Welcome Back, Mr. Nightcrawler
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He ate Nightcrawler!Nightcrawler
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Conspiracy Theories
We had quite a bit of downtime after the operation at Adar's house. Our own success was working against us; the Qataris viewed us as a terrorist organization and they were trying to put the country on lockdown. Police checkpoints on the highways, Qatari Special Forces, clad in their blue camouflage, running ops in town, secret police randomly searching vehicles, and so on.
It became increasingly difficult for us to run ops. Couple of teams almost got caught. Word came down for us to lay low for awhile. One thing most of us did was get tattoos. One of our members, guy named Hicks from one of the other teams, was an experienced tattoo guy. Though I'd never even considered a tattoo before, I went along with it. The Dead 6 tattoo was an image of a scythe-weilding grim reaper, imposed over a blood-red number six. We each got one on the backs of our left shoulders. Such identifying marks were forbidden, of course, but we did it anyway.
In any case, it was well into February of '05 when Tailor and I got our next assignment. Big Boss called us into the briefing room. As we arrived, though, we overheard him having an argument with Gordon. Apparently, Gordon wanted to shut Dead 6 down, and kept saying something about a Project Heartbreaker being cancelled. Gordon kept saying 'all of us' were 'going to fry' if the project wasn't ended soon.
Big Boss seemed to disagree. He said that we had a few more vital ops to run, and was told Gordon to tell Higher that we needed more time. Gordon replied that he wasn't going to hang with the rest of us, and that if Big Boss wasn't careful, things could go south in a hurry.
Big Boss balked at the thinly veiled threat, called Gordon a variety of names, and dismissed him rudely. Gordon stomped out, retorting that Big Boss didn't know what he was in for.
Curiouser and curiouser... Despite our curiosity, neither Tailor nor I mentioned the argument we'd witnessed to Big Boss during our briefing.
"Boys...you oughta know," Big Boss said, "they're tryin' to shut us down. Higher, that is. Seems we're too good at what we do; relations with Qatar are very strained right now. While the US flatly denies everything, the Qataris are certain there are Americans running around terrorizing their citizens. Ironic.
"In any case, we've made some powerful enemies out there. You need to understand. There are people out there pulling the strings behind this that have larger goals than the bull**** reasoning behind Islamic terrorism. International power brokers with billions of dollars at their disposal have a hand in all of this."
"Sounds like conspiracy theory stuff to me, Boss," I said skeptically. "What's their aim?"
"Easy, son," Big Boss replied. "They profit from it. Profit in power. Profit in oil revenues. Profit from instability in the Middle East."
"Okay," I replied, still skeptical. "So what are we going to do, then? Kill the Illuminati?" Tailor laughed.
"Actually..." Big Boss said, with a gleam in his only eye.
Our mission was startling, to say the least. Big Boss wasn't kidding. Apparently, there was this man named Rafael Montalban. He was a Spanish billionaire and quite the power broker in Europe and Latin America.
This man and his associates, according to our briefing, had been funding various terrorist groups worldwide, sometimes with seemingly conflicting goals. The overall goal seemed to be nothing more than chaos, from which Montalban and his friends profited enormously in various ways.
Now, I didn't know if this has anything to do with the Illuminati, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, or the guys that planned the European Union. That Art Bell Show stuff never really interested me, as I assumed most of it was nonsense anyway.
But...under all the bullcrap there's usually an interesting layer of truth.
Rafael himself was the tall, aristocratic sort. Jet black hair, Mediterranean feautres, suave demeanor. He could always be found in an expensive Italian suit, and he lived a life of luxury.
Which is not to say he didn't have an edge to him. Apparently he'd done five years in the French Foreign Legion, and had been decorated for valor. This man had experienced war, in bloody campaigns in Africa. How he made his money was unclear, but personal connections to the conflict diamond trade were suspected.
Montalban's personal yacht, the Santa Maria, was presently sailing up the Persian Gulf, headed towards Qatar. It was believed that Montalban was going to have a suaree of sorts on his boat, and meet with various constituents of his (several of whom we'd already whacked). Montalban was not alone on this ship; in addition to his exceedingly well paid, well trained personal security force, he'd have the usual menagerie of servants, call girls, crewman, and so on.
Disconcerting to me was the order to disregard these noncombatants if necessary. In other words, if we just had to sink the damned boat to get Montalban, that's just too bad.
However, the mission wasn't just to sink the boat. A submarine could do that a lot easier than we could anyway. Our mission was to board it, find Montalban, and capture him if possible.
Capture? This definately seemed strange for a Dead 6 mission. We were ordered to kill him if necessary, but to make every attempt to bring him in alive.
We'd transport to his yacht via a small assault boat. Apparently a helicopter would be provided for extraction. Tailor and I would not be going alone on this mission. We were to pick six more guys from the rest of the Dead 6 teams and plan the assault.
The other objective was Montalban's laptop. He had a custom-made, high security, ultra-encrypted machine that it was believed he kept his records and account numbers on. It was imperative that this laptop be recovered intact. The laptop was, in fact, more important than Montalban, given the vital intelligence it likely held.
We had 48 hours to prepare for this one, and like before, we had a night off. Jumping at the chance to leave the compound, Sarah and I went out on the town.
We went back to the City Centre mall. Browsing around, I found a jewlery store while she was indisposed in a clothing boutique. Casually looking, I noticed something in particular: an emarald pendant that perfectly matched her eyes. Eight thousand Riyals and it was mine. I suprised her with it when she came out of the store. Despite the taboo of public displays of affection in Qatar, she kissed me right there in the shopping mall, for much longer than local propriety would've allowed.
Later on, we found a photo hut and had pictures of us taken together. This was absolutely forbidden by Dead 6, of course, but again, we did anyway. Hell, I thought, we were all there on cover stories anyway. I was supposedly a pipeline technician for a gas company, and Sarah was supposed to be teaching English.
Though it was sort of a slip, that night was the first time I told Sarah that I loved her. My heart lept into my throat over the slip, but when she reciprocated as naturally as could be, well...you know.
It was the last time I can remember being happy.
TO BE CONTINUED...
We had quite a bit of downtime after the operation at Adar's house. Our own success was working against us; the Qataris viewed us as a terrorist organization and they were trying to put the country on lockdown. Police checkpoints on the highways, Qatari Special Forces, clad in their blue camouflage, running ops in town, secret police randomly searching vehicles, and so on.
It became increasingly difficult for us to run ops. Couple of teams almost got caught. Word came down for us to lay low for awhile. One thing most of us did was get tattoos. One of our members, guy named Hicks from one of the other teams, was an experienced tattoo guy. Though I'd never even considered a tattoo before, I went along with it. The Dead 6 tattoo was an image of a scythe-weilding grim reaper, imposed over a blood-red number six. We each got one on the backs of our left shoulders. Such identifying marks were forbidden, of course, but we did it anyway.
In any case, it was well into February of '05 when Tailor and I got our next assignment. Big Boss called us into the briefing room. As we arrived, though, we overheard him having an argument with Gordon. Apparently, Gordon wanted to shut Dead 6 down, and kept saying something about a Project Heartbreaker being cancelled. Gordon kept saying 'all of us' were 'going to fry' if the project wasn't ended soon.
Big Boss seemed to disagree. He said that we had a few more vital ops to run, and was told Gordon to tell Higher that we needed more time. Gordon replied that he wasn't going to hang with the rest of us, and that if Big Boss wasn't careful, things could go south in a hurry.
Big Boss balked at the thinly veiled threat, called Gordon a variety of names, and dismissed him rudely. Gordon stomped out, retorting that Big Boss didn't know what he was in for.
Curiouser and curiouser... Despite our curiosity, neither Tailor nor I mentioned the argument we'd witnessed to Big Boss during our briefing.
"Boys...you oughta know," Big Boss said, "they're tryin' to shut us down. Higher, that is. Seems we're too good at what we do; relations with Qatar are very strained right now. While the US flatly denies everything, the Qataris are certain there are Americans running around terrorizing their citizens. Ironic.
"In any case, we've made some powerful enemies out there. You need to understand. There are people out there pulling the strings behind this that have larger goals than the bull**** reasoning behind Islamic terrorism. International power brokers with billions of dollars at their disposal have a hand in all of this."
"Sounds like conspiracy theory stuff to me, Boss," I said skeptically. "What's their aim?"
"Easy, son," Big Boss replied. "They profit from it. Profit in power. Profit in oil revenues. Profit from instability in the Middle East."
"Okay," I replied, still skeptical. "So what are we going to do, then? Kill the Illuminati?" Tailor laughed.
"Actually..." Big Boss said, with a gleam in his only eye.
Our mission was startling, to say the least. Big Boss wasn't kidding. Apparently, there was this man named Rafael Montalban. He was a Spanish billionaire and quite the power broker in Europe and Latin America.
This man and his associates, according to our briefing, had been funding various terrorist groups worldwide, sometimes with seemingly conflicting goals. The overall goal seemed to be nothing more than chaos, from which Montalban and his friends profited enormously in various ways.
Now, I didn't know if this has anything to do with the Illuminati, the Trilateral Commission, the Bilderberg Group, or the guys that planned the European Union. That Art Bell Show stuff never really interested me, as I assumed most of it was nonsense anyway.
But...under all the bullcrap there's usually an interesting layer of truth.
Rafael himself was the tall, aristocratic sort. Jet black hair, Mediterranean feautres, suave demeanor. He could always be found in an expensive Italian suit, and he lived a life of luxury.
Which is not to say he didn't have an edge to him. Apparently he'd done five years in the French Foreign Legion, and had been decorated for valor. This man had experienced war, in bloody campaigns in Africa. How he made his money was unclear, but personal connections to the conflict diamond trade were suspected.
Montalban's personal yacht, the Santa Maria, was presently sailing up the Persian Gulf, headed towards Qatar. It was believed that Montalban was going to have a suaree of sorts on his boat, and meet with various constituents of his (several of whom we'd already whacked). Montalban was not alone on this ship; in addition to his exceedingly well paid, well trained personal security force, he'd have the usual menagerie of servants, call girls, crewman, and so on.
Disconcerting to me was the order to disregard these noncombatants if necessary. In other words, if we just had to sink the damned boat to get Montalban, that's just too bad.
However, the mission wasn't just to sink the boat. A submarine could do that a lot easier than we could anyway. Our mission was to board it, find Montalban, and capture him if possible.
Capture? This definately seemed strange for a Dead 6 mission. We were ordered to kill him if necessary, but to make every attempt to bring him in alive.
We'd transport to his yacht via a small assault boat. Apparently a helicopter would be provided for extraction. Tailor and I would not be going alone on this mission. We were to pick six more guys from the rest of the Dead 6 teams and plan the assault.
The other objective was Montalban's laptop. He had a custom-made, high security, ultra-encrypted machine that it was believed he kept his records and account numbers on. It was imperative that this laptop be recovered intact. The laptop was, in fact, more important than Montalban, given the vital intelligence it likely held.
We had 48 hours to prepare for this one, and like before, we had a night off. Jumping at the chance to leave the compound, Sarah and I went out on the town.
We went back to the City Centre mall. Browsing around, I found a jewlery store while she was indisposed in a clothing boutique. Casually looking, I noticed something in particular: an emarald pendant that perfectly matched her eyes. Eight thousand Riyals and it was mine. I suprised her with it when she came out of the store. Despite the taboo of public displays of affection in Qatar, she kissed me right there in the shopping mall, for much longer than local propriety would've allowed.
Later on, we found a photo hut and had pictures of us taken together. This was absolutely forbidden by Dead 6, of course, but again, we did anyway. Hell, I thought, we were all there on cover stories anyway. I was supposedly a pipeline technician for a gas company, and Sarah was supposed to be teaching English.
Though it was sort of a slip, that night was the first time I told Sarah that I loved her. My heart lept into my throat over the slip, but when she reciprocated as naturally as could be, well...you know.
It was the last time I can remember being happy.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Last edited:
BluesBear
member
Is someone pulling the plug?
Or is someone pulling our leg?
Will this be the end of Dead Six?
Or the end of a beautiful romance?
Or the beginning of a beautiful friendship?
Yeah they always say it's not you it's them.
But we all know it's us.
And what has happened to that "other" group?
Have we seen the last of them?
Of course not.
Will there be even more hijinks on the high seas?
Hell Yes.
Will the Santa Maria join the Nina and the Pinta?
Or will there be a Ninja in a Pinto?
And what will happen to Montalban's fine Corinthian leather?
Don't miss the next edge of your seat episode...
Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend
(But Emeralds will do nicely)
or
Ship Shape Showdown!
Or is someone pulling our leg?
Will this be the end of Dead Six?
Or the end of a beautiful romance?
Or the beginning of a beautiful friendship?
Yeah they always say it's not you it's them.
But we all know it's us.
And what has happened to that "other" group?
Have we seen the last of them?
Of course not.
Will there be even more hijinks on the high seas?
Hell Yes.
Will the Santa Maria join the Nina and the Pinta?
Or will there be a Ninja in a Pinto?
And what will happen to Montalban's fine Corinthian leather?
Don't miss the next edge of your seat episode...
Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend
(But Emeralds will do nicely)
or
Ship Shape Showdown!
mordechaianiliewicz
Member
Thankyou for this Nightcrawler, and Correia. I'm lovin' this stuff. To paraphrase Denzel Washington in Training Day "The Jason Bourne series, ain't got sh*t o you."
Or, if you're talking about Adar, "I'm surgical with this b**ch, Jake."
Or, if you're talking about Adar, "I'm surgical with this b**ch, Jake."
Dionysusigma
Member
Oh my gosh... this thread almost dropped off the front page! 
Update it quick, guys!
Update it quick, guys!
Diamondback6
Member
Yes, raytracer. Email subscription does the same thing, but far less work.
warwagon
Member
Umm.....Gentelmen, you forget that those operations were compartamalized, and eyes only.
For your transgressions, all back stop is off, safe houses are on lockdown, and contractual assets will not reply.
GOOD LUCK!
Control
For your transgressions, all back stop is off, safe houses are on lockdown, and contractual assets will not reply.
GOOD LUCK!
Control
-Eight Months Earlier
My group had the private backroom of the Thai restaurant to ourselves. The food had arrived, the mood was happy, and the piped in music was loud and had lots of cymbals in it. My crew was in high spirits, the job was a success, some Laotian drug lords were a lot poorer, and we were a whole lot richer.
Reaper, our techie, was proceeding to get drunk. Carl, our wheelman, was slightly less sullen than usual, beady rat eyes darting back and forth while he chain smoked. Train, the muscle, was his usual good natured self, laughing at every stupid comment. I was enjoying some nuclear-hot curry death mushroom dish and basking in the glow of another perfect score.
The beads leading into the private room parted, allowing a giant whale of a man in a three piece suit to enter the room. He was bigger than Train and probably weighed more then my entire team put together. My crew was instantly quiet. There was a slight motion to my right as Carl drew his CZ-75 and held it under the table, Han Solo style.
“Lorenzo, I presume.” The fat man pulled up a chair and sat. The chair creaked ominously under his mass. “Is that supposed to be your first name or your last?”
I finished chewing, savoring the eye watering pain. “Neither. Who the hell are you?”
“My name isn’t important, but I work for Big Eddie…” He trailed off as he said that, smiling with that strange quality of the slightly schizophrenic. “I have an assignment for you.”
I slowly put my chopsticks down. “I’m retired. Me and your boss are square.” Standing to leave, I pulled some Thai Bahts from my wallet and threw them on the table. I had no interest in anything related to Big Eddie, possibly the most brutal crime-lord in history, and all around bad person. Prior jobs I had performed for the man had left me independently wealthy, but with a lot of scars, and a trail of bodies from here to Moscow. “Come on guys, let’s go.”
“My employer insists that you are the only person who can complete this assignment. Your gift of languages and disguises, your ability to blend in with any culture, to infiltrate any group, and your gift for violence are legendary in some circles. You, Sir, are the best of the best.”
“Tell him to find somebody else.”
The fat man chuckled. “He said you would say that.” He placed a manilla folder on the table and shoved it towards me. He passed other folders to Carl, Train, and Reaper. “He said you should look at this before you make any rash decisions… Mr.—“ and then he called me by my real name. There was no way he could know that. I froze as he opened the folder.
Pictures. Lots of pictures.
My crew began to flip through the pages of their files, eyes widening in shock, mouths falling open, Carl swearing in Portuguese. Reaper stood and pulled his Glock from his waistband, letting it dangle, folder still open in his other hand.
The fat man wiped his brow as he began to read from a list. “Six siblings, oh my, I do love large families. Robert, Jill, Tom, George, Pat.” He shoved a list of addresses towards me, paper clipped to a series of photos. “Big Eddie knows where each of them lives, where they work, what they do, and how to reach them at anytime. Should you attempt to contact them, Big Eddie will find out, and he will be most displeased.”
“They know about my daughter?” Train asked in disbelief, his big hands crunching the edges of the folder.
“You bastard.” I knew he was not bluffing. Eddie was capable of anything. They must have been gathering this information on me for years.
“Three of your siblings are married. You have seven nieces and nephews.” He told me as he passed me another stack of photos. School photos. I was across the table before he knew what was happening, my knife open and pressed hard between his second and third chin. Reaper lifted his gun and pointed it at the fat man, mouth curling in a snarl as he let the file fall to the sticky floor.
He didn’t even flinch. “Your mother lives with your sister Jill now, still in your hometown. On Tuesday evenings she goes to her book club. During the week she baby sits while Jill goes to work, managing a Waffle House.”
I twisted the knife, and a small trickle of blood splattered on his white collar. His little pig eyes were hard and cold as he stared me down. “Your oldest brother, Robert, is, surprisingly enough, an FBI agent. He has a lovely home in the suburbs, and a beautiful wife, and two lovely daughters. You will take on this assignment, or Big Eddie will take care of them first. You know how he feels about cops.”
“And if I just cut your throat and disappear?” I hissed, leashed anger bubbling to the surface.
“You won’t. We’ve studied you. You will do what it takes to protect your family. Plans are in place, that if I do not return, or if you are not observed attempting to complete this assignment, then your family will pay the price. You may try to warn them, you may try to protect them, you may even attempt to locate our organization, heaven knows if any one is insane enough to try it is you, but you can’t save all of them. You know how great our employer’s reach is, and there is no place in this world where you can hide them all.”
He was not bluffing. Eddie was more powerful than most governments, a shadowy figure involved in every criminal enterprise on the planet. I withdrew the Benchmade, wiped the blood on the fat man’s shirt, folded the blade and put it back in my pocket. I hadn’t even spoken to my family in years. They thought I was some sort of international businessman. I knew that if I tried to warn them, even if they believed me, there was no way I could protect them all. Sitting back down, I nodded at Reaper, and he stuck his Glock back into his waistband.
“That’s better. Here is the mission. There are three phases. You have one year.”
I opened the proffered folder, read a few lines, and then laughed out loud. “You’ve got to be kidding. This is impossible.”
“One year, Mr. Lorenzo. Or we will kill everyone you have ever loved.” He gestured at the mushroom dish. “Are you going to finish that?”
####################
Train had disappeared during the night, having crawled out his hotel room window. No doubt deciding it was safer to disobey Big Eddie and attempt to hide his family, rather than take on this obvious suicide mission in Qatar.
One week later, someone shoved an envelope under my door. Inside was a newspaper clipping that told the story of a family of three that had been killed in Lincoln, Nebraska, apparently of a gas leak explosion. Train’s picture was underneath the headline.
#####################
Back to the present.
The van slalomed around the corner. I bounced painfully against the wall. The girl I had rescued was sitting next to me, head back on the seat, totally out. Apparently she had been drugged by the bad guys.
“Easy, Carl, don’t get us killed.”
“Don’t you tell me easy. Plan, Lorenzo, we had a plan. Who the hell is the chick?” He swung us around a truck full of sheep, and when I say full of sheep, I mean that literally, like it was piled full with legs sticking out the top. “The chick was not part of the plan. I would have remembered that.”
“They were going to torture her. I couldn’t just leave her. She sounded like an American before she passed out. We can just drop her at the embassy gates and take off.”
“Easier said that done,” he gestured out the window at Qatari army vehicles streaking in the direction we had come from. “Cops crawling everywhere. They probably have checkpoints around the embassy. We’ll never make it.”
To accentuate his point, I saw a man on the sidewalk getting the hell kicked out of him by some of the Qatari secret police. “Okay, our place is closer. Get us off the streets.” Doha had gone insane.
“I’m not taking her to our place. We can’t let anybody see what we’re working on.”
“Do it, Carl.” I ordered. My crew was loyal, and I seldom had to pull rank, but this was my crew, and it wasn’t a democracy. The driver swore, his beady eyes glaring at me in the rear view mirror. We reached the compound in minutes. Our apartment was in the rear, and luckily had an attached garage so no one would see us carry the girl in.
Reaper met us at the door. He was a tall, skinny kid, with black stringy hair, and a penchant for Marylin Manson t-shirts. He had a Glock shoved in the front of his pants. “What happened out there? Police bands are screaming about some massacre. Did you get the box and the book? Who’s the babe?”
“Lorenzo’s decided he’s Robin Hood or some ****,” Carl spat. I ignored him, and carried the girl up the stairs and into the apartment. I laid her gently on the couch. She was still out.
I handed Reaper the box. His face lit up. “Dude, this is awesome.”
“Don’t throw a party just yet. Somebody beat us to the code book and whacked Adar.” I put the DVD in his hand. “The shooters are hopefully on this, and we need to figure out who they are. We need that book or the box is worthless.”
“On it, chief.” He ran for his computer.
I flopped onto the couch next to the girl. My hands were starting to do the post-action shake. No matter how many times I did something like this, that part never changed. Carl sighed, leaned his AUG on the coffee table, and sat on the loveseat.
“So I guess it was pretty bad in there?” he asked slowly. We had been working together for ten years now, and sometimes it still took a moment to get through the Portuguese accent. He was a small man, balding, with a dark complexion, and arm hair that looked like a rug. We had met in Angola, where he had been working as a mercenary. Working with me had apparently been more interesting.
“I shot three of them. Took out some more with a grenade.” I shrugged. “The guys before me made a real mess. Got at least seven that I saw.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch.” He gestured at the girl. “And what do we do with her now?”
I studied her for the first time. She was young. Probably in her twenties. I had thought that she was from the Philippines when I had first seen her, as most of the servant girls in Qatar were from there or Indonesia. Now I wasn’t so sure. She was tall, and didn’t look quite like most of the servant girls I had seen here. She was snoring peacefully in a drug addled haze. One eye was badly bruised, and it made me glad that I had shot those men.
“I couldn’t leave her. You should have seen the girl upstairs,” I said. Carl didn’t respond. Acts of mercy were few and far between in his life. I patted her down, no documents, no passport. Something caught my eye. “Check this out.” I held up her wrist. She had a gold ring on one finger.
“What’s that say?” he asked, squinting his beady eyes.
“California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo. Class of 2002.”
“Think she stole it off a tourist I hope?”
“I’m thinking that we’re going to need to come up with a pretty good cover story for when she wakes up.” I gestured around the room. Hundreds of pictures were tacked on the walls. Posters of Al-Falal, Adar, building schematics, road maps, and miscellaneous paper littered every corner of the room. A scale model of the Phase III target was on the coffee table, and there were at least ten visible guns, and that wasn’t counting the RPGs in the corner.
“You’re the one with the imagination. I just drive good and shoot people.”
“Guys, come check this out,” Reaper called from the other room. “I’ve got your shooters.”
We entered the makeshift computer room, and hovered over Reaper’s shoulder. He was playing some Finnish Goth metal on his Ipod. “I’m skipping past the torture stuff, this Adar was one ****** up *******. And here is where your shooters come in.”
“Slow it down.” Two men, dressed all in black, faces smeared with black greasepaint, armed with UMPs. One a few inches over six feet, kind of stocky, and left handed, wearing stupid fingerless gloves. The other thin, and probably 5’9 or 5’10 with a real short military hair cut. The bigger one booted Adar down, bellowed at him, obviously shocked and angry, the execution, and then the quick ransacking of the bedroom. So these were the men who had plunged Doha into chaos.
“Who are these *******?” Carl said. “What is this, ninja dress up hour? What’s with the makeup? How were they going to explain that if they got picked up by the cops?”
“Play back when the tall one yells at Adar.” Reaper complied. I listened. The shooter was young, wearing what looked to be prescription type goggles. His face didn’t look like the face of a killer, but there was no hesitation when he put a bullet in Adar’s brain pan. “He’s an American. Judging by his accent, he’s from the north end of the country. Great lakes. Michigan, Wisconsin maybe.”
“How in the hell can you tell that, from one little shouted thing?” Reaper asked incredulously.
“Kid, I speak eight languages fluently, and can get by in fifteen others.” That much was true, it was a gift that came naturally to me. “I’ve pretended to be a hundred different people over the last twenty years. I can do accents better than anybody in Hollywood. He’s from some place with a lot of Scandinavians and Lutherans.”
“Well, when you were pretending to be Khalid, I couldn’t tell you weren’t Qatari, down to the man dress and the perfume. You say he’s from Minnesota or whatever, I believe you.”
“Go back a bit.” Carl frowned. “I’ve seen this guy. He was at the mall in Doha. Remember ‘cause he’s tall, and he bumped into me. He was with this really beautiful girl.”
“You sure?”
“She was really hot, Lorenzo. I’m not kidding with you. I remember thinking what was she doing with somebody like him.”
“It’s a lead. We’ve got to find this guy, so we can try there. Reaper, do me a favor, and grab my notepad from the living room. When I was playing Khalid, I made friends with some of the shop keepers at the mall. I’m going to give them a call.”
Reaper nodded, adjusted his Glock, and moved for the living room.
“Kid’s gonna shoot himself in the crotch, carrying his gun like that.” Carl said. Reaper flipped him the bird on his way out.
“We don’t have very good health insurance in this business either,” I muttered, studying the face of my new adversary. These men were standing in the way of me completing phase three. Until I had that code book, the box was worthless. Without that box, our families belonged to Big Eddie. I did not know who these mystery shooters were, but my new mission in life was to find them, and kill them if I had to. I blew up the picture until it became grainy. The shooter had a killer’s eyes. This was going to be a challenge.
There was a sudden crash from the living room. Carl and I both drew our guns, and moved apart. I disengaged the safety on my 1911 and pointed it at the doorway. Carl took up position behind the desk, CZ extended in front of him.
“Reaper?” I shouted. “You okay.”
Our guest had awoken. Reaper stumbled into the doorway, his arms raised in a surrender position. The girl stood behind him with his Glock 17 pressed into the base of his neck. I didn’t have a shot.
“Sorry, chief,” he said slowly.
The girl glared over Reaper’s shoulder. The drugs must have worn off, and she was obviously angry and confused. Her eyes darted about between us. “Nobody move! I’ll shoot this guy right in the head,” she ordered. I had been right, she was an American, and she apparently knew how to use that Glock. “Who are you people? And what am I doing here?”
“Well... that’s kind of complicated.”
She tightened her grip on the Glock. I could imagine a 9mm exploding through Reaper’s head. “Give me the short version, *******!”
“Okay, well, there I was...”
########
To be continued...
My group had the private backroom of the Thai restaurant to ourselves. The food had arrived, the mood was happy, and the piped in music was loud and had lots of cymbals in it. My crew was in high spirits, the job was a success, some Laotian drug lords were a lot poorer, and we were a whole lot richer.
Reaper, our techie, was proceeding to get drunk. Carl, our wheelman, was slightly less sullen than usual, beady rat eyes darting back and forth while he chain smoked. Train, the muscle, was his usual good natured self, laughing at every stupid comment. I was enjoying some nuclear-hot curry death mushroom dish and basking in the glow of another perfect score.
The beads leading into the private room parted, allowing a giant whale of a man in a three piece suit to enter the room. He was bigger than Train and probably weighed more then my entire team put together. My crew was instantly quiet. There was a slight motion to my right as Carl drew his CZ-75 and held it under the table, Han Solo style.
“Lorenzo, I presume.” The fat man pulled up a chair and sat. The chair creaked ominously under his mass. “Is that supposed to be your first name or your last?”
I finished chewing, savoring the eye watering pain. “Neither. Who the hell are you?”
“My name isn’t important, but I work for Big Eddie…” He trailed off as he said that, smiling with that strange quality of the slightly schizophrenic. “I have an assignment for you.”
I slowly put my chopsticks down. “I’m retired. Me and your boss are square.” Standing to leave, I pulled some Thai Bahts from my wallet and threw them on the table. I had no interest in anything related to Big Eddie, possibly the most brutal crime-lord in history, and all around bad person. Prior jobs I had performed for the man had left me independently wealthy, but with a lot of scars, and a trail of bodies from here to Moscow. “Come on guys, let’s go.”
“My employer insists that you are the only person who can complete this assignment. Your gift of languages and disguises, your ability to blend in with any culture, to infiltrate any group, and your gift for violence are legendary in some circles. You, Sir, are the best of the best.”
“Tell him to find somebody else.”
The fat man chuckled. “He said you would say that.” He placed a manilla folder on the table and shoved it towards me. He passed other folders to Carl, Train, and Reaper. “He said you should look at this before you make any rash decisions… Mr.—“ and then he called me by my real name. There was no way he could know that. I froze as he opened the folder.
Pictures. Lots of pictures.
My crew began to flip through the pages of their files, eyes widening in shock, mouths falling open, Carl swearing in Portuguese. Reaper stood and pulled his Glock from his waistband, letting it dangle, folder still open in his other hand.
The fat man wiped his brow as he began to read from a list. “Six siblings, oh my, I do love large families. Robert, Jill, Tom, George, Pat.” He shoved a list of addresses towards me, paper clipped to a series of photos. “Big Eddie knows where each of them lives, where they work, what they do, and how to reach them at anytime. Should you attempt to contact them, Big Eddie will find out, and he will be most displeased.”
“They know about my daughter?” Train asked in disbelief, his big hands crunching the edges of the folder.
“You bastard.” I knew he was not bluffing. Eddie was capable of anything. They must have been gathering this information on me for years.
“Three of your siblings are married. You have seven nieces and nephews.” He told me as he passed me another stack of photos. School photos. I was across the table before he knew what was happening, my knife open and pressed hard between his second and third chin. Reaper lifted his gun and pointed it at the fat man, mouth curling in a snarl as he let the file fall to the sticky floor.
He didn’t even flinch. “Your mother lives with your sister Jill now, still in your hometown. On Tuesday evenings she goes to her book club. During the week she baby sits while Jill goes to work, managing a Waffle House.”
I twisted the knife, and a small trickle of blood splattered on his white collar. His little pig eyes were hard and cold as he stared me down. “Your oldest brother, Robert, is, surprisingly enough, an FBI agent. He has a lovely home in the suburbs, and a beautiful wife, and two lovely daughters. You will take on this assignment, or Big Eddie will take care of them first. You know how he feels about cops.”
“And if I just cut your throat and disappear?” I hissed, leashed anger bubbling to the surface.
“You won’t. We’ve studied you. You will do what it takes to protect your family. Plans are in place, that if I do not return, or if you are not observed attempting to complete this assignment, then your family will pay the price. You may try to warn them, you may try to protect them, you may even attempt to locate our organization, heaven knows if any one is insane enough to try it is you, but you can’t save all of them. You know how great our employer’s reach is, and there is no place in this world where you can hide them all.”
He was not bluffing. Eddie was more powerful than most governments, a shadowy figure involved in every criminal enterprise on the planet. I withdrew the Benchmade, wiped the blood on the fat man’s shirt, folded the blade and put it back in my pocket. I hadn’t even spoken to my family in years. They thought I was some sort of international businessman. I knew that if I tried to warn them, even if they believed me, there was no way I could protect them all. Sitting back down, I nodded at Reaper, and he stuck his Glock back into his waistband.
“That’s better. Here is the mission. There are three phases. You have one year.”
I opened the proffered folder, read a few lines, and then laughed out loud. “You’ve got to be kidding. This is impossible.”
“One year, Mr. Lorenzo. Or we will kill everyone you have ever loved.” He gestured at the mushroom dish. “Are you going to finish that?”
####################
Train had disappeared during the night, having crawled out his hotel room window. No doubt deciding it was safer to disobey Big Eddie and attempt to hide his family, rather than take on this obvious suicide mission in Qatar.
One week later, someone shoved an envelope under my door. Inside was a newspaper clipping that told the story of a family of three that had been killed in Lincoln, Nebraska, apparently of a gas leak explosion. Train’s picture was underneath the headline.
#####################
Back to the present.
The van slalomed around the corner. I bounced painfully against the wall. The girl I had rescued was sitting next to me, head back on the seat, totally out. Apparently she had been drugged by the bad guys.
“Easy, Carl, don’t get us killed.”
“Don’t you tell me easy. Plan, Lorenzo, we had a plan. Who the hell is the chick?” He swung us around a truck full of sheep, and when I say full of sheep, I mean that literally, like it was piled full with legs sticking out the top. “The chick was not part of the plan. I would have remembered that.”
“They were going to torture her. I couldn’t just leave her. She sounded like an American before she passed out. We can just drop her at the embassy gates and take off.”
“Easier said that done,” he gestured out the window at Qatari army vehicles streaking in the direction we had come from. “Cops crawling everywhere. They probably have checkpoints around the embassy. We’ll never make it.”
To accentuate his point, I saw a man on the sidewalk getting the hell kicked out of him by some of the Qatari secret police. “Okay, our place is closer. Get us off the streets.” Doha had gone insane.
“I’m not taking her to our place. We can’t let anybody see what we’re working on.”
“Do it, Carl.” I ordered. My crew was loyal, and I seldom had to pull rank, but this was my crew, and it wasn’t a democracy. The driver swore, his beady eyes glaring at me in the rear view mirror. We reached the compound in minutes. Our apartment was in the rear, and luckily had an attached garage so no one would see us carry the girl in.
Reaper met us at the door. He was a tall, skinny kid, with black stringy hair, and a penchant for Marylin Manson t-shirts. He had a Glock shoved in the front of his pants. “What happened out there? Police bands are screaming about some massacre. Did you get the box and the book? Who’s the babe?”
“Lorenzo’s decided he’s Robin Hood or some ****,” Carl spat. I ignored him, and carried the girl up the stairs and into the apartment. I laid her gently on the couch. She was still out.
I handed Reaper the box. His face lit up. “Dude, this is awesome.”
“Don’t throw a party just yet. Somebody beat us to the code book and whacked Adar.” I put the DVD in his hand. “The shooters are hopefully on this, and we need to figure out who they are. We need that book or the box is worthless.”
“On it, chief.” He ran for his computer.
I flopped onto the couch next to the girl. My hands were starting to do the post-action shake. No matter how many times I did something like this, that part never changed. Carl sighed, leaned his AUG on the coffee table, and sat on the loveseat.
“So I guess it was pretty bad in there?” he asked slowly. We had been working together for ten years now, and sometimes it still took a moment to get through the Portuguese accent. He was a small man, balding, with a dark complexion, and arm hair that looked like a rug. We had met in Angola, where he had been working as a mercenary. Working with me had apparently been more interesting.
“I shot three of them. Took out some more with a grenade.” I shrugged. “The guys before me made a real mess. Got at least seven that I saw.”
“Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch.” He gestured at the girl. “And what do we do with her now?”
I studied her for the first time. She was young. Probably in her twenties. I had thought that she was from the Philippines when I had first seen her, as most of the servant girls in Qatar were from there or Indonesia. Now I wasn’t so sure. She was tall, and didn’t look quite like most of the servant girls I had seen here. She was snoring peacefully in a drug addled haze. One eye was badly bruised, and it made me glad that I had shot those men.
“I couldn’t leave her. You should have seen the girl upstairs,” I said. Carl didn’t respond. Acts of mercy were few and far between in his life. I patted her down, no documents, no passport. Something caught my eye. “Check this out.” I held up her wrist. She had a gold ring on one finger.
“What’s that say?” he asked, squinting his beady eyes.
“California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo. Class of 2002.”
“Think she stole it off a tourist I hope?”
“I’m thinking that we’re going to need to come up with a pretty good cover story for when she wakes up.” I gestured around the room. Hundreds of pictures were tacked on the walls. Posters of Al-Falal, Adar, building schematics, road maps, and miscellaneous paper littered every corner of the room. A scale model of the Phase III target was on the coffee table, and there were at least ten visible guns, and that wasn’t counting the RPGs in the corner.
“You’re the one with the imagination. I just drive good and shoot people.”
“Guys, come check this out,” Reaper called from the other room. “I’ve got your shooters.”
We entered the makeshift computer room, and hovered over Reaper’s shoulder. He was playing some Finnish Goth metal on his Ipod. “I’m skipping past the torture stuff, this Adar was one ****** up *******. And here is where your shooters come in.”
“Slow it down.” Two men, dressed all in black, faces smeared with black greasepaint, armed with UMPs. One a few inches over six feet, kind of stocky, and left handed, wearing stupid fingerless gloves. The other thin, and probably 5’9 or 5’10 with a real short military hair cut. The bigger one booted Adar down, bellowed at him, obviously shocked and angry, the execution, and then the quick ransacking of the bedroom. So these were the men who had plunged Doha into chaos.
“Who are these *******?” Carl said. “What is this, ninja dress up hour? What’s with the makeup? How were they going to explain that if they got picked up by the cops?”
“Play back when the tall one yells at Adar.” Reaper complied. I listened. The shooter was young, wearing what looked to be prescription type goggles. His face didn’t look like the face of a killer, but there was no hesitation when he put a bullet in Adar’s brain pan. “He’s an American. Judging by his accent, he’s from the north end of the country. Great lakes. Michigan, Wisconsin maybe.”
“How in the hell can you tell that, from one little shouted thing?” Reaper asked incredulously.
“Kid, I speak eight languages fluently, and can get by in fifteen others.” That much was true, it was a gift that came naturally to me. “I’ve pretended to be a hundred different people over the last twenty years. I can do accents better than anybody in Hollywood. He’s from some place with a lot of Scandinavians and Lutherans.”
“Well, when you were pretending to be Khalid, I couldn’t tell you weren’t Qatari, down to the man dress and the perfume. You say he’s from Minnesota or whatever, I believe you.”
“Go back a bit.” Carl frowned. “I’ve seen this guy. He was at the mall in Doha. Remember ‘cause he’s tall, and he bumped into me. He was with this really beautiful girl.”
“You sure?”
“She was really hot, Lorenzo. I’m not kidding with you. I remember thinking what was she doing with somebody like him.”
“It’s a lead. We’ve got to find this guy, so we can try there. Reaper, do me a favor, and grab my notepad from the living room. When I was playing Khalid, I made friends with some of the shop keepers at the mall. I’m going to give them a call.”
Reaper nodded, adjusted his Glock, and moved for the living room.
“Kid’s gonna shoot himself in the crotch, carrying his gun like that.” Carl said. Reaper flipped him the bird on his way out.
“We don’t have very good health insurance in this business either,” I muttered, studying the face of my new adversary. These men were standing in the way of me completing phase three. Until I had that code book, the box was worthless. Without that box, our families belonged to Big Eddie. I did not know who these mystery shooters were, but my new mission in life was to find them, and kill them if I had to. I blew up the picture until it became grainy. The shooter had a killer’s eyes. This was going to be a challenge.
There was a sudden crash from the living room. Carl and I both drew our guns, and moved apart. I disengaged the safety on my 1911 and pointed it at the doorway. Carl took up position behind the desk, CZ extended in front of him.
“Reaper?” I shouted. “You okay.”
Our guest had awoken. Reaper stumbled into the doorway, his arms raised in a surrender position. The girl stood behind him with his Glock 17 pressed into the base of his neck. I didn’t have a shot.
“Sorry, chief,” he said slowly.
The girl glared over Reaper’s shoulder. The drugs must have worn off, and she was obviously angry and confused. Her eyes darted about between us. “Nobody move! I’ll shoot this guy right in the head,” she ordered. I had been right, she was an American, and she apparently knew how to use that Glock. “Who are you people? And what am I doing here?”
“Well... that’s kind of complicated.”
She tightened her grip on the Glock. I could imagine a 9mm exploding through Reaper’s head. “Give me the short version, *******!”
“Okay, well, there I was...”
########
To be continued...
Nightcrawler
Member
Intersections
Okay, this is how it is. Correia and I are going to go off into an appendix, detailing our "crossover". Think Spider Man meets the X-Men type stuff. The next chapter of the main storyline will be Dark Water. Everything that comes in between is this appendix. The chronology of it takes place between The Jackal and Conspiracy Theories. Thank you all for your support. This is a hoot!
Okay, this is how it is. Correia and I are going to go off into an appendix, detailing our "crossover". Think Spider Man meets the X-Men type stuff. The next chapter of the main storyline will be Dark Water. Everything that comes in between is this appendix. The chronology of it takes place between The Jackal and Conspiracy Theories. Thank you all for your support. This is a hoot!
AStone
Member
<rim shot>
Badda boom.
</rim shot, w/ lots of cymbals>
{But the strange thing is,
it reads almost as good from the bottom up...
What are you people chewing on?
And where can the rest of us get some?
}
Badda boom.
</rim shot, w/ lots of cymbals>
{But the strange thing is,
it reads almost as good from the bottom up...
What are you people chewing on?
And where can the rest of us get some?
}BluesBear
member
[voice=William Conrad]
What befalls next our heros?
What light through younder window breaks?
What would you do for a Klondike bar?
Will one set of heros turn our other set of heros into zeros?
Will One turn the other into None?
Will the girl just kick their collective butts into oblivion?
Will Boris and Natasha finally find romance and financial independence starring in the Frostbite Falls Community Theatre production of The Sonny & Cher Story?
Hey, it could happen.
Don't miss our next exciting episode, from wherever it comes,
GoldiGlocks and the Three Bearers
or
Little Read Hiding Hoodlums
[/voice]
What befalls next our heros?
What light through younder window breaks?
What would you do for a Klondike bar?
Will one set of heros turn our other set of heros into zeros?
Will One turn the other into None?
Will the girl just kick their collective butts into oblivion?
Will Boris and Natasha finally find romance and financial independence starring in the Frostbite Falls Community Theatre production of The Sonny & Cher Story?
Hey, it could happen.
Don't miss our next exciting episode, from wherever it comes,
GoldiGlocks and the Three Bearers
or
Little Read Hiding Hoodlums
[/voice]
AStone
Member
<subtle but uncontrollable chuckling>
<hovering droid voice>
"Move along.
Move along.
Nothing to see here.
Move along."
</hovering droid voice>
<hovering droid voice>
"Move along.
Move along.
Nothing to see here.
Move along."
</hovering droid voice>
mordechaianiliewicz
Member
Bluesbear, you're killin' me. What are you a stand up comedian or something?
Rexrider
Member
Anyway this thread can be made a "sticky". Not that it is too hard to find since it is always floating to the top anyway.
Do we have a Thread of the Year Award? If so, I nominate this thread.
Thanks Nightcrawler and Correia. This is way cool.
Do we have a Thread of the Year Award? If so, I nominate this thread.
Thanks Nightcrawler and Correia. This is way cool.
For the record, when this thread started I decided I wasn't going to like it.
Oh brother, some internet wannabe writer(s). Geez.
Oh brother indeed! I could not have been more wrong.
I like it! I like it!
Nightcrawler, Correia, BluesBear..... you have got to stop frittering away time on things like sleeping, eating, bathroom breaks, etc.
Just keep writing...!!!
Oh brother, some internet wannabe writer(s). Geez.
Oh brother indeed! I could not have been more wrong.
I like it! I like it!
Nightcrawler, Correia, BluesBear..... you have got to stop frittering away time on things like sleeping, eating, bathroom breaks, etc.
Just keep writing...!!!
qlajlu
Member
I don't care which one of them writes, just write. I'm as hooked as everyone else and this waiting for the next installment is very, very hard.
Nightcrawler
Member
Dark Water
The week had started out so nice, I thought to myself. A few days earlier, we'd gotten up early and gone to Johnny Rockets. Johnny Rockets was an oddball restaurant in downtown Doha, with a 1950s American theme. Like that other so-called American restaurant, Ric's Kountry Kitchen, it was of course staffed entirely by Philippinos. But it was about the only place to get a decent burger, and one of very few places actually open for breakfast.
But that had been days before. There I was, in a tiny assault boat, clipping through frigid winter Persian Gulf water in the middle of the night. The rest of the crew had their laughs at me, too. I was the only one wearing a life jacket.
Well screw 'em. I can't swim and I hate the water. The fact that I was laden with fifty pounds of assault gear wouldn't have helped my buoyancy either.
There were nine of us packed onto that boat. All were dressed in full battle rattle ninja gear. Fatigues, body armor, heavy weapons. For the first time since I'd been in Qatar, I'd been able to use my FAL. I had eight spare magazines on my vest. Just for laughs, on my left thigh rode my S&W 629 .44 Magnum in a Blade Tec tac holster. That'll get their attention, anyway.
Somebody yelled that we were five minutes out. It was pitch black; I had no idea how they could tell. I guess the guy driving the boat (who was not part of our team) knew what he was doing.
I looked up, not loosening my death grip on the boat's safety handles, and saw Montalban's yacht ahead of us. It was very well lit, and was clipping along slowly on that moonless night.
We used no suppressors on our weapons this time. They weren't called for. Once we launched our boarding ladder over the side, they'd know we were there, and it would get ugly.
Our mission was simple. Find Montalban and his laptop, capture him if possible, kill him otherwise. Retrieve the laptop. Sounded simple, right?
Except for the part where we had to do a hostile boarding of his yacht, without having a layout of the ship, with only eight guys, and without having any idea what kind of security he had on board. Honestly, we were just going on faith that Montalban was even on the damned boat! Such were the missions that Dead 6 was created for. The impossible, borderline-lunacy ones that weren't worth wasting less expendable assets on.
Showtime. The ladder went up, and latched on. Tailor was the first one up, with me right behind him. He had his primary weapon, a tricked-out M4 carbine, slung, with his USP-45 drawn. He was up and over the railing, and I was right behind him, having removed my life jacket. Right behind me was one of the guys from the other teams, number 36, with a Remington 870 shotgun.
Before Tailor even hit the deck, one of the yacht's guards appeared. They were wearing blue polo shirts and black pants, and this one was carrying a Steyr TMP submachine gun. Tailor put two rounds into him, and his body hit the deck with a thump. Then all hell broke loose.
As the fifth man got on the deck, all of the vessel's deck lights turned on, and spotlights began to search the water. A klaxon sounded, and men could be seen running and heard shouting.
We were on the aft end of the boat, on the port side. Tailor and I leveled our weapons to cover as many angles as we could, trying to get the entire team on the deck before we moved.
Two more guards, weapons ready, appeared from the front end of the boat, running in our direction. From a kneeling position, I put the red dot of my FAL's Aimpoint on the first man's chest and opened fire. The .308 carbine barked loudly, and the man fell. Two more shots and the second man was down.
Seven of us were aboard now. The eighth man fell to fire as he was coming over the railing. He plunged into the black water below and was gone.
The yacht was big. We'd have to do a cabin by cabin search looking for Montalban, hoping to survive the experience. Tailor, myself, and number 36 moved together up the port side of the boat; the other four men would move up the starboard side. We'd start by going belowdecks, and they'd go above, to capture the bridge and the radio room.
It was insane. A protracted, running gun battle in the confines of a luxury yacht. Resistance was heavy, and there were plenty of noncombatants running around the muddle things up. We had been ordered to disregard them, but...well, you know.
36's shotgun roared, dropping a shotgun-weilding opponent, and we were into the engine room. We paused there to regroup while Tailor disabled the ship's engines. I got on my headseat.
"Bravo, this is Alpha, engine room secured. What's your status?" The reply was peppered with intermittent gunfire.
"Alpha, this is Bravo! We've taken the bridge and have..." A long burst of automatic weapons fire could be heard. "The ship's radio is disabled, but they're trying to retake the bridge. Twenty-Two is down, and Forty-Nine is slightly wounded. We'll hold it!"
Two men lost already. It had been less than ten minutes. Things were not going well. Nonetheless, we had a mission to complete. We regrouped and went back out into the corridor. Stepping over the bleeding bodies that lay in the passageway, we began our search for Montalban's cabin. Gunfire could be heard resonating through the ship, as could the screams of those aboard. What a mess.
Several minutes and a magazine change later, we'd located Montalban's plush cabin. He'd barricaded himself inside, undoubtedly with the last of his guard force. The three of us stacked in front of his cabin door and made ready.
36 pointed his shotgun at the doorknob, and chambered a breaching round. Tailor and I, the left and right side of the corridor, respectively, leveled our weapons at the door. It seemed like it happened in slow motion.
First came the loud roar of the shotgun. As the door swung open, Tailor and I moved forward, weapons at the ready. 36 brought his shotgun up to level as he chambered another round.
The red dot of my Aimpoint hovered over the torso of one of Montalban's blue-shirted guards. I fired, and the bullet entered his chest through the sternum. His G36C carbine fell from his hands as the round exploded out of his back, and he collapsed to the floor.
On the left side of the room, taking cover behind a dresser, another guard opened up on us with another G36. One of his rounds passed through 36's head, and my face was spattered with blood. Tailor returned fire with a long burst from his M4, tearing through the dresser and shredding the guard.
As 36's body was hitting the floor, Montalban was crouched at the back of the room. His right hand came up, holding some kind of revolver, and he fired.
I felt as sharp impact as the .357 Magnum slug embedded itself in my ceramic chest plate, and I was knocked off balance. Tailor brought his M4 to bear again, and Montalban was torn apart by fire. Tailor's rounds ripped through him and into the large glass display case behind him. His body fell into the shattering glass, his revolver dropping to the deck with a thud.
By the time I'd recovered from the impact and had my weapon shouldered again, it was over. 36 was dead. I looked down at him. I was still in adrenaline-induced shock I think. The worst, for me, was yet to come.
"Clear," Tailor said.
"Clear," I replied, breathing hard.
Montalban was dead. We'd failed part of our mission. But there, on an oversized wooden desk, was his laptop. I hoped that whatever was on it had been worth so many lives.
"Bravo, this is Alpha," I said, surprising myself by how calm I was. "Target is down, we have the package. What's your status?"
"Alpha...this is Bravo. There's two of us left. Ringo's down. But I think we got 'em all."
"Roger. Dust 3, this is Alpha. You copy? Come get us." The helicopter pilot responded.
"Copy that, Alpha, Dust 3 enroute. ETA five minutes. Stand by for extraction."
"Roger. Alpha out." Taking a deep sigh, I looked down at 36 again. Jesus.
Rather than stare at that gruesome sight, I moved over toward's Montalban's desk to retrieve his laptop. It was then that I noticed Montalban's revolver laying on the deck.
Being something of a revolver afficianado, I was surprised to see that it was an engraved Korth. Well, makes sense, I thought. Guy like Montalban's probably got more money than God; if anyone can afford a five thousand dollar gun, he can.
The extraction was chaotic. The Blackhawk couldn't land on the yacht, and the survivor's of Montalban's crew were still in an utter panic. We were hoisted onto the hovering helicopter one at a time. Our three remaining dead were unceremoniously dumped into the ocean. I wondered if their families back home would ever know how they met their end.
With such thoughts in mind, and the gentle motion of the helicopter resonating through my body, I drifted off into troubled sleep.
TO BE CONTINUED...
The week had started out so nice, I thought to myself. A few days earlier, we'd gotten up early and gone to Johnny Rockets. Johnny Rockets was an oddball restaurant in downtown Doha, with a 1950s American theme. Like that other so-called American restaurant, Ric's Kountry Kitchen, it was of course staffed entirely by Philippinos. But it was about the only place to get a decent burger, and one of very few places actually open for breakfast.
But that had been days before. There I was, in a tiny assault boat, clipping through frigid winter Persian Gulf water in the middle of the night. The rest of the crew had their laughs at me, too. I was the only one wearing a life jacket.
Well screw 'em. I can't swim and I hate the water. The fact that I was laden with fifty pounds of assault gear wouldn't have helped my buoyancy either.
There were nine of us packed onto that boat. All were dressed in full battle rattle ninja gear. Fatigues, body armor, heavy weapons. For the first time since I'd been in Qatar, I'd been able to use my FAL. I had eight spare magazines on my vest. Just for laughs, on my left thigh rode my S&W 629 .44 Magnum in a Blade Tec tac holster. That'll get their attention, anyway.
Somebody yelled that we were five minutes out. It was pitch black; I had no idea how they could tell. I guess the guy driving the boat (who was not part of our team) knew what he was doing.
I looked up, not loosening my death grip on the boat's safety handles, and saw Montalban's yacht ahead of us. It was very well lit, and was clipping along slowly on that moonless night.
We used no suppressors on our weapons this time. They weren't called for. Once we launched our boarding ladder over the side, they'd know we were there, and it would get ugly.
Our mission was simple. Find Montalban and his laptop, capture him if possible, kill him otherwise. Retrieve the laptop. Sounded simple, right?
Except for the part where we had to do a hostile boarding of his yacht, without having a layout of the ship, with only eight guys, and without having any idea what kind of security he had on board. Honestly, we were just going on faith that Montalban was even on the damned boat! Such were the missions that Dead 6 was created for. The impossible, borderline-lunacy ones that weren't worth wasting less expendable assets on.
Showtime. The ladder went up, and latched on. Tailor was the first one up, with me right behind him. He had his primary weapon, a tricked-out M4 carbine, slung, with his USP-45 drawn. He was up and over the railing, and I was right behind him, having removed my life jacket. Right behind me was one of the guys from the other teams, number 36, with a Remington 870 shotgun.
Before Tailor even hit the deck, one of the yacht's guards appeared. They were wearing blue polo shirts and black pants, and this one was carrying a Steyr TMP submachine gun. Tailor put two rounds into him, and his body hit the deck with a thump. Then all hell broke loose.
As the fifth man got on the deck, all of the vessel's deck lights turned on, and spotlights began to search the water. A klaxon sounded, and men could be seen running and heard shouting.
We were on the aft end of the boat, on the port side. Tailor and I leveled our weapons to cover as many angles as we could, trying to get the entire team on the deck before we moved.
Two more guards, weapons ready, appeared from the front end of the boat, running in our direction. From a kneeling position, I put the red dot of my FAL's Aimpoint on the first man's chest and opened fire. The .308 carbine barked loudly, and the man fell. Two more shots and the second man was down.
Seven of us were aboard now. The eighth man fell to fire as he was coming over the railing. He plunged into the black water below and was gone.
The yacht was big. We'd have to do a cabin by cabin search looking for Montalban, hoping to survive the experience. Tailor, myself, and number 36 moved together up the port side of the boat; the other four men would move up the starboard side. We'd start by going belowdecks, and they'd go above, to capture the bridge and the radio room.
It was insane. A protracted, running gun battle in the confines of a luxury yacht. Resistance was heavy, and there were plenty of noncombatants running around the muddle things up. We had been ordered to disregard them, but...well, you know.
36's shotgun roared, dropping a shotgun-weilding opponent, and we were into the engine room. We paused there to regroup while Tailor disabled the ship's engines. I got on my headseat.
"Bravo, this is Alpha, engine room secured. What's your status?" The reply was peppered with intermittent gunfire.
"Alpha, this is Bravo! We've taken the bridge and have..." A long burst of automatic weapons fire could be heard. "The ship's radio is disabled, but they're trying to retake the bridge. Twenty-Two is down, and Forty-Nine is slightly wounded. We'll hold it!"
Two men lost already. It had been less than ten minutes. Things were not going well. Nonetheless, we had a mission to complete. We regrouped and went back out into the corridor. Stepping over the bleeding bodies that lay in the passageway, we began our search for Montalban's cabin. Gunfire could be heard resonating through the ship, as could the screams of those aboard. What a mess.
Several minutes and a magazine change later, we'd located Montalban's plush cabin. He'd barricaded himself inside, undoubtedly with the last of his guard force. The three of us stacked in front of his cabin door and made ready.
36 pointed his shotgun at the doorknob, and chambered a breaching round. Tailor and I, the left and right side of the corridor, respectively, leveled our weapons at the door. It seemed like it happened in slow motion.
First came the loud roar of the shotgun. As the door swung open, Tailor and I moved forward, weapons at the ready. 36 brought his shotgun up to level as he chambered another round.
The red dot of my Aimpoint hovered over the torso of one of Montalban's blue-shirted guards. I fired, and the bullet entered his chest through the sternum. His G36C carbine fell from his hands as the round exploded out of his back, and he collapsed to the floor.
On the left side of the room, taking cover behind a dresser, another guard opened up on us with another G36. One of his rounds passed through 36's head, and my face was spattered with blood. Tailor returned fire with a long burst from his M4, tearing through the dresser and shredding the guard.
As 36's body was hitting the floor, Montalban was crouched at the back of the room. His right hand came up, holding some kind of revolver, and he fired.
I felt as sharp impact as the .357 Magnum slug embedded itself in my ceramic chest plate, and I was knocked off balance. Tailor brought his M4 to bear again, and Montalban was torn apart by fire. Tailor's rounds ripped through him and into the large glass display case behind him. His body fell into the shattering glass, his revolver dropping to the deck with a thud.
By the time I'd recovered from the impact and had my weapon shouldered again, it was over. 36 was dead. I looked down at him. I was still in adrenaline-induced shock I think. The worst, for me, was yet to come.
"Clear," Tailor said.
"Clear," I replied, breathing hard.
Montalban was dead. We'd failed part of our mission. But there, on an oversized wooden desk, was his laptop. I hoped that whatever was on it had been worth so many lives.
"Bravo, this is Alpha," I said, surprising myself by how calm I was. "Target is down, we have the package. What's your status?"
"Alpha...this is Bravo. There's two of us left. Ringo's down. But I think we got 'em all."
"Roger. Dust 3, this is Alpha. You copy? Come get us." The helicopter pilot responded.
"Copy that, Alpha, Dust 3 enroute. ETA five minutes. Stand by for extraction."
"Roger. Alpha out." Taking a deep sigh, I looked down at 36 again. Jesus.
Rather than stare at that gruesome sight, I moved over toward's Montalban's desk to retrieve his laptop. It was then that I noticed Montalban's revolver laying on the deck.
Being something of a revolver afficianado, I was surprised to see that it was an engraved Korth. Well, makes sense, I thought. Guy like Montalban's probably got more money than God; if anyone can afford a five thousand dollar gun, he can.
The extraction was chaotic. The Blackhawk couldn't land on the yacht, and the survivor's of Montalban's crew were still in an utter panic. We were hoisted onto the hovering helicopter one at a time. Our three remaining dead were unceremoniously dumped into the ocean. I wondered if their families back home would ever know how they met their end.
With such thoughts in mind, and the gentle motion of the helicopter resonating through my body, I drifted off into troubled sleep.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Last edited:
DRZinn
Member
But did he keep Montalban's revolver?
BluesBear
member
WOWSERS!!! That was almost as dangerous as that time the Duke Boys snuck up behind Boss Hogg's still and Sheriff Roscoe...
...aw never mind.
[voice=William Conrad]
Well that sure enough was a close call for our hero.
Thankfully a burial at sea was not in the cards for our anti-aquatic hero.
But just what makes that laptop so important?
Will the data be retrievanbe?
Will it bring an end to the hostilities?
Will there be any nekkid jay-pegs?
And did Nighty keep the prized revolver?
And just what is the value of a slightly used luxury yacht with a few bullet holes.
For these ands other answers, you 'll just have to wait until our next suspense filled episode,
Whirleybird Whirlwind Romance On The High Seas
or
Korth By Northwest
[/voice]
...aw never mind.
[voice=William Conrad]
Well that sure enough was a close call for our hero.
Thankfully a burial at sea was not in the cards for our anti-aquatic hero.
But just what makes that laptop so important?
Will the data be retrievanbe?
Will it bring an end to the hostilities?
Will there be any nekkid jay-pegs?
And did Nighty keep the prized revolver?
And just what is the value of a slightly used luxury yacht with a few bullet holes.
For these ands other answers, you 'll just have to wait until our next suspense filled episode,
Whirleybird Whirlwind Romance On The High Seas
or
Korth By Northwest
[/voice]
Last edited:
yy
Member
shouldn't the dead be stripped of their weapons and armor? Unless the crew had forethought to use the weapons and armor to weigh down the bodies in the sea.
Still, if the bodies were recovered with the weapons and armor, tha'ts proof of American involvement, right?
Still, if the bodies were recovered with the weapons and armor, tha'ts proof of American involvement, right?
sm
member
CC & Company...
I'm waiting for the Steve McQueen Motorcyle Scene as per Great Escape
I dunno if 'Crawler and Correia are doing requests but hey, never hurts to ask- right?
We have had Sex, Drugs and Rock & Roll, Did the Urban Cowboy Bit , I know for sure Correia will Avoid the Fountain Scene from TWOG...Lorenzo's Theme song must be "Comfortably Numb" [hey it worked for James Caan in "Thief"].
Soundtrack for Movie:
Comfortably Numb- Pink Floyd
American Woman - Grand Funk Railroad
Magic Carpet Ride - Steppenwolf
Live Like You Were Dying -Tim McGraw
Independence Day - Martina McBride
All Along The Watchtower - Jimi Hendrix
Night Moves - Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band
Mustang Sally - Buddy Guy
Tied To The Whipping Post - Allman Bros
Pirate Looks at Forty Jimmy Buffett
Steamroller Baby! The uncut, long play dirty version - James Taylor.
The more Chapters - the longer the movie, and the more soundtrack I can add.
I need a really good scene for The Eagles Take It To The Limit
I'm waiting for the Steve McQueen Motorcyle Scene as per Great Escape
I dunno if 'Crawler and Correia are doing requests but hey, never hurts to ask- right?
We have had Sex, Drugs and Rock & Roll, Did the Urban Cowboy Bit , I know for sure Correia will Avoid the Fountain Scene from TWOG...Lorenzo's Theme song must be "Comfortably Numb" [hey it worked for James Caan in "Thief"].
Soundtrack for Movie:
Comfortably Numb- Pink Floyd
American Woman - Grand Funk Railroad
Magic Carpet Ride - Steppenwolf
Live Like You Were Dying -Tim McGraw
Independence Day - Martina McBride
All Along The Watchtower - Jimi Hendrix
Night Moves - Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band
Mustang Sally - Buddy Guy
Tied To The Whipping Post - Allman Bros
Pirate Looks at Forty Jimmy Buffett
Steamroller Baby! The uncut, long play dirty version - James Taylor.
The more Chapters - the longer the movie, and the more soundtrack I can add.
I need a really good scene for The Eagles Take It To The Limit
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