Reprisal!- The Eagle's Challenge

by Cliff Roberts

  Upon turning the man over, both Alex and Tom were surprised to discover the man was not Hispanic as they had thought, but Arab!

  “What’s going on here?” Alex asked as he looked around cautiously.

  “Shit, that changes a few things,” Tom blurted out quietly. “Ron, what’s the sit-rep?” Tom asked.

  “I’ve got four black SUVs fighting through traffic headed for the golf club. I also have about twenty men slowly sneaking through the neighborhood with AK-47s, and I don’t think they’re the police or one of Garza’s extra support teams,” Ron reported. “This is getting worse.”

  “Okay, we’re going to bug out, and we’ll meet as planned at the van. Then I guess we’ll have to figure this thing out,” Tom commented. “Remember, wait fifteen and then get out of Dodge if we haven’t shown, and we’ll do the same if you’re later than fifteen.”

  “Okay, I’ll cover you. The SUVs on the fairway are either neutralized or the guys have gone off chasing the shooters in the woods. I’ve no idea where Garza has gone, but you don’t know when the idiots in the woods across from you may come back to look for him,” Ron informed Tom as he and Alex trotted back towards the safety of the tall grass and the ditch.

  A moment later, Ron shouted “bingo” over the comlink, and both Alex and Tom dropped to the ground before looking back. They looked just in time to see the lead man of a group of three men dressed as groundskeepers exiting the tree line, falling stiffly to the ground on his face. Then, one after the other, the two other men fell to the ground dead as Ron eliminated the threat.

  “Say, it’s getting awfully busy around here. You might want to hurry things up. I’ll meet you back at the van,” Ron said as he clicked off his comlink.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Hassam left work early for his lunch date with a cute congressional aid from Texas. The young woman was absolutely beautiful. Long blond hair, long legs that went all the way up, pert breasts and an ass that just wouldn’t quit. She was the perfect decadent infidel whore, and Hassam was looking forward to the afternoon he’d be spending in bed with the woman. Sure, he was a bit cocky, but he’d long ago perfected the art of seduction, and he’d never failed to win a woman over in just a few short minutes. He drove into Georgetown where most of the restaurants were crowded with the younger college set. He liked it here because it made it easier for him to blend in, since there were a large number of Middle Eastern students attending the local universities.

  It hadn’t occurred to him that the restaurant where he was meeting the young woman was the same one that he and his late friend, Jason Combs, had met at last year, right after the convention. He’d been able to lure Jason and his boss, the president, into committing treason through bribery. He realized where he was finally as he pulled into the parking lot and noticed how jammed the place was. As he hunted for a parking space, he quickly dismissed any thought of Jason. The fool had caused his own demise. What a waste. Hassam drove around to the back of the building in search of a parking space, finally found one, and pulled in.

  As he stepped from his car, he suddenly realized he wasn’t alone. Three men had stepped out of the maze of cars, or maybe from within the building, and seemed to be encircling him. Lost in thought and searching for a parking space, he hadn’t notice them or much of anything else. Once he did notice them, it was too late to avoid them. So, he stepped right up and confronted them head on.

  The three men were dressed in business suits and were spaced evenly around him, one in front and one on each side, off to an angle so that they could also cut him off if he tried to turn and run. They were all looking at him but not saying a word. For a brief moment, he was concerned for his safety but then decided he really had nothing to fear since he had diplomatic cover. If there was anything of a legal nature these men wanted, they’d have to talk to the embassy. It didn’t occur to him that they might have something illegal in mind.

  “Mr. Saud?” the man in front asked as he stepped forward to within two feet of Hassam, causing Hassam to hesitate and take a step backwards. Hassam looked around at the other two men before he spoke.

  “Yes?” Hassam responded. “Who wants to know?”

  “I need you to follow me, sir,” the man in front stated firmly as he waved his hand towards a van sitting in the aisle a few yards away.

  “I’m sorry, but do I know you?” Hassam asked.

  “It’s this way, sir!” the man stated again, very politely.

  “Look, sport, I don’t think so. I’ve got diplomatic immunity, and I’ve a lunch date. So, if you’d be so kind as to move out of the way—”

  That was as far as Hassam got in his rebuff of the man. The man behind him had shot him with a Taser, which dropped Hassam to the ground where he lay writhing in pain.

  The van pulled alongside the downed Hassam, and the men quickly loaded him into the van before driving off. Before he could recover from the Tasering, the men used flexi-cuffs to bind his hands and feet. Duct tape was then placed across his mouth before putting a dirty, smelly canvas bag over his head, the drawstring drawn tightly around his neck making breathing rather difficult.

  How long he had lain bound in the back of the van, Hassam had no idea. The ride seemed to take several hours, but he had no way of knowing for sure. He just assumed it had been a long time since he was so tired.

  Once the van stopped moving, Hassam was dragged out of the van and sat on a chair, where he bound hand and foot before the smelly bag was removed. Hassam still had no idea where he was. He only knew he was in a room with no windows and single lightbulb dangling from a wire above his head. The rest of the room outside the dim light’s sphere of influence was pitch black.

  Hassam sat silently for several minutes before someone, completely covered head to toe in black, stepped out of the darkness, grabbing the tape on his mouth and quickly yanking it off. Hassam winced as the tape tore away, stinging his skin and pulling out several of his facial hairs since he was in need of a shave.

  “Mr. Saud—” someone spoke from the darkness.

  Hassam cut off the man sharply. “I have diplomatic immunity! I demand to be released immediately! My government will hear of this!” Hassam practically screamed as he tried to take control of the situation.

  “Shut the fuck up!” the voice rudely replied as a hand shot of out the darkness and slapped Hassam hard across the face. Hassam sat quietly, seeing stars, as the voice began again.

  “Mr. Saud, you have been a very bad boy. It seems that you have been providing cash bribes to government officials. Now, I know that this type of thing is acceptable in some parts of the world, but unfortunately for you, it’s not acceptable here in America. We don’t like that sort of thing. So, we’d like to give you a chance to explain why you would do that. You can start by telling us where the money came from and who you gave it to. Do you think you can do this?” the voice asked.

  Hassam sat silently, his eyes darting about the room looking for the person speaking to him. Suddenly, a fist raced out of the darkness and rocked Hassam’s head backwards, drawing blood from his lip and nose, causing him to groan loudly.

  “Did that get your attention? I hope so! We really don’t want to have to get serious about asking these questions. Now, who have you paid, and where did the money come from?” the voice asked again.

  “Fuck you! I have diplomatic immunity! You cannot hold me! I cannot be arrested!” Hassam spat.

  “You’re under the wrong impression, Mr. Saud. We aren’t the police or any other governmental agency. We don’t exist! We’re no one! But we will need to know the answers to our questions, and we will stop at nothing to make sure you tell us and that you tell us the truth.”

  Another fist jumped from the darkness and rocked Hassam to his left, almost knocking him and the chair over.

  Hassam saw stars again. Once he regained some of his faculties, he spit blood in the direction from which the punch had come, only to receive another blow from the opposite direction, this time se
nding him and his chair over onto the floor.

  “We can do this all day, Mr. Saud. Let us know when you’re ready to talk,” the voice concluded just as a foot raced out of the darkness and caught Hassam in the ribs, knocking the wind out of him as he and the chair slammed across the floor, banging his head against the concrete wall. That was when it got worse, a lot worse.

  Hassam was set back up and then rubber hoses began flailing away at him. The hoses struck him in the head, neck, shoulders, stomach and legs. The pain grew in intensity until Hassam cried out, but the beating continued. Then, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Hassam sat quaking with pain, blood running down his face mixed with tears.

  “Mr. Saud? Have you thought of anything you’d like to share?” the voice asked. When Hassam remained silent, the voice asked, “No? Okay then. We’ll move on to the next step. You weren’t hoping to have children someday, were you?” the voice asked menacingly.

  “Fuck you, you infidel dog!” Hassam spat, doing his best to be defiant.

  “Oh, sooo brave and yet, sooo stupid! We don’t want to torture you further, but if that’s your attitude, so be it!” the voice stated firmly.

  From the darkness came two metal poles that slowly closed to where the tips met, and bright sparks arced between them. Hassam could smell the ozone that the spark had burned.

  “Okay, here we go. One crispy critter, coming up!” the voice excitedly shouted as the poles disappeared into the dark once again.

  From the darkness, Hassam heard someone making a weird sound: Daha, daha, daha, daha! a new voice stated over and over. Then the voice that had been talking to him said over the other voice, “Oh, no! The poles are coming!”

  Suddenly, the poles speared out of the darkness and prodded him in the shoulders, causing immense pain to shoot through his body and making his hair to stand on end. Hassam, at the edge of consciousness, heard the men laugh at his spasmodic jerking of his body fueled by the electric shock.

  “That was setting number one. Did that persuade you to be cooperative?” the voice stated without emotion. Hassam shagged in the chair held in place by the straps, struggled to breathe.

  “Kind of stings, doesn’t it? I’ll give you a minute to collect your thoughts, and while you do, we’ll reset the charge to the number two setting,” the voice said. At that moment, someone slapped the back of Hassam’s head very hard with what felt like a metal pipe, causing him to black out.

  Hassam awoke to the acidic aroma of smelling salts, and he quickly realized he was now naked and something sharp was poking him in his scrotum. Then icy cold water suddenly began to pour over him, and he immediately began to feel a tingling in his right foot. The tingling slowly grew into a sharp burning sensation that began to travel up his leg to his groin, where it became excruciating. Hassam cried out in pain only to black out again.

  Waking a second time, Hassam found icy cold water was being poured over him yet again, and he immediately began screaming, which evoked laughter from his captors as they turned on the juice once more. Hassam screamed in agony for several seconds before he again passed out. This went on for what felt like an endless lifetime, until finally the voice told everyone to be quiet. Hassam tried to stop crying but he was unable to. The pain was so intense. It took a hard slap to his face, inflicting more pain, before Hassam managed to quiet himself.

  “Mr. Saud! How good of you to come around again. We weren’t sure if we’re going to have to use adrenaline to revive you. It appears that you and electricity don’t get along very well. Hasn’t anyone ever told you not play with electrical items when you’re sitting in a pool of water? I guess not! I guess they’ve never installed electricity in your homeland,” the voice stated sarcastically as a few chuckles emanated from the dark.

  The laughter stopped as quickly as it began, and the voice began to speak once more. “I’ve been very patient with you, Mr. Saud, but I can only keep my temper under control for so long. You know, your old friend, Mr. Ashrawl, he didn’t last this long. He told us everything and more. He even begged for his life, which I was inclined to spare but Mr. Bascome had the fix in. It seems that Ashrawl had to die because you were afraid he’d talk. Well, I’m sorry to say, you were too late. He had already talked weeks before!” The voice stopped speaking, letting the information sink in.

  “So now that you know that we know, what do you say? Are you ready to tell me what I want to know? Or do I need to turn on the juice again?” Hassam bobbed his head affirmative, and the voice snickered, “Excellent!”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Who the hell were those guys?” Ron exclaimed as he jumped in the back of the van. The team had just witnessed an attempt on the life of Fast Eddie Garza. It had taken place on the same golf course and at the exact same time they had planned to assassinate Garza themselves. The intrusion was an unexpected event, and they were pissed. Not because it happened, but because whoever these clowns were, they had failed to take him out, and now the team’s job had become almost an impossibility.

  “I have no idea,” Tom replied as he slipped into the passenger seat and Alex slipped behind the wheel.

  “They were waiting for Garza, just like we were. They knew Garza’s schedule and his entire security setup,” Alex added, starting the van and driving off down the street through the lazy resort beach town of Boca Bianca, Costa Rica.

  “How did we miss those guys? I know I never saw anyone watching Garza or the villa, other than us,” Ron lamented.

  “Well, it’s too late now to worry about that. What are we going to do next?” Tom asked as they headed back towards the tourist section of town on the coast road.

  “Find someplace to stop near downtown, so we can figure this out,” Ron directed Alex, which caused Tom to give him a look of irritation.

  “Alex, go to the café we had lunch at the other day,” Tom countermanded.

  Ron glared at Tom momentarily before he stated in a huff, “Whatever.”

  Eduardo Garza or Fast Eddie, as international law enforcement referred to him, was a major drug lord. He had operations in six countries including the United States and had made himself a target of Kilauea Corp. Security by joining forces with Al-Qaeda in Central and South America. The attempted assassination had taken place right in the middle of their attempted ambush of him. The interlopers had struck with what should have been overwhelming force, but due to a great deal of extremely poor marksmanship, they had managed to miss Fast Eddie and ruin the team’s opportunity at the same time.

  After a few minutes’ drive time, Alex pulled the van into the parking lot of a small cantina that was located on the edge of the tourist area. It was a local’s hangout, which was exactly what Tom wanted. He wanted to blend in and go unnoticed as they tried to figure out how to get things back on track. Once inside, they picked a corner booth in the back, where they each ordered a beer. They sat silently, each lost in their own thoughts for several minutes as they tried to make sense of what had happened.

  Alex looked around at the other patrons, checking to see if they were paying attention. None of them were. Finally, he whispered, “I can’t tell you where they came from, only that the guy we found on the golf course was not Hispanic. He was an Arab!

  “Arab? Could Azzaam be trying to take out Garza, before Garza took him out?” Ron asked in a soft whisper.

  “We managed to bug him. Maybe Azzaam managed to bug him, too,” Alex suggested, in a quiet voice of his own.

  “If he did, he heard what we heard, and that would make me want to take Garza out as soon as possible,” Tom chimed in.

  “After the fire, didn’t Garza send his number three man after Azzaam?” Alex asked.

  “Yeah, he sent Anastas Soto with some men to find out what the Arabs had been up to and take them out,” Ron recalled.

  “That might explain how the Arabs knew when to hit him on the golf course. Soto got sloppy and got caught. How else would they know to have men waiting on the course, acting as greenskeepers? I t
old you I thought something was wrong! I hadn’t seen any greenskeepers out on the course that late in the day, any of the times I scouted the course. Nor were they even around the course when Garza was playing,” Alex commented defensively.

  “Yeah, you were right, and we should have listened, but that’s water under the bridge now. What are we going to do about Garza?” Tom queried.

  “We’ll need to reacquire him somehow and then wait for another chance to—”

  Ron’s words were cut off by an extremely loud rumbling sound that grew into a solid boom coming from outside the café. It was followed instantly by a strong shock wave, which passed through the café, shaking the dishes on the table and rattling the pictures on the wall. Ron, Tom and Alex each dropped to the floor instinctively. They knew it wasn’t an earthquake or thunder, but an explosion.

  “What the hell was that?” Tom blurted out as he raised his head above the table and looked around the dining room of the small café. The other patrons were all standing and looking out the windows. It appeared that no one else had bothered to duck for cover.

  “Get up!” Tom whispered.

  The three of them quickly stood and began walking towards the door, trying to look casual. Stepping through the door and out into the street, they could see a large cloud of smoke to the northwest in the area known for the resort hotels. They immediately and instinctively knew that the Arabs had bombed the hotel where Garza had moved after the fire at his villa. They quickly jumped in the van and drove off towards the devastated area, unsure what—if anything—they could see or do once they arrived there. They knew they had to try and confirm whether Fast Eddie was dead or alive. They assumed he was dead.

  The tourist area was in chaos when they arrived. The local police hadn’t yet arrived, and a large crowd was already milling about, blocking the streets that led to the bombing site. They managed find a parking space about a half-mile from what they believed was the blast zone, behind a small local grocery store. As they walked towards the resort area, they saw the street fill in behind them with hundreds of people wandering about, coming and going in all directions. Several shops had their windows broken, and the crowd began looting the stores. From where the team was standing, they could see the main looters were kids, probably street gangs, taking advantage of the chaotic situation to go on a crime spree.