by Sam Jones
Eventually the call came on the safe house’s landline.
Ferris.
She told Billy to get his shit and camp out on the sixth level of a parking lot back in Miami.
“We need to talk.”
Three hours later, Billy was waiting in complete silence in the garage, wondering what was going to happen next and hoping he hadn’t been pulled off the assignment.
Sykes deserves justice.
His family deserves justice.
And then it hit him. A tug in his gut, the same one that visited him every day.
Every day since Special Agent Andy Sykes died.
Billy always put up the front that it didn’t bother him as much as it did. He kept his head down and powered through the days where he felt the hole in his heart fighting to heal itself, but every once in a while he couldn’t help but think of his buddy.
Every once in a while he remembered his brother.
For someone like Billy, whose team didn’t have a lot of players on the bench, Andy Sykes was the best friend that he ever had.
Hands down.
They had initially met during the war, both of them drafted into the same unit of the Marine Corps. Their first meeting was somewhat hostile, but it would end up turning into one of the top-ten buddy comedies of all time.
During basic, Billy, only one week into the thick of his training, was climbing the wooden obstacle on the course when he slipped and fell onto the goliath, two-hundred-and-fifty-pound ox and former convict by the name of Cronauer and nearly got his head split open by the guy’s gorilla-sized fists as a result. Sykes, never having spoken more than two words to Billy at this point, stuck his nose into their business on behalf of Billy right as Cronauer was cocking a fist and Billy was raising his own in response.
“Let it go,” Sykes said, wedging himself between Billy and Cronauer. “It was an accident.”
“Run along, dickhead,” Cronauer said. “This is between me and the pretty boy here.”
“Back off, Cronauer,” Sykes said, standing right next to Billy; nudging him and letting him know that he had his back. “Seriously.”
Cronauer sized them up. He wasn’t going to back down. He said, “This ain’t your problem.”
Sykes said, “You’re everybody’s problem.”
Cronauer took a step forward. “You really want to do this? I don’t think you want to take that chance, asshole.”
Sykes took a step forward and closed the gap further. “Try me you fat fuck…”
Cronauer sized up the situation and realized that Billy and Sykes together could make the hypothetical brawl go either way.
He decided it wasn’t worth it.
From that point on, Billy and Sykes finished basic and rode out the war together, dodging bullets, fighting off malaria, and cracking jokes side by side while they thought of home. They fought together, in the mud and in the rain, surviving countless close calls and tightening their bond as every day felt like it might be their last.
Including that fateful ambush during a routine patrol in an area that was supposedly free of hostiles, according to the dog-shit intelligence the unit had been provided by Washington.
During the fight, Billy took a bayonet to the leg and was sent back home while Sykes stayed behind another eight months. It was a tear-filled departure the day Billy was evacuated on the Huey out of a village in Da Lat, Sykes and him holding hands in that kind of arm-wrestle pose as Sykes shouted over the roar of the helicopter, “I’ll be home soon, bud. Keep the beer cold for me.”
For the next eight months, Billy healed, wrote to Sykes, and sweated over his safe return.
It was ’Nam, after all.
Chances were high you wouldn’t survive.
But be it grace, fate, or the good Lord himself, Sykes made it through. The news of his discharge made Billy rejoice to the point that he bumped his head on a ceiling fan from jumping up too high.
The band was getting back together.
Upon Skye’s return, however, Billy couldn’t help but notice that his friend was a little more grizzled. A little more scarred. A little more lethal. All of it reflected in Sykes’s newfound and infamous thousand-yard stare that Billy had seemingly managed to avoid during his run through the jungle.
Even though they were each other’s confidants, Billy never learned much about what happened to Sykes in the eight months he was crashing on Billy’s couch in Atwater after he had left the war behind. All Sykes would tell him was that he got into some “hairy shit.” Whatever happened after that was something that he didn’t want or care to divulge.
Billy eventually left it alone.
His brother was back, and that was all that mattered.
After nine months in LA crashing at Billy’s place after being discharged, Sykes had decided the time had come to move on. “I need to find my happiness, Billy,” he said. “I’m not happy. That war screwed me up. I just…I want to start over and find something to live for.”
After a tearless good-bye—only because they were being “men” and holding it back—Sykes took off in the used car he purchased with the last of his money, filled up a tank of gas, and went off to find his happiness.
Billy was bummed.
But he knew they’d meet again.
Fast-forward to two years later: Billy Reese is in training at Quantico when he walks into a hand-to-hand combat training session and stumbles across none other than Andrew fuckin’ Sykes in the gym with pads on and a gray “Trainee” shirt on him identical to Billy’s.
When they saw each other, it was like Christmas, the two men calling out each other’s names and turning heads as they ran up to each other and embraced and couldn’t believe that the other was there.
“What are you doing here, man?” Billy said, unable to help himself from hugging his friend in front of their peers and superiors, likewise for Sykes.
“I’m becoming an Untouchable,” Sykes said. “I found my happiness, brother.”
Billy was happy. Sykes was happy. Billy was happy that Sykes was happy.
It was a good feeling for both of them.
For Billy and Sykes, it felt like fate had brought them back together, and even though they were in different places at different times during the course of their training, both were comforted in knowing that their brother was just a stone’s throw away.
However, upon graduation, the frequency of Sykes and Billy’s face-to-face meet-ups was no longer consistent. From that point on, it was holidays only and the occasional meet-up in airport bars all across the country. The FBI was a big organization, and their skill sets landed them in different places.
But distance and time changed nothing. They were brothers. Always had been. Always would be.
And then one day Billy got a call that changed everything.
Someone killed Sykes.
Billy remembered every minute detail of what was going on when he got the news. He was in the middle of watching an old Eastwood flick on the television with his feet on the edge of the couch and a beer in his hand when Ferris called him up and dropped the bomb. Billy had said nothing for several long seconds as his heart sank into his stomach and Ferris’s words took their time to process. The moment that she said, “Sykes is gone,” his thoughts immediately ran to Will—Sykes’s eight-year-old son.
The kid still had his mother. He wasn’t alone in this world. Nonetheless Billy made a promise to Sykes weeks before he was gone, one that he took as serious as he did his friendship.
“Do me a favor,” Sykes had said to Billy while the two were shoulder to shoulder on the balcony of Sykes’s home in Atlanta, the sun setting and chilled beers in their hands.
“Shoot,” Billy said.
Sykes looked over his shoulder at his son watching TV in the living room.
His little replica.
“Something happens to me,” he said to Billy, “that kid is going to need you. He’s going to need, you know… that father part in his life, whatever you want to call
it.”
“Don’t say crap like that.”
“Don’t be naïve.” Sykes turned and faced Billy. “You know what we do for a living. You know the risks involved. Hell, I’m about to jump in with Rico Castillo’s crew. Someone makes me there…”
Sykes snapped his fingers—quick as that.
Billy said nothing in the hopes that Sykes would let the whole thing go.
“Just promise me,” Sykes insisted as he looked back at the sunset. “Promise me that if something ever happens to me…”
He looked at Will, playing with his toys and joyously clapping his hands.
He didn’t need to say the rest.
Billy saw the look in his friend’s eyes. “Of course, bud,” he said. “I’ve got you covered. You know that.”
Sykes pat his friend on the shoulder and took comfort in the response. They clinked their bottles together, watched the sun fall in the west, and shared the last laughs of their friendship before Sykes was killed six weeks later.
And the assholes that killed him sent the pieces that were left of him to their bosses in the Hoover Building.
The guy who opened the package nearly vomited all over his desk when he saw the contents inside.
Billy was nothing shy of enraged when he found out. The broken television set resting in the living room was a testament to that fact.
After getting over the initial shock of adjusting to the new facts of life, Billy focused his rage and channeled it into more constructive efforts, mainly finding the people that killed Sykes and made him suffer in the process. He lobbied hard with Ferris to put him in the position to find the party responsible, however many of them there were.
And then Billy was in Miami, working the streets and inching his way to justice.
Settling the score was his drive.
Checking in on Will and Heather was his promise.
After the botched deal with Santoro, and before leaving the safe house in Layton, Billy had realized it had been over a week since he checked in on them. He picked up the phone in the kitchen and dialed a number he remembered better than the digits to his own birthday.
Three rings passed before the other end picked up.
“Sykes residence. Tommy Sykes speaking.”
“I’m guessing you’re pressed up against the television, boy.”
“Uncle Billy!”
“How’s it going, kid?”
“Good. I’m watching Airwolf.”
“What’s that about?”
“It’s about this high-tech helicopter that takes down bad guys.”
“Sounds like my kind of show.”
“Do you want to watch it with me when I see you again? I used the VCR you bought us and recorded a few episodes.”
“Of course, buddy. I can’t wait.”
“Awesome!”
Billy smiled. It always felt good when the kid was in high spirits, even if it was for only a few seconds at a time.
He asked, “Is your mom home?”
The kid said, “Uh-hu. She’s coming to the phone right now.”
Billy could hear the phone changing hands and the muffled voice of someone older in the background giving Tommy a command.
Heather’s.
“Billy,” she said, neither vexed nor delighted at saying his name.
“Hey, Heather. How’s things?”
A pause.
“Same. You?”
Another pause.
“Same.”
Billy could hear Heather moving to a different room. From what he remembered from the layout of her home in Atlanta, the foyer was to the left of the phone.
She’s probably ducking into it right now.
Billy shifted the phone to his other ear. “You still there?”
“Yeah,” Heather replied, a little more quiet. “I just…”
Billy waited for it.
Ask me…
“Have you found him yet?” Heather finally asked. “The person that killed Andy?”
Billy felt like his lips were chapping as he thought of the best way to let her down.
“No,” he finally said. “Not yet.”
Another pause from Heather.
Billy could sense the disappointment through her breathing over the receiver.
“Billy,” Heather said in a higher octave, much like the tone she spoke to Tommy with—a sense of authority laced with love.
“Yeah,” Billy said, ready for any request.
Another pause.
“They sent my husband back in pieces,” she finally said. “They…”
Heather sniffled, her words escaping her.
Billy rubbed his neck raw, at a loss for what to say.
Tears were held back on both ends.
Seconds that felt like they were crawling passed before Heather cleared her throat and finally broke the tension. “Please,” she said to Billy, calm and collected. “Just find them.”
Billy stopped rubbing his neck and stood at attention. “I will,” he said. “I promise.”
Another pause.
“We gotta go,” Heather said. “I told Tommy we could watch that show of his.”
“Airbeast.”
“Airwolf.”
“Right. That’s the one…”
Both waited for the other to hang up.
Heather finally made the call.
“Good-bye, Billy,” she said. “Stay in touch.”
The line went dead before Billy had a chance to reply.
After putting the receiver back in the cradle, he braced against the counter and thought of Andy, Will, and Heather Sykes, his heart heavy and a surge of sadness swirling in his chest.
He thought of the memories he shared with Sykes and the potential ones he—and Sykes’s family—had been robbed of.
Then he thought of the man—or men—who tore him apart.
The orders were to find and apprehend them.
Billy was more inclined to just drop them where they stood.
No more dwelling. Start moving.
You’ve got shit to do…
Shaking off the phone call, Billy grabbed the keys to the getaway car and made the drive back to Miami. He had only been up in the parking garage for about twelve minutes playing back his phone call with Heather and Tommy when a knock came at the window halfway through “Under My Thumb.”
He looked to the right and saw three punks, all dressed—appropriately enough—like something out of a punk-rock music video: leather jackets, frayed denim vests with patches of different names of obscure bands crudely stitched on, and combat boots laced halfway up.
Young guys.
Just shy of juniors in high school, probably.
The guy in the lead with the gold tooth was flashing it at Billy like it was a badge, an arch look in his eye and a fedora resting tight on his crown with the flap folded up in front in a poor attempt at a fashion statement.
Billy didn’t know what these guys wanted. To start trouble, most likely.
And he really wasn’t in the mood for it…
The guy with the tooth knocked on the window.
Billy let out a sigh and rolled it down. “Gentlemen,” he said.
The guy with the tooth looked inside the car like a patrolman on a traffic stop. “How’s it going tonight, brother?” he asked, the goons behind him poised like a pair of bodyguards.
Billy shrugged. “I’ve had better nights.”
The trio of idiots laughed and exchanged looks. “Well,” the guy with the tooth said, “it’s about to get a whole lot worse…”
More laughs.
“See,” gold tooth continued, leaning against the door, “we’re the, uh…valets for this lot. And we’re here to relieve you of your vehicle.”
CLICK! He produced a switchblade and flicked it open in front of Billy’s face.
“Free of charge,” he added.
It didn’t faze Billy in the slightest. He just pouted his lower lip in a curious fashion like he did when he learned something n
ew on Jeopardy.
He slowly reached over to his right. “Of all the cars you go to jack,” he said as he pounded a fist on the door, “you decide to take this piece of shit.”
Gold tooth’s leering melted into a frown. “Get the fuck out of the car,” he ordered. “Now.”
He took a step forward. The dimwits behind him followed suit.
Billy quickly drew his Colt, pressed it into gold tooth’s neck, and cocked the hammer back just for a cinematic touch. “I’ll give you a ten-second head start before I shoot you,” he said. “How’s that sound?”
Gold tooth retracted the switchblade and held up his hands in submission.
“It’s cool, man! It’s cool!”
Billy then said, “Then boogie on out of here, please and thank you.”
Gold tooth nearly relieved himself in his pants as he slowly stepped away from the car. He backed up into his goons, shuddered, and then ordered them all to run before booking it toward the stairwell behind them.
Billy engaged the safety on his Colt and placed it back in its holster. “Fuckin’ morons…”
Moments later, an unmarked sedan squealed onto Billy’s level to the right. Billy could tell from the outline of the driver that it was his boss, Special Agent in Charge Rebecca Ferris.
It was the jawline that gave it away. “Sharp” was the best way that he could think of describing it.
Billy killed the engine and got out of the car, Ferris pulling up next to him and stepping out of her sedan at the same time. She was an attractive woman who kept in great shape; she was ten years Billy’s senior though they looked close to the same age, and her athletic figure showed through her plain and official dress slacks, button-down, and blazer. Her blond hair was pulled back in her signature tight bun that kept her from showcasing too many of her emotions, like a poker player trying to hide her tells.
She pointed to the guys sprinting in the opposite direction. “Who was that?”
Billy threw a look over his shoulder. “Local track team…”
Ferris held a composed expression. She was a fifteen-year veteran of the job who managed to maintain a sterling reputation and a loving family her entire career with a commendable and stellar performance all around. As a mother, as a wife, as an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Ferris had a flawless style, a level head, and a commendable work ethic. She was an analytical, by-the-numbers agent. She left nothing to chance. Never did, her entire career.