by David Archer
Noah shrugged. “I'm just here to do what you tell me,” he said. “If I have to listen to him, or anyone else, then you're going to have to point that out to me. One of the first things I learned when I began taking jobs was to find out who the boss is, and then do what the boss told me to do. As far as I can tell, you're the boss, so if there are any other bosses around here I need to know about, please make sure I do.”
Allison laughed. “No, I'm your boss,” she said. “That's not anything you gotta worry about. Johnson just likes to make sure his own ass is covered, that's all. He does his job, though, which is why he's still here.”
Johnson returned a few moments later, and announced that Team Camelot would be assembled in the conference room within a few minutes. “Do you need me to stick around for this introduction?” he asked Allison.
“Not particularly,” she said. “This is out of the ordinary, I know, but it's the way I want to do things in this case. They all know me, so I can handle this.”
Johnson nodded, then turned around and left the room. A moment later, a tall, thin young man stuck his head into the room.
“Ma'am? I was told to report here?”
Allison smiled at him. “Yes, Neil, come on in. We're having a little get together, and you're part of it.”
The young man came in and took a seat, and Noah looked him over. He barely looked old enough to be out of high school, and was probably a star on his high school basketball team, to judge from his height. Noah guessed him at around six foot five, but he was thin enough that a best guess of his weight put him around one fifty.
Neil was looking him over, as well. Noah wondered if the kid knew that he was looking at his new team leader.
Another man suddenly opened the door and poked his head inside. This one was not as tall, but he was definitely bulkier. He saw Allison, grinned and walked in. “Well, it looks like I'm in the right place,” he said. “Johnson called and said I was supposed to be here, like ten minutes ago.” His eyes flicked to Noah, but then he looked back at Allison.
“Yes, Mr. Conway,” Allison said. “Please come in and have a seat; we're waiting for one more person.”
The man she'd called Mr. Conway sat down, and nodded at the skinny kid named Neil. Noah took note that they obviously knew each other, and suspected from this that they were both guessing he was to be the new member of their team. Neither of them said a word to Noah, or to each other, for that matter. They seemed content to just wait quietly for whatever Allison had in store.
“Is this where I'm—oh, I guess it is,” said a young woman at the door, just before she stepped inside. She nodded at Allison, then at the other two men, and took a seat.
Allison sat forward and smiled. “I'm doing something that breaks our usual protocols,” she said, “because we're dealing with an extremely unusual situation.” She indicated Noah with a flick of her head. “I want you all to meet Noah Wolf, who is going to be your team leader. Noah, let me introduce you to Sarah Child, who is your transportation specialist. Sarah came to us about eight months ago, right after she and her father were arrested for running one of the biggest chop shops in the Dallas area. Don't let her small size and pretty face fool you—she can drive anything that has wheels and can probably tear it apart and rebuild it even while it's moving down the road. When you're out on a mission, it will be her job to make sure you get where you're going, and hopefully back again.”
Noah leaned over and extended a hand, and Sarah shook it. “Nice to meet you,” he said, and the girl rolled her eyes.
“Yeah, charmed, I'm sure,” she said.
Allison pointed at the tall, skinny kid. “This is Neil Blessing,” she said. “Neil is one of the most accomplished computer hackers we've ever run across, and he was so good that we recruited him straight out of high school. Of course, that had a little bit to do with the fact that he was going to complete his senior year at the Chicago Youth Authority Special Education Division. Like you, Neil is an orphan who spent the majority of his teens in foster care, and he seemed to like the offer we made him.”
“Yes, I did,” Neil said. “Especially since she's leaving out the part about how I was to be transferred to a federal prison on my eighteenth birthday, to begin serving a sixty-year sentence without possibility of parole, just for making some minor adjustments to, oh, well, my bank account. Let's see, sixty years in prison, or work for the government and help them kill people? Hmm, not that hard a choice.”
Noah leaned forward again, and shook hands with Neil Blessing. “I completely understand,” Noah said. “Good to meet you.”
He looked at Allison, who flicked her eyes at the other man. “This big lug is Moose Conway. Moose will be your muscle, the backup man. Like you, he's got a military background, and just barely failed to make the cut for Navy SEALs. He's been here for about a year and a half, now, and actually graduated, but he asked to be recycled and go through all the training again. Since we didn't have a team to assign him to at that moment, I agreed, and he's probably the best possible man to have in that position on your team.”
Noah extended a hand to Moose, but the big guy just looked at it. “You may be the team leader, and I may have to take orders from you, but that doesn't mean I have to like you,” Moose said. “I know who you are—I read all about you in The Army Times. I don't know how anyone can give you a second chance after you killed your own men and even your platoon leader. You keep your hands to yourself, understand? I'll do my job, and you can count on me to do it, but don't ever expect me to sit down and have a beer with you. You're a mad dog, and you should have been put down.”
“Mr. Conway,” Allison said, “you will stand down, right now. As it happens, there is a large mountain of evidence that proves that Noah was completely justified in the actions he took. You of all people should know that things are not always as they seem, and this is one of those cases. I'm not going to bother trying to explain it all to you, but get this through your head. Noah Wolf acted honorably when he killed Lieutenant Gibson and the other men who died that day. If he hadn't, he would not be sitting here, right now, because I would agree with your assessment. Do I make myself clear?”
Moose nodded once. “Yes, Ma'am,” he said. “I'll just keep my opinions to myself.”
Noah stood up. “Allison, if Mr. Conway does not feel comfortable being on my team, then I believe you should release him from it. I cannot count on a man who harbors animosity toward me.”
Allison looked at him and grinned. “Then, if I were you, I would find a way to eliminate that animosity. He stays on your team, because he's the best man I've got for the job.” She looked at all four of them. “You four will make up our newest team, which will be Team Camelot. Camelot—that's Noah—will be going through an abbreviated training course, and you'll be going through some of it with him. It's quite possible that you may find yourselves out on your first mission within just a few months. Keep yourselves sharp, and stay ready. At this point, I don't know what your first mission will be, so I can't give you any tips on how to prepare for it. Just be ready, because you'll probably have to move quickly when it comes.” She looked at each of their faces in turn. “Any questions?”
Sarah raised a hand. “I have one,” she said. When Allison nodded at her, she looked at Noah. “All I want to know is are you going to get us all killed?”
Noah's left eyebrow popped up. “I'm certainly not planning to,” he said. “Can I ask what prompted that question?”
Sarah looked at him for a minute, then shrugged her shoulders. “A friend of mine says he knows who you are,” she said. “He says you don't think like a normal person, that the things most of us worry about don't seem to mean much to you. Is that true?”
Allison started to interrupt, but Noah put a hand on her arm. “According to a small army of psychiatrists, I suffer from an unusual form of PTSD that leaves me without emotions. I don't get angry, I don't get scared, I don't love and I don't hate. I've spent almost all of my life pretending
to be normal, but you four deserve to know the truth. If you tell me a joke, I may not realize it unless somebody else starts laughing. If you share some bad news with me, I'm going to offer sympathy, not because I feel it, but because I've learned that's what you're supposed to do in that situation. I've spent my entire life studying how humans act, so that I can pretend to be one of you. That's the reality I live in.” He took a deep breath. “As to the value I place on things like human life? Let me put it this way. The reason I have bothered to study the way humans act is so that I can do what other people would consider the right thing, when it’s time to do it. Sometimes, however, I have to do what I believe is right, and that may not be exactly what everyone else wants. Instead, it will be based not on fear or anger or any other emotion, but solely on a logical conclusion drawn from available facts. Now, what that should mean to each of you is that I'm going to naturally want to do whatever I can to protect you. However, if protecting you means the failure of the mission, then I'm going to put the mission first. Does any of that make sense to you?”
Sarah sat there and just stared at him, and Moose busied himself with looking at the ceiling, but Neil leaned forward, put his head in his hands and muttered, “Oh, God help us, we're all going to die.”
THIRTEEN
“Don't let Moose get to you,” Allison said. “He comes from a long line of soldiers and sailors, and if he had his choice, he'd still be in the Navy.”
“Then why isn't he?” Noah asked.
“Remember I said he just barely failed to make Navy SEALs? Well, after he was notified that he was not selected, especially after going through such intense training just to find out if he was good enough, he sort of snapped. The captain who told him the bad news ended up with a shiner, and Moose ended up with a BCD.”
“Bad Conduct Discharge?” Noah asked. “He's probably lucky that's all he got. Assaulting an officer, without reason? Really bad idea.”
Allison grinned at him. “Yes, well, Moose figured that out the hard way. Anyway, that's how he turned up on my radar, and I couldn't see any sense in letting all that training go to waste.”
Noah looked at her sideways. “With that kind of training, I'm surprised you didn't make him a team leader himself. An assassin.”
She shook her head. “No way. Moose isn't a man who can inspire others to follow him; he's not a natural leader. And except for that one lapse in judgment, he has always been dedicated to following the orders of those in command. You figure out a way to make a friend out of him, or at least get his animosity under control, and you'll have the most loyal man you could ever hope for on your side.”
Noah nodded. “Speaking of loyalties,” he said, “tell me about Neil Blessing. Is he always that sarcastic?”
“He is, yes. It's a defense mechanism with him. Neil was always the nerdy kid, and as tall as he is, it turned out he was far too clumsy for any type of athletics. Academically, intellectually, he's a genius, and if he hadn't been stupid enough to brag on Facebook and twitter about hacking into the bank's computers, he probably would've gotten away with it. It seems that there's always little fractions of a cent in the daily interest calculations that get swept into some digital limbo, and Neil created some way to collect all those fractions and add them together in his own bank account. Fifteen thousandths of a cent at a time doesn't sound like much money, until you realize that his bank is a national corporation with several million clients. This kid was racking up almost eleven thousand dollars a day, and not one cent of it was ever detected as missing from anywhere else.”
Noah blinked. “If he was dumb enough to brag about what he'd accomplished, then I'm not sure why you're still calling him a genius.”
“Stop and think, Noah,” Allison said. “Genius is the ability to see past the limitations that most of us are faced with, and accomplish the impossible. That's what he did, without a doubt. However, it is possible to be a genius and still be rather stupid, like that guy who created the internet security software that made him a billionaire, then ran off with his secretary and murdered her husband so no one would find them. Pretty stupid, wasn't he?”
“Okay, I guess I see your point. Can I at least hope that Neil has learned his lesson about boasting?”
Allison laughed. “I suspect you could actually bet on that.”
They pulled into the underground garage of Allison's building, and this time she pulled up behind a black-and-silver Corvette. Pointing at it, she said, “That's your car. Like I said, don't go wrapping it around any trees, or I might decide to shoot you myself.”
Noah grinned and got out, but she called him back just before he got into the Corvette. “Don't forget to gather your things from the motel,” she said. “Those clothes are yours, along with the computer. Take them out to your house with you.” She waved once, and drove away.
Noah got into the Corvette and slipped the key into the ignition. He pushed in the clutch and started the car, found reverse on the four-speed and backed it out of its slot. A moment later, he was turning out of the garage onto the street, and making his way back toward the motel.
Marco stuck his head out of his room as Noah pulled in, and came jogging over a moment later to eyeball the Corvette. “Holy cow,” he said, “what a ride! How did you swing this?”
Noah shrugged. “The dragon lady said Doc Parker picked it for me. Can't say I'm too upset about it, though. It's a sweet set of wheels.”
Marco whistled. “I'll just bet.” Without asking, he reached down to the grill and pulled the hood release, then tilted the hood up and whistled again. “Man, I haven't seen that much chrome in forever,” he said. “Looks like a four fifty-four big block, but I'd bet there's nothing stock about it. Want my guess? It'll pass everything except a gas station.”
Noah grinned. “Good thing they give me a gas allowance, then, isn't it? Listen, I just came to grab my clothes and such, they got me in a house out by the lake already.”
“Yeah, I knew that,” Marco said. “I'll only be here a couple more days myself, just getting in some refresher training. Not that I need it, you understand, but it never hurts to keep yourself on top of your game.”
Noah nodded, and opened his door. “Hey, by the way, how do I check out of the motel? I mean, there isn't an office or anything. Where do I leave the key?”
“Just leave it in the room,” Marco said. “Somebody comes around to clean up after we leave, they'll take care of it. Just make sure you take all your stuff with you, because once you leave the key, you can't get back in.” Marco waved, and wandered back toward his own room.
Noah quickly gathered up the clothes that had been bought for him, carrying them out carefully and laying them on the passenger seat of the car. When he was done with that chore, he went back to get the computer and found that it had a satchel it fit into, so he packed it carefully and carried it out as well. The only things left were the snacks and pop he had bought the night before, and he was glad he hadn't thrown away the plastic bags he’d carried them home in. They went back into the bags, and then into the floorboard of the car.
A quick glance around the room told him he hadn't left anything behind, so he dropped the key onto the dresser and started out the door. At the last second, he went back and checked the bathroom, gathering the shampoo, soaps and razors, and taking those as well. He closed the door behind him and got into the Corvette, fired it up, then began following the map Allison had given him to find his new home.
Even though the compound wasn't all that large, the drive out to his new house took almost 20 minutes, mostly because Temple Lake Road was full of twists and turns. He found County Road 640 with no trouble, turned onto it, and found the house only a couple of minutes later.
It was bigger than he'd expected. When Allison had said it was a refurbished farmhouse, he had thought of something like the one he had stayed in as a teenager, an old, rickety two-story that looked like a refugee from Green Acres. The house he found, however, was probably twice the size of the one
he remembered from back then, and quite beautiful. It appeared to have been built from cedar, and he could see that it had undergone some extensive remodeling in the not-too-distant past.
He parked in front of the garage, then walked over to the door and opened it with the key. The sky was overcast, so he found the light switch inside the door and was amazed when he saw the expanses of oak that greeted his eyes. It took him more than fifteen minutes just to walk through the house, looking at all of the different decors that were used inside, and he couldn't help wondering if it weren't all lost on a man who didn't even know how to appreciate such beauty.
He went out to the garage and found the button to open the garage door, then walked out and pulled the Corvette inside. He closed the garage and began carrying all of his things into the house. Snacks went into the kitchen, root beer into the refrigerator, and then he had to decide which of the four bedrooms he wanted to claim. In the end, simple logic won out, and he took the one on the ground floor that had the big master bathroom attached to it.
Allison had told him that he didn't have anything scheduled for the rest of the day, so he gave himself a chance to look the place over. Once he had explored the house for the third or fourth time, he walked outside and began looking at the rest of his little estate.
The first thing to catch his eye was the barn, and he wandered over to it and pulled the big door open. A musty smell greeted him, the old scent of horses and cattle that always seems to be present in one of these buildings. It reminded him briefly of the farm he had lived on as a teenager, and he remembered some of his adventures in the loft of the barn back then. A quick look around showed him the ladder that led up to the loft in this one, and he climbed up it just to look around.
