Pandora 2: Death is not an Option (2 page)

Taking this as an opportunity for bigger and better things, he moved around before landing in Miami. After several illegal and increasingly violent professions, he wandered up to Jamaica as part of the crew of a local pornographer’s yacht. Pierre loved telling everyone he met that he was the descendent of the famous eighteenth-century New Orleans pirate Jean Lafitte. With his long hair and manicured beard, he certainly looked the part. The pure truth of the matter was that he was no more a relative of Jean Lafitte then he was of the Marquis de Lafayette of Revolutionary War fame. Still, he reveled in regaling people with his fantasy of pirate blood in his veins and his destiny as a buccaneer.

Being the manipulative sociopath that he certainly was, Bouchard convinced the crew to mutiny. They took over the yacht and slit the throat of the incredulous pornographer. Bouchard and his new minions spent two days ravaging the several porn actresses aboard before slitting their throats too. The young women were then tossed over the side to join their sleazy employer at the bottom of Davy Jones’s locker. Pierre Bouchard sailed the yacht up to Miami, where he was able to sell it to a local drug lord. Realizing that he had finally achieved his manifest destiny as the present-day reincarnation of the infamous Jean Lafitte, he quickly adapted to the life of a privateer by plundering ships, amassing booty, and channeling his inner Blackbeard.

The crew that Bouchard worked with was a constantly shifting entity that gained and lost members with the mercurial whims and moods of its degenerate roster. Some came or went looking for a
more or less raucous lifestyle, but what usually happened was that a late-night boozy argument led to a knife fight that often left one of the combatants lying gutted on the floor.

Two individuals stayed with Bouchard and wound up being his close partners in crime (although he liked calling them his First and Second Mates). The first of these criminals was an unknown cipher who only went by the name of Corso. He was a strikingly uncomfortable-looking man in his early fifties. At six foot one and painfully thin, with long, corded arms and unusually prominent veins, he looked like a cross between Keith Richards and Iggy Pop. He sported a mop of unkempt hair that was starting to go salt-and-pepper. His deeply set, intense eyes and heavily lined permanent scowl made Corso a bit frightening to look at. Behind his back, the men said that the zombies looked healthier than Corso did. He knew of this, of course, but didn’t really care. In fact, he quite enjoyed his ability to inspire fear just by looking at someone. It wasn’t just his looks that made him unusual. When he was a child, he sustained a head injury (due to a completely indifferent and often drunken mother) that had damaged the amygdala in his brain. This left him with a very uncommon condition in which he had absolutely no fear of anything. Things that would normally make anyone run away or at least stop and think had no impact on him whatsoever. He would do any dare, go up against anybody, or break any law. Local kids were in awe of him, although in truth they were afraid of him because of that. The very, very unfortunate thing about him was the fact that he also suffered from CIP. Congenital Insensitivity to Pain is a rare malady that causes a person not to feel any pain. This disease generally ranges from complete insensitivity to any kind of pain sensation to an indifference to pain. Corso suffered from the latter. People with CIP tend to have shorter life expectancies because they don’t know when they’re hurt and could die of internal bleeding or other injuries or sicknesses. Combining this with Corso’s amygdala-based no-fear response would normally be a death sentence. However, because Corso’s feeling of
pain was more indifference than complete insensitivity and because he was intelligent enough to realize the dangers of each, he was very careful about what risks were worth taking and which were not. He knew the value of being able to look into the barrel of a gun with a smile on his face or having someone hit him and just grinning at them, but he was smart enough to also know when to use this talent and when not to. Overall, it made him a very scary individual.

The second person couldn’t have been more in contrast to Corso. Carlos Guzman was a mild-looking twenty-eight-year-old with a slight build and a receding hairline. He was five foot ten with a pleasant face and innocent expression that made him seem bland, harmless, and totally forgettable. Carlos used this to his advantage. Born in Venezuela to a well-to-do family, he grew up privileged and protected. His parents always had wanted him to attend medical school and had groomed him from childhood for the profession. Carlos was an exceptionally bright boy, and he would have perfectly fit into his parents’ role for him—if not for a few rather disturbing peccadilloes. Maybe originating from his parents’ constant talk of medicine and anatomy, young Carlos enjoyed operating on the various cats and dogs he was able to get his hands on. Even more disturbing, he really enjoyed doing this while they were still alive. His parents naïvely chalked this up to his increasing interest in anatomy that any doctor would need, but when two neighborhood girls disappeared, they began to suspect the worst. While he was applying to medical colleges, the third girl disappeared. A week later, her flayed and vivisected body was found artfully arranged in a drainage ditch. This time his parents, fearful of disastrous repercussions against them if Carlos’s hobby came to light, quickly made arrangements for him to study medicine in the school in Colombia. Ever the mild-mannered young man, he graciously accepted his fearful parents’ wishes.

It was not long after starting his continuing studies at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá that the young almost-Dr. Guzman
started up his bloody outside activities again. He continued undiscovered until the body of a young man he met in the bar was discovered with his entire intestines removed from his abdominal cavity and arranged neatly next to him though still actually attached. To make matters worse, the victim’s eyelids were Super Glued open so he could view the operation in its entirety. Carlos’s parents had recently cut him off from any more funding, and he had been reduced to seeking money from a local member of the drug cartel. A series of misadventures on Carlos’s part and the suspicious and curious nature of the loan shark led to him following and then catching Carlos in midoperation on a prostitute whom he had just abducted.

Knowing Carlos owed him money and a little unsure of what to do, the cartel’s loan shark asked his boss how he should proceed. Paco Lamentoya, Bogotá’s cartel kingpin, was an imaginative criminal. Intrigued by this upper-crust serial killer, he had the young man brought to him. Paco wanted to see this killer himself. The interview proved to be life changing for both. Originally intending just to kill Carlos after his curiosity was satisfied, Paco listened to this rather plain-looking monster speak of his intense lust for causing pain and decided to use these interests for his own agenda. There happened to be a little problem of certain drug shipments arriving short, and he was having trouble finding out exactly who was responsible. It was down to four men, and normally he would just kill all four to make a point. However, the longtime trusted associates were very valuable for their knowledge and expertise. He hated to lose three of them for nothing. Making an unusual executive decision, he put Carlos on the payroll as sort of an inquisitor-in-residence. All Carlos Guzman had to do was find out who the guilty party was without leaving the others unusable. The young, sadistic serial killer threw himself into his work with gusto. His study of human anatomy, nerve centers, and pressure points, as well as his experience with just how much pain a person could take before dying, proved to be invaluable. In one day the culprit was uncovered, and the other three were returned to
their positions, much older but much wiser. The traitor was given to Carlos both as a gift for him and as punishment for the miscreant. It took five days for the unfortunate thief to die; by then he had been reduced to the level of a broken, gibbering animal.

All went well for Carlos Guzman for a few years. Then Pandora came. After flying to Miami to meet the cartel representative so he could be used to make an example of a couple of local hijackers, he became stranded in the American city. As fate would have it, one of his chaperones was Corso, who was working this as a side job while Bouchard was lining up another yacht takeover. Corso also saw the opportunities in Carlos and brought him into the fold, where he quickly attained the moniker “Dr. Death.”

These and others like them in the pirate crew were now holed up in the northeast portion of Key West.

3

E
veryone had finally entered the resort hotel’s lobby. Sean, Mike, Jack, and the rest of the Jersey contingent, along with Tommy, his squad, Jake, and the former residents of Diamond Sea Estates, were there. Also attending were Regina, whom they all had become friendly with, and Mel Gorman, a crusty charter-boat captain whom Jake had taken a liking to. Jake, seeing all were there, walked to the middle of the group seated around him.

“Thank you all very much for accepting my rather abrupt invitation for this informal meeting. I apologize for any disruptions this may have caused to your various agendas.

“As some of you already know, I’ve been communicating with a close friend of mine via the marine channel on the yacht. This person is Matt Logan. We have had several business dealings over the years and have become close friends.”

Tommy raised a hand with his index finger pointing up. “Excuse me, Jake. Is this the Matt Logan who heads Dark Delta Security?”

“Yes, it is,” said Jake, smiling.

“Wow,” said Tommy, eyes wide and head shaking. “That is heavy-duty.”

Jake nodded. “Of course. Matt Logan used to be a Delta Force operative when he was much younger. Using his knowledge and instinctive business acumen, he started a private security firm based in Washington, DC. I know, what with Blackwater and the rest, that the private security outfits have not had the best press out there. Matt was different, though. He used only highly vetted ex-Delta, Seal, or other Special Forces vets. Maintaining a training regime second to none and keeping only the best of the best, he hired out only to clients who were aboveboard and had America’s interests at heart. He wasn’t looking to loan mercenaries or adrenaline junkies to third-world dictatorships. Also—and this is not well known—he worked with some of our government agencies.”

“You mean like the CIA?” Naomi asked.

“Nooo, I’m speaking more of the kind that doesn’t have any initials and stays very black and deep cover,” Jake explained. “Anyway, Matt has a satellite office on the island of Antigua. After Pandora, the prime minister of Antigua invited Matt and his entire staff to take up residence on the island. In return for keeping the island zombie-free and keeping out any outside criminal cartels from using the island as their home, Matt would be given free rein to do as he saw fit. Matt, who had his men all over the globe, saw early on in Pandora that disaster was happening and flew all of his operatives home before the countries closed their airports. He has all his own planes, so that was not a problem. When he got the invitation, he jumped at the chance. He has been getting in touch with his various friends and business partners and inviting them to come to Antigua to help set up a competent infrastructure to rebuild a new island nation.”

Jake stopped and looked around the room. He was looking for early reactions to his information. He could already see that several of the group had already made the mental jump to where he was going.

“So,” he continued, “Matt asked me if I would come and help reestablish the economic infrastructure there.” Pausing, he glanced around. “I have accepted his offer. I think this is a good thing, a safe thing, and the right thing. I also spoke to him about everyone here in our situation. Matt assured me that all of you are invited and would be welcomed there. As he said to me, ‘We need good people here.’

“I know this is a sudden decision, and I understand that something of this magnitude needs time to digest. Today is Monday. I would like to leave by the weekend. I would love everyone to come with me. I immensely respect all of you, and frankly, I have grown quite fond of you. But I truly understand if you choose not to make the trip. This may not be everyone’s cup of tea, and you may have different goals to achieve. To those of you who stay, I sincerely wish you good luck, good health, and safety. But know this: the invitation is a standing offer. If you change your mind, you will always be welcome. I have some preparations to make now. Let’s all get together at a later time and revisit this to see where we all stand. Thank you.”

With that, Jake smiled a small smile, clasped Tommy on the shoulder, and walked out of the room. For a minute, everyone just sat there and looked at each other. Morris Jacobi glanced at his wife, Emma; took her hand; and stood up.

“Jake spoke to us earlier. We are going with him,” he said. Then he looked at Bob Mills who nodded at him. “Bob and Margaret are coming too.”

It was as if the floodgates opened at that point. Everyone started talking at the same time. Questions flew, opinions were given, and then more questions were asked. Most of these seemed to be of the going or staying variety. Sean at last stood up and put his hands up. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold up. This is getting us nowhere. Let’s break this meeting up and talk individually, and tomorrow we’ll meet again.”

“Good idea,” Tommy remarked. “I’d like to see everyone in my squad in the lounge right now.”

With everyone still talking and gesturing, though at a much quieter level, they all got up and walked out of the room in small groups. Sean, Linda, Mike, and Sue were softly talking when Jack came up to them.

“Some news, huh?” Mike said to Jack as he came up and put his hand on his shoulder.

“Oh, yeah,” said Jack, “although my brother Tommy suspected something like this was in the works.”

“Really?” Linda asked.

“Yeah, he told me the increased radio chatter gave him a heads-up that something was brewing, and he just put two and two together.”