October's Ghost by Ryne Douglas Pearson Read Free Book Online Page A

deadly ability would be offered, not only for the eyes of Papa Tony, but for the eyes of his masters, for whom a final act of convincing was necessary before committing support to the rebellion.
    Antonio both heard and felt the breath of Ojeda on his neck. It surprised him some that the colonel chose not to watch the scene more closely, but then the man had lived it for so long. In each safe house—a generous term in a country where the accommodations depicted on Gilligan’s Island were ostentatious by comparison—he had been moved to, twelve in all, Ojeda had kept him intimately informed of the preparations and the participants who were signed onto the plan. So strange it was, Paredes had come to realize, that a man whom Ojeda and his comrades had respected for decades could destroy that trust and loyalty with such a minor act. They would have killed for Fidel Castro, but now they would kill to unseat him from power, from his throne of arrogance. The bullet that had killed General Eduardo Echevarria Ontiveros, hero of the Revolution and true leader of men, might just as well have been fired by volley at the presidente himself.
    But acts seen as insignificant by the mighty often propelled lesser men to counter the injustice they perceived with a fury never imagined. And fury was the proper word, for it was something Antonio knew was key to Ojeda’s being, and it was something to be revealed momentarily before his very eyes.
    The flashes were rapid in succession, like a string of noiseless firecrackers exploding to one’s front. The brightness flared the night-vision glasses and were compensated for automatically, the optics fully recovering by the time the sharp cracks reached Paredes and Ojeda four miles distant. A joyous yell erupted from beyond the grove of palms as the sound passed over the rebel command staff.
    Like a coach looking for evidence of mistakes or missteps on the part of his team, Paredes watched for several minutes as mayhem erupted on the base below. Pilots, alerted by the blasts and the subsequent alarm, ran from their quarters to the flight line where they stood, bewildered, as they stared at their suddenly grounded aircraft. To the west of the planes a flash erupted from the base’s maintenance hangar, followed quickly by a bright orange fireball that did not subside. Fingers of orange licked out of the half-open door and the shattered windows as equipment vital to the operation of the aircraft was consumed by the inferno. A few minutes later, as the Hind pilots and crew scrambled to their ships and took to the sky, the final blow of the opening was struck.
    Antonio lowered the glasses as obvious muzzle flashes erupted around and in the control tower. He turned to Colonel Ojeda, who stood in the same position as before, his eyes cast not upon the successful operation unfolding, but toward the sky almost straight up. “Sufficient for your government, Papa Tony?”
    Paredes smiled, wishing in vain that the cameras a hundred miles up could see the look in the colonel’s eyes, for no further confirmation of the viability of this rebellion would be necessary. “Ample, Colonel. It is a fair fight now.”
    Ojeda’s gaze came down upon the American’s satisfied face. At several other airfields across the country similar actions would be happening, effectively taking the Revolutionary Air Forces out of the fray. The skies would belong to no one. Still, it was a fact only of tactical convenience to the colonel. “Papa, I would fight this war with a stick, a stone, and the hate in my heart.” The expression on his face changed slightly, to something that seemed to perplex and slightly frighten the American. “It was fair when they had an air force. Now the battle is mine.”
    Grandiose, some would label the claim, but they were not standing in the shadow of the man who, as lit from above by the bright, full moon, resembled the earthly embodiment of the grim reaper. Antonio Paredes was, and he pitied