Corrector

by Blink, Bob

  Nate was a better shot than Jake, and had used the Glock before, albeit with the standard barrel. He looked at the pistol that Jake handed him with the extremely tall sights and the threaded barrel. Slowly he unscrewed the thread protector, then reached out his hand for the adapter Jake had made on the shop lathe. Uncertainly, he screwed the oil filter onto the end of the adapter. Jake had selected a tall and relative narrow filter rather than the thick filter used by the Chevy.

  “That’s the strangest contraption I’ve ever seen.” Nate said. He held out the handgun, attempting to align the sights on the target they had set up. “I still can’t see the target. The filter blocks the sights.”

  “I know,” agreed Jake. “Those sights work well enough with the thinner commercial units, but aren’t any help with the oil filters. You’ll have to get the feel and shoot by instinct. The range will be less than fifteen feet.”

  “And these really work?”

  “You’ll see. Surprisingly well actually.”

  They spent an hour practicing. By the time they finished, Nate was able to consistently place his shots into the kill zone of the silhouette targets they had set up. Jake fired almost two hundred rounds, reaffirming his own comfort with the weapon he would be using.

  It all came down to this. Jake and Nate were in position on the rooftop waiting for the two men to arrive. Zack and Cheryl had intercepted Karin and had convinced the two women to stay out of San Francisco yesterday, opting for a day at Sea World instead. Today they were supposedly on their way back to Nevada. Jake hoped so, but worried about the reception he would receive once he returned home himself.

  Jake was waiting exactly where he had the last time. Nate was further back in a hide where he couldn’t see the spot the shooter would go to, but where he had a clear view of the stairway door. They each had a throw-away phone and communicated strictly by text. They had passed a couple of messages earlier to ensure reliable communications.

  It was time. The shooter had come out onto the roof a few minutes earlier and was in the process of setting up. Jake texted a quick code telling Nate he was moving, then dropped the phone in his pocket. He stood and slowly moved toward the man a short distance away.

  Jake heard the three sharp thuds behind him. He couldn’t help clenching somewhat at the sounds, but nothing came his way. That had been Nate. As he heard the man fall, the shooter in front of him perked up in response to the sounds. He turned suddenly and started to bring the Uzi around as Jake had expected. His own pistol aligned on the target, Jake fired two quick shots. He had planned to shoot for the chest, but something about the man’s clothes suggested more padding than seemed normal. He might be wearing a vest. Anyone could buy one of course, but cops in particular would have access to such equipment. Jake adjusted his aim and put the two shots under the upraised arm into the armpit. Then he shifted his aim upwards and put another pair into the man’s head. While this was happening, he heard another muffled shot behind him. Certain his own target was dead, he quickly looked behind him.

  Nate was standing over the body of the cop.

  “Bastard had a vest,” Nate whispered. He had put a final shot into the wounded man’s head.

  Quickly they scanned the area for their brass. Nate was able to find all of the brass for the Glock, but one of the rounds from the Sig had bounced off and gotten itself lost. There was no time to worry about it. Quickly they moved toward the fire escape and made their way down to the street level.

  Fifteen minutes later they were in their car. Forty minutes later Nate tossed the incriminating pieces into the bay from the center of the Richmond Bridge where Jake had momentarily stopped as they drove across. As they drove onto the 80 Freeway, Jake called the San Francisco police and told them to check for shooters on the building. They pulled the batteries from the throw away phones and ditched them in Vallejo where they stopped for gas. Several hours later they were in Nevada. Upon arriving home, Jake called Karin while Nate called Zack.

  Chapter 22

  The calls were intended to arrange to get together the next afternoon to review events and coordinate their status, as well as to let the others know they had returned safely. Damage control and coordination, just in case. Jake couldn’t see where they had left any kind of a trail, but he didn’t want his friends at risk and it was important they all understood where matters stood. Nate talked briefly with Zack before hanging up. He had better luck than Jake had.

  “You had to kill them, didn’t you?” Karin had said when Jake reached her on the phone. The news had carried the story for several hours of the two armed men who had been found dead on the roof of the building at Pier 39. Thus far the word hadn’t come out about one or more of them being cops, but Jake couldn’t imagine how it would be more than a day or so before that was leaked to the media even if the police didn’t choose to reveal it themselves.

  Jake had to remember that from Karin’s perspective this was the first time they had communicated since the last awkward discussion that had ended unhappily more than two months earlier. She wouldn’t have any memories of their meeting in Vallejo and the time they had spent together there. She would know only that Zack and Cheryl had appeared, revealed to her what Jake had told them about upcoming events, and now would see that he had acted the same way as in the past by arranging to kill the shooter.

  “I tried to let the police handle it,” he said lamely in response to her accusations.

  He had. But it had spiraled out of control and in the end this was the only way he could see to bring the matter to a conclusion. He had hopes of making her understand that. If not, however, he’d accept the inevitable. As he’d driven home from his weeks long sabbatical, he’d come to terms with a future without her. That might be where this all ended. At least she was alive, which mattered most to him. Even if they couldn’t be together.

  “I’ll be back tomorrow,” Nate said as he prepared to leave for his own home. “Is Karin going to come?” He had overheard a little of Jake’s conversation.

  “She said she would, but I’m not certain. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

  “At least Cheryl managed to keep Ellen out of it,” Nate said.

  That was a surprising development, but one that pleased Jake immensely. He’d been worried about Ellen as the potential leak. He didn’t know her very well, and this situation would have been a bit of gossip he’d worried she might reveal. But Cheryl had approached the woman and explained that she needed to speak with Karin privately. After explaining the situation to Karin, the two women had concocted the story that Karin needed to return to Nevada late the next day to meet with Jake who would be returning from his trip. It was important. Ellen had accepted the situation as a possible reconciliation attempt. As a result, the foursome had spent the next morning and early afternoon at Sea World, and then Karin had left with Zack and Cheryl. Ellen would be going into the city the next day, then would drive down to Redwood City to visit an old schoolmate before returning to Nevada herself. She never learned of the intended attack in the city nor of Jake’s ability.

  “It’ll work out,” Nate said encouragingly. “We’ll help her understand.”

  Jake wondered, but maybe having the others know would help somewhat. Still, Cheryl hadn’t been fully supportive of what he was doing, and the two women may join against him.

  “I don’t know,” Jake said honestly as he tried to rub some of the tenseness out of his neck. “How about you? Are you doing okay?”

  Nate flashed him an awkward grin. “I guess. I still half expect to see the police arrive with sirens blaring as they come to arrest me for murder. It’s almost unbelievable we did what we did. But having seen what was going on, I know it was the right thing. They were about to do exactly what you told us. If we hadn’t been there . . .”

  “It’ll go away,” Jake promised. “I felt exactly the same the first couple of times. Call me if you want to talk.”

  Nate nodded, then climbed into his car and started it up. He wave
d as he drove away.

  Nate was the first to arrive after lunch. Zack and Cheryl were next, arriving half an hour later. Nate and Jake were watching the news when they knocked at the door. The media was reporting that one of the men was a cop and the other was his brother. Names were reported, so at last the identities had been revealed. The reports were also revealing that it appeared the two men had been intent on an attack on the tourists, and whoever had shot them had prevented a significant number of casualties. No motivation for the attempted attack was being given. Thus far, the police were also not indicating any leads as to who had killed the two men on the roof.

  “We were listening in the car,” Cheryl said when Jake told her what was being broadcast.

  “Do you think you got away clean?” Zack asked, somewhat concerned.

  “No one saw us. I can’t see any way for them to trace this to us,” Jake explained. “We’ve ditched everything we took with us to the scene.”

  “You planned to kill them all along, didn’t you?” Cheryl asked.

  It starts already. “Yes,” Jake admitted. “I couldn’t see anyway else to end it. Especially since one was a cop. A call to the police about the intent would have gone unheeded and more than likely would have just delayed the attack to another date and location. If we had captured them, we would have been left trying to explain how we happened to be on the rooftop waiting, armed with weapons that are very illegal in California. I’m not sure who would have ended up in the most trouble. This was the only certain way to stop it. Besides, I owed the bastard for shooting Karin.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us this beforehand?”

  “I needed you to convince Karin. If you’d told her my intentions, I’m not sure what actions she might have taken. It could have been something that upset the entire plan.”

  “It’s done,” Zack said, interrupting. “From what the news has been reporting, it would have been exactly as you described. I still have trouble understanding how this ability of yours works, but stopping the killing was the right action.”

  The discussion was interrupted by Jake’s doorbell.

  “That’s hopefully Karin,” Jake said. He left the others in the living room and walked back out toward the front of the house. His heart beat faster in anticipation of seeing her again.

  Jake pulled open the door and there she was. She looked wonderful. Her long hair was being teased by the light breeze. She wore a white buttoned blouse and a knee length skirt which showed off her legs. Thank god he’d been able to prevent her being harmed.

  “Come in,” he said awkwardly. After their brief discussion he didn’t know if he should reach for her, embrace her, or keep his distance.

  “Jake,” she said somewhat coolly. She stepped past him and walked back to where the others could be heard.

  Jake followed behind her after closing the door.

  Karin and Cheryl were hugging when Jake entered the room, and then they all sat. Zack turned down the sound on the television, but left the picture running in case there were new developments they might want to see.

  “So you told them about your special ability,” Karin said when he sat down in the large padded chair adjacent to where she sat.

  “I had to. I needed their help.”

  “And now you’ve implicated them in one of your killings.”

  “There was little choice. You were at risk. I had to stop him from killing you.”

  Karin winced at his words. “Cheryl told me a little about that, but no details. But she told me you had been able to stop that by calling the police. Why didn’t it end there?”

  “Because others, people who hadn’t been involved at first, would have died as a result of my actions. That had to be corrected.”

  Jake took twenty minutes and went through the full set of events that had led to him drafting his friends. He explained the multiple back-tracks that had resulted. He was blunt about what had happened the first time and what Karin’s fate would have been. She was a bit pale when he finished.

  “It still ended up with you murdering someone. Just like before. Just like we argued about. And now Nate is an accomplice.”

  “He’s right,” Cheryl said unexpectedly. Karin looked shocked, expecting an ally in the other woman. Jake was taken aback as well.

  “Zack and I talked about it half the night. It isn’t a pretty option, but it is the best one available. Sometimes you can’t have things the way you would like. The world isn’t always fair. It was those two men or a bunch of innocent people.”

  “Jake still murdered them,” Karin objected, but with a trace of doubt after Cheryl’s words.

  “Killed them. There’s a difference,” Zack disagreed. “You don’t claim a soldier murdered the enemy or a cop murdered a criminal. At times you have to take a life to save a life, or in this case many lives.”

  “He stalked them and killed them without warning,” Karin objected.

  “Much like a military sniper,” Nate said. “The goal is to stop them, not engage in a fair fight. It’s not racquetball where sportsmanship is paramount. The goal is to win and walk away alive. Anything else is stupid. Jake had special intelligence about the situation which he applied to correct the situation and, and this is important, survive the encounter.”

  “Who would you rather died?” Cheryl asked softly. “Those two men who planned to murder innocents, or the dozens of men, women, and children who were out enjoying their day with no thought to the risk they were under?”

  “But why Jake? I don’t want Jake to have to kill people. There should be another way.”

  “This situation clearly showed that sometimes there isn’t much in the way of other options,” Nate said. “Jake tried. Look what happened. I’m still uneasy about it all, but I’m glad we did it.”

  “I don’t like it much either,” Jake added softly. “But I wouldn’t feel right letting it happen without doing anything.”

  “At least you now have a support team,” Cheryl said. “Perhaps we can help you somehow. Maybe there is a way for a group to help handle this.”

  “That won’t work. The people and the secret would be at risk. It would only work if my secret was exposed, and I fear what that would mean. It would also be hard for those involved.”

  “Why?” Zack asked.

  “Generally, you wouldn’t know if anything had really happened. Suppose there was a mass killing. We all agree that it should be stopped. So, I go and stop it. Afterwards I tell you we agreed, but all you would know was that someone had been killed and there had never been a mass killing. Unlike me, none of you would have the before and after memories.”

  “That would be weird,” Cheryl admitted.

  They talked about the situation for more than two hours. Jake agreed he would coordinate with the others for any future events and see how it worked. It would be good to be able to talk with someone about his plans, but he suspected over time it wouldn’t work out. He was also uneasy that so many knew his secret, but they were all his closest friends, and there was no changing that at this point. It was the cost of saving Karin, a cost he was more than willing to pay.

  Jake walked Karin to the door while the others waited in the living room. She was quiet and subdued.

  “Jake, I owe you my life. Don’t think I don’t appreciate that. I still feel all crawly when I think about what you said happened. But I don’t know about all of this. I’ve missed you, but what you do still feels wrong to me somehow.”

  Jake felt hollow. He was afraid where it was going to end up. With all his control he managed to hold himself together.

  “Think about it. Talk to Cheryl. Better yet, call me and we can talk. I promise I won’t press, as much as I want to. I can’t say I’ll simply stop what I’m doing. I can’t let people die when there is a way I can help. I wouldn’t be me. It wouldn’t be right in my eyes. I’d be letting them be killed so I could have what I want. Can you understand that?”

  “A little maybe. Cheryl has made me wonder. Be
patient, please!”

  They hugged. It was a step forward. He walked her to her car where they hugged again. Then he watched her drive away.

  Chapter 23

  “You are convinced the shooting in San Francisco is related to the earlier cases, aren’t you?” asked Special Agent Jim Laney.

  Special Agent Susan Carlson nodded in response. They were meeting in Carlson’s office at FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. along with agent Shaun Hansen to review the status of the open investigation into the string of shootings spanning the past few years.

  “There’s a great deal that appears different in this instance,” objected Laney, “at least on the surface. For one thing there were two of them this time. That’s something that has never happened before.”

  Carlson had brought Laney onboard just over a week ago as someone who could afford to be out of Washington more often than herself. Carlson was of the opinion they had finally managed to get a break in the case, and she wanted someone who would be free to pursue the investigation more aggressively than her current workload would allow. There were lots of other cases demanding her attention, many with real clues to follow.

  “That indeed is something we haven’t seen before although it’s possible the second lawbreaker has been there all along, but has been silent and in the background. The previous cases have all involved a single victim, so perhaps he wasn’t needed in an active role. It might explain how the suspect has always been able to surprise his victims. Remember, one of the two men was killed with a 9mm Sig-Sauer as before.”

  “Granted, one of them used the same kind of pistol, but the rifling didn’t match anything, and the other was a Glock. It could be simple coincidence.”

  “It never matches,” Carlson reminded Laney. “It just means he uses a different gun, or at least a different barrel each time. I think it’s the same guy. The situation is too similar to the other cases.”