He glanced at Honi. Four men lay on, or were falling to, the sidewalk. Her hands and arms were a blur. The customs agent had already fired his weapon once at a man to Jake’s right, but the shot was not well placed. The man was wounded but not down. The attacker fired back and hit the customs agent in the left base of his neck, blood spraying out in front of him. Jake pivoted and swung his gun up to the attacker’s face and pulled the trigger. He felt a bullet tear through the skin of his upper left arm from the back. He shot another attacker on the outside of the group. The two remaining men turned and ran. Jake looked around, trying to assess where the next threat would be. The Japanese businessmen were gone. Honi was down, not moving. The customs agent was lying on his side, blood pouring from his neck and mouth.
Jake pulled his cell phone out and speed dialed the bureau car driver.
“Agents down. 911, now.”
He felt dizzy as he slumped to the sidewalk. That’s when he saw the blood running down his right side. He watched in a dazed state as the bureau car flew across the park. The lights and siren were going The car weaved between the trees. People scattered in every direction. He was breathing heavily as weakness overcame him.
Is this when someone watches me die? he wondered. Then everything faded to black.
A beeping machine woke Jake. He looked around the small room. Briggs sat in the only chair watching him.
“Good. You’re awake.”
“Agent Badger?”
Briggs lips drew tight. “We have to wait and see. The customs agent was pronounced dead at the scene.”
Jake closed his eyes. Losing a fellow agent was an unfortunate reality of the job. The problem was you never got used to it, and you never really got over it. Somehow you had to figure out how to live with it. He refocused on Honi.
“How bad is she hurt?”
Briggs held up a plastic evidence bag with a feathered dart inside. “This was embedded in the left side of your suit collar. It’s the only reason Agent Badger is still alive. It gave us a sample of the poison. She had a dart, just like this one, stuck in her back.”
Jake breathed out and slumped back in the hospital bed. “There was a second team.”
“Behind you, from all indications. They didn’t want to be seen. Compressed air dart guns don’t draw much attention, especially in the middle of a gunfight.”
“The two Japanese guys?”
“Vanished.”
“Any IDs on the guys who attacked us?”
“Oh yeah. Fingerprints and facial recognition came through. That’s where it gets interesting. They were all Bratva, Russian mob.”
Jake frowned. “How did the Russian mob get tied to two Japanese businessmen with regular passports but theoretical diplomatic immunity? What happened couldn’t have been a coincidence.”
“No. We don’t think it was, but right now the whole thing is one giant puzzle. As soon as you can manage it, I want you working on solving that puzzle.” Briggs checked his watch. “I’m having both you and Agent Badger airlifted to Walter Reed. I want both of you near Washington, where you belong, not in New York. I’ll see you there.”
Two nurses came in and started prepping him for the transfer, as two FBI agents stood guard by the door. Well, he thought. At least no one had to watch me die. Just let Honi live. I’d give anything not to have her die.
The helicopter flight was noisy, rough and exhausting. Shortly after he arrived, an Army doctor came into his room carrying X-rays. He snapped them onto the light panel, placed a recorder on the table next to Jake’s bed and turned it on.
“You’re very lucky. Bullet entered your right rib cage between the fifth and sixth ribs, followed the ribs around under the intercostal membrane of your chest, and lodged next to the fifth thoracic vertebra.”
“So I’ve got a bullet next to my spine?”
“Yes. The good news is that it didn’t sever the intercostal nerve, but it is putting pressure on that nerve and shutting down all nerve conduction.”
“Meaning?”
“It’s blocking the pain you would normally be feeling with an injury such as this.”
“Operable?” Jake asked as the seriousness of his wound gradually sunk in.
“With some difficulty, yes. It’ll take between four and five hours. We need your consent to proceed.”
“Where do I sign?”
“I assume you’re right-handed?”
Jake nodded.
“You’re right arm isn’t going to work well enough to sign anything, hence the recorder. I need clear verbal consent and a statement that you understand the risks.”
After going through all of the details and associated risks, Jake gave his consent.
“Great. I’ll see you in the operating room in about half an hour, though I doubt you’ll remember being there.”
Jake felt helpless and without control again. He wasn’t going to die from this, but would it be an injury in the line of duty that would force him into disability and retirement. He fought against the anxiety that rose within his chest as a nurse injected something into his IV line. Within seconds he relaxed and closed his eyes.
Jake woke up groggy. As soon as his mind cleared he pressed the nurse call button.
“Agent Badger,” he said. “Is she?”
“She’s down the hall.”
“Take me to her.”
“That’s not a good idea, you need your rest. She…”
“Either you take me there or I crawl there. Decide.” He was in no mood for a debate.
The nurse blinked several times and pursed her lips. “I’ll get a wheelchair.”
As she wheeled him down the hall, Jake spotted two FBI agents at the doorway to his room, one at the nurse’s station and one at each end of the hall. Two agents, NSA he assumed, stood at the door to Agent Badger’s room.
He felt panicked when he saw her. She was unconscious and on a breathing machine, its sound rhythmically pulsating. His fear of another devastating loss flooded back into his mind. His breathing rate increased.
“It’s just a precaution,” the nurse said. “The less energy she has to put into breathing, the more she has available to fight the poison.”
“Move me over next to her.”
Now close to the bed, he reached out and held her hand. There was no response, but at least she felt warm. A few minutes later the doctor entered the room.
“Is there a problem?” he asked.
“Not as long as I can stay here. How long is she going to be…like this?”
“Right now we are still flushing the toxin out of her system. Maybe tomorrow we can make a change. The blood tests will give us that answer.”
Jake looked at the doctor, trying to force the question out of his mouth.
“Normally, she would have a fifty-fifty chance of surviving, but with her small body size, the dose of toxin was large by comparison. Right now her chance of surviving is around thirty percent, but she impresses me as a fighter, so maybe she’ll make it.”
She’s a fighter, alright, he thought. Briggs had told him she had killed six large men with her bare hands before she went down. She was hitting all twelve master meridian points, half second each target. Six large guys in three seconds: That had to be some kind of record.