I, Weapon

by Vaughn Heppner

  “Did Karl know this?”

  “Parker was telling Karl when I overheard it.”

  This was outrageous. It was a crime against his humanity. “Where is Parker now?” Bannon asked.

  “As far as I know, where she’s always been: in Santa Clara at the Institute.”

  “The place I escaped from?” he asked.

  Susan nodded.

  Bannon lowered the pistol and stared up at the stars. There was the ring of truth to Susan’s tale, but he didn’t know if he could trust that. If Jocelyn was alive, he had to find her, to rescue her from Parker. Why would they have lied to him? Did Jocelyn hate him for some reason? The idea didn’t ring true. But what did that mean? As Susan had said, how could he trust any of his memories?

  “Let’s go,” Bannon said.

  “Hey. I told you something critical. Now you have to let me rest or you have to leave me here. You promised. You made a deal, remember?”

  If he left Susan, she would tell the others she’d told him about his wife. No. He needed the element of surprise, and that meant keeping Susan with him for as long as he dared.

  “Keep walking,” he said.

  “But you promised me.”

  “I did, and I’ll let you go. Right now, I want you with me.”

  Susan’s features hardened. “I get it. You don’t want me to tell them what I told you, or that you know about your wife. You’re a shit, Bannon. Do you know that?”

  “If I am, you people made me one. Now keep walking.”

  -27-

  In Washington DC near the Potomac, Henry Griffith, the Controller, sat in the dark in his wheelchair. With the strike against Justice Blake tonight, bad news kept pouring in.

  Whirring sounded in the darkness as Griffith turned his wheelchair toward the door. With this operation he did what needed doing, what no one else had the inner fortitude to do. Others would misuse the power he had accumulated.

  He shook his head.

  Tonight wasn’t the time to dwell on that. He had a job to complete. He must ensure his survival so he could make certain the United States continued to exist in its imperial form. The British Empire had collapsed. The Russian Empire had collapsed. He would make sure the core of America survived so the American Empire continued to dominate the world. This amazing union could only truly fall from within, from the forces that might rise up and tear at itself. Half of America thought one way, and the other half thought the opposite way on a host of issues. He was a force helping to glue the country together by eliminating the worst offenders toward separation.

  The cell phone in his hand buzzed, and a light appeared with the sound. It illuminated Griffith’s face, a wrinkled and wizened thing with hard dark eyes like twin flakes of coal.

  “Yes?” he said.

  “The bloodhounds are on their way,” Max said. “We should have them in half an hour.”

  “Kill him,” Griffith said. “Kill him no matter where you find him. He must never be allowed to tell his side of the story.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do not fail, Max.”

  “I won’t, sir.”

  Griffith hung up and he dropped the cell into his suit’s pocket. The whirring commenced again from his motorized wheelchair and a door slid upward in the darkness.

  The sounds of people and bright lights washed over Griffith. Men and woman sat before computers, while giant screens hung on a wall. This was the nerve center of ATS and tonight Griffith was personally going to ensure the death of his best assassin, the one who had caused his stepdaughter Jocelyn to die.

  ***

  As they tramped through the forest, Susan watched Bannon sidelong. The man reminded her of a jungle cat. He walked with a pent-up energy, a fierce vitality and could move with startling quickness. Did he know about the Department of Defense project that had speeded his neural impulses? She doubted it. He was a living weapon, and now he planned to take her with him.

  She had to get free. She had to warn Parker. If Bannon made it to Parker and if Bannon found his wife…that could blow the lid off ATS. Susan knew she would go down hard in a Senate investigation. She’d helped assassinate many people. She’d used Bannon time after time. To be in his power now was something she hated.

  He was clever and could think on his feet better than most people could after a month’s consideration. Look what had happened to Karl: gunned down just like that. It seemed to her it was simply a matter of time before Bannon realized he should do the same thing to her.

  She had to outwit him, but it wasn’t going to be easy. The bullet wound in her shoulder didn’t help. She had to keep faking how much it hurt. Oh, it was bad, but she could take it for a while, especially after the painkillers. If she heard Max or if she heard bloodhounds baying…

  “Why not let me go,” she said.

  Bannon didn’t even glance at her. He was staring up at the stars again. He kept his gun tucked in his belt. If he was a normal man, she might have tried for it. But with his reflexes, no way. It would be a death sentence to try.

  “Bannon, are you listening to me?”

  “Shut up,” he whispered.

  She heard it then, the whine of a plane, a small one. No, that must be a UAV. It would have infrared imaging. Maybe she should make a run for it.

  She cocked her head and heard something else. It sounded like a thousand police cruisers coming in the distance. Bannon had told her about Max killing two CHP officers. The Controller must have ordered their deaths. It was a brutal but clever move. The CHP would send all their cars here to help with the downed officers. The Controller would see to it that Bannon took the blame for the hits. The fool didn’t realize that he had no chance against ATS. They had screwed with his mind so many times…he was a dangerous pawn, but a pawn nonetheless.

  “I’m just slowing you down,” she whispered. “You need to get the hell out of here.”

  Bannon pulled her down beside him under a pine tree. He forced her to crouch with him. A lance of pain shot through her shoulder.

  “Why did you do that?” she complained.

  “Quiet.”

  She glanced at him sidelong. He was staring up at the heavens. Was he searching for the UAV? How could that help him?

  Ah, she saw a stone just the right size. Slowly, she reached for it. If she could raise it up and dash it hard against his head, she would be the hero in ATS. She would make Max and his cleaners look like idiots. Why did men think it always took big guns to take someone down? Her fingers curled around the stone. Bannon was busy staring at the sky. Good boy, just stare there a little longer. She pried the stone out of the ground and brought it to her. She lifted it up over his head.

  He turned like a leopard before she could bring it down on him, catching her wrist. He shook her wrist until she dropped the stone. Picking it up, he pitched it away. Then he went back to staring up at the heavens.

  She might have cursed at him. She might have told him to wipe the grin off his face. But he didn’t grin. He didn’t say a word. He seemed to be ignoring her now as he watched something up there. Could he see better in the dark than normal people could? Damn, but he moved fast.

  “I had to try,” she told him.

  He glanced at her, stood and clutched her triceps, the one attached to her good shoulder. He hauled her upright and pushed her in the direction he wanted to go.

  “Why don’t you say something?” she asked.

  “Save your breath for walking,” he told her.

  She frowned. There was something different about him now, an iron determination. She shouldn’t have told him about his wife. That had been a mistake. She thought that if he learned about Jocelyn it would unhinge him, maybe bring about a mental collapse long enough for her to escape. Just her luck that hadn’t happened. Being here in the dark with Bannon made her think joining ATS had been a mistake. She should have seen this day coming.

  I have to escape. I have to outwit him.

  For the first time in her life, Susan had
an inkling of what it felt like having Bannon against you.

  -28-

  Bannon heard the tiny UAV up here. There were more of those lately, sky-eyes spying on the American people. No doubt, the UAV was making sweeps, using infrared tracking, hunting the forest for him. It was possible they already knew where he was.

  Susan had nearly caught him by surprise with her rock trick. The small things often tripped you up. He’d heard her clothes rustle just in time. He’d been having a flashback, he supposed, the surfacing of an old memory from another Bannon.

  He saw himself in his mind’s eye with a helmet, assault rifle and special rock-climbing gear. He wore Delta insignia and they had been tracking a weapons dealer. The thing he recalled was their UAV, a man-portable unit. The big ones were often controlled from a thousand miles away. The small units usually had a nearby controller or pilot. Bannon suspected a van or a pickup as the drone base. It was likely backup for the main ATS team, was probably somewhere near here.

  He took out his map and tiny flashlight. He and Susan were here. The various roads around them…hmm, given the UAV’s flight pattern, where would he park a van?

  Instinct told him the road to their left would be the most likely position. He studied the vegetation between him and them.

  “That way,” he said a moment later.

  Susan looked at him, and for the first time he saw the hint of fear in her eyes.

  “Go,” he said.

  She began trudging under trees and over dead vegetation. He followed as he listened to the UAV in the distance.

  Time passed and she began breathing harder. “The painkillers are wearing off,” she said.

  “You’re tough.”

  “I can’t go on like this for much longer.”

  He heard the tiredness in her voice. If this worked, she could rest. Her head drooped and she didn’t even pay attention to the blaring sirens. More CHP must be showing up. They would converge onto 17-Mile Drive en mass after learning that two of their officers had gone down so brutally. That’s why he needed the ATS van.

  “Down,” Bannon said, pulling her beside him.

  She glanced at him. Her face had become much too sweaty and heated. “I’m tired,” she whispered.

  “See that van?”

  She frowned and looked harder where he pointed. “Oh.”

  “It’s one of yours,” he said.

  “No. Karl, me and Max were the only ones out here.”

  “I’ve been thinking about it and I’ve decided to let you go,” he said. “So why bother lying to me?”

  “You’re not letting me go.”

  “Leave,” he said. “You’re slowing me down and I have to move fast now. Ask for help at the van and good luck.”

  “I’m telling you the truth. That’s not our van.”

  “If it’s not with you, then it was spying on you, back-up to make sure you did your job right.”

  “What?”

  “Do you think your chief trusts you completely? Obviously not, as that’s an ATS van.”

  “Why do you think so?” she asked.

  “It’s controlling the UAV up there. There are likely several drones searching for us.”

  “Why can’t it be a regular van?” she asked.

  “What is it doing sitting here on the road in the dark? Either way, you can go.”

  “Just like that you’re freeing me?”

  “I already told you,” he said. “You’re slowing me down. It’s time for me to fade away and I’m not going to do that with a wounded woman tagging along.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Okay, don’t. But what do you have to lose finding out if I’m really letting you go or not?”

  She blinked at him and finally hoisted herself to her feet. “Thanks for nothing, Bannon. You’re a bastard, getting me shot in the shoulder.”

  “Sure. Next time, don’t be the handler for a brainwashed assassin. Things might go better for you.”

  She took a step away from him, turned back and gave him a funny look. “You’re really letting me go?”

  Instead of answering, he faded away from her. Susan watched for several seconds before turning and plunging down the wooded hill. She headed for the van on the side of the road.

  ***

  Inside the van, two ATS field agents sat in swivel chairs in the back. The taller, Franklin, monitored several screens. Each screen showed the infrared camera image from a UAV sweeping the forest. One drone caught a glimpse once of a large mammalian creature. The computer analyzed and concluded it was a deer. The trouble with the drones here was the density of the forest and that too many people were out tonight. Already they’d sent Max and his team to two lovers making out in the darkness.

  The second, shorter man shifted the harness of his gun. He was security for the first man.

  Franklin flipped a panel-switch for one of the drones. Six seconds later an alarm rang in the van.

  “What’s that?” the shorter man snapped. “Do you have Bannon on visual?”

  “No. Someone’s close to us, to the van.” In his roller chair, Franklin slid to another set of screens. “There,” he said, pointing.

  On the screen, they saw a woman working her way toward them.

  “Look. She’s running now, waving her arms, coming straight for us.”

  Franklin glanced at the other man. “It’s Susan Bither. She must have escaped from Bannon. I’d better alert the Controller.”

  “What’s she saying?” The shorter man drew his gun, a .357 Magnum. “How does she know to run for us?”

  “Have you ever read her profile? She’s smart. She must have connected us to the UAVs.”

  “I don’t like this.”

  “Go see what she wants. I’m calling the Controller.”

  The shorter man took two swift strides and threw open a rear door. He jumped outside and then crumpled backward with a bullet hole in the middle of his forehead.

  Franklin sat bolt upright in surprise. He had his hands on the comm-gear, but had not yet begun calling. He sat there, blinking at his partner. Realization changed the features of his face. He looked outside at the darkness. In the moonlight out there was a man sprinting for the van. Franklin lunged off the swivel chair and dove for the front of the van. He had to get out of here. A bullet clipped his side and he crashed onto the van floor.

  I’m hit.

  Instead of panicking, Franklin got angry. Despite the pain, he slithered around and crawled for the back of the van. He had to reach the gun. A bullet spanged off the van’s floor and hit a piece of equipment. The sprinting man was firing at him. Crawling faster, Franklin reached the back of the van and slithered outside. He saw a woman then. She ran toward him.

  “It’s Bannon!” Susan shouted.

  “You’re helping him!” Franklin shouted. He lunged for the .357 Magnum. He had to get it or he was a dead man. Susan shouted, too, and she dove for the gun. They reached it at almost the same time. Franklin elbowed her. She grunted painfully and raked at his eyes, scratching her fingernails over them. The pain was like fire. He ducked his head, yelling all the while, and put his hands on the gun. She grabbed for it and then the loudest boom of his life sounded.

  Franklin froze. Was he dead? Had she killed him? She groaned in a pitiful manner. He disengaged, with his hands gripping the .357. He couldn’t see much with his scratched eyes, but he brought up the gun.

  There was a sound. He had no idea what it might be. The next moment, he blew off his feet backward and the back of his head hit the dirt. It didn’t matter anymore to Franklin because he was dead, with a bullet in his brain.

  ***

  Bannon breathed heavily as he knelt beside a gut-shot Susan. Nearby were the two dead ATS agents.

  “Why did you wrestle over the gun?” he asked. “You were just supposed to bring them out of their turtle shell.”

  She told him some choice words about what he could do to himself.

  He’d been sprinting for the va
n ever since “freeing” Susan. Unfortunately, he’d had farther to run, as he’d swung wide around her. Fortunately, he moved much faster. As the rear van door had opened, he’d knelt, raised his gun and fired smoothly from fifty yards away. Then he’d waited, seeing the second man in the lights of the computer screens. He’d shot, but not to kill. He hadn’t expected the agent to play the hero, nor had he expected Susan to run all the way to the van. She must have been more desperate than he’d realized or she had tricked him and had been saving her strength.

  The fact that she’d taken the bait proved how desperate she must have been. People often heard what they wanted to hear. She’d wanted to escape, so even though him freeing her had gone against logic, she had at least partially accepted his offer.

  Why did she have to wrestle over the gun? He couldn’t just leave a gut-shot woman to die, no matter how evilly the woman had used him for who knew how long.

  Bannon entered the van, shut off the alarm and gently helped a bandaged Susan inside. She was losing too much blood, which leaked past his wrap.

  “You used me just now,” she said between gasps. “You’re no different from us.”

  What was he supposed to say to that?

  “I never believed you anyway,” she said, and began to curse him.

  Bannon slammed the back door shut and slid into a swivel chair. He put each UAV on autopilot. Then he began studying the situation, seeing where the police congregated and where Max and his snipers were.

  “You hang in there,” he told Susan. “I’m getting you to a hospital.”

  “There are only five exits from 17-Mile Drive,” she said. “The police will have every one of them covered. You’ll never make it and I’ll probably die because of it. You killed me, Bannon.”

  “What I’m looking at tells me a different story,” he said. “The police are busy combing the woods for us. Some of them have even begun searching private homes.”

  Susan groaned, clutching her stomach. “You as good as killed me.”