PARADOX - Chapter 41

Chapter 41

May 8, 2012 – In the mountains near Lago Trafull – Argentina



The higher they climbed the steeper the draw became. The helicopters ferrying the attackers passed over half an hour earlier without the hint of a search pattern. Monday knew their commander was smart for not delaying. It had to be Dorbec, as he was well tuned to Special Forces capabilities.

The only one in the group who had any difficulty keeping up with the maddening pace was Henri, even so, he never asked for them to slow down or to stop. Monday’s guess about Doctor Prestano being in good shape was correct and the young Cencio was obviously a born athlete. Lofton was an old infantry grunt so the thought of him keeping up never entered Monday’s mind. Although they had no rappelling gear or rope, he and his team had free climbed many mountain ranges and were very experienced in what to look for and what to keep away from.

The narrow draw was beginning to open up and the thick underbrush was becoming difficult to negotiate. Monday signaled for the group to halt and motioned for Taco Bender. The short and ruggedly built little Hispanic had barely broken a sweat even with a seventy pound ruck on his back.

“How far to the place where you hid the jewel?” Monday leaned his worn MP-5 on a rock outcropping next to him.

Taco Bender searched the terrain around him, picking out points he remembered, then curtly replied. “Another two hundred meters higher up.”

“We’ll wait here for Weps and Scout,” Monday announced. “The attackers didn’t follow so they shouldn’t be very far behind us. He signaled for Chewey to take point security and Oddball to cover their rear.

Their enemies obviously had excellent resources to target their hideout so quickly. Arrangements had been made through CIA channels for renting the villa, yet they somehow knew within hours where the Team base was. Either there was a leak in the system or the locals were so frightened they freely cooperated with the enemy, probably the latter.

Ten minutes later he heard an old team signal that meant IFF, Identify Friendly or Foe. The rear guard had caught up to them. Weps walked over and deposited his lanky frame next to Monday while Scout stole a stick of beef jerkey from his bosom buddy Bones. “No pursuit,” he stated, pulling out his canteen and taking a short swig of water.

“Dorbec knows we have up-link capabilities and he’s smart enough to un-ass the area before any of our war birds get here.”

“Still can’t figure out what alerted us to the assault!” Weps shook his head. “If Colonel Dorbec is still in command I doubt two separate attacking forces could have blundered into each other. That’s the only thing that could have happened.”

“Dorbec may have been working with another less experienced force,’ Monday mused. “They could have screwed the pooch and fired on Dorbec’s men thinking they were our LPOP’s, listening posts/observation posts.”

Weps shrugged, pulled out a Slim Jim and offered one of the spicy beef sticks to Monday. Pogie Bait, as it was called, was very popular while on field operations. Slim Jims, beef jerky, Granola bars, even the ubiquitous John Wayne bars found in MRE’s.

“As soon as we hit the summit of this big hill, we’ll make contact with Fatboy,” Monday advised The Geek. Fatboy was their contact at Special Operations Command. I’ll call for an extraction so we can at least get the jewel into safe hands.” Five minutes later he gave Chester the signal to move out.



Dorbec and his remaining two men were climbing a parallel draw to the one Monday’s Team was rapidly advancing up. He knew exactly why Wilhelm had pulled his forces out. He also knew that he had no choice but to make contact with Stiehl’s Team and, mend their fences, as the Americans say. He had no up-link capabilities, no supplies, and very little ammunition. Their field packs had been left in the rendezvous area before they moved out to assault the villa.

He was also going on two hours sleep over the past 48 hours and he was thoroughly exhausted. His mind still could not grasp the enormity of their situation. Two men left from his entire team. It was difficult to accept, an alien concept to him.

Lars signaled for them to halt and pointed at a position to his front. He had evidently spotted something or someone. Dorbec made his way up to Lars’ side and scanned the terrain in front of them. Within minutes he saw the sniper. The sniper was well concealed behind a large bolder in a natural fault on the other side of the parallel draw. The man’s steady gaze was down hill as if he was not expecting someone to approach on his flank. Dorbec gave the signal to scan the area for additional snipers or spotters. His training told him that this was a good position to establish at least two sniper posts.



“Over there,” Taco Bender whispered, pointing at a ten-foot gash in the wall of the draw about twenty yards further up.

Monday gave the signal to set up a 360 degree perimeter and sent Weps ahead to an elevated pile of boulders to act as overwatch. He waited a full five minutes before signaling to Taco Bender to retrieve the jewel and the documents hidden in the crevice. Although no movement had been spotted, this was a danger point and Monday’s gut feeling told him to be wary. All eyes were scanning the sides of the draw around them.

Taco Bender crept slowly towards the opening, his eyes moving back and forth and up and down. They had secreted the small package about five feet off the ground in a crack of the wall and placed several slivers of stone in front of it. The ground inside the crevice was littered with flat slabs of granite. He inched forward, stepping on the flat granite and reaching up to remove the slivers of rock.

A deafening explosion erupted. Taco Bender’s torn and mangled body landed a good thirty feet from the blast. He was dead well before his body came to rest amid a pile of dead brush and crumbling rock.

Chewey screamed then jumped up and raced towards Taco Benders broken corpse. He was three steps away from the body when a silent round hit him in the chest. Seconds later, the noise from the sniper’s weapon reverberated down the draw. Chewey lay beside Taco Bender’s body, his chest heaving up and down, crimson pools of blood pumping out and spreading over his shirt and equipment. He and Taco Bender had retired near each other in a small out of the way village.

The sniper was too far away for the others to determine his location. Weps scanned in the direction from which the round came, using his high power sniper scope in an attempt to locate the enemy. There were far too many places the sniper could be hidden.

Monday realized two things immediately. First, that one of his men would die before his eyes if he did not help him immediately, and secondly, the only way to draw the sniper out was to give him a target of opportunity.

He signaled his intentions to Weps and Chester then spotted a pile of rocks near Chewey that would provide some small amount of cover. Monday counted down from three with his fingers, then rushed out into the open. The team fired their weapons in three round bursts while Weps scanned the area for signs of the sniper. Monday made it to Chewey, grabbed him by the boots, and quickly pulled his huge body behind the small pile of rocks. The sniper was too smart to fall for the ploy. He knew that any one of Monday’s team could be seeking his slightest move while the others fired diversionary rounds. He waited patiently.



The sudden explosion startled Dorbec and his men. They were not in a position to see down the parallel draw at the source of the explosion, but they immediately spotted the second sniper as he readjusted his position. Dorbec signaled for Lars to take the sniper on the left and for Claude to take the one on the right, slightly higher up. Like Monday, he counted down from three with his fingers and jumped out into the open.

Just as he expected, the two snipers were surprised by movement on their flank and attempted to adjust their weapons aim accordingly. They were too slow. Two shots, two dead snipers.



“Snipers have been hit!” Weps watched the body of a man fall from his position on a cliff top and the another slide down into a narrow cleft. He spotted their movement the same time that Lars and Claude had. “We have an unknown assist.”

Without waiting to see if there was another sniper, Monday jumped to his knees and quickly removed Chewey’s equipment harness. He then used his combat knife to cut open his blood soaked shirt. The wound was no longer pumping blood. He could tell from the location that it had pierced Chewey’s heart. He glanced up and saw a smile on Chewey’s rapidly cooling face.

“Son of a Goddamn bitch!” Monday screamed, jumping up and throwing his weapons harness to the ground. He was oblivious to his surroundings. He, Chester and Chewey had been together in the Group from the time they first entered the Basic Qualification Course. Monday loved Chewey’s wife Alicia like a sister, and his kids were like his own. “Damn! Damn! Damn!” he screamed, stomping around in a circle. “It’s all my goddamn fault!”

“White flag coming in,” Weps yelled. “Must be the ones who got the snipers.”

Monday halted his tirade to see three men slowly walking down the draw. His mind was still reeling from the loss of two of his team members. To his shock, he saw that one of the men was Colonel Dorbec. Without even thinking, Monday chewed up the ground between them and tore into him with a savage fury. Bones started to intervene but Chester waved him off realizing this was what both men needed.

They fought like animals for what seemed like hours. Each man took turns getting the upper hand. One moment Dorbec was straddling Monday and lashing out with his beefy fists, the next Monday was on top of Dorbec gouging his fingers into his eyes. They kept going until their faces were bloody and knuckles raw and torn. Finally, neither man could even swing a punch or even crawl to their knees. They collapsed into each other’s arms.