Codename: UnSub (The Last Survivors Book 2) Read online

  The dilemma was new. He didn’t need to know more about Soubel in order to assassinate him, but Kyle wanted to know. Who would send money to a man who wanted to watch people burn? Especially as those burned weren’t marks, at least not in his professional definition of the word. It was random, and wasteful. Arbitrary death fomented chaos, and that was bad for his business. Even the Children had a core tenant that they held to. Alek Soubel had only anger, and his apparent narcissism. People were burned because of chance interaction with him.

  So, who would fund that?

  Despite the hour, his curiosity was nagging him. Kyle needed to know more, needed to know what made Aleksandyr Soubel tick. Well, it wasn’t as if he couldn’t do research, it had just proven more efficient to use the services of the triplets. Except, that was the common course of action, and Derek’s words rankled him. Had he truly become predictable? If so, doing his own research would break that pattern.

  Money was the easiest place to start, as he had already hacked the account. He would just have to sift a bit further in to the past, to find out more. The account was old, and so it provided a wealth of information – including the locations of the banks where withdrawals occurred. A few years back showed a long stretch in San Diego which Kyle cross-referenced to news headlines for that city. A similar period occurred in Orange County, and both locations had been plagued by an increase in arson while Alek Soubel sojourned there. It seemed setting fires was not a new habit for the leader of the Burners.

  The more he looked the more evidence Kyle found of Soubel’s violence. And the more he found, the deeper he had to look. Discovering what made this man a monster was having an addictive effect on Kyle. Time meant nothing, only the ever increasing tidbits of information he gleaned had any relevance to him.

  Until the screen he was staring at started to blink at him. The strobe effect was accompanied by a flat bleating sound that roused him from his academic stupor. The information that was displayed momentarily confused him, and then it registered that Alek was at a local branch attempting to make a withdrawal. Kyle muttered a curse at himself for falling into the trap of unnecessary research, and gathered his gear. He was not about to lose the opportunity to collect this bounty in a timely fashion.

  It took less than seven minutes for Kyle to reach the branch that Soubel was using to acquire funds. A quick glance around the site showed him two potential sniper nests, which would offer the best view of the bank’s front door. He settled on the one less visible from the street, and had his rifle assembled and trained on the door about two minutes later. It was perfect, including the view of nearby flag to help him gauge wind-speed. All he had to do now was wait for the man to appear.

  It was not a long wait.

  Kyle sighted in, intending to go for the clean shot to the glabella, center of the forehead. He didn’t get the chance, as the phosphorescent trail of a tracer round crossed just behind the head of his target, taking off Soubel’s pony tail. He pivoted his rifle on its tripod, and realized the round came from the sniper location he discarded. From where he was currently located, there was no way for him to get eyes on that nest. He had to physically go there.

  It was the matter of ninety seconds, but Kyle knew there was no way for him to intercept the shooter. Whoever it was, was long gone by the time he got there. He, she, whoever left Kyle a message – on a table, most likely the table used to steady his rifle, was his shell casing, standing alone on a lace doily.

  Kyle took a deep breath in. Seeing that shell casing offended him; it was unprofessional to leave your brass behind. But he knew that it was a taunt, a challenge. “Come get me!” it screamed to him. The gauntlet was laid down, and he would accept.

  Though it was unlikely to hold much in the way of physical evidence, Kyle picked the shell casing up using a plastic bag. On the off chance there was something as mundane as a finger print on the shell, he would need to isolate it. Another deep breath in, then let it out; he was going to need…assistance to deal with this.

  The Aleksandyr Soubel contract would have to be tabled for the moment – after that botched attempt he would likely go to ground. The prey was wary now, and it would take time for him to relax back into a discernible pattern. In the interim, there was the matter of this most unprofessional contract thief. A very strict punishment was exacted upon assassins who poached another guild member’s contract, and as the last Master Assassin, Kyle would be obligated to enforce that punishment. But first he would have to find the poacher and what he needed now was information. The Ground Zero was looking like a good place to begin this hunt as the triplets were information specialists, in their own way.

  The trip there seemed to take hours, despite the relative nearness of the bar. It had been a long time since any contract challenged him, so that might have been the cause of his fatigue. Maybe it was the combination of Anderson’s killer, Ruedes’ words, and the fact that Soubel was a mystery that made the previous night seem to have gone on for way too long. Either way, Kyle felt exhausted and it showed.

  The early morning sunlight glittered golden off the windows of the buildings, in a seeming cheerful greeting that Kyle ignored. Unsurprising, the Ground Zero was doing a steady business, though with fewer of the unwelcome elements thronging the entrance. Kyle easily slipped past what rabble was there, and made his way to the main bar. With what felt like the weight of the world on his shoulders, he sat down in his usual seat, back to a wall, and looked up to see Mickie standing over him.

  Wisps of her hair stood on end, but her brassy tresses were mainly contained in a wavy tail. Dark circles cast shadows under her blue eyes, indicating that she had been working the bar for most of the night. A small smile crossed her face when Kyle first looked into her eyes, but was quickly replaced with a worried little frown.

  “What’s got you looking like what the cat dragged in?” The words were spoken quietly as Mickie leaned in, pulling a bottle from under the bar.

  “I don’t want to talk about it” Kyle’s voice was barely more than a whisper, but Mickie heard it well enough. “I have something I need Lotus to take a look at. It’s a bit more delicate than what I can analyze on my own.”

  “Of course, and the usual fees will apply.” The words were spoken with the cadence of familiarity – this was a regular business transaction. “Go on back. And Kyle, if there is anything else…” The words hung in the air, as Kyle wearily shook his head, walking to Lotus’s demesne without a backwards glance.

  Chapter 17: Utterly Forsaken.

  February 3, 2094

  Kevin Anderson moved like a specter through the Muir woods. He didn’t really like going anywhere near the Forsaken, the same way he never liked going near any cults. He was just glad the Scientologists had been taken out in the last war—those guys were really creepy. He could at least talk to the Children.

  The Forsaken were an entirely different kettle of fish. This was a cult that was one part street gang, and one part Manson family. Unlike the scavengers of the street, the Forsaken were supposed to kill before they could join the membership, though how true it was is a little vague, considering that there were no roll calls, and it was hard to verify that the clipped body parts brought in by a group weren’t all from the same body. But, according to Kevin’s friend Shen Lo, the population of San Francisco had swelled in 2090, and evened out again in short order. Most of those stories for why it evened out again included the Forsaken. A million strong, one murder per person, would have been more than enough to decimate the population of San Francisco, if not worse.

  Kevin wandered at the outskirts of the Forsaken territory. If anyone caught a glimpse of him, there was no reason for anyone to suspect anything interesting. There were a lot of people in the Forsaken, and like any cult, there were new people coming in all the time. He wouldn’t be at all out of place. Okay, he was generally clean, and they were living in a forest, but that could be explained by being new … or dirt not showing up on his dark clothing.

  As
long as no one got within smelling distance of him, he wouldn’t have to explain himself.

  There was only one structure in the Muir woods, and it was where Andreas Forman and Harris Derringer had made their base of operations. There was nothing in the way of security. If someone caused trouble, they would be killed.

  And here I am, causing trouble. I wonder if I have enough weapons?

  The building was immaculate, modeled in a pseudo-Japanese fashion, with sliding doors that looked like they were made of paper, but were actually plastic.

  Kevin Anderson walked up to the front of the building and knocked on the front door.

  Despite the straightforward, warhammer bluntness of the approach, he had put a lot of thought into this. There was no other real approach other than direct interrogation. He was living in a world without forensics – no trace fibers, DNA profiles, or even fingerprints – which meant that the quality of the physical evidence in his investigation boiled down to anything that early Sherlock Holmes could do.

  That depends, was fingerprinting around in the 1880s?

  Kevin raised his fist to knock on the door, and for some reason, hesitated.

  The disorder usually referred to as post-traumatic stress, amongst its various and sundry negative psychological impacts such as flashbacks, also includes sensitivity to sights, sounds, and an “overreaction” to such stimuli. However, what most laypeople fail to realize is that all of these symptoms are, in reality, survival mechanisms for anyone who has had to undergo prolonged battle conditions. A loud noise on a battlefield is reason enough to duck – because if you stop to investigate the first sound, you probably won’t live long enough to hear the second.

  However, since Kevin Anderson had been living the last year in constant combat conditions, his body reacted before he knew what he was doing – he spun out of the way before the falling body could land on him, feet first. Later, he would realize that he had heard the faint scrape of boots against roof tiles.

  The attacking shape was shorter than Kevin, but spry. Even though Kevin was in motion, the attacker was on him quickly. Kevin backed up, avoiding two spinning kicks for his upper body. The follow-up attack was a low sweep, which Kevin hopped over, pulling his knees to his chest, and stomped down on the attacker’s ribcage. The attacker kept spinning, so the fellow’s ribs weren’t scattered like a vase dropped from a roof.

  The attacker rolled, taking Kevin’s legs out from under him. Kevin hit the ground with a fall break, absorbing the impact on his shoulders and forearms when he slapped the ground. The attacker rolled to his feet, then jumped for Kevin. The exiled spy pushed up on his left foot, shooting his hips up, and kicked out with his right, taking the attacker in his sternum.

  Two seconds later, both Kevin and his attacker were back on their feet.

  The attacker dove forward, going into a strange cartwheel kick. Kevin sidestepped and C-stepped, swinging around to ninety-degrees away from the attacker. As the attacker came up to a standing position, Kevin’s arm was already whipping around the smaller man’s throat. His right hand clamped over his left bicep, and his left hand snaked around behind the attacker’s head, squeezing the throat, cutting off the man’s blood and air.

  Kevin’s attacker pulled his knees to his chest in an attempt to pop his head out of the choke and slip to the ground. Kevin tightened the grip, wrenched back and slammed the guy to the ground, using his weight advantage to keep him down.

  Kevin head on until his attacker stopped writhing. He kept the hold on for another two seconds, just in case the guy was faking it.

  “About time,” he muttered. He released the choke, grabbed both wrists, pulled them at the small of the guys back. Kevin looked up and around to make sure he hadn’t suddenly developed a Forsaken audience of the damned. He slipped out a roll of duct tape, and secured both wrists in a matter of seconds, and pressed his knee into the man’s back.

  He pulled his captive around the back of the building before someone noticed him. The last thing he needed was a million blood-hungry cultists noting that he was dragging one of their number deep into the backwoods.

  When he was far enough away, Kevin stopped and looked at the nimrod. He was somewhere over five and a half feet, wiry, with a narrow face, sharp little mustache, and neatly clipped brown hair. He had seen the Forsaken number two once before, but he couldn’t forget the face of Harris Derringer.

  Next time, maybe I should just phone ahead. Kevin smacked Derringer a few times. “Come on, I don’t have all morning.” He glanced at his wrist watch, and winced. He wanted out of there before the sun came up.

  And what are the odds that the one sick sonofabitch I came here to find just happened to almost fall into my lap? Kevin looked, drawing his gun, and swept the area. It could be because he’s former SAS and is one of the few people on this side of the continent who could possibly see me coming. But if he saw me coming, why didn’t he call in his minions? He has to have minions, he’s all but the head of this cult. They’re all his minions. Come to think of it, so is his supposed boss.

  “There won’t be anyone else, mate,” Derringer said from the ground. Kevin barely looked at him, keeping an eye on the surrounding area. Derringers shifted until he could get himself into a half seated, half laying position. “Most of me killers aren’t here during the night.” He smiled. “They’re out hunting.” He looked Kevin up and down. “You ain’t one of the normal crowd we get around here. Most of the blokes who come in trying to either prove themselves or kill us don’t get that close.”

  Kevin spent another beat checking the area, then lowered the guns and made eye contact with Derringer. The eyes were dark, almost black in the low light, and Kevin was suddenly reminded of the blank and empty look of sharks he saw at the aquarium. What was it that Mandy said about Angie Vaughn? Pure evil? I can see the resemblance between student and mentor.

  “So, what can I do for you, Mister…” Derringer looked him up and down again. “Anderson, ain’t it? You’re certainly not Elsen, and you are sure as hell not one of Rohaz’s men.” He gestured at Kevin with his chin. “You leave them bugs here last year?”

  Kevin nodded, remembering the listening devices he had left all over the Muir woods. “Just getting the lay of the land. I hope you and your sock puppet didn’t mind.”

  Derringer chuckled and shook his head. “Course not. I’d never hold it against someone for doing his due diligence. And what may I help you with today?”

  Kevin found it strange that Derringer hadn’t even been upset that he knew of the relationship between Derringer and Andreas Forman. He focused intently on the Forsaken’s face as he asked, “That depends, have you been in the city lately?”

  Derringer blinked. He tried to make it looked natural, but Kevin studied the micro-expressions – the slight bunch of the lips, the little tense in the eyebrows, the narrowest incline of the head. “Should I have been?”

  “Probably not. Let’s just say I have a corpse with all the hallmarks of a professional butcher job – plenty of skill, zero restraint, and pure sadism.” Kevin tapped Derringer with the pistol muzzle. “Which leads me to you.”

  Derringer gave a small grin. “Me? Whatever do you mean?”

  “After a little research on you, I know that you had problems with authority, collateral damage, and thought that urban renewal meant burning residential neighborhoods with the occupants still there. Hell, the British thought that you were such a malevolent little cuss that you were shipped to San Francisco so fast after the bombs fell, you might be the first Exile. And if your protégé is any indication, I should probably kill you on general principles. However, since I’m a generally nice human being, I’d much rather shoot the correct party.” Kevin pushed the gun into Derringer’s forehead some more, and said, “Back to my original question – been to the city lately?”

  “Sorry, but no.”

  Kevin did and said nothing, but expected the answer. Derringer’s face had told him all he needed to know the first time, but
he had no intention on showing this particular nutjob what his personal capabilities were, while at the same time wanted to impress him with his intelligence resources. “Next question: do you know anyone around here as skilled as you are?”

  “Almost all of my men. I’ve been busy training my lot to be as good as me, at least in hand-to-hand combat.”

  Kevin narrowed his eyes. Derringer was probably boasting, trying to show Kevin that he had a hand to play that was just as deadly as anything Kevin could dish out. But the odds of Derringer training his people to be just as good as he was were slim to none. If you were the king of the killers, you didn’t want any upstart getting ideas.

  Derringer arched his brows. “What about your pet demons in town?”

  Kevin gave him an evil smile. “Nope. If the Children slip their leash, they risk eternal damnation. And I’m certain that they’re as well trained as your guys.” If you’re going to one-up me buddy, you had better do better than that.

  Derringer cleared his throat. “So, are you going to kill me already, or are we just going to sit around for a while until my lads get back?”

  Kevin thought it over a moment. Killing him wouldn’t be a problem. And it wasn’t like he hadn’t assassinated people before. His personal kill count was so high he was probably considered a mass murderer. And it wasn’t like he needed a reason to kill Derringer, the man was responsible for more dead bodies than Kevin, and a lot of Derringer’s victims didn’t have it coming.

  However, without Derringer, what does Forman do without his restraint? If Forman wakes up one morning and has a whim to let his army of minions ravage the city, it’ll be this little schlub to keep him from doing that.

  Kevin’s answer was “If I leave you here to work yourself free, do I have to worry about blowback on your end?”

  Derringer shook his head. “Can’t see why. You’ve not nothing I want, and most of our interaction has been curiosity on your part. Far as I’m concerned, we’re clear. Though I have to ask – you mentioned protégé earlier.”