Hawk, page 5
part #6 of Will Slater Series
He said, ‘Is she dead?’
King just nodded.
‘Christ, King,’ Slater said. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘It was quick. That’s some consolation, at least.’
‘Why are you here?’
‘Why do you think?’
‘Did you track down who did it?’
‘I found them right after. I wasn’t far away. I just missed them.’
‘I assume they’re not around anymore.’
‘You could say that.’
‘How many?’
‘Two.’
‘Who sent them?’
‘That’s why I’m here.’
Slater paused. ‘Maybe this was fate, then.’
King cocked his head. ‘Why’s that?’
‘I was about to wrap myself up in a war with half the Budapest crime families. But I pulled myself away from it. That’s something I rarely do. I just got the sense it wasn’t the fight for me.’
‘Lucky you ran into me, then.’
Slater paused to consider what had been said. King wasn’t saying much. There was still the remnants of intense loss and pain and anger in his features. There were heavy bags under his eyes, and hard lines creased into his forehead. But apart from that he looked energised, revitalised, in phenomenal physical condition.
He was ready for a war.
Slater said, ‘How’d you find me?’
‘In Russia, you told me about stem cells. That night when I saved you from Ruslan and took care of you — before we stormed aboard the icebreaker. You were delirious. Semi-conscious. It was one of the worst concussions I’d seen. We talked about a lot that night, but I’d be surprised if you remember any of it. The brain is funny like that.’
Slater said, ‘Most of the events around that time in Russia are a blur.’
‘Does that worry you?’
‘It’s an isolated incident. If it spills over to the rest of my memories, I’ll start getting concerned. But what good will that do, anyway? No use stressing over the inevitable. If it happens, it happens. I figure it’s best to be blissfully oblivious to all of that anyway. I hope I don’t realise what’s happening to me until I’m a vegetable.’
King frowned, and scrunched up his face, and said, ‘You really think that’s the way it’s going to go?’
‘It wouldn’t surprise me if it happened to either of us. We know very little about the brain. And we’ve abused ours.’
‘At least we made hay while the sun shone.’
Slater nodded. ‘That we did.’
‘You didn’t ask what you told me about stem cells.’
Slater shrugged. ‘It makes sense. I would have told you about the clinic I found in Tijuana. I’ve used it repeatedly. I assume you saw the news of a one-man war in Zimbabwe. You read between the lines, and figured I’d need patching up not long after.’
‘There was no guarantee.’
‘Then count yourself lucky. Because I probably didn’t need them. Zimbabwe didn’t bang me up like I thought it would.’
‘Then why’d you go to Tijuana?’
‘Because it’s a fountain of youth.’
‘You ever wonder if there’s side effects? As far as I can tell, none of it’s scientifically proven.’
Slater paused for rumination, and sipped his beer with a wry smile. ‘I don’t think I’d have done ninety percent of the shit in my life if I was worried about side effects.’
King stared at his closest friend, and shrugged. ‘Sometimes I worry about you.’
‘You shouldn’t. I’m doing fine.’
‘You’re redlining every area of your life. Don’t you see that? Sooner or later you’re going to break down.’
‘You think?’
‘From what I gather, you train like a fiend until your body’s on the verge of collapsing. Then you’re at peak capacity for a fight, so you throw yourself into some quest for justice. Then that leads to a host of injuries, so you pump yourself full of stem cells to streamline the recovery process and juice you up for the next go round.’
‘That sums it up.’
‘You ever think you’re doing too much?’
‘Are we really having this conversation?’
King shrugged again. ‘You’re right. I’m not one to judge.’
‘When did this happen?’ Slater said.
They were both hesitant to touch on the grim details, but they both knew it had to be done.
King bowed his head, composing himself. Then he said, ‘Two months ago.’
‘What have you been doing since?’
‘Not a whole lot. I didn’t think I’d ever find out what depression was like. I didn’t think I was built that way. I’m sure you’re the same. The amount of death we’ve seen. The amount we’ve caused…’
‘But?’
‘But I’ve never felt anything like this,’ King said. ‘And it worries me.’
‘What exactly about it worries you?’
‘The fact that I’m going to do something about it.’
‘That’s never worried you before.’
‘If I’m back, then I’m back,’ King said. ‘And I’ll never find anything like what I had with Klara. At least, not for a long time. I’ve been a shell of myself for two months. Keeping the same routine. Staying in shape. But just going through the motions. Relying on habit alone. If I decide to investigate what happened, and why, then I’m going down a one-way street.’
‘You really think you can choose to walk away from this?’
King shook his head, rage in his eyes. ‘No. That decision’s already been made. I was just summing up the courage to translate it into action.’
‘And now?’
‘And now I’m here.’
‘And what happens now?’
‘Now I go back to the way things were. And I figured I’d ask for your help. Because you never changed.’
‘Welcome back.’
‘This isn’t what I wanted.’
‘It’s not about what you want,’ Slater said. ‘It’s about the way things are. And this is how it happened.’
King said, ‘You ever lost someone close to you like that?’
Slater said, ‘That’s a complicated question with a complicated answer.’
‘If you have, I need to hear it. I can’t be alone with my thoughts anymore. It’s driving me fucking insane.’
So Slater told him all about a young kid he’d fought tooth and nail to rescue from the depths of hell.
8
King listened to the tale with a pained expression on his face.
Slater figured most of it was a deliberate attempt to wrap himself up in the story. King had no doubt been dwelling on Klara’s death for a couple of months now, and he needed something — anything — to change his neural pathways. He needed to plunge into someone else’s problems. Just for a brief while. It was some sort of respite.
King said, ‘You told me about Macau. I didn’t know about the rest of it.’
Slater shrugged. ‘How could you? It happened after Russia.’
‘What happened to the Lynx program?’
‘I don’t know,’ Slater said. ‘But I met someone from it during my travels. She was raised in it. Her name was Ruby. They fashioned her into a killer.’
King said, ‘They did that to us, too.’
‘But we chose this life,’ Slater said. ‘She didn’t.’
‘Did she see your side?’
‘Eventually. The last I saw of her, she was having a forceful conversation with the man who started the program. In Northern Maine. Deep in the woods. I don’t think it turned out well for him.’
‘But you don’t know for sure?’
‘If I had to guess, the Lynx program is dead.’
‘They might have tried it again. Re-engineered it. Adopted version 2.0.’
‘If they have, I’ll need to pay the mainland a visit soon. But not right now. I’m still number one on the covert world’s shit list. That’s why I went to Zimbabwe in the first place.’
‘What did you do there?’
‘Nothing pleasant.’
‘But it worked out in the end.’
‘That seems to happen a lot,’ Slater said. ‘Just the nature of our talents, I guess.’
‘That’s why I came,’ King said. ‘You’re a good luck charm. You’re the only ally I could think of.’
‘Have you tried to follow the trail yourself?’
King nodded. ‘I’ve hit a brick wall.’
‘Is that why you’re here?’
‘I’m here because you’re the only person besides Klara in my life.’
Slater stiffened. He drank greedily from his beer and his face turned to stone. He said, ‘You were adamant about what you wanted in Russia. You chose a life of exile. You left me alone, which might have been what I wanted, but I always knew you’d be back. You tried to settle down when it wasn’t in your DNA. At least I had the capacity to recognise that before I tried to start a family. I sent Shien away for her own safety. You didn’t do that. Are you sure you made the right decision?’
King’s mouth formed a hard line, and his voice turned cold, and he said, ‘Are you fucking insinuating that it’s my fault she’s dead?’
Slater cooled himself. He took a deep breath. ‘No. I don’t know what to think. Maybe I’m just as messed up in the head as you are, but I haven’t accepted it until now. I think I’m just confused. I want to help you, but I don’t know what I want to do with my own life. I’m at a crossroads.’
King paused. ‘Is it because of something that happened in Zimbabwe?’
Slater said, ‘I can’t stop thinking about it.’
‘About what?’
‘What I’m not doing. Every second I rest, I feel like I’m letting people suffer and die. It’s driving me insane, but I never stop to consider it. It’s my personal life philosophy, right? Help people, all the time. Because if I don’t, it’s selfish. If I stop, and try to have a life for myself, I’m letting innocent people get tortured and maimed and raped in every country, all over the world. And I can’t do it all, but I can attack it one step at a time. Which is why I supercharge my life — like you said. With stem cells and unbelievable workout routines and constant battles with anyone and everyone. Because the alternative scares me. But you were right, King. You can’t do it forever. You burn out. It fries your neural pathways. It makes you lethargic, and depressed, and you don’t know why the hell you started in the first place. Because I’m never going to fix everything, am I? So I’m remembering what I saw in Zimbabwe, and I’m thinking — that’s what’s happening everywhere. All the time. Why am I even trying to make a dent in it? So I go round and round in circles like that, and I never have the opportunity to voice my concerns to anyone, because if I’m choosing a life like this, then I’m choosing a life of solitude. And you’re the only person who understands, but I thought you were gone forever. And now you’re back. That’s what I’m grappling with.’
He wound down, and ordered another beer from the waiter as the thirty-something man with a pencil moustache floated past once more. He sat back on his chair and put his hands behind his head and exhaled a deep, long breath.
King just watched him, silent, brooding.
Slater said, ‘I’m sorry that I’m not focusing on what happened to Klara. It should be priority number one. But you said it yourself. I need to sort myself out before I help anyone else.’
‘I can give you time,’ King said. ‘It doesn’t have to be right now.’
Slater locked his steely gaze onto King and said, ‘No. It does.’
‘You said—’
‘I just sorted myself out. By speaking it out loud. I never get the chance to do that. It’s liberating. That’s all I needed.’
‘Slater…’
‘Nothing would make me happier right now than finding who killed your girlfriend and tearing their head off,’ Slater said. ‘So let’s do that.’
The waiter returned with a fresh pint, and Slater finished the entire beverage in a series of gulps. He put the empty glass down on the table and interlocked his fingers and raised an eyebrow at King. ‘What now?’
King drummed his fingers on the table, and despite the circumstances the hint of a wry smile traced across his features. He said, ‘You’ll never change, will you?’
Slater said, ‘Not for as long as I live. I think I’ve found the way to make the most of my short life. Should we get the fuck out of here?’
King said, ‘Let’s.’
The two warriors rose in unison. The ruin bar was emptying out as the clock kept ticking, entering the early hours of the morning. They set off toward the front door, and Slater passed the waiter halfway across the floor. He slipped the man a 10,000 Hungarian Forint banknote. The equivalent of roughly forty American dollars.
‘I get change,’ the waiter said over the racket of the music.
Slater shook his head.
The man gave a warm smile and melted away into the pulsating darkness.
King said, ‘I assume there’s plenty more where that came from.’
Slater looked at him. ‘How much did I tell you in Russia?’
‘Not all of it. But enough. Let’s talk when we get out of here.’
Reunited once more, King and Slater made for the exit.
Like nothing had changed at all.
9
The night was cold, and the street was emptying out.
The pair set off in the direction of the fifth district, despite King’s apprehension to return to the general vicinity of the townhouse.
‘You sure you’re not going to run into any more trouble with those two scum?’ he said.
Slater had debriefed him on the situation with Lukas and Benicio on their way out.
Now Slater said, ‘I’m sure.’
‘You never know. Especially with those types.’
‘I know,’ Slater said. ‘Trust me. I humiliated them by sleeping with their wives.’
King threw him a sideways glance. ‘You do that sort of thing often?’
Slater shrugged. ‘Not usually. I guess you could say I’m in a dark place at the moment.’
‘I understand,’ King said.
Slater shook his head. ‘No, it’s foolish. I shouldn’t be making that claim. I’ve got nothing between my ears compared to what you’re going through. I couldn’t imagine.’
‘I’ve had two months to process it,’ King said, but it was an empty, futile statement.
‘Has it helped?’
‘The time has almost made it worse,’ King said.
The same dark rage crossed his features.
There were no tears, no emotion whatsoever. Just anger. The knowledge that King had the skills to do something about it, but had failed all the same. He probably blamed himself.
Slater put himself in King’s shoes, and came away with a queasy picture of what he might be going through right now.
Slater assumed that the time for emotion had already come and passed. Besides, he’d never known Jason King as one to dwell on sorrow.
Just as he himself didn’t.
But it had allowed them both to achieve longevity in a career choice that usually left its participants dead or broken within a few months, if not weeks. They’d thrived for years — close to a decade each — as solo operations for a clandestine black ops division of the U.S. government. Although it had shut down their capacity to treat other areas of their life like they were regular people. They’d seen death and torture every day when they were employed. They’d been taught — no, conditioned — to compartmentalise it and shut it away and pretend those uncomfortable feelings had never existed in the first place.
But a loved one?
Slater pulled up a mental image of Shien, the young girl he’d rescued from a casino in Macau and deemed himself responsible for protecting. He’d guided her onto a safe path twice — once after Macau, and again after he’d mistakenly handed her to a man with impure intentions the first time.
He imagined finding her body. He tried to consider how that would feel.
He went down a dark corridor in his mind, and it took him a few seconds to resurface. When he did, he found King staring at him. They were still striding down the desolate streets of Budapest, hands in their coat pockets, breath steaming in front of their faces.
But King was watching him.
The man said, ‘What?’
Slater said, ‘I was trying to put myself in your shoes.’
King got a bleak, soulless look in his eyes and said, ‘Don’t.’
‘It’ll get better.’
‘She was everything to me.’
‘I know. But you’ve got fifty years of your life left, at least. That’s assuming we both die of natural causes.’
King half-smiled. ‘It’s ironic, isn’t it?’
‘What is?’
‘All of it,’ King said. ‘The shape we’re in. The dedication we need to get to the highest level. The way we’re able to hone our bodies into whatever we want. It means that if we don’t get ourselves killed in the interim, we’ll probably live to be the oldest men on the planet.’
‘I wouldn’t go that far.’
‘But that same level of dedication committed us to our career choice. So it should have got us killed right at the start.’
‘But it didn’t. And here we are.’
‘Here we are.’
They kept moving. Down dark streets, completely at ease with the late-night stroll. For they were two of the most vicious, hardened killers on the continent, and any petty criminals looking to make a quick buck by relieving them of their possessions would find themselves in a world of trouble they knew very little about.
Slater almost hoped they got mugged.
Just for the entertainment.
King said, ‘I know it’ll get better. Eventually. But not right now. Right now I need to dwell on it. And right now I need to make it my life’s purpose to find out who the hell did it, and why.’
‘Did you ever consider that maybe I wouldn’t want to help?’
King looked across. ‘Never.’
Slater nodded. ‘Then you got that right.’
