“I think I lied. It’s a death trap if someone finds us without warning,” Chris said. He sat opposite her in the small compartment, his eyes on the linked comu. “Bedford has been ahead of us the whole way. I suspect he still is. From now on we’re not safe, anywhere, anytime.”
“I understand that Bedford has gone into high gear: the bomb, Maas, Josephson and his notes, but I still can’t imagine why now?” Livvy asked.
A woman came down the corridor, moving steadily and ignoring the windows in the upper part of the doors into the compartments. Chris watched her traverse the length of the corridor and turn the corner that lead to the next vestibule.
“I don’t know why it’s happening now. Perhaps Josephson made some break-through discovery and his excitement overcame him. Or it’s something to do with Jesse. Something unexpected. I’m going to talk to Micaela next, to warn her. Perhaps she can tell us. Something has stressed Bedford’s timetable.
“In terms of getting leverage on Bedford, though, we need to know if Josephson has limits. Is Josephson’s cooperation with Bedford totally voluntary, or is there some coercion there? Either way, does he know enough at this point to give us some evidence on Bedford?” Chris asked.
“Paula didn’t need much time to figure it out. Once you started talking about Jesse, she knew,” Livvy said. “She didn’t even think about it that long, she just knew. Josephson knows. He’s been doing the research. He just doesn’t care. Maybe it’s too tantalizing an experiment for him, the creep. And of course, the money.”
Chris was watching a short, stocky man with a pleasant 21-year-old face turn the corner from the short corridor at the end of the car. The man advanced slowly down the corridor, glancing into each compartment or, if the blinds were closed, knocking and making an inquiry, all the while smiling apologetically as though he were looking for someone. There was a vaguely unnatural rigidity to his right arm and the angle of his right index finger.
Placing a finger on his lips briefly and then pointing towards the corridor, Chris took Livvy’s arm and guided her towards the compartment door. He crouched under the window that formed the upper half and then pulled her down in front of him, spoon-fashion, so that they were both pressed tightly against the door and jammed against each other in the narrow space. They hadn’t been so close since Livvy had almost landed in his lap during their encounter with the last gunman, and this time the contact was longer, but both of them were as tense as coiled springs.
Chris had had just enough space to pull his Stinger after they’d gotten into position, but Stinger darts didn’t cut all the way through doors. High caliber palm pistol bullets, if they were the right kind, might.
On the linked comu Chris held in front of them both, they watched the gunman advance to their compartment and stop to scan the interior. On the comu, it looked distant and unreal, but they detected a slight change in the light above them, then it was gone.
“As soon as he reaches the end of the car, I’ll be going out after him,” Chris said softly. He was still watching the man’s progress on the comu.
“Wait,” Livvy said quickly, trying to instill urgency while being as quiet as possible. “What if he’s smart enough to be suspicious of an empty compartment? He’ll be waiting in the next car, or turn back and catch you in the corridor.”
“I know,” Chris said. “But he’s a pro and we have to take him now. If we don’t, he’ll come back when we don’t expect him or catch us when we leave the train and he’ll control the situation.”
“Now,” he said, giving her a boost she didn’t need. “And wait here.”
She grimaced but didn’t protest. After checking the comu one last time, Chris dropped it onto one of the seats, opened the door, and stepped out into the corridor.
By the time Chris got into the small twin-doored vestibule occupying the space between their car and the next, the gunman was near the end of the corridor in the next car. It was Chris’ goal to catch up to him while he was still in the next vestibule. The timing was crucial and intolerant of hesitation. Chris ducked out of sight, counted to 5, then opened the vestibule door and sprinted down the length of the corridor. It had worked. The gunman stood alone in the vestibule, his back to Chris, reaching for the far door leading to the next car.
Chris touched the sensor to open the door in front of him. As it began to slide open, he aimed through the gap and fired twice. It was unavoidable that the gunman was alerted at the first sound of the door opening behind him and turned and fired as well, shattering the glass and hitting Chris twice in the chest. Chris fell back against the wall of the compartment immediately behind him and, breathless, started a slow slide to the floor.
The barbed darts from Chris’ Stinger sliced through the gunman’s clothing and found flesh. As the gunman was raising his arm to make a head shot, the darts advanced until they sensed the correct subdermal layer, then released their miniscule load of potent anesthetic. He was a pro, and aware of what was happening. As he lost strength in his arm, he barely had time to grimace, then he hit the floor and went out.
They were both on the floor in ungainly sprawls amid the shattered glass when Livvy ’s momentum carried her into the wall at the end of the corridor. She hit it with her side and successfully kept her Stinger aimed at the point where Chris had been standing just a few moments before.
“McGregor, oh my God,” she said when she saw the holes in his shirt, then registered the absence of blood simultaneously with Chris’ painful gasp as he drew breath.
“Get him cuffed,” Chris whispered. He drew another shallow breath. “He may have auto…reversal implant. I’m just going to… sit here a minute.”
“Got it,” Livvy said, pulling her cuffs out of her bag. She was a little bit breathless herself, but she took some satisfaction in securing their captive’s arms and legs as tightly as the cuffs allowed. She found two other small pistols, one at each ankle, when she searched him for backup weapons, and impatiently jammed them and the palm pistol into her bag. Then she sat down next to Chris.
“That was masterly, except for getting shot, McGregor. As soon as you left I started worrying that maybe you only had the one vest and had given it to me this morning. I was already coming after you when I heard the glass shatter. I am going to clock you, as soon as your ribs heal.”
Chris wasted a painful breath on a short, soft chuckle.
“I want to know where you got this ruthless streak,” Livvy said.
“These are… really bad guys. You have to be proactive.”
“No. I mean ruthless, as in how you treat your partner,” Livvy replied, making Chris laugh painfully again.
They heard the sound of converging footsteps.
“Got your credentials… handy?” Chris asked. “I don’t care to reach for mine… at the moment.”
Their prisoner awakened fully and glared at them as High Speed Security personnel moved cautiously in from both directions.
“Yeah,” Livvy said, searching her bag. “Wouldn’t want to be mistaken for the really bad guys.”
“What now?” Livvy asked.
There’d been a brief discussion with High Speed Security, which had converged on the scene heated and ready for a fight. After an exercise of some tact and matter-of-fact civility and charm, almost exclusively by Livvy, the LLE officers had handed their bound and disarmed prisoner over to the High Speed people. That seemed to mollify them more than a little. In fact, the security lugs actually seemed pleased to have a real-life professional assassin safely in custody. They had a nice little cell they didn’t get to use that often.