Elite 2: The Wrong Side of Revolution

by Joseph C. Anthony

  “Tommy,” Daniel said calmly, staring into Tommy’s sunken eyes while trying to explain the bizarre circumstance they found themselves in, “I swear, I didn’t kill your uncle.”

  “Then who the fuck did?!” Tommy demanded.

  Daniel thought for a moment. He couldn’t know for sure, but he had a pretty good idea.

  “It must have been Demérs…”

  Just as Daniel had finished his sentence, Tommy pulled the trigger of his gun, the bullet slamming straight into Daniel’s chest.

  The force of the blast threw Daniel onto the floor. The Kevlar had stopped the bullet, but the impact had still caused a lot of pain and discomfort in his chest.

  “And you work for Demérs!” Tommy roared, circling around the table, his gun still pointed at Daniel.

  Daniel gasped for air and readjusted his pain receptors. He did all he could to keep his mind from blacking out.

  Tommy moved to stand over Daniel’s feet, his gun now aimed at his head.

  Without thinking Daniel swung his right leg around, kicking Tommy’s hands to the left. Instinctively, Tommy fired a bullet into the floor.

  As quick as he could, Daniel bent the knee of the same leg and thrust it at Tommy’s knee cap, bending it the other way.

  Tommy shrieked and fell down on top of Daniel, the pain causing him to drop his gun to the floor.

  Daniel saw one of the other men moving in for a shot on the other side of the table. Daniel quickly sat up to grab Tommy as he was falling and use him as a shield. Impulsively the man fired anyway, hitting Tommy in his left shoulder blade.

  Tommy screamed in anguish from the continuous pain.

  Daniel turned his head to see the third body guard moving around the other end of the table to flank him. Tommy’s gun was sitting on the floor just to Daniel’s left. Quickly Daniel picked it up and fired in the direction of the flanker. The bullet caught him in the right leg just above the knee, a fraction of a second before he was able to get off a shot of his own. His body twisted as the bullet ripped through flesh and impacted bone, causing his shot to miss and sail into the far wall on the other side of Daniel.

  Before Daniel could react, the man who had shot Tommy in the back gave up on shooting and went diving over the table at Daniel. His body landed on top of both Daniel and Tommy—Tommy now sandwiched between the two combatants, still shrieking in pain. Daniel looked over to see the man with the wounded leg now bringing his gun back around on Daniel.

  Daniel never understood how he thought to do what he did next, but knew only that it all happened in one fluid motion.

  He pumped himself up so that he was able to throw both of the men on top of him over the table which sat just past his feet, while at the same time tucking into a roll under the table, grabbing his own gun which still sat on the floor as he did so. Once under the table he reached up with his left hand and in one foul swoop lifted the far end of the table up and brought it down between he and the shooter.

  He knew the table wasn’t enough to stop the bullet so he continued his motion, pulling his entire body up off the floor using his left arm as a lever, his body remaining horizontal to the ground.

  The man fired. The bullet went sailing through the table and underneath Daniel’s now elevated body. Daniel used his upward momentum to swing himself up and over the table. As his feet touched the ground he pointed his gun at Benze’s wounded body guard as he lay on the ground. A split-second before Daniel could fire the man he had thrown over the table with Tommy jumped on his back, causing his shot to miss.

  Knowing the wounded shooter on the floor wouldn’t wait another second to return fire, Daniel spun around as quickly as he could, causing the shot to end up in his other attacker’s back.

  Daniel then grabbed onto the now wounded man on his back in order to keep him from falling off before charging in reverse, falling off his heels and crashing into the shooter on the floor.

  Both men let out a half-grunt/half-scream upon contact. The shooter’s arm now lay pinned to the floor in front of Daniel. Daniel stepped on his wrist with full-force, shattering bones and releasing the man’s grip on his weapon.

  Daniel then spun around and smashed the butt-end of his Glock into the temple of the guy on his back, rendering him unconscious.

  Quickly, Daniel stood up and ran to the sliding door at the back of the kitchen, opening it and sprinting out of the house. He found himself standing in the middle of an expansive patio. All around him was an elegant array of outdoor furniture, and in front of him the largest brick grill he had ever seen. To the right was a rectangular infinity pool, complete with a swim-up bar on the far end.

  Benze certainly knew how to live life—or at least did know how to live it.

  Daniel turned to his left and ran around to the front of the house, trying to find his escape. When he came to the front corner of the mansion, he peered around the corner to assess the situation.

  Demérs’ SUV was nowhere to be seen. One of Benze’s guards in black seemed to be tending to the other who was out cold.

  Over the radio Daniel heard a voice say “There’s still one out there. Take him out!”

  The conscious guard in black then turned to take a look around for the target. Daniel took a look behind him. No one seemed to be coming from behind. He looked straight ahead and saw the tree line 150 yards out.

  He looked back at the guard. There were still 50 yards between them if he went now. He hoped Benze didn’t hire security staff based on their marksmanship.

  Daniel took a deep gulp of oxygenated air, got his heart pumping and his blood and adrenaline flowing. It was time for some cardio.

  He pushed off the ground powerfully with his right foot and took a giant stride toward the tree line. Each time his foot planted into the ground he used his quads, calves, and hamstrings to rocket himself forward, quickly bringing his leg back up to repeat the process.

  He heard a gunshot from the direction of the front of the house. He hadn’t a clue where it landed, all he cared about was that it wasn’t in his body.

  He soared at max speed, having never run so fast in his life. His lungs were burning from the frigid air and his heart was pumping but mentally it felt as though he were at rest. His showing off on the treadmill was finally paying off.

  In what felt like minutes but was really less than a dozen seconds, Daniel arrived at the wooded area that surrounded the property. As he approached he saw a down limb at the very edge of the tree line. Effortlessly, he leaped over top of the limb and into the woods. He heard male voices crying out from behind him. Judging by the state in which he had left the men in the kitchen, only two could have still been after him.

  He ran and juked through the trees, seeing three moves ahead as he did so. He even managed to take his jacket off while he was running. He made sure to run in a zig-zag pattern to make it more difficult for the guards to track him. After thirty more seconds of running through the woods, he arrived at the black fence that guarded the estate.

  The top of the fence was lined with spikes, but given that they were six inches apart it was of no consequence. He took half a second to check behind him and saw no one. He then jumped up and grabbed onto two separate sections of the fence where there were no spikes. He then pulled himself up until he could plant a foot onto another one of the spikeless six-inch areas and thrust himself over the fence.

  He took a breath as he again scanned the woods for his pursuers.

  “Freeze right there!” Someone barked from behind him. This voice was female.

  He turned to see a woman with a gun pointed at his chest standing fifteen feet away from him. She was rather attractive—dark black hair hanging down from beneath a thick winter cap. Her skin was seasonably pale, and her cheeks a rosy shade of pink from the cold air. Her femininely shaped eyes were an unusually light shade of brown that blended seamlessly into her high cheekbones.

  “Who are you?” She asked, stepping forward and ripping his gun from its holster. He had secure
d it just before making his mad dash across the yard.

  “Who are you?” Daniel countered.

  “Really?” she asked sarcastically, keeping her gun trained on Daniel. Her gun looked very similar to his own.

  “They’re trying to kill me,” Daniel explained while trying to convey a sense of urgency. “I need to get out of here.”

  The woman stood and contemplated. She was wearing a dark blue snow suit and black boots. Mittens hung down from the ends of her sleeves. It appeared as though she may have been out there for a while.

  “Why are you here?” She demanded. “Do you work for Benze?”

  “No one works for Benze anymore,” Daniel rebutted.

  “What?” she almost shouted. “Did you kill Roger Benze?”

  Daniel immediately regretted his smart assed comment.

  “No,” he explained. “But I’m being set-up to make it look like I did.”

  The female assailant thought for a moment, trying to put the pieces together for herself.

  “Did you come here with Gordon Demérs?” she asked him.

  “You know Demérs?” Daniel countered.

  “I ask the questions!” she shot back.

  Daniel took a moment then nodded in agreement, hoping to speed of the pace of their little chat. She was the one with the gun after all.

  “Yes,” he answered her question.

  “You work for him then?” she followed.

  “Yes…well…no. Not officially, but I was hired to protect him for the weekend. It seems he had other plans.”

  The woman seemed to continue putting together puzzle pieces in her head.

  “You work for Richfield, don’t you?” she asked, suspiciously familiar with the name.

  Daniel’s instinct was to ask her how she knew Richfield, but he caught himself. She could probably already tell by his reaction that she was correct.

  Just then, a man’s voice shouted from the other side of the fence. “Where the fuck is he?”

  Daniel turned back toward the woman who had him at gunpoint. “The men trying to kill me,” he explained.

  The woman quickly put her gun away on her hip holster and pulled something from her back pocket. “Agent Eva Stone, FBI,” she said in a low tone, flashing her badge. “Come with me.”

  Daniel was frozen for a minute, unsure of what had just happened and why the FBI was involved, but he figured she was his best bet to get away safely.

  Daniel followed as he and Agent Stone ran through the woods in the direction of the county road. She moved with impressive agility, especially for being in a snow suit. It did not take long before they came out of the trees.

  “This way,” she ordered, taking off toward a black sedan parked along the side of the road a hundred feet or so to their left. “Get in” she told Daniel when they arrived at the vehicle. She quickly cranked the ignition and put it into gear, taking off down the two lane road and away from the Benze estate.

  Daniel took a moment to breathe and allow his conscious mind to remove itself from his manufactured neural pathways. He could suddenly feel the cold on his skin and the pain in his chest. He shivered and groaned all at the same time, a horrible grimace on his face.

  “You alright?” Agent Stone asked him.

  Daniel unbuttoned his shirt and noticed the half-flattened bullet still stuck to his vest. He pulled it off to examine it.

  “I guess you weren’t lying about them trying to kill you,” she remarked.

  Daniel took another deep breath and shook his head. “I need to get back to Elite,” he told her, still examining the bullet.

  “Not yet,” she countered. “I’m taking you to a nearby government safe house. The director is going to have a few questions for you.”

  “The director of the FBI?” Daniel asked confused.

  Agent Stone let out a small laugh. “Of my department,” she explained.

  Daniel nodded in understanding, refusing to feel foolish for asking what seemed like a logical question.

  “I will be safest at the Elite complex,” he pleaded. “Richfield can protect me. Your director can ask me questions there.”

  She laughed again. “No way that’s ever going to happen.”

  “Well then let me out,” Daniel demanded. “You can’t force me to go with you.”

  “Oh but I can,” Stone corrected him. “You are now under protective custody.”

  She then turned and smiled at him. “You’re mine.”

  Daniel turned and tried to look upset, but for some reason he wasn’t. In his mind Elite was the most logical place for him to go right now, but a part of him wanted to see what the FBI had in store for him. He was now very curious as to exactly what it was he had been caught in the middle of, and how Richfield and Demérs both played into it.

  “I’m guessing your director knows Richfield then,” Daniel suggested.

  “That’s classified,” Stone responded.

  Daniel paused, not expecting her response though he probably should have given the cryptic nature of her brief interrogation in the woods.

  “What exactly is it you’re after Benze and/or Demérs for?” He asked, expecting the agent to throw up another brick wall.

  “Also classified,” she said. “But with your help I think we may be able to put away a lot of really bad people for a long time.”

  Daniel was still confused, but he supposed the answers could wait. Right now he was just happy to be alive. He couldn’t believe Demérs had tried to have him killed. How did Jordan never notice that her fiancé was evil?

  Jordan!

  He had to call Jordan and tell her what happened. He needed to tell her to be careful and get away from Demérs the first opportunity she got. She was in danger!

  He pulled out his phone and opened his contacts.

  “Whoa, whoa!” Agent Stone shouted, grabbing his phone out of his hands. “Absolutely no phone usage! Are you kidding?”

  She took Daniel’s phone and turned it off. “You know who we’re dealing with here. You don’t think they have means to track you?”

  Daniel panicked. He understood her concern, but he couldn’t leave Jordan in danger.

  He tried to convince the agent to hear him out. “Demérs’ fiancé—she’s a friend of mine. I have to warn her!”

  Stone sat quietly in the drivers’ seat and contemplated. “The teacher?” she finally asked.

  Daniel jumped up. He should have known FBI would be aware of her.

  “Yes!” Daniel responded. “I need to make sure she’s safe.”

  The agent let out an exalted breath. “When we get to the safe house and I call the director to let him know that I have you, I will also let him know to assign someone to get the girl out.”

  Daniel slunk back down into his seat. It wasn’t preferred but it would have to do.

  When the conversation had finished, Stone pulled the car into a random subdivision. Daniel hadn’t been paying any attention to where they were going.

  “We’re here,” she said.

  Chapter 8

  Agent Stone swung open the front door to a two-story home smack dab in the middle of the subdivision. She stepped aside and gestured for Daniel to enter the house.

  The inside of the house looked remarkably normal, as though it were taken straight out of a family sitcom from the nineties. Just inside the door was a plain wooden staircase that led to the second floor. The entryway had old wooden floors that creaked with every step.

  The house was dimly lit as all of the blinds were currently closed, allowing only a few small strands of light to pass through. Though there was a thin layer of dust on most of the surfaces, there was next to no clutter.

  “I’m going to report in to my supervisor,” Agent Stone told him. “There are drinks in the fridge, help yourself then wait for me in the dining room.”

  The FBI agent locked the door behind her, generating a bit of unnerve within Daniel. She then did a quick one-eighty and started jogging up the stairs.

&n
bsp; “Don’t go anywhere if you want to stay alive,” she yelled down to Daniel as she reached the top.

  Daniel moved past the stairs and made his way through the wide, open entryway which led into the kitchen.

  It seemed that the FBI had bought into the idea that the best place to hide was in plain sight. Anyone who saw the house from the outside or in would suspect it to be the household of your typical suburban family.

  The floors of the kitchen were the same wooden floors as the entryway. It was fully equipped with a stove, dishwasher, refrigerator, wooden cabinets, and even the kitchen sink—all of which appeared plain and ordinary.

  On the back wall of the house was a sliding door that looked out over a fifty-foot by fifty-foot backyard, separated from the neighbors’ by a short chain-link fence.

  Across from the kitchen but in the same general room was a dining area with a simple, round wooden table placed directly in the center with four chairs situated around it. Beyond the dining room a single step led down into a living area where the floor changed from wooden flooring to off-white carpeting.

  The house was exactly that—ordinary. There was nothing about it that stood out as being any more or any less than ordinary. It was perfect for those who preferred not to garner any added attention.

  The refrigerator offered a rather limited selection –either bottled water or cola. Daniel opted for a soda and carried it with him to the dining room table. As soon as his butt hit the seat he heard Agent Stone making her way back down the staircase.

  “The director should be here in a half-hour with reinforcements. We’ll just hold tight until then,” she told Daniel as she entered the room and made her way to the fridge. She had changed out of her snowsuit and was now wearing a white blouse tucked into her blue jeans underneath a tan leather jacket. Her dark hair cascaded over her shoulders as she strutted across the floor with leather boots that matched her jacket.

  “I require reinforcements?” Daniel asked accusingly.

  Agent Stone smiled as she pulled a bottle of water from the refrigerator. “Once Demérs’ men find out you’re still alive they’ll come after you. When that happens you’ll have both them and the remainder of Benze’s gang after you. If I were you, I would be grateful for reinforcements.”