The Storm Protocol

by Iain Cosgrove

  ‘Where the fuck have you been?’

  It was his mother's voice, but it sounded different, slurred. He hadn’t known why then, but he knew now; she’d been drinking heavily. She did a lot of that, especially in later years.

  ‘Can we do this some other time, I'm tired.’

  This time, it was his father’s deep and gruff voice.

  ‘No, we fucking cannot.’

  His mother’s reply; there was a crash and a tinkling sound.

  ‘That was clever.’

  His father speaking again.

  ‘And you'd know all about clever, wouldn’t you? Mr fucking big shot. Well just tell me one thing. Just tell me why her?’

  His mother's voice had cracked at the end.

  ‘Because I love her,’ his father had said simply.

  Eoin had heard a scoffing sound.

  ‘Love! Don’t give me that crap. You don’t know the meaning of the word. The only person you love is that twisted image you have of yourself; the big important man about town.’

  Eoin had crawled on his belly as far forward as he could go. If he hadn't seen the shrug, he would have assumed his father had shrugged anyway. It was what he did when he had nothing to say.

  ‘You sicken me,’ she’d said. ‘What about me? What about our son?’

  Eoin had seen her hand come into view, as she’d flung it in the direction of the stairs.

  ‘That loveless fruit of a loveless marriage is not my son. He’s your son.’

  Eoin had swallowed the cry that he’d wanted to scream. He’d wanted to fly down the stairs to confront the stranger who’d kidnapped his father. He’d wanted to beg, to entreat, to plead. Why was he talking that way?

  Even though he could not see her face, Eoin could visualise his mother’s eyebrows narrowing, as they always did when she was annoyed.

  ‘You cannot deny him,’ she’d said, dangerously softly.

  ‘No, I can’t deny him and I never would,’ his father had acknowledged. ‘But I don’t love him, and that’s because of you. I don’t love you and it’s poisoned my feelings toward our son. So I’m leaving both of you; more for your sakes than mine. We’ll all be better off out of this prison we call a family.’

  ‘You can’t leave me. Without me you’re nothing,’ his mother had shouted. ‘My parent’s money made you, and with their power and influence, they can break you too.’

  She’d snarled the last bit like a tiger.

  ‘Maybe so,’ his father had said resignedly, ‘but I'll take my chances. You can keep the house. I have no need of it. I can’t live like this anymore. I’m going to live with people I truly love.’

  Eoin hadn’t picked up on the subtle nuance, but even as sozzled as she was, his mother had leapt on it like that self same tiger.

  ‘What do you mean by people?’ she’d asked, dangerously quietly.

  He’d seen his father sit down heavily. Eoin could see his face muscles working overtime, as he’d tried to think of an excuse, a diversion. It was then that he’d looked up; he’d seen Eoin lying on the landing and their eyes had locked. Eoin had seen the pain and suffering and regret in almost equal measure.

  ‘You have a half brother,’ his father had said.

  The fracture of the cosy image that Eoin had built of his world had started from that second, and it was still getting larger.

  A discreet knock on the door brought him forward thirty years. Had it been that long? Three quarters of his life looking for vengeance. He’d forgotten how to love and now rage was driving him on. No, that was wrong; it was the revenge itself that drove him now. He needed closure, and in his mind, it was the only way he would get it.

  He clicked the switch on the bankers’ lamp that was situated on the desk in front of him, and blinked as the room was instantly enveloped in a soft golden glow.

  ‘Come,’ he said softly.

  The door opened and Dave Keegan walked in. As he sat at the desk and settled into the chair, Black Swan could see that he was twitchy. That was never a good sign with Dave. Black Swan rolled the biro between his fingers from the index to the pinkie and back again. Dave watched, mesmerised, as the pen traversed backwards and forwards like a metronome.

  ‘So?’ asked Black Swan.

  Dave kept silent; he knew what was coming. It was always best to let Black Swan get it off his chest.

  ‘I'm presuming it isn't good,’ said Black Swan. ‘I can read you like a book, Dave. You’re transparent.’

  Dave looked up and then wished he hadn't. There was an unmistakable and unspoken question on Black Swan's face.

  ‘We were unable to neutralise the target,’ Dave mumbled.

  Black Swan nodded almost to himself.

  ‘I saw the papers; we made quite a mess of the house at least. How many did we send? Two?’

  Dave swallowed hard.

  ‘Nine,’ he said.

  ‘Nine,’ said Black Swan softly.

  The pen he’d been twirling between his fingers suddenly snapped.

  ‘Nine!’ he screamed.

  He got up from behind his desk and walked around. He bent down until his mouth was just inches from Dave's ear. Dave closed his eyes and braced himself for the hairdryer.

  ‘Nine!’ screamed Black Swan again. ‘You're telling me we sent nine heavily armed men to kill one person and they failed.’

  ‘He had help,’ said Dave quietly.

  ‘What do you mean, he had help?’ asked Black Swan. ‘Unless it was a team of navy seals, of course,’ he added sarcastically.

  He paused, as another idea formed.

  ‘Anyway, how could he have a team, he doesn't know anybody here; he’s been gone too long,’ he finished.

  ‘Well he’s certainly found some allies now,’ said Dave. ‘At least according to our eyewitness, he has. And they were not afraid to defend themselves.’

  ‘So just how many of this goon squad survived?’ asked Black Swan.

  ‘Just one,’ said Dave.

  ‘Just one, Christ almighty, how did they kill eight people. How many friends are we talking about here?’ asked Black Swan thickly.

  He returned to his place, and sat down heavily.

  ‘The eyewitness reckons three, maybe four in the house.’

  ‘All armed?’ asked Black Swan.

  ‘Seems like it,’ said Dave.

  ‘Where did he get the guns?’ asked Black Swan, almost to himself.

  Dave knew he was out of the woods, blame wise.

  ‘He must have some contacts here,’ replied Dave. ‘Either that, or he made some contacts after he landed.’

  ‘We need some more intelligence and we need it yesterday,’ said Black Swan. ‘We knew he was a mob enforcer, but he must be more connected than we first thought.’

  ‘Well, he did work for the Mancini's,’ said Dave.

  Black Swan's face hardened.

  ‘So the mistake appears to be mine,’ he stated remorselessly. ‘I underestimated him; I assumed he was just some low life bar room thug.’

  He stopped to compose himself for a few moments.

  ‘Dave, I want to know everything there is to know about this ghost. I want to know where he lived over there. I want to know how far up in their organisation he was. But most of all, I want to know who his new friends are, and where he's getting his weapons.’

  ‘That could be a fairly tall order, boss,’ said Dave. ‘Look how tough it’s been to get any information on him over the past twenty years.’

  ‘We found him though, didn’t we?’ said Black Swan. ‘I’m just sorry our original plan didn’t work. But time is on my side. I found him once, I’ll find him again.’

  He paused to consider his next sentence.

  ‘So does this eyewitness have anything more to add do you think?’ asked Black Swan, changing tack.

  ‘Nothing that he hasn’t already told me,’ said Dave.

  ‘I want to talk to him,’ said Black Swan. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Safe,’ replied Dave.

/>   ‘Let's go,’ said Black Swan.

  #

  They drove in silence, the only sound the thrum of the tyres on the newly resurfaced road. Dave also fancied he could hear the intensity of Black Swan’s thoughts. His employer could be a focused and scary guy.

  ‘Can I ask you a question, boss?’ Dave ventured into the silence.

  Black Swan looked up.

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Who is this guy?’ asked Dave. ‘What is this guy?’

  Black Swan said nothing.

  Dave carried on blithely, the words tripping over each other, as he hurried to get them out.

  ‘One of the things I like about you, boss, is that you are so rational,’ said Dave. ‘You consider problems and think things through. When you act, you generally act decisively, after weighing up the pros and the cons. But this....’

  Dave searched for the word.

  ‘....quest. This revenge mission just does not make any sense to me. There’s no rhyme or reason to it. It’s just so out of character for you.’

  Black Swan smiled.

  ‘I don't know how many times I've asked myself that very same question, and told myself those self same facts,’ he said.

  He sat back and pondered the question for a while.

  ‘Do you know what, Dave,’ he said, ‘and this is no idle boast, I can guarantee it. If I’d put half the amount of energy into my business as I’ve channelled into this revenge mission as you call it, then the Bullock would be history, and I would already be controlling large parts of the Dublin trade.’

  ‘So why?’ asked Dave.

  ‘I suppose it’s a bit like the white powder we peddle,’ answered Black Swan. ‘A junkie doesn’t question why he’s addicted; he just chases the object of his addiction. Since I was ten, there has been this huge unanswered question in my life. It’s got to the stage now where it doesn't matter what the answer is, as long as there is an answer.’

  Dave could almost see the hurt in Black Swan’s eyes, as he remembered.

  ‘This unanswered question; it basically destroyed my childish vision of the perfect family. And to cap it all, it turned out I was the only one who believed it anyway, which makes it worse; living someone else’s pretence.’

  ‘So, why does it matter so much?’ asked Dave.

  Black Swan shot him a sharp look. Dave knew he was on dangerous ground, but he just wanted to know at this stage.

  ‘Your parents are dead, right?’ he asked.

  Black Swan nodded.

  ‘So, this is revenge for them then?’

  ‘It’s more complicated than that,’ said Black Swan. ‘Some of this is retribution for what I could have been and should have had. To be brutally honest with you Dave, I have no feelings at all. You know that; you’ve seen it. People talk about love and hate, I see none of that; it’s invisible to me. If someone owes me money, I’ll have them roughed up; if they persist, I’ll have them killed. Sometimes, I’ll slip on my leather gloves and hurt people myself. Not because I like doing it, or love doing it, but because it is expedient. It is an expected response to certain stimuli that will get me results in business. It’s exactly the same as this revenge or whatever you want to call it now. I just need closure. That’s all it is at this stage. I know practically nothing about this guy; I just hate what he stands for. It’s a promise I made to my ten year old self, and I’m going to keep it.’

  Dave glanced at his boss in the rear view mirror.

  ‘We’ll find him, don’t worry,’ he said softly.

  ‘I know you will,’ said Black Swan.

  Five minutes later, they pulled up outside a rundown Georgian terraced house. At first glance, it looked like any normal crumbling collection of student bedsits. Everything in fact, had been engineered to give that impression.

  The two men ignored the steps up to the faded, but still impressive eighteenth century facade. Instead, they opened the gate in the front railings, and trotted down the modern fire escape into the tiny basement level courtyard.

  The door was set into the wall that supported the main staircase up to the ground floor. A battered old post box was hung at eye level next to it.

  Dave took out a key and opened the post box. Inside was a gleaming metal keypad. He entered a pin number and the door opened inwards with a click. They stepped across the threshold into a dimly lit corridor, and walked to the first door on the left. Dave opened it and went straight in. The glare of the overhead lights was blinding, especially after the relative murk of the passageway.

  The room was equipped in a way that would put most private clinics to shame. There were two large hospital beds against one wall, one of which was very much occupied.

  The large austere male nurse turned around as the two men entered.

  ‘Leave us,’ said Dave brusquely.

  The field hospital, as he called it, had been his idea. Black Swan had been hugely supportive. It kept any of their men who were injured out of custody, and they could be convalesced and put back on the street as soon as was reasonably possible.

  The occupant was hooked up to various machines. They could see a self administering morphine dispenser, but the man’s forehead was still creased in pain. He stiffened when he saw Black Swan and Dave. They heard his breathing quicken, and the gasps were loudly amplified by the full face oxygen mask he was currently wearing.

  Dave removed the mask, prompting a flash of fear in the man's eyes, as his airway became restricted; his chest rising and falling in a shallow and laboured fashion. Dave quickly slipped the nose tube over the man’s head, and then waited until his breathing had returned to a semblance of normality.

  Black Swan pulled up a chair and sat beside the bed, like a concerned relative.

  ‘So, what's your name?’ he asked softly.

  ‘Adrian,’ the man gasped.

  ‘So Adrian,’ said Black Swan. ‘I hear you guys got yourselves into a spot of bother.’

  Adrian coughed; one of those full bodied coughs that may have been agony or laughter, it was hard to tell.

  ‘You can say that again,’ he whispered, his eyes pain filled and bloodshot.

  ‘Tell me everything you remember,’ said Black Swan soothingly, sitting back.

  ‘Well, Decco collected us all from the pub car park in the van like he always does. He said it was going to be easy. He said it was going to be like a turkey shoot.’

  Adrian coughed again; tiny blood drops could be seen forming on the crisp white sheets. Black Swan waited patiently for him to continue.

  ‘When we got to the house, Decco sent four guys round the back. I was one of them. As we got into position behind the house, I heard Decco shouting a name, Thomas I think it was. There were several volleys of gunfire. We waited and got ready to hit them from behind, but as we were approaching the back door, it literally disintegrated in front of us.’

  He coughed again.

  ‘It was like that scene from the start of Saving Private Ryan. I’d never really heard a bullet in flight before. I was always the one launching them. It was chaos; screams, shouts, bullets flying everywhere. And then I was hit; two in the leg and one in the chest.’

  He coughed for a third time, as if trying to emphasise the injury.

  ‘At that stage, we had three down. They looked pretty dead and I wasn’t sticking around to check. I managed to scramble out of the yard. Next thing I hear a scream and then boom; knocked me clean off my feet. I didn’t even look back. I rang Dave and here I am.’

  ‘Anything else you can remember?’ asked Black Swan.

  Adrian shook his head. He looked drained and tired.

  Black Swan got up. He gently removed the oxygen tube from Adrian’s nose. Adrian smiled at him gratefully, and this time, when the laboured breathing returned, he wasn’t scared. Adrian noticed distractedly that Black Swan was wearing a black leather glove. He didn’t see the small hospital issue pillow until it was too late; until Black Swan caught it from Dave, and jammed it down over Adrian’s face. He
scrabbled weakly, his hands plucking ineffectually at Black Swan's arms, his legs kicking feebly under the tightly tucked hospital sheets. His movements became progressively less frantic, until finally they ceased altogether.

  Black Swan looked at Dave impassively.

  ‘He’s in a better place now. I hear hell is pleasant at this time of year.’

  The nurse returned and regarded the stiffening corpse impassively. He pulled the sheet over Adrian’s head, and then busied himself disconnecting the tubes and wires.

  As Black Swan and Dave watched, the man seemed to pause and then it was like one of those comedies where the light bulb comes on over the main characters head. He walked, or more accurately, jogged out of the room and returned a minute later. He whispered to Dave as he handed over the plain white envelope.

  Dave dismissed him with a wave of his hand. He extracted the contents and quickly shuffled through the documents contained within. He briefly paused and Eoin could see his lips moving. He was shaking; Eoin hoped it was with excitement.

  Dave wordlessly handed over the contents of the envelope.

  Black Swan browsed through the photographs, as the hate rose from them and took physical form. Thomas Eugene O’Neill. There must have been twenty pictures; shots from long and short range and from all angles. There was also a brief handwritten note.

  I managed to place a GPS tracker on subject, as well as an electronic surveillance device for listening. He has already destroyed the listening device and will discover the tracker eventually but it could be useful for the time being; gives me a slight advantage. He is currently on the way to Kinsale. Use this knowledge and act on it wisely.

  ‘This is great news,’ said Dave with a smile, punching his boss lightly on the arm.

  ‘Is it?’ asked Eoin.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I know why I want him,’ said Eoin. ‘But I don’t like competition.’

  Chapter 39 – Remembrance

  21st May 2011 – Eleven days after the Storm.