Thicker Than Blood

by James P. Sumner

  “Shit. Okay.”

  I stand, but keep low, glancing out the windows as I move over to the body, watching out for the glint of a rifle scope from one of the neighboring buildings. I look at both of Sterling’s hands in turn, to figure out if he was left or right-handed. After a moment, I grab his right hand by the wrist, and drag him over to the safe. I place the thumb on the scanner. The lock whirrs and clicks, and the door falls open.

  “How did you know which hand?” asks Josh.

  “There was a small indentation on the outside of his right ring finger, which would’ve been caused from holding a pen. I noticed the amount of paperwork on his desk, so figured he would have been writing recently. If he wrote with this right hand, chances are he was right-handed, so that’s the hand he would’ve instinctively used to code the safe.”

  Josh looks impressed, but says nothing.

  Inside, there are some loose papers, a cell phone, and a flash drive. I take everything, stuffing them inside my jacket. “We’ll check all this later. Now, we can think about getting out of—”

  The glass next to the door shatters, as a hail of automatic gunfire erupts from outside the office. I duck, bringing my arms up to cover my head. “Fuck me! Josh, are you okay?”

  I look over and see him doing the same. The door is thin and won’t offer much protection from an onslaught like this. He slides the gun over to me. “Get us out of here, Adrian.”

  I take it and crouch behind the desk. I rest my hand on the surface, taking aim. The firing’s stopped, for the moment, so I just need to wait for them to show themselves so I can shoot them. I take a deep breath and try to focus my mind. Sterling’s out of the picture, which must be a huge blow to The Order, regardless of how or why. After speaking with him, we know more about them than we did before we got here, which is a bonus. We’ve emptied his safe, so we’re done, and I can forget about him now. I need to concentrate on getting the pair of us out of here in one piece. One of the things Sterling didn’t have a chance to mention was exactly how many people are coming for us. I only have sixteen rounds in this Glock, after putting one in his leg, so I suspect every shot will have to count.

  At least there are no innocent people to worry about.

  Through the space where glass used to be, I see a man appear at the end of the hall, level with the elevators. He’s wearing a suit, and walking slowly toward us, carrying a machine gun he’s in the process of reloading.

  Rookie error. You don’t show yourself until you’re prepared to fire your gun.

  I take aim and squeeze off two rounds in quick succession. Both find their target, punching themselves into the guy’s chest. I hear the faint thud as he collapses to the floor, and hold my aim a few seconds longer, to make sure he’s done moving, or breathing.

  Yup. He’s dead.

  “Josh, let’s go.”

  I spring to my feet and head for the door. Josh stands, and moves to follow me, but stops himself. Instead, he heads back over to the desk.

  I look over my shoulder, frowning. “What are you doing?”

  He starts frisking what’s left of Sterling’s body. After a moment, he retrieves a wallet out of his inside pocket. He holds it up to me. “Might come in handy.”

  I smile. “Check you out, pillaging corpses. I’m so proud.”

  We step out of the office and look around. Ahead of us is clear now, as far as I can tell. The corridor stretches to our left and right, too. I look right, and see no sign of anyone. I look left, and…

  Oh.

  There are four men about forty feet from us. Two crouching, two standing behind them, all holding guns, which they have trained on us. They’re not dressed the same, so it’s not an official unit, like the kind Pierce used to run. These are assassins, like me. And they have the drop on us.

  Shit.

  Josh sees them. “Oh, bollocks.”

  I sigh. “Maybe you can throw that wallet at them?”

  19

  10:59 PDT

  No one moves. Time hasn’t slowed down for me, it’s stopped altogether. My arm is frozen to my side, rendering my borrowed Glock temporarily useless. My mind is rushing toward multiple conclusions and quickly analyzing each one for plausibility.

  I’m fairly certain we’re screwed.

  These assholes in front of us have most likely been there for a while. Everyone knew where we were, so there was no need to rush. The guy I killed just then, his job would’ve been to draw us out, plain and simple. Josh wouldn’t have seen these guys by looking out of the office, not from the angle he had.

  We were played.

  Shit.

  I lost sight of the bigger picture and dismissed Sterling’s threat of The Order’s finest descending on us. Now we’re trapped, because I didn’t plan ahead.

  Double shit.

  I’m losing perspective. It’s taken me until this moment, right here, right now, to realize I’ve been going about this all wrong. I’m trying to stop The Order, but I’ve been giving them too much credit. Showing them too much respect.

  Maybe Josh was right when he said I sounded afraid of them.

  Maybe I was.

  But why? They recruited me because they recognized my talents. They know how dangerous I can be. And they also sent a lot of manpower after me when I turned my back on them, which tells me they’re more threatened by me than maybe I should be by them.

  So, no… there’s no triple shit. Not this time. See, I’ve got this situation all wrong. I’m not trapped on the seventeenth floor of a building with a bunch of assassins.

  They’re trapped here with me.

  The scene unfreezes, and I push Josh back into the office as I spin counterclockwise, whipping my other arm up to quickly take aim, and squeeze off four deliberate rounds. I react much faster than anyone else and watch with some degree of satisfaction as each bullet buries itself between the eyes of its intended target.

  Josh reappears in time to see them drop to the floor, as the sound of the collective thud fills the hallway. He looks at me, his eyes wide. “Holy shit…”

  I look back at him. “It’s about damn time these people find out exactly who the fuck I am.”

  He lifts his hand and we bump fists. He pats my shoulder. “Amen, brother.”

  We walk side by side toward the elevators, renewed urgency and purpose in our steps. I don’t know how full this building is getting with trained killers and have no wish to find out. A moment of epiphany can work wonders, but it can’t magically create more ammunition when you’re outnumbered twenty-to-one. Those four back there? They were nothing. But this isn’t the time to get cocky. It’s the time to be smart.

  As I pass the corpse in the suit, I hand the Glock to Josh, and crouch to take the assault rifle this asshole was reloading when I killed him. I eject the mag. It’s full. He was ready to start shooting at me but was just a fraction too slow.

  We reach the elevators, and I press the call button on the wall between them. I watch the display screen above each one, but neither whirrs into life.

  “You think they’ve disabled them?” I say to Josh.

  He shakes his head. “They wouldn’t usually be able to do that without cutting some of the power to the building. Maybe they’ve got a separate—”

  Shit!

  A cacophony of gunfire erupts to my left, and I instinctively drop to one knee as I level the rifle, ready to fire. As the shooting stops, I take a breath, steeling myself. I see an arm and a leg appear, then a torso, as someone makes their way around the corner, coming from the right side. I see the gun they’re holding…

  I’ve seen enough.

  I fire two bursts in quick succession, adjusting my aim slightly between each one. Bullets strike the middle of their thigh, and a second later, the stomach. I watch the body drop and see the gun slip from their hand.

  Easy enough, but we’re not out of the woods yet. That was a mixture of auto and semi-auto gunfire a moment ago. Whoever I just killed dropped a handgun, which means there
are more people waiting around the corner. I look back at Josh, who’s crouching against the wall opposite the elevators, his gun held expertly in both hands. I point two fingers at my eyes, and then back along the corridor, at Sterling’s office—a silent instruction to watch our ass.

  I move quietly toward the edge of the wall and lean against it. I slow my breathing, and snap my head around the corner, affording myself a split-second glance, a flash that will tell me all I need to know.

  More gunfire sounds out, chasing me back into cover.

  Holy crap!

  I saw six people, but there could’ve been more. They were taking cover in the doorways of the offices lining the corridor. I’m sure I recognized one of them—a member of the unit Pierce used to run.

  I don’t like these odds.

  We need to leave.

  I stand and set off running back toward Sterling’s office. Josh hastily follows.

  “Where are we going?” he asks.

  “Not that way, that’s for sure.” I look both ways once we reach the office. To the right is the group of dead guys. To the left… “There. The fire exit.”

  We rush through the door, into the cold, concrete stairwell. Fluorescent wall lights buzz on every side. I peer over the metal railing that winds itself around the outside edge of each flight of steps, looking both above and below us.

  “Josh, we need to get out of here and get the information we took from Sterling’s safe to Schultz.”

  He nods. “Yeah, but that’s easier said than done. How many more floors are likely to be filled with highly-trained hitmen?”

  I shrug. “Honestly? Probably not that many. The Order might have a vast array of resources, but they don’t have hundreds of men to spare on a moment’s notice. If I had to guess, I would say they’ve sent people directly to us, as well as a team on the roof, and a team waiting for us in the lobby. Maybe thirty men in total. And we’ve already taken out six.”

  “So, how do we get out?”

  “You tell me. What’s the logical move?”

  “I dunno… To go down, and out through the main doors to the street, maybe?”

  I nod. “That’s what I would say, too. We can’t stay here, because we’ll never fight everyone off at the same time. And there’s no sense heading for the roof, because… what? We jump twenty-odd stories to safety? That’s insane, right?”

  “What’s your point, Adrian?”

  “My point is that’s how logic dictates we’re going to think, and a dollar for ten says that’s how Horizon thinks we’re gonna think.”

  “So, you’re saying…”

  “We head for the roof.”

  He nods. “…we head for the roof. I knew you were going to say that. You know logic usually prevails, don’t you?”

  I smile. “Not when I’m around.”

  He scoffs. “No shit.”

  “It’ll be fine. There’ll be less people on the roof than in the lobby. Besides, you’re going to have a chopper meet us up there.”

  “I am?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Ah, right. I am. I can do that.”

  I roll my eyes. “And I thought I was guilty of forgetting myself in a crisis. Jesus…”

  He takes out his cell phone, and dials a number as we start running up the flights of stairs, taking two steps at a time. We pass the door for the eighteenth floor. A few moments later, we pass the nineteenth.

  I couldn’t tell what Josh was saying behind me, but he’s just hung up, and drawn level with me. “The chopper’s en route, but it’s thirty minutes out.”

  “That’s no use to us, Josh. We need it now.”

  “I know, but at least it’s carrying a team of my best men, all heavily-armed and ready for a fight, which is better than nothing.”

  “I guess if we don’t make it, they can always clean up afterward and get the information out of here.” I lean out over the rail and look up. “How many floors does this place have, exactly?”

  “Twenty-four, I think.”

  I take a long, deep breath. “Man, I’m out of shape.”

  We turn the corner at twenty, but as I step onto the next flight, I hear a noise above me. I snap my cast up, signaling to Josh to stop. We step back, plant ourselves against the wall, and wait, listening intently.

  I hear boots. Multiple, heavy footsteps stamping on the concrete, getting louder with each second that passes.

  Josh nods toward the sound. “Logic’s a bitch, isn’t it?”

  “Shut up.”

  I tighten my grip on the rifle, and rest it on my cast, ready to fire. It’s hard to tell how many men are coming. You can bet your ass the ones we left on the seventeenth called ahead to their friends above us. Probably below us, too, although it’ll take them longer to reach us. They’re going to pin us down and either wait us out, knowing they have more ammunition than we do, or they’ll swarm us, guns-a-blazing, take the hits, but ultimately get the job done.

  I nod to his gun. “How many bullets you got left?”

  He checks the magazine. “Ten, plus one in the hole. You?”

  “Not enough.”

  We’re cut off from the roof, twenty floors up, with a significant number of skilled assassins closing in on us from all sides, and not enough bullets to kill them all.

  Okay, fine…

  Triple shit.

  20

  11:12 PDT

  I yank open the door leading onto the twentieth floor and step through, quickly checking both sides to make sure we’re alone.

  It’s eerily quiet, save for a desk phone ringing somewhere on the other side of the office. Josh looks around. “The only way out of here is this door, or the elevators, which weren’t working before. We’re trapped in here, you do realize that, right?”

  I let out a heavy, frustrated sigh. “Yeah, I know. I’m thinking.”

  I head left, following the layout until I reach the elevators, and hook the strap of the rifle over my head and arm, so it rests comfortably on my right shoulder.

  I press the call button again.

  Nothing.

  Josh gestures wildly with his arms. “Great! We need a plan, Adrian.”

  I raise an eyebrow at him. “Will you relax? Jeez. I thought you were supposed to be the rational one…”

  “It’s hard to be rational when you’re being hunted. We’re not all accustomed to shit like this, y’know?”

  “Yeah, I know. But you used to be. It’s just like riding a bike, man.” I pause a moment and smile, trying to lighten the mood, maybe lift his spirits, but it doesn’t work. He’s just staring blankly at the wall ahead of him. “What’s going on with you, Josh? Since Sterling exploded on us, you’ve not had your head in the game. Kinda like Sterling, thinking about it…”

  He turns to me, his eyes wide. “Oh, I’m sorry! Sorry I can’t remain calm when shit like this is going on! I was never used to this, Adrian. You seem to forget, I spent most of our mutual career behind a desk, miles away from the bullets. I know I can take care of myself, but this is insane. The shit you do, the shit you get yourself in the middle of… It’s a world away from the things I did for this country, and for my own. I’m not you! You bring me along on what’s effectively a suicide mission and you can’t understand when I get a little bit fucking concerned! I have a lot more to lose than you do. No offense…”

  “None taken.” I regard him quietly. Adrenaline must be pumping double-time right now, and he’s not controlling it. He’s panicking. “Y’know what? You’re right. You’re not me. You’re better than me. Yeah, you have more to lose, but that just goes to show you’ve accomplished so much more on your own than you ever did booking my Greyhound tickets. But you’re still the same guy I’ve known over half my life. The same guy who steered me through the darkest of times… who is single-handedly responsible for my success. And that guy wouldn’t be acting like a pussy at a time like this.”

  He frowns at me and his lip curls with anger. But I don’t care. I’m right and he knows it
.

  I step toward him. “At first, I thought maybe you were still a little pissed with me about the whole faking my death thing, but that’s not it. Truth is, you’ve gone soft on me, Josh. The things you’ve been doing with GlobaTech are staggering, and I have no doubt you’ve earned your place in history because of them, but you’ve grown so accustomed to being invaluable, you’ve forgotten what it’s like to take risks. To put it all on the line. This isn’t about what we have to lose. It’s about why we have to win.”

  I slap him across the face, the crack of the impact lingering around us in the silence. He steps back, his eyes wide with shock, and puts a hand on his cheek. I set my jaw, in case this doesn’t work and he hits me back, or something. “Now find your balls, Josh, and find them fast, because we’re up shit creek without a paddle here, and I can’t do it alone.”

  The silence now is deafening and a little awkward. I hold his gaze, waiting. After some tense moments, he looks away, sighing heavily. “Okay.”

  Phew.

  I move in front of the elevator doors. “Gimme a hand, would you?”

  I place the fingertips of my left hand on the crack between the doors, pressing in as much as I can. Josh moves next to me and does the same with both of his. Between us, with a little effort, we force them open. I lean in, and look up and down the shaft. I can barely see the carriage below us, so it must be either on the first floor, or close to it.

  “What are you thinking, Adrian?” he asks.

  I turn to him and smile as I point to the wall of the elevator shaft facing us. He looks over at it and then back at me. His expression is deadpan. “No…”

  I nod. “Yes.”

  “But I thought you hated heights?”

  “Not as much as I hate being shot.”