AMIRA

by Matthew Betley

  Chapter 24

  The helicopter had already landed by the time Amira ran through the chain-link fence gate and up the hill. A Bell 505, the smallest utility helicopter in Bell’s production line, the blue and white chopper sat on the pavement thirty yards away from the nose of the Air Force One replica as Trevor Emerson stepped into the open cabin on the passenger side. A man and a woman stood near the ticket booth at the bottom of the drivable passenger stairs that led up to the hatch of the plane. The downdraft of the rotor wash whipped around them, and they huddled together in the waning daylight.

  Amira ran as hard as she could towards the helicopter, intent on maximizing her only chance to prevent Trevor Emerson from escaping justice. Her eyes were glued to the cockpit, but she wasn’t fixed on Trevor. The pilot’s the only way. She didn’t know who the man was, his history, what family he had. All that mattered was that he’d agreed to act as a get-away pilot for a traitor, and that fact alone sealed his fate.

  As she grew closer, the helicopter lifted into the air as Trevor took the co-pilot’s chair on the right and watched Amira through the plexiglass. She was less than thirty feet away when she stopped and raised the SIGSAUER P229 9mm pistol and trained it on the pilot, who was focused on a clean takeoff so close to the Air Force One Experience. The helicopter continued to climb, but not quickly enough. Even though her sights were placed on the upper body of the pilot, she saw the look of fear appear on the face of Trevor and was pleased at the reaction. Time to test my aim. She pulled the trigger slowly, and the accurate 9mm pistol bucked in her hand.

  A spiderweb appeared in the cockpit glass where the pilot’s face had been, and Amira pulled the trigger again. More holes appeared in a perfect grouping. She waited for a response, but the helicopter hung suspended in the air, thirty-five feet above the pavement. Did I miss?

  The nose of the helicopter suddenly lurched and tilted forward as if tipping over, its nose pointed to the ground. The two people near the ticket booth were jarred from their amazement, and they turned and fled under the left wing of the Boeing 747 away from the helicopter.

  The helicopter shot forward and down, and Amira realized her aim had been true – she’d struck the pilot, and he’d pushed the cyclic flight stick forward and turned the throttle, which both dipped the nose and accelerated the revolutions per minute of the rotors. The Bell 505 shot forward directly towards the upper cockpit area of the Air Force One replica.

  Oh no, Amira thought, and turned away from the inevitable.

  In a tremendous roar that seemed to rip the world apart, the rotors of the Bell 505 slashed into the aluminum skin of the 747, tearing chunks of the shell away in pieces that flew in all directions, skipping across the pavement. The bird dug into the airplane, burrowing itself deeper as its engine disintegrated and the rotors broke apart, including a huge piece that tore a chunk of concrete three feet away from Amira’s head as she lay prone on the pavement, her hands over her head in defensive but useless protection. And then the world went silent, the unfolding destruction over.

  Amira looked back in awe at the 747 and the Bell 505 that now lay partially buried within the nose of the plane, its cockpit swallowed whole. Smoke rose from the ruined engine on top of the helicopter, but there were no flames. That’s one small mercy. But there’s still one last thing to do.

  Amira strode purposefully towards the stairs, which had escaped the destruction. She had to confirm that Trevor Emerson was dead or alive. The day could not end without it.

  Chapter 25

  John cringed in pain as he took the steps two at a time, his back throbbing from where he’d crashed into the railing. He hit the ground floor, ran past the hostess station, and exited the same way he’d entered less than ninety seconds before. There was blood on the sidewalk, and the skewer lay discarded. If nothing else, I hope the bastard dies of some kind of foodborne illness, he thought wishfully.

  He looked in both directions and heard shouts from around the curve to the right. He broke into a run, the pain in his back transitioning from the stabbing phase to the dull, throbbing phase, relieved at the slight improvement.

  He rounded the corner and spotted Samuel less than a block away, crossing the street in a sprint in front of a Starbucks. Come on, man. Why do you have to make this so hard?

  John ignored the pain, tapped into his reserves, and ran faster, his eyes tracking Samuel. While the skinny African was fast, John was faster, and he’d already reached the midpoint of the block when Samuel disappeared to the left around the corner.

  John knew there was no chance Samuel could escape, but he also knew the man’s fight-or-flight mode was fully engaged, and there was no shutting it off until he’d been caught. John had participated in too many chases like this one, and just like high-speed police pursuits, they usually ended only one way – with dramatic destruction and the suspect in custody or dead. And it’s your job to make sure no one else gets hurt.

  John reached the Starbucks on the corner to his left and kept running. National Plaza Street curved to the right along the water, with the Redstone American Grill restaurant on the left. Just past the restaurant was the entrance to the pier, which was where Samuel was when a second police vehicle squealed to a stop in the middle of the street. Unarmed, Samuel did the only thing a desperate man could do – he bolted left down the pier.

  Seconds later, John reached the same spot and screamed to the female African American Prince Georges County deputy who’d emerged from the SUV, “I’m FBI! I got this. Get to the Grace’s Mandarin to your fallen officer.”

  He didn’t wait for a response and ran up the pier, passing the enormous sand playground that contained a silver head and limbs sticking out from the sand, as if a giant were emerging from the ground. Known as The Awakening, it was another sight to behold at the National Harbor on a normal day that didn’t involve gunfire and mayhem.

  The pier was several hundred feet long and ended in one of the biggest attractions in the area – the Capital Wheel, a one-hundred-and-eighty-foot-tall Ferris wheel that provided views of the Potomac, Alexandria, the National Monument, the Capitol, and even the National Cathedral far away up the hill in northwest DC.

  This late in the afternoon so close to dusk, there was a lull of pedestrians on the pier, and both men ran around them like football players conducting cone drills.

  John was within twenty yards of Samuel when the fleeing man reached the end of the pier and the enormous wheel above him. He shouted, “Just stop for God’s sakes! There’s nowhere left to run. I won’t shoot you if you surrender.” His Kimber was trained on Samuel’s back, but the big gondolas kept spinning behind him, and he didn’t want to risk striking one.

  Samuel turned as the few pedestrians in the area scattered at the appearance of the two men. John’s peripheral vision caught a teenaged couple pull out cell phones and begin recording. Perfect. Just what I need. To be on Tik Tok.

  “You’re right, but it doesn’t matter. This country has no place for me. I’d rather die than spend time in one of your prisons.”

  “Well, I know what the prisons are like in Sudan,” John replied, recalling what Logan and Cole Matthews had told him about the black site prison they’d broken out of on their operation in Sudan. “And ours make yours look like wealthy country clubs. You killed a police officer back there, and no matter what happens, you’re going to pay for it. Your only hope is to stop running and get on the ground. Now.”

  Samuel contemplated his fate, and he knew that the man spoke the truth. But he also didn’t care. His war had ended with South Sudan’s independence. Asim’s first cousin, he’d already been in America working as a taxi driver in DC when Omar had approached him months ago with an opportunity for vengeance. He’d tired of feeling like a cliché, a foreigner driving a cab in a rich country’s capital. The amount of money Omar had offered would have provided him a comfortable life until the end of his years, but that was not to be, and he knew it. But he also knew he’d rather die on his own term
s than surrender on his knees in front of this American. I can die with honor, he thought, and responded with one resolute word: “No.” He turned and ran up the steps that led to the loading platform of the gondolas.

  “I knew this wasn’t going to be easy,” John muttered to himself as he reached the steps just as Samuel disappeared on the back side of the stairs. John bounded up the steps, reached the top, and leapt over a railing that divided the wide steps into multiple boarding lanes that led back down to the platform.

  “Hey! What are you doing?” a white male in his thirties, one of the Capital Wheel operators, exclaimed more in surprise than fear at the appearance of the skinny black man with a bloody white shirt.

  The operator stepped in front of Samuel, even as John clambered down the steps. He looked past Samuel at John, saw the pistol and FBI badge dangling from his neck, and said, “What the hell?”

  Samuel punched the man in the face, stepped forward, and delivered a violent push that sent the staggered man flying across the platform. He landed on his haunches and lay back, dazed at the violent attack.

  The only good thing about the assault was that it provided John the extra seconds he needed to holster his Colt 1911 and close the distance to Samuel. His prey heard his approach above the mechanical hum of the Ferris wheel’s four fifty-horsepower engines, and he turned his head just as John crashed into his back and sent the skinny man flying to his knees.

  Multiple white steel canopies with white, opaque panels covered the space, creating shifting shadows in the fading daylight as the gondolas kept slowly moving down across the platform and back into the air.

  “You,” John said to the fallen operator. “Get up and get out of here. Move.” The command shook the man back to reality, and he rose, moving slowly to the steps, holding his jaw where he’d been struck.

  When the operator was out of sight, John stood still and waited for Samuel to recover. The man turned to face him, straightening up from the blow John had just delivered.

  “Last chance. I won’t ask again.”

  Samuel only smiled in a weird, bitter way, as if laughing at himself. “You are correct. At some point, we all run out of chances.”

  Samuel rushed forward and threw a flurry of punches aimed at John’s head. John slipped and batted them away, as he found himself against one of the white steel girders supporting a canopy. Samuel suddenly turned to his left and swept his right leg up in a smooth roundhouse kick. John sidestepped it to his left and pushed Samuel’s shoe harder, forcing it to strike the steel girder.

  Samuel grunted in pain and brought his leg back to the platform.

  “That had to hurt, Samuel. Sure sounded like it. You want to keep doing this, or can we call it a day?”

  “You know my name,” Samuel said, pursing his lips. “Very well. What’s yours?”

  “John, and that’s all you’re going to get from me until you stop fighting.”

  Samuel shrugged, and instead, rushed forward, trying to tackle John, who brought both elbows down on the man’s upper back.

  Playtime’s over, John. End this, Amira’s voice sounded calmly in his head.

  John twisted to his left and raised a knee into the bent-over Samuel’s midsection. He repeated the move two more times until he felt the man go slack in his arms. He stepped to his right and flung the man away, sending him to the platform in a heap of battered bones.

  He moved closer to restrain Samuel when the fallen man somehow rose to his feet and turned to face John one last time. In his right hand was a small black knife with a curved tip and serrated back. He stared at John, and then he motioned with his left hand for John to come to him. It was the act of a man who wanted one last opportunity to prove himself before his conqueror.

  For the briefest of moments, John considered the challenge, but then he thought of Amira, and rational discourse took control in his head. I’m too old for this shit.

  In a blinding move, he drew his Kimber and fired a .45-caliber slug that struck Samuel in the upper right leg, shattering his femur. The man shrieked in pain and collapsed backwards through the opening in the railing for passengers to load and unload the gondolas.

  John recognized what was coming, but there was nothing he could do to stop it. By trying to preserve Samuel’s life, albeit with a severe wound to his leg, he’d inadvertently doomed him to death. It was like watching a horrific car accident in excruciating slow motion.

  Samuel howled in pain as the fifteen-hundred-pound, climate-controlled gondola descended on to the platform with less than ten inches of clearance below the massive carriage. He sensed the presence of the car and turned to his left, just in time to see the black bottom of the car smash into his face, breaking his nose and left cheekbone. His head twisted to the right as the car traveled over his body, rolling and breaking it inch by inch as it slowly worked its way across him. He screamed in agony, but his cry was cut short as his head was pinned next to his shoulder and the carriage snapped his neck with a loud crack that made John wince.

  The car cleared the body, and John stepped forward and grabbed Samuel’s legs. He pulled the dead man clear of the opening, and Samuel’s eyes stared up accusingly from a head that had been internally and bloodlessly decapitated.

  John stared down at the man, but he felt no sympathy for the cop killer who lay dead before him. “You brought this on yourself. No one else,” he whispered, and turned away to find the wounded operator to turn off the Wheel. Whatever passengers were left onboard were about to find out that they’d paid for a ride that included homicide as an added attraction.

  Chapter 26

  Amira stepped off the mobile staircase and into a hellish landscape of twisted metal, leaking fluids, and dark shadows. Immediately to her left was the nose of the plane where the museum had reconstructed the presidential sleeping quarters. She’d seen pictures of it in the press coverage that had announced the Air Force One Experience – two blue-blanketed beds, one on each side of the nose angling in towards each other, wood paneling shelves, a wooden chair, and even a large desk at the foot of the bed on the starboard side of the plane. But that picture had been wiped away, replaced with something ripped from a disaster movie.

  With dusk approaching, the presidential quarters were shrouded in darkness. The bulbous glass of the cockpit stretched across the space, a black glossy reflection that touched each bed as if the mechanical beast slumbered upon them. There was a gap where the open compartment of the helicopter intersected with the skin of the plane, but all she saw was darkness, taunting her with hidden threats. Overhead, chunks of the airplane’s skin had been torn from the frame by the rotors as if a giant clawed beast had swiped at the nose. The desk had been toppled over and amazingly stood on its left end as if at attention, a deep crack running down the middle of the bottom of the desk. Hissing and popping noises rose from the helicopter’s ruined engine, and the pungent odor of hydraulic fluid and aviation kerosene filled the space. She realized the cockpit glistened because of the fluids leaking down it like a slow-moving lava lamp.

  She held her pistol close to her chest, ready to extend and fire at the first moving object. Here we go. She took a step forward so she could peer into the cockpit and determine if Trevor was trapped inside with the pilot. Part of her hoped he’d died in the accident, but either way, she had to know for certain. She took a second step towards the plexiglass when she sensed movement from her right, and she instinctively sidestepped to the left as the axe sailed by her right arm, missing by inches.

  Bastard, she thought as she shot out her arms to neutralize Trevor, whose face was a red mask from the lateral gash he’d sustained above his forehead when he’d struck the windshield in the crash. He wielded a crash axe constructed of a titanium handle, stainless-steel blade, and a stainless-steel pike. Lightweight, it had gaps in the handle and looked like it had been constructed out of metallic bones and belonged in the hands of a Viking, not a former CIA employee. Trevor brought the pike end of the savage-looking weapon bac
k up and knocked Amira’s pistol away as the pointed pike buried itself in her forearm.

  The weapon discharged, a deafening sound in the enclosed space, and she dropped it from the pain that shot up her arm. She grunted through the white hot agony as Trevor pulled the weapon free from her arm. He swung the axe down and backwards in a wide circle as he tried to bring it down on top of Amira, but she reached up with her fully functional left arm and grabbed the handle just above his right hand, stopping the axe at its apex. While her right hand might have dropped her pistol reflexively, the hand still worked, and she balled it into a fist and smashed it into Trevor’s face.

  Trevor brought his left arm up to defend against the blows, but several punches landed, dazing him.

  Amira sensed the momentary weakness and slammed his right hand against the cockpit plexiglass. She delivered a knee to his left side and felt his body weaken, even though he still held the axe handle. She slammed his hand one more time against the Plexiglass and held it in place as she punched the underside of his right wrist as hard as she could. The result was instantaneous, and his hand reflexively opened, releasing its grip on the axe.

  The axe fell, and she caught it in her left hand, ending its freefall. She spun like the ballet dancer that she once was in a perfect pirouette, pike end of the axe flashing around her in a flat arc.

  Trevor sensed the motion and dropped down into a crouch, and the pike sailed over his head and buried itself into the Plexiglass of the cockpit.

  Amira yanked on the axe, and the pike freed itself, tearing a chunk of Plexiglass away.

  Trevor launched a sharp uppercut, but Amira moved her head, partially slipping it. The force of the punch was still enough to send pain shooting along her left jawline, but she ignored it and brought the end of the axe handle straight down into the middle of his back. While it wasn’t sharp enough to pierce his body, the chisel and wire-cutter handle shot pain up the middle of his back, and he dropped to his knees. She struck him again, and he fell face-down on to the yellowish-beige carpet, which was soaked from the leaking hydraulic fluid and aviation kerosene.