The Storm Giants

by Pearce Hansen

  Everett held Kerri one more time, fitting to her full length, tight and snug. He and Tobias hit the road again.

  “So that’s what matters to you, Everett?” Tobias asked. “A big risk showing me that.”

  Of a sudden, Tobias gasped. “Wait a second. You didn’t want to leave me alone with the gold and I wasn’t about to get out of the truck. You had to either bring me down here or break a sweat digging a hole.”

  “Bingo,” Everett said. “Maybe I’m rubbing off on you.”

  “Fat chance of that,” Tobias said. “Listen. I’m not what you’d call a team player. But we’re partners, right?”

  “Right,” Everett said.

  Tobias pursed his lips. “I’m with you to the end Everett, whatever the payday. I see what you have.”

  “I get it,” Tobias said.

  Chapter 41 : High Noon with the Widow

  When they hit Santa Rosa, Everett called the Widow on the cell phone he’d confiscated from her girl. He rejected the Widow’s first proposal for a meet spot, wrangled with her like he cared where it went down, and then agreed as if giving in.

  He made one more call after, during which he allowed himself to pace up and down the sidewalk. He talked for several minutes and then hung up.

  He got in the truck and turned to Tobias. “No matter what goes down, keep your Desert Eagle holstered. Don’t kill anyone unless I do.”

  “You’ve played it well enough so far Everett. What if your plan goes sour?” Tobias put on an innocent look, asked in a fake tremulous voice, “What if they take you out and I’m left alone like a babe in the woods?” His chin even quivered, he was a laugh riot he was.

  “Then have as much fun as you like, and it’s a one way split. Get rid of the evidence package if you’re the only one comes out of this. Won’t matter to me, but I’d prefer the Man not bother my people.”

  The Widow had picked an illegal squat of a warehouse in an industrial ghost town southeast of Oakland Civic Center. The abandoned light industrial area gave the Widow the privacy she craved. There were too many approaches for the Widow to interdict with a roadblock. It being out of business meant there wouldn’t be any cleaning ladies or rent-a-cops muddling up the tactical equation.

  Everett insisted the meet take place within half an hour of phone call’s end. Half an hour wasn’t enough time for the Widow to bring big guns to bear if she had any.

  The weather was bad, meaning good. Rain poured down in black poison sheets, always a gift to the attacker.

  There was occasional thunder behind the torrents of precipitation. The storm giants lurked close by, enjoying his predicament and mumbling advice about the line.

  The Widow had outside security standing in the wet next to the freight entrance door. Her gun punk was dressed in the kind of moldy rags a bum would favor, however the disguise ring true. The guy’s face was clean, and he wearing expensive tactical boots. The homeless around here only surfaced at during the day, free meal time: the local kids made occasional sport of dousing bums in gasoline and torching them.

  The pseudo tramp rapped on the rolling door as Everett idled the truck toward him. At either end of the alley, the Widow’s hunting pair of Beamers pulled up to block the entrances, trapping the snack truck like a fly in a pitcher plant. What, she couldn’t even spring for a third vehicle?

  As the rolling door shrieked and rattled its way upwards, Tobias looked like a kid entering a candy store. The Widow waited dead ahead in the middle of the warehouse. Next to her stood the driver girl from the piney woods.

  A red dot of light splashed across Everett’s face as he drove the truck inside. To his left, behind the laser’s dazzle, a figure with a rifle inside a windowed office space. The shooter’s upper body was framed by the square opening a glass pane once filled. As Everett squinted against the light spatter, the sniper’s aim dropped to his throat.

  Everett blinked the spots away and looked around to see if the guy had any crossfire backup. This was the only sniper exposing himself. The Widow did seem threadbare in her assets.

  The blocking cars and a sniper in place – basic, so textbook and predictable. The Widow had something unorthodox up her sleeve, or was so comfortable with her perceived advantage she didn’t feel the need for creative effort.

  The laser dot held steady as Everett exited the van. Then it moved to pin Tobias as he got out the shotgun seat. Tobias giggled as he looked at the red love letter dot over his heart. He waggled his fingers in the laser’s beam like he was playing with the light show at a rave.

  Irked by Tobias’s disdain, the red dot shifted to Everett. The beam commenced a metronome pattern of bouncing back and forth between them. The sniper didn’t want either of them to feel left out.

  The warehouse’s interior was a typical industrial loft, the ceiling two stories above with a cement floor filling almost the entire interior. A semi-enclosed office space by the entrance. The building was one big killing arena.

  In the far corner was a hole in the ceiling where part of the roof had collapsed. Rain poured in the hole and puddled on the floor, making an eerie waterfall noise.

  The brick walls in that corner were blackened from smoke, with charred heaps of animal bones marinating in the rain puddles. A big Satan head and pentagram were spray painted on the bricks. The devilish graffiti was obscured by soot from previous burnt offerings, rippling as though alive beneath the water sheeting down it.

  Used condoms and broken liquor bottles were scattered about. The place stank: rotten food, stale alcohol, long term low levels of personal hygiene. Mostly, that ‘sticky floor in the porn palace’ stench that dominates any public fuck den that doesn’t have good ventilation.

  “I will assume you have the gold,” the Widow said. “I have the million dollars, in small bills as specified.” She hefted the briefcase; it appeared satisfactorily heavy.

  She said, “However, as for the DNA samples? The terms of our arrangement have changed; they are elsewhere, safe. This was never merely about the gold, nor about removing Phil. I needed to see if your reputation for getting the job done was truly warranted.”

  She leaned forward. “You have proved yourself to be as good as I was told you were. I need you to realize what a team we will make in service to the white race.

  “I can forgive you your woman and son if you work for me, though I would prefer you father more blue eyed children. I can share you, I am not jealous. Your family’s lives in exchange for your satisfactory employment – and your being near me when I desire you. I will pay you well. You will have the adventure you crave.

  “Doctor Dauffenbach was your spiritual father. He made you who and what you are today. He liked you, you know. He spoke of you more than once before the Jews persecuted him. You weren’t like the others. They were weak and held no attraction for me.

  “Can you really say you are happy in this approximation of life you have now? Can a man such as you thrive in such inactivity? You are rusting with your so called family. You will fade away if you do not take my offer. What do you say, my Everett?”

  She spoke of fading away as if it would be a bad thing. Still her recruiting pitch had an enthralling seductiveness, like Phil’s offer and Larry’s nonstop pouting.

  In the distance, the storm giants laughed in glee. Everett technically had three job offers on the table. He could inflict himself on the world again if he pretended that others making the decisions absolved him.

  Kerri and Raymond appeared in his mind and he turned his back on the Life one more time. The Widow saw his rejection, her china doll face hardened further as her mouth opened to bark a command. Time slowed to a crawl, her lips spreading as if there were hours left before she ordered their deaths.

  The cell phone in Everett’s pocket chirped twice. The Widow’s mouth shut.

  Everett took a step to the side, putting space between himself and Tobias. The laser sight was on him alone.

  “Stand next to your friend, immediately,” the Widow said.
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  Everett slid his hand into his pocket. The driver girl dropped to one knee and aimed her Beretta at his head. The sniper’s laser dazzled the corner of Everett’s vision as it aimed in on his head as well.

  Everett beamed his raptor grin at them, letting it flow for their inspection.

  “Hocus pocus and abracadabra,” he said, his eyes lightning bright.

  He hit the speed dial button.

  Chapter 42 : ‘An Interesting Man to Be Around’

  A muffled explosion happened behind Everett where the sniper was stationed. The laser dot stopped dazzling his eyes. The driver girl shifted her gaze past Everett’s shoulder, and started to aim her pistol in that direction.

  Everett was already blazing forward with the bread knife. He rapped the driver’s wrist with the hilt’s butt as he passed by her. Her pistol clattered to the cement as Everett stepped past to the Widow.

  The edge of the bread knife hovered rock steady beneath the Widow’s chin, a few microns away from actual contact. Everett took professional satisfaction in not touching the skin. The Widow and he stood frozen in an intimate tableau, centered on the blade’s threat.

  Someone opened the rolling door behind Everett. Even over the rain, he heard the subdued mumbling of multiple silenced automatics outside in the alley. It sounded like someone trying to start a fleet of dead lawn mowers over and over.

  Three men in black, all wearing night vision goggles, rappelled down through the hole in the ceiling. Two of them took a knee and aimed in on the Widow and her driver with silenced Uzis. The third started in Everett’s direction.

  The man he assumed to be Mister Mossad stood before him with a valise in his hand and his night vision goggles up on his forehead. He didn’t look a thing like Everett had envisioned. The goggles looked pretty cool. Everett would pick up a pair, if he lived through tonight.

  “Slice and dice her, Everett,” Tobias giggled behind him. “Paint the floor with her blood.”

  Everett shook his head. “That would be too quick. Don’t want to touch her again anyways.”

  He turned to Mister Mossad without pulling the bread knife away from the Widow’s smooth white throat. “You ready to accept delivery?”

  Mister Mossad held out the valise. Everett lowered his blade and took it.

  A black clad man scuttled up and cuffed the Widow’s slim elegant wrists behind her, ratcheting the bracelets tight. A van pulled into the garage as the man cuffed the girl in turn.

  Everett opened the valise and looked at all the wads of money inside.

  “One million dollars, as agreed,” Mister Mossad said.

  Everett looked at him.

  “Oh, yes,” Mister Mossad said in apologetic tones as he pulled his wallet out his pocket and handed Everett a single. “One million and one dollars.”

  Everett placed the dollar bill into the valise with the rest of the money and turned to the Widow. “You see,” he said. “Went with the highest bidder. Are you proud of me?”

  Her iceberg face writhed beneath the concealing mirror shades.

  “Here is the evidence package,” Mister Mossad said, handing over another valise. “She had these blood samples in a safety deposit box. We had to extract it.”

  “How’d you manage that?” Everett asked.

  “Have I asked as to your methods, sir?” Mister Mossad asked. “Did it not occur to you that we might renege on our deal? Take the gold and let you swing slowly, slowly in the wind?”

  “Wasn’t a chance,” Everett said. “Would have been stereotypical, you would have been buying into her opinion of you.”

  Mister Mossad winced melodramatically, and then smiled. “My father was a Nazi hunter; he even worked with Simon Wiesenthal. I never hoped to see a day like today, to both remove a Nazi – even a false one – and to recover what was stolen from the victims of the Holocaust. This may be impertinent. I am curious as to why you agreed to deal with us. You could have gotten much more money elsewhere.”

  “Was mainly about getting the DNA samples back. You had the assets to get the job done, and she couldn’t connect you to me.” Everett said, resisting the pointless impulse to be secretive as Mister Mossad. “There was one other thing.”

  Everett walked to the snack truck, next to the idling van. The gold was being transferred by three men in generic overalls. One man handed the bullion to another outside the truck who handed the ingot to another man inside the van, who stacked them reverently in a storage compartment built into the floor of the van.

  Everett watched the moving ingots for a few seconds, and then reached for one as it was passed along. The man passing it looked to Mister Mossad, who nodded.

  The man handed over the ingot. Everett flipped the gold bar over to expose the underside, revealing a corrugated surface of molar shaped fillings and teeth fragments like the one Phil showed him.

  “This is not new to us, my friend,” Mister Mossad said. “Every Israeli lives with this from infancy. It is in our bones. Are you a jihadist, to deny the reality of the Holocaust?”

  Everett handed the bar back to the work crew and spoke to the Widow. “You said Doctor D was like the sperm donor who sired me. Sure, D taught me my best lessons about pain. But he’s not owed any Father’s Day cards.

  “And you. Trying to act like we’re long lost sweethearts? What you did was ten times worse than Doctor D – all he did was torture me. Trying to push that race drivel my way? Like I ever needed color as an excuse to hate you all. Oh yeah, meant to tell you: Phil’s still alive. After finding out what you wanted done to him, he says goodbye and good luck.”

  She aimed her shades-armored gaze at him. His own face was reflected in them. Irked, Everett removed her aviators.

  Her eyes were sky blue as he remembered, and would have been beautiful if the sun glasses’ habitual concealment hadn’t allowed her the luxury for years of not having to hide her emotions. Seen without the shelter of the mirror shades, her eyes crawled like the boneless vermin that scuttle for shelter when you lift a rock.

  Gesturing at the surrounding Israelis, Everett said “Figure it stings more for you, coming from Jews. But I hope you remember my part of it, in those moments when you’re feeling low.”

  Everett asked Mister Mossad, "Will she suffer?”

  “We are not barbarians,” the Israeli agent said. “But she will not be pleased with our treatment. No, she will not end well.”

  Tobias appeared next to Everett. He eye balled the Widow’s driver, who returned his gaze. He stepped up and whispered in her ear.

  She was taller than Tobias and he had to stand on tiptoe to speak. With a look of surprise, she looked down at his expectant face and nodded. A smile blossomed tremulous on her lips.

  Tobias put his arm around her waist. “Uncuff her Everett. I seen what you got up in Mendocino and I want me a piece of that, too.”

  Everett and Mister Mossad stared.

  “Everett,” Tobias said. “You owe me. I’m already out of my end of what Larry would have gotten us. Comes to about . . .” He went blank as his lips moved in internal calculation, his thumbs ticking at the tips of his fingers as he counted.

  Everett said, “We’re taking the Widow’s money too. Subtracting Larry’s ten percent, my end, and what you’re receiving, you only lose between 12-and-a-half to 17 mil. You get the Washington, okay?”

  “That’s all Craptacular, Everett. But this girl is mine, and I’m taking her as part of my end.”

  “May I speak to you aside?” Mister Mossad said to Everett. They stepped off a little ways. “You cannot trust her. She will be a threat to you as long as she is alive.”

  Everett quirked his lips. “She’s seen what’ll happen if she gets dumb. And I do owe him. We’re no saints ourselves. Let her go.’”

  Mister Mossad shrugged, made a hand signal gesture, and one of his crew unlocked the girl’s bracelets. She rubbed her wrists, looking down at them as if disbelieving her freedom. She and Tobias held hands like schoolyard sweethearts.
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  “You seem an interesting man to be around,” Mister Mossad said. “You know we have a detailed file on you, yes? I volunteered for this to see your work. To be frank, I had expected something more direct.”

  “Retired now.”

  “Ah. As you say, of course. If you should ever return to circulation, you need only contact one of our embassies.”

  “Offer number four,” Everett said.

  “Beg pardon?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “If there is nothing else. We are even? ‘Even Steven,’ as you Americans say?”

  “Yes,” Everett said. “Even up.”

  “Good. Then our business is through. You have the gratitude of the nation of Israel. So long as you never threaten our interests of course.”

  Chapter 43 : A 21st Century Bonnie & Clyde

  They got in the truck and rolled. Tobias and the girl whispered together but they weren’t scheming, they were just typical honeymooners mind melding.

  “By the by,” Tobias said. “Agnes has something to tell you.”

  Tobias’s sweetie looked uncomfortable, and didn’t meet Everett’s eyes as she spoke. “The Widow said your mother cooperated with us. That was a false statement. Your mother was in a coma when we drew the DNA samples from her. She did not betray you.”

  “Oh.” Everett said. “That’s nice to know. Where to now?”

  “Larry’s, I guess. I prefer to give him the bad news in person.”

  Everett pulled over down the block from Larry’s place. Lights shone through the spray painted windows. Loud music blasted away. Larry was throwing a party for the Lost Boys tonight.

  “I dunno, Everett. It’s almost like I didn’t even earn my end,” Tobias said. “You had to come rescue my sorry ass when I stepped in it.”

  “You could give up your share,” Everett said.

  “No, no,” Tobias said. “I guess I did my bit after all. Um, you’re not going to tell Larry?”

  Everett held out the briefcase. “Anybody that rides with me gets paid, that’s policy. You maybe want a reference letter?”