Abby fired again, grazing its head, then the dog leapt.
Instinctively, she raised her arm to shield her throat and the dog’s teeth sank into flesh. Its eighty-plus pounds of momentum knocked Abby onto her back, then the mongrel began shaking its head like a shark.
Heartsick, Cozart dropped onto the ground to establish a line of fire that wouldn’t hit Abby and put a bullet into the canine’s skull.
“How bad is it?” he asked, scrambling toward her.
“I’m fine,” she snapped. “Let’s get out of here before the handlers show up.”
They piled into the Humvee. Cozart hit the ignition and accelerated along a fire road, kicking up a plume of dirt and pine needles.
He’d only driven a quarter mile when the first bullet punched through the windshield and zipped past, close enough for him to feel the blast wave of air.
As Abby maneuvered to return fire, Cozart grabbed the scruff of her neck with his right hand and forced her down below the window line.
“What the hell are you doing?” Abby shrieked.
“Pregnant women don’t get shot on my watch,” he shouted, grappling to right the fishtailing vehicle.
A second hunk of lead bored through the armored door and burrowed into his left calf.
Cozart swore aloud and grunted, “Armor-piercing rounds.”
Instead of lead penetrators, which were a relatively soft metal, these were made of hardened steel, tungsten, or tungsten carbide; able to tunnel through the vehicle’s armor plating.
Accelerator jammed to the floor, a hail of gunfire pinged against the Humvee. Glass shattered, foam stuffing from the seats began floating in the air, then Cozart felt a molten hot dagger lance his lower back. Glancing down, he saw the exit wound, a gaping dark hole in his abdomen. He couldn’t move his left leg, but was able to keep his right foot on the gas pedal.
“Abby, are you okay ...? Abby, answer me!”
82
South of District Nine, California
BRADLEY PACED THE dank family room of the safe house. Moisture-swollen floorboards creaked beneath his boots, and his movement was stirring a musky odor. A red-tinted lantern cast a hellish glow over the walls and ceiling, creating the ambiance of a dungeon and highlighting every ripple and bow in the dark wood paneling.
Gorka sat slumped atop a one-armed, paddle-back kitchen chair, chin drooped against his chest, snoring and sputtering like a jalopy running out of fuel. CJ had used the owl to plunge him into a deep sleep and disable his hearing, lest his evil mind eavesdrop on a subconscious level.
Matthew was asleep in CJ’s arms, his angelic face illuminated by the laptop, and Bradley stared at the boy, feeling a breath-stealing pang of regret. He would never see his child, never rock his infant to sleep, never read his toddler a bedtime story, and the realization set off an avalanche of emotion. Guilt, disillusionment, bitterness, and contrition.
This evil prick took my life, he thought, glaring at Gorka. Robbed my child of a doting father and Abby of a loving husband ... Shit! Where the hell is Abby?
She and Cozart should’ve been there by now. Were they lost? Or in contact with the enemy?
Bradley had heard distant gunshots just before the security alarm sounded. Did Night Sector lock down Athenian Grove? Did Abby and Cozart have to fight their way out?
“Worrying isn’t going to get her here any faster,” CJ said, adeptly reading his facial expression. “Why don’t we get started with Gorka?”
Battling an obsessive urge to go find her, Bradley’s gaze whipped toward the detached garage where the truck was stowed.
“Cozart’s got Abby’s back,” CJ continued, “and you’ve got a fifteen-day deadline. The sooner we get the intel from Gorka, the more time we’ll have to destroy White Rabbit.”
Wingnut was right. The First Sergeant would lay down his life for any of the TEradS and he would march into hell to protect Abby.
Brushing away a confounding mixture of jealousy and gratitude, Bradley grunted, “Wake ‘em up.”
With the stroke of the keyboard, Gorka’s eyes fluttered open. He looked around, seemingly puzzled by his surroundings, then rolled his neck, which was undoubtedly stiff from his prolonged nap.
The old man squinted at the owl; then, speaking with a mongrelized Hungarian accent, Gorka said, “That is my property and—”
“Where’s White Rabbit?” Bradley barked.
A glint of surprise registered in the billionaire’s stony eyes. His pupils contracted into predatory slits. “You cannot stop us. We will decide not only who lives and dies, but how they live and how they die.”
“You’re deranged.”
Gorka smiled as if dealing with a simple-minded child. “Do you think it unwise to improve the human race through genetic engineering?”
“The Nazis exposed the ugly truth about eugenics, but I have to give The Consortium credit. You always conceal your evil deeds behind a veil of altruism. You’re such hypocrites.”
“Truth be told, you are the hypocrite,” Gorka said. “Our interest in eugenics was inspired by the United States. In fact, from 1909 to 1979, California sterilized approximately 20,000 degenerates ...”
Bradley felt like he was falling. How could the U.S.A., a Bible-loving, God-fearing, constitutional republic endorse forced sterilization?
“... And we ALWAYS disclose our intentions. The masses are just too stupid to comprehend it. For instance, Margaret Sanger, founder of the Birth Control League—which you know as Planned Parenthood—wrote, and I quote, ‘We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population. And the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.’ You see—”
Breath rushed from Gorka’s body. He doubled over then fell onto the floor, groaning and sniveling.
“Feel powerful now, Asshole?” Wingnut stabbed the enter key, and the billionaire’s eighty-year-old carcass writhed in pain.
“CJ, enough!” Bradley snapped. “We need him alive. And conscious.”
“Fuck Gorka!” The Pilot jabbed the enter key three more times. “That bastard is responsible for the deaths of millions. He was about to burn Matthew alive!”
Bradley latched onto the laptop and jerked it away from CJ. “I get it. The piece of shit deserves to die—painfully—but if you kill him, we’ll never find White Rabbit, and the slaughter will escalate.”
Face flushed with righteous anger and embarrassment, CJ hugged his son tighter.
“You, the sheeple, are weak and naïve,” Gorka hissed. “Your compassion guarantees your failure. We are strong and wise. There is no boundary, no limit we will not cross to achieve our objectives. Unfettered by conscience, we will always prevail!”
The sound of an engine seeped into the room, and Bradley returned the laptop to CJ. “Immobilize him,” he said, readying his rifle and starting toward the kitchen.
Gorka licked his dry, cracked lips like a predator eyeing an easy meal. “I’m tagged with a GPS tracking device. Night Sector is here to liberate me.”
“CJ, shut him up. NOW!”
Peeking through a pair of moldy lace curtains that adorned the kitchen’s bay window, Bradley’s eyes widened. His stomach contracted, and he felt bile rising in his throat.
A bullet-riddled Humvee was parked on the driveway, and Abby was dragging Cozart from the vehicle. The First Sergeant was covered in blood and barely conscious.
“Shit!” Bradley shouldered his rifle strap and darted outside. He hoisted his injured teammate off the ground and carried him into the kitchen.
CJ’s voice was wafting from the family room. “... and the NSA replicated your GPS transmitter, so your Night Sector saviors are chasing a ghost through the San Joaquin Valley.”
Bradley assessed Coza
rt’s wound. Abby had already packed it with a hemostatic dressing, but the cellulose sponges didn’t fill the cavity and the blood loss was continuing. He fumbled through his backpack for his XSTAT syringe, injected another dose of compressed, tablet-shaped sponges, and applied pressure. Cozart didn’t flinch or even grimace.
“Stay with me,” Abby pleaded. Her blood-stained fingers stroked his cheek, reassuringly, almost affectionately, and Bradley felt a spike of jealousy rising like a rogue tide. He’d made peace with Cozart’s feelings for Abby, but had yet to come to terms with Abby’s feelings for Cozart.
Pushing harder against the wound, Bradley felt the First Sergeant’s pulse weaken and fade. He pressed two fingers against Cozart’s carotid artery then bowed his head. “He’s gone.”
“No-o-o-o!” Abby disintegrated. Forehead resting on the chest of her fallen teammate, she sobbed and gasped and trembled.
Damn ... I just sent the Dear Jane e-mail a week ago; how long was this brewing between them?
Was Abby having an affair?
Could the baby actually be Cozart’s?
“There’s nothing else we can do for him,” Bradley stated woodenly. Noticing that the sleeve of Abby’s jacket was torn and blood soaked, he knelt beside her and ripped away the ribbons of fabric. He frowned at a pair of two-inch gashes connected by an arch of smaller puncture wounds.
“That fucking dog!” Bradley muttered, digging into his first aid kit.
Guilt and intense sorrow were shining in Abby’s steel-blue eyes, and the depth of her pain settled like a smoldering coal in Bradley’s gut.
If she had such deep feelings for Cozart, why didn’t she break things off during the inauguration?
Did she feel obligated because I rescued her from the orphanage?
“It’s my fault ...” Her voice dissolved, and Bradley wasn’t sure how to respond.
Comfort her? Or emotionally distance himself ahead of their inevitable good-bye?
“It’s not your fault, Abby. Cozart would’ve taken a bullet for any of us. That’s just the kind of guy he was.”
The comment triggered a snorting gasp and a resurgence of tears.
Cozart wasn’t kidding about pregnancy hormones, Bradley thought.
He cleaned her wounds and wrapped them with sterile gauze then guided Abby into the paneled family room. She sank down onto the floor and slouched against the wall. A zombie-like thousand-yard stare replaced the waterworks, and Bradley couldn’t decide which was more worrisome.
CJ had hefted Gorka back onto the chair, and was typing out a text message on the encrypted satellite phone. The Pilot looked up. His baby-blue eyes toggled between Abby and Bradley, soft with empathy and concern, then he handed off the phone to Bradley, inviting him to read the exchange.
Python: WTF? This was a capture mission. Your need for vigilante justice just put thousands of lives in danger.
CJ: What are you talking about?
Python: Senator Conn, Gaggle CEO, Centcom General, Bishop of D9—ALL dead. Unidentified boatman escaped. Would’ve been easier if you didn’t leave a witness.
Every muscle in Bradley’s body clenched, realizing that Abby had opened fire on unarmed men. Consequences twisted and turned inside him.
“Damn it, Abby! You disobeyed a direct order!”
“I know,” she cried. “It’s my fault. I got Cozart killed.”
“What the fuck were you thinking?”
Abby winced and forced a hard swallow. “I was thinking that those bastards were going to do it again,” she railed, her voice shrill and fracturing under the strain of remorse. “That they’d be right back there tomorrow night, burning toddlers alive—”
“Yeah, well congratulations, you saved one kid and provoked a Consortium terrorist attack that could kill thousands!” Betrayals, both personal and professional, were sluicing through Bradley’s veins, stoking his temper. He was vaguely aware that allegations of infidelity were fueling his outrage even more than her insubordination, but he couldn’t reign it in. “You know damn well how dangerous this mind-control technology is! You put our lives at risk, the entire country at risk, the whole fucking world at risk ... all for your own selfish need for instant justice!”
“Bradley!” CJ shouted. “This is counterproductive. We need to find a solution.”
He inhaled a slow breath and it gradually dawned on him. He wasn’t enraged over Abby’s alleged fling with Cozart, her insubordination, or the disruption to his mission. He was irate over the prospect of Abby being executed or spending her life in jail; over his child growing up without a mother or a father; and he couldn’t assume the blame for the wrongful shooting because the world believed that he was dead.
“Solution?” he scoffed. “You think Abby can just waltz back onto base with the murder weapon, dog bites that’ll require rabies shots, and Cozart’s dead body?”
83
3,000 feet below White-Jefferson Air Force Base, Ohio
RYAN INVITED RONE TO share the game-changing piece of intelligence with a roll of his hand. He was eager for good news, a tangible sign that The Consortium was on a collision course with justice. Now that his daughter had been born, he felt an even more compelling need to eradicate this evil, vowing that Isabella would not grow up in a world plagued by pedophiles, satanic cannibals, and psychopaths who wanted to depopulate the planet.
“Immediately following the destruction of the nuclear-tipped missile,” Rone began, “the acting attorney general announced the appointment of a special counsel ...”
Ryan’s enthusiasm deflated. These investigations tended to be costly, drawn-out proceedings that delivered more news headlines than justice.
“... tasked with investigating Russia collusion and the assassinations of Aldrich Ames, Ben Arnold, Roberta Hanssen, and Aaron Burr.”
“The special counsel is investigating me?” Indignation was boiling inside Ryan. “These sick fucks attempted a coup to unseat a duly elected President. They’re raping and eating American children and the Department of Justice is investigating me?”
“I know how it looks, Mr. President, but I assure you it IS essential.” The Admiral rocked back in his chair and expelled an audible sigh. “False accusations serve strategic purposes. First and foremost, they provide cover for the stealth investigation into The Consortium. Second, they create the illusion that The Consortium is still in control, thereby minimizing the threat to the public. And third, the takedown of this network can’t look like a political purge.”
“Sun Tsu,” Ryan said. “Appear weak where you are strong.”
“Exactly. And it’s not going to be easy.” Rone’s bloodshot eyes flitted toward the bustling operations center below. “They’re going to come after you, and your family. Hard.”
“Yeah, the nuclear-tipped missile made that pretty clear.”
“I’m not referring to kinetic attacks; military intelligence will deal with those. I’m talking about character assassination. You’ll have to absorb the media’s slings and arrows with grace, knowing that you are protecting the American people. Just like taking a bullet on the battlefield.”
Ryan shifted in his chair, worried about his family.
Thank God Isabella is too young to understand, he thought. A daily onslaught of hateful lies would be brutal if she were a teenager.
It would be difficult for Franny and Sybil, he knew; but his wife was a former Army Sapper who had singlehandedly declared war on the peacekeepers, and his adopted daughter had inspired a grassroots insurgency.
“How long will this investigation take?” Ryan asked.
“Years,” Rone replied bluntly. “Indictments will remain sealed until the entire network has been rolled up under RICO—The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, which provides for extended criminal penalties.”
“Years?” Ryan sneered. “We can’t allow them to run around molesting and sacrificing children for years! They need to be arrested NOW! Handcuffed and perp-walked for all to see.”
“Resignation?” Ryan protested. “They ought to be executed for treason!”
“Those who were coerced through blackmail and threats to family must be allowed to walk away. We simply cannot arrest seventy percent of Congress without damaging the nation. Consider this a surgical procedure, Mr. President. Removing the cancer fast is not advantageous if it kills the patient.”
Ryan nodded, conceding the point. Most Americans were honest, hard-working people who couldn’t even fathom such evil. They had to be protected.
“We need to exercise extreme care,” the Admiral continued, “to ensure that every diseased cell is ousted, lest it grow back. And since The Consortium is a worldwide criminal enterprise, our actions must be coordinated with other countries.”
The scope and complexity of this endeavor was making Ryan’s head spin. Flabbergasted, he said, “I just don’t understand how this can possibly work. How do we make arrests with corrupt FBI agents? How do we conduct trials with corrupt DOJ prosecutors, corrupt judges, and intimidated or bought-off jurors?”
“That’s why we’ll need to use military tribunals—”
“For civilians? Won’t that play into The Consortium’s narrative and make me out to be a dictator?”
Rone gave a somber nod. “That’s why Gorka Schwartz is paying Anti-Ty to take to the streets, likening you to Hitler.”
Mind Power- America Awakens Page 32
