Trigger smirked as he spoke. “You should see it, John. The entire world is in an uproar! They’re calling for the President’s head and their money back. We won!”
“How did you get the report sent off?”
“I found a security hole in their backup systems. It is, after all, only an oil platform. I was able to insert the report into the backups, and then it was simply a matter of forcing the system to retrieve it.”
“How did you do that?”
“I performed a brute force hack. It was obvious what I was doing, to the computers anyway, and the moment I succeeded in corrupting some of the data, the security protocols forced a reboot with the backup. It loaded it for me and sent it for me.” He chortled, very much pleased with himself. “They never saw it coming.”
“Well done, my friend,” John’s voice said in his ear. “Very well done. That should be the last nail in the coffin.”
“Let’s hope so. But don’t forget. There is that other three-man team out there.”
“Any sign of them?”
“No. I think they’ve gone completely dark. That means they aren’t even communicating with each other except with hand signals. And since the camera network is still down, I have no real way to track them. I suspect, however, they are headed towards your last position.”
“Could they be monitoring our transmissions?”
Trigger shrugged, even though John couldn’t see the gesture. “Eventually, I suppose. But it would take time and require broadcasting on their own. The last signal I detected was a transmission from satellite to an area about three square miles. There was no outgoing response. I have no way to track them at the moment.”
There was silence over the coms while John digested that information. “Maybe we should rendezvous on the other side of the island. I don’t like being separated.”
“Stop being a worry wart,” Trigger said. “They don’t even know about me.”
At that moment, some sixth sense warned Trigger that something wasn’t right. The normal sounds of the jungle surrounding the quaint hut had gone suddenly silent. This did happen on occasion when a large predator happened to be traversing through. But this seemed to be something more, something more complete.
He rose from his seat, cursing as it squeaked unnaturally.
“Trigger, you still there?”
Not responding right away, the thin man moved silently over to one of the boarded-up windows and peeked through a crack in the wood. He stared for long seconds, scanning the trees and underbrush for something out of place. He knew nearly every inch of the ground outside, so he felt confident that he could spot something out of place.
“Trigger?”
He moved to another window and peered through the crack. There. A tree on that side was casting an unusual shadow. Something was there, in the concealing darkness—something large.
“They’re here, John,” he whispered quite calmly.
A pause. Then, “I’m coming.”
“You’ll never make it, John.”
“Just hang on.”
“It’s been fun, but we both know they got me boxed in. Stay away.”
“Trigger!”
“See you on the other side.” Trigger reached up and pulled the ear piece out of his ear and dropped it to the ground. He stepped on it, smashing it. He didn’t want his killers to use it to locate John and the others.
One against three. Not good odds—not with him bottled up in this flimsy hut. The moment he stepped outside, he would be cut down. He figured they wouldn’t wait too long to come on in and get him either. He drew his pistols and looked out through the crack again. Yes, someone was definitely out there. He shifted to another location and peered through a third crack. He didn’t see anyone there, but that didn’t mean anything.
Sitting down on the ground he folded his legs Indian-style and placed both revolvers in his lap. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and listened. They were good, he’d give them that, but he knew the instant they moved in on the thin door of the hut. He waited calmly for the inevitable. He had chosen his position well. He was not in direct view of any windows or the door. He would be able to flank anyone coming through the door, and he had adequate protection from the various pieces of furniture that had been strategically placed around the room.
No, he would not be taken easily.
When the door flew open from a violent kick, he was ready. Both revolvers came up in a fluid motion. No doubt the slip-guns would look strange to most people, having no triggers or trigger guards. The only way to fire the guns was to manipulate the hammer. He was the trigger. And he was good. Very good. Both hands could work independently of each other if needed.
In this case, only a single man came barreling through the door. The heavily armored soldier rolled across the floor trying to locate, identify, and then eliminate any potential threats. Trigger was more than a threat. He was lethal force.
Both revolvers discharged simultaneously, his thumbs working the hammer of each revolver with lightning speed. One round struck the soldier in the neck and the other in the face. The man was dead before he stopped rolling without ever having realized where Trigger was.
Still sitting cross-legged on the floor, he waited for the next move of the remaining soldiers outside the hut. When it came, he wasn’t unduly surprised. He would have done exactly the same thing in their position. Two incendiary grenades rolled into the room, coming to a stop nearly in the center of the room. This was immediately followed by two phosphorous grenades—not the smoke kind, but the fire kind. One flew through the air to hit the opposite wall and another rolled gently through the door no more than a foot.
Trigger sighed. The incendiary grenades would shred the little hut. Nothing inside would be able to withstand the blast. There was nothing he could hide behind to escape. Even if there was, the phosphorous grenades would consume the hut in fire within moments.
He sighed again, regretful. His regret was more general than specific, encompassing all of his dreams and hopes of a future he would never realize.
The room turned white and then black. Trigger knew no more.