Autumn (Four Seasons Book 1)

by Robert Sullivan

  “Hello everyone, this is Greg Carlton. We cannot let the Black Hand to continue to destroy the city. I think we should revisit Bob's idea to recruit people."

  Within a minute of sending the email, Greg received an invitation to an instant messaging app. He accepted it and found himself in a group chat with the conspirators. His coworkers were already online, apparently also taking advantage of the lack of oversight by the director.

  “Welcome Greg,” Bob wrote. “What do you mean recruit?”

  “I say we go out on the streets and find people who want to help stop the Black Hand,” Greg wrote back.

  “Electing people won't get anything done,” Christine messaged.

  “I didn't mean we find politicians. I mean we find fighters,” Greg replied.

  There was no reply for a minute, leaving Greg fixated on his screen, waiting for somebody to message back. He was worried that he would be kicked out of the group chat when Charles replied, “We don't really have any choice at this point. We either fight back or die.”

  “How do you propose we do this?” Bob wrote.

  Greg was about to reply when Eric joined the conversation by writing, “If only you had somebody on the outside that could leak you information about Black Hand activities. Maybe if you had that information, you could find a way to stop them.”

  Greg cracked a smile and wrote, “Is there anyone else you know in the Black Hand that might be convinced to help you set up this spy network?”

  Before Eric could reply, Bob wrote a message that said, “You aren't in charge here, Greg. This is too dangerous for us to even think about.”

  Greg was about to write a furious reply when Charles and Christine both replied at the same time. “We need to do something Bob and if you won't do anything then Greg should lead us…We don't have time for this, Bob, either fall in or get out.”

  Eric chimed in as well, saying, “I want Greg in charge.”

  Ashley finally joined the discussion, saying, “I want Greg to lead as well.”

  Greg held his breath. Everyone in the conspiracy had just declared that he should be their leader, except for the previous one. The possibility that he could lead a fight against the people who had so wounded his city was an intense feeling for him. To exact justice and revenge against the people who had caused so much pain was an exciting prospect.

  Bob finally replied back, “I don't think this is the right way to go about things. But if this is how everyone feels, then I will fall in line.”

  Greg smiled. “Thank you all for your support,” he replied.

  “What do you want us to do?” Eric asked.

  Greg was about to reply when Christine suddenly messaged, “Hang on I just got a line into Drexel's office so we can eavesdrop on her. Let's listen in:”

  Greg plugged headphones into the computer and clicked on the link that Christine had sent. Emma Drexel's voice immediately started speaking and she sounded very agitated.

  “...this was not a part of the deal. I agreed to look the other way while you propped up the Black Hand on the condition that they would not do anything like this. I even let them abduct Veronica Lopez as a concession to you. Do you know how hard it was to cover up an agent's disappearance and make it look like she was dead?”

  Greg's heart skipped a few beats as Emma paused to let whoever she was talking to speak. “That's a bullshit excuse and you know it. It was bad enough you let the Black Hand get so far out of hand that a federal investigation was started against me. How do you think they are going to react to this? Even the President is calling for my resignation. That's how bad this has gotten.”

  Emma paused again before she said in a low, more worried tone, “Wait, you told them explicitly to rob the Federal Reserve? Why?”

  Greg could scarcely believe what he was hearing as Emma continued, “Well was all this worth the trouble? Let me answer that, no! I suppose it's all fine and good that YOU are doing well in the face of this crisis, but I am facing prison! The deal is off, do you hear me!? I am going to resign this afternoon and I am going to tell my successor not to play your game.”

  There was a pause again as the other person starting yelling too, though he could not make out what they were saying. “I don't care!” Emma shouted back. “Just be...”

  There a sound of shattered glass and a falling noise. Greg stood up to look in the direction of the office and saw Christine already rushing into the room. Charles and Ashley got up as well and followed Christine into the room, followed shortly by Greg.

  Emma Drexel was lying face down on the floor with a hole in her back where a bullet had struck her. The window pane had shattered upon being breached by the bullet. Greg looked out the window, but could not see anyone. He turned back to see Charles calling 911 and Christine down on the floor trying to help Emma.

  Greg did not know what to feel until Emma said weakly, “Is Greg here?”

  “I am,” Greg said flatly, walking over to her and kneeling down so she could see him.

  “I'm sorry, Greg,” she said, spitting blood.

  “For what?” he asked, pretending he had not heard the conversation.

  “I let them take Veronica,” Emma said. “I wanted to keep them from bothering us directly so I made a deal with them.”

  Greg leaned in closer, forgetting his hostility towards Emma for a moment. “Is she alive?” he asked desperately.

  “I don't know,” Emma said, coughing up more blood. The bullet had done serious damage to he abdomen and she was bleeding too much.

  There was no point in pretending they had not just heard the conversation. “Who were you just talking to? It sounded like they were propping up the Black Hand.” Greg asked.

  Emma did not look angry that he had been eavesdropping on her. “I don't know. All they promised is that I would be rewarded for not going after the Black Hand. Some reward it turned out to be,” she said, her voice weakening further.

  Greg did not say anything, so she continued with her last breaths, “Greg, you have to stop them. Make amends for what I did.”

  Greg looked her straight in the eye and said, “I will.”

  Emma had lost too much blood at that point. She let her head fall on the carpet and breathed her last. Greg knew that he should feel sad, but given his hostility towards his boss over the last month, it was hard to muster up sorrow. The others felt the same way, as none of them looked remotely sorrowful at Emma’s death.

  Greg noticed her phone had fallen on her desk when she had been shot and the call was still active. He picked it up and barked, “Who is this?”

  A computerized female voice answered, “No one of your concern.”

  “It is my concern,” Greg said furiously. “You attacked my city. You took my fiancée. I’m going to take your Black Hand down.”

  “By all means, go ahead and try,” the voice replied. “Although even if you did manage to take out the Black Hand, it wouldn’t get you anywhere. My movement is much larger than some street gang.”

  “What do you mean?” Greg demanded.

  There was no answer as the line went dead. Greg threw the phone across the room where it shattered against the wall. “Who was that? What did they say?” Christine asked urgently.

  “Whoever it was, they covered up their voice by talking through a computer,” Greg said bitterly. “This person said that they were a part of something much bigger than the Black Hand. She said we would learn just how big soon.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Christine asked.

  “I don’t know,” Greg replied, glancing out the window. “Whoever they are though, they are controlling the Black Hand in some way at least. So to get to them, we have to go through the Black Hand.”

  “What do you want us to do?” Charles asked.

  “We need to get into the Black Hand and find out what they are up to next,” Greg explained. “For that we need Eric.”

  “I’ll get him on the phone so you can talk to him directly,” Christine said.
/>
  “Good. I’ll need Bob too. He seems to be the one most eager to expand this conspiracy. He may not like why we need to expand it now, but I’m sure he’ll still do it,” Greg reasoned.

  “I’ll help him with that,” Charles said.

  “What do you want me to do?” Ashley asked.

  “I’m not sure yet,” Greg replied. “What do you want to do?”

  Ashley thought for a moment, then said, “I can raise our profile on social media. You know there are a bunch of shadowy groups that no one really knows who they are? I can make something like that for us.”

  Greg nodded. “I’ll leave you to it then.”

  Later that evening, Greg was back at his apartment. The smoke from the destruction was finally beginning to clear as the shorthanded fire department had finally been able to get ahead of the situation since the attacks had ceased. It certainly did not hurt that they were protected by heavily armed National Guardsmen. For the first day since the previous Friday, the city was quiet.

  Greg was in his recliner with the news on nearby, though he was not paying close attention to it. He was busy thinking about the insurrection he was plotting against the Black Hand. The excitement that he had felt earlier had begun to ebb away and nervousness was beginning to set in.

  It was not just the Black Hand, although that by itself seemed an insurmountable task considering the size and scale of the attack they had just launched. Greg was also worried about whatever was pulling the strings behind the Black Hand. From what that person had said, they were much larger than the Black Hand, though with similar malicious intentions.

  Yet Greg could not help but feel that the voice, though filtered by a computer, seemed familiar. Maybe it was somebody that he had seen on TV before. One thing Greg was sure about, however, was that the person had been female. He had no doubt that this mysterious woman was pulling the strings of both the Black Hand and the organization behind them. How she was doing it or why was beyond Greg at the moment, though he was determined to find out.

  A news report came on that caught Greg’s attention. It was not about what happened to New York, but it was related. “The Iowa caucuses were supposed to happen last night, but in the wake of the attacks in New York, the three major parties cancelled the caucus and rescheduled them for a week later. The hopeful candidates are in New Hampshire, trying to get their first delegates since none were awarded in Iowa last night,” a reporter said.

  Greg frowned. He had not thought about the caucus at all given what had happened. It did not surprise him that they would be cancelled. From what he understood, when the September 11th attacks had occurred, all air travel in the nation had been shut down. It would not surprise him that a caucus halfway around the country would be cancelled in the wake of a national tragedy.

  The reporter continued, “One candidate, however, is not wasting any time in New Hampshire. The Globalist candidate Liam Hensen does not face a primary battle and is using the free time to help the people of New York. Hensen tried to get into the city, but was unable to because of the virtual lockdown of the city. Instead, he is running a donation drive in Carmel to aid people who have been made homeless in the wake of the attacks.”

  The footage cut to Liam Hensen, who was indeed running a donation drive. He spoke to the reporters that were there while collecting clothes and putting them in boxes. “It is absolutely unacceptable that this happened. As a country, we need to come together and so no more to this kind of violence. We cannot let our cities burn to the ground like this.”

  Greg was suitably impressed; Hensen at least was not using the tragedy to peddle for votes. He had known politicians to take the mantra, “Never let a good crisis go to waste,” a little too literally. To his credit, Liam Hensen was not doing that; he simply seemed concerned with the welfare of the people who had suffered.

  Though he had not been much into politics in years past, Greg had resolved to follow this election a bit more closely than that in the past, since it would have huge ramifications to the ongoing economic depression and civil unrest. Liam Hensen seemed like someone he could vote for.

  Greg decided to follow his campaign a bit more closely. If his insurgency against the Black Hand start to work out somehow, maybe he could enlist help from Liam Hensen. It would be a huge strategic advantage to have a Presidential candidate speak out against the Black Hand and urge New Yorkers to take up Greg’s cause.

  As the news story ended, Greg looked out across the city from his window. Somewhere out there, people were suffering and those who had caused the suffering had gotten away. His face hardened as the idea of revenge boiled up in him again. He hoped he would not have to wait long to start exacting justice on the Black Hand for what they did.

  Chapter Nine

  The Prayer

  Following the shock of the attack in New York, February saw a flurry of activity across the nation to try to help heal the wounds that had been opened. Donation and blood drives were conducted all over the country and private companies pledged their support as well, rushing much needed supplies like warm clothes, food, and water to the displaced of the city. It brought a sense of unity to Americans that had not been felt in a long time.

  Rebecca could not help but feel left out of this care and support Americans had developed for one another. To be sure, there was a record number of supplies being sent to New York. However, she felt that Kansas City needed the same kind of attention from the average American and they were not getting it. Whatever help the city needed, it would have to come from within the city itself as the nation’s care was currently fixated on the financial capital of the world.

  In the first weeks of February, Rebecca and Anne had gone with Ed and Kathleen to try to set up donation drives for the people within Kansas City. In the wake of the New York attack, however, they were having a hard time getting people to donate to the people in Kansas City. That was even if they could get donations at all, given the economic trouble that gripped the city. There was not much charity to go around and what little there was to go around was sent to New York. For the Smiths, it was a long road back.

  On President’s Day weekend, Anne and Rebecca were up in the tower brainstorming ideas to elicit donations for Kansas City. The Midwest was showing its usual inconsistency in weather, with spring like temperatures on tap for that day. Rebecca had opened the balcony window to let the warm air waft in.

  Anne and Rebecca were sitting on the floor, looking at a map of the city. They were looking for more affluent areas to target with the hopes there would be a better shot of finding donations there. They had already gone through most of Prairie Village, which was a small suburb to the south of Kansas City proper that straddled the state line on the Kansas side. The only part of that enclave they had not gotten to yet was the area along the Missouri border itself.

  There was a sudden knock on their door and they turned to see Georgia peer into the room. “Can I come in?” she asked.

  Her presence came as a surprise to the two girls. She had been content to stay behind and work on her schoolwork while Anne and Rebecca had gone off to help improve the community and had not interacted with them much since the snow day. Nonetheless, Rebecca replied, “Sure. We’re just talking about where we are going to ask for donations next.”

  Georgia sat down next to them, frowning at the map. “Where did you two come from exactly?” she asked, not mincing words.

  Anne and Rebecca glanced at each other. Ed and Kathleen knew about their backstory, but they had not told any of their foster siblings. “Why do you want to know?” Anne asked shortly.

  “I have a good reason to ask, because I want to know if you are putting this family in danger,” Georgia said forcefully.

  “How would we putting this family in danger?” Rebecca asked.

  “I interact with other people outside this house,” Georgia explained. “We don’t live in a bubble here. They’re saying the reason the gangs are so active across the river is because there were these two
girls who went through their turf. They started a gang war that hasn’t stopped since. And then suddenly, you two show up.”

  “It seems like a coincidence to me,” Anne said, coldly.

  “Is it though?” Georgia asked. “I saw the way you two reacted when Ed told us about the gang violence up north. Now suddenly you’re trying to get it to stop. It’s like you know you did something bad and are trying to make up for it.”

  “We didn’t do anything wrong,” Rebecca spat. “We were just walking around.”

  “Rebecca!” Anne said.

  “Did you stop to think that they might find out you are here and come after us all?” Georgia asked.

  “Are they still looking for us?” Rebecca asked.

  “So I’ve been told,” Georgia said coldly. “I know people who are close to those gangs. What you are trying to do here, it isn’t going to work.”

  “Why wouldn’t it?” Rebecca asked, frowning.

  “Do you think that getting people to donate stuff to the refugees are going to help with the gangs at all?” Georgia asked harshly. “I’m not dumb enough to go up there to look for myself, but I know people who are closer to it then we are and they say it’s a warzone.”

  Rebecca knew it, though she did not want to admit it. She knew that helping the refugees would just be treating the symptoms, not actually rooting out the problem. “We didn’t really know what else we could do.”

  Georgia sighed and got up quickly. She walked to the door, peered down the stairs to the tower to see if they were empty, then shut and locked the bedroom door. As she came back over to them she said, “Look, if Ed and Kathleen knew what I was really up to when I was supposed to be doing homework, they’d flip their shit. They want to try peaceful ways to solve the problems of this city, but that won’t work. I joined a sort of underground resistance in the city to the gang problem.”

  “You what?” Anne asked incredulously.