Chapter 14

I felt like a real piece of shit but I have to admit I felt relieved when I heard it was Rachael that had been kidnapped and not one of my girls. That didn't last long though. I mean if you put my feet in hot coals and tied electrodes to my testicles you could probably get me to admit I had even started liking the little twit ― a little bit anyway. But that didn't matter. Being a kidnap victim is nobody's idea of a good time. The percentage of live retrievals is depressingly small and completely independent as to whether or not the ransom is paid. Our little songbird was in a tough spot and I wasn't sure how the hell I could help.

Yes, we did ultimately find out what happened and the root cause was of course ― you guessed it ― Connor! In addition to being the stellar human being he was, he was also a gambler and as with everything else he did he wasn't worth a shit at it. Naturally he owed a lot of money to some fairly nasty people. No, he didn't arrange to have her kidnapped, I almost wish he had. He would have probably fucked that up like everything else he did and we wouldn't have had the problem.

He didn't arrange a kidnapping but he did set up a private interview for these selfsame nasty people and Rachael. He was told they were big fans and just wanted to meet her and this private meeting would go a long way to relieving his debt. So right after the concert he guided her and Faolain (Faolain absolutely refused to let her go without protection; God bless the man.) to a secluded part of the theater where they were jumped and Rachael taken. In the process Faolain was shot and at this time he was in serious but not critical condition. Unfortunately, Connor wasn't although later I'm sure he'd wished he had been.

"What do the police say?" I asked.

"They said they'd kill her if we went to the police, so we haven't," Leanne sniffed but was calming down.

"They always do," I replied. "Is Magaoidh there?" She nodded. "Put him on."

"Sirrah?" Magaoidh looked calm and at ease; in a battle tested soldier that usually means he's wired hot and ready to go. "Mr. Camberge refused to call the authorities in on this." He made "Camberge" sound like a curse word.

"Camberge is a fucking asshole, but this time he might be right," I admitted. "If your cops are as corrupt as ours they probably have dozens of moles in the department who'd sell out their own mother for a stiff drink. I'm willing to bet whoever these guys are they'll know immediately if the cops are called. Did she have her tracker on and have you been able to follow it?"

"Sir, she did," he replied. "We were able to track her to the middle of Dublin but it faded out." That meant they probably had her underground or in a building somewhere. If it faded out it probably meant she still had it on but our equipment wasn't sensitive enough to read it. Unfortunately our gear was civilian grade and not military ... I had an idea.

"Colour Sergeant! Tell the girls I'm working on it and I'll call you right back." I didn't wait for the acknowledgement but switched him off and called the one person I thought could help.

"My Lord, Leforge, can't you let an old man get his sleep?" BGEN Clemson yawned when he finally arrived. "You tell my staff it's a matter of life and death ... Well I can only hope so." I quickly filled him in on what happened.

"That's rotten luck for sure," he grumbled. "But I'm not sure how I can be of any assistance."

"Don't you still have a mutual defense treaty with Ireland?" I asked. I knew they did. Actually "mutual defense" was a bit of a misnomer. For certain considerations Great Briton agreed to be Ireland's sole defense. In other wards Ireland had no standing army and GB had small garrisons of British troops scattered around the island, mostly Irish serving in the British army. These weren't really for defense purposes; Ireland's real defense came from being included under Briton's umbrella of naval, air and space forces. The troops were there mainly to man logistic and intelligence posts.

"That being the case," I continued, "do you still run reconnaissance drones around the area?"

"I believe we do," he said with twinkle in his eye. "As a matter of fact I believe we are running an exercise over Dublin proper later this night: a surprise exercise. It'll be an anti-terrorist exercise ― hostages and all that. I wonder if there is something specific we should be looking for?"

"How about a hostage that has a tracker on her? Say giving off a signal in the range of..." I gave him the transmitting frequency of our trackers.

"Oh jolly good! That adds a bit of realism to the scenario, now doesn't it?"

"If your boys get a hit you'll need to send the location to Colour Sergeant Magaoidh," I told him. "Damn it! I wish I could be there," I cursed.

"Well why not, old boy?" he asked.

"Because they kicked me out of their fucking country!" I fumed.

"Yes, I head about that," he chuckled. "Something about propensity for violence or some such nonsense; I could hardly believe it. You seem to have such a gentle nature to me." I glared at him.

"Why don't you head down to your airport there, Martin," he chuckled. "I'm thinking that the colonel in charge of this exercise could use a bit of advice from an expert. It probably wouldn't be a bad idea for him to hire you as a consultant for a night. Of course we'll take care of your transportation and since you'd be a contractor under military control you won't need to worry about those silly little visa things."

I quickly contacted Magaoidh who accepted what I'd arranged with the blasé indifference of a senior NCO who expects miracles from his officers on a daily basis. Leanne was incredulous that I would be coming over so soon. If the truth be known so was I but it wasn't only NCOs that expected and planned around the ability of their superior officers to shit miracles as required.

I didn't pack, I just changed into a nondescript old battle uniform without the insignia and headed down to the airport not knowing what to expect. What I really didn't expect was a British Space Service suborbital admiral's gig to be waiting for me.

"Major Leforge?" the pilot saluted me and I returned it automatically.

"Uh, yeah," I stood there flabbergasted.

"Better get in, sir," she said cheerfully. "We have to get this bird up in the air if we're going to get back in time for the exercise."

"Right," I mumbled and climbed in and sat where she pointed me. Making sure I was securely strapped in she commented, "Can't have the luggage banging about the cabin now can we?" She strapped herself in, put the control headgear on and started talking quietly to someone, probably the control tower. Seconds later we were moving smoothly down the runway and gently lifting into the air.

"Roxy-doxy here," she spoke into the com. "Package onboard, wheels up, feet wet two mikes, ETA 0200 local, out." We climbed steeply to about 22,000 meters and leveled off.

"Hold on to yer boys, Major," she grinned over at me. "Let's see what this lassie can do." With that she touched a pad and I was pressed back against my seat, hard! This lasted for about three minutes and the acceleration eased until I couldn't feel it at all; I did feel pretty light.

"Wow!" I gasped.

"Exciting isn't it?" she grinned again. She had just a touch of a Scottish accent. She was caressing another part of the pad and lifting the control harness until it just rested on her head. I wondered who was flying the freaking thing and it must have shown on my face.

"This lovey flies herself," she grinned. "Don't know why they don't just give the dog wings and put him in here." I must have looked confused because she continued. "You know these things fly themselves so well they only crew them with a pilot and a dog and the pilot's only there to feed the dog." Yeah, I had to ask.

"Oh, the dog's there to bite the pilot if she tries to touch anything!" she answered gleefully.

Pilot humor! Give me a break! "Thanks, I wasn't expecting something like this," I said looking around at the six-passenger cabin.

"Not yer normal pickup," she admitted. "But I was taking the baby out for a test hop after some maintenance and was over Newfoundland when they diverted me. Only took a few to bob on down, a sip of fuel and we're on our way." She paused for a moment studying me. "Do you mind me asking why yer so bloody important to this exercise they had to get you over to Ireland so quickly? The only way to get there faster is to strap yer arse on a ballistic missile and drop you on way over. If it's classified I'll understand. I'm just a glorified coach driver after all."

"I'm not sure it's really what I'd call classified," I admitted. "I'm hoping my part of the exercise will be at the end of it." I gave her a condensed version of what had happened to Rachael and what the mostly fictitious exercise was all about.

"Oh, I'm sorry to hear about the lass," she said with sympathy. "I've become quite a fan of theirs. Not a blip on the screamers (news channels) about it ... Wait! You're him aren't you!" she squealed with delight. "You're the major of The Major's Harem! I though you looked familiar! Wait till my mates hear that I flew him over!"

I groaned. Fucking scandal sites!

Of course after that she was chatty as could be wanting to know everything about the band, me and of course our love life. I will say she wasn't upset one little bit when I told her more than once that certain topics were private and I wasn't going to talk about them. She'd just grin and go on to the next question. I did admit to the fact that Leanne, Niamh and I were planning to get married sometime in the near future but asked her not to broadcast it if possible, especially to the scuzzies.

"Bah!" she waved it off. "I wouldn't piss in their mouth if they were dying of thirst." I didn't think she was old enough to have served during the war but she sure learned the unfiltered directness of a vet from somewhere.

"So what about the other two, the little brunettes?" she wiggled her eyebrows at me. "You going to marry them too?"

"Well they haven't asked yet, now have they?" I bantered back.

"Think yer man enough for four women, Major?" she asked elbowing me in the side.

"Hell no! I doubt I'll survive the year," I replied. "But when I die it's going to be it's going to be as a soldier: doing my best and with a smile on my lips." She laughed so hard I just sat there hoping she didn't jog anything too important. A few minutes later the control panel beeped and she slammed her control helmet down in place and began speaking quickly and quietly. The whine from the engines muted slightly and the nose dropped slightly.

"Twenty minutes and we're on the ground, Major," she told me when she was finished. "We'll be dropping into our airbase just outside of Dublin. There's a team meeting you on the pad."

"Thanks, Roxy." She'd told me Roxy was both her name and her handle. I won't go through the landing but suffice it to say if you keep your eyes squeezed tightly shut and try to think of anything except what's going on it's not so bad. I wished I'd done it. I'm sure there were other times I was more terrified but I couldn't remember any of them at the moment ― still don't.

Once we were stopped, she popped off the control helmet, helped me unbuckle and helped me and my rubber legs down to the tarmac. She didn't seem to notice that we had been that close to slamming into the ground at supersonic speeds. Pilots!

There was a van waiting but before heading over there I turned to thank Roxy for the ride; not the landing, just the ride. Before I could say anything she had her arms wrapped around my neck and was kissing me with a lot of enthusiasm. Almost before it could register she pushed herself away and giggled.

"I guess that means I'm part of your harem now," she grinned, gave me a little finger wave as she turned and headed back towards her plane. I just shook my head and jogged to the van.

"Major Leforge!" a bright-eyed second lieutenant snapped to attention and saluted as I approached. I casually returned it and nodded. There were six of them; the second louie, four privates and two sergeants that looked like they were old enough to be Magaoidh's compatriots.

"The recon bird got a chirp and we have a fix on the target," he continued before I could say anything as they hustled me into the van. We were moving before they even closed the door. "You're — ah, team — is there already. It'll only take us about fifteen minutes to get there."

"Thanks, Lieutenant," I nodded gratefully.

"Now, Major," he continued. "I have been instructed to inform you that no active duty personnel may take part in any simulated hostage rescue. It's strictly forbidden for any of us to interfere in what is a civilian police matter. We can be there to observe but unless fired upon we cannot become involved."

"I understand completely," I nodded. "I'm grateful for any help at all but I know you have limits."

"Very strict limits." He returned my nod. What he could do is relay to me all the information they'd been able to gather from the spook-bird.

"It's an older part of town," he began. "The signal if coming from there," he poked a finger through the holographic image of a building projected in the van's holo-tank. "Sorry, no thermal imaging," he responded to my unasked question. "The buildings in this section are old enough they actually use steam heat. All we can see is a number of hot spots; they could be occupants or merely radiators; there's not enough movement to be sure.

"We're almost there," he said as I heard the crackle of information being sent to his headset. Very few officers were given implants anymore and even fewer enlisted. There wasn't any combat to speak of and the expense was considered extravagant. "We'll be meeting with your team about a block away from the target." Right after he said that we pulled into a darkened vehicle recharging station. There were already three large cars there. I saw Magaoidh, Caoimh and Mac standing beside one.

We stopped and I jumped out heading over to my team but before I could get there the door of one of the cars popped opened and four figures tumbled out. I was hit by a flurry of femininity before I could make it halfway across the parking area.

"What in the hell are you four doing here?" I asked angrily as eight hands, four bodies and four sets of lips did their best to cover me.

"We had to," Leanne sobbed as she clung to my neck. "You're going to save her, aren't ya Martin?"

"I'm going to do my best, love," I replied giving each one of them a quick kiss and gently pushing them away from me. "But none of you should be here! This could be dangerous."

"She's our cousin..." Leanne stated flatly.

"Me sister," Niamh continued.

"And yer our man," Eimile and Shauna finished in unison.

"We had to be here," Leanne explained.

"Okay, but I don't like it," I huffed. "When we go in, you four are getting into that car and not coming out for anything. Got it? Because if you don't I will have you bound hand and foot and locked in that car!"

"He's talking about tying us up," Shauna sniffed and tried to smile. "Even in desperate times all he can think about is sex." Her ploy worked as the other three giggled through their tears and Eimile gave her a shot in the side with an elbow.

"I just want you safe," I replied softly. "Everything I hold dear is standing right here. I have a job to do and I won't be as effective if I have to worry about you out here while I'm in there."

"I think we can handle that, Martin," I looked behind the girls and standing there was Brigadier General Clemson surrounded by his squad of SAS bodyguards. They were holding 5mm submachine guns at the ready scanning the streets and rooftops through IF/UV goggles. Standing to one side was Becky Brighton in a pair of drab utilities and on his other side was a hard looking middle-aged woman in the uniform of the Irish National Police.

"Becky and I will tend to the lasses while you fellows do your little task," he continued.