Chapter 5

The War On Drugs

 

At Fort Bragg, the pre-dawn morning was cool. A patchy fog hung along the low-lying areas, as Jason drove onto base. He parked and went into his office at four a.m.

He was waiting and hoping for his uplink to light up, with word that Delta had finished their night-drop. Before long, they should be on location and moving to their target. Jason sipped his coffee, thinking and looking at the blank display screen. Nothing like a night-drop to wake you up, he thought to himself. Jason missed being in the action, but, as a father with a growing family, he also appreciated the time off afforded him since he was promoted to colonel, and commander in charge of Fort Bragg.

Jason looked at one of the pictures sitting on the edge of his desk. The Delta Team picture was taken just before the Black Water mission; Jason was standing next to his old friend, Derek. He missed his friend, with his smile and his corny jokes. Jason could still see it, from his dreams: the image of Derek standing in the doorway of the cartel base, when a bullet ended his life.

 

 

In southern Texas, about twenty miles west of the Pecos River, Delta Team had just finished their drop through the clear, starlit night and were gathering up. With all accounted for, Tex gave the order for Delta to move into the cover and set up a defensive perimeter.

Tex lit up his uplink com. “Capcom, Capcom, the bird has landed. Copy?”

“We copy that,” Capcom replied: “the bird has landed.”

 

 

Back at Fort Bragg, Jason was relieved as he watched the display screen light up, six yellow dots blinking on the screen. Yes, the uplinks are working. All is good to go, he thought to himself.

Jason grabbed his uplink and called in to Capcom: “Let’s make it happen. Delta is go.” Jason then set the uplink down and prayed for his men, and a successful mission.

 

*

In south Texas, Delta was about a mile or so due east of their target. Intel had confirmed it was the drug-processing cartel base; the building was spotted by one of their recon drones. It was a large, camouflaged pole barn, which was set up in a heavily-wooded area.

Inside the barn, the cartel criminals were in a good mood, laughing and joking with one another. With open borders, their profits had been through the roof. They were now unpacking a fresh shipment from their friends in China. It was a big shipment of the new and improved, even deadlier fentanyl mix.

Back in the cover, Delta was on the move, single file, low and fast, with Jorge Morales on point.

After a long run, Tex signaled hold as his uplink lit up.

“Delta, Delta – Capcom. Do you copy?”

“We copy that,” Tex replied.

“You have the green light,” Capcom replied.

Tex signed off and checked their headings. “We are green for go, people. Let’s move; we’ve got a long way to go.”

“I got it, boss,” McDonough added. “Let’s kick some cartel ass!”

With that said, Delta continued onward, making their way through the dense cover. On they pushed, with the speed, determination and unending endurance that set them apart. If the cartel criminals only knew what was coming for them, they would have run for their lives.

 

 

Back in NC, Jason left his office and made his way over to Capcom, to stay with the ongoing Delta mission. But his stomach decided it was time to take a break and stop for some breakfast. Once there, Jason talked with some of his direct reports. He was learning that with his promotion came much more responsibility.

 

 

Back in south Texas, a large, white van came off the dirt-and-gravel road, and pulled into the cartel base: the drivers who would help spread the fentanyl up into the heart of America. The cartel leader heard them and opened the large bay doors, bringing light into the darkness, and the sight of his driver friends. Quickly, they went inside and a very large amount of cash changed hands. The cartel leader smiled as he stuffed his jacket full of cash.

He turned to the drivers. “Come, sit down, take a rest. Let us have a drink. Tonight we celebrate.”

 

 

Out in the cover of night, Delta was getting closer. Tex and Morales scanned up ahead, and out into the tree line in the distance. To the east, they could see slivers of light coming through the cover.

“That must be it,” Morales said.

“Yes, that’s got to be our cartel friends,” Tex replied, as he scanned with his night-vision scope.

Back into the cover they ran, and Delta went into stealth mode.

 

 

At Fort Bragg, Jason was at Capcom, drinking coffee to stay awake. Everyone was watching the display screen as the blinking lights moved toward the target.

“It won’t be long now,” Jason said to one of the Capcom operators.

 

 

At the Texas cartel base, Delta had moved in, making their way up close. They could see the building ahead, and a van parked in front of the open bay doors.

“I see two armed guards,” Blair said. “They’re out in front of the driveway.”

“Okay, I see them,” Tex replied. “McDonough, you and Blair use your silencers; take them out. We’ll move to the doors and wait for you.” Tex took out a stun grenade. “Once were set, I’m going to flip this through the doors and we move in.”

“Got it, boss: back to the doors,” Blair said, as he was attaching the custom silencer onto his Glock 19. As Blair and McDonough slipped into the darkness, Delta crawled their way to the side of the bay doors.

Before long, they could hear talking and laughing going on inside the building. Tex could feel the tension building; the unique feeling of fear mixed with excitement that always came to him before battle.

Out in the cover, Blair and McDonough were making their way in the cover, along the side of the driveway.

“Smell that?” Blair whispered.

“Copy that,” McDonough replied, to the distinct smell of marijuana smoke. Standing at the end of the driveway, the two cartel members had their weapons shouldered and were sharing a joint. They were laughing about something.  

Slowly, the two soldiers pushed on through the cover, until they were very close. Then, weapons at the ready, they moved in for the kill.

Each man ran out of the cover, handguns up, and fired: Pop! Pop! Pop!

One of the criminals pulled out his handgun, and somehow managed to let out a scream before a bullet tore through his head.

“Oh, shit,” Morales said. “Let’s head back.”

Inside the building, the cartel leader jumped out of his chair. “What the hell was that?! Get the weapons!”

Everyone inside was yelling, as they scrambled for their guns.

Tex wasted no time, and pulled the pin on his stun grenade. He moved up and flipped it through the doorway. Delta stayed low as the grenade detonated with a thunderous boom.

Inside the building, the powerful blast had taken down three of the six criminals. One of the criminals, up in the loft sleeping area, was rocked awake; he got up and fumbled for his shotgun.

The cartel leader and his assistant were shaken, but had managed to roll themselves out of the blast area. They were disorientated and fumbling with their weapons.

Guns at the ready, Delta made their move inside the building.

Tex caught movement to his right and opened fire, with two short bursts. The cartel leader screamed, his blood flowing, and went down for good. His assistants opened fire with their AK-47s, as Tex and Morales ducked under a large wooden table. Dudash swung in low; he was on them in an instant, and took them down in a hail of gunfire.

McDonough and Blair ran in and took another suspect down, as he was shooting and screaming.

The gunfire stopped and Tex looked around.

“Okay, nice and slow, let’s check them out,” Tex said, and pointed.

“Got it,” Blair replied, and they moved to the criminals sprawled out on the floor. One was dead and the other two were yelling, in pain from bullet wounds to their legs. McDonough picked up their weapons and Blair secured them with wrist locks. Blair got his med-kit out and tried to get them to calm down, to hold still so that he could treat them.

Tex was relieved to see his teammates were all good. “Okay, everybody, let’s check for weapons and any intel we can use.”

“Look here: all these boxes are packed full of drugs,” Blacknal said, as he pulled a bag filled with white powder from one of them.

Tex turned to Morales, his explosive expert. “Make sure it’s all destroyed. Level the place.”

“Yes, sir – I like it,” Jorge replied with a grin. Everybody knew how he loved to blow up things.

Unbeknown to Delta, the suspect up in the loft was trying to compose himself, as he slowly crawled his way to the front of the loft for a look. Slowly, he brought his shotgun loaded with buckshot into firing position. Thomas Blacknal and McDonough were just below the loft, looking at the cartel leader, his cash scattered about the floor. He was shot up bad and lying in a pool of blood. McDonough knelt down to pick up a weapon, when the man in the loft opened fire.

Boom! Boom! 

Blacknal screamed as the buckshot hit him in the chest and the shoulder. He was knocked backward off his feet and went down hard.

McDonough popped up and opened fire, and Tex was moving toward the loft, firing. The cartel man was caught in a rain of crossfire and came rolling down the stairway, blood spurting from his mouth.

Blacknal was on the floor, moaning: “Oh, shit, I’m hit! I’m hit!”

“Get the med-kit!” Tex yelled, as he ran to help Blacknal.

“I got it!” Blair said, as he ran to Blacknal and started to take off his bloody shirt. Tex tried to hold Blacknal still as Blair went to work.

“The rest of you, go check the area,” Tex said. “We don’t want any more surprises.”

Morales checked over the wounded suspects. One of them must have been close to the grenade blast and he had serious bullet wounds; he never stood a chance. The other two had leg wounds, but none seemed too serious. They were talking, trying to blame their leader for everything, as Morales applied a tourniquet to one man’s leg and treated their wounds. Afterward, the two suspects were moved and tied to one of the bay doors.

Blair had Blacknal’s body armor off. He had heavy bruising on his upper chest area and a bullet wound on his upper shoulder, just above the collarbone. Blair applied some pressure bandages, to slow the bleeding.

Blacknal screamed: “Oh, fuck, that hurts! It’s not too bad, is it?”

Tex got a close look at Blacknal. His body armor had saved his life, but one of the buckshot hit the top of his armor, before going into the shoulder – there was no exit wound. “Hold tight, buddy,” Tex said. “You’re going to be okay. We’re going to get you some help.”

Blair pulled a morphine ampule from the med-pack and popped it into Blacknal’s vein. Before long, the powerful med calmed Blacknal. “Oh… that’s better,” he said, before he slowly drifted off.

Tex tried to calm himself, his body running on adrenalin. He moved to the doorway and lit up the uplink. “Capcom! Capcom! We need medevac and evac. Copy.” Tex looked at Blacknal and the suspects. “Capcom, we have three wounded, ready for extraction.”

 

 

Jason heard the call. Oh, fuck! Three wounded! he said to himself, as he listened…

“We copy that, Delta,” Capcom replied: “extraction and medevac to the target area.”

 

*

 

Tex and Morales gave Blair a hand, helping to get Blacknal situated. They found a blanket and some pillows in the loft, and did what they could for him.

Blair moved to the wounded criminals and checked on them again, while Tex and Morales went outside to check on the perimeter. They found Dudash and McDonough out by the dirt road.

“All is quiet out here. How’s Blacknal doing?” Dudash asked.

“He’s beat up pretty good, but he’ll be okay,” Tex replied, as he lit up a smoke. “He got some buckshot in his shoulder. Medevac is en route. We need to set this place to blow.”

“I’m on it,” Morales replied, and ran with a spring in his step.

Tex looked up at the sky and, as always, thanked God they had made it through another one. He noticed the sky was getting lighter to the east. Sunrise is not far away, he thought to himself. He started back, and found Dudash and Blair.

“Okay, guys, we need to take pictures of everything – especially the drugs.”

“We got it,” Dudash said, as they got started.

Tex looked around for intel, and found some cell phones, some files and another big pile of cash.

After taking pictures, McDonough stacked all the cartel’s weapons and ammo. Morales, who had the place wired to blow, went over to the piles of weapons and drugs, and soaked them in gasoline.

Out in the pre-dawn skies, closing in on Delta’s location, were two Boeing CH-47 choppers. On board one of them was a medical team and three fully-armed soldiers, the Army chopper dispatched from Fort Sam Houston. One of the pilots grabbed the com. “Delta, Delta, Stalker is inbound. Copy?”

Tex grabbed his com. “We copy that: Stalker is inbound. What’s your E.T.A., copy?”

“We got about five minutes or less,” the pilot replied. “Give me a mark. Copy?”

“Copy that, Stalker,” Tex replied; “on my red marks.”

Tex signed off and turned to Blair. “As soon as we hear the thumpers, set up the L.Z. with two flares, out on the road.”

“I got it,” Blair replied, and ran out the door.

Everyone was outside waiting, as Morales pulled the van inside the building and closed the doors. The high explosives were mixed with thermite and Morales had them all in place; once he activated his handset, the fireworks were twenty seconds away.

Tex checked on Blacknal. He was drowsy, but seemed to be holding up okay. Then, it was not long before they heard the thumping in the distance. “Okay, set the flares; Stalker is inbound!” Tex yelled out.

The choppers banked into a wide turn, closing into the target, then suddenly, up ahead to the west, the pilots saw two bright-red lights. The pilots eased off and started their descent toward the road.

At the cartel base, everyone stood watching and waiting as the choppers came hovering down, blowing dust and debris everywhere as they touched down. One of the choppers’ doors opened and two men came running out, with stretchers in hand. The Army troops helped Delta carry out the wounded.

An Army sergeant looked at the dead guards lying out on the road, and came over to Tex. He saluted. “Looks like the cartel had a real bad day.”

“You got it, soldier. That was the idea!” Tex replied, “Good to see you and our ride home.”

Before long, everyone was aboard the CH-47s and lifting away.

“Okay,” Morales said with a grin, “fireworks time!”

“I like fireworks,” Blair added.

Tex moved for a look and, suddenly… boom! A blast rang out and a big, bright, rumbling fireball came thundering up out of the tree line. Everyone was then cheering, the reality that it was over helping ease the tension.

Delta found out that they would be touching down at Fort Sam Houston, to catch a connecting flight – a transport – for the ride back to North Carolina.

Aboard the medevac, the medics were swarming over Blacknal, starting him on an I.V. drip and some meds. Four of his upper ribs were broken, and there was muscle and tendon damage on his chest from the impacts. His left shoulder was stabilized and ready for surgery.

 

 

Back at Capcom, the call finally came in and a cheer went around for another success. Jason was sorry to hear about Blacknal, but relieved that he was expected to fully recover. He was thankful for another successful mission – another feather in the hat for him and the Delta Team.

The mood was good at Capcom but, with only an hour or two of sleep, Jason was tired, yet happy. Now all I need is some sleep, he thought to himself, as he headed for his quarters.

The final report on Delta’s successful mission indicated that the amount of drugs destroyed had a street value of over five million dollars – and, most importantly, the mission would save countless American lives. Two prisoners were captured, most likely to become the source of more cartel secrets, and over a million dollars in cash was confiscated, along with valuable intel. It was a major blow to the drug business and the cartel.

Thomas Blacknal underwent surgery and was soon in full recovery. After healing up, and some time in physical therapy, he was expected to be back with his friends in Delta soon.