by Declan Finn
“I’m told that one of the mercs lost last year was one of your people first.”
Derringer frowned, really thinking. “You don’t mean Angie, do you? She was a fine girl, but I wouldn’t have called her a protégé.”
And I wouldn’t have called her a fine girl. Maybe a ruthless sociopath. “Files say different. But I guess they don’t know everything.”
Derringer smiled. “No. They never do. I guess this is goodbye, Mr. Anderson. I’ll be seeing you.”
Kevin smiled. “If I have anything to say about it, the only place I hope to see you is in Hell.”
“Haven’t you heard? We’re already there.”
Chapter 18: Tyger, Tyger
The first thing Alek noticed was heat on the back of his neck, followed by the familiar scent of burning hair. It made him smile momentarily, until he noticed his hair brushing against his cheeks, and he realized that the smoking burning was his own. That was the first time he had every truly felt panic, and he knew, standing in front of the bank, was dangerous.
Considering the likely cause for his sudden haircut, almost all of San Francisco had suddenly become too dangerous for him.
But this was not the first time he had been in this situation, and he had the right instincts – run. Alek was nothing if not thorough. He had a bolt hole, of sorts, prepared for this eventuality. All he needed to do was get there.
Time flew as he traversed the miles to the heart of the Muir woods, to the security of the Forsaken. He reached the outskirts of their camp and headed to a small clearing, where a carefully laid pyre waited for him. Buried in the sticks was a flare, his own quiet little signal to Harris Derringer, giving Alek time to rest and prepare for the negotiations to follow Derringer’s arrival. With a sigh, he lit the pyre, and watched the flare shoot into the canopy.
Alek Soubel didn’t have long to wait. Derringer’s laughter entered the clearing well before the man himself. The battle of wits had begun.
“So, finally bit off more then you could burn, Alek?” His voice echoed in the stillness of the trees, and it was hard to pinpoint a location.
“Yes, Harris, something like that. I’m calling in my favor. I need out of the city for a while.” As much as he tried, the exasperation seeped into his voice.
“Well, I’m sure we will welcome you in the bosom of the Forsaken. Andreas hasn’t turned anyone away – provided they turned everything over to the community that we’ve built here.”
“Cut the crap, Derringer! You know I’m not relinquishing my possessions or any of that crap. I just need a little anonymity for a while. We had a deal. Now, I’m expecting you to honor it.”
Alek had found where Derringer had been hiding, and circled the clearing until he stood before him, his squeeze bottle pointed into the shadows that concealed the smooth talking Derringer. It was a dangerous ploy – Alek wouldn’t be leaving the Muir woods so easily if he burned Harris. The vast majority of the Forsaken might not know who he was, but Andreas Foreman did. And should Foreman declare Soubel a target for taking out his close friend Derringer, he wouldn’t have much hope of living, let alone leaving the woods.
But as they both knew a burn didn’t have to be lethal to be painful. Long seconds ticked, neither of them speaking as the bonfire creaked with the sounds of wood burning.
Chapter 19: Traffic Jam
Islamic Republic of France
Amanda Esmeralda “Mandy” Rohaz, in the top ten earners for the Mercenaries Guild, checked her ammunition one more time, and wondered how many more people she would have to kill.
Maybe I shouldn’t have blown our last driver’s head all over that checkpoint guard.
Mandy was grateful that, in the legion of nimrods she had found kidnapped, she had found more than a few of them who had a brain. The only reason that they had been captured was mostly due to dumber friends who had brought them along for the right. Most importantly, one of them actually knew how to drive a truck.
This came in handy as Mandy and her rescued captives sped down the highway, chased by police cars. After all, someone had to return fire. Between the cop cars and the police helicopter, Mandy was having a fun time multitasking.
The next time I do this, I don’t do something as subtle as shooting up the place. Next time, I bring a full tactical team. It might actually be worth splitting my cut with everyone who came along … Mandy frowned at the thought of splitting her take. Then again, on the other hand, maybe not.
Mandy looked through the hole cut in the back of the truck to see whether or not the police had figured out that it wasn’t a good idea to try drive directly behind them. The last three times a cop had done that, she slipped a few hand grenades through the slot in the door. That at least made them back off. And, despite the car tires being armored, the police were using laser rifles, and hadn’t tried to shoot them out.
Well, then again, we are going at about seventy. If I were the cops, I wouldn’t want all of that gold spread out all over the road. And I have to stop calling them cops. They’re mutaween.
The religious police of the Islamic Republic of France had been well-trained in, well, beating unarmed civilians. Mutaween weren’t exactly used to Mandy’s type of striking back. It was probably the only reason that the car had managed to get that far. After all, the mutaween at the checkpoint knew enough to give them a second look, but didn’t really know how to handle having gray matter spread all over him like gross confetti. Then the replacement driver Mandy had in the passenger seat took over, and this particular SNAFU had commenced.
Mandy had several high explosive rounds, but she wanted to hold on to them until things got really bad.
She looked back at the gathering of stupid tourists, and asked, “Does anyone here know how to play sports? Preferably baseball?”
“Don’t you mean softball?”
Mandy arched a brow. “What are you, wimps? Softball’s for…oh, nevermind.”
Another one raised her hand. “I play softball. What do you need?”
Mandy reached down, grabbed a belt off the floor, and lifted it high, showing the string of grenades attached to it. “I cover, you play ball.”
The girl – Mandy had a hard time thinking of any of them as women – paused, shrugged, and said, “Why not?”
Another girl grabbed her and said, “They could shoot you!”
The volunteer jerked her hand away. “Don’t you remember the cages we were in two days ago? Being shot sounds better.”
Mandy smiled. “Good woman.” For her, I’ll make an exception. “You know how to arm them, right?”
She picked up one. “Pull the pin, flip this handle thing, and throw?”
“It’s called a spoon, but I’ll take it.” She reached down, grabbed two submachineguns she had borrowed from the slavers back at the warehouse, and nodded to a third to open the door.
Mandy lowered herself to a deep-kneed squat, had both guns up and at the ready. “Now!”
Dual-wielding was nothing new to Mandy. She was one of the few people she knew who was actually good at doing it – a rare commodity, but it helped that she trained that way, as well as being naturally gifted to it. Of the five cars that were still behind them, Mandy opened up at the cars to her two o’clock and directly ahead of her, while the softball play fired a fastball right over Mandy’s head. The mutaween diver in the car at ten o’clock grenade was cracked in the head, killing him. The car swerved to the right, taking the car away from the truck, when it exploded.
Mandy redirected her fire to the cars eleven and one o’clock, and the neck grenade whizzed over her head, straight through the windshield of the car directly behind the truck. This one swerved off to the left and exploded.
Mandy felt her guns stop firing and the magazines drop out. She tossed both of them to the floor, and drew both of her sidearms, firing for the two cars. “Close the door!”
The truck door came down like an ax, and Mandy let out a breath. She slid down the HUD display on her helmet and track
ed both cars. The one on her left was slowing down and drifting. After changing the settings on the scanners, she found that she had drilled both the driver and the engine block.
Mandy smiled, holstered one handgun, and used her HUD to track exactly what she was aiming for, and then fired through the hole in the truck door, putting three rounds in the mutaween’s tires.
Mandy smiled, reloaded, and said, “Does anyone have a twenty on that helicopter?”
The driver radioed back. “I think it’s trying to land in front of us.”
Mandy frowned, then reached for her high-explosive rounds. She looked up to the hatch on the roof, and said, “I’m going to need a hand up there.”
Two of the women cupped their hands, and Mandy used them for a boost on top of one of the crates. She scaled them, moving up the boxes like a ladder.
When she got to the top hatch of the trailer, she gave it a little push, and it stayed right where it was. Aw crap. That’s not good.
“Twenty seconds,” she heard in her earpiece.
Without thinking, Mandy ordered, “Bank right.”
She was glad that the gloves she wore were part of her armor, because otherwise, this was going to hurt.
Mandy let go of the crate, falling to the floor of the truck. Thankfully, her memory-cloth body armor instantly reacted, hardening and absorbing the impact. She dropped and rolled, heading right for the back of the truck.
“Open the main door!” she cried, knowing that she had only one shot at this trick.
The woman who played ball with the cops had the main cargo doors unlocked just in time for Mandy to hit the door at full speed.
Mandy grabbed the door handle with her left hand as it flung open. She rode the door as it swung her out into traffic. It whipped her around the left side of the truck, putting her into the middle lane, and slammed her against the side of the trailer.
The helicopter was parked in the middle of the highway. She raised her gun, aimed, and fired.
The nice thing about chlorine isotope rounds was that they basically vaporized anything they hit. She fired three rounds at the helicopter, clearing the road.
Unfortunately, it not only vaporized the helicopter, but also part of the road.
Damnit. She keyed her radio and yelled, “Gun the engine! We’re going to need to jump the gap.”
The truck’s acceleration jumped up far and so fast, Mandy was whipped back around by the door…but not enough.
In fact, Mandy was left dangling out in the middle of the road, while the truck’s engine gunned it for the whole Mandy made in the center of the helicopter.
Which meant that Mandy was perfectly centered to meet the helicopter’s burning cockpit head on.
She had exactly one idea, and seconds to do it. This is going to hurt, she thought as she loosened her grip on the door for a split second. She fell, and let her feet touch the street for just an instant before she grabbed tight again. Since the road was going at eighty miles an hour, that was enough movement to shove her, and the door, back into place.
Unfortunately, that meant that her legs were around the height of the bumper. The door slammed her against the door frame. Her armor once against absorbed the impact, but damn, it sucked.
Then the truck hit the hole in the road. Mandy threw the gun into the truck and grabbed the other door, bracing herself before she went flying again.
The truck’s front wheels slammed back to the highway, one of the four tires exploding like a bomb.
As she was dragged into the truck, Mandy thought This is not my day. She didn’t even get to her feet, just laid on the floor. She keyed her radio one more time.
“Mandy to Cortez.”
After a minute, Major Rohaz came back on the line. “Yes, Mandy. This is Cortez. You’ve been quiet for a few days.”
“I’m going to need an extraction team meeting me in a few hours.”
“Where do you need us?”
“Track my GPS. You tell me. The sooner the better.” She sighed. “Helicopter preferred. Something to lift a fully-loaded sixteen wheeler. This is going to be a big one.”
***
When Kevin returned home just before nine, he only really expected a handful of things: Kyle waiting in the apartment; Shen Lo waiting in the street; or someone hanging from the fire escape due to one of him numerous booby traps.
He didn’t normally run into Kaye Wellering, CEO of the Hacker’s Union.
Given their relative heights, Kevin was lucky he didn’t run her over. Not much taller than five feet tall, Kaye Wellering was a petite redhead with green eyes, who was so attractive, Kevin was dubious that anything about her was real.
“Why, Mr. Anderson, such a pleasant surprise,” she said as though she meant it. Kevin believed that was as genuine as her looks, especially that part of it being a surprise. Kaye was wearing four-inch heels. If she’d just run into him, she would have been clacking along the sidewalk loud enough to give him plenty of warning.
Kevin smiled, and hid his annoyance. He wanted nothing more than to be in his bed right about now. He had spent four hours on the Forsaken lead, only to have that fun conclusion. “What brings you to my neck of the woods, Madam Wellering?”
“Well, I heard that there was a man murdered in Chinatown. You know I have plenty of employees in the area, and I wouldn’t want them to be hurt by some roving madman.”
Kevin nodded sincerely. Yes, because she’s so weak and helpless. Her office is rigged with so many booby-traps, I can’t imagine that she doesn’t carry a nanite-based mace. “Well, I’m looking into it right now. I can only imagine that the victim was targeted by someone close to him, and walked into Chinatown with the victim.”
Complete bullshit, considering that a close friend would have beaten him to death in private, and not in the street.
Kaye smiled. “Good to know. Have you asked Kyle for help?”
Does she know that Kyle had targeted the guy? Who knows? “It’s not interesting enough for Kyle. I think he’s more the crossword type.”
The CEO of the Hacker’s Union gave him a wry little smile. “Of course. By the way, have you given any more thought to my offer?”
Kevin arched a brow. She still wants to hire me to work for the Hackers on Alcatraz? “No,” he answered honestly. “I wouldn’t even think of it. I have too many responsibilities in Chinatown. Thanks, though.”
Kaye arched her own brow, mirroring his. “If you don’t find the murderer, Shen Lo’s Tong will probably run your ass out of town.”
Kevin’s eyes narrowed. Is that good intel, or did her mythical ’President Omar Zephyr’ suggest the ’find the killer or be gone’ idea to the Tongs? “Why are you so interested in hiring me?”
She smiled. “Walk with me.” She turned and started moving towards his apartment. “You have skills we need,” Kaye explained. “We have electronic intelligence, but not human intel. You know how to deal with people. You managed all the conflicting cultures and groups to get the outcome you wanted with the priests.”
He gave her a wry smirk. “Are you trying to tell me that the Hackers lack social graces?”
She gave a genuine laugh—possibly the only genuine thing about her. “I’m saying that my people are borderline autistic in some cases.”
“I’m glad to see you think so highly of them.”
She shrugged. “We all have our strengths. They have theirs, and you have yours. I can’t imagine any of them having thought of the Masada plan.”
Kevin laughed at the thought of it. “It’s a nice bluff. All it was is one part mutually-assured destruction—San Francisco versus the rest of the world—and one part practical joke. Tell the ’real world’ that if we go, they go, they’ll tear the world apart trying to find the weapon we hit them with. If we don’t actually have a weapon, they’d never stop looking. It’s a simple spy trick, nothing more. I’m sure you would have come up with something in time.”
Kaye shrugged. “Actually, it was more like a few hours afte
r you left. It set us back a few days on a couple of projects, but we had the full Masada program fully operational by the time the East coast got your message.”
He almost missed a step and stumbled, but recovered so fast that no one noticed. Kevin then had to restrain himself from grabbing Kaye Wellering, the most powerful person in San Francisco, and wringing her little neck like a chicken.
He cleared his throat, and said, “I’m sorry, I must have misheard you. Did you say that you actually made a Masada program?”
Kaye nodded, blithely ignoring—or just not seeing—Kevin’s dismay. “Of course. Mutually-assured destruction is no good unless you have a weapon,” she said in an offhand, sing-song voice that an adult would use to explain things to a child…or maybe the other way around.
Kevin forced himself to remain calm, despite the fact that he was apparently party to global Armageddon. “I seriously hope that the trigger mechanism is someplace secure and stable. I would hate for it to be triggered by, oh, say, an Earthquake.”
Kaye waved her hand, brushing away his concern. “You’re overly cautious. We haven’t had an Earthquake hit San Francisco since 1906.”
He thought about it a moment and concluded, “Well, we’re due.”
She laughed merrily, touching his shoulder, and gliding a hand down his arm as though they were old friends. “Oh, Kevin, you’re so adorable, worrying over little details like that. How cute.”
He nodded, as though acknowledging the joke. And she wonders why I don’t want to work in her little madhouse. “Anyway, if you don’t mind, I’ve got a long day tomorrow.”
Kaye smiled. “Of course. But keep in mind that my offer is always open.”
***
“One of these days,” Kevin muttered as he slipped through his window. “I’m going to come up and have nothing to worry about. No one will be hunting me, no one will be waiting for me in my apartment, and I’ll be able to remember where all of my traps are this week. ”
