Every so often, he will turn back, firing bullets at the creature chasing him, but he had his chance to murder me. He and Royce would have been successful, weren’t it for my guardian angel.
I could outrun him easily, but need him to lead me to Emily Rickard.
“Stop!” calls a voice from the helicopter above, yelling over a loudspeaker, “Put down your...things, and come along quietly!”
Maya is dead. Hazel is dead.
I am Death, and have no plans to go down without a fight.
The grizzled agent reaches Constitution Avenue; passing the National Archives, he cuts across the Smithsonian’s lawn toward the National Mall. No idea where he’s going, but it’s not toward Emily.
Might as well stop him here.
As if Tim understands every motive and decision, one of the multiple arms reaches out. It backhands Hardwick, sending him flying as we cross into the Mall. He lands on his side, wincing and spitting blood, only meters away.
I have to deal with the choppers.
There are four. They circle each other, careful not to cross paths, but panic in realizing they are nothing compared to me.
The legs, limitless in flexibility, extend easily. Four stay on the ground, to hold the others stable. Lifting me high towards them, the helicopters cease planning movements, skirting too close to each other. I remain in the center of them.
I don’t want to kill them, Tim.
Understanding of this, two of the airborne arms reach out, wrapping around one chopper tail. They fling the helicopters around, shaking up their passengers. Inside the cabin, my pursuers scream. One of the other helicopters tries to turn and escape, only to be held hostage by the other two limbs in the sky with me.
Below me, a flood of sirens arrives at the intersection of Ninth and Constitution from all directions. Law enforcement officers of all stripes and agencies pour over the Smithsonian’s lawn.
The limbs holding the first chopper slow, coming to rest sideways over the museum’s roof. Their occupants are coaxed out, given the chance to jump to safety. Doing the same with the other in his grasp, the airborne vehicles are emptied before the arms turn, flinging them at the Potomac with incredible accuracy. The blades of both are still operating, causing the vaulted choppers to spin violently in the air before landing in the water. Each casts red clouds and smoke on impact, sweeping black trails into the night sky.
Tim repeats this process with the other two circling helicopters, and soon, their floodlights no longer shine on Stephen Hardwick’s broken form. The limbs lower me down to where he crawls away, still under the illusion he can escape me.
Just as my feet touch solid ground once more, a platoon of FBI, DCPD, CIA, Secret Service and the Army burst through the hedges. For the third time in two days, I am surrounded, unsure how long I want to keep playing this game.
New choppers take the old ones’ place. circling the sky overhead while I am enclosed by snipers on rooftop buildings.
One by one, the voices ring out.
“Hands above your head!”
“Don’t you fucking move!”
“What is this goddamned thing?”
All of this destruction to save one little girl.
“Alright!” I call back, “Tim, put me down.”
The arms of shadow lower me to solid ground, retracting into my shoulder blades. Seconds later, they are wisps of my flesh, no longer visible to the men and women dispatched to apprehend me. All breeds of law enforcement have me at a standstill.
I want no more violence.
“This is the man responsible!” I say, pointing at Hardwick, who stops trying to crawl from judgement, rolling on his back to watch. “I don’t know how deep this mess goes, or just how many of you are involved! But God fucking dammit, we’re supposed to be here to serve and protect- the people, not our fucking jobs!
“Am I better than him?” I ask, shaking my head, “Not really. But you can’t take me down without arresting him, and everyone with a role in covering this up! Because everything I have done has been to save kids, and everything he’s done is....” I have to fight the burning eyes, but it comes anyway; the sobs out of my throat are fought, but prevail.
None of this is ever what I wanted to be.
“So,” I say, “What the fuck is it going to be? Are you law enforcement, or mercenaries? Are we for the people, or ourselves?”
All of these, the man who called himself the Spider told me on the phone, are steps which had to be taken in order to make this conversation tangible.
Just like the man Hardwick pretended to be, I had to become a monster to be heard.
Do you really believe I could walk up to you in the street, and have a civil conversation, without your colleagues shooting me on sight?
“All I want,” I tell the legion of authority trained on me, “is to bring Emily Rickard home. I don’t want all this. So let’s do our fucking jobs, and I’ll keep the freaky shit to a minimum, deal?”
This is it.
My moment of judgement in the eyes of colleagues. My clothes are frayed with fire and they see me capable of things I don’t want to consider myself.
The mob of blue and black goes uncomfortable, but nobody hates me enough to risk the limbs of Death re-emerging. I will take their silence as encouragement.
Walking to Hardwick, I pick up his weapon, flung aside when Tim hit him like a car. I don’t need the arms of darkness to subdue him, because several bones are broken, evident by grunts and wincing as I drag him along the grass. He fights every step until I stop, pointing the gun in his face.
“This is what it’s come to, Stephen. Unfortunately, you are the mastermind of this sick, twisted game! Don’t quite know where Royce figures in, but he’s going down, too.”
Hardwick chuckles, wheezing at the lung which I potentially collapsed.
“You’re too late, Knox.”
He knows he’s dying, and can take Royce’s location to the grave. He thinks Death will protect him, but it is on my side.
“I’m going to give you one chance to do the right thing, Stephen. Don’t let a child suffer for a career you won’t live to practice. Your brothers will pay for it, instead.”
He laughs, but the breath in it is final.
“Go to hell,” he groans. His head rolls to the side, eyes blank. In any other case, I know he would be a lost cause. Standing, I return to the cavalry blocking off a retreat to the Smithsonian.
I have no expectation of escaping this alive, or a free woman.
“Tell you what,” I tell them, squinting at the replacement choppers shining floodlights on me. “I’m going to make this easy for all of you. He’s dead. There is nothing holding any of you to this insane plan of his. If you let me stop Ryan Royce, I will turn myself in. Won’t say anything about the agents who sided with Hardwick, and take full accountability for my actions.”
“Did he give you the girl’s location?”
The frontline DCPD officer who asked the question is a black woman, no tolerance for bullshit in her expression. Her weapon, trained over the passenger side of a cruiser hood, can vouch for that.
“No, but I can find out,” I reply.
“How are you going to do that,” a male agent asks, “if Hardwick didn’t tell you?”
I smile back at their piqued curiosity.
“I have a superpower.”
Returning to the Arcway is a matter of Tim extending the shadow limbs from my shoulder blades, enveloping me in a cloud before evaporating away in the wind. To the people who witnessed it, is surely unexplainable, and will be the cause of many lost nights of sleep.
Tim has rendered me invisible, because Hardwick hasn’t noticed me standing there, plain as day, while they converse. I circle my former partner, trying to reconcile the persona he sold me with the human being he is.
“What is this?” he asks, climbing to his feet. The grizzled agent frowns, taking in the arrangement of darkness around us. There are no doors or windows into an escape
route, because Death has none to offer him.
“Welcome to the Arcway,” the man who calls himself Death says, “My name is Tim. Please, do not panic. You will not come to harm.”
“Am I dead?”
Tim locks eyes with me, offering a subtle shake of his head. “Unfortunately, you succumbed to your injuries, Agent Hardwick.”
Hardwick sighs. It is a breath of relief, unaware this celestial being is against him.
“Well, at least she didn’t get anything,” he mutters.
“What was that?” Tim asks.
“Oh, nothing. Somebody asking me questions as I died. I didn’t give her anything, thank God,” he chuckles.
Tim nods over Hardwick’s shoulder at me, where I have chosen to take my final stand against him.
“Well,” I say, “not yet, anyway.”
Hardwick gasps at my reappearance, stumbling back, almost losing balance. If Tim weren’t there to catch him, he might have fallen on his ass, scrambling away from me.
Bunching his collar and one of the suspenders in my grip, I launch him the other way. Hardwick stumbles, landing on his knees. Storming up to him, I train the gun on the back of his skull.
“What is this?” he asks the ground.
Kicking out, my shoe pushes him onto his back where he holds up his hands in surrender, knowing I am more powerful than he will ever be.
“Thought we were done, Stephen?” I ask, “How many times can you resurrect him, Tim?”
The man who calls himself Death shrugs.
“Many as you like, or need.”
“Good,” I reply, “how many more times do you want to die today, Stephen? Can do it different ways- shooting, drowning...guillotine, if I so need. I can get a guillotine, right, Tim?”
“Of course.”
Hardwick grimaces, struggling between his endgame and the threat of eternal pain, inflicted over and over again.
“So you see, Stephen,” I conclude, “you’re not as all powerful as you believe. On the other hand, I’ve had a special friend since I was five years old, who is all powerful, and ready to let me tear you apart.”
He says nothing, still.
“Where is Emily Rickard?” I yell.
At further silence, I pull the trigger. Hardwick’s current iteration is shattered between the eyes, rendered a mess of brain and blood between my legs. Stepping over the corpse, another copy of the grizzled agent manifests at Tim’s feet. Still recovering from the bullet I sunk in his skull, he struggles to maintain the line between awareness and terror.
Pulling him to his feet, I grab his new incarnation by the shirt again, training the gun back on his forehead.
“There’s no one to hear you scream, Stephen. Nobody to help you. Want to go again?”
“No,” he winces.
“Where is Emily Rickard?”
“What is it with you? Huh? Think they’re going to throw a parade in your honour, Knox? Look at you. A fucking monster; just another piece of shit thinking you’re better than you are!
“Nobody is going to care, Ramona. They’ll forget all you gave up for one kid. You’ll remember it, the rest of your life; you’ll... have to endure the consequences.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I reply. Pointing the gun down, I fire it through his stomach. I don’t know how many bullets are left - I suspect my ammunition has no numerical limit in this place.
Hardwick collapses, suffering all my rage, wishing it had end. The only end it has is Emily’s location. I ignore the theatrics, crouching over where he has fallen on his back, heaving as blood pours from his crumpled solar plexus.
Grabbing the rough cheeks, turning his head; I force those bloodshot eyes to peer into my own.
“Tell me what I want to know, Stephen. Do the right thing.”
Unable to respond, Hardwick seizes. I shoot him in the head and seconds later, he is reincarnated once more. But this time, in storming the distance between his last incarnation and this one, he screams, raising hands in front of his face.
“Alright!” The dual syllables are probably all he can manage in his state of shock. Three deaths in five minutes would do it to anyone. “I’ll fucking tell you! Just please, stop!”
I look to Tim, who wears no sympathy in the mask for my old partner. I see no reason to, either, and replace the gun against his skull.
“You have three seconds!”
“Potomac Boat Yard!” he says, “Just off Canal Road.”
I push the cold muzzle deeper into Hardwick’s temple, resisting the urge to shoot him a third time. Instead, I ask what the plan is.
“Royce is making the exchange with the buyer now. An agency boat will escort them to international waters, and then Emily Rickard is gone.”
“How many men are with him?”
Hardwick hesitates.
“How many?”
“All of them!” my former partner says.
“I want a fucking number, Stephen!”
“Twelve, including Royce.”
I have everything I need. Backing away from Hardwick, I drop the gun on the ground, turning away from the man responsible for all of this. Beyond redemption, he crawls for it; scrambling to his feet, he aims the gun at the back of my head.
I know this, because I hear the sound of the empty chamber; the mechanism with no bullet to draw on. I hear the click of Hardwick’s failure, all before turning to face him one final time.
As he stares at the emptied weapon, I ask Tim if he can transport me to Royce’s location.
“Of course,” my guardian angel says, smiling upon my defeated nemesis. “Just have to tie up some unfinished business here.”
“Wait...you’re not coming with me?”
Tim grimaces.
“Of course, I am. I will merely be distracted for a moment, so you won’t have use of me. That said, Ramona,” he says, “we will have to discuss our physical separation when this is all over.”
“I don’t know what that means, Tim. As usual.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Tim recants, “I am getting ahead of myself. Go on. I will meet you at the Boat
Yard. We will see this through together.”
“Okay,” I say, looking back to a portal which forms, disrupting my perfect idea of darkness. I don’t look at Hardwick; the man is no longer worth my time. Satisfying as it is seeing him sink to his knees before Tim damns him for all eternity, I have no wish to watch it occur.
All that matters, as it ever did, is bringing Emily Rickard home.
Chapter Twenty
No matter how you look at it; no matter how history remembers our heroic deeds, in spite of the darkest ones, I will not be remembered fondly.
I don’t know what I expected when I joined the Bureau. No idea what I was chasing; some sense of purpose, perhaps. Maybe on some subconscious level, I wanted to be able to legally shoot someone.
Kidding.
I had no expectations of a long, illustrious career, like Hardwick did. I didn’t become a law enforcement agent to gather commendations, or suck dick to the top of the hierarchical ladder. Was never political, or an asskisser.
In all likelihood, history will remember Ramona Knox as the woman who decimated a city’s worth of federal agents, and caused tens of thousands of dollars in damage to an iconic building in the Capitol. She will then be remembered for becoming a literal monster, rampaging through the streets of Washington, D.C., legs of shadow pounding the tarmac beneath them.
If I can free Emily Rickard, I will accept that legacy.
Appearing where Tim’s portal leaves me, across from the Potomac Boat Yard- a rowing club for children, ironically- I didn’t expect to live long at all. Since my earliest experiences, I have felt unworthy of life; like Daniel Knox should have shot me at the same time he murdered Tiffany Stewart.
I believe they call it survivor’s guilt.
The man who calls himself Death is the only reason Hardwick was exposed, and he will be the reason Ryan Royce goes down, too. Wa
lking to the chain link gate, behind which upturned kayaks and canoes are set neatly, the boathouse’s grimy exterior would almost be peaceful, if not for argument from inside it.
Tangled, singed hair blows at the back of my neck. In the space my heart should pound, the idea these could be my final steps into whatever awaits me on the other side should terrify me.
Easing the gate behind me back to its original position, I am decidedly at peace. I unholster the gun I used to repeatedly murder Stephen Hardwick, mysteriously replaced in my holster. Holding its barrel level to my temple, I approach slowly.
The voices inside the run-down boathouse are barely distinguishable. Twelve white males in their mid-thirties are all a carbon copy of one another. Only two are prevalent.
I recognize one’s as Ryan Royce.
“Fuck this!” the detective exclaims, just beyond the doorway I peer around. “I’m not going down for this, Mark! I got a career, and a shit apartment in Westminster I’m more fond of than I should be. No wife and kids yet-”
“No, just the FBI bitch you’re fucking,” Mark says; matching a face to the voice, I recognize him from the warehouse in Georgetown.
The suited man. Beside him, I count Patrick Barker, and tally his friends at nine more. I don’t remember all their names, but they’re going to be dead in a few minutes.
I need eyes on Emily Rickard.
“Not exactly fucking her anymore, am I?” Royce protests, “Cunt is dead.”
Nice.
“In any case,” Mark says, “We can’t wait on our silent partner indefinitely, Ryan. The buyer is coming for the girl. We have to be ready.”
Royce scoffs.
“The Russians aren’t going to deal with us! This is Hardwick’s deal. They’re his contacts. Girl is worth nothing to them if he can’t guarantee their security on the way out.”
“Regardless, Ryan, we’ll have to take the chance.”
Royce is clearly unnerved by Hardwick’s tardiness, because he pulls a gun on the man in a suit. So much rests on their protection from the Bureau; there is no way the DCPD could sustain an operation of this magnitude, for this long, and it still be classified to Hell. Without Stephen Hardwick, they are exposed.
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