The Geronimo Breach (36 page)

He cleared his throat and began to speak, a deep baritone long bent to the artifice of holding an audience’s attention, well modulated, passion and intensity obvious in every syllable without any evidence of stridency. This was a man’s man, a leader and a visionary, a man capable of finally, after centuries of oppression, delivering to the Mexican people the promise of their legacy.

“Look at the prosperity Mexico has enjoyed over the last eleven years. Under the party’s leadership, a new, burgeoning middle class has been created, and poverty has been eradicated in many of its most pervasive forms. Our economy is the eleventh largest in the world, strong and resilient, like the Mexican people, who have triumphed in the face of adversity and built a better future for our children!”
El Gallo
proclaimed, emphasizing points by stabbing at the air with his hat.

The crowd burst into well-choreographed spontaneous applause, led by party agitators who were in attendance to galvanize cheering at the appropriate points. The television cameras tracked over the thronged celebrants – one could hardly watch the outpouring of enthusiasm without being moved.

“I love my children, and I have taught them to love God, and Mexico. I like to think I’ve shown them the difference between right and wrong, between good and evil, between a road with promise and one that leads to purgatory. Children are the country’s future, and so we must do everything in our power to build a safe environment where they can excel. They shouldn’t have to worry about drug cartels shooting up the streets, or pushing their poison in our schools. We cannot give in to their terrorism. Not because it’s the right thing to do. Not because it’s the easy thing to do. But because of the children. We must do what it takes, for the children, for Mexico’s bountiful harvest of talent and hope!”

The hunched figure adjusted the tripod of the high velocity rifle, watching as the oration hit full stride and the gathering of citizens applauded again. The actual words were lost on him because he was behind the speakers, in the tower of the church three hundred yards from the optimistic assembly. He was invisible to the security forces in place around the rally, the rifle recessed in the small rectangular openings of the tower’s pinnacle.

The gunman watched the red balloons that framed the stage for clues as to the amount and direction of any wind. He was in luck. The late spring gusts were nowhere in evidence. It would be an easy shot.

He was startled by a car backfiring on the road below. Several security men ran in the direction of the percussive blast, accompanied by six soldiers. They watched as the ancient farm truck rolled down the street, straining under its load of hay. At the next intersection, the engine backfired again; the group of gunmen exchanged relieved looks, laughing with merriment at their defense of
El Gallo
from a poorly tuned V8. The sentries returned to their positions as the great man continued to paint his verbose vision of a bright new future.

A crow landed on the balustrade of the tower, and fixed the man with its beady stare. For a reason he couldn’t define, he was momentary chilled; the hair on his arms standing erect. He wasn’t a believer in omens or symbols, but lurking somewhere in his schooldays the crow was deemed a foreteller of bad luck. An impression from his past nagged at him, tried to surface, but he shrugged it off – he didn’t have time to waste on being spooked by a bird. The man grinned at his own imagination – allowing a crow to throw him. It would be a day of bad luck, all right, but not for him.

The crow bobbed its head several times, then pecked at the stone it was standing on before giving up on its project and flying away.

He reached into his pants pocket, extracted a pair of dense foam earplugs and set them in front of him, along with a digital watch displaying the time. He had thirty seconds. Checking to ensure that everything was in place, he compressed the plugs and inserted them into each ear before returning his attention to the florid man pontificating on the stage. He seemed to be reaching a crescendo, and the gunman couldn’t help but smile again. This was going to be a funny one, if there ever had been. He couldn’t wait to see the papers tomorrow.

El Gallo
was building his intensity, railing against the cartels as the embodiment of Satan crawling over the planet in human form. The words were powerful, and the emotions high as his voice increased in volume.

“These scum are a cancer on the body of the state; they are toxic purveyors of poison and suffering. They accommodate the demands of the rich
Gringos
, who buy their products even as their own country collapses from the weight of its own excesses. They have turned Mexico into their whore, and its children into their slaves. We suffer so that pimps and rich socialites can snort the devil’s dandruff during their orgies. I would send a message to these traitors who suckle at the tit of the false God to the north. I would send a telegram. The message is, no longer will we be your burros or your lapdogs. No more will you use our blood to lubricate your war machine. We are Mexican, and we are tired of being the back yard where you dump your problems, where you come to turn our daughters into prostitutes and our sons into groveling peasants. Your time is over, and we will now reclaim the bounty that is our birthright! We are strong and proud. And most of all, we are Mexican. We are family – and we will be free!”

The bells of the church began ringing, announcing the arrival of the noon hour, and
El Gallo
, in fever pitch, slammed his head forward onto the podium in his now-famous trademark move. The crowd burst into a spirited and hearty applause.

It was only when he slumped to the floor with blood spreading over the back of his hand-stitched white silk cowboy shirt that the screaming began.

The young novitiate moved with easy determination to the doors of the church as the pealing of the bells trumpeted God’s grace and presence in everyday life. An ancient woman crossed herself as he passed, her weathered face momentarily glowing with a devoted smile. He turned when he reached the door and genuflected, his cassock brushing the ground as he crossed himself before the vision of an unfortunate savior crucified so that humanity could be saved, movingly depicted in the statue that dominated the wall above the altar. The sun streaked through the elaborate stained glass windows over the door, bathing the interior in a dazzling multi-colored glow; the nearly empty chamber radiating a tranquility that was regrettably absent from the cruel world just outside the doors.

With bible in hand, and fingering his rosary, he exited the house of worship and crossed the street; a pious man on a mission to save the world.

Twenty minutes later, the bodyguards and soldiers crept up the stairs to the tower top, guns at the ready as they strained their ears for any hint of threat. The huge bells had fallen silent, and the only sound besides the scream of the sirens from the square across the street was the cooing of amorous doves taking refuge in the tower rafters.

The leader of the team held up a hand in warning when he saw the rifle, still on the tripod, a single spent shell casing lying by its side. He softly moved towards it; the blood drained from his face as he saw the item held in place by the votive candle.

The stern countenance of the highly-stylized rendering of the royal presence seemed to sneer at the intruders, the brandished sword proclaiming to one and all the regal superiority of the seated man.

He approached the card as if in a trance, then reached down and retrieved the tattered rectangle, holding it up for his men to see.

The King of Swords had struck again.

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King
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Excerpt from Fatal Exchange

Fatal Exchange

Russell Blake

Copyright © 2011 by Russell Blake

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law, or in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, contact
[email protected].

A shriek ripped through the bunker, then slowly tapered off to a moan punctuated by congested gasps and feeble gurgling. At first it was hard to tell the gender of the screamer by the timbre of the emanation, but then the moan gave it away.

It was a man.

The noise was coming from a room at the end of a dimly lit hallway, concrete construction, everything painted a sickly olive-green and reeking of disrepair. Behind the chamber’s steel door stood two men in brown uniforms of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. A third man wearing a short-sleeved pleated dress shirt sat at a metal table upon which rested an old wooden box with a hand crank, and what looked like a weathered carpentry kit, with all the usual tools present. There were other, more arcane instruments strewn over a small rolling stand, and a tray containing rubber gloves, an apron, and a Dremel.

The floor sloped gradually to meet the drainage grid in the far corner, where an old faucet intermittently dripped water. Illumination was dim on the periphery but brighter in the middle of the space, where a large lamp hung from the ceiling, housing a bank of hundred-watt incandescent bulbs.

The air was putrid and smelled of urine and feces, and ventilation was poor – they’d needed to improvise a facility on relatively short notice. As the building had originally been a holding cell for prisoners offloaded from returning naval ships, powerful climate-control and air-moving machinery had never been deemed necessary.

All three men had their attention focused on a naked Asian man in his late thirties, strapped to a metal chair directly below the lights. His head rested on his chest, where a thin thread of saliva and blood slowly trickled down his concave ribcage. The screaming had stopped, replaced by sobbing and whimpering, high pitched and eerily reminiscent of a cat in heat.

The smaller of the uniformed men approached the seated figure, carefully avoiding the pool of filth around the chair—the victim had voided his bowels and bladder at some point during the interrogation, contributing to the stench in the room. He leaned in close and spoke softly in Burmese.

“Where is it?”

The man in the chair moaned. The uniformed man tried again, reasonably.

“Where is it? We know you took it.”

The subject didn’t register the words. Annoying. The officer had so many more pleasurable things he could be doing. Right now he was running late for a rendezvous with one of the young ladies he favored with his charms, as well as the odd food voucher or handful of coins.

He pressed onward. “We don’t wish to make this last any longer than it has to. It would be a shame to have to bring your family into it, but you’re leaving me no choice. How old are your two daughters? Eight and ten, I believe? Think of them. Answer the question. For them.”

The man slowly raised his head and regarded the officer. One of his eyes was missing, or rather had been punctured earlier in the discussion, and was leaking its ocular fluid down his battered cheek. The pain had to be excruciating.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I swear.” The words ran together in a hoarse mumble, due to the obliteration earlier levied upon his face.

The officer shook his head imperceptibly and sighed. His tryst would have to be delayed; this was going nowhere. Shrugging his shoulders, he reached into his pocket and retrieved a pair of white foam earplugs, then turned to the man in the short shirtsleeves and nodded.

Without hesitation, the man cranked the handle on the old wooden box. The victim shrieked again, an otherworldly sound that bespoke unimaginable horrors. A pair of worn blackened wires ran from the old hand generator to the seated man’s genitals, where the bare ends had been affixed with black electrical tape. The smell of burning hair and flesh mingled with the other noxious odors.

“Where is it? What did you do with it?”

More gurgling.

The taller officer removed his round wire-rimmed glasses, cleaned the lenses carefully with a handkerchief, and addressed the man in the shirtsleeves.

“Use the drill.”

The shirtsleeved man nodded, and removed from his bag a device resembling a dog muzzle, with straps on the back terminating in metal hooks. He clawed his hands into the man’s head, forcing his face into the contraption. The front section had a hinged mechanism controlling two short metal rods now plunged inside the man’s mouth. The rods were grooved, worn by the many previous sets of teeth which had ground them.

He secured the metal hooks to the chair back, and tightened the straps so the man couldn’t move his head. Then, with a practiced twist, he turned the lever on the side of the mechanism, forcing the man’s mouth open, allowing access to his dental plate.

Pausing for a moment, the shirtsleeved man considered his shoes, now soiled with the accumulated expulsions. Aggravating, but there was nothing to be done about it. He hoped they’d wash clean.

Turning, he donned a plastic apron with an incongruous faded image of a dancing crab, and selected the Dremel, a tiny high-speed jeweler’s drill used for polishing and grinding work. He inserted the bit—a small tapered cone with serrated edges running from the tip to the base, useful for boring holes in stone or metal—and tightened the shaft.

The victim’s eye went wide as the screech of the high-pitched motor filled the space.