CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
The agent becomes the poet.
It
had begun. The powers-that-be had threatened Henn for so long about his
fatherly way of running PIA. All agents were mollycoddled, they said. They were
badly trained and because of it they were cowards who shot to kill at the first
sign of trouble. Despite knowing of the threat, Henn read the fax countless
times hoping to see a different message but he could not make it say anything
other than, ‘Cancel all agent training until further notice.’ Now he wondered
just how far they would go.
Laughter, lately a rarity, disturbed
his pained thoughts and he rose a questioning eyebrow to the man operating the
communications console.
“You should hear this!” said the man
answering Henn’s look. “That Russian bastard is teasing his partner again.”
The serge of hate Henn felt for the
greasy, overweight Jack Chadwick was hard to control. This man was not his
choice but that of the powers-that-be, he was one of the many changes that had
been happening during the last weeks. Where he had been recruited from, he dare
not think, but his hate of the Russians was beginning to put everyone on edge.
An untidy Peter Steele was already twitching in anger, not only about his
friend being called a bastard but also from the deep hurt the young man felt at
having someone else called Tzavros’ partner.
“All right, Chadwick,” said Henn
biting his lip. “Put it through on the monitor so we can all hear.”
A familiar smile returned to Steele as
he listened to the shaking voice and the hiccups that told whom Tzavros was
teasing.
“Please!” pleaded Nutt. “Please, back
me up! Christ! They’re shooting at me – stop laughing – I’m gonna die – help
me!”
“How did you ever work with that damn
Russian? That’s a dirty trick to play on Pia’s only coward,” said Chadwick and
only Henn’s warning look prevented Steele from showing that an American could
conjure up a few dirty tricks of his own.
“They’re gonna kill me – help me for
God’s sake – give me back-up...” The sound of heavy gunfire snapped Henn into
action, snatching the microphone away from the surprised Chadwick he shouted,
“Net One, Tzavros, is everything all right down there?”
“Couldn’t be better,” came the reply.
“Zav, this is Steele, you okay?”
“Fine thanks,” Tzavros replied as in
the background Nutt yelled in fear.
“That’s enough, Mister, he’s had
enough, give him back-up,” shouted Henn as Steele frowned and pointed to the
map to confirm Tzavros’ location.
“I’m going in,” he informed Henn.
“Steele?”
“Don’t worry, I’m not armed. There’s
something wrong out there. Where’s Vacily?
“He’s up. Taken the trainees for a
chopper lesson. Do you need him?” Henn asked worried by Steele’s sudden
concern.
“Not sure. How would Vacily have answered the questions we both asked Zav? They’re both the same, you know?”
Despite
taking every available short cut and disobeying ever traffic law it still took
Steele a half an hour to reach them. For a moment, he could only see a very
frightened Nutt crouching behind a wrecked car. Then he saw him, amide flying
glass and bullets Tzavros sat on top of a fire hydrant, grinning.
“Zav! Kakovo tsiorta tebe nujzno?” shouted Steele as he ran across to
Nutt.
“Thank God, Mr. Steele, what’s going
on?” said a relieved Nutt ducking to avoid another round of bullets.
“Stay here and give us covering fire.
Have you a spare gun?” Steele said, then smiled at Nutt’s horrified look and
ran back to Tzavros.
“Nutt’s covering – go!” Instantly they
collided as Tzavros turned left instead of the signaled right and again Steele
shouted, “Kakovo tsiorta tebe nujzno!?
Zav, answer me!”
“Chas?”
answered Tzavros.
The capture of the men attacking Nutt
came second to the problem facing Steele now. Tzavros was scowling and backing
up into a car-park as bullets continued to fly in Nutt’s direction. Zigzagging,
Steele ran towards Nutt and dived the last few feet, then he rolled over onto
his back and placing both hands to his head whispered, “No, please no! God, if
you’re listening, not Zav.”
“Sir! What’s wrong?” Nutt asked
suddenly aware of the sudden cease fire and the disappearance of their
attackers.
“Keep down. Two things, Henn and I
asked Zav if he was all right. He said he was fine. He would never say that in
the way he did. More importantly, I just asked him what the Hell he was doing,
his answer was ‘one o’clock.’”
“Wrong code again? You know what he’s
like with his codes. He’s just forgotten...”
“It wasn’t a damn code, it was a
question in his own blasted language.” He turned onto his belly and thumped the
concrete as he looked at Nutt. “His damn eyes are green!”
“So are mine.”
“It was one of our jokes, you know?”
Steele said noticing the look of sympathy from Nutt. “No you don’t know, do
you. I used to tell him that he must be the only man in the world to have
orange eyes. He would snarl, you know, curl his lip up? That’s when his eyes
would darken until they were nearly brown. He’d get his passport out and
proudly point at his description. ‘Amber!’ he’d yell, ‘Not orange.’ It was a
joke between us and he knew I only did it to make him cross. Now they’re green.
I think he’s turned into a Changer,” he said sadly
“He’s joking, look at him. That’s Zav
honest Injun.”
“He’s my friend, you know? I have to
give him one more chance because of what he means to me.” He stood and raising
both arms in the act of surrender, he faced his friend. “Please, Zav, if this
is a joke remember what you would do if I ever got this code wrong. Do you
understand?”
“Yes,” he said smiling.
“And the poet, without a sound...”
Steele watched his partners face and silently prayed for him to speak. The
movement was so swift, Steele was nearly caught out as Tzavros’ gun began to
blaze. Flinging himself back down beside a puzzled Nutt, Steele gave one small
despondent cry before speaking to Nutt.
“Don’t move, whatever you do, don’t
move. That isn’t Zav but, I think it has his reflexes and aim. Let him run out
of bullets then we jump him.”
“How do you know?” Nutt did not wait
for an answer as he heard the distinct click of an empty gun and he jumped up
only to be knocked to the floor by Steele. “Nutt! I said stay down. God, I
don’t know what to do here. Zav always carried another gun in the back of his
belt. Some blasted Russian thing.”
“He showed it me. It’s a Tokarev
TT-33. God, that’s another eight rounds.”
“That’s the thing, plus, taped to his
wrist is an electric gun. One shot, but that could be anything. You know what
he’s like with experiments, it could be a conventional bullet or, gas. Wait for
my signal.”
Holding his nose in an attempt to stop
hiccupping Nutt looked from Steele to Tzavros. The only one to look any
different was Steele who showed every symptom of fear while Tzavros calmly sent
another bullet towards him. He had worked with the cold Russian long enough to
know how perfect his aim was. If he wanted to he could kill Steele but all he
was doing was playing with him, a damn Russian cat and an American mouse.
Russian humor, that’s all it was.
Nutt’s attention wandered as he tried
to locate the men who, minutes before, had been firing at him. They had
vanished, the only sound was Steele’s breathing, his own hiccups and the song
of children. He frowned as he tried to remember when he last had heard the
beautiful sound that floated on the wind. Laughter, delicate as thistle down
yet stronger than any rock.
“Oh, God! Kiddies!” whispered Steele
pointing towards a group of children skipping towards them.
“It’s okay, Sir. He won’t hurt
nippers. He loves em. He sees them and he smiles, you know that.”
“Give me your gun. I can’t have him
hurt babies.”
“God, no!” said Nutt in horror.
“That’s your mate. He won’t hurt them.”
“Look at him! Christ, Nutty, he’s seen
them – look at his face – at his eyes – he’s aiming. Give me your gun because
only one person has the right to shoot him and that’s me!”
Trembling, Nutt obeyed and watched as Steele stood and aimed the gun, “Zav!” he called. “Goodbye, my friend.” and as Tzavros turned towards him and a gun fired, Steele said sadly, “And the agent, without a sound, let fall his pistol on the ground.”