THE CONTRACTOR

by R. SAINT HILAIRE

  She clicked a few keys on a laptop.

  “Yessir. You’re a bit early, but we can get you all set up. No worries. Let me call Gary. He will get you to where you need to go.”

  So I stood there, probably with a stupid “I see a hot girl” face, waiting for Gary—whoever that was. The room was stark. Nothing but the counter, the girl, a laptop, and a door at the back of the room. It smelled dusty, like…abandoned dusty.

  I really hope this isn’t gonna suck.

  The door at the back of the room opened, and a large, bald, heavily-muscled man came into the room. He had desert-camo pants and a gray tactical shirt with the sleeves rolled up over his large, vascular forearms. His watch looked heavy.

  “Gary?”

  “Yessir. Nick, glad to meet you.”

  He grabbed my hand with two of his meaty paws and gave it a hearty shake.

  “Super-glad you could join us. We’ve heard a lot about you, and I bet some of it is true.” He smiled.

  “Glad to be here.”

  “Let’s go,” big Gary said.

  I picked up my two bags and thought, Why is everyone so big? Big Dave and Rusty are big, this guy is big… What are they eating? I mean, I’m sure I could outrun them, out-swim them, and definitely do more chin-ups than them, but for absolute power and strength, they had me by a mile. Strange thoughts.

  We headed through the single wooden door in the room. I may have winked at the receptionist. On the other side was a short hallway. It was still all basic cinderblock construction. No doors. No windows.

  Gary took a key fob from his pants pocket and pointed it at what I knew were elevator doors at the end of the hall. They parted. We stepped in. Shiny stainless steel.

  “Welcome to The Hole,” Gary said with another broad smile.

  There were four buttons on the elevator panel, which let me know that there were three floors below the top floor. I wondered what kind of secret CIA spy-station was set up here in the middle of nowhere. I imagined a room with walls of huge monitors showing satellite feeds from across the globe. Drone strikes might be coordinated from this exact location. Perhaps secret surveillance of Americans was happening right here. Phone taps, listening devices, secret camera feeds…

  We rode just one floor down. I probably didn’t have the clearances to see what were on the floors below. I was excited to see what the Company was going to let me see on my floor, however.

  The door opened, and we strolled into another hallway with cinderblock walls. At least these were painted a light OD green. There were doors to who-knows-what on either side. Fluorescent lights lined the ceiling. I could hear muffled voices, probably of covert agents planning their next mission.

  “Okay, Branson, this is your room.” Gary said, opening one of the doors.

  My room? I looked into what I had stupidly imagined being something more to see what looked like a college dorm room. A single bed, wall locker, small desk and chair. No window. No bathroom.

  “I hope this will do. You won’t spend much time here, anyway. You’ll either be in a classroom or the field most of the day…and night,” Gary said, followed by a chuckle.

  “This is cool,” is all that came out of my mouth.

  “So, Nick, one floor down…”

  Here it comes. I’m gonna be told that I don’t have access or maybe that I do have access, but that either way I have to keep my mouth shut about what I see, or they will have to kill me…

  “…is our bar and game room for afterhours shenanigans.”

  Okay—disappointed, not disappointed. Guess this isn’t a secret listening station. Guess it’s just a training facility put in the middle of nowhere to give us the yardage needed to practice long shots without pissing off the neighborhood.

  Gary added, “Meet us down there around four. We’re doing a little meet-and-greet for the cadre tonight.”

  “Aye-aye—catch you then,” I said, giving a mock salute.

  “Oh, and by the way, don’t go down to the bottom floor. That’s a secure floor,” Gary said as a last-minute thought.

  I knew it! Just a training facility, my ass…

  I unpacked what little I had brought with me and was psyched to get my hands on a rifle. If this course ran anything like military sniper training, we would be using M24s, M24A3s, and probably M107s. I love the big Barretts. But that would be tomorrow, after the briefing.

  There were two shared bathrooms and shower rooms on the floor, so I headed down to the nearest one, cleaned up a bit, checked my awesomeness in the mirror, and headed down to our little soiree.

  In the elevator I was tempted to press the bottom-floor button but resisted. My curiosity had gotten me into bad shit before, and I just wanted this to go nice and smooth so I could collect my paycheck and head home in ten weeks with no drama.

  As soon as I opened the door, music and the smell of alcohol flooded into the elevator. Happiness. There were six or seven guys along with the receptionist—Yay!—milling around the room, drinks in hand. I thought they said it started at four? Oh well.

  Anyhow, as I walked into the room, Gary jogged his muscle-bound body over to me.

  “Nick! Glad you stopped by. Didn’t have any other plans this evening?”

  “Well, I did, but she ended up here,” I said with a wink.

  Gary waved his index finger at me like Dikembe Mutombo. “No, no, no…she is off-limits to everyone!”

  “Just kidding, buddy. I am happily married to someone who would stab me without blinking an eye.”

  Gary laughed. “Me too, but she’s a yoga teacher. Figure that shit out. She loves peace and harmony, but—oh, by the way—she will cut you.”

  We both laughed, completely understanding each other.

  “Grab a drink. We got hard alcohol and…um, hard alcohol.”

  “That works for me.”

  I grabbed a scotch from the bar. Was bummed there was no Balvenie, but Macallan twelve would do nicely. I made my way around the room, introducing myself to the other instructors. A few worked for the CIA, a couple were active military, and a couple more were working for private contractors. The facility, it turned out, was a multi-functional training area focused on various shooting scenarios. There were Protective Shooter Courses, PSD Pre-Deployment Shooter Courses, a MOUT site, and Sniper Training ranges. So, not so secret after all. The men varied in their backgrounds and experience but had one key thing in common: they had all been in the shit. Each had experienced real-life combat in one form or another. It was a room of dangerous men, and one woman.

  Speaking of the one woman—she remained hard at work while the rest of us partied. She walked around the room with multiple clip boards, getting each of us to sign NDAs, waivers, and next-of-kin contact forms.

  After about forty-five minutes of shaking hands, clinking glasses, and telling tales, Gary called the room to order.

  “Okay, gents, listen up.”

  The conversation lowered to a murmur, then silence.

  “Hope everyone is thoroughly enjoying the drinking and the bullshitting.”

  There was laughter and the raising of glasses.

  “Just a couple serious notes, and then we can get back to this debauchery. Tomorrow we start training. This is a five-week intensive course. Each instructor will have four shooters. We typically start at 0730 unless we have a night mission. We end the day at 1830, so it’s a friggin’ long day. Safety is our number-one priority here. Any student or instructor who breaks safety protocols will be removed from the ranges immediately. Two of those infractions and you’ll be doing the duffle-bag-drag the fuck outta here—understood?”

  There were nods around the room. Everyone knew the safety protocols by heart but silently agreed to hold each other accountable for even the slightest infraction. Nobody wanted to make it out of combat alive just to be killed in a training exercise by someone making a stupid mistake.

  Gary continued. “The training calendar will be posted literally everywhere, and we will slide one under
your door before morning. There are no excuses for showing up late or intoxicated, but that should go without saying. Other than that, enjoy your evening, and we will all meet on the top floor at 0700 tomorrow.”

  Again, we raised glasses, and then got back to our conversations, games of darts and ping pong, and discussions about war-time adventures.

  Morning came fast because we slept fast. We all shit, showered, shaved, and then made our way to the top floor by 0645—because ten minutes early is five minutes late.

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” Gary said with a caffeine-induced smile. “Looks like you all made it through the night unscathed. Let’s head down to the bottom floor.”

  Yessss! We get to see the secret shit!

  We all piled into the tin can and watched excitedly as Gary pressed the bottom-floor button. I could see there were a couple other guys who looked excited, too.

  The door opened, and what we saw was immediately recognizable. A semi-dark room filled with a large gray cage. The cage had one door with a lock that resembled something from a jail or dungeon. There was a small window in the cage that had just been unlocked and opened by a man inside the cage. Inside that cage were large green metal boxes with doors. A man in black tactical pants and a tan t-shirt with a large ring of keys hanging from a carabiner attached to his tactical belt moved from box to box, unlocking and opening each. Inside were our tools of the trade, stacked neatly in rows, muzzles facing up. M24s.

  The secure floor had in fact been the training site armory. No satellite observation monitors to be seen. Just good old-fashioned firepower.

  Each man signed a register as he took a single M24 with bipod and scope.

  As we all signed out our rifles, a bus full of actual and potential snipers were arriving on the top deck, being assigned their rooms, and preparing for the start of their course.

  We packed back into the elevator and headed to the top floor to meet the new meat. I like to imagine that we looked like a bunch of old experienced badasses as we walked out of the front door of the somewhat-dilapidated high-desert building—complete with shooting sunglasses, caps decorated with various military insignia, and mean-looking M24 rifles slung over our shoulders.

  There was a line of about twenty-six men standing at parade rest, each in desert-camo duty uniforms. We had no idea of their backgrounds, but each was certainly vetted—and handpicked for this course. This wasn’t a pay-us-three-thousand-dollars-and-we’ll-teach-you-how-to-shoot course. This was funded by the government, so each of these men was needed for some future job that required at least some of the skills taught in this course.

  After a little speech by Gary—in which he welcomed everyone, set ground rules, reviewed the training calendar for the week, and talked about hydrating and firearms safety—he assigned four men to each instructor. We were doing our impromptu meet-and-greets as two Tahoes drove up to the facility.

  Gary waved his hand to the instructors, and we loaded our gear in the back before hopping in to ride to the day’s training site.

  Gary remained outside for a moment and addressed the trainees. “Gentlemen, today’s training site is two klicks in that direction. We will meet you there. Have a nice run!”

  Then he jumped in the front seat of the SUV, and off we all went, watching the surprised faces of the trainees disappear in a cloud of dust behind us.

  The cadre stood in front of a set of partially rusted and windblown aluminum bleachers, waiting as the trainees began to show up from their two-thousand-one-hundred-eighty-seven-yard run. Though each arrived breathing hard, the less-than-two-mile run had been relatively easy. The only reason for their breathlessness was their competitive spirit—which meant that even this little run had been a competition for them. The filed into the bleachers and sat waiting for their next exercise.

  Bill Yamamoto, a short, half-Japanese Special Forces Sniper Instructor stepped forward from our line and addressed the trainees.

  “Okay, guys, attention please. Welcome to the start of the Sniper Training Course.”

  He went on to go over the safety SOP in detail. Then he lifted his M24 and talked them through the basic functions, parts, and specs. Most already were familiar with the Sniper Weapon System. He then made it very clear that although this was a sniper course, taking a shot only happened under special circumstances, such as assigned elimination of high-value enemy personnel or materials. Shots could also be taken to disrupt enemy operations or to eliminate immediate threats.

  It was another set of skills that the CIA and military organizations valued the most. Those skills were intelligence gathering, observation and reporting, target acquisition, and impact assessments. Those areas were where they would be spending the majority of their training time.

  Of course, all the cadre knew that in order to keep attention and motivation, taking shots on a daily basis was necessary. So each day either started or ended with range time.

  During the first week, they worked the eight-hundred-yard range using only hard sights and a partner with a spotting scope. They practiced the basics like range estimation, windage, compensating for mirage and boil, improving shot groupings, breath control, and correct trigger pull. Over time, we had them put on the scopes and work on snaps and movers—targets that pop up or run side to side on a rail system. Then we moved them up to 1000 yards. This was where the attention of your spotter really mattered, and where everyone learned to work as a member of a team. Academic time focused on ballistics, stress management, more range estimation, and aim compensation techniques. They also went through the book on stalking, infiltration, intel gathering, land nav, commo, rules of engagement, and did a ton of math. None of these military men were dummies.

  Every day entailed some form of cardio training, academics, range techniques, concealment and stalking, working with partners, target acquisition, and sending rounds downrange. At night there was chow, study time, and party time. Our receptionist, who we nicknamed “Ellie-Mae”, ensured that all the admin processes, equipment and ammo reqs, and alcohol orders were correct and delivered in a timely manner.

  We all got to know the trainees pretty well. Some of them actually had more field experience than the cadre. Some had already operated as Snipers in the field—or had at least earned their sniper designations from their various military branches. We even had two real-deal covert operatives. It was an interesting crowd of seriously dangerous human beings. Yet all were friendly, open, and funny.

  I had learned over the years that the quiet, friendly, self-deprecating operators were the dangerous ones. The guys who always talked about the shit they had been in, the shots they took, and about their general badassness—those guys were full of shit. That was none of these guys!

  Before you knew it, we hit week five. I’m not sure we spent enough time doing all the things we needed to do. It seemed rushed to cram into five weeks what I had been used to spending twelve weeks refining—but we did the best we could.

  The final week was focused on using the big boy, the Barrett M107 with its super powerful .50 BMG round. The Browning Machine Gun round has been around for literally a century, and it is twice the size of a .300 Win Mag. We used the standard ball round and also the AP—the armor-piercing round. Put ten rounds of that into a magazine, aim, pull the trigger, and release a round moving at 2800 feet per second. A good sniper could take out a target at more than 1500 yards. A great sniper, even more—like the infamous Sgt. Kremer, who was said to have hit his target at over 2000 yards.

  We spent a day on the range doing very long shots at humanoid targets, radar dishes, fuel drums, and vehicles. All of the training culminated in the fifth week. On long-shot day, we moved the trainees between bipod and sandbag, and between shooter and spotter. Shooters would shoot. Spotters called adjustments. I called the reengage countdown: “Five, four, three, two, one.” The shooter had five seconds after his first shot to pull that bolt handle, eject the round, reset the bolt handle (which loaded another round into the chamber), reacquir
e the target, exhale, and pull the trigger. It was important to be able to reacquire quickly, though technically our goal was one shot, one kill.

  The interesting thing about shots from the 1500-plus-yard range was that the target would be taken out by surprise. He wouldn’t hear the shot. The bullet would reach him before the sound did. That was the goal. One shot; complete surprise. The whole “Man, I didn’t see that coming!” scenario was the ultimate shot.

  Days two, three, and four were prep-and-practice runs for the final test. Tons of time was spent on perfecting the ghillie suit, using natural camouflage, using terrain for concealment and cover, intel gathering, reporting on observations, and lighting up targets for tactical strikes from the air. We also spent time fucking with the trainees, of course.

  We made them run to their firing positions while holding full ammo cans over their heads. We drove them to the nearby hills and had them crawl through streams while in their ghillies. We gave them dud rounds so they would have to endure extra-stressful target reacquisition. We purposefully ensured some of their stalking exercises went through areas with thorns and snakes. It was all to guarantee that they would be able to operate in less-than-desirable situations—but it was also fun as hell for the instructors.

  The final test was to be conducted about an hour’s drive from the training facility in an area with foothills, scrub, a field, and a river. There was also a mock encampment where we would place high-value targets such as communication equipment, critical vehicles, and mock high-ranking enemy officers, guards, and so on. There was also the command tower, from which instructors would stalk you as you tried to stalk your targets.

  Each trainee got one practice run and one final run. Where this was different from a military sniper course is that nobody was going to receive a coveted patch or pin or title. They would simply have a positive or negative recommendation from the cadre to the Company. People at a higher paygrade would make decisions based on our feedback as to how, when, and if they would use each shooter for missions. In the case of the two gents who were already covert operatives, it would simply be the final decision as to whether they should use any of the skillset learned in the course or abstain.