African Firestorm

by Craig Reed

  "Slow, but overwhelming. Mostly, the police here are corrupt or incompetent, but there are a few who are neither. It's the private security forces you have to worry about. SeaStar has a contract with one of the better security companies, but they also have contact within the white power fringe groups. My contacts say that Aswegen uses the white power gangs to watch his warehouses. However, if you can give me until this evening, I can arrange it so that both the police and the security companies are distracted."

  Ilshu shot him a suspicious look. "Distracted? How?"

  "Leave that to me, my friend."

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Capetown, South Africa

  Night had fallen in Capetown, and the darkness fought with the city lights. It was beginning to cool down, but the humidity remained high. The OUTCAST team had set up in the Cape Africa Hotel, waiting until dark before leaving. During the planning, the team had discussed when to make their approaches to both the SeaStar offices and the main warehouse. It had been decided to make both approaches at night. Aswegen maintained a small apartment in the office building, and with the ongoing crisis, he wasn't going anywhere. The warehouses were closed, as the company currently had no ships in port.

  Tanner and Liam reconnoitered both locations in the afternoon, noting the security and surroundings. SeaStar's headquarters was located in a small office complex, next to Nelson Mandela Boulevard, on the edge of the Woodstock district. A mile and a half to the northeast was SeaStar's main warehouse, a large structure less than a mile from the Capetown docks. Once the two were sure of their approach, they returned to the hotel and briefed the rest of the team.

  They also decided that Black Team — Liam, Danielle, and Stephen — would first enter the warehouse and begin accessing SeaStar's internal network. Once that was underway, White Team — Tanner, Naomi, and Dante — would entered SeaStar's offices and question Aswegen, using false INTERPOL credentials. Once the network had been accessed, its contents downloaded, and Aswegen questioned, the team would assess the information and plan their next move.

  White Team sat in a car in a small parking lot three hundred feet from the business complex. The facility consisted of seven buildings clustered closely together, varying in height from four stories to six. The buildings were mostly glass, a mix of blues and gray concrete, with silver accents. The team could see two guards manning a security station at the main entrance. A steel pole barred vehicle entry into the complex. A two-lane street ran in front of the office park entrance, intersecting with the road where the team's car was parked.

  "SeaStar has the entire top floor of building three," Tanner said. He sat behind the steering wheel of the car, a Mitsubishi Pajero Sport 4x4. He stared at the office building through a pair of binoculars. "You can just see the lights from here. There's also a helo pad on the roof, and Aswegen uses a helicopter frequently."

  "I see the lights," Naomi said. She was in the front passenger seat, dressed in a dark pants suit and flat heels. "They must be burning the midnight oil."

  "They're on the hook for three quarters of a billion dollars’ worth of cargo," Dante said from the back seat. "Not to mention facing the wrath of an irate Iranian government. If I was them, I'd be doing the exact same thing."

  "Aswegen may lawyer up on us," Naomi said. "He knows INTERPOL can't do anything to him."

  "That's why I want him off-balance from the start," Tanner replied. "I want Naomi to take the lead as soon as we enter the offices. Aswegen doesn't like aggressive women and likes African blacks even less. You're going to be his worst nightmare."

  Naomi smiled. "I like that plan."

  "Dante and I will back you up and watch out for anyone trying to blindside us. His bodyguards have a tendency to curb-stomp anyone their boss tells them to. Don't draw your pistols unless you see a gun. We're supposed to be INTERPOL — which means we have no power to arrest and no jurisdiction."

  "Which is why you want Nay in full 'Black Bitch' mode," Dante said.

  "Yeah. At worse, it'll keep everyone's attention on us. At best, we might rattle something out of Aswegen we can use."

  There were several clicks in the ear-piece worn by Tanner. "Black to White," Liam said. "We're parking now. No sign of activity."

  "Copy, Black," Tanner replied. "Let us know when you're inside. One out."

  Dante put his hands behind his head and stretched. "The waiting is the hardest part.”

  * * *

  SeaStar’s main warehouse was a large structure, just off Marine Drive. Across a side street, behind a steel girder of a building under construction, Liam scanned the warehouse through night-vision goggles. To the right of the warehouse, near the highway, stacks of empty cargo containers sat like giant building blocks. To the warehouse's left, a dirt-cover lot sat ready for construction. The lower part of the warehouse was brick, while the rest was steel, with the SeaStar logo affixed to the side of the building. Liam could see a pair of red steel doors facing his team. There were a couple of outside lights on, but most of the warehouse was in shadow.

  They had parked their car two streets over, near a small tavern. Wearing Dragonskin armor, weapons and other equipment under long dark coats, they’d snuck into the deserted construction site and settled in to observe. Separated from the street by a thin wire fence with an opening to Liam's left, the construction area was mostly in darkness.

  Danielle's background check on SeaStar's CEO had turned up enough to convince Tanner and Liam not to take chances. Aswegen was an ardent apartheid supporter, though he had muted that opinion publicly since the fall of the old system. But he did have strong ties to local white supremacists gangs, which he used as extra security or when he wanted someone opposing him removed. South African Police Force records, dug out of their system by Danielle, indicated that members of one such group, The National Federation of Free Afrikaans (NFFA) were either listed as security guards or workers in this warehouse. Which is why in addition to their pistols, each team member carried FN P-90 submachine guns and two extra 50-round magazines slung under their coats.

  "One to Two," Tanner whispered, relying on the throat microphone to carry his words to Stephen, who was twenty feet away, to Liam's right.

  "Go for Two," Stephen said.

  "See any activity near those cargo containers?"

  "Negative."

  "Three, you ready?"

  "Yes," Danielle replied. She was five feet behind Liam, in the shadow of a construction generator. "Can we get a move on?"

  "Patience," Liam muttered as he raised his NVGs from his eyes. He and Tanner hadn't see any security cameras when they had looked at the warehouse that afternoon, and saw nothing now to indicate electronic security was in place.

  "All right, we move in ten seconds. Three on my left, Two on my right. The red doors are the target."

  In his head, Liam counted down. When he whispered, "Go," the three headed for the opening in the fence and raced across the street, through a narrow parking lot, and over a low wall. Danielle went left, Stephen went right, both covering their flanks with their P-90s.

  Liam knelt next to the door and looked at it. If this was a combat mission, he would have used a dab of C-4 and blown the lock, but it was a "Sneak and Peek" mission — get in, take a look, and get back out without being noticed — so he had to utilize other methods.

  From a pouch at his waist, he removed a lock pick gun, sometimes called a snap gun. He inserted a thin steel rod into the squarest device's "muzzle," then fed the rod into the lock until it wouldn’t go any further.

  "Ready," he whispered.

  Stephen backed up, moving past Liam until he was next to Danielle, his weapon still pointed to Liam's right.

  "Set," Stephen whispered.

  Liam gripped the door handle with one hand and squeezed the lock pick's trigger with the other, twisting the gun to the left, and pulling on the door handle. The door opened and Stephen stepped up, inserted his foot between the opened door and the jamb. Liam removed the lock pick gun, dropped it
back into its pouch, pulled out his own P-90, and pointed it in the direction Stephen had been covering. He duck-walked back until he was between his teammates.

  "We go on three," he whispered. “One… Two… Three!"

  Stephen used his foot to open the door and stepped inside. Liam followed, staying low. Once inside the building, he swung to the left while Stephen covered the right. A couple of seconds later, Danielle moved between the two, ready to help either teammate.

  Silence and near-darkness greeted them. There was a wall of shelves in front of them, running from left to right. Boxes of all shapes and sizes occupied those shelves, which reached nearly to the ceiling. Only a couple of overhead lights were on, leaving the buildings mostly in shadow.

  Stephen slid his foot over the door jamb, and the door closed silently. Liam held up his NVG. The three pulled down the night-vision goggles each wore, and their vision improved dramatically. The shades of green revealed they were alone.

  "We go right," Liam whispered. "I’m on point, Dani next, Stephen, rear guard. Let's move."

  They moved silently down the row until they reached an intersection of shelves. Liam checked to make sure it was clear, then moved quickly and silently across to the row on the other side. The others followed one at a time.

  They crossed two more intersections without incident. As they approached the third, a round of raucous laughter stopped them. All three knelt and listened.

  " — and the kaffir's looking at me like I have two heads, blood pouring down the side of his face. So, I hit him again on the other side of the head!" More laughter followed, indicating more than two or three people were listening to the speaker.

  Liam dropped prone and slowly leaned out until he could see the source of the conversation. Four rows of shelving down, he could see several folding tables that had been set up in the warehouse's center, which was open enough for the tables to be set up in a "U", the base of the U facing Liam's direction. Seven men, all white Afrikaans dressed in blue shirts and dark pants, sat around the tables. Beer bottles were plentiful, some clustered in groups of six or seven, while others were either by themselves or in smaller groups. Food stacked on plates also occupied the tables, as did empty dishes. Liam's eyes zeroed in on several South African-made Vektor R4 assault rifles leaning against the tables, all within easy reach.

  "Hey, Sledge!" one of the men called out to someone Liam couldn't see. "How much longer are we going to be sitting here? I haven't seen my girl in two days!"

  "Tough," a voice said. A tall, muscular man walked into view. He was dressed like the others, only he had a shaved head and a profile like a rock face. "Die Baas said we stay here until he tells us otherwise. Is that clear?"

  "But Sledge—"

  "Berg," Sledge growled. "Shut up and make a security sweep. Take Carel with you."

  The speaker rose, grabbed his rifle and motioned to another man sitting at the table. "You heard Sledge," he said sharply. "Let's go." The second man got up, grabbed his rifle and followed Berg. The two turned right at the next shelf row and disappeared.

  Liam slowly pulled his head back and looked at the other two members of his team. "Problems."

  Outside SeaStar's offices

  Tanner listed to Liam's description of the extra security at the warehouse. "Can you continue the mission?" he asked.

  "We can get into the offices," Liam replied, "but getting out is going to be a bitch."

  "Okay, so get in," Tanner said. "And after we're done here, we'll move to your location and see if we can arrange a distraction for you to get out."

  "Don't be too long," Liam said. "These guys may be Neanderthals, but they're well-armed Neanderthals and used to violence."

  "Copy that, Black. We'll be there shortly. White out."

  "Maybe we should we abort this mission?" Naomi asked, looking concerned. “That sounded kind of sketchy.”

  Tanner frowned, but before he could answer, there was an explosion in the distance, to the southwest. A few seconds later, another distant explosion occurred, this one to the southeast. As that sound faded, a third boom, from the east and somewhat closer than the others.

  "What the hell?" Naomi looked around, head on a swivel.

  "Thunder?" Dante asked, also glancing about.

  Naomi’s expression now belied true concern. "No, those explosions weren't natural. I think someone just set off some bombs."

  Across the street, both guards left their posts at the gatehouse, surveying their surroundings in an attempt to locate the source of the explosions. A delivery truck appeared on the street from the right, slowing as if it was going to turn into the office park. One of the security guards, one hand on his holster, the other hand up in the universal signal to stop, stepped into the truck's path.

  The vehicle slowed to a stop. The cab doors opened and two men dressed in black leapt out. As the guards tried to draw their pistols, the newcomers raised their own pistols and fired several times, the attached sound suppressors making the shots almost inaudible to the three in the car. The two guards crumpled to the ground at almost the same time.

  Dante’s hand reflexively unsnapped the catch on his pistol’s holster. "Something's going down."

  As one of the intruders dragged the guards' bodies out of the way, the driver ran back to the truck and climbed in. The truck rolled forward to the guardhouse, where the second man entered the gatehouse. The pole barrier was raised and the truck rolled through into the business park.

  "A robbery?" Naomi asked.

  Tanner stared through the binoculars as the truck came to a stop in front of the building housing SeaStar’s offices. The truck's rear door rolled up and half-a-dozen figures in black, each carrying an AK-47 assault rifle, leapt out. A guard stepped out of the building and was cut down by a sustained burst of gunfire.

  Tanner dropped the binoculars and started the SUV. "It isn't a robbery," he said, putting the car into drive.

  "It's a hit!"

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SeaStar Warehouse

  Berg Van Gelder and Carel Hoek had been NFFA members for several years. Both were uneducated, and prone to violence against non-whites or whites who didn't believe in white superiority. Both had served time in prison, though only for a fraction of the crimes they had actually committed.

  Van Gelder was the taller of the two, forty pounds overweight, with a buzz-cut and a face that was best characterized as "piggish" (though no one would say so within his earshot.) Hoek was thin, with close-cut blond hair, and slightly less ugly than Van Gelder.

  They were more than halfway through their "security sweep," which entailed nothing more than walking around the warehouse's interior perimeter, and checking to make sure all the exit doors were locked. Flashlights lit their way, because Die Baas — Aswegen — was a cheap bastard, preferring to save on his electrical bill by not lighting the warehouse unless there was cargo coming in or out.

  "I wonder what has Die Baas so worried," Hoek muttered. "Does he think those kaffir Somalis are going to come down here and take this warehouse?"

  "I don't know," Van Gelder growled. "But he's paying us to make sure no one breaks in here and steals anything."

  "I don't like this, Berg.”

  "You don't have to like it. You just have to do it."

  For a couple of minutes, the only sounds were their footsteps. They reached the northeast corner, but as they turned, they heard a small ringing, like a coin falling onto the concrete floor ahead of them. "What the hell?" Hoek muttered.

  They moved forward slowly, flashlights probing the ground ahead. After a few seconds, the beams picked up something glittering on the floor. They stepped close and Van Gelder bent down and picked it up. He stared at it in the beam of light.

  "It's a Krugerrand!" he said, flipping the gold coin over.

  "How in the hell did it get here?" Hoek asked.

  "I don't know. I—"

  Neither man saw their killers come out of the darkness. A figure in black came up from behin
d each man, placed a hand across their mouths, jerked their heads straight up to expose the neck, and cut each man's throat with a knife before driving the blade into each man's kidney. The dying men struggled, blood gushing from their deep wounds. Their killers dropped them to the floor and watched them die without saying a word.

  Yasir Ilshu stepped out of the darkness and nodded to his men. He reached down, picked up the Krugerrand, and put it into his pocket.

  Without a word, the ICA group moved past the dead guards, their blood glistening in the flashlight's illumination.

  SeaStar Offices

  The 4X4 was already traveling at thirty miles an hour by the time it hit the intersection. By the time it shot past the guardhouse, it was doing forty. Both Dante and Naomi had their pistols, H&K SOCOMs, out and ready. Tanner jammed the shifter into second gear as he turned the wheel. The vehicle began skidding, the rear of the car whipping around in a bootlegger's turn. The vehicle came to a stop ten feet away from the truck.

  "White to Black," Tanner said into his radio. "We have a Condition Omega here!"

  "Do we withdraw?" Liam asked.

  "No, find a way to get to that computer! We can handle it here!"

  All three came out of the Pajero with pistols raised. Two figures in black came charging out of the building, their AK-47s raised to fire, but the OUTCAST operators were quicker, firing several times before either assailant could shoot. Both thugs went down as several .45 slugs slammed into them.

  "Expect trouble, Black," Tanner continued. "I don't think this is a random attack."

  "Copy," Liam returned. "We'll figure out a way."

  Dante quickly checked the truck's cab, while Tanner scoped out the back of the truck and found nothing. Naomi knelt next to the downed guard and checked for a pulse. After several seconds, she shook her head. "He's gone."

  A sudden barrage of multiple sustained bursts of gunfire sent them running into the building. They stopped only long enough to make sure both gunmen were dead, kicking their rifles away from the bodies. Tanner hissed, "Stairs," motioning to a staircase in one corner of the lobby.