Chapter 34

John's death shattered Donna. She took to walking the airstrip just as John had done. However, this was not the meditative stroll that John employed to work out problems. No, her walks were closer to runs. She ran herself ragged moving at just under a jogger's pace. Whenever Donna went to the strip ... which was almost always, now ... she did so with a drive that gave one the impression that she was running away from something. When asked to make a decision she would not answer definitively. She would say, "I'll think about it and get back to you." Then she would walk the airstrip again, back and forth, up and down, walk, walk, walk. Things were beginning to fall apart without a firm hand on the rudder of the organization.

Lena, too, was grieving. Because of that fact the food was not as stellar as the crew had become accustomed to, to tell the truth, the food quality had descended to a level just barely better than terrible, and that caused an added descent into depression for the others.

Things would have been just as bad for Rianna and Mary had it not been for the baby. His antics and the fact that he was beginning to show some mental abilities kept the two women on their toes, and very distracted ... sad, but distracted. It was the fact that she was so deep into her own grief, as well as preoccupied with the baby, that Rianna didn't think to just enter and adjust the minds of the others, as she had done before.

Times were desperate!

The members of Odin's Own saw all that was happening and though they knew John, they were not as close to the man and so not as deeply affected as the others. The eight got together for a meeting and decided that something drastic had to be done. The whole of John's organization was terribly at risk because no one was taking the lead.

It was decided that Asha should be the one to get the ball rolling because she had known Donna the longest. The next morning, at that in-between time when the sun isn't up yet but there is enough light to see, Donna was leaving the lodge.

She was surprised to hear Asha's voice call from the shadows, "Donna?"

It was getting on toward fall by now and the temperature was low enough that Donna saw the clouds of steam Asha exhaled before actually seeing the tall black woman.

Grief made Donna jumpy and irritable and she snarled, "What? What do you want?"

"That's not the question that you should be asking, Donna!" retorted Asha with equal savagery. "The question is; what are you doing to your own people, Donna?"

"WHAT? HOW DARE YOU TALK TO ME THAT WAY?"

"I dare because I'm your friend, Donna," said Asha gently as she pushed off from the wall and moved out of the shadows. She turned to look out at the rising sun and said, "I'm your friend and I'm worried about you, all of you."

Donna stared at Asha for a moment then blinked several times. "All of us? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Come. Walk with me, and I'll explain."

The two stepped off of the porch and meandered around the grounds. This was not the furious, determined, demented laps that Donna did on the airstrip but, rather, a gentle stroll with a friend.

"Ok, girl, explain yourself."

"Have you looked around lately? Do you see what's happening? All of these people followed John ... without hesitation. John made you the leader and they accepted that ... without question. They are looking to you for leadership and all you do is put them off and race up and down the runway! Donna they are coming apart! They put their trust and their lives into your hands and you do nothing! If Vezza comes now, you will all die! Is that what you want? To join John?"

That question hit Donna like an actual physical blow to the solar plexus! It took the wind completely out of her, stopping her in her tracks.

She turned to look at her old friend and said with the breathiness of one totally winded and filled with shame, "No ... Of course not..."

"Well, then act like you want to lead. Never show or say that you don't know what you are doing. The words 'I don't know' from a leader are poison and will kill your people quicker than a bullet. Indecisive actions will do the same. I don't always know what I'm doing, but I never tell my girls that. I make the best decisions that I can, with the given intel available. They work out, or they don't. But that is human, and the girls know and accept that. No one is infallible. You have to do the same thing!"

"I don't know how to do that, anymore," said Donna as she choked up and began to weep softly.

Asha hugged Donna and said softly, "Look, honey, you spent a lifetime with that man. All you have to do is ask yourself, 'What would John do?' All things are made up of smaller things joined together, so just take what John did on the small things and join those actions to each other. You will then have the answers that you need."

Donna clung to the big black woman until she was spent with weeping. "Please Asha, sit here with me for a while."

The two sat down on a big log and watched the compound come to life with the morning sun and it was then that Donna noticed that the place was a mess. No one was doing their job. They just wandered around, aimlessly.

"I did that didn't I?"

Asha looked where Donna was looking and saw the mess, "Yep, in the end it's all down to you."

Asha could see a change start to come over her friend. Donna's back stiffened and a hard determined look came into her eyes. She rose from the log and brushed her butt off as she headed for the main building with a firm determined stride.

With the slightest of smiles playing across her lips Asha said softly, "That's better, girl."

Then, she too stood, and watched Donna walk across the yard and on up the front porch steps with ever increasing determination.

Hanging from the roof of the porch was a large steel wagon wheel rim. Donna grabbed the steel rod that hung from a cord next to the rim and began to bang the rim furiously making a loud obnoxious noise similar to the steel triangle used to call all hands to chow, in the old cowboy movies.

At the same time Donna yelled at the top of her lungs, "ALL RIGHT, EVERYONE! GET UP AND COME HERE! NOW! COME ON! COME ON! GET OUT HERE!"

People came running in all manner of dress—some with robes and bed hair, others with pants on but little else. With the exception of Asha—who was fully dressed—Odin's own showed up half naked but fully armed. That, in and of it self, showed just how sloppy Donna's crew had become—they too should have come running with weapons in hand!

Donna looked at the questioning faces of her people as Odin's Own formed a perimeter facing outward with weapons at the ready. This was her family and her heart throbbed with pain as she gazed at them.

"There's no need for weapons, guys," she said to the members of Odin's Own.

"That's ok, Donna, we'll just keep an eye out," said Asha.

"Right, but listen up, too, please."

"Sure thing, Boss," said Asha.

That remark brought a look from Donna, but she saw only encouragement and so she returned to the job at hand

Donna continued to gaze out at all of the faces for a few beats more, cleared the lump from her throat and began to speak.

As she spoke, she kept up a mental mantra, "Remember how John did this, remember how John did this, remember how John did this..."

"John is dead! A great man has died! We have lost a great leader, our leader, our father, and our friend. I'm the leader now, by John's order. We have been in mourning and that is fine, but now we must carry on, just as he told us to. I'm sure that more mourning is needed but that, now, must be done on our own time. There is work to do, folks! So let's get with it! I want a working lunch Lena so please plan a meal that will fit, like say a cold buffet. Ok?"

Lena stood up straighter and said firmly with a nod of her head, "Yes Ma'am!"

Donna's demeanor was obvious to all. She was back and that strengthened them all.

"Good. Now I need to know what's going on, so bring hard copies of the status of your various responsibilities to the lunch, please. Ok? Thanks! Now get dressed and start the day. Oh, and let's spend a few hours policing this place!"

Donna whispered as she passed Asha, "How's that for a start?"

"Go girl!" Asha whispered back.

Donna stopped halfway down the steps and stood there thinking for a minute then turned toward Asha and said, " Look my people are rusty and still hurting, how about Odin's Own taking up the perimeter patrols for awhile?"

"Sounds like a plan to me ... Boss," said Asha with a broad smile as she turned and walked off.

Lunchtime finally came and all were surprised at the board that was set by Lena, the buffet was fit for a king. The return of leadership snapped the old woman from her grief and she became the force of nature that she had always been, creating gastronomic wonders to please the eye and the palate.

Once everyone had made their selections and found a seat Donna stood and said, "Thank you Lena for a sumptuous spread. Now, I know that John liked to get right down to business but I would rather wait until lunch is over and start the meeting over our coffee, ok? Now, enjoy your lunch."

Everyone liked the idea and set to. Most had seconds if not thirds before being sated.

The table was cleared, coffee and baked sweets were served and the people settled in for what would be a lengthy and serious meeting. It took three hours to get through all the status reports, the questions, and the suggestions that were generated by the information that those reports contained.

The blacked out SUV sat hidden in the vegetation along the side of the dirt road that passed the small ranch house. In the failing light of dusk the vehicle was all but invisible. Inside the car sat three people preparing for a mission, checking weapons and smearing black goop on their faces, it was far too hot and humid to use ski masks in southern Florida.

Their target tonight, was the Brigadier's grandson and his little family. The new baby boy had come home today, and would make a good incentive for the young parents to talk.

Rene kept pulling her knives out and checking the edges of the blades with a sort of anticipatory glee in her eyes.

"Will you stop that, woman!" snapped Jaron, the other team member. He was a compact black man who had the light of insanity in his eyes. "You'll get your chance to play with the baby before we kill 'em all. Anyway, I don't get your fascination with the lil' ones."

The woman gave the man a cold stare and asked, "Is that any different than your fascination with white women—the way you love to carve them up, slowly?"

The two started to argue when the third person, Niels, a cold Nordic man with ice blue eyes and white hair, stopped their bickering with a snapped order, "Silence!"

Instantly the two others went silent for they feared their leader more than any man on earth.

"FOCUS ON THE JOB! THIS IS NOT PLAY TIME! WE NEED TO FIND OUT WHERE THE BRIGADIER IS HIDING! NOT PLAY WITH OUR PREY! IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?"

The woman and man nodded and sat still.

An hour later the leader said, "It is time."

Instantly the two others were out of the vehicle donning their night vision goggles as they moved silently toward the now dark house. One went to the left and the other to the right as their leader went for the front door. They communicated by clicks of their radios rather than the spoken word and as soon as the two indicated they were in position the leader tossed a flash/bang in the front window and then kicked in the front door. At the same time the woman kicked in the back door and her partner smashed the slider from the pool area and entered a tiny bit later than expected.

The leader was the first to go down, followed quickly by the woman but the third member of the team saw his partner thrashing around on the floor and fled so quickly that he was out of range of the taser that had been fired at him. However, he fell dead twenty feet from the house, killed by two silenced shots fired from the pool house. The assassin was then stripped and his nude body left where it had fallen for the vermin to consume.

Some insects had already found the body and were feeding on the open wounds.

Inside the house the other two assassins were drugged and bound for transport to an old abandoned house a few miles away. It would be they who suffered this time, for it was the relatives of the tortured and murdered family that were to have the privilege of the interrogation.