Elite

by Joseph C. Anthony

  “When he gets into the kitchen he gets a big surprise – The ambassador sitting in his chair, his head lying in a pool of his own blood on the table.”

  Daniel’s jaw dropped in disbelief, though he should have expected the outcome given the theme of this morning’s lesson.

  “While the two agents were occupied with the postman, Monouís had broken in through the back door, snuck up on the ambassador in the kitchen and slit his throat.

  “It turned out Monouís had sent the package to the safe house, knowing that Thompson would be suspicious. He even went as far as to steal the postman’s uniform out of his locker the day before, knowing that he would then have to wear the spare that was kept in the post office – the spare being an older design which was a different color than the current uniform, and also not in our friend the postman’s size.”

  “Just because it’s different, doesn’t mean it’s a threat,” Daniel repeated the day’s mantra, as if on some twisted episode of Sesame Street.

  “Don’t be distracted by the unusual, and never leave the client unprotected,” Richfield emphasized.

  Daniel nodded again in understanding, now a little giddy from Richfield’s story, excited to be a part of such a romantic, although terrifying line of work.

  “Well I’m done talking,” Richfield said, hopping up from the desk. “Let’s go shoot stuff.”

  Daniel felt the excitement building inside him as he and Richfield rode the elevator down to Level Five, which housed the shooting gallery. Daniel had never shot a handgun before, and he felt a great deal of enthusiasm about learning.

  The doors of the elevator slid open and the two men made their way into a long, narrow hallway made entirely of concrete. To their right was a wall with a set of windows that extended the entire length of the hallway.

  On the other side of the glass was another concrete room, though far more vast than the hallway. Five feet from the other side of the glass, a long metal surface ran parallel to the hallway, three feet off the ground. Every four feet along the surface was a divider made of some sort of white material that Daniel could not identify.

  There were only two other agents on the rage currently – one female and one male – shooting at targets of different ranges. Daniel recognized the man though he could not put a name to the face. Currently the woman appeared to be shooting at a target that was further away than the man’s.

  The sound of the shots was violent, echoing off the concrete walls in the room, but the glass wall greatly dampened the sound from the hallway.

  “The range is one-hundred yards deep,” Richfield spoke into Daniel’s ear

  Halfway down the hallway was a glass door which led into the range. Daniel guessed that with all of the glass around the shooting range it had to all be bulletproof. As they approached the door Daniel noticed a table sitting just outside the gallery, an array of ear protection sitting on top of it. Most were the ordinary red, plastic headsets one would expect to see at a shooting range, but two of the headsets were black, with a microphone extending from the left ear. Those were the headsets Richfield picked up for he and Daniel.

  “Put these on,” he said, handing one set to Daniel.

  Daniel placed the ear pieces over his ears and Richfield reached up to flip a switch over his left side. Richfield then put on his own headset and did the same.

  “Can you hear me?” Daniel heard Richfield’s electronically delivered voice sound in both of his ears.

  “Yes,” Daniel responded, causing Richfield to cringe and throw his hands up over his ears. He then adjusted what Daniel guessed was a volume knob, before gesturing for Daniel to speak again.

  “Is that better?” Daniel asked.

  With a satisfied grin blank nodded and gave Daniel the thumbs up before heading into the range.

  Just inside the doorway Mr. Blank was sitting on a plastic classroom chair reading the paper, a set of giant red earmuffs covering his ears.

  “Hey, Danny Boy!” Blanked looked up to greet the man when he noticed the door open.

  Daniel nodded in a sign of greeting, figuring that between the earmuffs and the gunshots Blank wouldn’t be able to hear a word he said anyway. He had barely been able to make out Blank’s greeting except for the fact that he was able to read his lips. He then looked at Richfield who gestured to the nearest shooting pod.

  As Daniel stepped up to the table, there was already a black handgun there waiting for him. The slide was pulled back and an ammo cartridge lay next to it.

  “Now have you ever shot a gun before?” Richfield’s voice asked over his headset.

  “I shot a rifle once when I was thirteen,” Daniel responded, peering over his shoulder back at Richfield.

  Richfield stared silently a moment before delivering an un-amused, “Great.”

  “Well this isn’t going to be anything like that,” he added.

  Daniel chuckled before looking down at the gun in front of him.

  “This is a Glock twenty-two,” Richfield explained. “It fires a forty-caliber round, meaning that the round is point-four inches in diameter, or ten millimeters.”

  Daniel nodded in understanding as he continued to eye the angled hunk of steel, anxious to get his hands on it and let her rip.

  “This is your gun now,” Richfield stated.

  Daniel turned and raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t expected to receive his very own pistol today.

  “That’s right,” Richfield answered Daniel’s unspoken question. “Standard E-P-S-F issue. Same weapon the FBI uses.”

  “And the Detroit Police!” Blank yelled, somewhat audible now that the other two agents in the range had momentarily ceased fire.

  Daniel and Richfield both turned to the man out of time with pondering glances.

  “Hey,” Blank said, throwing his arms up in defense, “If it’s good enough for those guys…”

  He let his sentence trailed off as though he had made his point.

  Daniel and Richfield both shrugged, as if both seeing the man’s point, and turned their focus back toward the Glock.

  “Now this is the only gun I’m going to teach you how to shoot, because most standard semi-automatic handguns will be similar to this one, and there should be absolutely no instance in this job where you should need to use anything else. You’re there to protect people, not kill them,” Richfield explained.

  Daniel turned to Richfield with a pouty look upon his face. He was really hoping he would get to learn how to operate firearms of all different types.

  “Well, maybe we’ll shoot some fully-automatics down the road just for fun,” Richfield said slyly, a grin of his own forming on his face.

  “But this is the gun I need you to get used to. There are three primary defenses you will have at your disposal out in the field. The first and most important is your mind – especially yours. The second is your body – again, especially yours. The third and final line of defense is your Glock.”

  Richfield looked to Daniel for understanding,

  “And…well…” he added, “yours is just like everyone else’s in that instance.”

  “So,” Richfield resumed, “Loading. Pick up the gun with your dominant hand.”

  Daniel reached down and grabbed the handle of the gun with his left hand.

  “No, no,” Richfield corrected, “Wait, are you left handed?”

  Daniel looked at Richfield, then down to ponder for a moment. He used different hands for different things. He threw with his right, but he wrote with his left.

  “Hold the gun out straight for me like you’re gonna shoot,” Richfield instructed.

  Daniel did as he was told and extended the gun out in front of him, wrapping his left index finger around the trigger.

  “Left handed,” Richfield’s voice said over the headset. “Great.”

  The tone in Richfield’s voice was the same as when Daniel had told him that he had never shot a handgun before. Daniel felt a bit offended by the remark, but decided to let it go.

/>   “No big deal,” Richfield assured Daniel, patting him on the back. “I’ll just have to switch this out for a left-handed gun.”

  He reached down to pick up the gun, but Daniel stopped him.

  “No it’s fine,” Daniel assured him. “I’m pretty ambidextrous. I’ll just do it with my right.”

  “Don’t be silly. You won’t be as accurate,” Richfield countered, again reaching for the gun.

  “I’ll be fine,” Daniel retorted, reaching down and placing his hand on the gun to prevent Richfield from taking it. “I’ve never done it before, so it shouldn’t be that significant. I do a lot of things with my right hand.”

  He wasn’t really sure why, but Daniel already felt some odd attachment to this particular gun, as if it had been his for over a decade rather than only ten seconds.

  “Okay,” Richfield conceded, moving his hand back away.

  Daniel reached down and picked up the gun, this time with his right hand.

  “Now pick up the cartridge with your left hand, and use your left index finger to make sure the rounds are seated properly.”

  Daniel picked up the loaded cartridge, pressing on the top round with his index finger to make sure it was securely in position at the top of the cartridge.

  “Now slide the magazine into the hole at the bottom of the gun, and make sure you jam it firmly into place,” Richfield instructed.

  Daniel did as he was told.

  “Good,” Richfield continued. “Now there are two ways to can move the slide into place. First, you can press the slide release button until the slide moves itself forward.”

  Richfield pointed to the release button, but gestured for Daniel to wait before pressing it.

  “Or you can do it the man’s way,” Richfield added with a bit of edge to his voice. “Pull back on the slide and then release it.”

  Daniel kept the pistol pointed forward, and with his left hand pulled back on the slide and then let go, watching it snap into place over the barrel of the gun.

  “Beautiful,” Richfield encouraged. “Now let’s work on your grip.”

  Richfield proceeded to show Daniel the correct way to grip the gun, using the three fingers wrapped around the front of the hilt to pull the grip back into his hand, with his right thumb pressing into the grip. His left hand then wrapped around his right, his left thumb pressed against the left side of the grip.

  “Now your stance,” Richfield said, moving on to the next lesson. “I’m going to teach you the Weaver Stance, because it’s the best.”

  “What about the Isosceles Stance?” Blank chimed in from the back row.

  “Fuck the Isosceles Stance!” Richfield yelled back to him.

  “Now put your left foot out in front, pointed toward the target, and your right a step behind you at a forty-five degree angle,” Richfield directed, watching Daniel’s feet as he moved. “Feet should be a bit more than shoulder-width apart.”

  Daniel got himself into position and held the gun out in front of him, ready to take aim.

  “Now make sure you lock your right elbow, and keep your left arm slightly bent, pulling the gun back into your grip.”

  Daniel followed Richfield’s instructions, standing ready to shoot.

  “We’re going to have you shoot at targets twenty-five yards down range for now,” Richfield explained. “This is pretty average. Most gunfights happen at seven to twelve feet, but to be honest only thugs and amateurs mess with that crap. If you’re dealing with a trained killer and they’re beyond twenty-five yards away, they probably aren’t going to be using a handgun, and if they’re any closer, they probably aren’t planning on using a gun at all because that’s just plain sloppy. This is why you probably won’t have to worry too much about using your sidearm, but occasionally a thug-amateur does get cocky and we have to be ready to deal with that.

  “Now use your left thumb to release you safety and line up your sights.”

  Daniel reached with his left thumb over to where the thumb-safety sat near the trigger of the gun, and carefully wrapped his right index finger around the trigger, remembering to maintain the proper grip.

  “Remember – place the front sight in the middle of the rear notch, keeping the top of the sight parallel with the top of the notch. Keep your eyes focused on the front sight, and get ready for the kick.”

  Daniel smiled. He had already planned to take care of that. He reached back through his neural pathways, feeling each signal as it was sent to each appropriate muscle in his body.

  The target was blurry in his vision as he kept his focus on the forward sight. When he finally had it lined up just right, he reached back into his brain and commanded each muscle to freeze, rendering him virtually paralyzed, but with the target perfectly lined up in his sights. A gorilla could have crashed into him and it would not have altered his position.

  “Now squeeze the trigger smoothly, making sure not to rub your finger along the inside and messing up your aim,” Richfield commanded. Little did he know it would take a lot more to alter Daniel’s aim in his current state.

  Daniel released only the muscles in his right index finger, and began to squeeze the trigger.

  The gun fired. Daniel felt the pressure on his hand caused by the recoil of the pistol, but his muscles remained lock, not giving an inch.

  He altered is focus from the sight on his Glock to the target, a bullet hole appearing just a hair right of dead center.

  “Not bad,” Richfield commented.

  “Steady hands are not going to be an issue,” Daniel commented, beaming with pride after such an impressive first shot.

  “Yeah, well it gets harder,” Richfield retorted.

  After six more shots Daniel proved that a single stationary target presented very little challenge for him as he was able to line it up and lock onto it every time. However when it came to multiple targets he found himself struggling to line them up in a timely fashion, each time have to twist in his stance, realign his sights, and lock himself back into place. He found himself having to choose between quickness and accuracy.

  Even more of a challenge was when Richfield had him try his luck with moving targets. This prevented him from locking his muscles into place as he needed to be able to move along with the targets. This also meant that he had to adjust himself to fend against the recoil of each shot.

  These things would all come to him with experience. For now he would just have to accept that a marksman he was not, and hope that Richfield was right about it being one of the least important aspects of being an agent.

  “Just shooting at the guy is generally enough to chase him away, and in this line of work, that should be enough,” he had told Daniel when they were leaving the range.

  It was a strange realization for Daniel. So much emphasis had been on becoming more than human and being able to kick ultimate ass, and yet he was now learning that eliminating your opponent should be the lowest item on your agenda when out in the field. The first and only priority is keeping the client safe.

  The intensity of his previous training now seemed almost excessive in nature, not to mention his surgery. Why in the world did a personal security agency need a super-soldier on their team? It almost seemed to be a waste of his talents.

  But it was too late in the game to be asking those questions now. He was here, and he was special, and he owed that to Blank, Richfield, and Horchoff. He was not going to let them down. They had made him more than he could have ever dreamed being, and for that they had gained his loyalty and respect.

  “Go get lunch and meet me back at the sparring room,” Richfield told Daniel. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  Daniel scarfed down a big taco salad for lunch then made his way to the sparring room. He was curious to see what kind of surprise Richfield had in store for him that afternoon. He hoped he would find Elise waiting for him, reassigned to work with him for another week or more, but he doubted it.

  As he walked onto the mats in the combat training area of th
e complex, Richfield and Blank stood waiting for Daniel in the center of one of the sparring mats.

  “Here I am,” Daniel said as he stopped in front of them, ready for his surprise.

  “Daniel,” Richfield said, a shit-eating grin on his face, “meet your sparring partner for this afternoon.”

  After finishing his brief introduction, Richfield and Blank moved apart, revealing a stout, tan figure jumping up and down behind them, getting himself pumped up for a bout against his new, old foe.

  Jitters turned to Daniel and hopped up to him, jerking his head back and forth on his neck in an attempt to get the kinks out.

  “Ready for round two?” He asked Daniel in an all-too-cocky manner.

  Daniel, now feeling a growing anger for both Jitters and Richfield, pulled his shirt over his head and made his way to the edge of the mat where Richfield was now holding out a pair of gloves for him to wear.

  “What is this?” Daniel asked angrily, as he grabbed the gloves out of Richfield’s hands and feverishly pulled them over his own.

  “I was watching you a lot last week with Elise,” Richfield explained. “You’ve gotten a hell of a lot better, but you always hold back with her. I want to see what you can do when you let it all out, and this way I can be sure that you will.”

  Daniel turned to face his stocky opponent, bouncing up and down in the center of the mat.

  As others in the room began to pick up on what was happening, they suddenly began to lose interest in whatever else they were doing and turned their attention to the rematch between Daniel and Jitters about to go down in the center of the room. Even folks from the fitness room next door started making their way over to watch the two arch nemeses throw down.

  “Go get your mojo back, Danny Boy,” Blank said into Daniel’s ear before pushing him toward the center of the ring.