Desperate Rendition - Chapter 5

The spot the gang leader pointed out was, in fact, on the far edge of town. When Taylor found it, he could see why they’d want a place like this. Still in the city, giving them access to travel quickly, but backed away near open land, giving good sightlines. It was also a large, walled house, which gave it an additional layer of security.

Not perfectly secure, of course. For one, the house made up part of the wall, so there were doors to the outside. For another, it was still part of the city, even if the outskirts, so there were other buildings near it, allowing someone to get close to the building without being seen.

It took some time, but Taylor did find a taller building whose roof he could climb to get a look down into the compound, which is really what it was. He waited and watched for almost an hour, until late into the afternoon, trying to get a feeling for what he was up against, and it quickly became evident that he had a problem.

While there could be people inside, it seemed like there might be less than half a dozen people in the entire compound, and only two vehicles. He’d seen more than that at the market, driving to the construction site, and even just in front of the hotel they’d previously been staying at. The most likely explanation was also the one that they were out on Bonnie’s trail.

Which is exactly what Taylor hoped wasn’t happening.

Taylor was less worried about them getting Bonnie than he was their pushing her to leave town or give up and go underground. Seeing them operate twice now, they weren’t terrible. They had good unit cohesion and operated as a team, they just overpowered everything, which sounds good on paper, but it made them sloppy as hell. Against third world armies, it would work, but someone like Bonnie, it gave her too much room to move.

They could still get lucky. Taylor had learned a long time ago that being good didn’t stop the bullet you didn’t see, and if you stayed downrange long enough, eventually your luck would run out.

All of which meant he had to find out where they were, and the answer was inside the compound he was watching, since it was clear no one was leaving from there any time soon.

There were some obvious entry points. Over the wall into what looked like the driveway and courtyard was the most obvious, but the house looked right at it with big windows. It was just too exposed. And he needed to avoid getting into a gunfight. There’d been enough brushes with the locals already. He’d been lucky, but there was no guarantee that luck would hold.

The back door was the next most obvious. There were cameras facing it, which were a problem, but it was also right near other buildings and an alley, which would allow him to get close to it.

Anything else, he’d been in the plain sight of the open street.

He wished he’d had someone with him who knew more about these kinds of entries. A SEAL or maybe Delta. SF was focused on small unit tactics and interfacing with locals, which didn’t usually include a lot of breaking into locked compounds. And the FBI actively frowned on that sort of thing.

Taylor made his way down to the street and cut across to one of the side alleys that led toward the compound. He stopped just at the edge of the alley, peeking around the corner to get a better look.

He took it back. They had not been the worst he’d seen tactically, but they were still fucking amateurs. He’d been concerned about getting too close and having them pick him up before he got close enough to the building to scope it out, but there were no cameras pointing toward the alley, even though it was the most likely way someone wanting to assault it would approach the building.

More surprisingly, the cameras didn’t cover each other, either. There was one that covered the door, but it didn’t have any other cameras pointing toward it, so someone could get to it without being seen. Which is exactly what Taylor planned on doing.

Taylor looked around the alley. There was something he used to do when he was a kid, to trick other kids into thinking birds pooped on them. The alley was full of debris, and it didn’t take long to find what he needed. Some dirt, some small gravel, a scoop of water, and a little chunk of drywall that he smashed into as fine of a powder as he could, which he then mixed up in a discarded paper cup.

The result looked reasonably like bird poop. Checking one last time, to make sure no one was really paying attention, he dashed across the street, staying out of the range of the camera and coming up behind it. With a quick glance around, he scaled the wall, gripping a sconce for support. Reaching around the camera, he smeared the mixture over the lens, obscuring its view in a way he hoped they’d write off as just a bird pooping on it.

Assuming no one was looking at the feed when his hand passed over it.

Dropping back down, Taylor quickly picked the lock, which was rickety and didn’t look to have a security system attached to it, and slipped through the door. There was no sign of alarms and he didn’t hear people running, so it seemed he was safe.

Considering how these guys had done everything else and this was a fallback position, he’d been fairly certain they wouldn’t be prepared for something like this. Especially since they weren’t protecting themselves so much as hiding from the local authorities for all the mayhem they’d caused.

Taylor moved carefully through the hallway, gun in hand, listening hard. This was a huge risk, and he knew it. If they saw him and it turned into a shootout, he’d be in a place he had not studied the layout on, outnumbered, and almost certainly outgunned.

Not an ideal situation.

The place was a dump. Crumbling walls, trash everywhere, and just overall neglect. Any sergeant Taylor ever served under would have had his ass if he’d let his barracks get in a condition like this. Taylor had worked out of incredibly poor villages, living with families in mud brick huts that had been better maintained.

Getting near a bend in the hallway, he heard voices coming his way. There wasn’t much to hide behind. Taylor backtracked the way he came until he found a small bathroom that he dipped inside of, shutting the door. It was a good thing he had, as the voices continued, passing him. They were bitching about Caracas in general and this place in particular, and it seemed as if they’d been sent to clean off the cameras, which meant no one had seen him smear the concoction on the lens and had bought his ruse. Good, although that wouldn’t take them long and would put two guys behind him.

He needed to move fast.

Taylor peeked out and, seeing the hallway was clear, moved faster this time in the opposite direction, checking a few rooms here and there. Plan A was to find something that would give him a clue as to where they went. Plan B was to grab someone and beat it out of them, but outnumbered like he was, that was a much riskier plan. If it came to gunfire, he wouldn’t be able to stay here, and it would be hard to drag a guy through the city streets to somewhere else to question him without being stopped.

Taylor’s luck ran out as he got to the third room, opening the door and almost running into one of the mercs face to face. Thankfully, Taylor had at least been aware there were people about. It seemed like this guy hadn’t even considered the possibility that someone might waltz into their headquarters and just stood there making an impersonation of a fish.

Taylor had his gun out, but shooting was the worst thing he could do right now and needed to be avoided unless absolutely necessary, which meant immobilizing him quickly. Taylor was moving the second his brain registered the merc, which was slower than he would have liked but fast enough to beat the guy to the draw.

Taylor wound back and smashed his forehead into the guy’s face, stunning him. It hurt like hell, but it required almost no build-up at all. There was no telling how good his opponent was, and had he tried to pistol whip him, the guy might have managed to block it and force Taylor into a grappling situation.

Which Taylor definitely didn’t want to be in.

Even as he smashed his forehead into the guy’s face, sending him stumbling back and stunning him, Taylor was rapidly assessing the situation and saw almost instantly what he needed to do. As with most PMC guys, this guy was over-kitted, wearing a harness full of gear he wouldn’t need in the field, let alone just on base. The room did look like it was being used as some kind of armory, so maybe he was planning on heading out, but it was still too much crap.

One of the things he had was a cross-chest knife in an unclipped easy-draw sheath. These guys acted like they needed instant access to all of their weapons at every moment, but there was a reason sidearms and knives were snapped down. It made it harder for someone within arm’s length to grab them and use them against you.

Taylor was about to teach him that lesson, although he wouldn’t live long enough to make use of it.

As the guy took a stumbling step back, Taylor reached onto his vest with his off hand and pulled the blade out of the sheath. It was an off-hand pull, reversed in an awkward grip, so it would have been easy to knock it out of Taylor’s hand, but the headbutt had given Taylor his opportunity.

Taylor didn’t even bother reversing his grip. Tilting the blade up toward the guy’s chin, Taylor stabbed up, sliding the blade into his throat, the well-sharpened edge slicing through skin, muscle, and windpipe with ease before lodging against the spine, stopping its progress.

The guy’s eyes bulged out as he weakly grabbed at Taylor’s hand, more of an automated response than a conscious move. He was already dead. It just took a few seconds for the rapid loss of blood and lack of air to do its work. He locked eyes with Taylor in disbelief as he passed the final seconds of his life before his eyes rolled up in his head and he slumped.

Taylor pulled the knife out and dragged the guy out of the doorway and into a corner.

The room had a rack with a few rifles on it. Not as many as this kind of outfit would normally carry, but with guys in the field, it made sense. What this room didn’t have was any kind of clue. Taylor looked around the room and was about to give up on the room when a burst of static from the dead man’s body.

“Pyotr! Get your ass out here. Vulkov is calling for backup.”

Taylor rolled the man over and found a radio clipped to his belt. He needed to move. Taylor thought about hiding the body, but it was pointless. Besides the fact that there were hardly any people in the compound, so they’d be looking for him, there was a giant pool of blood by the door that he didn’t have time to clear up.

He needed to start moving fast. If they were heading to back up Vulkov, then all he needed to do was follow them.

Of course, he had to get out of this place first.

Taylor was still in the armory, about to leave when two men came walking past, not running but going at a quick pace.

“Where the hell is Petrov?” one asked.

“Probably taking a dump again. Let’s go.”

Taylor waited until their voices faded before sticking his head out. All clear. He moved quickly, the way he came. There was a chance, when they found Petrov’s body, they would call everything off and look for him, but that was a risk he was going to have to take. Carrying it out into the streets of Caracas wasn’t exactly an option and if he hid the body, they’d still see the blood and have to go searching for him.

Taylor made it out of the door without running into any more of the men. He did notice his bird poop concoction was gone from the camera, which had a clear shot of his face. Between this and the market, they knew there was another player, which could make his job harder down the line.

Not that keeping his involvement secret from them was ever going to be possible, or part of the plan.

Taylor had just made it across the street when he saw a black SUV tearing out of the compound, heading past him east into town. Taylor sprinted to the borrowed jeep, hopped in, and took off after them, hoping like hell they were headed for Bonnie.