The Wuhan Mission

“Sam, meet me in an hour. Same church?”

“Yep. What’s up?”

“Bad news” replied Roet and hung up.

*

Sam Chilvers pulled up across from Immanuel Presbyterian. He saw Roet’s car outside. Sam scanned the street and surrounding area before putting his phone in the glove compartment and grabbing the pistol.

Marcus was waiting inside, seated in the same place as the last time.

Sam joined him, sitting close, but looking around the church to make sure that they were alone.

Roet started with: “We lost Wu’s daughter. The Chinese took her last night.”

“How the hell did the Chinese find out about her?” exclaimed Sam.

“We must have a leak” said Roet. “They picked her up on the street, near Chinatown. Grabbed her in broad daylight… well it was nearly dinner time.”

“You didn’t geo-tag her all this time you’ve been watching her?” asked Sam incredulously.

“Yeah, we put locator on her keys. We know where she is, or at least we know where her keys are. The locator puts her in Brooklyn in a warehouse. It hasn’t moved since it got there last night.”

Sam nodded. “Are you sending a team in?”

Roet nodded back: “FBI SWAT are giving me a team. We’re going in tonight after midnight. There’ll be fewer people around. I’m flying to New York in two hours. I’ll lead the team. We will be going in heavy. They probably won’t be expecting us.

*

The FBI jet touched down on Long Island with Roet aboard. He’d managed to hitch a ride despite the annoyance in the voice of the FBI agent whom he’d had to convince.

The SWAT team approached the Brooklyn warehouse in four unmarked sedans.

“Comms check.” The team counted off as the cars pulled in a block from the entrance to the warehouse.

Roet’s voice came over the comms: “We need to take the girl unharmed. Once we have visual confirmation, clean up the scene, shoot to kill. Get everybody.”

The team quickly and silently jogged into position outside the side entrance. The warehouse was listed as ‘restaurant kitchen supplies storage’ but there was no knowing the layout of the place.

“Breach!” came the order, and the entry ram hit the door which bent and swung open with a loud clang, giving away their presence in the building to whomever was inside.

Roet and the team of six were inside in seconds. The dimly lit warehouse was deathly quiet as they all found cover and began working their way inside through the rows of shelves toward the back. Quietly clearing each section as they moved forward, covering each other. Roet, wearing a bulletproof vest, carrying an MP5 submachine gun, handed to him by the team captain in the car, huddled behind the agent in the lead who had a bullet proof shield.

“Please don’t shoot me in the back with that thing. Are you trained on an MP5?”

“Of course I am!” snapped Roet, lying.

As they approached the back wall of the warehouse, Roet saw that there were three doors. The leader motioned that they would split into three teams of two, and open the doors all at once.

The leader signaled the countdown with his fingers: “3–2” and then suddenly the whoosh and thud of five bullets hitting three members of the team. “Contact high right!” yelled the Team Leader. Muzzle flashes on the right side of the warehouse… Pistols with suppressors continued firing at them. The team returned fire to the right. Roet opened the cheap wooden door in front of him to take cover. He heard the crack crack of a pistol in front of him and felt two painful thuds in his chest before he saw the Chinese agent inside who had shot him. As Roet fell to his left, his finger pulled back on the trigger of his own weapon, spraying the contents of his magazine around the right side of the room, as the Chinese agent lunged low tumbling skillfully toward the doorway, springing again to his feet, making his escape to the street and into the night.

The Team Leader lit up the shooters to the right with automatic fire, bringing all three to the ground. The three FBI agents still standing entered the other two rooms which were empty. “Clear!” came both the signals.

The Team Leader turned on his radio: “We have four team members down with gunshot wounds, three suspects killed. Send ambulances ASAP.”

Roet grunted as he loosened his vest to feel behind it. Relieved, he thought ‘No penetration’ as he looked around the room at all the bullet holes he’d made in the walls.

“Shit, shit, shit!” Roet yelled as he saw the lifeless and bloody body of the daughter of Dr. Wu lying in the corner. Roet realized that he had shot her squarely through the neck with his machine gun fire and she had already bled out. He wasn’t used to the weapon, having never used one like it before.

“Damn!” said the Team Leader as he saw the girl’s body, lifeless on the floor.