Without warning

by John Birmingham

  The cop fixed him with a baleful glare. ‘Well, don’t you be wandering off, Mr Kipper. I’ll be needing to speak to you again.’ He turned his back on the three engineers with that, and trotted over to a couple of uniformed officers, barking orders as he went.

  ‘Jesus, what a fucking mess,’ said Barney.

  ‘Uh-uh,’ grunted Kip. ‘We’d better find out what broke down, do what we can to help, then get back to council. We’ll call the city councillors, tell them what’s happened.’

  Tench looked troubled. ‘I tried, Kip. But none of them are available.’

  ‘What d’you mean?’ he snapped, instantly regretting it. ‘Sorry. It’s just I keep hearing this – it’s bullshit. Where are they?’

  His friend shrugged. ‘I even tried a few home phones and their cells, but nothing. And if you call Municipal Tower you just get routed into phone-menu hell out at Fort Lewis.’

  ‘Why? How come our calls are going out there?’

  ‘Not ours, just the councillors’. When you call them direct, I mean.’

  Kip started walking Heather over towards an ambulance. She had zoned out. She was looking shocked and pale and he wanted to get her cared for as quickly as possible. The paramedics, however, had their hands full with more serious casualties.

  ‘Heather, I’m going to get someone to run you out to the hospital,’ he told her. ‘No, scratch that – they’ll be completely overloaded. Do you have a doctor in town? Someone we can call?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, but I’ve been to a clinic near my apartment a couple of times. I got food poisoning my first week here.’

  ‘Jeez, Seattle’s been good to you, hasn’t it… Okay. Barn, you think you could drive Heather over to this clinic and get her checked out? Don’t take any shit from them – it’s city business.’

  ‘No problem,’ replied Tench.

  ‘Okay, you guys go now. Fuck the cops, they know where to find you. I’ll deal with them. Off you go.’ He shooed them away, keeping an eye on the sergeant, who had his back turned to them.

  A long line of ambulances was speeding down 4th Avenue South towards them and he could hear a chopper, more than one, approaching from the city. Hopefully it would be a medical flight. The media couldn’t take their helicopters anywhere without written authority from Fort Lewis. The entire state had been declared a no-fly zone, in order to ‘secure’ the city’s airspace and approaches. It was bullshit, of course. There were no more unpiloted, empty aircraft headed for Seattle. They’d all crashed within hours of the Disappearance. But General Blackstone hadn’t got around to removing the restrictions.

  Well, for once, Kipper was glad of it. He could really do without having to deal with a lot of jackass reporters this morning.

  * * * *

  Nearly six hours later, he finally made it through the last checkpoint on 5th Avenue, where a couple of Humvees with ring-mounted machine-guns blocked access to the Municipal Tower, the city’s administrative centre. A kid with the name-tag Meyer read his papers, stamping his feet in the cold while his breath plumed in the frigid air. He didn’t look at all pleased to be out in the open. The sun had disappeared again, and a light drizzle was drifting down from the leaden sky. It stung Kipper’s eyes as he waited for his papers, taking him back to childhood memories of swimming in pools with way too much chlorine.

  ‘Looks fine, sir,’ said Private Meyer. Or was it Specialist Meyer? Kip never really knew where he was with these military types. ‘Just park as normal and head on through. Major McCutcheon is waiting to see you.’

  Kipper was about to walk away when he pulled himself up. ‘Sorry, who’s waiting to see me?’

  Young Meyer consulted his clipboard again. ‘Major McCutcheon, sir,’ he repeated.

  ‘I don’t know any McCutcheon, son, Major or otherwise. What’s it about? Unless he’s come here to explain where your guys got to this morning when they should’ve been guarding my food bank, I’m not interested.’

  Meyer looked severely discomforted. ‘Sorry, sir. I don’t know why he came to see you. He’s General Blackstone’s aide, if that helps.’

  Kipper blinked away the burning rain that was running into his eyes. ‘Well no, it doesn’t… but… Damn it. McCutcheon, you said?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Major Ty McCutcheon. He’s waiting for you inside, sir, in the… er… deputy mayor’s office.’

  ‘Okay. Thanks.’ He stalked off. If nothing else, this McCutcheon might make a convenient punching bag. God knows he needed one after this morning.

  Forced to take a parking spot a good long walk from the tower, he didn’t recognise many of the vehicles, and noted that a fair amount of military transport had fetched up here, too. The thin mist of rain started to thicken up, falling heavier and forcing him to hurry. He no more wanted to be out in it than poor Private Meyer. Two more guards, both of them toting rifles, greeted him at the door, eyeballed his papers, and reminded him that he had an appointment with Major McCutcheon. Kipper tried to shake off his anger with the rain and pushed past them into the heated and slightly humid interior of the building.

  He could tell immediately that many more folks were in residence than was normal, a good number of them, perhaps most, out-of-towners. Every fourth man or woman was dressed in a military uniform. A couple of very expensive suits were wrapped around some very polished Eastern accents, too, he noticed. And Canadians seemed to pop up at each corner, announcing their presence with a rising inflection and an ‘eh!’ for every occasion. None of the newcomers recognised him, but here and there he caught a despairing look from a city employee. He had no idea how many people knew about the fuck-up at Costco – it certainly hadn’t been on the radio as he’d driven in. Those stations still operating were given over to official announcements spliced in between wall-to-wall music, and none of the announcements made any mention of the trouble this morning.

  By the time he reached the deputy mayor’s office, he’d calmed down a little, and decided to ditch the meeting with this McCutcheon guy. He was going to be far too busy with all the blow-back from the food bank disaster and opted instead to attempt an end-zone run to his own office.

  ‘Yo! Kipper, you made it, man, good to see. Come in, dude. We need to talk.’

  The engineer nearly jumped out of his boots.

  The army officer (or was he army? They had majors in the air force too, didn’t they?) was a lean, forty-something man with a bristling grey crew-cut. He looked the part, but sounded like a surf bum. A Californian, maybe? There was no avoiding him though, so Kipper set his features and made the best of it.

  ‘You’re McCutcheon, right? Did you come in here to explain what the hell happened at Costco? You guys were supposed to be there guarding the handout. You insisted on it, as I recall.’ As soon as Kipper started to speak, all of his bottled-up rage and frustration spilled out. He was nearly shouting by the time he’d finished. ‘All that bullshit about major security operations being an army gig now – but I got eighteen people dead, and the entire fucking city locked down again! It’s not good enough, Major!’

  ‘No it’s not,’ countered a gruff voice from somewhere behind McCutcheon. ‘Now get your ass in here, son, and help us sort it out.’

  Kipper pushed in through the door, surprised to find another uniformed man in the chair behind the deputy mayor’s desk. This one was older, bald, and much more thick-set than McCutcheon. ‘Who the hell are you?’ Kip asked, as the major pushed the door to slightly.

  The man, who was dressed in fatigues like McCutcheon, gestured to a chair for the engineer to sit in. ‘General Jackson Blackstone,’ he said. ‘Take a seat.’

  Kipper blinked and froze. ‘You. You’re the fucking idiot who insisted that the army would handle security this morning. Great fucking work out there, guys. Top-shelf effort.’

  ‘Sit. Down.’ Blackstone’s voice came out in a low growl.

  McCutcheon pressed Kipper towards the chair, placing a hand gently on his elbow. ‘Yeah, sorry, not our finest hour,’ he
said. ‘We sent two platoons over to that marketplace that got hit last night. It’s a snafu, Kipper – I’m sorry, it happens. Come on, we need to talk.’

  ‘You’re damn right we need to talk,’ replied Kip. ‘And what’s with the invasion?’ He gestured to take in the hordes of military personnel swarming the building. ‘Is the army taking over or something?’

  McCutcheon remained unaffected by his hostility. ‘Naw. We just stand out because of our superior grooming and fashion sense. Really, if it weren’t for that, you wouldn’t even know we were here. Come on… I’m not army, by the way, I’m air force. Special liaison to the civil power, for now. General Blackstone is army, and co-chair of the Special Means Committee.’

  The air force officer fetched a coffee pot from the sideboard. The office was crowded with paper files, maps and electronic equipment, all of it military issue. Blackstone sat as quietly and impassively as if he were a log on the forest floor.

  ‘You want Java?’ asked McCutcheon. ‘It’s fresh. But the milk’s not. I got some very nasty military-issue creamer, if you want.’ He held up a drab olive container with a white plastic slide top on it, by way of explanation.

  Kipper grunted, asking for a mug of black, no sugar.

  ‘Damn, that’s hard-core. You sure you’ve never been in the service?’

  The chief engineer nodded grumpily. ‘I’m certain. People shouting at me just pisses me off.’

  ‘Well, fair enough then. You gotta love the shouting, or it’s just not the life for you. How’s your family, by the way? They pulling through okay, got enough supplies?’

  Kipper shook his head in exasperation. ‘Look, what the fuck is this? I have a major disaster on my hands. Eighteen people dead. And you call me in here to make fucking small talk.’

  The major walked over to the door and carefully closed it, cutting off the growing hubbub from the corridor outside.

  General Blackstone spoke up as he did so. ‘The last time I checked,’ he said, ‘we had a lot more than eighteen dead. When last I checked, our casualty count was well over three hundred million, Mr Kipper. So I have some sour news for you, sir. This morning was a minor fuck-up, and there will be more of them.’

  ‘A minor -’

  ‘That’s right. And there will be more of them. More death. More chaos. Get used to it, and get used to dealing with it. Because if we don’t deal, it’s game over here. In this city. Everywhere.’

  Kipper waved away the cup of coffee McCutcheon held out.

  ‘What are you talking about, General? If this morning was your idea of dealing with things, then yeah, we’re fucked.’

  ‘Look, this is kinda delicate,’ said the air force man, taking a perch on the edge of the desk, where he could look down on Kipper. ‘We’ve got a bit of a problem with the council, I’m afraid.’

  Kipper shrugged. He’d wondered how on earth the military was going to continue working so closely with a group of people who were almost their antithesis. ‘Well, apart from this morning, things seem to be getting done,’ he offered. ‘All my department’s requests are going straight through the Special Means Committee and getting approved without any questions. What’s the problem?’

  Major McCutcheon sort of whistled inwards, which Kipper recognised as the universal sign of bad news coming. ‘Well, the thing is, we don’t really have a Special Means Committee,’ he confessed.

  ‘What?’ asked Kipper, completely dumbfounded.

  Blackstone leaned forward. ‘I had them arrested three days ago.’

  McCutcheon actually looked embarrassed for a second. ‘Yeah. And we’ve been kinda winging it ever since.’

  * * * *

  24

  ACAPULCO DIAMANTE, ACAPULGO

  The roadblock was almost professional. Four old cars arranged in a herringbone pattern that forced any oncoming traffic to slow to a crawl as it negotiated a winding course through the obstruction. A dozen armed men, locals by the look of them, lounged on the bonnets and inside the vehicles, passing around bottles of no-name tequila and Dos Equis lager, and smoking an assortment of cigarettes and reefers.

  ‘We could take that left,’ suggested Fifi, pointing to a narrow side street that remained open to traffic, just before the roadblock.

  ‘No,’ replied Shah without hesitation. ‘Too narrow. Nowhere to go. And they have enfilading fire from the roof-line and windows above. We must reverse immediately or go through.’

  ‘Drive on,’ said Jules. ‘But slowly. Don’t spook them. They’re probably just shaking down the turistas. I’m sure we can talk them around to leaving us be.’

  She lifted the dark grey Franchi SPAS 12 auto shotgun from the improvised gun rack that Shah had installed on the dashboard of the Jeep Cherokee, and jacked a round into the chamber. Behind the wheel, Sergeant Shah – they’d all taken to calling him that now – slowed the vehicle and made sure his own weapons cache, a pair of MP5s, was close to hand. In the back seat, Thapa and Fifi readied themselves.

  They had almost managed to drive right up to the edge of Acapulco Diamante, the most exclusive tourist enclave in the city, but the roadblock brought them to a halt a couple of hundred metres from the start of the private resorts and clubs. Jules had been expecting trouble even earlier, which is why the Jeep was kitted out with so much firepower. Until now, however, the sight of a few gun barrels lazily produced out of the Cherokee’s windows had been enough to negotiate their passage through the town, where most of the violence they encountered was still small-scale and anarchic.

  ‘Sergeant Shah, if you wouldn’t mind, I think Fifi and I will handle the negotiations. A prominent display of your willingness to kill anybody who interferes with us would help, of course.’

  ‘Of course, Miss Julianne.’

  The former non-com brought them to a halt at least twenty-five metres from the blockade. A lot of the men up ahead were carrying rusty revolvers and.45s, which were unlikely to hit anything they aimed at over ten metres away. And most of them appeared to be drunk or stoned, which further called into doubt their chances of deliberately targeting anybody. There was a lot to be said for volume of fire, though, and they had plenty of that to go around.

  Jules slipped a pair of sunglasses down over her eyes and stepped out of the cabin, fitting a radio headset. Fifi emerged behind her, already wearing her commo gear, the same sets they’d used back on the Rules. Immediately the wolf whistles and catcalls began. It was almost comical, really. It was a hot, bright day and both women were dressed in shorts and hiking boots. Jules wore a Level III A armoured vest over a white tee-shirt, but Fifi had only a sleeveless checked L.L. Bean to protect her. She’d knotted it, exposing a long expanse of tanned, finely muscled midriff, and most of the would-be desperadoes were torn between which of the chiquitas they wanted to objectify and harass the most.

  One guy stood out from the rest, simply because he didn’t ogle them or grab his crotch. He just stared cold and hard at the four gunned-up intruders.

  ‘That’d be our guy,’ Jules whispered into the mike. ‘He’s mine.’

  ‘Gotcha,’ said Fifi, who took her much-loved Russian PKM from Thapa at that moment. Jules was almost certain she felt the ambient temperature drop as blood began to run cold. ‘What’s happening back at the car?’ she asked.

  ‘Both Shah and Thapa are good to go, if they have to.’

  ‘Are they being obvious about it?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘Excellent, and… Good morning, seсor. This is your turf now, I suppose?’ Jules favoured the gang leader with the full wattage of her smile, holding the shotgun so as to squeeze just a little more cleavage up towards his face.

  ‘You presume I speak English, no?’ he said in reply.

  ‘You look like an intelligent, educated man, well travelled and worldly wise. It’s a reasonable assumption.’ She beamed at him. ‘Especially when you use big words like presume.’

  In fact, he looked like the worst sort of bad news. Sober and mean and not likely to be sweet-t
alked or bullshitted into anything he didn’t fully intend to do.

  ‘I am the block capitбn here now,’ he informed her. ‘I coordinate security for the Mayan and Fairmont resorts.’

  You mean you’re shaking them down for protection, she thought. ‘Well, that’s excellent,’ said Jules. ‘Because that is where we are headed this morning. So if you’d like to provide an escort for me and my friend here…’

  Fifi winked and grinned, while never taking her finger off the trigger of the PKM. ‘Howdy, Capitбn.’

  ‘… we’ll be on our way,’ Jules continued. ‘We have business up there, Mr…?’

  ‘What business?’