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“Okay, Mojo, what next?” Chief Wasner asked. “Is the trooper coming with us? She doesn’t exactly seem to be dressed for it.”

“No, she’s not. She’s not involved in this.”

Lonnie looked at Marcus. “What is going on?”

“You need to go.”

She glanced over to the men at the trucks. They were unloading equipment. Several of the men took assault weapons from duffle bags they had lifted from the backs of the trucks. The men quickly checked the weapons, then strapped them around their bodies.

“No, I’m not leaving!” Lonnie insisted. “These men are armed with assault weapons! What in the hell is going on here, Marcus? Who are these men?”

“Trooper Wyatt, these men are old friends of mine from Spec Ops. I offered my house as a staging ground for an exercise they’re having up on Eielson. That’s all this is.”

Lonnie looked back up at him. “Mr. Johnson, you are one poor liar. You had better let me in on what is going on here. Or…”

“Or what?” Marcus growled. “You’ll arrest more than a dozen men armed with machine guns and take us in for questioning? I have work to do. Trust me. When the time is right, I will tell you what’s going on. For now, just believe me when I say that it’s in your best interest not to know yet. Now unless you have a warrant, you’d better get in your car and go.”

In the light of the headlamps, she could see some of the faces of the men present. They were hard-looking faces. Their eyes bore the cold glare of the professionally violent.

“Is this related to the two men I showed you?” she asked, regaining her professional tone.

“That’s what we are going to find out,” Marcus answered. “I’ll let you know when I get back. In the meantime, just trust me.” He paused and looked straight into her eyes. “I have never let you down.”

The words stung like a hot needle piercing her heart. She was at once furious that he would hurl such barb at her when she could not defend herself, and racked with guilt at the truth of his statement. He had always kept his word to her. It was she who hurt him. She was the guilty one.

Lonnie walked quickly to her patrol car and got in. She had to get out of here before her emotions boiled over and she made a fool of herself in front of all these men.

As Trooper Wyatt drove away, the group of Navy SEALS returned to their preparations.

“Seems like you know her pretty well,” Wasner said.

“Yeah, I used to. We’re old acquaintances,” Marcus replied.

“Yeah, right. Old acquaintances, my big hairy gluteus maximus. You sounded like ex-marrieds to me.”

Marcus’s face was hard and angry. He abruptly turned and walked back toward the cabin, ignoring Wasner’s comment. “I’m going to get my gear. Let’s get moving.”

As he walked away, Beckwith said, “Wow, Chief, sounds like you touched a nerve on that one.”

“Hmmm.” The chief scratched his head. “I never knew old Mojo had been married. Imagine that.”

Ten minutes later, Marcus came out of the house, dressed in over-whites like the other men. He crossed the yard to where his snowmobile was parked beside the house, mounted it, and started its engine. The machine’s high-performance engine fired right away and Marcus slowly turned it around, driving up to where the others stood.

As the last of them loaded their gear, they mounted their snowmobiles and started the engines. The sound produced by the mass of suppressed snowmobiles was an eerily quiet rumble, like a gang of other-worldly beasts, a deep hunger growling in their throats as they crouched in the snow, preparing to leap up and devour their unsuspecting prey.

The band of warriors took off down the trail next to the road. Wasner’s SEALS rode two to a sled. The man in back held his weapon at the ready in the event of danger. They drove with no headlights.

Every man wore the latest 5th generation full-field, color night vision goggles which allowed them a complete field of view in near total darkness. The goggles looked like large wrap-around sunglasses with thick lenses. Rather than rest on the tops of their ears, the night vision glasses were held on by a custom-fitted, over-the-head strap that contained micro-technology to translate the slightest light waves and heat signatures into visible objects. They were equipped with anti-flash technology that registered unexpected bright flashes, such as vehicle headlamps and gunfire, and instantly suppressed the area of the lens where the flash occurred to avoid eye damage. In the light of tonight’s three-quarter moon, the visibility was as good as if it were noon on a sunny day.

They gunned the machines quickly up Johnson Road to the trail Marcus had taken earlier. Without having to stop to check traps, it would take less than an hour to get to the spot where Marcus had earlier taken his lunch. Silently, they stalked through the night in an eerie, snow-covered replay of the Ride of the Valkyrie.

1. Chapter 15
   

Thursday, May 14th, 1998

Airfield Loading Area

Plymouth Naval Base, England

01:00 AM

The men sat quietly around the tarmac, awaiting the final preparations of the C130 crew that would transport them, with the assistance of two in-flight refuelings, to a wide jungle airstrip four miles outside the village. They would be inserted via a touch and go maneuver wherein the aircraft descends to the runway, slows enough for the men to run out the back ramp, then ten seconds later is pulling up again and leaving the area.

This maneuver, while being highly effective, is also quite dangerous. The pilots have to work within the constraint of a minimum runway length of 5000 feet. The airfield the Royal Marines would be using for this operation was exactly that long, according to intelligence records. Just in case, the C-130 they were flying in was equipped with JATO, or Jet Assisted Take Off, propulsion tanks. These fuel-filled canisters reduced the minimum runway length to less than 4000 feet, as long as the Marines disembarked without incident.

The tactic, successfully employed by the American Army Rangers during the invasion of the island of Grenada in 1983, allows for a fast-moving aircraft to drop a large number of troops without parachutes and leave the area before the opposing forces can figure out exactly what is happening.

Operation Brothers Keeper, as it was being called, would insert the Royal Marines of 2nd Troop, Mike Company, 43 Commando, and Gunnery Sergeant Marcus Johnson USMC, in that manner. The Marines would then move on foot three miles to the orphanage. Once there, they would offer to extract the British nationals and any other Europeans in the immediate area, then move everyone willing to go to a field two miles to the west of the village. A squadron of Sea King helicopters would then pick up the entire group. The helicopters were already on the way to Guinea from a Royal Navy fleet based in the South Atlantic.

Once the extraction was complete, all persons would be taken to a safe airfield in Guinea, loaded aboard the waiting and refueled C-130, and returned safely to England. That was the plan as laid out in the briefing room. Plans seldom happen as intended.

While the Marines waited on the airfield tarmac, Marcus took advantage of the downtime to pull out the letter Pops had brought him in the mess hall. He examined the envelope for clues as to where it was from. It was remarkable that the letter had made it to him at all. The whole thing was a smear of ink and forwarding labels that rendered it almost double its original thickness.

Unable to determine from whom it came, he pulled up a corner of the glued-down flap, pushed a finger in, and ripped the top open in a smooth, sliding motion. Inside was a single-page letter written in ink, by hand. It took him several minutes to recognize the script. It was not his mother’s handwriting, full of big looping letters that rolled across the page. This handwriting had a more regular, almost squarish, appearance to it. Marcus glanced over the front of the letter, then turned the page and saw in the bottom corner the name and signature of Lonnie Wyatt.

Marcus,

I know it’s been a long time. I’m sorry in every way you can imagine for the things I have done and not done over the years. I wish I could make up for the mistakes I’ve made and the pain I’ve caused you. I’m writing this letter to let you know that things have changed. I have changed.

I love you.

I always have, but in my own selfish understanding, or lack of understanding, I could not comprehend how you could want to stay in the Marines and claim to still love me. It hurt me so much because I thought you loved your precious Marines, and the violence of that lifestyle, more than me. I couldn’t understand how you could reject me like that. When you wouldn’t leave the Corps, I was so angry and broken that after I returned home, I would yell and scream at my parents or my students, then break into tears for days.

That has changed now—my understanding, that is. I don’t know if you were aware of it, but I am now an Alaska State Trooper, stationed in Palmer for the time being, but soon to be sent out for a bush assignment. I left the school district about two years ago and started this new career in order to help change the world in a more active manner. About the middle of the academy in Sitka, something clicked in my mind and I had a sudden realization of what you must feel for the Marines.

Until I became a trooper, I had never known what it was to make a physical difference in the lives of other people. A few weeks ago, I found myself face to face with a rapist who had hurt several young girls. He tried to escape, but I was able to chase him down on foot, and took him into custody. As I cuffed the beast, it felt as though I had just saved the lives of a dozen girls, maybe more. The feeling was good, very good.

I suddenly realized that this must be the same feeling you get when you defeat the kind of people you have been spending the past twelve years fighting. At that moment, I understood that the reason you couldn’t leave the Corps wasn’t because you didn’t love me—it was because you did love me, and so many other people, and that you wanted to protect us all from the bad things in the world. I think I finally understand, at least a little bit, of what you find in your Marine Corps.

Marcus, I’m writing this letter in hopes that you will know that I still love you. I want you, and am waiting, if you are willing, to come back to you. If you will have me, and the offer is still available, I want to reconsider my answer. Please let me know once you get this letter. I am waiting to hear from you.

Lonnie

April 2, 1998.

Marcus was stunned.

Lonnie.

He hadn’t heard from her in years, and now suddenly she was writing and acting as if almost no time had lapsed. What would he say? What could he say?

He had never stopped loving her. He had heard bits and pieces of her life’s happenings from Linus back in Salt Jacket over the years, but had not spoken to her in nearly five years. And now, she was practically saying she wanted to marry him.

Marcus was shocked at his own feelings. There was no anger, no resentment. When he was honest with himself, he acknowledged that in spite of the years and the hard, violent life he had led up to this day, he had been waiting for this letter the entire time.

He had not touched another woman, had not eaten a meal alone with a woman, had not walked down a street alone with a woman, had not made eyes with, flirted with, or fantasized about another woman since 1984. Even after Lonnie had refused to marry him eight years earlier, he had continued to wait for her alone, fully expecting that someday, just such a letter would come to him.

Now it had happened, and the only feeling that rose to the surface was explosive joy. The plane was nearly ready—there was little time, so he found a piece of paper and a pen and jotted a response to her letter.

Lonnie,

My dearest love,

I have received your letter; it took more than a month to get to me. I am very happy to hear from you. I want to you know that I have never stopped loving you. If you are serious, wait to hear back from me again soon.

Right now I’m with a contingent of British Royal Marines heading to a peacekeeping mission for a short time, and should be back in a week or two. Once I return, I’ll write more—maybe even call if I can.

Sit tight and wait for me. I’ve waited for you to come back all these years, and have kept myself only for you. I’ll write as soon as I return.

With all my LOVE,

Marcus

P.S. – A poem for you

The flowers of late summer

Their petals falling to the ground

Seem to die

Snow and ice bury them

Beneath a chill layer

Covers their colorful beauty

In a hard, cold blanket

Lifeless winter

But those flowers

At the rising of the sun

And spring’s warm caress

Again burst forth

From beneath the ice

And their blossom

Blesses all who see

Their glorious radiance

Draws the eyes of men

And the wonder of the flower

Spells again

The birth of a new summer

Such is the awakening of love

The reawakening of our love

My beloved one, let our flowers blossom

Till I return.

Marcus always carried at least two envelops with him in the event that he needed to write something to his parents or Linus while in the field. He pulled one out, penned his return address at Plymouth on the corner of it, and copied the address Lonnie had included in her letter. He called out to one of the ground crew of the C-130 who was passing by on his way back to the hangers.

“Hey, mate, can I ask you a favor?” Marcus said.

“Sure, Yank, what do you need?”

“Can you mail this for me? It’s a really important personal letter.”

“Sure. How fast you want it there? Post or FedEx?”

“Post is fine,” he said, and handed the RAF technician a five-pound note. “I have no idea how much the postage will be—it’s going to Alaska. But this should cover it, and get you a pint as well.”

“Alaska?” exclaimed the RAF man. “Whoa. I’ll be sure to get it started as soon as the post office opens.”