Chapter 6

Posted: March 06, 2007 - 12:23:14 am?

It took a day to arrange, but finally Gabe hooked up with a convoy headed towards Palanquero Air Base, located northwest of Bogotá. Chief Salazar had decided that he and two of his men would ride with the convoy as well, explaining to Gabe that he wanted to "evaluate the performance of the escort troops we trained."

Gabe wasn't buying that story for a minute, but he appreciated Ricky's wanting to help. The trip took all day, but just after dusk, they pulled through the heavily guarded gates of Palanquero Air Base. Palanquero was a very secure installation, because most of the tactical fighter-bombers in the Colombian Air Force were stationed there. Gabe, Ricky and the other men ate supper with some of the soldiers from the battalion the Special Forces guys were training. One of the men was a young soldier named Tomas Vasquez. Gabe was amazed when Salazar told him that he had arranged for Tomas to take a few weeks leave to act as Gabe's guide.

Tomas spoke some English and Gabe spoke decent Spanish, so they had no problems communicating. Tomas seemed to be a conscientious young man. Even better, from Gabe's point of view, Tomas was from a small village on the border between Cundinamarca and Tolima Provinces. Tomas's knowledge of the area in which he thought his children might be held captive was a gigantic bonus, as it freed Gabe from having to ask questions that might draw unwanted attention to himself.

Gabe and Tomas spent the afternoon of the seventh day of his children's captivity finding transportation. They finally settled on a four-wheel drive Ranger pickup truck. The truck's body had seen much better days, but it was mechanically sound, and had a camper shell on it. The truck put a two thousand dollar dent in Gabe's money belt, but he figured it was money well spent.

Gabe and his new guide left Palanquero, and drove south to Tenjo, the small border village that was Tomas's hometown. Gabe agreed to go to Tenjo first, because it was in an area where the FARC was very active. That it allowed Tomas to visit home for the first time in six months was a bonus.

Tomas's parents were extremely happy to have their son home for a visit, and were very cordial toward Gabe. Tomas's mother was a handsome woman in her early forties; his father was a distinguished looking man a few years older. The Vasquezes ran the town's primary bakery. Tomas's younger brother and sister both worked there along with an aunt and cousin. Tomas's mother, Isadora, latched onto the fact that Gabe was single; you could almost see the matchmaking gears turning in her head. At dinner that night, Isadora's twenty-nine year old widowed sister just happened to show up.

Isadora's sister, Selena, was a petite and very pretty woman, barely five feet tall. She was almost as shy as Gabe. Being shy, though, didn't stop them from feeling the electricity that passed between them, when Gabe gently took her proffered hand as they were introduced. Isadora was all smiles when Gabe and Selena went for a walk after supper. Her smile would have been even broader if she had seen them holding hands as they walked around the small town's central piazza.

"I am not usually this forward, Gabriel, but it seems as if I've known you forever already," Selena said softly as they walked along.

Gabe chuckled; it was refreshing to find a woman who considered herself forward for holding hands on the first date.

"I don't get out much, so this is kind of new to me, too. As you said though, I feel very comfortable being with you. I'd really like to spend some time with you, but I don't know how things are going to play out with finding my children."

Selena nodded. She thoroughly understood his feelings, because her husband and son had been innocent bystander victims of a gun battle between FARC and AUC soldiers. She stopped suddenly and turned to face him.

"I believe that I can help you with your search. I know the people in this area from church and the bakery better than Tomas. I also hear all the gossip at the bakery, I will keep my ears open for you."

Gabe gave her a nod and a slow grin.

"It's a deal. Of course, I will have to see you every evening to find out what you learned," he said with a wink.

"Por supuesto, (of course) Gabriel, I too think that would be necessary," she answered with a shy smile.

Commander Zorra was true to her word, as on the seventh day of their captivity, Pete and his sisters were being herded out to the pond with their laundry. Herded was an apt description, because the crew for laundry day was three times the size of bath days. About twenty-five women made the trek with them this day; all were carrying bundles of clothing or washing paraphernalia. Two women carried a large zinc washtub between them, a couple had washboards and more than a few were carrying boxes of laundry soap.

When Pilar came to the cell door to collect Pete and his sisters, she was surprised to find all four of the siblings nude. When she cocked a questioning eyebrow, Pete gave her a little shrug.

"We decided that if half of us had to be nude, all of us would be."

Pilar smiled and shook her head. They were truly a close and loving family, if they were willing to share each other's humiliation. Too bad the Comendadora was busy planning tomorrow night's mission, she would have loved seeing this. Pilar nodded towards Lorena and the other guards to bind and blindfold their captives. Pete looked up in surprise, when Lorena bound his hands in front of him, with a two-foot length of rope between his manacled wrists.

"So that you may help with the washing, we will bind you looser and also place hobbles on your feet. Do not get any ideas of escaping because of it, as we will have double the number of guards today. In fact, if you do not cooperate fully, we will call for more guards and they will all be males."

"No need for that, Captain Ortiz. You will have our complete cooperation," Pete said quickly.

Pilar gave him an appraising look, pleased that he had respectfully addressed her by her rank.

"Very good, Señor. I will take you for your word."

Pete was glad when Lorena lowered the burlap hood over his face. Standing naked in front of a couple of dozen women was about the most embarrassing thing he'd ever done, but he felt it important to stand with his sisters on this. When Katherine suggested they also go naked, he readily agreed, but that agreement had been made when he thought only women who had already seen him naked would be there. To his chagrin, he now found himself the center of attention for a bunch more of them.

During the convoluted trip to the pond, Pete asked Lorena why only women were on the laundry detail. Lorena gave him a tinkling laugh before explaining.

"It is like this, Pedro, we women do the laundry to insure our clothes are washed correctly. We learned from harsh experience that when men were involved, our clothes were soon ruined. So we do the laundry and the men clean the caverns. As a bonus, we get to play in the water and sun an extra day a week. It was a good trade, especially as most of the men don't change clothes that often anyway, and seldom wear anything except their uniforms."

Once they were at the pond, Pete was amazed by the efficient manner in which the women went about doing the laundry of a hundred people. They filled the washtub with the buckets, dumped in a bunch of clothes, and added the soap powder. Two women manned the washboards, others took the washed clothes into the pond to rinse and wring them out, while a third crew carried the clothes to the makeshift clotheslines to dry. The women rotated jobs, so Pete and his sisters got a taste of each duty. It wasn't a big chore for Pete, no matter what his task, because he was the only man among twenty-five naked, giggling and joking women.

One big surprise for Pete was that his sister Stephanie teamed up with Lorena and him. Stephanie seemed much more relaxed around him, and she even joined in on the joking around.

"So Petey, are you going to help bathe us, now that you can use your hands?" she asked with a teasing little smile.

Pete grinned and replied.

"I don't know if I would remember what I was supposed to be doing, once I got my hands on your incredible body."

Stephanie blushed beet red, but surprised him even more with her saucy answer.

"I trust you, Petey. I know you'll stop before you get too carried away."

Pete got over his shock and had to admit that it was a blast frolicking in the pond with Pilar, Katherine, Lorena, Stephanie and a couple of the other women he had just met. One thing about the female guerilla fighters, they were all in good shape, with excellent bodies. They ranged the gamut in looks and stature, but they all seemed to be buff and healthy. It didn't take long for him to sprout a major erection, looking at all that lovely flesh. Of course his hard on became a major topic of conversation among the women, with Lorena having a couple of whispery, giggling asides with some of the more interested of them.

Things were looser and livelier at the pond, because Commander Zorra was not there. Instead, she was in the main chamber of the caverns, giving her patrol order to her subordinate leaders. She had sand brought in from the gorge, and had constructed a sand table, on which she had fashioned a miniature version of the airport. The sand table had rocks on it to represent helicopters and vehicles. She stood beside the sand table with Captain Garza, both his lieutenants, and all four of his sergeants. Zorra started her order.

"My soldiers, we have been given an important mission by the Front Commander. We have been honored with the opportunity to destroy the helicopters that are spraying poison on the crops of our people. Your company will conduct the attack while Bolivar Company stands in reserve. Lieutenant Augustine, your Guerilla will provide security on the main road in front of the airport. You will emplace one squad here to the north and one at this curve in the south. Nothing is to pass towards the airport between the hours of 0200 and 0300. Do you have any questions?"

Augustine studied the sand table and consulted her map, pointing out the locations on the map to Zorra, to show her understanding. Zorra nodded and continued.

"Lieutenant Calderon, your Guerilla will be the assault force. You will pick your five best grenadiers and pair them into three teams with two riflemen. I will fill out the third team. You will assign three of your best men and Sergeant Morales to aid Captain Salazar in neutralizing the gun jeep that patrols the airport perimeter. It is imperative that the jeep be taken out silently, so we can infiltrate the grenadier teams across this large open area to this position."

Zorra drew a line from the perimeter fence to a location about a hundred meters from the helicopters.

"When we reach this position, each team will target a separate helicopter. If the first rocket misses, the second grenadier will take it out. If the first rocket destroys the target, the other grenadier will engage a secondary target. After all six rockets have been fired and the targets destroyed, the teams will exfiltrate back to the fence with Captain Garza's team covering us."

When Zorra finished issuing her order, Sergeant Morales, a grizzled veteran of twenty years in the FARC, whistled his appreciation of her plan.

"Comendadora, your plan is diabolical! The capitalist soldiers will not know what hit them until we are safely back home."

Zorra smiled at the old soldier with genuine fondness. Morales's enthusiastic acceptance of her plan would instill confidence in the other soldiers.

"It will be so if you insure the gun jeep is neutralized. That is the key to our success, my old friend. To help you with that task, I have a few gifts from our comrade Hugo Chavez that I've been saving for just such a mission. I will issue them to you and Captain Garza, so that you can familiarize your troops with them. (note: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has provided weaponry to the FARC.)

"If there are no other questions, go and brief your men. I want every man's weapon and equipment checked twice. We will meet in the protected area at 1700 to start rehearsing."

Salutes were exchanged as the soldiers filed out of the cavern. Zorra was heartened by the cool professionalism of her soldiers as they discussed the mission among themselves, because it showed their confidence in her leadership.

John Riley and Brian Bellows spent the seventh day of the Ballard's captivity in their hotel in Bogotá. The call upon which they were waiting finally came at six in the evening. The caller was Arturo Guzman, the DAS agent.

"Sorry for the delay, Señors," Guzman said, "but it took some time to track down the ticket agent. The couple who abandoned the car at the bus station bought tickets and boarded the bus to the city of Ibaque, the capital of the Tolima Department. I have alerted our office in Ibaque, and faxed them the best photos we have from the surveillance videos from the bus station. I don't hold out much hope of locating them, but Tolima has an active and large FARC presence, so it might be a good place to start your search anyway. I will of course keep after the matter."

Riley agreed with Guzman, anxious to start the search and rescue for real. Guzman provided him with the contact information for the AUC commander in Tolima, but warned Riley he would have to work out his own deal for hiring the man's services.

After the telephone call, Riley, Bellows and the four mercenaries sat down to plan their trip to Ibaque. Tomorrow would be spent obtaining supplies and arranging transportation. They would leave the morning after. Riley called Sean O'Malley and brought him up to speed on events to date.

Pete Ballard received another pleasant surprise when Pilar told his sisters, Darla and Stephanie, they could put on their clothes. Both sisters were thrilled at the privilege, and quickly dressed along with everyone else. It had been an excellent five hours for Pete, even though his throbbing erection received no relief. Of course, it helped that Katherine whispered in his ear that she would take care of that problem later, after they were in bed.

The evening with his sisters was the best they'd spent since the kidnapping, as they laughed and joked about old times. Darla and Stephanie were so happy about having clothes to wear, that they even made light of their captivity. Their cheery mood lasted right through to bedtime.

That night, Darla herself pulled both mattresses together at bedtime, and again put Pete in the middle, this time between her and Stephanie.

"We missed having you close to us, Peter. We don't seem to be able to sleep nearly as well without you now," Darla explained.

Katherine was a little put out by the sleeping arrangements, but held her tongue. She understood her sisters' needs. Pete understood also, and did not lament too badly the opportunity he was missing with Katherine. Besides, it felt good to him to have one of his sisters snuggled up on each side of him, their heads on his shoulders, as he drifted into dreamland.

Waking up for Pete was even more pleasant, because as the fog of sleep faded, he found himself nestled up against a most delightful ass, while his left hand cupped a cantaloupe-sized breast. As he came fully awake, he realized that the wonderful body he was wrapped around belonged to his sister Stephanie. Pete was almost in a panic as he tried to disengage himself from his sister. He was afraid that she'd never trust him again, if she woke up and found him groping her, with his morning wood wedged into the crack of her butt.

As Pete tried to pull himself away, Stephanie grabbed his hand and pushed her butt more firmly against him.

"Don't you dare move, Peter Ballard, I've never felt this comfortable with a man in my entire life," she whispered.

Gabe Ballard woke up at four-thirty in the morning of day eight. He had set his alarm for that early, so he could go to work at the bakery with Tomas and his family. The Vasquez family started baking at five in the morning and opened the bakery doors at six-thirty. They baked until noon then closed up shop from one to four in the afternoon. They were open from four to six in the evening.

Gabe enjoyed working in the bakery and was amazed at the hard work it took to make the loaves of bread and pastries they produced. His arms were leaden by noon from the constant kneading of the thick dough. The work became especially pleasant after seven in the morning, when Selena came in to man the sales counter in the front room. Panadería de Vasquez (Vasquez Bakery) sold fresh bread and pastries over the counter, plus it had a small coffee shop with five tables. Selena was a tiny whirlwind of activity, as she took care of everything by herself.

Of course, Tomas's mother Isadora made sure Gabe was sent to the front often, to deliver product and bus tables. Isadora introduced Gabe as a Canadian friend of Tomas, who was on holiday in Colombia. Gabe was just less than six feet tall, with a slender build, gray eyes and light brown hair. He wasn't movie star handsome, but he had the rugged good looks that most women found attractive. Gabe's presence drew a lot of teasing questions from the women clientele; questions that caused Selena to blush and stammer. Mixed in with the teasing banter were a few seemingly innocuous questions from Selena. Questions such as, "I heard your daughter married a FARC soldier. Where are they living now?" By the end of the day, Gabe had leads on the general location of three FARC units within thirty miles of Tenjo Township.

John Riley and Brian Bellows parted ways on the afternoon of the eighth day, as soon as Riley and his four mercenaries were equipped and armed for the trip south to Ibaque. Bellows was staying in Bogotá to coordinate activities with Arturo Guzman. No one could figure out Guzman's position, but it was obvious that he wielded enormous influence. Riley and his men spent the night at their hotel, with plans for an early morning exodus towards Ibaque.

Commander Zorra spent the morning of day eight rehearsing her soldiers and making sure that her subordinate leaders were prepared for the mission upcoming very early the next morning. One of her first actions was to open the heavy door protecting the special weapons her column had accumulated. Sergeant Morales was with her when she opened the room, acting in his secondary capacity as the unit's armorer. From the weapons locker, Zorra removed two Soviet-made AS 'Val' silenced assault rifles and two VSS 'Vintorez' silenced sniper rifles.

The 'Val' and 'Vintorez' were developed in the 1980s for the Soviet Spetznaz (Special Forces). The weapons were purpose built with the silencer integral to the weapon. The weapons had made their way to the Carlos Sanchez Column from Russia by way of Cuba then Venezuela.

Morales first loaded nine magazines with SP-5 ball ammunition, to use to train Captain Garza and the three members of his team. After the men showed mastery of the simple but accurate weapon, he would load all the magazines with the special, 9x39 millimeter, SP-6 armor piercing, subsonic rounds. The heavy subsonic projectile made the weapon very effective for distances up to two hundred meters, but at distances less than one hundred meters, they were especially lethal.

When Zorra was confident that her troops knew their assignments for the raid, she called a halt to the rehearsals and told the soldiers to get some sleep, because they were in for a long exciting night.

Day eight for Pete and his sisters was a boring day, until Pete asked the guard for a meeting with Commander Zorra. Since Zorra was involved in preparing for the airfield raid, Pilar came to the cell to see what he wanted.

"Captain Ortiz, my sisters and I are bored to tears. Is there anything we can do around the camp to help time pass faster?"

Pilar said she'd check with the Comendadora and get back with him. At lunch, she was finally able to pass Peter's request on to Marta. Marta thought for a minute and then told Pilar to find some duties that would benefit the camp, yet not compromise their security. Since the day-to-day operation of the camp was Pilar's responsibility as the column's executive officer, she had just the jobs for them. One of the jobs involved clearing a side tunnel, and opening up some chambers deeper into the mountain that Commander Zorra wanted ready for future expansion of their unit.

By one in the afternoon, Peter and Stephanie found themselves working with a wheelbarrow and shovels, clearing the detritus from a narrow side tunnel. Darla was assigned to work in the kitchen, and Katherine became Pilar's helper. Pilar split the siblings up, so that it would discourage any of them from trying to escape. She kept the little wild one with her, for selfish reasons of her own.

Pete and Stephanie worked well together, and were soon making a dent in the rubble blocking the tunnel. Pete carefully brought up the subject of early this morning as they worked.

"Stephanie, I apologize for groping you this morning. My body just responded to a beautiful woman in bed with me. I can't say it won't happen again, but I swear I'd never do anything to hurt you."

Stephanie stopped shoveling and turned to face him, a little smile on her cupid bow lips. Her fine, almost platinum blonde hair was in a ponytail that flowed out the back of the baseball cap she'd borrowed from him. She was wearing baggy jeans and a sweatshirt, the usual clothing she wore to hide her charms. Pete thought at that moment she was as adorably cute as it was possible for a woman to be.

"Do you truly think I'm beautiful, Pete?" she asked wistfully.

Pete took off the heavy leather work gloves Pilar had provided them, and gently touched her cheek. Here was the crux of Stephanie's problem; she had always been self-critical about her looks and intellect. When men or boys tried to tell her she was pretty, she thought it was just a line to get into her pants or maul her big breasts. Stephanie was always quick to point out that her face was too round, her hair too fine, her mouth too small, and her nose too big. She also knew she wasn't as gifted mentally as her siblings; it had always been a struggle to keep her grades above a C.

"Listen Stephie, since the day Mom brought you home from the hospital, I have thought you were beautiful inside and out. Nothing has changed, except we're all grown up now," he said with sincere conviction.

Stephanie's smile grew wider, just before she threw her arms around his neck and fused her lips to his. She broke the kiss after a number of seconds, and snuggled into his arms.

"Promise you'll hold me again like you did last night," she said softly.

"Try to stop me," he replied.

Although their passionate kiss had only lasted the briefest of moments, it did not go unnoticed. Pilar had just turned the corner leading into the passageway the siblings were clearing, when she stopped in her tracks. She silently watched them embrace and kiss, before she quietly retreated.

As Pete shoveled the rubble that was clogging the tunnel, the geologist in him started to assert itself. He picked up a couple of intriguing looking rocks and examined them closely. Zorra said that the tunnels and rooms were a played out gold mine and reclaiming other metals from played out mines was Pete's forte. Pete noticed immediately that many of the rocks contained dull gray striations that were characteristic of the platinum group of metals.

Pete bounced the rock in his hand as he thought. He knew that metals from the platinum group were often found when mining for gold, silver, copper and nickel. If this mine played out during the time of the conquistadors, the platinum metals were never recovered. They couldn't have been because technology didn't exist back then to separate the platinum ore from the rock. Stephanie brought Pete back to the present before he could give it any more thought.

"Come on, Petey, stop daydreaming and give me a hand. I don't want to be stuck in that cell again because the commander thinks we are slackers."

At 2100hrs that night, Zorra's raiding patrol started leaving the caverns, using all three exits. They departed in groups of five at a time, and spaced their departures apart by five minutes per exit. The unit linked back up an hour later, at an intermediate rally point (IRP) two miles west of the camp and five miles from the airport. The Guerilla tasked with security on the main road left the IRP at 2230. The main party assault force departed at 2300.

Half an hour after midnight, the assault force entered their objective rally point (ORP) in a small clearing about five hundred meters from the airport fence. Guides from the observation post were waiting at the ORP to lead Zorra and her soldiers to where the raid would jump off. Zorra and Captain Garza checked their radios one final time at the ORP. The radios were small plastic handheld walkie-talkies from an electronics store. Zorra was using cheap little radios, because they were hard to intercept or directionally find, because of their low power and short range. Communications security was a large issue within the FARC, because of the electronic eavesdropping capability of the United States. These particular radios would be used tonight, then destroyed so they would never be used again.

At 0115, both assault teams were in place at the fence that surrounded the airfield. Zorra and the raiding party were at a point along the fence directly across from the helicopters. Garza, Morales and their two soldiers were at the extreme western end of the fence, at the point where the jeep made its u-turn. At 0135, both teams used bolt cutters to breech the bottom of the perimeter chain link fence.

As soon as the gun jeep was headed in the other direction, Captain Garza and his men wriggled through the gap in the fence and concealed themselves under their gille suits, partially submerged in the retention pond that handled water runoff at the end of the airfield. Garza steeled himself and signaled his men to remain completely motionless, as the jeep turned at the opposite end of the field and crept back towards them. The seconds seemed to stretch into hours, as the vulnerable men continued to hug the ground. Finally, the lights of the jeep went by them, and Morales leapt to his feet. Morales's task was to take out the machine gunner. He accomplished the task with two bullets into the man's exposed back.

While Sergeant Morales was concentrating on the gunner, Captain Garza ran into the road and shot the driver. As the driver slumped to the side, the other men dispatched the occupant of the jeep's passenger seat. Garza ran down the slow moving, out of control jeep, jerked the driver's body out of his seat, and jumped into the vehicle. The other men rushed up just as Garza wrestled the jeep to a stop. Morales and the two soldiers stripped the former occupants of the jeep of their weapons and web gear, then dragged them off the road, as Garza made a leisurely u-turn with the jeep.

Morales jumped onto the back of the jeep when it was headed back in the right direction, and took up a position behind the machine gun. One of the other men jumped into the passenger seat, while the last guerilla fighter headed for the fence with the silenced weapons and gillie suits. The entire operation took less than two minutes, and the silenced Russian weapons had been whisper quiet.

Zorra's radio clicked once as the jeep headed in their direction; it was the signal from Garza that he'd accomplished his mission. Zorra sent the first soldier through the opening they'd cut in the wire, and as soon as the jeep passed their location, sending him across the road. Zorra was the last person through the fence, making it just before the jeep u-turned at the opposite end of the fence. She and her fighters hugged the ground until the lights of the jeep passed them again, then sprinted forward. It took four rushes before they were into position a hundred and fifty meters from the helicopters.

Portable lights on twenty-foot tall masts ringing the helipad brightly lighted the helicopters. Only two guards were flanking guard posts around the perimeter of the pad. The lights also lit an area around the helipad out to about one hundred meters. Anything beyond that distance, though, was in total darkness. Zorra used that fact to her advantage, as she deployed her three grenadier teams.

The three teams of grenadiers were spaced about twenty-five meters apart. They were in a prone position in a drainage swale that cut through the open area. Zorra, from her position in the center, signaled the primary grenadiers onto their knees. When she dropped her hand, all three fired simultaneously. Two of the rockets found their mark, as a pair of the helicopters went up in a huge blast of smoke and flame. The third rocket fell short by a couple of feet, and bounced harmlessly under the tail section of the third copter. The secondary grenadier on that team fired his rocket immediately with better results.

Zorra and her troops changed their location as soon as the rockets were airborne, to get away from the lingering gray-blue smoke cloud that was the RPG's signature. From their new location, Zorra sighted in on the fuel truck and sent her rocket flying. She was already moving again before it struck its target. The fuel truck detonated with a ground-shaking explosion, right before the last rocket fired struck the stacks of fifty-five gallon drums of herbicide. The powdered contents of the drums rained down on the carnage, as the guerillas slipped away towards the fence, running at a crouch.

Zorra urged her soldiers on, as the occupants of the tents were starting to fire towards them. This was the dicey part of the mission, but she had planned for it, as suddenly Morales opened up on the soldiers firing at the Comendadora's force, using the captured machine gun. Morales soon had the pursuers running for cover, as he methodically laid down a deadly grazing fire that swept side to side.

Zorra and her team finally made it to the fence and slipped through it. Seconds later, Garza screeched up in the jeep. Sergeant Morales detached the machine gun from its mount, handed the man in the passenger seat two metal cans of ammo he'd found, and jumped to the ground. As soon as the three men from the jeep wriggled through the fence, Zorra made sure she had an accurate accounting of all her troops, then sent them on a circuitous route back to the caverns. As soon as the other small groups had started their exfiltration, Marta reloaded her RPG, shouldered it, and blew the jeep to smithereens.
Joe J & Wet Dream-Girl
Chapter 7