by James Quinn
Ahead, they saw the lodge, an old, archaic building with a single lamplight dotted in the top bedroom window. They assumed the old man was in bed. He would die there.
The wind was coming in great gusts and now that they were within range to attack, the killers clutched their weapons tightly. What did they care, he was one old man on his own and caught unawares. He would be easy prey.
* * *
Scorpius huddled himself into the furthest reaches of the small bedroom, gripping the Mauser tightly. He looked down at his knuckles, noticing they were white with tension.
He'd been sitting in the top bedroom for the past twenty-five minutes. He'd been both dragged, then pushed up to the top floor of his house before being barked at to “stay put” by the little man who'd come to protect him. Scorpius wondered at that. Was the man's priority to protect his charge, or to kill the assassins who were sniffing at his door… perhaps a little of both.
He had been in this position only once before, when the Russians overran Berlin, slaughtering, raping, destroying and looting their way through the city. The fear then had been the reckless murder of both innocents and the not-so-innocents of the Nazi party. It was expected. Like a storm wave engulfing a coast, it takes all in its path indiscriminately. They would all fall together.
But this was something very different. The targeted murder of a man because of who he was, what he had become, made it personal by definition. He imagined the killers approaching; boots on cobbles, jackets snagging on bushes, then moving when the cloud covered the moon, edging nearer and nearer to his sanctuary, their fingers tense against the weapons that had been brought here to execute him.
The minutes ticked by. Thirty minutes, forty minutes and then heading towards an hour. And just as he had convinced himself it was all a false alarm, that someone in London was overreacting to an imagined threat, it was then that he heard a dull… boom… as a shotgun roared. It was in the cellar he would have guessed, judging by the muffled bark.
Then silence.
The lights went out throughout the house, leaving only moonlit shadows scattered across the floor… and then it got very, very noisy as the musical rhythm of semi-automatic gunfire began.
* * *
As soon as he'd heard the engine of the boat approaching from the distance, Gorilla had moved into action. Scorpius was to make his way to the top bedroom and lock the door. The killers would have to fight to the top of the building if they wanted to get to the target, and hopefully, Gorilla would be able to eliminate them before they got that far.
If they did get that far, well, let's hope those rounds in the old Mauser still worked and the old man was a decent shot, he thought.
Gorilla's plan was to use the top bedroom as bait, made even more obvious by it having the only light in it. For his part he would start in the basement, viewing through a hidden vantage point window to see how many were approaching and then work his way up behind the killer, or killers, to take them out of the game. Not the worst plan in the world, but not the best, either. In Redaction jobs, you worked with the hand you'd been dealt.
He'd opened the small floor window in the cellar. The floor window was level with the exterior grounds and looked out over the gravel courtyard. It was only the size of a tea tray, not anywhere near big enough to be able to crawl through, but was more than big enough to look through and see who was approaching the side of the house.
In the distance he now saw three men approaching, coming out of the misty rain, appearing like phantoms. Two large and one small, dressed in dark combat fatigues, each carrying a compact submachine gun of undetermined make. They seemed to melt out from the bushes that bordered the front lawn. So they'd approached from the cliffs in a seaborne operation, thought Gorilla.
They were at a distance of twenty feet when the smaller man barked out an order, lost to Gorilla's ears thanks to the driving winds. The small man was the one he wanted to keep alive. His body shape and size fitted one of the men they'd tagged in Marseilles. The others were bigger and bulkier, hulks and nothing more than sub-contracted hired guns, he was sure. They were therefore expendable.
The smaller man and the heavy man on his right branched off to make their way around to the main entrance. The other man kept on moving at a steady pace, heading towards the window. His body was slowly disappearing from view, but his legs were fast becoming the main focus through the window. Gorilla crouched down against the wall to the side of the window. He heard the crunch of gravel continue for a few more seconds and then it stopped. Gorilla glanced quickly and saw a pair of big-footed army boots, directly in front of his face.
Then he heard the grunt as the man began to crouch down to peer through the small open window, the muzzle of his weapon leading the way. The low level of the window meant he couldn't get a clear view, so he moved the weapon carelessly to his left hand and began to lower himself onto his knees. Sure that there was no threat, after all, it was only one old man who wasn't expecting company, the gunman crouched down on all fours to peer in through the gloomy cellar window. All he saw was the limited outline of a dark cellar.
It was then that Gorilla moved. He simply stepped from the side and jammed the shortened barrel of the shotgun against the glass and pulled the trigger.
The report inside the cellar was deafening and Gorilla's ears rang. The blast had hit the gunman square in the face. The heavy buckshot and glass had completely removed his features, leaving a mass of red, fleshy pulp and his body had buckled forward onto his knees. What remained of his head slumped forward, jamming itself onto the jagged shards of the now-fractured window pane.
With no time to admire the results of his work, Gorilla pumped another round into the chamber. In the distance somewhere above his head – the kitchen, he assumed – he was aware of the rata-tat-tat of gunfire. It seemed to be ripping apart the wooden door which led to the kitchen and was followed by a thump as the unmistakable sound of a boot kicked it open. More rata-tat-tat, rata-tat-tat as the gunman started shooting at shadows.
Amateur, thought Gorilla, only shoot at something you can see, you must be almost out of ammunition by now.
He flicked the switch to the power supply off covering the house in darkness. With these kinds of odds Gorilla needed all the help he could get, and prolonged darkness would help. He turned and ran at full pelt up the wooden cellar stairs, determined to get to the kitchen before the second gunman had a chance to reload. He was almost at the cellar door when it was flung open wide and a large, dark figure stood in silhouette at the top of the stairs.
Gorilla took the final step as a mighty jump, leaping forward and up. Both men clashed together, body weight hitting body weight. But Gorilla, ever the survivor of encounters like these, was determined to get the upper hand by smashing the butt of the shotgun pistol grip into the teeth of his opponent.
The man collapsed backwards against the wall in pain, his hands coming up to his face to try and stop what remained of his teeth from scattering into the darkness of the cellar. He needn't have bothered, as almost instantly, Gorilla had grabbed the man by the front of his tunic with one hand and was jamming the barrel of the shotgun up under his chin with the other.
The metal of the Remington cut into the second gunman's skin before… boom… another shot that ripped up into the intruder's head, and even in the murky darkness, Gorilla was aware of the combination of grey and red and tissue and bone as the brute of a man slid to the floor. At this kind of distance and with that kind of wound, there was no need for a second shot.
He reached into his coat pocket for new cartridges and pushed them into the feeding tube. One, two, three and then he pumped a new round into the chamber.
Gorilla flung back the cellar door and moved into the low light of the kitchen, his shotgun leading the way. Two down and one to go, except this time, his plan wasn't for killing the leader of the hit-team unless he had to, which made it all the more difficult. It was to be a capture.
He held tight to the sho
tgun and moved from the sanctuary of the cellar and into the foreboding darkness of the house.
* * *
Gioradze had heard the first muffled roar of a firearm from the side of the house, where Luc had gone to investigate, and then the crash of gunfire as Pierre had attacked the kitchen door to the rear of the building. He himself had swept quickly through the house, checking his angles and working his way across the rooms to the staircase.
Always the tricky part that – staircases. He knew to take them quickly and to leave the downstairs for Luc and Paul to deal with. Besides, he had seen the light on in the top room and knew that was where his target must be. He wanted to be the first one through the door for the kill. The boys could deal with anything downstairs.
He was almost at the top of the stairs now. Leading onto a landing, he moved forward carefully, slowly, the weapon up and ready. The door was illuminated by a thin seam of orange light at its edges. Gioradze smiled to himself, he was on the verge of taking out another target from the hit-list and looking forward to another payday. He bashed open the door with his shoulder and it flew back, hanging on, barely, by the bottom hinge after the top hinge shattered. His eyes quickly acclimatized to the gloom and he noticed the little candle lamp, emitting a sinister orange glow.
It was the bald head of the wizened old man that he noticed first, the orange light shining off his pate. Then, as he concentrated, he took in the outline of the man, sat crouched in the corner, his knees drawn up and what looked like the world's oldest pistol gripped between his hands and pointing directly at the door or more correctly, at whatever was coming through the door. Which on this occasion, was Gioradze.
Gioradze raised the Uzi and centered it on the figure in the corner. He saw the man tense and then shake with effort as he tried to pull the trigger on the Mauser and… click. Nothing. Dead. An old man, holding an old gun and using old ammo, thought Gioradze. This was like shooting fish in a barrel. He centered the Uzi back on the man's head. At this range, the bullets would simply decapitate him. Another one taken off Marquez's list—
He didn't hear the boom of the shotgun. He just felt a sharp pain shooting up the back of his legs, his aim wavering as he dropped the Uzi. He looked down and saw tissue and bone, all encased in a gelatinous mass of blood. He felt himself slowly sliding down the doorframe, before another round of heavy lead ripped through the other leg. He winced and his eyes watered. Soon the pain would come in great abundance, that he knew for sure. But first he might be able to get to the Uzi…
He saw the weapon kicked out of his reach and heard it clatter along the hallway.
The pain in his legs was coming now in intense waves. He turned his head, gasping for air, and looked up into the face of a small, blond-haired demon. The man's face was pale and set in a determined grimace. In his hands he held a pump-action shotgun with a shortened barrel.
The last thing Gioradze remembered was the small man raising the shotgun, rotating it around so that it resembled a club and then bringing down the heavy wooden butt of the weapon onto his skull. A white light shattered his mind and then there was only blackness.
Chapter Eleven
Gorilla carried the killer to the kitchen and sat him in a wooden chair. He tied both arms to the chair's armrests with rope from the cellar and rolled up the man's right sleeve, exposing his forearms. With the man secured, he set about inspecting the damage to the killer's lower legs.
The heavy shot had mangled the calf of one leg and almost totally eradicated the knee and the shin bone on the other. Unless he had surgery soon, the chances were that the man would bleed out and die and for what was about to come, Gorilla needed him very much alive. He padded out the wounds with tea towels and handkerchiefs culled from the old man's chest of drawers, before binding it all together with strips of bed sheet. Not ideal, but better than nothing under the present circumstances.
Gorilla switched off the kitchen light and instead lit a small oil lamp, which the old man probably used to visit the shed out in the dark. The darkness immediately engulfed the room, leaving only a red-tinged spotlight illuminating the small area where the killer was bound. To Gorilla, it looked like a scene from an old black and white movie-set, where the torturer has his victim exactly where he wanted him. It was both eerie and disturbing.
He squatted in front of the still-unconscious man and weighed up in his own mind how best to approach the forthcoming inquisition. Hard or soft? Kind or cruel? Physical or mental?
In truth, Gorilla had no idea which was the best option to take. He wasn't trained in interrogation methods and in the few times he had taken part in them, he'd simply gone with his instincts. So far, he had been quite successful – as to whether he would be as successful with this CIA contract killer was another matter; only time would tell.
He began to gently pat at the man's cheeks, to try to rouse him. With no response, he ever so slowly began to increase the force of the slap. The man gradually began to come around; a groan at first, followed by a confused turning of the head as he tried to get his bearings, and completed with a wince and a cry as the pain from his damaged legs finally registered. The man raised his head, a frown of fury and pain on his face, and glared up at his captor.
“Do you know who I am? Don't you remember me?” asked Gorilla
Gioradze squinted and tried his best to focus on the other man's face. “What do I care who you are? You look like a fucking Russian, if that's what you mean.”
Gorilla smiled to himself. He could see what the other man meant, with his short white-blond hair, pugnacious manner and robust build he could very easily be mistaken for the archetypal KGB thug. Gorilla saw no reason to dissuade the killer of this assumption, in fact, if he played it right, it might actually be an asset in the forthcoming interrogation. “You should care about who I am. It could have life changing consequences for you. You need to be concerned, at the very least,” said Gorilla.
Gioradze snorted. “Fuck you. Torture me all you want. You think this is the first time I've been tied to a chair and tortured?”
“Probably not,” said Gorilla. “But this isn't the first time I've tied someone to a chair and interrogated them either, so on that score we're equal.” He was thinking of his time spent with the forger in Belgium. But the one thing Gorilla was positive of was that, unlike the forger, this killer would not be walking away safely and with a suitcase full of cash.
In his role as faux KGB interrogator, Gorilla had decided to use that oldest and most dangerous of tactics first; honesty. Honesty to the subject, honesty about his potential fate, honesty leaves the subject with no place to hide and no maneuvering room. It spells it out for him in stark detail. You are here. I am here. These are the facts.
“I won't tell you a thing, you Russian pig,” said Gioradze, as the anger started to rise in him.
Gorilla frowned. “Oh, I believe that you believe that. But there's one thing I can tell you from experience and that is, everyone talks, everyone has a breaking point. You just have to find the correct leverage. For some its pain, some people can't handle pain. However, in your case I think that you're such a tough man you could withstand it, I have no doubt.”
The Georgian was breathing heavily now, gulping in huge lungsful of air, mentally bracing himself for what was about to come.
“Some people fear the danger that their loved ones might be targeted, but again, not applicable in your case,” Gorilla continued.
Gioradze snorted with derision, as if the thought of using another human being as leverage over him would never have succeeded.
Gorilla knelt down so they were face-to-face. “What I think is, that in your case, it's simple. It's Biology. It's your own body. You're wounded, tired, under stress, so you're already weak, maybe even compliant, although you would never admit that. No, the one thing that's going to let you down here is your own body.”
Gioradze looked down at his mangled legs. For the first time, the stunning realization that he was in pain, in a forei
gn country, isolated and about to be interrogated by a Russian operative, hit him.
“And you really don't remember me?” asked Gorilla, looking the man in the eye.
Gioradze shook his head violently. “I fucking told you – no!”
Gorilla brought his face closer, so that they almost touched, nose-to-nose, and then whispered through gritted teeth. “I'm the hitter from Marseilles. I'm back to haunt you, and you don't look pleased to see me at all, you miserable son-of-a-bitch!”
* * *
He was doing it by the book, exactly as the basic written instructions included in the sealed case advised him to. Gorilla unzipped the little leather case, exposing the syringe and two vials of the pre-mixed 'truth drug', known as Sodium Amytal.
With two complete vials, he had one to use now and a spare one should he need to extend the interrogation. He knew there was no such thing as a truth drug, but rather, it was a combination of certain powerful chemicals designed to make the subject more pliable and less resistant. He carefully inserted one of the vials into the syringe, ensured the needle was straight and pulled the plunger back to the stated dose. Finally, he firmly flicked the glass casing to make sure no air bubbles had found their way into the solution. Satisfied, he approached the man tied to the chair.
“Don't move and don't struggle, it won't do any good. If you do, I'll have to stop you,” said Gorilla, inclining his head towards the shotgun standing nearby. A good 'crack' from the club handle would subdue an uncooperative subject.
Gorilla carefully injected half the chemical cocktail into the cannula attached to the man's arm in one continuous push of the plunger, and while the bound assassin didn't struggle following his warning, he did shout and curse at his captor.
Gorilla ignored the tirade and instead focused his mind on the upcoming interrogation. He knew it would take anywhere between ten to fifteen minutes, depending on the man's metabolism, before the drugs started to take effect and from then onwards, he would have anywhere between twenty to thirty minutes before the drug's effects began to dissipate.