Three men were seated in front of a wide wall of monitors, and all three turned toward the door as he threw it open. In an almost comical display, all three assumed the same facial expression, somewhere between surprise and intense anger as they realized the person bursting into the room was not supposed to be there. But even as they drew their weapons, Perry fired his own. Five suppressed bursts, four fired as a pair of double taps, aimed to kill, a final one meant to incapacitate. Two slumped dead in their chairs. The third, who had managed to stand, sagged to his knees. He pressed one hand over the hole in his stomach and tried to draw his weapon with the other. Perry moved in quickly and kicked him in the face. The man’s head flew back and he tipped, seemingly in slow motion, to his side until he was laid out on the floor. Perry stepped on his throat and pointed at the gut shot.
“That looks like it hurts.”
“Baise toi,” the man groaned.
“Tsk. Language! Now, let me ask you a question. Do you speak English?”
With his voice growing increasingly strained, no doubt due to both the pain ripping through his midsection and the pressure Perry was exerting on his windpipe, the man repeated his original statement.
“Wrong answer. And I don’t need your permission to have sexual intercourse with myself.” Perry removed his foot from the man’s throat, but only so he could drop his heel forcefully across the man’s mouth. He felt teeth breaking beneath his shoe. The man let out a scream, which morphed into a strangled gasp as Perry returned his weight to the man’s throat.
“Let’s try again. Do you know how to speak words in the English language?”
This time the man nodded, but said nothing.
“Yay, progress! There is an American diplomat somewhere in this building. Am I correct?”
The man’s eyes hardened a bit, but when Perry increased the pressure on his throat, he nodded again.
“Yes,” he said in a strangled voice.
“You’re a fast learner. Your mother must be so proud. Now, the diplomat, he’s on this floor, somewhere. Correct?”
The man’s head bobbed in the affirmative.
Perry performed a slow clap. “Such good work. Clever, smart, industrious. If only you weren’t so ugly, you might have a future. Although, I supposed breaking all your visible teeth didn’t help with that. Sorry. Ah, well, dentists can work miracles these days. Next question: is his wife with him?”
Again, the man’s facial expression changed. Clearly unhappy at the line of questioning, he didn’t reply.
Perry sighed. “Aw, and you were head of the class. I’m afraid not answering is a punishable offense.” He removed his foot from the man’s throat once more, quickly moving it onto the bullet wound which was rapidly turning the man’s white shirt a brilliant crimson. Perry stepped down hard on the hole at the center of the bloodstain, eliciting a scream far louder than Perry was comfortable with.
“Quiet! I’m sensitive to loud noises, even when I’m not hungover. So thoughtless! Kids these days, only thinking of themselves. Don’t scream again, young man, or I’ll give you something to scream about. We don’t want to attract attention. Now, where were we? Oh, yes! The woman. Is the diplomat’s wife with him?”
The man spit a significant amount of blood from his mouth. “Yes, asshole. They’re together. Two rooms down on the opposite side of the hallway.”
“Well, that was rude, but you answered my question, so you get a reward.”
Perry knelt and gently stroked the wounded man’s hair. Leaning his mouth close, he whispered, “I’m going to make it stop hurting now.”
A lightning-fast chop to the man’s throat instantly crushed his windpipe. And a moment later, he was dead.
Perry wiped the blood from the sole of his shoe on the beige carpet, leaving a satisfying smear, and looked at the wall of monitors.
He could attribute the luck he’d had in remaining undetected to the sheer volume of views the screens presented. There were easily seventy different scenes flickering before him, and it took him a minute to recognize the one that showed the foyer through which he’d entered the building. They might have had him there if they’d been watching, but the angle of the camera provided a view of only the first two-thirds of the room. He’d moved so quickly to the stairwell that he’d have been visible for only few seconds.
Oddly, it didn’t appear the stairwell itself had any cameras at all and, although he was unable to determine which of the multiplicity of screens showed the sixth-floor hallway, he did see that the cameras in those corridors were indeed panning back and forth, a flaw that had likely allowed him to reach the security office undetected. He would have preferred to disable the hallway’s cameras before he went back out, but was unable to determine which of the hundreds of buttons and sliders were responsible for them, so he turned to a panel of circuit breakers on the wall adjacent to the monitors and attempted to open it. The panel was securely locked, and he didn’t want to take any more time playing around, so he fired two quick shots into it. A shower of sparks told him he’d damaged something, and as he turned once more to the monitors he saw that about half had gone black.
That’ll have to do, he thought.
Perry walked back into the hallway and quickly made his way down the hall to the door the guard had indicated. Its shining label read “617.” He tried the handle, but found it was locked. While he now felt much more confident no one was going to see him via security camera, he didn’t think the noise he’d make kicking the door in was worth the risk. Reaching into the inside pocket of his jacket, he extracted a thin, metal lock pick, and began working the tumblers. Fortunately, the building’s 1990s vintage locks had not been replaced with new, more secure models. After only a few seconds he opened the door.
The room was large, its interior dimly lit. There was no sound as he entered and closed the door behind him. As his eyes adjusted to the scant light, he made out a pair of chairs in the middle of the room with a table between them. A lamp from the ceiling, its beam focused directly on the table top, was the room’s only source of illumination.
He moved forward slowly. As he got closer, he saw the beam of light was pointing to a gallon-sized plastic bag, in which was a severed foot. In the chairs to either side were the bodies of Barton and Amanda Pickering. At least that was Perry’s assumption. Bart was recognizable, even though the expression of horror frozen upon his lifeless visage suggested he had died in considerable agony. The identity of the woman was nothing more than an educated guess, since the body no longer had a head.
An instant later, Perry heard a very unwelcome hissing sound and a foul-smelling gas permeated the room.
Gasping, he fell to his knees, furious at himself for being careless. The room was suddenly bathed in light. The door flew open and two men wearing gas masks and carrying automatic weapons burst inside. They ran to Perry and stood over him, looking down as his sight dimmed, faded, and then went completely black.
8
Perry awoke with the worst headache he could remember having, and for him that was saying something. His initial impression was that he was back in his apartment, and he’d either had way more to drink than ever before, or he’d gotten hold of some very bad liquor. He called weakly to his dog.
“Flem,” he croaked. “Where are you, buddy?”
Instead of hearing Fleming sniff by his ear, he heard laughter, followed by the voices of two men speaking French. And everything came back in a rush. He tried to give his head a forceful shake to clear the cobwebs, but he found he could not move it at all. All else failing, he opened his eyes. The sight that greeted him seemed surreal, and he wondered if that explained the apparent paralysis. He was asleep. It was a dream.
He saw three men. Two, young and fit, stood and flanked the older third man, who was seated on the most elaborate chair Perry had ever seen. The arms and legs were intricately carved, and were either painted gold, overlaid with gold leaf or perhaps constructed of solid gold. The cushions were a deep purple, an
d stuffed to the point where they could no longer be called plush. The thesaurus in Perry’s mind kept flipping back and forth between “bloated” and “obscene.” The cushions also appeared to be inlaid with jewels. He couldn’t help but think that for all its opulence, it couldn’t be very comfortable.
Perry emitted a cough, which unexpectedly evolved into choking laughter.
Judging from his facial expression, the seated man was both surprised and annoyed by the levity. “Something is funny, Mr. Hall?” His accent was French, but not heavy—his English was excellent.
“Your—” Perry began, but then started coughing again. Not only had the gas knocked him out, it appeared to have done a number on his throat. His suffering seemed to improve the man’s disposition.
The man leaned forward impatiently. “Yes, go ahead?”
“Your chair. That is the stupidest damn chair I’ve ever seen. If you don’t mind me saying, King Louie.”
The man sat back, his frown returning. “A rather mean-spirited remark, but not totally inaccurate. This throne did in fact belong to Louis XIV.”
“I was talking about the monkey from The Jungle Book,” Perry said. “And the name’s Parker. Jarred Parker.”
One of the standing men stepped forward and punched Perry on the jaw. Because his head was secured and couldn’t give with the blow, it hurt even worse than it should have.
“Yes, we found your identification cards. SpyCo may not be a very effective agency, but your forgery department is to be commended. Did you think we would be unable to run facial recognition on you, Mr. Hall? Scorpion keeps very detailed files on enemy operatives. And by the way, Mr. Hall, has anyone ever told you that SpyCo is not a particularly awe inspiring name for an international espionage agency? You need a name which will strike fear, which is why Scorpion is such an excellent brand.”
Perry spit the blood pooling in his mouth. “Scorpions are overrated. Most are a mere nuisance. The sting may hurt, but it’s not lethal.”
Now the other man stepped forward and repeated his counterpart’s action, striking Perry’s jaw on the opposite side of his face. This time the punch was of sufficient force to tear the duct tape holding his head, lessening the impact. It also meant if all his bonds were duct tape, what he had planned would now be considerably easier.
“I think you’ll find this Scorpion quite lethal,” the seated man said.
Perry found the pain from the punches quixotically therapeutic. The last of the cobwebs cleared and he began moving his eyes around the room.
He was indeed duct taped to a plain wooden chair—a mistake on their part. Aside from the three men and the throne, the room appeared to be empty. He attempted to move his legs, and found he could wiggle them slightly. His hands were secured more tightly, but that wouldn’t matter. He had a strategy in place, but he needed to engage the man in conversation a little longer.
“I’m going out on a limb here, but you must be Pierre Montemarche.”
A junior to mid-level operative would have grown very uncomfortable at being made. It was a natural reaction, even when one appeared to have the upper hand. But neither Perry nor Montemarche were that low in the pecking order. Perry had denied his identity at first, then simply ignored Montemarche as he’d bragged about Scorpion’s ability to see past his subterfuge.
In Pierre Montemarche’s case, however, there was an added element of ego. He thrived upon being recognized. Not necessarily as a Scorpion adjunct, but in general. Perry was sure his private office would be lousy with pictures of himself shaking hands with celebrities, cutting ribbons, breaking ground with shovels painted gold. The only thing a man like this loved more than money and power was himself.
“You are correct,” Montemarche replied.
“And this is your building.”
“Correct again.”
“And you are the son of a bitch responsible for my two dead friends in Room 617!” He appeared to be growing angry and irrational. Exactly the image he wanted to portray.
“Mon Dieu! You’re three for three. Batting a thousands, I think you say in American baseball.”
“Something like that,” Perry said, smiling at the slight mistake. “You can’t really think I’m going to let you live after what you’ve done, can you?”
Montemarche broke into a round of hearty laughter, so intense that his henchmen smiled at the sound of it. “You hardly seem positioned to make such a claim, although your dossier indicates that you are psychologically predisposed to outlandish flights of fancy. It also indicates that you are, or at least were, something of a premier operative. You must have done something to anger Monsieur Moore for him to assign you to find a diplomat and his spy wife. But that is of no consequence. For they are dead, and soon enough you will be as well. You have no inkling of the scope of Scorpion’s plans for this city.”
Still moving his legs in tiny motions, imperceptible in the dim lighting of the room, Perry now gave the appearance of being intrigued by the worm Montemarche had just cast in his pond.
“Plans? What are you talking about?”
Montemarche smiled, but for a moment said nothing. Perry feared his better judgment might trump his ego and keep him from talking further. Already knowing the plan, he didn’t really care what the Frenchman talked about. Only that he kept talking a little longer. He needn’t have worried. The man’s hubris appeared to have no limit.
“Your agency was involved in action which, frankly, would have led to prosecution by the World Court.”
“My company was involved in something that would interest The Hague?” Perry asked innocently, as he began making headway in loosening the tape around his ankles. “I highly doubt that. What were we going to do, start a nuclear war?”
Montemarche’s eyebrow shot upwards. He stared at Perry for a moment then again broke into a second spasm of laughter. “You should go on a game show with such abilities. You are now four for four. Your agency was indeed involved in getting a nuclear device into the hands of some people who would have used it in a manner contrary to the interests of Scorpion, and financially speaking, to my own interests. Terrorism, if used properly, is capable of breaking the spirit of an entire people, but more importantly it can be highly lucrative.”
“You’re talking gibberish,” Perry said, hoping to pick at his ire. Moving him rapidly from laughter to anger would unsettle him. The ploy worked. Montemarche pointed at Perry, and the man to his right, the one who’d punched Perry first, stepped forward and did so again. Perry let it happen, steeling himself for the impact. The man must have been a boxer at one point in his life, because he knew how to belt a guy. Perry saw stars, and had to blink a few times to keep from blacking out. He also felt something in his mouth, and he spit out a bloody molar.
“Our operatives located the bomb, and, after a particularly bloody firefight, we secured it for our own use. All we needed was the arming key and the codes that would activate the ignition device. That is where the late Monsieur Pickering came into play. Embassies are shockingly easy to infiltrate, and the office of the chief communications official, though you would think otherwise, equally easy to bug. Although Pickering was careful not to use the telephone to discuss the fact that he was in possession of the very items we needed, he was less cautious when it came to face to face meetings. He arranged a meeting at the Opéra, which we, in turn, canceled. With extreme prejudice. With the bomb, the key, and the codes in our possession, the ball was for our court. I believe you Americans have the best sports analogies!”
Perry snarled, causing Montemarche to smile once more. He appeared to love getting under Perry’s skin, so Perry let him think he was succeeding.
“We have decided upon a much better use for the nuclear device. Rather than detonating it in some remote, camel-scented village full of zealots who hate your country with a commendable yet misguided passion, we have decided to set it off at Paris Point Zero.”
Perry was legitimately angry now. The pompous bastard was so sure of himse
lf that he was bragging about murdering millions of people, detonating the nuke at the geographical center of the city, meters from Notre Dame Cathedral.
He knew that, although they had the titanium clutch that held the key and the codes, they probably had not yet been able to open it. The clutch, which appeared to the untrained eye to be a thin, solid piece of highly polished metal, in fact had an opening mechanism based upon the same principal as the one that kept Perry’s secure telephone hidden back on his terrace. Only the correct series of movements across the blank surface could open it, and the possible permutations of such movements were endless. So Montemarche was blowing smoke. That made Perry even angrier. Angry and ready, at last, for action.
With a speed that caught all three of his foes off guard, Perry jackknifed his upper body downward, while simultaneously inhaling as deeply as he could. The combination of the downward thrust and the expansion of his chest caused the tape holding him to the chair to fail. At the same time, he stood, having freed his feet just enough to allow him to do so. He squatted violently, completely removing the tape from his ankles.
He was still attached to the arms of the chair by the tape around his wrists, but in a flurry of motion Perry leaped into the air, over the back of the chair, landing with the seat now in front of him. As the suspected ex-boxer began to reach inside his jacket for his gun, Perry lifted the chair over his head and smashed it to kindling on the man’s head, even as his weapon cleared its holster. Perry grabbed the dazed man’s arm and twisted the elbow at an impossible angle, simultaneously grabbing the gun. Using the boxer’s own finger along with his own, he shot the other guard in the face before the man could do anything but gape in astonishment at the blur of activity.
Ripping the gun free from the boxer’s broken arm, Perry rammed the barrel into the man’s mouth and squeezed off a single shot.
Assignment- Adventure A SpyCo Collection 1-3 Page 13
