Jay watched Pyro as he stood 10 ft. away with his mobile pressed up against his ear. After a few moments Pyro ended the call and said, ‘Today must be your lucky day young cub.’
‘Huh? What you talking about.’ Jay replied.
‘Not you.’ Pyro retorted.
Still looking up at the windows high above their heads, Pyro raised his hands, slowly walked around Jay and came to a stop in front of Leon.
‘I was talking to you.’ He said coarsely. ‘Today is YOUR lucky day.’
With that the main door of the warehouse burst open followed by the words ‘Pyro, tell your men to stand down.’
Pyro’s face was one of indignation but he knew any form of retaliation would be futile. Before he could give a response the voice came through the warehouse door again.
‘Tell your men to stand down Pyro, or say your prayers.’
All the men in army gear waited for their boss to give the order however Pyro just stood there in silence looking into Leon’s eyes.
‘Pyro you’re not going to get another warning… !’ The voice ordered. ‘One, two…’
‘Ok, Ok.’ Pyro relented, motioning his men to lower their weapons.
‘Go, Go, Go…’ Another voice called out.
Within five seconds three men wearing black tactical army fatigues stormed the warehouse, with their UMP45 machine guns with infrared scopes expertly pointed at individual targets. A couple seconds went by and another five men entered followed by another five, all wearing the same black fatigues with their weapons cocked, aimed and ready.
Jay gave way to a chuckle. ‘You jammy son-of-a-bitch! How did you manage this?’ he said smiling.
‘I didn’t!’
‘So how the Chief know we were here?’ Replied Jay confused.
No sooner did the words leave his lips, Chief Edwards’ casually walked into the warehouse. Unlike the previous thirteen men who had entered before him, the chief was wearing the same blue pants - that went with the suit he was in nearly 24hrs earlier and the same white shirt and blue tie, - all covered by a level 2 bullet proof vest.
Still with his hands in the air Pyro called out ‘My friend. You don’t look too bad for a dead guy.’
‘Neither do you.’ Chief Edwards replied.
Pyro chuckled, ‘You were always the funny one.’ He said.
‘And you were the one who always had something to smile about.’ replied the Chief sarcastically;
As if on cue Pyro flashed the Chief a broad smile, turned his attention back to Leon and said ‘Tell your father that even though I may be going down, my boss will still want his money.’
‘Shut up Pyro.’ Chief Edwards interrupted, - who by now was standing only 5ft away from him.
Leon called out, ‘Chief let him talk… !’ Then turning his attention to Pyro, said ‘What are you talking about? You know my father? What money?’
Clearing his throat Pyro slowly lowered his hands to his side and was about to answer Leon’s questions but Chief Edwards cut him off.
‘Pyro, you talk again and I’ll end your life right now?’
Pyro doubted very much that the Chief would actually shoot him in cold blood, so without any hesitation took one step forward and said ‘End my Life. Stop talking shit DL-65. You know god damn well my life ended when they took my daughter away from me.’
Hearing those words caused Leon to think about Kerry, which in turn made him heave a sigh. The Chief looked down at Leon for a moment and then motioned to one of his men in black tactical gear to loosen him and Jay from their restraints. He then walked over to Pyro and clamped his wrists together with a pair of handcuffs.
‘You do realise you brought this on yourself?’
Pyro scoffed. With his hands behind his back he looked over at Leon and said ‘what’s wrong with you young cub? Didn’t you know that’s what they do? Take your family away from you, if you say no.’ He paused, cocked his head over his right shoulder and said ‘isn’t that right DL-65?’
‘Shut up. The names Chief Edwards to you and the only reason you’re not dead is because I need to bring you in alive.’
Pyro chuckled. ‘You know you won’t get anything for me. You could have brought me in a long time ago. I was counting the days.’
‘Chief, what is he talking about?’ Leon interjected.
Chief Edwards moved Pyro to the right so that he was no longer standing in his line of sight and looked at Leon who by now was out of his restraints, gently tending to the bruise on the side of his head. The Chief was unsure what to say so he just shook his head instead, adjusted his grip on Pyro’s arm and started to walk towards the entrance of the warehouse.
By this point Jay was also on his feet and had moved around the chair he was just tied to and over to Leon. Placing a hand on his friends shoulder he said ‘you gonna be ok man?’
Leon nodded his head but after seeing Jay’s face up close he realised he was in a much better physical condition.
‘Dang… !’ Leon exclaimed. ‘Am I gonna be ok… ? Look at your face.’
While he was steady on his feet Jay looked like he had gone twelve rounds with Mike Tyson. The right side of his bottom lip was bleeding; he had a cut on the right side of his chin and another across his right cheek which was sitting on top of a large swelling.
‘You gonna be aight?’ Leon questioned, looking at the scares on Jay’s face.
‘Yeah, I’m straight. My head hurts like hell though.’ Jay paused for a moment and noticed the chief was just about to exit the warehouse. Motioning Leon out of the way Jay shouted, ‘So chief, Is that it? Your just gonna lead Pyro away without saying a word? You gonna answer Leon’s question or what? What’s the deal? What have you got us into?’
The chief stopped a couple steps short of the warehouse door and was about to reply to Jay’s questions however Pyro shrugged off the Chiefs handle on him, turned around and shouted ‘You’re a Desert Lion young Cub. A Chameleon, just like we were - just like your father was.’
‘Don’t you mean is?’ Leon retorted. ‘I know he’s still alive.’
Pyro gave Leon a large smile and was about to verify Leon’s last statement but the Chief cut him short by grabbing hold of his wrist and twisting his right arm until it buckled against the restraint of his handcuffs, releasing pressure up through his elbow and dislocating his shoulder. Pyro made no sound of pain, just gritted his teeth and took long deep breaths. The Chief leaned in behind Pyro’s ear and grunted. ‘I said Shut - Up’!
The chief made a motion with his free hand and the 13 men that had stormed into the warehouse started to gather up Pyro’s security guards and lead them outside into the early morning air. Leon quickly ran up behind the Chief and pulled on the back of his vest, ‘Chief! You can’t expect to do all of this and still keep us in the dark.’
‘Exactly… !’ Jay shouted out. ‘What do you expect us to do now? We pretty much know everything.’
Letting go of Pyro the Chief immediately turned around to face Jay.
‘You don’t know everything.’ he said coldly.
Lowering is head a little the Chief let out a sigh, and then said ‘I am sorry kid. You didn’t deserve any of this. You were just born at the wrong time and to the wrong parents.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Leon retorted.
Shaking his head Chief Edwards said ‘Look, even if I wanted to tell you everything, what good would it do you?
‘Try me.’ replied Leon.
After a short pause Chief Edwards gave Leon a nod of the head and then after exhaling heavily through his nose he said, ‘Ok. Try this. In 1776 the US government quite literally transformed into what we know it to be today - taken over by a world-wide conglomerate named Camistock.’
‘Whoa, whoa, whoa! You can hold it right there Chief…’ Jay i
nterjected. ‘. . . You’re talking about some New-World order shit aren’t you? I’m a grown ass man and if you didn’t know already, we work for the F.B.I. We all know that’s just some crazy conspiracy theory.’
Pyro laughed mockingly at Jay’s statement however Chief Edwards refused to acknowledge it altogether. He just shook his head and continued, ‘If you check the Chapter 8 files you’ll find that a Dr Jonathan Rhys Bawlings was the founder of the whole Camistock idea. He was a Freudian follower who believed in the Psychiatry shaped by war or Thesis-Antithesis-Synthesis’
‘Sorry. What was that?’ asked Leon slightly confused. ‘You’re going to have to speak English on this one.’
Chief Edwards let out another sigh. Not out of frustration but more to do with the fact that time had now grown a pair of legs and was running away from them; Usain Bolt style.
The Chief made a clicking sound with his tongue, looked down at his watch, released another sigh then said, ‘Basically, Bawlings believed not in creating solutions to problems but instead, create the problem for the solution and then synthesis. After world war one, Camistock set up a school in the US, based on an early version of the ‘Listen Institute of Human Relations’ in London. They specialised in HNTO, Hostile Neurological Take-Over or brainwashing. Now we’re not just talking about your everyday run of the mill brainwashing,’ he said adamantly. ‘We’re talking about full scale global shit. Using Dr Bawlings ideas constructed by German scientists and then perfected by the English after the first world war, our Government realised its significance and realised it could be used to influence not just the US but the whole world to act and think in a certain way, which in turn would make it easier for them to pass certain laws. The project was code named ‘Aqua’ but now if you do hear anyone talk about it, they would no doubt laugh and call it the Aqua conspiracy.’
‘Ok… So what you saying Chief? How do we fit into all that? What does my father have to do with some world-wide conspiracy… ?’
Realising how naive Leon really was to the real truth Pyro decided to speak up.
‘It’s not a conspiracy young cub. This is real life.’ He said.
The chief applied some pressure to Pyro’s right arm so as to remind him of how quickly he could inflict pain.
‘Talk again. I dare yah.’ Spat the Chief into the back of Pyro’s ear.
Deep down he really did not have any issues with Pyro. In fact he was hoping they could have worked out their differences but at that moment he could not afford Pyro to say something that could endanger their lives. He waited to see if Pyro was going to take him up on his dare but as he had hoped, he declined. Seeing no comeback the Chief Edwards turned his attention back to Leon and said ‘Your father, Pyro, me and a few others were all a part of an unclassified elite black-Ops unit called “Desert-Lions” aka “Chameleons”. We worked UNDER the US government but ONLY took orders from Camistock. You could say we were the hardware to the Governments software… Whenever the majority of any group rejected a trigger released through the media or some other information service, we were sent out to cause disruption. I won’t go into the details or the names of those who had to be removed. But I will say no one was off limits. Even a few of our own presidents had to be erased in order to keep Camistock’s agenda in tacked.’
‘Are you kidding me?’ Jay interrupted again.
‘It’s no laughing matter.’ Chief Edwards replied. ‘We were trained to infiltrate and blend into the surroundings of our target - hence the name Desert Lions. We were all given an assignment in Belize however when we received our full orders it was nothing like any other mission we had undertaken. We were told to wipe out a whole area, mothers, children, old people; they wanted everyone in that location gone and then spin the story that it was government in-fighting backed by the islands gangs.’
‘Come on Chief. That doesn’t even sound reasonable!’ retorted Jay, sounding more curious than anything else.
With a sigh the Chief replied ‘Doesn’t it? Over the years the Agency has implemented different versions of that mission throughout the Caribbean. Just look at Haiti, Cuba and Jamaica - the list goes on.’ The Chief paused and waited for Jay’s response however when none came he continued,
‘Anyway, when we were given our assignment your father told the Agency he wasn’t going to go through with it. He decided he had enough. Obviously that was not an option Camistock gave any of us, so they threw him into prison.’
‘I know this already.’ Leon said flatly.’
‘Yeah, that’s old news.’ Jay chimed in. ‘. . . Why don’t you tell us what happened to you.’
With his head held low, the Chief replied ‘I can’t say I’m proud of it… but I took the mission. I, I had too.’
No one replied to that. Pyro was there. He already knew the answer to why the Chief followed through with the assignment so he really did not need to hear the details again. Jay reasoned the way the Chief started the sentence told him the story was going to be depressing so he opted to let it pass. As for Leon, he could tell that whatever it was affected the Chief deeply. So just out of respect, he felt it best to let it go. The Chief however was silent for what seemed longer than a few seconds and now Leon started to regret not asking the Chief to explain himself. The silence was becoming uncomfortable. He was about to say something when Pyro - who was also aware of the tension - shuffled his feet to the right, away from the Chief which immediately caught his attention.
Looking over at Leon but addressing all three, the Chief first cleared his throat and said ‘After a few years, under the guise of President Reagan, Camistock came knocking on your father’s prison door. In exchange for a chance to live the rest of his life on the outside he would become their sole supplier of drugs in the south. Your father took the deal. To be honest, I would have too. He became a millionaire overnight and a billionaire within two years. In all the time they worked together he and Black made well over 6 Billion dollars. With all that money Aaron was able to rub shoulders with not only the rich and famous but those individuals Camistock needed to keep an eye on - if you know what I mean? He had a good thing going. But he messed up…’
‘How?’ Leon blurted out.
‘He met your mother.’
As soon as the words were said, the Chief realised his mistake.
‘Wait. I’m sorry…’ he said. ‘. . . How it sounds is not what I meant. What I meant to say, was he decided to have a family. Having a family was never part of the deal. So Camistock arranged for you to be shipped to one of their boarding schools when you were old enough…’
‘What!’ Jay exclaimed. ‘Glenmuir was a school backed by Camistock?’
‘Yep, one of the best.’ replied the Chief. ‘. . . I’m surprised you didn’t realise that before. Most, if not all the boys who leave Glenmuir either end up finding careers in the CIA, FBI, the Pentagon or some other department headed by the Whitehouse. Anyway, after you and your mother were sent away your father evidently started planning a way to disappear.’
Leon cut him short, ‘Hold it right there Chief. So where is my mother now?’
‘I don’t know!’
‘What you mean, you DONT KNOW? You MUST know where she is?’ Leon pleaded.
‘I’m sorry. But I don’t.’ replied the Chief. ‘When your father evaded us three years ago, your mother was moved to another secure location. Whereabouts I have never been informed of.’
While Leon thought about the Chief’s answer Jay said, ‘So Black is a Desert Lion too?’
The Chief looked back at Jay with indignation.
‘Come on, of course not! Do you not see the size of that fat shit? Black was an up and coming drug dealer the Bureau had been watching due to his family connections in Haiti. We had hoped we could use him for information, so Leon’s father was assigned to turn him. But what Aaron didn’t know, was that after a few years the higher-he
ads made a deal with Black behind his back.’
Leon looked over at Jay with a raised eyebrow to which Jay smiled, knowing the Chief had just confirmed what they already knew to be the case.
‘So what was the deal?’ Leon asked.
The chief let out another sigh and simply said ‘Karim.’
‘Karim?’ Leon repeated
‘Yes, Karim. We or should I say Camistock, felt the US needed someone else to take over as the main symbol of Terrorism. Osama played his role. In all honesty, he’s been breathing rented air for years. We’ve always known where he’s been hiding. The last report was that he’s residing in Pakistan right next to an army base.’
‘Are you being serious?’ responded Jay after a slight chuckle.
Chief Edwards nodded his head in response and then said, ‘Since 911, it was becoming apparent that a large portion of the world was not buying into our Governments story of terrorism… As in, starting and ending with him that is. So they started to groom Karim. However Camistock soon realised unlike Osama, Karim had his own agenda. Unfortunately, we didn’t find this out until it was too late. So when we became aware he was looking for funding, we decided Black would be the idiot stupid enough to think we actually needed his money.’
The Chief let out a slight chuckle and then said, ‘I mean, come on… Camistock owns Wall Street and the fucking treasury, why would we need him.’ The Chief paused to clear his throat then said ‘Anyway, your father intercepts a text message we already had. I don’t know how but he figured out what was going on from beginning to end.’
‘So you ordered Black to kill him?’ Jay asked.
Chief Edwards gave Jay another cold hard stare but rested his attention on Leon. Pleading his case he said ‘No I didn’t. Your father brought that one on himself. He called the Superior at his house. Demanded they return you and your mother and you all be given freedom…’ The Chief paused for a moment then said ‘. . . Your father told him, if he did not do as he was told he would kill him and make sure the whole world finds out about the governments affiliation with Camistock.’
The Desert Lion's True Colours Page 14
