getting to me,” Hunter suggested.
“Yeah,” Raven said. “I got something I got to do, maybe you could help me out…”
“What’s that?”
“I got to go take a look at a guy, quick sneak and peek…will you watch my back?”
Hunter answered before he thought. “Sure, Paul.”
3
“Here.” Raven handed Hunter an ear-bud headset with a featherweight microphone. Hunter looked up and down the street; it was a typical Frankfurt residential block: no yards, drive in garages on a few, but most of them European flats, two to three stories with parking out front. The street was clean and well lit. At almost midnight, there was no one on the street, and the lights in most of the houses were off.
Raven was all business now; the voluble story teller had fallen away, and the cold tense mask of the street operator back in place. Hunter glanced around. The dark empty windows on the street bothered him; there could be a resident in anyone of those windows who might glance out and see the two men huddled in the shadows. Though not likely.
“It’s easy,” Raven said. “Hang back here, between this garage, where you got good line of sight on the house. Only thing I need you to do is tell me if you see a light come on, or if a car comes by, or if we get really fucked and the Polizei come prowling around. Okay? I just need to slip in and take a peek, should be in and out in ten minutes or less.”
“You’re working alone on this?”
“I always work alone. I was supposed to have a back up but there was a glitch. I found out you were here, and the rest is history. Got it?”
“Got it.”
Raven slipped his own headset into place, whispered “Check, check, check…”
“I have you 5x5.”
Raven grinned. “Once the soldier, always a soldier. Okay. I’ll be right back.”
He slipped away, his charcoal gray blazer and dark blue denims blending into the shadows just as well as any camouflage might.
Hunter eased back into the shadows afforded him by the overhang above the balcony, took a deep breath to oxygenate himself and bring his heart rate down, and watched the street. He scanned far and then near, using the technique of keeping his eyes moving forward and back so as to utilize the peripheral vision to pick up anything out of place; he relaxed himself, and let his subconscious mind, so well honed by years of training and application, do the heavy lifting.
Nothing.
A whole lot of nothing.
Something about this whole thing bothered him, just a little. A covert sneak and peek operation would normally have a full security element as well as the actual entry team; he’d never heard of a one-man, even a two-man job before. There was no redundancy or safety built into the operation and that flew in the face of everything he knew and had learned about operational planning.
But this was Paul Raven, the Alleycat, and he was in a class all his own.
Faint and far off, there was the hiss of tires and the muted roar of an auto engine.
He felt before he actually saw Raven slip away from the low fence that separated the houses.
“Let’s go,” Raven said in a low voice. He took the headsets and stowed them in a dark attaché case.
“Everything all right?” Hunter said.
“Perfect,” Raven said. “Perfect.”
4
While Hunter had heard of the Frankfurt sex clubs, he’d never been in one before. Never really had an interest, though he liked to get laid as much as the next guy, and also didn’t see the sense in spending the money. Sachenhausen was the famous red light district, and the general sleaziness of the district turned Hunter off. He didn’t find the anorexic heroin addict look favored by the German hookers to be particularly attractive, either.
This place was different.
It was well off the main drag in Sachenhausen, with no signage or hawkers in the front to lure in passing soldiers. Residences, a few small shops, and this discreet building. At the front door, one rang a bell, which was answered by a large, well dressed East German with a bristle cut hair do and the posture of an old soldier. He greeted the two of them courteously.
“Good evening, gentlemen. Please come in.”
“Thank you, Fredric. How have you been?”
Fredric inclined his head and said to Raven, “Very good, Mr. Wynne. We haven’t seen you for a long time.”
“Business, Fredric. I must work hard to indulge my pleasures, yes?”
The big man laughed and gestured toward a cloak room staffed by a stunning Asian woman in a red sheath, perched attentively on a stool.
“Please give Miko your coats so that you may be comfortable. What would your friend enjoy as a beverage tonight, Mr. Wynne?”
“Mr. Smith might enjoy a fine single malt, Fredric. Would that suit you at this time of the night, Mr. Smith?” Raven said, smiling at Hunter.
“Actually, I’d like a pils, a short one, first. Then perhaps a glass of Bushmills, the green label if you have it,” Hunter said.
“Excellent, Mr. Smith.” Fredric walked them into a lavishly appointed lounge and guided them to two deep leather arm chairs set beside the fireplace. “I’ll see that they are brought immediately. Would you
gentlemen like some company or a little private time?”
“Oh, a little private time first,” Raven said. “Please, Fredric. Let us enjoy our drinks a little…it will give you time to get the ladies up.”
“We are ready to meet your every desire, Mr. Wynne.”
“I know, Fredric. That’s why I keep coming back. Please tell Mathilde to come say hello, if she’s still up.”
“I’m sure she will be by shortly, sir.”
The big man left them alone. Hunter stroked the fine cordovan leather of the armchair, studied the artwork in heavy gold frames, the tapestry that covered one wall.
“Wynne?” he said.
Raven laughed. “Friend of mine. He lets me use his name some times. He assists me in his discretion, and I trade him stories.”
“Really?”
“He’s a writer. Novelist. Did other things, in another life, too. Maybe you’ll meet him someday.”
“Mr. Smith was real original.”
“That’s as much as you need, here.”