I Am the Mission: The Unknown Assassin Book 2

by Allen Zadoff

  “They’re still going to find me guilty.”

  “But there are mitigating circumstances. You’ll avoid the death penalty.”

  “So I spend the rest of my life in prison? No, thank you. They’re going to need someone to blame, Daniel. Someone to punish.”

  “There’s still a chance for leniency,” I say. “A few years in prison, and then you can go home.”

  “What home?” she says.

  She’s right.

  Her father and brother are dead. Camp Liberty will be dismantled.

  Her hand slips into her jacket pocket and comes out holding something.

  A cell phone just like her brother’s.

  She looks at me across the expanse of rooftop. I step toward her, and she moves closer to the edge.

  She holds up the cell phone between us like a warning.

  “You know what this is?” she says.

  “A backup detonator,” I say.

  “That’s right.”

  A gust of wind blows hard and I have to steady myself, redistributing my weight.

  I look at the way Miranda is standing. Her body is tight, resistant. She is desperate and out of options.

  My mission is to kill her. At least according to Mike.

  I haven’t heard from Father or Mother in days. Mike showed up claiming to be some kind of messenger, but can I be sure why he really came?

  For all I know, The Program has ceased to exist. Mike could be lying to me, sending me after her for his own reasons.

  Maybe he was embittered by Francisco’s turning against The Program. His first recruit became a traitor, so he invented a mission as payback.

  If there is no real mission, I’m out here alone without a true purpose.

  Which means there might be options for me. For both of us.

  “Would you leave with me?” I ask Miranda.

  “And go where?”

  “Somewhere. Anywhere.”

  “You want to take me into custody.”

  “I’m not a cop.”

  “Maybe not, but the street below is filled with them. I agree to go, and you take me down and turn me over to them. Then you walk away.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “What, then?”

  She lowers the detonator.

  I say, “The first night on the mountain, you told me you wanted to know what was happening in the real world. Maybe you can live there for a while, see what it’s like. Maybe we both can.”

  Her face softens for a moment, then her eyes cloud over and her face turns to stone.

  “If I left with you, what would that make me?” Miranda says.

  “It would make you free,” I say.

  “No,” she says, shaking her head. “It would make me a traitor. Like my mother.”

  My eyes are drawn to the motion in her hand. I look down and see her dialing a number on the cell phone.

  “Don’t do this,” I say.

  “There’s no way out.”

  I think about four days ago, standing in a circle of soldiers with their weapons pointed at me. The riddle that Father created for me.

  “That’s not true,” I tell her. “There’s always a way.”

  “I’m sorry,” she says, and she dials the final number on the cell and hits CALL.

  I brace myself for the explosion—

  A second passes, then two and three.

  Nothing happens.

  She looks at the cell, making sure the number is correct. She presses it again.

  I’m looking at the giant antennas around us.

  “We’re surrounded by high-frequency radio antennas,” I say. “They can block cell signals at this proximity.”

  Her eyes dart around the roof.

  “It’s done, Miranda.”

  She peers over the edge of the roof toward the ground.

  “It’s not done,” she says. “You said so yourself. There’s always a way. I can still get a signal. I just need to be closer to the ground.”

  I suddenly understand her, the insanity of what she is contemplating.

  “You don’t know if the vans were wired correctly. You don’t know if your cell phone signal can transmit through the walls of the subbasement.”

  “But there’s a chance, isn’t there? If I were closer to the explosives. There’s a chance it would work.”

  I hear sirens down below us, their sound carried up by the wind.

  “The bomb squad may already be down there,” I say. “They may have dismantled everything.”

  “Not everything,” she says. “I don’t think so. Truck bombs with fail-safes and trip wires? It’s going to take them a long time.”

  “We don’t know that.”

  I’m moving steadily toward her now, a step at a time.

  “I think you’re wrong,” she says. “The bombs are still armed. They just need the right signal.”

  “Don’t do it,” I say. “Come away with me.”

  She smiles.

  “You think you’re going to save me, but you’re wrong.”

  She looks out across the dark expanse of the city. The wind pulls at her clothing.

  “I don’t need to be saved. I just need to finish what we started.”

  “We?”

  “My family. My legacy,” she says, and she steps off the building.

  I rush to the edge, and I see her falling back into space.

  Few people could do what she’s attempting. A fall like this would cause most people to flail, spinning out of control. They might pass out before they hit the ground or even have a heart attack.

  But Miranda expertly adjusts her body in the air, spreading her arms and legs in the classic arch position of a skydiver. A falling object does not accelerate indefinitely. It reaches a terminal velocity and cannot fall any faster. By taking the arch position, she controls her descent, creating wind resistance and increasing the time it takes for her to reach terminal velocity.

  There is no way that she will survive, but she’s not trying to survive.

  She’s trying to complete her mission.

  In the last seconds I see her pull her arms together above her head, the cell phone still clutched tightly in one hand, the other reaching to press the keys.

  I turn away before she hits the ground.

  A second later I feel the deep rumble of explosives detonating far below me.

  The vibration travels up the steel of the building like a great shiver, and then the roof suddenly tilts to one side as a critical support lets loose in the structure far below. The angle steepens as another support gives way.

  This is not a professional demolition, a neat series of explosions that will collapse one floor upon the next. It’s an enormous blast in one corner of the building that sends it leaning sickeningly to one side.

  There’s no way for me to get out of the building in time.

  The best I can do is to run in the direction of the building’s fall.

  My mind is racing, calculating angle and distance as it changes moment to moment.

  There are perhaps thirty feet between this rooftop and the next nearest building, a smaller tower across the street.

  Thirty feet away and a seventy-foot drop. An impossible jump.

  But as the federal building tilts, the space between the buildings decreases.

  If I can time it right, it will be like jumping from one falling domino to the next one that has not yet fallen.

  If I can time it.

  Metal screams and windows explode beneath me. I hear bolts snapping and people shouting from the ground below.

  Terror beats in my chest. I imagine jumping into space and falling, plummeting to the ground like Miranda.

  Twenty-five feet between rooftops now.

  That’s what my eye is telling me, but I might be wrong. Under this amount of duress, judgment can falter. I’m trained to work under pressure, to make significant and life-changing decisions under the most extraordinary circumstances.

&n
bsp; Fifteen feet might be an acceptable risk. But twenty-five feet?

  I’ve got seconds left to decide.

  I’m too afraid to move. I’m frozen in place with the calculations racing through my mind, the distance, the possibility of making the jump, the likelihood of making a mistake.

  The building tilts farther, knocking me to the rooftop. I manage to get back to my feet.

  If I stay here, I’m going to die. If I jump, at least I’ll have a chance.

  Certain death or uncertain life.

  Suddenly distance doesn’t matter.

  I propel myself forward, running for the edge. I wait until the last possible moment, and then I jump into space—

  I’m more than halfway across when I realize I’m not going to make it.

  I’m descending faster than I’m moving forward, and even though I elongate my body and reach with my arms, there’s no way I will get to the other side.

  I flash back to a week ago, the camp in Vermont, a beautiful summer day, a dark green lake. I was leaping from a cliff, trusting fate as I dove into the water.

  It’s easy to trust fate when you think it’s on your side.

  But sometimes fate turns against you.

  The way it did me, the day I met Mike.

  The way it does to the people I meet on my missions, the people who breathe their last breaths in my arms.

  The way it’s turning against me now.

  Because now I am falling.

  There is open air beneath my feet. I take a final breath, filling my lungs with oxygen, preparing myself for the terrifying drop to the pavement below.

  Fate will have its way with me now in the form of a last fall.

  My training doesn’t matter anymore. I’m falling, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

  That’s when I see it.

  A rope.

  It appears in front of me seemingly out of nowhere, bright orange knots in intervals down its length.

  For a moment, I think I’m imagining it. A visual hallucination from a desperate boy who is about to die.

  Illusion or not, I reach for it.

  My fingers wrap around hard nylon cord. Real cord.

  I grasp it and my hands slip. It takes every bit of strength I have to hang on hard enough to stop my fall.

  But I am strong. I don’t let go.

  My hands burn down the length of the rope until I come to a stop near the very end. Suddenly I go from falling to rising into the air, the rope swinging from side to side as I’m buffeted by strong winds from above.

  I look up, following the length of nylon upward, craning my neck until I find its source. The rope has been dropped from a helicopter.

  I stare up at its belly as it rises slowly, the rotors catching air and pulling me away.

  When I look below, I see the Federal Building collapsing onto a downtown street, a rolling dust cloud enveloping several city blocks. It is an image that is terrible and familiar at the same time.

  With the building gone, the darkness in the city is complete. Boston is a black void beneath me. Above me is open air.

  I climb.

  I reach the skid of the helicopter, then pull myself up into the cargo hold. I recognize this helicopter. I flew one just like it in Vermont less than a week ago.

  I flop onto the floor and pull the door closed behind me.

  The pilot looks back at me, a concerned expression on his face.

  It’s Father.

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE

  “WELCOME BACK,” HE SAYS.

  “Where did you come from?” I say.

  “What does it matter? I’m here. Dropping you a lifeline.”

  Lifeline.

  It’s the same term Francisco used.

  “Why now?” I say.

  “Because you needed one now, wouldn’t you say?”

  “And before? When I was cut off in Camp Liberty, trying to communicate with you?”

  “That’s a longer conversation,” he says.

  I watch Father, his face impassive as he scans my body, assessing my health.

  “You weren’t injured,” he says.

  More a statement than a question.

  “I wasn’t injured,” I say.

  “Then let’s get you out of here.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX

  I USE A FIELD DRESSING TO WRAP MY BLEEDING HANDS.

  Then I climb into the passenger seat next to Father.

  I look out through the windshield. A moment ago the sky looked like death. Now it looks like the opposite.

  “I haven’t been able to get ahold of you for four days,” I say.

  Father won’t look at me. His focus is straight ahead as he monitors the helicopter’s controls.

  “I tried to contact you,” I say angrily. “We had contingencies in place, a safe house, a plan—”

  “I know,” Father says.

  “But you disappeared! Why?”

  “I was under orders,” he says. “I had no choice but to cut you off.”

  I take a long breath, forcing back the rage that’s growing inside me.

  “Tell me why,” I say.

  “First Francisco dropped off the radar, then you disappeared into the camp. The Program was hemorrhaging. That’s what it seemed like from our perspective. We had to stop the bleeding, or we risked losing everything. Can you understand that?”

  Mike told the truth. I went into camp, and The Program interpreted that as a betrayal.

  “What did you think happened to me?” I ask.

  “We thought you’d been recruited, that you had turned.”

  “You think my loyalty is that fragile?”

  “As we discussed before the mission, there were questions about you.”

  “But you tested me. You said I was fit for duty.”

  “And then you disobeyed orders and went into Liberty.”

  “So you wrote me off.”

  “You can understand why we had doubts after what we’ve seen recently. From you and the other soldier.”

  Two operatives breach protocol, one after the other. From The Program’s perspective it couldn’t be a coincidence—they’d have to assume it was systemic. At that point everyone’s allegiance is suspect until proven otherwise.

  On one hand, their choice to cut me off makes sense.

  On the other hand, they left me in the field to fend for myself, assuming betrayal instead of coming to get me.

  I say, “If you still had doubts, you should have contacted me. We could have talked about it.”

  “If we had tried to contact you in the camp, Moore would have killed you. We had to assume he’d discovered our soldier and was expecting a second mission insertion. Any suspicious behavior, and he would have acted against you. So we could not contact you.”

  “If you were so worried about Moore killing me, why did you decide to do it yourself?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The kill order,” I say.

  “We never put out a kill order.”

  I watch Father’s face to determine if he’s lying. I don’t see any evidence of it, but he’s expert at hiding such things.

  I say, “You sent a freelance team to attack me at the safe house.”

  “That team wasn’t meant for you,” he says.

  “Funny, because it was me they were shooting at.”

  Father exhales slowly, his grip tightening on the cyclic.

  “We know you left Camp Liberty to go on an operation at Lake Massabesic.”

  “The water treatment plant.”

  “That’s right. We saw the photo that was transmitted from the plant. We had to assume you’d turned. If so, you had likely given us up to Moore. Maybe you’d told him about the safe house. He would send people to investigate, perhaps try to access our comms. We hired a freelance team to wait for them. Just in case.”

  “But you’d already sanitized the house. Even if Moore’s people had come, they would have found nothing.”

  “It was a
n opportunity.”

  I look at Father. His face is composed again, his control of the helicopter precise.

  “What kind of opportunity?” I say.

  “The woman you met at the safe house is an ex–FBI agent. She was part of a team that investigated Moore a decade ago.”

  I think about the woman, her reaction under fire, the way she managed herself in what should have been a panicked situation.

  “You put a freelance team in place so if Moore’s people showed up at her house—”

  “It would look like Moore was exacting revenge,” Father says. “An attack in a suburban neighborhood. Civilian casualties. Moore’s people on the scene.”

  “You were setting him up,” I say, suddenly understanding.

  “It would be an incontrovertible reason for the FBI to go in and break up the camp. Not the mission we had in mind, but we realized we had to take Moore out one way or another.”

  It’s an ingenious plan, if you disregard the fact that The Program was willing to sacrifice an innocent family to achieve it.

  I realize now that I made a mistake thinking the freelance team was sent for me. If The Program wanted me dead, they have other ways to do it.

  Quieter ways.

  Father says, “We had no way of knowing you would be the one to go to the safe house.”

  “But it was me,” I say. “And I was alone.”

  “Regretful,” Father says. “But you did what you were trained to do. Thank god you survived.”

  Father adjusts the helicopter, arcing to the west, away from Boston.

  When I look back at him, he’s watching me.

  “You spent a long time inside that camp,” he says.

  “Barely three days all told.”

  “But it was enough,” Father says.

  “Enough to kill Moore? Yes.”

  “Enough to find out the truth. About our soldier.”

  I nod. This is what Father is interested in. I see him struggling to appear casual.

  “What happened to the soldier?” he says.

  “He’s dead.”

  I watch Father’s face, gauging his reaction, trying to understand what he feels, if he feels.

  I see nothing there. No sadness. No pity.

  “You’re sure he’s dead?” Father says.

  “I’m the one who killed him.”