“I will have you all tracked down and killed in your homes with your entire families!” Gutiérrez said as he watched the strangers unroll a large set of nylon harnesses.
Will Mendenhall, after being interrupted by the cartel leader and his threat, looked at Gutiérrez and then simply raised the gun and hit him in the forehead with the gun, sending him grimacing as he fell back onto his ornate emperor’s throne.
“It’s very rude to interrupt,” he said as his eyes lingered for only a moment on the man. He turned back to Ellenshaw, who was not smiling even though he knew he had screwed up. “We’ll talk later, Doc. Now help get this asshole prepared to fly.”
Charlie did as he was told.
Jason Ryan started frantically pushing Morales and his chair forward through the frightened inmates. He was screaming for the condemned men to make a break for the gates and the prison parking lot beyond. He heard the Apaches open up somewhere to his right and hoped there wasn’t wholesale killing going on. After all it wasn’t Gutiérrez’s henchmen they were after, it was only Morales and the leader of the most brutal drug cartel since the Cali, Colombia, extremes of the eighties. He made sure that the guards tending to the wild animals in their cages were either eliminated or on the run, then he went to the direct center of the yard and waited, feeling very exposed to whatever guards made it past the circling Apaches.
With the blare of noise coming from the Archies and the powerful twin engines of the Apaches, no one heard the deeper bass rumble of something much larger as it approached the prison. Men ran and screamed as the giant Chinook double-rotor transport helicopter broke over the height of the south wall. The rotor wash of the large CH-47 heavy-lift chopper knocked men from their feet as they ran away frightened from the American black ops display confronting them. The harness struck the ground near Ryan and he immediately took hold and started strapping the shocked and frightened computer genius to the harness. The wide-eyed young man made no sound other than to scream when Ryan faced him.
“Now don’t move until you’re told,” he said.
“But who in the hell are you!”
“Bye, kid, nice meeting ya!”
Morales was about to ask again when his world went away. He and his chair were pulled so violently upward that he knew he had left his stomach somewhere rolling on the ground with Ryan. As for Jason he had to smile as the screams of the young selection of computer science department head were heard even over the noise of the music and engine assault. The harness held as the boy and his chair flew skyward toward the hovering Chinook. Ryan made sure the kid was pulled in by the CH-47’s crew and then he made his way toward the double gates that held the prisoners inside. He opened them and started moving inmates free of the yard. As he did he looked at the three horse trailers and that was when Jason Ryan really smiled.
In the balcony above the action, Sarah, Charlie, and Rodriguez had Gutiérrez ready to ascend into the blue skies above Mexico. The man finally opened his eyes against the pain of Mendenhall’s rebuke with the pistol. The dark eyes widened when he saw the black American looking down at him. He was about to scream something over the noise of the Archies when Mendenhall held up his right hand and just simply waved good-bye as Gutiérrez burst into the sky, ripping the makeshift shade cover from the prepared balcony. Will smiled and then attached his own lines as did the other three. He saw Ryan as he stood just below with his own harness attached and waiting.
“Hey, toss down the warden and his men!” Jason screamed at a confused Will. Then he saw his friend’s smile and knew exactly what he had planned. With the help of Ramirez, Sarah, and an angry Ellenshaw, the five men were eased to the asphalt below by rope.
As inmates freed themselves from the prison, Jason Ryan, United States Navy, looked down at his handiwork and with the large tattoo gleaming its glorious colors in the sun he gave the signal. The second CH-47 Chinook lifted him, Sarah, Rodriguez, and Mendenhall free of the ground, and with four personnel hanging from the giant bird, slowly made their way north toward the border. Operation Alcatraz was now complete.
Ten minutes later the prison warden awakened with a fright at about the same time as his guards and Gutiérrez’s henchmen. With wide eyes and loosened bladder they watched the black-coated Yucatán jaguars as they started creeping toward the spot where they had been deposited. Just before the first sleek cat lowered its ears to spring, he saw the scrawled note between his splayed legs. He read it and then looked up just as the five wildcats started forward with hungry intent. As the freed men ran into the surrounding countryside and the remaining prison guards decided they needed to find new work, the small note blew away in the wind and only the warden of Rio Natchez Prison would ever know what it said: “Compliments of the Greater Nevada Historical Society.”
2
The woman waited inside the idling taxicab until she spied her target. She lowered her dark glasses and took in the familiar figure of the man she had known now for eight years. She smiled and then pushed the sunglasses back up her slim nose. She straightened her skirt, then gave the cabdriver a twenty-dollar bill, and took a deep breath as she readied for the confrontation that had been coming for many years. She opened the door and with her briefcase in hand started to follow the broad-shouldered object of this covert visit as he took his brown-paper-bag lunch to the nearby park area.
Assistant Director of Department 5656 Virginia Pollock waited while the brutish little man chose a tree to sit under. She again lowered the sunglasses as the man saw three squirrels frolicking under the protection of the trees. Like most California squirrels, these were in no mood to move from the shade of the tree and the pinecones it offered. She grimaced as she watched the gray-haired man remove the stub of a cigar from his mouth and then lean over.
“You fuckin’ rats going to move or am I goin’ to throw you into a stew?” the raised voice asked loudly. The squirrels all stopped and looked up into the angry and mean face of the man and then decided they would indeed act like squirrels and run for their lives.
“Yeah, that’s what I friggin’ thought, bunch of pussies.”
Virginia shook her head as she watched Master Chief Petty Officer (retired) Harold C. Jenks slowly ease his bulk onto the grass. She saw that the master chief was tired. The blue denim work shirt he wore was wrinkled and the hair on his head was a little grayer. Assistant Director Pollock knew, like Jack and the rest of her colleagues, that Jenks wasn’t taking the recent personnel losses to the nation too well. The master chief had lost as much as anyone at Group; he had lost a student and dear friend when Carl Everett vanished into the wormhole after guaranteeing the destruction of the enemy in its own dimensional shift over Antarctica.
The master chief pulled out a sandwich and then looked at it and decided he wasn’t that hungry. Virginia saw him speak with several of his people who were far better dressed than Jenks. Their clothes were expensive and clean, while the owner of Blacksmith Engineering was a complete mess—Even more so than usual, Virginia thought. When Jenks said the last to his passing colleagues he saw the tall, thin woman looking at him. He closed his eyes for a moment and then opened them in time to see his worst nightmare still approaching.