Freedom Incorporated (2 page)

He caressed the cold
carbon-steel barrel.

A shallow ripple of skin
between his eyebrows was all that signalled a frown, the only
outward indication of his mounting frustration. He crouched, the
black leather of his mid-calf boots creaking in protest. And again
he fingered his scar, an inch above his thick hairline. The
sensitive pads on his fingers crept across the slight pinkish
bulge, invisible to all but the closest examination.

The Raven was one of the
few men who never found the rain bothersome. Perhaps he had thick
skin stretching across his bones, or perhaps the tingling pain
simply never registered with his tampered brain. Either way, he
took no note of the trickle down his chin that dripped a steady
tattoo on his trousers. It was getting heavier but there he would
remain, as always, until an omen released him from the shackles of
caution.

*

Adam stood
before Dan noticed the rivercat slowing for Meadowbank station. He
eased himself out of his seat, surprised to feel his lower back
seizing in protest. He gently massaged
the
taut muscles
while strolling casually to
the front of the cabin.

The deckhand
expertly looped a mooring line over the bollard and hauled the
ferry close enough to use the gangway. The passengers shuffled
past. The rain
was
pounding on the corrugated iron roof of the ferry
terminal
and it
drowned any words they may have uttered. Once more Dan
deferred to the others, disembarking last. He nodded a mute thanks
to the deckhand who dutifully grunted in reply.

His attention
shifted. There were four people between
Dan
and Adam. He watched the
beret
’s peculiar
bob
and sway
,
caused by
the older man’s arthritic gait. The Meadowbank terminal emptied
into a barren car park where a dilapidated ute – parked lengthways
across three faintly marked spaces – spoke volumes about the
suburb. Dan stopped at the end of the terminal, his nose inches
from a curtain of water caused by
the
combination of poor guttering and
leaf-litter. It distorted his vision, giving the world a surreal
texture. Most of the passengers scurried to their cars, one man
holding his briefcase over his balding scalp in a futile attempt to
avoid acid scarring. Another dived into his Commodore and revved
the engine hard before grinding into gear and laying rubber on the
road. With a vigorous swirl of the wheel, he navigated the chicane
and sped out of Meadowbank as fast as his thrashed car would take
him. That seemed to be a common sentiment. He was the first, but
others followed. Soon only those unfortunate enough to actually
live in Meadowbank were still there – stranded and ambling to their
dreary apartments.

Dan took a
deep breath. It smelled like rain. Rain and a broken sewage pipe –
fairly common with Sydney’s outdated sewage system. His nostrils
twitched, detecting a hint of chemicals drifting across the river
from the factories that had reopened at Rhodes a decade ago. He
knew, at least intellectually, that they had to go somewhere. But
emotionally it made no sense. He couldn’t fathom why people would
allow something like that in their backyard.
But only poor people live here now,
he
reminded himself sombrely. And poor people had no political
friends.

Adam had
already reached the old rail bridge so Dan swept the car park with
a final suspicious gaze before walking briskly to catch up. They
passed beneath the new bridge and veered right to head up the hill,
toward the apartment blocks that dominated the suburb. The only
other passenger from the ferry
was
hurrying
to the left, soon
indistinguishable against the dreary backdrop.

Dan felt the
familiar rush, the tingling sensation, the sharpening of all his
senses, the knotting in his stomach.
He
had enough adrenaline pulsing
through his veins to reanimate a corpse. Ten paces. Dan narrowed
the gap, made sure they were alone, and reached inside his coat.
His fingers laced the handle of his 1911 automatic pistol. His
preferred model was virtually antique
,
but it was reliable and the newer
weapons had never
impressed Dan enough to
make him abandon his favourite Colt.

Five paces.

Dan raised his
weapon and calmly said, “Adam Oaten.” It was a statement, not a
question
,
and it
carried a note of warning. “I shouldn’t need to tell you not to
move.”

Adam froze
mid-step and turned slowly, only to see to the .45 jutting in his
face. He uttered a resigned sigh. “I was wondering if you were one
of
them
.” He
didn’t bother to mask his contempt.

“
Over to the
toilet-block.” Dan gestured toward the brick structure with his
weapon. It reeked of late twentieth century architecture. The once
garish bricks now only held the memory of their former yellow.
Dozens of snails had embarked upon the arduous journey across the
path that rimed the squat building, advertising themselves as a
meal for hungry birds. Adam picked a delicate path around
them.

“
Hands on the
wall.”

The skin on the back of
Adam’s hands looked like tissue paper, ready to tear at a moment’s
notice.

The air reeked – an acrid
combination of vomit and excrement that the drizzle only
aggravated. Adam spread his legs and let Dan pat his sides for
weapons.

Dan
pressed
the muzzle of
his
automatic
into the small of Adam’s back, hard enough to bruise. He
grappled with his handcuffs and slapped them around Adam’s left
wrist. Then, with a twist to the cruel metal
that
would
ensure
compliance through pain, he wrenched Adam’s arm behind his back and
fastened the other half of the cuffs. It was never easy; Dan felt
vulnerable working alone. He’d never grown accustomed to it after
leaving the force. Only the reassuring click-click-click of secured
handcuffs released the tension pent within.

“
You’re
American aren’t you?” – Silence – “Aren’t you going to read me my
rights?” Adam turned to search his captor’s face when the tension
eased on his arms.

“
Hadn’t
planned on it,” Dan said huskily, shaking his head. He no longer
operated entirely within the law. He wasn’t acting
illegally
– after all,
Adam Oaten was a dangerous man and Dan needed to apprehend him –
but there were simply no laws that covered his line of
work.

Adam Oaten had five days’
unkempt stubble on his chin and carried an air of moral
superiority. He was the type of man that could look down his nose
without tilting his head.

“
So you’re the
latest puppet?”

Dan didn’t
understand the question. He raised an eyebrow, one of the few
expressions he permitted on his stony face.
“What
’
re you
talking about?”

“
But not a
particularly clever one I see.” Adam rubbed an itch from his cheek
onto his shoulder. “Not if you haven’t yet figured out the
game.”

“
What
game?”

Adam searched Dan’s face
for the answer to an unasked question then said, “To answer that
would take me longer than you’d care to listen.” He grunted. “Tell
me, do you have trouble sleeping?”

On a whim, Dan played
along. “And if I did?”

He laughed. At least
that’s what Dan imagined the sound was supposed to be. It sounded
more like a crumbling wall. “Yeah, I bet you do. You have the
brainwashed look. That naïve expression I’ve seen a million times
in a million people.” His shoulders slumped, something invisible
snapping within. “But I don’t have the energy left to save you. So
do what you will, and find your salvation somewhere
else.”

Dan wondered
whether Adam Oaten was entirely sane.
Salvation?
Dan didn’t consider himself
in need of salvation, and even if he did, Adam would be the last
person he’d seek for assistance. Months had passed since Dan had
needed anything from anyone, and he was fine with that just the way
it was. His patience snapped. “Whatever,” it came out harsher than
he’d intended and he added more softly, “come with me.”

The stinging
pain registered first. Dan slapped a hand to his neck the way he
might swat an insect
and was
surprised to see it splotched
with
red when he pulled it
away.
Blood?
In the
shocked moments that followed he couldn’t comprehend how that was
possible. He looked to Adam, he hadn’t moved.
Then how…?
He left the question
hanging as instincts took over and he drew his Colt, his eyes
urgently groping for the threat.

Then he
registered the shattering sound. With rising dread he felt his
wound
again
.
Superficial. Just a graze.
He risked a glance back to the toilet-block. Sure enough,
there was a blossom of powdered glass on the
bricks
.
The larger
shards had already danced to a stop on the concrete path
and
caus
ed
the
nearby snails to retract their antennae.

Dan peered through the
drizzle, sweeping his handgun in an arc, ready to squeeze the
trigger at anything that moved. He paced backward, acutely aware of
the looming danger. He used his free hand to put pressure on Adam’s
chest.

“
Get back,” he
ordered gruffly.

Adam shuffled to obey,
pulverising a snail as they retreated into the women’s
toilet.

Dan was
preoccupied scanning the park, alert to anything that moved. A pool
of water collecting in the hollow of a sodden newspaper gleamed
with movement 30 metres away. He jerked the Colt toward it then
steadied his
aim
with
his
other
hand.
Damn trees.
They provided
the
perfect cover. The assailant could
ha
ve been anywhere
;
there was simply too much ground for
Dan to cover. A copse of trees 20 metres away sprouted foliage
thick enough to conceal an entire squad.

Adam coughed. It was a
strained, spluttering cough and it commanded Dan’s attention. One
glance was enough. Someone had fired not one, but two capsules. And
the first had hit its mark. Adam hunkered against the inner wall of
a toilet stall. A spasm contorted his body, jerking his legs from
beneath him and he landed heavily on his rump. He coughed again,
this time flecking blood at the corners of his mouth. The capsule
had entered his upper thigh and the hollow pellet had delivered a
devastating strain of nanotoxin.

It was useless. Dan could
see that. The time until death depended solely on the potency of
the nanotoxin. He wished he knew what to say. He fumbled silently
for the key to his handcuffs.

“
Don’t bother
with that now.” It obviously pained Adam to speak around the
swelling of his tongue. The whites of his eyes darkened and Dan
watched helplessly as they ripened to sickly saffron before
blooming to rouge. “Do me a favour…”

“
Name it.”
What else could he say to a dying man?

“
Spare me…” –
blood flecked onto his shirt through a hacking cough – “a
bullet.”

Dan stepped back and
lined Adam’s forehead into his sights. The barrel quivered and he
held his breath to steady his aim.

He fired a single round
and Adam’s head jerked back and slammed against the flimsy toilet
stall. For a moment that looked like where he’d rest, but slowly he
toppled and slid to his left, striking his temple on the filthy rim
of the toilet and dislodging his beret. He finally came to rest on
his side, the handcuffs twisting his arms behind his back at an
unnatural angle.

How
pointless,
Dan thought.
He didn’t have to die.
A flame of
hatred kindled in Dan’s inner darkness.

He retrieved
his cuffs and tightened his grip on the Colt before edging toward
the entrance.
Damn you!
He knew who it was. He knew exactly who’d killed the crazy old
fool. He peered outside, eyes locking onto anything that looked
remotely dangerous. The park was empty.
Impossible.
He knew the Raven was
close; the rain was too heavy for a long-distance shot. At
fifty-metres a capsule might penetrate a dozen raindrops, and
nobody could accurately predict where it would land after
that.
And that’s why I’m still
alive.
He gingerly felt the gash on his
neck. It wasn’t bad; the nick had barely broken his skin.
But if the glass had shattered…

The world
outside was a plethora of movement. Every leaf jiggled cheekily in
the rain, all vying for Dan’s attention. He tried to scan beyond
the noise, seeking something out of the usual. He didn’t know the
Raven well enough to predict where he’d hide.
And he may not wait for me to leave.
It was a chilling thought. The last thing Dan wanted was a
shootout with a lunatic.