A Long Time from Home Pt. 02 Ch. 04

A moment out of the corner of my eye caught my attention and I focused on it without turning my head. A vaguely humanoid shape was sitting in a bush, looking like he or she was doing their best to stay hidden. "Miss Jobe. If you have a knife, hand it to me."

"Yes, sir." She said with surprise in her voice, but a moment later she handed me a combat knife.

I activated a Vis Power that enabled me to see in near darkness and looked at the shadow again. It was a young man, not much more than a boy, and while he looked harmless, he wasn't alone. Next to him a man with a beard was crouching, aiming a rifle at the Park Rangers, looking like he was waiting for the right time to shoot.

"People in the bushes. Don't shoot." I told Halima and Ferrandis, before I threw the knife in a hard underhand throw and sent out a mental attack in rapid succession. The hilt of the knife hit the man right in the head and since mental attacks were faster than a thrown knife, they both hit him at the same time, causing him to fall and let go of the rifle.

With a curse, Halima drew a gun and pointed it towards the bushes from where the sound had come and shouted, "Don't move!" in Spanish.

Ferrandis sprang into action as well, lifting his rifle and repeating Halima's order.

I tried to see what the young man was doing, but at the same moment, the chopper circled around and the extremely bright searchlight hit my eyes, blinding me.

With a curse, I cancelled the Vis Power and kneeled on the ground, making me a smaller target while I waited for my vision to return.

"Are you hurt, sir?" I heard Halima ask next to me.

"No, just blinded by the light." I answered with a shake of the head. "Give me a few minutes and I'll be fine."

"Yes, sir." She paused and said, "That was quite a chance you took there, sir."

"Not really." I answered, covering my eyes with a hand. "I usually hit from that distance. The problem was making sure that I didn't kill him, by hitting with the point first. I don't know the law here and I don't want to end up in jail."

"Makes sense." She was silent for a few heartbeats, before she asked. "Why not use a gun, sir?"

"Because I'm better with a knife." I explained drily. "I can make that throw ninety-nine times out of a hundred, but with a gun, it's more like one time out of ten."

I didn't add that Petra had persuaded me to try shooting a handgun at the Villa's shooting range, but not only did the noise bother me, I was also not a good shot. At least not naturally and I didn't feel like using a lot of time trying to learn a weapon I didn't like.

"That's bad." Halima chuckled. "Good thing I had a knife then."

"Yes."

When my vision returned a little later, it felt like an anti-climax. The poachers had been secured in the car, including the young boy and the unconscious man in the bushes. The cars had been searched and the Park Rangers had found several endangered birds sitting in cages, along with the skin of a jaguar and two jaguar cubs. A quick search of the memory from the jaguar even showed that the two cubs had exactly the same markings, making it highly likely that they were the two cubs from the mother jaguar in the Jaguar Rescue Center.

On the bright side Ferrandis was extremely grateful for our help and happily gave the now recovered Marco a wooden box with the two jaguar cubs inside, so they could be transported back to their mother at the Jaguar Rescue Center as soon as possible.

The way Ferrandis stressed 'as soon as possible' made Halima Jobe look sideways at me, like she was asking if I agreed, so I just nodded. There was nothing more for us to do here, so we might as well take off and get the cubs back to the center.

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Rescue

Mid-August, Costa Rica

The house where at least some of Curtis' kids were kept was located on a fenced estate in the mountains outside the capitol of San Jose and was well guarded, according to Petra's research. Like the boarding school, it was a former hotel with a lot of gardens and natural areas surrounding it, making it extremely difficult for anyone to approach undetected. The buildings were located in a valley in the mountains about an hour from San Jose, far away from any prying eyes.

The biggest of several problems was that at least some of the armsmen that guarded the kids most likely were the same type of mind-controlled drones I had encountered in Curtis' dungeon, which meant that they had orders to kill the kids in case of an attack. There were eighteen guards with six guards on the inside and the rest was tasked with guarding the outside, working eight-hour shifts in groups of four, so that one group was sleeping, another group was relaxing and the last was on active guard duty. There was a small overlap during 'business hours', but that was the general system.

I wasn't surprised. It was almost the same system that every military- or defence- force I knew of had used since the dawn of time for the simple fact that it worked, but that the guards on the outside at least had some spare time in which to relax told me that they weren't as heavily mind-controlled as those on the inside.

Besides the eighteen armsmen, Petra and her group had spotted at least two people, who didn't look like guards and I assumed that the compound had a small staff to make food, clean and everything else a large compound needed. However, since they were in a house not connected to the building housing the kids, they didn't worry me.

What did worry me was the electronic security and as it was Curtis and not Parker who had set it all up, I didn't have the codes or anything else that would allow a small force to enter undetected.

The size of the house was also a problem, as the kids were kept in different places in the large compound, making it hard to secure their safety.

The only outsiders who could get inside the house without raising an alarm, were the paying customers and even those had codes and secret passwords, depending on who they were. They were also known by the guards, which eliminated the possibility of reading the correct codes from someone's mind and using them to gain entrance. Even the delivery truck that brought them food once a week was useless, as it was an old pick-up truck with no places to hide in.

In short, the possibility of conducting a successful rescue without the use of Powers was nil and even with Powers, getting all the kids out alive was dicey.

On the positive side, the guards around the perimeter looked relax and slightly bored, having guarded the place for a long time without anything happening. They also didn't have any visible guns as that would have brought the attention of the police. Of course, that didn't mean they didn't have any weapons, but at least it would be handguns and not military grade rifles.

Making a decision, I had the women follow one of the customers to his home, and then visited him in the night to read his mind while he slept. Besides giving me a better idea of the layout of the estate, it revealed one important piece of information: There were no cameras inside the house, only on the outside and nothing was being recorded.

That piece of information was the reason why I was sitting in the back of the Dragonfly 12 helicopter, dressed in Iron Silk, and wearing a backpack with a parachute, as it flew towards San Jose airport at almost maximum altitude. Though it felt just as hideous as driving in a car, the luxurious equipped helicopter wasn't as noisy as I had feared, and the discomfort could be tolerated.

As one of the choppers from Curtis' villa, it was a civilian helicopter and not one of the attack choppers from Villa Bonita. I did suggest using them, but Petra and Esther both disagreed as it would be almost impossible to hide the use of the helicopters military weapons and with the absence of a regular military in Costa Rica, the government would quickly figure out who had pulled off the raid.

They did think that using the choppers to get the kids back to the school was a good idea and from what I understood the mountains made it almost impossible to track the helicopters with modern detection systems (They called it a radar).

In front of me Afifa, the good-looking Pakistani who was the pilot, turned her head to look in my direction. "We're at the position in thirty seconds. Are you sure about this, sir?"

I was tempted to say no but nodded with a smile instead. "Yes, it's the only way we can do this fast enough."

From the look she sent me, I was sure she thought I was insane, but instead of commenting on it, she looked resigned, glanced at her watch, and slowed down the helicopter to a full stop. "Now, sir."

With a nod, I opened the door to the cabin and jumped into the night.

The wind whistled in my ears as I fell towards the ground. The helicopter had been farther above ground than I had thought it would be, but I could see the lights from the estate shining like stars against the darker earth and angled my body, so I fell towards it. It seemed like it rushed up to meet me, but as I used my ability to levitate it slowed down to an acceptable speed and I looked around for a safe place to land.

There were none on the ground, so I aimed for the roof of the main building since that was the largest target and touched down silently next to a chimney.

Just to be on the safe side in case there were cameras the customer didn't know about, I tied the scarf around the lower part of my face and placed the hat on my head to conceal the white hair.

Then I placed the unused parachute on the roof, drew my knife and stalked towards the rooftop windows Petra had promised me were open every night. She was right and a moment later, I was inside the building.

Reaching out with my mind, I contacted Delina. "< I'm in >"

"< One moment >" The communication expert replied.

I stayed where I was, until she sent. "< All wires have been cut and the house is now isolated, sir. Beware there's still a single customer inside. Good hunting >"

"< Thank you >"

Closing the connection, I started my search, going through the buildings one by one. Fortunately, there weren't many of the mind-controlled guards and while taking them out did take some time, it was more due to the distance between them, than any difficulty in the take-down itself.

Just to make sure that nobody entered the buildings after I had left them, I used an Ars Mentalis on the doors, that made them expand slightly and jamming them in the doorframe after I had closed and locked them after me.

It also meant that as I moved on, the chances of someone trying the doors and discovering they were blocked grew as time went by and I breathed a sigh of relief, when I reached the end of the third and last building after having taken out the two guards in there. That left only the staff and my mind-read of the guards had shown that they lived alone in a building not directly connected to the rest.

I reached out with my mind to connect with Petra. "< Go! >"

"< On our way >" She replied, followed by a "< Now >" a while later.

At first, I couldn't hear anything, but then the distant sound of gunfire tore through the silence of the night. Unlike the single 'pops' from a pistol that I had heard at the shooting range or the buzzing sound from the helicopter's weapons, this one was a series of rapid cracks, with each shot blending into the next in quick succession. The sound was answered by gunshots that sounded like they were just outside the building.

A movement out of the corner of my eyes, made look in that direction. One of the doors to the kids' room had been opened and a middle-aged man dressed in a housecoat walked into the hallway, stopping abruptly when my mental attack hit his mind and sent him into a coma. A moment later he hit the floor, causing a muted yelp from within the room.

Walking over, I looked into the room and discovered a young boy sitting on a bed, looking terrified. Instead of trying to talk with him, I put him into a deep sleep.

The sounds of guns being fire had disappeared and I waited patiently, until I heard the sound of engines and then reached out to Petra. "< Status, please >"

"< The guards outside are dead or have surrendered and the area is secure >" She replied. "< No casualties, but Svetlana took a shot in the shoulder and is out. According to both Riya and Shoba, we got to get her to a hospital soon >" She paused for a moment and changed the subject. "< I've sent the other group to capture the manager and the ordinary staff >"

"< Good. See you inside >" I answered and walked over to the doors to remove the trick on them, so they could be opened. A moment later, Petra's group of dark clad and hooded soldiers were inside. I handed them the keys I had taken from the guards and they started to empty the rooms.

Instead of helping them, I asked Petra. "Where's Svetlana?"

"In the Landrover, sir."

"Show me."

As Petra had said, Svetlana was laid out in the back of one of the big Landrovers, while Riya and Shoba were trying to stop the bleeding. The bullet had hit in one of the few spots not covered by the modern armor they were wearing and had penetrated deep into the shoulder, breaking bones, and rupturing blood vessels on the way.

Despite her light brown skin, Shoba looked pale as she said. "I don't think she's going to make it. She's bleeding internally, and we can't stop it."

"Hospital?" suggested Petra calmly.

"She'll be dead before we reach it. Even if we use a helicopter to get her there." Answered Riya in a quivering voice.

Looking at the wounded Russian woman, I sighed. Internal bleeding severely limited the options I had. If I used Vis to heal the wound, it would require hours of meditation, which we didn't have time for right now, and that left only Ars Mentalis. That too had its problems, one of them being that it was too efficient to explain away easily, but I would have to deal with that later.

With a sigh, I said. "Shoba, you need to leave. You too, Petra. You're in charge of the mission."

For a moment, they both looked like they were going to protest, but with the loyalty codex, they really didn't have a choice and then Riya and I were alone. "Riya, you need to guard me and stop anyone from disturbing me. That's an order."

"Yes, sir." She said, looking slightly confused as I took off my jacket and shirt to avoid any interference from the clothes.

Placing my hand on Svetlana's wounded shoulder, I sent my senses into her body, looking for the bullet. It had fragmented slightly, but wasn't hard to find and using telekinesis, I got the fragments to the surface. Returning my senses to my own body, I used my knife to cut the bandages off, ignoring Riya's muted expression of horror, and removed the metal pieces.

The problem with Ars Mentalis is that by and large, you can only heal yourself. While that is very nice, it's not useful for healing other people, so a method was invented to overcome that problem. Called Tralativa (Baylon: Transfer), it transfers a wound or any other medical problem from the patient to the healer. Needless to say, this can be extremely dangerous and usually hurts a lot, but it had the advantage of being both swift and efficient. At least for the patient.

With a sigh, I took a leather strap from a small pocket in my belt, placed it in my mouth and bit down in anticipation of the pain that was about to come and activated the Ars Mentalis trick.

A shimmering field surrounded both Svetlana and I for a few heartbeats and then my shoulder felt like it was on fire as the wound was transferred from her to me, while hers were healed instantly.

Pain shot through my body, as bone broke, blood vessels ruptured, and nerves were torn apart.

It took a lot of self-control not to scream and I groaned in pain through the leather strap as I closed my eyes and concentrated on the numerous Ars Mentalis tricks needed to heal the wound. Mental energy soared through my body, cleaning everything and forcing the damaged body parts into their right places, before fusing the blood vessels back together. More mental energy surged as I followed by healing the bones, nerves, flesh and finally the skin.

It took time, but fortunately the pain subsided as the healing progressed and while it would take a while before I could move without reopening the wound, I still breathed a sigh of relief. In that respect, healing was like glueing something together and putting clamps on it: Once the glue was into place, it took some time before it had hardened enough to become permanent, but at least you didn't have to hold it.

I spent some time enjoying the sheer feeling of not being in pain before I opened my eyes.

Svetlana was still out cold, but Riya was looking at me with expressions of disbelief on her face, which in my experience was one of two possible responses for people seeing Ars Mentalis healing for the first time. The other response was fear, and I was glad that wasn't the case here. For some reason, it was never awe or wonder, which would have been nice for a change.

Riya found her voice. "Are you okay?"

Letting the leather strap fall from my mouth, I said "I will be in a little while."

She shook her head. "If I hadn't seen that with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it." She paused for a moment, before asking. "Did it hurt?"

"Exactly as much as being shot, but it was the only way to do it in time," I said. "Just give me a little while to finish healing... then we can move on."

"What about Stella?"

"Her wound is gone, but her body still suffered a violent impact and will need time to recover. She won't wake up for a few hours."

Riya leaned closer and gave a soft kiss. "Thank you."

"Well, I sent them into harm's way. The least I can do is to heal them if it's possible."

She nodded with a smile. "Anything I can do?"

"No really. I just need some time."

"Well, then stay here until the helicopter arrives." She looked at my shoulder. "Can I touch your shoulder?"

"As long as you don't punch it." I replied with a slight smile.

"Good, then I'll use the time to wash off the blood." Riya said.

"Thank you."

Riya took her time cleaning away the blood and when she was done, the shoulder was healed enough for me to dress again with some assistance from her.

The timing was perfect, as I could hear the helicopters approaching just as I left the Landrover and a moment later the first one landed in the former hotel's parking lot. It was the same M8 Banshee that I had been in when we looked for the poachers earlier in the week, and while it surprised me somewhat, that Petra had chosen a military chopper as a transport, it did make sense, as it was designed to carry a group of soldiers.

A moment later the other helicopter came into view as it also landed on the dimly lit parking lot.

This one was even larger than the first one and I recognized it from what I had seen in Parker's memory as the civilian Dragonfly 30, that belonged to Villa Bonita. As the name implied, it originally had room for thirty passengers, but the version at the estate had so much soundproofing and other luxury upgrades, that it could only transport twenty-five persons.

As soon as the helicopters had touched down and the doors had been opened, the women began guiding the kids into them, with most going into the Dragonfly 30. Other carried the stretcher with Svetlana into the Dragonfly Banshee and as soon as every kid was safely inside, the doors closed and the choppers took off, heading towards Vista Verde.

"Shouldn't you have been in the chopper as well?" asked Riya as she left the Landrover and discovered me standing in the parking lot.

"No. I need to read the minds of the surviving guards and wipe their memory, before we leave this place." I told her. "Oh... and I need to persuade both the customer I knocked out inside and the guards to go to the police and confess their crimes."