Tasìa picked through the bodies for more loot. With the netted bag Della gave her, she had room in it to take all of their small arms, magazines, clips and grenades.

Four of their knives were of good enough quality for her collection of combat blades.

She searched through their wallets. Disappointed, Tasìa grimaced to find that none of the debit cards on the operative corpses were as easy to exploit as Faison's had been.

Tasìa was confident that with the right software she would find a means to access their accounts as well.

Still, she had several hundred dollars cash in USD, expensive watches, and high-value jewelry. Special operatives tended to wear a lot of jewelry.

She also took a diamond stud out of El Clavo's nose. Wretched and slimy it turned out to be given she inflicted several wounds on the man's face.

Stealing ain't always pretty.

Given her expertise, this extraction of wealth took her a little over two minutes.

El Clavo's walkie-talkie began to beep.

"Big Daddy to El Clavo. How are we looking? Subject apprehended, or, better still, dead?"

Tasìa grinned. Big Daddy's words made her day. Made her feel extra special. Having a fan club tended to do that to a girl.

She picked up the walkie-talkie.

"Little Sister here. I'm afraid El Clavo can't come to the phone at the moment. Or, any moment ongoing from here on out for that matter."

Several seconds of silence passed by before Big Daddy spoke again.

"Ms. Tasìa del Alma-Gris?"

"Yes?"

"The fuck did you do to my Tier One team?"

She glanced at the corpses. Took a double-take at the burnt remains of Manuel. She did not bother to take anything else from him that she didn't loot before he was incinerated.

"You consider Manuel Tier One? Maybe El Clavo, but Manuel? He got the rest of them killed."

"Whew," Big Daddy sounded out of breath. "Excuse me, ma'am. I need a moment."

She heard several deep breaths and the man walking away from his walkie-talkie.

As she tried to make sense of this, Tasìa realized the PA was trying to get her attention with a blinking blue light.

It was Felicité.

I'm back, Tasìa. Everyone in Ward Nueve is getting interviewed. I had mine. It didn't take as long as I thought it would. I have a new present for you.

Tasìa smiled.

I love presents. Tell me! Tell me!

Tell me!

Okay, okay. I won't keep you in suspense, any longer. I got you . . . Access codes! The SIU is yours for the taking.

"Little Sister, are you still there?"

Big Daddy's voice came back on-line.

That was very thoughtful of you, Felicité. It's exactly what a girl always wants. I have to talk to some head clown. I think he wants to negotiate. Later.

"Right here, Big Daddy."

"Before we continue our discussion, I have to know purely as a professional concern. How did you rope them all into dying?"

The walkie-talkie had a camera. Tasìa took a picture of the corpses lying together and another of the hole she made in the wall. She sent the pics over to Big Daddy.

"See that hole? They never bothered to look up; they just assumed that I went downward as that was the route that would give me the most distance from them.

"I set one on fire. Manuel, of course. The others came scrambling to assist him. I mowed them all down as they stood over him trying to put the fire out."

Big Daddy laughed.

"That's some Sendero Luminoso level fucked up shit, right there, Ms. del Alma-Gris. With your relationship to General Kutuzova, that shouldn't surprise me."

As Big Daddy spoke, Tasìa checked the access codes. The elevator. Something about it caught her attention.

One floor on the elevator route read Code Orange Authorization. It wasn't an entire floor, just a corridor that led to a helipad.

Tasìa grinned from ear to ear in her best goblin-faced smile ever. She knew now how she was going to get out of here.

With the exception of the route to the helipad, Tasìa locked down all the floors, bringing all of the double-sealed doors down.

They weighed eighteen thousand pounds each. It would be a bitch to open them manually.

"Hey, Little Sister, are you up to something? You are not simply using my penchant for good repartee to carry out a scheme are you?"

"Of course not, Big Daddy. I'm just preventing you from doing anything you are going to regret later. Like sending some more Gremlins over to fuck with me."

It was now time for Tasìa to begin her bluff. She continued.

"You should know, I have acquired a little insurance policy."

"Little Sister, it wounds me to my soul to think you would think that I would pull some amateur hour bullshit on you. Do you know how many years I have been in this business?"

"Big Daddy, I'm sending you an exact coordinate. Get one of your bright boys to bounce a Geiger off it. Tell me what you get?"

She sent over a text. The coordinates to the Muskovite.

Big Daddy cleared his throat. He continued.

"While we wait for the results, tell me what we are to expect."

"I have a nuclear reactor on overdrive. Every two hours I send a special radio wave pulse that tugs the rods back as the extra energy from the cycle I started creates a field of attraction that heats the rods up further and further. It's all a bit over both our heads, but trust me, you will want me to keep hitting that button.

"When I am gone, you can send your bright boys in to dismantle it. You are not going to like where those coordinates lead. It is going to keep you too busy to try anything underhanded just to coordinate a little diplomacy."

"Ah, fuck," Big Daddy answered. He got the gist of what she meant.

Tasìa heard whispers on the other end. Some men were speaking into Big Daddy's ear.

He was near the phone, but did not have it up to his ear. She heard him yell to someone, "Shit, shit, shit. How did we let this happen? We have no bargaining chips at all."

"Hey, Big Daddy? You sound like you are shaking like a leaf over there."

"Just found out you got me over the barrel."

"Not a good feeling, is it?"

"No, it isn't, Little Sister."

"Can I trust you'll hang tight while I catch a helicopter out of here."

She heard only breathing for several seconds.

"Do what you feel you have to do, Little Sister. I'm sitting tight."

Tasìa found Della's bunk. With one of the stock Swiss utility knives she found on Mule-lick's body, she cut the zip ties binding Della's hands and feet.

She handed her the knife to cut the other women loose.

Tasìa found Victoria. After she cut the ties binding the woman, she handed her the PA.

"I went to the trouble of finding your son, Sebastián's phone number. Give him these coordinates. With his influence and his business empire it shouldn't be any trouble for him to get helicopters over here and to get the Salvage to back off while we all are transporting out of here."

The former President of Paraguay cried for several minutes before Tasìa could prompt her to get over her disbelief and make the call.

A little over an hour later, as they flew over the complex, Tasìa used her last bluff. She called Big Daddy.

"I just pressed the button one last time. Your boys have two hours before the shit starts getting really hot down there."

"We're still waiting on the spooks to clear out. They are still packing."

Tasìa peered down at the tower. She saw in the fenced-in area something that gave her a moment of pause. A white F-150 just like the one Kae-Kae's killer drove.

Peeking around further, she found him. The white-haired man was instructing León as he carried bags out to the truck.

I'm never working with that piece of shit.

Tasìa thought as she wondered how she was going to break it to the general. She shook the matter from her mind, and continued her conversation.

"Big Daddy, I am sending you a map with an alternative route to the tower cellars so you can get that little business taken care of. It's much more imperative than keeping some spooks with a long-dead mission happy."

She recalled the dream she had the night before and the dire warning she recieved. At least that is what the Incubus would have you believe.

Fifty odd miles out from the prison, Tasìa had the helicopter land on a desolate country road. It was two miles from a safe house she had never told anyone about.

"Tasìa, words fail to convey what I owe you," Victoria began. "I will have our lawyers look into getting you a grant of clemency. I imagine the Salvage will hardly be in a position to object."

Tasìa shook her head.

"It would be a waste of their time. I plan to go back to doing what I do best."

"That being?"

"Raiding the abandoned mansions of Esconda Vida."

Victoria laughed. Her right leg shook across her knee as they sat together in the back seat of the leather-upholstered business copter.

"I was beginning to think that you were some kind of special operative sent to bring us, the Disappeared, back to civilization. You really are a little criminal aren't you?"

Tasìa nodded her head.

"Those mansions are abandoned by those who chose to leave, who could afford the detoxification process, while the rest of us are forced to endure this."

Victoria gave her that politely cross look that only she could pull off.

"I have news for you, Tasìa. A lot of us cross that border. I have been over there on the other side. It is quite a pain, though. You spend a week detoxing, and three weeks in isolation.

"I can see why there are some who choose not to come back until this crisis is over, but I could never do that myself. This is home. No matter if it's somebody else's idea of Hell. This is my home."

Tasìa grinned.

"I could not have said it better, Madame President. I wish you the best of luck."

"You too, Tasìa. You too."

Tasìa jumped out of the helicopter cabin and removed her bag from the storage. The helicopter flew overhead. As it disappeared from view, she texted Felicité.

I made it.

So happy :) Felicité texted back. Don't you forget about me, Tasìa.

Tasìa looked towards the sun, a free woman. It was near to sunset. All around her, the world appeared wide open, ripe with possibilities.

She texted Felicité back.

Never, my friend. Never.

The End of Book One

Tasìa del Alma-Gris continues soon in Book Two: The Premie Harvest