Chapter 10

~ONE MONTH AGO~

When Major George Slate escaped UEO custody, he contacted General Albert Denton.

"Slate, where the hell are you?" Denton fumed.

"I'm well-hidden. Did all of our targets survive?" He'd been part of an Air Force black-ops team assigned to dispose of some UEO traitors—Captain Bridger, Lieutenant O'Neill, and Lucas Wolenczak—and make it look like an accident.

"Affirmative. Black is lucky he's dead, or I'd be kicking his ass for his incompetence."

Slate winced. So Bridger hadn't been lying. Black really was dead.

"Give me another team and I'll finish the job," Slate promised. As far as he was concerned, the three traitors were also complicit in the death of his teammates, Major Klein and Colonel Black.

"Negative. It's too risky now. Where are you?"

Slate didn't like the sound of that. "I don't know how secure this line is," he lied. "General, you didn't think I was really going to give them your name, did you?"

"You gave them Overbeck."

"I didn't know Overbeck from Adam. They figured him out all by themselves and I played along."

"My sources say your plea bargain included naming who gave you orders. That would be me."

"I swear I never told them anything. I never would have named you, General. It was all just to keep them occupied until I could escape."

"Then why won't you just tell me where you are?"

"Because I think you don't believe me. You think I'm going to betray you and that makes me a liability. I know what happens to liabilities. Is there any way I can earn your trust?"

"Finish the job."

"Alone?"

"If you're not going to tell me where you are, how would I send help?"

"You've got a point." He sighed. "Understood, General. I won't let you down."

There was only one of him and three targets. While he was trying to figure out how to get back on that sinking sardine can without being recognized, seaQuest disappeared for a week and he thought he'd hit the jackpot. Talk about making it look like an accident!

But the bloody submarine "magically" reappeared (Yeah, right. That was so obviously staged by the media) and supposedly had an encounter with a spaceship (and if you believed that, there's some swampland in Louisiana for sale…) But idiot politicians probably bought it. Slate grinned to contemplate the monetary implications for the space program. After that, seaQuest headed to New Cape Quest, scheduled for dry dock. That was perfect. He wouldn't have to board. The crew would all be on land and vulnerable. Slate grew a beard and colored all his hair.

~ONE WEEK AGO~

A huge crowd met the returning sub in New Cape Quest and it was a simple matter to hide in that crowd. Too many of the crew had seen him when he was a prisoner, but he'd changed his appearance quite a bit and hid easily in the multitude.

Wolenczak disembarked first. He met some lady on the docks, chatted, and then left with another woman. Slate memorized the license plate number of the limousine he left in.

Lieutenant O'Neill got off next. He and some long-haired Hispanic guy headed toward base housing. He shouldn't be too hard to find later. With any luck, the next time, he'd be alone. He wasn't Slate's first choice anyway. The captain disembarked considerably later, and the lady who'd first talked to Wolenczak was still there to meet him. Slate was a paratrooper and a pilot, but not a sniper, and while he'd do anything necessary under orders, he had no orders to kill an innocent woman. And if he couldn't kill her, he couldn't allow her to become a witness. Slate kept on them for over a day, but Bridger never left her even long enough to buy a pack of gum.

Slate gave up on the captain for the present and used the license plate to track down the Wolenczak boy. But no sooner had he staked out the kid's ritzy apartment complex and found him alone but who showed up? That infernal Captain Bridger and his lady friend! From the amount of gear they loaded into the lady's rent-a-car, it looked like Wolenczak was planning an extended visit with Bridger, probably to conspire some more, if he knew traitors.

He followed the three of them to Miami where they boarded the bullet train. It wasn't hard to find them in the AmTrak passenger list online and discover their destination. Since they all bought one-way tickets to Washington D.C. at the same time, he now knew their traveling companion was Dr. Kristin Westphalen, a British citizen in the country on a temporary visa. He'd have to find a way to get the two males away from her. Then it hit him. If he could capture the lieutenant, he could use him as bait to lure the other two into a trap somewhere remote and then kill all three of them at once. No lady. No witnesses.

~PRESENT~

Sure enough, it was easy to find the lieutenant back in New Cape Quest. Slate watched him for a couple of days, waiting for the perfect opportunity. In the morning, he walked to the dry dock and spent about 30 minutes talking to that Dagger oaf who was staying with the beached sub and cleaning up after work crews. Then O'Neill went SCUBA-diving with some short guy whose Italian-Philly accent Slate remembered hearing from seaQuest's brig. But the Hispanic guy was no longer around. The lieutenant evidently lived alone and spent the majority of his time in one of those dinky, drafty bachelor pads common to all military bases.

On the second day, after talking to the Dagger janitor, O'Neill left the navy base carrying a bunch of stuff. He walked to a public park near the beach and found a deserted spot of grass, surrounded by trees and hedges, and overlooking a lighthouse. He set up an easel and a folding chair, and then unpacked a canvas, palette, and paint. Then he sat there, all alone, and started to paint. Slate couldn't have asked for a better set-up than this. He readied two tranquilizer darts and loaded them in his rifle. It was too bad he needed to keep this gangly four-eyes alive, because this spot was so isolated, it would have been a perfect place to kill him.

Slate and was about to take the easy shot when he realized the guy was laughing. He watched a little longer and saw him nod and smile. He couldn't see a Bluetooth in the ear facing him, so it had to be in the other ear. He didn't want to take him out when he was talking to someone. The tranquilizer wasn't so immediate that he couldn't call for help if he was already connected. Wait a minute. Pasty Painter wasn't talking at all. He was just listening. He probably had one of those wireless EarDot radios. Slate laid low and watched a while to be sure. Ten minutes and his lips never moved. By his expressions, it was apparent he was listening to something, either that, or the guy was certifiably insane.

He'd had enough of this goon. He aimed his rifle and fired noiselessly. The dart hit him in the bicep and he fell sideways off the chair without even opening his mouth. Perfect. Slate walked over to the unconscious body and looked around for the EarDot, but he couldn't find it. However, those things were so small that had it fallen into the grass, he'd never see it. The good news was, there was definitely no Bluetooth.

Slate hurried to his vehicle and removed a wheelchair from the trunk. He might be able to drag the guy to the car unseen, but he didn't want to take a chance with an errant jogger or bicyclist. This was Florida, after all. Propped in the chair with a blanket over his lap and sunglasses over his eyes, Slate could pass him off as an invalid brother he'd taken out for some sunshine. Pale as he was, no one would doubt he needed it. The body was a little hard to maneuver into the chair by himself, but Slate was sure no one could see him through all the trees and bushes.

He got the guy strapped in so you couldn't tell he wasn't holding himself up, and then exchanged his glasses for dark shades. Slate packed up the paint and palette and placed the supplies atop the lap-blanket of his invalid. He straightened his own clothes and hair before walking nonchalantly behind the wheelchair and slowly to his car. He'd loaded the dart to the maximum dose, recalling how this guy had been so resistant to Videxicone when they drugged him on the Fifi. He wouldn't be waking up for a very long time.

Slate took a good look around to make sure no one was passing by before he did the awkward transfer from the chair to the car. Skinny though he looked, he was heavy. Slate didn't bother trying to sit him up. He dumped him on the back bench seat, secured his wrists behind his back with a thick zip-tie, and covered him with a sheet. He'd already set the rear and side windows to mirrored shade. Almost every car sold in the state came with windows that could be tinted, untinted, mirrored, and opaqued with the turn of a knob. It was touted for reducing exposure of passengers and upholstery to UV rays, but Slate only cared that no one could see into the interior of his car. It was still too hot in September to stuff a body in the trunk. At least not if you cared about keeping it alive to be useful as bait.

He locked the car and made a quick trip back to the little hidden vantage point to grab the easel and folding chair. He also found and removed a paintbrush that had fallen in the grass. It was better nothing be left behind to give anyone a clue that something had transpired here. He looked again for an EarDot, but couldn't find it. He consoled himself with the fact that it was literally a needle in a haystack. If he couldn't find it, knowing where to look, then no one else would. Slate stuffed all the extraneous junk in his trunk and then quietly drove off. Cruising just below the speed limit (so as not to draw any attention), he had enough charge on his batteries to go at least 500 miles before he'd have to stop and recharge.

Slate didn't like being this close to UEO headquarters and all these navy guys. In fact, he didn't like being this close to the ocean either. Klein had died on a submarine and Black drowned when his jet copter was shot down over the Pacific. Slate wasn't going to be anywhere near the water if he could help it. He had several options for a hideout—all of them far inland—and plenty of time to consider the merits and pitfalls of each one while he drove further and further away from the cursed ocean.