'A' for Argonaut Read Free

them, no one else mattered. The Army had been his life. Now he was on his own for the first time in twenty years. His legs throbbed. His head felt like a bell tower at noon. His skull fractures were healing, but he feared the panic attacks the doctors had warned him about. He gripped the crutches so hard his fingers bruised. He shook his head clear, then used all the strength he had to straighten his back.
    The Fort Bragg compound stretched in front of him, its barracks and four-story office buildings pieces in a vast board game. Now he realized that he was no more than a chip himself and the game’s players had a hidden agenda‌—‌one that had clearly eluded him.
    His fingers probed his pocket for his AA chip, a constant reminder that Alcoholics Anonymous had ended the tornado that had taken over his life before he stopped drinking. He held it in a vice-like grip, grateful.
    “Whatever you put in front of your sobriety, you will lose.”
    The counsel had come from a tough-talking, big-hearted Irish firefighter just before he died. Big Bill, his AA sponsor, had helped him to absorb that principle as gospel. He hadn’t had a drink or a hangover ever since. He was determined that the present wreckage of his life wouldn’t lead him to pick up again.
    For the next two days he thought about his future. He was alone, crippled, an emotional wreck, but he wasn’t helpless. Slowly the pieces came together. He had to find the cancer in the Pentagon, to expose it and cut it out. In the process:
    I will eradicate the Animal .

Chapter 2

    Two
    Tropic Haven Corporate Retreat, Swakopmund, Namibia
    I t began six weeks before the trial. Maran was in Swakopmund, preparing for Operation Taxi Home, his Cabinda hostage recovery mission. He had planned it out exhaustively. Figuring it could be his swan song after serving for twenty years, he wanted it to be perfect. He read the briefing documents prepared by the home office. The yellow border meant, as the title sheet stipulated, it was TOP SECRET//EYES ONLY. He hoped that meant for his eyes only.
    He flipped to the back. The two last sheets were bordered in blue signifying less sensitive information: CONFIDENTIAL//SENSITIVE//NOFORN meaning those sheets contained “intelligence” that wasn’t to be shared with non-U.S. citizens. It gave a thin film of protection from enemies who might find in them a clue as to why they were being used in a secret briefing conducted by a U.S. military Special Ops officer like Maran.
    More bureaucratic ass-covering , he had thought. He recalled the ridiculous “Top Secret” UFO-Alien-Invasion Threat reports from years earlier.
    He read on:

    RAMPAGING REBELS TERRORIZE CABINDA
    Electronic Clarion & Call
    Africa on the Web

    KINSHASA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO ‌—‌ The outlaw rebels known as the Progressive Front for the Liberation of the Exclave of Cabinda, or PFLEC, have left a trail of death and destruction in their rampage against the Angolan government. Villagers and police believe the PFLECs hold occult powers and use them to turn themselves into man-eating animals. Police are searching the area around Cabinda for PFLEC members accused of kidnapping, dismembering, and eating the vitals of 33 people. The fighting in the provinces between Kinshasa and Cabinda has raged since Angola tightened its grip on the exclave in the wake of political turmoil.

    US MERCENARIES STOP CABINDAN REBELS AT OIL FIELDS
    Luanda Daily Cyber-Mail
    AFRICA ON THE WEB

    CABINDA, ANGOLA ‌—‌ A large, heavily armed force of mercenaries, most of them former U.S. Special Operations Force fighters, has engaged with rebel forces that have repeatedly attacked offshore oil platforms. Global Coast Oil Corporation, which is closely connected to U.S. President Hope Valentine, owns and operates the oil installations. The area produces ten percent of America’s oil and accounts for most of Angola’s export revenues. To maintain control of the region, Angolan President Dr.