Rogue Op II Page 4

  Chuck lunged and dove after him, reaching for his legs and tripping him.

  The killer yelled in anger. He thrashed on the ground like a serpent. Chuck regained his feet as fast as possible.

  Scraggly Hair was already charging Chuck, who’d dropped his gun when he dove.

  “You die,” the fuming assassin announced, his big arm cocked for a haymaker punch. Chuck sensed that if the big guy was able to land his blow, his face was going to break like one of the Peruvian melons he’d seen in the market.

  Chuck blocked his punch with a nasty blow to the inside of the killer’s wrist. Before Scraggly Hair could scream in pain, Chuck delivered a devastating ax-hand blow to the side of the killer’s neck. He stiffened as he absorbed the shock. Chuck stepped in close and threw him down with a hip toss.

  As if he felt no pain, Scraggly Hair had no sooner hit the ground when he clawed at Chuck’s eyes, warding him back. As the thug’s arm got free, he delivered a battering ram elbow to Chuck’s chest, knocking him on his back.

  The big guy picked up a large stone from the ruins—the size of a duffle bag, 300 pounds or more of rock—and lifted it over his head, grunting with exertion and rage. He yelled as he heaved it. Chuck rolled just in time to miss being crushed. He felt the ground vibrate as he sprung to his feet.

  The killer assumed a fighting stance in the dark room of the old prison.

  Keeping his distance, Chuck delivered a kick to the back of his knee. Scraggly Hair staggered, but improvised, punching Chuck as he regained his balance. Chuck fell backwards, his back slamming into the wall.

  Scraggly hair attacked, but Chuck darted to the left, stealing the momentum.

  As Scraggly Hair spun around, he followed Chuck who circled back around. Chuck faked with a hand movement, then spun himself and unleashed a spinning side-kick to the body. The assassin blew backward, falling and hitting his head on the big stone that he had thrown.

  Now he was dazed, and Chuck grabbed his gun, firing a shot that ricocheted off the rock, just inches from Scraggly Hair’s face.

  “Don’t move!” Chuck said. “Or the next one won’t miss.”

  There was no answer.

  Lightning flashed outside. White light flickered in through the barred window.

  “Lie on your stomach!”

  “Okay, okay.”

  Thunder shook the ruins, and another lightning bolt gave a glimmer of light. When Chuck saw the man on the ground, he stepped closer and kneeled next to him, pressing his gun into the man’s back.

  “Where’s Lazar?”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I’m bleeding.”

  “Good. That means I’ve done my job,” Chuck replied. “Now get up.”

  “My leg is cut. Please, I’m going to die if I don’t stop the bleeding.”

  Lightning lit up the room again, and Chuck saw something that scared him. The assassin’s phone was lying on the ground next to him and was lit up.

  “Who did you call?”

  “Nobody.”

  “You’re lying to me. You called for backup, didn’t you?”

  Chuck punched the hoodlum’s face several times.

  The man groaned in agony. “You don’t stand a chance.”

  “When will they be here?”

  “Any minute now. If you shoot me, they will kill you.”

  “That’s not how it works.” Chuck twisted the man’s arm behind his back until the man shrieked in pain.

  “Get up,” Chuck said.

  The big man struggled to stand. “Stinking Americano,” he growled. “Dead man.”

  Chuck wrenched his arm even harder this time and was rewarded with a scream.

  “Please, no. Stop! Let me go and I will ask them to spare your life.”

  “Where is Lazar?”

  “I can’t tell you that. He’ll squash me like a bug if I do. He doesn’t like anyone knowing where he is”

  “Well then, you have a choice. Die now or die later.”

  “Alright, alright. He’s in the mountains.”

  “Where?”

  “Viracocha. The lost city.”

  “How do I get there?”

  “I don’t know. It’s extremely remote.”

  Chuck grabbed the man’s leg and viciously dug his fingers into the killer’s bleeding wound.

  The man screamed even louder like something Chuck never wanted to hear again, but he continued to wrench the wound harder. Then he let go and punched the killer in the face with a bloody fist.

  “I said, ‘Where is it?’”

  The man cursed in Spanish. Then he said, “Alto, alto. Please no more. I can’t take it. There is a ranch outside of Lima. A helicopter is waiting there to take us back to the lost city mañana. The pilot knows how to get there.”

  Chuck pulled his logbook and waterproof Space-Tek pen from his pocket. “If you want to live, write down how to get to this ranch.”

  Scraggly Hair wrote quickly as lightning flickered in the sky outside.

  When he was done, Chuck stuffed the logbook back into his pocket. As he did, the killer flinched, so Chuck punched him in the gut, twisted him around and shoved him face first against the wall. Then he backed away. “I didn’t want to do this,” he said as he straightened out his shooting arm. “Adios.”

  “You said you wouldn’t kill me if I helped you,” the man screamed.

  Movement caught Chuck’s eye and he looked towards the sea. He saw the running lights of a boat heading towards the island. The boat was really moving.

  “You’re right. I did say that,” Chuck said. He pistol whipped the assassin, knocking him out cold.

  Chuck ran for the shoreline, grabbed the rope, and jumped in the cabin cruiser. He brought the engine to life and backed away from the prison island.

  The boat had tremendous power and muscled through the rough water, rising over waves and crashing down into watery troughs. The sea was choppy and gale force winds blew in from the west. The cabin cruiser was rocking wildly, and it was hard for Chuck to keep his balance at the wheel.

  Chuck poured on the power until the cabin cruiser was flying over the waves and crashing down—over and over. He pushed the marine engines hard. Gas raced through her pipes like blood through veins. The pitch of the engine whined with high rpm’s as the propellers rose out of the water. Then the engines growled deeply when they splashed underwater. They groaned like a man carrying a log on his shoulder as he humped down the beach in loose sand. As the blades bit the waves, the boat lunged forward off another swell.

  The boat launched and landed at high speed.

  Boom! Boom! Boom!

  Then the shooting started.

  Full automatic.

  Bullets ripped through the cabin cruiser, and Chuck ducked down, surprised that he hadn’t been shot.

  He pulled back on the accelerator lever and let the cruiser drift for a minute.

  He slipped below decks to see what was in the crates that the Black Cobras had been transferring. When he cut the canvas straps and pulled the wooden lids off the crates, he wasn’t surprised.

  The killers he’d dealt with on the island were Black Cobra gunrunners. The crates were full of weapons…

  RPG’s and AK-47s.

  Chuck took an RPG grenade launcher up on deck and staying low, he aimed it at the approaching boat. Once again, they riddled the cabin cruiser with gunfire, but this time Chuck responded.

  An RPG crossed the gulf between the two boats and smashed through the windshield. The approaching boat erupted in a fireball. Shards of wood splashed down in the water.

  “So sad,” Chuck said. “Such a waste of a good boat.”

  Chuck held up his RPG launcher. “Is this what you’re looking for? Why don’t you come and get it now? Come on. Come and get it! What are you waiting for? You sure wanted it bad a minute ago.”

  For just a moment, he watched the boat burn like a Viking burial pyre. In a moment of silence, he heard the crackli
ng of flames and waves slapping the side of his boat.

  “How do you like that, General?” Chuck said as if Lazar was right there. “I’m bringing a surprise with me to the lost city for our reunion.”

  Then he heard water sloshing around down in the cabin. It was dark, but it was obviously rising fast.

  Careful to keep his balance, Chuck got behind the wheel of his rocking cabin cruiser and rode the bronco about a hundred meters before she sank. While treading water for a minute, he pulled off his boots and started swimming.

  Twenty minutes later, he rose out of the water just past the beach at the tip of La Punta. With his laces tied together and his jungle combat boots slung over his shoulder, Chuck walked down the street in the dark. He was happy to have lived. At least he had a lead to follow. That was better than nothing. But his problems seemed to be growing. Lazar would soon learn that several of his assassins were dead. That would not go over well.

  CHAPTER 8

  Callao, Peru

  Chuck continued walking through La Punta until he reached the mean streets of Callao, Peru. There he hotwired an old sedan. He began driving east toward the Andes mountains. Lazar was up there, and Chuck was going to find him.

  Chuck followed the directions the man on the island had given him and drove to a ranch near Lima where a Black Cobra helicopter pilot was waiting to return the brothers to the lost city. The pilot was not in his bird, but Chuck found three M16’s in there all loaded with attached M203 grenade launchers. He grabbed one and sauntered into the helicopter hangar, where a dude was sleeping in a chair. Chuck kicked the chair out from under the guy.

  “Get off your ass. You’re taking me to Viracocha.”

  “Who the hell are you?” the pilot protested as he got up off the ground.

  Chuck raised his M16. “Your new boss. Get moving.”

  CHAPTER 9

  The helicopter soared over the Altiplano, the high plateau distinctive to the imposing Andes mountain range. Chuck marveled in awe at the barren expanse and the occasional posse of vicunas that dotted the landscape below.

  Soon the helicopter rose higher as it climbed seemingly toward the top of the world. The Spanish conquistadores likened the Andes mountain chain to parallel ropes and called them Cordilleras. These parallel mountains combined and stretched out for an astounding five-thousand and five hundred miles along the western edge of South America. In places the range was two hundred miles wide.

  Their beauty and majesty made Chuck forget to breathe. They reminded him that his life was as insignificant as a speck of sand. His life was like the momentary glimmer of a firefly compared to the long history of the magnificent mountain range below him.

  To behold the vastness was to see himself through a microscope. Unimaginable scenery passed endlessly below him on such a vast scale that he felt minuscule in comparison.

  The mighty Andes rose from the crust of the earth forming the spine of the great South American whale. Tortured ridges strung surreal ice peaks together like a blue opal necklace. Massive ice formations weighed down the steep faces.

  The helicopter carrying Chuck headed for the lost city. It was soaring two thousand feet above a valley between two Cordilleras. On a northeasterly route, it flew between the Urubamba and Vilcabamaba mountain ranges. For a hundred miles, it soared over remote gorges and spectacular ridges. It flew on and on. It passed over plateaus, valleys, streams, and waterfalls—too many to count.

  Finally, it soared over a valley that was flooded with a bright turquoise-colored glacial meltwater lake. Far below him was a largely unexplored world—at least unexplored by Chuck Brandt.

  There were a thousand valleys where a man could be alone to hear the wind and drink from the cold mountain creeks below him.

  There was a magnet deep inside of Chuck that felt the pull of the wild regions of the world, the vast no-man’s land that daily felt the lash of nature. Below him were thousands of ridges and peaks that waited to be explored, but at the moment there was only one place that had a grip on his soul.

  He thought about the mountain goats of the Rockies, their horns locked in mortal combat. He thought of eagles swooping down on helpless prey. He thought of General Ivan Lazar and his crimes against humanity…

  Oh, the vast, barren, lonely wastes of the Andes. They were devastating to the soul of a man. Chuck imagined armies of Incas marching over the mountains and deserts of Peru. Those brutal men were sculpted by this brutal land. They brought hell upon their neighbors, slaughtering them like sheep and enslaving them. Chuck remembered with sadness the poor souls at Lazar’s operation in the Amazon. He remembered them dying. He remembered Andy and all the others. Lazar was a monster—a mass killer who had to be stopped.

  Back in the Amazon, Chuck had promised to pay Lazar a visit. Now he was ready to confront him face-to-face. Minutes felt like seconds, and every second reminded him that he was getting closer to the wolves’ den. Chuck knew it was insane for one man to go up against Lazar and his Black Cobra guerilla fighters, but he felt he had no choice. He also knew that even a dozen men would have a brutal fight on their hands against Lazar and his lair of assassins.

  CHAPTER 10

  Apurimac River Gorge

  For nature, time knew no limits in the Apurimac Gorge. Years were like seconds. Melting glaciers had fed the Apurimac River for centuries. Beginning at an altitude of over sixteen thousand feet meltwater formed rivulets that trickled into the high-mountain river. For hundreds of kilometers, the river wound through mountain valleys, sometimes with nearly vertical canyon walls—walls of shifting geological properties, changing colors, and alternating surfaces. At intervals, the canyon walls were volcanic, shale, sandstone, and limestone. Eventually, the Apurimac merges with the Urubamba, and then the Ucayali River and in that extremely remote and forested area right before the merging of rivers, there is a forgotten city. This lost city is nearly fifty kilometers from the nearest village. Few have ventured into this area because it is so isolated and rugged, and not only that, to get there one must pass through extremely dangerous territory—an area dominated by coca farmers, terrorists, and drug traffickers.

  The lost city is sealed off from the outside by precipitous ridges, vertical cliffs, and deadly chutes that are plagued by mudslides and avalanches. The area is so rugged that one cannot get there by car, truck, boat, or airplane. Only llamas, mules, and mountain climbers can handle the steep mountain trails, but few humans ever try. Only a few even know it exists. If anyone studied a map and tried, they’d never make it. They’d most likely be killed by terrorists and drug traffickers before they ever got there.

  Gazing out the window of the soaring helicopter, Chuck’s eyes followed the track of the raging river that cut through the deep canyon wall. Rapids crashed over rocks. Waterfalls plunged down cliffs. The powerful river cut channels across the high-elevation plateau and flowed northward.

  As Chuck sat there contemplating the river’s wild and untamed ways he felt the helicopter begin to descend. Slowly at first, then the rotors of the copter rapidly give up altitude.

  Chuck put the barrel of his gun against the pilot’s neck. “Let me remind you that I play hardball. Once you drop me off, you’ll no longer be needed. Get me as close as you can, but not too close. If you blow my cover, it will cost you—dearly.”

  The pilot landed on a sand bar near a wide bank of the river. After Chuck destroyed the radio and tied up the pilot, he jumped off the craft. He took one last look at the pilot and his bird, then set off down a muddy jungle path. He was headed straight for the wolves’ den.

  CHAPTER 11

  Viracocha

  Dressed in green camouflage, General Ivan Lazar was a large, muscular man with dark hair, a strong broad forehead, and eyes of steel that glittered with energy. His office sat atop a plateau high above the clouds. On the plateau, Inca slaves had long ago chiseled stone into rectangles and stacked the stones as if they were LEGO ® bricks to make a fifty-foot wall that enclosed the plateau. Behind t
he barrier, the slaves built sturdy stone dwellings that were topped with thatch. Lazar had reinforced the stone walls of the round buildings, replaced their thatched roofs with matte brown metal ones and renamed the mountaintop citadel Viracocha. His lost city was now so overgrown with foliage and so well camouflaged from the world that no one even knew it existed.

  Back in the fifteenth century, hundreds of round buildings had sat on the mountain top citadel. Now the remains of most of the ancient structures littered the plateau, but about twenty-five had survived and been restored by Lazar. Most of these restored buildings were about thirty-feet in diameter and housed his Black Cobra brigade. However, a couple of the buildings were more than forty-feet wide, and General Lazar had taken the four finest of these larger round homes for his personal residence and office complex. These larger buildings were clustered around a quadrangle, the center of which had a stairway to the underground. The underground was an elaborate tunnel system that had originally been carved into the earth by the Chachapoya Indians. After being conquered by the Incas, the Chachapoya continued quarrying the tunnels, only now they labored as slaves for their oppressors. Lazar had always marveled at the quality of the Chachapoya’s work, especially after the Incas had taught them even more refined masonry techniques. The complex tunnel system was made up of hundreds of escape shafts and catacombs…and most importantly the underground contained a crypt. This vault housed Lazar’s most prized possessions—his Inca treasures. Over many years, Lazar had amassed an impressive collection of plundered artifacts, treasures and remains and hidden them in the ancient mausoleum at the end of the underground complex. There was only one way in the crypt and no way out. It was the perfect place to store the relics that he had been collecting for years. They were stored at the perfect temperature with open-air windows that kept the humidity at the perfect level.

  General Lazar paced in his office. He had a dozen problems to solve related to his earth-shattering plot against America—and he was taking them one at a time.