1: Landing in Quito
As I lugged my duffel down the stairs in the Quito airport, I spotted another sign with Granger printed on it. Shades of Huntsville, except the person holding it was not an alluring young woman with the most incredible eyes I’ve ever seen.
At about 5’9” he was a trim, balding man in the second half of middle age with a jaw that looked as if it was carved out of rock and thick, black plastic birth-control glasses perched on his nose. I had a feeling the grey stubble on his cheeks and chin was permanent. Otherwise he wore black combat boots, green and brown-splotched jungle-camouflage trousers, and a medium-blue polo shirt. Odd looking duck.
He lowered the sign and started across the floor toward the bottom of the stairs, and as I stepped off the last step he offered his hand. His grip was like a vise. Quietly, he said, “Real-world problem?” His voice was deep and raspy, like he’d choked himself with that grip at least once.
I grinned. “Real-world solution. I thought I was supposed to go first.”
He ignored that. “Federico Cantán. I’ll be your spotter.”
With those specs? They’re what, a quarter-inch thick?
“This way.” He pivoted away as only an old military guy could do, and I followed. As he walked, he balled the sign in his fists and dropped it into a trash receptacle near the front door.
Outside, I caught up with him. “So where’re we going?”
“That’s need to know. You’ll be there when it’s time, so you don’t need to know.” He pointed across a wide asphalt driveway. “Over there.”
I followed him across the driveway and through a cast-iron gate that also reminded me of Huntsville and toward a beat-up green-and-black-and-tan camouflage Land Rover.
“Get in. The plan has changed. We’ll go to a room first so you can change.”
The thin passenger door of the Land Rover closed with a distinctive, military, no-frills metallic thud.
He started the truck and whipped it backward out of the space, then worked the gearshift lever, popped the clutch, and showed no signs of slowing as we approached the exit.
Miraculously, the gate attendant raised the bar just before we got there. I don’t think it would have mattered either way to Federico.
*
Maybe fifteen minutes later we pulled into the parking lot of a single-story, seedy-looking motel that put me in mind of the No-Tell motels back in the ‘States.
As Federico opened his door, propped the toe of his left boot against it, and lit a cigar, he said, “Room 17. Get in, change for the field, and get out. Bring your bag with you. You’re not staying and we’re not coming back.”
He exhaled the first heavy cloud of smoke through his door, and when I opened mine it whipped away in the cross-breeze.
I went in, changed, put the clothes I was wearing back in the bag, zipped it, and beat feet back to the truck. As I opened the door on the truck and started to climb in, Federico gestured through the windshield. “Close the door. You were born in the barn?”
I ran back and closed the door of the motel room, then ran back to the truck and climbed in. He’d moved my bag to the back seat.
He backed out again and the open driver’s side door swung open. He worked the gearshift lever, popped the clutch, and let the forward momentum slam his door. Then he cranked the complaining window down with one hand as he took the cigar out of his mouth with the other and steered into traffic with his knees.
I have to say, though, I was never scared. The Land Rover was like an extension of his body, and he flowed through traffic more than drove through it with whatever body part. The man was an artist.
2: The Quiz Master
We left the human noises of Quito after a time on a major road. One sign we passed read E-20. Maybe a half-hour after that we were driving through mountains and the road was curving and switching this way and that. From the position of the sun, we were generally heading south-southeast.
Federico’s cigar had gone out the window a few miles back. I looked at him. “How long ‘til we get there?”
The near corner of his mouth curled into a half-grin. “Ah, you are a young quiz master.”
I chuckled. “A young quiz master with 35 confirmed kills.”
He jerked his head around. He wasn’t smiling. “With your rifle or your statistics?”
I fell silent.
After a time he said, “My apology. TJ wouldn’t have sent you on this one if he did not think you were up to it.” He gestured at nothing. “Eh. I am older and tired. Sometimes I grumble. Pay it no mind. But in time you will learn to ride like a stone when you are being transported like one.”
He paused, then wagged a hand. “A couple more hours for this part. Then a rest and maybe something to eat.” He laughed. “Maybe even a woman, eh?” He glanced at me. “You know what those are, right, young quiz master?” He wagged the hand again. “I’m joking. The women will probably all be locked away. The farmers do not like us much.” He tapped his chest. “Because we outshine them.” He reached across the cab and slapped me on the chest. “You outshine them.”
A long moment later, he wagged that hand again. “Then maybe a snack or a final meal, then maybe some sleep, but up off the ground unless you want a snake crawling in with you.” He shook his head. “Nasty things, snakes. And then another couple hours in the early darkness.” He clapped me on the left shoulder. “And then a three-kilometer hike with only the quiz master and his poor spotter sidekick, and then a settling, and finally, you, the quiz master, will deliver the goods."
We rode in silence for another half-hour or so, and then he swung the truck onto another major road and we were traveling north-northeast. A little later, a sign read E45. I don’t know why I kept looking at signs. I knew nothing about Ecuador other than that it was there and the nations that bordered it.
As we drove into a small town called Lumbaqui, he said, “You were with the military? With the 35 kills?”
“Yeah. Six years. Well, five and a half sniping. I had the same spotter for most of it. A guy named—”
“Me too.” He nodded. “The U.S. Marines for me, but much longer ago.” He looked at me. “You were Army?”
“No. I was Marine Corps too.”
“Ah. A modest man. Usually a Marine says that first. Usually only Army or others say ‘military’ and make you guess.” He paused. “Do I look 74 to you?”
“No sir. I thought you were maybe 60, tops.”
He laughed. “Ah, a quiz master and a diplomat with both ‘sir’ and an age I passed long ago.” He paused. “I too was a sniper before this.” He paused. “Well before this. Twenty-two years of my thirty.” He tapped the earpiece of his glasses. “That was before these. But I do not want to talk statistics or faces or families even of the enemy.” He paused. “Most of them were us but on the other side.”
He wagged the hand again and continued north-northeast. Maybe five miles later the road turned due east. Then, when the road curved back to the southeast, he left it and plunged through brush into heavy jungle on a dirt road. The foliage was so thick I could see the road only occasionally. We continued along that unruly path for another hour.
3: Camp Granger
“Here we are, Quiz Master!”
The brakes squealed loudly as Federico slowed the Land Rover then plunged between two massive bushes that screeed new pinstripes along both sides of the truck. We burst into a clearing covered with green and yellow grass maybe a foot tall.
The sun was high overhead in a blue sky I hadn’t seen for the past hour. Only distant clouds though, which is always a good sign. We lurched over a fallen log that slapped my head against the ceiling, and Federico pointed to the right front. “Look.”
I looked. A cardboard sign was nailed to a post. The sign read Camp Granger. I laughed.
“Do not get a big head. The camp is named for TJ’s choice of you, not for you personally. You will earn the sign at first light tomorrow morning. And no, you may not have it for your ‘I love me’ wall.” He chuckled, curved the truck to the right, and stopped next to an olive-drab fuel tanker. The tractor was nowhere to be seen.
As I unbuckled my seat belt I looked around.
A group—two men and a woman, all dressed in camouflage—were seated on webbed lawn chairs some twenty yards to the left around a small firepit. There were two empty chairs at the firepit also.
One of the men, about my age, slender and with warm mocha-brown skin, got up and started walking toward us. He raised a hand and grinned. “Federico!”
Much farther to the left a small, ramshackle wood-frame house with peeling white paint was nestled at the north end of the clearing. Just to the east of it was small barn with no paint, and a few small white outbuildings.
Across the clearing near the eastern edge, a small helicopter rested, inert, its blade sagging slightly. That was maybe maybe thirty or forty yards away from the firepit.
Federico opened his door. Quietly, he said, “You are coming too? Or will you await an engraved invitation?”
As I opened my door and stepped down, to the approaching man he said, “Rafael! You are no longer alone. I have brought another child to the gathering.” He laughed.
As I walked past the front of the Land Rover, the two men hugged. The slender man said, “You have been well, Papá?”
“Gracias, mijo. I am always well.” Federico glanced back and gestured for me to join them.
When I did, he clapped my left shoulder, grinned, and looked at Rafael. “This is the quiz master himself.” He looked at me. “Quiz Master, this is my son, Rafael Cantán. As God is pleased with his Son, so am I pleased with this one.” He laughed.
Rafael bowed his head slightly as we shook hands, then stepped past us and started toward the Land Rover.
Federico and I continued toward the firepit. “He is a gentle soul and not one of us. He will top off the truck and then join us again.”
At the firepit the man and woman, both around my age or a little older and both slender Caucasians with short brown hair, rose from their chairs.
Federico smiled and gestured toward the woman. “Quiz Master, this incredibly beautiful young creature is Celia Jordan.” As she held his shoulders and kissed him on both cheeks, he wagged a hand toward the man. “That tired old splintered stick is her husband, David Jordan. As you can see, he is living proof that his taste in women is perhaps exponentially better than the lovely Celia’s taste in men.” He laughed.
Smiling broadly, Celia reached past him and shook my hand. Except for her eyes, which were a flat, quiet brown, she reminded me a little of Aspen.
As Federico dropped into one of the lawn chairs, David Jordan stepped around his chair and the others, then moved up alongside his wife. He grinned as he offered his hand. “Dave. I’m your pilot. Quiz Master?”
I grinned. “It’s a long story. Sam.”
“I can only imagine.” He laughed as we shook hands.
I had a feeling there would be no escape for Egregio Moguel even if I hadn’t been there.
I picked a chair and sat down and we talked and laughed together.
*
When Rafael joined us again a few minutes later, he smiled, bowed his head slightly, and carefully handed me a scoped, military issue, 7.62 millimeter M-14 rifle with the original wooden stock and a standard, 20-round magazine. It was a thing of beauty.
Federico gestured with the cigar he’d just lit. “Love her, Quiz Master. She is all yours until we return to this clearing in the morning.”
I dropped the magazine and pulled the bolt to the rear.
A cartridge ejected and Federico caught it.
As I field stripped and checked out the weapon, the slight rattling that came from the buttstock told me it even had the original cleaning rods.
Federico nodded and gestured with the cigar again. Quietly, he said, “It is good to see you are on your game, Sam. Perhaps you are not a quiz master after all, but a man with answers.”
When I’d reassembled and loaded the weapon, I stood it next to my chair and we all continued laughing and talking late into the night.
4: Breakfast, and the Ingress
At around 2:3o a.m. Federico opened the driver’s side door of the Land Rover, and I looked to the left. I’d opted to sleep in the passenger seat, the M-14 standing on the floorboard and resting between my legs. “I’m awake.” I gestured toward the windshield. “The chopper.”
He nodded. “Ah, yes. Among the more welcome sounds on the planet. Music to my ears. That sound always woke me up too, even when I was asleep in the back of the hooch.” In the darkness he wagged a finger side to side. “But only if it was on the ground and winding up. Never if they were only flying over or landing. In that case they were none of my business.”
I chuckled, got out, and followed him to the firepit.
Celia had found thick paper plates somewhere and piled each one high with scrambled eggs and link sausages and a firm plastic fork, then set the plates in the chairs. When she sat down, only Dave was still absent, but nobody had lifted a fork.
I glanced at Federico and grinned. The flames of the fire were reflected in his eyes. Somehow I thought that was appropriate. “We dine together, right older brother?”
He smiled and nodded, then shrugged. “We fly together, we fight together. If we can manage it, we die together.”
Dave approached soon after I sat down. The chopper continued to churn up in the background. He picked up his plate and sat, and we all dug in.
*
That breakfast was maybe the best breakfast I’d ever eaten, but there was no conversation. In what seemed like only seconds, the food was gone. I tore a strip off my paper plate, opened the buttplate of the rifle, and wedged the paper into the well to silence the cleaning rods.
Then the plates and forks were flaming orange and blue and yellow in the firepit, and Dave, Celia, Federico and I, the rifle in my left hand, were crossing the grass toward the chopper.
Celia went forward and dropped into the copilot seat, and Federico and I sat in two of the four seats in the back. He glanced at me, then looked away. “Now about two more hours. South-southeast.”
“So Colombia?”
He only nodded, then straightened his left leg and reached into his pocket. He pulled out a folded sheet of typing paper and passed it to me. “This is our target: Egregio Moguel. Only you and I know this. The others know only where to insert us and how long to wait.”
As I unfolded the paper to study a black and white image of a short, stocky Hispanic man in a beret and camouflage clothing, he pointed at the paper. “We may hope he will be alone for his morning walk. That the others will wait inside for his return. They have done so in the past, except one time. On that day, two others of the 40 or so in the encampment joined him.”
So he’d been there before. Probably on reconnaisance.
“All of them are armed. And not with antiques. But they have no fire discipline.” He wagged a hand. “From ten feet away, they will go to full auto, spray a barn, and only hope to hit wood.”
“You’ve seen them shoot?”
He smiled slightly and nodded. “But I am not a barn.” He shrugged. “We have a saying: El burro dispara mejor que ellos.” He paused. “The donkey shoots better than they.” He chuckled, nodded again, then patted my leg just above the knee. “I will be right back, Quiz Master.” He stood and moved past me, then past the two empty seats behind us as I continued to study the picture.
Moguel had thick sideburns that ran halfway to his jawline and a thick moustache that draped over the corners of his mouth.
Broad shoulders and chest and a wide forehead. So plenty of target area for a .3” bullet to impact. Heart or head. One shot, one kill.
When Federico worked his way past me to his seat again, he was carrying a shorter version of my rifle, a carbine, but with a curved “banana clip” magazine. He hefted it. “Just in case.”
I looked up at him. “So only forty enemy and two Marines with fifty-two cartridges between us? I like our odds.”
He smiled slightly. “I think you will be all right.”
I folded the sheet of paper and handed it back to him and he straightened his left leg and put it back into his trouser pocket.
*
The eastern sky had not begun to lighten when the chopper pitched forward and dropped suddenly at a steep angle. As many times as I’ve ridden even larger birds into insertions, I’ve never gotten used to that strategic landing stuff. I involuntarily gripped the seat with the only part of my body that was in contact with it.
The idea of a strategic insertion is to get as close to the ground as possible before the pilot levels off and approaches the drop zone. As if any enemy won’t notice the sound of the blades and target the chopper on sound alone. I’ve seen good pilots level off only a foot or two above the surface.
But no smoke trails from launched rockets flashed through the sky to greet us, and I didn’t hear the popping of any small arms fire. So far, so good.
Federico patted my knee again and gestured that we should stand up.
He stepped past me, reached for the handle on the cargo door, and slid it open.
The wind whipped through the cabin, and beyond him flickers of silvery grass highlighted in the dim glow of the half-moon flashed past the cabin in a blur.
I stood and moved up beside him. The sound of the blades overhead was much louder through the open door. I’m sure my knuckles were white on the forestock of the rifle.
He looked at me and yelled, “When he hovers, we jump.”
I only nodded.
The chopper slipped to the right, swung its tail in a wide arc, flew I think north another thirty or forty yards, and hovered maybe a foot off the ground.
We both jumped, both landed on our feet, and Federico raced away, ducking below blades that would never touch him.
I followed in the same posture.
Behind us, the chopper lifted a little, pitched a little—I could tell from the sound and the wind of the blades—and soared away to the north, then the east.
I stopped and turned to watch.
Federico hissed, “No time for that now! Come!” then raced away.
I turned and ran after him, still crouching for some reason.
A moment later we both plunged into the darkness of the bush.
A few yards in, he stopped and crouched.
I crouched next to him.
As the sound of the chopper faded behind us, he said, “From here we go silent.” He held up three fingers. “Three klicks in. I have the point.”
I nodded.
We both rose and I followed him at a silent, smooth jog along what appeared to be a fairly well-defined game trail. The only sound of our passing was the occcasional leaf brushing against our pants.
*
Three kilometers is a little over 1.86 miles. As we jogged, I gauged the distance for myself by splitting the difference between how long it would take me to walk a mile and how long it would take me to run a mile. Based on that, about a mile and eight-tenths later and some ten feet ahead of me in the sporadically moonlit darkness, Federico slowed and raised a fist I could barely see, then stopped, turned, and crouched.
I stopped and crouched, maintaining my distance.
He raised one finger and nodded, his eyebrows arched.
One. Got it. I nodded.
He formed a zero by touching his middle finger with his thumb, then opened it and repeated the motion.
Okay, one, then two zeroes. We have about 100 yards to go. That jived with my estimate of how far we’d come. I nodded.
He rose, turned, and put his hand to the side, palm down—go slowly—as he started moving away along the trail. No more jogging. From here on in, we walk.
He started moving away along the trail.
*
When Federico finally stopped again, he knelt on one knee. The near, western edge of a long, narrow clearing lay a short distance ahead of us. The near edge was rimmed with slightly taller grass and low brush, and a fallen and rotting log that angled northwest to southeast.
Some three hundred yards away, set just inside the jungle off the north edge of the clearing to take advantage of the overhead canopy, were two large, dark, squared-off spots. Given their relative size, I took them to be GP (general-purpose) tents. A short distance after the first tent, a second GP tent. Some twenty or thirty feet beyond the second GP tent was a smaller, oval tent. It was set at an angle, the narrow end facing us. That was a CP (command-post) tent and where Moguel himself would stay.
I made the distance to be about 320 yards. About two-tenths of a mile.
Beyond the far, narrow end of the clearing, the horizon above the jungle was just beginning to turn a lighter shade of dark.
Federico leaned forward to the ground and low-crawled another twenty feet or so. He stopped just left of the northeast end of the log and pointed to his right, then cupped his hand to indicate I should move up.
I went to the ground and low-crawled forward, angling to the south, and stopped behind the southeast end of the log. He was right. Even through the low brush and sparse tall grass, it was an ultimate shooting position. I settled in behind the scope and put the crosshairs on the door of the CP tent, then glanced at him and nodded.
He flashed me a thumbs-up.
5: The Hit on Egregio Moguel
As the eastern horizon grew steadily less-dark and then began to brighten to violet, I settled into my position behind my rifle.
I dug a stick out from under my right thigh and tossed it to my right, then dug my toes into the soft dirt and rotting leaves to give myself leverage in case I need to shift position or lower my sight picture a little.
Finally, to get a feel for the sight picture, I put my eye to the scope and focused the crosshair on the flap over the entrance to the CP tent. I shifted my position a little, taking into account Moguel’s short stature.
Got it.
I hadn’t discussed with Federico whether I could pop the guy as he came out of the tent. He’d only mentioned Moguel “walking” before.
Then again, Federico’s pretty thorough. If it mattered where I dropped the target, I’m sure he would have said something. If I drop him at the door of the CP tent, that would effectively block anyone who was in there with him from coming out, at least immediately.
Then again, probably nobody was inside with him this early.
Maybe I should let him start walking.
Federico hadn’t said in which direction he walks either, but if he comes this way, it might be better to put him down right in front of the nearest GP tent. That might give a lot more people pause about piling out of that tent and the next one.
I wish the rifle had a sound suppressor. It has a flash suppressor, so—
Oh! The flash suppressor! It would expel gas straight down, raising a cloud of dust. Maybe Federico has a cloth or something. When you lay a cloth on the ground below your flash suppressor it keeps the suppressor from blowing up a geyser of dust and giving away your position.
But I easily dug my toes into the dirt and leaves behind me. The damp dirt and leaves. It’s all damp. So no dust will blow up.
I took my eye from the scope and glanced at the ground below the flash suppressor, but I could feel the ground beneath my left elbow too. It was almost spongy.
It’s fine.
I put my eye to the scope again, felt the buttplate of the rifle in the hollow of my shoulder. Perfect. It felt natural. I wish this was my personal weap—
The tent flap shifted slightly, then again, then bulged a little.
I took a deep breath, released half of it.
I watched. Waited.
The flap didn’t move again.
I used the brief reprieve to settle my spirit behind the scope. There’s the body and there’s the spirit. Settling the body behind the scope is all mechanics, like setting windage and elevation: the cheek weld, the position of the left elbow, the forestock resting on, not gripped by, your left hand, the steady sight picture, and even the steady trigger squeeze.
Settling the spirit behind the scope is different. Settling the spirit behind the scope is the shooter becoming part of the rifle and the scope and the crosshair. It’s the shooter becoming one with all of it, with the situation, and even sending part of himself downrange with the bullet. It’s the practical, non science-fiction use of the Force they talk about in all the Star Wars stuff. You beome the rifle and the sight picture and the bullet. Settling the spirit behind the scope is how you never miss.
It's how I never miss.
The tent flap shifted again. I sucked in a breath, released half, settled.
The flap shifted again, then again, and I slipped my finger into the trigger well.
The flap burst open and—
A woman came out in a long, colorful skirt and a white blouse, her black hair wild. For a second she crouched, her hands over her face. Then she turned southeast and ran, her hands still at her face.
I took my eye from the scope and watched.
The clearing wasn’t wide and she had almost reached the jungle to the south when the flap blew to the side again and a man came out.
He didn’t look right.
I put the crosshair on him: no hat, disheveled hair, bareshested, suspenders hanging from the waistband of his camouflage trousers, the front of them open.
It wasn’t Moguel. Too tall, wrong face.
Still, I wanted him.
I glanced over at Federico, my eyebrows arched.
He’d just lowered the spotting scope. He put out one hand and shook his head.
The man turned his back to me and leveled a pistol in the woman’s direction.
I put the scope on his head and watched, my finger on the trigger.
The tent flap, closed again, was at the left edge of my field of vision.
But if I fire, Moguel will know a sniper’s here. I’ll queer the assignment.
I slipped my finger out of the trigger well, and the man fired.
I jerked my head up from the scope.
The woman was still running, her hands down from her face, her arms pumping.
The man fired again.
The woman was still running and—
The tent flap exploded open and even with my naked eye it was Moguel.
I dropped to the scope again, shifted the crosshair.
Half-in, half-out of the tent, Moguel raised an arm and yelled something at the man. I only made out ‘dispara’—something about shooting. He was yelling at the man for shooting.
The crosshair settled on Moguel’s head and he turned away and I fired.
The rifle exploded and an angry wasp crossed the distance to Moguel and took him above the left ear and he crumpled in the doorway of the tent.
I dug in my toes, about to to shift my body slightly left to put the scope on the other man and—
He ran to Moguel and crouched and put one hand on Moguel’s left arm and the crosshair settled and I fired.
The man folded forward over Moguel’s legs and—
Federico said, “Shit” like a snake hissing and I tore myself from the scope and looked left.
He was pulling his carbine forward and he settled in behind the open sights and I could tell he was focusing on the GP tents.
I dropped behind the scope again, the toes of my boots still dug in, and shifted my body to the right a couple of inches to bring the rifle around to the left and the door of the GP tent opened and someone leaned out and looked east and ducked back inside.
Federico hissed again but—
I put the scope on the tent pole at the southeast corner of the first GP tent—the one the guy had looked out of—and fired, and that corner of the tent collapsed inward and—
Federico hissed again, a little louder, and—
I shifted slightly and put the scope on the tent flap of the next GP tent and—one-thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three—and it didn’t move and—
Federico hissed again, much louder, and I took my eye from the scope and looked to the left and he was on his knees and gesturing for me to come.
I got up almost as fast as he did and a moment later we were racing headlong back down the trail to a much friendlier clearing.
6: The Egress
Maybe a hundred yards along the trail Federico slipped to the left and crouched.
I followed him, and when I crouched my breath was ragged.
He grinned at me and then reached with his right hand to slap me lightly on the cheek, then pointed at me. “You listen, eh?”
I nodded.
He said, “Good,” then fished a small device that looked similar to my VaporStream out of his pocket and pressed a red button, then dropped it back into his pocket and stood up. “Let’s go.” He started jogging along the trail again.
*
We’d almost reached the east end of the clearing where Dave and Celia had dropped us when the sound of a chopper came from behind us. One moment it wasn’t there at all and the next second the sound was all over us and then the rotor wash was there and the chopper passed us and set down about twenty feet into the clearing.
The cargo door was open and facing us. We both ran and jumped aboard, and the chopper lifted off before we could get into our seats.
The chopper pitched a little to the left like it had before, and Dave arced it around to the north and then the west and we were on our way back to Ecuador.
I took off my bucket hat and used it to wipe sweat off my face.
Federico clapped me on the right shoulder and grinned and said nothing.
*
Once we were well on our way, Dave came back and crouched in front of me and Federico. He must have handed over the controls to Celia. He looked at me. “So how’d it go, Sam?”
I shrugged. “It went all right I guess.”
He nodded. “We heard you guys start shooting.” He flicked his gaze to Federico, then back to me. “So we picked up and hauled ass to the east, then looped around and came in out of the sun. We thought you might need a little help keeping them in their tents.” He grinned. “‘Course, you didn’t.” He wagged a finger at Federico. “I should’a known.” He chuckled. “Anyway, we did a couple of passes over the camp. We spotted the two dead guys, but I figured more might come outta the tents so—”
“They did not dare!” Federico laughed and clapped me on the shoulder again. “This one is a beast! He did all of the blasting! He is selfish in that way.” He chuckled. “He got both of the men,” he held up one index finger, “but the primary target first of course—and then he cut a tent pole on one of the big tents with a third bullet to let them know we were still out there. I have never seen anything like it.”
I wiped the back of my neck with my boonie hat. “I just didn’t want us to have to fight off a horde of them.”
Dave frowned. “Oh, you guys could’a handled ‘em. Federico here’s a great shot.”
I grinned. “That isn’t what I meant. See, there were two of us and only about forty of them, so it wouldn’t have been a fair fight.” I paused and glanced at Federico. “We had ‘em outnumbered, didn’t we boss?”
He laughed. “I believe we did at that.”
Dave only grinned and shook his head. “Well, it’ll be a while before we’re back. You guys make yourselves at home.”
When he stood up and went forward again, I looked at Federico. “I enjoyed this.”
He nodded. “It was a good time.”
“I kind of wish I could stay, but—” I shrugged.
“Oh, I will speak with TJ about you. If I have anything to say about it, you will be back. There are deserving targets all over the place in this part of the world.”
*******
Author Note
“The Quiz Master” is derived from the novel Blackwell Ops 42: Sam Granger.
About the Author
Harvey Stanbrough was born in New Mexico, seasoned in Texas and baked in Arizona. For a time, he wrote under five personas and several pseudonyms, but he takes a pill for that now and writes only under his own name. Mostly.
Harvey is an award-winning writer who has written and published over 110 novels, 10 novellas, and over 290 short stories. He has also written 19 nonfiction books on writing, 9 of which are free to other writers. And he’s compiled and published 5 omnibus novel collections, 29 collections of short fiction, and 5 critically acclaimed poetry collections.
These days, the vendors through which Harvey licenses his works do not allow URLs in the back matter. To see his other works, please key “StoneThread Publishing” or “Harvey Stanbrough” into your favorite search engine.
Finally, for his best advice on writing, look for “The New Daily Journal | Harvey Stanbrough | Substack.”
Settling the spirit behind the scope is how to never miss.
This is the best line in a story full of them! Black Ops stories rule!