by Guy Adams
‘I always did,’ Gleason said quietly. ‘But today’s war is a little different.’
Damn right it is, thought Mulroney, it’s war for the hell of it. He made a snap decision and slipped his hand into his pocket to turn on the phone.
‘We’re outnumbered,’ he said, ‘and they’re prepared for us. We’re fighting for a vague promise of cash. More likely we’ll end up bleeding out in the middle of Constitution Gardens. Yeah, Cotter, this war is different. I thought we were in this for the money! But you don’t care about that, do you?’
‘There are more important things than money.’
‘Yeah,’ Mulroney agreed, ‘there are, and maybe if you asked me to risk my life for them then I would. But this isn’t even about principles, this is just about pulling the trigger for the hell of it. Somewhere – and maybe it’s since you started playing with that freaky goddamn rifle you love so much – you’ve got yourself all turned around. You’ve lost perspective. Cotter, you’re not the man you once were.’ Mulroney paused. ‘Or maybe this is what you always were,’ he said finally. ‘I don’t know.’
They drove in silence for a moment, Mulroney looking down in his lap, Gleason staring straight ahead at the Lincoln Memorial as it rose up ahead of them. A monument to a dead president, Gleason thought. They’ll need another one in about an hour.
The phone in Mulroney’s pocket began to ring.
Mulroney just stared at his pocket for a second, utterly disbelieving his misfortune. Then he reached for his gun. Gleason was quicker – despite his age, he usually was.
They drove on, Gleason steering gently around the memorial. ‘Answer it,’ he said.
‘It’s not my phone,’ said Mulroney. Realising how stupid that sounded, he tried to elaborate. ‘I picked it up at the cottage, that’s all, Thought it might be useful.’ The phone’s answer machine took the call, the ringing finally stopping. ‘Look,’ said Mulroney, ‘I’ll get it out, you can take a look, it’ll just be someone wanting to speak to, well… whoever the hell it was that owned that house.’
Mulroney held the phone out to Gleason, nearly dropping it as it began to ring again. Gleason placed his gun in his lap and took the phone. ‘I believe you,’ he said. ‘Now maybe we both need to calm down a little.’
Mulroney lowered his own gun and Gleason answered the call.
‘Mr Gleason?’ asked a voice.
Gleason kept his face impassive as he answered. ‘Yeah.’
‘This is a representative of the United States Government.’
‘That so?’
‘Indeed. Might I suggest you dismiss your subordinate? It can’t be a great surprise to learn he has sold you out. That is why I have this number. He gave it to us so we could trace your movements. For now, that trace is not happening. I have bought us a little time so that I can make a proposition to you. I imagine you will doubt that, but all I can say is this: if we just wanted to trace you why would I call and warn you of the fact? Think about that as you deal with Mr Mulroney. I shall call you back in a minute or so.’
The phone went dead before Gleason had a chance to answer. He placed the phone in his lap, moving casually.
‘Well?’ said Mulroney. ‘Who the hell was it?’
Gleason swung his fist into Mulroney’s face, breaking his nose. He snatched Mulroney’s gun and, straightening the car a little before he ran it off the road, pointed it at him.
‘It was for me,’ said Gleason. ‘Interesting, don’t you think?’
‘Jesus, Cotter!’ Mulroney whined, blood dripping onto his lap from between the hands he cupped to his nose. ‘Somebody’s screwing with us, OK?’
‘Really?’ Cotter asked. ‘That the best you’ve got?’
Mulroney sighed. ‘OK, screw it. You were acting like a flake, what do you expect? I found myself an exit. Do what you like, I ain’t begging.’
‘They tracing the phone?’ Gleason asked.
‘Of course.’
Gleason thought about it for a moment. The man on the phone certainly had a point, if they just wanted to track him why alert him to the fact? He was not a naturally trusting man, but in this case logic dictated he hear the man out. But he would also take something else the caller had said under advice: he would continue alone.
‘Damn shame,’ he said to Mulroney.
‘Eighteen years, man,’ Mulroney replied.
‘Yeah.’ Gleason shot Mulroney in the temple and picked up the phone just as it began to ring.
‘We alone now?’ the voice asked.
‘Yes,’ Gleason replied. ‘Now say your piece before I dump this thing.’
‘Well, Mr Gleason, we’d simply like to offer you a job. We both know that this current trajectory of yours is untenable. Shoot up central Washington if you must, but where do you go from there? Do you really imagine a future where we will be wiring money into offshore bank accounts just to make you go away? That’s not what we do to terrorists, Mr Gleason. We simply keep pursuing them until eventually they are dead. You know this. You are one of the blunt tools we have used to achieve this goal in the past.’
‘And your alternative?’
‘You come to work for us. You would be our ultimate enforcer in matters of global security. It is a select position. One that has had very few occupants.’
‘And the current man in the post?’
‘The gentleman that forced your location in Colorado out of David Ellroy. Unfortunately for us, some short time after you had already vacated it.’
‘And how does he feel about being replaced?’
‘I imagine you’ll be able to ask him soon. We have held off the involvement of the security service. They are still loitering around the parks of central Washington waiting for a viable cellphone trace to lead them to you.’
‘Whereas your man?’
‘Is already en route.’
‘Lying son of a bitch.’
‘Not at all, the offer is genuine as long as you are the last man standing. If you agree to take the post, you will be cared for for the rest of your life, given free rein to indulge your tastes and act as our singular global enforcer. We may even let you keep some of the weaponry, though, naturally, our people would like to study it a little first.’
‘Cared for for the rest of my life?’
‘Indeed, every comfort will be afforded you. We treat our employees well, Mr Gleason.’
‘Up until you choose to replace them.’
There was a slight pause at that. ‘Do you want the job or not?’
‘I’ll let you know.’
Gleason threw the phone out of his window and watched as it splintered beneath the wheels of the car behind him.
Ahead, where Constitution Drive continued through the parks, a large barrier was erected. No great surprise there, Gleason thought. Easy enough to arrange and who cares if you piss off a few tourists? There was a sign on the barrier: ‘Warning – Gas Leak’, it declared.
Gleason turned left, continuing up 17th Street, running parallel to the park. He passed the White House and continued on, noting the ring of barriers and the security staff. When he was able to pull off the road, he did so, yanking Mulroney’s dead body forward so his head leaned on the dashboard. He had a bottle of water in the compartment of his door and he pulled it out, unscrewing the cap and splashing it on the passenger window to clean off the worst of the blood. People didn’t pay that much attention, he decided, and security had enough area to cover without checking out all the cars in the vicinity.
He reached for the long bag on the back seat and pulled it forward onto his lap. He wouldn’t need as much of this as he had hoped. Just one man left standing.
He pulled out a small box of wires and glass attached to the pocket of a rucksack. Leaning forward, he pulled the rucksack on back to front so that the bag hung at his chest. Inside was a heavy string of D Cell batteries. There was room for a couple more handguns from the shoulder bag, so he added them and then zipped the rucksack up. Last of all, he gripped the Ytr
axorian rifle and pressed a switch nestled in the centre of the box of wires. There was a quiet whine as it powered up from the batteries and he stepped out of the car. As he moved over to the sidewalk, an old man walked right into him. Of course, Gleason thought, dodging the oncoming pedestrians who made no attempt to step out of his way. It’s working, he realised, they don’t notice me. The rucksack was a portable perception filter, a device that didn’t render the wearer invisible but convinced those around not to notice. Its effect was fragile: draw too much attention and it would stop working altogether, but as long as he walked slowly and made no sudden movements it should give him all the advantage he needed.
He walked back along the road, heading down Pennsylvania Avenue where the pedestrians thinned out to be replaced by the barriers and the fake gas-leak warnings. Gleason found a spot between groups of security staff – he didn’t want to try this directly under their noses – and pushed his way past the barrier and off the road. Nobody looked towards him. He began to walk along the grass, heading straight for the rear of the White House.
The area was thick with uniformed security services, gathered together into groups or walking in pairs around the periphery keeping their eyes peeled for someone suspicious. But he wasn’t suspicious, was he? He wasn’t even here…
He walked slowly, not even wanting to run in case that was enough to compromise the effect of the perception filter.
As he got closer, he felt the fronds of the Ytraxorian gun close around his hands, that electric tingle spreading up to his elbows.
Was it as easy as this? he wondered. No doubt, once he started firing, people would pay more attention. But by then it would be far too late.
Was there nobody to stop him?
‘We can recognise your man on sight!’ insisted Rex, exasperated at the security services’ lack of interest in either his or Shaeffer’s presence.
‘Thanks to a miraculous new gadget called a camera, so can we.’
Max Scott, chief of the uniformed secret service policemen – and man most likely to have a severe migraine by midday – had little patience for interdepartmental interference. He had enough on his plate without agents from other agencies getting under his feet. The President, against Scott’s advice, was refusing to evacuate. Apparently, he didn’t want to send a message of ‘no trust’ in those charged to protect him. ‘Besides,’ he had said when the emergency meeting drew to a close, ‘it’s just one guy, right?’
‘If you want my opinion,’ Scott said to Rex, ‘and you’re going to get it whether you do or not, this whole situation is going to wind up being a false alarm.’ He held up his arm to stop Rex arguing. ‘And if it isn’t, I have several hundred uniformed officers and special agents waiting to catch this whacko and throw him into a cell.’
‘Look,’ said Rex, ‘I know you guys can do your jobs. I’m just asking that you let us be involved. As a courtesy.’
‘In my line of work, courtesies are few and far between. You’re in my way, and I don’t need you. Get beyond the security barrier and stay there.’
Scott marched away leaving a small detail of officers to escort Rex and Shaeffer back to the road.
‘Great,’ Rex sighed. ‘So we’re left circling the perimeter, hoping we get lucky.’
‘You expect a man who’s trained to infiltrate and execute to stick to the sidewalk?’ asked Shaeffer. ‘It’s not really my style.’
‘Tough. If we break in, all we’re going to do is draw fire away from Gleason. The last thing they need is two targets to divide up their forces.’
‘Point.’
They walked up 17th Street, feeling utterly redundant as they tried to survey the parkland through the trees.
Gleason waited until he was about twenty feet from the White House, raised the rifle and cleared his mind of everything but the intent to do damage.
Just as it had above the Denver traffic, a wide field of almost entirely transparent energy flowed from the barrel of the gun and spread out towards the building. Gleason squeezed the rifle tight in his hands, let the electric caress of the seaweed fronds cover him from head to foot. He returned energy of his own, channelling the fear and anger of every battlefield he had ever experienced back into the rifle and out of the barrel.
He heard shouting from his left. Here they come, he thought, finally. He released the trigger, letting the cloud of energy roll towards the building as he turned his fire on the security services that were running towards him. He experimented, telling the rifle what he wanted it to do as it coughed bursts of energy through the air towards his attackers. Some of the men vanished; others crumbled to dust. The more he fired, the more the air seemed to alter around him. Time itself seemed to slow, the air becoming a thing of liquid. Noises distorted, becoming low, bass roars.
The wave of energy struck the building and cracks radiated outward, as if it had been hit by a hammer. The effect crept wider and wider, rolling over walls, creeping up pillars, blacking out windows.
Gleason felt the world draw slower still as all around him men fell or vanished.
He felt weak. That electric numbness creeping over him as he sank to his knees, the rifle drooping and sending a wedge of grass deathly yellow as it touched the ground.
In front of him, the White House finally fell, toppling inwards like a controlled demolition, walls falling, glass cracking. Plumes of brick dust erupting upwards. There was screaming, those low, slow voices speeding up now the rifle was powering down. The world was a record finding its correct spin speed. Nobody came near him now, all staring at the utter destruction of the iconic residence before them. Bodies were viewable in the wreckage but they were as decaying and aged as the stone that piled around them.
‘Got you, you bastard,’ said Gleason.
His breath was short and he could barely raise his head as he saw an old man walk up to him. The man was wearing a light-grey suit that was almost as out of place amongst this destruction as the smile on his face. He recognised the old man’s face, had seen him somewhere recently… Then he remembered: it was the man he had bumped into after stepping out of the car.
‘Well, Mr Gleason,’ said Mr Wynter. ‘I imagine you must be rather pleased with yourself? Today can, after all, be considered something of a success.’
The old man reached down and pulled the rifle out of Gleason’s hands. Try as he might, the old soldier couldn’t resist.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Mr Wynter, ‘the nerve agent I spiked you with during our earlier collision isn’t permanent.’ He gave Gleason a smile. ‘When you’re my age, you take all the advantages you can get.’
This is him, Gleason thought, this is the enforcer… the man they wanted me to replace.
‘Fascinating, isn’t it?’ Mr Wynter continued, looking at the rifle. ‘A weapon that responds to the potential of who wields it.’ He gave a chuckle. ‘Just wait until it sinks its teeth into me!’
The gun pulsed brightly as the weed fronds closed around Mr Wynter’s old hands.
Mr Wynter sighed, quite taken aback by the energy that pulsed through him. ‘Oh yes…’ he said. ‘That really is something else, isn’t it?’
Gleason mumbled something, still not able to speak.
‘What was that?’ Mr Wynter asked, leaning in close.
‘Get on with it,’ Gleason whispered. ‘Shoot me.’
Mr Wynter laughed. ‘Now why would I do something as stupid as that?’ he asked.
He turned the rifle on himself and pulled the trigger.
Twenty
Rex and Shaeffer drove into central Washington and parked a short walk away from the Washington Monument.
‘You going to have any sway getting in here?’ Shaeffer asked. ‘I mean, at least tell me we’re not going to get shot by our own people the minute we stray too close?’
‘You think I should have brought my special, pink CIA T-shirts so they knew who we were?’
They came to the barrier and Rex waved at one of the men loitering around the railings
trying to look like a gas engineer.
‘Hey,’ he called. ‘Rex Matheson, CIA.’ He dangled his ID as the man walked over. ‘Now obviously you just work for the gas company, but can you tell your foreman that I have someone who has worked alongside Gleason for years, knows his methods, can recognise him on sight and, as such, should really be on the same side of the barrier as you?’
The man in the overalls stared at him in confusion for a moment.
‘Now, if you would,’ said Rex. ‘If the President gets himself assassinated while we’re all stood here playing with our dicks, I’ll feel we’ve had a wasted morning.’
The man snatched Rex’s ID and walked away, pulling a radio out of the pocket of his overalls. Glancing up and down the road, he began to talk into the radio, his back turned to Rex and Shaeffer.
‘Subtle move,’ said Shaeffer. ‘How long do you think it’ll take for us both to be escorted over the city limits?’
‘He’s secret service,’ said Rex, ‘and I’m banking on the fact that the secret service hasn’t the first idea who we are and likely won’t care.’ He smiled at Shaeffer. ‘You always think you’re the centre of attention? It would take the gasman over there several hours of interdepartmental cross-checks just to find out your surname. He’s going to check with his boss, and as long as neither of us are red-flagged as security risks we should at least get on the other side of that fence.’
The man returned and waved them past the barrier. ‘Chief wants to talk to you.’
‘I just bet he does,’ said Rex, grinning at Shaeffer. ‘Where’s he at?’
The man in the overalls led them to the Ellipse, where a group of uniformed security services men stood waiting.
‘You the CIA guy?’ asked one of them.
‘You the man in charge?’ Rex replied.
‘Only CIA would have the lack of manners to answer a question with a question,’ the man replied. ‘Max Scott, Chief of Police. What’s this I hear about you knowing this guy?’
‘We’ve been tracking him for a few days,’ said Rex. ‘This is a former member of his unit, been helping us since the rest went rogue.’