by J. N. Chaney
Sanders sputtered. “Shoot your…? Slow down—”
“I offer you something in good faith, and this is what I get?”
“Hal, listen, I’m not sure what you think just happened, but—”
“From now on, we kill a hostage every hour on the hour until our demands are met. Do you understand?”
Sanders sounded desperate to regain control of the situation. “Hal, listen. We are working as hard as we can to negotiate something with the Liberation Front.”
“The Ti Bier Liberation Front!” Oubrick snapped. “Get it right!”
“The Ti Bier Liberation Front,” Sanders corrected. “But these things take time.”
“Then you can do the math on how many hostages you’re willing to sacrifice until it’s done, can’t you.”
“Hal, wait—”
“We’ll talk again when you have better news for me,” Oubrick said, and then flicked off the radio. Then, over his own comm, Oubrick said, “Travis, report.”
“We’ve got them pinned down in the fifth-level offices,” one of the men replied.
“How convenient for them,” Lars interjected.
I told him to be quiet as Oubrick spoke again. This time, however, I felt a chill go up my spine.
“To the vigilantes who’ve been assaulting my men,” said the leader, “I wish to congratulate you on your six kills. That is quite an accomplishment, if I do say so myself.”
“He thinks there’s more than one of you, sir,” Lars noted. “That’s an accomplishment.”
“Well, aren’t we?” I asked, winking at the closest security camera.
“I can only assume,” Oubrick continued, “that you have obtained our communication frequency and have been listening in. Therefore, hear this: I will execute the night administrator in my care in exactly—” Oubrick paused, and I imagined him setting his fancy analog watch— “fifteen minutes. If you wish to save her, you know where to find us. See you soon.”
The channel went silent as the fire retardant continued to spill into the office. I backed away, trying to think of what to do next. Then, as if the fates smiled on me, something went right for a change.
“Let’s split up,” said a voice from down the hall. It was Travis. “You go left, I go right.”
“Copy that,” replied Lundgren.
Big mistake, boys, I thought.
13
Based on the directions Travis had doled out moments before, the bruiser entering my office wing was Lundgren. He seemed to ignore the dense fire retardant swirling around his helmet’s bullet-proof visor, and kept his automatic weapon up. He was methodical, clearing one aisle of cubicles before moving to the next. This was both good and bad. Good in that he was predictable. Bad in that he was being very thorough. Like the man who’d first investigated the security hallway on the first floor, this man was a professional.
My hope was that I could take him out with minimal effort in order to put distance between me and the next assailant, Travis. Hopefully, Travis was just as busy in his own office wing, and I could put Lundgren down before Travis could back him up. The last thing I wanted right now was facing both of these heavily-armed professionals at the same time.
I had to act fast, I had to be precise, and I had to be merciless. This boiled down to violence of action and speed, plain and simple.
I lay prone beneath a desk in a cubicle two rows from Lundgren’s current path, holding my pistol in a firm two-handed grip. All he needed to do was come around and down the next row. When he walked by the ten-centimeter gap under the cubicle wall that I was spying under, I’d unload on his feet. I slowed my breathing and readied myself for the critical moment slowly walking my way. Couldn’t he hurry it up a little?
Almost all firearms training, whether private, military, or law enforcement, focused on hitting targets center mass or in the head—the latter being more deadly but with a larger margin of error. Rare was the school and more demanding was the program that forced trainees to focus on unconventional methods of dispatching an assailant—more brutal ways.
Conventions and accords of all kinds had been drafted to keep evil out of war. But that never made sense to me. Those bureaucrats wanted to keep good people from becoming bad guys in combat—prevent the whole to kill a monster you have to become the monster thing. I got it. Really, I did. But it was silly. If you’re going to kill someone, and you’re going to be good at it, of course you had to become a monster! If you didn’t, more good people would die, starting with you.
When facing the enemy, the point wasn’t to keep from becoming a monster, it was choosing what kind of monster you wanted to be. If there was anything I’d learned while attending the law enforcement and military’s joint Advanced Tactical Evasion and Combat school—or ATEC—that was it: to choose the beast within. If you let someone else choose for you, you’d already lost. Instead, it was up to you to maintain self-control, to think outside the box, and to execute with precision every damn time.
It was also where I learned how to leverage the human body’s astounding intolerance for pain to my own advantage. Sure, a bullet to the heart and one to the head dropped an enemy cold. But those weren’t always available. Like right now. Instead, you had to look for weak spots—for chinks in the proverbial plate armor. Or, in my case, the body armor and riot gear. So I went with the most under-protected point of the majority of all combatants…
Their feet. As my own situation proved in spades.
To be honest, I always found the lack of armament around operative’s feet surprising, since the rest of the human body counts on those two little extensions of meat and bone to stay upright—a fact I was about to prove yet again.
Lundgren had turned down my row and was moving toward me. I repositioned my hands on my pistol and waited. I heard his heavy footfalls, louder under the weight of all that riot gear.
The toes of his right foot appeared under the cubicle wall, then his whole left foot. I breathed out, placed my sights on his ankle, and squeezed.
The weapon’s report was deafening from under the desk. The muzzle flash lit up the space like daylight, and the smell of spent gunpowder seared my nostrils. But none of those factors deterred me from looking away as the round blew out the other side of Lundgren’s leg. I fired twice more, separating his shin from his foot in a splintered spray of blood and bone.
The man screamed, falling to his right knee, and then crashed to the ground. I repositioned my sidearm, now aiming up into the man’s exposed ass, and fired three more rounds. He jerked as the bullets drilled into the bottom of his torso, slamming into gastrointestinal organs. But the man wasn’t going down without a fight.
Lundgren summoned what strength he had, surely fueled by a surge of rage, and rolled over on his side, bringing his face in line with mine. I moved my pistol to hit him in the head, but not before he brought his own weapon around and fired. The bullets went wide, but they did force me to roll away out of my hiding place.
He squeezed the trigger again, sending a spray of gunfire skimming across the top of the office carpet, ripping long troughs through the fibers. But I was off the ground, climbing up on the desk. I glanced over the top of the cubicle and pointed my weapon over the other side, aiming at his belly.
I fired several shots, most of which struck him in the lower abdomen and groin. I could see blood pooling around him in the carpet. He had only seconds left to live—which meant my job here was done. The only bad part was that all the gunfire had surely given away my position and attracted his partner, Travis. And if hadn’t, his next comm transmission sure did.
“Lundgren,” Travis yelled over comms. “Is that you?”
“Northeast office wing,” Lundgren said through a garbled hiss of pain. “Single shooter—”
The rest of whatever he was about to say was cut short as I fired two rounds under his helmet’s visor and into his throat. His neck exploded on the carpet, releasing his head’s weight from his body and causing it to roll away.
> I stared at the body for a second, willing myself to connect the gruesome image with the hostages who’d already been killed, as well as all those who would be if I didn’t get this job done.
“Lundgren? Lundgren!” Travis swore over comms and then said, “I’ll be right there!”
It was time to move. I leaped down from the desk and holstered my pistol. Then I pulled my MX090 back up and started running down the rows of workstations.
“Any bright ideas, Lars?” I asked. “You can’t tell me how to make hand grenades out of staplers by any chance, can you?”
“I’m sorry, sir, but there is no record—”
“It’s a joke, buddy.”
“Ah, very good, sir. On another note—”
“Does it have to do with killing Travis?”
“Not directly, no, sir.”
“You think maybe it can wait, then?”
“It concerns Miss Fontaine, sir.”
“You mean Rachel? The cute hostage from earlier?” I asked, recalling her in that tight dress.
“While I cannot speak to the subjectivity of her cuteness, per se, I can confirm that, yes, that Rachel, sir.”
“Hurry it up, pal. I’m about to get shot at again.”
“Understood. You are approaching the corner office that she has taken sanctuary in.”
“That one?” I asked, pointing with my free hand. “Up there to the left?”
“Indeed, sir. The views seem to be as panoramic as she previously indicated.”
“I don’t care about the views right now, Lars. Is this all just to let me know which office not to shoot into?”
“No, sir. I wanted to inform you that it appears as though Miss Fontaine is on Mr. Reynold’s computer and is attempting to access the vault’s internal security matrix.”
“What?” I said, slowing slightly. “How is she doing that? I thought you said the whole system is locked down.”
“I did, sir. As for how she is interfacing with the vault, it seems she is using a highly complex decryption key to attempt a system incursion and—”
“A system incursion?” Suddenly, my image of Rachel began to change. But I couldn’t reconcile the emotional woman in the security lounge with who Lars said was currently hacking into the building’s network. Had the lady played me? If so, she’d fooled me good. “Lars, buddy, you sure we’re talking about the same Rachel Fontaine from downstairs?”
“The cute one, yes. And while I can’t be entirely certain of her intentions, it appears as though Miss Fontaine is most likely trying to prevent the vault from opening.”
“Prevent?” Well, that changed things a little. “As in, keep Oubrick out?”
“That is correct, sir.”
Just then, a voice commanded that I stop from far behind me. I didn’t even turn around to see who it was—which was good, since bullets smacked into the wall I was running toward, barely missing my body. Damn, this guy can shoot, I noted.
“Who’s out there?” asked a woman’s voice from behind the corner office door coming up on my left.
“Let me guess,” I said to Lars. “Rachel.”
“Indeed, sir.”
Just great. The last thing I wanted was for automatic weapons fire to penetrate a door where another hostage was being held—even if that hostage was a computer nerd from accounts receivable doing gods knew what with the network. Hells, I’d take any help I could get right now. But with how fast Travis was gaining on me, I worried that a confrontation outside her door was going to be unavoidable.
“Rachel? It’s me, Flint,” I yelled.
“Flint?” She started playing with the lock.
“No! No! Don’t open the door!”
“Why not?” she asked. As if to answer her question, a stream of bullets flew past my head and pelted the corner office. Several rounds plunked into her door. Fortunately, the wood looked pretty thick, and I couldn’t see any light from inside the office.
“Stay down!” I yelled.
“They’re shooting at me!” she screamed.
“No,” I said in a corrective tone. “They’re shooting at me. You stay hidden and shut up!”
Rachel didn’t reply. Good girl, I thought.
Another spray of gunfire peppered the cubicles as I dove for cover. Something told me that Travis was going to be harder to take down.
14
I needed to get Travis firing away from Rachel’s office. I’d never forgive myself if that woman died from a stray round to the head. Still, I was running out of room. This was the end of the office wing and all I had were workstations and several outer offices.
With the element of surprise long gone and my options dwindling, I decided to take a stand among the desks and force Travis to ground. Then I could use my agility against his heavier load out and try to out maneuver him. Such a strategy had plenty of pitfalls. But I was fast, and with any luck, I could flank him with a few well-placed rounds.
I ran in a crouch, moving past several workstations, and then popped up with my MX090 in ready position. Travis was looking at where I’d been instead of where I was now. I saw a look of surprise register on his face while I squeezed off three rounds at him. But he moved his riot shield between us and the bullets were deflected with loud thunks.
Travis returned fire, his weapon switching into an ultra-high-rate of fire. It shredded the cubicle tops directly in front of me like it was shooting through paper. Whatever that rifle was, it was badass. But not as badass as mine—I just needed to get past his riot shield.
I ran another three spaces down the row, intending to create a pattern for Travis to anticipate. Then I planted my feet and popped up, firing two more rounds that I had no intention of landing on him. Still, the bullets struck his shield as before. But he started moving in my direction along his own row. Bingo.
“Sir, if you intend to use the same maneuver again, you have an eighty-seven percent chance of being—”
“If I want your percentages, Lars, I’ll ask!” I yelled as more gunfire filled the space my head and shoulders had just occupied.
“Is that something you would like instituted as a permanent condition or only for—”
“Shut up, Lars!”
“Let’s institute it for now,” Lars concluded. “Shutting up, sir.”
I moved down another few spaces and made ready to pop up, when Travis beat me to it and shredded the cubicle wall above my head. Guess Lars was right after all. But I’d wanted him to be. I stole a quick glance to see Travis slide to his left even more, sidestepping along with me.
Now was my chance to double back the way I’d come.
I grew up playing the carnival games at the Founders Day celebrations when it rolled around every year. My favorite was Bulltooth Basher. Only a few of my friends ever figured out the pattern—everyone else said the damn animals appeared at random. But they didn’t. It was an algorithm. You just had to have a fast enough memory to memorize it. And when you did, you could pop the suckers off with the laser gun. Eventually, I’d won so many giant stuffed animals for girls that the fair owners tracked me down and banned me from the game. Within another two years, they’d ban me from the entire carnival altogether. But Jennifer Lee kissed me when I gave her that giant Razzo Ripple stuffed animal and it made it all worth it.
I was almost all the way back to where I’d entered the row, when I heard gunfire erupt on the opposite end—at the place where Travis expected I would pop up next. Assumptions are a bitch.
He hadn’t even stopped firing when I brought my MX090 over the top of the closest cubicle and fired, this time on full-auto. Flames leaped from the end of my muzzle as a torrent of bullets crossed the office wing and struck Travis’s flank. Most were absorbed in his extensive body armor, while others glanced off his helmet. But I only needed a few to find the gaps in his armor.
Travis swore then swatted at the rounds like they were an angry swarm of fire wasps. Before I could see if I’d inflicted any damage, he twisted toward me and returne
d fire. I ducked just as his stream of fire whizzed over my head. More cubicle material shot into the air. Bits of plastic and plexiglass pelted me as I covered my head and doubled back yet again in the opposite direction.
Travis must have been really pissed, since his finger remained on the trigger far longer than it should have. One key to winning a firefight was fire control. The best weapon in the world didn’t do you any good if it was empty. Still, Travis continued blowing through rounds until I heard that magical little sound.
Click.
I stood up, back on his shield-side again, and poured rounds into his flank. In his haste, he’d not only failed to manage his ammunition well, but he’d failed to raise his shield. My rounds slammed into his chest and head and, once again, he swore and tried batting the rounds away. This time, however, I saw blood spray out behind him. I knew then that my efforts weren’t in vain. I still couldn’t tell what I’d hit, but it didn’t matter—the bastard was wounded.
Travis brought his shield up as he dropped his spent magazine and inserted a new one. Then he racked the first round and raised his assault rifle. By then, however, I was back down in my trench, bolting for the middle.
“Come out, you little bitch!” Travis roared. “And I’m gonna make you bleed.” For emphasis, the man sprayed a burst of bullets down and back along the row of cubicles—which was a complete waste. He was losing control.
“Sir,” said Lars. “Might I suggest the stapler beside your head?”
“You already told me they don’t make good grenades,” I whispered.
“No, sir. I mean for use as a distraction. Your assailant’s blood pressure is spiking, and the hormones in his amygdala and greater limbic system have given him tunnel vision, resulting in a failure to process information objectively.”
“What in the hells are you are you talking about, Lars?”
“Throwing the stapler may distract him, thus providing you ample opportunity to hit him again.”
“Oh.” I reached up and grabbed the stapler. “I take back every mean thing I’ve ever said about you.”