The Measure of a Man [The Exceptionals Book 1]

by Jerry Kokich, Teel James Glenn

  "And so,” The Artist said triumphantly, “set off the Omega Program."

  The Artist started to laugh. The Bodyguard looked at him, confused. Lastshot shot a glance at Skorpion.

  Skorpion rushed to a com link access terminal, and began typing frantically.

  "While she was looking for that one line, my Omega Program was intertwining itself so intricately, so completely, you'll never get it out of your computer systems and the systems that it links to—like your defense systems. On the next February twenty ninth, Boom!"

  "Skorpion?” Lastshot asked in an agitated voice.

  Skorpion looked up from the terminal and shrugged her broad shoulders. “It's in like Flynn!"

  Goldstrike made a disgusted noise. “Oh, I have just about had it!” He raised his Speed Cannon pointedly at The Artist.

  "And what do you intend to do?” the mastermind asked.

  "Well, what's going to stop me from just blowing you away?” Goldstrike threatened.

  "Matthew,” Temper said. “We're the good guys."

  "You can't—” The Artist said, suddenly unsure. “I know the Exceptionals Charter—and you don't dare."

  Goldstrike cocked his Speed Cannon and sighted between The Artist's eyes.

  "Don't dare me..."

  "Nanites!” The Artist yelled.

  "What?” Goldstrike asked.

  "Nanites in my blood and bone marrow,” the mastermind said, his confidence returning. “Sub-sonically linked to the Omega Program. I die, they die, you die. Now, you'll all be sorry."

  When he saw the look of shock on the surrounding faces, The Artist puffed up his chest and his whole manner changed. “I'll be my own greatest work of art. The rest of the world will know I should have been an Exceptional!"

  In a move almost too fast for the eye to follow, his restraints fell away and he pulled a small pocket pistol from inside his vest. He raised it to his temple.

  Temper flung a throwing star that knocked the weapon out of his hand, and Firststrike dashed forward. The one-eyed Exceptional stunned The Artist with a nerve strike, knocking him unconscious.

  "I hate performance artists,” Firststrike said.

  "Thank you, Jason,” Lastshot said. “I really thought Matt was going to kill him."

  "Hey! I have some self-control!” Goldstrike said.

  Temper gave a very un-ninja like giggle. “Some?"

  Skorpion brought them all back to the problem, “So, now what?” she said. “That program is in so deep, it could take weeks, maybe months to get it out."

  Lastshot looked at her and this time it was his turn to shrug his shoulders.

  "We keep him here ... as our guest,” he said. “As long as it takes."

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  Chapter 14

  The next night, The Bodyguard was back in the Trench in a deliberate attempt to return to normal as fast as possible. There was a larger than usual weeknight crowd, obviously drawn by the Tri-v show of last evening. The team had spent the day debriefing with Pentagon representatives and had done one news conference—heavily controlled by the President's own press flack—and then had been left alone to reflect. That meant down time at the Trench.

  The Tri v was constantly running clips from the night before and commentary from anyone who would volunteer an opinion.

  The Bodyguard was scattered about the bar, each surrounded by their own groups of fans.

  Firststrike held court over a number of tough, wiry martial arts types laughing quietly at old ‘war’ stories and debating formula one and Grand Prix records through the ages.

  Goldstrike was at the center of a bevy of beauties—the fan club was actually called the “gold diggers"—and redheaded Erica of the previous night was on his knee.

  Temper seemed to have acquired a small cache of admirers of both sexes, though she seemed to favor encouraging the young women who admired her ‘stand up for herself’ attitude over the drooling males.

  Echo was playing soft jazz on a piano in the corner, right beneath the plaque from the draughts tournament he'd won the year before. There were two well-dressed women with him who looked totally out of place in The Trench.

  Skorpion and Lastshot sat off to one side, away from the hubbub with lagers and a bowl of pretzels in front of them.

  "You feeling better about it all?” Skorpion asked Lastshot, who was still holding the letter from the dead boy.

  "I'm still here, Red,” he said. “It makes a little more sense. There are just some things I can't do—I couldn't save Eddie, or Billy, but guys like Retlow—like I used to be when I was doing the black ops—would've hurt a lot more little Billy's, if there wasn't somebody like you or me doing the job we can do.” He folded the letter and put it back in his breast pocket where he'd been carrying it for weeks, now more as a talisman than a reminder of failures.

  One of the coeds from the previous night came shyly up to the table. She stood beside Lastshot and shuffled back and forth from foot to foot, working up the courage to speak. “Is this a good time?” she asked.

  Lastshot exchanged a look with Skorpion then asked, “Pen?"

  "Pen?” Skorpion repeated in a questioning voice.

  Lastshot did his best John Wayne voice and said, “A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do."

  * * * *

  Deep in the fourth level basement of The Bodyguard's headquarters was a vault-like room. It had a separate and self-contained oxygen and power system. It would survive any but the most direct hit of a small nuke. It had been intended as the final ‘fail-safe room’ for the team members, but had become something more:

  The room now resembled a morgue. In a single clear tube much like a hyperbaric chamber The Artist was kept unconscious in electro sleep—a medically induced coma, on a metal slab. A wisp of smoke snaked around The Artist's body, keeping him in stasis.

  "As long as it takes,” Lastshot had said. And he meant it.

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  Chapter 15

  "Frag it! Eddie, we're not gonna make it!” Le'Schott felt his stomach turning in fear as the mortar rounds pounded in the distance like the footfalls of a giant chasing him.

  "Don't sweat it, kid!” Eddie Winters’ voice was so calm, so reassuring. “This Big Wolf has gotten out of worse.” His eyes had that twinkle in them like every martial arts instructor he had ever had that said: I've got the answer kid, but I won't tell you—I'll make you earn the answer.

  "You and Retlow are in my wolf pack, Le'Schott,” Winters said. “Uncle Sam doesn't pay us heroes to get dead, kid."

  Without warning, a mortar shell exploded near Winters, lifting him into the air and slamming him into a tree. Le'Schott was flattened and half deafened by the blast.

  He looked over at Winters, sprawled like a broken doll over a fallen log. He was not moving.

  "Eddie!"

  Lastshot sat bolt upright in bed, covered in a cold sweat. He was in his room at The Bodyguard's headquarters. It took a moment for the vivid colors of the jungle to fade, dissolve and reform themselves into the walls of his room; and the sound of the mortar became the personal com line beeping.

  He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and shook his head. He keyed the com unit. Senator Warren Stryker's face appeared on the viewscreen.

  "Senator, sir ... what is it?"

  "I thought you should see this image, Lastshot.” A high-resolution photo replaced Stryker's image. It was a long-range shot of an apparent farming plantation, with a number of people, including soldiers, in old Khmer Rouge uniforms in the central compound.

  "This has been computer corrected for angle of refraction so there is some distortion, but look closely at the man in the gray coveralls."

  Lastshot stared at the image and punched the magnification mode on the com link, unable to believe what he was looking at.

  He dialed the magnification until it was pixilated beyond real purpose, but it didn't matter; he had seen what he needed to, what he had never imagined he would.r />
  "Eddie...” he whispered.

  * * * *

  Goldstrike was whining as usual. “Why do we have to stay?"

  The full Bodyguard was assembled in the ready room. Matthew and his twin brother sat across from Lastshot. The distaff members of the team, Skorpion and Temper sat next to Echo.

  It was six hours after Lastshot had received the senator's call.

  "Somebody has to stay,” Lastshot said. “We have to take a Russian and a Korean because of jurisdiction; you and Caesar don't have the requisite jungle training for the mission—"

  "But—"

  "—And we don't have time to bring you up to speed. A lot of strings got pulled very fast to organize this.” He stared directly into Matthew's eyes with a haunted fire that the golden marksman had not seen in them before. “The compound is going to be torched by UniPol in four days as part of the new drug interdiction imperative the U.N. has launched. Very top secret. And can't be put off for fear of a leak so we go ASAP; end of discussion.” Everyone in the room sensed that this mission was different and the quiet settled as they watched Matthew squirm. It was Echo who broke the silence.

  "So, we'll be real short staffed: who's going to be stationed here on temporary?"

  "Several members of the Privateers will be assigned—"

  "You mean paid off,” Goldstrike said under his breath. The Privateers had been the first of the licensed, but non-governmental Exceptionals and as such were often resented for ‘cashing in’ on their status. When they did step in to act as replacements, they charged Uncle Sam a hefty fee. Lastshot continued as if no one had spoken.

  "—to temporary status while we're away, and one member of Team Liberty."

  "Which Privateers?” Echo asked.

  "Thin Ice—"

  "Righteous!” the black Exceptional said.

  "—and Floater. Liberty Team's Veteran will be coming up from DC."

  When he heard the name of The Veteran, Matthew rolled his eyes.

  "Oh, no, not him!” He covered his face “He never shuts up about his time with the bureau; I'll kill myself."

  "He's eighty-four years old,” Lastshot said, the exasperation clear in his voice, “and ninety-two percent bio-enhanced; you will show him some respect."

  "Some ... “Goldstrike mumbled.

  "Matthew...” Temper said in her best school marm voice.

  "Oh, all right,” he replied in the put-upon-schoolboy tone. “But one more story about ‘my days hunting Osama', and I'm going on leave time!"

  * * * *

  New Rikers Island had been completed only three years before and had been intended for the new class of super criminals that had arisen, some said, in reaction to the Exceptionals. Most acknowledged the need for a facility to house the bio enhanced and the fanatics of the new world order.

  Lastshot's security clearance got him onto the Island and his implants kept him from being able to make face to face contact with Abe Retlow. He had to settle for a secure wall-size plasma Tri v screen that gave the impression that the two men were face to face in a small room.

  "Come to gloat, Big Wolf?” Retlow asked.

  "Not my style, Abe, you know that.” Retlow wore bandages on his head; arm and one leg where his standard military implants had been removed. The bandage across his nose was from where Lastshot had broken it three weeks before.

  "I came to ask you a question,” Lastshot said. His voice took on the haunted quality that had so frightened Goldstrike.

  Lastshot's tone was so strange that even the hardened Mercenary became curious. “All right, you get one question for old time's sake, Cousin."

  "I respect that, Abe.” Lastshot had trouble forming the words, and there was no delicate way to ‘ease’ into it. “Was Eddie Winters dead when we evac-ed?"

  That stunned Retlow. It was not a question he thought anyone would ever ask him again; the military court of inquiry had done that after the mission in Cambodia. “You had that worm crawling around in your brain all this time, Conner?” The muscular criminal laughed then, a deep hardy laugh that pulled at his stitches.

  "I need to know, Abe.” Lastshot stood statue still, his features locked in a grim expression while Retlow laughed until he had tears in his eyes.

  Lastshot's tears were not from laughter.

  * * * *

  The United States Air force, despite political protests back in the 2020s, kept an active presence on the resort island of Guam. Twenty hours from when Lastshot received the communiqué from Senator Stryker, the jumpjet carrying The Bodyguard rolled to a stop at the base on the island.

  Lastshot, Skorpion, Firststrike, and Temper walked across the tarmac from an Air Force transport in a preview of the heat they would face in Cambodia. Across the field they could see a Russian Confederation plane, and a Korean Unity jetcopter.

  The base commanding officer, Major Robert Mendez, a handsome Latin man in his late forty's with gray hair, walked up to the team and saluted.

  "Welcome to Guam.” Beside the officer was a young woman in her mid thirties, dressed in civilian cargo pants and a work shirt. She was dark blond and had sharp features. She stared straight at Lastshot.

  "This is Susan Winters,” Mendez continued, “the photographic analyst who got this ball rolling. Your counter-parts are waiting in my office.” The rest of the introductions were made as they walked towards the base headquarters building. Lastshot felt like the woman's eyes were boring through him the whole way.

  Winters, he told himself, No connection. Just a coincidence.

  Two people were waiting in the Commanding Officer's office. One was just under two meters, a muscular man in his late forties, blond and handsome in the most Russian of ways. He was wearing a black jumpsuit that was laced with a network of silver thread webbing. He was Konstantin Verzhinsky, technically codenamed Ursa Major but he was already famous worldwide as a cosmonaut and hero of a disaster on the moon before he became part of the Russian Exceptional team, The Red Stars. A thin line of circuitry ran along the line of his jaw and continued into the threading of his uniform.

  The other person was from the Korean Exceptional team, The Travelers. She was a beautiful Korean woman in her late twenties, with long luxurious black hair, wearing a red jumpsuit. Her eyes were covered by surgically implanted individual iridescent lenses. She was known as Sunray. When the door opened, Ursa Major and Sunray stood up and snapped to a very military attention.

  "Allow me to introduce Sunray, from Korea—” Mendez said.

  "Good day, comrades,” she said in perfect English. She was grinning and the implanted lenses gave her eyes a cat-like quality.

  "—And, Ursa Major, direct from St. Petersburg."

  "An honor to meet you, sir,” Lastshot said and saluted rather than shook hands with the Russian. Ursa Major returned the salute and then offered his hand, which the American took.

  "Prozalsti, tovarisch,” Ursa Major said smiling. “I look forward to working with you.” He spotted Temper, walked right up to her, took her hand and kissed it.

  "Especially you, gospodja."

  Firststrike seemed to stiffen at the Russian's advances to Temper. Sunray walked up to the one-eyed Exceptional.

  "You are Firststrike?” she asked. It was impossible to truly assess her expression since the lens implants had the effect of mirrored sunglasses. With Firststrike's silvered eye patch, they two looked of a kind.

  "Yes,” he said.

  "I have heard great things about you,” she said with a coy smile. “We must share ... techniques sometime."

  Skorpion, looked at Firststrike and Sunray. She leaned close to Lastshot and whispered, “This could get ugly."

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter 16

  The team took an hour to get some hot food and pull gear from the base's stocks for the mission, then reassembled for their mission briefing. Lastshot took a position standing in front of a plasma screen map; the others were seated around the room. Ursa Major sat very close to Tem
per; Firststrike found himself next to Sunray.

  "The area we're going into is this high plateau section, in the north near the Laotian border, between these four peaks."

  "That is inside, actually in Cambodia, yes?"

  "Yes,” Lastshot said. “It is. These photos were taken by a drug interdiction team who were almost caught by the surviving Khmer Rouge splinter groups. We can't drop anybody in due to wind shear from these peaks."

  "With all your wonderful western technology,” Ursa Major said in a jolly tone, “why can't you get better photographs?"

  "Because of atmospheric conditions in this region, unless something goes directly overhead, we can't get a good view,” the team leader said. “And this mission doesn't carry high-enough priority to change the course of one of our satellites."

  "I have a question,” the Korean Exceptional said.

  "Yes, Sunray."

  "Why are we doing this?” It was a flat statement with no rancor in it, but Lastshot felt himself stiffen as if he had been attacked.

  "One of the men in the photos is believed to be Tamok who was Pol Pot's right hand man and successor, and was convicted of crimes against humanity."

  "Wasn't he reported dead?” Sunray leaned in as if to listen more intently, but just happened to brush against Firststrike's arm in the process.

  "Yes, but apparently, he's not.” Lastshot's eyes scanned the group. The young woman, Winters, returned Lastshot's gaze with a frigid look for a long moment before he continued.

  "In thirty-six hours,” Lastshot held his voice to a mechanical perfection, “UniPol torches the place to destroy the opium crop; if it is Tamok, we have to make sure he's the main course. And, if there are any POW's, as these photos seem to indicate as well, we have to get them out safely.” He looked at the faces of the people in the room, most of them hardened, elite professional warriors who would follow him into hell if asked and found himself thinking: It may very well be Hell.

  "All right, people,” he continued aloud. “We leave at midnight, so we insert just before dawn. Get prepped, and relax.” He stepped away from the map, and the team members got up to leave.