Keeping The Faith (John Fisher Chronicles Book 2)

by William Lehman

  The light finally dawned on these two assholes that I wasn't going to be browbeaten. The pilot held up his left hand and said "All right, I get your point. I'm reaching into my shirt for my credentials."

  "Dude, you better make a slug seem like a fighter jet. If I get any inkling that you are pulling anything but an ID out, I will shoot you. Repeatedly."

  "Got it." With that he very slowly moved his left hand down and with two fingers lifted a chain with an ID badge out.

  "Underhand...toss it to me."

  He did just as asked and the ID landed about a foot in front of me. "Mary, come on out, and bring two sets of handcuffs. I have some in the Tanngnost if Lars didn't keep any." A couple minutes later Mary came out of the cabin carrying a Socom M-1A and a couple pairs of cuffs. I walked up to the ID once Mary was actively covering the two, and took a look at it, it was from the DIA. I expected as much frankly. Though if the truth were told, they were probably seconded to the CIA. Either way, they didn't have jurisdiction here in the States, off of a military reservation. I went up to the first one and, making sure to stay clear of Mary's line of fire, handcuffed then frisked him. Then I did the same for the other one. Between the two of them I took off over a dozen weapons, and four handcuff keys. I probably still missed something, so I wasn't going to take any chances.

  "OK boys, sit yourself down and explain what the Hel the DIA thinks they're doing invading a private home inside the United States."

  "We weren't invading anything; we just came to talk to you about a case you were on."

  "Yah-huh, tell it to the judge. You don't just come to talk to someone with full auto weapons out and no ID."

  "Look, Fisher, you know how the game is played. Lose the girl and we'll talk."

  "You just don't get it, do you? You're not in a position to negotiate. I caught you off the reservation. Your boss isn't going to cover for you; they'll leave you out to dry on this. I've got surveillance video, I've got the works. At the minimum you're going to take the fall for Civil Rights charges. Oh, and that's civil not criminal, so what do you think your chances are of getting out of it? Washington is a real 'privacy' type state, they may vote for the left, but they're more old school hippy left, not NAZI left. The president ain't getting you out of this one. Your only hope right now is to convince me that you guys are really not the assholes it looks like you are...and do it fast."

  You could see his act collapse. "Look, you were asking questions and investigating something that was way off your reservation. The guy you were asking about was part of a very secure operation. We checked up on you, you know how that type of ops work. We need you to stop investigating this guy now."

  "By 'this guy', I assume you mean Johann Messinger?"

  "Yeah, that's him, but we really wish you wouldn't even mention his name."

  "He's dead."

  "Exactly, glad you understand."

  "No, I mean he's dead again. He was killed by a logging truck about six months ago."

  "Oh, so you'll be leaving the issue alone then?"

  "Not so much. See, he was part of some sort of commune up in the hills, and they're poaching on the National Park. It's my job to stop that. Then there's the fact that apparently all of these guys are ex-military, and probably ex-black ops. They need to be brought in out of the cold."

  "The PTBs aren't going to like this."

  "Then they shouldn't have just tossed away their troops like so much trash when they were done with them. Damn it, that's just wrong."

  Whatever Paul Cox, or at least that was the name on his ID card, was about to say was interrupted by the sounds of a power boat coming this way at high speed, running a siren. The sheriff boat pulled alongside the dock and two officers hopped out, guns drawn. Mary and I quickly laid our guns down before the officers could tell us to. We had a nice little discussion with the deputies over who were the good guys and who were the bad guys, and I got to go back to the house and get my badge, and then the boss got called in.

  When it all got sorted out, there were charges filed against the two guys from the CIA, but we were required to clear the blackberries from the chopper and let them take off. They were supposed to land over at the Orcas Island public airfield to be booked and released. The Lieutenant had flown in with our SWAT chopper, so she rode herd on the other chopper on the way back. I was sure I would be hearing more about this little inter-agency squabble, gosh, I just can't wait.

  After the fur settled a bit and everybody left the place, we finally got to eat. It was lunch by now, and my stomach was thinking my throat had been cut. Then we went on with figuring out all of the little secrets of the place, and Mary did some teaching on magic, we were both of the clerical school, so a lot of the stuff that she knew, I could learn. I did some work with her on firearms and edged weapons--surprisingly little actually, there wasn't much to teach her other than the intricacies of some of the military weapons, and how to shoot a full auto weapon. I could usually beat her with a blade, but that's as much speed and strength as skill, I was just bigger and stronger, and being a 'Thrope made me faster.

  That evening brought dinner and quiet conversation, then a movie and bed. Yeah, I know, boring, just like old married folks. Frankly, I could use some boring right now. The next morning Lieutenant Murphy was on the phone wanting to know why I felt I had to pick a fight with every Federal Agency in the directory. Well, I laid the whole thing out for her, how they had shown up all assault style on my front lawn, without so much as a warrant. Then I explained how "The Company" played the game. This was phase two of the "we did something wrong a long time ago and we don't want anyone to dredge it up now" game.

  If we don't knuckle under, and we don't fight back with something to shut them down, the next phase goes physical. At that point someone gets hurt, or maybe it goes political and someone gets hurt in the career field. Either way, the next step is an escalation of force. But we stop punched them now. They have two agents in lockup, and risk a political black eye of enormous proportions. The Pacific Northwest coast is almost as liberal as much of the Northeast around Massachusetts, and without as much of the "anything for the safety and security of the nation is ok, give us your damn guns" vibe so present in the east. The locals would like nothing better than to give those "Jackbooted thugs" of the CIA a huge drubbing in the press for operating off the reservation. So now they'll try to soft soap us. That's fine, I'm not out to "expose" the things we did in 'Nam, or anywhere else. Sometimes, things need to be done that aren't exactly something you want to tell grandma about, I get that...Hel, I did that.

  I just want to stop the problems in my forest, and protect a bunch of vets that didn't get the care they should have gotten when they came off the line. Once the Company gets into soft soap mode, we can talk to them. The problem with that agency is that anytime they get caught doing something questionable, their first answer is always the same, threats, bombast, and bluster. Until they get it out of their system it's just impossible to have a reasonable exchange with them. Now they'll listen to reason.

  The rest of the day we spent having fun. I knew that tomorrow I had to pick up Pete and start looking for a bunch of emotionally disturbed (that's Politically Correct for crazy) veterans that don't want to be found, and may not be sure the war's over. I needed some fun.

  Chapter Eight

  Monday found me setting sail for Seattle. The weather sucked, but nothing like the trip up to Coon Island from Sequim. All in all, it was a pretty typical winter sail here in the Puget Sound. I gave Pete a call on the way down, so he was waiting for me at the public pier. Then we had to sail up to Everett so he could get his gear, which was a major pain-in-the-ass logistics-wise. See, neither of us had a vehicle at the marina, and neither of us wanted to leave their vehicle at the marina when we took off. Oh, Pete could have taken his police vehicle over to Sequim on the ferry and the bridge. But then we would have had two vehicles on that side of the water, which we didn't need. So we had an officer pick us up and ferry us arou
nd to get what we needed, then back to the boat. I also took a little time to give a call to the lawyer that I seemed to have inherited with my great-uncle's estate. I wanted to get a certain lawsuit started. By then it was late enough that, rather than push it, we stayed on board for the night and headed out in the morning.

  Tuesday dawned clear and cold; one of those days we have here in winter where the weather is perfect for sailing, assuming you have warm clothes. The wind was blowing out of the southwest at about eighteen knots and there wasn't a cloud in the brilliantly blue sky. The ride up to Sequim was great. Full sail the whole way, one rail practically in the water, and the rigging humming like mad. The sort of sail that makes you glad you're alive. All too soon it was over and we were pulling in to Sequim.

  On the way up Pete had told me about something that had made the news over the weekend, seems the Coast Guard had boarded a Liberian-flagged merchant that had refused all contact. They found a real "Marie Celeste". The ship was empty, with meals still on the plate, and charts open in the chart house, but no one on board. They did find a fortune in heroin though. Thinking back on it, I believe this was the ship that 'bout ran me over. Weird. Still...to work! After we docked, and I touched base with the harbor master, I gave Head Ranger Tigner a call, just to let him know we were here. Then we started gearing up for the hunt.

  The plan was for us to head up to the last sighting of our poachers and see if we could track them. If not, then we would do a search through the area that they normally frequent until we came across a trail, then follow it until we found the main camp. This would involve changing, as there was no way in Hel we could track these guys in human form. So first thing we needed to do was let Tigner know that we would be running in the woods, and probably living off the land. Yes, this would constitute poaching by the strict letter of the law. We would stick to bunnies and small game, which were very plentiful, but still, it was poaching. On the other hand, there was no way for us to carry enough supplies to find these guys while in animal form. So I let Tigner know, thereby covering our asses.

  See, the problem is that a 'Thrope in animal form eats about ten percent of his or her weight a day, and almost all of it needs to be protein or carbohydrates. Now I figured it would take us anywhere from one to three weeks to find these guys, maybe more. That puts us each carrying five hundred pounds of food. At which point we would have about as much chance of sneaking up on these guys as Savonarola had of being appointed to the High Court of Elfhame Ladder of Gold in Italy. Hel, we would be lucky to move with that sort of weight on our backs. We could cache food, but that would let the guys we were hunting for know we were in the area, due to our frequent trips back to the cache. In the Teams we had either had food drops, or lived off the land. Tigner was all right with our hunting bunnies when I called him, so the next morning we arranged for Tigner to bring up someone to drive our rig back, and headed for the last reported kill.

  Some guy on Lost Mountain Road had found the remains of one of his Angus steers a couple days ago. The Sheriff had asked him to stay away from the kill until we could get up there, which I thought was damn nice of him.

  When we got up there, Randy and Alex were standing by one of the Ranger trucks waiting for us. I introduced Pete to them and we all walked up the hill to the kill. There was some snow on the ground, but the kill had happened after the last snow fall so that shouldn't be a problem. I could faintly smell something even in human form, so we should be able to track. We dropped our gear on the ground and tossed the keys to Alex. She seemed to want to stick around while we shifted "Just to make sure you get off all right." I managed to convince her that it would be a Bad Idea. The first time someone sees somebody shift it's usually going to cost them whatever is in their stomach. It doesn't take very long, but it looks really gross.

  The other reason I didn't want her around was that we wanted to save our uniforms in case we needed to shift back for some reason. It's hard to project an air of authority while you're on display to the world. The only thing we wear that can handle the change is one load-bearing vest. Everything else splits or gets otherwise buggered up. They had a very thin microfiber uniform that would pack up small, but it still got torn up if you wore it during the change. So if you want to have human-style clothes to change into, you strip down before changing...all the way down. Have I mentioned that changing is enjoyable? Really enjoyable. As in, sporting the gallant reflex enjoyable. Now, I don't know about most guys (as this just isn't a topic that comes up in normal conversation), but exhibitionism, with a gal that is at least mildly warm for my form, just isn't my thing if I'm never going to take her up on it. That being clear, I wanted her out of the way before I stripped down and packed my uniform and skivvies into my vest/backpack. These things were something they came up with in the teams as a way for us to carry our gear when shifted. They use a neoprene vest as the base because it stretches to accommodate different shapes, then has multiple pockets of different sizes to handle our weapons, clothes, radios, a small survival kit, and a first aid kit.

  After we got stripped down and packed up, Pete and I both shifted. Suddenly everything was brighter, crisper, and more vivid. I could smell the other cattle the rancher had, one of them was slightly sick, but I couldn't tell what with. It would be an easy target though. There was the acrid smell of wood smoke from someone's fireplace, snow in the air in about two days, and the smell of several predators. I could see the wind, and taste the air. This was one of the subtle traps to Lycanthropy. It's just so damn intense being in animal form. You could feel movement of anyone near you, see far more color and range than human eyes, and smell a bee farting in the next county. (OK not really but it seemed that way). The first few times you experience it, it's overwhelming. That was one of the things they spent some time working with in BUDSL (Basic Underwater Demolition/Seal-Lycanthrope). Strength and endurance training wasn't quite as necessary for a 'Thrope, but discipline and overcoming your animal, now that was a significant issue. Another issue we spent a lot of time with was communication while in animal form, which was damn important when you can't talk. There was a sort of a battle language that had been developed, using body language, tail position, and vocalizations. (OK, fine, meows and growls, snarls, etc.).

  I looked over at Pete and he was through changing as well, so as much as I would like to revel in the moment, it was time to go to work. Fortunately, the cold wasn't an issue, and never would be unless we were up in the peak areas, though we would need to eat soon. Now I could describe the tail positions, head positions, body language etc., that made up our conversation, but it's just too cumbersome. So instead, I'm just going to give you the human translations of what we said in animal form...it's just easier that way.

  Pete looked at me and asked if I had the scent, and I nodded. We had worked this sort of thing before, my nose is better than Pete's, his hearing is better than mine. It comes of the nature of the cat. Pete was a caracal, a large open plains cat from the Steppes of Asia. How he became a caracal is a story in and of itself. The short version is that he had been a Seal before he became a 'Thrope. He was on a mission when he crossed a young Marxist Muslim who happened to be infected. Pete lived, the terrorist didn't, but Pete grows fur now. His cat form has long legs, really good eyesight, and ears that could double as anti-missile radar on the DEW line. He's built around an open plains hunter design. A courser, if you will; me, I'm a cougar. Basic general purpose CAT, one each. So Pete would do over-watch on me, and make sure that no one was tracking us in return, while I did the tracking. That being said, I got started.

  After a couple hours of tracking these guys, the trail started to disappear. It's like the training came back to them once the excitement of the kill wore off. During the tracking, we identified several different guys. A cougar like myself, two wolves, a bear, and some sort of a weasel-smelling critter. I don't think it was a weasel, the smell is wrong, but definitely the same family. I didn't smell that unidentified big cat, which was just as well as far
as I was concerned. I'm not sure what it was, but I have my suspicions based on what I know of these guys, and my suspicions said Tiger. I wanted nothing to do with having to tangle with one of those. While tracking, we managed to scare up a couple grouse and a bunny each, so we weren't hungry any more, and no animal goes thirsty in the Pacific Northwest.

  I had forgotten how enjoyable catching and eating your own kill is. I haven't had much time of late to do the whole "live off the land as a cat thing", and while I like my food cooked (slightly) when in human form, the taste buds seem to change a bit when you shift. The experience of running down a rabbit (it's better still with deer, but we had promised) and feeling its heart pump the lifeblood into your mouth. Sorry if you're squeamish, but you can't be a 'Thrope without a bit of blood lust. I don't exhibit it anywhere else, but come hunting time, it's there.

  Back to work though. The trail got harder to track; I was doing more casting about for scent, so I wasn't moving as fast. Just as well, because that allowed Pete to notice the deadfall trap that they had set across their trail before I hit it. Well, can't say I was surprised, the basics of these guys M.O. led me to figure they would set traps. The going was tough too, the underbrush was pretty thick, and with the vest/packs on, we snagged more often than a normal animal would. Then there's the fact that this is just flat out rough country. The slopes around here are all better than thirty degrees, most are better than sixty. The valleys are all stream beds, and this being winter, there was water and ice in them. The blackberry bushes were dormant for the winter, but the thorns were still there. I'm not going to say any more about the terrain, unless it's pertinent, suffice to say that we were in young, rough, high mountains, some of which were old growth, and none of which had been thinned or messed with since Franklin Roosevelt made this place a National Park. After sunset we stopped for the night, there was no reason not to; the trail was days old, so pushing through to catch them wouldn't matter; that and the temperature was starting to drop like a rock. The snow started making that squeaking sound that anyone from snow country knows means it's getting real cold. It was quiet out here too. I had forgotten how quiet the woods gets when the wind stops and the local birds aren't sure they're not on the menu; you could hear the ice crystals grow.