by Ben Follows
The director nodded thoughtfully, making the same expression he had held the entire time, his anger only visible deep within his eyes. Jake spoke of his escape and how he figured out Harold’s betrayal and confronted him at the farmhouse.
He was just about to tell his first lie—what he had done with Janet—when he heard the faint sounds of rotors overhead. He froze, looking up at the roof as the rotors became louder, dividing into at least a dozen sources. Jake couldn’t help himself as his heart leaped, and for just a moment he smiled, gone so quickly he was certain he had gotten away with it.
“You piece of shit,” said the director so softly that Jake barely heard him. “You led them right to us.”
Jake reacted the moment he processed the words, jumping from his chair and diving across the desk at the director. The director dodged out of the way. He was nimble for someone his age.
Jake slid off the desk and landed on his hands, shifting his head just fast enough to see the director push the red panic button beneath his desk and jog to the corner of the room, fumbling with a gun at his waist.
Jake jumped to his feet. He had precious seconds before the doors burst open and guards entered. He grabbed a fountain pen off the desk. He lunged at the director, barely registering that he was screaming amid the roar of helicopter rotors. He could see the shadows of men and women rappelling down into the compound, hundreds of them, outside the windows of the director’s office.
The director pushed himself against the wall as Jake lunged, fountain pen held high in his hand, ready to impale his neck.
Jake barely dodged the knife that flew past his face, feeling the wind as it swung past and shattered a window pane.
He dodged a second knife more by instinct than seeing it, using his backward momentum to duck behind the desk. During his dive he got a brief glimpse of the new combatants. Ten men and women flooded into the room, all wearing the same black uniforms, guns and knives at the ready, half going to protect the director, the other half spreading around the room to corner Jake. He breathed heavily, unsure what to do, wondering how he had ever thought he’d be able to pull this off. He stared at the director, who was now shielded by five bodies, all of whom were better trained and had more experience than Jake did. The director looked nervous. He was clenching his jaw.
Jake’s heart dropped as he realized he couldn’t win. Not here. Not now.
In a desperate gamble, he used the desk as a launching point and threw himself like an Olympic diver toward the already slightly broken window. He flipped mid-jump and heard guns firing. He hit the window with the small of his back, feeling the glass splinter and crack from the point of contact outward.
Bullets hit his arms and torso, splashes of blood erupting from the exit wound. A knife impaled his arm, and he shouted out in pain.
Then he was falling through the air from the second-story window. It only lasted a few seconds, however, during which he finished his flip to land feet-first.
He hit the ground.
Hard.
His right ankle hit first and gave way beneath him, a cracking sound filling his ears as he rolled forward in a instinctive effort to get away from the glass shards. He only partially succeeded. Several broke through his shirt and pierced his skin. He came to a rest on one knee, the one not connected to his injured ankle. He breathed deeply, doing his best to move. All around him were sounds of war, gunshots and shouting and screaming and fear and agony all brought together under the umbrella of the roaring helicopters.
He heard shouts from the windows above, and a new burst of fear-fueled adrenaline coursed through him. He did a quick assessment of his injuries.
His ankle was the worst, bending in a way it wasn’t meant to bend, but the bone hadn’t broken through the skin. At least four bullets had struck his arms and torso, and there was a knife still sticking out of his arm. Only one of the bullets had exited his body, however, so he wasn’t bleeding out at the moment.
There was glass in his lower back, but that was the least of his problems. He pushed himself onto his left leg and looked around. He was in a small alleyway behind the building, against the Compound wall. He hopped on one foot to the wall, wincing hard every time his broken ankle grazed the ground, despite his best efforts to keep it elevated. He leaned against the wall, breathing heavily.
He looked over his shoulder at the window through which he had leapt. The lights were still on, but there was no activity. He looked around. No one was coming for him.
The sounds of war were beginning to die down. Jake forced himself to move along the wall until he could see around the edge of the director’s building and into the courtyard.
There was still shouting and screams, but the battle was over. FBI agents walked around, checking the pulses of the hundreds of Compound agents lying dead in the center of the battlefield.
Jake could imagine it, the FBI rappelling in ready for a battle, only to have their opponents suddenly dying in mass numbers, falling to the ground, lifeless where before there had been life.
“Help!” Jake screamed, his voice weak and drowned out by other noises. “Help!” he screamed again.
A few nearby FBI agents looked up and began shouting to one another to help him. Jake sank down until he was seated against the wall.
As the FBI agents got closer, Jake was able to make out what they were saying. They weren’t FBI agents, Jake realized, noting the red maple leafs on their uniforms. He frowned and tried to formulate an answer, but it slipped away from him.
“That’s him,” one said. “That’s Lavelle.”
“Oh my god,” said the other. “Get a medic team over here. Alert Agent Thompson that we got him.”
Jake began slipping in and out of consciousness, barely aware of what was happening as he was lifted onto a stretcher and carried across the compound. In his moments of lucidity, he saw enough to answer his remaining questions.
The children were gathered in one corner, armed guards surrounding them. They seemed to have mostly survived. Jake saw them jumping at the guards, trying desperately to get away, to get out of the prison made by the people they had been taught to hate.
He saw Mr. Jacobsen and Mrs. Paula lying side by side, as though they had been in the middle of a conversations when the FBI had invaded and they had retired themselves. All around them the same scene repeated itself, people who had killed themselves in the name of hiding criminals from the authorities. It had once seemed like a noble pursuit. Now it seemed like a waste of life.
Jake wondered what Mr. Jacobsen and Mrs. Paula had been talking about when they had killed themselves.
He lost focus again, getting only a brief glimpse of being loaded onto a helicopter with medical supplies around him, a man with a red cross and a maple leaf on his lapel welcoming Jake into the plane. In his last moment before finally losing consciousness, Agent Thompson climbed into the helicopter beside him.
Chapter 52
Nicholas sat at his desk, switching between staring at the phone and out the window, as he had been for the last few hours.
“You know,” said Keelan, standing statue-like beside the door, “there won’t be a call any time soon. Be patient. They’ll call.”
Keelan had not been involved in the raid on the compound but had gotten an update from Thompson that morning with the new plan.
“Keelan, shut up,” said Nicholas, turning back to the window for what must have been the hundredth time. “If they don’t succeed, it’s useless. I can’t upload the video, and we can’t go after Dimitri. It would be pointless. This makes or breaks my career.”
“It will only define your career if you let it.”
“Would you shut it with your stupid life advice for one second? Why can’t you feel some emotion like a normal person?”
Keelan shrugged. “You can’t control this. Why worry?”
“Why worry? You’re a fucking robot. Forget it.”
The intercom on the desk came to life. “Sir,” said Emma, “someone
’s here to see you. Says it’s important.”
“I’m busy,” said Nicholas. “Tell him to never come back.”
“Sir, I don’t think you have a choice.”
“What are you talking about?”
The door to the office burst open. Keelan jumped back to avoid being hit. Emma, looking terrified, stepped into the office, her hands up in the air. Dimitri Kulovich stood behind her, a gun to the back of her head.
“We need to have a chat,” said Dimitri, “about how you’ve been fucking over our deal.”
Nicholas stood slowly, trying to look confident. It wasn’t the first time he’d had a gun pointed at him, but he didn’t have the ability to face it down calmly that Frank Tanners once had. It wasn’t in his nature.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” said Dimitri, shoving his gun into Emma’s head and making her yelp. “You went to the FBI, you fucking rat.”
Nicholas watched him. “You’re right,” he said. “I worked with the FBI, how did you know?”
“Because I’m not an idiot. It’s obvious. It was a cakewalk to find this place. So what was your big plan?”
Nicholas said nothing for a few moments, meeting Emma’s eyes, trying to read what she was thinking. “You know,” he said, “you did a really good job tracking me. I respect that. You’re right about almost everything. What do you want?”
“I want the video back. Return it to me so you can’t release it first. That’s what you’re planning to do, isn’t it?” His eyes suddenly narrowed. “Wait, what do you mean almost everything. What did I get wrong?”
Nicholas smiled. “You know what I do here, Dimitri. I coordinate assassinations. It’s a dangerous business, and a lot of people want to kill me and the people I love. So why would I have a regular woman manning my front desk?”
“What are you—?”
Emma’s elbow shot backward, digging into Dimitri’s stomach. All her whimpering and yelping disappeared, replaced by a firm determination. Dimitri fell back and keeled over, grabbing his gut. Emma spun and kicked him in the face. Dimitri jerked sideways, breathing heavily.
Keelan stepped forward and went to kick Dimitri. He swung his leg, but he wasn’t fast enough. Dimitri recovered and thrust out his leg, taking out the leg Keelan was standing on. Keelan fell forward, throwing his arms out in front of him to cushion the blow.
Emma ducked out of the way then lunged again. She was faster, but her clothing and high heels restricted her movement. Dimitri dodged her attacks, moving like a boxer, and punched her straight in the chest. She fell backward and hit Nicholas’s desk. Nicholas himself was standing against the window, trying to remain as far away from the fight as possible.
Dimitri, breathing heavily, stepped toward the television set to the right of the desk, guessing correctly that the DVD was still in the player.
Emma reached up on the desk and grabbed a pair of scissors, using them to slice up the sides of her long skirt and allow her legs full motion. She slipped off her high heels and tested them in her hands like a pitcher, holding them by the spiked heels.
Dimitri pushed the “eject” button on the DVD player and reached for the disk as it popped out. The first high heel hit him from behind on the back of his neck, drawing blood. He spun just as the second heel arrived, making contact above his right eye and drawing blood as well. Emma leaped the desk and jumped at Dimitri, her right foot kicking for his face.
Dimitri dodged, batted the kick away, and threw her down to the ground in one fluid motion.
“Stop,” said Keelan, and all eyes turned to him. He aiming a gun at Dimitri. There was an enormous purple bruise over his left eye. “It’s over. Put back the DVD and I might let you leave.”
Dimitri began to raise his hands. Nicholas said nothing, watching the situation unfold. Emma rolled onto her back and into a crouching position.
Dimitri grinned and lowered his hands. “If you shoot me, you know what will happen?” he said. “That video of Frank Tanners gets released to the world. You weren’t going to release it to the world, were you, Nicholas?” He turned to face Nicholas. “You were just going to release it to your network. If one of my people releases it, the FBI will be all over you. The public will be begging them to arrest you. Is that what you want?”
Nicholas said nothing.
“Didn’t think so. And Keelan? Is that what you want?”
Keelan hesitated and began to lower his gun. In that moment of hesitation Dimitri lunged forward, accelerating with such speed that drops of blood from his wounds seemed to float in the air.
Keelan only just began lifting the gun back up when Dimitri grabbed a hold of it and shoved it down. The gun went off and a bullet burrowed into the floorboards. Dimitri elbowed Keelan in the chest, using his full momentum. Keelan lost his grip on the gun and fell backward.
Dimitri spun the gun and fired at Keelan as he fell. Once, twice, a third time. The bullets formed a triangle on Keelan's chest.
Keelan looked down as he collapsed onto the floor. He propped himself up on one elbow as the blood spread across his shirt, darkening his shirt. Keelan looked up at the man who had shot him.
The entire sequence took less than a second, but Nicholas felt as though he could have recounted every detail.
Dimitri spun and pointed the gun at Emma and Nicholas. Nicholas hadn’t moved, but Emma was on her feet, ready to pounce. She hesitated at the sight of the gun.
“I’m going to leave,” said Dimitri, “and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
He began to walk backward, tracing a wide arc around Keelan, whose eyes were showing less life every second.
He made it to the door and grinned. “I almost forgot. I don’t need this copy.” He took the DVD he’d taken from the video player and dropped it on the floor.
He stomped on the disk, shattering it into a dozen pieces. He repeated the action until the disc was hundreds of small pieces. He spread out the pieces with his foot.
“Our deal is still on,” said Dimitri. “Remember that.”
Dimitri closed the door, but Nicholas was certain that in that last moment as the door closed, he had winced and grabbed his stomach, a look of fear crossing his face.
Chapter 53
Jake woke up from unconsciousness for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. He couldn’t feel his injuries, but there were bandages around his waist and his leg was elevated.
He looked around and was surprised to find the sounds of helicopters were gone, despite his still being on a stretcher within one of those helicopters. He tried to sit and found that he was handcuffed to the side of the stretcher.
“The hell…?” he said, grabbing the handcuffs and trying to free himself.
“I’m glad to see you’re awake.”
Jake looked up. Thompson was standing on the ground outside the helicopter. Behind him was a forest. The helicopter had landed in a clearing.
“What’s going on?” Jake asked.
Thompson stepped into the helicopter and sat down. “We won. We invaded, and they started falling dead. Those who didn’t kill themselves sent the children to attack. I’ve never been more terrified in my life than seeing those children run at us, looking like they knew how to use the guns they held.”
“What happened?”
“We killed some of them, and they killed some of us. We saved as many as we could, but they refused to give up.” Thompson paused. “I want to say I’m sorry for ever doubting your story. I believe you now. I’m sorry you had to grow up with that, but it’s over now. No one else will be exposed to it.”
“The director?”
Thompson shook his head. “We went into the building. There was a tunnel leading from the basement. It went almost a mile and came out on a road at the edge of the forest. We found tread marks from a few cars. We put out wanted notices, but I doubt we’ll find anything.”
Jake nodded and looked away
. “Why am I handcuffed?”
Thompson looked away. “I made a deal with Kathryn Landy. I’m sorry.”
Jake nodded. “Are we heading back now?”
“Back?”
“To the States? We’re in Canada, based on the uniforms those soldiers were wearing.”
Thompson nodded. “The other choppers are already there. Get some rest.”
“Why aren’t the other—?” Jake began to say but stopped as Thompson jumped out of the helicopter bay and climbed into the cockpit beside the pilot.
Jake leaned back. He squinted as something bright between his feet shone into his eyes. He stared at it as the rotors started up. Jake lunged forward, reaching with his free hand, ignoring the muted stabs of pain in his side. He snatched up the reflective object. It was a key.
He didn’t have time to think. He put the key into the handcuffs and freed himself. He massaged his wrist. The helicopter lurched as it started to ascend. He rolled off the bed, still wrapped in the blankets. He threw them off and saw what the medics had done for the first time. He had bandages around his midsection and a cast on his ankle. There was a black bag there that Jake recognized as the one he had kept in his hotel room. He grabbed it and the crutches beside it and then used both his feet—the cast slipping a bit as he did so—to launch himself out of the helicopter door.
He landed on his shoulder, protecting his broken ankle. His shoulder made an odd sound, and he groaned.
The crutches and bag fell from his hands. Dirt from the hard ground puffed up into his face and eyes. He wiped them off just in time to look up and see the helicopter flying away.
Thompson was sitting in the cockpit, looking down at Jake.
He nodded, and Jake nodded back.
The helicopter flew south, silhouetted by the setting sun on the longest day of Jake’s life.
Jake grabbed the crutches and pushed himself into a seated position. Inside the black bag were eleven pill bottles, bandages, and short written instructions on which drugs to take each day. Interspersed among these were Jake’s weapons, fake identity papers, and nonperishable food. There was also a note about a doctor in a nearby town who wouldn’t ask any questions.