Seal team six extra size.., p.43
SEAL Team Six Extra-Sized Holiday Bundle, page 43
"They're gonna have to redraw the fucking map," Chili grinned.
"Hoo-ya," Heath said with a whisper.
They lay in the hide until nightfall. Not wise to be up and moving around right after an action like that. The Taliban fighters and their sympathizers and informants would be watching from all over this range for any movement following that series of blasts. Here in their hidey-hole they were invisible even to searchers standing a few feet away.
So, the two SEALs lay in the cleft of rock they'd covered with desert camo cloth. They sipped water to remain hydrated and took turns napping and watching until the sun fell away behind the mountaintops and before a sliver moon rose in the cold, cold night.
Chili broke the long rifle down into roughly equal parts stored in a pair of fortified hard cases. Normally one of these Barretts weighed in at close to thirty pounds. This one was closer to forty thanks to the heavier chrome-interior barrel Chili had milled for him special by an armorer in Montana. The receiver was reinforced as well to take the SLAP rounds without stressing.
They packed out everything they packed in leaving the hide looking as though it had never been touched. They were humping close to seventy pounds of gear and weapons.
Then they made their way down the rocky trails several thousand feet and twenty miles down the mountain using night vision gear to guide them over the uncertain terrain. They reached a broad flat area just before morning. It was preassigned as their primary dust off. The Blackhawks came out of the morning gloom and one dropped down long enough to haul them aboard while the other made a lazy circle above with guns trained on the surrounding hills.
They rotored for Camp Leatherneck and warm food and cots. They found a call-out waiting for them. It was back to the States and a new operation and goodbye to Afcrapistan.
For now.
CHAPTER THREE
MAZATLAN, MEXICO
Brazilian hip-hop music thudded from a courtyard somewhere.
A raspy woman's voice keened above a pounding bass. She was rapping in rapid Portuguese about rum and love and the unfairness of life. Otherwise the curving lane was quiet and empty in the shadowed dark.
An old car, a Malibu station wagon, sat on its rims in a weedy yard where the street ended in a T-intersection. The lot marked where the home of a middle management drug trafficker once lived. The corner house was ripped down back when Felipe Calderón was president and the government was still serious about ending the narco business and had adopted the zero tolerance methods of the gringos.
German Reyes lay in the back of the broken down car surveying the street with binoculars trained through the tinted rear window. The night was turning chill but it was a relief from the sweltering heat of the day. He'd been laying here in hiding with his partner for over eighteen hours. Watching and waiting. There were few lights in this part of Old Town. It looked pretty in the dark. The old style buildings with their bright paintwork, gingerbread masonry and wrought iron balconies all lay muted in moonlight.
But he'd seen it in the day. The peeling paint, the crumbling stucco, the garish gang tags sprayed one over the other on the walls. The tags told a history of decades of one gang overpowering another in the shifting drug war here. Sinaloa symbols covered over by Zeta tags and once again overlapped by Sinaloa markings.
At first glance it looked like any neighborhood in decline, scorched by poverty and rotting in neglect. The shiny new SUVs put a lie to that. They parked pulled up close on the narrow sidewalks on either side of the street leaving barely enough room for passage between. Big Escalades and Explorers jacked up as high as they could go with gleaming finishes and tricked out with super-chargers and spinner wheels.
These were the rides of the gangbangers who called themselves insurrectos, as if they fought for a cause other than money and power. This street was a home to no one. German knew that behind walls like these were storehouses and laboratories for refining drugs; mostly the rendering of opium and coca into the fine powders that would demand big money up north. The danger and stink of crystal meth manufacture demanded it be performed in a more remote locale; the folds of the canons and arroyos in the hills surrounding Mazatlan.
German's strike unit of the Policía Federal (PF) dropped the station wagon here weeks ago where it was dutifully stripped by local kids and left to rust on its rims. They left it here long enough that it blended into the background as just another stolen car abandoned after a joy ride. Early in the morning, before the sun rose over Sinaloa, German and Padilla Falto crept into the car to wait through the day until this hour.
They brought gallon jugs of water to stay hydrated but finished them long ago. Their stomachs rumbled from hunger and their throats were raw from thirst. Both of them stank from sweating and farting in the enclosed space and the German swore he could see the air within the close quarters of the car.
A larger force of PF agents were waiting with their unmarked armored vehicles a few blocks distant where they appeared to be providing security for acorrido concert in the park. In actuality they were awaiting German's signal to move in and move in fast.
Invisible on the rooftops all around, were children employed by the gangs to watch all traffic and make noise if they saw the approach of anyone on foot or in a car that they did not know. They were paid with candy, sodas and comic books and a few pesos to take home to Mamasita. More desired prizes like Gameboys were given to watchers who successfully alerted the insurrectos to the arrival of policía or rival gangs; sometimes it was impossible to tell from one another. It was an infallible system that allowed the gangbangers to flee or, in the worse case scenario, prepare to ambush the intruders with overwhelming force.
Just a few blocks over, Yanqui tourists were still walking through the shops or crawling the many bars that lined the brighter streets. Less than a mile away other gringos lived in gated retirement communities with private security. They were ex-pats escaping high prices and taxes and willing to endure a spoonful of local culture every now and then.
"It's not happening," Padilla said in a whisper. "Not tonight."
"It's good," German assured him. "My intel is good."
"God, I want a cigarette," Padilla groaned softly.
"You make any more noise and the ninos will light you up," German said and wiped the glass of the binoculars with the sleeve of his t-shirt.
Their greatest anxiety was that some of the neighborhood kids might set fire to the heap they were using as a hide. The little bastards set fire to wrecks like this just to watch them burn. The thought of roasting alive in here inspired them to stay quiet.
"They're not coming. Bobo lied to you," Padilla hissed.
Bobo Luiz was a tweaker and a paid informant. He came to German a week ago and claimed he wanted to clean up. Bobo swore he hadn't slept in a month and he was afraid his heart would stop and he would still be alive, kept from death by the shit he smoked. He already looked two days dead with his swollen red eyes and bone-thin body covered in scabs from compulsive scratching. Bobo wanted out and had information to trade for a trip to a rehab in Cozumel.
According to Bobo, an upstart gang called Pecadores Diez, Sinners Ten, was looking to make a major leap forward in meth production. They were made up of parasites that lived off table scraps left by the Sinaloa cartel. Crystal meth, or crank, was an entry level business in the drug trade. To make money in marijuana, coke or heroin you needed land. The cartels had that side of it wrapped up. But meth was created by a chemical process and all you needed was an abandoned rancho or a trailer, and the proper chemicals and you were in business.
An outfit could cook and move enough weight to make themselves millionaires in just a few weeks. But that was just a little bite. Any more than that and the enforcers of the big gangs would come down on their asses and kill them and all their families after some recreational rape and torture.
But the trouble with meth production was obtaining crystal's most elusive ingredient: pseudoephedrine. This common ingredient in over-the-counter cold and allergy medications was a bitch to come across in bulk. And bulk is what any gang needed if they wanted to make the big payouts in a hurry.
Bobo swore on his mother's eyes and his sister's ass that the Pecadores had a contact who promised them pseudo by the shitload and no lie. And it was coming in a truck. Tonight. To a Pecadores' holding house on this very street.
Who was their supplier?
Bobo didn't know.
Where was the stuff coming from? Stolen up in the USA?
Bobo shrugged. No idea.
Was it pharmaceutical grade? Pure pseudo or just cases of cold pills?
No se. I don't know that.
It was this lack of detail that convinced German that Bobo was for real. The sad little tweaker didn't elaborate or spin a tale of invented names and places. He only had this handful of information to sell and was betting his life on German acting on it. German was as sure it wasn't a lie as he could be with a piece of human feces like Bobo.
Lights slashed through the shadows inside the station wagon and both men hugged the gritty carpet of the floor. An engine rumbled and turned off the feeder street into the narrow lane. The headlights moved past and German peeped over the top of the dropgate to see a battered delivery van move at a crawl. It navigated the gap left between the high-end rides that lined the walks.
German lay on the floor of the Malibu and keyed his radio three times fast. Waited a count of four and keyed it three times slow. That was the signal to the waiting tactical team a few blocks away.
He and Padilla slipped from the far side door of the Malibu away for the view of the van. They crept around to where they could use the car as cover and still see down the street through the station wagon's back windows. German held his Glock in sweaty hands. Padilla cradled a cut-down Remington shotgun.
Down the lane they could see the van stopped fifty yards away. It sat idling in the street with brake lights flaring; the driver's foot nervously tapping the pedal. The van was awash in a glare as a door opened in one of the windowless houses facing the street. Figures moved from the house and German could faintly hear voices in an exchange but couldn't make out any words. The back cargo doors of the van were popped and the men from the house formed a chain to load the contents of the van into the house. Case lots of something. They didn't appear to be heavy.
"Come on, come on," German breathed between clenched teeth. The trucks of the PF strike squad should have been here by now. He fought down the urge to move in himself since all that would result in was getting him and Padilla killed. They were certainly outgunned and they had stripped off their body armor hours ago when they were broiling in the derelict car.
A rapidly growing rumble shook the ground under German's feet and a broad black armored truck veered sideways into view at the base of the T-intersection and, lights strobing, powered down the lane toward the parked van. German and Padilla were up and running with weapons raised. The five-ton truck covered in plate steel plowed toward the van. It side-swiped the custom SUVs on either side driving them against the walls of the close-packed houses and into one another in a riot of screaming metal and showers of sparks. Chrome trim and pebbles of safety glass flew into the air and the quiet of the night was ripped apart by the shriek of multiple car alarms exploding into life.
German sprinted behind the truck as close as he dared. He held the Glock straight-armed before him. Padilla was behind and to his right with the shotgun trained forward in both hands.
Both officers were shouting "pay-effay," PF, over and over. Not as a warning to the stunned gang members backing away from the van, but to their fellow officers to identify which side they were on so as not to get blown away by an eager compadre.
The truck slammed into the idling van with an impact that threw the van slewing forward to wedge itself at an angle between two parked SUVs. Fully armored PF officers burst from hatches all over the truck. An armored gunner manned a machine gun mounted in a turret atop the truck. German raced up to retake command of the operation.
Warning shots are an alien concept to Mexican law enforcement. Automatic fire poured into the gang members caught blinking into the crazed pattern of flashing lights filling the close confines of the lane. Bodies fell to the street and German led his troops over them to the entrance of the house that was receiving the cargo from the van seconds before.
The Pecadores swiftly recovered from their shock. Heavy fire streamed from the home's front door followed by more from second story windows. A PF officer went down, his helmet flying off along with half of his head. Another went down with wounds to the legs and lay rolling and crying out on the cobbled street. The heavy machine gun atop the PF truck opened up with a thunderous roar and the gunner in the turret swept the front of the building creating a dense cloud of brick dust momentarily silencing the gunfire from the windows.
Screaming orders as he ran, German was through the door of the house beside the first tactical officers. The fire of his Glock was lost in the pounding bursts from the M4s beside him. They brought down Pecadores gunmen seeking pitiful cover behind a jumble of furniture in a small entry room. German finished off a young gangbanger not old enough to grow a mustache. A double tap to the chest. The others fell under the hammering of lead from the officers who swept the room before rushing up the stairs to take down the shooters concealed above.
The adrenalin surge of the previous ten seconds drained away and German sat down on the arm of a bullet-riddled sofa spattered with blood and shit. He felt dizzy for a second and shook it off. He'd been awake for more than twenty four hours and the tension and deprivation were telling on him. But the job was only half done now. This was his operation.
He raised his head to listen to the thud of boots and falling bodies above. Flurries of automatic fire that shook plaster from the ceiling. They died away followed by the cough of single pistol shots. The finishing shots. No prisoners in this business. Why bring them in when their caiques would only bail them out that same night and help them vanish across the border to Guatemala or north to the streets of Los Angeles or El Paso.
And then the house was quiet.
German stood and took the arm of one of his sergeants.
"Tell Padilla I need him to help identify some of these bastards."
The sergeant goggled at German from under the brow of his helmet.
"Lieutenant Falto is dead, Capitan," the sergeant said.
"Where?" German asked.
Padilla lay in the street by the ruined van. One of the officers had pulled the tail of Padilla's shirt up to cover his dead eyes. He lay in a pool of blood standing atop the dry dust of the lane. A good man. An honest man. And where would German find his like again in the Mexico of today?
"Capitan?" a corporal spoke from his side.
"Yes?" German said.
"What language is this?" the corporal said and placed something in German's hand.
German looked at a bright rectangular package in orange and blue; a neon yellow logo in a cursive lettering crossed the face of the box. Except for the foreign alphabet it was recognizable as a commercial cold remedy; the same as one might buy in any farmacia. He turned to see that there were many cases spilled from the van bearing the same logo. Thousands of boxes of pseudoephedrine-based antihistamines.
"Arabic," German said. "I think this is Arabic."
CHAPTER FOUR
DOVER AFB, DELAWARE
Pig was waiting in the shade of a hangar when the big C-130 touched down and did the slow taxi to where personnel waited to take away the special passengers. The bird lowered its tail ramp and the process began. It all went smooth and with only a few low spoken orders. These medics and nurses had their share of practice in the past decade of war.
First off the plane were the gurney cases. Guys strapped down with heads secured in neck braces for transit. Some alert. Some knocked cold on meds. Clean linens and blankets protected them from the chilly air and hid their injuries. But it was easy for Pig to see where the covers sagged where limbs should be. One poor bastard was in a body cast from the waist up with his arm stuck in a permanent near-salute supported by a steel bar.
Wheelchairs next. There was a bit of a tussle with a guy who refused to sit down and insisted on walking off the plane. They finally wrestled him down and it was a female Navy corpsman that got him to stop kicking. She put her nose to his and gave him quiet hell through gritted teeth. Jarhead, Pig thought, had to be.
Then the walking wounded. A lot of these guys had no obvious injuries but Pig knew better. They could be headcases. But most probably had the kind of life-altering injuries that meant years of rehab just to get back to a percentage of their former selves. That was almost Pig a few weeks ago.
E-7 Angel Luis Bravos was named "Pig" by a training officer at Coronado for Angel's loving devotion to the Squad Automatic Weapon with the same porcine nickname. He had stepped off a C-130 just like this one maybe a month before. He got himself seriously fucked up in Surinam. He told the pretty nurses at the navy hospital at Chinhae, South Korea that he fell when fast-roping out of a Blackhawk at Abbottabad. He wasn't really injured on the mission to take out Osama Bin Laden. But that was better than telling all those honeys he fell over his own feet to land ass-up in the Borneo jungle.
They pinned him back together there and then shipped him to Ramstein in Germany for rehab and to make sure he got the rest he needed. SEALs hate rest like nature hates a vacuum. He was itching to GO and made the staff's life hell with his eagerness to return to duty so they signed off on him early and shipped him to Dover. He cracked himself out of his own casts and did the rehab thing with another crew of pretty nurses. Pig assured them he'd go slowly. But at night he was up doing lunges and push-ups and pull-ups and running miles in place in his own room in the dark. He needed to cover those broken bones with new muscle to rejoin the team down in Little Creek for the next call-outs.
