by Jack Murphy
When he finally got there, his face red and dripping with sweat, he held onto the metal structure, standing on it with his boots and resting for a moment. Testing his grip on the handle of his Sub-Saharan knife, he pulled it free and cut through the tether chord. Placing the knife back in its sheath, he slowly made his way down the tower.
“Are you okay?” Pat asked him once he got down on the roof. “I thought we had lost you for a second there.”
“Me too,” Deckard said. “Me too.”
50
One by one, the mercenaries dropped off the roof of the windowless building. After a careful examination for an easier way in, there was no other entrance aside from the single doorway on the ground level. Hanging off the side of the building, each man let go and fell a few feet down to the gravel. Once on the ground they were at the outer wall and outside the range of the microwave detectors that were arrayed between the building and the fence.
Deckard, Pat, and Kurt took up positions around the front entrance where the biometric sensors were located while Aghassi started pulling out his tools.
“Let's watch MacGyver get us out of this one,” Pat said breaking his balls.
“You fuckers are going to eat your words,” Aghassi promised.
Retrieving a small tube of finger print powder, he blew a small amount over the glass fingerprint scanner installed next to the door. Next, he booted up his notebook computer and set it down while the operating system loaded. Waiting on the computer, he pulled a small sandwich bag from his kit and shook his beef jerky out of it, dumping the Slim Jims in his cargo pocket. Taking a few hits off his Camelbak water bladder, he spit some of the water into the plastic bag.
“Hold this,” he said, handing the bag to Kurt while he went back to his computer. Clicking through the ToughBook computer he brought up the picture he had taken of the relieved command center staff member who he had photographed during the guard shift change. Transferring the image from the camera onto his notebook, he cropped the image of the man's face and put it against a flat black background.
“Give me that bag,” Aghassi said, grabbing it from Kurt.
Holding the computer screen up in front of the camera that conducted the bio-metric face scan, he placed the bag of water on top of the powder that had stuck to the oils left behind by previous user's finger on the scanner.
The face scanner measured the distances between distinct physical features on the face in front of it, thirty seven different measurements in all from ear to ear to nose to lip, to eye to eye, and so on. The water bag pressed down on the powder residue sticking to the fingerprint, simulating the flat pad of the finger itself. Both scanners hummed as they operated.
After a few seconds there was a click within the door as a deadbolt lock retracted back inside the heavy metal door.
Deckard reached out and grabbed the handle. The door easily swung open on its hinges without so much as a squeak.
“Eat your words,” Aghassi reminded him, just to say he told them so.
The mercenaries stepped inside, moving to the walls of the corridor as automatic overhead lighting kicked on. The walls were painted flat off-white with linoleum tiles on the floor, completely nondescript with nothing on the walls, not even a fire plan with directions. The door clicked shut behind them as Aghassi slipped inside while stuffing his computer back into his kit.
At the end of the hall, a door opened. The mercenaries held their weapons at the high ready as a figure appeared looking around, surprised that the overhead lights had flipped on. He was going business casual in khakis and a polo shirt.
“Oh,” his mouth hung open as he spotted the four shooters zeroing in on him. The Samruk International men walked forward, their muzzles not wavering from center mass of their target.
“Well,” the man conceded. “This is a surprise. You are coming in from Mexico?”
“Open the door,” Deckard ordered.
The black site employee scanned his access card and the glass door clicked open. As he opened it, Deckard pushed him inside. They were in some kind of war room. There were work stations lined up on desks, the screens blacked out as they were all in sleep mode. Six flat screen television sets were hung on the far wall. Five were turned off, the other was running a 24 hour news network but was on mute.
“Who are you?”
“Greg Soloman. I'm a special activities manager for G3 Communications,” he volunteered.
“Greg Soloman, special activities manager,” Deckard repeated. “Where is the safe?”
“What-”
Greg's words were interrupted as Kurt slammed a fist into the manager's stomach.
“Where is the safe?”
The G3 manager was struggling to catch his breath.
“Stand up straight,” Deckard said as he pulled him up. “Take us to the safe.”
Greg led them into the adjoining room where there was a shoulder high safe sitting in the corner of an office. Turning the dial, he opened the heavy composite metal door.
“Clean it out,” he said looking at Kurt and Aghassi. “Pack up whatever we can carry with us.”
Inside the safe were three ring binders filled with documents, compact discs, thumb drives, security access cards, portable hard drives, removable classified hard drives, manila folders packed with documents, and plenty more.
“Let's go Greg,” Deckard led him back out into the war room and pushed him into one of the swivel chairs. The chair rolled backwards and slammed into a work station. Deckard leaned over and got right in his face. Greg looked at the beard stubble, the sweat stains around the collar of his uniform, and every bruise and cut on his face that it had taken the mercenary commander to get to this point. “We are going to have a talk.”
“I get it, I get it, I get it,” Greg started talking a mile a minute. Apparently a G3 special activities manager wasn't a field operative who knew how to keep his cool. “I'm under duress. The insurance companies will cover for G3. I'll tell you what you want to know.”
“That's a good thing because you've got one of your boys cooling his heels in a mop closet with his battle buddy. Needless to say, he is going to be pitch hitting if he wants to jack off anytime soon.”
“What do you want?”
“What is the code name for this operation?”
“Which one?”
“How many are there?”
“Maybe fifty that are active and a hundred that are passive.”
“Holy shit,” Pat cursed. “This place is a murder factory.”
“Who are the Arabs patrolling around outside?”
“Those are MEK imports from Iraq.”
“The terrorist group?”
“We just got them removed from the State Department's list of terrorist organizations.”
“These are the guys you have been sending down to Mexico?”
“Yes.”
“What is the point of sending death squads down to Mexico? The cartels seem to do a pretty good job at killing each other on their own.”
“Not a good enough job,” Greg said nervously. “We used to have a couple big cartels, big drug lords that ran their operations but didn't wage open war. Then came the Pablo Escobars that tried to challenge the state. Guys like you went down to Colombia and took care of them but then the cartels split into factions and started warring with each other.”
“G3 was hired to help them with that task?”
“Basically. We sent operatives in to escalate the level of violence, get the smaller cartels to shoot it out with each other and the larger cartels until only the big ones are left.”
“Fuck,” Pat said shaking his head.
“Yeah,” Deckard agreed. “We played right into your hands.”
“You are the guys from Oaxaca? The ones who took down Ortega and Jimenez?”
“The same.”
“We would have gotten around to them, but yeah, we could have been on the same side.”
Deckard grabbed him by the throat.
&
nbsp; “We would never be on the same side as scum like you. Scum like MEK.” Deckard released him. “G3 has also been running guns to the cartels. Was that operation to run in tandem with the death squads?”
“Yes,” Greg said gasping for air. “The massacres provided the motivation, the guns provided the means. It is a layered operation that relied on allowing straw buyers at American gun shops to smuggle guns into Mexico but that is a drop in the bucket compared to the shipments of military weapons we are sending to the Mexican military. We send them to the military for distribution to the cartels directly after acquiring the weapons from the Middle East. Other times we send the weapons along official US military logistics channels as part of the Mérida Initiative and tip off the cartels so they can run transit heists. Other military grade weapons are put into the hands of select Mexican military commanders.”
“For the coup?”
Greg's eyebrows shot up in surprise, “that is just a contingency plan in case everything falls apart in Mexico and we cannot control the government. There are other contingencies. SOCOM has one drafted to send the entire Special Operations Task Force into Mexico and clean the place out. It would take the lessons learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, combine them with our studies of cartel tactics and apply them on the ground. Delta and Rangers would finish the cartels in five or six months. Total war. It is a backup plan if all else fails.”
“What is the primary objective?”
“Once we reduce the cartels to just the most powerful we help them go to war with each other.”
“The Sinaloa and the Zetas.”
“Yes, this is the stage we are at now. We help them weaken each other, then we help one destroy the other.”
“The cartel that walks home with all the marbles is pre-determined?”
“Yes, the Sinaloa is the favored cartel. They have the deepest institutional ties.”
“You mean they launder their money through all the right banks on Wall Street?”
“I can understand why you would make the inference, but I have no way of knowing the motivations of those who have employed G3 Communications for this job.”
“Log into your work station. I want to see what you have.”
Greg took a deep breath and logged into his computer.
“Once you've weakened the two largest cartels, then what happens?” Pat asked.
“Then we help the Sinaloa destroy the Zetas. The war between these two organizations would be so violent that the leaders of both groups will more than likely be killed, replacing them with younger, more pliable leadership. If not, such leadership will be supplied by inserting select officers from the Mexican military into the Sinaloa cartel.”
“The same officers that you have handed all these weapons over to?” Deckard interjected.
“They will be the new ruling class of Mexico.”
“What fucking think-tank lackey clown came up with this dumb fuck idea?” Deckard spat.
“Mexico has turned into an ugly place,” Greg tried to explain. “We have been fighting the war on drugs for years without any real results. This is a way to lower the violence to levels that everyone is comfortable with. We can't end the war but at least we can manage it. This is the best option for everyone on both sides of the border.”
“And a fat fucking paycheck for the managers!” Pat screamed.
A map popped up on the computer screen as Greg's login information was accepted. There were blips all over the world where G3 was running operations.
“What is that on your desktop,” Deckard said pointing to an icon. “North American Community?”
Greg opened the folder by double clicking with his mouse.
“The operations you have asked me about are a periphery to the overall national security agenda that we have been, in part, tasked with carrying out,” Greg said as he opened up a file showing a map of North America where there were no borders between the United States with Mexico and Canada.
“What the hell is that?” Deckard said.
“The North American Union,” Greg explained. “It is an amalgamation of the North American continent, joining Canada, America, and Mexico together as one for mutual security, economic cooperation, and a shared system of taxation.”
“What?” Deckard rubbed his forehead, trying to wrap his mind around the bizarreness of it all.
“When things really collapse in Mexico, whether it is at the height of our planned war between the Sinaloa and the Zetas, or because one of our contingency plans has to be enacted via a coup or direct US military action, there will be a push by all three governments for a mutual security agreement. At that time, the citizens of all three countries will be sensitized to the situation with feelings of uncertainty and insecurity. This will provide the political capital for all three countries to ratify an international treaty calling for the North American Union.”
“No,” Deckard answered. “No.”
“We are shutting this down tonight,” Pat agreed. “Fuck this.”
“Who else is in on this,” Deckard demanded. “Who is pushing for this shit?”
“What do you mean?” Greg exclaimed. “Like I said, the elites of all three countries are and will be pushing for it. This is the plan, this is what is going to happen. If governments oppose the plan they will be moved and compelled to support it. I don't know who all the players are, I just manage a small handful of operations from behind a desk. You would have to ask the CEO of G3 Communications.”
“I will-”
Deckard's words were cut off as something hissed inside the war room.
“They have initiated the destruction sequence,” Greg informed them. The room was already filling with smoke. “You managed not to trip it when you broke in here but they are watching,” he said pointing to the black ball mounted on the side of the wall. It was a security camera.
“Someone off-site?”
“Yes.”
Suddenly, flames were crawling up the walls. Black smoke was rising to the ceiling as the war room heated up. The place had been rigged with thermite and an initiation system that could be remotely triggered by whoever was watching on the security camera. Jogging over to the glass door leading to the hallway, Deckard saw that it was filled with flames. With their exit cut off, they were stuck in a death trap.
Aghassi and Kurt walked into the war room, coughing and choking on the smoke. Each held a clear plastic garbage bag filled with documents and other materials taken from the safe.
“We definitely got what we came here for,” Aghassi said. “But I'm not sure if we are going to survive long enough to do anything about it. We need to get out of here.”
“It won't be easy,” Deckard said with tears running down his face as the smoke stung his eyes. “Our exit is an inferno. Push into the office where there is less smoke.”
The mercenaries had to crouch down to keep their faces out of the smoke, the heat was intense, almost overwhelming as the walls were quickly being consumed by fire.
“If we don't have an exit out then we will just have to make one.”
The Arab bolted upright in his bed.
The trailer was pitch black and silent other than the steady hum of the air conditioner and the sudden vibration of his cellular phone as it slid across the night stand.
“Nam?” he said, answering the call.
He listened intently to the voice on the phone. Their security had been breached. Someone had not only penetrated Area 14 but also the Command and Control center. The destruction sequence had begun. The mercenaries would be liquidated along with the on-duty special activities manager, the one they knew as Greg. It was a necessary sacrifice in order to eliminate the threat and maintain operational security.
The quick reaction element that had been training at Area 17 several miles away was being called in but in the meantime he was to wake his MEK squad members and move directly to the command center to provide containment if it became needed.
The Arab indicated his understanding bef
ore hanging up the phone. Reaching for the AK-47 propped up next to his bed, he flung open the trailer door and began screaming for his men to grab their weapons and follow him.
Slipping on his boots, he rallied the death squad.
Someone had followed him back from Mexico.
He had a feeling he knew exactly who that someone was.
51
The explosive charge blasted a hole through the roof, the sheet metal tearing and peeling outwards with the blast giving the appearance of a giant bullet hole. Through the smoke that poured out from the gap in the building's roof, a heavily armed mercenary appeared. Climbing out of the hole, he turned to help his team mates up.
Deckard pushed Greg up where Kurt Jager firmly grabbed him by both shoulders and hauled him up before dropping him on his side at his feet. The G3 communications manager hit the roof with a thud, his body bouncing off the surface with a gasp of escaping air from his lungs. Deckard emerged from the column of black smoke, coughing and gagging.
“Shooter-One,” Pat said, taking charge while Deckard was trying to regain his voice. “What's going on?”
“We have lots of movement,” Nikita reported. “About a dozen men waking up and kitting up from their sleeping quarters. They are starting to move to your position.”
“Slow them down.”
Nikita had transitioned back to regular long range sniper rounds, ditching the sub-sonic ammo. Still, the hollow crack of the suppressed rifle could hardly be heard. Pat failed to identify a muzzle flash from the aircraft graveyard which spoke well for the sniper's hide site selection.
“I got two of them,” Nikita radioed in. “But then they realized the general direction I was shooting from and took another route, behind the hangars. They should be on top of you guys in seconds. I will do what I can when they get out in the open.”
“Okay,” Deckard said as he regained his voice. “Let's get off of this roof before it collapses, fall back to a defendable position, and-”
His words were cut short as a RPG rocket barreled into the communications tower on the roof and exploded into a ball of fire. Releasing a high pitched creak of metal on metal, the tower fell sideways across the roof. Deckard and Kurt dived out of the way as the twisted metal hulk slammed into the roof, the end of the tower snapping off as it hit the edge of the roof.