by Karl Weber
“Negative. Cox is a traitor. I repeat, Cox is a traitor. You’re headed toward an ambush.” Anna’s warning fell on deaf ears as the radio channel was at this point nothing but static. Looking at the monitor, she could see the rogue Specter who separated from Cox. That son of a bitch. Anna figured the Specter must’ve done something to the Secret Service’s communication channel after Cox shrugged off her warning to the POTUS’s bodyguards. The president and his escorts were headed toward an ambush.
Anna quickly made her way out of the security room with nobody else knowing of the danger that the president was headed towards. She kicked off her heels then broke out in a full sprint down the hallway toward the garage. She tried to contact Jack over comms but again heard nothing but static. There was nothing else Anna could do but keep running and hope she could stop the threat in time.
Chapter 12
“Here’s his weapon. It’s primed and ready,” the CIA agent said as he handed the Specter a Dragunov sniper rifle. The rifle had a black finish and looked to be well worn from use.
The rogue Specter took the weapon and looked it over. “This thing is a relic.”
“Maybe. But it does shoot straight.” The CIA agent looked down at the rifle’s previous owner, the Middle Eastern man who lay dead next to his feet. “He killed enough U.S. soldiers with it to attest to that.” The terrorist was shot dead by Cox and was lying in his own blood behind the black van. The third terrorist was dealt the same fate and on the opposite side of the van with an AK-12 in hand as if he had helped gun down the Secret Service agents guarding the president’s limo.
The Specter looked toward the opposite side of the garage where Cox was crouched behind a strategically placed car with his pistol in hand. He would be the one who brought down the terrorist responsible for the assassination of President Huckleberry. Or at least that would be what the public was led to believe. The Specter tapped his SCU and vanished. He brought the rifle barrel over the hood of the van and steadied his sights on the large doorway the president was soon to come through.
The two CIA agents, having done their part, jumped inside a green sedan parked in the garage that Cox had put in place for them to use as a getaway vehicle. The man in the driver seat started the motor and reversed out of the parking spot, which was only two spots down from where he’d parked the van. He put the sedan in drive and slowly maneuvered around the president’s limo, careful not to get too close and ruin the crime scene.
Anna had just exited the hallway and could see the green sedan with its two occupants wearing balaclavas. The sedan drove past the limo as it made the long left-hand corner to make its way toward the garage exit. Anna raised her Brigham 2031 and pointed it toward the escaping vehicle. No single shot from her handgun would disable the vehicle, so Anna’s only hope to prevent the perps from escaping was if she could kill the driver.
She leveled her weapon’s sight onto the head on the masked driver. Anna held her breath to steady her aim and squeezed the trigger. The bullet penetrated the windshield right before it was splattered with the driver’s blood. The vehicle swerved to the right and crashed into the parked vehicle next to the one Cox was crouched behind. Anna fired off two more shots at the rear window and tried to hit the still alive occupant in the passenger seat.
He bent down into his seat as he heard the bullets penetrate the rear window and zip through the vehicle. The CIA agent looked to his left and saw his ally slouched over the steering wheel with blood dripping out of his head.
Cox stood up from where he was hiding and fired off a couple of shots toward Anna. All were misses as she crouched down, still barefoot next to a parked black Secret Service SUV. Cox kept firing to keep Anna suppressed. Meanwhile, the remaining CIA agent tried to escape the crumpled sedan.
He tried the passenger side door before quickly realizing it was pinned shut. Instead, he climbed out of the sedan via the driver-side door after pushing his dead comrade to the asphalt.
Anna peeked out from cover and fired off a couple of shots aimed at Cox. One shot hit the left front fender of the car he was using as cover with the second shot hitting nothing but air.
Cox crouched behind the parked car again to fully shield himself. He knew that was a safe position to be in, as the engine block of the parked car was thick enough to stop any almost any size bullet. Cox peeked around the front fender and noticed one CIA agent dead on the ground and the other crawling out of the car, careful to stay low.
He fell out of the vehicle landing on his dead ally. After a roll the agent’s knees found the asphalt. He looked toward Cox.
“I’ll keep her pinned down,” Cox told the masked agent while giving him the hand gesture to flank. The agent responded with a thumbs up and then drew the pistol he had holstered on his hip. Cox rose up and fired off three more shots in Anna’s direction.
She heard the shots as they clanked off the SUV she was using as cover. Anna knew she was pinned down. The evening gown looked nice on her, but it wasn’t great for storing gadgets. At least there was one gadget that she was able to bring. Her Predator Lenses.
They were such great utility and seamless to wear that Anna figured there was no reason not to wear them just in case. She winked in the right eye for thermal vision with hopes that she might have an easier time spotting her enemies.
Anna slowly peeked around the SUV’s fender and could barely make out the heat signature that was the top half of the head belonging to the CIA agent. It was slowly making its way down the side of the car headed in her direction. Anna was about to fire at the flanker but froze when she saw a human-shaped heat silhouette stand up behind a van on the opposite side of the garage. The silhouette was posed in the position of someone holding a long gun. Anna realized it was the assassin. The rogue Specter. More shots landed on the SUV, making her fall back out of instinct.
The bullets kept hitting the SUV at a consistent rate and left Anna unsure how to do deal with the assassin. She was trapped. That was until she heard a gunshot that sounded like it came from a cannon. Her ears rang as she looked across the garage where Jack had just fired off his .44 Magnum revolver. It was a large enough caliber so loud only a deaf person couldn’t hear it.
Jack looked down his revolver’s iron sights at the masked man he’d just dropped. The man’s blood was sprayed across the rear passenger door. Jack looked to his right at the doorway where he heard a conglomeration of footsteps fast approaching.
The Secret Service agent who led the president’s escort team put his arms up to stop the team in their tracks when he saw Jack standing in the middle of the garage with his weapon drawn. Gazing to their right, the group saw the rest of the carnage that had just ensued.
The rogue Specter grunted as he looked down the Dragunov’s scope. The president’s escorts had stopped just short of the opening. He only had sight on the head Secret Service agent but not the president.
Jack looked toward the group of bodyguards. “Get the president away from here, now.” The head of the team nodded, and the entire group turned around and went back down the hallway.
“You son of a bitch,” the Specter muttered underneath his balaclava. His target was gone, the operation botched. All he wanted to do was take out his frustration on the one responsible. The reticle of the scope was adjusted from the open doorway onto Jack’s head.
Anna recognized the danger Jack had put himself in by ridding the Specter of his target. “Jack, get down!” she shouted. Jack complied and crouched behind the sedan next to him. The bullet just missed him as Jack still heard the sound of it breaking through the air, passing over the top of his head. He looked right and saw the hole in the concrete wall where the shot landed. It gave him an idea where the shooter was located.
The Specter pulled his face away from the rifle’s scope and gazed left where he barely made out Anna crouching behind the black SUV. He raised the Dragunov that he had rested on the hood of the van for stability and repositioned it to put the crosshairs on her.
&n
bsp; Anna noticed the heat silhouette change and instinctively fell back again. The shot hit the asphalt, missing her by inches. She wasn’t sure what to do. She now had the attention of both Cox and the invisible Specter. She looked across the garage at Jack, who was still crouched. Communication between the two of them was next to impossible without their enemies overhearing them.
Jack hatched an idea looking back at her. He pointed at Anna with his index finger before turning it into a gun and acting like he was firing it at the ceiling. He then pointed at himself and made hand gesture to move around something.
After taking a second to process what he was trying to tell her, Anna nodded at him. She brought her handgun over the hood of the SUV she was crouched behind and blind fired a couple shots toward the Specter. Anna knew none of them would hit; it was just to keep everyone else’s attention off Jack. It must’ve worked, as Cox fired off two shots at her while the Specter fired off another shot that again hit pavement.
Taking advantage of the diversion Anna gave him, Jack pressed himself against the garage wall and moved forward. He tightly clutched his large caliber revolver as he moved toward the sniper who’d shot at him.
After passing by three parked cars, Jack stopped when he noticed the dead terrorist in a pool of blood. He had a vague line of sight on Cox, who was in cover on the opposite side of the garage and considered taking a shot. Jack decided he wasn’t ready to give up his position, especially with him still not knowing exactly where the sniper was. He waited until he knew Cox wouldn’t notice him cross the open space. When Cox rose out of cover to fire at Anna, Jack made his move.
Anna knew that Jack had no way of knowing he was sneaking up on an invisible Specter. Unsure what to do, Anna watched Jack as he crossed the empty parking space.
Jack made it to the other side of the van and raised an eyebrow at the dead terrorist he found at his feet. He looked up to see Cox directly across from him. Jack raised his revolver to fire at him until …
“He’s right in front of you,” Jack heard Anna shout. “The Specter’s invisible.”
Her second statement told Jack what he needed to know as he lowered the barrel of his revolver and fired at what to him looked like nothing but air. The Specter reappeared with his back on the ground and a largely noticeable bullet wound on his ribs. The tac suit Specters wore had Kevlar fiber that stopped most handgun rounds, but the .44 Magnum was one of few exceptions due to the bullet’s massive size.
The Specter looked back at Jack and showed no sign of surrender as he went for the pistol on his chest holster. Jack fired his hand cannon one more time and terminated the Specter. Before he had time to look up, Jack felt a bullet cut through his left shoulder. He fell on his back, dropped his revolver, and found himself lying on the asphalt and staring into the eyes of the dead terrorist.
The two were ironically shot by the same person. Cox stood up from cover to land the finishing blow on the man who helped ruin everything. Cox was aiming at Jack, who was reaching for his revolver but had no chance of getting to it in time. That was until Cox dropped to the ground after being shot in the chest himself.
He slowly brought himself to his knees and crawled forward to retrieve his handgun, but it was kicked away by a barefoot Anna. He found himself looking straight down the barrel of her Brigham 2031.
Anna stared at the defeated man with a cold piercing look in her eyes. “You’re finished, Cox. Cooperate or …”
“Or what? If I help you, I die. If I don’t help you, I die. Just fucking shoot me and get it over with.”
“I could do that. Or I could keep you alive and convince you to cooperate using less than pleasant methods.”
Cox scoffed at her remark. “I’m sure you would do that.” His right hand made its way under his dirtied suit jacket. “But I’d rather go out with some dignity.” Cox drew a little 9mm pistol from his waistband and raised it toward Anna before going limp after she shot him in the head.
“Damn it,” Anna muttered. It really sucked. All of the accomplices that she and Jack had met in the assassination attempt were now dead, leaving nobody to question. Nobody that could be used to help convict those behind the attack. Anna turned herself around and looked at Jack sitting up and clutching his shoulder. She walked up to him.
Grunting in pain, he shrugged off his tux jacket to reveal his bloodied white shirt underneath. Anna looked at her partner with concern. Jack looked at his bloody shoulder before looking back up at Anna. “I’ll live.”
Anna scoffed before holstering her pistol and getting down on her knees next to him. “Not if you bleed out. Take off your shirt,” she ordered like a nurse instructing her patient. Jack unbuttoned his shirt, and she helped him work his way out of it.
There was an entrance wound on Jack’s left shoulder where Cox’s shot had landed. Anna checked the back of Jack’s shoulder for an exit wound and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that there was. She reached over to the Specter’s dead body and retrieved the small first-aid kit attached to his utility belt, then opened the kit and retrieved a roll of gauze. She wrapped it around Jack’s shoulder to cover the bullet wound and slow the bleeding.
“Who was he?” Jack asked, gesturing at the dead Specter only feet from him.
Anna stood back up and walked over to the Specter before pulling his balaclava off. The man’s rough chiseled face along with his unkept whiskers and thick eyebrows told Anna everything she needed to know. “His name is, or was, Travis Snyder. Somewhat of an old-timer in the Specter program. He was getting close to retirement. Was always an opportunist. Can’t say I’m surprised that he would sell out.” Anna sighed. “I should’ve suspected him.”
“Don’t be like that.” Jack could sense Anna’s guilt and wanted to comfort her.
She looked back at him. “How can I not? If we fail at keeping the president safe, then what good are we?”
Jack reached up and softly grabbed Anna’s hand to get her attention. He looked her straight in the eyes. “We didn’t fail. Not yet at least. There are too many backstabbers in this government to keep track of. We cannot always predict who will attack us next. Only be there to stop them when they do.”
Anna took a deep breath. Jack’s words seemed to help. Being the co-leader of an entire espionage unit was so much more demanding than just being a Specter working for the CIA. The days of being a spy who just followed orders and went where they were told sure seemed so easy looking back on it.
Anna looked down at Snyder and saw something that could be of use. She bent down and undid Snyder’s SCU device attached to his left wrist, pulling it off him.
“Going to have Price take a look at that?” Jack asked.
Anna inspected the device closely. She brought it up to her own SCU that that was completely identical. “A Spectral Control Unit has some of the hardest software to crack on the planet,” she remarked. A Specter’s SCU was probably one of the last devices the U.S. government would want to fall into enemy hands due to the sensitive information kept on them.
“Then I guess it’s a good thing we have one of the best hackers on the planet at our disposal.”
“Indeed.” Anna looked at Snyder’s SCU one more time before walking over and putting the device into one of inner pockets of Jack’s tux jacket. “If we don’t know who to trust, then I’d rather not take any chances with the crime scene analysts misplacing something.”
“Good idea. Just make sure to get me a doctor before I become a victim of the crime scene too, alright?”
Anna looked down at the dead bodies that surrounded them and shook her head over her boyfriend’s choice of time for humor.
Chapter 13
Anna was lost in thought. She was sitting down at her desk inside her personal office located on the ninth floor of the Vigilance HQ building. It was nice, spacious, and across the hall from Jack’s. Anna’s had a scenic view of Chesapeake Bay along with the rest of the city of Baltimore, which made Jack jealous. The windows were tinted triple-glazed, simi
lar to the windows the NSA headquarters used to avoid electronic eavesdropping. So much had happened in the last few days that she just needed a moment to wrap her head around the outcomes.
Her train of thought was broken when the glass door to her office slid open and Jack walked in. He was back in his usual suit and tie.
“How are you feeling?” Anna asked.
Jack swung his left arm back and forth. He only grunted a little bit as a result. “I won’t be trying out for any football leagues anytime soon, but I should be fine.” The statement reminded Jack of his college days back when he played as a college football quarterback on scholarship. His peers thought that he might’ve been good enough to go pro, but Jack had decided he would rather have a career where he could make a real difference in the world.
He sat down across from Anna. They both decided the night prior that a meeting in the morning to discuss where to go next was in order. “Only three days until the election,” Jack stated.
Anna knew what he was implying. “Meaning there’s still time for another attack.”
Jack wrapped his arms behind his head and leaned back in his seat while letting out a long sigh. “Also meaning we don’t have long to figure out when and where the next attack is going to happen.”
“What’s the president doing for protection now?”
“I was informed he wasn’t leaving the White House anytime soon.”
“Doesn’t mean he’s safe?”
“My thoughts exactly.” Jack’s eyes were closed as he relaxed in his chair.
Anna, feeling burned out herself, was using her arm as a headrest while she let out a sigh herself. She then remembered a point of conversation from the Deep State meeting. “Didn’t Daniels mention something about a backup plan?”
Jack’s eye’s shot open, and he sat up straight in his chair. “He did. It was with Patterson, I believe. Something about Daniels didn’t want to sacrifice their ace in the hole.”