Chapter Six

Jaxon

The building is an apartment block in a run down part of the neighborhood left over to stray dogs and tangled weeds that look like they’ll stop at nothing to bring brick and metal back to the earth. Tendrils grow up the side of fences and walls like fingers on a underground beast, while dogs scamper around pissing freely on whatever is still left to claim. If people still live here, they do so hidden from the rest of the world.

I count three vehicles in total, and two guards on the entrance to the block, about as heavily armed as I expect this faction can afford to allow them. They look like kids with little experience, and by the way they're holding their guns, like they’ve never been trained how to shoot them. I expect this is meant as a deterrent for anyone thinking about going inside, but it’s not enough to work on me.

A quick check of the perimeter tells me there is only one entrance and exit, that all but two of the windows are boarded up, not a single one of the adjacent buildings is inhabited and nobody is guarding the roof.

Based on previous experience, if Ruby is inside this building at all, which is highly likely considering the presence of guards on the door, she’s likely to be in one of the rooms on the upper floor, which means that if I start on the ground floor, I’ve got to get past whoever they’ve stationed in the way without raising the alarm enough they all come hurtling towards me at once. If I go in via the roof instead, and if I’m not mistaken about her location, I can get to Ruby first, and then deal with everyone else when I’ve already secured her.

Armed guards are an occupational hazard I’d prefer to avoid, but it pleases me to see them, because it means that if intel is good and it’s definitely Ruby and not some other poor hostage inside this building, she’s one hundred percent still alive. And if she’s still alive, it means that whatever she has that they need, they still haven’t gotten it out of her yet. Ruby was a hard ass when I knew her five years ago, and I can only imagine she’s gotten even worse since then, after being here for so long.

I find the perfect spot, launch the grapple hook onto the roof, pull the cord tight and make sure it can take my weight. When we used to use these five years ago, the metal hooks made a tinny sound against concrete that no matter how quiet they landed, had the potential to give your position away, but these modern devices are made of a rubber housing that produces a silent impact. Each cord can hold up to five hundred pounds which means that the wall is likely to give way long before it snaps.

I check my weapons, set my timer to five minutes, take a deep breath and begin to scale the wall.

It’s a three story building with a roof terrace, made of old crumbling brick that smells like car fumes and chalk, bleached white by the sun. I move quickly up to the third floor, to one of the two windows that haven’t yet been boarded up, flip the heat sensor goggles and edge towards the window frame.

The outside wall is too thick for the heat sensor to work, but even before I get close enough to the window I can tell the room is empty. I detach the support from the cord, drop into the rectangular space quietly and press my back against the wall.

The door to the room is broken and hangs off its hinges like a twisted branch after a thunderstorm. Beyond, into the darkness of the corridor, I see little else but dust and shadow. There is nothing on the heat sensor either, which means that either these walls are too thick to pick up the signal or what’s more likely is that there’s nobody in the coverage area.

My timer says four minutes twenty seconds and counting. I leave the room, step carefully out into the corridor and work my way to the front door. This is an abandoned apartment still filled with remnants of the people that used to live here and when I see the family portrait still hanging on the wall, albeit slightly wonky, I get a shudder up and down my spine.

At the door I hear the faint lilt of voices, and drop the goggles again. There are three people on the sensor, standing outside what I assume to be the door to another apartment in the block, beyond which there is another mass of heat, which could either be Ruby and her captors, or simply another group of soldiers on the payroll.

I’ve got to get out of this apartment, through those three initial soldiers without anyone else inside the other apartment finding out, and then through whatever else is inside, before anyone gets a chance to either hurt Ruby or take her somewhere else. It’s not going to be easy, but easy wouldn’t be fun, and fun is why I got into this job in the first place. Besides which, the harder it is, the more impressed Ruby is going to be when I save her.

The MK23 with silencer is perfect for this kind of situation, so with my gun of choice in my hand, I drop the latch on the door, and step into the shadows while it slowly swings open.

As much as I would try to negotiate with hostage takers before taking any other offensive action, sometimes there are situations where the time for negotiations has long since passed. I can only imagine what they’ve been doing to Ruby over the last few days, and it’s absolutely certain that if I stepped out now with my hands in the air and every intention to try and enter into a peaceful trade, they’d fill me with so much lead they’ve have to reinforce the bottom of the coffin for my burial.

The squeak of the door yawning open attracts the guard’s attention, and despite rule number one of keeping yourself alive in a situation like this being doing exactly the opposite, one of them decides to come and investigate.

Illuminated by the glare of the lights above them, I can see exactly what I’m dealing with. Three idiots with outdated guns, playing games that are way out of their league. While the lead soldier and who I presume is the most experienced of the three approaches the open door, the other two look on with sleepy confusion. A second and a half later they are all dead, not a single one of them given time to even think about raising their guns. While I catch the falling soldier closest to me, it’s near impossible to dispose of the other two without them making a sound. I move into position quickly, waiting for the other apartment door to open.

It doesn’t take long for another soldier to come and investigate the sound but before he has time to raise the alarm, his blood is running out against his chest. Outside the door at the far end of the corridor I take down two more guards, before quickly clearing the other rooms of the apartment before a single enemy shot is fired. Before I kick the door down, I count eleven soldiers dead in my wake, and I’ve hardly broken a sweat. Two years out of active service and I feel as fresh as ever.

The door swings wide, snaps off it’s hinges and spins against the back wall. Out of the haze of dust come a volley of bullets that disappear down the corridor and zing into the darkness beyond. I can tell by the sound it’s an AK47, and whoever’s using it doesn’t give a fuck who he hits.

The thinness of the wall gives me a heat location, and the accuracy of the glock does the rest. The first bullet drops him to his knees while the second chews through his chest, putting him down on his back.

With whom I presume is the ringleader momentarily disabled, I turn my attention to the remaining guard whose idiocy in the face of attack outdoes all of the rest of them combined. For some reason he decides a kamikaze style attack is the best way to tackle the situation, and as soon as he rushes out into the corridor, I drop him like a sack of potatoes.

The room is small, dusty and illuminated by a single angle poise lamp. On the ground in front of me, groaning in a pool of his own blood lies the man who I presume is the head of this amateur organization. A little further away, out of the spill of light provided by the lamp, lies the body of a young woman, her face covered by a hessian sack.

I kick the AK47 away and shoot another bullet into the man’s arm just in case he thinks about picking it up again, and just in case Ruby wants to say a few choice words to him. After that I go to Ruby, and I know it’s Ruby because I’d recognise those perfect legs anywhere.

I rip off the sack and wince at what they’ve done to her. She’s alive, but barely conscious, and as much as she might want to, she won’t be saying anything to anyone for a while.

“Hello Ruby”, I say, my heart skipping a beat. “Let’s get you out of here.”

I cut her hands and legs free from the chair they’ve bound her to, and before I gather her up into my arms, I dispense of her attacker, with a bullet straight through his forehead.

“Jessica”, she moans to me, as she hangs her arms lifelessly around my neck. “They know where she is.”