Chapter 6 - The Breach at Terminal 42
At 1:15 a.m., rain began to pour over Lake Michigan, drowning the city in a dark, slick fog.
Terminal 42 was a sprawling industrial warehouse surrounded by shipping containers, rusty cranes, and chain-link fences topped with razor wire. Outside, the lights of the Navy Pier Ferris wheel flickered through the rain, casting long, eerie shadows across the docks.
Inside a modified tactical command vehicle parked two blocks away, I adjusted my dark ballistic vest, pulling a black fire-resistant mask over my face.
"Power grid cut in three... two... one," Frank announced over the comms.
Instantly, every floodlight, security camera, and perimeter fence light across Terminal 42 died. The entire shipping terminal was plunged into pitch-black darkness.
THUMP-THUMP-THUMP!
The sharp crack of high-powered rifle fire echoed from the nearby grain silos as Ghost’s sniper teams took out the two mercenary guards stationed on the warehouse roof.
"Breach!" Leo yelled.
Our armored assault vehicle smashed through the heavy steel chain-link gate at forty miles per hour, plowing straight into the loading bay doors of the main warehouse. The heavy corrugated metal doors burst inward with a deafening screech of torn iron.
Flashbang grenades rained into the dark interior.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Blinding white light and thunderous concussive blasts filled the warehouse. My assault team, clad in dark tactical gear with night-vision goggles, poured through the breach like shadow specters.
"Blackwell personnel! Clear the floor!" Leo roared over his bullhorn.
Mercenaries in dark uniforms scrambled behind wooden crates and steel shipping containers, firing wildly into the smoke. But they were fighting in the dark against men who had spent five years preparing for this exact night.
I moved through the central aisle of the warehouse with steady, lethal precision. A mercenary stepped out from behind a forklift, raising an AK-47. I ducked beneath his sightline, drove my tactical knife upward into his vest joint, and fired two rounds into his chest before he hit the concrete.
We advanced like a relentless wave, clearing the lower warehouse floor in under six minutes.
"Ground floor clear!" Leo reported, reloading his magazine. "Vincenzo is on the upper catwalks, heading for the bridge of the MV Corazon!"
I looked toward the rear of the warehouse. A covered gangway led directly from the second-floor office suite onto the main deck of the Panamanian cargo ship docked alongside the pier.
"Secure the perimeter, Leo," I ordered. "Nobody follows me onto that ship."
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"Boss, you need back-up—"
"I said nobody follows me," I repeated, stepping onto the metal stairs leading up to the catwalk. "This is personal."
