The Great Crime Spike: A Dystopian Thriller Novel (Liberty Down Book 1)

by Eric M Hill

  Kellerman grunted. “No, they hate his guts. But believe me, we’ll all meet our Maker before we make it to the Senate.”

  “We’ll see about that,” said Alvarez.

  Chapter 69

  Four black SUVs drove toward Washington D.C., strategically separated in two-mile intervals from one another. Each car watched the others on a screen and communicated with encryption technology that Anderson said was lightyears beyond NSA.

  An ambush would most likely be aimed at the first car Cuning’s people spotted. Depending on the type of attack, the remaining cars would take evasive action. And, again, assuming that the attack was both not lethal and not the car that held Kellerman, they’d still have a chance of getting him to the Capitol alive—although a very slim chance.

  They drove as fast as they could without drawing the attention of the police. Good thing it was so late. The police were nowhere in sight. Or better yet, they were not in the sight of the police.

  The plan was to spend as little time on the interstate as possible. No need in making it easy for Cuning’s killers. They took Highway 50 as they exited Winchester and stayed on it until they got on what Director Kellerman insisted was a “death trap”—Interstate 66. One of the SUVs separated from the others and took its own route toward the nation’s capitol.

  As they neared the overpass of I-66 at exit 53A, Kellerman was looking like a prophet.

  Anderson saw it on a screen. “It’s about to get interesting,” he said. “There are two people on that overpass with powerful scanners.”

  Kellerman tensed. “Maybe it’s nothing,” he said hopefully. “You’ve sold millions of those things.”

  “What they’re using is stronger than an SP-30 or even a 50. It’s not one of our personal use models. It’s an LE model for sure.”

  Kellerman tensed more. “A law enforcement model. It’s got to be President Cuning. Then they can practically see into the car,” he said nervously.

  I don’t tell you jackals everything, thought Anderson.

  They drove through the overpass.

  “I’m more concerned about their ability to count than I am about the scanners. Whatever questions they have about this vehicle will be answered when they see the others.” Anderson pressed his finger against the screen and spoke. “We’ve got scanners on the overpass you’re approaching. Let’s assume it’s Cuning.”

  Kellerman’s face and forehead was heavy with nervous perspiration. He rubbed his brow. He knew better than anyone what the president was capable of. “Let me out of here.”

  “Calm down,” said Anderson, looking across at him.

  “I mean it, Anderson. Stop this car and let me out of here,” he demanded. He tried to open the door. Kellerman felt a prick on his neck. He snapped his neck around. “What was that?”

  “I told you to calm down. Now you will.”

  Kellerman’s eyes glared, then widened and narrowed several times as he fought the drug. “You…rotten—” His heavy tongue refused to move. His head dropped and his eyes focused in a dead stare at his legs.

  “Don’t worry, Director. It won’t knock you out completely, and it won’t last long. It’ll just keep you from doing something stupid. Like jumping out of a moving vehicle.” Not that I wouldn’t love to throw you out myself, he thought.

  The last Titan zipped under the overpass. A half mile later flashing red lights appeared behind it. The lights closed in fast.

  “We’ve got company,” said King. “

  “Looks that way,” said Anderson.

  The Titan pulled over and slowed, but didn’t stop.

  “Stop the vehicle and stay inside,” came an authoritative voice from the police car’s speaker.

  The Titan stopped.

  “You think it’s President Cuning’s people?” asked King.

  The police car stopped. Its front driver and front passenger doors opened. Two officers began to get out.

  “Since when do police ride two to a car on the interstate?” said King.

  The officers walked oddly toward the Titan. Their bodies were turned at an angle to the right, their right arms glued behind them and out of view.

  Anderson scrolled a ball on the device as he watched the screen. “Probably started the same time they were issued machine guns. They’re carrying T-NOC 5s.” He waited until the officers, or whoever they were, were on both sides of the SUV and said, “Start the ignition.”

  The ignition started. Both police jumped back and opened fire into the vehicle. Bullets ricocheted off the windows, but tore into the Titan’s body before being stopped by the armored plating. The Titan’s wheels spun against the ground, burning rubber as it peeled away. The officers pressed their triggers, spitting out more fury after the runaway vehicle.

  They both turned and ran for their car to give pursuit. The driver of the Titan slammed the brakes and turned the vehicle to the left. Its back end swung around. The grill now faced the police car. The Titan sped directly toward the police cruiser. The stunned officers stood at their open doors for a horrifying moment before sprinting several yards and jumping atop the wall that separated east-west traffic.

  The black beast that hurled toward them cut right, missing their car by only inches and sped west on the eastbound interstate. The officers hopped off the wall and took off after a vehicle being driven by someone in another state with a wide smile who was looking at a screen.

  “I’d say it’s Emperor Cuning,” said Anderson.

  The drone’s missile hit the second empty SUV. Anderson didn’t see the fireball, but he did see the Titan’s image disappear from the screen. Only a missile could have done this. He’d been correct in his concerns. NSA hadn’t compromised his stealth. Human eyeballs had. The guys on the overpass.

  Chief King looked at his little girls. “Semper Fi.”

  “Semper Fi,” they said together.

  “Cuning obviously knows we’re here. Time to let the whole world know what we’re up to. It’s the only way we make it out of here alive.” He put the call in to FBI Director Fulcrum.

  Director Kellerman stared droopy-eyed at his legs. His muscles still wouldn’t obey him, but he managed to slur out, “We’re…not…going…to make it. He’ll kill me…in front…of the whole world…if he has to. That’s…his…style. Ash…”

  Chapter 70

  Ashley wore night vision glasses that resembled fashionable sunshades. She crept through the White House reporter’s home with the silence of a cat. Her gun’s barrel led the way to the edge of the dead woman’s bedroom door. She looked at the sleeping woman and smirked. She appeared so peaceful lying there. And why not? Relatively young. Not as beautiful as she was, but attractive. Engaged to be married. Nice neighborhood. Good job.

  She raised her eyebrows in mock sympathy. Nothing good lasts forever, she thought. She looked on the end-table next to the woman’s bed. Of course not. Reporters don’t need guns. They’ve got the First Amendment.

  She crept to the side of the bed and pointed the gun. The barrel was two feet from the reporter’s face. “Sandra,” she said softly.

  The woman’s name moved politely forward from her deep subconscious. She smiled a little. She heard her name again, this time more clearly, almost at the conscious level.

  Ashley smiled at the dead woman’s smile. “Sandra, you make one sound above a whisper and I will put a bullet in your head.”

  Bullet in your head.

  The ominous words burst through the ceiling of her subconscious mind like a fishing float bursting through the surface of the water and then resting on top. The woman’s smile disappeared.

  Ashley’s smile disappeared. “One word above a whisper, Sandra. You understand?”

  Oh God, am I dreaming? Please be a dream. She slowly opened her eyes. It was no dream. A dark hole of death was pointed at her face. It was so terrifying that she couldn’t take her eyes off of the gun’s opening.”

  “Anything above a whisper and I splatter the Botox. Now…take your eyes
off of the gun and look at me.”

  She may as well have told her to take her eyes off of a growling four-hundred-pound tiger that was only two feet away and hungrily looking at her.

  Ashley spoke in a cold whisper. “Look…at…me, Sandra.”

  The trembling woman looked for the first time at the person holding the gun. It was a woman.

  Ashley took handcuffs out of her pocket. She backed up a couple of feet, the gun still pointing at the woman’s head. “Keep your hands where I can see them and slowly roll over onto your belly.” She did. Ashley tossed the cuffs onto the bed. “Put your hands behind your back and put these on.”

  The woman’s hands shook terribly, but she managed.

  Ashley put the woman’s legs together and placed a plastic tie around her ankles. She rolled her over onto her back. The woman’s face begged permission to speak. “You have a question?”

  The woman’s mouth was open. Her head nodded.

  “Go on. But remember what I said about the Botox.”

  “Why are you here? I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else.”

  “Your name is Sandra?”

  “Yes, but it’s Sandra Cooper. I’m a reporter.”

  “Yes, I know,” sang Ashley. “That’s why I’m here.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You will. I’m here to give you a message.”

  “From whom?”

  “The message is—you listening, Sandra?”

  Sandra nodded with her mouth wide.

  “Nothing new. You’ve heard it before. The president..remembers…his opponents.” Ashley smiled.

  The reporter’s bladder weakened. “The president?” she whispered in a quiver.

  “The president,” said Ashley, with pursed lips. “He wants me to remind you of what he told you at the press conference. ‘Justice has a way of catching up to those who slander me.’”

  “I wasn’t trying to make him look bad. I was just doing my job.”

  “I know. The First Amendment.” Ashley’s phone vibrated. Her eyes bore into the woman as she answered. “Not yet, but I’m here, looking at her. Yeah, in a couple of minutes. Oh? The brainiac is full of surprises, isn’t he? I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry. Target practice.” She put the phone into her pocket.

  “You’re going to kill me, aren’t you?”

  Ashley put her finger to her own lips. “Shhhh.” She opened a dresser drawer with her gloved hand and pulled out a pair of socks. She stuffed one into the woman’s mouth and tied the other around her mouth and face.

  “Am I going to kill you? No, someone else is going to kill you—among things. I’m going out to kill someone a lot smarter than you.” She looked at her and shook her head. “You people and your holy First Amendment.”

  Ashley left the bound woman on the bed. She had a traitor to kill. Maybe two. It was a miracle that Dr. Anderson had gotten so close to D.C. without getting killed. And it was looking more and more like he was slipping through their fingers.

  Anderson had blasted to the world that he and Chief King were transporting Director Kellerman to Capitol Hill so that he could reveal something so damning against the president that it could cause his impeachment. An army of flesh and blood and digital reporters, as well as the FBI, was now a part of his unholy entourage.

  Ashley went downstairs. She opened the reporter’s front door, stepped outside, and closed it, leaving it unlocked for their predator to earn his freedom and to randomly choose Sandra’s home to commit a horrible crime.

  A few minutes later the bound woman felt a hand on her, and she heard a man’s voice. “Hey, baby. Guess who’s home.”

  Chapter 71

  Ashley navigated her motorcycle through D.C. It was an armed camp. Tense soldiers and endless roadblocks and partitioned areas were everywhere. But this isn’t what put her on edge. After all, she was on assignment for their boss.

  It was the tens of thousands of armed people camped out around the city that didn’t consider the president their boss that made her nervous. It wouldn’t take much for something to trip hell’s wire. Those roadblocks and partitions designed to keep avowed enemy groups from one another wouldn’t mean too much with hundreds of thousands of rounds whizzing in every direction.

  They also wouldn’t mean too much if Congress denied the president his STOP legislation. Who could tell what a huge, heavily armed and angry mob would do if Congress voted against their safety? The president had Congress in a bind. An involuntary smirk rose from Ashley’s belly and formed on her face. Either way, the president gets something, she thought. STOP or a citizen’s rebellion.

  But in her opinion, STOP was a whole lot better than a rebellion. Rebellions could sometimes act like an ungrateful dog. They’d been known to bite their masters in the butt. Yep, killing Kellerman was definitely the safest move.

  Ashley listened to the directions being transmitted to her earpiece. She followed the voice’s navigation to the right checkpoints. It was like the parting of the Red Sea. Only it wasn’t God who was smoothing her path. It was someone on Team Cuning.

  Ashley entered a building, went up six flights of stairs two stairs at a time, and stationed herself at the firing point. Now all she had to do was wait for the targets as they were ushered to the crosshairs of her rifle’s scope.

  ***

  At the soldier’s direction, Anderson’s Titan rolled slowly and cautiously toward the armored vehicle. He wondered at the irony of the elevated young man behind the 50-caliber machine gun looking down at them. That much power in the hands of someone so young. The Titan was armored and bullet proof, as far as regular munitions were concerned. But a 50-caliber machine gun was just one step below King Kong.

  “Stop!” yelled an approaching soldier on foot.

  “Most definitely,” Anderson said just above a whisper. He stopped. So did the several cars of reporters behind him.

  The soldier spoke into his bullhorn again. “Lower every window. Now!”

  They complied.

  The soldier raised his rifle. Another tense soldier joined him and went to the passenger side of the vehicle. “Everyone! Raise your hands!” he said, trying to ignore the hologram reporters who were peppering them with rapid questions.

  “You must know that this is Dr. Anderson.”

  “Dr. Anderson said that someone in government may try to stop them.”

  “Has the president ordered you to stop Dr. Anderson?”

  “Has he ordered you to kill Director Kellerman?”

  “Sir, you do know that the world is watching?”

  “Following an illegal order does not exempt you from prosecution.”

  “Director Kellerman, why don’t you share with the world right now what you plan to tell Congress?”

  “Yes, if it’s important enough to take down the president…”

  On and on and on came the questions.

  The soldier on the passenger side of the window kept his eyes focused on the people in the Titan, but he cursed under his breath and imagined shooting that hologram projector out of the air.

  “Yes, sir,” said an army officer into his phone. He looked at Anderson’s vehicle. “Soldier, stand down!”

  The officer walked briskly to the car. He stretched his neck looking inside. “You can pass. But you have to get out of the vehicle, and you have to be escorted.”

  “We know our way to the Senate,” Anderson said, respectfully.

  “I’m sure you do, sir. But I have my orders. You and Director Kellerman are authorized to enter the perimeter only with an escort, and only if you agree to use the exact route dictated.”

  “And the reporters?”

  “Can’t do anything about the holograms, but the flesh and bloods aren’t authorized.”

  An FBI agent exited the car and walked authoritatively toward the officer with his badge held high.

  The officer’s eyes steeled as he focused on the approaching agent. “No one but Dr. Anderson and Director Kellerman cros
ses this line. That includes F—B—I.”

  The special agent’s badge lowered, as did his hopes.

  Chief King bent over to Anderson’s ear. “No FBI. Only you and Director Kellerman, and you have to walk down streets they’ve preselected? I don’t like it. This thing has got set-up written all over it.”

  Anderson weighed the options. Actually, there was only one. They had to make the walk. This was the only one that gave them any chance at stopping Cuning. And it was the only one that gave them a shot at dying through some other means besides murder. “Director Kellerman? It really boils down to you.”

  Kellerman roughly rubbed his hand over his head and shouted a curse. He shot the expletive out three more times. That’s exactly what he wants, he thought darkly, and spoke through gritted teeth. “He always gets what he wants.”

  Anderson and King looked at one another.

  “Yes!” blurted Kellerman. “He kills me and maybe someone will finally connect the dots.”

  Anderson suppressed the rage that rose in his belly at this man’s hypocrisy. This wasn’t the time or place. He looked at the irritated officer. “Okay, Captain, we’re going.”

  The captain barked out a couple of orders to some soldiers as Anderson and Kellerman opened their doors.

  Chief King gripped Anderson’s arm before he exited. “Remember, you’re not alone.”

  “I don’t care about me, Chief. We have to stop him. We can’t afford to fail.”

  The chief nodded grimly.

  Both men stood before four soldiers who were apparently the escort. They walked several steps when the captain yelled, “Wait!” as he held his phone to his ear. He walked over to Anderson, squeezed his shoulder, then did the same with Kellerman. “Okay. Go on.” He turned and walked away, speaking into his phone.

  “What was that all about?” asked Kellerman.

  “Looks like your boss wants to make sure his targets are real,” said Anderson.