Chapter 391

I was up early. After breakfast, Andy and I went to the hospital to see my wounded and talk with the doctors. The injuries were worse than I had been told.

The doctors did not want to, but accepted that they would be shipped back to the US today. The men did not want to go home either, but understood the options were better there for rehab and could spend time with their families and assist in training as they felt like it.

Linda called to tell me that the investigators were at Entebbe waiting for us to pick them up. Andy sent the Blackhawk.

On the way back to the embassy, Andy and I stopped at the lumber yard. The owner supplied a name and number and even called to set up an appointment; the stone contractor would be there when we got there.

Andy and I were meeting with the contractor when I could hear the Blackhawk in the distance. The contractor had not had work in two months and desperately needed work. He could start as soon as he got his equipment. A handshake was all he needed and he got it.

The chopper was circling to land, giving the investigators an aerial view. I was standing in the front door watching a glass contractor repair the broken front door. The two terrorists had tried to get into the front of the embassy through those doors, only to run into Linda, Ellen and Alice. The interesting thing was there were no stray bullet holes; they had made every shot count while under stress.

I was in the kitchen at the coffee pot when I heard, “Hello stranger, have you got an extra mug?” in Russian.

“You don’t sound like a stranger and I have plenty of mugs for old friends,” I replied in Russian. When I turned around not only Frank but Eric, Victor, the triplets and several more people - including Senators Whitby and Harrison - were standing there. The ones I did not know, I had shaken their hands the day I took the oath.

“This place looks like a war happened outside,” Senator Whitby said. “And you look like you have been in one.”

“There was for a while,” I replied. “I may look bad but they are worse and I won. The only problem is I took no prisoners so there was no one left to sign the surrender document, so the war goes on.”

After the coffee a complete tour of the embassy grounds was undertaken.

“Take all the pictures you want first; clean up and repairs are starting in a few minutes,” I said.

And take pictures they did; every single car, both trucks, both walls, from on top of the embassy, the deflection wall we had built that now had most of the flag paint missing. There were several pieces of steel from the truck that were deeply imbedded in the wood. It would take the skid steer to get them out.

Howie had crated the drones up this morning; there were only 2 of the general purpose devices left assembled and they were in one of the eight foot crates - out of sight out mind, so to speak.

I walked away from the group to call Cory Richfield, “Make me 10 more of each device. They worked quite well.”

Then I called Robbie, “Order another 1000 pounds of ball bearings.”

We talked about the Blackhawks I had bought. He had already received shipping manifests for them. They were to start arriving in a week. Chester Crane Company was going to leave a crane on site to unload them.

I finished the calls and then went to stand with the investigators to watch the skid steer wrestle the truck out of he east wall and off the mangled steel pilings. The contractor was going to straighten them as best he could.

The contractor said it was a family business. When he showed up he must have brought every son, cousin, nephew, son-in-law and then some. They started putting the wall back up from both ends and the middle.

There were four different groups mixing mortar in pans with a mortar hoe and chipping mortar off the rebar they were going to reuse.

I noticed when I was walking around that there were ball bearings everywhere. I wondered if any business had one of those parking lot magnets we could rent or buy to collect them.

I would find out after this group left; so far, no one had said anything about them so there was no need to bring attention to them.

The investigators were ready for the closed door circus to begin. I resigned myself to the task as I filled my coffee mug again. It was going to be a long morning and afternoon.