Voyager

by Carl Rackman

  She was momentarily puzzled. No one ever screwed around in Supra. It was strictly professional all the way.

  She blinked, exhaled slowly, and then focused on the scope. The vehicles were now lined up at the veranda.

  “Mirage? Or should I call you Breecker?” The voice cut into her earpiece again.

  She felt a flash of concern, which quickly turned into anger. “Sharkfin, check comm.”

  “Forget Sharkfin, he’s off the net. It’s me, Mirage. Brad Barnes. From the FBI.”

  She felt a definite chill down her spine that tightened the muscles in her neck and shoulders. What kind of trick was this?

  “Mirage. You knew what was going on when you took the SD card from the guy in Queens. You have to help me understand.”

  She was struggling to concentrate. She breathed carefully to regulate her climbing heart rate.

  “Please, Mirage. Show me you can hear me.”

  “Whoever you are, you’d better shut up.” Saying the words helped her focus back on the scene in front of her.

  “Okay. That’s great. You can hear! Just tell me who you work for.”

  “That’s not going to happen, mystery man.”

  The front door of the house opened outwards. Mendoza would be masked by it, further compacting the time she had to make the shot.

  “Then I’m going to have to stop you.”

  She ignored him, but it was hard to shut him out. His voice buzzed right inside her ear, and she couldn’t switch him off without losing her intel channel to Sharkfin.

  “It was you in the hospital, wasn’t it? My fiancée? Why were you checking up on me, Mirage?”

  Mendoza came into focus. She tagged him with the aiming reticle and quickly lined up the crosshair with the target dot. She breathed out slowly and took first pressure on the electronic trigger.

  “You knew, didn’t you, Mirage? You knew it was all about Voyager.”

  With ‘Voyager’ echoing around her head, she pulled the trigger.

  There was a momentary delay as the computer calculated the exact millisecond for the release; the rifle kicked with a slight pop.

  She could see the distortion in her scope of the bullet’s trail, weaving slightly as it flew.

  Mendoza was stationary, crouched as he swung his foot into the SUV, when the bullet smashed into the fleshy top of his shoulder at the base of his neck. The impact whirled him almost 360 degrees, but she knew immediately it wasn’t a kill shot.

  The reaction of his bodyguards was instant. They bundled him into the car and covered him immediately with their own bodies. The big SUV’s tyres screamed as they tried to grab purchase on the dusty soil, raising a cloud of dirt that obscured her view.

  “Mirage to Sharkfin. Mission fail, repeat, fail. Aborting. Request immediate pickup. Over.”

  “I told you, Mirage. We have control now. Why don’t we meet up and talk?”

  She laughed under her breath. She had already stashed the rifle in its case. The blanket followed immediately after and she expertly fixed the shackles in place with a series of quick snaps. She shrugged off the baggy suit and crammed it into her pack. She hefted the pack on her shoulders, slung the rifle case beneath with the strap across her chest and took off up the mountain, agile and fast in the close-fitting camouflage bodysuit.

  Brad Barnes was watching her from the operations room of a US Navy frigate about eighteen miles offshore. She was clearly visible on a live feed from a stealthy robot plane sixteen thousand feet above the wooded hillside.

  He was could see the men further down the hill were mobilising. They hadn’t fixed Mirage’s exact location but knew the direction of her shot. The first group of armed men were only a hundred metres away and pointing their weapons towards the tree line while the squad leader scanned with binoculars.

  If Mirage was lucky, she would get over the crest of the hill without breaking cover.

  Brad could hear Mirage’s breathing as she pounded hard up the hillside.

  She cursed him in short breaths over the comm channel. “Is it your mission in life to screw mine up? I’ve never failed a mission. Period. But you almost ruined it for me in New York, and now here you are again. How did you find me?”

  “Your people gave you up, Mirage. They told us exactly how to find you. Come in. We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

  She didn’t answer but continued to drive up the hill dodging oak and pine trunks, ducking and weaving past branches and hurdling roots as though she belonged in a forest. She was leaving her pursuers far behind.

  “Listen, Barnes, or whoever. I’m not having this conversation now.” She was barely two hundred metres from the crest of the hill and showing no sign of tiring.

  Brad’s view from the drone zoomed out to take in more of the terrain. He could see the approaching helicopter far across the valley on the shaded side of the mountain.

  The light changed as she crested the hill. The forest was now bathed in orange hues through the overhead branches as the sun dropped behind the hill’s apex and she continued running downhill in shadow. She was sure her pursuers were now far enough behind to enable her escape.

  Her breath heaved in and out as she picked up pace on her descent. Her backpack shifted forward and the weapon case banged against her lower back with every footfall. She tried to steady it with one arm without unbalancing herself. All the while, the muscles in her limbs, idle for long hours of lying prone, began to protest at the pace. She had barely half a kilometre left to the pickup point, which she would cover in a few minutes.

  The beating blades of the chopper were intermittently audible over the sound of her breath.

  “Sorry, Agent Barnes. Looks like my ride is here. I guess I have to leave you again.”

  "I’m sorry too, Mirage. Your ride picked up another fare. The Mexican Air Force, to be exact. But we found you an alternative."

  “Goddamn you, Barnes!”

  She stumbled momentarily, twisting her ankle, but recovered quickly and kept running to shake off the sudden pain. The slip caused her weapon case to swing around to the side, making her twist to stay upright. She slackened off the pace, just enough to slide the strap up and around her shoulder to bring the weapon case back to the centre restoring her equilibrium. In the process, she temporarily lost concentration; her shoulder caught a large branch as she slipped past one of the low-slung oak trees.

  Immediately, she felt herself falling and threw out an arm to stop herself. Her grip slipped on a gnarled oak root, and her forearm gave way. She knew what would happen next and braced herself as the weight of her body, the pack and sniper rifle in its case landed hard on her elbow. She felt a sharp, blinding pain as her collarbone gave out with a crack.

  Brad watched the first group of four men reach the peak of the ridge high above. They carefully crested the hill, alert for a possible ambush, before they picked up their pace following Mirage’s trail through the forest. Then he noticed something had happened to her.

  He panned the drone’s camera ahead through the dappled shadows and saw Mirage pick herself up off the ground and painfully lift the pack and rifle case onto her back. He heard her gasp of pain through the comms link and saw her set off again, slower than before, clearly hurt but trying to keep up her blistering pace regardless. She was losing ground to her pursuers.

  Though the men seemed unable to fix Mirage’s exact position, Brad could see her three hundred metres ahead of them. He realised when she eventually broke from the forest’s cover, the pursuing men only needed a clear line of sight to pick her off.

  He felt a pang of concern, which didn’t surprise him, even as he recognised it. This woman, whom he had known for half a day, who had humiliated and ultimately tried to murder him, now became the focus of all his concern. “They’re less than three hundred yards behind. They’re going to try pinning you down until the other team arrives. You have to hustle, Mirage.”

  She ignored him. Every second exhalation was a small cry as she tried to suppress
her body’s natural reaction to her injury and the continued, merciless punishment of the pursuit. With a groan of determination she pushed herself harder to reach the pickup point, which was a relatively level clearing on the shallow hillside about half a mile in length.

  She could hear the helicopter now, a monotonous buzz interspersed with the chopping of its main rotors. She was far from exhaustion, but the exertion, coupled with the pain of her broken collarbone, aggravated by the heavy straps of her pack, made each step feel like double the effort.

  She tried again to call her handler. "Sharkfin. I'm reaching the pickup. Hostiles are two hundred metres behind. I have to lay low. I need medevac. Relay that to the chopper."

  Brad cut in. “Mirage. We can see you. We’ve got you.”

  "Negative. I’ll take my chances, thanks.”

  “You don’t have much choice, Mirage. Sharkfin can’t hear you. You’re hurt and you’ve got bad guys all over your ass. Are you going to trust me? Or do you still want to take your chances?”

  “I haven’t decided yet.”

  She ran across the slope of the hill along the tree line, keeping under cover and trying to put oblique distance between herself and the pursuers.

  So far nobody had fired a shot, but she considered they were probably going to try capturing her first. Given the interrogation techniques favoured by the cartel, which generally involved blowtorches and power tools, she would never let that happen.

  Brad saw the pursuing mercenaries clearly through the trees. They were beginning to split into two pairs, each following the circle of trees along the edge of the clearing.

  “Mirage! There are four of them grouped in two covering pairs. They’re both at your two o’clock at two hundred metres.”

  She shook her head and reached into the pocket of her pack taking out two smoke grenades. She popped one and threw it left-handed into the clearing. It began to belch thick purple smoke. Then she recklessly leapt up from the ground and threw the second in a high arc over the branches of the trees towards the men where it produced a thick screen of greyish-white.

  "Landing zone is marked with coloured smoke.” Brad had effortlessly assumed tactical control of his quarry. He relayed the instructions to the helicopter crew. His heart was pounding again.

  The helicopter came straight in, and Brad could see the flashes of the pursuers' rifles through the smoke. He could imagine her amazement when she saw the helicopter was a US Navy Seahawk rather than her expected ride.

  The large fifty-calibre machine gun in the back of the helicopter began barking in reply causing the enemy fire to quickly drop away.

  Brad relayed directions to the chopper; the gunner was right on the money. The bad guys were hugging the ground, completely ineffective.

  The helicopter was already pulling away from the clearing, staying low and pitching nose down to quickly pick up speed.

  “Ross One-Five, Stallion One. Package is safely aboard. Over.”

  “Roger, Stallion One. Good job. Ross One-Five out.”

  As the helicopter gathered speed and began to return to the ship where Brad was watching the drama, Brad prepared to cut off the communications with Mirage to block any attempts to track them. But then he heard, even above the din of the helicopter cabin, the words she softly spoke.

  "Thank you, Barnes. I was right about you."

  Chapter Eighteen

  Saturday, 14th January 2017

  Aboard USS Dewey, off Baja California Sur

  They were on the US Navy destroyer heading back to San Diego. Brad quietly let himself into Mirage’s room in the sickbay where she was sleeping. Her right shoulder and chest were wrapped in a thick support dressing protecting her swollen, fractured collarbone.

  She stirred, her face flickering with pain; it woke her and she shifted to a more comfortable position. Her eyes blinked open and she focused lazily on Brad but barely reacted as she recognised him.

  “Agent Barnes. It really is you.”

  “Yeah. It’s me. Long time no see, huh?”

  Her appearance was dramatically different to the Breecker he had met. Her hair was short and dark brown. The big, sparkling white teeth he remembered were prosthetics. Her own were small and even. Her eyes, which he recalled as hard, piercing blue, were a softer, translucent hazel. She had looked pretty in a wholesome way before - she seemed to have masked something more delicate and beautiful. She reminded him of Helen.

  It helped Brad that she looked so different; he didn’t have to remember her as the murderous blonde Diane Breecker. He could see her as more vulnerable in her present state. Mirage. It was a good fit for the woman in the bed. It was a soothing thought.

  There was a pause. Brad wondered if she was thinking about an afternoon in Queens three months ago when she tried to blow his head off. Even the vivid memory didn’t trigger his animosity.

  He decided to broach the subject first. “You know – what you did…I didn’t deserve that.”

  She gave a deep sigh. “Barnes. You shouldn’t have been there. You didn’t give me a choice. But I didn’t go for a kill shot.”

  Brad remained silent.

  “Look. I didn’t leave you like the other guy. You were just collateral damage. You knew about the data card. You would’ve tried to stop me. I knew you were a good operator, so I had to make sure you couldn’t hold me up.”

  “You could have shot me in the kneecaps or something.” He knew he sounded whiny. It was time to drop it. All things considered, he was doing pretty well.

  She paused before replying, “I’m sorry. But I tried to give you a chance.” She looked him up and down in the dim light of the sickbay. “You look pretty good for it, Barnes. Lost some weight, leaned you out a bit. You’re still pretty easy on the eye. Maybe more so.”

  She smiled coquettishly; Brad felt his pulse quicken.

  “Seriously, it wasn’t personal. Just doing my job,” she added.

  “What is your job?”

  “Can’t you guess by now?”

  “Some kind of mercenary?”

  She snorted a laugh, wincing again. “Some kind, I guess.” Then her face hardened. “Hey. You’re not here on a social call, right? Is this your excuse for an interrogation?”

  “It’s not really an interrogation. You’re not a prisoner. You’re actually our guest.”

  She laughed again. It sent a frisson of excitement down Brad’s spine. He was already getting out of his depth.

  “Yeah, right. Well, be a sweetheart and get my stuff back from the medics so I can get out of here.”

  Brad tried to be charming. “Well, okay. You’re not exactly a guest. But we are offering you an amnesty to come in.”

  “‘Come in’? I’m not some Donnie Brasco, Barnes. I already have a job. And you can’t afford my rates.”

  “Mirage…” He liked the sound of her codename and the way it caught and held her attention.

  Her amber eyes searched his face and lingered near the top of his forehead on his wound. He automatically moved his hand up in a self-conscious gesture.

  “You killed our people. You almost killed me. It’s not an offer that’s going to last for long.”

  “Don’t take it personally, Barnes. I play all kinds of characters. In many different languages. It’s just business.”

  “Is this business?”

  “Until I figure this out. I can hardly call it pleasure if you’re holding me to ransom. Then again…” She frowned. “How did you find me, Barnes. I need to know.”

  Brad considered the question. He figured he could tell her if it would help her to trust him. “We got a call from one of your people. He gave us everything. Where to find you, how to jack your frequency, even how to disable your tracking chip.”

  If Mirage was surprised she didn’t even flicker. “Bullshit. That wouldn’t happen. Not in a million years.”

  Brad shrugged. “I wouldn’t make that up. How else could we have known? The guy said you were having second thoughts about your work and
you might consider helping us.”

  She was silent for some time before speaking. “Well, Barnes. I’m not going to be busy for a while after this one.” She sighed. “Mendoza survived. That was a major screw-up. The cartels will be on the defensive. And it’s partly your fault. Hell, it’s all your fault.”

  Brad smiled in return. “The Mexican Feds picked up Mendoza. We tipped them off last night. They had a small army waiting in the next valley. I guess your buddy Sharkfin didn’t get a chance to spot them before we took down his drone. For what it’s worth - I’m sorry.”

  She seemed grudgingly impressed. “That’s still going to piss off my client, but I guess you tried.” She reached out and took his hand. Her own hands were large with fine fingers. Brad was perplexed. The intimacy of the gesture took him by surprise.

  She seemed to recalculate, and her eyes softened. “I believe you, Barnes. I guess you really want this to happen. I thought you might feel differently after what happened between us. No hard feelings?” she offered.

  Brad gulped. His hand felt paralysed. He didn’t want to pull it away, but he was fighting the urge to squeeze her hand in return. “Ah, no. I guess I can’t change what happened, and I’m just grateful to be more or less in one piece,” he replied.

  Her thumb made soft circles on the top of his hand. Brad was enjoying this too much and needed to watch his step. He tried to change the subject. “Do you have a name? A real one, I mean. Mirage is cool and all, but it’s not who you are.”

  She looked back at him, her eyes glistening in the soft hospital light. “Barnes – my name is all I have. I tell it to nobody.” She gave a tight smile and studied him for a few moments. “I guess you can call me Alex.”

  It was a perfect fit, even if it probably wasn’t her real name. “Alex. Okay, that works.” He was silent for a second. “Alex – what is Supra? Why are they using you to take down drug lords in Mexico and kill your own people?”

  “Barnes – you must have guessed by now?” She spoke in a soft voice, drawing him closer. “All of us on the Supra program – we’ve been genetically enhanced. If you saw us all together, you’d know something was going on.” She gazed at him, her amber eyes soft pools of sincerity. “The military has been obsessed with breeding super soldiers since the fifties. But we made it happen.”