Shadow Corps- Escape From Shadow

by David Reese

  Paul burst into a sardonic laughter, which was more to ease the tightness in his chest than from mirth. When he saw they weren’t joining in his mirthless laughter, he shut up.

  “You’re probably going to try and fight your way out of HQ…”

  “Damn right, I will,” Paul muttered through clenched teeth.

  “And we’re going to take you down,” Scott replied. He paused, fixing a cold stare on Paul. Then he said in a voice that could have put the fear of God in anyone: “I won’t hesitate, Paul. I swear to you, I won’t hesitate to put a bullet in your head.”

  Chapter 6

  “Gee, Scott, thanks,” Paul replied. “So much for being best friends.”

  “So your only option is to run away,” Scott said, shocking Irene who glanced at him with a start, surprised.

  “Run away, right now,” Scott said. “Open that door. Walk right out. Never return. Go into hiding. Go into exile. We’ll probably come after you, but we won’t find you. You’ll be safe. You’ll live.”

  Irene looked from Scott to Paul. Paul met her gaze. She didn’t say anything, which meant she agreed with Scott.

  For a moment, Paul saw his way out. An overwhelming desire came on him to take the offer. He had succeeded in saving the kids. There was nothing left for him back at Shadow Corps. This was his out. It could all be over in taking this one decision.

  However, try as he did, he couldn’t bring himself to make that decision. It wasn’t in him to run away—to cower like a scared dog. No, he wasn’t going to run. He was Commander Paul White of the Shadow Corps. He was not running anywhere. If they wanted to take him down, they had better be prepared to do it with a fight.

  Paul smiled at Scott. “It’s good to know I have you on my side.” He turned to Irene. “Both of you. Thanks.”

  “So a no then?” Scott asked to be sure.

  “No,” Paul replied. “Take us to the airport.”

  Scott continued driving.

  Moments later, Paul received a call from Thomas. He decided to take it through the vehicle’s comm system so Irene and Scott could listen in.

  “Thomas, go ahead,” Paul said, picking up the call.

  “Paul, you’ve got to stay away from HQ,” Thomas replied.

  Paul frowned. “Why?”

  “I just got a message telling me you’ve been relieved of you command and I’ve been placed in charge of the team,” Thomas replied. “I’ve been asked to bring you into custody for treason charges. Whatever you do, do not go to HQ. There’s a kill order pending on your dossier.”

  “But…”

  “Listen to me, Paul,” Thomas replied with a commanding firmness in his voice, easily slipping into his new role as the Commander. “Stay away from HQ. Let me find out what’s up. Let Scott and Irene take you AWOL. We’ll say you all were involved in an accident or something. Just stay away from HQ. Thomas out.”

  The urgency in Thomas’s voice caused Paul’s heart to climb his chest. All his thought about not going out with a fight flew out the window. He was indeed paralyzed with fear.

  They were now on Harborside Drive, approaching the airport. Boston Logan International Airport stood ahead of them at the very end of the road, its many lights blazing in the night.

  Scott looked in the rear view mirror. He was waiting for Paul’s instructions.

  Irene’s phone chirped as did Scott. Irene looked at her phone, then looked at Paul with disbelief.

  “It’s a capture order for you,” Irene muttered, her voice breaking with emotion.

  “We’re to bring you in with force if necessary,” Scott replied.

  Irene’s phone chirped again, while Scott kept on speaking. “The other guys would have gotten this information. Even the DHS agents. The FBI. The local PD. Everyone. It’s a department wide APB. You’re now the most wanted man in the United States.”

  Paul’s blood ran cold. Thoughts refused to form in his mind. He stared back at Scott, blank.

  Irene’s voice cut through the fugue. “Thomas sent me a message. He wants us to take you somewhere safe. He wants us to go off the radar.”

  Irene glanced at Scott then at Paul. “It’s an official order from him. I don’t understand. How can he issue an official order that contravenes the one issued from HQ?”

  “He believes we’ll follow his order and not the one we received from HQ,” Scott said, slowing the car down right at the point where there was a U-turn. He parked on the shoulder of the road and idled the car.

  Scott glanced at Paul. “You still want to do the whole Rambo thing?”

  Paul shook his head. “Thomas knows better. I trust him. Let’s do what he says.”

  Scott and Irene nodded. While Irene relaxed back into her chair, Scott pulled the car off the side of the road, did a U-turn, and gunned the vehicle down the other side of the road, away from the airport.

  “We have to switch vehicles,” Paul commented. “We also need to remove all the tracers. We need to go completely dark.”

  “I know a guy who can set us all up,” Scott replied.

  “Oh yeah?” Irene replied with a warm smile. “I know a guy, too.”

  Scott didn’t smile back. He only eyed her through the rearview mirror. “Well we’ll go with my guy first. He’s local.”

  They drove into the heart of East Boston before Scott rammed the car into an oncoming gas tanker. Irene and Paul managed to get the driver out in time before the tanker exploded in a ball of flame, burning the SUV to crisps. No one was hurt, except Scott who sprained an ankle trying to escape the SUV.

  Scott led Irene and Paul on a ten kilometer run through East Boston until they arrived in Orient Heights. At this time of the day, they passed through streets and dark alleyways to avoid police checkpoints.

  Already, helicopters were passing overhead every once and again. And with the tracers still in their blood, HQ had their locations and were probably vectoring police and DHS agents towards them. It wouldn’t be until another hour or so before shadow agents would be involved.

  Paul’s team members were probably already grounded—HQ would not be able to entrust them with bringing in Paul.

  By the time they got to Orient Heights, they were met by Scott’s guy, who led them to a small bungalow in an abandoned street. Without questions, this guy gave them already prepared liquids to drink, which would purge out the tracers from their bloods. He also arranged for weapons and vehicles: a 2006 Toyota Camry and a 2010 Corolla.

  Irene and Paul took the Camry, while Scott took the Corolla.

  “Thanks, man,” Scott said to his man.

  “No problem, Scottie,” the man replied. “Shadow agents landed at the airport a few minutes ago. They’re headed here. You had better leave immediately. Stay safe and I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  Scott replied, “I hope so, too.”

  This was the extent of their conversation. Scott ducked into his Corolla and drove off. Irene and Paul chased after Scott in their Camry.

  Sitting in the front passenger seat, Paul took the phone Scott’s man had given him and dialed Scott’s new number. They had already maneuvered unto I-93 and were currently speeding down the highway. Scott had the lead, Irene gave chase.

  “Where to now?” Paul asked.

  “We need to get out of Massachusetts,” Scott replied.

  “They’d have blocked all the roads,” Paul said. “Checkpoints everywhere.”

  “They may not have thought to block the way via Manchester,” Scott replied. “I know a backroad into New Hampshire.”

  “And if they have?” Irene asked from the driver’s seat.

  “Then we fight through the checkpoint and hope to God there aren’t shadow agents waiting for us there.”

  With a click, the line went dead.

  Chapter 7

  They drove in silence. The city side was dark, unusually so since Boston was a mega city that rarely went to sleep. Paul hadn’t been to this side of the East Coast in a while, yet he remembered that the
streets used to be lit up with neon signs of stores and restaurants and everything in between and of course a few street thugs and criminals causing a nuisance at this time of night.

  But now, he could have as well been passing by a ghost city.

  Aside from the streetlamps, the whole area was dark closer to Manchester. Paul became suspicious. It was protocol to cut power to whole areas before the ingress of shadow agents. This was to keep their queries disoriented or blinded, making it easier for shadow agents to perform their duty.

  In this case, Paul was the query. Irene and Scott weren’t since they were simply doing the bidding of their superior—now Thomas. Paul knew that if this blackout was caused by the Shadow Corps, then they were already compromised because it would mean they were being tracked.

  Try as he did to discard the notion that they were still being followed by some unknown method, he couldn’t. Paul wasn’t trained to lightly consider events. What people saw as coincidence, he was trained to see as enemy action until proven otherwise.

  The man they’d gone to wasn’t known to Paul, only to Scott. What if he had somehow planted a chip in them in case he needed an out if he was caught by shadow agents? It would therefore mean that their journey was ended even before it began.

  “Will you loosen up a bit?” Irene’s voice cut through the jumble of thoughts his mind. She briefed a glance at him before returning her eyes to the road. “You’re making me antsy.”

  Paul hadn’t realized his face was contorted in a focused frown. He allowed himself to relax, heaving a sigh as he did. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  Irene didn’t reply.

  Paul looked at her for a long time, noting the delicate curves of her face, her long, pleasing-to-look-at neck, the slight bulge of her breasts, the firm angles of her waist… He’d held that waist so many times that he’d taken it for granted since it belonged to him. Now he was going to lose it … he was going to lose her. His situation was beginning to dawn on him.

  He could ask her to come with him. But then she’d just interpret it as asking her to violate the law and be branded as a sympathizer. Of all the members of his team, Irene was one person who was an extremist with Shadow Corps rules. She would sooner slit her throat or yours than give up the Corps or go against its tenets. Putting her in that position by asking her to turn her back on the Corps would not only be cruel of Paul, it would be downright madness.

  “Will you stop looking at me lewdly?” she spoke, softly.

  Paul cut his eyes away from her body. Embarrassed, he focused on Scott’s taillights ahead of their car. They were currently navigating a roundabout somewhere in Concord—the last major town before entering New Hampshire. Instead of continuing on I-93 to city limits, they exited onto a narrow road that didn’t seem to be lead past a residential looking farmhouse up ahead.

  “You lost the right to do that, when you decided it was okay to break the rules,” she said.

  Paul shook his head, still trying to come to terms with the fact that she was referring to his actions of not burning a bunch of kids to crisp back at the harbor as breaking the rules. He resisted the urge to reply her. He knew that whatever reply he gave would never be enough. It would only lead to an argument.

  But Paul failed. “I can’t believe you would burn kids down!” he roared at her, his pent up anger coming to the fore in a bright blaze of glory.

  Irene was a bit startled, her hands flinching on the steering wheel.

  “It’s not wrong if it’s the mission,” she replied. Her face was clenched tightly.

  Paul couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Killing innocent kids is not wrong?” he asked. The very statement sounded more absurd now he had said it than when it was in his mind. “Who are you?”

  Irene turned to look at him before she spoke. “The same girl you’ve been having sex with for the past three months.”

  Paul looked away.

  “The same girl you professed to be in love with three weeks ago,” Irene continued. “The very same girl you scoured the entire Paris for just to buy a wedding ring.”

  That drew Paul’s gaze. “How did you know about that?” he blurted.

  Irene’s eyes were already teary. She blinked away the tears, several drops making their way down her cheek and turning them moist. “You were going to propose?”

  Paul didn’t reply. His hand instinctively went into his right pants, where the ring rested. He twirled the object in his fingers, taking time to feel the smooth surface of the diamond stone.

  Irene watched him do all that, her suspicion confirmed.

  “Then why throw it all away?” she asked, her voice suddenly thick with emotions. “Why throw away what we have?”

  “It’s not about us, Irene,” Paul answered. He couldn’t bring himself to look at her. He could feel her grief pour over him like a flood. “It’s about what’s right and what’s wrong.”

  “What we have is right,” Irene replied. “If it were about that, then you are wrong. Running away like this is wrong. Putting yourself in the position where you have to run away is wrong.”

  Paul shut his eyes. This little talk with Irene was giving him a headache. More so, it was making him question his motives.

  Why hadn’t he thought about the ring when he’d decided to spare the kids? Why hadn’t he given thought to Irene and how she felt?

  Paul eyes flew wide open when he heard the screech of a tire. Up ahead, Scott was bringing his car to a stop. Irene stomped on the brakes, too.

  They were currently on a two lane road bordered on both sides by dark, eerie trees.

  Paul’s reaction was to pick up to phone and call Scott. He wanted to know why they were stopping in the middle of nowhere. But then he heard the distinctive sound of a Shadow Corps drop ship—an incredibly advanced aircraft that ran on shadow energy. He quickly leaned in to the dashboard to look up at the dark skies.

  Descending to their position were seven drop ships. Seven.

  Each drop shop could carry at least twelve shadow agents. Paul did the math. They had sent eighty-four shadow agents to capture him.

  Paul didn’t know whether to be flattered or to be terrified.

  Chapter 8

  A powerful beam of light suddenly appeared over them from one of the drop ships. By now, Paul’s heart was thumping feverishly in his chest.

  “Unidentified vehicles, stand down,” boomed a voice over a speaker above. “Prepare to be boarded.”

  “Paul,” Irene breathed.

  Paul glanced at her. She motioned at the rearview mirror. “Look,” she whispered.

  Paul looked. Racing towards them was a long motorcade of SUVs. More agents were inbound—they had probably been following them for a while, waiting for them to get to this point, where their options of escape was all but nil.

  Paul’s phone rang.

  “Scott,” Paul said, putting the phone on speaker.

  “We’re surrounded,” Scott said.

  “No kidding, Scott,” Paul replied. “I already see that!”

  “There’s no escape from this one,” Irene said, “we have to surrender.”

  “I can’t!” Paul swore. “They’ll take me in and torture me.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe you should have thought of that before you developed a conscience on us,” Irene retorted, bitterness rolling from her like a boulder down a hillside.

  Paul glared at her. The tension racked up a few notches.

  “There’s one option,” Scott said a moment later, his tiny voice cutting through the sizzling atmosphere. “We can stall them, while you take off into the bushes. You can find your way out of Massachusetts. New Hampshire is only a few kilometers south.”

  “You want me to run?” Paul asked.

  “It’s the only way you don’t end up in a cell or worse in Purgatory, boss,” Scott replied. “I and Irene can easily be pardoned. Thomas, on the other hand, may not be so lucky, since he ordered us on this path. But you, you will not be spared.”

 
“He’s right,” Irene said. “Thomas put a lot on the line to get you out. If you decide to stick around, his sacrifice will be in vain.”

  Paul frowned. He didn’t like it. He didn’t like it one bit. He hated running like a scared cat. How could he run away from a challenge? He was a first rate, tier one black ops operative with a military background that would make any soldier in the world envious. Running away had been trained out of his DNA. To even consider such a suggestion was loathsome.

  On the other hand, the arguments Scott and Irene had made were true. Thomas was going to be investigated for ordering Scott and Irene to take off with the prisoner. He could probably get himself acquitted or he could get himself killed, it could go both ways for him.

  Whatever the case, he had put himself in the field of fire because of Paul. It would be insensitive and downright irresponsible if Paul took that sacrifice for granted by refusing to run.

  “Make a decision, boss!” Scott said.

  Paul looked again in the rear view mirror. The distant SUVs were now closer. Their red and blue lights pulsed but without the siren. Above, the drop ships had leveled up at a height of a three hundred feet. It was close enough for the agents to rappel down. But they weren’t doing so. They were waiting for the SUVs to surround them first.

  Paul judged that he had less than two minutes to make his escape, while not getting gunned down by the eighty something plus agents hanging over his head.

  “I’ll run,” Paul muttered, shutting his eyes and sucking in a lungful of air. When he opened his eyes, he said, “I need weapons.”

  “No time,” Irene and Scott said at the same time. Irene continued, “If they see you going for a firearm, they’d think you want to attack. They won’t hesitate to blow us up.”

  “So how do you suggest I make it away?” Paul said.

  Irene looked at him. She didn’t know.

  “You’re probably the most talented and powerful shadow-powered individual I know, Paul,” Scott said. “You’ll figure something out. I’ll distract them.”