Fury

by Llewellin Jegels

  “Yeah. Well, I don’t think they have anything to do with the surveillance, as I tried to tell Shelley,” Mel replied. “Remember what you told us about this guy being a consultant at the security firm?”

  “Division9, yeah,” I replied, nodding. “A lovely bunch of folks, by all accounts. We should send them a fruit basket.”

  “We should send them a pipe bomb,” Shelley interjected.

  “Indeed. Well, we already know Division9 are the ones doing the surveillance,” Mel said. “The best guess is that the guy’s operating alone, using Division9 to do what he can’t get done from his position within the CIA, for whatever reason.”

  I nodded, “Good point. If the CIA wanted to lay eyes on a place, they wouldn’t need to pay a security firm for the privilege.”

  “Exactly,” Mel said. “Which makes this a more personal situation than I would have liked it to be. More personal opens up all kinds of possibilities. Most of them not good at all.”

  “This has become a lot more frightening,” Shelley murmured. “A rogue CIA agent working with a morally dubious security firm to perform clandestine operations of his own choosing?”

  I had to agree. At least the CIA operated as a government controlled bureaucracy, something that could be handled through the correct channels. Not exactly a benevolent government controlled bureaucracy, but not Al Qaeda either.

  Or worse, the Library System.

  Still, a personal issue, undertaken through a shady security agency by a CIA agent… Well, it didn’t look good for us right now. This guy was a wild card, and wild cards had the tendency to be, well, volatile.

  “So the question here is: who the hell is this guy?” I said. “And what does he want with Don and Shelley?”

  “We’re going to have to find out the hard way,” Mel replied, sitting back and looking out of the windows.

  “The hard way?” I said. “So up to this point we have been experiencing, what, the easy way?”

  “Don’t be an ass,” Shelley said.

  “Sorry.”

  “No you’re not.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Ass.”

  “We need to call this guy again,” Mel continued, looking back at us and bulldozing his way through our ribbing. “And arrange to meet him. On our own terms, of course.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Nothing more?”

  Mel’s turn to call me an ass.

  “Ok,” I said. “So we call him up. But there’s one little hitch.”

  “Yes?” Mel asked.

  “Last time didn’t go so well, as far as I can recall,” I replied. “Something about the guy being a complete and utter bastard. How do we know he’ll just come to see reason this time around? Are we going to ask extra nice?”

  “He’ll come because I’m not going to ask him,” Mel replied. “We’re going to tell him.”

  I looked at him, my interest clearly piqued.

  “People, we’re not playing anymore,” Mel said, his expression set.

  “We’re going to tell him that we know who he is, where he works, and what he’s doing in his spare time. Then he might be a bit more interested in a meeting, don’t you think?”

  “I do think,” I replied, nodding. “But we can’t let on who we are-”

  “Hell no!” Mel exclaimed. “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Some have said,” I grinned. “But mom told me to ignore them because they were jealous.”

  “Ass,” he said.

  “Indeed,” Shelley agreed, nodding as if his statement had been a clinical diagnosis as opposed to a friendly insult.

  “Anyway,” Mel continued. “As far as this guy is concerned, we’re a completely unknown entity. The problem is, if he’s had surveillance on your place, Tom, it’s a good guess he knows your face.”

  “Damn,” I replied.

  “Yes,” Mel said. “Which means I’ll be going on this particular sortie on my own, like it or not, Tom.”

  “Fine,” I replied, shaking my head in agitation, realizing there we had no other decent alternative. “But only because we’re out of choices here.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence,” he said, sounding offended. “I was a SEAL too, you bastard.”

  “You know what I mean, Mel,” I replied. “I know you can handle yourself. I just don’t want you getting yourself killed on my behalf.”

  “Yeah,” Shelley said. “Neither do I, you’re a pretty damn valuable asset, Mel.”

  “Thanks, Shel,” he replied, almost but not quite blushing.

  “And you make great coffee,” I added.

  “Yeah, he does,” Shelley agreed with a smile. “I’d hate to lose out on the coffee.”

  “It would truly be a tragedy,” I concurred solemnly. “A tragedy and a terrible loss for the human race.”

  Shelley must have taught Mel the Look while I’d been taking our newest friend to the airport because that’s what I received from both of them. “Enough, you two.”

  “Ok, ok,” I rallied. “And you can kick ass and take names.”

  “Much better,” Mel replied, and the Look went out like a candle in a soft breeze. “I can indeed kick ass and take names.”

  “But how do we know he won’t bring friends?” I asked then.

  “We don’t, Tom,” Mel replied. “In fact, we need to assume he will. It would be stupid not to. But I have a pretty little something which I think may come in handy today.”

  “Yes?” I asked, very interested in this.

  “A M40A3 sniper rifle,” he replied with a roguish grin. “One thousand yard range. Nothing better for painting a target on our friend’s head, right?”

  “So I pull sniper duty,” I mused, nodding. “That will certainly put off any unwanted action on his part.”

  “Indeed,” Mel said. “How are your skills, my friend? And I don’t want to hear ‘rusty’ ok?”

  “It’s like riding a bike, Mel,” I assured him.

  He nodded, “Good man. Ok, so that’s the plan.”

  “Yeah,” Shelley said, looking like she’d perked up a bit. “Sounds good. Just don’t shoot the wrong guy, yeah?”

  “Thanks, Shel,” I replied. “Always good to have admirers.”

  “The knowledge of being in someone’s cross-hairs serves as an excellent deterrent,” Mel said, obviously thinking it all through. “If all goes according to plan, this should all go down without a shot fired.”

  “If all goes according to plan,” I echoed. “It had better.”

  “But how will they know you’re not bluffing,” Shelley said. “I mean when you meet. I assume you’re going to let the guy know he’s in the sights of a rifle, which is the point, right?”

  “Yeah, exactly. The rifle is equipped with a laser sight,” Mel replied. “Tom can paint something with it for a second, long enough for him to see we’re serious, then turn it off again. No sweat.”

  “Nice,” I replied admiringly. “And to the point if you’ll excuse the pun.”

  “Thanks,” Mel replied. “But we’ll see how good the plan is soon enough though.”

  “Yeah, we will.”

  “So,” Shelley said. “Shall we make the call?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Let’s do it.”

  Mel picked up his mobile, which was still jacked into the laptop, checked the cloaking program, and hit redial. He switched it to speaker-phone and put it on the table, so we could all listen in on the festivities.

  The phone rang a few times, and then, “What? I’m a busy man.”

  “It’s me again,” Mel replied calmly, almost conversationally. “Thought you might like to chat.”

  “Who the hell is this?” came the reply. “Wait. Yeah. You’re the asshole who tried to sell me-”

  “Shut up and listen very carefully to what I have to say,” Mel replied in a deadly quiet tone of voice. “We know who you are. We know who you work for. And we know what you’re up to. Do you understand me?”

  Silence on the other end of
the line.

  “Yes,” he replied at last, voice more composed than I would have liked. “I understand perfectly. You don’t know who you’re screwing with.”

  “I just told you I know exactly who I’m dealing with, you fool,” Mel shot back. “Perhaps you think you’re in the big leagues, that you’re the king of the fucking hill. Well, I’m here to tell you we have a much bigger hill than you do, and we have taken an interest in your conduct so far, which, by the way, does you no good.”

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “I’m the guy you’re going to meet in exactly one hour,” Mel growled back. “And it’s non-negotiable.”

  “And if I don’t?” Sounding petty now, like an arrogant schoolboy.

  “Then you’ll be dead by sunset,” Mel replied shortly. “Your call. I couldn’t care less which way you go on this.”

  “And I’m to come alone, I assume?”

  “Yeah,” Mel replied. “It would go a lot better for you.”

  “How do I know you’re not bringing any friends of your own?” the guy asked, and I wondered how Mel would respond.

  “I guess you’ll just have to trust in my good nature.”

  Yup, fair enough.

  Another pause, this one a bit longer, the guy obviously weighing his options.

  “Where do you want to meet?”

  A shift in momentum, however slight, in our favor.

  The sun hung high in a blue and cloudless sky as I unpacked the equipment on the roof of an office building across from the park Mel had chosen for the meeting. I had a bit of trouble positioning myself so that the rifle’s scope wouldn’t glint, reflecting the sun in the direction of the meeting and giving away both my position and any edge we had over the guy in the process.

  Nothing I hadn’t done before. Now we just waited for him to show up.

  I looked down the rifle’s scope at Mel, seated on a bench by a small lake, joggers moving about around him, the day peaceful and warm, in stark contrast to the conversation which would soon take place. He wore a black suit, white shirt, black tie. Government style, in keeping with how we were playing this. He also wore a black beanie, which he had told the guy would be how to identify him, but it in fact served a dual purpose, as it hid the discreet Bluetooth earpiece he wore. His phone and mine were in the middle of a call, and would be for the entirety of the meeting. This would allow me to hear the entire conversation through my earpiece.

  Set up and ready to go, I adjusted my position from across the park so that I looked down the scope while resting my arms.

  “I know we’re dark on the audio,” I said into my earpiece. “But I just want to inform you everything is set up. We are good to go. Good luck, man.”

  “The term is good hunting,” came a soft, mumbled reply, Mel no doubt masking his speech by not moving his mouth.

  I laughed, “You’re right. Good hunting, Mel.”

  Through the scope I saw him give a relaxed stretch, his back arching and his arms moving lazily up in the air, nodding slowly once by way of thanks.

  “You’re welcome,” I replied.

  Mel sipped his coffee as we both waited for the guy to arrive. Five minutes ahead of the allotted time a man in a grey suit walked quickly up to Mel and had a seat beside him. I felt a mixture of apprehension and excitement.

  This was our guy.

  From what I could make out through the scope, he seemed pretty ordinary, a guy of medium build and medium height, thinning brown hair which had already receded at the temples. Not someone who would stand out in a crowd.

  “Who the hell are you?” I heard him ask, his voice made distant because of its proximity to Mel’s earpiece, but not so bad I couldn’t make out every word. “Tell me now, or have I wasted my time?”

  “We’ll get there,” Mel replied, a touch of menace edging his otherwise melodious voice. “Firstly, you need to know I’m in no danger here, no matter what little plans you’ve put together.”

  “Really?” the man in the grey suit said, his eyes narrowing to mere slits.

  Mel kept his gaze steady. “Yes it is. For two very good reasons.”

  “I came alone, like you said,” the man in the grey suit replied. “There’s nobody else.”

  “Yeah well, I don’t like to take chances,” Mel replied. He raised a hand, his arm at a forty-five degree angle so that both he and his guest could see it, and I switched on the laser sight, painting his hand with the little blue dot. Then I shut it off again.

  “So,” the man said. “I guess you didn’t come alone.”

  “Nope,” Mel replied. “What can I say, you have yet to earn my trust.”

  “And reason number two?” the man in the grey suit asked.

  “Anything happens to me and everything we know about you will be leaked to the CIA, and the press. You’ll be done.”

  “Fair enough,” the guy grunted. But he didn’t seem perturbed, which made me wonder. Mel called it before I had the chance to whisper my thoughts to him.

  “So why don’t you call your own boys off,” Mel continued. “And we can be all civil, yeah?”

  “I told you already. I came alone-”

  “Like hell you did. Now call them off.”

  The man in the grey suit sighed, and spoke into his own earpiece, “Stand down.”

  “You have to do better than that,” Mel said. “Tell them to fuck off, or my people put a bullet in you right now. Don’t push me.”

  A pause, then, “Return to your stations. This operation is green. I repeat, the op is green. No danger. Return to your stations.”

  “Much better. Now shut down your phone. Let’s make this nice and private, ok?”

  “Like hell,” the man in the grey suit said. “You first.”

  Pretty ballsy, considering he had a rifle trained on him.

  Mel took out a phone, which he’d bought especially for this meeting, switched it off, all the while keeping his actions in full view.

  The man nodded, and did the same, removing his earpiece and handing it over to Mel, who promptly threw it into the lake.

  “Send me the bill,” Mel said.

  At that moment a jogger slowed down and stopped directly in front of them, ran a sweep over the man in the grey suit with what looked like a mp3 player, and nodded to Mel before continuing his jog.

  No digital signatures.

  Electronically, he was dark now.

  “Okay,” Mel said. “Now we can chat. Firstly, my organization has a few questions for you.”

  “Like what?” the man in the grey suit asked. He didn’t bother to ask for the name of Mel’s organization since that would have given him something to check after the meeting. Besides, I remained unsure if the identity Mel had set up would hold up against a CIA operative.

  Mel felt no such misgivings. One could never be certain of the enemy’s capabilities, so I considered it best to assume the worst. Mel had been out of the game for a while now, and I couldn’t fault him for having faith in his skills, so I’d let it go.

  “Like what the hell are you doing monitoring a civilian household?” Mel asked. “There’s no mention of it in the CIA database.”

  True. Before Mel had hacked out of the CIA mainframe, he’d done a fast sweep for anything related to Don Abaid and had come back with no hits, classified or not.

  “And how would you have access to our records?” the man in the grey suit asked, a smug look of contempt etched on his face.

  “Because it’s our job,” Mel replied. “It’s what we do.”

  “Who polices the police, right?”

  “Among other things, yes,” Mel replied. “It certainly looks like you need a bit of policing. So I’ll ask you one last time, what the hell are you doing running surveillance on a civilian household?”

  “It’s classified-”

  Nice try.

  “Like hell it is,” Mel snapped. “Division9 is no part of the CIA. So I’m guessing this is personal. Tell me what you think you’re doing unless yo
u want me to inform your superiors at the CIA you’re moonlighting with the civvies. Both you and Division9 would be in the shit, wouldn’t you?”

  The man in the grey suit must’ve been a bit shocked by the amount of information we already had on him, because he replied in a slightly hesitant voice, “How did you access all of this information?”

  “We know what we’re doing.”

  He shook his head. “No-”

  “Oh! You mean that piece of substandard encryption you use?” Mel said. “The same one you’re using at the Abaid household, you mean? We broke the code in minutes. You have no idea who you’re dealing with, do you?”

  “I’m beginning to wonder,” the man in the grey suit muttered.

  “Good,” Mel replied. “But wonder on your own watch. You’re here to answer my questions, remember?”

  “And how do I know you won’t put a bullet in me after I’ve answered your fucking questions?”

  That sounded familiar.

  “My organization has nothing to gain by killing you,” Mel replied. “Nothing to lose either. But let’s just say it’s easier not to kill you. For now.”

  “It seems you have the advantage,” the guy muttered, looking out at the little lake.

  “You bet I do,” Mel agreed.

  “May I just ask you a question before we commence,” the man in the grey suit asked, almost as if asking for a favor, still looking out at the still water.

  “Yes, okay,” Mel said. “Go ahead.”

  “What organization are you with?”

  “Sorry. Classified information.”

  “Fine,” he continued. “And what is your interest in the Abaid household?”

  “Let’s just say we’re protecting our assets,” Mel replied, and down the scope I saw him give the guy a long, meaningful look. “You done yet?”

  “One more question.”

  Mel sighed, “One more. Then we get this show on the road.”

  “Do you know the whereabouts of Mr. Abaid?”

  Shit.

  He didn’t know either? Back to square one.

  Mel shook his head.

  The man in the grey suit looked at Mel for a long time before his next statement.