It Ain't Paranoia if... Pt. 02 Ch. 02

"The shadows you were watching are a mix of men from the gente -- the tribes. They know the layout of the sensors and are moving toward the house.

"We were sent to update you; others were sent to your two friends on this side. The ten Americanos on the other side came to this place with us.

"We will take you to the valley floor without being seen. Carlos said to tell you that the plan has been updated. Instead of only the few Americanos, there are more than thirty of us, and your friend Raymundo has made sure we are well camouflaged and well-armed.

"The timing remains the same, but when the RPGs blow up the arsenal and the cuartel, eh, como se dice... quarters, of the soldados, we will be in place behind the house, prepared to enter. The main attack will appear to come from the front, but our people will be on three sides.

"As you planned, a small force will force entry through the back of the house, and free your family from the calabozo, eh, dungeon, where they are held."

I stopped him and interjected, "Are you certain that's where they are?"

I couldn't see his mouth, but his eyes crinkled in smile. "Si, we have someone en el interior. The children are well; su esposa has been... she isn't well, but she can travel."

"Do you know who has been harming her?"

"Yes, and I'll tell you now, but we must get moving. El macho Europeo -- the European man who took her is the main perpetrador, pero El Asaltante, the boss, has also ahh, violar... violated her. Now, we must go!"

Is it wrong to pray for God to deliver them to me? I did, as we followed the dry watercourse to the valley floor and silently moved along the walls of the mesa to the rear of the house.

The men I follow are lean, agile, light footed, and move as if they are young. I feel almost invisible in the desert night camouflage I'm wearing, but my gente indigena guides absolutely disappear in the shadows.

We came across two infrared sensors and a sound sensor that had been disabled; clearly, others were in front of us, or had already been here and moved on.

We did not encounter the brothers and their guides; I assumed they are arranged to attack the left flank after the explosions, since we're settled on the right.

T-3 minutes. Still no sound, movement, or lights.

Until suddenly there were.

A larger shadow and two smaller shadows emerged from the back door on our side. Leaving the door open, they moved to our group leader, who pulled them behind the fallen boulders behind which we were hiding. The door remained open, and I heard the larger shadow -- a woman -- say that she killed the guard at the door, but there was another in the hallway and two guarding the dungeon.

T-1 and counting. As the dim green glow of the big hand moved down and around the watch face, I grew more tense by the second. It no longer seemed hopeless; we have a very real chance with thirty allies! But so much can go wrong so quickly, and burying the bodies of Kaitlyn, Grace, and Logan is not the reason we came.

With twenty seconds left, the woman whispered in my ear in very good English. "They are safe in the rock prison, but you will need to help your wife out. They have all been abused, but your children can walk and run; your wife can not."

I nodded, and again prayed that I get the first chance at Miroslav the turncoat, at El Asaltante - whoever he is - and at anyone else who 'violated' Kaitlyn and harmed the children!

Being distracted by the woman, I neither saw nor heard anything, but my peripheral vision caught Los Indios dropping to their knees and covering the kids. The sky lit up with an explosion and a roar, and debris hit the rock wall behind us.

Men moved out from behind the boulder toward the house, rifles ready at their waist. I kept my AR strapped over my shoulder, unslung my tactical shotgun and surged forward. The battles inside the building were likely to be fought in close proximity, so the nine .38 caliber slugs in each shotgun shell would effectively stop whatever I hit, without spreading the pattern too greatly.

The first man stormed three steps through the door, dropped to his knee, and fired two bursts.

The next two men in line stood above him and opened fire as men ran into the hallway out of rooms on either side. I was fourth; I turned to the left and ran pell-mell down the hallway toward the rock dungeon located behind and below the main house.

Knowing the layout, just before I reached the down ramp I held the shotgun in both hands, dove, and slid forward on the slick, sandy concrete floor. My forward momentum brought me to the beginning of the ramp's decline in a prone position, with the shotgun pointing straight ahead. As my eyes reached the crest above the ramp leading to the dungeon, I saw a light shining down on the two guards kneeling side by side at the bottom of the ramp, outside a massive door.

One was looking over his shoulder at the door and his barrel was pointing up; the other had his rifle aimed at the hallway. I fired at him; he flew backward with a pattern of red across his chest.

I turned the barrel to the second man, who was turning his rifle back toward the hall. I fired a round that hit him in the throat and almost removed his head from his chest. I scrambled up and ran down the ramp, tossing the bodies away from the door. Not that I had any doubt, but there was no question they were both dead.

The thick old wooden door was padlocked; I looked around for a key but didn't want to get caught searching pockets, so I beat on the door with the butt of the gun and yelled through the bars, "GET AWAY FROM THE DOOR! CAN YOU HEAR ME? GET AWAY FROM THE DOOR!"

"WE HEAR YOU! WE'RE ALL BY THE BACK WALL!" yelled Dos.

I stood back a half step, angled the barrel down so anything penetrating the door would hit the floor, and fired the 00 into the lock. The lock and the hasp were gone, but some of the buckshot had penetrated the door. I hoped it hadn't ricocheted off the rock floor and hit anyone.

I threw the door open, jumped inside, closed the door, and took in the situation. My son and daughter were on sitting on the floor with their feet drawn up under them; Kaitlyn was between them, holding both against her.

They couldn't see my face due to the darkness and the balaclava, nor could I see them, but I could hear the children whimpering. I wanted to hug and comfort them, but time was of the essence!

Without speaking, I signaled them to move to the back corner below the barred window; they quickly slid over, although the kids had to help their mother. I swung the heavy door open enough to check the hallway; it was empty. I scurried to the window; no one was outside.

"Can you walk?" I asked Kaitlyn.

"Rob?" she asked in a confused voice.

"Yes, it's me, but you all must do what I say immediately! We'll celebrate later. Can you walk?" I responded urgently.

She nodded and forced herself up, using the rock wall for leverage. I could tell the kids wanted to run to me, but I hissed, "Help your mother, and stay behind me!"

I stepped out the door, crouched, picked up the AKs, and handed one to each kid. "Carry these in your other hands and follow me!"

We made it up the ramp and down the hall to the back door. "Go out that door and get behind the biggest boulder; one of our men will help you. Hurry!"

I stood guard at the door while the kids helped Kaitlyn stagger toward the line of boulders. A man emerged from the shadows and helped them behind the rocks.

The firing had moved toward the front of the building. Kaitlyn and the kids were protected, and I badly wanted a piece of the traitor and the jefe who had violated the mother of my kids, so I hung the shotgun back over my shoulder and took the AR in hand.

Bodies of men clad in underwear and tee shirts were scattered along the hallway and in the rooms; I saw no bodies dressed in night gear, and hoped the element of surprise had saved lives for our side.

There was room midway down the hall where shoots were being exchanged between gangsters holed up in a fortified room and men in black, although there were only two high windows through which to shoot.

I could also hear intermittent firing from outside, but the volume and ferocity had seriously diminished in the ten minutes since we made entry.

Winning and getting out without injury was our goal, but I wanted Miroslav and The Assailant alive; they had a bigger debt to pay!

Clay was one of the men engaged in the stalemate inside the house. I approached him and offered a concussion grenade from my belt; he quickly hugged me and asked if the family was okay. I nodded, said, "I think so, but Kaitlyn is injured."

His smile turned to a frown as he took the grenade.

I exchanged the AR for the shotgun, stood six feet back, and fired a round into the top hinge of the massive oak door; it held, so I fired another. This time it gave; I looked at Clay, who nodded.

The nine .33 caliber buckshot pellets blew the locked handle off, and the door tilted in enough that there was a four inch of clearance above one corner. Clay grinned, and lobbed the grenade inside.

I waited for the concussion, and then blew the bottom hinge off. We jumped through the door, one to each side, and assessed the situation. Four were clearly dead from gunshot wounds, five were lying on the floor moaning and holding their ears, and Miroslav the Serb was sitting on the floor about six feet away trying to bring his rifle to bear.

Clay targeted him, but I yelled "MINE!" and took two quick steps toward him. I kicked the rifle out of his grip with my boots, and clubbed him between the neck and shoulder with the stock of the shotgun.

He screamed and grabbed at his collarbone, which was as broken as I intended it to be. He looked up at me in fear; I pulled the Balaclava off and grinned down at him. "You're going to spend the rest of your short life wishing to hell you had just done your damn job!"

I saw the defiance emerge out of the fear, and he smirked, "Your old lady is a great piece of ass. I.."

He never finished that thought, because I broke his other collarbone, and then his nose. He screamed in pain and fell on his back with his legs spread apart; I kicked him in his nuts, and he emitted a high scream that made Clay laugh.

When the scream turned to a choking whimper, I leaned over him and growled, "The price you'll pay for that fine piece of ass is your life, and you'll be begging for it to end before we finish you off! That pain you feel right now? That's level 5 of 10!"

Clay was standing guard over the five men with bleeding ears, and two men I didn't know were zip tying their hands. He winked and added, "You fucking Serbs think you're bad asses, but these Indians know shit about torture you've never even thought of, Bitch!"

I pulled a drapery cord down, wrapped it around Miroslav's neck several times, and drug him out of the room and down the hall. He couldn't hold onto the rope with two broken collarbones, so he tried to get his feet under him and push to relieve the pressure on his windpipe. That worked for a few seconds at a time, and I let him, knowing that whatever relief he achieved now would be repaid in pain over the next few hours.

Light was beginning to color the eastern sky, and I could see that the few gangsters remaining alive were sitting cross-legged on the ground in the front yard. I found Abel and asked where The Assailant was; he said he didn't know, but he wasn't among the dead.

"Oh, he thinks he's Santa Ana; playing like he's just one of the boys. I have the antidote for that! Look after your former coworker; I'll be right back."

Abel looked down at Miroslav's writhing body; his eyes darkened and he kicked him in the gut. "Stay still or I'll dice you up, Pig!"

The man who had been taking care of Kaitlyn, Grace, and Dos had removed his balaclava and was helping her walk toward the house. I knelt for the kids and they ran to me crying. As they got closer, I could see bruising on their faces and arms in the early sunlight.

Miroslav's future pain just went up another notch.

When I could breathe again and the tears stopped falling, I looked up at a version of Kaitlyn I'd never seen before. She was pale and sickly, with sunken eyes, bruises on her face, a bloody spot in her hair, and she was wobbling. But she had the most resolute look I'd ever seen.

I turned the kids loose, stood, took her in my arms, and loudly thanked the Lord that they were alive. She hugged me and quivered for a few minutes before asking if it was over. I told her it was, but we had to deal with those left alive and get safely back to Texas before we celebrated.

She nodded, told me to do what I needed to do, and that their new friend would take care of them. I looked at their new friend, thanked him in English, and asked his name. He looked puzzled, so I tried in Spanish; he volunteered that his name is Arnulfo and he is a member of the Rarámuri tribe.

I know enough about the indigenous tribes to know that Rarámuri is the name the people outsiders call Tarahumara call themselves. I also knew that they are the greatest long-distance runners on earth, and Arnulfo looked the part in his skin-tight mesh night suit.

I turned to go back to the house, but a thought stopped me. "Kaitlyn, would you recognize the men who... harmed you?"

The resolute look was replaced with an angry glare. "Of course!"

"Can I carry you? We need you to identify them, and they are up front."

She held out her arms. I told Arnulfo to take care of the kids, and picked her up in a bridal carry. She was too light, and she moaned softly as we walked. I knew I needed to get medical care for her as soon as possible, but we needed her help first.

When I carried her outside, Miroslav smirked up at her and started to speak; Abel kicked him in the ribs and told him to stay quiet or his pain would increase infinitely.

She pointed down at him, and then spat on his face. "I want to be the one to kill him!" she exclaimed furiously.

"As you wish," I replied, "but first show me the others." I carried her toward the men sitting on the ground cross-legged, hands zipped behind them.

As we approached the first, Claude appeared. When the man would not look up, Claude yanked him by the hair and showed her his face. She shook her head; that continued through the next five, but I saw the sixth squirming and knew.

I gently set her on the ground, bent down, picked up a fist-size rock with one smooth side and a jagged side opposite, and handed it to her.

Claude raised the man before us by his hair, and Kaitlyn's face transformed into a mask of rage. She screamed and struck him on the left cheekbone with the jagged side of the rock. He screamed and tried to pull away, but Claude held his head still, and she struck him again, a little lower on his jaw.

"You sorry motherfucker! I'm going to shove a tree branch up your ass and set it on fire! Then I'm going to cut your nasty cock off and stick it in your mouth! You'll be begging to die before I finish with you!"

I glanced around and was pleased to see that Arnulfo hadn't brought the kids out. I'm sure they would have applauded their mother, but still...

Hell, I'd never thought of a burning branch up his butt, and I'm not sure our tribesmen had either. That was going to be interesting to watch, especially if the branch had bark and smaller branches on it.

"Anyone else, Kaitlyn?" I asked, to distract her. I had been told it was just the two, but perhaps there were more.

"I'm not sure, because I was tied face down some of the times, and they took turns on me from behind. I saw a Mexican government official and some Russian businessman yesterday, but they left in a helicopter after they tried me out. That's when the rapes ended; the Russian who bought me told them to let me heal, then send me to him."

That set her off again; she smacked the gang leader in the forehead, knocking him on his back, and then turned toward the Serb. She winced as she walked, but made it to him; this time he didn't smirk, he begged. She laughed, spit in his mouth, hit him in his already broken nose with the rock, and taunted him when he screamed.

"How does it feel to be on the receiving end, you coward? And believe me, just like you abused me over over, there is much more to come!"

Becoming concerned about her mental state, I put my arm around her and gently escorted her to the porch. I sat her on a padded swing and sat down beside her. "How did the kids get the bruises?"

"They fought for me when they came to get me, and were smacked around by the guards!"

She looked carefully at each of the men in the yard, and then pointed at one. "He was one of them, and so was he!" pointing at another. I got up, walked to the first man, and dragged him by his hair to the second.

"You hit my children?" I asked in Spanish. They both shook their heads and proclaimed, NO, NO! I looked back at Kaitlyn, who yelled, "Yes, they did! And more than once!"

Claude and two of the Ultimate Solutions guys wandered over and surrounded the two, who continued protesting their innocence until their recompense began. Two minutes later, both were silent, broken masses. The other wanna-be gangsters began begging for mercy. I called out to our allies, "They are yours; grant them no more mercy than they have granted your people!"

The mixed group of warriors wandered back into the yard, leaving only the members of the security team on guard. They walked among the captives speaking their won languages, and intermittently speaking in Spanish. I picked up enough to know that the cries along the theme of of "No! No! It wasn't me!" were in response to charges levied.

Claude and Clay came to the porch, where I was standing by Kaitlyn. Amongst the cries, Claude warned, "We've been here long enough; there are other gangsters out there, and we're also operating within the Sinaloans' territory." Then he laughed.

A grinning Clay picked it up: "We do have some good news - Paul Peveto is on his way with a construction chopper, so we'll be flying out, not walking! He'll be here in about half an hour. We need to find out what we can and do what we need to do before he gets here. His arrival will be seen and heard for miles around.

"Let's see if we can find some kind of adequate clothing for your family and get them ready. We'll handle the questioning, but we may need to confirm some of their answers with Kaitlyn, or maybe the kids."

The woman and children who escaped from the house just before the battle were now standing on the porch. I called them over and asked the woman if she could help us.

She smirked, and answered in impeccable English, "I know everything! We've been here a little more than three years! I know where the money and records are hidden, and the combinations to their safes.

"I know the names of the corrupt officials who succor them in repayment of bribes, and the names and contact information for the two men who participated in your wife's rape yesterday. These idiotas also have laptops filled with records on which there is no security!

"I am proud member of the Náhuatl tribe, and a medical doctor with undergraduate and M.D. degrees from Stanford. My children and I were kidnapped from my home village, where I was providing care to my people, by Juan Morales, 'El Asaltante'. That was three years ago, when they first settled here.

"We're alive because I acted as his wife, my children acted as his. Many times I wanted to kill him, but his second-in-command -- the one over there with the shoulder wound -- is more bloodthirsty than Juan!

"I can provide details of unspeakable horrors I have seen and endured, and the names and destinations - or burial sites - of the many who have been brought here before. But you must take me and my children out of this country! The survivors will kill us, no matter where we hide in Mexico!"