Shatter Point

by Jeff Altabef

  “Can’t you go to the police?”

  “Without direct evidence implicating him in these deaths or Darian’s kidnapping, what can we do?” Charles shrugged. “He comes from a powerful family. All we would end up accomplishing is warning him, thereby placing Maggie and Darian in further peril. They would become instant liabilities, and he would kill them immediately.”

  Her head dropped. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Our best opportunity is to grab him during tonight’s presentation. We need to track you to the meeting.”

  Steven removed a tiny perfume bottle from his pocket and placed it on the table.

  “What’s that?”

  “This perfume is laced with a specific radioactive isotope which will allow us to track you,” Steven explained.

  “Is it dangerous?”

  “It’s harmless. The isotope evaporates in six hours. They will know if you’re carrying any devices that emit signals of any kind. Plus, the transport will have a jammer, and so will the location of the meeting. But there’s no way to jam the isotope.”

  She stared at the vial for a moment. “Won’t they search me?”

  “They will definitely search you, but they will never find the isotope. This technology is so advanced it doesn’t even exist yet. They would need to know the exact signature of the isotope to detect it, which is impossible. Just apply the perfume like you would your normal fragrance an hour before the meeting.”

  “This is a dangerous situation,” Charles said. “I would understand if you decline, but I don’t see any other way to help Doctor Beck.” He checked the time on his Rolex. “There’s no time. We need your answer now.”

  Maggie sat uncomfortably on the leather recliner. A knifing pain stabbed through her ribs, her head ached, and worse than that, her spirits had reached an all-time low. A vase with flowers stood on the table in front of her, her sketchpad lay on her lap, and her pencils lay spread out on the table beside her. To pass the time, she had sketched the flowers and tried to capture their life and colors, but she failed miserably. They appeared weak, tired, and lifeless, just like her.

  I am a strong woman. The thought rang hollow, but she repeated it until she started to believe it.

  Cooper appeared in the doorway. He had an unsettling way of moving shadow-quiet.

  She forced a wide smile onto her face, trying to remember how she had smiled when she had first met him. Anyone who knew her would recognize the fake expression of happiness she now sported, but he didn’t know her. He remembered a young girl in pigtails who liked pink and had the nerve to reject him.

  He crept toward Maggie with an uncertain expression on his face, but his wide and wild eyes appeared combustible. He looked as he had when they’d first met—about to explode.

  She shuddered.

  He stopped ten feet away from her. “Why would you attack me?” He sounded immature, speaking in a boy’s voice.

  She had pondered how to answer that question all morning. She had to make up something good, an excuse he wanted to believe.

  “I was so angry, Cooper.” Her voice sounded feathery. “I keep thinking about all those years we wasted apart. You should have come for me sooner.”

  He furrowed his forehead. “You could have found me. I sent you the letters.” He waved his arms. “I’ve given you all this. I gave you gifts. The next place will be better. You shouldn’t have stabbed me.”

  The confusion and hurt in his voice was as plain as if he had written them across his face. He hadn’t really changed from that little boy she refused so many years ago.

  “I felt like I did when we were kids.” She remembered to smile. “I so wanted to go with you back then. You should have taken me away with you, but instead you left me. I cried for months. I’m sorry. I’d never do anything like that again.” She was a bad liar, but she did her best.

  He ran a hand through his perfectly placed hair and his anger seemed to subside.

  He smiled tentatively. “You can’t do that again. I won’t be pleased.” His brilliantly royal blue eyes fired with malice.

  The threat lurking behind his glare was real and dangerous. She wouldn’t get a third chance.

  ***

  Cooper studied a video feed of Maggie. She sat in the recliner, still drawing the same flowers she had been working on when he left her.

  He didn’t know what to believe. Her explanation made sense—she secretly loved him, and he could only imagine her anger at wasting those years, living a sorrowful life with that husband and her two children in poverty, when she wanted to be with him. Still, she could have reached out to him.

  It wouldn’t have been hard. She could have managed a simple letter or phone call. How dumb is she? I hate her!

  Rage ravaged his mind. He tossed a file from his desk and imagined cutting her with the surgical tools and squeezing her throat.

  “The Peterson twins are here to see you, sir.”

  He shut off the video feed and instructed his assistant to send them in.

  The twins’ wide shoulders swayed as they walked.

  He glared at them. “Why haven’t you apprehended Tom and Jack by now? I told you to take them yesterday!”

  The twins shared a look and the more talkative of the two answered. Tick was slightly bigger than his twin, and his beard a touch longer. “They’re off the grid. We can’t find them.”

  “I don’t tolerate excuses. Have you searched for their citizen identification cards?”

  “We’ve searched for their cards and their cell phones. Both have gone missing. Either they destroyed them or they’re jamming the signal.”

  “The system must be malfunctioning. Where would these boys find wave jammers? That’s sophisticated technology. Have you gone back to their apartment?”

  “Yes. They came home after we took their mother, but there’s no sign of them in the apartment. The older one, Jack, didn’t show at the club where he works, and Tom’s been absent from his internship without an explanation.”

  “What nonsense!” Cooper pounded his desk. “I pay you both plenty to do these tasks for me. I want them taken by morning. Failure is not an option!”

  Tock edged closer to Tick, looking nervous.

  “Yes sir,” Tick said.

  Cooper waved at them to leave. They had never disappointed him before. How could Maggie’s sons get their hands on a wave jammer, and why would they use it? Why is everything so difficult?

  He heard a sound in his head and for a few heartbeats he thought he had started hearing voices. Then he realized his assistant had called him, when she repeated her message. “Samuel Wickersham is on the line, sir.”

  “Put him through.”

  “I am so sorry about this Doctor Beck situation, Mr. Simmens.” Wickersham sounded apologetic, worried, a little scared maybe.

  “I don’t want Sheppard to find out about Project Qing. That would be a costly mistake. You will pay dearly for that mistake.”

  “The interrogator assures me he has told no one about Project Qing. He’s very confident of it.”

  “For your sake, I hope he’s correct.”

  “I understand, sir. Everything will be in order.” Wickersham spoke quickly as if any delay might be fatal. “The applications for both projects are impressive. I’m sure you’ll be pleased by the presentations.”

  “I’d better be,” Cooper snarled before he hung up.

  He glanced at his long list of messages: Ethel needed to speak to him, Homeland Security wasn’t sure where Moses and Gabriel had gone, his publicist wanted a statement about the Florida Ghettos, his wife called.... The list stretched on and on.

  He ripped it to shreds. A sharp pain knifed through his head and fragmented his thoughts into a million pieces. He shut off the lights, dropped his head to his desk, put the video feed of Maggie back on his computer, and pulled at his hair as he spied on her in silence.

  Violent, bloody visions filled his mind, and he started to kick the bottom of his desk until th
e wood splintered.

  Steven surveyed the small group before him: three teenagers, two untrained ghetto leaders, and one senior citizen who might stretch to five feet tall when she stood on a stool. A motley crew if ever one existed, but they were willing and had proven themselves in the past. They were not the team he would have preferred, but he could do a lot worse.

  He had grown up in the Philadelphia ghetto a lifetime ago, and had signed up for the armed services with a friend’s identity when only fifteen. After starting in the infantry, he moved to Special Forces within eight months. Two years later, he transferred to a special unit so black the summer sun couldn’t lighten them.

  He never officially left the super secretive black ops unit. No one ever left. The unit never officially existed, but when he turned thirty he had had enough, so he vanished.

  For the first time in his life, he worked for someone he believed in, someone he respected, but it scared him. Following orders was easy, but working for Sheppard had become difficult. He found himself vested in an outcome he could not control, one he wanted but feared would prove too elusive in the end. Somehow, Sheppard had breathed life into a heart he thought long dead, and he couldn’t go back now. He had a team, and they had a mission.

  “We have an informant on the inside who will wear a tracking device to the meeting.”

  “Who is the informant, and can we trust him?” Aunt Jackie asked.

  “For the informant’s safety, only I’m aware of his or her identity. I have no reason to distrust the informant, but he or she is not a professional and is, therefore, unreliable. We’ll take an unmarked van to the meeting and devise a strategy once we assess the meeting place.”

  “How tight do you think security will be?” Tom asked.

  “I expect it to be light, but I’m sure a handful of heavily armed private bodyguards will be at the meeting. You should expect the worst.” Steven worked a tablet to flash a picture of Cooper Simmens on the wall. “Our mission is to capture him alive and limit the number of casualties.” He glanced at Gabriel. “We don’t need any unnecessary fatalities. Once we detain him, we will use him to find Maggie. After—”

  “After that we kill him,” Aunt Jackie said. Gabriel glanced at her, and their eyes locked.

  “We will need to be quick and decisive, but we discharge our weapons only if we must. With that said, the bodyguards will use lethal force. You should all respond accordingly.”

  He opened a hidden door in the brick wall and revealed a large walk-in closet that contained a small armory of assault rifles, pistols, Kevlar vests, explosive devices, and an assortment of other neatly stored weapons.

  Moses whistled. “That’s a nice collection of toys you’ve got.”

  Steven frowned. “I know you all have various levels of training. We should keep the weaponry to a minimum. Simple and effective is all we need.”

  Tom lifted his dart pistol. “I’m fine using one of these.”

  Jack and Mary agreed with him.

  “Those will be fine, but I suggest you use the medium setting at least. I don’t trust anything lower.” Steven glanced at Moses and Gabriel. “If my information is accurate, you both prefer these AK-5000s.” He pulled two assault rifles off a rack on the far wall and handed them to the ghetto leaders.

  Aunt Jackie pulled Excalibur from her bag. “I’m good with this one. Excalibur has always worked for me in the past.”

  He nodded and removed a specially designed pair of sunglasses from a crate, then tossed them to Tom. “These glasses use the latest penetrating sound wave technology. They project images from the other side of walls. Their range is limited to fifty feet, and the images won’t appear razor sharp, but they will indicate the location of hostiles and the outline of the room. They take a little getting used to but will be helpful for a mission like this one.”

  Tom squinted at the eyewear. “They don’t seem large enough. Where’s the sound wave equipment?”

  Steven nodded. “You’re right, Tom. They work remotely. The van has the serious equipment. We’ll need someone to operate the gear and warn us about dangers outside the range of the glasses.”

  All eyes in the room turned toward Aunt Jackie.

  She bristled. “Don’t look at me. I don’t need sonar to do a little killing. I’m going in with or without the bat goggles.”

  “I’ll operate the equipment,” Mary said. “I’m the most capable person to handle the advanced equipment, and I’d rather not shoot anyone if I can avoid it.”

  ***

  Tom and Mary huddled close together in the interrogation room, knees rubbing against each other. They were finally alone.

  He smiled. “You’ve been a star. I don’t know how to thank you. We’d never know this monster’s name if it weren’t for you.”

  She squeezed his hand. “Maggie means a lot to me. I’d do anything to get her back, and you’ve been pretty spectacular yourself.”

  “I just hope we have time.”

  “The Professor said we should have a few days. We’re going to save her, I’m sure of it.”

  “I can’t imagine what she’s going through.” He shuddered. “What if this guy reaches the shatter point before we find her?”

  “That’s a negative thought, and we won’t have any of those. You know what Maggie says about negative thoughts.” She playfully wagged her finger at him.

  “Negative thoughts lead to negative results,” he said. His mom had told him that dozens of times over the years. “You know there’s no scientific evidence proving that hypothesis.”

  “Not everything needs to be proven to be real.”

  He frowned. “Do you ever wonder if the Fourteenth Colony and all this effort is worth it? Maybe we should leave the country to the Originalists. When we get Mom back, we could all move somewhere else, somewhere we can have a fairer chance away from this fight.”

  “This is our country, Tom. If we don’t fight for it, who will?”

  “Our odds of success are so low. The Originalists control the government, Homeland Security, the advanced technologies, most of the money, and the military. How can we overcome all those advantages?”

  “Stop doing that!” She shot him a sharp look.

  “Doing what?” He slumped downward, his face drawn.

  “Using math and probabilities to analyze everything! Fairness and doing what’s right count, too. Countries are governed by the will of their people. Throughout time, powerful governments have failed because of greed and excesses. We have a way forward. We just need to renew the social contract our country was founded on.”

  “It seems like we shredded the social contract decades ago.” Tom sullenly looked into her eyes. “So we can’t move to Fiji?”

  “How about you kiss me instead?”

  He didn’t need to be asked twice. His lips eagerly found hers as he folded into her warmth. He tasted honey and cinnamon and felt alive, truly alive, but the kiss lasted only a few seconds.

  Jack cleared his throat in the doorway.

  Tom pulled away from Mary and felt his face redden.

  Jack grinned sheepishly. “Time’s up. We need to go.” He tossed two facemasks at his brother. “Don’t worry, the masks have holes for your mouths so you can continue in the van.” He wiggled two fingers through an opening in his mask and made smooching sounds.

  “Very funny.” Tom moved toward the door but paused. A bolt of worry shot through him as he looked at his brother.

  When did he become this bad?

  Jack leaned awkwardly against the doorframe, his hand shaking, his face ashen, his eyes hollow and distant.

  “Are you okay?”

  Jack glanced back at him. “We’ll do whatever it takes to get her back. Right, brother?”

  Vanessa studied her reflection in the shiny steel elevator doors. Her beige silk blouse fit perfectly and tucked neatly into her light gray slacks, but her thoughts returned to the perfume. The scent reminded her of roses—not her typical fragrance. Would her father
notice?

  What do I say if he asks me about it?

  She shook those doubts from her mind and thought back to the first day she met Darian. She had jumped into this elevator with him inside. It was only her third day working in the lab, but she’d already heard much about the young, handsome, funny, and sometimes available young researcher. The women in the lab talked about him with such reverence and desire, she knew she must have him.

  At first, he was the new glittery toy everyone else wanted and therefore she must possess, but the relationship changed as the months passed. Her feelings for him transformed until she needed to be around him. She felt better near him. He brightened her life with color for the first time, and she would not go back to a gray world without him.

  When the elevator bell rang, she strolled toward her father’s office with her head high and her shoulders back. It was 7:44.

  Wickersham, Sanders, and George already waited anxiously for her. All three men wore suits and ties, although the differences were stark.

  Her father wore an Italian pinstripe suit with a solid red tie and matching silk handkerchief folded perfectly in his breast pocket. The bold hues contrasted deeply with the charcoal suit. Gold cufflinks held together the sleeves of his French cuffed shirt. The hand-tailored outfit looked as natural on him as a bathing suit on a swimmer.

  The two other doctors wore ill-fitting navy suits, checkered ties, brown belts, and scuffed black shoes. Both were so similarly dressed she wondered if they learned how to dress like that in medical school. They looked uncomfortable, as if counting the minutes before they could undress and slip back into white lab coats.

  “You look lovely, Vanessa.” Her father greeted her warmly, but she heard a touch of anxiety in his voice. “I think we should be going. The limo is waiting for us outside.”