22

It had been a week and Macy was back to work and Richard was just there smoothing things out for the Dragon Empire without much to do.
His days were low key as he supervised his daughter’s meals, her meds, which had reduced and he was happy that she was good, supervising her homeschooling, playing for her, going to the office for a few hours and then coming back home to play with her.
He didn’t want to inconvenience Macy by sending Melvin to her because he knew that she is busy getting ready for the upcoming shooting.
May had managed to infiltrate the crew by pretending to be Macy’s assistant.
From the report he got from May, Angela was fuming. She wondered how and why Macy got an assistant. She, Angela, was the one allowed to assign one to her and since, according to Angela, Macy wasn’t a star like her, she didn’t need an assistant.
Thus, Angela asked May to leave because she won’t be paid and Macy said that she was there because she was Macy’s friend and had decided to help her friend in her very first big role.
Macy was also surprised but she played along. She could tell that May was not a bad person in the few days they had spent together.
One morning as Richard was getting ready for his day, his special phone rang.
This was a red phone he always carried around and only two people had that number. Not even many people knew he had that phone including his brother and his daughter.
He didn’t receive the call because the phone rang for only three rings and he knew what that meant.
He called his daughter and bidnhwr good bye and then called Asher.
“Take care of Macy. Cash is here but just make sure that she is okay, okay?” Richard said with urgency and he parked a small bag and left.
When he decided to take his father’s offer of coming back, he knew this was bound to happen. He could t change who he was.
He went up to headquarters and there on the table he hadn’t sat on for a very, very long time, lay a red file.
Red meant urgent. That meant that the mission was urgent and he had no time to dilly dally.
He opened the file and as he thought, it was an assignment.
The file
In Dela Lucia, a small Latin American country in the farthest southern part of South America was holding it’s general elections.
People were tired of the ruling president Mr Antonio Fusco. Antonio Fusco was the defacto leader of that small country for the last twenty years and he was always elected without opposition. Anybody who always tried competing against him for the presidency died mysteriously or ran mad after disappearing for a few days.
This made it that no one had the guts to run against him.
He was a leader who sold his people to slavery, dealt in illegal weapons, funded terrorists and other illegal groups to make sure that he remained president.
The country was so run down that there wasn’t a functioning good hospital or schools because the country could barely pay civil servants.
This made it that everyone became tired and they started calling for change.
Not one person had the courage to face Mr Fusco in the campaigns except one Jose Maria Luis who was a former army general.
The man had also worked for the CIA and that was why he had the courage because the American government promised to help him.
The situation at Dela Lucia had now become a Human Rights issue due to all the killings and mass murders.
But now there was a problem, General Jose Maria Luis was missing. He had been missing for two days and they needed a good retriever to go and look for him and save him.
There wasn’t any other better than the Dragon known by many in the underground American businesses as Zeus.
“Everything was ready and Richard always worked alone and so, he just texted his brother that he would be away for a while to make sure that Melvin ate and slept on time and took her meds and classes seriously.
“Don’t go disturbing Macy at work,” Richard added as an afterthought and turned off his phone and left.
There was a special place specially chattered for him and it left Dulles airport at around four in the evening. It was a marine aircraft and thus, he would arrive on time because they would fly nonstop as they didn’t need permission from flight towers in the other countries.
He was travelling president style.
The journey that would take around sixteen hours on commercial planes took him only eight hours and he was dropped off at Santa La Paz airport at around one in the night.
The pilot gave him a one way cell phone, “call me when you need to be picked up,” the pilot said as he started the rotors and flew away.
He was now in Dela Cruz’s capital, Santa La Paz without knowing where to start. Good thing he had been given a number which to call.
There was a man who would be his handler and Richard couldn’t trust anyone. The last time he did, he ended up incapacitated and he had to hide in a ditch for four days without food.
He thus didn’t call the number he was given. For all he knew, the man could also be working for Antonio.
He left the airport and took a taxi at the gate. He had already won a disguise and even Melvin wouldn’t be able to tell that this was her father. He was a badly dressed old man who seemed like he had sewn the better of life with sharp eyes
He took a taxi and asked to be taken to a hotel where he could lodge.
“You new in Dela Lucia?” The driver asked as a way of making conversation.
“No. It’s my third time here. First time came here with me wife fi our honey moon. That de wa thirty years past,” he faked an accent even couldn’t tell where it was supposed to be from and answered the man.
He didn’t want to appear auspicious by keeping quiet.
“She died, God rest her beautiful soul. Though she was as hard as a stone, that wan. She di fly ti village with her sharp tongue. Oh, mi amor, I miss her,” he said as he sniffed.
“Sorry sir, my condolences,” the driver said regretting starting a conversation.
“It’s okay. Me here on our anniversary. I feel like Ima follow her soon. I want to tell her that me kam again like me promised her,” he said while sniffing.
“Okay. Where do you want me to take you anywhere in particular sir? There are hotels I could recommend,” the driver said sadly as he admired this man who would travel from…?
“Where are you from sir?” The driver asked.
“Jamaica me man,” Richard said the first name that came in his mind. He wasn’t a hood speaker. He loved action but he knew that to make sure that he didn’t appear as suspicious or stick in the man’s mind, he had to make conversation and be nice.
That way, even if anything were to happen, no one would suspect him.
“Oh, Jamaica. Nice. So, anywhere in particular?” The driver asked again.
“Oh, when me wife and I came we stand in de hotel near the star house. The… errr, the… what was it… mmm…” he pretended to think hard.
“The Catalina? It’s the one nearest the State House,” the driver supplied.
“Is it that? Me old brain is failing me memory. Yeah, take me there. Me want to see the same views me old lady and me looked at when we came here,” the old man said and the driver smiled fondly.
“I hope I could find a good woman like you to grow old with,” he said and then his face dropped
“What’s the matter me boy?” Richard asked feigning care.
“Nothing. There is no hope. I was engaged to this girl. She was killed by a rebel belonging to Antonio’s street army because she refused to be his girlfriend. Nothing was done because they are the law.
Only of general Jose didn’t go missing. We had hope but now it’s gone with General’s disappearance. It always happens. He was brave to have tried. At least we had hope for a while,” the driver lamented and Richard lifted the corner of his mouth in that way he did when he was hard at thought.
“Anyone knows where he was taken?” He asked in his American accent and it was lucky that the driver was absorbed in his own sorrow to notice.
“People suspect that he is in the rumoured dungeons in the State House or dead already. But they can’t kill a general because they know that the army light rise in protest even though he was retired.
There is a youth group that has come up to fight and they are demanding for his release.
I don’t know how long before that are found and killed,” the driver lamented and Richard was listening.
He was getting information without looking suspicious in any way.
“Of de General was to be found, do you think people would vote for him?” Richard asked again.
“Without a doubt. People are tired of Antonio. He is a murderer, a thief, a rapist, a terrorist and all. The hospitals have no doctors or medicine.
Schools have no teachers. Government offices are a sham, anyway, hey, sir, we are here. It was nice carrying a foreigner. It’s easier to talk to you because I can’t vent these things to a local. You never know who is Antonio’s spy and who isn’t,” the driver said with a shy smile and Richard smiled at him kindly.
“Dot worry son. You never know what de next day brings,” Richard said and paid.
He stepped out and watched as the young man drove away.
He then looked at the gates of the hotel where he had been dropped and smiled.
He then started walking towards the area that was clearly the state house by the size of the house and the lights.
He wanted to do a survey of the surroundings before deciding how to get inside.
He felt like killing Antonio once and for all would solve all the problems Dela Lucia had but he hasn’t been ordered to.
His mission was clear: retrieval of the General.