The Hunted

by James Phelan

The tram slowed as it neared the top.

  “All good?” Levine asked.

  Walker looked up at her, meeting her eyes. Looking at Levine, all he could picture was Squeaker’s face. Too young, too good to be gone. But she was. And Levine would pay for it.

  “We there, Ma?” the boy asked.

  “Almost, yep,” the mother replied.

  Walker held Levine’s gaze.

  Murphy said, “Walker.”

  “All good,” he said.

  “What was it?” Murphy asked.

  Walker kept his eyes planted on Levine as he said, “They sighted Menzil. He was near the Arch, headed for it, around ten minutes back.”

  “Good,” Murphy said. “We’ve got unfinished business, me and him.”

  The tram car stopped with a heavy thunk. The doors pinged open.

  “Let’s go, Ma!” the boy said, stepping on Walker’s feet as he pushed past.

  “Sorry,” the mother said, brushing by.

  Walker sat rock still.

  “Let’s see what we can see, shall we?” Levine said, still staring at Walker.

  “Let’s.”

  A group disembarked and walked by the roped-off area where those waiting to head down were milling about. The usher waved the next group on to board. Walker watched Levine’s back as she walked ahead.

  Murphy caught the back of Walker’s shirt sleeve, whispered, “We all good?”

  Walker didn’t answer. He kept his right hand loose by his right hip, ready to reach under his shirt-back and pull out the Beretta. “Work the crowd, start at the far end,” he said. “And watch her.”

  “Copy that,” Murphy said, pushing his way around eight people.

  Walker kept his eyes on Levine.

  107

  Walker scanned the faces in the crowd while keeping a watch on Levine’s movements. His hand was behind his back, touching on the grip of the Beretta.

  About eighty tourists were on the viewing platform, most rubber-necking for a view outside. All had been vetted by security at the base of the arch, making their way through procedures similar to that at any domestic airport: walk-through metal detectors, wands and pat-downs for those who failed twice. All bags and packs and coats and boots were put through the X-ray machine.

  So, Walker wondered, if Menzil’s up here, how’d he get a backpack through?

  Walker did a double-take at a guy who brushed by him—a St. Louis cop, huge guy, black. Not Menzil. He was hustling toward the tram cars.

  Walker got a bearing on Levine. She was at the center of the viewing platform, looking out one of the windows that faced the Mississippi. He thought of Squeaker and his mind went to the last moments she would have had, grappling desperately against an armed man in an attempt to save her cousin’s family. And she succeeded. And Walker had to succeed here today.

  He approached Levine from behind.

  He looked across at Murphy, who had reached the far end of the viewing platform. Walker, at six foot three, could see over most of the heads of the tourists. Murphy reached another uniformed cop at the end of the platform and then turned around to face back toward the crowd. Cops.

  Walker looked toward the tram car from which they’d alighted just minutes before—the other cop was standing there, looking back at him.

  Walker thought of the cops at the entrance at ground level, how they’d been looking among the crowd for Menzil—how they’d gone around the security without being checked.

  The DEA agents had gone to the warehouse and found Menzil’s clothes, nothing else.

  He’d changed clothing.

  And now Walker knew why.

  Menzil was dressed as a cop.

  Walker looked the other way.

  Murphy was headed toward him. And the cop was close behind, closing in.

  Menzil.

  108

  The pressure of something small applied to Walker’s side. The barrel of a pistol. He looked over his shoulder. The other cop. Menzil had another man up here. Not military, maybe a local criminal, a fixer for whatever Menzil needed here in St. Louis: stolen cars, a warehouse to store stuff in and operate from, police uniforms, weapons. He held a Glock pistol in one hand, and the other now tightly gripped Walker’s arm.

  Walker looked to Murphy, to the figure closing behind him. Menzil.

  He had a knife. High-polished stainless steel, a filleting knife. The slice was quick.

  “No!” Walker had never shouted so loud. The sound of it moved people. The guy holding him startled and his gun fired—the shot went wide but Walker felt the burn of powder against his back.

  Murphy fell. Menzil behind him, knife in hand.

  Screaming provided a soundtrack to the events.

  Most of the visitors remaining upstairs were packed into the empty cars—all but twelve, who were now watched over by the other fake cop.

  Walker looked up to the Glock in his hands, steady.

  “Three base-jump glide suits,” Menzil said to Levine, tossing her a pack that the cop behind Walker kicked across the floor. “You both follow my lead. You glide after me, pull your chutes a half-second after me, and we touch down on a rooftop across the river where the first car’s waiting.”

  “Good,” Levine said. She checked the contents of the big backpack.

  Walker saw four canisters wrapped together, and sandwiched between them a block of C4 and a double-detonation trigger: a timer in the form of a small digital alarm clock, set for 17:30, and what Walker recognized as a proximity detonator fashioned from a hand-held GPS unit—which Levine set at thirty feet from the ground level below.

  The pack would be launched out, and 620 feet down would come detonation level. Or, at 17:30 as a back-up. Whichever came first.

  Walker checked his watch: 17:24.

  He watched as Murphy struggled to keep pressure on the cut at his side. The SEAL was on the floor, flat, keeping as still as possible.

  Levine pulled on the base-jump suit, then moved to a room marked “RESTRICTED ACCESS.” As she pushed through the door, Walker saw an access ladder leading to a manhole in the roof. She climbed up, pushed the pack out before her and disappeared.

  Walker moved fast. In less than a second he turned and pushed the Glock aside, causing it to fire again. He broke both the guy’s arms before the pistol fell to the floor. By the time he spun his former captor around, Menzil had started firing his Glock—Hydra-Shok rounds, designed to expand inside a body and not pass through. Using the fake cop as a human shield, Walker dropped down, snatching up the fallen Glock as bullets shattered the viewing windows behind him.

  Walker sighted and fired at Menzil, hitting him twice in the chest and then once in the chin.

  The third bullet bored a hole through his head.

  Walker rushed back to Murphy. He was bleeding fast.

  The room went quiet but for the howl of wind blasting through shot-out windows and a few of the tourists who were screaming and falling to pieces.

  “My family?” Murphy said. His face flushed red.

  “I’m sorry,” Walker said. “Susan didn’t make it.”

  “My family!?” Murphy shouted.

  “They’re fine,” Walker said. “Jane and the kids, they’re fine. Just Squeaker . . .”

  “Shit. Who—who was it?”

  “Grant. Woods killed him. But he got Squeaker. He was going to use her and your family to stop us. But they’re safe now. Somerville’s men are with them.”

  “Go,” Murphy said, motioning in the direction they had last seen Levine. “Get her. End this.”

  109

  “Don’t,” Walker said to Levine.

  She stood on the roof of the Gateway Arch, one of the arm slings of the backpack dangling in her hand. Her other hand held a gas mask, and she’d already looped a tethered safety harness around her forearm.

  Walker said, “You don’t have to do this. You can get justice another way.”

  She faced him. Something settling in her eyes. “Justice?”

&nb
sp; “That’s why you’re doing this, right?”

  Levine dismissed him with a shake of her head, said, “You have no idea why.”

  “I know they killed your father, for what he knew.”

  Levine paused. “You just worked that out, did you?”

  “It’s easy to connect the dots when looking back,” Walker said. The wind buffeted them. “I can see your reason. Revenge. Fair enough. But they’re innocent down there.”

  “It’s more than that.”

  “That’s enough. I get it. The government had him killed to silence him. Revenge is understandable—but not like this.”

  “You think he’s the only one?”

  “No. I know he’s not. You’ve had the SEALs killed. All but one.”

  “Because they’re a part of this! They knew what they found and they kept their dirty little secret—it was men like those SEALs that ended him. I know it. Government-sanctioned murders. But now the whole world’s going to know what happened. How that war was really fought, what it was about, what they covered up.”

  “And then what do you think will happen?” Walker asked. He took a step closer. Then another. The wind was strong. “They’ll come out and prosecute the guys who hushed this up? The guys who killed your father?”

  Levine was silent, staring him down.

  “The SEALs found the WMDs, yes,” said Walker. “They would have taken that knowledge to their graves, because to do anything else would have meant a firing squad. But the man who inspected the weapons, who verified them and their origins—hell, the man who supplied them to Saddam in the eighties and trained the Iraqis how to make the shit? That was your father. He’s no innocent player in all this.”

  “They killed him!” Levine said. “He was killed by a DoD clean-up crew when all this stuff showed back up. I joined NCIS to investigate it. They were a DoD crew, Walker. DEVGRU, Team Six guys, right? US military—killing one of their own! My father!”

  “If that’s true, you could have come forward.”

  Levine was silent.

  “You can’t prove it, can you.”

  “It was them!”

  “You can’t prove it. You suspect it. Don’t do this,” Walker said, pointing off the arch. “They’re innocent people down there.”

  “No one’s innocent anymore, Walker,” Levine said. “Don’t be so precious. This here, today? It’ll make a show—to bring the home front back here, to make every citizen feel a part of the war, and part of the response. To show them all what our government is capable of.”

  “Just let this be.”

  “This,” Levine retorted, holding up the backpack, “this was made by the guys we’ve been fighting against in the Middle East all this time!”

  “Your father made it,” Walker replied simply.

  “He—he showed them how, but they made it,” Levine said. “It’s all politics, right? What’s a few more deaths along the way! That will come out, all of it, after the event, when this contagion will be tracked back to Iraqi labs.”

  “It’ll be tracked back home. You know that,” Walker said. He took another step closer. The wind threatened to blow him off his feet. Levine held on tight to the tether. “Those anthrax spores or whatever you’ve got there? They were cultured here. Sure, it may have been enhanced over there in Iraq, but it will point a finger back here. And that’ll point to your father and his work. You really want that?”

  “And what do you think our government will do about that fact?”

  Walker paused. “You want that to happen?”

  Levine was silent.

  “You know they’ll cover it up—but it’ll make waves,” Walker said. “The military will know. They’ll figure it out, make the connection. It’ll go back to your father. Ruin his reputation, if that’s all that’s left of him.”

  “It’ll make them all see his death for what it was,” Levine said. “And it will raise questions all the way through the military, and intelligence, and the government, about the truth of all this—the war, my father’s death, all of it.”

  “They’ll just cover it all up again,” Walker said, taking another small step toward her.

  “They might. But this—today—will get the country behind us. Think about it. Weapons of Mass Destruction, from Iraq, used here on American soil. They won’t cover that part up. Quite the opposite. All those hawks who sold the American people this war—the ones who knew that there were WMDs there because they were the ones who sold them to the Iraqis in the first place—they’ll be clamoring for another chance to go back there and get the job done right this time.”

  “Who’s your enemy here?” Walker said. “The government that went to war on a lie and then killed your father, or those in Iraq we waged that war against?”

  “They’re all the same—governments all end up the same.”

  “Is that how you sold this to those 101st boys?”

  Levine paused, looked in the pack, at the timer, said, “They had their own reasons.”

  “You’re going to kill innocent people down there, for what?” Walker asked, motioning over the side. Levine looked down at the crowd and Walker shuffled a couple of steps closer. “So you can restart a war in the Middle East?”

  “This will finish what we started,” Levine said. “They’re the ones who brought the fight to us in the first place. They did 9/11. They did London and Madrid and Bali. Let’s put it back onto them. Al Qaeda, ISIL, all of them. And while we’re at it, let’s get the whole country, the whole world, behind us this time. It’s a chance to stamp out terrorism for good. Let’s turn the Mid-East into glass—let’s wipe the whole region off the map. Let’s get our government and military and intel and police all focused in the same—in the right—direction.”

  Walker stepped closer still, now just ten feet between them.

  “Do you really think this will get the whole country behind another war over there?” Walker asked, looking over the edge. The view was spectacular. The sun glinted off the stainless steel arch and hit the city. The end of day. The beginning of night. The huge crowd was below, oblivious to what was unfolding above, energized by their own fury. Walker looked back to Levine and spoke simply. “You don’t have to do this.”

  Levine laughed. “So, what? Stop now? How do you think that would play out? I’d never see the inside of a court. You know that. They’d send me to some CIA black site and then I’d just disappear. You don’t know these men and what they’re capable of.”

  “I do know. I was one of them. Tell me about Zodiac.”

  “I’d never heard of it.”

  “The attack on New York. The trigger.”

  Levine smiled, said, “You’re trying to buy time, but there’s none left.”

  Walker took a step forward, seven feet between them. He said, “Do you really want to die today?”

  “Do you?” Levine countered. The wind whistled; it was hard to keep purchase. His stance was wide. Hers wasn’t, but she was maybe half his weight. The pack was in her hand. “Is this really something you’re willing to put your life to?”

  “Try me.” Walker checked his watch: 17:27. “Time to decide.”

  Levine smiled.

  “Can you fly?” Walker asked.

  Levine looked off the tower, then back at Walker—and they knew what was going to happen.

  110

  Levine reached her arm back and then launched the backpack over the edge. Walker dove right. His feet left the top of the arch, the hard steel of the memorial now behind him. He grabbed a handle of the backpack with his right hand, and now he was falling through empty space.

  Below: 630 feet, five thousand people.

  And in his hand, certain death, in the form of some kind of WMD, with a detonator and a timer. The explosives would be small scale but the blast would create a superfine disbursement, the resultant aerosolized mist deadly for those below—and then, in a secondary wave, for those who might rush in to attend the wounded and screaming and dying.

  And i
t was in Walker’s right hand. And he was falling . . .

  He reached out with his left hand, his palm burning down on the sloping stainless-steel surface. It did little to suppress the pace of the slide, so he pushed hard with the tips of his boots, but they too couldn’t halt the descent.

  Walker slid on.

  And on.

  He brought up his right arm to let the pack’s strap slip down his arm to his shoulder and allow himself to slam two hands flat against the polished-steel surface.

  Still he fell; the slope and his 230-pound mass were too great.

  He pressed his cheek against it, feeling the steel burn away at his skin as he slid.

  Still not enough resistance.

  He looked over his shoulder—

  The arch disappeared—

  And the surface under his feet changed. It didn’t flatten out. There was no ridge.

  Just a drop-off.

  Six hundred and thirty feet. Five thousand innocent people.

  First his feet went over, then his shins, then his knees, and as more of his body weight went over the edge and the resistance lessened, his fall quickened.

  His waist went over, and he felt his legs dangle in midair as he kicked around for purchase.

  Nothing.

  Nothing but a 630-foot drop. He would be the delivery man of death.

  At 17:28pm local time, Walker slid off the top of the Gateway Arch.

  111

  From the sloping top of the Gateway Arch to the lip where it ended was a sheer vertical drop.

  Walker’s fingertips found nothing but empty space.

  Then caught a hold.

  Nothing more than a finger-span deep, maybe three-quarters of an inch: a ledge of folded stainless steel.

  Two hundred and thirty pounds, plus the loaded Beretta, plus his clothes, plus the backpack; a total closer to 280 pounds. Spread across eight fingers, hanging by fingertips.

  Good news, for the smallest moment.

  The tiny ledge was there just to block rain from the glass windows of the observation area inside. Those viewing windows faced the ground at a less than vertical angle—they were inverted, angling the other way from the sloped roof, and away from Walker, at around twenty degrees.