CH70
Mac went to her post office box that she kept. She wasn't really sure why she had kept it. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. The stupid thing was finally paying off.
All she found when she opened it was a very small package. Probably bubble wrap inside. Getting to the office with her package. Mac opened it and found a flash drive inside. Inserting it into her computer, she let her anti-virus software run a scan over the entire drive. Which took a few minutes.
Opening the files inside, she started reading. And the more she read, the more her blood boiled.
DC is a funny town. You can skim money and not pay a price. You can actually steal money and not pay a price. You could even arrange to have someone killed and not pay a price. But this! Using HER military like this was just not going to fly. Mac may be a lawyer but she was a Marine first. And Marines didn't back down from anyone. Certainly not some air head Senator with delusions of god hood. HER military was not going to get corrupted by this civilian Yahoo.
Not bothering with either her phone or the intercom system, Mac gets up and opens her front door. "Find Jimmy and Keith. I want them in my office. Yesterday."
Getting a "Yes mam." Mac goes back to her desk and starts making notes based off of the flash drive, and the information it contained.
Twenty minutes later her door opens and in steps two marines. Built like brick walls. Their uniforms are crisp and clean and have probably been ironed to get them that way at least five times.
"Reporting as ordered Mam." Standing as still as a statue.
Mac knows these two well. They have done a lot of work together. And she knows they don't expect her to act like their commanding officer. She is more like an adopted sister to these two. However regulations are regulations.
"I need you two to find this person. I want him in my office. Yesterday." And Mac hands over a piece of paper with his name, rank and unit attached to. And here are your orders should anyone decide to interfere." And Mac hands over more papers. No one says "NO" to the JAG Chief of Staff. No one. Not unless they want to be reduced in rank several steps and then dishonorably discharged.
Giving her a "Yes mam." Jim and Keith turned crisply and exited Mac's office.
Smiling wide, Mac just loved those two. Well not that kind of love anyway. There was only one person that she truly LOVED, since they were quietly engaged to be married. Yeah based on her past, things were only getting better. They were even actively working on her biological clock. Mac was going to make sure they worked on it again when she got home tonight. Yea, she loved those two. Just, not quite that much.
Mac went back to her computer. She remembered reading something. Searching the drive again she found what she was looking for.
Picking up the phone, she dialed her friend in the JAG field office in Seattle, WA.
"Hank, it's Mac." She tells him.
"Sarah MacKenzie, as I live and breathe. I hear you got a promotion. It's about time they put someone with brains in that seat." A fellow marine never forgets another Marine.
"I'm glad you think so. I think this job has way too much paperwork involved with it." Small talk is fine for now.
"Yea, you would probably rather be standing in that court room making whoever is on the stand sweat bullets. How can I help you?" Getting down to business.
"I'm having a courier sending out some information to you. Should be there overnight. I want you to dig up everything you can concerning it. Everything Hank. Step on any toe you have to." Mac is being blunt.
"How big a toe are we talking about?" Does he need help?
"Have you got someone you can trust. Someone who will not back down?" Mac asks. Someone like Jimmy and Keith.
"I think I know just the person. You would never believe it looking at her, but she is a walking tornado if she wants to be. Might even give your Jimmy a run for his money." Hank laughs. He's seen Jimmy in action. He's never seen any Marine any better.
"I think Jimmy would take exception to that. Is she single?" Mac switches gears in a heartbeat.
"Oh, playing match maker now are we?" Hank prods her.
"Maybe." Mac replies softly.
"You give that man a reason to come out here and I'll make sure they 'run into' each other. Accidentally of course." Hank is laughing now.
"All I'll have to do is mention someone thinks they can take him and he'll fly out AWOL just to prove them wrong." Mac is having a little fun now.
"I can't imagine what would happen to this planet if those two had kids together." The thought is almost scary to Hank.
"We'll have a new 'Super Hero" team if they did." Mac really is convinced.
"I'll get to work on what you send straight away. And you get that boy out here Mac. I'm serious as a heart attack." Hank tells her.
"Thanks Hank. You be careful. And I'll think of some excuse." And Mac ends the call.
Hank for his part is wondering what is coming his way that required a personal call from the Chief of Staff. Must be big. So he gets his secretary to find Lt. Natalie Rushman and have her report to his office. Looks like it might be an exciting day tomorrow.
It took Jimmy and Keith all damn day to find this guy. And when they do, he has two friends with him.
When you are fighting the enemy you don't give quarter and there are no rules. The guy that answers the door gets a knee to the groin. He lets out a loud cry from the pain. This has alerted his two friends to unwanted visitors.
Jimmy quickly flips around his opponents back grabbing hold of him as he goes, using his momentum he has created to throw the guy holding his hurting balls across the small room and into his two friends. All three fall to the floor. Jimmy steps over and puts his foot squarely up under the chin of the first guy who starts to recover. This provides a satisfying breaking sound and he falls to the floor, unconscious. This action however has allowed the other friend to pull his weapon and raise it.
Jimmy however is just as fast and grabs the wrist holding the gun. But the guy is just good enough to get a shot off. The bullet manages to miss Jimmy. However it has managed to damage his dress shirt he is wearing. Now mad that he has to buy another shirt, and iron the damn thing 100 times. He flicks his wrist and is rewarded with the sound of bones snapping and the cry of pain from the guy holding the gun.
Unable to now hold onto the gun, it falls to the floor. The guy lying on the floor with the painful balls has seen the gun land just inches from him, and forgetting the pain goes to reach for it.
Jimmy however has noticed this move and stomps his foot onto the guys wrist, and using the motion of a ballerina pirouettes, spinning his foot on the guys wrist while still holding onto the other guys now broken wrist.
Using his free hand Jimmy uses the move to lift the guy with the broken wrist and throw him against the far wall where he lands on the guy lying unconscious from having his jaw broken. Bending down he relieves the first guy of the gun he just found with one hand while using his free hand Jimmy wraps it around his throat and lifts him up off of the floor.
Stretched until only his toes are touching the ground Jimmy squeezes his hand closed until the guys eyelids close then he releases him and lets him fall to the floor, unconscious.
With a little adrenaline still running, Jimmy turns to his friend. "You just gunna stand there or help me clean up the mess?"
"From what I can see you have everything under control." But Keith helps him pick up the place and carry them downstairs to their waiting car anyway.
Keith uses his cell phone to call for a team to come clean the place. They have a delivery to make to Mac. Three for the price of one. What a bargain!
It took almost 20 minutes for the cleanup team to arrive. As soon as they did Jimmy and Keith headed out to the office. They had a delivery to make.
The team swept the apartment. They found three HK automatic weapons. Three hand guns, two of them Sigs. They also found about 5 pounds of Semtex. Complete with remote activated blasting caps. They found one laptop and they found some papers that had been hidden under some recently installed wallpaper.
They also found a cell phone and long distance listening dish. As well as a digital recorder attached to it. There was also $4,455 in small bills. As well as a small duffle bag holding 3 very illegal silencers and one claymore mine also with a remote activator.
Taking all of it back to the office, they dropped off various parts to be analyzed by specialists.
The cell phone turned out to be a burner phone that had only ever called one number that was unregistered. Probably another burner phone. The laptop was encrypted and they were getting nowhere with it.
The claymore however still had its markings and was being traced. The same for the HK's and the Sigs.
The listening dish was nothing special. Even a civilian could get his hands on one if he tried hard enough. The digital recorder however was another matter.
The preliminary report was in Sarah MacKenzie's hands in less than two hours. Keith was holding not one but three men just outside her office.
Listening to these two recount how they happened to run across them and how they were escorted with their silent consent to her office was amusing. Keith hadn't even lifted a finger to help. "There were only three of them." Was his only defense. He had however been a sport about it all and offered to help pay for Jimmy's new shirt.
Mac had made a mental note to reimburse Jimmy for the shirt out of the JAG budget. It was in the line of duty after all.
Mac had let Jimmy go. She had a mission for him in Seattle. Hank would fill him in when he got there. She had told him to pack for several days. He may be gone for a while. Mac was grinning wide behind his back as he left. He had argued that he was needed here. If there were three there were probably more.
"Are you implying that Keith can't handle them?" Mac had teased.
"No mam." Standing ramrod straight. Mac had handed over his orders, and Jimmy turned and left her office.
Mac's only hope was that he married that girl or Jimmy was going to come back. And boss or not, she was going to get an ear full.
Note to self: Buy Jimmy and his wife a wedding gift. And say a silent prayer for anyone who ran afoul of those two and their child. They were going to need it!
Lt. Rushman knocked on the door. Getting an "ENTER". She opened the door and closed it behind her. "Lt. Rushman reporting as ordered sir."
"At ease Lt. I have a project that is going to get started tomorrow. I may have need of your special services." Hank tells her.
"Yes sir. Happy to help sir." Natalie is now excited. Finally a little action.
"I need you dressed and ready for action and in my office by 10:00." Hank hints.
"Serious action sir?" Hopeful.
"I have a courier package arriving AM. We will both find out then. So come prepared."
"Yes sir. I'll suit up appropriately sir." Please, please, please.
"That'll be all Lt." Hank dismisses her.
"Yes sir. Thank you sir." Stepping outside the building. "YES!" She screams into the air.
Inside Hank has heard that scream and has a huge smile on his face and shakes his head. It falls just as quickly as it came. She finds out Mac and him are playing match maker, he'll be lucky if he EVER gets out of the hospital. Then the smile returns. But it would be soooo worth it.
It's a miracle there is even one of these two. Let alone two at the same time. And if those two got together, heaven help us all.
Hank got his package early the next morning. Opening it he found a single flash drive. Inserting it into his computer and running a complete scan on the disk, he started reading. The more he read the madder he got. Someone was playing games with his military. The kind of stuff that had made it off his base under his nose had him trying to break the top of his desk with his bare hands.
Finding the parts he wanted he printed them out and put it in a folder. Then burned a disk of the entire drive and stored it in his safe. Placing the flash drive out in the open with all his other flash drives. Sometimes the best place to hide something was in plain sight.
Right on schedule Lt. Rushman knocked on his door. Getting the expected greeting from her he asked her to sit.
"What I'm about to share doesn't leave this office Natalie. Am I clear?" Hank is dead serious.
"Yes sir. Crystal sir." And Hank hands over the folder he had prepared just for her.
Taking a few moments to read it. When she's done Natalie looks up perplexed. "Sir, how, …?"
"That Natalie is what we are going to find out. Based on the complexity of this, there is likely going to be trouble. You up for a little exercise?" Hank already knows the answer, but gave her the fun of answering.
Smiling a predatory smile. "When do we get started sir?"
"Immediately. Meet me out front at my car. We are going to find out what the hell is going on and what they are doing to OUR military." Hank instructs her.
Standing. "Yes sir." Anxious to break some heads. Or at least some bones. Hank could only smile after she left. Everett was the biggest and best the Navy had. And he had plans for her. He was going to help her be in charge of the entire base if he had any say in it, and having the JAG Chief of Staff as as ace up your sleeve didn't hurt.
