Once More to Die

by Jim Johnson

  After all these hours, María Elena would either be already dead or still alive. Most of the time the smart guys would keep their hostages alive as possible trade bait. Tommy fully expected this might happen, and he was equally determined for it not to happen. He wanted to control events, make his entry on his own terms. Though, he noted, he’d sent his message to them telling them he was coming, to expect him.

  He drove away from Weston already tired. He hadn’t slept any that night; and the night before, while memorable with María Elena, had been long, but short on sleep. He grinned to himself; it had been worth the trade off for sleep.

  13 headquarters was so remote, it took him almost an hour and a half to reach the coral access road. The Harley’s tires offered up a grinding hum from the rough and mined coral. He kept the sun visor down and it became splattered with mosquito pulp. When he saw what had to be a lighted and guarded entry into the grounds, he veered to the edge of the road and tossed the duffel of clothes and his laptop backpack behind a pine tree.

  He slowed as he approached the entrance. He saw it had a two man guard shack in the middle of the road. More spotlights were on than you’d ordinarily expect. A security gate arm was down across the road and two men stepped out expectantly. They carried rifles, probably surplus M-16’s he guessed from this far. He decreased his speed much more and idled up to them.

  No, AK-47’s, he corrected himself. No surplus this. He scanned alongside the road as he approached the two sentries. He thought he caught a movement behind the underbrush lining the narrow road.

  He slowed to a stop and kicked the motorcycle into neutral.

  He decided to play on the fact that the Autolinx carrier was designed for carrying a golf bag and assorted clubs therein. In fact its appearance was of a golf bag and clubs.

  The two sentries moved toward him.

  He raised his visor. “Shit, this don’t look like Plantation Country Club Golf Course.”

  “What do you want?” asked the guy with a couple of chevrons.

  “We got an early tee time and I wanted to hit the driving range early to get the kinks out.” Tommy was assessing the situation. He was now certain that there were others, how many he didn’t know, in the brush, hidden and covering him.

  The guy was suspicious.

  “They don’t usually got guns at golf courses,” Tommy said wonderingly. “This ain’t Plantation, is it?”

  “No, sir, maybe you tell us who you are.” The guy’s AK-47 was no longer across his body; it was now casually held in one hand, muzzle pointing toward the roadbed at Tommy’s feet.

  “Jesus,” Tommy said, “is this some secret government installation? I’ll kill that son of a bitch who trick-fucked me into coming here. Shit. I’m gonna send him a telegram his mother died.” Tommy looked around behind him to set up the fact he was going to turn around.

  The chevron guy thought this was funny.

  “Hell, I’m sorry,” said Tommy. “Lemme go someplace and find out where Plantation really is.” He cranked the wheel over and engaged first gear.

  The chevron guard held up his hand and said, “I must check with operations. Do not leave.”

  Tommy engaged the clutch and revved the engine and shrugged at the man telling him he didn’t understand. He reengaged first gear and slowly went forward, turning to the left.

  They were startled. He gave a friendly wave and accelerated. He couldn’t outrun any bullets, so he had to gut it out. He went slowly and started to increase his speed as if normal. While it was still dark, he took a chance and snaked the machine slightly from one side to another. If they had a sharpshooter, he might escape the first shot or the first burst. He kept the RPM’s down so they wouldn’t miss the noise when he killed the engine.

  He continued on past the turn where he’d dumped his gear earlier. He killed the light and turned around. He coasted a hundred yards and got off and pushed the bike to the pines where his gear was hidden. He pushed the Harley out of sight and walked quickly down the road back toward the guard shack.

  He never prayed, but he did now; bringing María Elena’s clothes: would that jinx him. Was it too much to expect?

  He shook his head to clear it and dislodged a few mosquitoes. He’d looked hard for evidence of night vision, or infrared, goggles or glasses or whatever they might have. He’d seen nothing to indicate they had any.

  Once he could see the guard shack, he walked off the road next to the brush and trees lining the road. A quarter mile out, he merged into the jungle. He had to go farther wide than the hidden shooters would be ensconced. Some of the ground was soft and wet forcing him to walk more carefully. He had to decide whether to bypass the security check point altogether or go in and kill them all. The problem was that he was on one side of the road. Likely he could take out those in waiting on this side and then the two out in the open in the sentry shack. But that left any possible troops on the far side that would automatically open fire; if he lived through that, the noise would be a warning to Diego García and a whole lot more troops. Hardcore, well trained troops, not family guys with day jobs. No, he’d better continue on and not start the fight here and handicap himself by warning the whole camp.

  He swung wider and the edge of the swamp became deeper. He was up over his ankles by an inch and thankful he’d laced his boots high and tight. There was a minimum of moonlight, perhaps a quarter, and plenty of stars. While this helped him navigate his way, he’d have preferred rain. Rain would offer much better cover and allow him to move quicker.

  Mosquitoes swarmed around him, but they were attacking a man who’d lived in these conditions for many years, a man who’d walked all over Zaire and Angola under worse conditions. Those mosquitoes had given him malaria. There were worse diseases to be caught over there and he was thankful that malaria was his only one.

  He slung the AR-15 he was carrying over his shoulder and pulled out a pistol with a sound suppressor already attached. Dawn would be here soon and he knew he had to hurry for darkness was his best friend right now. He went as far as he thought necessary and then turned back to the approach road. The quarter moon was gone now and he found it easier to walk alongside the road. When he saw a flicker of lights through the trees and jungle growth, he moved to the cut-back brush maybe ten feet off the road and paralleled the road.

  In a few minutes, his internal night-movement guidance system told him to get away from the road and go through the woods. He did so and found a barely discernable sawgrass patch. He didn’t mind sloshing through ankle deep water and muck because by its nature it precluded most booby-traps and early warning devices. He doubted they had any of those things. After all, they had no ostensible enemies in south Florida, just in Cuba, and this place was merely a training ground with no external threats. However, Tommy believed in the Boy Scout motto: Be Prepared.

  He came out of the water behind a Melaleuca tree, an invasive species from Australia or nearby environs. He ducked under a branch and went around the trunk.

  Dirt and sand made up the ground around the lip of the camp.

  Tommy saw lights on everywhere. Something was going on, obviously. He spotted a jeep slowly cruising the perimeter with a spotlight illuminating the brush. He hurried back to the Melaleuca and stood quietly behind it.

  He was acutely aware that as soon as he was discovered, even if he avoided capture or won a firefight, his mission was over. All García had to do was call out for him to come in by threatening to kill María Elena. The bastard might even bring her out and have her assaulted in the open to draw him in. Don Diego had nothing to lose. Except Tommy was bound and determined the man would lose his life.

  So his plan boiled down to infiltrate silently and, once discovered, make a frenzied attack on the target, keeping them off-balance and on the defensive so they couldn’t use María Elena against him. However, he knew that no plan goes off without a hitch, and he’d have to be prepared to deal with whatever came along.

  He fixed the locations of buildings
in his mind; he certainly didn’t want to end up around the barracks and be discovered there. And there was no reason not to hold María Elena at the headquarters building—if they indeed had her here. Now that was his secret fear: that she was not prisoner here, or had not yet arrived. He shrugged it off, for he had no choice.

  The eastern horizon was showing light as Tommy Atkins began his assault. After the roving patrol had passed, he made his way silently into the compound. He headed obliquely toward what would charitably be called the motor pool: an open Quonset hut with a couple of vehicles inside and several outside. No one was about. He moved through the yard to the other side, grateful for the cover.

  He had little fear of dogs, for to maintain dogs they had to have a permanent cadre. And as watch dogs, out in the swamps and scrublands, there were too many animals which would trigger all-night barking. And no one wants to be awake all night with their dogs barking at rabbits, raccoons, possums, gators, and a thousand other sounds and movements and smells in the night.

  Before he moved past a troop carrier, he surveyed the area. All spotlights were on, pushing back the night. Occasional soldiers passed between buildings and he identified at least two more roving patrols. They were expecting a war?

  Well, they were going to get one.

  Tommy slung the AR-15 over his shoulder displacing a dozen mosquitoes. He drew his silenced pistol.

  He hurried into the repair building and searched around quickly. He found a pack of Pall Malls and a pack of matches which suited him fine. Behind the maintenance building he located the gasoline supply. It was a five hundred or so gallon tank. With a nearby wrench, he loosened the sump drain and gasoline began to flow. He took the demand hose and sprayed gasoline all over the tank itself and around the perimeter. He hoped the acrid smell wouldn’t attract unwanted attention. He filled a bucket with gasoline and poured a trail on the sand and dirt into the building itself. He splashed an area well with the liquid and sat the bucket down. He put two metal folding chairs facing each other in the center of the spilled gasoline. He spread a sheet of the Miami Herald between the two, anchoring each side with a couple of wrenches so that the newspaper page stretched between the two chairs.

  He went away from that area and lighted a Pall Mall. He inserted the unlighted end into the pack of matches and closed the pack. Mentally crossing his fingers, he walked carefully to the chairs and set the matchbook and burning cigarette gently on the newspaper.

  He moved quickly after that, not trusting his homemade bomb to work as he’d designed. He left the motor pool in a hurry. His time was now limited.

  As he prepared to snake his way forward, he scanned his recent memory for anything he’d forgotten. He imagined there was something, but couldn’t come up with it.

  He slithered through the shadows the lighting made between buildings. His breathing was slow and paced. One smaller outbuilding and then he’d be close to headquarters. He hustled to that building and looked around the side of that Quonset toward headquarters. Headquarters was a real building, likely block and siding construction was his guess. He cautioned himself to watch his aim should he engage in a firefight: he didn’t want to shoot through the building and hit María Elena.

  He was conscious of the passage of time. He imagined the Pall Mall burning down swiftly. He did know that if you weren’t dragging on the smoke, it took longer to burn down. Oddly, he wondered what brand of cigarettes Linda Landover smoked. He’d bet the rent money it was an unfiltered brand like Lucky Strikes.

  In front of the headquarters was an open plaza where troops gathered for formal ceremonies and briefings. An empty flagpole stood alone at the top of the parade grounds. Several vehicles slotted into parking in front of the building, and it was well lighted. A soldier left through the front door and nodded to the guards. Tommy wondered about a back door. He figured he barely had time to reconnoiter and turned to go back and around the headquarters to find out. Perhaps a stealth entry would be easier back there instead of out here in the well lighted and very open central plaza.

  He imagined the Pall Mall was now reaching the match heads in the pack and beginning to blaze, sulfur flaring up.

  He turned to retrace his way around this Quonset and saw three soldiers approaching quietly. They were just as surprised as he was that he’d turned and discovered them.

  His silencer spat six times and they went down, the last raising his AK-47. Tommy reloaded quickly.

  They’d known where he was. How?

  They were wearing ubiquitous headsets. So they’d been directed specifically to his location. Again, how? Night vision goggles or equipment wasn’t necessary in the spillover light here.

  The whoop whoop whoop intruder alert of a siren cut through the air. Somebody was watching him.

  What was it that he’d missed?

  He stood up straight and invested the time to look around. He was pretty well covered by the smaller Quonset and if he could see nobody, they couldn’t see him.

  So he looked up and around.

  Over there. A couple of hundred yards. Toward the end of the asphalt paved landing strip. The “control tower.” It wasn’t much, just a series of stairs leading to an enclosed platform. Likely used for monitoring military maneuvers. One man with a good pair of binoculars could survey the entire compound comfortably.

  The old Black Hawk squatted comfortably near the mobile control tower. Tommy thought that chopper might well be on stand-by to carry Diego García and his upper cadre away. Tommy shook his head, he had no time to backtrack and disable the chopper. Too much to do, too little time.

  Troops were beginning to stumble out of the barracks units and the guards on the front of the headquarters stepped to the edge of the landing, weapons at ready.

  Tommy shook his head knowing his mistake might well have killed him and damned María Elena.

  His attempt at a diversion must have failed, for surely by now the pack of matches had burned through the page of newspaper and fallen, sparks and flames, onto the gasoline soaked ground. The spread of flames to the mother gasoline tank would be immediate. But how long would it take for the thing to explode? If it would, that is, for it takes oxygen to mix with the petrol for an explosion to occur.

  That left only one thing to do: he had to attack before they got their act together. Keep them off balance. He reloaded and pocketed his handgun and brought the AR-15 to the ready position. A round was already jacked into the chamber and replaced in the magazine. He flipped the safety off and took off. He wanted to be at a full run before they spied him. He kept low and zeroed in on a van between him and the entrance to headquarters.

  A shout alerted him to the fact that he’d been spotted and he saw more soldiers come out the front. One man pointed at him and raised his rifle to shoot at Tommy. Tommy fired two three-round bursts at the group hoping for a hit, but not counting on it since he was running hard. His shots were closer than he’d thought and the soldiers scattered and dropped. Tommy wished he had some grenades. Next time.

  He slammed into the van and scurried around to the front, leaning quickly over the stubby hood and raking the front landing with a withering fire. He changed magazines quickly and continued. They were beginning to return his fire and several soldiers were gathered somewhere behind him had opened fire raggedly at him.

  Tommy berated himself. One mistake, now he was in an untenable position, caught in a cross fire in between enemy troops. He spared a couple of bursts at the soldiers emerging onto the plaza.

  He took a deep breath preparing to launch a frontal attack when the entire camp lighted up, all darkness swept away in a single giant explosion. Tommy felt the heat as the blast wave swam past him.

  He knew he had only seconds of grace and he sprinted toward the headquarters building, maybe fifty yards ahead. He sprayed the landing with another volley of fire. Someone was paying attention, for an AK-47 opened up and automatic fire crackled the night around him. They were too used to thinking that more is better. If you
depend on automatic you sacrifice aim, not to mention your magazine runs dry immediately. It’s why Tommy always used maximum of three round bursts.

  Another weapon opened up and Tommy felt a stinging sensation along his left forearm. He thought it was a good thing he was right handed. He zigzagged forward and reached the steps to the landing. The glow of the explosion was dying and soldiers were regaining their senses. Tommy fired two bursts and ran out of ammunition. He threw the AR-15 at a camouflaged figure aiming at him. The rifle bounced off the floor and hit the man in the hip.

  By then Tommy had an automatic out and began shooting shooters. Soon there were no more. He swarmed up the stairs and flattened himself against the wall alongside the front doors. Two outer screen doors were closed. The inner wooden double doors were wide open for the night breeze.

  A round clanged off the landing. They were homing in on him. He hoped they thought to be careful, for likely there were more of them inside. Nobody wants to be killed by your fellow soldiers.

  Suddenly, a cackling static came across the camp.

  “Atkins!”

  The public address system. He guessed the speaker was Diego García.

  Another fire flared off in the distance. And, he noted, dawn had exploded and night was no longer an issue to figure in.

  Tommy risked a glance inside and down the hallway. Nothing. Surely once he made his entrance, the place would fill with gunfire. He had no choice. It was about the only thing he could do. They’d expect him to charge right in.

  So he grabbed an AK-47 from a dead 13 soldier on the landing, and hosed off all remaining ammunition in the banana magazine across the plaza where he thought the majority of the enemy were. Then he slammed the butt of the AK-47 through the screen and tossed the rifle down the corridor. It drew immediate fire.

  That’s what they expected, and he didn’t want to disappoint them.

  He whirled, ran, and leaped off the landing, and raced along the side of the headquarters building. A couple of rounds came close, but it was obvious they didn’t want to fire into the headquarters, after all that’s where leadership was.