On a Lee Shore 13 - Demons in the Forest

There are demons in the forest.  In small villages like Guasimalito, on all three of the earth’s continents with third world populations, there are demons in the forest.  Ask any villager.  Within its borders, the village shelters its people, but in the black-green shadows of the timbered primordial expanse beyond, they’re on their own.  And at dusk, the dark ethereal perimeter seeps slowly inward, and as the shadows of the trees stretch toward the east swamping their sanctuary, the inhabitants bed themselves down behind doors and compound walls in hope to making it through until light.  Night.

The men are on the move toward a new target.  Several weeks ago on a different continent, Guasimalito, Jose Mirobal’s village, has already been hit, but the profile of tonight’s target is the same.  A remote village in a heavily forested region of a country plagued by civil war, drug-running and banditry.  The forest gives the men cover to launch a quick strike into the village and the ability to disappear quickly afterward.  The region’s history of unrelenting violence allows the men to do their worst without fear that an undermanned and corrupt regional police or militia, if it even exists, will take too much notice.  

    The hysterical shriek of a tin whistle sounded by the squad leader rips through the village’s nocturnal peace signaling the start of another incursion.  Teams positioned to the north, south, east and west of the village surge forward out of the trees toward their targets.  But these targets are not chosen at random.  One week earlier, the scout squad, disguised as missionary workers visited the village, identifying villagers in comparatively good health matching the requisite blood types and genetic profiles, taking photographs of those selected, and marking the GPS position of each target’s home, for use by the harvest squad.

    And so it begins.  Teams of three approach each targeted house.  One man, stationed outside keeps guard, armed with a AK-47, the nondescript weapon of a drug runner or revolutionary, under orders to neutralize any alarmed villager who might attempt to interrupt the operation.  Forcing entry to the home, the other two men shove flashlights in each occupant’s face, compare them to the target photos and either select or reject.  Resistance offered by an occupant, not being extracted, is eliminated with a single shot to the head.  The bewildered target is then bound with plastic cinch cuffs and gagged with duct tape.  Under no circumstances is the target to sustain any damage other than superficial injury, the viability of the target is preserved at all costs.  Members of the squad know that damaged goods will not be tolerated.

    On to the next house.  There, a frightened girl, only 14 years old, has been targeted and is being extracted.  Eyes bulging in their sockets, she frantically searches the room for an explanation, her hands bound tightly, her mouth gagged.  On the floor, her father, recently widowered, is bleeding out from a wound to the head that has severed his temporal artery.  He is alive, but not for long.  The victim’s legs are not restrained, the extraction teams need her to walk on her own.

    Exiting the village in the directions from which they entered, the teams travel at least two miles out of their way before doubling back to a stretch of road running from north to east of the village.  This is the rally point.  Waiting at a point in the road north of the village, a van begins bumping its way along picking up each team, in turn, as it moves to the south and east.  Each target is placed on a rack in the van, designed for just this purpose.  Only then are the victim’s legs restrained.

    Seventy-five kilometers to the southeast, a small field hospital has been set up, equipped with a reasonably sterile operating room, where a surgeon does the unthinkable.  The victims, including the young girl, are taken one by one, alive, into his chamber but emerge only as empty husks to be discarded and harvested merchandise, cryogenically preserved, to fill Miguel Mariposa’s manifest.