A Time for Patriots

The economy might be in the tank, the U.S. Border Patrol agent thought, and a lot fewer Mexicans were illegally crossing the border because there were no jobs in the United States. But they were still coming, and although the Border Patrol’s budget had been cut and a lot of the technology they relied on was in disrepair or simply not deployed, they were still catching them. The Mexicans were all carrying several one-gallon jugs of water looped around their necks with rope, plus backpacks, trash bags, or whatever else they could find to carry their belongings. They ranged in age from the teens to sixties, both men and women, and most looked in fairly good health, which was necessary when making this dangerous border crossing in such hostile conditions, especially in summer.

“Yuma, Unit Eighteen, intercepted a group of twenty,” the officer radioed. “Requesting additional transportation.”

“Looks like we might finally be getting some decent intel again,” the second officer said. “They were exactly where we were briefed.”

“Yeah, and remember, they briefed us that we might run into more OTMs,” the first officer said. “Let’s see if this was the group they talked about.” They had been seeing a lot more OTMs — Other Than Mexicans — on these intercepts lately — some were from as far away as China and Africa.

With the van’s headlights and spotlight still shining in their faces, the agents had the migrants move away from their belongings except for one bottle of water each, then sit apart from one another. All complied silently. Since it was too dangerous for just two agents to try to handcuff and search twenty migrants, it was better if they just waited for their backup to arrive, so they took their shotguns and stood, walking up and down the line, keeping watch.

The first officer stopped in front of one migrant. Most of them made occasional eye contact with the officers, but this one seemed to purposely look away all the time. Something about him didn’t seem right. He was in his midthirties, with several days’ beard growth, but somehow he looked out of place. Many migrants wore knit caps even in summertime — at night temperatures in the desert could drop sixty degrees from daytime highs — and many wore layers of clothing so they wouldn’t have to carry them. But this one looked… different, like a guy trying to make himself look like a migrant.

“Jim, I’m going to have a chat with this one,” the first officer said.

“What’s up?”

“A feeling. Maybe an OTM.” He motioned to the man and said in Spanish, “Stand up, sir.” The man looked up and pointed at his chest, then did as he was told when he saw the officer nod his head. “Turn around, hands behind your back.”

“Wait for backup, Pete.”

“Just this one.” He was the more experienced officer, so the other agent demurred, but rattled the ammo bandolier on his shotgun to remind the others that he was covering them.

The officer named Pete pulled out a set of plastic handcuffs and locked the migrant’s wrists together in a control hold. “Just relax, sir,” he said in Spanish. “What’s your—”

All he saw was a blur of motion, and suddenly he felt a hand drive into his face just below his nose. He tried to yell, but it came out a bloody gurgle. He then felt a knife-edge hand slam into his throat, then nothing.

“Freeze!”

the second officer shouted, and he whirled and leveled the shotgun at the migrant from his hip. But with amazing speed three other migrants shot to their feet, pulled the shotgun skyward, and knocked the officer to the ground. They quickly armed themselves with the officers’ sidearms and backup weapons…

… then, at a nod from the first migrant, began shooting the officers and the migrants on the ground, one shot each to the head.

“Twenty more miles to the pickup point,” the leader of the hit squad said in Russian. “I don’t know how far away the other Border Patrol vehicle is, but if they’re coming from Yuma, we should be good. At the pickup point we split up, then rendezvous as briefed. Let’s go.” The four assassins picked up their packs and piled into the Border Patrol vehicle. Before driving off, one of them activated a small device that would scramble the GPS tracking signal from the van.

Joint Air Base Battle Mountain

Days later

It was truly an amazing thing to watch, Patrick thought: a five-hundred-thousand-pound aircraft that seemed to float through the air as gracefully as a blimp. The C-57 Skytrain II — named after the military version of the Douglas DC-3 from World War II fame — was a flying-wing transport plane, resembling the B-2A Spirit stealth bomber but with a thicker bulbous midsection and its three turbofan engines mounted on pylons atop the rear of the fuselage. Originally designed to be a stealthy cruise-missile launch aircraft and aerial refueling tanker, today it could be adapted to various missions by uploading different mission modules in its two large internal cargo bays.