24 Declassified: 10 - Head Shot

by David S. Jacobs

  He rounded the curve. A scenic lookout area bordered the road’s eastern shoulder where a knob of rock jutted out from the cliffside, leaving enough space for a gravel parking area and a grassy patch studded by a boulder faced with a metal plaque tourist guide.

  A pickup truck sat in the parking area facing north, its lights dark. The Mercedes zipped by it. A pair of headlights flashed their sudden bright, dazzling glare in the rear window.

  The pickup truck zoomed out of the parking area and into the northbound lane with its high beams on. It was a big machine and the sound of its engine was loud as it took off after Jack in a hurry.

  It ate up the distance between itself and Jack’s car, quickly closing the gap. It had a high suspension and its headlights were correspondingly raised so that they seemed to shine directly into the Mercedes, flooding its interior with white-hot glare.

  The road hit a series of curves, forcing Jack to slow still further. The pickup was only a length or two behind him. The Mercedes handled beautifully but the pickup’s greater weight compensated for its height and Jack couldn’t shake it.

  The curves were long, lazy, and looping but the pace was frantic. The pickup truck bumped the back of Jack’s car, jostling it. Jack had to fight to keep from losing control of the wheel as the right side tires slid on the shoulder but managed to whip the Mercedes back on to the pavement.

  The pickup’s front was bolstered by a piece of solid steel plate that covered it from bumper to hood. Holes were cut in the plate to allow the headlights to shine through.

  The pickup lunged forward, slamming the Mercedes again, delivering a bone- jostling thump to Jack. His belly knotted at the thought that another such blow might trip the car’s air bag safety device, a development that could prove fatal in this lethal game of high-speed bumper cars.

  Trouble was that the pickup was doing all of the bumping and the Mercedes all of the catching. Jack could do nothing but thread the curves, riding both lanes and hoping no oncoming vehicle lay around each blind corner.

  Another hit destabilized the car, causing it to weave crazily and slide sideways toward the guardrail and the abyss. The Mercedes fishtailed as it took the curve but it took it, tires digging in and biting deep into the pavement.

  The pickup nudged the car, snugging its steel plated front against the vehicle’s rear at a tilted angle. The truck lunged with a snarl of power and shoved the Mercedes sideways.

  The car would have been swept off the cliff if the tilt were angled outward. But the tilt was angled inward, causing the car to slide sideways toward the rock wall on its left.

  The rocks loomed up in the driver’s side window, their craggy surfaces harshly lit by the intense glare of the pickup’s high beams. The car rushed sideways to meet them. There was the crump of collapsing metal and an explosion of shattered glass as the Mercedes plowed into the mountainside under the pickup truck’s impetus.

  A stunning impact followed, setting off a massive fireworks display inside Jack’s head.

  Then, blackness.

  THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 8 P.M. AND 9 P.M. MOUNTAIN DAYLIGHT TIME

  Mountain Lake, Colorado

  Jack Bauer’s awareness flickered, sputtering like a TV set with a loose connection. Bursts of sound and vision alternated with patches of darkness.

  Rough handling jarred him into wakefulness, restoring his sense of self. He could think but not move. His seat belt harness was open and he was being hauled out from behind the air bag, which had mushroomed out of the top of the steering column to fill the driver’s side with a big white balloon. He was dragged across the passenger seat out the open door and dropped to the ground.

  The fall jolted Jack into opening his eyes. He was bathed in white light streaked by red and blue flashes. He couldn’t see their source. He lay on his side on the shoulder of the road. His field of vision encompassed two pairs of legs and feet. Both sets of feet wore cowboy boots under loose-fitting trousers. One pair had sharp-pointed toes and fancy hand-tooled leatherwork, the other was squared off at the toes and unornamented.

  A square-toed boot stepped on his upright shoulder and shoved him on his back, setting off fresh fireworks in Jack’s head. A body wash of aching soreness kept him from blacking out.

  The boot’s owner straddled him and bent down. It was Taggart. He pulled Jack’s gun from the shoulder holster, said, “You won’t need this.” He straightened up and stepped away, tucking the gun into the top of his waistband. “Maybe I’ll keep it for a souvenir.”

  He stood on one side of Jack. Hardin, the owner of the fancy boots, stood at the other. A third figure stood at Jack’s feet. The stranger was a grotesque, short, skinny, and bowlegged. He had a bony, close-cropped scalp and wore round wire-rimmed glasses that made his orbs look like those of a popeyed frog. He wore a thin vest, a dark T-shirt decorated with an elaborate skull emblem, and skintight jeans tucked into oversized combat boots with steel toes and three-inch soles.

  Red and blue lights flashed on the trio, splashing them with weird highlights and color accents. The stranger gave a start, said, “Here comes a car!”

  Hardin said, “What of it? We’re supposed to be here, we’re cops. Wave ’em on, Cole.”

  “Right.” Taggart walked away out of Jack’s vision, his footsteps sounding on hard pavement. A car approached, its headlight beams sweeping across the scene. Its engine noise was loud as it slowed to a crawl and drew abreast; the noise lessened as the car passed and drove away. Hardin said, “That’s all there is to it, Mr. Pettibone. You’re nervous in the service.”

  Pettibone, the third man, was restless, fidgeting. One of his legs shook, vibrating to an invisible rhythm. He said, “I ain’t got all night. You, neither.” His nasal voice had a Western twang with a bite as sharp as a crosscut saw. He said, “The Rebel wants things done quick!”

  Hardin’s expression turned ugly. “I don’t take orders from Weld.” Pettibone fired back, “You both take orders from the same fellow— “

  “Yeah, and you ain’t him, so no more of your lip.”

  Taggart rejoined them. “What’s the problem?”

  Hardin said, “Pettibone’s got ants in his pants, that’s all. He’s scared of Weld.” Pettibone said, “Never mind about that! You do your job and I’ll do mine.”

  Taggart stood beside Hardin. “We’re doing it.”

  Pettibone said, “Take him to the station.” By “him” he meant Jack Bauer. “I’ll get rid of the car and be by directly to pick him up and take him to Winnetou.” Taggart said, “Sure you can handle that car by yourself?”

  Pettibone said, “Hell, yeah! I got me a set of chains and binders in the back of the truck. I’ll hook one end up to the car’s rear axle, drag it to the other side of the road, and push it off the cliff. I know what I’m doing, I used to be in the wrecking business.”

  Taggart laughed. “Used to be, he says.”

  Hardin cautioned, “No fires. We don’t want to call attention to this one for a while.”

  Pettibone shook his head. “Ain’t gonna be no fires. The engine’s off so there won’t be no spark to touch off any spilled gas.”

  Hardin said, “Get to it, then. We got things to do, too.” He turned to Taggart. “You take Bauer’s arms and I’ll take his feet so we can carry him to the car.”

  Taggart said, “You would leave me the hardest part of the work.”

  “Rank has its privileges,” Hardin said, chuckling. He stood at Jack’s feet while Taggart stood at his head. Taggart hunkered down, getting his hands under Jack’s arms and clasping them on top of Jack’s chest. Hardin grabbed Jack’s feet by the ankles, holding them together and getting them under one arm. The lawmen straightened up, lifting Jack off the ground. He choked back a groan as the movement sent new pain waves shivering through him.

  The scene came into view from a different perspective. The battered Mercedes slumped against a rocky mountainside. The pickup stood near it, facing north on the shoulder to the west o
f the road. The MRT car stood a dozen feet away, facing south in the southbound lane and blocking it. Red and blue lights flashed in the rooftop light rack.

  Hardin and Taggart hauled Jack to their car. Hardin said, “Hold him up—I’ll get the door.” He was breathing hard, huffing and puffing. He set Jack’s feet down on the pavement. Taggart stood crouched holding up Jack’s upper body while Jack’s legs rested on the macadam. Hardin opened the vehicle’s rear door and helped Taggart heave Jack across the backseat. Pettibone called, “Remember, Reb wants him alive and able to talk.”

  Taggart said, “We’ll treat him like an egg wrapped in cotton.” Hardin didn’t say anything, he was still trying to catch his breath. Taggart slammed the rear door shut. It was a patrol car so there were no handles on the inside back doors, and a wire cage separated the front seat from the back.

  Taggart got behind the wheel and Hardin got in the front passenger seat. Hardin wheezed, “Man! I got to get in shape some of these days.”

  Taggart said, “You’re in shape, you’ve been exercising those table muscles.”

  Hardin told the other what he could do to himself. Taggart laughed, made a K-turn into the opposite lane, pointed the vehicle north, and drove away.

  Hardin said, “No emergency lights. We don’t need them.” Taggart switched them off, said, “Like I told the man, it’s a dangerous road.”

  Hardin said, “For some folks, yeah.”

  A few cars passed them going in the opposite direction on the way to the Mountain Lake substation. The drive took less than ten minutes, each precious second giving Jack Bauer more time to collect his wits and gather what stores of energy remained to him. He could move now even though it hurt to do so. Every heartbeat was like a giant fist squeezing him, wringing him out like a wet washrag. His head pounded and he felt sick to his stomach.

  The MRT car turned right into the drive leading to the substation. Hardin said, “Pull into the motor pool so we don’t have to carry him so far.”

  The motor pool was a two-car garage attached to the substation. Its rollup door was open and its overhead lights burned bright. The car rolled to a halt inside one of the bays. A pair of chopped, heavy-duty Harley-Davidson motorcycles with extended front forks occupied the other bay.

  Taggart switched off the headlights and engine. He and Hardin got out and went to one of the rear doors. Hardin opened it. Jack lay sprawled on his side across the backseat, legs bent at the knees. Hardin used the pointy toe of one of his boots to kick the sole of Jack’s shoe. He said, “Get up.”

  He stepped back, unfastening the flap at the top of his sidearm so he could get at it more quickly. His hand rested on the wood-handled gun butt of the big .44. “Weld wants you alive but he didn’t say nothing about putting a bullet through your kneecap and that’s what I surely will do if you try any of your fancy tricks. Do you read me, mister?”

  Jack said, “Yes.”

  “On your feet then.”

  Jack swung his legs, sitting up and putting his feet on the garage floor. Colored dots of light showered over him, dimming his vision. He clutched the rim of the open door with both hands to keep from falling. The dizziness passed, the scene brightening as the stream of colored dots thinned and receded.

  Jack pulled himself out of the car and stood up. He lurched and staggered, putting out a hand on the rear fender to steady himself.

  Taggart said, “You look a mite unsteady, Jack. Let me give you a hand.” He gripped Jack’s arm above the left elbow.

  A closed door stood on the left side of the garage’s rear wall. Hardin backed up to it, hand resting on his gun butt, steadily eyeing Jack. He reached around behind him with his free hand, grabbing the doorknob and turning it, opening the door. The door opened outward and he had to step forward out of its way to open it fully. He backed through the doorway into the station, watching Jack all the while.

  Taggart said, “Here we go,” the pressure of his hand on Jack’s arm urging him forward. Jack advanced with slow shuffling steps, making out that he was weaker than he was in hopes of misleading the others about his condition. He made a point of staring straight ahead, not even glancing at Taggart’s sidearm holstered on the right hip or his own gun stuck into the top of Taggart’s waistband on the left side.

  Taggart said with great good humor, “Bet you’d like to get your hands on one of these heaters, eh, Jack?”

  Hardin said, “Try it. Just try.”

  Jack didn’t try for it. He went through the doorway into the main room of the substation. Sharon Stallings sat behind the dispatcher’s front desk drinking coffee. Miller Fisk was on the other side of the space, sitting with his feet up on the squad room desk and reading a hunting magazine.

  The two bikers, Griff and Rowdy, were both penned in the same single detention cell. Three steel-barred cage walls met a building wall of solid concrete blocks painted pale green like the rest of the building’s interior. A metal plank bunk covered by a thin fabric pallet jutted out from the stone wall. The big biker, Rowdy, sat on the bunk with his head tilted back. The smaller one, Griff, stood leaning against the front wall of the cell. Their faces were bruised, cut, and swollen from a recent beating.

  Fisk looked over the top of the magazine, eyes widening as saw Jack in the custody of Hardin and Taggart. His lips puckered in a soundless whistle. “Well, looky here! So you got him!”

  Taggart said, “Yeah, we picked him up for reckless driving.”

  Hardin said, “Get your feet off that desk, Fisk. You’re not back home in the barn now.”

  Fisk put his feet on the floor fast and stood up. “Sorry, Uncle Bryce—”

  “That’s Lieutenant Hardin to you and don’t you forget it!”

  “Yessir!” Fisk fastened his eyes on Jack, staring at him with abject fascination. His eyes got a glazed look in them. He licked his lips. “Yes, sir!”

  Taggart guided Jack across the room to the squad room desk. He said, “You don’t look so good, amigo. You better sit down.” He indicated the chair that Fisk had just quit, an office chair with four roller-mounted legs. Jack sat down in it. Hardin circled around to the other side of the desk so he’d have a clear line of fire if Jack tried something. His hand was still on his gun.

  Taggart took out a pair of cuffs from a leather case clipped to his belt. “Gun hand first.” He circled Jack’s right wrist with one of the cuffs and clamped the other one to the chair arm on that side. “Now the other. Let me have your cuffs, Fisk.”

  Fisk was quick to comply, his eyes glimmering and his face shining. Taggart repeated the process, this time cuffing Jack’s left hand to the chair’s left arm. He said, “Jack’s trouble with either hand. Ain’t that right, Fisk?”

  Fisk colored. “Never you mind about that!”

  Hardin took his hand off his gun. Taggart grinned, stepped back. “There you go, Jack. Now you don’t have to worry about falling out of your chair.”

  Jack said sourly, “That’s right neighborly of you, pardner.”

  Taggart laughed out loud. “That’s the spirit. Keep your chin up. You know, believe it or not, I kind of like you, Jack. That’s the hell of it.”

  Fisk said, “Well, I don’t!”

  Taggart rested a hip on the edge of the desk. “Tell me something, Jack, just to satisfy my own curiosity. How’d you get on to us?”

  Jack looked steadily at him. “The ATF men, Dean and O’Hara. They were pros. They weren’t drugged. I couldn’t see the cultists sneaking up on them and catching them unawares. But the MRT, fellow cops they knew and thought could be trusted, you could have walked right up and gotten the drop on them. They didn’t know the truth until it was too late.”

  “That’s not bad figuring.”

  “After that it was just a matter of the way things went down. You people were always in the right place at the right time to do some damage. When I found out that your outfit reported the Oliver crash first, it all added up.”

  “Too bad you didn’t know that we had a crash all p
lanned and ready for you.”

  “Yeah, too bad. I didn’t think the whole unit was dirty, either.”

  “For what we’re getting paid, we can’t afford not to be.”

  Hardin said, “That’s enough, Cole. You’re talking too much.”

  “Why? What difference does it make?”

  Jack said, “Dead men tell no tales, eh?”

  Taggart nodded. “Not this side of the grave.”

  Hardin made a dismissive gesture and crossed to the front desk. “Any messages for me, Sharon?”

  “Yes, sir. Sheriff Mack called to remind you about that confab over to Sky Mount tonight.”

  “Damn! I most forgot about that.” Hardin glanced at his watch. “Still got time to make it. Let’s go, Cole, we got to saddle up. We got that meeting with the county boys to map out security arrangements for tomorrow’s Round Table.”

  Taggart’s laugh was a short, humorless bark. “That’s a good one.”

  “We don’t show, some folks might get the crazy idea that we thought there wouldn’t be a session tomorrow.”

  “I see what you mean. Can’t have that.”

  Hardin spoke to the dispatcher, “Sharon, you’re in charge here while Cole and I are gone.” He turned to Fisk. “You hear that, boy? Trooper Stallings is in charge, and if she gives you an order it’s the same as if I did, so you hop to it and do like she says, savvy?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Mr. Pettibone will be by to pick up that one,” Hardin said, indicating Jack. “Don’t take any chances, Sharon. Make sure his hands are cuffed behind his back when you make the transfer. I want you to supervise it personally, you hear?”

  “You can count on me, Bryce.”

  “He’s got to be able to talk and he can’t be too busted up. You listening, Fisk?”

  “Yes, sir. Uh, sir? How much is too much?”

  “He can’t look like he’s been beaten half to death