Chapter 37

Sunday evening 9:00 pm

Near Red Dragon Compound

Near Olympic National Park

The team was assembled in the trees just a quarter mile from the property. The assault team would soon infiltrate from 3 different points along the property line. Maria would wait for a signal that Kelly had been rescued and was on her way out, then would pull the Cherokee up to the exfiltration point which was a rough footpath that led from the cabin directly to the road.

Lizzy was going to move Sarah’s civic down the road and take station in a hide they had prepared earlier across from where the driveway to the compound entered the main road. She could see the house and the road in both directions and would be able to give the all clear before Ben kicked off the assault.

Ben, working with Tom and Bobby had been able to explain to the wild ones what was going to be happening and where to stay away from so they would not be included in the kill radius when the claymores went off. Several of the wild ones had volunteered to be infiltration guides and provide surveillance. Bobby and Tom were going to work closely with Lizzy to coordinate communications to ensure that there wouldn’t be any distractions to the assault team once the balloon went up.

Ben took a breath to clear his mind. He then gave a kiss and an ‘I love you’ to each of the girls. Ruffled Tom’s ears and shook Ferg’s hand.

“Alright everyone let’s get this road on the show. Stay frosty and everyone comes home. See you on the other side.” Ben said with confidence on his camouflage painted face.

The plan was pretty simple. It was what amounted to a snatch and an ambush. The primary mission was to rescue Kelly. The secondary objective was to remove the immediate threat that Red Dragon presented by eliminating as many of their personnel as possible. The Chinese had become expert in manipulating public perceptions to hide their work, Ben had decided to use their own playbook against them. Working with Mei, Lizzy had prepared a digital ‘evidence’ of rival drug gangs trying to eliminate each other. Ben’s team just had to salt the compound with enough ‘proof’ to make the story plausible.

Of course no plan survives contact with the enemy.

Sunday evening 10:05 pm

Red Dragon Compound driveway entrance

Near Olympic National Park Washington

Ben had spent an hour getting just behind the front sentry position by the entrance to the compound. They had decided to time the kick off of the rescue when the sentries were least likely to be alert, which was during the midpoint of their shift.

Now he was nearly there. He was able to get within 6 feet of the sentry due to the heavily wooded location of the post and the fact that there was no lighting this far from the main house ... Now he just had to slip under the rear edge of the tarp and behind the sentry’s chair. He carefully examined the last 6 feet between him and his target looking for any protrusions or any detritus that could crackle or snap under his feet ... He slipped the Fairbairn-Sykes dagger from the sheath on his leg and considered his options.

Unlike the movies, cutting someone’s throat wasn’t that easy. There were some very thick tough muscles in the neck protecting the arteries there and unless you sever the windpipe at the same time they could still cry out. Then of course there was the blood spray that made everything slick. The sitting position of the sentry decided it. Sitting made the sentry’s head dip slightly forward making the brain stem a much better choice.

All his options examined, Ben dipped under the tarp, took two steps forward and drove the knife from down at his side upward under the back of the skull shelf into the target’s brain stem. The sentry quivered slightly and then was still. Ben said a prayer for the slain. He didn’t think it was going to help this one much. There was just too much darkness present for him to walk the path to the Upper world any time soon, but he owed it to the departed spirit to at least give an offering.

That done, Ben triggered his bluetooth headset. “Go” he sent to Sarah.

A moment later he got the acknowledgement from Sarah. He picked up his guide, a small friendly fox and began moving through the heavy woods toward the cabin to rendezvous with Ferg who had been busy setting the mines up for both the primary and secondary ambushes.

It occurred to him as they wound their way between the thickets of fir trees that having an animal guide was pretty awesome. They had found some fluorescent stickers that made the little critters easy to follow from behind. Of course NVG’s (Night Vision Goggles) were great but they didn’t tell you where to step or remind you to duck your head under a low hanging branch.

Hearing the ‘Go’ signal from Ben, Sarah replied “acknowledged.”

Sarah slipped out of her hide carefully moving to intercept where one of the coyotes was tracking the one man roving patrol. The tall, black clothed operative was covering the back of the property just behind the small cabin where Kelly was being kept. The moon was high now and to Sarah’s goddess enhanced tiger eyes visibility was excellent. She was able to track her target’s progress just inside a copse of maple trees. Just where the tree line opened up she would take her prey as he moved across the opening slightly toward her. It was about a 50 yard shot and she had to take him in the throat so he wouldn’t make any noise and would die too quickly to even send a radio click.

She smoothly slid one of the war arrows out of the quiver over her back. She first checked the fletching. Then she examined the stone arrowhead made out of the strange black obsidian. In the moonlight it was shimmering with a dark radiance. She touched her finger to the razor edge and immediately jerked it back. It was singing! Sarah didn’t know how she knew but she knew that anything killed with this arrowhead was going straight to the deepest pits of hell. Good, she thought to herself. That’s exactly where this bastard belongs.

Her target was two steps away from the opening when Sarah whispered a prayer “Goddess, guide my arrow.” She felt a warm answering pulse from her gift. As the target stepped into the opening Sarah drew and loosed the war arrow in one incredibly smooth movement that looked more like ballet than battle.

The target stepped right into the arrow. The heavy inch and a half wide obsidian head sliced through the target’s throat and severed his spinal column with a sickening ‘thunk’. Sarah could hear evil shrieks in her head as an unholy host was summoned by the singing arrowhead. She could feel the demons as they whipped past her. The man’s body twitched slightly as it was surrounded by twisting shadows that coalesced into one. The shadows intensified to an impossible dark and then they were gone.

Sarah just shook her head and padded silently toward her prey to retrieve the arrow. When she verified her kill she then keyed her headset. “Tango 2 down. Moving to overwatch.”

Now she just had to get into position to watch Ben, Mei’s and Ferg’s backs as they rescued her sister.

Ben, Ferg and Mei waited silently outside the cabin for Kelly’s signal. It would have been great to be able to psychically connect to her directly but for reasons unclear to Ben it didn’t work that way from person to person. Lizzy would relay from Bobby that Kelly had been able to distract the two kidnappers.

“Go” they heard from Lizzy.

Mei turned her invisibility gift on and stepped to the door of the cabin with her lock pics. She had trained extensively for defeating locks and this one wasn’t even a challenge. In less than 6 seconds the lock was open. Mei carefully cracked the door slightly and placed a bit of tape over the mechanism to prevent it from latching shut.

Of course to Ben and Ferg it looked like the door had just popped open on its own and then pulled shut again. Ferg was still pretty shocked by this, even though Mei had demonstrated her ability to him earlier. He smiled to himself as he thought about Ben showing up with not one, but with five women. He knew the situation was beyond weird right then.