Jack Be Nimble: Gargoyle

by English, Ben

  “Holy Mary,” he breathed, looking down from a steel gangway at the machine.

  It dominated the room. Not physically, no; the contraption wasn’t much more than ten feet tall and half again as thick. The whole of it sat on an enormous black base–insulation, Ian realized. But why? It had no definable symmetry. More of the thick, steely wires snaked into the machine from five other corridors. A single, glossy pipe of some kind extended from the apex up through the ceiling. Machine is the wrong word for this thing, he decided, squinting as the entire surface lit up. It’s more like some kind of animal.

  Twisting silver cables and solid, seamless steel housing wrapped themselves in a lattice around a center core at least four feet thick. The glass or crystal core pulsed with an inner light, and indistinct shapes moved liquidly just underneath its glossy surface. Ian found he couldn’t get a clear look at what they were. Every time he focused his eyes on the tube, its silvery brilliance pulsed yet again, leaving blue and red afterimages dancing on the backs of his eyes. The inner movement gave the eerie impression of life, alien life, to the entire apparatus.

  “Steve, Jack, guys,” he spoke into his mike. Nothing. Must be too much interference. Ian turned down the steel gangway and sprinted for what he prayed fervently was an elevator. The thing behind him began to vibrate and pound. Someone had turned it on, and it sounded as though whatever was inside was just waking up, and waking up angry.

  Miklos yawned. He wasn’t sleepy in the least; the reflex had been with him since he was a child, a precursor to any activity which excited him. Sound and distorted shadows played across the expressionless faces of his men. They stood silently behind the great white motion picture screen, some looking intently at the enormous images of Douglas MacArthur, the little girl swaying slightly between them. She’d been given just enough narcotics to keep her docile and unaware of her surroundings, though from time to time her eyes tracked the action on the back of the screen, lingering particularly on the face of the young MacArthur.

  The movie was winding up; he’d just gotten his call from the President of the Philippine Commonwealth, played by Antonio Banderas, to return to that country he’d loved as a child and organize its military. Hah! thought Miklos. Wait a few years. The Japanese have a surprise in store for you, you arrogant American meddler.

  But that would remain for the sequel. Already the end credits were rolling, and as the score boomed out from the speakers around them, Miklos signaled his men into motion. The plan was simple; mingle with the crowd and keep the little girl’s face down. He sat on his haunches and looked her in the eye. Still dazed, that was acceptable. “Move,” he said simply. He hated American martial music.

  Almost in position, thought Alonzo, waddling down a darkened hallway. He couldn’t wait for the chance to shed his second skin and assemble the weapons he’d brought along. Alonzo could probably get to his HK, but the grenades were beyond his reach.

  He hated these shoes. “Some disguise,” he muttered. Without warning, a door opened, and light spilled into the hall.

  “Who are you?” asked the man in the pale suit, obviously puzzled.

  “I’m fine, thanks, who’re you?” Alonzo said, shuffling by. Nobody’s supposed to be in this part of the building, he thought. What gives?

  “Stop right there,” the other man commanded, lifting a radio.

  Solomon returned Brad’s thumbs up as the murmur of the crowd increased beyond the glass. “Remember, we wait for Jack,” he said, fitting the rifle snugly against his shoulder in the spot weld, the surest position. The first two rounds were hostage duds, he reminded himself, special pellets that would shatter the glass before him and let it fall straight downward, instead of spraying it all over the civilians. He looked over at Brad, who stood, feet firmly planted and rifle aimed almost straight down.

  Below both men, the lobby and surrounding shop fronts were filling rapidly. If all went according to plan, the crowds would drift toward the main elevators and, as those filled, move on to the other elevators, tiled catwalks, and escalators which zigzagged down between the shop levels.

  Solomon wiped the back of his hand across his forehead. He was sweating rivers despite the chill air. This was always the most difficult part, the waiting with every sense alert, with every nerve screaming. Waiting until–

  There. “Targets onstage, gentlemen.” he whispered into the headset.

  “Got ‘em.” said Brad and Steve simultaneously. Six, no, seven men in gray suits all stepped out of a theater exit and began sifting through the crowd. Each man carried an air of indifference and walked at a different speed, but there was something strange about the way they moved, never straying more than ten feet from each other. Solomon could see a child in a blue coat and hat between them, holding the hand of the biggest, a huge blond Slav with craggy, scarred cheekbones like axe heads. The same face he’s seen on CNN only recently.

  “The one in the middle is Miklos Nasim, the Albanian terrorist.” Major Griffin’s voice across the digital connection carried an unmistakable note of disgust. “KGB-trained and one of the first to turn against his own people when the Soviets fell. As deadly as they come, fellows.” The man was devoid of expression–not merely relaxed, but utterly empty. Solomon imagined more than saw him expertly frisk each member of the crowd with his eyes as he steered his small charge purposefully toward the elevators.

  They were about halfway across Solomon’s line of fire when he saw a bushy-haired Asian woman in a voluminous military jacket and sunglasses sweep around a corner on rollerblades. She slid, oblivious, through the startled theatergoers, pirouetting and bouncing to whatever beat throbbed from her headphones. And she was headed full-out for the ensemble of Slavic killers.

  Solomon winced as the young Asian woman came out of a spin backwards and collided clumsily with two of the goons from Eastern Europe. The one closest to her made to step aside and brush her away from the little girl in blue, then folded over sharply in pain, clutching his abdomen. “Now!” whispered Jack’s voice over the headsets, and instantly the windows above the milling crowd shattered. The egglike shells that pounded down around the suited men exploded noisily on impact with the tile and filled the air with a reddish-green haze. The suits stumbled back uncertainly toward their leader. A ratcheting whine filled the air, and the entire crowd stampeded for the exit. Several had their hands pressed firmly to their ears.

  Steve’s chortle sounded over the digital connection, then was itself drowned out as he activated every single fire, smoke, and burglar alarm on the floor. The jets in the ceiling opened up full, then closed, then began spurting water sporadically, showering the multitude below.

  In the middle of the chaos the huge Slav leaned down and jerked the shrieking little girl back to her feet, more dragging than carrying her as he made for the hall leading to the stairways. He whipped a machine pistol from his jacket and aimed it at the mob before him. Before he could pull the trigger and carve an escape route for himself, the Asian woman, still fumbling, suddenly somersaulted over the back of his doubled-over comrade, in the process raking the huge man across the face and neck with her skates. Miklos barked a curse in his native tongue and swung the barrel of his gun towards her, but was engulfed in the crowd. Someone else ran into the backs of his knees and then his legs were knocked out from under him entirely. Briefly, he went down, under the crowd. Scrabbling upright, he found he’d maintained his grip on the blue jacket, but the little girl inside was nowhere to be found. The cloying smoke continued to rise. Miklos gritted his teeth against the cacophony and staggered towards one of his men.

  “I’m here for the bachelorette party on the 29th floor,” the clown said again.

  Cassiel backed away from the advancing jester. “You’re a bit off track, old chum.” He pressed the button on his radio. Something just a tad unsettling about stumbling across an elaborately made-up clown in the dark.

  He never got the chance to complete the thought, as the other man’s white-gloved hand, block
ed from view by the radio, prodded him in the stomach.

  “No funny stuff,” said the clown, jabbing again with the machine pistol.

  Brad hooted and fired the last of his noisemaker bombs down into the tightly-packed clutch of suits. Time to switch to real munitions.

  He shucked the special grenade attachment from his rifle and slapped in a clip. The boys below would never know what hit them.

  Across from him on the roof Solomon switched to infrared. They’d worked like this together in a dozen different countries, in at least as many situations. He’d already selected his first target, but Solomon hesitated. Something was amiss, something he couldn’t quite grasp. The fine hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and the skin began to twitch. He didn’t like the sensation. Of course something’s wrong, he thought crossly. I can look over my shoulder and set my watch by Big Ben if I care to! He shrugged it off and returned to his task. He pulled the trigger and shifted his crosshairs over another suit. He’d already squeezed the trigger again before the first man knew he was dead.

  The Asian woman, her prize clutched tightly to her chest, sailed around a corner far down the hall opposite the screaming mob. The little girl clasped her arms tightly about her rescuer’s neck, sobbing groggily. The two of them rolled in that manner around a few more corners, then spun to a stop near a janitor’s closet flanked by two elevators.

  “There there, dearie, we’ve got a bit of a surprise for you, we do.” The Asian set her charge on an upended garbage pail and spun back towards the hall, listening intently while she drew a knife and sliced cleanly through her shoelaces.

  The little girl continued to whimper behind him as Jack threw his coat, wig, and sunglasses into a nearby barrel. He scoured his face with a specially treated towel, and stuffed that and the remnants of his disguise into the barrel. Scant seconds had passed and things were going almost according to plan. He set his pistol on a drinking fountain and reached into the trash barrel, retrieving a small knapsack.

  “Come on, Ian,” he muttered at one of the elevators as he slipped into a pair of black running shoes. “Don’t worry, your Highness, we’re almost in the clear.” He spoke into his headset. “Groucho, this is Jack. Where the hell is our ride out of here?” He glanced back at the girl and did a double take.

  It wasn’t the Princess.

  Solomon’s finger was just tightening again on the trigger when he realized what it was that caused his scalp to twitch. Two open windows? He raised his head to shout at Brad, forgetting his headset.

  Just in time to see his friend go down under a flash of fire from the upper window.

  The two bearded men leaned back from the casement, laughing. The smaller one shifted his automatic rifle enough to reach his radio. “The boss was dead on, Michael. There is at least one more on the roof; I think Raphael and I can take him. Yes sir. Where can he hide?”

  His companion nudged him and handed over another clip for his Kalashnikov. “Look, the black one is running.” They both laughed and leaned out the window.

  Nyet, ya Amerikanyets

  “Brad, Sol?” Steve blinked uncertainly at the streaming video on his screen. He could see Jack and what was obviously the little girl, but smoke obscured everything else. “Major, let’s see if we can--”

  But she was already ahead of him, running over the debris-strewn floor to a window. “Your men are under fire! Pull them out, get them out now!”

  Halfway to the window himself, Steve nodded and spun back to the computer, then halted abruptly. “What are you doing?” yelled the major.

  He pointed wordlessly across the hall to a monstrous, shrouded shape. Behind several layers of plastic, it had been hidden from view, just another silent tangle of steel and drop cloth. But the outline of the huge turbines and the fanlike rotor blades was unmistakable. Peering through the gloom at the surrounding area, Steve’s swirling brain noted disposable fuel bladders and various mechanics' tools corresponding to the upkeep of a military helicopter. A set of thick cables ran from either turbine to a pair of machines about the size of ice coolers. Each machine hummed softly. It’s being kept warm, Steve realized. Drawing closer, he and the major could see the pulley-and-wheel system on the nearest wall; the entire section was nothing but a pair of rollback doors.

  Steve scrambled over his workstation, groping for his headset. “Chico, Zeppo, get out of there.” Where was Jack? “Ollie, we’ve found the missing Sikorsky. Its right here with us! Do you have the package? Ollie?” The security cameras on screen showed nothing.

  “I’m here, Steve. We’ve got the wrong girl.”

  “What?”

  Jack held the drowsy child awkwardly in one arm, eyeing the hallway. “It was a setup, a double-blind.” Might as well forget code names, now. He paused to shift the little girl to one side, then tapped the elevator call button with the barrel of his gun. “Her name’s Flora Clark, she’s one of the kids that disappeared the morning after Christine was kidnapped. Decoy. Hey, where’s Alonzo?”

  Steve was beginning to hyperventilate over the digital interface. “No—word, Jack; we need to pull out. Solomon and Brad may be down. We’ve lost the—element of surprise.”

  “Steve, I doubt we ever had it. Any clue where the princess is?”

  Before he could answer, Major Griffin pointed over his shoulder at the screen. The two of them watched as a security camera tracked several blurry images down a long corridor. Steve typed feverishly on his keyboard. “Oh, my. They’re moving, Jack. From Raines’ office on the thirtieth floor. Looks like they’ve got the little girl with them. And I’m reading some kind of fire on that floor.”

  Jack’s voice was utterly calm. “Alright, Steve. Now: are you plugged into the elevators? Got any control there?”

  “Uh, I’ll work on it.” Steve practically dove into his rucksack, yanking out coils of cable. “Major!” he hissed. “Help!” He thrust the tangle of cords at the British woman.

  Jack kept talking, his voice still level, “As soon as you can, see if you can lock out all the elevators on their floor. Keep them moving up to you, away from the crowds down here. Did we set off enough alarms?”

  “Yeah, firefighters at least will be here in a few minutes. But if that other fire is for real--”

  “Good. Might as well trip any other alarms this place has. Make Raines’ security think the whole place has caught on fire, or something. You can do that, right? Piece of cake, isn’t it?”

  Steve was beginning to relax. “Yeah, uh, should be.” He began to tap out commands to the central computer.

  Jack chuckled across the digital connection. “Practically nothing compared to the time you set off the sprinklers in the Oval Office--”

  “Hey!” Steve smiled despite himself, typing faster.

  The major spoke. “Listen, Flynn. We’ve called in the cavalry, as you Yanks say. SAS and D-11 will be here in less than fifteen minutes. Get the little girl to safety, then meet me in--” she yanked the blueprints straight. “The thirty-fifth floor hallway. Take the central express elevator. If you hurry we can cut them off.”

  Jack grimaced. “This is getting much too complicated. I’m on my way.” Just then the elevator door slid open and Ian staggered out. “Here!” Jack passed the little girl over to the other man. “Get her out on the street and call a cop.”

  “No, Jack, wait! This thing downstairs--” Quickly Ian related what he had seen.

  “Beats the hell out of me, Ian. Maybe one of those Tesla things you saw on T.V. I’ll ask Raines about it if I see him.” Jack ran back down the hall, gun in hand.

  Ian looked at the little girl. She yawned and closed her eyes.

  Solomon threw himself into motion, standing and firing at the same time. A bullet gouged a nick into the edge, an inch from his left foot. This was insane.

  The enormous black man dropped his rifle and began to sprint across the roof, toward the oncoming fire. He wondered if this would surprise the gunmen long enough to buy him some time. Just a few seconds
.

  He leaped over the first skylight with nearly a foot of roof to spare. “Hold on, Brad!” he shouted.

  Jack ran through the abandoned lobby, taking note of the four suited bodies and where they lay. Steve had killed the sprinklers and turned the alarms off, though colored lights still flashed in shops further down the promenade. Someone was shouting above him, and he turned just in time to see Solomon sail overhead, bathed in the golden light of the theater’s marquee. If any of them lived through this, he thought as he exited the lobby, this was going to make one hell of a story.

  Solomon exhaled hard as he hit the other side. One more hurdle to go. He kept his head down, expecting any moment to feel a hot explosion rip across his chest or legs. One more skylight. He was close enough now to see that Brad was still moving, still conscious, and that surprisingly little blood had run down the window on which he lay. Still sprinting, Solomon drew his pistol and fired into the glass above and below his friend. The maniacal chatter of gunfire from the window sent him into a full-out dive, and Solomon slammed down onto his friend, shattering the window on which he lay.

  They fell through the darkness, shouting, in a shower of sparkling glass.

  The major securely fastened her handgun in its holster at the base of her spine and checked her tightly-knotted hair. Watching her from behind his laptop, Steve noted what a decidedly pretty woman the major was. He snapped the last cable into the appropriate port and began typing, his thoughts awhirl. Great timing, Fisbeck. “Good luck, Major.”

  The programs which ran the elevator operated on a completely different platform than the building’s security. Access to the elevator would be difficult–no, it would just take a bit of time, he corrected. This is what he was good at; he knew exactly what to do. Steve glanced up in time to see the resolute line of the woman’s shoulders as she walked away. She looked lethal, pantherlike.