“Dietrich, is your earpiece working?”
“We’re both fine down here.”
“Are any of the ear pieces on the roof functional? Please respond.”
Elliot responded with a prolonged series of on/off that generated an irritating string of sharp staticcy responses.
“Okay. Forget it. Sounds like a technical issue. Keep your eyes on the west side. We’re still getting motion alarms in the woods.”
He responded with a single on/off.
“They just told us that there is no one on the second floor, and there are two in the basement,” said Rayce.
“Why are there mercs deployed in the basement?”
“My bet is that the garage door is wide open just waiting for someone to walk in. They have two mercs down there in case we get past their rooftop snipers. As soon as someone walks into the garage, they’ll open fire.”
Now on the second-floor landing, Elliot opened the wiring closet door off to the side. It was as advertised. He saw a stack of four network switches with numerous blue network cables connected to the front. Evan's instructions had been clear and accurate. He pulled the DOS device from his pocket and plugged it into an open port on the top switch. There was no fanfare. A red light blinked on. Elliot looked at Rayce and shrugged his shoulders; they moved on.
“The internal cameras should be down by now. They’re blind to us,” Rayce whispered. “Give me one minute, and then send the elevator down to the basement. Give me another minute to get rid of whoever is down there, and I’ll meet you in the main floor corridor.”
Rayce disappeared down the stairwell, and Elliot checked his watch.
Rayce snuck a peek through the window on the basement stairwell door and saw two guards off to his left. They were using a pair of cement pillars to partially shield themselves from the open garage access door on the far side of the lot. They looked bored. He ducked down and waited. The elevator ding sounded right on time, and he waited until he heard the doors slide open before stepping out into the garage. It was no contest. Rayce had his AS Val already pointing at the guard’s backs before they realized what was happening. Rayce did not try to be precise; he directed two short bursts at the soldiers, and they went down without retaliation. He did not dally in the basement; his task was accomplished, so he went back up the stairwell he came down on.
“No issues?” queried Elliot as they approached each other on the first floor.
“None. The two mercs were watching the garage entry door. As expected, they fell hook, line, and sinker for the elevator door.”
“This is a stun grenade,” said Rayce quietly as he pulled a compact device from his fanny pack and handed it to Elliot.
“It’ll detonate three seconds after you pull this pin and release the handle. I want you to pull the pin and toss the grenade in through that door,” he explained as they stood down the hall from a door that they knew led into the NOC.
“Close the door, and stand back. As soon as the grenade detonates, I’ll come in through the other door and take them out. If anyone comes out of your door, shoot him.”
“Won’t the grenade blow the walls out?”
“It’s a stun grenade, a flash-bang. There is no shrapnel. The explosion is designed to create a lot of noise and an intense flash. Whoever is in the room will be momentarily incapacitated from sensory overload. If there are four of them in there, I should have plenty of time to take out three and leave one for questioning. Ready?”
Elliot gave him the nod, and Rayce trotted down the hall and around the corner to stand by the other NOC door.
* * * * * * *
Rayce heard Elliot’s door open followed by some shouting. He could make out the word “grenade” through the door and then a blast that shook the building. He didn’t wait. As soon as he heard the explosion, he stepped in through the door with gun leveled. There were two soldiers on the floor to his right where they had dived for cover. A short burst stitched across the two of them. He fanned the gun across the rest of the room and then stepped in farther to peer into an alcove in the back of the room. There were no other mercs in the room.
Elliot entered the room and swatted a layer of smoke from in front of his view. He saw Rayce, weapon now lowered, moving toward two bodies on the other side of the room.
As he approached the fallen mercs, Elliot heard a phlegmy cough from a merc who was lying on the floor with his head propped up against the wall.
“This one is still alive,” said Rayce. “There were only two here. I don’t see Yilmaz or the other two heavies you described from the office. Maybe this guy can tell us where they are,” said Rayce putting down his rifle as he pulled out his knife and advanced toward the wounded merc.
The soldier saw what was coming and turned his head to face Rayce. “That knife won’t do you any good, comrade,” he croaked. “I won’t last the hour.” He nodded down toward the two large entry wounds on his torso.
Rayce took a long look at the man and sheathed his knife. He silently concurred with the soldier's prognosis; he also knew resolve in a man’s eyes when he saw it. He knelt down beside the dying man and looked at him for a few moments before speaking.
“I’m giving you a chance to come clean, soldier. The men you‘re working for are nothing more than thugs and murderers. Tell us where to find Yilmaz.”
The soldier coughed, and bloody spittle dripped from his mouth. “Why should I?”
His voice went soft as he searched for a connection with the fading merc. “We’re the same, you and I. We fight on different sides, but we’re the same. We’re soldiers. Take away our weapons, and all that’s left is our word and our honor. You have a chance to balance your score sheet before you go. Tell us what we need to know so we can stop these assholes.”
The soldier's head sagged, and Rayce thought that he was gone, but a brief coughing bout brought him back. “There’s a letter in my wallet. It’s a note to my daughter. Make sure she gets it, and I’ll tell you what I know.”
“You have my word,” Rayce said quietly.
The dying man had no time to evaluate Rayce’s sincerity but at some level had already made up his mind that he was trustworthy.
“The men you seek will be flying out of the private Shellco terminal at Dorval as soon as they are allowed, sometime around 6:00 a.m. this morning. “
Elliot checked his watch. It was 2:25 a.m. They had three and a half hours.
“Who will be on the plane?” probed Rayce.
“Banik, Yilmaz, and two other mercs with him… and whoever makes it out of this bunker tonight.”
“Where are they going?”
“They’ll be headed for the Ukraine. I’m not sure where exactly.”
“There is no extradition treaty in place with the Ukraine,” interjected Elliot.
“Where are the rest of you? I don’t see Yilmaz, the guy with the big neck or the guy with the moustache.”
“They left a few hours ago. Something about tying up some loose ends. They should have been back by now.”
Elliot immediately wondered if Les RD Boys and the police chief were the loose ends.
“What about the big man, Ogrodnik? Do you know how to find him?“ Elliot blurted.
“No. He works for Banik. Only Banik knows how to contact him.”
“Is there anything you can tell us about him? Any clue as to where he might be?” pleaded Elliot.
The soldier's eyes drooped noticeably, but he was still able to shake his head no.
“What about his name? Is Ogrodnik his last name? Give us something. He has my partner!“ Elliot’s voice rose an octave now bordering on panic.
The soldier's head leaned back so he could see Elliot through the drooping stare. “Ogrodnik? Ogrodnik’s not his name,” he rasped.
“It’s what he does,” he managed to squeak out before another coughing fit took him.
Elliot waited anxiously until the cough had been satisfied. “What do you mean, what he do
es?”
“It’s what he does. Ogrodnik means The Gardener in Polish.”
Elliot heard a number of colors in his mental Rubik’s Cube slot into place. He thought back to the staged suicide at Kulas’s house and the matchbook by the ashtray. He had opened the matchbook looking for a number or name that may have been scrawled on the inside cover, but there was none. But the matchbook was from Hochelaga Landscaping. It seemed so obvious now. What would someone like Kulas want with a landscaping firm? What little lawn he had was more weed than grass and hadn’t seen a lawn mower in weeks. And the dirt on the passenger side floor of the white van where Ogrodnik sat. Not just dirt but dried potting soil, something you wouldn’t expect to see around Kulas’s house, but something you’d definitely expect to find on the shoe of a landscaper.
“Rayce, I think I know where he is. I know where to find Ogrodnik.”
He quickly explained as Rayce listened. “I have to get Rivka.”
“Do what you have to do. I’ll go through their phones to see if I can find a clue to where Yilmaz might be. When I’m finished, I’ll help you. Otherwise, we meet at the airport. Take a gun with you.”
“I’ll take one of the trucks downstairs. You can have the other,” said Elliot as he left.
Rayce turned his attention back to the soldier. The soldier's eyes were now closed, his life almost gone. He reached underneath the dying man and took his wallet. The folded paper was found within.
The soldier opened his eyes to look at Rayce, now unable to even speak.
Rayce read the question in his eyes. “You have my word, soldier. I’ll make sure your daughter gets the note. I’ll tell her you died in battle, with dignity. You fought for what you believed in and that she should be proud. That’s all she needs to know.”
The soldier’s eyes closed again, and Rayce knew they would not re-open.
He set about going through the fallen soldier's pockets and checking their phones for messages from Yilmaz. There was nothing of value on the bodies in the NOC, so he made his way up to the roof to check the dead mercs.
The sound of an incoming vehicle caught his attention as he watched from the roof. Is that Elliot returning already he wondered? The black SUV roared up the road toward the bunker. The truck did not hesitate as it took the sharp left turn and headed for the open underground parking lot. Rayce saw the shiny reflection of Yilmaz’s bald head as the glow from a streetlight passed through the cab.
Rayce grabbed a handgun from the nearest soldier and bolted from the roof. He knew that as soon as Yilmaz saw the bodies in the garage, he’d run. As he burst from the building's front doors, the SUV was already out of the parking garage and squealing around the final turn to the entrance road. Rayce got down into a crouch and pumped a half dozen shots into the passing truck. From his vantage point, he hit the cab of the truck repeatedly, but it did not slow. The truck took the hard left onto the road that ran away from the bunker and accelerated away from Rayce. He watched as the truck continued to speed on expecting that at least one of his bullets would find the driver, but the truck's course remained steady. The brake lights flared when the truck came to the end of the long driveway, the truck already well beyond handgun range. Rayce rose out of his crouch to find keys to the other truck downstairs knowing full well that by the time he could muster the truck, his quarry would be long gone.
A squeal of tires snapped his attention back to the truck 300 yards away just in time for him to see a pickup truck reverse out from behind a dumpster and T-bone the SUV in a violent crash.
Sammy, thought Rayce. Rayce sprinted down the long driveway with gun in hand. He saw two figures climb out from the SUV from the side that was still intact. Rayce watched as the two jumped from the truck and headed toward the bordering forest. The first figure disappeared into the woods and, behind him limped the glossy pate of Enver Yilmaz.
Rayce watched for movement in Sammy’s truck but kept his gun trained on the SUV as he neared. A quick check of the SUV revealed the body of Head and Shoulders with a bullet hole in the side of his head.
He quickly checked on Sammy, who was only now showing signs of life in the pickup. Rayce pulled the driver door open. “You OK?”
“I’ll live, just a little bump on the noggin. I saw them run into the woods in that direction,” said Sammy pointing to his right.
“You stay here; I’m going in after them.”
Rayce entered the woods where he had seen Yilmaz go. He slowed down to a crawl as he let his eyes acclimatize to the black of the woods. The darkness was complete with only a faint glow from the city shine filtering in through the treed canopy overhead. Not wanting to walk into a trap, Rayce stopped completely to listen for the sounds of escape. His sight, now tuned to the dark as well as they were going to be, was of little value. The areas that were illuminated enough to see into would not be the areas where hiding men would wait. Rayce pulled out a compact package from his pocket and carefully took out a pair of hearing aids. Using hearing aids to find quarry when adequate sight was not available was a trick he had used in Iraq. NVGs were not always available, so alternate means were needed to locate those hiding in darkened caves.
As soon as he put the aids in, his auditory senses were pummeled by a cacophony of sound. It took a long minute for his mind to filter out the extraneous noise created by the wind in the trees and the background sounds of a city. He slowly turned his head searching for sounds that were not innate to the wooded environment. He imagined that his head was like a radar array, slowly scanning the surrounding area in search of sounds that a wounded or running man might make. The sound of a soft gust of wind stopped his movement. No, not a gust of wind, a soft, raspy, breath-like sound, not at all natural, but contrived: not a sound he would normally expect to hear given his locale. It was the shallow, uneven breathing sound that a wounded man might make when trying to be quiet. He moved his head slowly from side to side until he was able to fix the direction of the breathy sound. He determined that the source of the noise was not moving and less than 40 feet ahead. Not surprising, thought Rayce. A wounded man trying to make his way through a dark forest would make too much noise to go undetected. He would be lying in wait somewhere directly ahead, waiting for the reckless pursuit of his tracker. Waiting with weapon drawn, waiting for Rayce to walk into a bullet. He would not fall into that trap. He lay down on the ground and advanced slowly in an infantry crawl, always keeping to the shadows where no light existed and used his enhanced hearing to keep the target in front of him.
The raspy sound of breathing was now no more than 20 feet ahead. Rayce picked up a pine cone and flicked it to the side where it landed 10 feet to his right and watched ahead for movement. He saw the movement of a dark form repositioning itself toward the fallen pine cone. Where before only darkness existed, Rayce was now able to make out the indistinct outline of a form before him. The cadence of the breathing was quicker now. Rayce imagined that figure before him was pointing his gun in the direction of the pine cone waiting for another revealing sound. He flicked another pine cone into the same area, and the entire wooded area was instantly lit up from the muzzle flash of Yilmaz’s handgun. Yilmaz fired at the sound twice before he realized he’d been duped. The gun flash illumination allowed him to see Rayce lying 20 feet off to his right, but by then, it was too late. Rayce squeezed off two rounds at Yilmaz’s head. He needed the first shot to kill his quarry and the second shot to light up the results of the first shot. The illumination from the second shot exposed half of Yilmaz’s bald pate still flipping through the air and Yilmaz looking toward Rayce not yet realizing he was dead. Good riddance. See you on the other side, Yilmaz, he thought to himself.
Rayce stayed where he was, his ears now ringing because of the amplified sound of gunshots. Whatever advantage the hearing aids had given him was now gone as he could now hear only a shrill tinnitus like ringing caused by the discharges of the recent gunfire. He didn’t move while he waited for the ringing in his ears to fade knowing t
hat his position was now compromised and that there was still another soldier in the woods close by. He started getting up when he felt the cold end of a gun barrel press against the back of his head. He turned his head carefully to look at the gun holder and was greeted by the shadowed face of the mustached man from the subway photos. Rayce couldn’t hear his words clearly but saw him mouth the words “drop your gun.” He did.
The merc dropped down with a knee on Rayce’s back and brought his hands behind his back to bind them. Rayce knew that the merc would want to use him as his ticket out of this mess; he’d have done the same. With hands now securely bound behind him, Rayce was dragged up to his feet, the gun still pressed into his head and pushed forward, back the way they had come.
They made their way through the woods, and gradually the light from the open parking area started filtering in enough so that they could see where they were walking. A flash of color off to their left startled them both, and Moustache swung his gun around ready to shoot. He held off in time to see it was only one of Sammy’s beach balls that had become untethered. Moustache looked at Rayce and cracked a smile that said, “Too bad for you, soldier. The beach ball cannot save you.” The smile was still on his face when the metallic glint of a large blade flashed downward and severed his gun hand at the wrist. The smile turned into a look of disbelief as Moustache watched his hand, still clutching the gun, fall to the ground.
Sammy raised the cleaver again and delivered a hard blow to the head with the flat of the cleaver that sent the merc to the ground.
“Remember me, dickface? Yeah, that’s right. The fat cook is here, and it’s payback time; too bad for you that my fuckin' people invented an eye for an eye.”
Sammy kicked the gun away from the writhing merc and then cut Rayce’s binds with the left-handed cleaver. Rayce didn’t waste any time picking up the gun. He threw the hand back at the merc and aimed the gun at his head.
“Time to answer for Sarah,” he said as he fired a round into Moustache's protesting mouth. Rayce tossed the gun back at the now lifeless body and turned to Sammy.
“Thanks again, Sammy. Is your truck still running? I need another favor.”