Beepbeepbeep...beepbeepbeep.
Hunter opened his eyes from his doze and carefully reached up to retrieve his watch from his forehead. His heart started accelerating in anticipation. Pressing the light button on the watch, he checked the time; he had 4 minutes, forty seconds to go. The altimeter gave the altitude at 34,000 feet. Putting on the watch and slipping the GPS from its strap, Hunter verified that they were still on track. Replacing the GPS, he quickly reached in an inside pocket and removed a small five-button RF transmitter. Hunter lifted up his oxygen mask briefly and lightly clamped the transmitter between his teeth, then slowly reached to his right and used the struts there to help him maneuver his body so that he lay on his right side and his back was against the wall.
Pressing the light button on the Suunto again, he read that he had 1 minute, 32 seconds to go. His heart pounded a little louder, a little faster. He counted to thirty while removing the transmitter from his mouth and sliding its plastic cover back.
"26, 27, 28, here we go", he thought, mimicking the intonations of that phrase in the song by the Chemical Brothers. Firmly, Hunter pressed the far left button on the transmitter.
------
Ting!
"What the hell?" The pilot asked, turning quickly toward his copilot who shrugged while looking just as puzzled as he did, scanning the instrument panel and what he could see of the moonless night outside. They heard one of the stewardesses through their headphones:
"Ladies and gentlemen, the pilot has illuminated the fasten seat belt sign, indicating the possibility of turbulence..."
-------
Hunter smiled to himself, imagining the confusion above him, and BTO's song replaced the Chemical Brothers: "You ain't seen nothin' yet..." Illuminating the watch once more, he began counting again. At thirty-three, Hunter pushed the far right button on the transmitter, slid the plastic cover back in place over the buttons, jammed it back into his pocket and quickly braced himself hard against the wall as the aircraft's wheel well started swinging open underneath him. Three seconds later, before the strut started moving, Hunter released himself, rolling face down. He stabilized and made sure he was freefalling in the same direction that the aircraft was going, then silently thanked the crew of Delta Flight 1583, nonstop from Atlanta to Sacramento, as it continued on its way, leaving him high above the Navajo Nation territory of northeastern Arizona.
During the 91 second drop, Hunter thought of his mission again, hoped he was dropping close enough to his objective but not too close. He didn't want to warn anyone of his arrival. He hoped his chute would open without problem. Above all, he hoped he would not land in or on something he would regret. Hard to tell what is coming in the pitch darkness. Then again, he was happy to be heading into the darkness. It meant he was in the desert area where he was supposed to be and not around any cities or towns. Off to the far left, he'd noticed the lights of Flagstaff. Rotating his left wrist toward him, he reached over and illuminated the watch, seeing the numbers of the altimeter drop faster than they could be read or registered. With his heart thumping again loudly, he said,
"Please..." just as the chute deployed, making the tell-tale shudders and thud as the wind slipped inside and spread the nylon wide. Automatically, Hunter turned left toward the wind, a 135 degree turn, directly south. As he pulled the forward lines a bit so that he would almost float in place, he rummaged in his pocket again, removing the night vision goggle. Swiping his breather mask down under his chin, he bit the goggle's strap and took his wind goggles off, putting them where the NVGs came from. After slipping the NVGs over his head, Hunter turned on the switch, pulled the breather back over his nose and mouth and looked down as the green glow brightened. Nothing but brush and what looked like flat land. Good landing. Pulling the GPS, he was intensely relieved and surprised, in fact, that he was really close to where he wanted to land. Pulling down on the left risers, he turned left, rode for about a quarter mile and then swung around the remaining 45 degrees so that he was once again facing north west and brought himself down fast, flaring back at the end so that he landed softly in the Polacca Wash.
"Oh, what perfectly, beautiful dumb luck", Hunter thought as he released the chute connections, while looking around him carefully. According to his understanding of where he was, he knew he either had about a 14 mile easy walk or a six mile harder walk to his objective. Hunter had already decided to take the six mile route, even though it would be strenuous. His opponents, if there were any, would not expect him to come from the northwest where the canyons narrowed and deepened and where the terrain was more fierce. No, not when, to the southeast, one could walk up the canyons with ease. The problem with that route, aside from being expected, was the wind from the south blowing up the canyons that would bring sound and smells to the cave.
"Never good for a surprise," thought Hunter. "Upwind is good." Stuffing his rolled chute into his backpack, adding his breather mask and tubes and wind goggles, he thought for a second, then dug the transmitter out of his pocket and slid it into the bag as well, before quietly zipping it back up and shrugging it onto his back. He only had about another two hours or so before the moon would start to rise. He began walking.
Moving northwest, Hunter cut across a narrower and not so steep ridge between the Polacca and Ramhead Washes. Straight ahead was an easy draw that would take him up to the ridge overlooking Donkey Spring Canyon, about a mile northeast of the cave.
------
Silently, Hunter lay on his stomach, the rucksack in front of him, helping the bush, he hoped, look a bit bigger in the dark than it was. Unzipping a side pocket, he removed a blowgun, extended it and put it to the side and then reached back in for a small plastic case of darts. He could hear two men quietly talking where he knew the cave to be. A problem, it was, trying to figure out how to get down there. All approaches would be seen, with the exception of that above, which would be impossible due to the loose rock and the twenty or so foot nearly sheer drop. Hunter dared not look at his watch again; it would not help him in any way. The moon, he supposed, would begin to rise in a bit and he was happy for the extra time of darkness the ridges to the east would provide. Hunter removed a shotgun microphone, placed it in the bush facing the voices and placed the earbud in his ear. He could hear the men as easily as he could see around him with the NVGs.
"...some more coffee?"
"Yeah, I'll get it when I get back. I'm going up to look around. Gotta piss, too."
Hunter started at that and didn't feel very good about his lot in life all of a sudden. He was only about 70 yards from the edge that led down to the cave.
"Nobody's coming 'til 'bout three or four o'clock. You know that."
He sat up quietly, opened the dart case, placed a dart in this mouth and grabbed the blow gun.
"Still, I gotta check. And I do have to piss." Hunter heard the man start climbing up the slope, and removed the earbud.
"Please God, let this camo do its job," he thought as he ducked his head down a bit. After hearing the footsteps stop, Hunter slowly raised his head, looking through the bush to see the sentry lift NVGs to his eyes and slowly pan around. The man appeared more interested in looking at a farther distance than where Hunter was sitting. Before the sentry swept toward him, Hunter lowered his head again, tucking himself into a ball.
Three seconds later, Hunter slowly raised his head again. Seeing the man slowly scanning back around to the left, Hunter moved himself into a crouching position. The wind was still gusting and was stronger up here than the wind down in the canyons. Hunter stopped thinking of the man, now, cognizant of that other sense that is detectible as having the feeling of being watched. The man dropped the NVGs from his eyes, letting them hang from his neck, and quickly walked toward a cactus, while muttering to himself "Gotta piss like a Russian racehorse."
Glad for the sounds of the gusting wind and the splashing pee to mask his footsteps, Hunter quickly covered the ground between him and the sentry's back. Thinking about his objective, then, Hunter waited until the man put his member back into his pants and started turning around before moving very fast, all at the same time clamping one hand over the sentry's mouth and pinching his nose shut while pressing the thumb and forefingers of his other hand against the man's carotid arteries and wrapping his right leg in front of the man's legs, to both take the man down and keep his legs from spasming and making noise as the oxygen and blood was shut off to the brain. Hunter bent down like a vampire toward the man's neck and let the dart into his neck and left it there while he slowly let the man down to the ground.
The neuro-muscular chemical, designed for war, was perhaps the best Russian invention since Vodka. Quite unlike the other chemical weapons, the ugly ones that caused death and permanent internal eroding, this one was a gem. Its victims remained conscious, but couldn't care less what was going on around them, and didn't have control of their muscles to do something about it if they did care. After a couple of hours, the victims fully recovered, although most often they needed a shower and a change of clothes. With a slowness, the sentry's eyes opened.
Hunter smiled at the man, patted his cheek lightly and whispered, "Shhh. You'll be all right, boss." Bending down next to the man's ear, he said, "I'm going to leave my stuff here, ok? You take care of it for me. And I need to borrow your jacket and hat. I'll bring them right back." Hunter maneuvered the guy to take his jacket off. He shrugged out of his own jacket and draped it over the man to keep him warm. Putting the man's jacket and hat on, he returned to his bush, collected his equipment and put all but another dart back in the bag. Holding the dart gingerly, he stepped back over to the sentry, put his bag down and said, "Be right back, jefe."
He walked quickly toward the slope to the cave, not caring much about noise now. Hunter placed the dart, point up, inbetween the webbing of the first two fingers of his right hand. When he reached the mouth of the cave, the man inside said "Jesus, you sound like a freakin' herd of cattle. Here's your coffee", extending the steaming cup out to Hunter. As he grabbed the handle of the cup, Hunter carelessly let some of the coffee slosh on the man's hand, while simultaneously pricking the man with the dart.
"Oww, shit!" The man exclaimed, shaking the coffee off his hand. "You get your own damned coffee next time. Damn!" The man reached down to rummage in his bag. Hunter ducked over to him and put him in the sleeper hold. The man slumped forward as Hunter kicked the burner and coffee pot away from in front of the chair. He laid the second sentry down just as gently as the first, and taking a small flashlight from his pocket, stepped over the man as he began to convulse.
The beam of the flashlight showed a table about twelve feet back upon which was a pile of gold and silver coins. Flashing the light on the floor, he moved to the table, stepping over a wire on the way.
"1933D Walking Liberty, huh?" Hunter chuckled, quickly moving the gold coins to the side and examining the dates. 1923S, 1934D, 1938 and 1940S. No 1933D. Picking up the 1934D, Hunter looked at it. He shined the light on the side of the table. No drawer. Bending down and shining the light under the table, Hunter found yet another silver dollar, stuck to the lip with bubble gum.
"Bastards." Hunter muttered as he took the dollar, stood up and looked at it. 1933D. Hunter bent back down, stuck the 1934D Liberty on the bubble gum and quickly left the cave.
Reaching the first sentry once again, Hunter traded jackets, frowned at the guy and said, "Thanks, man. You really should watch what you eat, though. That's foul." Hunter tossed the sentry's hat so it covered the man's face, grabbed his bag and began his walk southwest down the Polacca Wash.
Shortly before dawn and a short distance before the Polacca wash crossed highway 87, Hunter found a place to throw himself down to sleep. The last 24 hours had taken its toll on him and he slept quite soundly, waking six hours later, just long enough to take a leak before he fell back into a light slumber until early afternoon. Although impatient to get started again, Hunter waited until dark before continuing on his 120 mile journey to Winslow.
----------
Before his eyes slammed shut the third morning, Hunter reached in his pocket, fingered the silver half dollar and wondered if it was even missed. He also thought how ingenious it had been to go to the trouble to have a fake dollar made, since 1933D Walking Libertys were never produced. Yet he had returned the gag by replacing the one coin with the closest match, the 1934D, hopefully making them think their counterfeit was still safely hidden. The last thought before sleep overtook him was that perhaps his fellow Greyhound passengers, bound for Alburquerque, had crawled out from under the slime at the ends of the earth to ride the bus.
"The only place you'll find weirder people," he thought, "is at the DMV."
CHAPTER 2
Hunter stood before three guys he'd never seen before, and all three were dressed to match the fleabag motel they were in. As one of them spoke, Hunter fingered the half-dollar.
"For all your inventiveness, H, you failed the mission. Would you care to tell us how you got to the objective so quickly, where you got that special...ahh...concoction and why you disappeared for three days before answering your phone?"
"Not really, sir. If I failed the mission, everything else doesn't matter anyway, right?"
"I suppose that's true. Can we have the coin back anyway? And then you may rejoin your unit. There will be no repercussions; your mistake was a common one."
"I imagine so," Hunter said, "since there was never a 1933D Walking Liberty made."
"Indeed."
Hunter took the coin from his pocket and flipped it across the several feet between him and Mr. Speaker.
"Call me if you change your mind." He smiled at all three and turned toward the door.
Puzzled at his words, the man looked at the coin and handed it to the guy next to him.
"Ahhh, Hunter..."
"Damn!" Exclaimed the second guy, looking at the coin.
Hunter stopped moving, smiled at the door and turned around with a straight face.
"Sir?"
"Go on back to Atlanta, file a low-key expense voucher for this trip. We'll be in touch."
"Yes sir. Thank you, sir."
"Thank you, Hunter. And welcome."
At this, all three men stood up, moved forward and shook his hand. On his way out the door, Hunter heard Mr. Speaker say in barely controlled rage:
"I want those two lackadaisical fuckwads replaced. Send their sorry asses to Fort Drum until they rot or retire, whichever comes first." The man literally spit. "Not checking the coin under the table? Unfuckingforgivable."
Hunter did file the "low-key" expense report, which meant he had gone on Temporary Duty to Hawaii to a SCUBA expo to discover new, potentially useable technology.
----------
On the fourth morning after he'd left the three strangers, Hunter sat on the edge of his pond feeling free and light-hearted. He had purchased the ten acres surrounding him for a mere $11,500 and had paid the $550 to have county water put in. After he had started building his house, according to the rules, he received an address from the Marion County building inspector. His "house" consisted of a tent in which he lived the brief amount of time he was there and a roomy, concrete block shed that contained only his toilet, a sink and a shower. Water was heated by a black, plastic 55-gallon drum sitting on the edge of the southern roof.
He had bought the property in 2001 and called the forestry service out to dig the pond deeper. With the drought going on in the South at the time, Hunter determined himself lucky indeed that he could reshape and resize his pond, giving himself about an acre of flatland that used to be pond bottom back in the days of plentiful, normal rainfall. Since it was directly adjacent to the new pond, Hunter knew the earth itself would remain fairly well hydrated during the summer, so he could grow his vegetables without having to irrigate.
He had stocked the pond from a fish farm in Alabama and he knew that the bait he was currently using was too big; the fish needed a couple more years to grow. Still yet, he cast his rubber baits in with a bobber, occupying himself and meditating happily.
Suddenly, the cell phone went off with "Perdido en un Barco" by Mana and Hunter jumped.
"Hello?"
"Hola, papi. Que mi encuentras en el area siete." The phone went dead.
"Well, hell." Hunter said to the non-biting fish, "Time to boogey."
Glad enough for another mission, but sad that he would be leaving his "home" and do-nothing time, he reeled in his line, consolidated the telescopic pole and stashed it in the trunk of his '93 Mercury Topaz. Going to his tent, he pulled a duffel bag from his flight bag of clean clothes and picked up the pile of dirty clothes stashed in a corner.
Finally with the tent folded up, replaced in its bag and in the trunk of the car, and after replacing the lock on the metal door of the "outhouse", Hunter drove off toward Sarasota, where, being area seven, someone would give him something to do.
Hunter opened his eyes from his doze and carefully reached up to retrieve his watch from his forehead. His heart started accelerating in anticipation. Pressing the light button on the watch, he checked the time; he had 4 minutes, forty seconds to go. The altimeter gave the altitude at 34,000 feet. Putting on the watch and slipping the GPS from its strap, Hunter verified that they were still on track. Replacing the GPS, he quickly reached in an inside pocket and removed a small five-button RF transmitter. Hunter lifted up his oxygen mask briefly and lightly clamped the transmitter between his teeth, then slowly reached to his right and used the struts there to help him maneuver his body so that he lay on his right side and his back was against the wall.
Pressing the light button on the Suunto again, he read that he had 1 minute, 32 seconds to go. His heart pounded a little louder, a little faster. He counted to thirty while removing the transmitter from his mouth and sliding its plastic cover back.
"26, 27, 28, here we go", he thought, mimicking the intonations of that phrase in the song by the Chemical Brothers. Firmly, Hunter pressed the far left button on the transmitter.
------
Ting!
"What the hell?" The pilot asked, turning quickly toward his copilot who shrugged while looking just as puzzled as he did, scanning the instrument panel and what he could see of the moonless night outside. They heard one of the stewardesses through their headphones:
"Ladies and gentlemen, the pilot has illuminated the fasten seat belt sign, indicating the possibility of turbulence..."
-------
Hunter smiled to himself, imagining the confusion above him, and BTO's song replaced the Chemical Brothers: "You ain't seen nothin' yet..." Illuminating the watch once more, he began counting again. At thirty-three, Hunter pushed the far right button on the transmitter, slid the plastic cover back in place over the buttons, jammed it back into his pocket and quickly braced himself hard against the wall as the aircraft's wheel well started swinging open underneath him. Three seconds later, before the strut started moving, Hunter released himself, rolling face down. He stabilized and made sure he was freefalling in the same direction that the aircraft was going, then silently thanked the crew of Delta Flight 1583, nonstop from Atlanta to Sacramento, as it continued on its way, leaving him high above the Navajo Nation territory of northeastern Arizona.
During the 91 second drop, Hunter thought of his mission again, hoped he was dropping close enough to his objective but not too close. He didn't want to warn anyone of his arrival. He hoped his chute would open without problem. Above all, he hoped he would not land in or on something he would regret. Hard to tell what is coming in the pitch darkness. Then again, he was happy to be heading into the darkness. It meant he was in the desert area where he was supposed to be and not around any cities or towns. Off to the far left, he'd noticed the lights of Flagstaff. Rotating his left wrist toward him, he reached over and illuminated the watch, seeing the numbers of the altimeter drop faster than they could be read or registered. With his heart thumping again loudly, he said,
"Please..." just as the chute deployed, making the tell-tale shudders and thud as the wind slipped inside and spread the nylon wide. Automatically, Hunter turned left toward the wind, a 135 degree turn, directly south. As he pulled the forward lines a bit so that he would almost float in place, he rummaged in his pocket again, removing the night vision goggle. Swiping his breather mask down under his chin, he bit the goggle's strap and took his wind goggles off, putting them where the NVGs came from. After slipping the NVGs over his head, Hunter turned on the switch, pulled the breather back over his nose and mouth and looked down as the green glow brightened. Nothing but brush and what looked like flat land. Good landing. Pulling the GPS, he was intensely relieved and surprised, in fact, that he was really close to where he wanted to land. Pulling down on the left risers, he turned left, rode for about a quarter mile and then swung around the remaining 45 degrees so that he was once again facing north west and brought himself down fast, flaring back at the end so that he landed softly in the Polacca Wash.
"Oh, what perfectly, beautiful dumb luck", Hunter thought as he released the chute connections, while looking around him carefully. According to his understanding of where he was, he knew he either had about a 14 mile easy walk or a six mile harder walk to his objective. Hunter had already decided to take the six mile route, even though it would be strenuous. His opponents, if there were any, would not expect him to come from the northwest where the canyons narrowed and deepened and where the terrain was more fierce. No, not when, to the southeast, one could walk up the canyons with ease. The problem with that route, aside from being expected, was the wind from the south blowing up the canyons that would bring sound and smells to the cave.
"Never good for a surprise," thought Hunter. "Upwind is good." Stuffing his rolled chute into his backpack, adding his breather mask and tubes and wind goggles, he thought for a second, then dug the transmitter out of his pocket and slid it into the bag as well, before quietly zipping it back up and shrugging it onto his back. He only had about another two hours or so before the moon would start to rise. He began walking.
Moving northwest, Hunter cut across a narrower and not so steep ridge between the Polacca and Ramhead Washes. Straight ahead was an easy draw that would take him up to the ridge overlooking Donkey Spring Canyon, about a mile northeast of the cave.
------
Silently, Hunter lay on his stomach, the rucksack in front of him, helping the bush, he hoped, look a bit bigger in the dark than it was. Unzipping a side pocket, he removed a blowgun, extended it and put it to the side and then reached back in for a small plastic case of darts. He could hear two men quietly talking where he knew the cave to be. A problem, it was, trying to figure out how to get down there. All approaches would be seen, with the exception of that above, which would be impossible due to the loose rock and the twenty or so foot nearly sheer drop. Hunter dared not look at his watch again; it would not help him in any way. The moon, he supposed, would begin to rise in a bit and he was happy for the extra time of darkness the ridges to the east would provide. Hunter removed a shotgun microphone, placed it in the bush facing the voices and placed the earbud in his ear. He could hear the men as easily as he could see around him with the NVGs.
"...some more coffee?"
"Yeah, I'll get it when I get back. I'm going up to look around. Gotta piss, too."
Hunter started at that and didn't feel very good about his lot in life all of a sudden. He was only about 70 yards from the edge that led down to the cave.
"Nobody's coming 'til 'bout three or four o'clock. You know that."
He sat up quietly, opened the dart case, placed a dart in this mouth and grabbed the blow gun.
"Still, I gotta check. And I do have to piss." Hunter heard the man start climbing up the slope, and removed the earbud.
"Please God, let this camo do its job," he thought as he ducked his head down a bit. After hearing the footsteps stop, Hunter slowly raised his head, looking through the bush to see the sentry lift NVGs to his eyes and slowly pan around. The man appeared more interested in looking at a farther distance than where Hunter was sitting. Before the sentry swept toward him, Hunter lowered his head again, tucking himself into a ball.
Three seconds later, Hunter slowly raised his head again. Seeing the man slowly scanning back around to the left, Hunter moved himself into a crouching position. The wind was still gusting and was stronger up here than the wind down in the canyons. Hunter stopped thinking of the man, now, cognizant of that other sense that is detectible as having the feeling of being watched. The man dropped the NVGs from his eyes, letting them hang from his neck, and quickly walked toward a cactus, while muttering to himself "Gotta piss like a Russian racehorse."
Glad for the sounds of the gusting wind and the splashing pee to mask his footsteps, Hunter quickly covered the ground between him and the sentry's back. Thinking about his objective, then, Hunter waited until the man put his member back into his pants and started turning around before moving very fast, all at the same time clamping one hand over the sentry's mouth and pinching his nose shut while pressing the thumb and forefingers of his other hand against the man's carotid arteries and wrapping his right leg in front of the man's legs, to both take the man down and keep his legs from spasming and making noise as the oxygen and blood was shut off to the brain. Hunter bent down like a vampire toward the man's neck and let the dart into his neck and left it there while he slowly let the man down to the ground.
The neuro-muscular chemical, designed for war, was perhaps the best Russian invention since Vodka. Quite unlike the other chemical weapons, the ugly ones that caused death and permanent internal eroding, this one was a gem. Its victims remained conscious, but couldn't care less what was going on around them, and didn't have control of their muscles to do something about it if they did care. After a couple of hours, the victims fully recovered, although most often they needed a shower and a change of clothes. With a slowness, the sentry's eyes opened.
Hunter smiled at the man, patted his cheek lightly and whispered, "Shhh. You'll be all right, boss." Bending down next to the man's ear, he said, "I'm going to leave my stuff here, ok? You take care of it for me. And I need to borrow your jacket and hat. I'll bring them right back." Hunter maneuvered the guy to take his jacket off. He shrugged out of his own jacket and draped it over the man to keep him warm. Putting the man's jacket and hat on, he returned to his bush, collected his equipment and put all but another dart back in the bag. Holding the dart gingerly, he stepped back over to the sentry, put his bag down and said, "Be right back, jefe."
He walked quickly toward the slope to the cave, not caring much about noise now. Hunter placed the dart, point up, inbetween the webbing of the first two fingers of his right hand. When he reached the mouth of the cave, the man inside said "Jesus, you sound like a freakin' herd of cattle. Here's your coffee", extending the steaming cup out to Hunter. As he grabbed the handle of the cup, Hunter carelessly let some of the coffee slosh on the man's hand, while simultaneously pricking the man with the dart.
"Oww, shit!" The man exclaimed, shaking the coffee off his hand. "You get your own damned coffee next time. Damn!" The man reached down to rummage in his bag. Hunter ducked over to him and put him in the sleeper hold. The man slumped forward as Hunter kicked the burner and coffee pot away from in front of the chair. He laid the second sentry down just as gently as the first, and taking a small flashlight from his pocket, stepped over the man as he began to convulse.
The beam of the flashlight showed a table about twelve feet back upon which was a pile of gold and silver coins. Flashing the light on the floor, he moved to the table, stepping over a wire on the way.
"1933D Walking Liberty, huh?" Hunter chuckled, quickly moving the gold coins to the side and examining the dates. 1923S, 1934D, 1938 and 1940S. No 1933D. Picking up the 1934D, Hunter looked at it. He shined the light on the side of the table. No drawer. Bending down and shining the light under the table, Hunter found yet another silver dollar, stuck to the lip with bubble gum.
"Bastards." Hunter muttered as he took the dollar, stood up and looked at it. 1933D. Hunter bent back down, stuck the 1934D Liberty on the bubble gum and quickly left the cave.
Reaching the first sentry once again, Hunter traded jackets, frowned at the guy and said, "Thanks, man. You really should watch what you eat, though. That's foul." Hunter tossed the sentry's hat so it covered the man's face, grabbed his bag and began his walk southwest down the Polacca Wash.
Shortly before dawn and a short distance before the Polacca wash crossed highway 87, Hunter found a place to throw himself down to sleep. The last 24 hours had taken its toll on him and he slept quite soundly, waking six hours later, just long enough to take a leak before he fell back into a light slumber until early afternoon. Although impatient to get started again, Hunter waited until dark before continuing on his 120 mile journey to Winslow.
----------
Before his eyes slammed shut the third morning, Hunter reached in his pocket, fingered the silver half dollar and wondered if it was even missed. He also thought how ingenious it had been to go to the trouble to have a fake dollar made, since 1933D Walking Libertys were never produced. Yet he had returned the gag by replacing the one coin with the closest match, the 1934D, hopefully making them think their counterfeit was still safely hidden. The last thought before sleep overtook him was that perhaps his fellow Greyhound passengers, bound for Alburquerque, had crawled out from under the slime at the ends of the earth to ride the bus.
"The only place you'll find weirder people," he thought, "is at the DMV."
CHAPTER 2
Hunter stood before three guys he'd never seen before, and all three were dressed to match the fleabag motel they were in. As one of them spoke, Hunter fingered the half-dollar.
"For all your inventiveness, H, you failed the mission. Would you care to tell us how you got to the objective so quickly, where you got that special...ahh...concoction and why you disappeared for three days before answering your phone?"
"Not really, sir. If I failed the mission, everything else doesn't matter anyway, right?"
"I suppose that's true. Can we have the coin back anyway? And then you may rejoin your unit. There will be no repercussions; your mistake was a common one."
"I imagine so," Hunter said, "since there was never a 1933D Walking Liberty made."
"Indeed."
Hunter took the coin from his pocket and flipped it across the several feet between him and Mr. Speaker.
"Call me if you change your mind." He smiled at all three and turned toward the door.
Puzzled at his words, the man looked at the coin and handed it to the guy next to him.
"Ahhh, Hunter..."
"Damn!" Exclaimed the second guy, looking at the coin.
Hunter stopped moving, smiled at the door and turned around with a straight face.
"Sir?"
"Go on back to Atlanta, file a low-key expense voucher for this trip. We'll be in touch."
"Yes sir. Thank you, sir."
"Thank you, Hunter. And welcome."
At this, all three men stood up, moved forward and shook his hand. On his way out the door, Hunter heard Mr. Speaker say in barely controlled rage:
"I want those two lackadaisical fuckwads replaced. Send their sorry asses to Fort Drum until they rot or retire, whichever comes first." The man literally spit. "Not checking the coin under the table? Unfuckingforgivable."
Hunter did file the "low-key" expense report, which meant he had gone on Temporary Duty to Hawaii to a SCUBA expo to discover new, potentially useable technology.
----------
On the fourth morning after he'd left the three strangers, Hunter sat on the edge of his pond feeling free and light-hearted. He had purchased the ten acres surrounding him for a mere $11,500 and had paid the $550 to have county water put in. After he had started building his house, according to the rules, he received an address from the Marion County building inspector. His "house" consisted of a tent in which he lived the brief amount of time he was there and a roomy, concrete block shed that contained only his toilet, a sink and a shower. Water was heated by a black, plastic 55-gallon drum sitting on the edge of the southern roof.
He had bought the property in 2001 and called the forestry service out to dig the pond deeper. With the drought going on in the South at the time, Hunter determined himself lucky indeed that he could reshape and resize his pond, giving himself about an acre of flatland that used to be pond bottom back in the days of plentiful, normal rainfall. Since it was directly adjacent to the new pond, Hunter knew the earth itself would remain fairly well hydrated during the summer, so he could grow his vegetables without having to irrigate.
He had stocked the pond from a fish farm in Alabama and he knew that the bait he was currently using was too big; the fish needed a couple more years to grow. Still yet, he cast his rubber baits in with a bobber, occupying himself and meditating happily.
Suddenly, the cell phone went off with "Perdido en un Barco" by Mana and Hunter jumped.
"Hello?"
"Hola, papi. Que mi encuentras en el area siete." The phone went dead.
"Well, hell." Hunter said to the non-biting fish, "Time to boogey."
Glad enough for another mission, but sad that he would be leaving his "home" and do-nothing time, he reeled in his line, consolidated the telescopic pole and stashed it in the trunk of his '93 Mercury Topaz. Going to his tent, he pulled a duffel bag from his flight bag of clean clothes and picked up the pile of dirty clothes stashed in a corner.
Finally with the tent folded up, replaced in its bag and in the trunk of the car, and after replacing the lock on the metal door of the "outhouse", Hunter drove off toward Sarasota, where, being area seven, someone would give him something to do.