Glenn Beck - The Eye of Moloch

She didn’t mind being underestimated by strangers at first, not at all. In about an hour, in fact, a number of innocent lives—plus her own—would depend upon it.

The nearby sentry was facing her as she approached. The dusk was fully descended by then and with maybe ten feet still between them he held out a flat hand and addressed her by the book, the blue-white glare from his flashlight in her face.

“Halt!” he shouted. “Identify yourself, and let me see your hands!”

In only these few words he’d told her more than he probably imagined. English was not this soldier’s native tongue; his accent indicated a gutter strain of Spanish, Español Mexicano, with the faint but distinctive peculiarities heard in those proud to have been born and raised in the rougher parts of the Distrito Federal.

“Virginia Ward,” she said. “I’m expected. I’m here to see—”

“Advance to be recognized.”

With her patience fading fast she took a moment to bring out her ID and then came forward, the small black leather folder held open at eye level for his review. The large man briefly flicked his bright beam down to the turf in front of him, indicating without further courtesy where she should stop and await his full inspection.

In the spillover light Virginia had spied some details of his uniform. Where a badge or an indication of rank should be, there was only a nameplate and a sewn-on yellow crest. This chintzy embroidery identified him as an employee of Talion, a mercenary services company she’d been seeing more and more of in her deployments.

This wasn’t a military man, not a law enforcement officer, maybe not even a U.S. citizen. He was nothing more than a dressed-up, spit-shined, testosterone-swollen gun for hire.

“Ma’am,” he said sternly as she continued to approach, “put down your bag for me, extend your arms out to either side—”

The guy stopped talking then, and snapped to stiff attention. Evidently he’d finally caught sight of the three bold letters on the face of her ID folder, the ones that translated to shut up and stand down in every allied covert-ops phrase book around the world.

Virginia didn’t bother to pause as she walked past the man, though she did make a mental note of the look in his eyes. He’d just seen a ghost, so it seemed, and that was as close an approach to the truth as someone like him should ever be allowed.

• • •

First things first: she began by sending a lieutenant outside so he could direct his men in firing up the electricity. She dismissed another soldier with orders to manage the clueless mercs and, more important, to receive the skilled reinforcements who would be arriving close behind her. Not that these new ground troops and heavy weapons would be of any help to her own solo mission, but if she should fail, this place might rapidly find itself on the southern front of a new war zone and they’d need to be ready for anything.

With those priorities addressed, by the light of battery-powered lanterns she began the mission briefing with the other senior officers in attendance.

What they already knew was this: A week earlier a truckload of heavy automatic rifles and cop-killer ammo had been prepared for passage out of the United States across the Arizona–Mexico border. This shipment was a small part of an ongoing and idiotic ATF gun-walking operation that for whatever reason was designed to put weapons into the hands of criminal gangs. Meanwhile, a completely separate Drug Enforcement Administration sting was in the process of spiriting five tons of primo Purple Haze and nearly a hundred kilos of nearly pure cocaine toward a distribution center in the same general area. Finally, the FBI (in cooperation with the Joint Terrorism Task Force and an armed subdivision of the Internal Revenue Service) had initiated a crafty setup that involved the delivery of several million dollars in unmarked cash to the nearby hub of a Sinaloa money-laundering enterprise.

All the while none of these agencies had been apprised of the converging actions of the others—but through its network of moles, informants, and double agents, the Los Zetas cartel was totally on top of all three.

As it turned out, a key target of these operations—a fearsome man known in his circles as the Executioner—was running a little sting of his own from his stronghold in Mexico. His planning was impeccable, his intel was frightfully detailed, and his men—an elite band of MS-13 foot soldiers and Sureños defectors, led by an underboss of the Texas Syndicate—proved to be far more organized and prepared than the U.S. attorney general and all the king’s horses at the Justice Department.

The outcome had been a devastating surprise attack. When it was over, three federal agents were dead, six more were missing, and two Border Patrol officers had also lost their lives as the Los Zetas gangsters simultaneously hijacked the southbound trifecta of drugs, money, and guns.

After lying low for a few days at a stateside hole-in-the-wall they’d switched vehicles, consolidated their swag, and then set off toward the safety of their home base in Nuevo Laredo.

Barely sixty miles into the trip their single overloaded truck full of stolen treasures had broken down with a flat tire on the southern acres of some land owned by an Arizona rancher named Harland Dell. As the hoods were changing their tire Mr. Dell got the drop on them, apparently thinking they were just another pack of everyday smugglers or coyotes. He held the trespassers at gunpoint and called in the authorities.

The resulting bust didn’t sit well at all with the Mexican kingpin, and it was more than just the loss of this unusually valuable shipment that enraged him. The precedent this might set for other brave U.S. citizens couldn’t be allowed to stand, and so the head man announced a vendetta: an example was to be made of this American.

In a sudden move of unprecedented brass the Los Zetas outlaws surged across the border in force and commandeered the Dell property. They were now holding the family hostage, and the ransom they demanded was the release of their men and the return of their truck with all the spoils it contained. That’s where the situation stood at the present moment.

Virginia checked her watch and addressed the post’s young commander. “Do you know how many of them we’re up against?”

“About a dozen that we could see, and probably more by now. We commissioned a flyover yesterday by a Cessna 206 from the Highway Patrol. They got a fairly good view before they started taking small-arms fire and had to back off. Then this morning we got as close as we could and put up a blimp with a camera system, and the Kestrel got some even more detailed images before the bastards shot it down.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“They shot it down with a SAM, probably a Stinger.”

“They shot down a recon blimp with a guided missile.”

“A U.S.-made guided missile. Overkill, I know. I guess they really didn’t want to get their pictures taken.” He slid across a small stack of photographs. “Have a look at what we got while the bird was up.”

Though the photos were chilling they didn’t tell her much she hadn’t already suspected. The place was obviously fully occupied and well guarded. Corpses were strewn all about, probably left where they’d fallen after what must have been a short and futile defense of the property against a merciless, overwhelming invasion.

“You’ve cut the power and the landlines to the place.”

“Right.”

“Has anyone spoken to them?”

“We’ve harvested some cell numbers that they’re using”—he passed her a sheet with the information—“but listen, these guys aren’t negotiating. The last they told us was, midnight tonight they start kicking more bodies out the front door.”