by David Archer
Sam blinked. "Yeah, I'll bet it is. I take it those are expense accounts?"
"Yeah, something like that. Whoever I'm working for gives me one to use for the expenses of the mission, I'm assuming so that they can keep track of where I'm at and what I'm doing. When the mission is over, they tend to forget about those little accounts, so I just hang onto the cards for emergencies. Like having something put back for a rainy day, you know? I've been living off of them for the last two years, now. Ever since I went off the reservation and onto this mission."
They had parked near the corner of I Street and twentieth, and were walking in the general direction of H Street. Chandler's office was in the building there, and while they didn't want to get too close, they needed to be closer than they already were.
As Ken had suggested, the plan was to try to use him as bait. They had to find a way to get Chandler alone, and that wasn't going to be easy to do. The only thing that he might want badly enough to risk coming out of his secure location would be the chance to shut Ken down for good.
Of course, that meant convincing him that Sam was willing to turn on Ken and hand him over. In order to do that, Sam would have to do the best acting he'd ever done, convincing Chandler that all he wanted was the chance to go home and live a normal life with his family. If it worked, Chandler would meet with them and hopefully, they would get the chance to take a shot that would put an end to his power in the political world.
"Okay," Sam said, "now, assume something goes wrong and he just decides to put a bullet in each of our heads. We'll be dead, and he just rides off into the sunset, right?"
"We're not going to make it that easy for him," Ken said. "He has a life here, he's well known. We meet in a public place and he can't risk taking a shot at us. Someone would whip out a cell phone, and he'd be on YouTube ten minutes later. He can't take that chance." He grinned. "I, on the other hand, am a spook. They can post me on the Internet all they want to, and if anyone can identify me, more power to them. All it will do is add to the mystique of my reputation. I can assure you, it wouldn't be the first time that I had been caught on camera in the middle of an assassination. I've probably already starred in a few videos, that doesn't mean anything to me."
"But do you really think he'll be alone? If it were me, I'd have a half-dozen people hiding in the crowd, so that all I had to do was point the finger and stand back and watch while we got blown away. We know he has goons; why wouldn't he bring several with him?"
"You misunderstand me; I'm assuming that he will. Hopefully, I can spot them before they spot us. We'll need to take them out, first, before we can get close enough to Chandler to do the job." He reached into a pocket and pulled out what looked like a hearing aid. He handed it to Sam and pointed at his ear. "Put that on," he said. "Tuck that little wire inside your ear, it's got the speaker on it. I've got one, too, they’re like little telephones. The microphone is super sensitive, and can pick up what you say, even if you whisper. Once we get the meeting set up, we'll turn these on so that we can work together on taking out his backup. Just remember, once you've identified one of them, you can't hesitate. It has to be a shot and it has to be fatal. You can't capture these guys, and you can't turn them. All you can do is kill them."
"I understand," Sam said, and he reached back under his jacket and withdrew a pistol from the waistband of his pants. It was smaller than his Glock, a thirty-two caliber automatic with a silencer, one that Harry had given him once before when he was warned he might have to shoot first, and ask questions later. "I'm ready, and I'll do what I have to do." He slipped the little pistol back into hiding.
Ken smiled and patted him on the shoulder. "I don't doubt your courage, Sam," he said. "You've got bigger cojones than just about anyone I've ever known. You've already taken on things that even I would've hesitated to tackle. I'm not a bit worried about your courage, but that doesn't mean that you can overcome a lifetime of conditioning that says you can't just walk up and shoot someone through the head. Not too many people can do that, not without going through a little bit of self-recrimination. The trouble is, you won't have time to argue with yourself about whether you are doing the right thing. You have to take the shot, take it quickly and make sure it's right between the eyes."
Sam stopped walking and turned to face him. "Look, Ken, I get it," he said. "And just between you and me, it won't be the first time that I've gone into something knowing I was going to kill someone. That whole terrorist nuke thing at Hoover dam? Trust me, I had every intention of killing that kid. Not only did he have a nuclear bomb that he was planning to use against my country, but he had murdered my best friend and former partner. He bought himself a death sentence the minute he pulled that trigger." He turned and started walking again, and Ken grinned as he followed.
"Like I said, Sam, I wasn't worried about your courage. Now I'm less worried, and more sure we’re going to find some way to pull this off."
They kept walking for a couple of blocks, and then turned left. Sam noticed two men suddenly paying attention to them as they turned the corner, and he caught Ken's eye. "You see them?" he asked.
Ken nodded. "Yeah, I did. One of them seems to be talking to his wrist, so he's telling someone up ahead that we're coming in their direction. Are you ready?"
"Ready as I'm ever going to be," Sam said. "I see two up ahead who seem to be looking this direction, as if they're expecting to spot someone." He turned and glanced over his shoulder. "And those two back there are following us, so I'm guessing were about to be squeezed in the middle. This is the part where you pull one of your magic tricks out of your little black bag, right?"
"Something like that," Ken said. "How accurate is that little gun of yours? Say, at thirty feet?"
"Pretty accurate," Sam said, "and we're about to find out, anyway. The two had have just been joined by a third, so we've got five altogether. Two behind and three ahead. How do you want to play this?"
"Well, the street's pretty crowded, so they're not gonna start shooting unless they can get us in the open, away from other people. The longer we can stay bunched up with all these other sheep, the longer they're going to delay taking action. They're following protocol, not firing into crowds; luckily, we don't have that disadvantage. The moment, and I mean the very moment, that you're confident you can fire three shots and take three down, you draw and fire. While you're doing that, I'm going to take out the two behind us. You get the ones in front because you can keep them in sight, I'll take the ones in back because I've got years of experience at rapid target identification. Everything is on you, when you fire, so will I."
Sam swallowed hard. Ken was right, and he could see the three men who were waiting ahead of them; in a matter of seconds, either all three of them would be dead, or Sam would be. He kept walking, trying his best to look unconcerned, until he was close enough that he was sure he could hit all three targets. He knew that it had to be head shots, there could be no possibility of survival.
Two more steps, then one more, now! Sam drew the little thirty-two of his waistband and raised it in one smooth motion. Pop! Pop, pop! Three shots, barely making any noise through the silencer, and all three of those men were down. Even as he was firing, he heard the two louder booms from Ken's gun as he shot the two men behind them.
The crowd around them was screaming, some people running while others dropped to the ground. Ken spun and grabbed Sam by the arm, propelling him forward at a run. "Put the gun away," he hissed, and Sam shoved the little pistol back into his waistband as they ran.
They ran past the three men Sam had shot, and turned a corner, suddenly finding themselves in another crowd that didn't seem to be aware of the shootings. They stopped running, then moved into the crowd and through it.
Sam looked at Ken. "I don't get it," he said softly, "your gun wasn't silenced. Couldn't these people hear your shots?"
"They probably did, but gunshots are so common in DC that most people just ignore them unless they're happening right close by
. Check it out, we're only about four blocks from the White House, but there's enough street crime and drug activity here that anyone who heard the shots will figure that's what it's about. Nobody would even suspect that it might have to do with political intrigue, even though we are smack in the middle of Intrigue Central. Crazy, isn't it?"
Sam shook his head and kept walking. "What's crazy is that we just killed five people, and I don't even hear a police siren. Nobody's running after us, screaming for us to stop — that's wild, Man." He glanced at his hand, which was trembling slightly, then looked back at Ken. "So, after that, I'm guessing that Chandler knows we're here, wouldn't you think? I'm sure at least one of those guys got word to him through a com link."
Ken shrugged, rubbernecking the area and looking for new threats. "That would be a safe bet," he said. "That means it's time for you to make your call. Look, there's a Starbucks up ahead. The Matomic building is only a couple doors down from there, and that's where his office is. Right now, that's where he'll be. I don't know about you, but I could use a latte."
Sam rolled his eyes, but followed Ken into the coffee shop. He took a seat with his back to a wall, positioned so that he could see every entrance, and waited for Ken to get his latte. When he came back to where Sam was sitting, he handed over a straight coffee, as well.
"Chandler's not going to want to come over here," he said, "he'll want to pick a different spot to meet. What you got to do is make sure that it's somewhere very, very public. Make it – make it the front steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Tell him you'll meet him there in an hour, and that you got me disarmed and restrained."
Sam looked at him for a moment, and then shook his head. "This is crazy, Ken," he said. "We’re talking about turning you over to him, without weapons and in handcuffs. He can put a bullet through your head as soon as he's got you in sight."
Ken reached into his pocket and produced a pair of handcuffs that he handed to Sam. "You used a lot of these in your time, right? See anything odd about this pair?"
Sam looked them over. "Looks like a pair of regulation police cuffs, to me." He handed them back. "Why?"
Ken grinned, and put the cuffs on himself. When he had them securely snapped around each wrist, he held them out to Sam. "All good and secure?" Ken asked.
Sam felt the cuffs and nodded. "Yeah, good and tight," he said.
Ken chuckled, and hit the two cuffs against each other. Both of them flew open, and literally dropped from his wrists. Sam's eyes went wide, and Ken laughed. “Houdini specials,” he said. “I got these from a magician, a guy who does all those escape acts. He gets put in these, and then he goes into a box or something, but the next thing you know, he's free and standing in the crowd beside you. They're wonderful.”
"That's pretty cool," Sam said. "So, I hand you over wearing those, and then as soon as the two of you are out of sight, you pop free and then — then what?"
"If everything goes according to plan, then one well-placed strike with the heel of my hand and Mr. Chandler is no longer a problem. The problem with that is that things never go according to plan, so I'll have to wing it as I go along."
"And what am I supposed to be doing all this time? How am I supposed to know whether you succeed or not?"
"That depends on Chandler. I'm not sure what he'll do about you, he may want you to come along as he takes me in. If he does, then he'll want you unarmed, as well."
Sam shook his head. "I think if I go along with that, we're both dead. Giving up my weapon and letting him have us both strikes me as a very bad idea."
"You're not thinking properly," Ken said. "He'll be alone, so there'll be two of us against the one of him. That increases our chances of success. Remember, this guy is as tough as I am; he's not going to be easy to kill, especially without weapons. Nevertheless, we've got to get the job done, somehow. I'm not dead certain what his next move is, but I can guarantee you that it will put America in a worse position on this whole global stage issue. He's got to be stopped before he can make that next move."
Sam took a sip of his coffee, hissing because it was extremely hot. "Lord, I don't know how these people stay in business; they must burn the lips off of most of their customers." He looked at Ken. "I guess that's part of what's making me so nervous, that we don't know what it is he's doing. How do we know for sure that killing him will put a stop to it?"
"Look at the prophecies," Ken said. "Chandler is trying to bypass some of the things that have to happen. If he can do that, then the globalization he'll be bringing on won't be the real thing, and it's possible that it will mess up the situation so badly that the genuine fulfillment of prophecy could be set back years, maybe even decades. That would be enough of a disaster on its own, but a side effect of his activities is his determination to eliminate organized Christianity. Every prophecy from every other religion makes it plain that in order for their view to come to fruition, Christianity must be destroyed. Now, the most powerful tool Chandler has in his arsenal for attacking and destroying Christianity would be Islamic jihad. If he can orchestrate effective Islamic attacks on Christians in various places around the world, including right here in the United States, then some of the people he's got positioned in other countries will begin to gain power. That power will be thrown behind him, making him even stronger than he already is. Sam, he's got to be stopped. Everything our country stands for, everything it was founded on and built on is literally hanging on the edge of a cliff, ready to be toppled over to its destruction. There are very few of us who even see the danger, and we are all that's standing between life and death."
Sam nodded. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. I just wish I knew more about how this is going to play out. If we had some clue what it is he's really up to, it might even give us a better idea of how to move against him. But if this plan is all we've got, then I guess we have to go for it." He looked at Ken. "Are you ready?"
"I'm ready as I'm going to be," he said. "Let's do it."
Ken handed Sam a cell phone, a number already punched in and simply awaiting activation of the call. Sam looked at it for a long moment, and then pushed the green button and held it to his ear. He heard ringing, and then a tentative answer.
"Hello?"
"My name is Sam Prichard," Sam said. "I think we have business to discuss."
There was a silence on the other end for a moment, and then Sam heard some beeps and whistles. A second later, the voice came back on the phone. "What kind of business might we have between us, Sam Prichard?"
"I have Kenneth Long," Sam said. "And I've come to the conclusion that I don't want to be on your bad side. That sounds to me like there might be a potential arrangement for us to make. We can each get what we want, and come out ahead."
"And what is it you want, Mr. Prichard?"
"To be able to go home to my family, and live a normal life. Maybe some sort of job, something I can do to keep that normal life when the world goes crazy."
"And in return, you're willing to give up Mr. Long?"
"Good Lord," Sam said, "isn't that what I just told you? Look, I've got him disarmed and in handcuffs. I'll hand him over, and then you can do with him as you please. I just want out of this mess."
Again there was a silence, and for a moment Sam thought the connection had been cut. Just when he was about to ask if anyone was there, the voice came back. "What about your pal, Harry? I know that he and I are not on the same team, so why would I assume that I can trust you?"
Sam sighed the phone. "Look, Dude, there's something really weird going on here. I don't know what it's all about, but I've got people screaming at me about Bible prophecies and stuff from Babylon, and I don't know what any of them are smoking. The only thing that sounds like it could be true to me is that the world is about to change, but I've been seeing that coming for a long time. Now, if there's one thing I know about change, it's that you have to know which side of the fence to be on when it happens. What I want is to be on the side that will let me raise my daughter and not be involv
ed in any more of this international crap. As for Ken, all I know about him is that he's some kind of government hit man, so if he gets whacked, I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep over it. Now, can we make a deal? Because if not, then I'll have no choice but to throw back in with Harry and Long, and that's not what I want to do."
"Mr. Prichard, tell me what you’ve got in mind. When and where do you want to meet, and how do you want to hand him over?"
"One hour from now, just you, alone, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. That's a nice public place, don't you think? Ken will be with me, his hands cuffed in front of him and covered with his jacket, and I'll have him covered with a silenced automatic from a few feet away. At this point, he knows I don't have anything to lose. If he tries to run, or cause any commotion, he's dead and he knows it. And incidentally, he thinks I'm turning him over to a Justice Department investigator. I gave him a song and dance about how Justice wants him, and told him that Harry had sold him out. He laughed at me and said that so many people at Justice owe him favors that he'll be back on the street ten minutes after I hand him over."
Sam heard Chandler chuckle. "That's pretty shrewd, Mr. Prichard. It's also probably pretty smart, because if he knew you were bringing him to me, there's a good chance you would end up dead. Very well, one hour from now. I'll come alone, as you requested, and I expect you to do likewise, with the exception of our friend Mr. Long. You give him to me, and I will give you a card with a phone number. That number will always be able to reach me, no matter where I am in the world, and will entitle you to certain favors that will help you to achieve your goal of living a normal life with your family. Those favors might include jobs, ways to avoid problems that others might face, things of that nature. Is that agreeable?"