Enhanced

by Ben Brown

  Octavien headed for the door. Chinwendu followed, briefly looking over her shoulder at the dead man hanging so grotesquely from the knife.

  Chinwendu followed the Frenchman as he weaved through the crowd. She was amazed at the lack of interest shown to the man in front of her. He was covered in blood, yet no one seemed to notice. Octavien looked like he’d been mugged or beaten, but no one wanted to offer any help.

  It was no wonder that crime went unnoticed in big cities. People were so wrapped up in their own lives. No one gave a damn about anything other than getting from one place to another.

  Chinwendu kept scanning the crowd for signs of her new team mates, but she saw nothing. This was a good thing because it meant Octavien wouldn’t sense he was being watched. Chinwendu knew that Octavien could sense her feelings, so she needed to stay on top of her emotions. One slip and he might sense the betrayal.

  * * *

  Lea, Martinez, and a team of heavily armed agents entered the bookshop. Martinez was shocked at the scene before him.

  Lea, however, was expecting a gruesome sight. She had been chasing Dominic’s subjects for some time now, and she knew that things often ended this way.

  “Check in with Kennedy, make sure he has a fix on Zac and Chinwendu’s location. Then help me get this man down,” Lea said as she approached the dead man.

  A moment or two later, Martinez came over to her. He helped her lift the man down. The old man was very light and the two lifted him with ease. They laid him gently on the floor. Martinez patted him down checking for a wire; there was none. Lea covered him with a sheet that one of the agents handed to her.

  “Kennedy is tracking them simultaneously with satellites and the GPS implants. Chinwendu hasn’t reached Zac’s location yet, but we have Zac’s location watched. He’s been placed in a 4x4. He seems to be unconscious still and there’s a man standing by the car. He’s the one identified as René. We’ll wait until the car is on the move before we start following them.” As Martinez spoke, his eyes never left the old man’s dead body. An agent came over to tell them both that the shop was clean of all electronic surveillance devices.

  Martinez looked at Lea with a puzzled look on his face. “Don’t you find that odd? If you were waiting for contact from operatives, wouldn’t you keep this place under surveillance? Plus, you would want to keep our friend here honest.” He pointed to the blood-drenched sheet.

  “This feels sloppy. If I’d been running this show, I would’ve had some way of knowing what was going on in here, wouldn’t you?”

  Lea got up and looked around the place more closely. Martinez was right. Dominic wouldn’t leave this old man to his own devices. He would want him monitored night and day. Lea looked all over the shop, but came up dry. She stood with her hands on her hips. She tapped her fingers on her belt as she chewed her lip.

  “Martinez, would the dampening field indicate that there had been any transmissions?”

  “I’ll find out, give me a second,” Martinez said as he walked over to a laptop. He studied the screen for a moment. “The dampening field did block a signal. It then scrubbed the signal to make it look as if it had been damaged by a random electro-magnetic field. This should prevent suspicion. Weak signals, such as those put out by bugging devices, are often corrupted. But where is the bug?”

  Lea looked at the sheet that hid the dead man. “Martinez, get your people to scan him.” She pointed at the corpse.

  Martinez signaled one of the agents.

  A young woman ran an electronic wand over the dead man. She pulled back the sheet and scanned his left arm again. The agent twisted the old man’s arm so she could see his forearm, stared at a small scar, and scanned it. She looked up with surprise and shouted, “He’s hot!”

  Lea looked at Martinez with alarm. “Please tell me the dampening field is still up!”

  Martinez simply replied with one chilling word,

  “No.”

  “Damn it! We need to abort! Dominic could have heard every word, since we dropped the field. Doc, are you listening? We need to wake Zac and warn him.”

  “I’m on it!” Doc shouted. “He should be awake in a second or two. Chinwendu’s still a minute from his position.”

  Martinez looked at Lea. “The field was dropped when the sweep came back clean. I raised it again once I saw evidence of the signal. Nevertheless, there were at least two minutes where a signal got out. I’ve put all our units back on full alert. We’re ready to go when you are, Lea. Just give the word.”

  The young female agent came over to her and said hesitantly, “I’m sorry. When I did the sweep, and it came back clean, I didn’t think to check the field records on the laptop. No one has ever hidden a bug inside someone’s body before. It’s standard protocol to turn off the field after a sweep comes up clean.”

  Lea didn’t feel sorry for the agent. She knew this mistake would cost lives. Lea walked away from her without a word.

  “Martinez, we can’t send your men in, not in the middle of New York.” Lea rubbed her temples as she spoke. “It would be a massacre. Zac will need to handle things himself.”

  Martinez’s mobile rang; he quickly raised the phone to his ear.

  “Hold on, Kennedy, let me put you on the loudspeaker,” Martinez removed the phone from his ear and pressed the speaker phone button. “Okay, Kennedy, go ahead.”

  “We have been monitoring your location, and we detected a brief period of time where a weak signal escaped.” Martinez tilted his head, trying to hear Kennedy’s small and scratchy voice over the activity that was taking place around him. Lea had no difficulties hearing him with her enhanced ears, and she didn’t like hearing what she already knew.

  “We know that. Now, please tell us you blocked it!” Lea shouted angrily.

  “No we didn’t block it, and it’s a good job we didn’t! Normally, a bug transmits to a passive receiver. In other words, it’s impossible to find where that receiver is. However, this is no normal bug. From what I could ascertain by analyzing the signal it greatly resembles the implants that Lea and the others have. When the signal from the bug got out it didn’t just transmit blindly. Instead, it had to go through an encrypted protocol which resembles that of a wireless network. This meant that a small encrypted data packet was sent from the bug to the receiver. The receiver then authenticated the packet and sent an encrypted data packet back to the bug. This is known as ‘hand shaking’. We have managed to pinpoint where that packet was sent from. I’m sending those coordinates to your field laptop.”

  Martinez looked at the laptop and confirmed that he’d received them. He then uploaded them to his Blackberry.

  “Let’s go. We have to pick up the ball now, before there are any more mistakes!” Lea headed for the door.

  Martinez knew not to argue. He simply followed her, unsure of what they would find next. One thing he was sure of, Lea was ready for anything.

  8

  Zac felt a massive electrical charge pulsing through him. His body spasmed then turned rigid. His eyes flew open, but he could see nothing; the pain was blinding. It was the most intense agony he’d ever felt. He couldn’t scream; it was as if his whole body had been taken over, and he couldn’t regain control. Then it was gone. Zac slumped back into the black leather of the seat.

  “Zac, listen to me, don’t make a sound.” It was the Doc speaking. Zac could hear the panic in his voice.

  “The plan’s gone wrong. We think Dominic knows what we are trying to do. You’re in a car and Chinwendu is on her way to your location. She has one of Dominic’s operatives with her. There’s another outside the car. I’ll warn Chinwendu about what’s happened, but you need to get out of there.”

  “Understood.”

  Zac looked out the window and saw a man in a trench coat. He was staring intently down the street. He failed to notice Zac moving around, partly because he was concentrating so hard on the street, but also because of the dark tint on the window.

  Zac worked his w
ay across the seat to the other door and tried the handle. It was unlocked. He managed to open it just wide enough to squeeze through without being seen. He shut the door, hoping the sound of the traffic would cover the noise. Then he simply walked away. The person by the door didn’t once take his eyes off the street. Zac watched him as he walked away. The man’s demeanor seemed childlike.

  * * *

  Octavien’s phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket and answered. “Hello. Yes — I see. Okay I will see you then.” Octavien was looking at Chinwendu. He ended the call and placed the phone back in his pocket.

  “Who was that?” Chinwendu asked. She knew something was wrong — she could feel a change come over Octavien.

  “It was just René, he is getting impatient. We must hurry,” Octavien replied, becoming agitated.

  Chinwendu knew he was lying about René. René didn’t understand English.

  “Chinwendu, this is Dr. Skinner. The plan has gone wrong. You need to get out of there.” As Chinwendu heard Doc’s voice in her ear, she instantly became frantic. She tried to control herself, but it was too late. Octavien had felt her sudden anxiety and turned to face her.

  “What is it, Chinwendu? You seem tense. Would it be because you’re a lying bitch? You have betrayed Dominic, the man who saved you. Did you think you could, or should, get away with that?” Octavien had venom in his voice. She knew he was going to try to kill her.

  * * *

  Zac stood on the opposite side of the road to the man in the trench coat and followed his gaze. Zac instantly saw what he could not. He saw Chinwendu confronted by a man wearing a blood-covered coat similar to that worn by the man at the car. He had clearly taken a beating. Zac concentrated hard, straining to hear what was being said between the two. It was clear to him that Chinwendu’s assailant meant business. Zac made his way towards them, staying on the opposite side of the street. He needed to be sure the man at the car wouldn’t notice him crossing. The street was all but empty, how would he cross unseen? At that moment, a shop door to his left opened and half a dozen Japanese tourists poured out onto the street.

  A small fat woman bustled her way to the front of the group.

  “Now if all of you could please give me your attention.” The tourists fell silent instantly. “Thank you. Now we just have to cross the street to wait for our tour bus, it should be here shortly. Once we’re all onboard the bus, we will head to the world famous Grand Central Station. If we’re lucky we will have time to sample a hot dog along the way.”

  The tourists began to clap enthusiastically as she led the way across the road. Zac couldn’t believe his luck. He grabbed the arm of a particularly old woman. She smiled at him congenially as he helped her to cross the road. They made their way across the street; Zac had to stoop slightly to stay concealed among the camera clicking hoard.

  Once safely across the road he headed towards Chinwendu and her assailant. He approached the blood covered man from the rear. Zac could feel him getting ready to hurt Chinwendu.

  “Excuse me, but do you have the time?” he asked. The man was now nose-to-nose with Chinwendu.

  “Piss off, I am busy!” he replied.

  “Typical Frenchman, another arrogant prick.”

  That got his attention, and he turned to look.

  Zac could tell the man didn’t recognize him. He looked Zac up and down and started to say something, but didn’t get the chance to finish. Zac punched him in the throat. The shock on his face was priceless. As the man grabbed for his injured neck, Zac hit him again, this time between the eyes. He went out like a light. As he crumpled, Zac caught him under the arms and leaned him over a nearby mailbox.

  Zac looked in the direction of the car. The tourists, who now stood between him and the car, had their cameras pointed in his direction. They clearly seemed excited to see what they must have thought was a real life New York mugging.

  The short fat woman was talking quickly into a mobile phone. Zac could hear her speaking to the cops.

  He turned back to Chinwendu. “Do you still have my gun?”

  She seemed dazed; it took her a second to answer.

  “Your gun … ? Yes — yes I forgot I had it — here you are.” She reached into her African style robe and pulled out the large firearm.

  Suddenly, at the sight of the gun, the tourists started to scream.

  The man by the car was heading towards the commotion, towards them.

  Zac calmly took the gun from Chinwendu and adjusted the tranquillizer setting, lowering the dosage. He turned to face the man who was now approaching them at a fast trot.

  When the man was about one hundred fifty feet away, he pulled his gun and fired.

  Zac watched the bullet approaching and adjusted his stance so the bullet would pass him by. He fired the tranquillizer and the man fell to the ground as the tourists scattered in every direction. Zac put his gun back in its holster and threw the man from the mailbox over his shoulder.

  “Chinwendu, you grab the other one.” He nodded in the direction of the unconscious man in the street. “We’re going to get these two out of the city. We’ll use their car.”

  Chinwendu was still surprised to see him, but she did as commanded. They carried the two back to the car.

  The crowd around them was still screaming and shouting. Zac could hear sirens. The cops were clearly on their way.

  “Throw your guy in the boot, then get in the driver’s seat and get us out of here. I’ll put this one in the back with me.”

  Zac opened the back door of the four-wheel drive and threw the still unconscious man inside. Chinwendu jumped behind the wheel.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  He thought for a moment. “Check the GPS. See where these two have been. With a bit of luck, they had to use the GPS to get around.”

  Chinwendu smiled as she checked the device. “René and Octavien seem to have a bad sense of direction. There is a whole list of places these two have visited in the last few days.”

  “Can you be sure the GPS has been solely used by these two? And which one is this guy?” Zac said as he pointed to the slumped body next to him.

  Watching him in the rear view mirror, Chinwendu pulled out and drove into the street, away from the commotion.

  “The one you have is Octavien, the other is René. They’re brothers,” she said. “I’m sure they used the GPS because it’s been set to French. The last few places in it are restaurants around the city, but there are two other addresses outside the city. I think we should head for those, what do you think?” Chinwendu asked.

  Zac was looking out the rear window as the cop cars pulled up. He turned to face the front of the car. The man beside him began to moan; he was starting to come around.

  “That sounds like a plan. I’ll see what Octavien here has to say for himself.”

  Chinwendu tapped the touch screen on the GPS and started to head out of the city.

  * * *

  Lea stormed out of the shop with Martinez in her wake. He was talking furiously into his mobile phone; after about thirty seconds the call was finished.

  “The roof of the building where the Ops center is set up will be our extraction point. I’ve arranged for a team of Special Ops troops to join us. Some of which will be in the chopper used for our extraction. We’ll meet with the remaining choppers and troops ten klicks from the target. We’ll go in together, you’ll have the lead.”

  Lea stopped in her tracks and turned to face Martinez.

  “This target, where is it and what kind of building is it?”

  Martinez checked his Blackberry. “The target is approximately fifty miles outside New York. It seems to be an estate in the Hudson Valley. The house is a large mansion placed on twenty acres. It appears to be very secluded.” He looked back at Lea.

  Lea paused for a moment staring at the ground. She was troubled by the way things were going. This was Dominic’s style. He always found a way to throw his opponents into disarray. She needed to
take control of the situation. She needed to get the upper hand. Lea knew what they were facing, Martinez didn’t.

  “I think Dominic’s there. Zac mentioned that he sensed he was in a large stately home, and the place you just described certainly fits that description. For that reason, I think it wise if I take the point until Zac rejoins us.”

  Martinez nodded.

  “Tell your men to expect heavy resistance,” Lea said as she opened the door to the building where the extraction was to take place.

  Martinez instantly passed on the information. Two minutes later the two were on the roof, waiting for the Black Hawk.

  As they waited, Lea contacted Doc. “Hi, Doc, is Zac awake yet?”

  “He’s more than awake, he’s captured the two guys from the book shop, and he’s heading to the Hudson Valley. He thinks he has a lead, and from what Martinez has just said, I think he’s right.”

  Lea smiled as she listened to Doc. She knew Zac would cope with anything that came his way — his latest actions certainly proved that to be true. “Can you re-open the communication between our implants please, Doc?”

  “Done, communications are now open. I’ve been listening in on what’s been said between you all. If Dominic is at the target — please be careful. He most likely knows that you’re on your way there by now. He won’t take things lying down.”

  “Thanks for the concern, I’ll be careful. Zac, are you there?”

  “Good to hear your voice, Lea, what’s the score?”

  Lea felt relieved to hear her friend’s voice. She hadn’t realized until this point how worried she had been. She’d been trying not to get too attached to him, but now she knew she’d been kidding herself. She cared for her colleague more than she was willing to admit.

  “We have an inbound chopper coming to take us to the location you’re heading for. We believe Dominic may be there, the location matches the description you gave. We’ll reach the target in 18 minutes, what’s your ETA?” She scanned the sky for the chopper. She saw it in the distance, closing fast.

  “We’re still over forty miles out, so with the traffic most likely an hour. I’ll get Chinwendu to gun it; we could be there in fifty minutes. I’ll get Doc to clear the roads in front of us as best he can. One of the guys from the book shop is coming around, so I’ll see what I can get out of him.”