With a Vengeance

by Marcus Wynne

  Like many politicians and other entertainers, he looked smaller in person than he did on television. He was small, banty almost, with a slight stoop and a pronounced bow between his knees that would be comical in someone else. Sam’s voice was slow and firm, and he took advantage of the innate charm of the Mississippi accent to full effect on the women in the room.

  He had the look of a habitual adulterer, Basalisa thought, and probably remained friends with many of them for years, like another famous southern politician from a state to the north and west of Mississippi. But to his credit, he didn’t try that with her.

  “Special Agent Coronas, I’m Sam Waters,” he said, looking her in the eye. They were about the same height. “I very much appreciate you taking the time to fill me in on things here. I realize that you have a full plate and then some, and I don’t want to keep you from your work. There is nothing on the national agenda more important than what you are doing, and I want you to know I know that. I’m just here to find out what I can do to help you do your job better, and faster. If that’s possible. So I won’t be taking up much time…and we can keep the dog and pony show to a minimum, all right?”

  He summoned up an ingratiating grin, then turned his attention to Hunter.

  “Special Agent James,” Sam said. “I just want to thank you for your service, sir. Your military service, and your distinguished, honorable, and very courageous service in your present position. I want to thank you on behalf of my constituents, and I believe I can safely speak for all Americans in tendering you the thanks you are due.”

  Basalisa noticed how that effusive praise made Hunter uncomfortable, and it was interesting how quickly the Congressman picked up on that as well.

  “I don’t mean to embarrass you, sir,” Sam Waters said quickly. “So I’ll just leave it at thank you, all right?”

  “That’s fine with me, Congressman,” Hunter said.

  “Well then, Agent Coronas,” Sam said, pulling out the nearest chair and waving her instead to the executive chair that had been reserved for him. “You won’t mind if I rest my old bones while you talk, do you? And don’t feel you need to stand and deliver…you’ve been working some long hours and feel free to take a load off. I’d fire up a smoke, but these damn gubmint regulations have robbed us tobacco sinners of the simple pleasures of a leisurely cigar.”

  “I’m sure we can bend things a little,” SAC McLaughlin said.

  “No rule bending on my behalf, Agent McLaughlin,” the Congressman said lightly. “I don’t believe that sets a good example.”

  “Of course, sir, of course!” McLaughlin hastened to say.

  “Agent Coronas?” Sam said.

  “Yes, Congressman,” Basalisa said. “I appreciate your candor, and I’m grateful for the opportunity to cut things short.” She ignored the dagger glance the SAC shot her.

  “Here’s the short version,” she said. “We are working a number of investigative leads. Primarily among those is tracking any connection between the shooter at the airport and Ahmed Samir Said, and then concurrently, thanks to Agent James’s efforts, monitoring and tracking what appears to be increased hostile surveillance on aviation security operations in the upper Midwest, specifically in the Chicago area at O’Hare and midway airports. We have an intensive electronic investigation going on to track the movement of the video data files transmitted to us.

  “Key investigative findings at this point include the identity of the shooter at the airport…”

  “Who was he?” Sam Waters interrupted.

  Basalisa paused. “Our investigation indicates that he was retired Master Sergeant Alvin B. Torkay, a US Army veteran of the first Gulf War. At this point we have identified no linkages whatsoever between him and Ahmed Samir Said. We have discovered that his military records have been tampered with; certain portions deleted and the master paper file, the original, is missing the National Records Center.”

  “Now what the HELL does that mean?” the Congressman said, clearly agitated. “Was he a Muslim? One of the Nation? What?”

  “No sir,” Basalisa said. “He was a Catholic, non-practicing as far as we’ve been able to determine.”

  “We’ll come back to that,” the Congressman said. “Give me the rest of the news, and I hope it’s not all as bad as that!”

  “Yes, sir,” Basalisa said. “Investigation continues on the electronic tracking. We hope to make some progress there. Other datums that have surfaced concern Ahmed Samir Said…the name he’s given is made up of the first names of the first three AKAs attached to one of the hijackers of TWA 847 in 1985…”

  “He’s one of those?” Sam said.

  “We don’t believe so,” Basalisa said. “His appearance is younger than you would expect from someone who would have been in his 20s to early 30s in the middle 80s. We suspect it’s a pseudonym meant to show solidarity with prominent hijackers and attackers of the US Civil Aviation System.”

  “Agent James has done an excellent job in assembling an intelligence profile that indicates that there is significant hostile surveillance on-going. Not just aircraft, but also at airport terminals, facilities frequented by airline personnel…very much in line with what the video footage you provided shows.”

  “Oh, hell yeah,” Sam Waters said. “That footage…anything on that?”

  “We’re working it, sir,” Basalisa said. “The DVD that came to you was slipped into a regular courier bag, went through the usual screening for explosives and bio/chem and then went into the distribution system. All prints on the slip case came from people in charge of handling that item, but our forensics continue. The digital signature of the recording indicates that the same camera that captured the original Said footage captured some of the footage on your DVD. So it’s the same people.”

  “Why? Why tell us what they’re doing?”

  “To promote panic and fear, sir,” Basalisa said. “That’s the purpose of terrorism.”

  Hunter shifted forward slightly, a non-verbal cue that Basalisa picked up.

  “Agent James?” she said.

  “It could be deception as well,” Hunter said. “The planners could be muddying the waters, giving us so much to look at that we’ll miss something else, that something else being what they are really working on.”

  “That’s pretty convolute thinking, isn’t it?” Sam Waters said.

  “It’s an integral part of 4th generation warfare, Congressman,” Hunter said. “Deception is part and parcel of the kind of network warfare we’re fighting right now.”

  “You think the involvement of a retired Army sergeant is part of that?” Congressman Waters asked.

  Hunter shrugged. “I can’t answer that, Congressman. It could be. It could also be that there’s a glaring and obvious linkage that we just haven’t found yet. It’s too early to tell.”

  “That bothers me,” Waters said. “That really bothers me. Okay. So that’s it in a nutshell, then, huh? All right. I can take the briefing materials with me, read it on the plane back to Washington. But this is the important thing, the thing I came here to ask you face to face…what else do you need to get your job done? What can I do? Whose ass do I have to kick, if kissing it won’t work?”

  He paused and looked long at Basalisa, then at Hunter.

  “I want the two of you to know that you have an ally in me. A friend. Somebody who will go to bat for you and stay there till it gets done. The President has honored me with this appointment, and while there’s a lot to it, from this old boy’s perspective the most important thing of all is what you all are doing here. That’s it. Nothing more than this. Finding these sons of bitches before they hurt any more Americans, crushing them and their apparatus. So tell me. Now. What else do you need? More bodies, more money, what?”

  Basalisa inclined her head at Hunter. “Agent James?”

  Hunter nodded. “Congressman, we need you to come down hard on the TSA and DHS about the need to step up all additional security measures on all aviation security rela
ted installations in the Upper Midwest, and then across the country. It’s not just in-flight we have to worry about…though that’s plenty. We have to worry about the Enroute Centers, we have to worry about the terminals, we’ve got to worry about what’s on the public side. The powers that be are crying about the money…but sir, what is one life worth? What about a couple of hundred? Or thousands?”

  “I’ll be on the phone to the Secretary and the National Security Advisor as soon as I’m back on the plane and can have a secure conversation,” Waters said. “You can count on it. What else? Agent Coronas?”

  “The Bureau has seen that I have all the resources I require, Congressman. There is no higher priority in the FBI than this investigation, and I have what I need. It would be useful, though,” she paused, glanced at the SAC. “If Agent James was able to communicate directly to your office, to keep you informed about how things go, and keep you in the loop. I could do that, of course, but Agent James has more flexibility.”

  “Done,” Sam Waters said. He gestured to a young assistant. “Joanne? Give Agent James the office numbers….and give him my cell phone.”

  “Your cell phone, sir?” the young aide said, surprised.

  “Direct means direct,” Sam Waters said. He looked at Hunter. “My friends all have my cell phone number.”

  Despite the obvious working that Waters was doing, Hunter nodded in acknowledgment. “Thank you, sir.”

  “Anything else?” Waters said. “No? Well then, let’s get out of your hair, all right? You two want to walk me out a bit?”

  Hunter looked at Basalisa, who nodded. “Sure, Congressman. Would be an honor.”

  “Bet that was the shortest Congressional briefing you ever gave, huh?” Sam said, grinning.

  “Well, sir,” SAC McLaughlin started.

  “I appreciate your time, Agent McLaughlin,” the Congressman said, cutting the FBI supervisor off. “Let’s go.”

  Hunter and Basalisa followed the Congressman out. Waters slowed and let the two of them draw abreast with him while the SAC hurried ahead. In the hallway there was a crowd of FBI agents, some in raid jackets, along with uniformed Chicago PD cops and a smattering of plain clothes protective agents from the Capitol Police.

  “Son of a bitch likes to lead the parade, don’t he?” Sam Waters said to no one in particular, pointing his chin at the waddling back side of SAC McLaughlin. Basalisa kept her face carefully impassive, but Hunter allowed himself a small grin.

  Force of habit and training kept Hunter a step behind the Congressman to the Congressman’s right, and as they moved down the hallway they brushed by an agent who had paused for a moment, his back to them. Something about the man’s posture bothered Hunter…there was some tension in the man’s neck and he wasn’t doing anything…

  As they walked by the man turned to look at them, the Congressman, then directly at Hunter, then back at the Congressman. Hunter clocked him: Asian male, probably Filipino, healthy and fit, hard eyes, some kind of intention lingering there…the Asian agent had an open folder in his left hand and his right hand was out of sight behind his leg…

  Pay attention, even to trifles…

  The words of Musashi as passed on by Raven, so long ago, by the running waters of the river, deep in the canyons…

  “What does it mean, ‘To hold down the shadow?’” Raven said. “This is when you can see your attacker’s spirit…his intention. You beat his timing with an appropriate action so as to establish your own timing…you smother his intention with yours…”

  In the way that those who have never been in harm’s way will never understand, the warrior within Hunter James pulled together a million bits of information about the Asian agent standing there with a folder in his hand, the set of his shoulders, the narrowed gaze, the tension in him, maybe even the faint smell of adrenalin rising, some even said the very energy of a human, and he knew what was coming and he stepped forward his left hand reaching for the agent’s shoulder, just a push…

  …and the agent flipped his folder up at Hunter’s face, but Hunter had seen that technique before, a long time before, beside the river…

  …most people never see the knife coming,” Raven said. “But to introduce subtlety, artistry even, to the attack, you integrate deception in all things…give their eyes something else to look at, and send the attack along right behind that…their brains won’t be able to process it coming in like that…

  But Hunter could.

  He ignored the folder flapping at his face, struck the agent (solid muscle under his hand and definite intention) with his left hand and felt, rather than saw the blade coming up in a classic pekiti tersia opening attack, the rolling jab at the eyes, to blind the opponent and degrade his ability to fight, and Hunter’s forearm struck his opponent’s knife hand (part of his brain registering the length of the knife held pikal style, the point down and the edge in) smothering the attack and slammed, body to body, against his opponent, bouncing him off the corridor wall.

  “Knife!” Hunter shouted.

  And, as was to be expected, the relaxed agents, all of them armed and trained, took a moment to try and understand what was happening.

  Except Basalisa Coronas. She grabbed Congressman Waters by the back of his neck and the belt at the small of his back, and spun him away from the two struggling men.

  “Cover, goddammit!” she shouted, as she hustled the Congressman down the hallway towards and exit door. “Cover us!”

  Three agents, all her own, sprang after her, pistols blooming in their hands like deadly flowers. The others stood for a moment more, torn between assisting Hunter or running after the Congressman. Two agents rushed to help Hunter.

  Too late, Hunter shouted “Stay back!”

  He tried to drive his knee into his attacker, but the younger, stronger man was ready for that, and as soon as one of the assisting agent’s laid hands on him, blocking Hunter, the knife man was ready for that as well. The agent trying to help wrapped both hands around the attacker’s knife hand, and he never saw the left hand drop down and present the other knife, edge up…the knife man ducked his knees, and then thrust up with the strength of his legs assisting him as he opened the helping agent’s belly like a shopping bag.

  Hunter saw the dying man’s eyes open wide with shock, and he smelt the unmistakable smell, something you’d never forget once you’d smelt it, the reek of an opened active intestinal tract right under your nose. And the Filipino killer never blinked.

  He’d killed like that before.

  The gutted agent fell back, his hands clutching at the huge open wound and the greasy coil of blue white intestines spilling out.

  “Fuck!” his partner screamed.

  The Filipino assassin kicked the other man back, butted at Hunter, then brought both hands up the whirling flow of a double dagger attack. It looked like a buzzsaw with massive teeth coming at him.

  Not enough space to draw his pistol; that’s what the attacker was counting on.

  Hunter stumbled back, away from the blades; he had no angle of attack for empty hands…

  He felt, before he heard, the shot pass him. A series of cracks and the compression of bullets coming very closely by him. The ting of a bullet nicking a blade, and Hunter saw the sparks of that, felt metal spatter on his face; and then the sudden dark holes, two of them, right on the bridge of the assassin’s nose…

  Hunter’s hand fell to his pistol, but he saw it wasn’t needed. The assassin stumbled forward. One hand, still clutching the knife, fell to his front and embedded the blade in his own thigh. He fell, boneless, to the floor.

  Hunter looked back, over his shoulder, where the shots had come from.

  Basalisa Coronas was locked out in a solid Isosocles, a Combat Commander rock steady in her small hands, her muzzle and sights tracking the downed assassin. She brought the pistol to a high Shaw ready, checked 360 degrees, then moved in.

  “Are you injured?” she said to Hunter.

  Hunter checked. Blood seeped
from his left forearm. He tugged the sleeve up and saw the swell of a cut. Not bad, maybe a few stitches.

  “Nothing serious,” he said. He looked down at the dead assassin, then at Basalisa. Her eyes were narrowed, and he saw the pulse beating in a small vein in her forehead. Her nostrils flared and she took a deep breath, held it, let it out slowly, then did a tactical reload on her .45 and holstered it. She dropped the partially empty magazine into her blazer pocket.

  “Thank you,” Hunter said.

  She looked at him, and for an instant he saw all the way to her core being. Past the adrenaline rush, past the fear they all felt, past the cool control to the fierce righteous killer at her core.

  “My pleasure,” she said.

  4

  “Christ on the cross,” Sam Waters said. “Just what the hell is going on here? It’s bad enough I got the press out to gut me, but the FBI too?”

  Hunter gave Sam an appraising look; the humor, while a little forced, was real nonetheless and that was a welcome, and surprising trait in a politician who’d just had a narrow brush with a real and ugly death.

  “That was some damn fine shooting, Agent Coronas,” Sam said. “I thank you for getting me out of harm’s way.”

  Basalisa nodded, once. Then she turned to the task at hand.

  “I want him taken apart,” she said. “All his clothing, all his ID, everything down to his underwear. I want all the camera access footage, I want the logs from the entry points, I want everything. I want to know who he is, where he came from, how he got here.”