Omega Reborn: A Jake Reardon Thriller

By M.J.S. House

Moments after leading Seton Hall to an NCAA Tournament basketball victory, senior point guard Jake Delaney is brutally attacked.
Jake learns, “the mastermind of this plot lives… and he won’t stop until YOU are dead.” With his mother’s safety in mind, Jake decides to join Omega- an elite team of operatives whose sole purpose is to maintain national security and take out threats the government can’t.
Jake learns to be a leader “off the court” with the talented members of Bravo team, each with their own special skills. From Amy Leung, a marksman, to Rafik Aziz, a cybersecurity specialist, to Deion Carson, a martial arts master.
After a year of training, Bravo team embarks on a mission to interrupt the flow of fentanyl coming across the US southern border. The mission is compromised!
If Jake and the Omega team are to survive, he must learn who to trust and how to build that trust with his team! Or else….
Read “Omega Reborn” the suspenseful sequel to “Turning Pro” by M.J.S. House!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 4, 2024
• ISBN: 9798369411186

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Copyright © 2024 by M.J.S. House.

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without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the

product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance

to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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Rev. date: 01/04/2024

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1   Yellowknife, Northwest Territories

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Epilogue

Chapter One

CHAPTER 1

Yellowknife, Northwest Territories

Jake Reardon crouched in a wooded area just north of the airstrip. His boots dug deep into a muddy patch, newly formed by the precipitation. He watched the facility in the distance through his binoculars. Men with heavy gear patrolled the perimeter, sweeping, keeping watch for Jake and his team. A fox, whiter than the snow, bounded past Reardon’s sightline. He watched the animal, knowing that the serenity of the natural world would soon be disrupted once he gave the order and he and his team began executing their plan.

Jake and Omega Team: Bravo were monitoring what had been, until recently, an abandoned airstrip. It had been used by the Canadian military, a mining outfit, the US military and now the group Jake and his team were monitoring. Jake’s team had been tasked with breaking into this military outpost to assess the target and ascertain if a high value asset had been hidden in this makeshift military base. There was a reason so many organizations had used this airstrip. It was in the middle of nowhere which made it easy to defend. It was in the shadow of a small mountain, which meant it could not easily be seen by planes passing from the north. It was self-sustaining, difficult to get to and ferociously well-fortified. It was not going to be easy, but Jake felt he and his team were up to the challenge.

Jake enjoyed the gentle snowfall a moment longer until his comms device crackled to life and the sound of his team member’s voice buzzed in his ear.

There’s more than we thought, Carson said. We might not draw enough of them with plan A.

Carson had snuck into the facility’s main building to perform reconnaissance. His job was to assess how many personnel were there and what kind of cargo they were hiding. Jake liked Carson. More than that he knew the man to be eminently qualified. The man had spying in his blood as the great great grandson of civil war spy Mary Bowser. He seemed born to obscure himself in any given situation. Jake liked that about him, though the man could be a little overcautious from time to time.

Well, we don’t have a plan B, Jake responded.

Maybe we had better come up with one, Carson advised.

Come on, Copperhead, Jake teasingly admonished, using Carson’s call sign. Carson had earned his nickname early on in training. Jake and the rest of Carson’s team members recognized his ability to camouflage himself in almost any environment, not unlike the copperhead snake. The name seemed to fit. Don’t you trust your teammates?

I’m just trying to cover all my bases, Carson said.

Are you telling me that Ibex is not going to succeed with his part of the mission? Jake asked, mock-offended on behalf of Rafik, whose call sign was often mocked by his team members for being a glorified goat.

Don’t drag me into this, Rafik Aziz (call sign Ibex) said over comms. When Rafik was asked why he wanted to be named after a horned Eurasian goat, he responded that the Ibex was regal and dangerous. Despite the gentle ribbing, everyone on the team respected Rafik’s perspective on the matter. Rafik was positioned on the other side of the facility, trying to attain the best possible vantage point for his part of the mission. Jake could almost see him from where he and sharpshooter Amy Leung were posted in the woods on the south side of the facility.

I’m just telling you what I see, Crossbow, Carson explained.

Standby for my order. We are moving ahead with the plan as designed. Jake turned and looked over at Amy, his de facto second in command. I hope you are ready.

Always, she confirmed, using her scope to observe the facility.

Can you believe these guys? Jake asked her. One sign of pushback and they want to bail.

Maybe Carson has a point, Amy suggested, using Carson’s real name since she and Jake were speaking in person and not over a comms channel.

Not you too, Jake said. Be on my team for once.

Jake, all three of us are on your team, but you have to understand that we are going to have our own opinions about the best way to put a plan into motion.

These cold-weather missions play hell on my bad ankle, Jake said, changing the subject.

You sound like an old man, Amy joked. Not the 20-year-old wunderkind of Omega.

Amy could hardly hide her jealousy. She had been in Omega for a full 18 months before Jake showed up. All three of his team members had. They were all competent operators in their own right with impressive expertise earned through various military training programs.

Rafik Aziz was a demolitions and small machines expert who spoke about ten languages, including Arabic, Turkish, Kurdish and Farsi. Carson was a high-level martial artist as well as a master spy who was an expert at getting into and out of places undetected, while Amy was one of the best sharpshooters Jake had ever met. Yet here Jake was, with no military background to speak of, leading the team. The only bona fides he brought with him was his history as a division I basketball star and the lineage of being the son of Omega’s most impressive operative, Chuck Arrowhead Reardon. Jake felt like he had a lot to prove and he planned on doing so by calling the shots and showing that he could lead the team better than anyone else could.

Standby for execute order, Jake said into his comms unit.

Ready for orders, Rafik said.

Standing by, Carson said.

Jake was happy they had fallen into place. They would see that his plan was going to work. He was excited to see it played out correctly.

Jake gave the order and he watched the facility through his binoculars.

For what seemed like a long time, nothing changed. Jake watched through the binoculars wondering if Rafik was having trouble completing his task. Then Jake saw it. The Freefly Alta X drone, four propellered and coasting low toward the target. Rafik was masterful with the way he flew the craft, especially when he had a sight line. He was an artist with that thing, Jake thought. It zipped across the horizon without a single guard noticing the small remotely-operated vehicle.

Drone 866, approaching target, Rafik said over the communication device. Jake did not respond, but merely nodded as he watched it.

One of the armed guards noticed the drone just as it approached the north wall of the facility, but it was too late. The drone swept in low and delivered a 35-pound payload of C4 explosives. Jake mourned the fact that he could not see that side of the facility from where he was. What he could see was that the drone had caused a major explosion on the other side of the facility and that all the patrolling soldiers in his line of sight were making their way to the other side of the building to see what or who was attacking them. Jake wasted no time and he sprinted from his hiding spot toward the facility with Amy covering his approach.

When Jake was within twenty feet of the facility, he saw that not all of the soldiers had vacated their positions. He looked up at the facility to see a sentry on the wall taking aim at him. Jake wondered if he had made the right call after all. He tried to zag his approach, but he knew the sentry had the high ground and that made Jake a sitting duck. When he heard shots ring out, he was surprised to find he had not been hit. Amy, from her position in the woods, had fired on the gunman and when Jake looked up at the wall, the soldier was gone.

Jake wondered if he had been hit or just scared off. It did not matter, he realized. Everyone defending the airstrip knew Jake and his team was coming. It was just a matter of the distraction lasting long enough for them to get to where the prisoner was being held. Jake made it to the facility and kicked in a door to gain entry. When he entered, the place was dark and wide open. The outpost was made up of three small buildings near an airstrip. Rafik’s explosions had damaged the north end of the airstrip and drew most of the soldiers who had been patrolling the area. Carson was in the westernmost building, about 100 yards from Rafik’s handiwork.

Jake met up with Carson in the building behind a row of industrial sized cable reels.

Hey Crossbow, Carson whispered, slipping out from the shadows. Carson had disarmed and incapacitated a guard upon entering the facility and was dressed in the dark clothing of their adversaries.

Copperhead. I hardly recognized you in your new outfit.

Carson just smiled and led Jake to what had become the main objective of the mission. They slipped silently through corridors, hiding in shadows and behind any available cover if anyone came close. At the end of a long corridor, Carson stopped and used a purloined key card to open an office door. Inside the office door was something that surprised Jake. He turned and looked at Carson with his eyes wide. Carson returned the look.

We found something, Jake said over comms to Amy and Rafik.

What’s that? Rafik wanted to know. Did you find a way to part your hair that makes you look old enough to drink?

Very funny, Jake said, But you are going to be the one buying the drinks because we discovered ourselves a hostage.

Jake and Carson looked at the floor of the office at a man whose hands and feet were bound and who had a bag over his head. They had found what they were looking for.

CHAPTER 2

Carson stepped into the office that was being used as an impromptu jail cell. The man they had just discovered, bound and with a bag over his head, was of a large build and seemed cognizant based on the way he reacted to the arrival of Jake and Carson. Carson knelt down next to the man and pulled out a knife and got to work cutting the zip ties that kept the hostage immobile. He started by cutting the bound feet and then moved onto the hands. Before he was able to cut the ties on his hands or remove the bag on the prisoner’s head, Jake stopped him.

We don’t have time, Jake said. Let’s go.

Sorry, Carson said, grabbing the hostage by the collar and yanking him to his feet. We are going to have to take this off later.

The hostage loudly objected to this, but it was hard to understand his complaints considering he had a bag on his head.

What’s going on in there, Crossbow? Amy asked over comms. You need an escort?

Roger that, Stormcloud.

Jake and Carson exited the small office where the hostage had been held, only to find three men standing in their way. Jake could tell that they had surprised the three men almost as much as they had certainly surprised him and Carson. Carson, who had one hand on the hostage, looked at Jake and shrugged before executing a perfectly placed, head-high front crescent kick, immediately rendering one of the men unconscious. Jake grabbed one of the men by the collar and pulled him forward, crashing his head into his knee, which only landed a glancing blow. The third assailant reached for his holstered gun and Carson, with his free hand, grabbed a hold of the man’s wrist and prevented him from drawing his weapon.

They must have been coming here to check on the prisoner, Jake said to Carson as he tried to get behind his opponent to effectuate a choke hold.

Must have been, Carson said, pushing the hostage back into the office to be able to more effectively grapple with his opponent who was still trying to unholster his own gun.

Jake gave up on the choke hold and instead opted for strikes to the temple, hoping that might result in unconsciousness.

Are you almost done over there? Carson asked as he leapt