by Dave Nesbit
I idly checked my phone as I heard them talking in there. To say I was not prepared for what came out would be an understatement.
Cathy walked out of the dressing room in an outfit that would have done any courtesan proud. Black lace panties, bra, and stockings with a matching garter belt. I'm pretty sure my jaw hit the floor.
She grinned and preened, then turned on her heel to show off the full effect.
Then she walked back into the changing room. Leaving me with an amazing vision in my mind and a tight feeling in my pants. Now, I didn't dare look at my phone. I was the like the kid in the theatre just before the movie starts. Tense in my seat waiting for the next amazing thing to happen.
This time she came out in a white outfit much like the other. Stockings, garter, panties... and a white corset that pushed up her cleavage to form a very nice shelf. She smiled prettily and turned showing off the other side.
“What do you think?” She said with a grin that made it pretty clear she knew my answer already.
“Hang on, I'm trying to remember how to speak.” I said a few moments later.
“I'll call that a positive.” She moved forward and sat in my lap. “Now then, which one should I get?”
Now let's just assume for a second I could even think at that moment. Which wasn't very likely. The feel of her in my lap was amazing and the view was, if possible, even better. I took a moment to regroup and collect my thoughts, then said. “Well I'd suggest both. Choices are not my strong suit right now.”
She laughed. “I can see why.” She wiggled on me and I tried very hard not to gasp. “I guess I'll take them both then.” She got back up with a grace I could never manage and walked back into the changing room with a sway to her hips that spoke of rhythms as old as time. Needless to say, she had my undivided attention.
A few moments later she came out in the clothing she had worn in, much to my disappointment. She smiled at my mock pout as she came out. “Expecting more of a show?”
“Not sure if I was expecting but I was certainly hoping.” I said getting out of my chair.
“Well, we'll see about later.” She said as we went to the front and paid for the purchases. The clerk smiled sweetly as we walked out.
We ambled out on the street past shoppers and down the cold concrete. I took her and gently pulled her to the side of a sports bar window and kissed her. The idea seemed to appeal to her and she joined in with gusto.
“I take it you enjoyed the show.” She said as we parted.
“Just a lot.”
“Ohh good, my folks are out of town for the evening.” She said and wiggled closer.
“I love the idea of where this is going.” I said. Something on one of the TV's caught the corner of my eye. The world could wait; this was far more important.
Or so I thought; looking up I saw what the image was and my mind went cold. The screen showed a dark brown panel van that had a giant smoking hole in the side, the shot switched to an overhead from a news helicopter. What looked suspiciously like bodies were arrayed around the van.
I went back to doing to my best to ignore the image when my phone buzzed in my pocket. ‘It's a coincidence.’ I thought and returned for another kiss. I could feel Cathy's leg sliding around mine and my body being drawn in closer. My hand slid up her side and for a few brief seconds the world fell away and all was perfect.
Then my phone buzzed again.
“Oh for fuck sake.” I said and pulled back a little and retrieved it from my jacket, not bothering to look and see who was calling. “Unless someone just died, call me back tomorrow.” I said.
“Actually five people did, we're calling you in.” Watson said over the line.
Cathy looked at me, rolling her eyes as she sighed. I looked at her and shrugged helplessly.
“Can this wait an hour?” This was one of my dreams coming true. It wasn't like those guys were gonna be any less dead, right?
“No it can't, a train load of shit just hit the fan and we need you in asap.” Watson hung up. Remember folks, Generals do not ask for things. They simply state what they want and it's wise to give it to them.
“That didn't sound pleasant.” Cathy said.
“It wasn't.” I admitted. “We've got a situation; I'm needed in.”
“Dammit.” She said and slowly let me go. Her shoulder slumped a little, it was the first time I had ever seen her anything other than chipper. I didn’t like being the cause of it.
“I'm really sorry.” I said. “Believe me, I'd rather be with you.”
“I would hope so” She mustered up a weak smile. “I'll just have to make sure you won't escape next time.”
“I'll look forward to it.” I said and stepped back. Then smiled thinking of a wonderful way to get even.
Reaching into my backpack I pulled out my school glasses, put them on and took a moment to steady myself then focused my mind on the sensation of magnetic fields and took off into the air.
Chapter 36
I knew immediately that the shit had truly hit the fan when I flew straight into school and no one bothered to comment on it. I landed right in front of the admin building just to make sure no one could miss it.
All that was said when I came in was. “Glad to see you came promptly.” Watson looked me over as I came in, and Hamilton was laying out briefing folders. I took a seat next to Ramon. “What's the story?”
“It's weird, all I know is what I got from the news.” He said. “Let's see what they have to say.”
Rachel walked in looking a little worn, but took a seat at the table and opened a briefing folder.
Watson stood up and walked to the front of the desk. “We have an issue. Several hours ago an unknown group attacked the transfer van our two bad guys were in. They used a rocket launcher to stop the van. Then attacked it with automatic weapons.” He paused as pictures of the van and the various guards were brought up.
“Our Russian friend was killed in the initial blast, but they made off with your former classmate for reasons unknown. After they secured him, they killed the driver and the guards we had detailed to move them. It was a very professional piece of work.” Watson said in the tone of voice that made me think he wanted to congratulate the people who did it with a 2X4 to a sensitive spot.
Shawn looked up from the papers. “Okay, what's our role in this?”
Hamilton stood up. “We're not certain as to who the attackers were. If they had killed both ‘Touched’ in the vehicle we would assume that Humans for Humanity were involved. As this was a professional job and an obvious move to break out at least one ‘Touched’ we have a number of concerns.”
“Such as?” Lynn asked.
“Currently several private security and intelligence firms have been actively recruiting various members of ‘The Touched’.” Watson said. “We had received intelligence that the run on the Federal Reserve might have been an operation run by one of them.”
“Why would a security firm do that?” Rachel enquired.
“Our theory is they were testing our response. And possibly their weapons.” Hamilton said looking grim. “Currently we need you to be on standby in the event that we get any news regarding what happened.”
It was my first experience with the phenomena of “hurry up and wait.” Yes, I knew that our presence could be needed at a moment’s notice. Chances were though that it wouldn’t. It took real effort not show how pissed I was. Now I wanted to congratulate these clowns with a 2X4. Or an I beam, that would work too.
“You all have briefing materials in front of you and more uploaded to your tablets. Review the data and be ready.” Watson said and got up. It was an obvious call for dismissal.
I grabbed the folder and the rest of my stuff and headed out. Ramon and Shawn followed although Rachel stayed behind to talk to Hamilton about something. As we walked out another house was waiting outside. Led by my dear friend Andrew Reynolds and the rest of his crew from house 17. They were a good team, on par with us in terms of p
ower and skill, but apparently they had problems gelling as a group. At a guess I'd say they had a number of personality conflicts. That's what happens when you make a team filled full of people who are used to being in charge, or are the children of people who run the show.
The notion of having power because daddy had power never made sense to me. Then again, I'd never been in that situation so I really had no concept of power and wealth as a birthright.
Andrew looked me over as we came out. “Looks like someone spoiled your little victory.” He said.
“I guess they knew we wouldn't be there.” I said with a smile. Andrew didn’t look like he was prepared for a response.
“Well, I guess Watson is going to want us to clean up the mess.” He said with a smirk that really made me want to punch him in the face.
“Hey do you mind if I name one of my kids after you? Douchebag Larkin has a real ring to it.”
His eyes widened and he took a step forward. Just in time for Hamilton to walk out and usher their team in. “See ya later.” Andrew said. His face sneering now.
“Oh I'll count on it.”
From there I walked back to the house; contemplating the notion that there are people who might just be genetically disposed to being assholes. Sitting down on one of the large comfy chairs in the living room, I began paging through the folder. A lot of the paper was written in government speak which was roughly as dry as day old toast.
The report on the attack itself was pretty straightforward. Pointing out that the transfer van had been ambushed; which told the feds right away that the whole operation had been compromised long before they even left.
Looking over the pictures, I saw that the van had taken two solid hits from anti-tank rockets. AT-4 launchers were found at the scene. ATF were backtracking the serial numbers on them, but just that they left them behind, told me an awful lot about them. Whoever had procured the weapons and ordered up this little gig clearly wasn't that concerned about getting caught.
The first rocket had hit the van in the engine from about a hundred meters away, then when it was stopped they hit the back part of the compartment with another rocket, aiming for the area where the guards where. Our Russian friend had been a little too far forward and got wiped out by the incoming jet of molten metal.
The guards were either killed on impact or stunned by the explosion. The team then opened the back with a small charge of explosives on the lock, dragged the guards out and gave them all two shots to the head.
They then grabbed Jimmy and escaped in a four-wheel drive SUV, which was dumped later for another vehicle. Most likely they were long gone and headed across a border if they had any sense. Killing a bunch of feds was going to raise a lot of heat that they would really not want to be around for.
Now the question was who and why?
I read through the intelligence report that was attached to the preliminary investigation and a name kept coming up. “Olympus Security.” It had been formed by a Greek shipping magnate back in the 70's as a private firm to protect shipments in ports with dubious reputations. Sometime in the late 80's it got bought out by a U.S. Defense contractor who expanded it into a private security and intelligence firm, which operated primarily in the Mid-East and Asia. They had expanded into Europe at the turn of the millennium and now had offices in the U.S.
The company got a large and varied selection of weapons from the defense firm and had been active in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Rumor had it they had a hand in a coup in a diamond producing country in Africa.
They had the means and method to pull this off, the third part of the criminal trifecta was motive.
Which seemed obvious with a second’s worth of thought. They had been approaching various “Touched” over the last few months trying to get them into the fold. Throwing around money like they had a printing press.
There were pictures on the pad and in the file of representatives of the company meeting with various “Touched”. Including my dear friend Jimmy. The theory that the Federal Reserve heist was a testing ground for weapons to use on “The Touched” now seemed much more certain.
It made sense when I thought about it. Jimmy was a smash and grab artist, not a full-fledged bank robber. Vasily had been an electrical engineer, but neither of them were planning experts. All Olympus had to do was wait for the feds doing surveillance on them to notice they were eyeing the bank. After that a “Touched” confrontation was kind of inevitable.
“Man, it sure would have been nice to know about this in advance.” I said out loud as the last of that idea fell into place in my mind.
“Know about what?” Shawn was scanning a different section of the report.
“The guys from Olympus security met with Jimmy a couple of weeks prior to the raid on the Fed.” I answered.
“Seriously?”
I showed him the part of the report I was reading. His eyes went wide. “Ever get the feeling things are getting deeper than you want them to?” Shawn said with a raised eyebrow.
“Truth be told; if I think about it too much, I get paranoid all over.” I said.
“How so?” Rachel asked walking downstairs.
“Defense contractors. Access to weapons straight from DARPA, these guys are connected as fuck all up and down the political stream. It's a conspiracy theorist’s wet dream.” I said.
“Well what do we do about it?” Shawn inquired.
“Focus on the job at hand. Jimmy's got to be long gone but we need more data on these guys. You know anyone who hacks?”
Shawn smiled. “I'll get back to you.” He walked out looking pleased with himself.
“How long do you think it will take him to scare up something?” Rachel watched him leave with a wicked smile on her face.
“If there's not a folder of info on the table by tomorrow I'll buy the whole team pizza.” I said.
“I won't take the bet.” She said smiling.
“You look very pleased with yourself.” I said to her. That smile had me curious.
“I have reason to be. I talked to Lynn, you'll get the news tomorrow.”
“No hint?”
“Nope, it’s bigger than you think.”
“I should probably stop by the commissary to get some aspirin shouldn't I?”
“I warned Hamilton about what’s coming and he pulled out a bottle of migraine formula.” She walked off outside.
Well, this was going to be exciting.
Chapter 37
I come from an Irish family, if my name doesn't give it away. The Irish as a culture are the kings of understatement. They called a 30-year civil war “The Troubles” for God's sake. So you can understand how when I said ‘this was going to be exciting’ I might have thought I was on target.
The next day? It started with the shit hitting the fan, and then it got weird.
Thankfully none of the shit hitting the fan was aimed at us. Sure, we were going to get splattered with it, but the person it really splattered all over was Lynn's former step-dad, who happened to be the local head of a branch of Humans for Humanity.
The day started like normal. I was having coffee and breakfast. Trying to remember how to be human before another training day, when we all got called into Hamilton's office. All of us.
We gathered and walked over to the admin building and trudged up the stairs. None of us spoke as we waited for Ramon to walk in. He came in about a minute after we did. Looking a little flushed and sweaty. “Sorry, had a work out.” He said by way of explanation and stood in front of the desk.
I was curious as to what was up but only Lynn and Rachel seemed to have a good line on what was going on. Rachel looked very pleased with herself and Lynn looked more nervous than usual; twitching as she stood there. Looking like an involuntary wave of guilt was washing along her body.
Hamilton got down to business once we were assembled. “At eight o'clock this morning the Kenosha County Sheriff's department served a warrant to Lynn's former step-dad for him to give a sample
of his DNA for cross examination with another sample they had in their custody. That sample would be used to complete an indictment against him for sexual assault, statutory rape and battery.”
Lynn's fidgeting settled at that moment. Like now that the secret was out, the weight of the planet had been lifted from her shoulders. Rachel had a smile that reminded me of an alpha wolf that had spotted a lone deer.
“Apparently he then requested to grab his jacket and disappeared out the back door.” Hamilton said.
“Fuck!!” Rachel said loudly. Hamilton gave her a look that made her quiet down quickly.
“There's a warrant out for his arrest but currently, he's out there. We're keeping an eye on the group to see who might be supporting him, but...” He stopped a moment and shook his head.
“Something tells me this next part is going to suck.” I said.
Hamilton continued. “Humans for Humanity is a group filled full of people who have extreme opinions on a number of subjects. Now when their local leader is facing an indictment quite a few of those extreme people are convinced that this is happening not because he's a criminal but because the government has it in for him. As a result, they're pissed and looking for someone to vent their anger on.”
“And that would be us.” Shawn said.
“Exactly.” Hamilton answered. “There's talk on the boards they have online of taking violent action, but we have nothing clear as of yet.”
“So what do we do?” Rachel said, looking pissed.
“Train, be ready. And if you go out watch your back.” Hamilton said by way of reply. “Sorry to be vague, you need to know about the potential threats but at this point we don't have anything specific.”
Rachel slammed her hands down on the table, looking like she wanted to scream and walked out. I shrugged and followed.
She made good time through the halls but I caught up with her outside where she looked like she might hyperventilate.