The Phoenix Variant: The Fifth Column 3 (11 page)

‘Where’s the SUV?’ Sophia yelled.

Aviary fumbled with her iPhone. ‘Uh, wait, they’re still there. Not moving! Just half a block right ahead of us!’ She leaned forward, pointing through the shattered windscreen.

Sophia peered out her driver’s side window to see the vehicles ahead properly. She spotted the gray SUV about six cars ahead, in the right lane. It was sitting almost in the center of Times Square, a major junction between Broadway and the road she was stuck on now, Seventh Avenue. Triangular in shape, Times Square was—unfortunately for her—a pedestrian plaza. From where she was, stuck in the center lane, she couldn’t get much closer. Traffic wasn’t going anywhere.

In her rear-vision mirror she caught sight of the other gray SUV in the distance. It didn’t seem that its occupants had seen her yet, or at least identified her cab as the one that took them out, and they probably wouldn’t since they were all packed in with other cabs in every direction.

She looked over at the other side of the Times Square plaza. Broadway was closed from vehicles entirely: it was just foot traffic. But she spotted a black 4WD pulling up near the barrier adjacent to her. The occupants were slow to emerge, moving for the trunk to get their shopping out. The vehicle was facing outward, parked alongside a sunglasses stall on the sidewalk.

‘Take the wheel,’ she said to Aviary.

Sophia jumped from the cab, crunching her door against the poor car next to her. With her slim ruck still on her shoulders, she legged it past the glass ticketing building. She watched for the driver, intending on stealing his key.

As she reached the corner, past the metal barriers, a squad car pulled in front of her. Two officers emerged, pistols drawn.

‘Great,’ she muttered.

They were yelling at her to lie down on the pavement where she stood. The crowd dispersed around her. She did as she was told, following their instructions. Until they came too close.

The nearest officer holstered her pistol and reached for handcuffs. Sophia clamped the officer’s ankle, fixing her to the concrete, and pushed into her kneecap with her other hand. The knee went sideways. The officer wobbled and fell backward. Her leg straightened out, her foot still pinned by Sophia.

Sophia launched upward, unholstered the officer’s pistol and aimed it at her partner. She held he captured officer and, pulling her to her feet, used her as a shield. Sophia closed the gap, shifted her aim back to the head of her new hostage.

She could hear Aviary squealing in her ear. ‘I think they’re trying to get out of the SUV!’

When Sophia was close enough she slumped her hostage into the other officer and used her as a stepping-stone. She kneed the other officer in the face, jumped over and kicked him in the back of the head. She landed behind the pair, pivoted, stole the pistol from his holster. They crumpled to the floor together. With a stolen Glock in either hand she dumped the magazines on the road and tossed the pistols into the back of the squad car.

‘They’re moving! Still heading south!’ Aviary shouted. ‘Chute three of three!’

Lane three of three
.

Sophia searched the right hip pocket of the second officer. She found his set of keys and took the squad car. She reversed, gently knocked them aside, and drove over the curb and onto the corner of the sidewalk.

She didn’t stop, pushing through the metal barriers. The barriers were all linked so they rattled along with her for a bit. She tried a J-turn, but they got in the way and she was only half-facing the SUV on the other side of Times Square.

The road was painted blue to indicate foot traffic. She drove over one of the entangled barriers. Her tires bit into the road. She accelerated, roared past a slanted ticketing building and toward the center of the Times Square plaza. Pedestrians—not expecting to look out for cars—scattered. Once the building was clear she could look across at the traffic on Seventh. She searched for the gray SUV and found it on the outside lane. It wasn’t moving.

She negotiated the metal poles through the plaza. Her squad car flattened a metal trashcan. Between her and the gray SUV: a few pedestrians and some metal tables and chairs, painted red. Above the gray SUV, the giant strobing arches of McDonalds.

She knew it would only be a matter of time before the SUV driver decided to pull up onto the plaza and illegally circumvent the traffic. But if she could box him in from the outside, she would deny him that option. The SUV would be trapped.

And she would have five armed men to deal with, she reminded herself.

Well, she’d cross that bridge when she came to it.

She drove through a red table and chairs, flinging them into the air. She was past the point of discretion. She had the NYPD in pursuit, and possibly the second SUV. And the first SUV would see her coming very soon. She hit another red table. The driver must have seen it.

The first SUV made a sudden getaway—over the curb and onto the plaza.

Sophia stamped on the gas pedal, smashed through another set of table and chairs. She caught up to the SUV while it was still in second gear. She had a chance. Positioning herself just to the side, she brought the nose of her squad car hard into the side of the target vehicle and aligned her front wheels with their back wheels. She steered sharply into the SUV, as hard as she could. At this slow speed she’d need a good hit to destabilize it. The SUV wobbled, went out of alignment, started sideways.

Sophia continued with her own turn, correcting herself just before colliding with the traffic on Seventh Avenue. The SUV looked about to straighten up.

Don’t you dare.

She accelerated.

The SUV started to right itself.

It struck a pole. Came to a sudden stop.

Sophia found herself boxed in between the traffic on her left, a statue on her right, the SUV in front. Her rear would soon be populated by NYPD and the second SUV. It was about to get messy.

She did the only thing she could do.

She hit the brakes and crashed into the SUV cabin, sandwiching it between her half-obliterated squad car and the pole, which now leaned at a precarious angle. They weren’t going anywhere.

Her airbag deployed, smothering her face. She leaned back, released her seatbelt and checked for her Glock. It was still in her waistband. Her arms hurt, her head seemed fine. She remembered her face paint and wondered vaguely how disturbing she must have looked taking down those two NYPD officers as a skeleton from another realm.

She opened the door to step out. Dizziness took over. She realized she wasn’t fine at all. She was concussed. She tried to stand but collapsed beside the squad car. Looking up, she saw the SUV’s rear hatch flip open. Armed men in black fatigues hustled the bound operative out.

The bound operative was led toward the traffic, out of Sophia’s view. Sophia tried to move but couldn’t. All she could manage was stopping the world from spinning around her. And even that was a challenge. She turned to brace herself on the squad car and noticed another vehicle speed out into the plaza behind her. Great. It wasn’t the NYPD. It was the second SUV.

Fear twitched inside her.

Move
.

Hurling herself to one knee, then both knees, one foot. She touched over her head, through her hair, feeling for anything warm or wet. It came away dry, smudged with ash from the museum explosion. She staggered around the open door, using it to hold her steady.

The second SUV was a blur in her vision. It pulled up behind her. She could see more masked soldiers in black, carbines in hand. An NYPD squad car pulled up behind it. Not good. She staggered around the hood of her squad car.

She had to move faster.

She reached the edge of the hood and almost fell. The gridlocked traffic on Seventh was only twenty feet away. If she could get there she would have some concealment. She took one step. And another. Then a third. Her legs were fine but her head had other plans, lurching her to the left and then to the right. Her balance was completely shot. She staggered dangerously to the left, slumped against a 4WD. To the commuters she must have looked drunk.

She ran her hands along the 4WD’s hood, let it guide her. She found her way into the traffic. Through the lanes she could see the masked soldiers in the distance, rushing up the avenue toward her.

One of them fell.

She heard someone yell. In pain.

Moving across the center lane, Sophia collapsed between two cabs. Her Glock slipped from her waistband. She found the handgrip. It was all she had.

She heard glass shatter. Shots fired. The discharged rounds echoed down the avenue, the sound bouncing off the vehicles like a hundred whips. She aimed her Glock at the attacker.

‘Motherfucker,’ Nasira said. ‘What the hell they do to your face?’

Sophia remembered her face paint. She took her finger off the trigger, turned to see the second gray SUV idling behind them, just past the statue. Aviary was in the driver’s seat and three black-masked heads lolled unconscious in the back.

‘Get in!’ Aviary yelled.

‘Thanks for smashing into us back there,’ Nasira said.

Sophia looked back over at two black shapes slumped on the plaza pavement and realized Nasira had in the last forty seconds taken out all of the masked soldiers from the second SUV.

‘Where did they take the operative?’ Sophia said. She tried to get to her feet and almost fell.

Nasira caught her. ‘They took her,’ she said. ‘Let’s go.’ She helped her across the traffic and past her beaten-up squad car.

Everything went a bit fuzzy after that. Sophia found herself in the back of the SUV with three bound soldiers, their masks removed to reveal glaring eyes. She ignored them and propped herself against the side, her dizziness receding.

‘Who are you?’ Sophia said.

They didn’t respond. Their hands were bound in their laps so she could see immediately if they tried to free themselves. She kept out of arm’s reach while Nasira took the wheel, relegating Aviary to the passenger seat.

‘They can probably track this vehicle so we need to ditch it,’ Nasira said.

‘Follow the operative,’ Sophia said, her voice slowly gaining strength. ‘Then we do a costume change.’ She aimed her Glock at the nearest soldier. ‘And a bit of Q and A.’

Damien sprinted through a grid of white boxes on legs, each box containing a miniature flowerbed.

Over his shoulder he saw Jay a few paces behind, his face pale from the jump. 
At the end of the green terrace he saw the Corinthian soldiers land. They started toward Damien and Jay, swords and daggers in hand.

‘Not giving up easy, are they?’ Jay said.

Damien started running again. He reached a row of beehives. He could see the bees inside, crawling across honeycomb. Behind him, Jay ducked a spatha and kicked one of the soldiers into a garden bed. It collapsed and both the soldier and the garden bed hit the ground together, spilling soil across the fake grass. Jay stole one of the wooden legs and kept moving.

Another soldier rushed through an aisle of boxes toward Damien, puglio gleaming in one hand. Damien stepped to one side, revealing a beehive behind him. He ripped the cage door from its slide. It wasn’t the swarm of angry insects he was hoping for, but a flurry of unsettled bees launched into the soldier, slowing him enough for Damien, still holding the beehive door, to bat the puglio from his grasp and slip the cage door under the soldier’s golden helm, crushing his carotid artery. The soldier passed out, covered in confused bees, and fell back onto another beehive. It tumbled to the floor and spewed more bees. These ones were angrier.

In a clear demonstration of bee avoidance, Jay circled behind Damien and sprinted for the door at the end of the terrace. No fewer than five soldiers followed. Damien knew the remainder would be gunning for the elevators in this tower to cut them off.

Jay had reached the door at the end, his lockpicks already in the lock.

‘Got it!’ Jay said just as Damien arrived.

An arrow shot past Damien’s ear. It punched through Jay’s shoulder as he opened the door. Damien rushed toward him, helping him through as he lost his footing. He almost deafened Damien as they stepped into a day spa.

‘What the fuck!’ Jay yelled. ‘Who shoots someone with a fucking arrow?!’

Blood dripped over the marble floor. Damien could see the arrow was a narrow one, fortunately for Jay it was designed more to penetrate armor than cut as many arteries as possible. Jay hadn’t recognized his good fortune quite yet; he was now on both knees as he looked down at the arrowhead in disbelief.

Damien moved back to the door, closed and locked it again.

‘You wouldn’t by any chance have a door stopper in your pocket?’ Damien said, running past him to a circular wooden and marble table.

‘Yeah, everywhere I go,’ Jay spat.

‘Didn’t think so.’

Damien dragged the heavy table across a soft rug, screeching along the marble floor, and shoved it firmly against the door. He was thankful it opened inward. What he wasn’t thankful for was the tuxedo not allowing them to carry a tourniquet.

Jay was on his feet again, wincing.

‘Can you move?’ Damien said, starting for the entrance to the day spa.

‘If I want to stay alive I probably should, so yeah,’ Jay said from behind him.

Good, Damien thought. There really was only one solution to this, and that was to get out of this building. Secondary to that was tending to Jay’s wound. Although Jay would argue that secondary was getting hold of their pistols and, more importantly, the rest of their kit. They’d left that, of course, in another hotel. By now Jensen had probably sold it all.

Sophia pulled the black combat pants over her jeans, part of the uniform they’d stripped from the bound soldiers in the SUV. She slipped the kneepads over them.

‘I’m guessing you had no clue I was in the back of that SUV,’ Nasira said.

Sophia could see Nasira relacing the paracord on her sneakers in the adjacent toilet cubicle.

‘I don’t have X-ray vision so no,’ Sophia said. ‘How did you end up in there?’

‘Long story,’ Nasira said. ‘Short version is I got lifted in Peru by Blue Berets and brought back here. They stowed me in that SUV.’ She paused. ‘I’m guessing you were the crazy bitch who crashed into us around that roundabout.’

‘It was a traffic circle,’ Sophia said. ‘And maybe.’

‘Yeah, I lost my handcuff key when you did that, thanks,’ Nasira said. ‘Next thing I know the SUV pulls up in Times Square and the masked boys pile out.’

‘They were after me,’ Sophia said. ‘Or at least making sure I didn’t get in their way.’

Nasira tapped a Glock under the cubicle wall for Sophia to see. ‘Cops find me a minute later.’

‘Donated their weapons?’ Sophia said.

Nasira laughed. ‘That’s all they donated,’ she said. ‘Can’t shoot accurately with this, trigger pressure too heavy. Don’t know how those cops shoot straight.’

‘They don’t,’ Aviary said.

‘Great,’ Nasira said. ‘Tried to take their mags but all they had in their pouches were cigarettes. Better than nothing I guess.’

Sophia reached for the tac vest and zipped it over her T-shirt. Public bathrooms were difficult to find in New York so Aviary had taken them to the NYU Midtown Campus, two blocks from Times Square.

The campus was mostly abandoned by now so they didn’t have to worry about blending in. As for the soldiers, they’d left them bound in the SUV. She knew they’d eventually escape, but she’d rather that than have to kill them.

‘Half of New York City has already evacuated,’ Aviary said from her cubicle.

‘Evacuated what?’ Nasira said.

Sophia heard her light a cigarette.

‘Hurricane,’ Aviary said. ‘Big one. Coming right for us.’

‘Hurricane?’ Nasira said. ‘Are you shitting me?’

‘Just looking at the news feeds now,’ Aviary said.

‘Fifth Column behind the evac?’ Nasira said.

‘Hard not to be,’ Sophia said. ‘Operatives crawling the island.’

Aviary tapped her phone against the cubicle door. ‘We can track them now!’

‘Good for you, kid. So why did Blue Berets steal something from operatives?’ Nasira said. ‘That doesn’t even make sense—they’re all Fifth Column. Someone gone rogue? Insane, maybe?’

‘We don’t even know if they were Blue Berets,’ Sophia said. ‘But there were a lot of operatives on the map. Nine.’

She heard Nasira whistle as she holstered her own Glock on her belt and finished lacing her sneakers. They were black and she preferred them over the soldiers’ combat boots. She stepped from the cubicle with her stolen M4 carbine to find Nasira already waiting. In addition to Sophia’s and Nasira’s Glock 17 pistols, they each had an M4 now.

Nasira was checking over hers. ‘Not bad,’ she said, cigarette in hand.

The M4 was modified to some degree, resembling an M4A1 SOPMOD—Special Operations Peculiar Modification.

‘What are you thinking?’ Sophia said.

‘From the chatter in the SUV, I’m guessing Blue Berets,’ Nasira said. She expelled a cloud of smoke toward the ceiling. ‘Special forces at least.’

‘Normally issued MP5s though,’ Sophia said.

‘Yeah, they’re accurate as fuck but they have the stopping power of a water pistol,’ Nasira said. ‘Pistol rounds though, what do you expect?’

Sophia knew that in an urban environment like this, it was likely they would be issued something with a bit more range. ‘They had the Magpul PDRs at the OpCenter in Denver,’ she reminded her.

The futuristic looking Magpul PDR was an ultra-compact bullpup-style carbine that Sophia thought had never made it into production. Perhaps the Fifth Column took over manufacture and produced it internally.

‘Then I have no fucking idea,’ Nasira said. ‘But I’m glad we have a few.’

Sophia inspected the modified Colt M4A1 in her hands. Many of the modifications operatives like her had made to the M4 had soon filtered down to the Special Forces inside the Fifth Column. It came as no surprise to her that these carbines they’d stolen from the Blue Berets were almost identically modified to her own back in Project GATE.

They weren’t the Lewis Machine & Tool M4A1 carbines specifically designed for Project GATE’s operatives; those were both expensive and staggering in their attention to detail. But the Colt M4A1 was versatile and reliable, and she was happy to have it.

This M4 had a flat top receiver, no carry handle. Replacing the plastic hand guard, an aluminum M1913 rail for attaching optics and low profile iron sights. It wasn’t her preferred rail but it would do the job. The fixed stock had been replaced with a collapsible stock. While the fixed stock was stronger and simpler, it was never the right length for close quarters or varying loadouts. Again, not her favorite, but it had a rubber buttpad that made it stable and comfortable to shoot.

The optics were x1, which did well up to four hundred meters. Sophia avoided magnified optics unless she needed to engage at long distance, and a carbine really wasn’t suited for that anyway. This carbine had an EOTech holographic diffraction sight. They were quite popular but the circle with the hash marks around the dot cluttered the sight and annoyed her.

Like all carbines bearing optics, this carbine had back-up iron sights installed. Military issue iron sights were flimsy, but these were spring-loaded and out of the way. Only the front sight remained visible through the sight.

The pistol grip was modified, but once again not what she would’ve chosen. This grip was ergonomic but it also had a thumb rest that would get in the way when shooting ambidextrously. It also lacked an ambidextrous magazine release and safety, which she needed to remember when she started transferring from her strong to her support hand.

She was pleased to spot a tac-latch though, which let her slap the charging handle to clear any malfunctions. It seemed to have become standard among Blue Berets.

A small tac light was attached to the bottom of the rail. There was also a visible light illuminator attached to the top of the rail, connected to the sight.

The tip of the barrel was fitted with her favorite flash suppressor and compensator, the Vortex by Smith Enterprises, which almost completely eliminated any flame or spark, keeping her position concealed while firing.

While she appreciated some changes, she didn’t appreciate all of them. For one, she would’ve replaced the vertical fore grip with an angled one that allowed her to grasp the barrel with her palm facing inwards, like she would hold a sword. The fore grip on this carbine encouraged poor body position and fatigue, a common mistake among special operations units. She planned to just ignore it and grasp the barrel how she wanted. It gave her better control and let her move naturally.

Nasira was doing it right now, aiming through her cubicle to check the holographic sight. She gripped the carbine near the very end of the barrel; fingers underneath and thumb over top.

Nasira seemed satisfied and let it hang from its sling. ‘Why you going after that one operative, anyways?’

‘The ruck,’ Sophia said. ‘Whatever is in that, they really want it.’

‘And now they have it. You think it was explosives for some other detonation?’ Nasira said.

Sophia pressed her lips together and realized how thirsty she was. She shrugged, leaned over a basin and drank from the faucet. She had a full water bottle in her ruck but she wanted to save it.

‘Hey guys, do you tuck your pants into your boots?’ Aviary called out.

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Sophia called out, wiping water from her chin. She caught sight of her menacing face paint in the mirror. ‘I should probably wash this off.’

‘How’s your concussion?’ Nasira said. ‘Chimera vector fixing it up?’

‘I feel better,’ Sophia said.

‘Sure you’re telling me everything?’ Nasira said.

Sophia wiped water from her lips. ‘I just did.’

‘You risked your life and ripped up half of Broadway just to stop people who
might
be Blue Berets from snatching a ruck that
might
have something dangerous inside while nine operatives circle like sharks,’ Nasira said. ‘Seems a little overkill.’

‘You
might’ve
missed it but they just blew up half of the upper west side. The morning news will be calling it the next 9/11,’ Sophia said. ‘I don’t know what’s in that ruck but it
might
be pretty damn important.’

Nasira still hadn’t blinked. ‘You’re a bad liar.’

‘I’m not lying,’ Sophia said. ‘Whatever it is, it’s dangerous.’

Nasira shook her head just slightly enough to notice. ‘You wanted the operative,’ she said. ‘You wanted to deprogram the operative, didn’t you?’

‘Look, if the opportunity arose,’ Sophia said. ‘We could find out what’s going on.’

Nasira raised an eyebrow. ‘’Cause those soldiers back there were real talkers, weren’t they?’

‘They don’t know anything,’ Sophia said.

‘Which is intentional,’ Nasira said. ‘So they can’t be interrogated by operatives—sorry, terrorists—like us.’

‘Aviary, you have the location?’ Sophia asked, still staring at Nasira.

‘Yeah, the Waldorf, if you can believe it,’ Aviary called out from her cubicle. ‘Maybe because it’s one of the first evacuated buildings so they think no one will bother checking … Sorry. Just … having some zipper difficulties. Hold up.’

‘It’s not about the ruck, is it?’ Nasira said. ‘This is an obsession. I don’t think you even know why you do it anymore.’

‘Because we
need
them,’ Sophia said.

‘You keep telling yourself that. Why?’ Nasira said. ‘To do what?’

‘To do
anything
,’ Sophia said. ‘Don’t you get it? We’re almost extinct.’

‘What happens when you have enough operatives?’ Nasira said. ‘Do you even know how many is enough? You even know what comes after it?’

‘No,’ Sophia said. ‘But I’ll know when I get there.’