Carl heard a whisper to his left. “Oh my God!”
He glanced that way and saw the redhead fumble with her cell phone and point it at the altercation.
One of the cops grabbed the man by the back of the collar. Carl remembered this was to restrain any movements the man might make. Then the cop kicked the man’s right foot to the side to spread his feet wider and keep him immobilized, but the man’s foot slid too far, and he fell to his knees and screamed. A second officer rammed his knee against the back of the man’s head. He kneed him so hard, the man’s face made a crack in the window glass and left a streak of blood as he slid to the ground. He rolled over and tried to fend away the flurry of fists and boots pounding him. He even brought one of the cops to the sidewalk with a lucky kick to the shin.
He had absolutely no chance for salvation. There were four cops and they had guns, tasers, carbon-composite sticks, and pepper spray, but only one of the officers used anything other than fists and boots. Quickly overwhelmed, the pedestrian curled up into a ball.
The cops kept at him, punching and kicking. One extended a telescoping baton and swung it every time one of the other cops withdrew a boot to kick again. The one with the stick had expert aim, repeatedly striking the man on hard bone—skull, elbows, knees, wrists, and ankles.
The fourth cop took a break, stepping back. He kept looking around as if to make sure no one got too close or tried to interfere, though the only other pedestrians Carl could see were across the street. A young couple had stopped to watch, but when the fourth cop eyeballed them, they quickly resumed walking at a hurried pace.
Then that cop looked into the coffee shop.
Carl sat facing the window wall and assumed the least threatening posture he could imagine. He sat with his feet flat on the floor and his palms flat against the metal top of the little table, one hand on either side of his coffee mug.
The officer caught his gaze, and a flicker of recognition flashed in his eyes. Carl’s face was, of course, one of the most famous on the planet. The officer glanced to Carl’s left and shouted, “Camera!”
The other three officers immediately abandoned their victim and focused on the redheaded woman in the coffee shop. Carl knew then he was in imminent danger. For whatever reason, those cops—those bullies—were lusting to beat the crap out of someone, anyone. They’d just done it to the man on the street and now they were coming for the young woman recording the video. No way they’d ignore the two young baristas behind the counter. No way they’d ignore Carl. That’s what cops were trained to do.
Constantly evaluate situational awareness. Assess and control all variables that might be a threat. Put everyone on the ground and sort out the innocents later.
When they got close enough to Carl, they’d notice he was armed.
The three police officers moved toward the door while the fourth—the one who had pointed out the camera—did a curious thing. He squatted down and rifled through the bleeding man’s clothes. He expertly searched the man’s pockets, shirt collar, belt, ankles, and even quickly pulled off his shoes. He was looking for something but didn’t find it, so he stood and followed the other three into the coffee shop.
Three police officers charged through the door headed for the young redhead’s table twenty feet from Carl and hollering for her to surrender her cell phone. The fourth paused just inside the door, sizing up Carl. Glancing down at Carl’s windbreaker, he saw the bulge of a hidden shoulder holster.
“Gun!” the officer yelled, pulling his service weapon at the same instant the first cop swung his baton at the redhead.
The third officer was just passing Carl, so he kicked the center pillar of his small table and sent it sliding into the officer’s path. The table slid right out from under his coffee cup and the porcelain mug fell to the floor by his feet and shattered.
The officer tripped up momentarily in his attempt to avoid the collision, and in that instant, Carl leaped between him and the second officer. He pulled his Glock and pointed the bulbous black suppressor at the fourth officer just inside the doorway, who could not shoot now that Carl was in their midst.
Carl fired at the trailing officer in the doorway—head shot, three meters—and heard gasps and shouts behind him as the first two officers pivoted toward him. Even as he fired point-blank under the chin of the third officer, he launched a vicious back kick aimed toward the thick vest of the officer right behind him. It was just enough to shove that man off-balance and against the first officer, and both men couldn’t get their weapons free in time.
Carl pivoted and dropped to a knee, then fired twice more. Two more head shots, one meter. He slid his Glock back into his shoulder holster and zipped his windbreaker all the way up, then scanned the room as he retrieved his four spent shell casings. Amazingly, the young redhead still held up her cell phone as if filming the encounter was more important than her personal safety.
“You okay?” Carl said.
“OhmyGod!” she whispered. “Please don’t shoot me.”
“Sista, if I wanted you dead, I could have just let that cop cave your face in with his stick. Now turn off that video, get your ass up out of that chair, and get that man to the hospital.” He pointed at the black man writhing and bleeding on the sidewalk. He hollered at the young baristas peeking up over the counter against the far wall. “You too! Both of you, get over here and help!”
Carl turned to leave, then stopped by the door. To the redhead he said, “Email me a copy of that video file.” He wanted Agent Palmer to assess his reaction, tactics, and speed, so he gave the woman an anonymous email address and waited while she fiddled with her cell phone. “And don’t call any more cops unless you want that to happen to you too.” He head-nodded at the bloody man.
He pulled the door open and left the coffee shop. Glancing across the street, he saw his CIA informant peeking around the edge of the glass door. The man had watched the whole encounter, and now the meeting was clearly off. No doubt the police CSI—Crime Scene Investigators—would scour every available witness and surveillance camera to find out who the shooter had been. The American Terrorist’s presence in Chicago would be known and the manhunt would be on again. Carl couldn’t chance compromising his informant’s identity. He’d have to try to reschedule.
Carl turned away from the meeting site and mentally cursed the police. But something tugged at his gut. Though the four officers were white, the assault didn’t seem like an ordinary case of cops assaulting a random black man they may have suspected of a crime. This was an ambush. Their victim had not tried to fight back or run. He’d only tried to duck and cover, and no doubt the cops could spin that fact to support their use of excessive force. They’d get away with it, Carl knew from personal experience. They always did, even if caught on camera. The internal police department investigations and the rare Grand Jury almost always found the excessive violence justified. These cops were specifically waiting for that man, though. They were searching for something he presumably had. The way the fourth cop had been looking around was troubling too, as was how they’d gone straight after the woman with the cell phone with a vengeance.
He dismissed the thoughts from his mind. Whatever that man or those cops were involved in was none of his business. His only task now was to escape and evade, then check in with Agent Palmer. Still, he was curious about the strategic reason behind the ambush. He executed a near-perfect military about-face in mid-stride and headed back to the assault victim. The red-haired woman and one of the baristas had just knelt beside the man on the sidewalk and were trying to help him to a sitting position. They all regarded Carl with suspicion when he squatted with them.
“Why did they attack you?” Carl said. “What were they looking for?”
It took the man a few seconds to collect himself to the point where he could respond. He was a mess. His left shoulder appeared to be dislocated, and his left elbow was broken at an unnatural angle. His face was bloodied, nose flattened, lips torn from multiple boot im
pacts. More than a couple of his teeth littered the sidewalk, and his blood streaked down the coffee shop glass.
“They control the police,” the man muttered.
Carl grunted. “Of course, they control the police. That’s the way the system works.”
“No, you don’t understand.” The man coughed up blood. “It’s real control. Behavioral control. With technology. They can make them do anything.”
“They who?”
The man’s head lolled, and his chin fell to his chest as he lost consciousness.
Chapter 9
Chief of Police John Bildemeyer entered the office and stood beside and slightly behind his boss on the top floor of the thirty-seven-story Stennhauser building in downtown Chicago. They both looked out over the city through the expansive window wall. The midday sky was slightly overcast.
The man he stood with wasn’t his boss in the same way as was the city mayor but rather had paid a lot of money to have the chief of police do his bidding. Bildemeyer walked the uneasy tightrope of managing the city’s police force under the employment and political oversight of the mayor while carrying out certain less-than-legal police initiatives overseen by the man beside him. Mr. Karuhl was a deadly man who served even more powerful and deadly men. Chief Bildemeyer served at the pleasure of the mayor, yet he lived at the pleasure of his true boss. He knew that both statuses were interdependent.
“We have a problem, Mr. Karuhl,” Bildemeyer said.
“Indeed, we do,” answered the man. “Do you have a solution to that problem or do you need me to solve it for you?”
“There’s no way we could have anticipated the American Terrorist would be having coffee here, in our city.”
Mr. Karuhl cast a sideways glance in his direction, and his light blue eyes sent a stabbing chill down Bildemeyer’s spine. “You don’t have to be defensive just yet, Chief. My people know exactly what Carl Johnson is capable of. What I want to know is, how is he involved here? Why was he at the location of the takedown? How did he know of our operation?”
“Unknown. A cell phone video showed he was just sitting there, and he did not take action until one of the officers recognized him. It appears he was waiting for someone.”
“Our target?”
“Unclear. If Johnson had been waiting for our target, perhaps to get the data from him, then he would have interfered before the officers converged on the man.”
“Agreed,” Mr. Karuhl nodded. “He could easily have dispatched the police officers anytime he wanted.” The man took a deep breath, seeming to contemplate something. “You released the altered video to the media?”
“As you requested.”
“It was not a request,” Mr. Karuhl said with grunt. “But what about the red-haired woman? I find it hard to believe she is just a bystander who just happened to film the encounter. I’d like to know how she is involved. Could there be a connection between her and the American Terrorist? Were they just acting for the sake of the video?”
“Probably some bleeding-heart liberal. Bystanders always film police activity, especially when a black man is involved.”
Mr. Karuhl grunted again. “They still think taking videos will make a difference, but it won’t. Not in the coming new world.” The man gazed out the window again. “I want those loose ends eliminated.”
Eliminated, Chief Bildemeyer thought. In other words, murdered…the red-head, Malik Tavares, and the coffeeshop baristas.
He said, “Do you think the American Terrorist knows about your experiment?”
“Thanks to the vice president’s failed power grab last year, we’ve had to accelerate our plan past the experimental test phase. We are now in Phase Two large-scale demonstration trials. My benefactors have been gradually militarizing the nation’s police forces for almost twenty years. They’ve been patiently waiting for technology to catch up with their goals. And for the last few years, the media has been conveniently circulating our disinformation: Black Lives Matter.” Mr. Karuhl snorted contempt. “The black population and their white sympathizers have no idea what’s coming, and they won’t until it’s too late. They have no idea other minorities experience the same brutal treatment in almost equal percentages. We’ve kept the news media and social media focused on white police versus black people because the implication of modern-day social slavery keeps people polarized, and therefore distracted from our true operation. Now it appears someone—this Malik Tavares—has connected the dots. We must know who set him on this investigative path. Who are his sources?”
Mr. Karuhl inhaled and blew it out. “And how is this goddamned American Terrorist involved? It can’t be coincidence he was here.”
“You said we’re in Phase Two trials?”
The man nodded. “We’ve had great success manipulating several recent small-scale protests of police brutality by increasing the aggressive behavior of the police. Chicago, however, is the first citywide test scheduled for next week. Just think of it.” Karuhl waved a hand at the expansive window wall. “If we can incite on-demand citywide clashes between the police and the civil population here, and later, across the country in multiple cities simultaneously, the population will give up enormous amounts of personal freedom to be saved from a perceived epidemic of civilian protests and violence.
“It’ll be just like when the Patriot Act was enacted. People will give up their freedom just like they did after Nine-Eleven. And I have to admit, the American Terrorist’s activities over the past few months have actually aided our effort. So, while the former vice president was reckless in his attempt to co-opt our plan with his own, he has actually been helpful. His influence and financial backing has now made large-scale implementation of police control practical and imminent.”
Chief Bildemeyer got an uneasy feeling in his gut. “Is that what the reporter uncovered? The timetable?” Either Mr. Karuhl trusted him and was inviting him into the inner circle by divulging these details or, more likely, he’d outlived his usefulness and become expendable. In that case, revealing confidential information to Bildemeyer was irrelevant. The chief set his mind to formulating an escape plan to isolate himself from the current operation.
Mr. Karuhl said, “Calling Malik Tavares a reporter is like calling a mall cop a police officer. Nevertheless, he did a remarkable investigative job culling our plan from myriad seemingly unconnected data points. Clearly, we don’t want this report public or we wouldn’t have ordered the man’s death. Unfortunately, Tavares didn’t have a thumb drive on his person, and he wasn’t foolish enough to store his report in the cloud where we could easily access it.”
Bildemeyer nodded. “I have CSI people I trust going through his apartment. We’ll find his data.”
“Eliminate every electronic trace of his research.” Karuhl fell silent for several seconds. “We’ve used a large number of scientists and doctors, and all but a trusted few have been eliminated. Tavares must have found a trend in the data our own specialists missed. The public might have fun posting conspiracy theories online about a secret alliance between the former vice president and several corporations to develop biochemical agents that control aggression and paranoia”—Karuhl raised both hands in a quote-unquote gesture—“but if Tavares reports the exact methodology or the fact that we are all ready to begin Phase Two trials….”
“Mass hysteria.”
“Believe me, Chief, mass panic is the desired outcome. That would trigger the widespread civil unrest we need to nationalize the militarized police forces and various states’ National Guards, all under a single commander…our commander. The president and her government won’t be safe from their own Secret Service, or from the FBI, CIA, or TER if we can trigger aggressive behavior in any target we choose.”
“And the vice president takes over the government?”
Mr. Karuhl grunted. “Trust me, the former vice president, Rainman, is a nonfactor, and we have not decided whether or not he has outlived his usefulness. But government control is inevitable with th
e help of my benefactors.” Mr. Karuhl nodded, then continued. “But if Tavares releases his research on the exact biochemical compounds and the activation frequencies….”
Bildemeyer got the feeling that Mr. Karuhl was jockeying for the top position in the new world order, whatever that was going to be, but he finally understood the stakes. “Then the plan can be circumvented.”
“Police brutality keeps the people focused on the police. However, if the people know that we cause police brutality, then their focus will be on us.” Mr. Karuhl was silent for a long time. “Okay, here is what I want you to do.”
Bildemeyer absorbed his instructions and tried not to betray his shock. What the man was proposing was a bold countermove fraught with risk…for the chief of police.
“I can’t use my police officers for that. I’ll need to contract—”
Mr. Karuhl tapped his ear. “My people are sending a specialist within the hour. All your people need to do is provide intel.”
“Understood,” Bildemeyer said. “And if the American Terrorist interferes again?”
“I find it difficult to believe that Carl Johnson would be involved in our little corner of the world. My group has seen intel that suggests he is currently involved in more global affairs, eliminating the people involved in the death of his son. Still, the coincidence of his presence here cannot be ignored. If he interferes again, then our specialist will deal with him too.”
“Very well.” The chief of police turned to leave.
“You are not to leave these premises until this issue has been satisfactorily resolved. Make your phone calls from here.”
Chief Bildemeyer looked around the luxuriously appointed room. All the furnishings were designed in colors of white and gray, including the carpet. He could easily overpower Mr. Karuhl if he chose to do so, and the smaller man no doubt knew this, but then he’d have to escape a dozen or more of his boss’s security forces scattered throughout the top floor of the building.
American Terrorist Trilogy Page 72
