CHAPTER 1
A click connected the man at the payphone with the voice on the other side of the line. "What have you got?" said the man on the other side. "Something you could be very interested in." was the response from the phone booth. "Were you followed?" "No" "are you sure? We wouldn't want a repeat of last time now would we." Last time had been a disaster the man in the booth thought "I'm sure. I followed instructions to the letter." "Well is he all they said he would be?" "We haven't tested him yet but he appears to be" "what's the info?" asked the other voice. "Mitchell, Ryan, J. Commander, U.S. Navy, Aviation division from 08 to 12 and then joined the seals, his serial number is 377851." The man on the other side of the line went silent for a second as if contemplating the impact this would have on all the people involved. Then he thought it is necessary; we have to do this. "Ok any relatives?" "Yes" the man in the booth replied "only one in state is his wife though." "Good, we might be able to use her to help us draw him in. What's her name?" the line went silent a second time as the man in the phone booth stumbled around in his wallet looking for the slip of paper with the requested information. "Ok the wife's name is Candice. Apparently she works at an accounting firm not to far from here." "When can we be ready?" "As soon as you like" "how many people are with you?" "Three others and I can have air support anywhere in the city within 10 minutes" "do you know where the targets are?" asked the voice. "1512 3rd street." 1512 3rd street was the location of an upscale Italian restaurant named Di angelo's and it was not far from where the current conversation was taking place. The man on the other end thought for a minute and then replied "If I was to give you the go ahead on this one you could get it done and not harm the girl nor raise too much alarm." "We have an extraction point about 2 clicks north of the restaurant on the roof of a parking garage and as for harming the girl if he doesn't have a gun it shouldn't be a problem" "even if he does it shouldn't be a problem" replied the voice. "It wont, sir" "ok then" there was a pause but both ends of the conversation already knew the next word
"Go."
Inside the restaurant
"It's beautiful." Candice said looking up from the necklace in the black box Ryan gave her. "Was it expensive?" she asked. "How much is expensive?" asked Ryan. "Over 150" "could you make that 200" "you didn't.did you?" "Yeah I did. Sorry" "it's alright I still love you." "I love you too," Ryan said taking the bill from the waiter who had just arrived at their table. He signed the bill and gave it back "You may leave whenever you like, sir" was the waiter's less than emphatic response. "Ready?" Ryan asked as he stood up. "Yea." Candice replied as she put on the necklace. Ryan grabbed his jacket from its roost on the chair, took Candice by the hand and they were off to the parking lot.
Parking Lot Outside it was cold and damp. There were still small puddles of rain on the streets from the storm earlier in the day. Steam rose steadily from manhole covers as it does most evenings when the temperature is near 40 degrees F. Ryan and Candice rounded the corner and entered the parking lot. They were confronted with two men wearing dark clothing, holding knives and speaking a strange language. Ryan immediately identified the ragged sounding language as Russian. He told Candice to run for their car but almost before he could get the words out of his mouth it happened. The man closest to Ryan thrust his knife at him in a lateral stab. Ryan countered by grabbing the man's wrist and twisting. He then pulled his assailant forward and snapped the man's arm up behind his back, causing him to drop the knife. Ryan then delivered the final blow. He reached for the man's chin and spun it 90 degrees to the left, snapping it like a twig.
Candice reached the car as she realized that Ryan had the keys, she tried the door anyway. It was to no avail. She ran around the front of the BMW to try the other door. She never got the chance; as she rounded the front of the car she was attacked by a third Russian and shoved into the back of a black mid size sedan.
Ryan turned to face the second attacker just when he kicked. Ryan caught the man's foot and shoved upward, the man fell over, Ryan continued the circle with the man's leg until his knee was next to his face. By this time the attacker's sedan had reached the place where Ryan killed the first attacker. He saw the sedan, knew he wouldn't catch it on foot, spun and headed for his car.
3rd street
The sedan sped down the middle of 3rd street towards the turn to the predetermined extraction point on top of a parking garage. It was closely tailed by Ryan's BMW. The two cars dodged in and out of traffic, running red lights, weaving between taxis, and doing all of this at around 95 mph.
In the back of the sedan Candice sat alone trying to figure out what had just happened, it had all happened so fast that she just didn't know what to think. This coupled with the opaque tinted windows and almost complete lack of light in the backseat made it very hard to discern which way was up.
Ryan on the other hand was painfully aware of his surroundings at the moment. He watched as the sedan rounded the corner of 3rd and 2nd avenues. I'm not gonna make it I'm moving too fast Ryan thought as he slammed his foot down on the brake and downshifted from fourth to second totally bypassing third and almost grinding into first. The car slid sideways into the center of the intersection. and came face to face with an oncoming bus. Ryan floored the gas pedal and yanked the wheel to the right. He missed the bus by only about two inches. THERE Ryan thought as he saw the sedan screaming its way into a parking garage about a half block away. He followed the black car into the garage with blinding speed. The two cars locked into a circle pattern spinning ever upwards, is this ever gonna end Ryan thought and why did they pull into a garage.
Top level of the garage The sedan reached the top level and spun to face Ryan's still speeding car. Ryan reacted by once again slamming on brakes but this time twisting the wheel to the left. Why in god's name would these people go to the top level of a garage? Ryan thought. Then he saw it. It was a small black helicopter with two 3 barreled mini-guns.
"Oh this is just not fair," Ryan said to himself as he jumped from the z-4. He took cover behind his car for the time being and watched as the car next to him was chewed to pieces by the guns. He felt the around pocket inside his jacket, and withdrew a .44 magnum Desert Eagle. 8 shots for one helicopter and two men on foot He thought pulling back the slide. He let it loose and with a click the weapon pulled one round from the magazine into the chamber. The helicopter turned its side to him in an effort to land behind the Russian's car. The two men from the car exited their vehicle and waved to the helicopter. Apparently they had stopped their car too close to the edge of the building for the chopper to land. The pilot swore in Russian as he realized he would have to land in between the sedan and Ryan's Z-4. Ryan however had seized the opportunity to choose better cover when the helicopter swung to the right. He was currently running towards the sedan, gun in hand and aiming at the driver. Ryan stopped about 20 meters out and crouched behind a truck, steadying his gun on the truck's hood. He applied the necessary 3-pound pull to the trigger and the gun fired off one round with a deafening BOOM. The driver of the sedan didn't even see it coming. Even though he had been standing behind the open door of the car Ryan's bullet hit him as if he had been standing in the open. The bullet impacted with such force that it knocked the man a full 5 feet forward and over the side of the garage. The second Russian spun, revealing a submachine gun he had hidden in his overcoat. He lifted the weapon and aimed at Ryan. Ryan didn't have time to think, he just ducked off of instinct and prepared for the volley of 9mm parabellum lead that would within the next second or two be pinging off of the hood of the truck. The helicopter drowned out the sound of the gun as it set down in between the two cars. The man with the submachine gun stopped firing and opened the back door of the sedan.
Candice saw light start to seep in through the door as the man opened it. She pulled her legs back and once the door was fully opened she kicked hitting the man squarely in the stomach and knocking him over.
Ryan came around the truck in just enough time to see the man with the submachine gun hit the ground. The pilot of the helicopter watched as Ryan walked over to the man on the ground aimed at the man's forehead and splattered his thoughts all over the pavement. The pilot spun the chopper around so that it was now facing the sedan, Ryan, and Candice who had just emerged from the car. Ryan didn't have to know what was going to happen next. He knocked Candice behind the car as he dove towards her and the safety of the sedan. The area where they had just been standing exploded into sparks and flying concrete as the helicopter loosed it's gun on them. The bullets from the mini-guns raked across the top of the sedan and into the other row of parked cars as the chopper yawed from left to right. It was Then that Ryan saw his chance. He leapt sideways (to the left) from the cover of the sedan as he fired three shots at the helicopter's pilot. It seemed to happen in slow motion Ryan could see the bullets leaving the barrel, the slide rocking back and forth with every squeeze of the trigger, the expression on the pilots face as the first bullet pinged harmlessly off of the cockpit window. The second bullet was a bit lower and made a visible crack in the "bulletproof" glass. The third bullet shattered the window spraying glass into the cockpit and into the pilot's upper torso. Ryan landed hard on the spot which only moments before had been torn to pieces by the helicopters gun. The pilot, now screaming in pain from the shards of glass which had found a home in anywhere from his waistline up, lost all control of the aircraft and consequentially it drifted to the right. The blades struck a suv not too far from where Ryan was laying, sending debris and shrapnel across the roof of the garage. The suv tumbled toward the car next to it as the chopper took its place. The blades then made contact with the ground yanking the rest of the helicopter in a circle to it's left. The tail of the helicopter hit the ground and was bent in towards the chopper's center.
Then it all went up in a massive fireball.
Ryan stood up, climbed out of the minor hole he had landed in and walked over to Candice "Are you alright?" he asked. "Ryan , what was all that about?" Candice retorted. "I don't have time to explain now, can you walk?" "Yes." "Ok then, we have to leave before the cops arrive. I'll explain what all that was about on the way?" "on the way? We're going home?" "No, we can't go home. At least not now. If they knew we were at that restaurant then I have to assume they trailed us from the house. " Ryan said helping Candice to her feet. "Alright where do we go?" Candice said brushing the hair from her face. "I have a few places we can go to lay low for awhile. But I think it would be best to get back into contact with the office." Ryan said. "Office? You mean the CIA. Don't you? I thought you turned them down" Candice said thinking of the few weeks Ryan had spent training for a possible position in the CIA. "I did but right now I think that might be our only way of making it through the next few weeks alive. Besides I still have more than a few contacts we can trust. A few of whom have more money than we would possibly need to stay in hiding for the rest of our lives." Ryan explained, opening the car door and sliding into his seat. Candice mirrored his actions on the other side of the BMW. Ryan changed the subject in an effort to avoid having to answer more questions than necessary "We're gonna need a new car as soon as possible. After that little escapade I wouldn't be surprised if the cops got a whole lot of calls about a crazy guy in a silver Z-4." "We could go home and get the other car." Candice said it more as a question than a statement. "No home is out of the question remember. And even if it wasn't the El Camino is licensed under both of our actual names. Which is another thing we might have to lose for awhile." "And we are going to do that how?" "A friend of mine"
A click connected the man at the payphone with the voice on the other side of the line. "What have you got?" said the man on the other side. "Something you could be very interested in." was the response from the phone booth. "Were you followed?" "No" "are you sure? We wouldn't want a repeat of last time now would we." Last time had been a disaster the man in the booth thought "I'm sure. I followed instructions to the letter." "Well is he all they said he would be?" "We haven't tested him yet but he appears to be" "what's the info?" asked the other voice. "Mitchell, Ryan, J. Commander, U.S. Navy, Aviation division from 08 to 12 and then joined the seals, his serial number is 377851." The man on the other side of the line went silent for a second as if contemplating the impact this would have on all the people involved. Then he thought it is necessary; we have to do this. "Ok any relatives?" "Yes" the man in the booth replied "only one in state is his wife though." "Good, we might be able to use her to help us draw him in. What's her name?" the line went silent a second time as the man in the phone booth stumbled around in his wallet looking for the slip of paper with the requested information. "Ok the wife's name is Candice. Apparently she works at an accounting firm not to far from here." "When can we be ready?" "As soon as you like" "how many people are with you?" "Three others and I can have air support anywhere in the city within 10 minutes" "do you know where the targets are?" asked the voice. "1512 3rd street." 1512 3rd street was the location of an upscale Italian restaurant named Di angelo's and it was not far from where the current conversation was taking place. The man on the other end thought for a minute and then replied "If I was to give you the go ahead on this one you could get it done and not harm the girl nor raise too much alarm." "We have an extraction point about 2 clicks north of the restaurant on the roof of a parking garage and as for harming the girl if he doesn't have a gun it shouldn't be a problem" "even if he does it shouldn't be a problem" replied the voice. "It wont, sir" "ok then" there was a pause but both ends of the conversation already knew the next word
"Go."
Inside the restaurant
"It's beautiful." Candice said looking up from the necklace in the black box Ryan gave her. "Was it expensive?" she asked. "How much is expensive?" asked Ryan. "Over 150" "could you make that 200" "you didn't.did you?" "Yeah I did. Sorry" "it's alright I still love you." "I love you too," Ryan said taking the bill from the waiter who had just arrived at their table. He signed the bill and gave it back "You may leave whenever you like, sir" was the waiter's less than emphatic response. "Ready?" Ryan asked as he stood up. "Yea." Candice replied as she put on the necklace. Ryan grabbed his jacket from its roost on the chair, took Candice by the hand and they were off to the parking lot.
Parking Lot Outside it was cold and damp. There were still small puddles of rain on the streets from the storm earlier in the day. Steam rose steadily from manhole covers as it does most evenings when the temperature is near 40 degrees F. Ryan and Candice rounded the corner and entered the parking lot. They were confronted with two men wearing dark clothing, holding knives and speaking a strange language. Ryan immediately identified the ragged sounding language as Russian. He told Candice to run for their car but almost before he could get the words out of his mouth it happened. The man closest to Ryan thrust his knife at him in a lateral stab. Ryan countered by grabbing the man's wrist and twisting. He then pulled his assailant forward and snapped the man's arm up behind his back, causing him to drop the knife. Ryan then delivered the final blow. He reached for the man's chin and spun it 90 degrees to the left, snapping it like a twig.
Candice reached the car as she realized that Ryan had the keys, she tried the door anyway. It was to no avail. She ran around the front of the BMW to try the other door. She never got the chance; as she rounded the front of the car she was attacked by a third Russian and shoved into the back of a black mid size sedan.
Ryan turned to face the second attacker just when he kicked. Ryan caught the man's foot and shoved upward, the man fell over, Ryan continued the circle with the man's leg until his knee was next to his face. By this time the attacker's sedan had reached the place where Ryan killed the first attacker. He saw the sedan, knew he wouldn't catch it on foot, spun and headed for his car.
3rd street
The sedan sped down the middle of 3rd street towards the turn to the predetermined extraction point on top of a parking garage. It was closely tailed by Ryan's BMW. The two cars dodged in and out of traffic, running red lights, weaving between taxis, and doing all of this at around 95 mph.
In the back of the sedan Candice sat alone trying to figure out what had just happened, it had all happened so fast that she just didn't know what to think. This coupled with the opaque tinted windows and almost complete lack of light in the backseat made it very hard to discern which way was up.
Ryan on the other hand was painfully aware of his surroundings at the moment. He watched as the sedan rounded the corner of 3rd and 2nd avenues. I'm not gonna make it I'm moving too fast Ryan thought as he slammed his foot down on the brake and downshifted from fourth to second totally bypassing third and almost grinding into first. The car slid sideways into the center of the intersection. and came face to face with an oncoming bus. Ryan floored the gas pedal and yanked the wheel to the right. He missed the bus by only about two inches. THERE Ryan thought as he saw the sedan screaming its way into a parking garage about a half block away. He followed the black car into the garage with blinding speed. The two cars locked into a circle pattern spinning ever upwards, is this ever gonna end Ryan thought and why did they pull into a garage.
Top level of the garage The sedan reached the top level and spun to face Ryan's still speeding car. Ryan reacted by once again slamming on brakes but this time twisting the wheel to the left. Why in god's name would these people go to the top level of a garage? Ryan thought. Then he saw it. It was a small black helicopter with two 3 barreled mini-guns.
"Oh this is just not fair," Ryan said to himself as he jumped from the z-4. He took cover behind his car for the time being and watched as the car next to him was chewed to pieces by the guns. He felt the around pocket inside his jacket, and withdrew a .44 magnum Desert Eagle. 8 shots for one helicopter and two men on foot He thought pulling back the slide. He let it loose and with a click the weapon pulled one round from the magazine into the chamber. The helicopter turned its side to him in an effort to land behind the Russian's car. The two men from the car exited their vehicle and waved to the helicopter. Apparently they had stopped their car too close to the edge of the building for the chopper to land. The pilot swore in Russian as he realized he would have to land in between the sedan and Ryan's Z-4. Ryan however had seized the opportunity to choose better cover when the helicopter swung to the right. He was currently running towards the sedan, gun in hand and aiming at the driver. Ryan stopped about 20 meters out and crouched behind a truck, steadying his gun on the truck's hood. He applied the necessary 3-pound pull to the trigger and the gun fired off one round with a deafening BOOM. The driver of the sedan didn't even see it coming. Even though he had been standing behind the open door of the car Ryan's bullet hit him as if he had been standing in the open. The bullet impacted with such force that it knocked the man a full 5 feet forward and over the side of the garage. The second Russian spun, revealing a submachine gun he had hidden in his overcoat. He lifted the weapon and aimed at Ryan. Ryan didn't have time to think, he just ducked off of instinct and prepared for the volley of 9mm parabellum lead that would within the next second or two be pinging off of the hood of the truck. The helicopter drowned out the sound of the gun as it set down in between the two cars. The man with the submachine gun stopped firing and opened the back door of the sedan.
Candice saw light start to seep in through the door as the man opened it. She pulled her legs back and once the door was fully opened she kicked hitting the man squarely in the stomach and knocking him over.
Ryan came around the truck in just enough time to see the man with the submachine gun hit the ground. The pilot of the helicopter watched as Ryan walked over to the man on the ground aimed at the man's forehead and splattered his thoughts all over the pavement. The pilot spun the chopper around so that it was now facing the sedan, Ryan, and Candice who had just emerged from the car. Ryan didn't have to know what was going to happen next. He knocked Candice behind the car as he dove towards her and the safety of the sedan. The area where they had just been standing exploded into sparks and flying concrete as the helicopter loosed it's gun on them. The bullets from the mini-guns raked across the top of the sedan and into the other row of parked cars as the chopper yawed from left to right. It was Then that Ryan saw his chance. He leapt sideways (to the left) from the cover of the sedan as he fired three shots at the helicopter's pilot. It seemed to happen in slow motion Ryan could see the bullets leaving the barrel, the slide rocking back and forth with every squeeze of the trigger, the expression on the pilots face as the first bullet pinged harmlessly off of the cockpit window. The second bullet was a bit lower and made a visible crack in the "bulletproof" glass. The third bullet shattered the window spraying glass into the cockpit and into the pilot's upper torso. Ryan landed hard on the spot which only moments before had been torn to pieces by the helicopters gun. The pilot, now screaming in pain from the shards of glass which had found a home in anywhere from his waistline up, lost all control of the aircraft and consequentially it drifted to the right. The blades struck a suv not too far from where Ryan was laying, sending debris and shrapnel across the roof of the garage. The suv tumbled toward the car next to it as the chopper took its place. The blades then made contact with the ground yanking the rest of the helicopter in a circle to it's left. The tail of the helicopter hit the ground and was bent in towards the chopper's center.
Then it all went up in a massive fireball.
Ryan stood up, climbed out of the minor hole he had landed in and walked over to Candice "Are you alright?" he asked. "Ryan , what was all that about?" Candice retorted. "I don't have time to explain now, can you walk?" "Yes." "Ok then, we have to leave before the cops arrive. I'll explain what all that was about on the way?" "on the way? We're going home?" "No, we can't go home. At least not now. If they knew we were at that restaurant then I have to assume they trailed us from the house. " Ryan said helping Candice to her feet. "Alright where do we go?" Candice said brushing the hair from her face. "I have a few places we can go to lay low for awhile. But I think it would be best to get back into contact with the office." Ryan said. "Office? You mean the CIA. Don't you? I thought you turned them down" Candice said thinking of the few weeks Ryan had spent training for a possible position in the CIA. "I did but right now I think that might be our only way of making it through the next few weeks alive. Besides I still have more than a few contacts we can trust. A few of whom have more money than we would possibly need to stay in hiding for the rest of our lives." Ryan explained, opening the car door and sliding into his seat. Candice mirrored his actions on the other side of the BMW. Ryan changed the subject in an effort to avoid having to answer more questions than necessary "We're gonna need a new car as soon as possible. After that little escapade I wouldn't be surprised if the cops got a whole lot of calls about a crazy guy in a silver Z-4." "We could go home and get the other car." Candice said it more as a question than a statement. "No home is out of the question remember. And even if it wasn't the El Camino is licensed under both of our actual names. Which is another thing we might have to lose for awhile." "And we are going to do that how?" "A friend of mine"