GodMode

by O. K. Mills

  “I’m glad we understand each other,” Silas said.

  “I’ll do my best to bring her to you safe and sound.”

  “Not necessary. I can extract abilities from corpses as long as they are kept at freezing temperatures and not more than three days deceased.”

  “Understood.”

  “She was last seen at a foster home in Vienna, Virginia. I would canvas that area to begin your search.”

  “This isn’t my first rodeo, Damien, but I appreciate the sentiment. I’ll be in touch when I have something.”

  The men shook hands before going back to the elevator. After a quick return to Silas’ office so Pike could get the necessary files, he was back in the main lobby of the Wilson building. He left the building quickly, made way to the parking garage and approached his cream white Porsche slowly, the gravity of the situation weighing heavily on his mind.

  Staring carelessly out of the passenger side window, twirling her curly blonde hair with one hand and a butterfly knife in the other was Pike’s girlfriend, Sharon Blake. She had been waiting for him.

  “You’re breathing, so I assume things went well?”

  “Who knows? Damien is one of those sadistic geniuses who would do something like, I don’t know, purposely get a fatal disease just to see if he could beat it.”

  “What’s the job?”

  “Not here. I’ll tell you on the way.”

  “Can you at least tell me where we’re going?”

  Pike fired up the Porsche, put on his $500 pair of Oakley sunglasses and shifted into first gear. He sat still for several moments, just letting the car idle before turning to look at Sharon.

  “No.”

  She sighed as Pike peeled out of the garage and onto the road.

  Silas stood in the now spotless laboratory watching Arata mop the floor. The only evidence that there had been a murder in this room only an hour or so before were the six conspicuous black garbage bags filled with the remains of Trevor Thorn.

  Upon sensing another presence in the room, Arata asked, “Do you really trust Pike, sir?”

  “Of course not. Marshall Pike is not unlike the mop you are using to clean this floor, Mr. Arata—a tool necessary to bring about a means to an end. What he is weighing now is whether it makes more sense to help me, betray me or help himself.”

  “You believe he will betray you, and yet you showed him the lower level chambers?”

  “That was by design, Mr. Arata. He is now fully vested. The allure of power draws him, while a life of subservience to me repulses him. He is calculating the lesser of his evils. It will not matter in the long term. When he has Brynn, we will kill him.”

  Arata nodded and continued mopping.

  3: Rivals

  “Why don’t you watch where the hell you’re going? I could’ve killed you!”

  If he only knew, Spade mused as he glared a hole through the driver who had nearly run him over. The man’s only crime was being in the street where Spade wanted to walk, but Spade scowled at him just the same. Once he had crossed to the other side of the road and made certain that the young girl was with him, he resumed his breakneck pace.

  Oddly, no one was actually tailing him except for the girl, and yet running seemed the best course of action, given what he had just experienced. As he ran, the irony that only 20 minutes earlier he could not even feel his legs flashed in his mind.

  This young girl had healed him simply by moving her hands near his body. He had enjoyed telling himself that he was a man of strong faith over the last seven years. Now, he wasn’t sure what he believed anymore.

  He certainly didn’t believe his lying eyes.

  Glancing back, he noticed that the girl kept up stride for stride. She didn’t look the least bit winded, and her shirt wasn’t even damp from sweat. In fact, she seemed to be allowing him to set the pace. That woman’s dying words were also seemingly on continuous loop in his thoughts.

  He’s coming for her. Don’t let them take her. Promise me.

  The questions were obvious: Who were “they” and why did they want her? As he considered them, he eventually ran out of breath. Pausing, he dropped his hands to both knees and scanned the immediate surroundings.

  It did not take long for him to realize that, beyond the street signs on the corners, he had absolutely no idea where he was. Furthermore, it dawned on him that, while he was not the perpetrator of the crimes from which he fled, the longer that he did, the guiltier he looked.

  He had to get someplace safe.

  The girl looked like she could easily go another mile at full sprint. Breathing evenly, she was still barely perspiring. She looked more concerned for him, point of fact.

  He reached into his pocket to grab his cell phone, only to discover that it had been damaged when he crashed through the house wall in the squad car. The touch screen was completely unresponsive.

  He swore—a rarity for him—and the young girl immediately grabbed his hand to comfort him. He looked down into her eyes and sighed.

  “You okay?”

  She nodded and smiled. Her eyebrows rose as if she had a question and then she pointed at him.

  “I’ll make it,” Spade gasped.

  They both knew he was lying.

  “I need to make a phone call to get us somewhere safe.”

  After a minute he closed his eyes, let out a deep breath, and calmed his mind. A few moments later he took the girl’s hand and just started walking.

  Don’t panic. Just walk. The answers will come.

  They walked for several blocks, and before long, they came upon an extensive highway that had more than a few shops, car dealerships, fast food restaurants, gas stations, small strip malls and office buildings lining either side of it.

  Spade spotted what appeared to be a pay phone at a gas station about a block away. A squad car came past, as they crossed the street, and Spade caught himself looking guiltier than he should have. For an instant he started second-guessing the decision he made to run out of the house, but just as quickly he put it out of his mind.

  That woman was dying, and instead of using her final words to say goodbye to this girl, she had told him to keep the girl safe. For now that had to be enough.

  That tattoo on that one guy though—the clubs suit symbol with the two faces—kept flashing in his mind.

  Where had he seen that before?

  “Please have a working phone,” Spade thought out loud as they got closer to the station. If he could get word to Bear, then maybe he could get some answers? Bear had served with Spade in the military and, aside from his brother, was the one person he knew he could count on.

  Spade walked briskly to the pay phone station, which took credit cards. He dug in his pocket to retrieve his wallet. What he did not notice was the missing phone receiver. Tugging at his arm, the girl pointed it out to him.

  He sighed and ran his fingers through his blonde hair.

  “Let’s check inside and see if they’ll let us use the station’s phone.”

  She nodded.

  “Do you want anything?” Spade asked her when they walked into the convenience store. The girl adjusted her glasses, nodded and ran off to pick out something for herself. He kept an eye on her before snapping out of it and remembering why they walked into the station in the first place.

  For a split second his mind went to his brother’s four children. He hadn’t had time to grieve Mike’s death, much less consider how he was going to tell his sister-in-law that she would have to raise those kids on her own now.

  “Focus, first things first. Find a phone and call Bear,” he whispered to himself.

  The girl came running up to him with a bag of Twizzlers and a Capri Sun.

  “This is what you want?”

  She nodded and smiled.

  Spade went to the counter. A scruffy-looking cashier wearing a nametag with “Akinwale” on it stood behind the counter in a sweat-stained shirt and blue jeans.

  “We’ll take these Twizzler
s, Capri Sun, and do you guys have a phone I could use? My cell is in bad shape.”

  Spade set the items on the counter and awaited an answer. Akinwale did not speak and made no move to ring up the items. He simply stood, frozen and stared at Spade as he tried not to shake.

  Spade repeated his request. Akinwale’s eyes quickly darted down and then met Spade’s again.

  “Are you all right?” Spade asked.

  “No, he isn’t all right, and neither will you be if you don’t hand over your money.”

  The sudden outburst belonged to a man who had been hiding under the counter with a Glock 23 handgun pointed at Akinwale’s crotch.

  Spade slowly eased the girl behind him as the thief stood to his full height, which was a full foot shorter than Spade’s six-foot, two-inch frame.

  The thief wore a tattered denim jacket, white T-shirt, faded blue jeans and work boots. The teeth he had left were stained yellow, and his lips and hands were dark around the tips—likely due to years of smoking. Though it was a bit too warm out, he wore a knit cap pulled low around his ears. On his back was a single strap backpack over-stuffed with items.

  “Your money or your life: Pick one.” he taunted.

  Keeping his cool, Spade did what he could to keep the girl hidden behind him. They stared at each other for several seconds, neither one making any moves. The only sounds were the sniffles coming from Akinwale.

  Spade broke the silence.

  “Do you have a cell phone?”

  “Man, what?”

  “Your phone. I need to borrow it, sir,” Spade replied, stepping toward the thief who retreated backwards a couple of steps.

  “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “Fool, I’m the one robbing you.” The thief nervously laughed.

  “I don’t have much cash on me, but I will give you what I have if you give me your phone.”

  “Look at my gun, man. I’m going to kill you, him and your little sister, you feel?”

  POP!

  It happened so quickly that it was over before it really started.

  Spade leapt over the counter and struck the thief with a blinding upward palm thrust to his nose that sent blood flying in every direction. The thief dropped the gun and brought his hands immediately to his face, which left his torso open.

  A front kick to the mid-section caused the man to double over, leaving him vulnerable to a rising knee strike, which Spade delivered flawlessly to his lower jaw, shattering it. Teeth, blood, pain and whatever was left of the man’s pride came crashing hard to the floor, along with his broken body.

  Spade calmed his breathing as he walked over to the defeated assailant and dug through his duffle bag. After several moments he produced a cell phone, but the battery was dead. He sighed.

  “I have a phone you can use,” Akinwale said holding up the receiver to the LAN line.

  Spade took it, dialed a number and stood for several moments listening to it ringing. Before long the voicemail answered with a generic “the party you have reached” message.

  “Pick up, Bear; it’s Spade. I have a code red. I need you to bring me in.”

  Earle Walker had seen many things during his 20 plus years working for the Vienna Police Department, but a squad car being driven through the front door of a house was a first, even for him. He looked around the residential neighborhood, thankful that it was early rush hour and most people were still at work; and those who weren’t were probably stuck in traffic on 66.

  “Was this the ‘shots fired’ call?”

  Walker gave officer Rickey Sweeney a look and ignored the question. Sweeney realized the obvious and rolled his eyes.

  “That was rhetorical, a-hole,” Sweeney laughed.

  “Spell ‘rhetorical,’” Walker quipped back.

  Walker and Sweeney had not been partners for more than a few years, but acted like an old married couple just the same. One often finished the sentence of the other, and even if they spent a while apart, they seemed to have a knack for picking up right where they left off. Sweeney pulled out his Glock and chambered a round, but Walker shook his head.

  “Nobody could have survived that, man.”

  Sweeney clicked the safety and holstered his service weapon as the two men made their way toward the hole where the front door of the house used to be. As they stepped inside, Walker immediately recognized Mike Spade lying dead in the middle of the living room.

  “Aww, no … not Mikey.”

  “You know him?” asked Sweeney.

  “I raised him. Like I’m raising you,” said Walker, his hands moving unconsciously to his goatee and followed by a backwards rub of his bald head. He exhaled heavily, looked at Mike for several moments, and then moved onto the rest of the scene.

  “He got family?” Sweeney asked, still staring at Mike.

  “Mother’s dead. Father has stage four pancreatic cancer,” Walker replied, his back to Mike as he looked over the rest of the house. “He’s got a younger brother though. Go and see if anybody is in the car and check the rest of the house. I’ll check on the bodies out here.”

  Sweeney nodded and walked over to the squad car, whistling in amazement at how it was wedged almost entirely into the wall and remained slightly suspended on the left back tire. Walker, meanwhile, knelt down and looked over a body with bullet wounds in the neck and face.

  “Took at least one with you, huh, Mike?” he said to himself before turning his attention to the body by the door—an older woman, probably in her 50s. She had sustained multiple gunshot wounds but had managed to crawl several paces to the spot where she was now.

  There was something familiar about her. He tilted his head to try to simulate seeing her at a different angle without moving her body and upsetting the crime scene. He looked around the room from his squatted position and scratched his chin.

  After a few minutes Sweeney re-entered the room.

  “Dead kids in the rest of the house, man and a birthday cake full of bullet holes. I think it was somebody’s birthday.”

  “Sherlock would be proud,” Walker joked. It earned him a middle finger.

  “Dispatch said something about a civilian on site.” Sweeney continued.

  “There are lots of civilians on site, whole block of them by my count.

  “There’s also a panic room in here. Don’t see that every day; this lady must have been loaded.”

  “How many?”

  “Oh, just one panic room.”

  “Dead kids, Sweeney, not panic rooms.”

  “Oh, I think 3? Maybe 4?”

  Walker sighed, stood up and walked toward Sweeney, who then held up his hands to halt him.

  “I’ll go and get a count.”

  Walker spat, disgusted with the amount of shortcuts his partner always seemed to take. Sweeney should have been a detective long ago, but he was incredibly lazy at times. But Walker loved him like his own son and was determined to make a man of Sweeney, even if it killed him. Before long he returned to the room with a more accurate count.

  “There are four dead kids in here, man. What kind of animal busts into a home and kills everybody in it on their birthday, no less?”

  “Not everybody,” replied Walker en route to the panic room. Once he had a look inside, it dawned on him.

  “One of them is missing. There were more than just four of them at this party.”

  “How can you know that?”

  “This is a foster home.”

  Walker caught himself and posed the question back to Sweeney instead.

  “You tell me. How can I know that?”

  “Walker, I don’t have time for your Socratic nonsense.”

  “You’re smart enough to know what Socratic questioning is, but not smart enough to do some simple deductive reasoning? Come on, Sweeney, think. What is out of place here?”

  “Well, the amount of kids she had for starters. Average shelter typically has a lot more kids.”

  “Go on.”

  “Typical shelter miss
ions take on kids from adolescence to like 17 years old. Most of those kids come from abusive situations, are neglected or need supervision. They provide emergency housing, referrals, health stuff, food, and such.”

  “And placement. That’s the most important thing. They find families to place the kids with,” said Walker who went over to the dead woman in the middle of the living room.

  “Do you know who this is?”

  “Jane Doe?”

  Walker sighed.

  “This is the billionaire Connie Powers.”

  “Living here?”

  “Maybe. Rich folks show everybody how much money they have. Wealthy folks don’t need to. Remember that, Sweeney.”

  “Checking that box.” Sweeney made a check sign with his finger. “So are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

  “On the outside it looks like a typical Fairfax home, but on the inside it has a panic room. And look at how this guy with the army tats here is dressed. He is in full military tactical gear. Why would he need that to kill a woman in her 50s?”

  “It didn’t work out that well for him anyway. He is dead,” Sweeney observed.

  “Open panic room within an unlisted shelter, and a dead mercenary on the floor lying next to a dead billionaire with four dead kids scattered throughout. If there were only four kids living in this house, then we wouldn’t be looking at this dead mercenary. We would be looking at three dead kids and a trail of his footprints headed out the door. One or more of them got out, maybe with the help of the civilian that dispatch mentioned?” explained Walker.

  “What should we do?”

  “We have to search the house for records of those who lived here; that way we have a visual to go by. We also need to know who was in the car with Mikey. We find them and then maybe we can start getting some answers as to what exactly was going on here.”

  CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP

  “That is excellent police work, officer. I am impressed. You’ve come a long way since the academy, Walker.”