Last Man Standing

34

When Web got back to the carriage house, Romano wasn’t there; Web even checked the antique cars downstairs in case his partner had crawled into one to admire it and had fallen asleep. It was almost four o’clock in the morning and his partner was probably prowling around outside. As a sniper, Romano had been restless with too much natural energy despite all their training to take things slow and methodically unless drastic circumstances dictated otherwise. Yet when it was time for action, just about everybody took a backseat to Paul Romano. Since Web’s cell phone was out of operation, he used the phone in the house to call Romano and breathed a sigh of relief when the man answered.

“So how’d your appointment go?” asked Romano.

“Boring. I’ll fill you in later. Where are you?”

“Everything was secure, so I’ve been poking around the place. There’s an old watchtower on the west side. See for miles in every direction.”

“I know; I’ve been there.”

“Well, I’m there right now. Felt like a little jog.”

“That’s a bit of a hike, Paulie.”

“Walk in the park. You might want to come out here and bring out a pair of NVs.”

“What are you spying on?”

“You’ll see.”

Web left the carriage house from the rear, slipped on his headgear, attached his ambient light source night-vision binoculars to it, powered up and fixed the relief to his eyes. The world instantly became an ethereal, fluid green. You couldn’t use the contraption for very long because the goggles were heavy enough that you would get a piercing pain in your neck, followed by a headache that would make you forget the neck ache. Web always kept one eye closed when scanning through the goggles even though this distorted your depth perception even more; if you didn’t keep one eye closed, when you stopped looking through the goggles all you’d see would be a brilliant orange ball in each eye. And at that point a ninety-year-old in a wheelchair could get the drop on you.

As a sniper, one had to use various pieces of equipment to get the job done, from high-tech to the lowest tech of all: camouflage. Web coveted his Ghillie suit, a concoction of burlap and cordura material that he had patiently covered with animal excrement and other foul substances to allow it to blend into a rugged forest or jungle environment. Each HRT sniper gave his Ghillie his own personal stamp and Web had spent years improving on his by defiling it even more. The Ghillie had been originally designed by the Scots over four hundred years ago in the course of waging countless guerrilla wars against those seeking to conquer them. It worked just as well now as it had then. Web had lain under his Ghillie in the middle of a jungle in Central America with dope dealers toting submachine guns walking all around him, and they never knew Web was there until he stuck his gun in their backs and read them their rights.

He moved forward again and pushed and then clicked the NV to IR status, which caused an internal light source to come on and vastly intensified the field of vision. Web wanted to make sure the equipment worked, for NV goggles batteries were notorious for failing right when you needed them to work. He didn’t like to use the IR for very long, because it had one major drawback. For anyone watching him with night-vision goggles, the IR magnifier gave off a light beacon, like a large flashlight in one’s face. Web would be a sitting duck. He clicked off the IR and put the headgear away in his backpack. He would rely on merely his eyes from now on, something he had done with every shot he had ever taken. Sometimes you couldn’t improve on nature.

The air was crisp and the sounds of the farm and surrounding woods many and varied. Web set a good pace and he covered the ground to the watchtower in enviable time. It was good to know he was still in decent shape. After eight years of relentless training you didn’t lose it all in a short period of time, he reasoned. He liked the forest in the darkness; it felt as comfortable to him as a La-ZBoy and a big-screen TV would to the average American male.

He sighted the watchtower and stopped. Since he didn’t have a cell phone, Web put his hands up to his face, formed a rude bugle of sorts and let out a call, the same signal he and Romano had used when they were sniping. It could either be a gust of wind or a bird commonly found just about anywhere. Web was sure Romano would remember, and a few seconds later he heard the answering message. All clear.

Web broke from the tree line and hustled to the watchtower, gripped the wooden rungs and climbed silently up. Romano greeted him at the little hinged door in the floor of the observation space. Web knew Romano couldn’t see Web’s fresh injuries courtesy of Toona and Big F, and that was just as well, because he didn’t want to waste breath right now explaining them. And of course Romano would give him a hard time about it. He could just hear the words Shit, you let them do that to you? passing through the man’s lips.

Web looked at Romano as he pulled out a ten-power Litton scope that was normally attached to a .308 sniper rifle.

“Anything good on?” asked Web.

“Check this out, right through that break in the trees to the northwest.”

Web looked through the scope. “I take it I’m looking at the Southern Belle.”

“Interesting stuff going on, for a horse farm.”

Web adjusted the scope to his eye and sighted through it. There was indeed a nice break in the trees, which revealed a fine view of the neighboring spread.

There were two sizable buildings that looked relatively new. Large trucks were parked next to them and Web watched as men with walkie-talkies raced in different directions. A door opened on the side of one of the buildings and Web saw that whatever was going on inside required a lot of light. A tractor-trailer was backed up to a warehouse-type roll-up door and men were bringing large boxes out on hand trucks and rolling them up inside the truck’s trailer.

“Something big is going on,” said Web. “Auto chop shop, drugs, stolen aviation parts, spies, technology pirates or lots of other things. Damn.”

“Fascinating neighborhood. And here I was, thinking Virginia horse country was just a bunch of old duffers riding around drunk chasing little foxes while the little women had tea in the afternoon. Boy, have I got a lot to learn.” He looked at Web. “So what do you think?”

“I think with all we got going on, the Southern Belle will have to keep. But if something pops at least we’ll be right here to do something about it.”

Romano grinned, obviously happy with the thought of coming action and possible mayhem. “Now you’re talking my language.”