Chapter 352

Before we knew it the weekend was over. The Sunday talk shows were filled with pundits who had all kinds of theories from mild to wild.

The wild was that the prince had gone undercover to Morocco to inspect and buy virgin sex slaves from the Libyan branch of ISIS and had been double crossed.

Centuries of tales of harems and private sex slaves were still rumored to be happening in the backrooms of the closed society that were made of the Kings and Princes. The modern internet only fueled the speculation with some of the postings from within the kingdom.

Sunday night I met the RRT at the airport welcoming them back. They were staying in the motel for the night then Monday night all 30 were going in five man teams to six different embassies in South America. When they returned next Saturday they would be here for two weeks setting up the security for the debates.

Monday I was glad to spend the day at KCC. I was even happy to see Bob Jackson and Mr. Nobles and play cat and mouse with their questions and my answers.

“Well, I see you missed some action in one of your hot spots,” Bob said.

“Yeah looks like it, you win some and loose some,” I replied. They did not know that I had spent a couple of days in Morocco.

Retraining the thirty from the six embassies moved faster this time. We were either getting better or all the informational e-mails were having an effect, or maybe both.

HR had everything they needed done in one day, including the physicals and DNA collection for our permanent records. The Morocco incident proved that we needed to add that to the file.

Tuesday and Wednesday they were split up between the shooting range and gym. The change over to the S&W 40 caliber went smooth. Jamie collected all the 9mm and issued them the new ones. By Thursday the work in the gym was done. These guys had kept themselves in shape or else the word was getting around about what we were going put them through and they went to great lengths to get in shape.

Tuesday night the international news ran a story that the ISIS Libyan branch had claimed responsibility for killing the Prince in retaliation for allowing the US to use bases there to bomb them in Iraq and Syria.

“No matter how hard you try, you cannot fix stupid,” I thought and to claim responsibility for that was as stupid as one can get.

On Wednesday the Saudi Air Force flew 500 bombing runs against ISIS and promised even more on Thursday.

Wednesday Jamie sent me a text wanting me to stop by the armory on the way home from KCC. I helped her carry in the 9mm pistols and all the collected ammunition. UPS had delivered two thousand clips to make belts today. It was her cover story to grill me about the drones.

We had a long conversation about them and that one day I would demonstrate them for her and Kevin at the same time. I also informed her that I had items in one of the gun safes and that I had changed the combination.

I was just leaving when Marcy called to tell me that I had VIP visitors waiting for me in the refreshment lounge.

I was not surprised to see Frank, Eric and Marty but I was surprised to see Smith, Phillips and Roberts - the wimpy triplets, as I thought of them - from NSA.

I grabbed a bottle of water and was pleasantly surprised to see Paula Craft - one of the homeless girls - working behind the counter as I paid for it.

“What brings you gentlemen to my little part of the world?” I asked.

“We need to discuss that in the privacy of your office,” Frank said.

“Are we going to leave them here? They are fixated on the shapely ladies on the tread mills,” I asked. I was referring to the wimpy triplets.

“They are the ones who wanted to come along. They wanted to see your operation, but are afraid to ask you,” Frank said.

I snapped my fingers to bring them out of their fixation. “Let’s go to my office,” I said.

Behind the closed doors of my office, “OK guys, you did not come all this way to stare at the lovelies, so what’s up?” I asked.

“The NSA thinks you held back some information. According to FAA records, one of your jets sprinted away in the wee hours of Wednesday morning to Morocco and while it is there, a massacre happens, killing a prince with some unusual ritual and then it sprints back just as fast a few hours later,” then Frank continued.

“Then we have a virus that wipes out all servers storing satellite and intelligence data for the African continent for the same period of time, and all our intelligence people say they are now in the dark about everything in the area for a two day period,” Frank said.

“All circumstantial I think, just a lot of coincidences, our jets fly all over. There was a round robin to Morocco Sunday, nothing happened while it was there. Then there were six different countries in South America and nothing happened, you’re barking up the wrong tree,” I replied.

“The prince was on your list as the paymaster and you want us to believe it is a coincidence that he was killed when your plane made a rush trip there?” Smith asked.

“Stranger things have happened. What makes you think I have any information that you don’t?” I asked.

“Well, we’ve got nothing; so anything you have would be a help. We know that your people on the ground do a lot more than look over the embassy wall; they have already proven that. Then there is your intel group, so we know you must have something,” Frank replied.

‘“Just for a topic of conversation, suppose I do have something - what is in it for me?” I asked.