Piranha Assignment

by Austin Camacho

  “Now for the fun part,” she said.

  “You got any slack in that jacket?” Morgan asked.

  “A little. Unlike yourself, I was awake when they were putting it on me, so I expanded my chest as much as I could. Now’s when we find out how much of an escape artist I am. How’s this thing attached in back? They’re not all the same.”

  “It looks like there’s straps at the ends of the sleeves,” Morgan said. “They kind of buckle together. Tricky using two hands, I’d guess. Impossible with your teeth.”

  Felicity only nodded and laid back with her knees up. Morgan smiled at Barton. Barton did not mirror his confidence. Felicity didn’t take it personally. Barton didn’t know her nearly as well.

  Slowly she began to roll from left to right. At the apex of each roll there was a short pause and a rather unladylike grunt. When she had gained sufficient give in the jacket, she started pushing herself around the floor head first. She had to keep her behind slightly raised to avoid pulling the skirt back down.

  It felt like forever, but six minutes after starting, Felicity stood up. The crossed sleeves were now wrapped around her hips instead of her waist. Strain showed on her face and she was dripping with perspiration. Her eyes seemed glazed over when she said “Going to have to pop one” to herself.

  “Point your feet back,” Felicity said in a distant tone. Morgan didn’t realize who she was talking to until she stepped over and he found himself staring into the crotch of her bikini panties.

  Felicity lowered herself until she was seated on her partner’s booted ankles. A tight smile showed she understood the absurdity of her position.

  “What are you doing,” Morgan asked, “besides giving Chuck here one hell of a show?”

  “I’m hooking these damned sleeves on your toes,” she answered. She felt a slight blush on her cheeks, even at this tense moment. “Then I’ll be pushing off from your chest. I’ve got this jacket loose enough to slide the sleeves past my hips.”

  “You can’t do it,” Morgan said with a grimace. “It’s too tight.”

  “I can do it. I’ll just have to be letting one of my shoulders come out of the socket.”

  “You’ve done this before?” Morgan asked.

  “A couple of times.”

  Their eyes met, his filled with sympathy, hers with determination. She accepted his caring and support without a word, never losing eye contact. She braced the balls of her bare feet against Morgan’s pectorals, drawing strength from him through his eyes all the while. A deep breath. A second. Then she thrust with her smooth strong legs and her hips slid over his feet. She released one strangled cry through clenched teeth as her behind hit the floor. Panting now, she rolled onto her side and slipped the long loop of sleeve down over her legs. With the sleeves now in front of her, she could breathe deeply.

  “Get it back in,” Morgan said. “Right now! The sooner the better.”

  Only a little dizzy, Felicity stood up. She propped her left hand on the back of a chair, clenched her teeth and dropped to her knees. The pop of her shoulder joint filled the room. She bit her lip and clamped her eyes tight against tears trying to get out. Then she looked up. Her face reflected a faint embarrassment, not that tears under these circumstances could be any reason for shame, even facing these two adventurers. Still, she needed to see their reactions.

  Barton sat turned away. He would not, or could not, watch her in pain. Good. Morgan wore the confident smile of a fan quietly cheering his team on. Rising, she approximated a salute with her hands still tied together. Then she stepped into the chair and up onto a card table. She swung her buckled sleeves up over one hooked arm of the chandelier. She stepped off the table to hang in empty air.

  Getting her chin past the straight jacket’s collar required some squirming. Once that was done, it took less than a minute of wiggling for Felicity to slide free of the garment. She landed lightly, facing her two man audience. Her dress remained in the straight jacket, leaving her standing in bra and panties. Her entire body shined with sweat. Her left shoulder was slightly swollen. Angry welts stood out at her waist and rib cage, abrasions from struggling against the stiff canvas jacket. Her hair was a matted thatch hanging at her back.

  “You’ve never looked lovelier,” Barton said.

  “Bravo,” Morgan said. “Wish I could do that.”

  “Praise for my abilities wins out over praise for my appearance,” Felicity said. She pushed Morgan forward and set to work on his jacket’s buckles and straps. She felt better, but not much. They were free, but free in the enemy headquarters inside a vast enemy compound.

  From here, she thought, it should get interesting.

  -29-

  The trio divided for a fast but quiet reconnaissance. They reunited after determining that big house was empty except for them. They stood in the front hall, stretching their stiff joints. In the stillness, time seemed to freeze, even though they all knew it was woefully short. Felicity paced the hardwood floor, eyes flashing in all directions.

  “Well, how do we play it?” she asked Morgan.

  “Wait a minute,” Barton said, looking puzzled. “I had the idea you were in charge.”

  “Hey, we each do what we do best,” Felicity said. “I do escapes but this is a tactical problem. Morgan’s element.”

  “Thanks,” Morgan said, putting his hands into his hip pockets. “I don’t think we can stop this nut and his whole army. But we’ve got to hope we can slow him down. Chuck, how’s your woodcraft?”

  “I’m pretty good outdoors,” he answered. “Wish I had a gun.”

  “Don’t need one,” Morgan said, walking over to the stairs. “Wish I knew how much time we’ve got. But I don’t. Best bet is for you to get to the kitchen, grab a couple of knives, and disappear out the back way. Try to get to some help. Bring the Panamanian Defense Force and the CIA if you can. We might have soldiers, sailors or Marines doing black ops in Colombia or Costa Rica who can get here quick.”

  “And you?”

  “We stay here,” Morgan said. “We harass, sabotage and delay until you get back with bigger guns.”

  “Guess I better get going then.” Barton reached out, grabbed Felicity’s arm, pulled her close and gave her a quick peck on the lips. “One for luck,” he said, then ran for the kitchen.

  “You get upstairs and dress,” Morgan told Felicity. “I’ll watch the door. When you come down I’ll change. Then we’ll grab some food and hit the woods.”

  “I’m gone,” Felicity said. She took the stairs in pairs and disappeared.

  Morgan leaned against the wall next to the front door’s hinges, scowling. Who were they kidding? He figured Bastidas’ force at nearly a hundred well armed sailors and security personnel. They knew the area better and were highly motivated. Plus there was Herrera, the most dangerous animal in the jungle. What chance did they have? How Morgan wished for one good squad of seasoned mercs.

  A danger signal crawled up the back of Morgan’s neck and he braced himself, praying it was Bastidas approaching. Seconds later the doorknob twisted and the door opened. A guard walked in, probably on some mundane errand. He just had time to see Morgan out the corner of his eye before the edge of Morgan’s right hand chopped into his throat.

  The man fell forward into Morgan’s arms. He was already dead. With a hundred to one odds, this was no time to be gentle.

  A shocked cry came from just outside. Another man stood in front of the door, trying to free his sidearm from its holster, and he wasn’t alone. Morgan flipped the dead man back into his friend. As they went down in a heap there was a blast, and a bullet smacked the wall five inches from Morgan’s arm.

  “Time’s up,” Morgan said, sprinting for the stairs. He went up the steps three at a time, with what sounded like a pack of gun toting wolves at his heels.

  Felicity stepped out of her room and started down the stairs. She wore black leotards, tights, boots and her modified carpenter’s belt of burglar tools. She had moved down most of a
flight of steps when she heard feet thumping toward her. On the second floor landing she came face to face with Morgan. She froze on seeing him, but his pace never slacked.

  “Disappear,” Morgan shouted as he ran past. “East of the motor pool.” Gunfire followed him. Felicity darted into the nearest room. The sound of pistol fire approached and went past, too many shots to count. They did not know she was there. She threw open a window and looked down. No one outside.

  “Guess these boys don’t know who they’re dealing with,” she said to herself. If climbing up to Morgan’s room had been a little challenging, scaling down was a snap. Felicity’s crepe soled boots gave her plenty of traction. She was on the ground in two minutes, running for the motor pool, leaving the action behind. She felt no doubt that Morgan would escape the house, just as she had. Her job was reaching the meeting point unseen.

  Morgan just managed to get his room door locked before his pursuers reached the fourth floor. He probably had thirty seconds to prepare his surprise. He grabbed the wooden case. Then he flipped the bed so it stood on edge, facing the desk, standing parallel to the door and to one side. He flipped the case open and grabbed some of the contents. With smooth practiced movements he popped cartridges into a magazine. A shoulder hit the door. The magazine slid into its well. The door shuddered under a second impact. Morgan slid behind the bed. His mouth formed a grim line.

  The door burst open and Morgan fired. The room rocked with the blast and the intruder flew back into the hall. He missed his Hi-power, but the forty-four caliber Desert Eagle caused more enemy hesitation than the nine millimeter ever could. No one returned fire for a full minute. Perhaps they got a look at the exit wound the world’s most powerful automatic pistol caused. During the pause Morgan slipped on his shoulder rig and grabbed his boot knives.

  At that moment Morgan was in his element. He was as at home in a firefight as a street kid in a gang war. He waited calmly for his pursuers to regain their nerve.

  Gunfire poured into the room, but in order to hit Morgan someone would have to show himself. He waited in silence until the shooting slowed. A Latin face poked into the room. Morgan blew it off. Then he leaped to the door. The men in the hall had no cover and looked astonished to see a face sticking out of the besieged room. Morgan was able to shoot two more men before anyone recovered his senses.

  Morgan was behind his cover before another barrage began. He figured he could sit there for half an hour, cutting down their numbers until they let him shoot his way out.

  A hero dived into the room and put two rounds into the mattress before Morgan slammed him against the wall with a well placed bullet. The dead man’s face stared at him in frozen fear. Morgan’s ears were ringing from the hammering his own gun was giving them. Gunpowder smoke stung his eyes. It was like old times.

  Suddenly, six guns opened up at once, deafening Morgan and throwing splinters all over the room. A small cylinder rolled in the door. Morgan had not expected tear gas. The CS grenade popped and he dived for the window, throwing it open. He was four flights up and out of options. He fired once behind himself. There was a satisfying yelp of pain and some Spanish profanity. Then he jumped.

  On a Hollywood set, dropping onto an inflated air bag or a stack of cardboard cartons, he had learned the weightless feeling was no different from skydiving. He rolled forward slowly, timing his drop so he would land on his back.

  Morgan’s window was above the mud bog behind the building. He landed spread-eagled on his back. The smack of impact jarred his skeleton, rattled his teeth, and forced the air from his lungs. The mud smelled like untreated sewage, but it was better than the gas that must by now have filled his room.

  Morgan rolled to his feet and ran for the tree line while assessing his position. It could be lots worse. The group in the house would not follow through that window. In fact, they might not even know he had escaped for several minutes. By the time they got downstairs he would be long gone.

  He saw no sign that the guards had raised a general alarm. Everyone else must have been busy preparing The Piranha, readying cargo at the motor pool or guarding the perimeter. And he had already begun his war of attrition. The seven corpses in the house might make other pursuers hesitate if ordered to search for him in the jungle.

  On the other hand it was broad daylight and he had no food and nowhere to go but the jungle. With no time to prepare for his exit, he had only grabbed one extra magazine. Without more ammunition, he had eight shots, plus the two in his gun now. Not much firepower against ninety odd guns. But maybe, if they came after him in the deep woods, he could get a few without firing a shot. He would trust his hands and knives there.

  Herrera worked steadily while he watched Bastidas, standing on his white Land Rover’s hood, directing the cargo loading and grinning his oversized, crooked grin. Every man in that motor pool knew just what to do, but appearing to direct them satisfied Bastidas’ ego. Herrerea felt he had earned the right. His years of plotting, planning and pretending were coming to delicious fruition and he wanted to be fully involved, even with the smallest details. Not all this gear was strictly needed, but only he and Herrera knew that. The Piranha had to give all the signs of preparation for an extensive trip when the “accident” happened.

  Herrera wandered among the trucks, helping with some of the heavier supplies. He stopped in mid-lift when a Jeep skidded to a halt at the motor pool gate. A lone worker jumped out and scrambled in, running to Bastidas. He babbled hysterically. Bastidas jumped down from the truck and backhanded him. Herrera sprang to his boss’ side. Bastidas spoke without preamble.

  “The Yankees have escaped. Take some men. Take all the men. Comb the woods. Find them. Now!”

  “Captain, please.” Herrera looked down like a schoolboy contradicting a teacher. “You are a genius, but I know this jungle. And I know these people.”

  “What are you saying?” Bastidas asked, closing his eyes and fighting for control.

  “Captain, forgive me but you have underestimated these people. The hunt through the city taught me to respect the girl. We sent Varilla to take care of Stark. He didn’t come back. Now they have escaped from straight jackets. If we send men into these deep woods after them they will die, one by one.”

  “Are you saying we should let them go?”

  “No, Captain, but we must be smart. Let the men finish their work. Give me ten men as beaters. We can find them in the copter, direct the beaters and let my guards, the beasts, do the dirty work.”

  “Can we spare the fuel?” Bastidas asked in a lowered voice. “That copter is our only way off The Piranha. We must be able to reach the shore or we’ll die with the crew.”

  “I’ve figured the fuel very carefully, with a good safety margin,” Herrera said, smiling under the long mustache. “There is no danger. And this way you can watch the end.”

  A vine snatched at Morgan’s arm and he yanked free. Yesterday’s water splashed on his head and down his neck. In the three tiered jungle, rainwater hung on the broad leaves forever it seemed. Morgan moved at a steady pace, using his seven inch Randall fighting knife as a machete to help clear the way. He was no longer approaching the motor pool. Now he was driving toward Felicity, following her psychic homing beacon.

  He found himself at the base of a jungle giant, a massive tree that held off its neighbors. A single shaft of light broke through and he stood in it, chest heaving, to get his bearings. His clothes clung like leeches to his skin. It was quiet, his passing having scared the jungle life away. As he regained his breath he could hear the birds returning, the small animals going about their business of survival. These were the sounds, the smells, the feelings of his past.

  Home.

  “Come on down, Red.”

  Felicity dropped out of the tree onto her hands and feet. When she briefly hugged him, he saw bits of leaf and bark in her hair.

  “Glad you made it,” she said. “Don’t know what I would have done if you didn’t. Now, what’s the next step? I don�
��t have a weapon or anything.”

  “I don’t expect you to fight,” Morgan said. “A frontal assault isn’t one of our options. The best I can come up with is getting over to the range and picking up the little rifle we left in the shed there. Maybe we can cause some trouble for them between the motor pool and the sub.”

  “Do you have time for breakfast?” Before Morgan could answer, Felicity walked around the big tree. When she reappeared, her arms were filled with fat, ripe mangos she had gathered on her rush through the woods. Morgan laughed out loud and pulled out a boot knife. A blood sugar boost was just what he needed.

  -30-

  The clearing around the motor pool was barely two meters wide. No trees grew there, but the grass was nearly four feet tall. Morgan and Felicity lay prone at its edge, watching two roving guards with slung AK-47’s.

  “I could sure use one of them,” Morgan said. “Why don’t you back off a ways, Red. You don’t want to see this.” She slid backward as he reached for his knife, carefully shielding its blade from the sun. As the guards passed, he drew his feet up beneath himself.

  The unmistakable whup-whup of rotor blades startled them all. Morgan crouched back and watched the helicopter lift off from the other side of the fence. It was a small two-seater that Morgan knew as the Robinson R-22.

  The guards looked up at the copter passing overhead. The downdraft staggered them, and flattened the tall grass nearby. An armadillo scrambled past Morgan, frightened out of the grass. Staring backward, Morgan saw the grass parted like ocean waves, and Felicity’s fiery hair standing out amid the waving green seas.

  One of the guards carried a walkie-talkie that suddenly shouted, “They’re right beside you.”

  The guards pulled the weapons off their shoulders. Morgan’s gun was faster. He blasted them both against the fence, but he knew that if the copter passengers had guns he would die trying for one of the rifles. Instead he retreated into the cover of the jungle. He dropped the empty magazine on the run and slammed the full one into place.