Grayson heard his daughter's voice come through the doorway. “If I drop my gun, you’ll shoot me anyway. Carl has you covered too.” She couldn’t see they had also captured and disarmed him.
Drawing his pistol, Grayson knew he couldn’t possibly take down both men quickly enough at his current distance with his 9 MM. They would likely have time to shoot Barb and Carl, probably killing them. Holding the laptop dangling in his left hand with its top forward, he held his gun in the back for concealment. He walked steadily towards the two men, thinking furiously of how he might arrange a trade of the laptop for the hostages.
Before the standoff culminated in gunfire, he needed to draw the attention of the two men to himself. They were hiding behind Barb and Carl in the event Stacy risked a shot at either of them. He was at a right angle to them, potentially with a side shot.
“I have Stiles laptop to trade!” he shouted, holding it forward as if using two arms to support it, his gun still hidden. “If it gets destroyed because you got reckless, you know he’ll kill you.”
They naturally looked his way, but the man holding Barb couldn’t pivot to stay behind her without exposing his side to Stacy’s shotgun. The thug holding Carl didn’t share that risk and dropped the rifle to grab the boys shirt collar as he stepped behind his shield, pulling him closer, his gun barrel stuck in Carl’s ear.
Grayson made things clearer. “If either of you shoots a hostage, you’ll lose your only cover, and you’ll die. If I smash this laptop that Stiles wants so bad, he’ll kill you for losing the only chance he had to make a trade. You know he doesn’t forgive mistakes.” He hoped they believed that.
Hearing her Dad’s voice, Stacy needed to tell him something he couldn’t know. “Dad, Stiles can’t Control them. I reinforced the Immune block before your transmission wore off. That was only five minutes ago.”
With the shouts echoing in the lobby, and guns displayed, the bystanders were taking cover or ducking out other exits. The open door of the garage stairwell funneled the shouts to where Stiles could hear enough to grasp what was happening. His men had hostages, and Grayson was up there with his equipment. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to force his men to die for him to kill Grayson. He was forced to use his voice and negotiation rather than Mind Control. That was an option that had always produced considerably less success for him in the past. He shouted up the stairwell anyway.
“Jackson, is it safe for us to come up the stairs?”
“No, Sir. The girl is in there with a shotgun.”
“Do you and Anson have her mother and boyfriend?”
“I have the woman, Anson has the boyfriend. Grayson is here in the lobby with your laptop. Says he’ll trade.”
“She didn’t drop her weapon when you got her mother? I heard you tell her.”
“No. It’s still aimed my way.”
“Perhaps she loves her boyfriend more.”
Stiles shouted up to Stacy directly. “Stacy put down your shotgun, or I’ll make Anson kill Carl. I don’t need him for a trade.”
Barb yelled, passion and determination in her voice. “Don’t do it, baby! We’re all dead if you do that. Stiles shot me while I was standing in the street after he made me stop moving and my gun was empty.”
Grayson heard the words, but he also oddly sensed them. It was a bit confusing because they arrived almost simultaneously with a strange echo effect. He questioned what he felt, but it centered near where his ears told him the words originated. His mind knew what he sensed, but it wasn’t Stiles.
Stacy, sounding puzzled, asked a question that on the surface seemed odd. “Was that you Mom?”
In a snide tone, Jackson answered, “It sure wasn’t me stupid.” To Barb, he said, “Keep your damned mouth shut, or I’ll shoot you in the thigh and watch you bleed.”
Grayson realized the significance of Stacy’s question. She was as confused as he was. It didn’t seem possible, but she felt what he had. He reconsidered what his daughter had just told him about renewing Immunity for Stiles’ henchmen.
Stiles was bluffing when he said he’d make Anson kill Carl. He might order that verbally, but he couldn’t Control him to do so. Anson, on the other hand, needed Carl as his protective shield, and he surely knew Grayson came armed.
Grayson considered how he and Stacy conferred Immunity on other people. He had an Idea, and it was worth a try because Stiles had two more gunmen with him, and before long he’d control a mob that had lost their temporary immunity from the broadcast that ended when the power died.
Time was running out, and he needed to try a bit of manipulation. “I don't want anyone shot. Even you two assholes if it puts my family at risk. Stacy?” He called to her.
“Yeah, Dad?”
“Keep the stairs blocked, but I think Jackson and Anson would feel safer if they joined each other. They won’t start shooting if they don’t feel so isolated and exposed.
“Jackson, you can move towards Anson and Carl, and we won’t interfere. That way you can support one another. No need for any shooting to start, which you might not survive even if you hit me.” He let his 9 MM show from behind the laptop.
Jackson’s eyes widened, and he realized he would be exposed to Stacy or Grayson’s guns if he did anything to his hostage. He started cautiously moving closer to Anson and Carl.
Grayson needed to alert his wife, but not be too obvious. He spoke lower, hoping his words wouldn’t reach the bottom of the stairs.
“Barb, don’t resist. Go with him. Remember what Mike showed us when we were in Elizabethtown. You are exactly like Mike, so if he could do this, so can you. Believe me; It’s all a matter of setting your mind to do what you need to do. These men are immune only because Stacy and I gave that ability to them. No one can control them while they have Immunity.
“Know this: the Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. I’ll take what Stacy and I give away when I make the trade for you and Carl with this laptop. Think your way through the rest.”
Jackson, joining Anson, sneered and said, “Screw you and your Goddamned religious bullshit, Grayson. You’d better pray I don't decide to kill her while I make you watch. Think your way through that, shit head.”
Stacy had shifted to the other side of the doorway to still aim at Jackson, who now had Barb positioned better between his two potential attackers, with Anson at his side.
Grayson was ready to act. “Jackson, how about I trade you the laptop for my wife? You pick it up and let her go. Anson will still have his gun on Carl, and you’ll still have him as a hostage. We can work out another exchange with your boss, and then everybody goes home safe. Stiles rewards success with money.”
Jackson looked interested. “How are you gonna get the laptop to me? You ain’t coming any closer to me with that gun in your hand.”
“I’ll slide the computer over, and you let my wife go when you pick it up.”
Without a pause for agreement, Grayson said, “Barb, this will be the trade, and Anson will still have a gun. The Lord is about to take Immunity away.”
Looking directly at Anson, a strained expression on his face, Grayson slowly crouched low and set the laptop on the slick pink granite floor, his gun still pointed towards Jackson, peering from behind Barb. He glanced at Stacy, then looked at Jackson with the same seeming strain on his face before he shoved hard on the laptop, sending it sliding and turning slowly on the polished floor, like a large square shuffleboard cue.
It slid a bit wide of where Jackson stood but stopped only two feet away. He bent to retrieve the computer, taking a half step.
Grayson looked at his wife. If she understood and did what he hoped she could do it would work out for them. If not, it was entirely up to him, and he hoped Stacy could help him save Barb and Carl. He was willing to die to do that.
Jackson touched the edge of the laptop and rotated it to reach under a corner, his gun’s aim drifting away from Barb slightly as he watched Grayson every second for any sign of trickery. He looked surprised at
the gunshot and the feel of the bullet’s impact as it tore through the left side of his neck and out the right in a spray of blood.
He turned his head to look where the shot originated, and his shock increased when he was struck again by a second and third bullet to his chest, fired by his accomplice, Anson. Carl abruptly dropped to the floor as Barb stepped over the dying Jackson, away from Anson, who was suddenly blasted by a shotgun slug, and simultaneously ripped by several 9 MM bullets while he stood fully exposed and unmoving, his weapon still aimed at his victim, Jackson.
Even as Anson collapsed, Barb recovered Jackson’s pistol from his dead hand, and Grayson rushed to her side. Stacy stepped through the stairwell doorway, but at a shout from Stiles below, she turned back.
“Jackson, Anson, did you kill them? Do you have my laptop?”
“Jackson has the laptop,” Grayson shouted back, answering him honestly. “But he won’t be giving it to anyone.”
He rushed over and kissed his wife quickly, winked, and ignored Carl’s confused question as he rose to his knees asking, “What just happened?”
Grayson picked up the Marlin, and told him, “Ask Stacy and Mrs. Grayson. I have to run.”
He spoke to Stacy in a low voice. “I know you sensed what I did, so explain it to him. But first, fire a shot down the stairwell. I want you to convince Stiles to get the Hell away from us. You have two more guns from Jackson and Anson to provide added firepower if they try to rush the stairs.”
He turned, patted Barb on her exposed and diapered rump, and said, “Better figure out how to use those ties dear, people are staring.” He laughed and was gone. Headed towards a side exit.
****
For Stiles, the flurry of gunshots reverberating down the stairwell confirmed his suspicion at what he’d sensed. He voiced his bitching to his two remaining men, who didn’t have a clue what he meant. “I didn’t think Grayson would come alone. There’s another BII agent with him who stayed mentally silent, so I wouldn’t know what I was facing. I don't know how their Compeller managed to get past the Immune resistance that girl gave them, but Anson obeyed the orders. I notice neither of you useless turds has gotten free of her Immunity transmission yet.”
He knew they hadn’t because he’d tried to send Arlo or Stan upstairs, guns blazing, using his Control ability. Arlo, one of Stiles former Shields knew how callous the boss could be, and had merely looked at him fearfully. “Sir, they’d see us coming. There ain’t no cover on the stairs. We don’t have body armor or helmets either. You said that shit wasn’t needed. That you’d stop everybody with your thoughts.”
A shotgun blast suddenly sounded in the stairwell as a reminder, and the slug ricocheted from the walls. With four henchmen dead or dying, and no hostage to use against Grayson, Stiles knew he had no bargaining power over the BII man from down here.
Out on the street, however, where his portable transmitter would have more range, he’d set the damn city afire, making the police shoot the rioters he’d send against them and the firemen. That carnage would teach the BII to stay the Hell out of his way after the congressional investigations into the agency’s carelessness came to light. The destruction and death toll in Louisville would make Seoul seem tame.
Stiles needed to get up to street level quickly, and as safely as possible. “Arlo, Stan, get in the car. I need to reach the street for the best broadcast range.” He patted his portable transmitter on his belt.
“The damned citizens should be losing their resistance to me by the minute, and Grayson and his brat can’t protect anyone beyond a hundred feet. In five minutes I’ll have this building surrounded by a screaming mob, and in fifteen minutes the inferno will start. I’ll drive, you two keep their heads down if they try to stop us.”
The three men ran to the sedan, the henchmen lagging behind, looking at one another, trying to figure how this fit of rage by Stiles was going to make them rich and powerful men locally. That was something Stiles had promised them.
They passed Bob Scanlon’s body between two cars. He’d taken a large caliber rifle bullet to the face as he stared down his gun’s sights after firing twice at fleeing figures. He’d managed only to hit a woman bystander that apparently had stepped out of an elevator. Andy Archer laid where he’d fallen, next to where the van was once parked. Stiles didn’t even check the two men to see if they were still breathing. He had written them off as less than useful.
Stiles started the car, did a three-point turn in the parking lane in front of the power room, and started accelerating towards the exit gate at the base of the ramp. He ducked as he drove by the elevators and stairs, in case one of the Graysons had descended. He’d lowered the windows on the left side, with Arlo and Stan poised in the back to fire at anyone they saw, but no shots rang out. It was all clear from this point, and he slowed to crash through the gate arm where he was supposed to insert a validated parking pass from an upstairs business. The arm shattered and pieces flew to the sides as he started up the ramp.
Pedestrians were crossing on the sidewalk up ahead at the exit street, so he blew his horn as he went up the ramp. That wasn’t out of concern for them, but if he hit someone, they might fly over the hood and smash through the windshield.
One pedestrian, instead of stopping, rushed to the center of the exit lane and turned to face the oncoming vehicle. The silhouette was a man, and the figure raised a rifle aimed at the driver. With an unmanly sounding screech, Stiles recognized Grayson, and even before he saw the muzzle flash, he threw himself to the right as he tromped on the accelerator.
The upslope and vehicle inertia prevented the surge Stiles wanted, as the tires squealed, and the .45-70 round punched through the windshield. It would have struck him in the hollow at the base of his throat had he not reacted so quickly, using the steering wheel to force himself down and to the side. The spalling of glass stung the left side of his face and ear.
The bullet missed its intended target, and flew over the back of the driver’s seat, through the headrest and smashed into the back of Arlo’s skull, who was still watching for anyone that might step out of the stairwell door to shoot at them as they fled.
Only the other rear passenger, Stan, saw the matador-like move Grayson made, to pivot aside, as the car left the ground slightly when it crossed over the sidewalk. The miss was inadvertently made possible by Stiles, who had turned the steering wheel as he desperately pushed against its lower rim to get as low as possible. He’d nearly been killed previously by gunfire when he didn’t get low enough in a car seat.
Without guidance, the car bounced hard as it reached the street, and was promptly clipped on the rear left fender by a passing car, sending the sedan into a sideways spin. The car slid into the curb, blowing out the right front tire and breaking an axle.
Grayson levered shells rapidly and fired three more times, twice through the driver’s window, expecting Stiles head to pop up for a look, and once at movement in the rear seat, as the last gunman fired wildly out the back window in Grayson’s general direction.
He worked the lever to load another shell, but the tube was empty. Carl had fired multiple times since he’d last reloaded in the garage. Dropping the rifle, Grayson reached for his holstered 9MM as Stan’s raised arm continued blindly firing his semiautomatic through the window in a fan pattern, without him fully lifting his head to see properly. He was counting on the volume of fire to hit his target when he knew Grayson’s general location. Luck and random chance proved him right. A bullet struck Grayson in his right forearm where it crossed his chest, his hand gripping the 9MM.
The chance intervention of his arm probably saved Grayson’s life for the moment, stopping a bullet that would have struck his chest right over his heart. But it broke his Radius, causing him to drop the 9MM he’d just pulled from the shoulder holster.
Stan, leaning over Arlo’s dead body, and peering over the rim of the back window, saw Grayson’s reaction and heard his grunt of pain. The clattering of the 9MM on the street dre
w his eyes, and he suddenly grinned. He took careful aim this time.
Shoot Stiles, he’s trying to kill you. Hurry!
Immunity was still affecting good old Stanley, allowing him to sense that thought as external, ordering him to kill his boss. But he also distrusted his boss, who had demonstrated no regard for his hired help today. He didn’t shift his aim from Grayson, but he reflexively glanced to his right, between the two front bucket seats to see what Stiles was doing. That was a mistake.
****
A few minutes ago Stiles had sensed mental commands when a Compeller had issued orders to his men in the lobby. He’d received this: Anson, shoot Jackson. Hurry!
Following that there were three pistol shots and Stiles sensed another mental order.
Anson, Freeze! Carl drop!
Then Stiles heard a shotgun blast and several more pistol shots, coming from a different sounding handgun. That’s when Grayson gave him that smug sounding reply to Stiles question, about Jackson having the laptop but that he wouldn’t be giving it to anyone.
He knew then his men were dead, thanks to the help of a BII Compeller. He didn’t know how a Compeller, someone who was significantly weaker than himself, had bypassed the Immunity transmission that was still in effect. Stiles had been frustrated by that limitation for the last hour and a half, completely unable to override that temporarily imparted resistance to his mind control ability.
During the gunfight accompanying that wild ride out of the parking garage, he feared Grayson was going to kill him before he could command anyone that was no longer immune. He had no idea Arlo was already dead, but Stan was definitely on the job, blazing away at Grayson. He didn’t see it happen, but he heard the grunt of pain from outside the car and saw Stan smile as he rose up and took careful aim out the window. He’d make that man wealthy if he killed his nemesis.
With Stiles, gratitude and loyalty were fleeting and ephemeral things. He sensed the mental command to Shoot Stiles; he’s trying to kill you. Hurry!
Controller Page 39