Until Nothing Remains: A Hybrid Post-Apocalyptic Espionage Adventure (A Gun Play Novel: Volume 1)

by C. A. Rudolph

  I nodded my understanding. “So we stay. Sprinkle a little pixy dust and work some magic. And somehow, someway, ultimately take down the caliphate?”

  “Sounds crazy…I know.”

  “Your brainpan is a trifle larger than mine. Do you have any clue just how the hell we’re supposed to accomplish that feat?”

  “I haven’t the faintest idea,” Natalia replied, laughing slightly at herself. “I just know that if we leave, nothing stands in the way to stop it. The people here, the law enforcement here…no one is equipped to fight an enemy that hides in the shadows, uses terror as their preferred weapon, and attacks at random. You and I are cut from the same cloth. We have skills that are formidable against enemies like this. We think like they do, and we come from the same neighborhood.”

  Natalia was speaking allegorically, but I knew what she was saying.

  “You mean the bad side.”

  She nodded. “We aren’t exactly good people in the grand scheme of things, Q. All my life, I’ve only been the best at one thing, and it’s in direct violation of the sixth commandment.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. Natalia was right yet again. We weren’t evil people, but we did do evil things, though it had never felt that way, at least to me. Killing had always served a purpose. It was the solver of all problems. And she and I were the best at it. Neither of us had any doubt in that fact. “I guess retirement gets put on the back burner for a while, huh?”

  “What good is retirement if there’s no world left to retire in?”

  We walked on for several yards in silence while taking turns studying the looks and actions of those around us. A smiling little boy walked past, his mother and father on either side of him, each holding one of his hands while he toyed with them. He looked delighted and carefree, like any other child just happy to be alive, with zero awareness of what was getting ready to happen to his country.

  Natalia turned to watch them when they’d passed. “I’m not going to stand idly by and watch them murder children, Quinn,” she declared. “I’m going to stop them, or I’m going to die trying.”

  When we reached the intersection of Connecticut and M Street, something peculiar caught my eye on the other side. While most pedestrians had their faces stuck in their social media applications, one person stood solitaire amongst them, and he was staring a hole through us.

  Seeing one, I knew there had to be another, so I skimmed the remainder of the scene. On the adjacent corner, I soon found his counterpart, who represented himself just as shamelessly as the other.

  Natalia tuned in to my concentration and mannerisms in seconds. “How many are there?”

  “A pair, so far. Charlie one, across the street, my eleven—gray jacket, aviator sunglasses. Charlie two is at three o’clock.”

  “Black leather?”

  I nodded only slightly.

  Natalia sighed. “What the fuck? Who else knows we’re here?”

  “I don’t know, it could be anyone.” I sighed. “They’re not just going to go away. Do we allow them to follow us, or do you want to ask them to dance?”

  She shrugged. “Let’s split up.”

  And the game began. I didn’t know who these men were or what they wanted, but the situation was about to get very hectic for them.

  Natalia disappeared into the crowd, and I went the other direction along M Street, checking behind me periodically using my sunglass lens’s reflective interior. Sure enough, my tail engaged and followed me. He was alone though, so I assumed his counterpart had done his due diligence and gone in pursuit of my wife. The poor bastard.

  After a couple of minutes of scanning the street for choke points, I found one just around a corner and slid behind a brick wall to lie in wait for my prey. I estimated it would be about forty seconds before I saw his face pass by, but I was wrong. It was thirty-five seconds. And it wasn’t his face I saw first, it was the glimmer off the steel muzzle of a pistol he held in his hand.

  With one hand, I swiftly disarmed the man while simultaneously putting a reverse knife-hand into his windpipe, causing him to gasp, lurch, and go limp. I took advantage of the strike’s effectiveness and pulled the man deeper into the alleyway after applying a chokehold tight enough to stifle his attempts at screaming or calling for help.

  After rendering him unconscious, I dropped the dead weight to the concrete, set his weapon aside, and began rifling through his pockets.

  Natalia was right, he was foreign. He definitely didn’t appear American, but he sure did have a lot of domestic identification on his person—all of it valid. He carried cash, credit cards, and even a Maryland driver’s license; but something just didn’t make sense.

  My mind began shuffling through random images and thoughts until, suddenly, I felt the ground shake beneath my feet like some small earthquake had occurred. Several seconds later, I heard a lengthy and loud boom, resembling that of thunder.

  “One of the missing airliners, no doubt,” I said to myself while speculating over all the possible locations nearby where it could’ve crashed. I assumed it would be the next breaking news story we’d see on television. All of Washington, DC, was about to go bat-shit crazy, and I assumed other major cities around the country weren’t far from doing the same. So much for getting a good night’s sleep anytime soon.

  I reached to my side and palmed the unconscious man’s pistol. It wasn’t American made, or even the typical Sig, Glock or Beretta frequently found here. It was an MP-443 Grach, Russian standard military issue. I hadn’t seen one since Natalia and I did a job two years ago in Kursk.

  I unbuttoned the man’s jacket and ripped open his shirt to get a view of the skin that lay beneath. Just as I expected, he was covered in colorful tattoos, some vivid, the lettering all appearing Cyrillic or Slavic.

  Now I was really confused. To my knowledge, we hadn’t acquired any enemies in Russia, and this man didn’t look Bratva to me. He couldn’t have been KGB; no skilled spy or agent of intelligence would’ve stepped into such an obvious trap like the one I’d just set for him.

  To hell with this. It was time for us to part ways with this city. I didn’t know why this man and his partner were here or why they’d chosen to follow us, but it didn’t matter. There wasn’t time to fully interrogate him, even if I cared to.

  I shoved the Grach pistol into my pants, stood, and went to make my way out of the alley just as a casually dressed stocky man with a buzzed haircut turned the corner and held up a hand for me to stop while pointing to a Glock he had hidden under his oversized fleece jacket. Had I not identified him, he would’ve been subdued and lying on top of the Russian not one moment later—the second victim of the day for this alleyway. But I knew who it was. Special Agent Dan Prosser, an overachieving, meddling case officer and, from what I remembered, a big-time ass-kisser. After all the bizarre events of today, I was now being paid a visit by the agency.

  Dan pulled off his sunglasses one ear at a time in dramatic fashion, like a motorcycle cop preparing to write a reckless-driving ticket. He looked down at the unconscious man lying on the polluted concrete behind me. “Making new friends, Oscar Kilo? Or have you switched career paths and become a thief?”

  Oscar Kilo. I hadn’t heard that in a while. It’d been my call sign in the Special Operations Group. It stood for and was the two-word phonetic version of overkill, one of the many monikers I’d earned as a shooter in the corps.

  I turned away for a second and shrugged unsympathetically. “I’m not very good at making friends.”

  Dan pressed his lips together in a smile and nodded while placing his sunglasses into the breast pocket of his jacket. “That’s a nice suit. Brooks Brothers, isn’t it? I think I have one of the same style, but in a tad darker shade.” He paused, and his tone deepened. “What are you doing in-country, Quinn?”

  “I have a better question. How did you know I was here?”

  He chuckled slightly. “You know how it is, Oscar Kilo. The company knows everything. No one can hide from us, eve
n you.”

  “I’ve never hid from anyone in my life. And you’re right, Dan. I do know how it is. What you’re saying is bullshit. Someone told you I was here.” I wagered a guess, even though I truly didn’t believe it accurate. “Was it Jonathon?”

  “Jonathon? You mean Rockland, right? Hell no. He’s a fucking ghost. As far as Langley knows, he went dark years ago, not long after going deep cover. But you didn’t hear that from me.”

  That was thought-provoking. I was going to file that tidbit away for later.

  While Dan fidgeted, I got a good look at a glint in a nearby building’s open fourth-story window. It was the sunlight’s reflection off what could only be a rifle scope. He’d brought a team along with him that included an overwatch position, leading me to believe this chance rendezvous had been prearranged in advance.

  “I don’t have a lot of time for chitchat, Dan. It’s my understanding the burn notice is a done deal and the feds haven’t declared me an enemy, so why the ambush?”

  Dan smirked. “It’s not an ambush—it’s more like a brush pass.”

  “You haven’t been a field agent in years, and that term implies friendliness. Is this a friendly visit?”

  “Let’s call it professional courtesy.”

  This back-and-forth was starting to annoy me. “Are you going to tell me what it is you want? Or did you come here to play Scattergories?”

  “I didn’t come here to play games with you,” Dan growled, his eyes narrowing. “But since you asked, I’ll tell you what I want. I want your ass out of the goddamn country. That’s what I want.”

  I smirked. “Oh. Is that all?”

  “For the moment,” he said. “Whenever you’re here, everyone I know gets antsy and my phone doesn’t stop ringing. They lose their beauty sleep, and then I lose my beauty sleep. And that shit makes me a very unhappy person.”

  Yeah. I was running on fumes too. I knew the feeling. “You’ll get your wish soon enough. I’ve already made the arrangements. Problem is, US airspace is probably going to be shut down soon. Don’t suppose you’ve heard about the recent terror attacks…”

  “If that happens, I suggest you head to the beach. Hope you’re a strong swimmer. It’s a big damn ocean.”

  I took a few steps forward. “Dan, I’m still very much a US citizen. And I’m not a threat to you or the agency…unless you decide to make me one. And if that’s how this hand is going to be played, I assure you, old friend, I will bring the hate all the way to your precious doorstep. It just so happens, right now I have more important items requiring my attention. I’d imagine the same for you, considering the current state of affairs.”

  “More important items, huh? Tell me, Kilo, what brings you and your wife to the US, anyway? For two of the most notorious hired guns in the world to be in town, you must’ve scored yourselves a monster of a job.”

  “The company knows everything, Dan, remember? There shouldn’t be cause to even pose the question.” I moved close enough to him so whoever was listening on the other side of his earpiece could hear me. My proximity to him would also make it nearly impossible for his sniper to get off a clean shot if he’d been so ordered. “When I was excommunicated, I did my part. I signed my final nondisclosure and disavowed all knowledge. The agency doesn’t need to worry about me.”

  Dan smiled and nodded as I backed away. “Okay. Then maybe we should worry about your wife instead.”

  That will be the day, asshole. Dig your own grave.

  “This conversation is over. Goodbye, Dan,” I said, and started to walk off.

  “Was it the two of you who started all that shit at the Saudi embassy and offed Khaleel el-Sattar last night?”

  I stopped walking and turned my head to him, but didn’t answer.

  “That got your attention,” he said. “The reason I’m asking is, that melee started a real political shitstorm. A bunch of federal agents are dead, and now the FBI is involved, and the heat is coming down hard on all of us to find out just what the hell happened there. We’re shaking down assets right and left now. Funny thing though, even with all the dead bodies we found, there’s no evidence of anyone being there who shouldn’t have been. And the few folks left alive, emphasis on few, don’t remember seeing a goddamn thing.”

  “Maybe they should get their eyes checked. What exactly are you insinuating?”

  “Nothing, Quinn. Nothing. Just putting out some feelers, that’s all. Whoever’s responsible got in and got out, and did a damn good job of doing so without being noticed. That type of warrior-of-the-night, shinobi shit just seems right up your bride’s alley.”

  My eyes met his and we had ourselves a bit of a staring contest before he looked away. I wasn’t going to give him the pleasure of a direct response—which I presumed was exactly what he was looking for.

  “Like I said,” he continued, “just putting out some feelers.”

  “Here’s a feeler for you. Want some advice?”

  “Well, sure. I love receiving unsolicited intel from former operatives.”

  “Then you’ll adore this. Read my fucking lips—keep your distance. And when you get home tonight, if you make it home, pray to whatever god you believe in that we never see each other again.”

  Dan hesitated. “Oh, don’t worry, Oscar Kilo. We won’t.”

  I grazed past him, shoulder checking him to the wall in doing so. As I turned onto the sidewalk on M Street, I looked over my shoulder and said, “Here’s some more advice. Tell your faggot shooter in the building across the street to start using an ARD. The sun’s glaring off his glass so much it looks like a signal mirror. I can see every time he takes a breath.”

  Dan turned around, chuckling. “Will do. Oh, and, Quinn? One more thing.”

  I stopped walking reluctantly, with him still in my peripheral. He tossed me a small transparent plastic bag, which I caught with my left hand. I studied the contents. Individually sealed, recently dated pharmaceuticals, appearing to have originated from a paramedic’s kit. It contained several unopened doses of hydrocodone and acetaminophen and cephalexin. Painkillers and antibiotics.

  I looked at him curiously. I wanted to offer thanks—maybe he wasn’t such a prick after all. But this souvenir wasn’t for me, and that meant Dan knew a lot more than what he let on. Typical fucking CIA. Everyone has an angle.

  “I’ll take care of your friend for you,” he said, pointing at my former tail on the ground, who was now starting to come around. “Go take care of the wife and get the hell out of the country double-quick. And take her with you.”

  Nearly a half hour later, I spotted Natalia walking towards me on the sidewalk about a block and a half away from the Mayflower Hotel. She looked pissed, and her head—which was now missing the white fleece beanie she’d been wearing earlier—was on a constant swivel.

  When we’d reached one another, we both said nothing and took a turn into the hotel’s heavy brass front entrance doors, heading straight for the elevators. After the elevator doors welcomed us inside, I pressed the button to force the doors closed, and followed it with a press that would take us on an express trip back to the club level and to our room.

  “Did you hear the crash?” she asked vacantly.

  I nodded. “I felt it. And I heard the explosion not long after.” I turned and gave her a quick once-over. “Everything go okay?”

  She nodded, her eyes staring a hole through the reflective metal elevator door. “You?”

  I shrugged. “Peachy. Would you have any idea why we have Russians tailing us?”

  “Ukrainians, you mean,” she corrected.

  “Ukrainians? How do you know?”

  Natalia rolled her lips through her teeth, then smiled weakly. “I just know.”

  Once we reached our floor, Natalia and I made a beeline for our suite’s door. It was obvious to me she now shared the same sentiment about leaving town as I did. I went to open it with my key, but she stopped me—first by grabbing my hand, then by holding up a finger to her lips. S
he carefully put her ear to the door and held it there for about ten seconds while the look on her face contorted.

  Fuck. I should’ve considered it a possibility after what we’d just experienced, that someone or even a group of someones would be waiting for us when we got back to our room, but the forethought had escaped me. Damn this fatigue.

  I knew Natalia was just as tired as I was and had been put through more stress than I had, but at this moment, it was a relief knowing she was still on point. How she was managing to do so was beyond me.

  As her eyebrows pulled down and together, Natalia held up a hand and three fingers, then four. She pulled her ear away from the door and backed away, motioning for me to do the same.

  Four men waited for us on the other side of the door of our suite, and I had no idea who they were or what they wanted from us, but I could only assume the worst now. Were they Russians? Ukrainians? The KGB? Or were they CIA paramilitary operatives waiting to apprehend and interrogate us for the killing of el-Sattar? I was reaching the point where I was too tired to give a shit. Whoever was behind the door was a threat, and I was a competent, bona fide expert at eliminating that very thing.

  Natalia looked to me for what to do next. She rarely deferred to me in these instances, but she knew that between the two of us, I was the most proficient door kicker.

  I pulled the MP-443 Grach pistol from my waist and handed it to her. The look on her face gave way to the notion that she knew exactly where it had come from. Without looking at me or giving me a single indication of hesitance, she press-checked the weapon and made ready.

  I slipped the Glock from its holster in the small of my back and took a couple of steps away from the door. I was tired and foggy and nowhere near in any shape for another encounter today. But here we were. We were cornered, and I felt about half of the man I normally was, but I knew that even at fifty percent capacity, I could dominate nearly a dozen normal men—or a half-dozen cold, calculating, well-trained ones.