by James Hunt
“Fine!” Sarah flapped her arms at her sides. “I’ll go take a shower. No need to go full nerd mode.” She turned and thought she saw the slightest smile curve onto Bryce’s mouth. But despite the trick to get her to leave, Sarah was glad she did.
The hot water and soap cleansed her not just of the smell of the farm animals and river but also of the fatigue that had plagued her from the lackluster performance of her REM cycles. She stepped out of the shower, thick strands of her jet-black hair glued to her muscular back, and made her way to her locker.
Once changed, she rejoined Bryce out on the floor, his eyes glued to the screen and tiny red veins crawling over their whites. “How long have you been working on this?”
Bryce barely moved his mouth and refused to look away from the screen. “Since you left the base.”
“You need a break,” Sarah said.
“I need to finish this.” Bryce pointed to the timer on his desk. “Before that clock runs out.”
Grace appeared, placing water, a sandwich, and a cup of coffee on the table, accompanied with a heavy dose of girlfriend scolding on her face. “You need to take a break,” Grace said.
“No time.” Like his communication with Sarah, Bryce kept his eyes glued to the screen, but Grace grabbed him by the chin.
“You will drink this water. You will eat this sandwich. And you will take five minutes to rest your eyes.” The tone was meant to be helpful, but the glare looked as if it would set Bryce on fire if he didn’t comply. And much to Sarah’s chagrin, he did.
“Johnny, can you watch the sequencing for me for a minute?” Bryce rubbed his eyes, swiveling out of his chair. “Just grab me if something pops up.”
“Will do.” Johnny took a seat in Bryce’s chair, and when Bryce walked past Sarah, she gave him a light pat on the shoulder.
“You played a hell of a game. But you’re done, son.” Sarah followed it up with a light pat on the ass that Bryce both winced and yelped from. She sat on the edge of the desk while Johnny filled in, and crossed her arms. “You ready for the big leagues, Johnny?”
“Um, I think so?”
“That’s it, get this guy out of here!” Sarah pointed her thumb over her shoulder just as the screen in the top right started to blink.
“Move.” Bryce shoved Johnny from his chair and enhanced the images flashing their alarm. “I’ve got a hit in Virginia.” His fingers moved swiftly across the keyboard, and his butt lifted from the chair as he leaned forward, inching closer to the screen, drawn to it like a moth to flame. “He’s in the western portion of the state.” The satellite imagery continued to enhance with every strike of Bryce’s fingers, and it wasn’t but a minute longer before he had him within one square mile. “Got you.”
Sarah clapped Bryce on the back, and the two immediately phoned Mack. Their superior didn’t share the same jubilant smile, but Sarah noticed a slight twitch in the corner of his mouth, and his eyes lit up at the news. “Good work. Hill, you’ll be leading in an extraction team with some of Mallory’s men. Priority one is to retrieve Grimes and ensure he doesn’t restart Black Box.”
Sarah raised her eyebrows. “So if I’m leading the team, that means I’m in charge?”
What faint glimmer of happiness Mack had shown earlier disappeared. “You will have field command, but you will still answer to me.”
“Got it,” Sarah said, pointing her finger and thumb like a gun and then giving an overexaggerated wink. “So I’m the commander.”
Mack rubbed his forehead. “This is going to be a very long day.”
Chapter 12
The vans had been ditched a mile back, no longer able to handle the terrain of the western Virginia mountainsides. Sarah led the team of six through the woods, following the tracker on the display in her forearm and Bryce’s surveillance to guide them into the area.
Trees sprouted from the ground every few feet, thickening the area and making line of sight difficult for the extraction team. Sarah made it a point to inform everyone that if it came to pulling the trigger, no one had that right but her—even though Mack and Mallory had both repeated their desire that she bring Grimes back alive.
“Less than one hundred yards,” Bryce said. “There’s still an hour left on the program blocking Black Box’s signal, so you have plenty of time.”
Sarah stepped around a tree trunk, the assault rifle that she had tucked against the crook of her arm scanning the horizon, her eyes filtering in data points and heightening her level of awareness to something almost supernatural. She hadn’t been this jacked for a mission since she had killed the man who killed her brother.
A hum caught Sarah’s ear, and she held up a fist. The six-person team, dressed in their special operations gear, stopped on command. She slowly stepped forward alone, circling a tree, and saw the corner of a building. “I have visual. Any bodies in the house?”
“I’m getting one heat signature,” Bryce said.
Sarah peered through the scope, continuing her sidestep through the cluster of trees, getting a better look at the building. It was nothing more than a log cabin, no doubt built by hand from the cleared patch of surrounding land, which must have been how Grimes kept it off the CIA’s radar. She took a step, flicking her hand forward, and the CIA team followed.
A generator on the side of the building hummed at a low frequency. Most likely diesel, judging from the size, and it ran a cluster of wires into the cabin itself. For a moment, she considered blowing it sky high. But there was no sport in that. And that nagging, competitive voice in the back of her head that fueled so many of her bad decisions currently had a megaphone to its mouth, screaming at her to take him mano a mano.
Once they reached the edge of the small clearing where the cabin had been erected, Sarah stopped the progression of the team, and they all knelt. There were no windows visible from her current position, so she circled around to the west side of the cabin. A small pane of glass appeared and then quickly shattered from the shotgun blast that sprayed buckshot across the tree trunk that Sarah ducked behind.
The CIA agents took firing positions, but Sarah waved them down. She craned her head around and saw the broken window was free of any figure. “Hope you have homeowner’s insurance for that!”
It was quiet for a moment, and Sarah wasn’t sure if Grimes was ever going to speak, but eventually, his voice boomed through the open window. “You’re in an awfully good mood, Agent Hill.” There was no laughter or joy in his voice when he said it. “How many did Mallory have you bring?”
“Six. But I think we can both agree that all we need to take care of this is us.”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Sarah stepped around the tree, rifle still aimed toward the house, but once she was fully exposed, she lowered the weapon and then cast it aside, making her way around to the front door.
“Sarah, this isn’t a good idea,” Bryce said. “Mallory is going nuts back at Langley right now.”
Sarah stopped directly in front of the door, her hands clenched tight into fists. “Then Mallory shouldn’t have agreed to put me in charge.” She glanced over to the agents, weapons lowered, though they all looked one wrong move away from unleashing hell. “Just do me a favor and keep an eye on my new friends, will you?” The door opened and stole her attention back to the cabin. “I’m gonna be busy for the next few minutes.”
Grimes stepped out, unarmed. “How long did it take for your people to find me?”
“Almost ten hours after the program was installed,” Sarah said, neither moving forward nor stepping back. “You put up a hell of a fight, Grimes. But it’s over.”
Grimes stepped down from the front doorstep, planting both boots on the soil. “You’re right about that, Agent Hill.”
It was the eyes that threw Sarah off. She remembered him as nothing more than a cookie-cutter agent in a suit. The suit was gone, and the past few days had caused his clean-shaven face to grow thick with stubble, but he had never previously posses
sed the look of wildness that he held now.
Grimes approached slowly, fists up in preparation for combat, and Sarah stood her ground, watching his feet, his legs, and the slight twitch in his shoulder whenever he pumped his arms.
“Be careful, Sarah,” Bryce said, his voice almost a whisper. “His file rates him as a very valuable field asset. He was their best.”
“So am I.”
Grimes attacked first, swinging a hard right hook followed by a quick jab. Sarah dodged the hook but felt the graze of a knuckle against her chin from the jab. The combination was fast but restrained.
The two fell into a circular dance, Grimes taunting with a few more swings just out of range, all of which Sarah evaded easily. She anticipated the next jab and countered with her right-fisted jab, flashing in the blink of an eye as she made contact with his cheek.
The hard reverb of contact rippled from Sarah’s knuckles all the way to her shoulder, and she actually felt herself wince from the blow, which was abnormal. What was even more strange was the fact that Grimes barely flinched. She stepped back, ripped off her jacket, and flung it aside, along with the holster that held her Colts. When she did, Grimes smiled.
“Ready now?” Grimes asked.
“It’s been a while since I’ve had to try.”
“Ditto.” Grimes lunged in again, this time full force, his right fist landing on Sarah’s cheek and his left on her ribs.
Sarah shook off the blows and quickly countered with a knee to Grimes’s stomach, and it was here the two locked horns. Meaty hands gripped the back of Sarah’s neck, and she felt her feet lift off the ground. She used the momentum of Grimes’s body slam and twisted in midair, countering his move. Both slammed to the ground, the wind knocked from their lungs, and dust and leaves swirled as they staggered back to their feet.
Sarah rolled to the right, circling around to Grimes’s side before he could block the kick she swept into his ribs. Grimes grunted, and Sarah followed up with a jab-cross combo, each contact bloodying her knuckles as if she’d hit concrete. The muscles along her shoulders and arms burned from jabs, hooks, and uppercuts. But for every hit she landed, every notch she knocked Grimes down, he matched her blow for blow.
Grimes spun a quarter turn, leading with his elbow, and cracked the side of Sarah’s head. White light flashed, and she didn’t even feel her body hit the ground. It was the hands gripped around her throat, choking the air from her lungs, that flooded the return of her senses.
Grimes straddled Sarah on the ground and she bucked her hips and swung her legs upward, somersaulting the two of them end over end, and then pinned Grimes on his back. A flurry of jabs worked his midsection before he landed a right cross on her chin that knocked her off him, but not before she landed a vicious hit to the left side of his rib cage, where she heard the unmistakable crack of bone.
Sarah rolled to her feet, and when she stood, Grimes was sluggish in following. The fight had noticeably gone out of him as he favored the left side of his body. He wiped a shaking hand to the bloodied lip then clenched his fist. “You didn’t get a clean break.” He straightened, taking in a deep breath, a noticeable twitch forming in his right eye from the pain. “It’s fractured though.”
Sarah bent her knees to a more athletic position. “I can fix that.” She charged, swinging her right leg to meet the impact point on his ribs, which he blocked. The blow to his side had slackened his speed, and Sarah pounced on the opportunity with a quick left leg sweep toward his head, which he barely managed to stop.
But the defensive move cost him the protection of that cracked rib, and Sarah thrust her fist into the wound with every ounce of her strength, this time feeling the bones crack in half. Grimes yelped and dropped to his knees, sucking in quick, sharp gasps. Sarah hovered over him, catching her own breath. “Told you.”
But despite the defeat, Grimes actually let out a raspy laugh, and though his voice sounded shaky, he maintained a tone of strength. “Hill displays an extraordinary ability in the field that is equal only to the destruction of her mental capacity through a self-centered and egotistical mindset.” He looked up, the blood still dripping from his lip and nose. “Do you know who said that?”
Sarah cocked her head to the side, thinking. “It has a fatherly disapproval to it, but my dad never knew about my real job.” She squinted. “Sometimes I think he thought I was a stripper.”
“Mack Farr. And do you know what else he said about you?”
“What?” The humor in Sarah’s voice had disappeared now. She didn’t like the fact that Grimes was bringing up old performance reviews. She didn’t like the fact that he was mentioning Mack. And she definitely didn’t like the fact that he was smiling.
“He said you couldn’t be beaten in field combat. Not by anyone.” Grimes spit a wad of blood. “He said that you were unparalleled in your physical abilities. And after experiencing those abilities firsthand, I have to say that I agree with him.”
Sarah scrunched up her face like she was speaking to a child who had just given their teacher an apple. “Aww, that’s so sweet.”
The smile had disappeared from Grimes’s face now, and sweat beaded on his forehead, some of it collecting in a large pool then running down the bridge of his nose and dripping off the tip. “So that’s why I beat you in another way.”
Sarah fisted the short crop of hair Grimes had on his scalp and yanked his head back, exposing the tender flesh of his neck. “We shut you down, Grimes. No Black Box. No more nukes.”
The corner of Grimes’s mouth twitched, and he struggled to hold back that smile, the wildness of his eyes no longer trying to hold back. “Who needs Black Box when I have the GSF satellite?” He spat another wad of blood, this time hacking afterward and drawing in a breath that rattled the broken ribs. “It wasn’t easy, overloading your systems so I could sneak my way in, and I wasn’t even sure it would work, but the events in India and Pakistan gave me the final push I needed to get it done.”
“He’s bluffing,” Bryce said, though his voice trembled in Sarah’s ear. “Even with our systems spread thin I have security in place to alert me to any data that’s stolen.”
Sarah crouched down to meet Grimes’s eyes. “What’d you take, Grimes?”
Grimes was trembling now. It could have been out of excitement; it could have been out of pain; or it could have been from both. “It’s not what I took.” He flashed another smile, this one just as painfully unsettling as the first. “It’s what I gave you that’s the problem. Go.” His eyes drifted toward the house then back to Sarah. “Check for yourself.”
Sarah shoved Grimes onto his back and then gave a firm pat to his ribs, triggering a crippling round of moans. “Don’t go anywhere.” She motioned the CIA team over, and they tied him up while she entered the cabin.
The command post he had set up was at the far end of the cabin. The monitors were still lit up and covered with whatever evidence Grimes wanted her to see. But she stopped on her way over, a cluster of boxes catching her peripheral vision. Some of the folders rested on top, open.
At least a dozen performance reviews, all of them hers, along with dozens of handwritten notes. “Looks like the CIA was keeping tabs on me. Or at least Grimes was.”
“The computer, Sarah,” Bryce said.
She dropped the files and looked at the monitors, the images on the screens growing clearer the closer she moved. “Emails. They’re all sent from Mallory’s account.” Sarah removed a USB drive from her belt and plugged it in, which allowed Bryce to search the computer.
Dozens of pieces of correspondence, sent from Mallory’s email server to various agencies within the United States Government, condemning the GSF with evidence linking them to terrorist activities all around the world. Missions linking them to legitimate terrorist groups, the manipulation of international affairs, and even blaming them for the Global Power incident two years ago. All of the emails and documents were marked as classified and all of them with Mallory’s approval and sign
ature. But the most damning email? Mallory’s communication to the nuclear states of the world with a detailed and elaborate report outlining the GSF’s creation of project Black Box and its plans for the blackmail and infiltration of the global intelligence community. The time of the email’s sending was just a few minutes after Bryce had managed to block Black Box’s signal.
“Oh my God,” Bryce said. “Our digital fingerprints are all over these documents. He took the same source code I used to stop Black Box and planted evidence on the GSF satellite to make it look like all of this originated with us.” The noise of quick strikes from the keyboard filled Sarah’s ears. “The blackmail, the attack in Tokyo, the assassination attempt of the Ayatollah, Sharief’s escape, the infiltration of India and Pakistan, Sarah, I…” Bryce trailed off. “It all shows it came from the GSF satellite. Everything Grimes built, everything he made… He’s pinned it on us.”
Sarah sprinted outside. The CIA special operators had lifted Grimes to his feet and handcuffed his wrists together. He was still smiling, the euphoria of what he’d done enough to push him through his pain.
“Black Box was just a means to an end. I needed to create a disaster so big that the world couldn’t ignore it.” Grimes wheezed a chuckle. “The real kicker was my own special program. I worked on it for over a year, though to be fair I did have a bit of help from some of Global Power’s original schematics. Your satellite had some of the best security features in the world, but you stretch any system to its limit and it starts to crack. And that’s all I needed, just a tiny sliver to plant a few emails, install a few pictures and documents. With all of the terabytes of data filtering in and out of the satellite and your support agents so busy with stopping the world from falling apart you didn’t even notice. In all honesty the hardest part was forging the documents from Mallory’s account. He was never a trusting man.” Another blood-splattering hack rattled his lungs, and he wiped his mouth. “Do you know what the GSF’s greatest strength was, Hill? Greater than your field abilities or the advanced technology that you possessed? It was your anonymity. No one knew you existed. But all of those whispers of ghosts and legends finally caught up with you two years ago. I found you.” The smile was spread from cheek to cheek now. “And now I’ve exposed you.”
