Free Sudden Threat by AJ Tata

jogger. Three Asian men, who he now realized were Japanese soldiers, had quickly responded to the breaching of the metal fence. As he watched, there were about ten soldiers standing at the location from which the man had been abducted.
    One man in particular seemed to be in charge. He was in civilian clothes and wore a pearl-handled revolver on his hip, like a cowboy. An old officer’s hat, like MacArthur’s, shielded much of his face, making it difficult to ascertain all of his features, but Matt could see that the man in charge was taller than any of the others.
    His information on the Predators had led him to believe that China was developing the unmanned aerial vehicles for clandestine use against the United States or its allies. His mission was to find out whether that was true.
    Yet, there he was in some uncharted rain forest of a remote, yet strategically vital, Philippine island, and he was watching Japanese soldiers and businessmen move about what appeared to be an old mine.
    Knowing he had no chance of catching the Special Forces team that had bolted into the jungle, Matt eased away from his perch and moved to the north, away from the gaggle at the fence.
    As he approached the fence on the northeastern side of the compound, Matt saw that there was a sensor wire running through the chain link and every fifty meters or so there was a solar panel and battery pack that powered each sensor. Matt’s experience told him that some enterprising villagers had probably toyed around with stealing the batteries for their own purposes, so he continued walking along a minor path that mostly paralleled the fence.
    Sure enough, when he reached a spot that afforded him a view, albeit darkened, of Cateel Bay, Matt saw that not only was the battery and solar assembly missing, but there was a small tunneled area beneath the fence. Either an animal had burrowed underneath, or an enterprising villager had evaded the sensors in that fashion.
    Matt scraped some loose dirt out of the hole, slid his rucksack underneath, then snaked his way under the fence, the barbs of the chain link scratching at him as he burrowed. Soon he was inside.
    He grabbed his rucksack and weapon, continuing downhill until he saw the opening.
    Kneeling behind a tree, Matt placed his PVS-18 night-vision monocular to his face and scanned the area like a pirate searching for land. He saw the group rounding the corner about seventy-five meters southeast of his position.
    He noticed a rail spur that led to a concrete ramp at the mouth of the complex in the mountain. What looked like an old mine shaft actually was some type of extremely well concealed facility. On the rail spur sat five flatbed cars and four armored vehicles or tanks. The Japanese soldiers seemed to have stopped in the middle of driving what looked like a German Leopard tank onto the last railcar, as the mammoth machine was perched precariously half on the last car and half on the ramp. It seemed to Matt that everyone was moving in the direction of the abduction, so he efficiently moved to the line of railcars and observed closely the tanks, committing to memory every detail possible. Six wheels, the two in the middle almost touching, an armored skirt, and what appeared to be a 120mm main gun.
    This is the Japanese Type 90 Main Battle Tank.
    He heard a sound less than fifty meters away and looked up. He noticed the taller, pearl-handled-revolver aficionado break away from the gathering and begin walking to the east with two armed personnel.
    Interesting.
    Matt backed toward the fence, stepping past some generators and telescoping lights like one might see at a Little League facility in the middle of a cornfield in Iowa. As he reached the perimeter fence, Matt followed the pearl-handled-revolver man in parallel and watched as they exited a small gate that was well guarded by at least four soldiers. He had moved along the fence about two hundred meters from where he had started. Not wanting to lose time by