Chapter 1: A Strange Arrival

December 11, 1989

Tobo was one of those island countries that had nothing going for it, except geography. It was just far enough away from Amra, and geographically large enough, that attacking the island would require a full naval task force. It was close enough that young enterprising individuals could smuggle products (agricultural products) to almost the whole eastern side of Amra. It also had a climate that was perfect for growing poppies. Its key exports to the world were opium and heroin, and its preferred destination was Amra.

There were at least thirty different key routes that led from Tobo to Amra. Some involved intermediate countries such as Teal, New Franc, and Termal. There were also routes that involved skimming the coastlines, going from small island to small island. There were three open water routes where the normal ocean traffic was enough to stress the ‘board and inspect’ capabilities of the Amran Navy.

It was on May 20, 1984 that the Amran government declared a ‘War on Drugs’ with the chief source being Tobo. This sounded great, in the newspapers. The only problem was that it was a war on drugs, and not on Tobo. This meant that Amra was not going to invade Tobo to stop the drugs at the source, so it was forced to work with the Tobo government. The Tobo military was sent into places to eliminate crops accompanied by Amran military advisers. This would have worked quite well, but it seemed as if every third recruit in the Tobo military had relatives who were growing poppies, were processing the opium into heroin, or were involved in smuggling.

After five years, the Amra’s ‘War on Drugs’ was going nowhere. Farmers planted poppies, the Tobo military destroyed a few fields every season, cottage industries were manufacturing heroin, and smugglers were getting the drugs into Amra. In Amra, wholesalers were receiving regular shipments, distributing it to middle men, and then low level dealers were selling drugs to users. It was a nice little economy all on its own.

As a result of the basic consistency of production, refinement, shipping, and sales; a handful of individuals eventually gained almost total control over the drug trade. The process of centralizing the drug trade started well before the ‘War on Drugs’ had been declared. In a lot of cases, the raids by the Tobo military were used by one group or another, to eliminate some competitors. By 1989, control of the drug trade had distilled down to one group: the Tobo Drug Cartel.

It would seem obvious that if there is one group in control of the drug trade, that the war on drugs should have been easily winnable. Eliminate that one group and declare victory. The problem was that the group in question controlled the Tobo government; which, in turn, controlled the Tobo military. That meant, the military wasn’t actually going to do anything that impacted the drug trade, regardless of what Amra wanted. It was rumored, but never documented, that the ‘poison’ sprayed to kill the poppy crops in some areas was actually fertilizer, or insecticides, or both.

The problem of political corruption wasn’t only a problem inside Tobo, but was a problem in Amra, as well. There was a lot of money in drugs. Where there is there is a lot of money to be made, there is leverage to use in gaining favors from powerful people. The head of the Tobo drug cartel had even been an honored guest of the Prime Minister of Amra!

The corruption in Amra basically manifested itself in a form of schizophrenic multiple personality disorder. On one hand, politicians, law enforcement organizations, and the military all spoke out against drug trafficking, and the cost in human lives that resulted from the horrible practice of drug use. On the other hand, those same individuals were committed to keeping a form of status quo. If the ‘War on Drugs’ actually came to an end, they’d be out work. So the game was to get a little positive press, get more money to grow the department, and get bigger and better toys. It made for lots of interesting thirty second news bites on television.

Politicians wanted spectacular arrests while not wanting the people they knew, or who had donated lots of money to them, exposed as common criminals. So they threw lots of money at the problem and bought equipment for use by the Tobo military, but didn’t really follow through on any of it. When some group got too aggressive, arms and legs were figuratively tied with bureaucratic red tape.

Then one day, a childhood friend of a minor director working within a branch of the Ministry of War which was tasked with ending the ‘War on Drugs’ died of a heroin overdose. With the death of his friend, the director, Mark Goodall, was upset and angry. He had always wanted to win the ‘War on Drugs,’ but had found the political maneuvering necessary to accomplish something, to be impossible. The more he pushed, the harder the system pushed back at him.

Mark had just about given up, when he read a newspaper article about the release of four Amran businessmen who had been kidnapped. The companies involved had hired a mercenary group which went in, and ended a major kidnapping ring in Kale. He wondered if they might be able to help. He made a call. Much to his dismay and disappointment, they turned him down before he was able to fully state that he wanted to hire them and why. It left him disappointed, and he basically gave up on ever ending the drug trade from Tobo.

A week after making the call, he went for a jog in the park near his office during lunch, as was often a habit of his. He was taking it easy. He was not pushing himself that particular day, nor really paying too much attention to his surroundings. He was surprised when suddenly he was hit in the face with a soft juggler’s bean bag. He stopped, and found that he was surrounded by laughing children. A woman with her face painted with flowers was standing in front of him with a large smile on her face.

She leaned towards him with a hand cupped over her ear. He stared at her thinking she was crazy. Then she turned to the children while jumping up and down excitedly. Her excitement was contagious and the kids were bouncing right along with her. He wondered if he was dealing with a lunatic.

“Kids! This nice man just asked me for date. Should I say ‘yes?’”

There was a loud cacophony of yesses, nos, and oohs from the children. He stared at her in disbelief. He knew he hadn’t done any such a thing. Yes, he was definitely dealing with a lunatic.

“I think he should have to wait for an answer. What do you think, kids?”

Yesses, and only a few nos, rang out. They were happy to be made a part of the whole thing, but didn’t want their entertainment interrupted. For his part, he had no intention of waiting around for her. The sooner he put some distance between him and this crazy woman, the better.

“Well, Mark, it seems the kids think you should wait for my answer. Have a seat over on the bench and read the newspaper. There’s a great article about how the Jade Force will join the ‘War on Drugs,’” she said with a broad smile.

He stood there staring after her. How had she known his name? What was that about Jade Force? That was the outfit that had hung up on him. He glanced over at the bench where there was a folded newspaper just lying there. He had read the paper that morning and there hadn’t been any such article in it.

She turned to the kids and, in an excited voice, asked, “What are we supposed to say to drugs?”

“No!” the kids echoed.

“That’s right!”

She picked up her fallen juggler’s bean bag and started juggling while singing a common children’s song. With great enthusiasm, the kids sang along with her. She slowly moved away from him, juggling the whole while, with the kids following her. He noticed that there was a group of mothers watching their children at play from a distance.

He walked over to the bench and picked up the newspaper. It was today’s newspaper. The front page was the same. He opened it to the second page. It was exactly the same as he had read, earlier. He opened it to another page, but this one was different. The type was the same, most of the articles were the same, and even the ads were the same, but the lead article had been replaced with instructions on how to hire Jade Force, to end the ‘War on Drugs.’ He couldn’t believe what it was saying. He was to hire them to be scapegoats for major failures in the ‘War on Drugs.’ That didn’t make sense to him at all.

A woman in a wheelchair rolled past. She paused and then said, “The park is not the place to read a newspaper. You should take it back to your office and read it there. Be sure that you follow the instructions on how to set up a contract for Jade Force.”

“What?” he asked staring at the woman.

She wasn’t the same woman who had told him about the newspaper. The crazy woman juggler was long gone, along with the kids who had been following her.

“Have a nice day,” the woman said and then pushed away in her wheelchair.

Where he had received nothing but resistance before this, the proposal to hire Jade Force as a convenient scapegoat went through the system like magic. It seemed that everyone liked the idea of having an outside party who could be blamed for failures. The outlandish budget only gave it more credibility. A contract with Jade Force was signed in record time.

The Amran Army had a small base along the coast of Tobo where the ‘Amran advisers’ to the Tobo military were stationed. It was on the outskirts of a large town. There was a chain link fence around it with several gates staffed with guards. There hadn’t ever been any kind of attack, so the guards were a little lax.

There was a lot of traffic in and out of the base, but it was basically a quiet place. Locals were hired to take care of the camp, doing things like gardening, laundry, meal preparation, and secretarial services. There were a couple of buildings no one was allowed into without proper clearance. There were guards at those buildings, but none of them had been challenged in years.

With the base abutted right against the beach, the most common pass time of the soldiers stationed there was to sit out on the beach, swim, and surf. It was a cushy place to be sent, probably one of the best duty stations in the whole Amran Army: no one was shooting at them, the locals were happy to do the daily grudge work for them, and they even had a guy who sold beverages on the beach.

Once a week or so, a handful of them rode along in a Tobo helicopter with the Tobo military looking for poppy fields. When they found one, they’d land nearby, discuss the matter, and then a plane would come by and spray the field, and some poor farmer would get hauled away for questioning. No one from Amra ever followed up on the field, or the farmer. That was Tobo’s problem.

At a few minutes before eleven o’clock in the morning on December 11, 1989, everyone on the base turned to look at the big four engined transport plane approaching the base from the city. It was flying very low, at just around four hundred feet of altitude. The ramp at the rear of the plane had been lowered. Suddenly, two figures popped out the rear of the plane with chutes deployed. Everyone watched, impressed by the low altitude jump, as they floated down at a sedate pace landing in front of the headquarters building. It took only a few seconds for them to get their chutes under control, rolled up, and stuffed in their packs.