Carter turned her head lights off, idling her cruiser down the dark, puddle-riddled road until she spotted the black luxury car. It stood out against the abandoned wrecks and grunge of this part of town.
She got into his passenger side. "Ok, spill. Where is he?"
Not even bothering to look up from his laptop, "I fear we may have moved prematurely. As we collected information on our people of interest, it seemed more likely that they were here as a conspiring group of perpetrators, we assumed, allied with the Mercenaries."
"I know all that..." She rushed him.
"However, with the hardware we recovered from Mr. Reese's Mercenaries, I was able to begin decrypting their communications. It appears we were wrong. They are actually the targets and this Event is the trap." Finch pulled out, slowly driving down between warehouses and old buildings, starting what he feared was a futile search.
"A trap for what exactly? And dammit, tell-me-where John is? And how the hell did you let him walk into this alone?"
That made Finch pause with sudden irritation. "I think you know Mr. Reese well enough by now, Detective, to answer that later part yourself." There was no controlling Mr. Reese, he wouldn't want too if he could. It was one of the things that made him so good at his job. "As to the rest... I'm working on them. The cell signals for each of our victims, including Mr. Reese's, were lost within this eight mile radius..."
"Radius! Finch they could be anywhere!" Carter's voiced raised with a crack, as it so often did when her exasperation grew to this level. "You have any idea how many hidden nooks and crannies these old places have?" There were only the two of them, three, counting Fusco when he showed, and that was nowhere near the man power needed to cover that size of a dead-zone, let alone one with so many likely holes. "Finch, let me call in. Get this place crawling with cops. We can deal with getting him from them later. At least he'll be alive."
Finch pushed on, fully aware of the daunting task at hand, but not willing to get the NYPD involved yet."Their jamming signal would need to be in the center of that circle. I've already narrowed it down by working from the outskirts in. And the last thing I understood John say, was something about 'going underground.' I've pulled up everything associated with the company that rented the shuttle buses, Trans Global. Apparently they've least a great number of properties throughout New York; a few within this area."
"Where? Have you checked them out?"'
"I have, and found nothing but undeveloped sites. Only one ever had any plans submitted to the city. In 2008 rather outlandish plans for a subterranean factory were turned down and the land left sitting. I hoped that something might reveal itself by coming here." He motioned ahead.
"That? That tiny building?"
"This is the closest I could get to the center and signal lose. Yes."
"So you think the Event is being held here, underground?" Carter said laced with doubt.
"I'm at as much of a loss as you are Detective. I can only hope that I receive another transmission to learn more."
"Tell me exactly, what you heard so far."
"I'm not certain I understand the context, the subtext however, was more than concerning. They referenced to 'outside interference,' which I assumed to mean Mr. Reese's earlier encounter, then mention 'setting a holographic room to maximum, and taking the five targets there.'"
Carter cringed at the possible interpretation. "We have to consider that 'taking them' might mean..." But she couldn't say the actual words.
"Detective... I refuse to believe that! I doubt these people would have gone through such elaborate measures if they simply wanted to kill them. If the challenge those Mercenaries posed to Mr. Reese proves anything, it's that they were more than capable of that at any time prior." Finch had to believe it.
It was true. Why wait to get them altogether? Had to be a different reason, but they were stabbing in the dark and wasting time. "Ok, so they want them for something, but we don't know why or where. Finch, this isn't much to go on. We need to find a way into that facility."
Finch was obviously frustrated. "Detective, the definition of insanity is to keeping doing the same thing and expect a different result. I don't think going in alone, guns blazing, is going to increase your chances of helping Mr. Reese.. - though he might argue differently. I think we need a more delicate approach."
He was going to throw the definition of insanity at her!? She was just about to protest when he distractedly added, "I need my other computers."
Carter had a sudden wave of anger roll over her already festering helplessness. "Research!? John might not have that kind of time!" She rolled her eyes wondering how in the world these two got along.
A gun-slinging hero with a death wish, paired a reclusive computer geek, guarded and careful to a fault. But the question barely sprung to mind before it clicked; they balanced each other. Two parts of an imposing whole.
Suddenly Finch made a halting gesture with the start of another incoming transmission.
"Report."
"Sir, we have a problem. The same unidentified man who killed Tom and Mike... the one we thought was dead.., is here."
"What?! What do you mean there?"
"Here Sir, as in, infiltrated the event posing as target Erinson#001."
"How could this happen! Do we know his objective? Anything about him other than he-isn't-fucking-dead!?"
"No Sir. We were not able to question him before he was incapacitated."
"How the hell he pieced this together, is what I want to know!"
"Unknown, Sir. What do you want us to do with him? Some of the guys think he's earned some respect and shouldn't end up like the others."
"If we had a choice, I'd feel the same way, but we have a reputation to uphold with W.A.R. and I'm not about to screw around with the Death Dealer. We move forward, he becomes the fifth target, and you make the scheduled delivery."
"One other thing, Sir. When he attacked Stevens, he laid into the guy pretty good."
"What? Goddamnit! You know that organ-harvesting, sadist needs undamaged parts! How bad?"
"Maybe some broken ribs, nothing too obvious, at first glance. He's breathing ok, so no punctured lungs."
"Fuck Mathison, control your men! And Lieutenant, this stays 'need to know,' got it."
"Yes, Major. What about the real target? Won't the Death Dealer know."
"Not our problem. We don't have time to deal with that anymore. Let's just make sure we're in the air before he figures it out. The plane is ready - so get moving. You've got two hours to deliver the targets, then we're done and gone."
"Copy that... Ah Sir?"
"What is it Lieutenant?"
"Permission to speak freely?"
"Make it quick."
"This is the last time right? We feel right about this anymore."
"This is the last time, son."
Carter looked up at Finch and saw her fear mirrored in his eyes. "Oh God, Finch.., we have to get them out of there!" She now knew why they'd only found part of the missing person in her case file. Left overs. "There has to be something, some way to find him..."
This was the horrific reason the machine had given them these numbers. He didn't want to think about the gruesome implications that this was the sixth year.
It took a long moment before he felt his voice return. "They said they were moving them. We need to figure out how." Finch determinedly added, "I need my other equipment..."
Without thinking, he turned the lincoln around, pushing it down the dark roads back toward the library.
Major Robert Keel paced the rain slicked dock, glancing from his watch, to the plane, then to the inky waters beyond. The headlights of his black SUV caught his large frame each time he passed, casting an enormous shadow over his men busily prepping their seaplane.
Mathison and his men should be no more than two hours. The plane would take another ten for take off, so in two hours and ten minutes, and this shit would finally be over. Keel would finally wash the blood of this six-year obligation from his hands.
Same date, once a year, he and his team were hired to handle the details of this barbaric job.
Half of it was great, a cake-walk. It was his team's job to control outside interferences, set up the location and provide muscle for W.A.R.'s weapons sales.
They were handsomely paid by the elite arms company, in both money and weaponry. The cutting edge tools made the rest of their work child's play, and if it was only W.A.R. they dealt with.., they'd happily continue. But it wasn't. It was the other half of the job that didn't sit right.
That half, they referred to as the 'Death Dealer.' God knew what his real name was. Dr. Mengele and Frankenstein were just a few of the other names his men used, but whoever the hell he was, he was a monster. The guy even gave him the creeps.., that alone should have kept him far, far away, but it wasn't that simple. Never was.
Six years ago, Keel had been faced with the inevitable loss of his baby sister. Annie. The only person in his life that he actually and truly gave a shit about. Life had given her a bum-rap; she needed a new heart. Fast.
So when he heard about this Doctor that could work the kind of miracle she needed, he did what he had to do. He ignored his finely honed instincts and sold his soul to that death-dealing devil, and got her new one.
At first he didn't ask questions. As long as she lived, the strings that came attached to that miracle didn't much matter. He did what was asked of him and kept he mouth shut. What was six years of service anyway? She was healthy again. His men got paid. Everything was fine... At first.
The fact that he was already a veteran killer in his own right, didn't lessen that this job was like dumping acid on your soul - it just ate at you.
Military support, hostage retrieval, surgical strikes, coups... that was good work, still had a certain honor and dignity. And he'd slept just fine doing it.
Forty fucking years, he'd been doing it, selling his services as a Mercenary to the highest bidder, and loved every minute of it - until this. This was sadistic theft and an affront to humanity.
Keel had to laugh, finding it ironic that he'd be so bothered by this when he'd seen and caused so much death. He certainly couldn't say he was a humanitarian. But this was wrong on levels even his fucked-up sense of morality couldn't live with.
Each year that cold-blooded butcher would give him a list of names. People he then had to make sure safely made it to the event, were capture and then deliver on time. But the faces of those men and women started weighing on him. The harvested hearts, kidneys, livers - God knew what else - those so-called miracles.., now had faces. And they haunted him.
But Keel did the job to perfection - that was just his way. Everything had always been flawless, no fuck-ups. Not until now.
Somehow, this mystery man had come out of nowhere, almost blowing the whole thing in the eleventh hour. How the hell had he found out? But it didn't matter, and at this point, he didn't care.
He actually wished he could let the wily son-of-a-bitch loose on the Doctor. That would be poetic. He smiled enjoying the idea, but knew he would stick to the plan. It was his way.
Keel stopped pacing and looked at his watch for the millionth time. Two hours left...