When Death Frees the Devil

by L. J. Hayward

  Right in the middle of the rock was a tower about four storeys high. It was thick and appeared impenetrable to anything other than a missile, a couple of which were attached to the underside of the helicopter. Jack couldn’t use them, however, not until they knew exactly where their people were. Which required a recce.

  Their first pass of the tower was all about shock and awe and told them all they needed to know. The tower was it for buildings, on the surface at least. Original plans for the base were long lost, but Jack didn’t doubt that there would be underground portions. Probably cells and hidden caches of weapons. It also showed them a helipad on the roof. The only sign of how to get on and off the rock. There wasn’t even a dock. The Mackay would have to deploy boats to get troops on shore.

  “Let’s get this started.” Jack hovered the bird over the helipad.

  Keira’s grin was pure and deadly. “Let’s.” With her bag of gear, she jumped out of the chopper, hit the cement roof in a controlled roll and came to her feet with a pistol out and scanning.

  Jack lifted back up, swung sideways, and dropped over the side of the tower. He pointed the nose of the Ka-52 at the concentrated heat signature and opened fire.

  The glass was bullet proof, but that was true only up to a certain point. Several hundred rounds impacting in under thirty seconds would shatter it no worries. Inside, people scattered to either side of the field of fire, some not fast enough to make it before the glass blew inwards in a million little ballistic fragments. Jack drifted the chopper to the left, chasing black clad figures and a few, more colourful ones as they raced away from the flying glass shards. He caught flashes of bright red, hoping that was McIntosh on the move. He didn’t see anyone that made him think “Ethan.”

  Back where he’d first blown out the glass, Keira rappelled down from the roof and swung into the observation deck. FN P90 at the ready, she stalked into the confusion. A moment later, something on the roof exploded. Crazed glass Jack’s bullets hadn’t yet cracked shattered under the violent pressure. People inside dived for cover. Then a second explosion, from the base of the tower, shook the whole structure. Keira’s devices should have taken out any stairs and lifts, effectively trapping everyone at the very top and delaying reinforcements from below.

  Jack returned to the roof, landed, and grabbed his own bag of gear. Keira had left him a rope ready to go and with his own P90, back up pistols and knives in place, he went over the side and down into the fight.

  Three dead guards sprawled across the floor just inside the broken window. Jack rolled over them, unhooked his harness and came up on one knee, scanning rapidly. A portly man in a white dishdasha lay near the wall, blood coating the back of his robe. He didn’t move. Keira had set up behind a knocked over, wingback chair, returning fire that came from the right.

  “There’s about twenty troops, maybe a half dozen non-combatants, and the targets,” she reported as Jack dove into cover with her.

  “Any sign of our people?” Jack watched the other direction, rifle up and ready, but no one seemed to be coming back that way.

  “Saw McIntosh go that way.” Keira pointed to the left. “Haven’t seen Blade.”

  “Okay. Give me a sec to contact the Mackay, then we’ll sweep the area.”

  Keira nodded and sent a short burst of gunfire after the quickly appearing then disappearing figure of an enemy scout.

  Jack closed his eyes and went sideways. He sent the prepared message to the frigate, got a confirmation, and came back to awareness just as several of the enemy made a combined effort to flush them out. Some stayed pressed to the inner curved wall, sending covering fire towards their position, while another pair slid along the outer rim to get a different angle of fire.

  “Time to move.” Keira sprayed bullets without aiming, leaped over the chair and backed away from the encroaching enemy.

  Jack went with her, watching where they were going, trusting her to keep their backs free of immediate pursuit. Just as he caught sight of the enemy ahead and fired, a startled scream sounded behind him. Wanting nothing more than to turn around and see what the sudden eruption of thumps and smacks meant, Jack concentrated on keeping the enemy in front pinned.

  “Keira, talk to me.”

  “We got help. Going to lend a hand.”

  It had to be Ethan. “Go. I’ll keep this side back.”

  The presence at his back moved away and he backed up with it. Thanks to the curve of the space, the enemy in front advanced as he retreated. The sounds of hand-to-hand ramped up behind him as Keira joined the fight. She was as lethal with her hands and feet as she was with a gun.

  Then suddenly the enemy in front surged forwards. More troops appeared, spreading out and firing on full automatic.

  “Oh shit.” Jack turned and ran. “Incoming,” he yelled as he went.

  Ahead, Keira was locked in a hold, enemy arm around her neck as she wrestled for control of a gun in the man’s other hand. Closer to the gaping hole in the glass wall, Ethan was an elegant blur of sweeps and kicks, swinging a pair of forearm crutches as weapons. At Jack’s shout, Ethan broke away from his opponent, planted the crutches firmly and swung both legs out, feet hitting the other man in the chest. He tumbled out of the tower with a wild yell. The moment Ethan’s feet touched down, he gave his own cry of pain and staggered towards the open air as well.

  Jack grabbed Ethan by the back of his shirt as he raced past, shot the man holding Keira in the back, and all but threw himself and Ethan behind a barricade of overturned tables. Rolling, he came up on a knee, rifle pointed at the strange man sitting against the inner wall, pistols in both hands.

  “Jack, no.” Ethan grabbed his arm and pulled his weapon down. “He’s friendly.”

  Keira crashed over the barrier and Ethan had to stop her from shooting the man as well. He was older than Jack by at least twenty years, greying hair buzzed to the scalp, a scar down one side of his face, and his legs were the thin sticks of a long time paraplegic. The man was bleeding from his right shoulder. Next to him was a wheelchair riddled with bullet holes.

  “He’s Zero, our handler,” Ethan said breathlessly. “He’s helping us.”

  “Us?” Jack asked warily.

  “McIntosh went that way.” Zero’s English was accented, though Jack couldn’t tell where the accent originated.

  Having worked out that the resistance was gone, the enemy closed in from their left, bullets impacting the steel tabletops and flying overhead, keeping them pinned.

  “She went after the bosses.” Ethan had lost one of the crutches, and the other one lay beside him, his hand resting on it, ready to snatch it up on a second’s notice.

  “I’m surprised you didn’t go with her,” Jack said as softly as he could.

  After a few moments, Ethan shook his head, the action weary. “That’s not what I need anymore. They’re not important to me. Not like you are.”

  Holy fuck and damn. Jack was ready to throw Ethan over his shoulder, get back to the helicopter and fly the hell away. He’d been half worried that McIntosh would have caught Ethan up in her plan to rid the world of the Cabal from the top down. But it was still the plan and Jack knew his director wouldn’t leave it half done.

  “Guys.” Keira had made a small gap in the tables and was firing through it. “Could use some help here.”

  Zero tossed Ethan a gun and then pulled himself closer to the barricade. He added single shots to Keira’s sweeping automatic fire.

  “Go after McIntosh,” Ethan said to Jack. “We’ll keep them occupied here.”

  Wondering why Ethan was opting to stay put, Jack finally put it together. Zero had a wheelchair, so the crutches were for Ethan. The weariness on Ethan’s face wasn’t about being tired. Now that he was still for a moment, Jack noticed the leg brace, the fading bruises on his neck, the stiffness of his shoulders. These weren’t injuries from the current battle.

  The anger came white hot and all consuming. Anger at whoever had hurt Ethan, at the Cabal bosses f
or orchestrating it all in the first place, and at McIntosh for putting them all back in this situation without bothering to ask first. She was his director, he respected her, knew she had a harsh job and that often personal feelings didn’t work well with the decisions she had to make. But right then, that meant little to nothing. She’d thrown him into the snake pit unprepared once before, and now she’d done it again.

  “Be right back,” he snarled.

  Hefting his rifle, Jack rolled over the barrier and raced after McIntosh.

  He found her about a quarter of the way around the loop. She was pressed into the shallow recess of the stairwell door, rifle taken from a fallen enemy across her chest. Her hair had been pulled back into a messy knot and her shoes kicked off. The skirt was torn up both sides, jacket gone, and a red mark showed a hard punch had landed on her right cheek.

  “Thank you for the timely arrival, Jack,” she said as he joined her in the meagre cover.

  “Don’t thank me yet. I’m really pissed with you right now.”

  A smile flittered across her lips. “I figured you would be. Sorry.”

  A black clad figure was creeping up along the outer rim. Jack sent three bullets their way and they crumpled to the floor, unmoving. “Consider this my resignation, Donna.”

  McIntosh leaned out of cover, fired, and ducked back in as it was returned by an unseen enemy. “Yes, I figured that too. On three?”

  “On three,” he agreed grimly.

  “Three.”

  They moved out together, covering each other as they advanced around the curve. The enemy didn’t retreat quickly enough and four armed troops came into view. Behind them was a white man in an expensive suit that looked decidedly roughed up now.

  “Camdon-Smythe,” McIntosh said tersely. “He’s a boss.” She swept her fire across the ranks of troops. Two dropped to lucky hits, most of the bullets impacting armour.

  The prick was pressed up tight to the inner wall, shouting at the remaining troops to “Kill them. Kill them now!” He must have been paying them a very good wage because they gave it a fair shot, keeping Jack and McIntosh pinned.

  “We’ll never get him at this angle,” McIntosh said.

  “They won’t let us retreat and come at them from the outer rim.”

  “I’ll do it.”

  “I’ve got the armour,” Jack corrected. “I’ll do it. On three.”

  Grudgingly, McIntosh said, “On three.”

  “Three.”

  McIntosh stepped out from the wall, firing rapidly. Jack sprang out further, tumbling into a controlled roll as bullets whizzed by him. One screamed by his left arm, leaving a burning wake, but he came up on one knee, aimed, fired and rolled back into cover.

  Enemy fire immediately stopped and Jack and McIntosh pressed against the wall, listening. No more desperate demands for them to be killed, no more obedient fire from the troops.

  “Got him,” Jack muttered.

  “You hit?” McIntosh asked.

  “Winged only. I’m fine.”

  “That’s goo— Jack!”

  McIntosh shoved Jack hard and he staggered as she stepped out in front of him, gun raised to fire.

  Bang!

  Ethan watched Jack vanish around the curve and wished he had stayed, or that Ethan could have gone with him. The pain meds had worn off quickly thanks to his Sugar Baby constitution and his leg was throbbing. Using it for support while kicking with the other was almost as bad as the other way around. The best he could do right then was make sure the troops here stayed focused on them and didn’t head back around to where Jack and McIntosh were hopefully together now.

  He joined Zero and the female asset in keeping the troops occupied. The pistol had a very limited number of shots, though, and he and the handler ran out fast. The asset—who introduced herself as Kiera—shrugged off her pack and told them to use it. Inside were more handguns and magazines. Furnished with new guns, they kept at it until Ethan noted movement on the horizon. A large ship was powering toward the island from the southeast. Two large choppers were racing ahead of it and a third was lifting from its deck. Reinforcements. They only had to hold out for a bit longer. Which wasn’t soon enough for Keira.

  “There’s barely a half dozen of them left. We need to end this sooner rather than later.”

  “She’s right,” Zero said. “We’ll run out of ammunition before them, then they’ll pick us off.”

  Ethan had to agree and as he looked around, he got an idea.

  While Ethan and Zero kept firing, Keira worked on Ethan’s distraction and in under a minute, they were ready to go. Leaving Zero propped up against the wall, Ethan and Keira moved out from behind the cover slowly. Keira pushed the wheelchair in front of them, dead body strapped into it, empty guns tied to the arm rests. With an extra shove, she sent the chair rolling toward the enemy fast enough they wouldn’t want to take the time to make sure it wasn’t a real threat. Sure enough, the enemy changed aim to the chair and the body jerked as it was pummelled with bullets. Distracted, the troops missed Ethan and Keira coming around the inner wall.

  Six. Seven. Eight shots and it was done. The last six enemy troops were down. Just beyond them was Balakrishnan, who had one of the female waitstaff as a shield, his arm around her neck and gun pointed to her head. Ten stood in front of them, S&W 500 in hand.

  “It’s over, Balakrishnan.” Keira aimed for him. “If you come with us willingly, you’ll live and be treated fairly. If you resist, well that’s a whole other story.”

  Ethan kept his sight on Ten. His leg was throbbing, the brace not made to support his weight, but he did his best to ignore it. Weakness in front of Ten was like chum in the water.

  “It won’t matter what you do to me, the Cabal will always exist,” Balakrishnan said. “It always has and it always will. Kill them.”

  Ten was moving before Balakrishnan finished speaking. Ethan had started moving even before his brother. He knocked Keira out of Ten’s line of fire, then dropped down, balancing on one hand and swept his good leg through Ten’s. His brother jumped, predictably, but that just gave Keira the opportunity to leap back in. A flying kick took the gun out of his hand and the follow through caught him in the ribs, making him stagger back.

  Ethan rolled out of the way as Keira pressed the advantage. She was highly skilled, keeping Ten on the defensive as she drove him away from Balakrishnan.

  Slowly standing, Ethan raised his own gun and sighted Balakrishnan’s head. Which was currently ducked down behind that of his human shield.

  Leg burning, Ethan settled into his stance. “This won’t work, Balakrishnan. Let her go and surrender.”

  Balakrishnan said nothing. Ethan scanned him for another vulnerable spot. He could get him in the leg but he might still shoot the woman. As far as collateral damage went, she wouldn’t be the worst Ethan had left behind, but he really didn’t want to be the sort of person who could do that and walk away anymore.

  There was a hesitation in the sounds of the fight to his right. Ethan glanced that way.

  Ten blocked a blow from Keira, knocking her arm out wide. His other hand jabbed in and Keira threw herself out of the way of the blade in that hand—directly into the one in his other hand, springing out from a wrist sheath. He got it in under her raised arm, through the gap in her armour. It was jammed in so hard that when she fell with a startled gasp, the blade ripped out of his hand.

  Ethan didn’t know Keira but Jack had spoken about her with admiration and respect when he’d told Ethan about their search for him. She was an Office asset, fighting to keep her corner of the world safe. It could have just as easily been Jack.

  The gun swung and he pulled the trigger, calm and deliberate. He was in pain and he was tired. It was time to go home with Jack and get out of this life he didn’t choose once and for all.

  Balakrishnan screamed as his knee blew out. He didn’t fire his gun, just flailed wildly and fell. The woman tumbled out of his hold and scrambled away as Ethan stalked
towards the last of his targets. The man lay on the floor, clutching at his ruined knee, blood seeping out between his hands. He was crying in pain, but when he saw Ethan standing over him, he shut up quickly.

  “If you could know the full pain of what you put me and my siblings through, I wouldn’t hesitate to show you. But as there is no way you could ever understand just what you stole from us because you are a heartless, cold-blooded piece of fucking shit, I guess I’ll just kill you, like you made me kill so many others. How does it feel?”

  He didn’t give the man time to answer. The bullet slammed into Balakrishnan’s head between his wide-open eyes.

  It didn’t feel like closure. It didn’t feel like an end. Ethan had told Jack the truth. Balakrishnan and the others didn’t count anymore. It felt like nothing.

  “It’s over,” he said, even though he didn’t feel that way himself. “No more orders. No more control. We’re free.”

  Ten smiled. “You are free. I was never caught.” He threw his knife.

  Ethan stepped into the trajectory, intercepting the spinning weapon a second sooner than he should have. The handle knocked into his chest and clattered to the floor. He was still moving when Ten met him with a fist. Ethan took the blow on his shoulder, shrugging it off as he rammed his forearm against Ten’s throat and drove him backwards into the glass wall. Ten pulled another gun and Ethan knocked that arm down, then jammed his elbow back into his brother’s face twice. He grabbed Ten’s arm and slammed it against the glass, trying to dislodge the weapon. It took a twist of the wrist to make him let go and it flew away.

  Ten reversed the grip and wrenched Ethan’s arm up and back. Spinning with the pressure, Ethan dropped to his knees and hauled Ten over his back, slamming him to the floor. Something moved in his leg and Ethan’s gasp was silent, the sudden, searing agony stealing his voice.