Chapter 5
The next day, Mike went to Robert's lawyer and set the legal things in motion that were necessary to settle the estate. The lawyer was not happy when Mike told him that another lawyer would take over from him shortly. Mike decided to sell one of the Suburbans and give the other to a charity when he left for South America. He made arrangements to have the Jeep Wrangler shipped to the Embassy in care of Tyler.
The marina manager called to ask him to pick up the check for the sale of the marina slip and Mike picked it up when he cleaned out his brother's storage shed. The storage shed contained a couple of coolers and some life preservers and an old grill that probably wouldn't work anymore. Mike gathered up everything and threw it in the dumpster at the end of the pier.
A real estate agent that Eve worked with called to ask if Mike was going to sell the house. When he told her that he was going to sell, she offered to buy it from him? She told him that she had always loved the house and the she would have it appraised and they could discuss the price after the appraisal. When he asked if she was interested in the furniture, she hesitated before answering. She told him that her offer would include the furniture; she was pleased that he was willing to sell the furniture with the house. She told him that Robert had had a professional interior decorator do the house and that she wouldn't change a thing. Mike told her that he had to get back to South America in about three months and the real estate agent told him that would work out fine with her plans.
The days started with the three men running at a local high school track at six o'clock in the morning. Ben and Chico kept well ahead of him and often lapped him several times. After their morning run, they would go to the gym in the basement and work out for a couple of hours. A postal vehicle delivered intelligence updates daily. The vehicle never made any other stops on the street and all of the briefings were delivered without postage.
After the second week they started to use a farm that Ben had found. The farm had been abandoned for years and he rented the farm at a much higher rent than was normal for that area. The bank snapped at the chance to have some money coming in on the farm. All of the buildings on the farm were falling down and the only well had caved in. No one knew where the septic system was. The three men started practicing hand-to-hand combat, tracking and explosives use. A range was set up at the far end of the farm for target practice.
Since the farm was forty-five miles from the house, they decided to spend Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the farm to practice and get ready for the mission. Jake had sent the Navy accountant and lawyer over to the house and they were taking care of the nuts and bolts of settling the estate. The accountant had suggested several investments for the money but Mike had resisted and insisted that the estate be liquidated and that all of the money be put into a Bahaman bank. He had the lawyer draw up a will leaving everything to the Widows and Orphans Fund that Delta Force had set up many years ago.
Ben and Chico had followed Mike in their truck and had brought all of the goodies that he had to learn how to use to the farm. They trained by running the fields and woods every day and Mike was getting better as the day that they had to leave got closer. He knew that he would never be able to match their physical conditioning because of his age. Ten years made a lot of difference. His leg also held him back a little, but he forced himself to ignore the pain as much as possible. He didn't think that his old injury would endanger the mission any.
They practiced tracking in the woods with the Palm Pilot/GPS system and he found that it was relatively simple for him to master. One morning he was supposed to locate them using the system and, when he got to the place that they were supposed to be, he couldn't find them. He looked for about a half an hour and still couldn't find them. He checked make sure that the GPS system was working. He leaned against a tree exasperated. He knew that they had to be somewhere around. Suddenly they stood up about fifteen feet from him. They were both wearing ghilly suits and had blended into the woods so well that, several times, he had almost stepped on them. The ghilly suites were a vast improvement over what he had when he was a Delta. They had been perfected for snipers and the suits could be made to match the type of environment that the sniper was in. The ghilly suit effectively broke up the outline of the man and made him almost invisible. There were recorded instances where a sniper was stepped on by the "bad guys" and was not discovered.
Ben and Chico instructed him on the latest land mines in use and how to detect and avoid them. Some of the plastic mines were almost impossible to detect if you didn't know what to look for. Ben told him that they would be carrying no land mines in with them, but they didn't know if the drug dealers had any around their camp and that it was best to be prepared.
They spent an entire day on how to protect your base camp. Chico instructed him on how to use the detectors that would be placed around the camp to warn them of approaching enemy soldiers. The detectors had to be placed far enough away to give them time to react and set up a defense.
"They're pretty good. They have a limited ability to distinguish between a man and an animal. It will indicate that the target is probably a man or probably an animal, but it's for you to check and make sure," he warned.
Ben pulled out a small plastic case, "This is a radio signal generator. It sends out radio signals on all of the known frequencies that are used to set off explosives by remote control. This is fun sometimes. We set off the target's explosives for them and then just sit tight. They check around, waiting for someone to attack them, and then decide that one of their own people made a mistake and they go on about their business. After they relax we go in and kill them."
They practiced stealth movements whenever they could. Mike was never able to catch Ben or Chico before they were close enough to kill him. They were both that good. Mike's old training began to come back to him. He learned to rely on his instincts and to be totally aware of all that went on around him. He learned to listen to every sound around him, the changes in the scents of the breezes that blew past him and the actions or inactions of birds and other animals. He knew if someone had been in the woods recently and had a good idea of how long ago they had been there.
Ben announced one morning that they had to practice the high altitude jumps the next day so they'd better drive to the air base that night. Mike got a strange sensation in his throat. He had never liked jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. He also didn't like the high altitude jumps. It was cold at the altitudes that were common with SEALS and Delta. Even on a summer day there was a chance of freezing to death if you didn't have a high altitude jump suit.
The next day they jumped out at eight thousand feet and floated down on the new parachutes to the farm. They drifted ten miles from where they had jumped. Mike was glad to be back on the ground and told them so.
"Hell, that ain't nothing man. Wait until tonight. We'll do it at night. It gets better at night, nobody can see us," Chico laughed as he watched the air force truck coming to pick them up to get them ready for the night jump.
They spent the afternoon going over the use of the instruments that they would use on the night jump. Mike asked why they had to practice night jumps, couldn't they go in by land. Ben and Chico looked at each other and grinned at him.
The night jump went well. Ben and Chico kept close enough to him to be able to cry out if he got into trouble. The weather was clear and the moon gave them a little light to maneuver by. Mike knew that SEALS jumped at night in any kind of weather. When they practiced hand-to-hand combat his age really showed. He was no match against the pair and all of them knew it. He knew that wouldn't be too big of an obstacle because they were sure the drug dealers didn't work out and practice hand-to-hand combat.
Ben was the sniper in the crew and he made sure that Mike got training on the new sniper weapon so that he would have a chance to avenge his brother. Mike had not lost his touch on weapons. He found that he was better than Ben.
Ben handed him a wicked looking rifle, "We'll be taking this in with us for sniping. It's the EDM Windrunner. It's one of the best sniping weapons around. We use these bullets. They're the ExtremeShock Anti-Terrorist round."
When he saw Mike examining the scope he said, "The Germans still make the best optics. We use the Zeiss scope on our sniper gear."
Mike looked at the bullet. The point had a star-faced pattern and was jacketed.
"They fragment when they hit the target. They have a lot better control under combat conditions. There's a reduced risk that they'll go through the target and ricochet around and hurt some friendlies. They make a pretty big hole in your target. The target usually is out of it after being hit with one of these."
Ben handed Mike a watch. It looked like any ordinary chronograph wristwatch with a plastic case and band. It had a quartz movement and was a stopwatch and showed day and date.
"This button on the side, don't push it except in an emergency. Normally the watch sends out a signal, randomly between eleven and eighteen minutes, so that you can be located during the mission. With the random sequence of signals, it's harder for the bad guys to pick up your signal. Washington likes to know how we're spending their money. If you push that button on the side, it sends out a beep every second until you're rescued and it's easier for the bad guys to find you too. I don't have to remind you that there will be no rescue from this mission."
They instructed Mike on the use of the new plastic explosives. He found that it was much more powerful than the C4 he was used to. Ben reviewed the tricks that special ops had used for years, like rolling the plastic explosive into a ball with many small round stones, nails or nuts packed inside it. When the explosive went off, the bad guys thought that many bullets had hit them and their friends and that there were a lot of special ops in the bushes shooting at them.
They reviewed how to conduct war, using things commonly found in the vicinity of the target. The average person would be amazed at what could become a lethal weapon in the hands of a professional. Ben reviewed the intell for them on what was on the base at Guevara's camp that they might be able to use to their advantage.
Ben and Chico both briefed Mike extensively on the Iranian subs that might be at the drug dealer's base. The big sticking point was that no one knew who was operating the subs, if they were there. If the subs were there, if would take a sizable crew to operate them, where were the personnel being housed? What should be done if the Russians or Iranians were operating the subs for the drug dealers? Ben and Chico didn't know. They were told to play it by ear. Mike didn't like that. He had seen men being hung up to dry by the military brass after everything went bad. Military brass had a habit of running around with their hands covering their asses.
One morning a car came to the house and dropped off a package for Ben. He read the contents and handed the papers to Chico.
"It looks like we go in one week. We'll fly down separately and meet on your boat at night and make the final preparations. Jake says that your boat is ready and that you're to pick it up and take it to Casasantanas and find a spot for it there. We'll have more intell and final instructions after we rendezvous on your boat."
Mike took the final days to clear up the last few things with the Navy lawyer and accountant. He left the lawyer with the power of attorney to settle the rest of the estate and settle on the house and then made preparations to fly back to South America. Ben and Chico would leave separately after he was gone.
Ben made a few phone calls and announced the military would sweep the farm so that no one would know what had been happening there. The farm had been rented for a year so Mother Nature would have time to erase whatever the military didn't catch.
The last night together they broke out the Bourbon and each took one drink and toasted the mission.
"Sergeant, You do realize that our mission is the primary mission. We cannot allow your mission to interfere with ours."
Mike nodded his head and they downed their drinks and put the bottle away. He knew what Ben had told him. They would kill him and leave his body in the jungle if he jeopardized their mission.
The next day he went to the closest church and handed them the title
for the suburban and told them to raffle it off for whatever money they
could get and use it for whatever they felt they needed. He got all of
the information that he would need to access his Bahaman bank account
and made sure that he could access it on-line.