Previously on La Plata: Vice, Ángel Bastardo ordered the boats to go bang.
La Plata Trilogy, FM20-22.
Ángel
As the sedatives wore off and the forest hills became clearer with the helicopter’s descent through the thin fog, Ángel Bastardo knew exactly where he was. The jungle was that what linked Hugo Ojeda and himself, particularly the complex for Venezuelan refugees that had allowed Bastardo to hide undetected in the Colombian rainforest. Just why Hugo wanted to meet Bastardo here, and not at his north coast Barranquilla HQ, was anybody’s guess. But if the rumours were true about Hugo, then madness had truly taken hold of him.
The jungle complex was now in view, a charred carcass of what had once stood tall. Hugo had ordered for it to be burnt to ground, around a decade ago. “An act of idiocy, indecency and an undoubtedly narcissistic move”, Bastardo mused.
“GET OUT”, barked one of the henchmen, as the helicopter landed in what was once the outpost’s central square. A gun pressed against Bastardo’s waist and the weary prisoner disembarked from the cabin, almost losing his balance in the process, as the helicopter’s rotors grinded down to a stand-still.
There, in front of him, stood Hugo Ojeda. He was immaculately dressed in an all-black suit, with the infamous golden pistol, El Silencio, holstered by his side. He looked every part the seasoned Drug Lord and was nothing at all like the young man Bastardo had left on the Montevideo airfield. “Like what I’ve done with the place?”, Hugo boastfully remarked to the weary Argentine.
“If you’re expecting me to beg for forgiveness, Hugo, you’re in for disappointment. Shoot me now and be done with this drama”, Bastardo replied. There was not much left in Bastardo’s arsenal, but his words were intended to wave off his apparent weariness and hope for a quick resolution.
However, if the rumours were true, Hugo had grown to savour every last bit of the murders he committed. It was said that his infamous snake poison pistol would not kill you until it had first drained the life out of you, inch by inch.
“We will come to your death shortly, Don Bastardo. But first, I want to know what your real plans were. You put me in Mexico, and I rebuilt your empire…I’ve become the biggest drug trafficker in all of the Americas. All for you to ignore my letters whilst you sat in your jail cell. When I do get you out of there, you blow my money up on the shores of Miami. A man like you at least owes himself the decency to tell the truth, moments before his death. Why turn your back on your protégé?”
Bastardo realised that Hugo was clearly lost. It’s true, he should never had have been left alone in Sinaloa all those years ago. It had been intended to hide him and was not to empower him.
“There were a lot of bad people in Sinaloa. Putting you there was to keep you hidden, our assets hidden under the radar, from the US authorities, whilst they went for the big Mexican cartels instead. This wasn’t meant for you, this life. You were a child. Now you’re a monster”, muttered Bastardo. He knew that the last line would aggravate his captor and he expected an immediate response, but Hugo stood pensively, his hand cupping his chin, as he stroked his small beard with his fingers.
“I hear things, you know. The bats in this jungle talk to me, and guide me, constantly. They saved me back in Mexico. They talk the loudest to me here in Colombia. I hear them now, and I know what I have to do”.
There were no bats flying around this morning. The jungle was instead eerily silent, something Bastardo had never experienced before. Dark forces were seemingly at work, and with it, the dark skies brought torrential rain: Rain drops as hard as nails that pattered down on the dark earth with abandon.
Hugo had to raise his voice further to make himself be heard over the sound of the sky’s tears hitting the jungle floor. “The bats tell me that you shouldn’t have the privilege of walking the afterlife with a face. Instead, you will walk the Underworld without one. Nobody will know who you are. This is the way to truly rid us of Ángel Bastardo. Gentlemen, bring me the acid”.
One henchman grabbed Bastardo, whilst another moved forward with a vat of fizzing liquid. It was confirmation of Hugo’s delirium, as Bastardo was pinned down to a kneeling position. He was about to lose his face in acid.
“A mad man can’t be negotiated with. I know I’m a threat to you, Hugo. That’s why I did it. That’s why the money went up in flames. Your people would prefer things under my stewardship, but instead they get a mad dog, who’ll get them all killed, one day”.
“Ha, defiant to the end”, Hugo laughed. “I’ll leave you with this, Don Bastardo: ‘Never interrupt an enemy when he’s busy making a mistake’. You once told me this, and Miami was a good mistake to see unfold. Ruslan, Natasha, Herb, Carlos…every one of them now dead. You’re the last of this little rebellion. Now, here comes your suffering”.
Hugo nodded to his associates and the next thing Bastardo felt was the hands of the gloved henchman, as his face was thrust down and forcefully submerged in searing acid. The instant rush of pain was so great that he screamed, pouring out all his energy into the act, before eventually losing consciousness, when he could scream no more.
Hugo
A few minutes passed before Ángel Bastardo’s body became listless. However, a death for Hugo was only confirmed when the black mamba poison hit the target and entered the bloodstream. It would have to be done, but Bastardo’s body would first have to be dragged to the Rio Negro, which sat to the eastern side of the jungle complex. It was a relatively narrow river here, but within a few miles several tributaries would merge, in order to become one of the grand waterways into the Amazon, which then led through to the Brazilian city of Manaus.
Terrible things had been done in this jungle, but this was to be Hugo Ojeda’s final sin. He would soon be free of Bastardo, and there would be no more threats to his cartel’s leadership. But his thoughts soon turned towards Ruslan Chepiga and Natasha Sibiski. Hugo had lied to Bastardo. They were indeed still alive, though untraceable, after the Miami shootout. Their trail had gone cold.
“It is perfect here”, Hugo said to his henchmen, who propped up Bastardo on the shoreline, against a huge boulder that separated the land from the water.
The water was shallow enough to reflect the morning sunlight, now breaking through the brief torrential downpour. The mist generated by the sun’s rays falling on the water’s surface was a sight to behold, as the birds and the buzz of the rainforest returned to its full voice. The ‘Snake of Sinaloa’ slithered closer to the listless body in front of him, drawing El Silencio from its holster. He could see the clouds above rippling in the water, but he couldn’t see his own reflection. In fact, he never saw his reflection anymore; ever since his stained-glass window had grown dark three years ago.
Hugo raised his pistol and took one last look at Ángel Bastardo, before sending him on his way with a one-way ticket to the afterlife. The Argentine’s face had been burnt away, with the flesh still bubbling around the bones of his jaw. Nobody would ever recognise this man again, even if his body washed up downstream.
El Silencio was fired, one last time, and its bullet pierced the torso of the prisoner. The impact was unusually soft for a pistol of its size, but enough to move the limp body away from the boulder and into the water. A kick from one of the henchmen saw the body of Bastardo slump deeper into the water, as the river’s strong current took over and moved it further away from the shoreline. Hugo saw it float away, and as he watched he heard cries that he felt resembled Father Martínez’s, off in the jungle’s depths.
The sins that had taken place in this jungle had made it haunted and Hugo Ojeda vowed never to return here. And neither would Ángel Bastardo.
Notes from the Editor
Friedrich Nietzsche once said something along the following lines: “An artist must portray the dark parts of the human soul as lifelike as the light parts”. I’ve taken the same approach within the ‘La Plata’ series. ‘La Plata: Colombia’ was a year of references to Hugo Ojeda’s descending decline into madness…the climax of ‘La Plata: Vice’ is the confirmation of that. We’ve also brought back the magical elements of Hugo’s story, and I was able to both revisit the jungle and pay homage to Father Martinez’s untimely death, way back in the FM21 prologue.
I also wanted to give closure to the story, in such a way that you could read the ‘La Plata’ series and feel a sense of conclusion; but with an element of anticipation, of “what comes next?”. The magical realism arc is not yet complete (I know, right), and I will return with some CreativeFM and hopefully, an enjoyable continuation via a post-network save. The save now goes offline, a forced divergence away from Chris’ story, who takes Ruslan and Natasha elsewhere.
Thanks for reading,
Tony / FM Grasshopper