Mark Young - Off the grid

A man’s voice came over the speaker, an explosion and gunshots in the background. “Sir, we are under attack. We-” is all he heard before the recording stopped.

He glanced at the last number dialed. The call came from the lab in Albuquerque. He dialed Collette’s number and listened to her cell phone ring until his call rolled over to voice mail. She was not picking up. Or unable to answer his call.

Something went wrong.

Frustrated, he tried to think of someone on-site who might be able to give him an update. He did not want to leave a phone trail to the lab, and if he called his contacts in Albuquerque, he’d be leaving a trail to those contacts with a timeline corresponding to whatever was happening at the lab.

He dialed a Seattle number. As soon as his contact answered, Richard demanded an update from New Mexico. “You have any contacts there you can trust? I need a quick assessment as to what’s happening.”

“Call you back in a few, sir.”

Richard hung up and thought about Joe O’Rourke and the interrogation. He dialed the medical technician standing by. “Move him back to the holding cell. Something has come up that needs my attention. We’ll have to continue this later.” He slammed the phone down, waiting for a call back.

Ten minutes later, the phone rang. He snatched it up. “Speak to me.”

“Sir, looks like all hell broke loose out there. They got police and fire responding. Reports of a bombing and a firefight going on. The cops are holding everyone back until they can assess the danger.”

“They have to get in there right now. Before anyone can escape.”

“I know sir, but the cops are playing it real cautious. Things are really volatile. They may be even calling the feds-ATF, FBI, and the rest of the federal alphabet-soup agencies.”

Richard shook his head. “No. No. We can’t have everyone poking their noses into that lab. We have to contain. Now!”

“It may be too late, sir. It sounds like a war just started.”

Richard ended the call and quickly dialed another contact in Justice. He needed to start containment immediately. Before too much information got out. And he needed to kill whoever did this before they could talk.

They needed to be silenced.

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Alena seemed transfixed as she stared at Redneck’s body. Gerrit grabbed her arm, tugging her toward the gaping hole in the wall. “We have to move.”

Willy came over the air, his voice frantic. “Mr. G, what’s going on down there? I show Redneck down. Not moving.”

“He’s dead,” Gerrit said, tersely. “Guide us out.”

“You got movement to your right. SWAT must be reacting to your shots.”

“Tell Jack to keep the engine running. This is going to be a close one.”

Alena started to move and he released his grip on her. “Follow me,” he said, crouching as low as he could to limit the target his body made. Off to his right, he saw a light flash, a police officer in full gear moving along the wall. Apparently they had not spotted the mangled hole in the fence. They must be zeroing in on the blast radius around the outer wall of the lab.

He sprang forward, hearing Alena’s quieter tread behind him. They made it through the outer fence when there was a yell behind them. Turning, Gerrit saw a flash of gunfire. One of the SWAT officers was firing. “Alena! Run! Run!”

Gerrit wheeled around and fired, aiming just behind the officer’s head. The officer flattened out, then began to rise to fire again.

At that moment he heard the whirl of blades as Jack Thompson’s voice screamed into Gerrit’s ear. “Run for it, boy. Give that flyboy some room to work.”

As Gerrit dashed across the open area behind the fence, he heard the sweet sound of 20mm cannon fire chewing up dirt as the helicopter opened up. Belching across the wire, each round raised dust as the perimeter turned into something akin to hamburger meat. Enough firepower to keep SWAT from chasing them any farther. The pilot made one pass, almost went vertical, then fell back for another run.

Just before Gerrit crossed a rise, he looked back one more time and saw the helicopter crew make a third pass. Those officers trapped on the ground knew better than to cross no-man’s land as the helicopter pinned them down.

He dashed down a sloping hill to a waiting car below. Alena reached the car first, diving into the backseat and leaving the door hanging open. Gerrit was a few steps behind. He flung himself inside, yelling, “Go! Go! Go!”

Jack Thompson stepped on the gas and the car hurled forward. Gerrit slammed the door shut, looking back to see the helicopter streaking across the sky into the darkness.

A mile away, Jack slowed down.

Gerrit keyed his radio. “Willy, give us an update. You tracking us?”

“Yeah, Mr. G.” Willy’s voice sounded subdued. “What happened back there with Redneck?”

Alena’s voice came over the air. Gerrit glanced over and saw tears in her eyes. “Willy, let’s keep this off the air. Redneck’s gone. There is nothing we can do now.”

Silence filled the car, oppressive, gloomy.

Another mile slipped by before Jack spoke. “What did happen back there, Marine? We need to know if we’ve got a security breach.”

Gerrit caught Jack looking back at him for a moment, then the colonel glanced away. “It’s as bad as it gets, sir. Kane planted Redneck to spy on us. Everything we know, Kane must know by now.”

“How could Kane have gotten to him?” Alena looked over at him, her eyes pleading.

Gerrit took her hand. “I think he was one of them the whole time. Working for Kane way back when Joe met him in Chicago. My guess, Redneck didn’t have a direct link to Kane, to protect himself from Joe and Willy. Didn’t know what kind of protections Joe might have raised to catch messages. They must have done the old spy world thing-maybe a dead-letter trip through an e-mail account, or maybe they did really old school-written only, left at a physical drop site.”

Jack piped up. “The good thing is he couldn’t get information to Kane on a regular basis. For example, on this op he couldn’t let Kane know what our plan was because he never was out of our sight. I mean, they didn’t even know for sure we came to Albuquerque until it was too late.”

A chill swept through Gerrit. “But he did know one thing he could have passed on to Kane.”

Alena gripped his hand. “Oh no!”

Gerrit nodded. “Kane must know Joe is in Harrogate. We need to get word to him right now.” He hit his radio transmission button. “Willy, we need to get in touch with Joe. Warn him that Kane might know he’s over there.”

“I’ve been trying to raise him. Joe’s not answering…” Worry seemed to weigh down every word Willy spoke. “I think they got to him, Mr. G.”

They reached where Willy sat with the rental van. He climbed into the car and they sped away, leaving the van and everything else behind. About ten miles out of town, Jack stopped and switched places with Gerrit. “You drive while I make a few calls.”

Gerrit listened to Jack phoning his contacts, glanced up in the rearview to check on Alena and Willy sitting in the backseat. Alena seemed to be fighting back tears. Willy sat expressionless, staring out the window. Neither had spoken since they got into the car.

Jack finished his calls.

Gerrit looked over at him. “We should be good until sunup. By then, I imagine Kane will have his people slip enough information to the local law enforcement that they will be broadcasting a BOLO on our vehicle-and us.”

Jack shook his head. “That’s why I just made those calls. Let my people know they need to squash any BOLOs if they can. I directed them to put out a bogus alert for known terrorist that just hit the lab. These terrorists are believed to be en route to Mexico. And we all know how well Mexico cooperates with the U.S. on border issues.”