AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Six years ago…
Classified location, South America
I don’t know what’s worse, the feeling of water stuck in your ear, or knowing it’s sweat. It’s so humid in this jungle, even in the dead of night, I haven’t stopped sweating since we crossed the border. Wearing 30 pounds of gear isn’t helping either. Fuck, this is miserable.
In formation, we are trekking through the overgrowth silently, well prepared for a situation like this. We were dropped off by our helo a few miles back, not wanting to risk being heard by our targets. The cartel is operating out of a farm, transporting drugs in the same trucks providing food to the community.
I hear voices chirping in my ear, my guys calling out what they see as we get closer to the crops surrounding the property. Brandt readies the drone, sending it up in the sky to scout the area for hostiles. It detects heat signatures, telling us that besides six warm bodies in an outbuilding on the other side of this food crop, the coast is clear.
Our hope is that the hostages are being kept in that outbuilding, the six bodies could be our six missionaries. Worst case scenario is they’re being kept in the main house on the north side of the property, which would require a lot more effort to extract them, and it definitely wouldn’t go down quietly.
According to the United States government, me and my team aren’t here right now. To them, we don’t even exist. They’d probably sell us out before they’d take accountability for the risk of sending us here. U.S. armed forces on foreign soil is not a good look, but neither is leaving six Americans to the mercy of a notorious drug gang.
Jesse slaps a hand on my shoulder, the silent “go ahead” signal distracting me from my overheated misery. We start through the corn field, slowly weaving through the rows of stalks, trying not to make our approach obvious. We halt at the edge of the corn, looking onto the property ahead of us. There doesn’t seem to be any movement anywhere other than the house. The music is loud enough to be heard from where we are about 100 yards away.
We know from the drone coverage to approach the outbuilding closest to us with caution, there should be six people occupying it. It looks like an old barn, bandaged with rusted sheet metal, probably used to store a couple of small animals at one time. It’s pitch black and utterly silent, even with the full moon, I doubt whoever is inside can see more than a couple inches in front of them. It’s got to be our hostages. We surround the building, hiding in the shadows, simultaneously looking for a visual and a way inside.
“Got a door on the south side, looks unlocked, it’s probably our best entry point. It’ll keep us out of the line of sight from the house,” Jesse relays over the comms.
“Copy.” One word of confirmation, and within seconds we’re all prepared to breach the door.
We’re going in blind, no one was able to get a look at who is inside. So we set up, prepared to encounter six hostiles, always ready for the worst-case scenario. Another hand to my shoulder, and it’s a go. With a twist to the door handle, the unlocked door swings open and we enter in a flash, staggering our entries to sweep the room. Our night vision goggles give us the advantage, the occupants know we’ve entered but can’t tell who we are, or where we’re standing.
“HANDS! HANDS! HANDS!” We shout as we enter, I immediately notice the group of people bound to a support beam in the middle of the room, their limbs are tangled, their bodies tightly pressed together, bound with rope. They cower away from our approach, straining to raise their hands against the ties binding them together.
I count the heads I can see -One, two, three, four, five…
My face flinches when the sound of a shot being fired goes off right above my shoulder, the silencer is the only thing keeping it from bursting my ear drum. Jesse dropped a man who was pointing a gun right at me from the opposite corner of the room. Six. The six warm bodies have been accounted for, but we’re still missing one of our hostages.
I glance back at Jesse, a silent thanks for covering me. He nods, a smug look on his face because he knows he just saved my ass. If we had a running tally of how many times we’ve saved each other in situations like this, we’d probably be neck in neck, but neither of us really want to know how close we’ve come to going home in a body bag.
We start untying the kids in the room, which is exactly what they are, teenagers, not a single one older than 19 probably. I wonder if they pictured hell to look like this when they preach about it from their Bibles… Bound and gagged, covered in dirt, blood, and their own waste, like pigs being prepared for slaughter.
“Please, you have to help my sister. They took her. Please!” A young woman pleads as soon as we remove the gag from her mouth.
It makes things complicated because now it’s not going to be a quick recovery as we hoped. Adding unknowns to a stealth mission like this makes it more dangerous.
“Where is she?” Jesse asks, and I relay back to command that our sixth hostage is not with the rest of the group, but suspected to still be alive.
“They have her tied to the back porch, up at the house!” Her words are frantic, the panic clear on her face.
“How do you know?” My voice is completely void of emotion, my tools for empathy are long gone and I’m not in the mood to be led on a wild goose chase. We’ve been on this property too long already, it won’t be long until they notice we’ve stolen the hostages back.
“Because that’s where they had me,” her voice quivers. I don’t know what I was expecting her to say, but that wasn’t it. I take a second to really look at the girl in front of me, trying to decide if she’s reliable enough to put ourselves at risk by going into the lion’s den.
She’s filthy, they all are. Obviously, they’ve been tossed around in the dirt quite a bit in the few days they’ve been here. Her hair is knotted, and tangled so badly I wouldn’t be surprised if they have to shave it once we get her home. They’ve all got splotches of blood here and there, a fat lip or two. The four guys all look like they’ve been clocked a few times.
“They had you up at the house then they just let you go?” I ask skeptically. It feels like I’m missing a piece of the puzzle, and I hate needing a clue. This whole mission has been a giant question mark. Why would they take these kids as hostages? What good would it do for a drug farm to keep extra mouths to feed and keep alive?
“They said I was ruined, they needed fresh meat.” Her words are so quiet I can hardly hear her, her eyes peer vacantly towards her feet. “Demasiada sangre.” Too much blood.
I’m not fluent in Spanish, but the word blood catches my attention. My line of sight follows hers, the stream of light from my flashlight illuminating her bottom half. Something coils in my gut as I comprehend what I’m seeing. Her linen pants are soiled with blood, deep red originating from between her thighs.
“God damn…” Jesse whispers from beside me, his words echo my own thoughts. This girl was brutalized, clearly raped, dragging out her torture repeatedly, and now they have her sister.
Chapter Twenty-One
Callie
