Phaze

by S. C. Mitchell

  In the restaurant, shocked silence hung in the air. Diners sat wide-eyed at their tables.

  Joel, Amber, and the teleporter were gone.

  Chapter 13

  Agents swarmed the restaurant within minutes, interviewing witnesses, taking pictures.

  Kayla paced in front of Aaron Braddock. “It all happened so fast. We need to find Joel.”

  He nodded, touching something on his datapad. “I’ve got everyone on it. We’ll find him.”

  Confidence or false bravado, his words didn’t help the cold knot twisting in her stomach.

  “Are you done with me here?” She’d given her statement. There was more she could be doing. She’d left her phone at home for the evening but borrowed Aaron’s to text Heather to bring her uniform and Chris if she could.

  Joel was the Xi Force team leader. Someone needed to step up, and she doubted Chris would or could. He was a great guy, but not a leader. Maybe she was overstepping, but something needed to be done, and quickly. Before the trail went cold.

  Aaron was all in investigation, find-out-what-happened mode. He hadn’t quite gotten to we-need-to-rescue-Joel mode yet. And time was wasting away.

  His phone dinged and he checked the message, then raised an eyebrow at her. “Kayla, I expect to be kept in the loop. No running off on your own.”

  Okay, Aaron Braddock was now the commander of the Xi Force base. She’d need to work closely with him. “We’ll be on coms. Any problem with me contacting Wylde? Joel told me he has some kind of tracking ability. We could probably use that right now.”

  He bristled. “Just watch yourself with that one. Joel trusts him. I don’t. But I do trust you.”

  A figure emerged from the shadows behind Braddock. Kayla hadn’t noted any movement, then he was just there.

  “Then it’s fortunate I trust her as well.”

  Wylde.

  Braddock jolted and spun. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Following a scent.” John Wylde narrowed his eyes on Braddock. “Thanks to your team’s stench, I appear to have lost it.”

  Kayla had read Joel’s report on the exploding building incident. Wylde had been in that building earlier. So had the black-clad teleporter. “Cigarette breath?”

  Wylde nodded. “That’s why I trust you. You’re smart, and you smell honest.”

  She smelled honest? “That teleporter can only port line-of-sight. They couldn’t have gone far on that port out of the restaurant. If we can figure out where they landed could you pick up his trail again?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe.”

  Positioning herself where she’d last seen the teleporter, she noted only two windows visible. One held a view of the buildings across the street. The other looked down the road a ways, taking in a scene that included the entrance to a dark alleyway.

  “There.” She pointed, then turned toward the entrance.

  Wylde held up his hand. “I’ll check it out. You’re not really dressed for—”

  “I’m here.” Heather bolted through the doorway, Kayla’s Phaze uniform draped over her arm. Chris followed behind. “I have Maggie and the Xi-1 on the vacant roof of a nearby parking garage.”

  Kayla nodded to Wylde. “Go. Take Chris. I’ll join you as soon as I change.”

  Heather followed as Kayla bolted for the restroom. She slipped out of her dress almost as soon as the door closed behind her.

  After handing her the uniform, Heather collected the dress. “I’ll take care of this for you.”

  “Sure as hell not the way I planned to shed it.” Kayla clipped the com unit around her ear. After numerous failures, they’d finally found an electronic configuration that would phase with her. Little by little they were figuring this stuff out. It helped to have access to some of the top scientists in the country.

  “I know, hun. I’m so sorry.” Heather handed Kayla her boots. “The backup team’s in place. Kirk’s at the Cray and Pike’s Rangers are standing by back at headquarters. Chris has a com unit for Wylde if he’ll wear it.”

  “He’ll wear it.” If she had to nail it to his head, she would.

  ~ ~ ~

  “So? What do we know?” Kayla puffed up to where Wylde and Chris stood shaking their heads.

  Haze drifted like a ghost in the dim lighting of the dank alleyway. Lose newspaper shifted and rustled across the asphalt in the slight evening’s breeze. The dumpster at the dead end of the alleyway overflowed with refuse and reeked of decay.

  Wylde, down on all fours, sniffed the ground. “They were here. Joel, Boris, and a woman.”

  Wait. What? “Boris?”

  Returning to two feet, Wylde continued sniffing deeply. “It’s taken me a while to identify his scent. The teleporter is a man named Boris Kozlov. I believe he is part of the Red Guard.”

  “He’s Russian?” She couldn’t recall the man speaking with any identifiable accent.

  “Deep cover KGB. I met him about ten years ago, when I was in Siberia.” Pain washed across Wylde’s face. “I knew the scent was familiar when I encountered him at the Ghaim base where they did that stuff to me, but the drugs messed with my head. It took me a while to connect the two scents.”

  Eventually, Kayla would get the whole story out of him, but not now. They needed to find Joel first.

  She handed Wylde the com unit. “Hook this around your ear.”

  Wylde held it to his nose and sniffed.

  “You don’t have to eat it. Just wear it.”

  Shrugging, Wylde relented and wore the unit.

  Chris’s eyes were unfocused. “I have narrowed down the possible vehicle types by this tire tread imprint I found in an oily patch of asphalt. I’ve got Kirk running the traffic camera footage for matches at this location.

  Kirk’s voice came over her ear com. “About ten yards down the alleyway.”

  Her gaze sweeping the ground, Kayla started moving. “What am I looking for?”

  “Joel’s phone.”

  Sniffing all the way, Wylde stooped down and scampered ahead on all fours. “Here.”

  He held up the phone. Damn, there’d be no tracking Joel that way.

  “Let’s get to the Xi-1 in case Kirk locates that vehicle.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Kayla’s heart raced as the Xi-1 took to the skies. Thanks to Chris’s computer enhanced vision and Wylde’s tracking skills, Kirk got a fix on the speeding, black SUV heading north of the city. He’d even found a camera angle that positively identified Amber in the driver’s seat and had a locked-on drone sending streaming video of the vehicle and its coordinates.

  All the while, Kayla had done . . . nothing.

  What good were her powers? She’d been all but worthless to the team so far, and Joel’s life was on the line. She needed to step up.

  But how?

  She sat in the co-pilots seat beside Maggie O’Donnell, staring out at the darkness ahead. The Xi-1’s engines whined as the supersonic jet shot through the sky. This low to the ground they needed to keep the speed down below Mach 1 to avoid sonic booms.

  “The target just took a turn on Highway Y heading east.” Kirk’s level tone offered a stable anchor to cling to.

  Joel would be all right. They’d rescue him and recapture Amber. Maybe even this Port guy. And it wasn’t too late. Maybe the evening was still salvageable.

  Maggie shot her a glance, then nodded. “We should catch them in about fifteen minutes.”

  God, she wanted to be in Joel’s arms again. Hugging him. Kissing him.

  They’d waited so long for this evening. Damn it, Amber.

  “Kirk sent me the video feed from the tracking drone.” Chris paced behind the two seats in the pilot’s cabin. “Shit, that doesn’t look good.”

  “What?” Kayl
a’s heart froze.

  “The SUV pulled onto a dirt road.” Teeth clenched, Chris fisted his hands. “There’s a small jet waiting in an open farm field.”

  Damn it. “Maggie, can’t we go any faster?”

  Maggie gritted her teeth. “To hell with regulations. I’m kicking it up to Mach 2. Only farm fields and forest out here anyway. A few cows are just gonna have to deal with a sonic boom.”

  Ahead through the windshield, the clearing came into view. Kayla could just make out the flashing lights on the tail of the aircraft.

  Chris shook his head. “They’re inside. The plane is taxiing.”

  No!

  The darkness ahead illuminated as the jet engine flared.

  Engines whined as Maggie throttled faster. “That can’t be faster than us.”

  The plane in the clearing didn’t look like anything she’d ever seen. Something like a bat-winged glider with a rocket engine shoved up its ass. “Kirk, can we track them on radar?”

  “The Air Force gave me access. I’m logging in now. We just need that plane to get high enough off the ground.”

  The jet took off, barely missing the tree tops at the edge of the clearing, staying low.

  “Kirk?”

  An exasperated sigh. “I don’t see ‘em on radar and the drone can’t match their speed.”

  Maggie sent the Xi-1 shooting forward toward the plane, and the distance closed. “We got ‘em.”

  Then a flash lit the sky. Kayla blinked away the fuzziness.

  “What the?” Maggie thumped the control panel.

  “Fuck.” Chris’s tone held frustration. “Some kind of stealth?”

  The plane ahead had vanished without a trace.

  Chapter 14

  Kayla dropped her phone on top of the pile of electronic devices on the conference room table. “That’s how they knew where we were?”

  Now it made sense. She’d left her phone behind for the evening but Joel’s bugged cell phone had lead Amber and Port right to the restaurant. No wonder, once they’d captured him, they’d disposed of his phone in that alleyway.

  Braddock nodded. “We’re still investigating. It looks like the contractor that supplied the phones is blameless, but the delivery boy received a significant payoff from a Ghaim shell company right after dropping the phones off.

  Chris threw his phone on the pile. “And all our phones have been bugged for the past two months?”

  “No wonder it felt like someone knew our every move on our honeymoon.” Heather harrumphed. “I’d like to get my hands on that little rat of a delivery boy.”

  “Too late.” Aaron shrugged. “He was found in his apartment hanging from a light fixture a week ago. It had been ruled a suicide. The police are reopening the case and the FBI is now involved.”

  And just when they’d thought Ghaim was out of the picture for good.

  Kayla hit the boil-over point. “Why the hell are we always playing catch-up with these fuckers.”

  And then there was Boris Kozlov, AKA Port.

  Wylde had been tight-lipped about how he knew, but provided some information about the teleporter. A former KGB agent, Port was part of the Russian equivalent of Xi Force known as the Red Guard Agency.

  Though Red Guard had been officially abandoned and shut down by the Russian government a few years earlier, the program went underground, supporting itself with what can only be called creative self-funding. Much of the internet scamming and theft attributed to the Russian Mafia was actually Red Guard criminal activity.

  Wylde wasn’t aware Kozlov had any super powers when he’d met him years ago. How Port acquired his ability to teleport was anybody’s guess, but it pointed to some success within the Red Guard program.

  Only recently, when he was captured and given Ghaim’s rendition of Kayla’s Mutalon formula, had Wylde discovered Kozlov could teleport.

  Strapped to a bed and given numerous injections, Wylde struggled with the agony of the formula surging through his system, and endured the cries of the other four victims as they’d thrashed about and died. He’d managed to break his shackles and escape, but Port pursued, which was why the teleporter hadn’t been there when Joel and Chris arrived on the scene.

  When she’d asked Wylde how he’d gotten away, he’d shrugged and said, “I gnawed through the leather straps.”

  Okay, add strong teeth to his list of super powers.

  They needed to move forward with as much speed as possible and keep digging to figure out where Joel had been taken.

  With no word on Joel, Wylde headed home to check on his wolf pack and try to clean up his cabin, but promised to come back as soon as possible. Despite his odd beliefs and standoffish manner, Kayla appreciated the man and his value to the team.

  He assured her he still wanted to be part of any action against Ghaim because of what they’d done to his pack. And right now Xi Force needed everyone it could get.

  “Any word on John Wylde’s ETA?” She’d feel better if he was here.

  Wylde’s cabin was too far away from Xi Force Headquarters for quick mobilization, and despite his misgivings, Aaron had been after him to move into one of the apartments upstairs, at least for now. Wylde wrinkled his nose but stated he’d consider it, before he’d left to check on his pack.

  In any case, the important thing now was to concentrate on finding Joel.

  Kirk Peters’ brow furrowed as he typed instructions into the Cray workstation. “I can’t ping any of Joel’s hardware addresses. That means he’s not connected to the internet. Either his local Wi-Fi is turned off, or he’s not within reach of any hotspots. He doesn’t have his utility belt on, so the Satcom would be unavailable, but if he could get within reach of a cellular or Wi-Fi connection, he should be able to contact us via his internal computer.”

  Jason Pike thumped the table. “Do we even know where to look?”

  Pike’s Rangers were on standby, the Xi-1 fueled and ready for fast takeoff. They just needed a destination.

  Shaking his head, Aaron Braddock paced. “Their damn jet never got far enough off the ground for radar to lock on to it before it activated that stealth mode. It took off heading northeast, but it could have gone anywhere after that.”

  Kayla ground her teeth. Damn it, Joel. Where are you?

  ~ ~ ~

  Joel fought his way back to consciousness. His internal computer was still booting up and hadn’t come fully online yet. No data. Where was he?

  “Good morning, lover.” Like nails on a chalkboard, Amber’s voice grated, reviving dark visions from the past that Joel had hoped to keep forever buried.

  Cottony dryness coated his mouth and throat. As the fuzz in his brain cleared, his computer finished loading up. Sensors scanned as his gaze swept his surroundings.

  The vast, stone masonry chamber, high ceilinged and dimly lit, held a scene straight out of a horror movie. Wan moonlight seeped through tall, multi-paned, arched windows augmented only by thick candles on jewel-faceted golden stands scattered around the room. Flickering shadows played along the walls.

  Dominating the scene, an intricately carved stone altar on a raised dais held the squirming figure of Alvin T. Seneroski. The undisputed head of Ghaim struggled against shackles on his wrists and ankles.

  Once a legitimate businessman, Seneroski built a corporate empire that became the world’s leading criminal organization. The magnate owned his own island that was essentially an independent nation. When Ghaim was declared a criminal organization, the U.S. and six other countries, with U.N. approval, blockaded the island, but all attempts to land had been rebuffed by his loyal security forces and the defensive fortress wall that ringed the island.

  Xi Force planned on aiding the multi-national force storming the island, but getting the international community behind
anything required red tape and string-pulling on the diplomatic level Joel didn’t even want to know about. Every country seemed to want something in return, even when the action directly benefited them anyway.

  Seneroski never left his island.

  Was that where Joel was now? He hung from shackles attached to the cold stone wall. To his right, a group of bound captives that included familiar faces from wanted posters.

  The cream of Ghaim’s upper echelon—all the missing bosses. Hands and legs tied tight, duct tape covering their mouths, most stared at the spectacle in the center of the room.

  “Are you awake, Joel?” Confidence drenched Amber’s tone. “I didn’t want you to miss this part.”

  “What’s going on?” He yanked at his restraints.

  Amber’s lips curled into a grin. “I’m making the world a better place, Joel. Just for you.”

  Reaching out with his internal wireless connection he found only one Wi-Fi hotspot and that was locked down tight. He started his intrusion program, but it would take a while to find the pass code.

  Amber tore the duct tape from Seneroski’s mouth. “Any last words, Alvin?”

  Seneroski pulled on his shackles. “Damn it, Susan, you can have anything you want. Money, power, a place on the council. Name it and it’s yours. You’ve proven your point. Now let me go.”

  Amber’s real name was Susan Mullins. As a corporate spy, she’d invented dozens of aliases. Amber was just the one Joel knew her by. The one that stuck in his head and haunted his nightmares.

  Dumph.

  Cigarette breath invaded the dankness of the chamber around Joel. The black-clad teleporter sidled up next to him. “This whole thing was orchestrated for you, you know.”

  Icy tingles crept up Joel’s spine. “What do you mean?”

  Amber commanded center stage on the dais, drawing a long samurai sword from a scabbard at her side. “Alvin, you old fool. The only thing you have that I want is your life.”