by Mark Graham
The next day Joyce caught a plane going to Houston, with another flight going to Laredo. Talon took a plane to Dallas, and another one to Laredo. Ice took a plane to Corpus Christie, then another small plane to Houston. They all got to their rooms hours from each other. Since Ice was the last to arrive, he called the other two and they met at a restaurant that was quite close to the motel. They each took their vehicles with them and they were kind of surprised to see Ice driving a fifteen seat van.
“Well,” Ice said smiling, “I thought we could use that big old thing and do our recon together. The windows are tinted and all of us can look out the same side and seeing the same thing. Besides, with this vehicle, it will look like we’re more like transporters and not agents. I can’t remember any agents, including on TV where someone used a monster like this.” Ice was right. Although very obvious the thing was as long as a four door pick-up with the extended bed.
All three were in separate rooms, none being closer than at least five doors away. They locked their vehicles and went to their room. A few minutes later Joyce left her room with an ice bucket in her hand. About five minutes later Ice did the same but actually stopped at the ice machine and filled the bucket; then proceeded right over and into Talon’s room.
They stayed their for a few hours, continuing their planning then fell into a conversation and what missions Talon had been on, sharing a lot of information abut the why, how, and where of what happened. The big man allowed Joyce to ask any questions. She learned too that Talon and Ice did things a little differently.
“One thing you have to remember Joyce,” Ice said, interrupting the discussion, “is each of us is different. Talon might see where the way he does something is the best way. I might figure something that is quite different. With you, you will probably think of a better way for you. On this job you have to be yourself so you don’t end up thinking you have to double guess another agent. It’s good to get to know other agents and maybe share an assignment with them. It will give you a lot of insight in how they might react to certain conditions.”
“For instance,” Ice went on, “if Talon was to try and get a guy into a dark corner he would more than likely walk up to the guy and order him to go to the corner. He’s big and ugly enough that the guy might do it. You on the other hand would find that obviously wrong. You would probably get the guys attention and have him hit on you, then take time to build his confidence. You’d then tell or imply that he needs to accompany you to the corner with him thinking he might get a little. Of course, when hidden he would get a little. A needle, knife, or ice pick. That is a broad example. But on something else you might have a reason to be in a motel room to do your thing, like we did in Houston; or, like me might find away to get up on the roof and end with the same results.”
The three continued to talk with both men giving Joyce more pointers. Ice was able to tell her more about a person’s body and what does what. He taught her where the large arteries were, so that she would know not to cut into those arteries, causing a very quick death, unless that was her attention. He also showed Joyce where the nerve endings resulted with the most pain, and what kind of pain it was. He even included where she could jab a guy, severing a large nerve in the guys neck or upper back and everything below would lose all feeling. The person could lie there and watch his body being destroyed one inch at a time, or like what Ice did once, was to have a tiger and hiena fight over the victim and the victim remaining alive until a big artery got chewed on. He showed her how he could place something on the body so the upper legs weren’t open to a bite, causing chewing up the body even more interesting.”
Joyce knew that Ice had the capability to do anything to a person and seem to get satisfaction in doing so. She had learned too that while he is in his mood he had no conscience, or feeling of guilt. What was surprising was that he was such a nice man, and within an instant turn into this terrible, awful monster.
With Talon she continued to believe he was generally a nice man too. But he could never do what Ice did, although his looks might kill a person with fright. Talon didn’t get into the pain thing much and would just rather kill out right. Ice had told her that Talon the Eagle had once ripped off a man’s arm and beating the man with the arm and really messing him up. Ice said the man didn’t die but would never be the same again, and not just because he was missing an arm. Joyce thought on that a little and had to agree that a person having their arm ripped off, then beaten badly by it would have to have a lot of remnant feelings for the rest of their life.
“Yeah,” Talon said, in the playing a retard person, “my goal will be met when I can rip a man’s head right off his body.” The smile he tried to give to Joyce cracked her up because it was so hideous. She just couldn’t help but love the guy. He could actually be the jokester at a party and pull it off well. When Joyce went over the files of the other agents she found that The Talon had an I.Q. approaching genius, and had written some well read research papers that were used part of the lesson they were learning. She found out too that Talon was an expert chess player, liked almost all kinds of music and often times before a mission would go for the classical and be more prone to Bach, or Beethoven. Some of the other agents had already told her, “If you find him listening to classical music it meant it was going to happen very soon.”
The next day they checked out where their targets were going to be. They had been told that there was a building, and several empty lots next to it. Many of the times the gang would be out in the lot, sitting on their cars and talking or planning a heist. The van could be seen driving around the area if anybody looked. It appeared to the agents that almost everything on that block was out of business, and the houses behind them, on the next street over had either been abandoned, or in the process of falling down.
Ice jumped out and told Talon to hang lose and could pick him up down the street a couple blocks away. He walked down what used to be a sidewalk to the building next to the empty lot, then around the building squeezing through a chain length fence and found a window opened on the far side and most of the building intact. He concluded that the gang, and even others used this place for doing drugs or whatever, and committing a variety of crimes and sins. He walked along the busted up sidewalk and checked the entire block, and actually checked each building, and got to know the area in detail.
After getting picked up, Ice was in the back telling the other two agents what he learned was there. They stopped at what looked like a decent barbeque place and got their order. Ice pulled out a pad of half-sized paper and began drawing and explaining. Then he went into detail of every building on the block, then more details about each building.
“This is what I came up with,” Ice told them. “I think Joyce needs to get in this building here. It’s right next to the empty lot and there’s an entrance point with a broke-out window on the opposite side. She can go upstairs, and be able to use a window up there that looks down onto the lot. She won’t be that far up, so should not have much problem with trajectory.” Joyce nodded.
“I think you,” he said looking at Talon, “should get to this house here,” Ice pointed to the house just behind the lot about midway. “You will have a clear line of site. The way they drive their cars into that lot is to drive down this alley here, and drive through a large open spot where the fence has been knocked down.” Talon nodded his acceptance.
“I can get up on the roof of this building here on the opposite side of the lot from Joyce,” Ice said pointing where the roof is.
“Both of you however will be in danger because anybody can get up to where you’re at by just getting entrance and walking up the stairs,” Ice told them. “Talon, I would advise you set up two or three locations where if they hit the line they blow up. We should have some grenades if we see we need to get a bunch at one time.”
“Joyce,” you haven’t gone through explosives school yet so can only give you about three grenades that you can throw or drop. Be careful, they are very powerfu
l. However, don’t try to use them as a booby trap because you really don’t know how to set one up yet. It’s easier to blow yourself up then is to set the damn thing up.
Ice continued with Joyce, “I think you probably have the most immediate danger because you will be the closest, with the problem being that they can get into your building because it is right there, and they more than likely know it the best.”
“We will all have explosive ammunition. I suggest we put them all into one gun, so not to be confused,” Ice instructed. “Talon, you and I have to have a clip of these bullets for our AK-47s. If it looked like any vehicle is thought to be leaving all we have to do is hit the car and everybody in and near it will be destroyed.”
“Joyce,” Ice went on, “I have some .44 magnum bullets so I think you being the closest can get what you want to get with that long barreled .44 I have.”
Ice continued, “These guys meet at that location every Wednesday night. That’s their meet night I guess. My information tells me that they call it their prayer meetings since that is the night a lot of churches have just that. One of the members, who works at a pizza joint usually brings a variety of pizzas, and several bring a case of beer. There are mostly Mexicans, but a few black, and even some white guys too. A very diverse group. Most of these gangs are of one race or another, and rule a particular area. These guys are a little older and don’t claim an area, except for that block. As far as other gangs go they can control anything they want, but just not that block. There has been some gun fights over it but the guys we’re putting out seem to have bigger and better guns. That is a good reason why we have to be careful. This gang in turn does heist jobs at warehouses, stores, or anywhere they want to go. I’m told, but don’t take as true, that somehow they contact the gang of whatever area they will be in and tell them to stay away. But with these guys and any other gang they have a problem of having a good organization, or don’t know how to run one. Our guys do. It’s thought that perhaps these guys had played baseball or football together, or may have met in the juvie.
“To give you the right to do so,” Ice said, “all people, man or woman in that lot is to be killed. With our special bullets we might want to start out blowing them all out, if they are all congregated at a particular spot. However, nothing in that lot will escape or survive, even if it’s a cat or dog. I think that when the time comes if there is anybody near one of us, one of the two others kill them with one silenced shot. If they are just scattered then we start with the outside of the perimeter and work in. If they are mostly in and on the cars we’ll take the cars out with a big bang. We’ll have a walkie talkie with an ear device, and a mic. I will suggest in what order, and what and who needs to do it. In other words, I don’t want us to waste a couple of our bomb bullets all on one car!” Ice said snickering.
“Just a question,” Joyce interrupted. “What if we get there and all goes to hell before we get set up.”
“Good question, Joyce,” Ice said answering. “If that happens we’re basically one for all, and all for one. Use your biggest weapons and work down. What I do, if my position is actually attacked is to use all the weapons, but not the shotgun. I save the shotgun for any close up work that might be coming at me, say like into a room. Our goal is to destroy any body, and anything. We hope we get it done in time for us to get out before the cops get there. If one or all of us are busted you both know what has to be done.” he said looking at each of them, with them nodding in agreement.
“It will be tomorrow night and we will get there well before night. That should give us a chance to find where we have to be and make it as nice and comfortable as possible. My informant says these guys start pulling in around nine, or nine-thirty, and they’re all there by ten. We’ll stay quiet until I give the go ahead. By then we will probably have our own assignments, and can kind of plan as we go, Remember, anything living. Man, woman, child, animal, whatever.”
“I-l-l-I think I couldn’t do a child at this point,” Joyce said.
“Well, glad you said it now,” Ice said. “We understand your predicament, so one of us will do them if there are any.” Ice also knew that Talon had a real hard time killing a child. Not necessarily the shooting, but the thoughts afterward affected him the most.
They went back to talking about different points and ways to kill people, and what worked best. They also talked about anything that came up. Joyce had most of the questions.
After an hour, Ice interrupted the conversation,” I need to get to bed and get a good night of rest. We’ll probably be done by eleven tomorrow night, but I still need my rest. Which leads me to ask what y’all want to do tomorrow. We have the whole day.”
“What’s our choices?” Joyce asked.
“Well, there is a zoo, and some museums down near the medical center, There’s the space center down south of town that can be interesting. There’s a great restaurant downtown that has a huge aquarium in it with some very significantly large fish in it. There’s also a very large three story mall in the Galleria which is right off highway 610, on the west side. Any of those interest you?
“They all sound great,” Talon said, “but I’d rather not do the shopping center for obvious reasons and it may tire us out too much for getting our assignment down correctly.”
“I like the idea of the aquarium. And don’t they have a museum here that is all about the Jews and stuff that was done in Germany?” Joyce said.
“Okay,” Ice said just putting his two cents in, “How about we just hang out tomorrow morning over a nice breakfast, and some coffee. Then about ten-thirty we take one of your cars and head down for a great meal where the aquarium is? After that we can go down to the Jewish museum. There really isn’t a whole lot of walking because it’s in a relatively small building,. After that we can play it by ear, If it’s not too busy we can decide to go to the IMAX there which is only several blocks away.”
“Sounds good to me” Joyce said standing up and stretching.
“Yeah me too,” said the very large ugly man, who again tried to smile and Ice cracked up. Talon went over and picked Ice up under his armpits and pushed him into the wall. Ice was off the ground by at least two feet and Joyce would swear the wall had been dented in, in the shape of Ice’s body.
“It’s about time you cut the shit mother fucker,” Talon said in a very mean and threatening way, “I’ve taken all the shit I’m going to take off you sissy girl piece of shit!
Joyce stepped back not knowing what was happening.
“Fuck you, you big ugly son of a bitch. On top of it, you have bad breath,” Ice hollered back.
Joyce didn’t know who started laughing first, but Talon put Ice back on the ground, no worse for wear.
“If we can’t fuck with each other, who can we fuck with?” he asked Joyce still laughing.
Joyce smiled back and decided she would be completely accepted by these two when the time came that she was the victim in this same kind of way.
All three went their way, and got a good night of sleep. Ice woke up and found that his shoulders were a little tender from Talon’s treatment the night before.
Everything went well the following day. They really enjoyed their dinner at the aquarium and very impressed with the large two or three floor aquarium. After they were done at the Jewish Memorial Museum Talon saw a ice cream parlor two blocks away, where they walked and got a large whatever it was they wanted. Talon paid for it.
Joyce had picked up a brochure along the way and found out the IMAX was showing a kids movie. Immediately Talon said that was out. He thought perhaps when he walked in both kids and parents would run in panic.
They walked around the area and found a few other things of interest, then went back to Joyce’s car. Ice jumped in the back and Talon squeezed himself into the front passenger seat. Ice ended up telling Joyce where she had to turn to get back to the highway they needed to be, and giving directions all the way back to the motel.
When they returned to the mo
tel they decided to kind of take inventory of their weapons and ammunition while still in the van. Between the three of them they found and loaded each weapon they would use with plenty of ammunition. Ice took six grenades and put them in his pile. Talon only took two because he would be farther away, and Joyce took three.
The three of them went to the motel lounge and got either coffee or a coke, and reviewed their plan. They then got back into Joyce’s car and headed north ending up at a crab shack. They had learned that each of them loved sea food. Both Ice and Joyce chose a variety of crab, and Talon chose a plate of catfish and shrimp. When they got their dishes all of them except for Talon thought it was way to much to eat. An hour later they left with full stomachs.
They returned to the motel, Ice suggesting they all get an hour of rest, or watch TV or something. They agreed and they all did whatever they wanted to do.
At quarter to eight Ice called the others with instruction to meet back at the van, and be ready to go.
All three showed up wearing jeans and sports shoes. Joyce had a lose fitting blouse that covered some of the things she would be putting on her belt.
When getting to their point of where they were to go, Ice drove them to a small lot on the next block over. When returning they didn’t see anyone and only one car that was going the other way. Ice dropped Joyce right near the broken window she would be entering, and helped with getting her stuff to the window and inside.
Ice then dropped Talon off right in front of the house he was assigned to, and was able to carry all his stuff by himself.
Ice thought to himself, “Maybe he should be the Hulk, if he was green he would be almost like the Hulk, but with an uglier face.
Ice’s last stop was the lot he had showed the other two. He got all his stuff together and was able to carry it all in one load. He realized it was actually too much but finally made it over to the far side of the building he was going to get on top of. He took out a long rope and what looked like a net, with larger than usual rope that made the net. He spread the net out, looked around and put all his stuff except for his Glock into the net. He brought the four corners of the net together and used the rope to tie it shut. He then took the other end of the rope and tied it around his belt, which was a big thick one.