Chapter 29

Friday Evening

Ben’s House

Harborton Washington

Ben had never experienced an operational planning brief quite like this one. In fact, it was more like a horny adolescent boy’s fantasy of a pajama party. It wasn’t that the girls weren’t capable of being serious and competent, it was just that they all insisted on wearing nothing but one of his shirts and their panties. Those were only kept on after Ben insisted that there was no way he could focus otherwise. The girls had no concern for him being overwhelmed as the only male. Tom, the coward, had decided to opt for perimeter security duty as the level of estrogen rose to insane levels.

Phone calls had been made to all those concerned to let them know a sleepover was in progress. Pizza had been ordered and consumed in massive quantities. Ben honestly didn’t think an entire squad bay of Marines could have eaten as much as these 5 girls. They were all arranged comfortably with Mei, Sarah and Lizzy on the couch and Kelly and Maria sitting cross legged on the floor while Ben was ensconced in his recliner. Finally, it was time to call the pajama-less pajama party/operational planning meeting to order.

“Ahem, okay, ladies let’s get started!” Ben cleared his throat to get their attention.

“Yes Ben,” they all replied nearly simultaneously.

Dammit I’ve got to figure out how they do that! thought Ben, “Okay Mei can you give us all an overview on who we are up against?”

Mei had told parts of her tale and bits and pieces of Ben’s escape but not all of it to everyone present. She sat up straight on Ben’s couch nervously smoothing the tails of one of Ben’s white long sleeve dress shirts over her exquisite upper thighs. Kelly had her laptop open on her lap and was prepared to take notes while looking like a sexy secretary with her reading glasses down her nose slightly. She was wearing one of Ben’s green polo shirts and pale pink panties.

“Yes, I don’t know all of how things started as there are multiple teams and organizations involved and it’s standard procedure to keep each team on a ‘need to know’ basis. But I am ... was a liaison working between teams so I can guess pretty well what I don’t know for sure. The team I mostly worked with is called ‘Lucky Panda’. That team’s mission is primarily corporate espionage. Simply speaking they are directed to buy, hack, coerce or blackmail corporate proprietary information. They target software, semiconductors, and biotech mostly.” said Mei

Lizzy raised her hand. Lizzy was wearing one of Ben’s favorite shirts, a very old threadbare yellow and scarlet boot camp PT shirt and demure plain white panties.

“So what happened with Ben was not typical for your team?” quizzed Lizzy.

“No, not at all.” I was trained in this kind of op but I have never actually done anything like this. The two that assisted me were both down on their luck American ex soldiers who thought they were working for the CIA.”

“So who were the other two chasing me after I escaped?” asked Ben.

“They were assigned to me temporarily from another group also working in this region. They are called ‘Red Dragon’ and are responsible for the import of large quantities of fentanyl into the Western U.S. In the last year they have also taken over the role of distribution. The two that were chasing you are from a larger team of PLA Special Forces that are used as security and enforcement for the fentanyl trade. That team are nothing but killers and torturers. Ben, I understand why you didn’t, but you should have killed them both like the mad dogs they are,”

Mei added quietly.

Ben nodded thoughtfully. The next question was from Maria who was wearing another of Ben’s dress shirts. This one was a pale blue and coordinated nicely with her Sponge Bob Square Pants panties.

“So the Chinese government is behind the import of fentanyl?” she asked.

“Oh yes, it’s one of their most successful government subversion efforts. In the background they essentially contract the productions of hundreds of tons of illicit fentanyl products a year. Then they support a large smuggling network throughout the Western US and Canada. Regular cargo ships stop briefly near the coast where small local boats are dispatched to offload the fentanyl. They also smuggle in molds and production equipment to produce fake prescription pills. The coastline here makes it ideal for this kind of operation. There’s so much coastline that the DEA and Coast Guard can’t even come close to patrolling it. Also most local law enforcement is ineffective and easily corrupted. “ Mei answered.

“So what kind of resources do these teams have?” asked Ben.

“Virtually limitless. The Red Dragon project is extremely profitable and has been since its first year of operating. In fact, it pays for the operating expenses for the Lucky Panda team. That small team has an operating budget of about 36 million dollars a year. I’m not certain of the exact numbers but I believe the Red Dragon team’s budget is easily 10 times that.”

Everyone sat stunned at that for a second. Sarah, who was wearing one of Ben’s old BDU tops, mostly unbuttoned, and a skimpy black thong recovered first.

“So this is one reason why you recommend that we don’t go to the authorities?” she said skeptically.

“Yes, it’s one reason. They can easily buy whatever influence they need and don’t already have. The local police, sheriff’s, prosecutors and other officials are vulnerable to either bribes or coercion. Even if we do find an agency to help us, the small towns in this part of the state don’t have the resources to be able to thoroughly investigate what’s happened. And the key problem is that they can’t protect us while they investigate. The PLA operations team are experts in ‘sanitizing’ people. Any witnesses can be ‘disappeared’, ‘suicided’ or discredited within days. Just think how easy it is to make someone an unreliable witness with today’s lax reporting standards, fake news and social media. “ said Mei sadly.

“Yeah I can also see how hard it would be to make anyone understand the motivation behind kidnapping Ben in the first place. “ said Maria with a sigh.

“Yes and that brings up why we also can’t make an attempt to bring in the federal government. I don’t know what would be worse. If they don’t believe us nothing happens. If they do believe us then what’s to stop them from putting Ben in a laboratory for life!” said Mei.