This is the story how we found Luca. A boy who was traveling with his mother in Mexico.
The story is written by Debra.
Debra has written the book Dirty Business which is published on Amazon.
I am not a believer. Not in any way. But time was running fast, and I feared we were too late. I must admit I hoped for divine intervention to find Luca alive. But then again. My team is one of the best teams in the world. If Luca was alive, we would find him and save him faster than any SWAT or SEAL team on the planet. After all, we can go places a US treaty can’t!
I got an idea. I called Celestine at home. I had to try. Celestine is my sister. She was raised in a monastery in Thailand, and she can see things. I don’t believe in supernatural shit, but Celestine is the most honest person in the entire universe, and I believe HER!
– I fear for Luca’s life I told her. Can you tell me anything that can help?
She was silent as a vacuum for 20 seconds. I didn’t say anything because I knew she was trying to get in touch with Luca.
– He is weak, she said. Barely alive. You must hurry. His light is burning out fast. Look for a five-pointed star!
We all know a thing or two about saving lives. After all, we are experts in taking lives, so it makes sense we are able to save lives too. Not to make amends. Just because it is the right thing to do. I think some wise guy once said something about that in a martial arts movie, but I couldn’t remember who he was.
My second sister Len is a huge help. Besides being the one flying around two yards above the ground doing roundhouse kicks, she is a skilled nurse and as such a goldmine for the team. We have emergency medicine on board – enough for most situations, but if we find Luca, we probably need to get him to a hospital fast.
So, I checked the map and my phone to find all the emergency rooms in Mexico City.
At the Undertaker, Coach would be able to monitor our phones via GPS, so I sent the emergency room addresses to him. He would then be able to guide whoever found Luca to the nearest hospital in case of an emergency.
And Dave is MINE! He is a former NAVY Seal and worked many years as a merc in Africa – which almost cost him his life.
Dave’s satellite was on top of everything, but the angle was quite flat as it was somewhere over the US, and it wouldn’t have an optimal view over Mexico City where we were. But it would help to some degree. SAT COMM would work just fine so audio and video transmissions would be possible. It’s only the optics that haven’t got optimal conditions.
– We move in five! Dave shouted. And remember! Get their wallets, phones, credit cards, bank info and anything else that could be of interest regarding evidence and money!
– At 1400 hours we are all in place and the OP is a go.
– If any of our perps refuse to talk, shoot him in the foot. Pain is an international language. Everybody understands pain. The sensation of being shot in the foot and not being able to stand up straight will flatten most pride and resistance. I know. I tried it myself a few times.
Internally we need no reminders to collect evidence and financial info. That’s Standard Operating Procedure. But we had new operatives on bord this time who didn’t know about these details.
We had no time to rent cars, so we stole them from the streets around the hotel. Police wouldn’t find us fast enough anyway so we should be OK. We had an hour to find our locations.
Dave and Psycho faced two locations each and if no one warned their perps they would be able to take no 14 and 15 down fast as they were close to their first locations.
I had one of the five bosses to entertain and at exactly 1400 hours I kicked his door and jumped in. I would have liked to open it silently and sneak up on him, but the door was locked, and I was in a hurry.
So, he would have a few secs. to prepare which meant I had to be ready to take down an armed guy.
I quickly swept the apartment and I found him in his office waiting for me. With a gun as expected of course.
With precision, I positioned my firearm at the threshold, lowered my aim, and discharged a barrage of bullets from my magazine. Swiftly reloading, I unleashed a few more rounds before silently peering into the room. There, I caught sight of my target cowering behind his desk in a desperate attempt to shield himself. I aimed my gun at the desk’s edge and strode forward, firing strategically to keep his head down until I could close in for the apprehension.
– Show me your gun! Slowly! I commanded.
But he didn’t. Well, he did but not the way I wanted him to. As I scanned the room, I caught a glimpse of his firearm protruding from the top of the desk, his hand tightly gripping it. In a desperate attempt to regain control, he blindly fired in the direction of the door – a futile effort as I had already anticipated his reckless behaviour and taken precautions.
The corners of my lips curled into a smirk as I observed his foolishness, believing I would be stupid enough to occupy any space in his line of fire. Little did he know, I was one step ahead.
He fired a few rounds more before I shot at his hand. Dunno if I hit the gun or his hand but he dropped his gun on the floor while swearing and cursing loudly.
My chance. Fastly behind the desk and introduced his head to the grip of my gun. He fell mourning to the floor. And bleeding I should add.
– I know what you do, and I am here to stop your bad business. I want to know where you operate on people, or I will operate on your brain with a 500-degree hot bullet! I hit him again to indicate the sincerity of my intentions. Besides I was furious. I really have no compassion for people who steal kidneys from kids. I desperately wanted him more than dead. But I needed information.
– Your organisation made a grave mistake a week ago. You snatched a 10-year-old American boy. I have made a heartfelt promise to his mother to reunite her with her son. And the cost is of no significance to me! Do you understand?
He looked quite terrified. But he didn’t answer.
On his desk, he had a small photo in a wooden frame. He was in it. So was a woman and two kids. Maybe 8-10 years old.
– These your kids? I asked and threw the picture at his face. I pushed him harder to the floor and forced him to look at the image, by holding it in front of his scarred face, while noticing his nose hair was long enough to almost touch the image.
– If you don’t tell me where Luca is you will never see your family again. I won’t kill you. I solemnly promised my sister not to. But I will make sure you will never see your kids again and you will live to regret what you did and miss them for the rest of your pathetic life.
He said nothing. I took his silence as an expression of his consent.
My skinny biceps don’t look impressive, but my anger from the injustice this villain caused, provided me with the strength I needed to pick him up and drag him out of the apartment, down the stairs and into the car.
– Step on it Freddy! I commanded.
Took us twenty minutes to reach the city limit where he pointed out an abandoned factory behind a tall metal fence.
– This is a big place, where do I start looking?
– The basement. He spoke.
I cuffed him to the wheel, and I went in. I messaged the address to Len and called her on my way down the stairs.
– I’m in an old factory looking for operating facilities.
I just sent you the address. Come over as soon as you are finished.
– I just got the same address from my perp! On my way! She said.
This was a huge place – couldn’t figure out what they once manufactured here, and I looked in every room I could find but nothing looked like an operating room. Everything smelled old and musty like no one had been here for years. The floors were dirty like you won’t believe it. Everything made of metal was rusty.
I found a heavy metal door behind some stairs, and it was securely locked, but I couldn’t leave without looking in there. So, I took my pick and started working on the door while Dad entered the room.
– This is getting crowdy, I said while I smiled at him. We must be at the right place.
The door gave up after two minutes and voila. Here it was.
The smell of chemicals revealed everything. But no Luca.
– Did you take your perp here? I asked Dad.
– Yes, he is in the trunk of my car.
– We need to ask some of them a question or two.
We ran upstairs as fast as we could, and Dad escorted his perp violently into the building while I dragged my perp the same way.
– The boy we are looking for isn’t here. Where is he?
Dad’s perp did some kind of fast movement with his eyes to avoid eye contact. I interpreted that as if he knew something. So, I hit him in the head with my gun and he fell to the ground. I like introducing perps like him to my Glock! It demands a lot of respect!
Being hit in the head usually has a way of eliminating the will to resistance away from people.
– Who is the doctor and who disposes of the dead bodies?
At the same time Dad twisted the other man’s arm – my perp, so far up his back he could pull his own nose hair from behind. I couldn’t hear if it snapped or not because the sound of broken bones would have drowned in his screaming.
But they sang like a boys’ choir, and we got a name. And an address. It was where Alma was. I immediately called her. She was en route with her perp – the doc and five minutes later she arrived.
She dragged him out of the car. That woman has a firm grip on men!
I did the same to him. I mean… The gun to the head at a certain velocity. And he also dropped to the ground.
– I assume you operated on a 10-year-old American kid one of these days and I want to know where he is. What did you steal from him?
– I… I… ehh…a kidney. Yesterday. I should have taken both, but lightning hit the building and the power disappeared.
– So where is the boy now?
No answer.
In situations like this, I still get overwhelmed by my demons. The shadows from my past are knocking on my door reminding me how it feels to be stuck in a dead end with no escape. A victim of torture and rape. Tied up and the only thing I could do was to shut down emotionally, and mentally and bypass my body. Luca was assaulted, sedated and too young to handle his situation, but because of my demons and my beginning understanding and accept of my past, I would go a long way to extract the necessary information needed to find Luca.
I kicked him so hard in his stomach that he probably broke a few ribs. He whined like a chicken farm right before feeding time. And his breathing stopped for a few seconds before he talked.
– Me and José drove him East – to the Bordo Poniente Landfill. He was dead so we dumped him there.
Dead!?? As my heart filled with sorrow and anxiety, I cuffed my perp to some pipes and dragged the pseudo-doctor to the car: I fired up the GPS on my phone and we headed for the landfill as fast as we could.
– Dad, you better call all the guys. If this is a huge place, we need them all. Maybe also call the police and see if they got some dogs. And an ambulance!
It took a little more than twenty minutes before we arrived at the landfill. It was huge. Depressingly huge. And closed. Looked like it had been shut down a long time ago.
– Take me to the place you left him, I commanded.
The quack walked around searching for something recognizable. We walked for ten minutes, and I was just about to lose my patience.
– I believe it was here, he said.
I looked around. Busses, cars, bikes, plastic bags, bricks, tires, cans, bottles, rats, barrels, rusty pipes… as long as I could see. It all looked the same. Dad, Alma and I searched but it seemed like an unconquerable challenge.
Dave and Psycho arrived first, and they started looking right away. It was getting dark so if this was going to take much longer, we needed light. We all had flashlights and it helped some, but the visibility slowly got shorter.
Rachel, Garcia, Goldie, Wes, Mason, Owen and Angel also arrived. They all had their perps cuffed in the car or the trunk. Angel was kidnapped and trafficked to Albania two years ago, but she escaped by killing three of her guards.
Police showed up. Four of them. Dad had told them the entire story on the phone, and they arrived with two dogs.
I have no idea how long time we spent searching. Time passed by fast and at the same time it felt like time had almost stopped. It was getting darker.
But we still weren’t able to find Luca.
The ambulance arrived.
The visibility was low, and I felt desperation and hopelessness creeping upon me.
Then I saw it. A small rusty truck almost buried in the trash. With a yellow five-pointed star on the door. I immediately remembered what Celestine told me.
– Over here! I shouted. It’s here!
I ran as fast as I could. Fell a few times but finally reached the truck and started looking around it.
I removed a lot of plastic bags as fast as I possibly could. He had to be here!
After turning fifty or sixty plastic bags and a few broken bikes I finally noticed something that didn’t fit in. An arm.
– He is here! MEDICS! I shouted.
I removed the last pieces of garbage, and Luca was free.
I immediately checked his breathing and his pulse. Nothing.
– Fuck me! We are too late, I said but picked Luca up quickly, put him on an old door and started giving him CPR anyway. Len was over as fast as a hurricane and started blowing air into his lungs while I gave him CPR.
We had to go on until the medics could take over, but we couldn’t move him until his heart started beating. Moving him would mean we had to stop working on him while carrying him to the ambulance and that could easily be fatal. So, we continued.
One of the paramedics gave Luca an injection, maybe adrenalin and Len and I continued to work on him while Angel held his hand.
Actually, the medics and us took turns in holding his hand, breathing for him and pumping his heart. Len is a nurse, and we have all done this before. We weren’t strangers to injured or lifeless persons. But it is fckn tough when it is an innocent 10-year-old kid! It’s not fair! The world is fckd up by selfish morons who couldn’t care less about other people. I think I hated half the world at that moment. Probably more.
Time went by so fast, and two hours felt like ten minutes. I could NOT give up! This is sooooo unfair! A ten-year-old defenceless boy! And some jerkoffs stole his kidney and left him for dead in this lousy dump!
Cockburgers!
Now, this is not a movie where medics give up after 10 minutes. I know from experience that it is possible to get people back even after hours of CPR. So, I was determined like hell to go on.
The longer time it indeed takes the less the chances. But it’s not impossible.
nd as long as Luca had a slim chance I was determined to fight for his life.
To this day I dunno what happened. Suddenly I saw Celestine leaning over Luca in a flood of soft light and placed her hand on his chest and this warm golden light floated from her hand to his heart. And boom! His heart started beating!
I was not surprised about Celestine. She was nearly 2.000 miles away in Santa Monica, but she can do things my rational mind can’t understand. And never will.
But I was so happy!
– Got a pulse! I shouted. Get ready to move him!
The paramedics had everything ready and after a few more minutes Luca also started breathing and we carefully moved him to the stretcher.
He was still unconscious, but the medics had an electronic beeper that indicated his heartbeat rate until we got him into the ambulance, and they took over.
The ambulance started driving with howling sirens and we all followed in our stolen cars. The police didn’t even think of checking! They hadn’t room for all these criminals so Dad and his friend helped drive all the perps back to the station.
We arrived at the emergency room 12 minutes later and the doctors there had everything prepared.
All we could do now was wait.
Goldie got to work on all the credit cards we stole right away. He actually confiscated quite a sum. These fckrs would not be able to afford a lawyer after Goldie visited their bank accounts. But they didn’t deserve it anyway.
Two of the police officers from the landfill asked questions and tried to get an overview of the situation, and we told them what happened.
Dave came over and hugged me.
– You did a wonderful job tonight!
I didn’t know what to say. I don’t think I did anything that anybody else wouldn’t have done.
– Geeeeeezzzzz what a fucked-up world we are living in, I managed to say while resting my head on his shoulder.
– I feel like I walk beside my self. Like I am partly in a wrong hostile reality and need to come home to my body.
– I got you! Dave said and hugged me tight.
Two hours went by before the doctor came out from the operating room. It was two very difficult hours not knowing if Luca would make it or not.
– Thanks to you he will make it, the doctor who came out of the operating room said.
– He is missing his left kidney, but he will be able to live with only one. He will recover and we will keep him here for a few days.
– He was delirious when he got here, because of infection. He said a word right before we anesthetised him. He said “Angels”!
My eyes got wet. I know exactly what he meant. It was Celestine! She was there at the exact moment he would have died. And she helped him. She guided him back. We couldn’t have done this without her!
– Will you call Luca’s mother? I asked Dave.
If Goldie hadn’t worked all night on the intel and if Dad hadn’t arrived with his friends and if Goldie, Garcia, Rachel, and Angel hadn’t flown the helo in advance and if that lightning hadn’t taken out the power in the abandoned factory and if we didn’t steal all those cars and if Celestine hadn’t told me about the yellow star…
It could be pure luck. It could be destiny.
It might also be because we are so God damn good at what we do…