April 4: A Different Perspective

by Mackey Chandler

  Whatever was going on, Otis was starting to think it was going to be very, very, bad when he finally did figure it out.

  Pretty Boy, as Otis had tagged the leader, waited until they were on the expressway ramp to speak again.

  "Damn, you are good," he admitted. "I was shown a picture of you. Not that great a pic, you have a reputation of being camera shy, but I have to admit if I was holding the picture in my hand I'd have let you walk right past me at the gate."

  "You should see me as a she," Otis adlibbed. "When I do the transgender thing with a blond wig and heels I can glare at everybody, daring them to say something and they all look down afraid to make eye contact."

  The fellow's laugh seemed genuine, not strained. He shook his head, probably trying to get the image out of his head and addressed his underling. "OK, give Mr. 'Dug-gan' his things," he ordered, giving Dugan a sarcastic double pronunciation. The second fellow, who Otis had already decided he'd designate as Loyal Minion, dug in a case and produced two pistols in clip holsters. One was a .22 with a long old fashioned suppressor and the second was a modern silent 9mm, with the special oversized long cartridges that used a binary powder.

  When the bullet was well on its way down the barrel, the cores of the powder grains were uncovered and the chemicals exposed caused an abrupt termination of the propellant burn and a quick drop off in chamber pressure. The stubby can on the barrel end held a silicone rubber bladder and silver wool heat sink which finished off what little of the pressure wave that wasn't suppressed behind the bullet.

  "Whichever pleases you," Minion offered.

  "You can never have too many guns," Otis informed him and took both, tucking them away comfortably like old friends. That didn't raise any objection from the men. He took the time to make sure each had a round up the snout, even shaking a round of the 9mm by his ear, to make sure it was the proper compressed load that went with the late model gun.

  Taking both meant these fellows had one less weapon than whatever they were personally carrying. Handing guns back to them seemed a bad idea. If he got arrested carrying these in California he was dead meat, but at this rate that didn't seem likely to be his biggest worry.

  "IWI," Otis said patting where the 9mm had disappeared. "Very nice," he complimented them on the silent Israeli weapon. "A recent serial number too, so it isn't as temperature sensitive as the early models."

  "Always glad to meet a connoisseur," Pretty Boy quipped. "Here is your deposit slip and account number for the up-front fee. This is a debit card associated with the account." The red card with a gold cross had a taste pad. Once you pulled the Mylar tab and touched the square it could only be swiped thereafter by the person who was imprinted on it.

  "There are no other signatories to the account and I assure you the other half will be deposited within minutes of word you were successful. In the event you are not successful, well, we all assume you won't be concerned about it," he smiled.

  Otis didn't say anything, certainly didn't ask, "Successful at what?" He did give the man his standard new recruit stare just to cover up his own inner turmoil. It had the desired effect. No matter how they tried to be nonchalant, it was written on their faces these two were afraid of him. Or who they thought he was anyway.

  "Really," the man said visibly regretting the word as soon as he said it. "Not that we expect you to fail or we wouldn't be here. I understand it would be foolish to stiff you."

  Otis looked at the printed teller slip. It was dated two days ago at the Bern Branch of Credit Suisse Bank for twenty million EuroMarks. He tried to think of the exchange rate and couldn't. It was - one hell of a lot of USNA dollars.

  "Here is your key card for the Sheraton. Your room is directly across the hall from a room that will be vacant when President Wiggen is making her dedication speech tomorrow morning. It's a clean shot just under two hundred meters to where she will enter at the back of the building. This is a master key card for the entire hotel," he said offering another. "Wiggen's security may scan the building for thermal sources before or during her speech. Everything above the third floor on that side of the Sheraton is supposed to be kept vacant tomorrow."

  "There are counters for that," Otis assured him. So that's it, he thought in wonder. The bastards are going to put Wiggen out of office in two years, but they can't wait for a sure thing and want to kill her now. He was disgusted. She was just another politician and probably a flaming jackass like most of the big shots they guarded turned out to be. But at least she'd had the guts to surrender to Home last year, when the orbital habitat had waged war on them. Certainly she wasn't the mental case the previous President Hadley was rumored to have been.

  "These are vital to leave behind," Pretty Boy said, giving him a transient alien ID card on a neck chain. It was the black sort that indicated a citizen of Home. He had a small zip seal bag with used tissues and other trash. "This is to be emptied in the room waste basket. It has DNA linking to the ID of the Home national, collected back when he was a USNA citizen."

  The spacers weren't using those ID cards anymore. Did these fellows really not know that? He decided not to ask, instead he said: "Will the ID show on the computers when the press hack or bribe their way in and check the name to see if there really is such a file? Somebody will do that, sure as hell."

  "Don't teach Grandma to suck eggs," Pretty Boy chided him. "It's all scanned in as a valid ID, with a long and detailed history."

  That level of computer access convinced Otis the two sitting there were Patriot Party. It was sort of amusing they didn't, couldn't, wear party pins. Wearing a party pin in public today would be suicide. They had recently tried to pull a coup on Wiggen and been handed their butts. But nobody else who would have the assets and nerve to push through such an assassination, or would really benefit from it. Even those opposed to Wiggen were happy she was in office instead of the Patriots by coup.

  This meant they plain didn't give a damn who knew it was them after the fact, which said a great deal about how they intended to rule. The realization of what danger he was in swept over him like a wave and he was shocked to find he enjoyed the adrenaline jolt. He hadn't felt this alert and alive since he was in the Trans-Arabic Protectorate, being shot at. The feral grin that came to his face at the adrenaline rush didn't have to be faked and made his welcoming committee uncomfortable.

  "Everything you requested is in the rear of the Dunestar. My driver will drop us off at a different parking deck and you can proceed with the Dunestar to the Sheraton. Here is a map, the key card works for the parking entry too. I'm sure you have resources, but here's five thousand in used bills. Consider it a tip so if you have need of any small items today you don't have to risk using any cards, just a little extra protection for both of us."

  Otis knew military personnel from all over before his recent retirement and despite the government's efforts to cover up, it was painfully obvious a lot of his friends could not be contacted any more. With one of them serving on a carrier, that likely meant about four thousand of his fellow crewmen were missing with him. Entire bases he used to receive supplies from and route traffic through, were just missing from address lists now. He was frustrated that it was too risky to inquire of their families, even where he knew them, because they could lose survivor benefits if they disclosed what they knew about their missing relatives.

  The United States of North America had gotten its butt royally kicked and these Patriot Party creeps were in denial about it. They were covering up the full extent of the damage, but anyone in the service knew too much to piece together to be fooled. The new party's intention was to take the USNA back to war with Home as soon as they could and get even more of Otis' buddies killed. Otis somehow found that a bad idea.

  "That should be sufficient," Otis agreed. "Please don't try to have me watched. If I suspect someone of being a tail I will kill them without hesitation," he warned.

  "That's not my job," Pretty Boy shrugged. "I won't be contacting anybody who would gi
ve a shit until after this is all over. If you see anybody, what the hell, whack 'em. If they are that easy to make I doubt anybody would miss their services."

  Otis made up his mind right then he was going to screw these guys. Not just turn them in and help the government run them down, but take their money and humiliate them. They were the worst sort of every creep he'd ever seen playing hard core like a game and indifferent to those under them who they regarded as just stage props - spear carriers. With the kind of money he was getting he could emigrate off Earth and not worry about having a job lined up. With that kind of funding he could even start his own firm easily.

  "Nice doing business with you gentleman," Otis said as they pulled in a parking deck and stopped. "Now go away," he snarled.

  Chapter 5

  "The two lieutenants and the two security guys who defected from New Las Vegas appear to be very compatible and are talking about opening a private security company," April informed her friends. "I was glad, because I felt responsible for setting up the situation that made the station security guys flee from NLV." She needed to talk less and finish her breakfast.

  Heather and Jeff exchanged a glance, but didn't say anything. April felt responsible for everything and had a definite rescue complex. It wasn't her fault how President Hadley had treated his people, or mistreated them. "How about that vacuum rat, who turned the Happy Lewis free from the dock grapples on ISSII back when the war started?" Heather asked. "Did he settle in and get a job here?"

  "Well, Eddie gave him a big enough reward for saving our butts that he could have started some sort of business of his own, but he doesn't have that mindset. Dave found him a position with one of those former workers of his that splintered off and started their own shop. I've seen him three or four times and he seems happy. He's a real solid sort," April asserted.

  "We seem to be accumulating a lot of refugees," Heather observed.

  "I think that is all for the good," Jeff said without hesitation. "We always had fairly good screening to keep the mentally unstable and the criminal from coming up. The sort that are leaving Earth now are self selecting for decisiveness and obviously for awareness that things are steadily getting less desirable down there and we have something better to offer them here."

  "If only we can keep it," Heather said worried. "I hold my breath waiting for some junior fascist to tell the Assembly we have to license every sort of activity and start making lots and lots of laws, for our own protection of course."

  "Don't worry too soon," April advised her. "We have the right to challenge and duel and my Granddad, Jon, Gunny and Eddie, have all talked and recruited others. There is a very unofficial group, party if you will, that doesn't have a name and doesn't want to even officially exist," she explained. Jeff and Heather looked at each other, intensely interested now, because the three had formed just such a secret pact before the war. "Don't slip and give them away, but if anyone stands up and tries to bury us under a new flood of government control, they will either end up on the next shuttle to the mudball, or have to stand to the fire of a half dozen of Home's fastest, most accurate pistoleros."

  That got a slow satisfied smile from both of them.

  Chapter 6

  They left Otis alone in the Dunestar in one of the upper levels of the parking deck, which was almost empty. His newly met companions all exited to the glass elevator enclosure and caught the lift without looking back. Otis took the driver's seat, started the Dunestar and drove back down two levels to where most of the spaces were filled and there were people walking about. Parking off in the corner of a nearly empty level was a stupid way to stand out and make people wonder what you are up to.

  Otis looked for security cameras and parked well away, backing in since there was no sign prohibiting it and several other vehicles were aligned that way. First he walked around back and lifted the hatch, confirming what sort of equipment they had left for him. Then he pulled his cell phone and called Keith anderson, the head of Safety Associates in Southern California. The man didn't expect to see him until the signing this afternoon and he'd undoubtedly be interrupting his work, but he needed some help right away.

  "Keith? Otis here. Yeah, I got in OK and I'm set for the signing later. I ran into some complications and I need a hand right now. This isn't any kind of bizarre test or anything. I do need you, or somebody, who can scan a vehicle for tracking devices and dispose of it for me. Also I need a ride away from here and have some things to haul and I'll need a vehicle until later this evening. By 'dispose' I mean take it to some bad assed nasty neighborhood and park it on the street with the keys hanging in the ignition. I'd try not to park it in front of any security cameras. Or if somebody knows a chop shop sell it to them, not too eagerly though, get the best price you can to avoid suspicion. Yeah, that's good."

  "I'm in a grey Jeep Dunestar at the Century Medical building on Sepulveda, on parking deck level 'D'," he looked and gave him the license. "And Keith, do you have anybody with the shop who shoots a .416 caliber Tac-Tech Barrett? Great. Would you have him loan you a round of ammo and a bullet puller? Well stop and buy one if he doesn't load his own. I also need a set of golf clubs in a bag, a big one, with a cart. I don't care what kind, just not antiques. They can be any length, used cheapies are fine, but wipe them for prints and spray them down to inhibit DNA testing."

  "Oh! Run a couple names for me too, passive search only, not a directed inquiry, see if the Feebs or Interpol has anything out on a Polzinsky, white male, European features, unaccented American English, shy of two meters, eighty kilos, pushing forty, moustache, no beard, graying at the temples. - I don't know, assassinations, gun running, war crimes, that sort of thing. -Yeah, no shit. and a Home national," he said, reading the data off the black card. The picture on the card was horrid. He described it as best he could, but every quality of the man was a non-descript medium.

  ONI knew somebody was meeting Mr. Polzinsky, if that was his name. Could be they knew his real name. No way did he intend to remain associated with this Dunestar. If the Navy didn't have a tracker on it the creeps who gave it to him probably did. Crap, could be both of them following it around on a map. The very thought gave him the shivers. He decided to take a walk until his people got here. There was no point in standing beside such a trouble magnet.

  Otis found a coffee kiosk in the lobby of the medical building. He got a latte with a hefty top of whipped cream and grabbed a handful of napkins for the inevitable mess. He tipped the fellow exactly twenty percent, not enough to remember him as cheap or generous. He walked around outside, taking a different route back to the Dunestar and saw Keith drive in past him as he walked up the ramp.

  He was pleased to see his man backed in on the far side, away from the distant security camera. They both went to the rear and opened their vehicles. Otis opened the big case on the floor and Keith looking over his shoulder let out a long whistle. The long barreled .416 Barrett was the military model, not the civilian version. It had the long tension sleeve barrel and a computerized Nightforce scope, with integral laser range finder and Doppler wind correction. The lumps of self adjusting servo motors projected from it instead of manual adjustment knobs. The compartmented case included trigger and barrel tools, cleaning necessities and two ten round magazines loaded with Hornady match ammo.

  There was a window breaching charge, that could be wired to the gun's electronic ignition. It would open a hole a few milliseconds ahead of the gun firing so there was no danger of deflection off the glass. The whole rig was way serious overkill for a two hundred meter shot. To the point where Otis doubted the pro had specifically requested this gun. A cheap hunting rifle would have been plenty and less likely to be tracked. In other circumstances he'd have been tempted to substitute a lesser gun and keep this for himself. It was a lovely piece of equipment. However, given what a serious crime the weapon was associated with and its unknown provenance, it was much too dangerous to keep.

  It was way too much gun, unless, he reflected tho
ughtfully, the gunman didn't intend to use the hotel room they provided at all, but planned to shoot from a more distant point of his choosing. Something he'd keep in mind. There might be other reservations or shooting sites, that the police could find and other people involved in setting those up, who Pretty Boy wouldn't have known about. He mustn't assume everything was as presented.

  Otis moved the gun and several other items to Keith's minivan. Otis could read the alarm in his eyes to have the illegal gun in his vehicle. Several sworn officers that worked for Keith shot the .416 or .50 caliber Barrett for their agencies or the Guard, not California cops, but Federal. Barrett didn't sell to California, so the state hated them and pointedly didn't issue private security permits for the big rifle. Possession broke so many laws in California, a grand jury would be a week making a list. Otis was his boss and he trusted him, so he didn't object - yet. Otis was pretty sure he was near Keith's limits though. He had the bullet puller, the requested round and a man in street clothing who must be his disposal driver.

  "I have Phil rounding up the golf bag," Keith assured him. "He's supposed to buy one at a used sports equipment store and park a couple blocks over on a residential street waiting for one of us. We can meet him there or call him in on the phone. You know, Wiggen is coming into town tomorrow. That's a hell of a bad time to be riding around with this in the van."

  "Wherever he parks is just fine," Otis said. "The sooner we're out of here the better." He pulled the bullet, poured the powder on a coffee napkin and pinched just a couple grains between his fingers to drop back in the neck of the brass cartridge. He replaced the bullet, tapping it home with the back side of the puller and chambered the round. "This will be a lot less of a problem in just a minute," he assured Keith.