The Serpent and the Crow

Book 1: Chapter Fifteen

The night was approaching. Douglas held binoculars as he gauged the compound. A few AK's patrolled the front gate.

He saw a hunting post occupied by another skinhead, and he was in a camouflage ghillie suit, the kind the makes you look like Swamp Thing. It does not fool a Native American.

Douglas was lying prone in thick vegetation. Cortez lay beside him with her sniper rifle.

Douglas spoke into the walkie. He said, "Two Skins armed with AK-47's. And one in a Sniper's Nest North of the Compound. Remember, we're going to do this quiet. There's more of them out there. We want Proctor alive."

Wade said, "I see him. We go quiet."

Wade signalled to Jador. She talked to three other men of Mexican descent to crawl forward. The men slithered towards Wade through the long grass. Wade knew these guys were not ordinary tour guides. The tattoos on their trigger hands were Para Los Muertos, PLM, or the American vernacular, The Dead Men. It made sense. When the entire population of Trepidation was outlawed up, you hire the other half to help you wipe out the rest.

Wade signalled to Jador and the Dead Men to stand down as he spotted a civilian inside. He crawled up to the window to take a peek.

The place looked like a fire hazard; it was a meth lab full of all sorts. They plastered the walls with Nazi memorabilia, from knives to guns and flags.

A naked black woman tied to a bedpost. She was in awful shape, her arms had track lines from being doped up. Three men were inside, and one of them already had his pants halfway down. Thee man retrieved a metal bat.

The skinhead said, "What you boys, reckon? She's taken all three of us like a pro. Do you reckon this nigger can take another round?"

The other two men sniggered. One of them drank hooch. He wore a confederate cap. He looked young to be involved with all this. But he was old enough to know that raping a woman was wrong.

The guy wearing the confederate cap said, "Gee whiz, Doyle. She looks limp."

Doyle grunted, "stop being a pussy boy. And hand me that lube."

The other man wearing overalls, sweating like a hog, undoes his button. His overalls fell to the ground. The moonshine he drank seems to have greased his hairy body up as if it were butter. He took his false teeth out.

Doyle asked, "What are you doing, Bubba?"

"I want a last slip and slide."

Doyle said, "I don't think so. She ain't going to get no more hot loving from us. She is going to get what every other nigger going to get, a dose of White Power."

Doyle lubed up the batting end of his bat, named white power.

They needed to do something and do it fast. Wade put on his silencer, and Jador did too.

Wade whispered into his radio, "We've got a civilian in there. If the two sentries outside come in, you know what to do, Cortez."

Douglas said, "Affirmative, she knows. I'm moving to your position for backup over."

Wade signalled to the men. Two Dead Men aimed their guns at each door hinge. Underneath their rifles was a one-shot shotgun shell or master key.

Doyle lined up his bat, but the woman squirmed away, screaming. Doyle, frustrated, orders Bubba and the Kid to hold her legs apart.

Wade signalled to the Dead Men, and they blew the hinges off.