Never Forsaken

by Michael Anderle

  However, once the team understood they would be working against, who they presumed were the CIA, it caused a few concerns on the part of Darrell and Scott. Gabrielle had no issues with it at all, as one might suspect. She looked over at her to team members, and asked them what their concerns were.

  Darrell looked at her, “We are talking about operating against American interests. I recognize that we might have some bad people from time to time; however, how can we be sure this team is bad?”

  Gabrielle replied, “Why would a simple snatch cause a problem?”

  Scott replied, “It isn’t if we just grab her and bring her to the Polarus that is the problem. The problem occurs if we have to get into an altercation, or a firefight.”

  Ecaterina put her phone down on the table, the noise catching everyone’s attention. She hit the play button and everyone was able to listen to the voice of the contact from the San Jose Police Department. It was obvious she was emotionally disturbed after her meeting with the American. It was hard not to feel empathy for the person behind the voice.

  Gabriele spoke into the quiet, “In my country, not too many decades ago, we had a government who was only successful by hiding the truth. Reporters, both those that are highly valued and those who seek truth make some governments unhappy. These reporters are just as valuable to a people as other agents who might be working for the government in a foreign country. Remember, this is her country, and the United States has no right to hurt a reporter who, may I remind you, told stories about what we did. I am not suggesting the United States is trying to harm her. However, something is going on that causes her to be concerned for her life. All we will be doing is going to pick her up and bring her here, if no one shoots at us, we obviously won’t be shooting at anyone else. However, might I ask what you would be willing to do if someone is shooting at us?”

  The look that came over Darrell and Scott’s face told Gabrielle all she needed to know. Darrell spoke for the both of them, “If someone is shooting at us for a simple taxi ride? I doubt they have our best interests in heart and unfortunately, whether they know it or not, they would not have the world’s best interests at heart. I would, we would, have to defend ourselves.” Scott just nodded his agreement.

  Up until now, Bethany and had stayed quiet. She rapped her knuckles against the table to get everyone’s attention, “Let’s get this out in the open right now. My focus, our focus, is to protect the world. Without the world, it won’t matter if you are from the United States, Germany, Romania, Costa Rica, Russia, China… you get the idea. Unfortunately, we will ruffle feathers. When you ruffle the feathers of really powerful people? They will come after you. We will have issues with some people in the United States. What we will never have, is issues with the people of the United States. I don’t believe that every person in the United States government, or any government across the world, can be said to focus on their people’s best interest. Some will, some won’t. However, we are focused on saving the earth. For now, your fights have been easy. The Forsaken have just been in a different country, or people associated with them. Realize, we will have enemies who have no clue of the UnknownWorld. They will want what we have, they will want TOM’s ship, they will want our technology, they will want me, they will want Frank, they will want my dad, they will want you. Some of those who choose to fight us will believe right is on their side. Unfortunately, I can’t agree with that. There will be people, possibly the President of United States and others, who may decide they are better prepared or possibly consider themselves or their role better positioned to accomplish the effort of saving the world.”

  She paused and looked at them all. “I won’t begin to question how well-meaning they might be. The same way I wouldn’t question how well-meaning China might be, or Russia might be, or Great Britain might be.” As each foreign country was mentioned, the men at the table realized they had introduced their sense of nationalism into the meeting. If the United States held all of the cards, there was no way that Russia, or China would play along. The only possibility to accomplish the efforts quickly, relied on being as neutral as possible. The fact that Bethany Anne, and most of her team, were Americans was already going to be a potential problem for the future.

  John spoke into the quiet, “As for me, Ad Aeternitatem.”

  Eric spoke next, “Ad Aeternitatem.”

  Darrell looked over at Gabrielle, “Sorry.” He looked over at Bethany Anne, “Ad Aeternitatem.”

  It was Scott’s turn; he looked over Gabrielle, “I apologize, Ad Aeternitatem.”

  Dan just nodded his head to Bethany Anne, they had already had this conversation a while back on the tarmac of a small airport in Miami.

  Dan chose to send Gabrielle, Darryl and Scott with Bobcat. Two hours later, after the extended tanks were filled, the team left to fly to San Jose. Ecaterina called the contact to let her know the approximate ETA.

  Constanta, Romania

  Scott was walking off his anger. He had been walking for the last hour and a half; he had a lot of anger. While he wanted to blame this Bethany Anne for Clarita’s death, being honest with himself he realized it was both Clarita’s fault as well as that bastard Adrian. Adrian for killing someone, and Clarita’s for trusting that sick bastard in the first place.

  It was just easier to blame Bethany Anne, than put the blame on a woman who had pulled him out of the depression he had been in for most of his life. He stopped a couple of hundred yards from the house, standing, looking up at the stars trying to make the world right again. He stood there, silent, still working out his issues when he heard the crunching of steps on pebbles, of people walking down a small trail coming in his direction. He turned slightly and crouched down, in case he was outlined against the night sky.

  His hearing was superb. Unfortunately, what he heard was plans to rush Stephen’s home to attack and kill everyone inside. There was a small argument about just ‘blowing the fucking thing apart’ and a scathing retort asking how the original talker would confirm Stephen’s death? What if he was underground? Would the ‘blow it up and let God sort out the remains’ guy like to try and remove all of the rubble to find a door, only to figure out Stephen had left by another route days before?

  Scott had heard enough. He started moving towards the house, staying in a crouch. He managed to get half way back when he moved around a bush and stepped squarely on a branch making a resounding crack. That did it; he was screwed on the sneaking part. He decided that speed was the best choice and took off running for the front door to the home.

  He heard a commotion behind him, some yelling. Well, if nothing else he and his siblings would be able to mount a defense inside the house instead of being caught unawares. Maybe Stephen had a good place to run to and then escape in the house. He was only twenty feet from the door when he heard a rocket go off behind him.

  —

  Stephen could hear someone quickly approaching the house. He stood up and paid attention to the door. Alerted by Stephen’s actions, Claudia and Juan turned to look in the same direction. While Scott should be back sometime soon, they hadn’t expected him to be running for the front door.

  —

  Scott yelled out, certain they could hear him inside, “We are under att…” The rocket propelled grenade hit him square in the back driving him into the front door before exploding, ending his life.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Stephen covered his face as his front door was blown into his house, chunks of debris rained down from the ceiling above. Claudia screamed.

  Stephen became calm, as cold as ice. No one in the UnknownWorld would be attacking him except one of his brothers. Anton would be his first guess, but he wouldn’t count out any of them until he got a name and he would, by God, have a name very soon.

  Ivan came running from the kitchen. Stephen reached over and grabbed Claudia by the arm, pulling her up off of the chair and out of her stupor, he took her to Ivan. “Ivan, please, take Claudia and go down to my bedroom. T
ake her through the door; you know the one I’m talking about, yes?” Ivan nodded his head. “Good, you two step inside and lock it from the inside. You will be safe there until I take care of this.”

  Ivan grabbed Claudia’s hand and gently pulled her in the direction of the stairs going down. She finally caught on to what was happening and became an active participant to quickly leave the first floor for safety.

  Juan and Stephen looked around noticing Scott’s body, in pieces, in his front foyer. Both of them heard rapid steps coming at them. Stephen spoke, “Come with me, we can defend much easier from the kitchen and living room area.” When they arrived in the kitchen, Stephen reached under one of the cabinets and flipped a lock mechanism; he then reached down to open a cabinet door and retrieved a pistol, tossing it to Juan. “These are loaded with silver, and will deliver quite a painful lesson not to intrude. Are you good using that?”

  Juan nodded his head. “I am good using this, and most things you can provide me.” Stephen pulled out two short swords tossing one to Juan.

  “That’s all I have up here; I wasn’t as prepared for a frontal attack as maybe I should have been. When we finish with these ass-hats, I will make sure to rectify that immediately.”

  —

  Bobcat was about half an hour outside of Costa Rica when he received a call from the ship. Gabrielle heard him say “Roger” before he turned around to get her attention. “We have the coordinates for her building; it seems she is concerned about them coming back right now. Additional agents have met up with someone she saw earlier so the decision has been made for her to go up to the roof and we will grab her from there. We have a rope ladder in the back, have the guys set it up in case we need it.”

  Gabrielle passed along the instructions to Darrell and Scott who got busy getting prepared. Fifteen minutes later, Bobcat turned around to get Gabrielle’s attention again, “I just got word we got pinged, they’re going to know we are on our way so this might be a hot landing.” Gabrielle nodded her head in acknowledgment.

  She got Darrell and Scott’s attention, “We will have to pick up our contact off the roof so I don’t want either of you firing any shots at all. I understand you both are fully on the team; however, there is no need to push your feelings on this matter right now. I will handle the situation, understand?” Both men nodded their heads in understanding.

  Gabrielle unhooked her sword belt from behind her back, and set it aside. If she had to move quickly, she doubted the sword was going to be beneficial for this operation. Fortunately, she did not expect to have to behead any Forsaken this time.

  Bobcat noticed they were attracting the attention from those on the street and in buildings below. He hated not knowing how high up their permission for this operation went. If they didn’t have some high level authority to be flying over San Jose, this operation might become pretty dicey, pretty quick.

  —

  Matthew Burnside was frustrated with his job. He and three other agents had been detailed go back to talk with Giannini Oviedo at her apartment and ‘respectfully request’ that she come with them for additional questioning. He wasn’t sure how he could respectfully request anything when four foreign agents showed up at her door, it could be nothing less than intimidating to the woman.

  Five minutes from her apartment building, he received a phone call from the CIA agent in charge. “Burnside here,” he listened intently to the man on the other end of the line. “What do you mean there is a Black Hawk helicopter coming in at us? Who the hell is sending a Black Hawk helicopter… you mean the group from the other week is back?”

  Matthew could feel the eyes of the other agents in the car staring at him as he listened. “Look, we aren’t black operatives here; our job is research and support of information which we then move up the chain. The fact that you’re asking us to do field operations is outside of our normal purview. What the hell do you want me to do against a paramilitary group? Hell no, I will not grab or snatch a woman illegally. Look, you do your job and I will do mine. We will make it work, fine, we are almost there and we will ask her gently to come with us. Yes, I will tell her the other group is coming after her, but that’s all I’ll fucking do. We aren’t going to commit a felony just because you have your panties in a twist about talking to this woman. Yeah, well, bite me.” Matthew stabbed the cancel button on his phone, “Fucking prick.”

  He turned around to the guys in the car, “I’m sure you heard that, but we have the paramilitary group, or who we suspect is them coming after our contact. We need to rush upstairs and persuade her to come with us.” One of the agents in the back asked a question, “What? No, this is not a snatch and grab. I’m not committing any felonies for some dick over in operations. You know as well as I do that if something goes wrong, he would disappear and we would be left holding the bag. So, we do this politely, and we do this legally.” He pointed at a building a block and a half down and on the left, “That’s her building. Park in the first spot you can find and let’s go.”

  —

  They were able to find a place to park a half a block away. As they got out, Matthew noticed two more agents coming from the other direction who met them at the front door to the building. He stared at them, “Who the hell are you?”

  “Backup.” Matthew looked between the two of them neither one offering him any more explanation.

  Matthew shrugged, “Fine, we’ll go get the lady you guys can stay out here.” Matthew’s group went into the building, and he noticed the two agents tagging along at the end. He couldn’t force them to stay behind, so he just ignored the two men and kept going up to her door.

  When he approached the door, he turned around and looked at his team, including the two new guys. “Hey, she is a little bit sensitive about strange men and her apartment why don’t all of you back off fifteen feet?” Matthew noted the two new agents took a few steps back. It was the most he could hope for so he ignored the rest, he turned back around and knocked on her door.

  He got no response. He knocked a little louder this time and waited. Nothing. One of the two agents came up beside him, “Is this the right place?”

  Matthew looked at him in annoyance, “I was just here this morning, yes, this is the right place.”

  The agent took one step back, “Good to know.” He pivoted on his left leg using his right to kick the door on the door jam, the door slamming open.

  “What the hell?” However, there was no one there to yell at, the agent had already entered her apartment. Matthew was pushed aside by the second agent entering the apartment. By the time he and his team got into the apartment the other two agents were walking back from what must’ve been her bedroom.

  “She isn’t here, are you sure she didn’t leave the building?” Matthew at first thought the question was directed at him before the other agent answered the question.

  “We didn’t notice her leaving through the front door, and we have her car staked out as well. So unless she decided to leave by the back door and walk, she is still in the building somewhere.”

  Matthew was watching this byplay when he realized a new noise was coming from outside. He stepped closer to the window and pushed aside the drapes when he recognized the sound, “Guys, we’ve just run out of time, I hear the helicopter approaching.” The two other agents stared at each other for a few seconds as if they were communing telepathically.

  The first one looked at the second one, “Roof?”

  “Roof.” Both men turned, and ran through the front door heading God knows where to get to the roof.

  Charlie, one of his agents looked over at Matthew, “Should we follow them?”

  Matthew sighed, “Probably; however, I’m not too enthusiastic about getting between those two and whoever is flying up above. So, this time it looks like we’re team back-up. Let’s go.” Matthew led his team out of the front door and told Charlie to close it as best he could. They went in the direction of the two previous agents assuming there would be a way to get to t
he roof wherever they ended up.

  —

  Matthew had almost caught up with the agents when they found the right way to get to the roof. In fact, he was behind them only a few feet when they burst through the door to get on the apartment buildings roof.

  The agents turned to look to the left so that was where Matthew looked as soon as he came out of the entryway.

  There was a Black Hawk helicopter dropping a ladder rope and a woman waiting for it at the far edge of the building, maybe sixty feet away. Two huge guys in black and a woman were in the back of the helicopter, it looked like. He flinched as two shots were fired next to him. He noticed one hole in the body of the helicopter.

  He turned and yelled, “What the fuck? You’re shooting at a spec-ops group you idiot!”

  Agent one crouched, “They bleed like the rest of us! Boss said to bring back that woman, and that’s what I intend to do.”