L. in A.d. ( The confrontation )

Barett's plan, at least the version he could come up with in 30 seconds, is to get out of here and find Utah. He is trying to pressure these locals to let him move out of the building, he needs room to move, get a sense for what is going on. From what he can deduce from the elephant and others is that there is a rivalry going on in town. The two groups argue and fight over things and have divided the town in half. They are afraid to leave the village because of the Predators at night, and are fighting among themselves in the village during the day. No real blood has been spilt yet.
Barett moves out in to the small plaza in the center of the village, right next to the odd church. Trying to excite the villagers and make a lot of noise, in the attempt to find Utah. He brings the group right to the edge but they won't go further, stopping just at the halfway mark. From across the town the other group has assembled, two large crocadile bipedals are at the center, one holds a large caliber revolver, the only gun he has seen so far, the rest hold tribal swords and the like. Out of the big building on the southside, steps Utah, surrounded by six others. Barett is a little surprised to see him in the opposite camp, but it looks like from the way they are acting that they hired Utah for the same purpose as Barett, to control the whole village. Shouting insults at Utah, he tries to incite a riot, so that he can escape. No luck on that, just as things start heating up a large hippo bipedal steps out from a small hut, his priest like robes wrapped hastily around him. He starts calming the villagers down, " My brothers, my brothers. " he says. " Please calm yourselves, there is no need for violence, please stop." His large presence and charisma calm the crowd, he speaks in tones of love and the like, very convincing like. If Barett wasn't such a hardened solider he may have believed some of it. The elephant drags him away from picking a fight with the Hippo, and back to the large distillary. The building is really a series of interconnected structures, maze like in its configuration, one addition connected to another. He stills thinks that burning this whole place down may have been the right idea. The elephant leads him upstairs to a large, well decorated room where an old man sits, surrounded by lackies. This is the real leader, he questions Barett about a few things then summons a strange old women from the shadows. He didn't notice her before and gets a strange vibe that she is all trouble for him. The old man asks her to read the future about Barett and the other stranger. Before she even pulls out her bag of magic crap, he butts in.
" Look I'm trouble and death for everyone around me." He says with as much grit and menace that he can muster. " That other mans my brother, my twin brother. I can take him, and you.." pointing at the old man. " Will rule this village, is that not what you wanted ? " The old man nods at Barett then waves his hand at the Witch. She throws some bones with writing on them on the ground, and spits in her hands, mumbling something to herself. She looks up at Barett and then to the old man. " He will betray you, he is dangerous. " she snarls between her rotting, black teeth.
" I told you that I'm trouble, but I will do my part, I will shoot this man." says Barett.
The old man looks him over and the old witch, then over to the elephant.
" We can't do anything till dawn as long as the priest is here, we will wait till then, find him a comfortable room to rest till then." and motions for Barett to leave.
On his walk to the room Barett finds out that the village makes a alcohol that is picked up from men that come in trucks about once a month, another 3 weeks away. The other group on Utah's side of town grow the grain they use to make the alcohol, there has been some problems in the past. Then the Hippo priest came in, then things settled down, but the old tensions are still there. The Priest is an outsider, someone they think was sent by the people who buy the alcohol. But none of these things really matter to Barett, right now he is going to get some needed rest, at lest for three hours.
In the morning, having slept with his hand on his gun, he marches right out to the plaza. " Hey you ignorant, slob come out and fight me. " He screams at the top of his lungs, towards the other big house. Utah steps out not long afterwards with a Girl Barett recognizes, Tsai Lee, the swordwomen. The two crocs are with him also. Barett keeps yelling at Utah and pointing to his chest where the armor plate is, signalling him to shoot him there. Just to get things started Barett shoots the croc with the pistol in the head. It was a clean shot and he drops where he stood, this agrivates the other croc and he lunges at Barett. Utah commands him to step back, but he still goes forward. Hitting Barett in the shoulder with a tribal sword ( well more like a machete ). Utah fires at the same time hitting the croc and killing him. Barett falls back and lets the body of the croc fall on top of him, faking death.
This event causes the whole crowd on both sides to go wild, and a massive riot rolls out through the whole village. Seeing an oppertunity to leave Utah grabs Barett, swings him over this shoulder. " He is one of mine, I will do what I want with him. " He yells, as they approach to tear Barett's body limb from limb. The Hippo priest is trying desperately to restore order but the whole thing has turned into one big bar brawl. Being ignored for now Utah starts walking out of town, Barett over his shoulder and the girl in tow. Barett whispers," Lets get some food and water before we go, maybe start some fires on the way out." Utah agrees and sends Tsai lee to start some homes on fire, as they grab some food at the little shop by the gate.
Barett learns from Utah that they had Tsai Lee tied up in the basement, naked and tortured. She had been sent on a mission almost 4 weeks ago that had gone wrong, and she was left here. They gave her to Utah to work for them. Clothed and with a tribal sword she walked with them out into the desert. Barett knew she was trouble, he was just hoping it was the good kind of trouble.

L.in A.D..The village

It was right out of some 1970's National Geographic magazine, right down to the fuzzy lens shot, there sat the small village. The red mud walls about ten feet tall, small one man look out towers unevenly spaced along it, the out line less a geometric shape and more a exageration of the natural roll and twist of the small valley it was sprawled in. Larger than it looked from the distance, the village contained several large buildings, multiple entrances and one large church like complex in the center. On the west side were several large fields and stock yards, and a large gap between the towers along that wall. The strange thing to Barett was that this village did not show up on any of the intel maps he had seen, or even a hint of one on the map he now carried. By now it was almost 2:30 in the morning, things were pretty quiet, almost dead in the village.
" There are no incandescant lights in this place." whispers Utah to Barett, " That just ain't right, all the lights we saw are lanterns and fires, best to not disturb the locals. I say we sneak in on the west side into the gardens, check the place out."
Barett agrees, the plan being to throw rocks at opposite sides to distract the guards and jump over the wall in the middle at the darkest spot. Barett goes first, swinging over the wall and into the gardens quietly. Utah makes the jump good but catches his foot on a wooden grape vine support, breaking the wood, the shaking grapes, making a loud noise. Running through the garden to the church like building, they hear the beating of metal drums, a warning cry goes up through the whole village. Managing to sneak into the large church building and climb the small tower, Barett can see dozens of people gathering along the wall. Strangly they stay on either side of what would be considered the middle of the village. After some cursory searching the two parties start arguing with each other. Deciding that this distraction would work well for cover, the brothers start to sneak over to the largest building on the north end. They leave the church, at least thats what they called it, more like a cross between a buddist temple and a country cathedral, with a large fat hippo statue at the head, behind a podium. They make thier way almost two hundred feet before popping around a corner, only to scare a small child. Instantly it screams, that high pitched, nails on chalkboard, but higher decibel level, death scream. As he is running towards the large building, people start streaming from the small huts along the way, Barett thinks, ' where did all these people come from and why do they even have metal drums at all, this kid is better than a air raid siren ? '
Diving through the makeshift window on the wall closest to him,in to the largest building in the village, as two seperate groups converge on him. Barett finds himself in what appears to be a large, medevil design but operating, distillery. Large wooden barells, charcoal stoked fires, tubes and vats. Thinking that his last flash/boom grenade in here would make a great distraction, he contemplates blowing the whole thing up. Looking around he notices that Utah did not come through the window with him, he is no where to be found. 'Where the hell is Utah' thinks Barett. Heading for the door on the east side he is confronted by villagers with farm tools, spinning to the west he can see a large elephant at the head of another group. Slowing down enough to realize that killing all these people is a bad idea, he waits for them to make the next move, slowly lowering his rifle and waiting on them.
The large bipedal Elephant speaks in a think south african accent, difficult to understand when added with his bad lisp. " How did you get past the predators, how did you get in ?" Barett finally makes out after the third time. Seeing that none of them are carrying guns, but tribal swords and spears mixed with farm tools , he relaxes a little more. " I killed it with my big boom stick. " Says Barett loudly, shaking his rifle in front of him. " Nasty little bugger, quick as hell."
"You killeddd de Predetor, You kiillleddd de nasssty ?" Spits out the Elephant surprised.
"Yea, I killed it." says Barett throwing down the metal dart he took from it.
The whole crowd goes hush, as they look back at Barett then the dart.
"You work for me, do job. " says the Elephant, all excited now, Barett can tell he is not all with it, a bit slow. " Be big man, much good, Silver bars in it for you, food, women, what you want?"
" Sure " says Barett, " lets do it now, who do I need to kill?.....where is the target ?"

Lost in African Desert

The cool night air moving across Barett's arm, lazily draped out the open window of the beat-up 68' camero, was the most comfortable thing that had touched his body in the last 48 hours. The open desert was dark and quiet, the dirt road, if that is what you wanted to call it, more of a rut through the red dirt and low weeds, meandered mostly straight ahead, to the south. Utah Blaine sat next to him, almost unseen, all decked out in black combat gear, a subdued skull in camo painted on his face. Utah kept tapping the fuel gauge on the dash and swearing, the needle dropping faster than even this lead sled should comsume. Barett eased back in the seat, inhaling deeply, the stench of stale tobacco and spilled coffee invaded his nostrils, the stolen camero had done it's job, gotten them away from the complete cluster failure of the mission drop zone. But now they were heading south, instead of north to the pick up landing, gas slowly leaking out of the old car, lost temporarily somewhere in the desert.
That would not be so bad, if it wasn't for the fact the radio's were toast, so much for high impact plastics. Ammo was low, lest than 80 rounds between them and seperated from the rest of the team. The twin brothers sat silently in the dark, waiting for the last drops of gas to push the camero as far as it could. Utah pulled it to the side off into the sand and weeds, the ground was flat and open with no real cover, letting it roll to a stop. Stepping out onto the sandy ground they stared at each other. "Lets keep moving south, most roads go somewhere, or past something. Perhaps we can find a radio or phone to get an extraction point out of here." Barett says, nodding towards the south. " I agree, nothing left to do but look for a place to hold up and get a line out." Says Utah Blaine, weary with the only option being to walk through the desert in the dark.
The walk goes with out excitement for almost two hours, the night sky not lending much light to the road they are following. Soon the dim lights of a small settlement shimmer in the distance, not very bright they seem more like fires than incadesant lights. Barett guesses that it could be 10 miles or more away, and suggests they keep an eye out, about two miles later they hear a scream in the distance. The scream and the unknown village, not on the intel maps, make them very cautious. After some time they come across the bloody mess of a gut pile. Searching the organs they appear to have been humanoid, and the large paw prints show that something came this way not long ago. Following the prints they come to a small ravine hidden by the shadows and rocks. Down at the bottom they see the remains of a goatman shepard, local sandals and robes lay bloodied around the pile of torn flesh.
They are just setting up to follow the tracks when two figures race toward them, one on each side of the ravine. Moving quickly on all fours the first throws a small, metal dart at Barett the second one at Utah. The twins duck and seperate, Barett to the left Utah to the right. The first tango ( unknown figure ) jumps at Barett. Swinging his rifle stock up to block the blown, and knock him down he makes a lucky strike right across the bridge of the nose, cracking the skull and killing him. The second tango moves away as Utah strikes at it missing. Barett takes a couple of shots with the rifle but he has moved to far away in the dark for any more shots to be taken. After some discussion they decide to heads towards the small village.

Coontail mystery ( the post log )

From the files Barett had taken from the Navy ops. center he learns that the Rich Rat, is a very powerful man. He does a lot of Business with the Pacific City states Navy, and the government, and has his hands into lots of things, but appears to be above board. The folder does contain a psych.evaluation that provides a lot of light on why things happened the way they did. According to the eval. the guy was obsesive about his reputation, that he was always clean. It seems that the whole event and problems with Barett at the college, was in a home owned by the Rich Rat. When things went down, he was called in and questioned by the police. He blamed Barett for the whole incident and felt it damaged his reputation, a blemish that he didn't deserve. He had invented things in his head and was hearing voices he thought were from old statues that he kept in his personal museum. The norns, or the three fates of Norse mythology, were some statues that he thought were telling him what to do. That is to kill Barett, problem that he was having was that Barett's alias had no history, the Rat just thought he was some punk college professor. When things proved more diffucult and Barett made the rush on his house ( though not sucessful by Barett's standards ), he ran scared. Now there is a lot of dead people spread across the northwest because one paranoid rich guy got burned by accident.
Barett is cleaning up the whole mess now, covering his trail and looking to make sure his cover is still good. If it looks bad, or things don't settle down he will need to go under deep cover and hunt down this Rich Rat. Some things that Barett did learn was that his training as a sniper saved his life, but his lack of a large edged weapon and training with one, was a major problem. He is looking into taking some classes on sword fighting. He is also setting up some other safe houses all along the coast.

Coontail mystery V (the house )

Barett looks himself over as he sits in the SUV at the bottom of the hill. The large house on the top smells of money and excess, an exotic design of Korean and domestic woods, it lays on a tactically superior position. Having took more damage than he first thought, he wraps his multiple wounds, and plans his approach to the house. Sneaking in the undergrowth, he can see through the large windows a Beautiful women with a sword walking around. Even at 2 am. there is still some activity in the house. Swinging around to the side he jumps the high wall and sneaks around to the back. The house is a series of connected buildings, interlaced with bridges and paths from one to the next. He can faintly make out conversation on the far side of the complex. Tripping an alarm he dives under one of the bridges for cover, shooting at the guard that comes looking for him. The return fire of a shotgun catches his leg, stinging the flesh, leaving the guard in his hiding spot around the corner of the building wounded. Barett busts into the back room attempting to make his way towards the front door and out, only to be intercepted by two guards with swords, striking one with the butt of his gun as he runs by. The other slices him across the shoulder with his sword. Deciding that this doesn't look so good for him, Barett makes a quick dash for the front, shooting out the large glass window and diving through. Running off into the dark forest, dodging and weaving. Scrambling into the SUV he heads into town, licking his wounds and rethinking his options, realizing that the farmhouse that was being shown on the screens in the operation room was his, he heads to his backup safehouse, a storage unit in town, loaded with ammo and guns, medical equipment and a motorbike.
After a few days of rest and some Stiching, he scouts out a small island for an meeting/ ambush. Sending a note to the Rat on the hill to meet him there in a few hours, Barett sets the trap. On the beach he plans a funnel trap, a series of booby trapped positions leading back into the forest with a truck at the back for a quick escape if needed, with a boat on the far side of the island. Just as he is setting the final traps up, a helicopter sweeps the island. Pulling out his .50 cal sniper rifle he shoots out the motor with several well placed shots just above the cockpit. The copter shudders, then smoke pours from the back, it limps down just north of him and bounces down on another small island. Heading back to the truck with a small boat in tow, Barett plans to head over to the copter, when he sees a navy troop boat speeding right at his position. Slapping some armour piercing rounds into the .50 cal, he places several rounds right into the pilots windshield. Taking cover behind the large dodge truck, he shoots at the attackers on the boat, as it crashes into the beach. The front opens and a dozen heavily armed black ops guys jump out. Looking for the one giving signals, and dodging behind the truck, Barett places two called shots to the leader, dropping him. Then picks off the closest guy to him, in the next volley of gun play.
Looking for the second in command, Barett focuses his fire on him and drops him, as he dodges behind the truck for cover. The return fire swiss cheeses the truck, leaving it useless for cover. Laying a volley of surpressing fire down, he heads back into the forest, hoping to lead them into his trap. It looks like a full team of sixteen was sent after him, only twelve remain on the beach now, one having escaped over to the right, trying for a ambush. Falling back to his first postion in the trees behind a log, he knocks down two more before needing to reload. Ditching the empty .50 cal, he brings up the .308 H&K, loading in more armor rnds spots out of the corner of his eye the large guy on the left moving in for a ambush. Dropping several rounds his direction, thinking he may have winged him with one, he goes back to concentrating on the now ten guys moving towards him. Bullets bite into the log and buzz all around him, but none manage to hit. Looking for the next guy giving directions he starts snapping off shots his directions, hoping to draw them closer to him, into the first claymores, just ten feet into the forest undergrowth. The black ops guys are good, but were caught off guard by the bad landing and death of thier leader, scrambling to regroup and form a good line, they concentrate fire at his position and move forward. Several shoots nick him as they blast his superior cover away. Diving back and sneaking through the forest he scans for the guy on his left, trying to backdoor him. Catching sight of him he fires repeatedly at him, after a small firefight the would be ambusher goes down. Sneaking over to his second line, Barett sets up his fire lane and picks off the point guy making his way into the trees, then ducks back down.
Letting them make the final few feet in, while he ducks for cover behind a large tree. Not expecting him to have laid a ambush of this level they walk right into it. When the smoke and dirt clear only five guys remain alive. Using his best trust and intimidate voice Barett yells at them. " Look, my beef is not with you, leave now and I'll spare your lives, other wise me and my men will ' lay you waste' Now go."
Having decided this mission was suicide, they make a quick tactical retreat and drive thier boat off the beach. Barett quickly makes his way to his boat on the far side and heads to the helicopter.
Beaching on the far side he sneaks over to the copter, engaging in a fire fight with a deadly operative, taking a few shots himself he backs him down into a thick jungle. Hearing him move and sensing a trap Barett throws a well placed frag grenade right at him. Killing a worthy opponent. Searching the island and not finding the Rich Rat, Barett makes his way back to the safe house, contemplating his next move.
Sitting in the storage unit, reviewing the stolen files and having just got back from the hospital and finding Mel and Tom in good shape and recovering, Barett thinks its time to end this game. When there is a knock on the door, approaching with gun drawn Barett she the snow leopard woman from the house, she tells him that her boss wants to end this and has called off the troops. Barett agrees to not kill him so that he can get back to his life.

Coontail mystery V ( the final chapter )

After all the crazy poems and insanity Barett finally gets to do some real shoot and scoot. After pulling in a favor from a pilot buddy of his, Barett is falling quickly from the helicopter, into the darkness below. Its just before complete dark, with the last rays of light filtering across the bay. His parachute strapped to his back, and gear stored all over his body, he plans on hitting the water just outside the naval base and swimming over to the building he figures is hiding the secrets that he needs. The water is bitterly cold as he splashes down a mere 300 yrds from his target. Ditching the parachute and donning his Scuba gear, he swims to the west side of the building, only to find no cover. Swiming to the other side of the pennisula, by the boat dock, he finds a little more cover but lots of cameras. Setting some explosives on nearby sailboats, he creates a large diversion. Having sunk his Scuba gear and changed into some black BDU's, he waits for the cameras to switch, holding onto his supressed H&K mp5 with night sights. Two figures exit the building and the cameras swing to them. Hitting the first figure and dropping him, the second dives for cover, after a small firefight the second drops. Rushing the buildings middle entrance he quickly climbs up to the roof, sneeking across to the skylights on the west side. Cutting a hole in the plexiglass bubble and letting himself down a rope into a massive warehouse, he scans the interior, pallet racks of navy crates fill the space and one lone light shines out on the far west wall. Making his way across the large space Barett sees two figures run down a hallway on the eastside, not having noticed him hiding in the shadows. The west side has a 2-story office set up, with exterior stairs to the top floor, High security doors and windows run along the side. Deciding to take one of the forklifts an run it into the window with a light on, he hopes to rush the door surprising the people inside. The noise of the forklift brings two guards from the hiall behind him first, shooting and catching the first with a shot to the head the second ducks for cover and is only grazed. By now the high security door opens and two mp's with M-16A4's pop out, he opens up the MP5 on them, starting a small firefight. A shot from behind grazes him across the thigh as bullets fly from both directions. Dropping both the MP's with the Mp5 he tosses a flash grenade into the room just as two more MP's rush at him, the bang and flash giving him the advantage as he ducks behind the concrete outerwall. Cracking the first guy out with the butt of his gun, he swings his leg out to knock the other over, only to miss. Engaging in hand to hand combat, he repeatedly smashes his gun butt into the two MP's till they go down. Swinging out of the range of the guy behind him in the dark warehouse, He jumps into the room spraying the entire room with a full clip from the MP5, an amazingly accurate burst combined with the grenade has left no one standing in the room. Shutting the door and bracing it with a chair, Barett finds himself in a covert operations room, with live feed of a operation, the video feeds show a small farm house, " This is a total goatf**k" he thinks, looking for another way out Barett grabs a laptop and a dead Admirals ID off the ground and heads out the only other door in the room on the west side. ( He hopes that he can make it out to the parking lot on the northwest side. ) Using the security card he comes to a room full of topsecret files, finding his and the man responsible for this whole thing. Making his way out dressed as a MP he took out, Barett makes it to the parking lot only to be confronted by another, he sucker punches him, knocking him out with one punch. Stealling a suv he makes his way to the House on the hill.

Tsai Lee

Tsai Lee comes from the Pearl River Delta of southern China, the city of Guangzhou, China (Canton). She is a daughter of the Heilong (Black Dragon) Triad Boss.

Her mother and father both come from the area of Lake Baikal Russia but moved to the highlands of Eastern Tibet and the mountains of Laos and China. Her parents then became immigrants after a forgotten war of the area and forced to move one more time to the low land cities of southern China. There they found it a hard go of things and lived a difficult living. Finally the family turned to the only thing they could get into; the secret societies of Gaungzhou. Tsia Lee's mother died a violent death shortly thereafter. Tsai Lee's father was left alone to take care of her, a younger sister, and a baby brother. He was not a good father but because of his skill in people management he rose quickly in the ranks of the triad. Tsai Lee and her siblings were raised by the gang members and had a special place of honor as pretty daughters and son of the second boss of the Triad. Tsai Lee shared an inner part of the Triad circle and learned about society, morality, relationships, honor and such through the gang's rigid hierarchical order. Her father wished Tsai Lee and her sister to be elegant courtesans; flowers of the Triad. But Tsai Lee found she was more skilled in the martial arts than her sister and that she had a more aggressive side to her that led to her causing troubles offending many powerful individuals. Tsai Lee is now a very beautiful Asian women with a scary hard-edge to her personality. She is assertive in her action but reserved in her demeanor. Her best skill is in the sword, in fact a master swordfighter and yet to meet an equal. Tsai Lee is about 5' 5" tall, has long black hair with faint snow leopard markings, gray-yellowish eyes and a distinct dragon/phoenix tattoo on her back.