“Definition: A fallen angel who is lost on Earth and doesn’t know what is to become of her. 

Someone who is good but seen as someone bad.”

Urban Dictionary

It was time to make another trip to one of the ammo vaults. A circuit was planned. Carbonell wanted to do a split run. He needed to pick up a couple of boats that had been left behind by another of his groups. Army incursions into the southern Departments had increased over the last few months. They needed the boats because of the amount of ammo they intended to move. It would be too heavy and slow to move it all overland to where they needed it. The boats, and their motors would have to be portaged in a couple of different places. Pirogues, although canoe-shaped, together with their motors, are heavier, bulkier, and more difficult to carry than canoes. They have to be manhandled, carried, and dragged through the jungle. But that was still faster and easier than hauling heavy crates of guns and ammo. Most of Carbonell’s men were deployed to get the boats to Fernie’s dock. Carbonell  and his small crew of four, including La Zorra, were going to the weapons cache to open the cache and start getting the ammo out of the ground to a prepared hiding spot close to shore. Altogether, they expected the journey to take about five days.

Their arms depot was in the jungle on the outskirts of a newly reclaimed farm. This move would be the last of the old stash they’d stolen from the Army so many years ago. They’d recently reorganized their supply routing to come from Ecuador. So this move was to make way for supplies coming in next month. The old stuff had to be gone.

The farmer was a lifelong guerrilla sympathizer. He was on their “payroll”. His farm could never pay enough to maintain even a small family above the poverty line any more than anyone else in the area could. He did small engine repairs that helped keep the area’s fleet afloat and operational. Colombian peasants typically live well below the poverty line. Each family in the department (Colombia is divided into departments, not states or provinces) had a different deal with the guerrillas that provided much-needed cash or other staples, even medical supplies at times. They lived far enough away from each other to keep them from intruding on each other’s business. Regardless, they all knew who made what. Their remote location made government monitoring of their activities a costly venture that made inspection tours rare and expensive.

La Zorra was the contact. The farmer would never see anyone else, or know where the ammo dump was. Its secrecy was part of the agreement, and breaching that agreement would be fatal. Essentially, he was paid well to know nothing. That was fine with him. His family had no inkling of the deal at all. While La Zorra was there, the farmer knew to keep himself, and his family close by the house, and not in the bush where there could be a chance encounter with the guerrillas.

When La Zorra knocked at the door, it opened. She walked in peering around in the gloom.  A gun muzzle touched the nape of her neck. She stiffened.

'How did they know I'd be here right now?' she wondered, looking at the remains of the family meal on the table. 'This is a setup. But not by Fernie. Someone from our group did this. Someone high up. Who?'

The farmer, his wife, and two children, a boy and a girl, were standing before her in the gloom. As her eyes grew accustomed to the dark, she could see dazed looks on their faces. Then the shapes of soldiers materialized, each with a rifle aimed at her.

“Don’t utter a sound if you want to live.” She gasped, but otherwise kept her silence. A second later, a rifle butt to the back of the head was intended to turn out her lights. Instead, she spun around, elbowing the man behind her in the throat and grabbed his rifle and yanked it up at the ceiling. The resulting gunfire from the AK-47 was enough to alert her men. She got another butt to the head and that did put her lights out.

There was a silence in the shack that seemed to last hours.

Finally, “Why don’t we take her outside and hitch her up to a fence post and use her for bait?” one of the soldiers volunteered. 

Outside, they undressed her. Under her clothes, they found she was a pale white, undeveloped, prepubescent child. Not much to look at. Kind of scrawny. Her unconscious form was carried out to a fence post. The rails were kicked away. Plastic cable ties were produced, and her hands were secured behind her encircling the fence post. Two of them lifted her up and strapped her legs to the post. Still unconscious, she drooped forward, drooling into the dirt, head hanging, her thick, almost waist-length hair loose, shielding her face and torso almost dragging in the dirt.

“That won’t work. Stand ‘er up again, let’s cable tie her to the post at the neck.” This was done, but her head was still sagging. The sergeant grabbed her long hair and tangled it over the top of the fence post to hold her head up. “We want her to be able to appreciate the finer points of being fucked up by the National Army, don’t we boys?” A couple of guys cheered.

“Someone get the family out here. They can watch. If she doesn’t answer our questions, we’ll shoot them one by one. José. You guard them. Line them up against the house. If this bitch doesn’t answer our questions put a bullet in one of them. Start with the mother.”

The family, all but Fernie crying, were lined up against the wall of their house. José, guarding them, was trying to look fierce, but he didn’t feel that great about possibly shooting the mother of the children standing right in front of him. But he reasoned that he’d seen enough of his comrades shot and killed by children who looked just like these kids, so no mercy. 

“Serge, get some water and pour it over the girl to wake her up.” La Zorra’s white skin was already starting to turn pink in the sun. 

A pail of river water woke her up. “Okay, you ready to answer questions?”

Nothing.

“Do you know what we’re going to do to you if  you don’t talk?”

Nothing. 

“Every time you don’t answer a question satisfactorily, Jose is going to shoot a member of this family. Are we clear?”

“She’s a mute,” the farmer said.

A shot rang out. A soldier dropped, blood started to ooze from his forehead. Everyone ducked except Serge, who had her and the fence post between him and the shooter. He figured he was safe. A sudden thought struck him. He stepped into her, bent over her, reached for her head and attempted to kiss her. Her head smashed forward with the little slack she had, crushing his nose and pulling out some of her hair. He screamed and recoiled into an upright position. A rebel’s bullet caught him in the forehead. He went over backwards with a rooster tail of brains and blood spraying the cart track behind him. 

The soldiers dove behind steel oil drums, a wagon, some shrubbery, and the corner of  the house. None of it bullet-proof. The barrels were all empty. More shots rang out to keep the soldiers pinned down. Once set, though, they returned a blanket of fire that nearly eliminated the need for cover. 

Carbonell had six men with him. He was facing, by his estimate, at least 20 men. The other reason he was there today was because they were short of ammo after a raid a couple days before. He and his men didn’t have enough ammo left to fight a protracted gun battle. It was a worst-case scenario. Carbonell did not want to shoot La Zorra unless he had no choice. He told his men to be patient, and make every bullet count. It became a waiting game.

What Carbonell didn’t know, was that there were two soldiers in the pole barn out back. Once the hidden soldiers determined the direction of fire, they slipped around the house and into the jungle. 

Meanwhile, Carbonell’s men took out a couple of more soldiers in the yard. Doing so gave away their locations, so they had to move. The noise they made moving covered the noise the two soldiers made approaching them from behind. Before Carbonell’s men could launch the next volley, the soldiers picked off two more rebels. A mad scramble for cover ensued.  With just three men left, he wasn’t in a position to storm the property.

One of the snipers had gotten lucky and clipped Carbonell. He lost a corner of the bony ridge over his right eye. He nearly fainted from the impact. Blood erupted. The snipers chased them deeper into the jungle before turning back. If it weren’t for the thought of the girl on the post, the two soldiers would have continued the chase, but she was too tempting. 

A month in the jungle with no girl, no female of any description, a pine board was looking like a viable option. Back in the farmyard, were two live girls not counting the mother, so no strings attached. It was hard to concentrate on the chase when they knew their quarry wasn’t coming back. Besides, the longer they followed the rebels into the bush, the greater the chance they’d be picked off themselves in an ambush. Turning back was an easy decision.

Back in the farmyard, order had been restored. The farmer and his family were lined up against the wall of the house. They all should have escaped in the confusion, but they couldn’t leave their youngest behind. He was too small to run, and out of reach at the moment.

The dead soldiers were moved to their army all-terrain 6x6, an American supplied, heavily armoured vehicle designed for moving in rough country. They’d brought it to use as transport if they found what they were looking for - an arms cache rumoured to be in this area. They couldn’t leave comrades behind.

One man was wounded. He was tended to. Pain or no pain, he was not going to miss the event they all knew was coming.

La Zorra was still on the post, glaring defiantly. Lieutenant Orñez ordered her removed from the post. He’d decided that she was too easy to shoot where she was, and so were they. He didn’t plan on repeating Sergio’s mistake. The spectacle idea, glamorous as it was, was just too dangerous. He didn’t want Carbonell taking potshots and spoiling their fun. They moved her behind the 6x6, put down a blanket from the house, and spread her out with a man to each hand and foot.  

“Are you ready to answer some questions now?”

“She can’t answer,” the farmer’s wife said.

“What’s your name?”

Silence, lips moving. 

The soldier turned and shot the farmer’s wife in the leg. She dropped like a stone, screaming.

“What’s your name?” La Zorra glared back but said nothing.

“What? No answer?” he turned to shoot again.

The farmer screamed, “SHE’S DEAF! SHE CAN’T HEAR YOU!”

The soldier turned back around and stared at Quinn.

“What’s her name then?” he asked the farmer.

She stared back at her captor, defiant but helpless. 

“We know her as La Zorra, the farmer replied. “We’ve never heard anything else. She never speaks.”

“Is that so? We’ve heard of you, La Zorra. I wish I could say it was nice to meet you. But no, you were with a group that killed my brother and my best friend. Death would be too kind for you. He turned to face his men. “Guys, have you ever heard of La Zorra? Do you have a personal message for her?

Several angry men surged forward. They’d have started beating her right then if not ordered to stand down. The farmer's wife was crying and moaning.

“‘Boys, this is a heaven-sent opportunity. She is La Zorra. I say she’s one of the Devil’s daughters. Remember the last Daughter we did? Now we have this one. She’s another demon. These little girl soldiers are deadly. This one has probably killed many of us, including my brother and Ramos, my best friend. What do we do with a beast like that?”

“FUCK HER!” one yelled. “LET’S BURY HER ALIVE LIKE THE LAST ONE!” Orñez held up his hand for silence. 

“How old are you?”

Nothing.

“You look like you’re nine or sixteen. We can’t tell. You know that? We wouldn’t have to dig a very deep hole to bury you, would we?” Turning to face his comrades, he told them, “It looks like we’re going to be robbing the cradle boys!” Another cheer, though more subdued this time. They didn’t want to draw Carbonell back before they were finished. 

“How about you lead us to the guns? You’re here to recover a stash of guns that belongs to the army, aren’t you? We can make this a lot easier on you.”

Silence.

Lieutenant Orñez turned and shot the mother in the head. The family screamed as one. 

“Oh, right, you can’t answer me. Well, if you can’t talk, you have other uses.” Orñez looked up at his comrades, “Should we take her back to headquarters or should we have some revenge and some fun at the same time? Who wants to take her back?” No answer. “Who wants revenge?” A murmur of agreement. “WHO WANTS SOME FUN?” Cheers all around. “Let’s do 'er then!” yelled Orñez.

“Not me.” Everyone looked about to see who’d spoken. It was Dom, the youngest and newest Black Ops member. 

“What’s your problem, Dom?” asked Orñez.

“This is a little girl. I’m not fucking any little girl, I have a little sister. If anything, our mission is to bring her back for questioning. If you want to fuck someone, fuck the other one, the farmer’s daughter over there and let’s finish our mission clean, amigos.”

There were some rumblings of anger. “Look, Dom," Orñez said, "you’re new. You don’t know what it’s like to see your friends and family murdered by these little girl soldiers. They may be young and cute to look at, but give them a gun and they’re just as deadly as any other soldier. This one, she murdered MY BROTHER! MY BEST FRIEND! Plenty of others, too. This one is famous because of her red hair. She's Chinese, too. She’s a rare fuck amigos. She’s known. Everyone wants her dead. Besides. Like I said. It’s personal. Really personal for some of us, including me. We want to end her ourselves. You already know that taking her back to headquarters will be nothing but hardship, and getting her there won’t yield any more information than we’re going to be getting out of her right here. If she could talk, that would be different. Maybe. But she’s deaf too. How do you question a deaf person who is also mute? You don’t.”

“Regardless, it’s not the mission.” 

“No, it’s not THE mission. But it’s our mission.” Saying so, he drew his revolver and fired a heartshot, killing Dom instantly. “Sorry guys, somebody like that, we can’t trust. He’d get us all court-martialled.” Dario, Manny, dump him in the river, will you? Maintain cover so you don't get shot yourselves just in case. Keep his ammo, but chuck his gun in the river.”