by Nick Thacker
Ben frowned.
“It was a joke, Ben. He seems distraught.”
“You have any idea why?”
“Probably thinking about our mission.”
“You know the details, right?”
Reggie nodded.
“Then why aren’t you distraught?”
Reggie laughed. “What’s to be distraught about? I’m excited about this one. Going to a simple snatch-and-grab. Nothing to it.”
Chapter Twelve
TWO DAYS AGO
“SIR, IT is done.”
The words sounded like money to The Hawk. They were money.
He smiled, knowing the man on the other end of the phone couldn’t see it.
“Fine,” he said, his voice as steady and calm as ever. “Good work, tell the others to pack it in and head home. We’ve got another appointment.”
“Affirmative, sir. Orders?”
“They will be emailed over. Check the secured account at 0700.”
“Roger that, sir.”
The Hawk hung up the call and placed the phone back in his pocket. He chewed the last bit of jerky and spat. So far, so good. He needed to call in this update, but he knew the client would have other priorities. This was a low-risk mission, and that meant it was relatively low-priority for the client.
He could call in the success later, right now he wanted to sleep.
The Hawk was a solitary man, alone in ways that would make other people crazy. He required the solitude, however, as it allowed him to focus on improving himself and his work. He could focus without distraction for as long as he liked, never needed to check in with the outside world.
To him, the outside world was just that — outside. It was distant, away from him, and he was detached from it. The everyday necessities most of his men required — debauchery, entertainment, pleasure — he despised. He had his ways of finding what he needed, when the urge struck, but the urge rarely struck. He had trained his mind and body to require little from the offers of the outside world, as the ‘inside world’ he’d built was far more fit for him.
Six years ago The Hawk had walked off the side of a mountain, a new and completely changed man. His mind had been cleared, thanks to his own willpower as well as some particularly uncomfortable ‘external’ motivations. He had been through trials, through hell and back, and he had emerged stronger than ever.
He had emerged stronger than anyone else.
He had completed the first part of his life as one man, and upon stepping off the mountain, he had begun the second.
He turned to the man standing at his side, a man he only knew by one name.
“Morrison, confirm the details. We can’t have any loose ends.”
“We never have any loose ends, sir,” Morrison replied.
“And that is because we always check for them.”
Morrison nodded and stepped away from The Hawk. He watched him for a few paces, his bear-like gait belying the man’s true speed and cunning. Morrison was a perfect second, ruthless and dedicated as The Hawk, capable as a soldier, but missing the special ingredient that made a man a leader and not just a manager.
The Hawk preferred this arrangement. He wanted no man to question his authority, and he wanted no competition from his subordinates. Morrison wanted The Hawk to lead, and he would do whatever necessary to ensure The Hawk stayed in power.
It was an arrangement that pleased The Hawk, yet it had only been forged from years of less-than-ideal situations. He had built this team — small, yet agile — from nothing, working his way through the amateurs and the hotshots until he had retained only seven men.
Morrison had been one of the first recruits, and he was neither an amateur or a hotshot. He simply performed, asked for nothing in return besides his paycheck, and he didn’t interfere in the affairs of the other men. He was, in a word, ideal. Out of the hundred or so men The Hawk had interviewed for the first batch of candidates, Morrison had struck him as both alarmingly adept and ruthlessly effective. A solid combination, but without much leadership ability, The Hawk knew Morrison would make a perfect second-in-command. A man who cared nothing for the gripes and complaints of his subordinates, but just wanted to get the job done.
It may have been overkill to put a man like Morrison in charge of the rest of the men, anyway. The Hawk ran a tight ship, personally interviewing and training the small army he was building. They responded to his leadership, and they responded to Morrison’s drill-sergeant command. After all, they were all from one branch of service or another, no matter what country the recruits hailed from.
Most of the men on The Hawk’s shortlist were American, but only because America was the nation he was born and raised in, and the country he knew best. Quite a few men made the list from South America and Eastern Europe, trained either in the jungles as mercenaries or in the war-torn climates that were constantly plagued with political strife.
He kept his ‘army’ small — at most twelve men, and as few as six when he was getting started — but his list of candidates, those who were interested in serving on his security team, was about two-hundred strong now. Men found him through word-of-mouth, mutual acquaintances, and recommendations. It wasn’t a difficult sell, either — he paid better than anyone in the business, and his team was known for its high-stakes missions and exotic travels.
In short, it was a soldier’s dream. Traveling the world, serving out justice where it was due, and returning home for a few months of well-funded peace and quiet.
He had started the company a few years ago and he was already considering expanding. He wasn’t sure how he would do it, but there were more good men wanting to help out than he had room for — and he knew now that there were plenty more corporate clients around the world willing to pay his fee.
This mission was actually a rare thing for The Hawk: it was domestic. Most of his work was abroad, working to quell uprisings and prevent — or control — organized labor forces that got unruly with their corporate overlords. He had been in more than a few close scrapes, but it seemed the more challenging the mission was, the more intrigue and excitement his men felt. They wanted more action, and they told their friends.
The Hawk played this up as much as possible, and when the promise of real action, plenty of intrigue, and an amount of money that made him look twice came along, he knew that domestic or not, this was a mission for his team.
So Ravenshadow found itself temporarily headquartered in a Philadelphia warehouse district, working out of an old, abandoned building that had been part of a larger group that had once spanned the entire city block. Many of the warehouses surrounding the space were also abandoned, and those that were occupied wouldn’t notice the goings-on of a few black-clad men that came went through a back alley.
A handful of his list of candidates lived within driving distance of Philadelphia, so he put those men on alert: Ravenshadow was engaged with a client, and additional help could be needed. Be ready, he’d told them.
The Hawk spun around and walked toward his vehicle. The worn 2007 Hyundai Santa Fe was a perfect urban vehicle — powerful enough to get through a barrier, small enough to outrun a threat, and normal enough to not warrant a second glance.
He’d lived out of a van at one point in his life, but he preferred the comfort of slightly more spacious accommodations so he’d traded in the van for a one bedroom efficiency and the midsize SUV. The home base allowed him the ability to have a place to return to after missions, but it also afforded him the ability to store more gear and equipment than he could have before. The SUV gave him a way to be mobile, to be able to move freely throughout the country without needing to fly often.
As he entered the vehicle and started the engine, his phone rang. He frowned, not expecting a call and not liking the fact that he’d gotten one. He checked the number and frowned deeper. Especially not a call from this number. He considered not answering; allow the phone to send the call to his default voicemail so he could check it later. The call
er likely wouldn’t appreciate the fact that he had ignored the call, knowing that the mission would be complete by now.
“What,” he said gruffly, not bothering to lift the end of the word into a question.
“Is it — is it done?” the woman’s voice asked. Her voice was frail, weak, as if on life support. He knew better, however. She was a professional just as he was — albeit a much different type of professional.
“It is.”
He waited, not caring to fill the dead space with more sound, more useless questions. He didn’t need to fill her in, that would come later with the report.
Still…
Until the contracted job had been completed, this woman owned his time. She owned him . That was the one downside of his job — his time was never his own. He was left to complete the job however he saw fit, and using whatever means that had been previously discussed, but while under contract he was expected to be available at any time.
“Okay. Okay, great. So — it’s finished. I mean —”
“It is done. I will provide a report later today.”
He could almost hear her nodding. She was nervous, but he didn’t care about that. She was a professional, and she knew how to manipulate emotions. She had control of her own, as he did, so he knew she was playing a game.
He didn’t play games. He wasn’t paid to play games.
“Good. That’s… good.”
He hung up the phone, knowing there was nothing more that needed to be said. There hadn’t been anything worth saying in the first place, and he had no new information than he’d had before the call.
Except…
Maybe there was something . Something in the way she’d spoken to him. Something deeper than even the false emotion she’d summoned.
He considered it for a moment, sitting silently in the driver’s seat of the vehicle. Wondered what it would mean.
What if his employer was actually nervous?
Chapter Thirteen
REGGIE WAS LOOKING AROUND THE cabin’s small living room, frowning and pacing while he tilted his head sideways as he tried to place whatever it was he was looking for.
“Need something?” Ben asked.
Reggie looked up, then smiled. “Oh, sorry — I was just wondering if there was another TV around here, one we could move into the living room.”
The only television Ben and Julie owned was in their bedroom, as the living room area was really not much more than a foyer that connected the two other rooms — the kitchen and small dining room and the master bedroom. Since Reggie stayed often, the living room couch served as his bed, folding out and turning the already tiny space into almost unusable space.
Ben shook his head. “No, but did you think you’d find one just laying underneath a book or stuck behind an end table?”
Reggie laughed. “Never hurts to look, I guess.”
“Sorry, we’ll have to use the one in the bedroom.”
“We can get cozy on the bed. You know, I could sit next to Julie —”
Ben held up a hand. “I’m going to stop you right there, buddy.”
Reggie laughed even harder and started in toward the bedroom. “Come on, guys, I just sent Mr. E a text and told him we’re all here.”
“We’re still doing the “Mr. E remote feed thing, huh?” Julie asked from the kitchen. “Seems like it’d just be easier to meet him in person one of these days.”
“Seems like it,” Joshua muttered. “I’m not sure what his deal is. He’s even more of a recluse than Ben.”
“Not even close,” Julie said, nudging Ben’s side. “Mr. E at least lives in a normal place. San Francisco or San Diego, something like that, right?”
Joshua nodded. “San Fran. Apparently has a mansion there.”
The three of them followed Reggie into the bedroom. If the living room was small, the bedroom was positively cramped. The queen bed took up most of the central space, and a small end table that held a lamp sat in the corner, smashed between the bed and the wall. Julie enjoyed reading at night, and Ben hadn’t been able to get her to switch to an electronic reading tablet. It was a source of pride to him that he had jumped to a Kindle, opting for a lighter and more portable way to read, while she was a dinosaur, clinging to her tried-and-true ways like a little old lady.
Reggie was already on the bed, his tall frame seated on the foot of the bed, his face no more than two feet from the television.
Joshua squeezed past him and chose to stand between the bed and the window on the side wall, and Ben and Julie took up a spot on the opposite side of the bed. Ben let Julie slide backwards and rest her head on his chest, and he sat up straighter to see over Reggie’s shoulder.
Somehow Reggie had already turned on the ‘smart’ television, navigated through the menu system to a popular video streaming app that had come pre-installed, and opened up a window and was currently typing — painfully slowly, using the tiny remote control’s navigation to select one character at a time — an address into a URL field.
“How’d you know how to do all that?” Ben asked.
He immediately felt sheepish. Julie twisted around and looked at him, and Joshua glanced over, a raised eyebrow cluing him in that this sort of technical finagling was apparently common knowledge.
“The question is,” Reggie said, his eyes still glued to the television, “how do you not know? With a techie wife like yours?”
“She’s not my wife. Not yet.”
“Well, you’d better hurry up and lock her down,” Reggie said. “Else I’ll have to —”
“Whatever you’re about to say sounds like it’s going to be extremely flattering,” Julie blurted out, “but I’m more than happy to be the tech genius in Ben’s life. Makes me happy knowing he’ll always need me.”
“Like a toddler needs its mom,” Reggie muttered.
“What was that?” Ben asked.
“We’re ready to roll. Everyone can see?”
They all nodded, but Reggie wasn’t looking at them. He’d typed in a long URL and pressed the main button on the remote, and after a few seconds a pixelated bust of Mr. E loaded onscreen.
“It’ll improve as the connection solidifies,” Julie said. “Maybe.”
“As long as we can hear him, we should be fine,” Joshua said. “He’s not big on facial context clues.”
The television’s built-in speakers crackled to life. ‘Good afternoon,’ the man’s voice announced. ‘I am glad you all are together. I hope your reunion is restful and enjoyable.’
Who talks like that? Ben wondered. The man they’d come to call their benefactor and new boss had always seemed a bit off to Ben. Not in an uncomfortable way, but just somehow socially different than anyone he’d ever met.
And Ben knew he wasn’t the perfect example of a socially gifted individual, so if he was able to pick up on Mr. E’s odd mannerisms, they must have been pretty obvious.
‘I am assuming Gareth and Joshua have told you that we have a mission, as of yesterday morning.’
Reggie, — Gareth Red — looked around to ensure that they were all tracking. Ben nodded at the screen, even though he knew the tiny webcam Reggie had placed next to the television was hardly high enough resolution for Mr. E to pick up the movement.
Mr. E insisted on calling each of them by their full names. ‘Harvey,’ ‘Juliette,’ and ‘Gareth,’ instead of their shortened nicknames. The first time they’d heard Mr. E use Reggie’s real name they’d all looked around surprised, only to find Reggie grinning. During his military service as a sniper, apparently, his team had smashed his last name and first initial into the moniker they all now knew him by. ‘Red, G,’ became ‘Reggie,’ and the name stuck.
“We’re all aware, thank you,” Reggie said. “What’s the mission?”
Ben knew Reggie had at least some of the details regarding their mission, but all he’d told Ben was something about a ‘smash and grab.’ It didn’t sound terribly appealing to Ben, and it certainly didn’t sound safe, but Regg
ie hadn’t seemed concerned.
Of course, Reggie rarely seemed concerned. The only time he’d seen the man lose his characteristic grin and get serious was in Antarctica, when he’d gone ballistic and taken out a team of enemy guards nearly single-handedly.
Unarmed .
The moment had been etched into Ben’s mind forever, and it had only increased the respect he had for his friend. Reggie was a cool, calm, and fun-loving guy who would go absolutely insane to protect his friends.
‘The mission is really more of a reconnaissance. Information-gathering mostly, though there will be some investigative work.’
Ben frowned. “Seems simple.”
Mr. E nodded. ‘Indeed, it seems so. I hope it is, but I cannot help but feel there is more to the story than what we have been led to believe.’
“Okay, boss,” Reggie said. “Tell them the story.”
Chapter Fourteen
JULIE PUSHED UP FROM BEN’S chest and sat up on the bed. She didn’t worry about Ben’s ability to see — he was a whole head taller than she was, even sitting down — and besides, the audio was more important than the video, as the feed’s quality hadn’t improved.
Rural satellite internet connectivity was about as reliable as that of any small-town coffee shop. Sure, it worked, but in a way that allowed for little more than checking email a couple times a day and streaming a YouTube video every now and then.
Mr. E had provided them with an upgrade through his communications company and satellite it owned, and it was nice to be able to browse faster and stream longer shows and movies, but the reliability was still sporadic, especially during the winter months during storms.
The plan, he’d said, was to eventually get them set up with a state-of-the-art array on top of the new addition to the cabin that would allow them higher speeds and connectivity — no matter the weather or time of year — that any city-dweller would rival.
Julie was excited for it, as her background and recent consulting gig was in IT, and she was good at it. But there was also a twinge of nostalgia, a small sliver of grief as she watched the reclusive, rustic cabin set in the middle of a gorgeous Alaska backdrop disappear and get replaced by a fully-modern, large, and likely corporate-feeling addition.