The Shadow Protocol

by Andy McDermott

  The Nationals’ baseball stadium passed on Adam’s right as he raced up Capitol Street. He visualized DC’s street map. Harper’s experience helped him pick out a route, decades of working inside the Beltway as useful as any satnav. Follow Capitol, then cut diagonally across the street grid on Washington Avenue before heading west along the south side of the Mall until he reached 17th Street. The Eisenhower Building was then just a few blocks due north. About three miles. Even though the streets were still busy, he was only minutes from his objective …

  Pulsing lights in the distance ahead warned him that he would have to change his route. A police car was tearing down Capitol Street toward him.

  N Street crossed Capitol at the next intersection. The cops were still a couple of blocks away. He took a left, screeching through the junction. The road was much narrower than the one he had left, but at least this time there was no traffic. Small two-story houses flicked by. He needed to turn back to the north—

  A pickup truck backed out of an alley directly into his path.

  Parked cars on each side left him nowhere to turn. He braked hard, the tires leaving smoking black lines along the asphalt. But they still couldn’t stop him in time—

  The Mustang was doing about fifteen miles per hour when it hit the pickup. The impact threw Adam forward. With the deflated air bag hanging limply from the steering wheel, there was nothing to stop him from cracking his head against the hub. He slumped back into the seat, dazed by pain.

  The engine stalled. He tried to focus, putting a hand to his aching head and feeling dampness. There was a red smear on the flaccid air bag. A paralyzing nausea rolled over him as he tried to raise a hand to restart the car.

  A middle-aged black man scrambled out of the pickup and stared in dismay at his vehicle’s crumpled side before turning to Adam in anger. “Hey! What the hell? Look what you’ve done, you asshole!”

  Adam took several deep breaths, forcing back the sickening dizziness. His fingers found the override in the ignition. He turned it. Something in the engine bay clattered alarmingly, but then the V8 burbled back to life. He put the gearshift into reverse.

  “Oh hell no you don’t!” cried the pickup driver, reaching for his door handle. “You ain’t going anywhere!”

  Adam reached into his jacket as if about to draw a gun. The other man retreated, worried. “Sorry, I don’t have time to exchange insurance details,” Adam said as he applied power. The Mustang briefly resisted before jerking away from the pickup, leaving a chunk of its radiator grille embedded in the truck’s mangled bodywork. One of the headlights was broken.

  He reversed until he reached a gap between the parked cars, then swung up onto the sidewalk to get around the obstacle. The man yelled impotent abuse after him.

  A siren behind grew louder. Adam checked the mirror. One of the Suburbans made a slithering turn off Capitol, the blue lights in its grille blazing.

  He shoved his foot down, snatching rapidly up through the gears as he powered along the sidewalk and swung back onto the road. The SUV followed, gaining rapidly. The Mustang had suffered mechanical damage—it was only subtle, but Adam could feel that it was less responsive than before.

  Another intersection ahead. He threw the car to the right, heading north—realizing too late that he was going the wrong way up a one-way street.

  Headlights came at him.

  He swung the Mustang to the left—then veered sharply back to the right as the other driver panicked and swerved across his path. The two cars missed by inches. He looked back, hoping that the Suburban’s route was blocked, but there was just enough room for the SUV to slip by.

  Someone leaned from the side window. Fallon. Laser light stabbed from his MP5 as he aimed at the fleeing Mustang.

  Adam jerked the wheel left as Fallon fired. Bullets seared past. Another burst as the soldier adjusted his aim, and the Mustang echoed with the hammering hailstone plunk-plunk-plunk of rounds tearing through sheet metal. Adam flinched, but the shots didn’t hit him.

  He was not unhurt, though. His left eye suddenly stung. Blood from the cut on his forehead was running down his face. He wiped it away, but realized from the size of the stain on his hand that the flow was not going to stop.

  Traffic ahead. He was approaching the intersection with M Street, cars crossing his path in both directions.

  A dazzling red dot fluttered across the dashboard. Adam ducked as Fallon leaned farther out and fired again. More sharp thumps of impact—and the right side of the windshield crazed as a hole was punched through it.

  The Mustang reached the junction. Left or right?

  Neither.

  Adam braced himself and plowed straight across, aiming for what he hoped would remain a gap.

  Horns blared, brakes squealed—then the Mustang lurched as a car clipped its back end. A sharp yank at the wheel and he regained control, checking the mirror—

  The car that had nicked him spun like a top as Fallon’s Suburban slammed into it. The SUV skidded around—then flipped on its side, crushing Fallon beneath it and smearing him over the road before rolling onto its roof. It smashed into a streetlamp, practically folding in half around it.

  Two down.

  But there remained one to go. Baxter was still behind him, the last Suburban refusing to give up its prey.

  The Mustang tore past a fire station, men already running out to help the crash victims. He looked ahead. The street ended at a T-junction. He slowed to turn west, feeling a shiver through the steering. The latest collision had added to his ride’s woes. Damage to the suspension, or one of the wheels; either way, he couldn’t keep going much longer.

  But he didn’t have to. Only a couple more miles.

  If he could survive them.

  Adam glimpsed a sign: I STREET. His mental map of the city warned him that he was in a minor maze of residential roads, with few direct connections to the major arteries he needed to reach. Heading north would only take him deeper into the tangled grid. But if he turned south at the western end of I Street, he would emerge on Maine Avenue. From there, he could follow the road northwest past the Washington Monument directly to 17th Street—and then it was a straight run north to the Eisenhower Building.

  Where Sternberg was waiting.

  The thought galvanized him. He wiped more blood from his eye and accelerated, weaving past trundling traffic. The junction was just ahead.

  And Baxter was behind.

  Like the Mustang, the last Suburban had lost a headlight. The cyclopean glare in the mirror was briefly lost to view as he made the turn south, then returned, closing in.

  Adam swung right and poured on the power to make a sweeping entry onto Maine Avenue. He forced his way into the traffic, leaving a trail of swerving and skidding cars in his wake.

  Reed navigated them all, the SUV’s siren howling a warning for other drivers to clear the way. Baxter brought up his MP5 again. The laser’s dot darted over the surrounding vehicles as Adam wove the Mustang through the shoal.

  The speedometer rose—sixty, seventy. But the Suburban was keeping pace—and the shudder through the steering column was getting worse, the Mustang twitching and wavering.

  Laser flare in the mirror as the SUV found a gap in the traffic and swung in behind the speeding Ford. There was a car to Adam’s left, forcing him to go right to evade—directly across Baxter’s line of fire.

  The red glare was overpowered by stuttering muzzle flash. More shots struck the Mustang—then the entire windshield imploded, crystalline fragments flying back into Adam’s face in the eighty-mile-per-hour slipstream.

  He instinctively shut his eyes to protect them from the hard-edged cascade, then forced them open again. He had to squint into the slashing wind—and the first thing he saw was a set of taillights rushing at him.

  He swerved—finding another car already there.

  The two vehicles caromed off each other with a crunch of metal, the second car bounding up over the central reservation. Adam hauled the wheel
again to slot into its space, missing the slower vehicle ahead by a hair.

  The road dropped into a tunnel beneath the Southwest Freeway. He pulled back into the rightmost lane, putting the car he had just passed between the Mustang and the Suburban. That gave him a few seconds’ respite.

  He would need it. There was a tight turn coming up.

  The Mustang emerged from the underpass—and immediately shot through a red light. Adam spun the wheel, bringing the car screaming through the traffic crossing the intersection and down the exit to the left, tearing alongside the monolithic block of the Federal Communications Commission. The road rapidly merged back onto another section of Maine Avenue … one leading to 17th Street.

  Only a mile to go.

  The Suburban reappeared behind him, barging a car aside. Baxter was getting increasingly desperate to stop him, putting civilians at risk. Harper’s part of Adam’s psyche tried to defend the collateral damage: The ends justify the means. Adam didn’t accept that, but in this case he had no choice but to do whatever was necessary to reach Sternberg.

  The road passed under two bridges. Another red light ahead, cars slowing in all three lanes—

  Despite knowing the damage it could cause, Adam swerved up onto the central divider to get past them. The Mustang’s suspension protested with a loud bang—then there was another crack of metal as the car hit a street sign, shearing its pole off at the base. He flinched as the sign flew at him, flipping up over the shattered windshield and clanging off the roof.

  He veered right to avoid a streetlight and crashed back onto Maine Avenue. Baxter’s SUV followed. The illuminated spire of the Washington Monument pierced the night sky above the trees ahead.

  The vibration grew worse. One of the Mustang’s wheels was definitely damaged. But he had to keep going. Back up to sixty, weaving through the traffic.

  The laser swept through the car—

  Pain exploded in his right arm.

  Adam screamed. More bullets clattered against the Mustang as it veered out of control and ran up onto the grass. A tree loomed in the headlight beam. He somehow found the strength to overcome the agony and turned the wheel. The trunk whipped past.

  Off the road, without streetlights, he couldn’t see the wound. The bullet had hit his biceps, the muscle on fire. He tried to move his arm. Searing, stinging pain crackled through the nerves—but he still managed to grip the shifter. He changed down, a strained gasp escaping through his gritted teeth. The juddering Mustang found more purchase.

  Lights ahead—another road through the park crossing his path. He aimed for a gap in the traffic and braced himself. Another slam came through the tortured suspension as his car hopped the curb and hit the asphalt before pounding back onto the grass at the far side.

  The Washington Monument was an unmissable beacon. Adam turned so that it was off to his right and angled through the park toward another thoroughfare. He swung onto it in front of a startled cabdriver.

  The pursuing four-by-four had barely been slowed by its off-road excursion as it charged after him. It was still on the grass, Reed running parallel to the road to give Baxter a clear shot. The laser stabbed between the two vehicles. Adam forced another car aside to take cover behind a van.

  Baxter fired anyway. Rounds ripped through the van’s sides, mangled bullets smacking against the Mustang’s battered flank. Adam accelerated. The ex-marine unleashed another burst as he emerged, but the shots went wide as Reed was forced to turn sharply to avoid a stand of trees. The Suburban bounced back onto the road behind Adam.

  The other cars gave him enough illumination to see blood soaking his sleeve. The bullet had gone through his arm, torn flesh around the exit wound. All he could do to stanch the bleeding was to take the wheel with his right hand, clamping his left over the injury.

  The burst of pain was so intense that Adam thought he was going to pass out—but pure adrenaline forced him on. The road ahead forked. He followed it to the right at well over twice the speed limit, at last on 17th Street.

  His final destination was dead ahead.

  And the man trying to stop him was closing fast from behind. The one-eyed SUV reappeared in the mirror. Baxter leaned out again. His MP5 spat fire. The window beside Adam blew out, more glass showering him.

  He cried out again as he let go of the wound, left hand back on the wheel so he could change gear. The Mustang picked up speed. Taillights rushed at him like meteors. He jinked between them, trying to give himself cover.

  No good. He couldn’t shake the Suburban. Reed was an expert driver—and his vehicle was only superficially damaged, while Adam’s own had taken a severe beating. The Mustang’s engine note became rougher. Warning lights flashed on the dash—temperature, oil pressure.

  He willed it on. Only half a mile to go. It had to make it!

  Buildings ahead as he approached the north side of the Mall—and another red light at the intersection with Constitution Avenue. He pulled out into the oncoming lane to pass the waiting cars—

  Someone was crossing the road!

  Instinctive terror punched at his heart as he braked and swung wide to avoid the pedestrian. The man’s look of shock as he shot through the headlight beam burned into Adam’s vision like a camera flash. Then he was gone, falling away behind as the Mustang recovered.

  The man was silhouetted by the SUV’s lights in Adam’s mirror—

  The Suburban didn’t deviate, swatting him aside. The dark figure tumbled along the road like a rag doll.

  Horrified, Adam looked ahead—and felt another shot of fear.

  Flashing lights ran across 17th Street a few blocks away. A police barricade, multiple cars and vans lined up across his path.

  Inevitable, Harper told him smugly. The Eisenhower Building is right by the White House. Of course they’re going to stop you getting anywhere near it.

  But the cops were less of a threat than Baxter. The Suburban drew in, engine snarling. Adam tried to accelerate again, but the crippled Mustang was sluggish. All he could do was keep weaving as he powered up 17th Street, trying to shake off the laser sight.

  It was impossible. The SUV loomed ever larger in the mirror—and then Adam’s rearview disintegrated as a bullet hit it, more rounds ripping into the roof and seats.

  Buildings blurred past on the left. To the right was open parkland, but if he tried to escape that way it would lead him straight into the gunsights of the men guarding the southern perimeter of the White House.

  He was out of options. The roadblock was coming up fast, past the intersection with E Street. The only way he could go was left, but that would take him away from Sternberg—and with Baxter right on him and the Mustang almost finished, he wouldn’t get far.

  Escape, how to escape …

  No. Attack.

  A large panel van was waiting on E Street at the intersection, blocking Adam’s view of the building behind it.

  His view—and Baxter’s.

  Last chance—

  Adam threw the Mustang into what he knew would be its final corner, the wounded vehicle’s pain as clear as his own. He passed the van’s front—then pulled on the hand brake.

  The car went into a spin, its tail flying out wide. He controlled it, feathering the throttle as the Mustang whipped around through a full 270 degrees. Its momentum sent it skittering backward behind the van—then he stamped the pedal all the way to the floor. The rear wheels shrieked, belching out vortices of stinking smoke as they scrabbled for a grip.

  They found it, arresting the car’s rearward motion—and flinging it forward.

  It was the same trick he had used to vanish from Bianca’s sight when she had tailed him from STS what felt like a lifetime ago, making a seemingly impossible turn into the warehouse’s loading dock just before she rounded the corner and reappearing right behind her.

  This time, he wasn’t going to give his pursuer a mere nudge.

  The Suburban had followed him, Reed and Baxter momentarily confused by his apparent disap
pearance—before they saw him coming at them from an unexpected direction—

  The Mustang rammed the SUV.

  Reed’s door caved in, not even the air bags enough to save him from injury. The Suburban slewed around—then its right rear wheel hit the curb. It flipped over, tumbling along the sidewalk before hitting a tree and spinning back into the road in a spray of glass and leaking fluids, ending up on its crushed side.

  Adam’s car fared no better. The collision flung the Mustang onto the sidewalk. It crashed through the hedges outside an art gallery. He braced himself, grabbing the seat belt—but the force of the collision as it slammed sidelong into the building’s wall was enough to dislocate his left shoulder with a hideous crackle of cartilage. He hit the steering wheel again, tearing a deep cut into his cheek.

  The engine stalled, the sudden silence almost shocking. He tried to sit upright, only to howl in excruciating pain as nerves scraped in his torn shoulder. He barely heard his own cry through the ringing in his ears. One eye was now blinded by the blood oozing from his forehead. He tried to focus with the other, the cabin swimming into view.

  He could still move his right arm, barely. More pain burning through the ripped muscle, he gingerly placed his palm on the center console and levered himself back into his seat.

  A blur resolved into the overturned SUV. Passersby looked on in astonishment, unsure what to do. A man ran up to the Suburban, peering inside—then jumped back as someone crawled out through the broken windshield.

  Baxter.

  One side of his face was covered in rivulets of blood from a ragged cut in his scalp. He lay sprawled on the street for a moment, catching his breath, then stood.

  The MP5 was in his hand.

  The onlookers hurriedly backed away as Baxter staggered toward the wrecked Mustang. Adam reached into his jacket. His fingers found the disk, still in its case—but he remembered too late that he had given Harper’s gun to Bianca.