Tyranny in the Ashes

by William W. Johnstone

  “I know,” Corporal Beto murmured, keeping an eye on the jungle. “It is muy estupido to say anything against the comandante. A wise man keeps his mouth shut in all matters when you are around him.”

  “Verdad,” Garza replied.

  A moment of silence passed.

  “Tell me, Sergeant . . . what was at the bottom of the hole under the clay pot? It looked like small pieces of gold wrapped in the cloth.”

  “How did you see that?” Garza asked. “You were supposed to be back in the jungle awaiting my command to enter the village.”

  Beto shrugged. “I walked forward to make sure everything was all right after I heard your machine-gun fire. When I saw you dig up the small pouch, I returned to my men.”

  Good, Garza thought, he didn’t see me shoot Lupe and Jose. Garza knew, however, it was still necessary to silence the only witness to what he had done.

  “You think you saw gold?” he asked, letting his right hand slide down near his pistol.

  “I saw something yellow . . . It glittered in the sun when you opened the cloth.”

  “You saw too much,” Garza answered. “You should have been looking the other way.”

  “What do you mean, Sergeant?”

  Garza pulled his weapon. “You saw something gleaming in the sun,” he said. “It was a mistake to be looking at what I took from the cloth.”

  Beto saw Garza lift his pistol, aiming for Beto’s head as the jeep moved over bumpy ground.

  “No, Sergeant!” he cried.

  “But you saw the gold.”

  “No! I saw nothing!”

  Private Corte looked up with both hands gripping the steering wheel . . . He knew something was wrong.

  Felipe knew he would have to kill the driver as well as Beto, since Private Corte had overheard what was being said between them. He’d just have to blame it on the americanos again.

  Garza was tightening his finger on the trigger, when the roar of automatic-weapons fire came from both sides of the jungle road.

  A series of molten bullets ripped through Sergeant Felipe Garza’s chest. He fell back in the seat of the jeep with his mouth full of blood.

  Private Corte was torn out of his seat by the incessant pounding of machine-gun fire as it swept him off the driver’s seat in a hail of lead.

  Corporal Beto fired at the muzzle flashes he saw in the jungle, moving the barrel of his fifty-caliber tripod-mounted weapon back and forth.

  The recoil of the machine gun made his arms tremble, and for a moment he wasn’t sure he’d hit anything.

  Then he felt a stabbing pain in his chest, as if someone had buried a knife below his ribs.

  “Dios!” he cried, his trigger finger locked on the firing mechanism. The hammering sound of machine-gun fire filled the forest.

  Bullets sprayed the jungle canopy above the caravan as more shots came from drivers in the trucks, single bullets fired by pistols and carbines.

  Felipe saw and heard what was happening without being able to lift a finger to help his men. All he could think about were the drums of fuel in the trucks, and the few gold coins in his pocket.

  “Kill them, Beto!” he croaked. “Don’t let them take the gold or the fuel!”

  The jeep sputtered and came to a halt without a driver at the controls.

  “What the hell?” Felipe Garza asked, his chest filled with fiery pain.

  He noticed that the driver’s seat was empty. He cast a glance back at Corporal Beto.

  Beto’s mouth was a fountain of blood. He continued to fire the machine gun.

  “Beto!” Garza shouted. “Kill these sons of bitches before we all are all killed!”

  Corporal Beto’s eyes had a glazed look to them, although he continued to fire into the jungle in a blind way, spraying the treetops with lead.

  “What the fuck are you shooting at?” Garza cried, holding his chest with both hands as if he could stop the crimson blood from leaving his body. “There is no one in the trees!”

  It was then that Garza saw the bloody bullet holes in the front of Corporal Beto’s shirt. Blood leaked down over his belt and into his pants pockets.

  “Keep shooting!” Garza ordered, trying to get up from the seat of the jeep in spite of the pains in his chest and deeper in his belly.

  “I ordered you to shoot, Corporal Beto!” Garza bellowed as more bullets came from the jungle, shattering the windshield he gripped with his right hand.

  A stinging pain entered his right armpit and it slammed him back into the seat of the jeep. For a moment he was stunned by the blow, not knowing what it was.

  He glanced down at his khaki shirt and saw blood streaming from his sleeve. He stared at it for a time, unable to think clearly.

  “They shot me, Beto,” he said. When he saw the front of his shirt, he knew he’d been wounded several times.

  “Drive away from here!” he said, his voice muted by blood crossing his tongue.

  He saw the driver, Private Corte, lying beside the jeep with a bullet hole through his head.

  Garza cast a look at the jungle. Two dark shapes were moving toward him and the precious cargo some of the trucks carried.

  “The gold,” he whispered, losing consciousness.

  His final thoughts were of the coins hidden in his pocket. Then he went to sleep.

  * * *

  Coop and Jersey stood over the bodies strewn about the jungle path. Jersey reached over with her foot and kicked Garza in the mouth. “That’ll teach you to kill innocent women and children, you bastard!” she growled.

  Coop glanced at her. He’d never seen her so furious. “You want to scalp the son of a bitch, too?” he asked.

  She started to give a sarcastic answer, then hesitated, a thoughtful look on her face. “You know, Coop. Every now and then you come up with a pretty good idea, even if it is by accident.”

  Jersey took out her K-Bar and squatted over Garza’s body.

  “Hey, wait a minute, Jersey. I was just kidding . . .”

  She looked up at him. “I’m not.” She bent and with a quick slash of the K-Bar made a circular incision around the top of Garza’s skull, then grabbed his hair and yanked a full scalp lock off in one squishy jerk.

  “Damn!” Coop said, almost gagging at the horrible sight.

  “Listen, Coop,” Jersey said, pausing to wipe her bloody hands on Garza’s shirt. “We’re stuck out here in the middle of a jungle, surrounded by hostiles, with no transportation and no way to ‘phone home.’”

  “We can take one of these . . .” Coop started to say, pointing to the jeeps in the path, until he saw bullet holes in all the hoods and steam coming from each and every motor.

  “Good thought, Sherlock. Wanta try again?” Jersey asked.

  “So, what does that have to do with scalping our enemies?”

  “The only chance we have to survive is to put some fear in our opposition. The more barbaric and crazy we can seem, the fewer men who are going to be willing to come into the jungle after us.”

  “You really think taking a few scalps will scare off men like these?” he asked, pointing to the dead lying around them.

  “Not just scalping, but I have a few more ideas. Remember, I’m part Apache.”

  Coop took a deep breath as he pulled out his own K-Bar. “Okay, Pocahontas, show me the way.”

  FIFTEEN

  Mike Post, Ben’s Chief of Intelligence, entered the office to find Ben and his team waiting for him.

  “I hear there’s been some word from Belize,” Ben said.

  Mike nodded, frowning. “Yes. Unfortunately, it’s not good news.”

  “Let’s have it, Mike.”

  “El Gato Selva, the intermediate between Jersey and Cooper and the assassins, radioed to say the entire mission was a bust. The assassins were killed, but not before they talked. Evidently, they gave away Jersey and Coop’s position and a hit team was sent in to take them out.”

  Ben felt his chest tighten and his mouth go dry at the words. “Do we
know what happened?”

  Mike pulled up a chair and set down. He reached into his coat, pulled out his pipe, and began filling it as he talked. “Our intel is not one-hundred-percent reliable. Jersey and Coop were staying in a small village in the jungle. The hit squad killed six or eight of the villagers and reported back to Perro Loco that they were after two Americans who’d paid the assassins. Later that day, radio contact with the hit squad was lost, so we don’t know what’s gone on since then.”

  Ben leaned back in his chair, a small smile on his face. “I can tell you what happened, Mike. Those soldiers made the mistake of messing with a buzz saw when it was busy cutting wood. Jersey and Coop took the hit team out.”

  “That’s possible, but we won’t know for several hours. This is all happening in a very remote part of the country and communications are difficult because of the mountains.”

  “Well,” Ben said, “I’m not going to wait. I’m going to take a scout team in after Jersey and Coop.”

  “But Ben,” Mike said, “you can’t leave. You’re right in the middle of negotiations between President Otis Warner and Cecil Jeffreys about the peace protocol.”

  “That’s gonna have to wait. Two members of my team are in trouble, and I intend to see that they make it back.”

  Mike fired up his pipe, sending clouds of blue smoke toward the ceiling. “Who’s going with you?”

  Ben nodded his head at Anna, Corrie, and Beth, sitting across the room. “My usual team along with a couple of my best scouts.” He got to his feet. “They’re waiting outside.”

  He crossed the room and opened the door. “Harley, Hammer, come on in.”

  Two men entered the room, each seeming as big as a house. Ben put his hand on the shoulder of a six-foot-four-inch man with blue eyes and red hair in a single braid hanging down to the middle of his back. “This is Harley Reno,” Ben said. “He’s gonna take us in and bring us out. He’s the best scout in the Army.”

  Reno nodded at the team as Ben stepped to the next man. Only marginally smaller than Reno, he stood six feet three inches and had coal-black hair and icy green eyes. “This is Scott ‘Hammer’ Hammerick. He’s our weapons expert, and also happens to be fluent in Spanish and knows Belize like the back of his hand.”

  Hammer stepped forward. “The country we’re gonna be fightin’ in is high mountain jungle. Lots of thick foliage, not too many open spaces. That means we’re gonna make some changes in the weapons you carry. Your M-16s won’t be much use up there, an’ they’re much too heavy to carry up and down mountain passes.”

  He reached down and unslung a small machine gun from the strap over his shoulder. “You women will be carrying these Mini-Uzis. Fully loaded, they weigh only four kilograms, have forty-round detachable box magazines, and can fire six hundred fifty rounds per minute on full automatic.”

  He nodded at Harley, who held out a shotgun with a pistol grip on it. “Ben, you and I and Harley will be carrying the SPAS Model 12. SPAS stands for Special Purpose Automatic Shotgun. It’s twelve-gauge, weighs 4 .2 kilograms, has a seven-shot tubular magazine, and on full automatic can fire two hundred forty rounds per minute.”

  “Wait a minute,” Corrie said. “Don’t shotguns have a very limited range?”

  Hammer shrugged. “Depends. We have a variety of slugs available, from light bird shot to heavy metal slugs that’ll penetrate steel plate at a hundred yards.”

  Corrie nodded and sat back.

  “Now, as far as handguns, the old Colt .45’s are out of date. I prefer the Beretta Model 93R. It fires a 9mm Parabellum bullet, has a twenty-round magazine, and can fire single-shot or in three-shot automatic bursts. On automatic fire, a small lever drops down in front of the trigger guard for the left hand to grab and steady your aim.”

  Anna got to her feet. “This is all well and good, but while we’re standing here talking, Jersey and Coop are in trouble. When are we leaving?”

  Harley Reno smiled at Anna. Evidently, she was his kind of woman—no bullshit, ready for action.

  “As soon as you get suited up and pick up your weapons,” he said. “We’re going to make a HALO drop over the mountains in six hours.”

  “HALO drop?” Corrie asked.

  “High Altitude, Low Opening,” Harley said. “We’ll go out of the plane at ten thousand feet but we won’t open our chutes until we’re a few hundred feet off the ground so we won’t be picked up on radar.”

  “Isn’t that cutting it awfully close?” she asked.

  Harley smiled. “Yeah. A tenth of a second late an’ you’re hamburger.”

  Hammer added, “But don’t worry, the chutes are fitted with automatic pressure gauges that open ’em automatically . . . most of the time.”

  Ben got to his feet. “Okay, team, let’s go. We’re burnin’ daylight and we’ve got an appointment with some friends to keep.”

  Paco Valdez entered the main room of the hacienda to find Perro Loco and Jim Strunk discussing new security arrangements in light of the recent assassination attempt.

  Loco glanced up from a map of the grounds when Paco entered. “What news have you of the squad with the aircraft fuel?”

  Paco shook his head. “There has been no radio contact for some hours now, comandante.”

  Loco slammed his hand down on the desk, making even the imperturbable Jim Strunk jump. “I want to know what is happening, and I want to know it now!”

  “Sí, mi comandante,” Paco answered hastily. “I will have the helicopter fly over the area immediately. The good news is there has been no signs of smoke in that region, indicating the fuel was not exploded.”

  Loco turned to Strunk. “Jaime, go with Paco and make sure that the fuel is found and delivered back here safely. If it is lost, it will seriously delay my offensive against Mexico City.”

  An hour and a half later, Strunk and Paco Valdez climbed out of the helicopter they’d landed in the center of the village where Felipe Garza had been when he’d last made contact. They were followed by fifteen handpicked troops who’d ridden in the big Huey with them.

  Strunk grabbed his AK-47 and led the way down the jungle path, following the tire marks of Garza’s caravan. Valdez strolled at his side, a short-barreled shotgun in his arms loaded with 00–buckshot.

  They’d traveled only two miles when they saw the remains of the convoy. The jeeps were sideways in the trail, crippled by hundreds of bullet holes, motors still smoking and sending up steam.

  “Mary Mother of God,” Paco whispered, and unconsciously crossed himself at the sight of the bodies of Garza and his men.

  Sergeant Felipe Garza had been scalped and was sitting spread-eagled with his arms tied outstretched to a tree. His abdomen was sliced open and his entrails were in a circle around him.

  Corporal Beto was tied down over an army-ant bed and was systematically being eaten by the hungry insects—his eyes and most of his face already gone.

  Another man was strung upside down from a tree, his head only inches above a bed of coals, which was cooking his brains.

  Several of the soldiers with Strunk and Valdez bent over on the trail and vomited on their boots; others just turned their heads, mumbling quiet prayers to themselves as they stared into the surrounding jungle with fear in their eyes, gripping their weapons so hard their knuckles were white.

  “Who would do such a thing?” Valdez asked.

  Strunk gave a lopsided grin of admiration. “Someone who wants to put fear into our troops . . . someone very smart. I’ve done the same thing a time or two, back in Africa when I was with the SAS. It’s very effective if done right.”

  “I will inform the men they are not to discuss what they have seen here,” Valdez said.

  Strunk gave a short laugh. “You can tell ’em anything you want, Paco. They’re still gonna talk about this.”

  “At least they weren’t smart enough to destroy the aircraft fuel,” Paco said.

  Strunk’s face became troubled. “Yeah, that was a mistake.” He shook his hea
d. “I don’t understand why they didn’t . . .”

  “You men,” Paco interrupted, pointing at a group of men standing near the jeeps. “Start unloading the drums of fuel. I will radio for additional trucks to come haul it away while you stand guard.”

  As two of the men walked to the nearest jeep and took hold of a drum, Strunk suddenly said, “Hold it! It’s a trap!”

  He was too late. The men tipped the drum up on one edge to roll it off the jeep, and a hand grenade that had been wedged beneath it popped free, its pin already removed.

  Strunk grabbed Valdez and dived to the ground behind a large banyan tree just as the grenade exploded, igniting the fuel drums in a giant fireball.

  Trees were leveled for a hundred yards and every one of Valdez’s squad was incinerated into ash in a split second of intense heat.

  Strunk woke up a half hour later, blood streaming from both ears and his nose. It took him another twenty minutes to free his legs from the banyan tree trunk where it’d fallen on him and Valdez.

  Paco Valdez was conscious but incoherent, and both men were still deaf from the explosion. By the time they got back to the helicopter, it was almost dark.

  “Loco is going to be very angry,” Paco said in a loud voice so Strunk could hear him.

  Strunk nodded. “We’d better come up with a good explanation for why we didn’t check the fuel drums for booby traps before we tried to move them.”

  “But Señor Strunk, we didn’t try to move the drums,” Paco said with a sly grin as he sleeved blood off his face. “We were about to examine them when one of my clumsy men stumbled over a trip wire and set the explosion off.” He spread his hands, an innocent look on his face. “There was nothing more we could have done.”

  Strunk nodded. “Yeah, that’s the way I remember it, too, Paco.”

  They climbed into the helicopter and the pilot started the engines.

  “I believe I will radio the comandante and tell him the bad news over the air,” Paco said, reaching for the microphone. “I am very much afraid if I tell him in person, he will shoot me before I can make my excuses.”