A Dirty Discovery
- 2 years ago
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RegretsChapter 6 free porn video
The takedown of the entire Falcon Shipping terrorist organization had gone well. Better than well ... it went bloody brilliantly with not a single lost hidden cargo sent to the bottom the sea or ocean!
The Dutch Unit Interventie Mariniers (Unit Intervention Marines, or UIM), probably took top prize, if anyone was keeping score ... and trust me, the international spec-ops community is fairly small and everyone is always keeping score. The Haytham-Azraq (or the Blue Falcon) was quietly taken at her dock just as she arrived, so that the incoming cargo of bomb making materials, and trained Hadji how knew how to make them, and also complete with delivery instructions to several local mosques, was seized before any alarm went out. Pleased with their success, they disguised themselves as the crew and hung around for the better part of the next week, as various criminal accomplices arrived offered this month's catch of stolen military material, and close to one hundred young women, kidnapped off of the streets in Europe.
The large packets of cash and gold from their European criminal enterprises, intended to fund the terrorists, was a very nice catch too. The other teams did nearly as well, including our own CIA SSB team that hit the docks of Annaba, Algeria and put the home corporate office of Falcon Shipping right out of business before their local political protection had a clue what was going on. My bosses, bosses boss got a Presidential Medal and the 'atta-boys' did flow downhill far enough to reach me.
Within about 72 hours, Falcon Shipping pretty much to the best of our records, ceased to exist. The intel we had all gathered gave us a pretty comprehensive listing of their top bad boys, and where to find them. The anti-terror units would remain busy for the next month or two. Their terrorist training camps would get cluster-bombed and the big jihadist organizers would soon find themselves off on a one-way trip to Gitmo ... or worse. Not bad for a week of vacation!
Before shuffling back home, I met Ed for drinks the last night I was to be in-town. I owed my mate and now one of my very best pals that and a lot more. I had a proposition in mind for him, but I needed to make sure.
"Ed, tell me the truth. How bad did this whole business fuck you over? We both thought I was just hunting down an old bird and maybe poking a bit into a few slightly dimly lit corners. Instead we screwed up royal, and blew open perhaps the largest single modern white slavery ring in England, and the entire financing operation behind a large and very crazy organization of jihadists. If this were a Bond film we'd now be drinking expensive champagne in a flash casino somewhere, but since we're both mid-level flunkies, our bosses are going to reap all of the glory for this whole operation – what should have been the crowning achievement of our careers."
"Aye, Mate." He murmured as we nursed our pints in a very quiet corner of the pub. "I think I'm getting a wee bit of a promotion, and a touch more salary, but no corner office for me. I'm 'too valuable' they say now for a corner office, so it's back to the field for me. Tying up Ollie's pickups and deliveries, and what local mosques or Muslim Youth Groups the bombs and guns might have been sent to. No raids though, too politically sensitive. Probably won't get to make a single arrest even, not of anyone who matters. Can't frighten the do-gooders at the Home Office by taking explosives away from local Hadji who might want to use the stuff on us, and probably soon. Peace and love between all of the children of the book, as they would say. They were already horrified beyond words that we raided the boat! If this operation had gone through channels they would have dithered until long after the boat had sailed and locked us both away for extreme terminal political incorrectness!"
"Ouch. We'll maybe you can clear the bottom level street gangs that had been snatching the girls. Lots of leads there and if you can knock out enough links of that chain, the other radical groups will have to fund their jihad in other ways."
"Aye. Some of that will do, I suppose. I think though that I'll just keep my head down and count the months to my retirement. I've really got two years to go, but with ministry cutbacks they're handing out early pensions to anyone that asks. I think I'll be a good lad and stay away from Hadji until after next spring and then put in my papers. I can't say I'd miss the job."
"How's the pension? Enough to travel down to Texas on occasion and visit."
"It's not generous, but I've put a bit aside and I can scrimp on what'll come. Are you serious about the ranch in Texas?"
"Very. I told one of my oldest school friends to find for me the most remote and time-forgotten chunks of real estate he could, and he told me last night on the phone that he's closing on a two hundred acre ranch near a sleepy little southern Texas town called Lovett. Slow, quiet and down-right lethargic, he says ... nearly forgotten by time and anyone who could possibly give a shit. Sounds good to me! Since my cover is blown and my photo is now in every Hadji picture reference book, the Company wants to give me an early retirement package with the option to continue doing my analyst job remotely via a secure Internet sat connection. All of the fun and none of the drawbacks! I'd be retired from field work and far enough away from the puzzle palace that the upstairs politics won't piss me off nearly as much. It beats being in witness protection, I guess."
Ed agreed. The way his shoulders hunched told me clearly that his own retirement didn't seem nearly as rosy as mine. Much as I had figured. Now I could spring one last final surprise before I skipped town. Secrets aren't really any fun unless you can eventually share them ... or one of them anyway.
There was still absolutely nothing special about the Haytham-Afra, now renamed the Tiger Lily. For the moment she was flagless, her seizure now pending in Admiralty Court. She could never be resold and if some spook agency didn't want her then she'd get sunk somewhere to keep her cleverly hidden smuggling bays out of the hands of some new enterprising captain.
The ship had been re-docked, correctly this time, and only one lone Scotland Yard constable was on duty at the gangplank. We showed our badges and sniffed our noses as if we were quite upper-management and too posh for this sort of low rent sightseeing. The rather bored constable didn't look at us twice and soon we had the entire run of the ship to ourselves.
Ed wasn't too terribly surprised. "You smirking bastard! You just couldn't go whoring it about and you kept something private, just for us to look at!" He looked and sounded ticked, but he actually laughed and began to smirk along with me.
"Alright," he added, "just what didn't you want our betters to find, or put their eyemarks or fingers all over?"
Sure, I had found two major smuggling holds on that near identical ship in the Red Sea, but I was sure that the mate had been holding something back for us. With a little private interrogation, I learned his secret, that the captain also had a small private place to keep his own personal swag. That particular Egyptian captain hadn't accumulated much ... but this particular Algerian captain seemed to be a bigwig and records indicated that he'd been making this run, or similar voyages elsewhere for at least a decade. I was sure that his private little stash was going to be worth a look.
Tapping my fingers against a bulkhead near the front of the ship, in the wet stinky anchorwell, I posed my pal Ed a very hypothetical question.
"Assuming for laughs, that you could retire next year under slightly more favorable financial circumstances, what would you do with your life?" I asked.
"Bollocks! Assuming that an old mate in the colonies didn't bore me to tears during my visits with stories about his very weird sex life, I'd be courting a certain widowed aunt of PC Emilie Johnson, named Goldie. Emilie was rather grateful that we'd rescued her and she's been trying to fix the two of us up together ever since. We both sort of hit it off, but neither of us ever has much more than a tenner in our pockets at any given time. Her widow's pension plus my meager one might do us alright in the end, but I'd wish to do better for her!"
"Well, just hold that thought! I'm not even fifty percent sure that what's in here is worth the drama, or even half of the hassle of getting to, but it is the last unexplored bit of this ship, and my fingers are prickling a bit with some anticipation."
To open this small panel required two separate mechanisms, first pressing one fake rivet in and then pushing and sliding the hidden door panel. It opened easily, a good sign that it had been used fairly frequently. Inside was a small cramped room that I could barely stand up inside, especially since it seemed full to about waist high with various sacks and crates. Plundered loot, or as they say on this side of the pond, lovely swag!
The real surprise was when I showed Ed that there was yet one more set of moveable panels, which opened a square access escape route into the river, just a few feet below us. A desperate man seeking escape at all costs could hide here, squeeze out the hidden porthole and inflate a rubber raft just outside the ship, fleeing in darkness with ones life ... and a few handy bars of gold.
Our late and unlamented ship's captain liked gold. Oh there were a few bags of American and British banknotes but most of the real wealth was in gold. At over $1500 an ounce at the time, just a few pounds of gold were enough to make a very comfortable escape back home. While there was other odd stuff, a bit of art, some coin silver and some nice looking old sterling dishes and tableware, but the gold alone, in one, five and ten pound bars, and quite a few mint sacks of Sovereigns, was enough to set up a man for life. I guess our captain had very definite ideas about the level of comfort he wanted for his retirement.
We didn't even try to count the stuff. Ed ran a few numbers up in his head and then winced. 'A lot!" Was his final calculation more or less, and I didn't disagree. If I'd been in the captain's shoes, I'd have quit a few years back. It doesn't pay to trust to ones luck for too long. Luck can be a very fickle goddess indeed!
I grabbed a double handful of gold sovereigns, just on principle for the souvenir and petty cash value and smiled at Ed evilly as I stuffed them into my pockets.
"Look Mate ... you've got two choices and I'm not going to be around to influence you either way. You can either make a 'surprise discovery', get another pat on the back and a hearty handshake from some Sir or Lord who would rather cut off his own hand rather than invite your for tea at his private club. Her Majesty's Government will undoubtedly claim the goodies. I don't Good Beth will ever hear a word about it, or get to roll naked in the loot on her royal bed, and your bosses will all get nice new wood paneling and carpeting in next years budget. Probably if it went into the Thames now, it would serve a more useful purpose."
"And the other choice would be the more obvious one, I take care it?" He laughed.
"Much too obvious for me to discuss even a moment further ... wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Especially if you could manage to find a nice sturdy riverboat and a trusting lad or two help you lift some of the heavier crates into the boat. Might take you a few nocturnal visits over a week or two, but you seem to be an unusually clever and enterprising gent! Look! I'm off on a plane tomorrow and I don't think more than a handful of anything is going to fit onto my carry-on bag! What happens from now on is on your watch!"
We winked at each other and laughed. Ed grabbed a handful of sovereigns for the road as well, and we locked up everything tight and secure. If they ever scuttled that ship, a fortune was going to go down with her!
We made the tour of Ed's five or six favorite pubs and I was none too steady by the time I was dropped off back at the Embassy. We'd tossed down more than a few pints, and quite a few whisky chasers. Needless to say there was no further discussion about PC Johnson's Aunt Goldie and her lovely endless shining golden tresses!
I flew out the next morning early, business class and looking every bit the normal traveling middle-management businessman. Annie, Leslie and Holly were back in tourist and not quite getting all of the free booze that one could toss down and remain civil while at 35,000 feet over the Atlantic. It was safer for them back there, playing tourist, and they understood the game ... except for Holly, who paid me a great many visits up front to keep an eye on me.
My head still hurt and would doing so for another month or two, and last night's drinking did make the pain temporally go away ... until I was again mostly sober, when it tried to make up for lost time. As for my leg and shoulder, they were both fine. I hurt myself worse once while falling out of a HumVee in Afghanistan.
A quick look once back towards Annie and Leslie showed the two ladies to be whispering with their heads together as thick as thieves. Holly hinted that they were discussing 'what to do about me', as if some sort of horse-trading or arrangement was being made. Holly refused to be pumped for important operational intel and she stuck her tongue out at me and skipped all of the way back to Tourist section.
Whatever the women had in mind, I wasn't going to find out anytime soon. I had a Company car complete with a pair of handlers waiting for me the moment I stepped off the plane and I spent the next entire week making reports and giving briefings that went the entire way up to the top of the spook food chain.
The main problem with my cover story of intuiting a link between London east end criminal gangs and our international War on Terror ™ was that there really wasn't a shred of physical evidence that should have led me on this wild vacation crusade. Fortunately, I had somewhat of a reputation for being a genius even before all of this, and now I had more than lived up to it. I just sniffed a lot at the questions they asked me and muttered BS like "Well, it was clearly obvious to me..."
Since I had been unfortunately out'ed, the idea of me taking very early retirement and 'consulting' from my new ranch in Texas appealed to everyone. Even with my six years of military service (which also counts for government civil service time) I still didn't even have twenty years completed, but the proposed month pension check didn't seem to reflect this – it wasn't much less than my previous monthly paycheck. The proposed consulting salary sounded like more than even my boss had made, and the sour look on his face alone was enough to make me nod my head in agreement.
I didn't even waste the time to blink, and just signed all of the paperwork quickly, before they could change their minds. My small staff was already madly photocopying every physical file they thought I'd ever need, and boxing up my small office for secure shipment to Texas.
I'd requested a month of two of peace and quiet to get established and settled in my new home, but already I could tell that they had projects for me already lined up. Consulting looked like it was going to be way more profitable than being a cubicle minion for another fourteen years until normal retirement!
As for the ladies, a semi-legitimate tourist service loosely affiliated with the Company picked them up from the airport and kept them busy for the next week seeing the sights. I think they all spent a full day being debriefed in Langley as well, just to see if our boys could mine yet one tinier nugget of info that our Brit counterparts had missed. In any case, this made everyone feel important. Their new American identities still needed a little bit of extra touch-up, creating false credit histories, employment records and even a prior school transcript record for Holly that could withstand close scrutiny.
I looked everything over myself twice before we left Langley; it was a very good, and even much better than usual cover identity job. No missing puzzle pieces – these new identities could survive even FBI or Secret Service investigations and with our new life in sleepy rural Texas, it would take a miracle for Hadji to ever get a whiff of our new lives. They'd try though ... they're vengeful bastards and my face is now a known link to the Falcon raids. Let them try!
At first glance, the quiet South Texas town of Lovett seemed exactly made to order! Except for a large computer gaming corporation just east of the Town Centre, nothing within ten miles looked like it had changed a bit in decades. The pace of living here was slow, almost glacial, except for a couple of miles of nude beach along the coast that partied daily like it was still 1999. The townsfolk's were an odd lot, alternately reserved but yet sociable, and strangers stuck out nearly immediately like a sore thumb ... exactly the trait we needed for our new refuge. I started to figure out quickly that nothing in Lovett is exactly as it appears to be, and initial concern quickly gave way instead to amusement. There is nothing a spy loves more than secrets ... and this town seemed to have them in spades!
Fay
- 28.04.2022
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