Long Overdue Time Away Ch. 09

"Al, you're point on this, I'm sure you and Karen have worked out a protocol. If you need me for anything tell me, if I'm in your way tell me. The security force Chris and I worked for is a very good resource. If nothing else they can provide bodies. Use Chris on that, he has people there."

Al put his hand on my shoulder and looked me in the eye. "How are you doing? What do you need ...personally from me?"

I was blank, I was trying as hard as I knew how to stay composed. I was afraid if I lost my composure I might not get it back. "This is as tough as it gets here Al, I cant loose my objectivity. I'll stop being any help."

"We're going to get her back, people like Karen just don't disappear. There is always a reason. Once we see it we will have a path. I promise. Its ok to let down, we have this."

"Al. I have to stay engaged on this, This is what I did. I retrieved a lot of high value targets domestically and abroad. In embassies, consulates, You name the place. I have to keep it together. Karen needs me to. This isn't about me."

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The rest of the day was spent reviewing what we knew about Karens disappearance and looking over the interviews, talking to people in town. Trying to see what was being missed. Which wasn't very much, only that she was gone. I talked to everyone that was in the house this morning. No one herd anything, no dogs barking, nothing. We checked her phone calls and there was nothing out of the ordinary there. We simply weren't seeing any clues. Greg the captain checked out he had been a long time employee go the dealer.

I was worried. I spent a sleepless night by myself. All our house guests went home. The dogs slept in the house. If I did go to sleep, I was afraid I wouldn't wake easily and I wanted them in as my alarm. I did drift off to sleep, I'm not sure what time. I was running through my mind all the possible reasons and scenarios...I was awakened by the sound of the ringer on my phone.

"Jim, we have a video. Get to my office as soon as you can." It was Al. "Karen's alive. You need to get here."

I got dressed and got in my truck and called Chris. "I heard, I'm on my way to Al's office now. Everyone is on their way." Then Chris said, "We'll catch these guys Jim. I know you're worried, and for good reason, we're going to get her back."

When I pulled into the lot at Al's office, Chris was just walking in the door. There were already six other people in the room when I walked in. Al got to me first. "You need to look at the video, its going to upset you. But we can't let that take over. I need you to look for clues."

"It's ok, play it." It was all I could say. The last twenty four hours were the longest of my life. At least we had something, I was ready to see it.

One of the guys in front of a computer put the video up on one of the screens. Chris was next to me, the video was one of those staged scenes of a group of terrorists with black masks pulled over their faces. There was a person in a chair in front of them with a black bag on her head. She was wearing sweatpants, they were torn and dirty. I knew who it was immediately. She was bare foot and I could see her painted toenails on her dirty feet.

My mind went back to the other night when Karen sat in my lap next the fire. Her legs crossed and feet resting on my legs. I remembered the softness of her hand when she put it on the side of my face before she kissed me.

I was snapped back to reality when the guy who had been speaking Arabic pulled the bag off of Karens head. Her face was swollen, one eye blackened her eye brow cut. She had been hit...more than once. They had a gag in her mouth and her hands were tied behind her. She looked scared. Terrified. Chris put his hand on my shoulder. We watched the rest of the video all six minutes.

"It's being translated now as we speak." Al motioned to a guy with headphones on in front of a computer screen. He was typing subtitles on the bottom of the screen as he was listening. He would stop and start, rewind and play again. He was also jotting down notes on a pad with a pen. Other people in the room were also watching the video on their own screens some were on the phone to other people.

"How soon until we have it translated?" I asked.

"Five minutes." The guy doing the subtitles looked at me.

I rubbed my face with my hands, it was the combination, I was trying to process what I was seeing, keep my emotions under control and rub the sleep out of my eyes.

"I need some coffee." I walked outside. I needed to collect my self. I had seen videos like this before. When we had assignments to recover an HVT(high value target). None of them were my wife. I stood there for a few seconds out in the cool morning air, the fog was lifting, I could hear the boats in the harbor and the seagulls complaining following them looking for a handout.

Thats when it struck me. I turned around, flung the door open and bolted for the nearest monitor with the video playing. "Rewind and play from the beginning." I looked at the analyst. He reversed the video with his joy stick to the beginning. "Turn the sound up. Put it on one of the screens, we need good sound. Ok, lets listen." The room went from a low roar with every one on the phone with someone else to dead quiet. The man on the video got through a couple of sentences, when I said "There. Stop and rewind from...play from here. Do you hear that? Was that a seagull? In the background?"

A young woman at a computer called over, "Isolating it now." Give me a second. "Ok bringing it up." She looked at me while we listened. "There" we both said it at the same time. She backed it up and played it again. "Running it against the database, we'll see what the computer thinks it sounds like. A couple of matches, seagull, bicycle tire skidding, let me cross reference...I'm going to say you're right, seagull."

"Okay, keep listening. See if we can back that up. Listen for anything else thats a tell."

She nodded at me putting her earphones on while looking at me wondering how I caught that.

I could see her listen and jot down on her pad what else she was hearing at various parts of the video. "Listen to this." She looked at me. "It's an engine, the database says a marine diesel."

Al spoke up. "Ok guys it looks like they have Karen someplace close to the ocean, close enough to hear sounds coming off the water from where she is. Lets look and listen. There are still things there we aren't aware of yet..."

"Like a church bell. I'm hearing three gongs. It's not likely that it was three this morning. So the video was made yesterday at thee in the afternoon. We also have a train in the back ground."

Linda continued to listen.

A few more guy's came in the door and Al greeted them and filled them in on what we were learning from the video. One of the guys I recognized, his name was Jeff.

I had worked with him when I was with the Security force. When he saw me he came over and shook my hand. "Jim, its great to see you, I sorry its under these circumstances."

"Thanks for being here Jeff. Al filled you in on where we are I'm sure."

"Yes, in addition to what he said it looks like we have a read on the IP address. Its Seattle."

"Can we narrow it anymore than that? I asked him."

"No, just Seattle. But with the other things I'm being told we are narrowing our search substantially." Jeff looked at me over his reading glasses.

"Jim, I'm getting the drone up and heading it that way. We are looking to see what satellites can help us." Al said from his seat next to Linda. "We have a City to send a detract team to, they staging for the chopper now."

"Al, I want Chris and I on that chopper! Where is the pick up?"

"The end of pier 6. I'll keep you updated. There is no reason for us to move. We can do what we need to from here. There hasn't been any direct contact Jim."

Al didn't need to tell me what that meant. If they wanted ransom it would have been mentioned in the video or they would have made contact and made demands. Instead the video was one of those Jihad rants. I knew we had a ticking clock. I was worried they meant to kill Karen, they just needed to build an audience. And that would be done through the media.

"We need to get the media to stall on reporting this Al. We need time."

"I'll contact my sources, it's inevitable that they will report on it. But we should be able to get them to hold off for...I'll see if I can get 24 hours."

Chris and I both threw our gear in the back of the truck and headed for the pickup point. I asked him about the detract team. "I picked them up from the Security Force. Jim, I know these guys, they're solid. They came from various teams around the country one of the guys is EOD. We'll be fine with who we have." We were driving to the pier and we could see the team was there and they were loading the chopper. We parked and loaded our gear as well.

Soon we were in the air and heading north. The ride was noisy it would have been futile trying to get aquatinted while we were in the air, there would be time for that when we landed.

My phone was blowing up with texted from Al, evidently there was a reflection in the video that showed a bridge, and they knew where it was. Now it was as simple as figuring out the angle and we would have a building the video was shot from. He was confident we would have it before we landed. Al was seeing what he could get from satellite imagery. We will want to see who has come and gone in the last thirty six hours.

The rest of the flight to Seattle was like this with every few minutes something new to report, we landed at SEA and were led to a van waiting for us and went to an empty warehouse a hundred yards away from the building thought to be the one where Karen was being held. This was an industrial part of town next to the waterfront. No one would look at us twice arriving in a van. Many of the adjacent buildings had activity. Trucks being loaded with forklifts, vehicles coming and going. We pulled inside and surveillance was set up from the top floor immediately. The guys unloaded the gear. Laptops were set up and communication was established with Al in the situation room.

I called Al right away while Chris went over strategy's with the team. "Jim, we have a traffic cam that shows six military aged men all with dark hair and beards. Resolution isn't great but it appears these are our guys."

"Did you see them bring Karen in?" I asked.

"They unloaded a plywood box large enough for a person. We are looking now to see who else in in the building. We need to get eyes inside. I want to know where everyone is before we can figure out how we are going to do this. The media is stalling on reporting on the video until morning. I want to know enough to get Karen out tonight. But I need to know how and where she is being held."

"Al are we going to do this with the FBI's involvement? Local PD?"

"I'm not sure yet Jim, I've been in contact with the Bureau. So far they haven't notified PD, Its pending on what we find out between now and when we go in. No one at this point sees any reason to involve the locals. It's being viewed as an International incident. So far everyone is leaning towards going under the radar. You know how this goes, after the extract, we turn the scene over to them and they can come up with their own story. And we were never there."

"That's the best way Al, its cleaner. And it happens on our timing. We'll keep talking. Right now I want focus on getting eyes inside."

"Jim it looks like there is foot traffic in and out of that building. All of it up stairs, business looking people. We're going to go deliver a pizza. Get the lay of the land." One of the younger looking guys had a pizza box and was heading out the door.

Chris was talking to the rest of the guys and waved me over. We made our introductions and one of the guys looked at me and said "I can't even imagine what this is doing to you man, but don't worry we're going to get her back. These guys don't know who they are fucking with."

"Hey Jim, come look at this." One of the surveillance guys motioned me over. He was looking through binoculars into the building. "Ground floor, third window from the right corner. There is some activity in there. Take a look."

"I'm seeing a couple of guys moving around, but with the curtains I cant tell what they are up to. I don't see Karen."

"I'm getting an IR scope set up. We'll be able to see their heat signatures through the curtains, and maybe through some of the walls. I want to see how many of them there are. And where she is in relation to them. It's 7:00 now we want to be ready to go in by midnight."

Chris came down from up stairs. "We pulled plans from the city, we have a current floor plan as well as the original. It looks like that building was built on part of the original tunnel system that was the old city. Even with these plans there is no telling what's there. A lot gets done with no permits. There is an access to the tunnel system from the basement here. Lets get a gps tracker on you and see if we can get under their building. Take a snake and a drill."

I found what I needed among the gear. It was familiar, not much had changed since I did this for a living. Some of the stuff was newer, better technology but the organization of it the same. It made sense, these guys work for the same guys I did.

I got what I needed and went down to the basement.

Chris followed me and put the camera on my vest, it had a gps feature. "Ok Jim, the drone is overhead and we have what it sees on our monitors, our gps signals will superimpose our positions on that image. They can tell us what direction we need to go to get under them. The drone has IR capability so we should be able to get right under them and know where everyone is."

I was strapping on my leg holster with my Glock 19 and extra mags. I also was putting mags in my vest for my M4A1 carbine. Even though our intent was go gather intel for an operation later that night we knew better than to go unprepared. I had done this too many times to know sometimes plans change. Chris was doing the same. We put night vision on our helmets. It would be dark in the tunnel and we wouldn't want to alert anyone we were there by turning on lights.

It took us a few minutes to find access to the tunnels but soon we were in. We had communications with both the situation room and the guys upstairs. We left glow sticks as we went to provide a trail to get back later on. With the guidance of the guys up stairs we were soon under the building we hoped Karen was in. We still didn't have confirmation she was there and I was feeling the anxiety of that, I needed to know we were in the right place. I needed to know she was ok.

"Ok, the IR is up from the drone. There are six guys in the room you are under now. There is one more, someone smaller than the others in an adjacent room. It looks like the six are watching tv or something. Lets get eyes in the room with the one right away."

I was already chucking the bit in the drill. "See if you can put me in the corner of the room, in case thats not Karen I don't want to be seen yet." Chris was talking to upstairs. I handed him the drill when he was in position. It seemed like an eternity to get through the floor, Chris needed to go slow to keep from being heard. As soon as he was through I had the snake with the camera on the end and slowly started to push it into the hole.

We were in, we had eyes. There was such a mixture of emotions when I saw Karen sitting in a corner on the floor. She was bound and gagged. The problem with the increased technology was I could also see her face was bruised, she was dirty, bare footed, here feet looked like she hadn't had shoes on at all, they were so dirty you could only barely see her painted toe nails. I was so glad we found her there, but it hurt to see here like this. I knew everyone was seeing what I was seeing. I knew I'd be getting feedback on what they wanted to see.

While I was looking at Karen and the room she was in, upstairs was guiding Chris to the room the six were in and he started to drill a hole. After some discussion we decided to let Karen know we were there. I knew the risk, but I needed to give her hope. The hope that this was going to be over. Chris had pushed a snake up the other hole, they were watching tv in that room. They were watching the news. No doubt they wanted to see their video featured. While Chris was watching them I pushed my snake up about six more inches and bent it ninety degrees looking right at Karen I turned the light on the end of it on I knew she would see it.

At first I could tell it didn't register with her what she was seeing. Then I moved the end up and down like a snake nodding its head at her. Tears started flowing down her cheeks. I could see her start to loose it. Her gaze was fixed on the snake. I made it shake its head no at her. She needed to regain her composure. The men in the other room didn't need to know something had changed. It was working, she stopped crying and the snake slowly nodded its head up and down.

"Jim we have a problem. These guys have made contact." It was Al. "They're pissed they aren't getting any exposure. They think we aren't taking them seriously, they are making all kinds of threats."

"Things are getting lively in there guys. It looks like they are getting ready to shoot another video." Chris was saying while he was looking at the monitor.

"We cant let that happen! I need two of you from upstairs down here now! Full gear. We breach now! I'm not going to watch these guys cut my wife's head off. You need det cord and flash bangs."

Chris was telling the guys in the situation room to guide us to the door on the south side of the room. It was the best place to enter the room from. I pulled the snake backdown to floor level and turned the light off. Chris did the same. We didn't want them seen, but we wanted the situation room to be able to tell us what was happening in those rooms. We left them there and were rushing through the maze of tunnels to get to that south door.

"Hurry up guys they're getting their swords and Ak's, their putting the camera on the tripod." I could hear the urgency in Al's voice as he kept us informed as we rushed through the tunnels. The two from upstairs were in overdrive getting their gear on and equipment together. They made the hundred yards through alleys to avoid being seen. Chris and I got to the door first. We went right to work putting the det cord we had on the hinge side of the door and had it wired when the other two got to us. "I was hoping we would get this going before Karen was in the room. Al was telling us. "It's too late for that. They are sitting her down in a chair in front of the camera. Listen up! Here is the layout, you are coming in the south door as soon as you are in, from left to right are, four armed males, hostage in a chair, she is in dirty white sweats. Next armed male near her. Then an unarmed cameraman three meters to the right. Be sure of your target! Breach on my command! Five, four, three...

I wasn't ready for this to go down so fast. Not this time. As Al was counting we were making assignments. There was simply no time to plan this. This was high stakes and we all knew it. It's not how any of us wanted to do it.

"...Three, two, one, BREACH!" The det cord blew the door and two flash bangs followed it into the room. The two upstairs guys fanned left and took out the guys with ak's. I was next and Chris took the man next to Karen and the camera man going right. There was only the sound of the the actions on our rifles filling the room. We were using silencers. None of the combatants got a shot off. Upstairs guys went to clear the offices and Chris went to the doors at the other end of the room to watch for the van.