Strong winds and clouds on the way out, but nothing we can't handle. Perfect weather when we get in, and a lovely afternoon on the course. I hit my personal best score, perhaps a sign that I should blow up stuff more often.
Once it's dark, I slip out of the hotel, hide my clothes up the coast, and make a naked run to North Korea, where everything is as it was when I left it. I don't know why I came, there was no chance it was rebuilt in 48 hours, but I needed to see it all again.
We have a mechanical delay on the ground requiring a part to be flown in from Honolulu, and we make it back to LA just after midnight on Sunday. I go home, crawl into bed, and sleep. No Fog Dude, no problem.
Mom, dad, Perez, Carolyn (my sister) and I are out to dinner Sunday evening, celebrating Carolyn's 22nd birthday, and her impending graduation. She's applied to a half dozen medical schools, all of which gave her admission and money, she just has to make a choice.
We're at the local sports bar, when part way through the Clippers game there's a news break, four US servicemen have been kidnaped in Afghanistan, and are going to be executed, one by one, unless the US withdraws from a province north of Kabul. Obviously, we are not going, but I am.
Perez looks me in the eye, I nod, and we both know it's game on.
It seems like forever before mom and dad grab a slightly tipsy Carolyn and head home. I grab a fired up Perez, and we figure out where I need to go. Not where the bad guys are, but where the guys who should know where the bad guys are are. Are? You know, the head Army guys.
We go together to my house, drop off Starbuck, and go in the Mustang out to Upland. Perez has my ereader, she's too anxious to go home, so she'll just wait for me.
Her last words are what I now want on my tombstone in a couple years, "Don't do anything stupid."
I fly at normal airplane speed out into the desert, not wanting to give the local Army any way to trace me back to the hiding place, then I hit the afterburners, and climb for all I'm worth. The light knows, I just sit back and let it steer, and before too long I am where I need to be.
The building looks just like its picture on the web, which I suppose it should, and the town looks just like its picture, which also shouldn't surprise me. I am naked, which doesn't surprise me, but certainly might bother some others.
There's a market nearby, and I land next to a stand with homemade blankets and other items. As is now my tradition, I convince the shopkeeper (kiosk keeper? cart keeper?) to let me borrow a blanket with the promise I'll return it.
There are two Marines with rifles standing outside the door to the headquarters building, lots of concrete obstructions and a tank a little further out. They are taken somewhat by surprise when I land, which is as I intended.
"Take me to the boss." I try to sound commanding, and almost said, "to your leader," but instead of being funny, it would probably start more alien theories.
They do as I ask. He's a real general, not a fake one. He's got four stars, not one. He sends someone off to get me real Army clothes. He knows why I'm here without me telling him. It's way more impressive than my fake general back home.
"We don't know where they are."
"But you know something? You can get me close?"
"We think so. No guarantees."
"That's my life. But I have to take a shot at it."
The clothes are here, and I get dressed in them, except for the boots. The general looks at me funny.
"Don't ask. I won't tell." He laughs. I explain that we need to get the blanket back to the market. He laughs again.
Someone else arrives with a map, a couple circles and a few X's on it. It goes on a big wooden table in the middle of the room. It's a big room with lots of tables, chairs and computers. This is the biggest table, and almost the only one without any technology on it.
"We are here." The general points, I understand. "They are probably in this circle," he names a town and points, "but they might be in this one," another name. "The X's mark our forward bases where you can get help, or hopefully, return our men. Questions?"
"Ordinary people in the circles. Friends, not so friendlies, bad guys?"
"All of the above. Mostly normal people trying to take care of their families, but a few folks who really don't like us. The normal people usually will stay away to avoid the bad guys' radar."
"Understood. Any other advice?"
"Yeah. Don't knock anything down until you are sure of what it is."
"Thanks. I'll try not to."
They hand me a camo colored GPS to complement the map, show me how to read it, and ask if I want anything else.
"The roof." The general escorts me to the stairwell, up two flights, and out into the bright sunlight.
"I'll be back." I manage to do that without any Austrian accent, and salute some molecules as I push off to the northwest.
The two circles are about 50 square miles, but mostly not capable of supporting life. There are a couple small villages, and places in the mountains where someone could hide. Nothing I can do but fly around like a fool, looking for hints.
I get one in the form of a .50 caliber round fired at me. It's two dudes, big gun, really stupid. I am on top of them while they are aiming the second shot. One of them yells something at me that makes me believe he speaks English. I knock his friend over the head, leave him sprawled in the dust, and lift the English speaker into the air, legs first.
"Where are the American hostages?" I don't know any simpler way to say it. He does not reply. I drop him a hundred feet, catch him and take him back up even higher.
"Where are the American hostages?" He says nothing. I don't know if this is actually torture, but it might be. Doesn't stop me. I drop him again, waiting to catch him this time at about 20 feet above ground level. Then we're back in the air, 500 feet higher even than last time.
"Where are the American hostages?" He cracks, says the name of a town in the second circle on my map. I ask him to be more specific, and he tells me about a house on the northern outskirts of a town. I drop him just a little, tell him I will be back for him and his family if he's lying, and put him down next to his unconscious friend.
I'm five minutes from the house, and I'm willing to take a risk. It's a stone structure, wooden shutters instead of windows, thatched roof, door made from one by 12 slats of wood, a couple goats outside, along with a Toyota pickup truck. I don't slow down, just rip through the wooden door.
Four men in local garb, two with guns, one with a big sword covered in blood, one with a camera. Three men in uniform on their knees, hands tied behind their back. The fourth a headless corpse, blood still flowing out, the head on the floor.
The four men are out cold on that floor before they can react. I know I broke some bones of the guy with the sword, crushed his hand, also his jaw. Don't think I killed him. Take a quick trip for the weapons, bending the sword into six inch folds, mangling the guns.
The three remaining men are standing now, trying to untie themselves, and I help them with that. Wanting to throw up, I also help them gather up their buddy's remains, and get the four of them into the truck.
It's a house. I know what to do with it. I implode the stone walls, and make a pile of rock surrounding the four evil men. My three are debating the merits of killing their captors. I put an end to the debate by lifting the truck above my head, and then into the air.
I'm about 5,000 feet up when I level off, not sure how high I have to be to avoid the anti- aircraft fire from below, but betting that the sight of a flying truck will bother them enough not to shoot. Half way back, two F-15's come to check us out, waggle their wings, and fly formation. Might make a funny commercial for the truck maker, except for the dead guy in the back.
The pilots seem to want me to follow them to somewhere, but I'm not going. I take the truck to the building where this all started, landing outside the front door, but inside the security perimeter. At least 20 people are there instantly, dealing with both the living and the dead.
The general came down too, and I surprise him by asking for my blanket. He tells me they've already given it back to the street vendor. I nod my thanks, and turn to leave.
"Thank you," it sounds official coming from a general.
I turn back to him. "I think I'm supposed to say something noble here, but you're welcome is all I've got. I'm sorry I lost one." I crush the molecules and start to head home, then correct myself and come back. The light is puzzled and then pleased when it figures out my intentions.
We sweep up and down every road we can find looking for hidden explosives and detonating them. At least a dozen go up. We find a couple big caches of weapons, and one building that might have been a bomb factory. It's a pile of debris now.
Satisfied, we turn for home, my new Army duds burning away on the down slope, leaving me naked once again. And, once again, I wake up a sleeping Perez in the parking lot.
"I am going to shoot you next time you do that." I laugh, sort of. "Didn't work?"
I tell her. Three for four. No more than five minutes too late.
"Are we going to have to go through the it's not your fault stuff again? If not for you all four would be dead, gruesomely, painfully, terribly dead. Be happy for three moms who get to see their kids again. The fourth will be happy for the other three, and proud of her son."
I don't say anything, except the obvious.
"Let's go home Perez."
Chapter 12
Kiana drops me off at home, and heads off for a nap and clean clothes before she has to spend a day at LAX. I am off until tomorrow. Halloween wants to eat, so I feed her and we watch the news together, waiting from the new SportsCenters to start.
Though there are happy interviews with three moms, and complements from the fourth, just as Perez predicted, the news is mostly about Syria. I was right there, I should have stayed and done something. The light kicks me in the ass. I do, in fact, have 27 hours before I need to be at work, but I remind it that I have a golf date with Taylor.
I pick her up about 9:30, let her know how much I approve of her basically too small golf outfit, and we go play the executive par 3 course, which requires a great deal of hands on attention to form. Then a nice lunch at the club house, where she talks about me and about him, which means me.
She thinks he should have stayed home and not gotten involved in overseas adventures. I disagree. Our first argument is over him. What would she do if she knew? I drop her back home, and there's enough warmth in the kiss to make sure I know the argument isn't serious.
Would she still think that if she knew I was driving out to Colton as soon as we finished? That I got naked behind a restaurant, then risked some serious daytime exposure (me and my salami) to go back to the Middle East?
As I am falling back to Earth at 12,000 miles an hour, it occurs to me that I probably should have done some research before striking out, to make sure I don't strike out. From altitude, I recognize the geography, and try to adjust the landing zone south toward Israel. The light thinks I'm stupid for trying.
Eventually, we end up in a small town, which I think is in Jordan, but I can't be sure. Doesn't matter, because I probably won't be able to return the clothes I steal. There is a bazaar in town, but I am currently standing naked in the shadow of a building a couple blocks away.
I get myself back into the air, circle town, realize that everyone has clothes hanging out to dry, find the most likely looking pair of pants, swoop in, grab them, and fly off. I'm sure no one saw, and the pants sort of fit. Too small really, but intended to be baggy so that they are wearable.
I turn north, steal some molecules, and go looking for whatever. This is the difficulty of not planning ahead. Where do I go? How do I know what to do? I can find the capital, but no one appears to be shooting at anyone else. With only a couple more hours to work, I don't want to go home empty handed.
Then I have a thought. The middle of town is easy to find, and I float there, then start to fly in circles, looking for tanks. Bad guys have tanks out here, good guys don't. That's my theory at least, and I'm sticking with it.
Did you know that the turret on top of a tank isn't actually attached to the tank, it just sits on it? I didn't. Do now. I grabbed the barrel of the gun on the first tank I found, thinking I would use it as a lever to lift the tank, when I'm suddenly holding the barrel and turret, and three guys are staring at me from their 50,000 pound steel camo convertible.
They yell, they shoot their handguns at me, they throw something. I just ignore them, turn the turret into a lump of junk, and go back to circling. Twenty five tanks and six helicopter gun ships later, I'm bored and heading for home.
I feed Halloween, and we just watch sports, no news, before I leave for the airport and Kona. Taylor gives me crap about him (that is me) being out of control, I try to avoid the restart of yesterday's argument as much as possible.
