by Sam Sisavath
The man shook his head in a chastising manner. “You’ve looked better,” he said, his voice muffled by the mask.
“Looked better?” Allie thought but couldn’t bring herself to say.
The man stood back up, and Allie found herself rising with him.
No, she wasn’t moving on her own power. The man was lifting her off the roof of the overturned armored transport.
Why was he lifting her? Why was he cradling her like she was some sad sack that needed his help to move?
Maybe because she was, and she did.
That makes sense, she thought just before she closed her eyes and, thank God, didn’t have to deal with the choking smoke clawing at her face and every other exposed part of her body anymore.
Epilogue
“How many?”
“One.”
“No, really. How many?”
“Really. One.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
“One guy did all that damage?”
“Affirmative.”
“Holy shit.”
Frank stared at the tablet screen. He’d seen the footage at least five times and still couldn’t believe it: One guy had ambushed the SWAT caravan and taken off with Allie Krycek. Or Aubrey White, as the WCPD knew her.
Two security cameras had captured the action from different sides of the same street. The one positioned on the side of a nearby warehouse had the best angle, while the other camera, from a gas station about half a block away, provided additional coverage of the sequence of events.
“I still don’t believe you. Let me see it,” Banks said.
The older man passed Frank the box of donuts and hot coffee he’d been getting while Frank sat in the back of their SUV and reviewed the footage. He put the sweets and coffee down and pressed play again and watched the whole thing for the sixth time. The footage was a copy sent to them from their contact inside the WCPD.
The ambush opened with the first vehicle in the caravan—a black GMC—appearing in frame from the right and stopping at a red light. The armored carrier came next, but it was slowing down when the first explosion flipped it onto its roof. The second escort vehicle, another GMC, was out of frame at the moment. For a brief two seconds or so after the initial explosion that took out the APC, the screen went bright white.
“Whoa,” Banks said, biting into a glazed donut. “What was that?”
He sipped his coffee. It was black and bitter, just the way he liked it. “He either knew the route the caravan was going to take, or he’s a damn good guesser.”
“How would he know the route?”
“Be sure to ask him that when we catch up to him.”
“We’re chasing him?”
“He’s got our prize.”
“I didn’t know she was our prize.”
“She is now.”
On the tablet’s screen, the commandos in the leading vehicle were scrambling to get out of their car when some kind of projectile appeared in the frame and struck the windshield before disappearing inside the SUV. Smoke immediately filled the interior of the GMC. The sight of heavily-armed professionals struggling to open a door, gloved fists banging on windows in panic, was not something Frank saw every day.
Neither had Banks, who asked with a mouthful of more donuts, “What was that?”
“If I had to guess, it was a grenade round loaded with some kind of incapacitating agent,” Frank said. “All the SWAT guys were still unconscious when backup arrived on the scene and found them.”
“Nice shot.”
“It gets better.”
“Damn.”
A dark black-clad figure wearing a gas mask appeared from the left side of the tablet and walked casually past the first escort vehicle.
“That’s him?” Banks said.
Frank nodded. “That’s our man.”
“One guy…”
“Just one guy, yeah.”
The attacker walked past the GMC as if the heavily-armed cops inside weren’t worth a second of his time. And he was right, because not a single one of the SWAT guys got out to stop him. One of them did manage to get the rear driver-side door open, but no one came through it. Instead, smoke that had enveloped the interior of the SUV flooded out into the street, expanding outward like some kind of eerie supernatural mist.
The dark figure stopped and fired again from a multiple-shot grenade launcher. One shot—two—three shots in all, before he dropped the weapon and unslung a submachine gun. It looked like a Heckler & Koch MP5SD. The man had good taste in weapons.
The black-clad shape continued striding confidently toward the overturned truck before vanishing behind it. More clouds of smoke appeared from the right side of the screen and were starting to swallow up the street, making it harder to see what was happening.
“First the shooter on the road that took on Krycek, now this dude,” Banks said. “We sure it’s not the same guy?”
Frank shrugged. “Could be anyone behind that mask. Could be you.”
“I wish.”
Another explosion, this one taking place at the back of the APC.
“What’s he doing now?” Banks asked.
“He just took out the doors,” Frank said. “He knows what he’s doing, and he came fully prepared.”
“Looks like it. Who is this guy?”
“That’s the million-dollar question.”
The man reappeared into frame, this time cradling Allie Krycek in his arms. Not that Frank could really tell that was an unconscious Krycek, but he already knew she was missing post-attack, and put two and two together.
The attacker disappeared off the other side of the screen with Krycek, leaving a smoke-filled carnage in his wake.
“Mr. Marshall know about this?” Banks asked.
“He’s been made aware,” Frank said. “Wants us to start looking for her.”
“Where do we even start?”
“Not his problem. That’s why we get paid the big bucks.”
“Maybe you get paid the big bucks, but I’m pulling in minimum wage here.” Banks finished off his donut and grabbed another one. “We need to start with those bomb threats from this afternoon. That’s how they got her moved and out in the open.”
Frank nodded. “Find the bomber, find the guy. Find the guy, we find our girl.”
He rewound the footage and froze the screen on the attacker, covered from head to toe in black and carrying Krycek in his arms while his MP5SD hung from a strap. There was no way to tell who it was, and none of the cops that were there had been able to get a good look at his face to give a description. The only way Frank could even tell he was looking at a man was the way he moved.
“He’s a professional,” Frank said. “He knew what he was doing. How many people in this world can pull this off? And he couldn’t have had a lot of time to set it up, either. Krycek was arrested this morning, and by nightfall, this.”
“Definitely a professional,” Banks said. “So how does that help us find him?”
“It doesn’t.”
Frank stared at the figure frozen on the tablet. Or, more specifically, at Allie Krycek’s limp body in the man’s arms. Frank had read all about Allie—the things she’d gone through, the things she’d done—and to see her like this, helpless…
“This just got a lot more interesting,” Banks said.
“Yeah,” Frank said. “A lot more.”