24 Declassified: 10 - Head Shot

by David S. Jacobs

  “I told you, I’m a secret agent.”

  “Bullshit—”

  “I’m also your key to Reb Weld.”

  That got them. Saying the name was like invoking the magic word. Griff and Rowdy stopped dead in their tracks, exchanging poker-faced glances. The mood in the air was delicate, hanging by a thread. Their hunting instinct was on full alert and one wrong word, one misstep could trigger a mutually slaughterous gun-down.

  Griff said, too casual, “I don’t believe I caught that name.”

  Jack said, “Now who’s bullshitting? Reb Weld. A name I’m not likely to forget because he’s tried to kill me several times today. I’ve got a feeling it means something special to you, too. You boys better stick close and make sure nothing happens to me because I’m your one way of finding the Rebel and cashing in on that fifty-thousand- dollar bounty on his head.”

  Griff and Rowdy stood there poised on the razor’s edge not knowing which way to jump, torn between greed and suspicion. Jack worked on their greed. “I’ll give you the short version. You may have heard that there’s a millionaires’ convention being held not far from here.”

  Rowdy said, “Yeah, we heard of it. Impossible not to with all the cops it draws; they’ve really been cramping our style.”

  “Reb’s being paid to wreck the party. My job is to stop him. You want him, too. He betrayed your outfit and sold out his club brothers so he could skip with the proceeds on their gunrunning racket.”

  Griff got huffy. “That’s not a job to us—it’s a sacred trust.”

  Jack said, “Yeah, with a fifty-thousand- dollar payday. We both want Reb Weld chopped for different reasons. I know how to find him. What’s more, I can square this cop-killing beef so that you’ll never catch any heat for it.”

  “You talk big.”

  “I can deliver. We’re all in on this double kill together. You know there’s not an undercover cop in the U.S. that could tie into that kind of action and ever testify about it in court.”

  Rowdy said, “That’s right, Griff—”

  “Shut up and let me think. Who the hell are you, dude?”

  Jack said, “I could show you a card that identifies me as a member of the Counter Terrorist Unit but anybody can get a fake ID. You’ve seen me in action, I’ve seen you in action. I’m not asking you to take it on faith. If I can’t deliver Weld, there’s two of you and one of me. You’re not afraid, are you?” Griff tsk-tsked. “That’s low, Jack. No need to get insulting.”

  Rowdy said piously, “The ’Benders fear no man!”

  Jack said, “That’s what I’m counting on. We can talk about the deal while we’re cracking into the armory. We’re going to need some heavy firepower quick and time’s running out.”

  Pettibone wouldn’t talk. He was the stubborn type. Also maybe a little bit stupid because there was no mistaking that Jack Bauer and his two biker allies meant business.

  Jack said, “The trouble is he’s more afraid of Weld than he is of us.”

  Griff said, “I’ll fix that.”

  “Remember he’s our prime lead to finding the Rebel. We need him alive and talking.”

  “He’ll live—unless he’s got a bum ticker.” Rowdy said, “He’s a speed freak. If he gets off

  on meth there’s nothing wrong with his heart. That shit’s a rocket ride.”

  Griff said, “You should know, bro.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  The object of their attention sat tied to a straight-backed wooden chair. Jack had decided to use a wooden one instead of a roller-mounted office chair for the simple reason that wood doesn’t conduct electricity.

  He was not unaware of the ironies present in the reversal of fortune that had seen him transformed in less than an hour from the subject of torture to the inflictor. This turnabout troubled him not at all, considering that it was Pettibone who’d delivered him to the tender mercies of the MRT. There was no way around the hard fact that Pettibone had to be made to talk, to spill his guts about the plot against Sky Mount. Hundreds of innocent lives and perhaps the fate of a great nation depended on it.

  Pettibone had walked unaware into the lion’s den less than fifteen minutes earlier. He’d arrived at the Mountain Lake substation to pick up Jack for delivery to Reb Weld. He parked the pickup truck with the steel-plated front behind the back of the building where it couldn’t be seen from the road. He went through the garage door into the substation, his knowledge of the site suggesting that this was a familiar routine with him. Jack wondered how many others Hardin and his crew had handed over to Pettibone for a one-way ride.

  Pettibone stepped through the door only to discover the muzzle of Jack’s pistol being pressed against his skull. He froze except for his eyes, which looked like they were going to pop out of the sockets. His thick- lensed glasses magnified his already bulging orbs as they took in the dead bodies of Fisk and Stallings.

  Jack said, “That’s right, Mountain Lake is under new management.”

  A quick search relieved the captive of a gun, switchblade knife, several sets of keys, a wallet, a packet wrapped in tin foil, and some pocket litter. The wallet yielded a state driver’s license issued to one Arthur Conley Pettibone. Jack couldn’t tell if the license or the bearer’s name or both were phony but it didn’t matter now that he had possession of the man himself. The tin foil packet contained several grams of a grainy white powdery substance. Rowdy put some on his forefinger and tasted it. “Crystal meth,” he said. “Pretty good shit, too.”

  Jack folded up the packet and pocketed it. Rowdy said, “Hey!—” Jack said, “I need you with a clear head and a steady hand for the next couple of hours.” Rowdy started to do a slow burn. “You’re taking a lot on yourself, dude.”

  Griff clapped him on the shoulder. “Forget it, man. Jack’s right. You don’t know what that shit’s cut with or what it might do to you. Besides, you don’t want him thinking that you’re one of those shooters who gets his nerve from a noseful of crank.”

  Rowdy decided to let it go. “I better not catch you tweaking any, Jack.”

  “No worry about that.”

  Griff said, “You know, Jack, I think I’m starting to believe your story after all.”

  Jack didn’t know how much the bikers believed of what he’d told them, which was nothing but the truth: that he was a counterterrorist agent on a mission to stop a plot spearheaded by Reb Weld. They did believe he could help them get Weld, and that was enough for now. That and the fact that he wasn’t a cop. Griff and Rowdy hated cops, as they declared at some length and with feeling. Jack actually had been a cop, a member of the LAPD SWAT team, but he saw no reason for burdening the bikers with unnecessary details that might derail the start of a potentially productive alliance.

  That’s how it is in the field, you work with what’s at hand. Griff and Rowdy were choirboys compared to some of the warlords and cutthroats that Jack Bauer had been forced to make use of in the devious and treacherous half world of the long war against global terrorism.

  Jack said, “Talk fast, Pettibone. Who is Winnetou? Where’s Reb Weld? What’s the plot against the Round Table?”

  Pettibone had recovered from his initial fright. His jawline and chin took on a belligerent set. He said, “I ain’t gonna say a goddamned thing and that’s the last you’re gonna get out of me.”

  “At least you have the sense not to deny anything. Stay sensible and save yourself a lot of grief.”

  Pettibone was silent, not even bothering to shake his head. He refused to listen to reason and the clock was running out. Harsh measures were called for. A preliminary roughing up and slapping around failed to make him see the light. More extreme inflictions left him gasping and groaning with pain but unwilling to unburden himself of the relevant facts.

  A nasty bit of business forced from him a choking half sob. “Reb’ll kill me if I talk!”

  That irked Griff. “Listen up, dipshit. Reb’s on the run from me and my bro here. You’re scared of him
? He’s scared of us. You’re gonna find out why.”

  Now Pettibone found himself tied to a chair in the garage. His eyes looked like shelled oysters, his glasses had been taken from him earlier at the start of the session.

  Fisk’s patrol car was parked in the substation parking lot. Rowdy started it up, drove it into the garage, and switched it off. He popped open the hood and got back behind the wheel.

  Griff held a pair of battery jumper cables that he’d found in the garage and busied himself under the hood. The jumper cables had spring- hinged, rubber-handled copper pincers at each end. He attached a pair to the twin terminals on the car battery.

  He crossed to Pettibone and stood facing him, holding the latter’s switchblade. He thumbed the handle stud and the blade came snicking out. It was a long, thin, sharp stiletto. Griff smiled evilly and moved closer to the man tied to the chair. Pettibone’s hands were tied with rope behind the back of the chair. He sat rigid, trembling, staring off into the distance.

  Griff cut off Pettibone’s vest and T-shirt, leaving him bare from the waist up. Pettibone’s flesh, rank and unwashed, was the dead-white of creatures that spend their lives in dark caves away from the sun. He was skinny with a prominent collarbone and his rib cage showing so clearly that each separate rib could be counted.

  Griff taunted, “What’d you think, I was gonna cut you?” He pressed the handle stud and the blade retracted. He pocketed the weapon. “Maybe later.”

  He picked up a galvanized metal mop bucket that he’d filled with water and dashed its contents on Pettibone, soaking him above the waist. He grabbed up one of the jumper cables, squeezing the rubber-handled grip. The inside of its saw-toothed jaws were sharp and pointy, the better to clamp down on battery terminals.

  Griff said, “We’re gonna give your tongue a jump start to set it a-wagging.” He fastened the clamp to Pettibone’s chest at the right nipple. Pettibone whinnied like a horse breaking a leg. Griff waited until the shrieks died down and said, “Hurts, huh? You wanna talk?”

  Pettibone shook his head no. Griff fastened the other jumper cable to Pettibone’s chest over his left nipple. Pettibone howled, squirming against the ropes, drumming his booted feet on the garage floor.

  Griff surveyed his handiwork with evident satisfaction. “Still won’t talk? No? What a dumbass.” He shook his head in disbelief. “You called the tune.”

  He upended the metal mop bucket and placed it over Pettibone’s head. Rowdy sat in the driver’s seat of the patrol car, resting his elbow on the top of the door and sticking his head out of the window, grinning.

  Griff said, “Start ’er up!”

  Rowdy switched on the ignition and started the car. The engine noise was loud inside the garage. Live current from the vehicle’s nine-volt battery streamed through the jumper cables into Pettibone, the conductivity aided by the water that had doused him.

  Pettibone looked like a white marble statue that had gone too long without a cleaning. His back was arched, his flesh rigid. Every muscle, tendon, and sinew stood out in bold relief. He spasmed like an epileptic throwing a fit, his head rattling against the inside of the metal bucket.

  Rowdy gunned the motor, sending blue-gray clouds pouring from the exhaust pipe and out the open garage door. Griff studied the face of Jack Bauer, monitoring his reaction. Jack’s expression was blandly neutral. He wondered what Griff expected him to do, flinch? He returned the biker’s survey with a pleasant smile.

  Thirty long seconds passed before Griff made a throat-cutting gesture, signaling Rowdy to switch off the engine. Silence fell like a concrete tomb lid.

  Pettibone slumped, sagging against the ropes. He panted for breath between the muffled sobs that came from beneath the bucket. Griff waited a minute until the worst of it had passed before he knocked on the bucket and said, “Ready to start singing yet?”

  Pettibone was still holding out. Griff said, “Hit it, Rowdy!”

  Rowdy started the car again. Pettibone convulsed as the electricity zapped him, reacting so violently that the bucket was thrown clear from his head to hit the garage ceiling. Griff said, “Wow!”

  The shocking ran longer the second time than the first. Griff gave the cutoff signal and Rowdy killed the engine.

  Pettibone took longer to recover the second time, too. He shivered, shuddered, sobbed, and shook. He wept and drooled. Griff cupped the other’s chin and tilted his head back so he could look him in the face. He said, “How about it?”

  Pettibone’s gurgled response was hard to make out. Rowdy frowned, said, “What’s he saying?”

  Jack interpreted. “The same old song: Reb’ll kill him if he talks.” Griff looked up at Jack. Jack raised his eyebrows as if to say, Is that all you’ve got?

  Griff was really steamed. He told Pettibone, “I’m through playing with you.” He unbuckled Pettibone’s belt and started opening his pants.

  Pettibone vented a fresh round of howls but this time he’d changed his tune. “I’ll talk, I’ll talk!” He did.

  THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 10 P.M. AND 11 P.M. MOUNTAIN DAYLIGHT TIME

  Rimrock Road, Colorado

  A patrol car bearing the emblem of the state police Mobile Response Team drove south on Rimrock Road. Hardin and Taggart were in it, Taggart driving. Taggart said, “That meeting ran long. I thought it would never end.”

  Hardin nodded. “Nothing Sheriff Mack likes better than the sound of his own voice.”

  “ ’Cept for maybe stuffing his fat face. Too bad that ol’ tub of guts won’t be at Sky Mount tonight.”

  Hardin was philosophical. “You can’t have everything. Look at the bright side: by tomorrow Mack’ll be out on his ass, looking for a new line of work.”

  Taggart chuckled appreciatively. “I reckon a lot of police bigs’ll be finding themselves in that position come sunup.”

  “But not us, Cole.”

  “No, sir.”

  “We’re clean as a hound’s tooth.”

  The moon was high, almost directly overhead, a three- quarter bone- white orb that seemed far distant from the mountain landscape. Moonlight reflected off the strand of empty road beyond the reach of the car’s headlights; rocky crags and needlelike pinnacles were silhouetted against a purple- black sky speckled with remote points of light that were stars.

  Hardin worked the hand mic, radioing the Mountain Lake dispatcher’s desk. The only reply was silence. Hardin replaced the mic in its dashboard bracket and settled heavily back in his seat. “Still no answer.”

  Taggart said, “That don’t mean nothing. They might be away from the radio, out back making the handoff, transferring the prisoner to Pettibone. Probably are.”

  “Kind of late for that. Pettibone should’ve been and gone by now.”

  “He might be running late, too.”

  “Um.”

  Taggart looked away from the winding ribbon of road unrolling under the headlights to glance at Hardin, the lieutenant’s heavy features in profile underlit by the instrument panel’s glow. “Ain’t worried, are you, Bryce?”

  Hardin said, “I just hope Fisk didn’t do something stupid.”

  “Like beating Jack Bauer to death?”

  “It could happen.”

  “Not with Sharon there to ride herd on him.”

  “You know what that jackass nephew of mine is like, Cole. Once he starts beating on somebody he’s hard to stop.”

  “He likes it too much.”

  “And he didn’t like Bauer, not even a little bit.”

  Taggart shrugged. “Say he got carried away and Jack is dead. So what?”

  Hardin said, “Weld’ll be pissed.”

  “Screw him. As far as I’m concerned he’s just another two-bit gun punk and snottier than most.”

  “On that score, my friend, we’re in complete agreement. Unfortunately Mr. Pettibone doesn’t share that opinion. He’s scared of Weld. He’ll be doing plenty of pissing and moaning if Bauer’s dead.”

  “Screw him, t
oo. If he don’t like it, tough. Anyhow, we’re almost there, so we’ll find out what’s what soon enough.”

  The car swung left around a bend and came on a long straightaway. The substation’s lights could be seen at the end of it. The car went to it, slowing as it neared its destination.

  Taggart said, “Home, sweet home.” He turned left on to the drive connecting the road to the parking lot and followed it. Hardin leaned forward in his seat. “I don’t see Fisk’s car—”

  Taggart said, “There it is, in the motor pool.”

  The car halted outside the garage. Hardin eased up and sat back. He groused, “Damn it, I told that boy not to park there. Honk the horn so he’ll come out and move it— ”

  Headlights came on, filling the car interior with white light. They belonged to the pickup truck that had been standing idling out of sight behind the station. It barreled out with a roar of power and plowed into the patrol car, broadsiding it on the driver’s side.

  The car wrapped itself around the truck’s steel-plated front. Hardin and Taggart received a hell of a jolt, only their seat belts saving them from being tossed around the car’s interior. The stunning blow knocked their hats off and left the duo breathless with heads reeling.

  Taggart caught a faceful of shattered glass from the driver’s side window, which had fragmented upon impact. So had that side’s rear window. The windshield frame was bent and the glass frosted. Taggart pawed his face trying to clear his eyes. He shouted, “He crazy—?”

  Hardin groaned, his body aching. He felt cut in half from where the seat belt harness had caught him. He raised his hands in a vain attempt to ward off the truck’s glaring high beams.

  The car shivered as the pickup went into reverse and pulled free of it, backing up to get some running room. The driver stomped the accelerator, and the truck leaped forward to deliver another pulverizing blow to the patrol car.

  The second hit transformed the car’s shape from a U to a V. The driver’s side accordioned. Jagged metal imploded, swatting Taggart. He writhed screaming and thrashing, but the seat belt harness held him in place. The front seat area was diminished by half, pinning its occupants against each other and crowding them against the passenger side. The windshield was gone, the entire sheet of safety glass having popped free of its now warped and distorted frame.