The Executioner's Game

by Gary Hardwick

  After high school Luther attended West Point, scoring top marks in academics, military training, and sports. And for the first time in his life, he met people who were smarter and more accomplished in certain fields.

  But while he was outmatched in some areas, no one in the institution had all the qualities he did. No one except Sharon Bane. Sharon was the female Luther. Born to a trailer-trash family, she was a rebel and had all the talent to back it up. They became fast friends, their difference in race and gender quelling any rivalry they might have had.

  Luther graduated with honors and planned to go into the Army Rangers to serve out his commission. These plans were changed when a government man came to visit. The man came each year, and each year it was rumored that he selected recruits for special assignment. Luther had never paid much attention to the rumors, but that year, after the visit, he was called in to a meeting and was surprised to see Sharon Bane and another cadet, Henry Trenchant, both of whom had also graduated at the top of their class. They were told that they would receive a special commission to work with an unclassified agency. The school did not know anything about the government man or whom he represented. It was widely rumored that the CIA or NSA was behind this.

  Luther and Sharon took the offer. Henry did not and was sworn never to breathe a word of it afterward.

  Luther, Sharon, and several others from Annapolis, the U.S. Air Force Academy, and the Marine Corps Recruit Depot at Parris Island were trained in secret for three years. They learned various forms of martial arts and were schooled in weapons use and explosives. The training was grueling and relentless. Eventually Luther and the others were removed from their units altogether and trained full-time.

  Luther soon understood that this special unit was not the CIA. The men who trained them seemed concerned primarily with methods of elimination. Even before they told him, he knew he was being trained as an assassin.

  This was when Luther met Alex Deavers. Alex’s arrival was heralded as the make-or-break point of the cadets’ training.

  He arrived during their fight instruction one cold day in Virginia. The cadets were randomly sparring when Deavers, clad in a crisp navy suit, entered the facility and assumed a fighting pose. The other instructors backed away, leaving the cadets to face the lone man five to one.

  Deavers approached the fist cadet, a young man named Tony Andrisi. Tony was generally agreed to be the best fighter of the group. Deavers faked a punch. Andrisi lifted his hands in defense and then delivered a kick that Deavers easily dodged. Then Deavers threw a punch at Andrisi that was so fast Luther thought it was another bluff, but the blow hit Andrisi on the temple and dropped him to one knee.

  Andrisi was about to move when Deavers said, “Get up and I’ll kill you.” Andrisi stayed down.

  Deavers put down Sharon and the other two cadets in similar fashion, each time faking an assault, then countering the aggression with a punch or kick that was too fast to defend.

  Deavers got to Luther, and Luther swore he could see the shadow of a smile on his lips. Luther stood fast and then searched Deavers’s face. Their eyes locked, and Luther saw something that set him at ease. Deavers raised a leg and aimed a side kick at Luther’s head. Luther barely dodged the assault but did not attack. Deavers then executed a series of moves, and Luther struggled to survive them. Finally Luther landed a punch, but Deavers swept his legs from under him, ending the contest.

  “Fighting is not about hurting your enemy; it’s about understanding him, then killing him,” Deavers had said. “This cadet avoided my assault as best he could until he saw a weakness. But of course he had the advantage of seeing die rest of you fail, didn’t he?” And now Deavers did smile.

  That day the cadets were told something of the institution called E-1. They were given as much info as they needed, which was not much. Luther surmised that he was being trained to kill, and the prospect excited and terrified him.

  During the next year, Luther was taken under Deavers’s wing and forged into another person. Deavers liked Luther’s youth and brashness. The young kid soaked up everything Deavers had to offer, learning the history of the agency and its secrets and memorizing the E-1 rule book, the blueprint for their future.

  Luther also learned to focus his anger and aggression into useful energy. Deavers trained him and the others to look at their exceptional status as human beings in a new way. They were elite and had to remain unburdened by the false morality of common people. They were being trained to eliminate the enemies of their country. They were machines to this end, and duty, honor, and patriotism were their fuel.

  Luther was accepted into E-1 at the age of twenty-one, the youngest agent in the agency’s history. He was given a document called the vita pactum, a simple one-page document in which the agent promised to give his life to the agency, and in return the agency would always take care of his every need. Luther signed it and was married to E-1 forever.

  Luther took to his new job with the same fierceness and brilliance with which he did everything else. Alex Deavers saw to it that Luther was not wasted in his new occupation. He sent Luther on a mission the first week after his graduation.

  Luther was dispatched to Germany to neutralize an arms dealer who’d become troublesome to peace negotiations in Eastern Europe. Luther knew nothing of him until he got there. When he received the file, he saw that the man, Caesar Reniddo, was a former army lieutenant trained in fighting and weapons. He was also a black man.

  That was Alex, Luther had thought. He wanted to test Luther in every way, including his racial loyalty.

  Luther neutralized Reniddo and his two bodyguards on his first night in the country. The bodyguards were killed with a silenced weapon. Reniddo’s throat was cut as he slept. Luther felt a great rush of emotion at his first kills. He was excited, guilty, sickened, and empowered by the feeling. It was like hearing bright music crescendo, then recede into silence—the cold, deep space of the human heart.

  Luther left an angry note, handwritten in Lebanese. The authorities made the normal assumptions, and the matter was closed. After that first assignment, Luther had gone on mission after mission, building his skill and confidence. His former life became a distant, faded dream, hidden under layers of missions and aliases and secrets. Detroit, his family, and the young, sweet Vanessa and the Cricket were ghosts locked in some faraway country. There were women, but they never lasted long; and there were friends, but they were all within the structure of E-1’s family. The agency became his life.

  Luther became one of Alex Deavers’s killing machines, a man possessed of deadly skill and cold, controlled emotion. He often wondered which was deadlier, the blow that killed or the lack of emotion that catalyzed it.

  Luther also became a patriot. Most Americans didn’t know the price of freedom, but he did. He’d visited the ghettos and hellholes of the world and had seen the look of loss and need in the eyes of the hungry and dying that would make a common homeless man’s stare look like a smile. Americans went through their privileged lives not knowing why they had cars, skyscrapers, NBA teams, and thirty-one flavors. Someone else in the world paid the price for our advantages, usually with their lives.

  Luther believed in America, but he was practical about it. If his country wasn’t the leader of the world, another country would have assumed the position, and it would be no less protective of its interests. A true patriot knew that everything in life was the lesser of two evils.

  This was how he and the other E-1 agents justified their occupation. The men and women they eliminated were plagues on humanity. If they were allowed to live, they would undoubtedly cause the deaths of countless innocents. So by terminating them, they actually saved lives.

  “Exit,” he heard Hampton say.

  “Got it,” he said almost at the same time.

  They were in sync as usual, he thought. He felt the music merge with his excitement as the Ford Explorer rolled off an exit and into the city of Baltimore, where he hoped that his mission wo
uld end quickly with the elimination of Alex Deavers.

  East Baltimore

  Luther and Hampton sat in the Ford and watched ships unload at East Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. The sun was out, but it was blocked by hazy clouds that made everything seem dismal and gray. Besides, it was nearing the horizon. Soon it would set, and the night would rise, taking the town to darkness.

  The area was generally unkempt, and the steady wind was filled with the smell of fish and the ocean. Something about this place unsettled Luther. He didn’t know whether it was instinct or the fact that he hadn’t been in America in a long time, but something had his mind on a yellow alert.

  Luther was settled near Wagner’s Point in Baltimore. That’s where the Métier had come into port.

  Dockworkers hurried about with a measured energy that suggested they had a long time to work and a short time to live. Luther remembered that feeling, the state of normality enjoyed by ordinary people. It seemed so distant now in his world.

  He was trying to figure out what Alex Deavers was thinking when he so cleverly deceived them by switching ships. Of course he was covering his tracks, but with the government’s information-gathering ability, it seemed an almost impossible task to get away cleanly. Still, Alex was too smart to have randomly chosen this city. It was too close to D.C., too close to E-1, to be anything but a calculated effort. Again, the question was why.

  “I know that the wolf came here because it was the last place we’d expect him to,” said Hampton. “But that couldn’t have been the only reason.”

  “If I know Alex, he had something hidden here,” said Luther. “Money, a contact, maybe a weapon.”

  “God, I hope it’s not one of my weapons,” said Hampton.

  Luther pictured Alex sneaking off the boat, paying off whoever had assisted him, then getting transportation. And Deavers had covered his tracks well. The locals and the FBI hadn’t found a single person willing to admit that he’d seen anyone fitting Alex’s unique description. And who wouldn’t remember a disfigured man?

  Hampton turned on his laptop, which was nestled securely in a holder built in to the dashboard. He pulled up the E-1 Operations Mission Program, called EOPM.

  “What’s it say?” asked Luther, aware of what Hampton was doing.

  “Most of the men interviewed were telling the truth about Deavers, all but one. A man named Kraemer was noted as ‘suspicious’ by the maritime authorities, the FBI, and the Harbor Patrol. Kraemer was part of the Métier’s rescue team when it came upon the Sjømannskirken at sea.”

  “But his story checked out,” said Luther.

  “It did, but two men on the Métier noted that Kraemer had disappeared for a time after the ship was under way again.”

  Hampton pulled up a picture of Kraemer. He was a round little white man whose features were doughy and bland. His skin was ruddy from years at sea, and his head was a mess of dark, greasy hair.

  “A handsome figure of a man,” said Hampton.

  “He’s our target. He’ll lead us to something.”

  “You mean to the wolf.”

  “I don’t think Alex is here anymore,” said Luther. “It’s been too long, and I know I wouldn’t sit so close to D.C. for an extended period of time.”

  They soon spotted Kraemer, who looked just like his picture. When he left work, Luther followed him away from the pier and into the city. Luther hit the Ford’s CD player, and Outkast blasted from the speakers. The thick bass and Andre 3000’s rapid-fire rap filled him with energy.

  “You’re going to kill me before the wolf,” said Hampton.

  Kraemer made a pit stop at a 7-Eleven and came out with a plastic bag holding a six-pack of beer. Kraemer got into his car, popped the top on a can, and drank.

  “Not a very safe driver,” said Luther.

  Kraemer pulled away. Luther waited a moment and then followed. Although Luther didn’t know the region, he did know that East Baltimore was the black part of the city and considered to be a dangerous area. That’s where Kraemer headed.

  Luther’s mind worked as he trailed Kraemer into the heart of the inner city, watching the faces turn from white to black and the sky fill with darkness.

  The streets in a place like this came to life at night. This didn’t unsettle Luther; it stimulated him. There would be danger, and he was ready. So far this whole wolf chase had been a mental cat-and-mouse game. He was definitely due for some real action.

  A startling thought occurred to Luther. Could Alex still be in the city? Was this a trap of some kind? Luther got excited for just a moment; then he calmed down.

  “He’s going into the inner city,” said Hampton. “What’s a white guy gonna do there?”

  “I don’t know. Any man can get into a lot of trouble in the ’hood,” said Luther.

  Kraemer stopped his vehicle in front of a run-down, blasted-out building near East Fayette and North Port streets. Although Luther had never been here, he sensed that it was not a safe place.

  Luther and Hampton watched as Kraemer got out, slipped what had to be money to two young black men, and went inside. The money, Luther knew, was payment for them to watch Kraemer’s car, a brand-new Volvo, much too nice a car to be in this part of town at night.

  Luther rolled by the building, and the two black men gave his vehicle more than a passing look. He drove for another two blocks, then turned around and headed back. The streets had the look of an urban war zone and reminded him a great deal of Detroit.

  “So what’s Kraemer doing here?” asked Hampton.

  “More important, what does his presence have to do with Alex Deavers, if anything?”

  Luther parked his Ford in the well-lit lot of a restaurant not too far from where Kraemer was. Hampton removed his sidearm, a 9mm Baby Eagle, and made sure it was loaded.

  Luther took a few steps away, then spoke. “You got me?” he asked.

  “Yep,” said Hampton, and Luther heard him clearly in a small earpiece he wore.

  Luther took his P99 and proceeded back to the building where Kraemer had gone on foot. He was wearing jeans and a black hooded sweatshirt. He’d fit right in.

  Luther walked the three blocks back to the building. With each step he grew more energized and more dangerous. The ghetto was just another kind of mission terrain, he reasoned. London, Prague, or East Baltimore—the mission was the same, and the rules and objectives still applied.

  “If Deavers isn’t here, as you suggest,” said Hampton, “we only need minimal effort.”

  “And what the hell does that mean?” asked Luther.

  “Try not to kill anyone,” said Hampton.

  “Not making any promises.”

  As Luther approached the building, he hoped the Volvo would still be there. It was. The two men were still watching the car, but now they were on the stoop of the building.

  Luther saw that they were hard street types, the kind of men who’d probably do anything for money. He debated buying them off but didn’t trust them to take his bribe. In most cases guys like this would just decide to rob him and stay loyal to their employer, in which case he’d have to kill them. He didn’t want that. Still, he would have to engage them in order to find out why Kraemer was in this neighborhood and in this building.

  “Two men in my way,” said Luther.

  The street was desolate. It still smelled like some kind of trap, but Luther pressed on. He moved closer, and the two men saw him. If one of them bolted for the building, he’d have to move fast. But they didn’t. To them Luther was just another brother from the ’hood, someone they had no fear of. They had beaten and probably killed men who looked more dangerous than Luther. The men had no way of knowing that the man walking toward them could bring quick and sudden death.

  One of them stood. He was of medium build and appeared to be only twenty or so. The other man was bigger and looked much more dangerous. That’s the one Luther wanted. In multiple-adversary combat, it was axiomatic that the larger of the two was usually the greater th
reat. If Luther could subdue the big man, the smaller one would feel vulnerable and would be easier to defeat. And it was always best to expend your freshest energy on the bigger man.

  Luther stopped a few feet from the standing man. He was wearing an Orioles baseball cap and a dirty gray T-shirt. The bigger man was wearing a blue Phat Farm sweatshirt. He just sat and watched, scowling.

  “Keep walkin’, nigga,” said the man in the gray shirt. His voice was thin but measured and very confident. “Nuthin’ for ya ’round here, playa.”

  Luther remained silent. And he did keep walking, right over to the other man. The big man stood up, but before he could react, Luther moved in and delivered a slashing blow to his throat. The man grabbed his neck, and Luther swept his legs from under him. The big man fell and hit the stoop hard, his head slamming on the bottom step. He was still clutching his neck and bleeding a little from the side of his head.

  Luther had turned while sweeping the big man, and when he was done, he faced Mr. Gray Shirt. The smaller man was reaching into his pants. Luther pulled his P99 and held it right in front of the man’s face. Gray Shirt stopped, and Luther easily disarmed him of the gun he’d been going for.

  Luther pushed Gray Shirt toward the fallen man and then pulled the fallen man’s gun from his waistband. He put both guns into the pouch of his sweatshirt.

  “You a cop?” asked Gray Shirt.

  “The white man,” said Luther, ignoring him. “Who is he, and why is he here?”

  “Fuck you,” said Gray Shirt.

  Luther stepped around Gray Shirt and kicked the big man in the jaw, breaking it. The sound made Gray Shirt flinch. Luther repeated his question.

  “I don’t know!” said Gray Shirt. “He just started coming here and paid us to watch his car. He stay here all night, and then he leave.”