The Chimera: A Black Force Thriller (Black Force Shorts Book 2) Read online

  The Chimera

  Black Force Shorts Book Two

  Matt Rogers

  Copyright © 2018 by Matt Rogers

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Onur Aksoy.

  www.liongraphica.com

  Contents

  Reader’s Group

  Books by Matt Rogers

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Announcement

  Books by Matt Rogers

  Reader’s Group

  About the Author

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  Books by Matt Rogers

  THE JASON KING SERIES

  Isolated (Book 1)

  Imprisoned (Book 2)

  Reloaded (Book 3)

  Betrayed (Book 4)

  Corrupted (Book 5)

  Hunted (Book 6)

  THE JASON KING FILES

  Cartel (Book 1)

  Warrior (Book 2)

  Savages (Book 3)

  THE WILL SLATER SERIES

  Wolf (Book 1)

  Lion (Book 2)

  BLACK FORCE SHORTS

  The Victor (Book 1)

  The Chimera (Book 2)

  1

  Washington D.C.

  Lars Crawford had come to learn many things over the three years he’d spent as a black operations handler.

  The opportunity, at the time, had been impossible to resist. His work for the Department of Defence had grown stale — most of his focus, involving research into human reaction speed in combat, had settled into a monotonous process of repetition. You could only do so much investigation before your subconscious gnawed at you, pleading for your life’s work to be put into practice. Lars had spent many, many years arguing for a division of solo operators, demonstrating through endless presentations to his superiors that sometimes a gifted soldier came along who needed to work alone.

  Three years ago, his requests had finally been granted.

  Ever since then, his life had been a whirlwind.

  Sometimes he found himself grateful for the opportunity. Sometimes he could savour the thrill of sending his operators into some of the most dangerous situations on the planet, because he had full faith in their abilities to succeed.

  And other times — like right now — he found himself so overwhelmed by events that were unfolding, so horrified and hopeless and unsettled, that he felt as if the world was set to come crashing down all around him.

  This time, it just might be…

  He sat in the windowless room with his head in his hands, taking a vital moment to compose himself before the upper echelon of military commanders entered and he was forced to put his game face on. Stress leeched from his bones, leaking into the atmosphere. It was palpable. He could taste it. He wasn’t sure how — when the party of officials stormed in minutes from now — he would manage to act like there was nothing out of the ordinary.

  Ridiculous.

  He didn’t need to pretend all was well, because everyone in the room would understand that shit had truly hit the fan.

  By this point he associated visits to the White House with mind-boggling stress. Black Force — the division he’d run for nigh on a thousand consecutive days — had its own headquarters several miles out of the city centre. He was only ever summoned into the bowels of this enormous building when situations transpired that were unimaginably sensitive.

  Like his current predicament.

  The door opened and three men entered wordlessly — there was no need for flippant greetings or unnecessary conversation starters. All of the group operated in a world with zero margin for error. There was no point exchanging pleasantries. The trio sat facing Lars across the undecorated room and they got straight down to business.

  ‘The informant wasn’t bullshitting?’ Lars said. ‘That’s what I’m getting from all this.’

  One of the men — a balding man in his early fifties — piped up. ‘It appears to be heading that way.’

  ‘How quickly is it heading that way? Because if any of this is in any way plausible, then we needed to act yesterday.’

  ‘If it’s really happening in Bhutan, then there’s not much we can do about it in a hurry.’

  ‘You think that was deliberate?’ Lars said. ‘Setting up their camp in one of the least accessible places on earth?’

  ‘Probably. I’d say that’s what they were going for. They need that window to pack up their stuff and flee if they notice suspicious activity.’

  ‘So we can’t do anything,’ Lars said, a lump forming in his throat.

  Bhutan, with a population just edging over seven hundred thousand, had little going for it in terms of international terrorism hotspots. That had all changed when the informant had arrived in the United States weeks earlier. At first they’d labelled his ramblings as the spouting of a deranged lunatic, but even the most preliminary of investigations had revealed that he might be telling the truth. The days had unfolded, and piece by piece the evidence had been uncovered — most of it coming in the way of discrepancies in the flight logs.

  Lars had been over everything what felt like a thousand times by this point.

  He didn’t need reminding.

  He needed an action plan.

  He dissipated some of the tension in his body by slapping an open palm against the wood surface of the table in front of him. One of the military officials jolted — Lars looked across and recognised the familiar face of the National Security Advisor. His life had become so fast-paced that he barely stopped to register who he was talking to anymore.

  ‘Okay,’ Lars said, taking a deep breath. ‘So this threat could be very real. So far, the flight logs don’t add up. That could mean anything…’

  ‘Well, the monastery is exactly where he said it was. We tapped into a couple of satellites over the region.’

  Lars went pale. ‘You sure?’

  ‘Positive.’

  ‘Jesus Christ, this is bad. And it’s a logistical nightmare.’

  The man in the middle — who Lars couldn’t remember if he’d met before — piped up. ‘We might have a solution.’

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘That doesn’t matter,’ the guy said, and he flashed Lars a dark look that could only mean he was someone unimaginably important. ‘What matters is that I have contact with Delta. Does the name Colt Griffin ring a bell?’

  Lars looked toward the first man he’d been speaking to — the only one who held a position within Black Force’s ranks. ‘Is that the guy we were looking at?’

  ‘Yes,’ the mysterious second man said, even though the question hadn�
��t been directed at him. Lars sensed irritation in his tone. ‘You’re the reason he’s in Bhutan, as a matter of fact.’

  ‘Why the hell is he in Bhutan?’ Lars said.

  ‘Because, apparently, you and your group of lone wolves were interested in him, which meant we couldn’t send him into the field … even though he held some of the best results we’ve ever seen in our Operator Training Course.’

  ‘That’s what we do,’ Lars said, equally irritated. ‘We recruit the best of the best. That doesn’t explain why he’s in South Asia.’

  ‘Soul searching. Finding himself. Who the hell knows.’

  ‘Why isn’t he with you?’

  ‘Because transitioning from the Delta Force to the shadows of your organisation puts my men in a state of limbo. Right now he’s not officially employed by anyone. So I don’t know why you’re asking me the questions. You’re the one who ordered it.’

  ‘So he’s on vacation?’

  ‘Not really. We told him to go home to his family and friends and let them know he might be taking an extended trip. Yes, I know I wasn’t supposed to do that. But I’ve handed two of my men over to you before and I never heard from them again.’

  Lars paused. ‘You think they’re dead?’

  ‘I don’t know what to think.’

  ‘They’re still alive. But I don’t think you understand the sensitivity of what we do. And none of this adds up. Why did Griffin decide to go to Bhutan of all places? And isn’t it awfully convenient that it lines up with the intel we just got? How do we know he’s not involved?’

  The mysterious guy simply shrugged. ‘All good questions. None of which I can answer. You’ll have to ask him yourself. He’s in your hands.’

  ‘He’s our only option?’

  The first man said, ‘He’s the only link we have in-country. He’s the only one who could pull anything off within a twenty-four hour window.’

  ‘He’s one guy,’ Lars said.

  ‘I thought that was your specialty,’ the second man sneered.

  Lars sighed. ‘I’ll make the call.’

  2

  Paro Valley

  Bhutan

  Colt Griffin didn’t quite know what he was doing in Bhutan.

  In fact, he hadn’t been aware of the country’s existence a couple of weeks earlier.

  The last portion of his life had been filled with uncertainty, and all the secrets and withheld information had reached a fever pitch when his superiors had called him into a room and told him he was being released from the Delta Force, effective immediately. Flabbergasted and hurt, he’d predictably made a fuss. Eventually, his commanding officer had felt enough pity to quietly inform Griffin that the results of his Operator Training Course were being closely looked at by a secret division of the United States military. He’d been told to make peace with his past life and prepare for an extended detour through the world of black operations — that is, if he was up for the challenge.

  He couldn’t think of anything else he’d rather do.

  For the past couple of weeks he’d been mulling over what his superiors had said. He’d been told to report to Washington D.C. on March 15th for an official offer, and everything other than that had been shrouded in secrecy. He knew almost nothing about what was going to take place, but he took solace in the fact that he should know literally nothing.

  Command had been generous in hinting at his future.

  There was the potential that he was heading for great things.

  And that was all he needed.

  Family was a moot point, but his superiors didn’t know that. So when they’d told him to go make peace with his past — effectively hinting that whatever lay in his future was akin to a death sentence — he hadn’t felt the need to go back to the hellhole town he’d grown up in. They were the reason he’d fled to the military. He’d do great things without them ever knowing, and that would prove himself more of a man than his father ever could have been.

  Which was how he’d ended up with a two week window to go and do whatever the hell he wanted, granted that he wound up in Washington at the end of his travels. He’d thrown a dart across his tiny studio apartment at a world map poster and it had landed in Bhutan, a portion of South Asia he couldn’t say he was familiar with.

  But Griffin never half-assed anything, or went back on a promise.

  He’d packed a bag with the bare essentials, bought a one-way ticket, and now he found himself here.

  He sat at the edge of a sweeping field of grass, his back to a waist-high wooden fence running the entire perimeter of the property. He didn’t know whose farm it was, or whether he was welcome loitering around its outskirts. He simply needed a place to sit and eat and think. He chewed on a mouthful of jasha maru, savouring the warm chicken stew. He’d bought it from a food cart a mile down the road and carried the wooden bowl to a quieter section of the Paro Valley.

  Granted, everything was quiet out here.

  But that was what he needed.

  He didn’t know much about his future, but he assumed that soon his life would be hell.

  A voluntary hell, of course, considering the fact that he would lay down his life for his country.

  But hell all the same.

  If someone asked him what he was doing here, Griffin would struggle to come up with a cohesive answer. His brain had said go, and he had obliged. A week ago he’d been in Texas, and now he was in one of the more alien, beautiful regions on the planet.

  He’d always been spontaneous.

  He finished the meal and spent a moment soaking in the scenery. There’d been plenty of time for that in the Paro Valley, but he hadn’t yet become accustomed to it.

  The rural trail he’d been strolling down for the past hour was situated at the very bottom of the valley, a flat expanse of farmland dotted with clusters of civilisation. Towns materialised every few miles. Picturesque mountain ranges ran into the distance, most of them draped in low clouds and shrouded in mist. Lush sloping walls of green boxed him in on all sides, leading to destinations unknown. Griffin hadn’t even bothered to consider venturing into the mountains. As far as he could tell, it was a death wish. They were inhospitable and sparsely populated and dangerous to the uninitiated.

  Although the temperature was relatively cool, sweat leeched from Griffin’s pores, largely due to the intense humidity. It certainly had nothing to do with his physical fitness. The six-month Operator Training Course he’d gone through in the Delta Force had put him in the best shape of his life. He was fresh out of the program, which had thrust him into a state of limbo as he wondered what the offer would consist of.

  He hadn’t found out a thing about the nature of his results. Those had been kept resolutely hidden. But they were no doubt being scrutinised, because every other participant in the training course had continued down the usual route to becoming a Delta Force operative. Griffin had seen nothing of them since he’d been carted into that tiny office and told what was happening.

  He got to his feet and slung his hiking backpack over his shoulders, clipping the chest strap across his pectorals. It was roughly a five-mile trek back to the small room he was renting in a budget hotel near the Paro Airport. He’d been strolling aimlessly around the Paro Valley for the better part of a week now, and in the back of his mind the knowledge that he would need to return stateside hovered ominously. Part of him wanted to disappear into South Asia and never return.

  But he had potential, and that carried with it a burden.

  He had a responsibility to fight.

  Especially if the results of his Operator Training Course were as special as they’d been hinted.

  He set off at a leisurely pace, with no pressing need to be anywhere. After a half hour of trudging along the gravel he passed back through the same tiny village he’d visited some time earlier, returning the now-empty wooden bowl to the food vendor along the way. The Bhutanese man with deep wrinkles etched into his forehead nodded, offering a warm smile.

 
; Griffin returned the smile.

  He had no reason not to.

  He was young. He had his entire career in front of him. His ascent through the ranks of the United States military had been faster than anticipated, and it seemed after this brief detour in Bhutan he would be accepting even more responsibility.

  His life, relatively speaking, was good.

  Then he reached the opposite end of the village, passing huts and a handful of stone-walled retail stores selling fresh produce and other goods, and passed by an archaic wired payphone coated in rust. The entire thing had seemingly fallen into disrepair years ago. Griffin took one glance at it and determined that it no longer worked. Not that he had anyone to contact in the first place. He certainly didn’t want to speak to his family.

  He continued along the trail, passing the payphone.

  It rang.

  3

  Something about the harsh shrilling pouring out of the rusting speaker set Griffin on edge.

  On top of that, the timing unnerved him.

  He didn’t believe in coincidences.

  He took a long look in either direction, as if hoping a stranger would materialise out of nowhere and answer the call. But there was no-one in sight. Griffin was as alone as it was possible to be. He didn’t move, listening to the discordant ring-ring, ring-ring cutting through the peaceful silence of the valley. He wasn’t sure what the hell would happen next, but he figured he might as well pick up the phone.