Ezra’s impostor was running.
Dillon took careful aim from the bedroom.
Just as the sphere hit the ground and automatically detonated.
The villa seemed to change suddenly from luxury hotel accommodation into a maelstrom of chaos. The furniture was picked up and tossed about and smashed to kindling wood in a fury of explosive obliteration. The floor shook and trembled; glass shattered; there came the splintering of timbers and the wrenching of metal. Dillon remained on the floor under the bed, his senses running at full throttle as dust and debris spat through the doorway. He suddenly realised with horror that if the roof caved in he would be pulped under the weight of it.
He glanced up, his eyes blinking in the sudden dust storm.
The noise and shaking gradually subsided.
There was the hollow sound of plaster dropping off of the walls onto the floor.
Dillon could hear his own heart. Hear the air rushing in and out of his lungs. Feel the adrenalin in his blood stream being pumped to every part of his body.
He glanced right. A heavy timber purlin, hung down at a precarious angle from the partly fallen ceiling; dust was floating thick in the air and only then did Dillon realise that the blast had deafened him and his ears were ringing.
The villa’s sprinkler system suddenly cut-in, a mist of water dampening down the dust.
Dillon eased himself to his feet, treading carefully over and around the debris, moving through to the living room that was like looking at a scene from a war-zone. All the windows and their frames had blown out. The furniture had been tossed around and turned into matchwood and the mess was everywhere, outside in the garden and even strewn around the beach. The walls had been stripped, large portions of the plaster ripped off and scorched and there were piles of rubble where the ceiling had completely collapsed…
The man who had been impersonating Ezra had been running for the beach…
Dillon moved outside, wiping cool sprinkler water mixed with brick dust from his face.
There were people running up the beach towards the villa, shouting and talking into two-way radios.
Dillon’s eye caught sight of the imitation Ezra in the corner of his eye.
“Fuck you, Dillon.” Hissed the man.
Dillon stepped off of the deck, and walked over to the prostrate body of the large man, who was lying on his back clutching his blood soaked leg. The long open gash running up through his left limb glistened, the wound bleeding freely, the flesh and muscle torn open by flying debris when the sphere detonated. A split second earlier and Ezra’s impersonator would have made it to the sanctuary of the beach and the protection of being a sufficient distance away from the blast.
Dillon grinned nastily. Putting the muzzle of his Glock in the man’s face.
“Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m someone who has been paid a lot of money to impersonate Ezra.”
“Well, no shit Sherlock. So who are you?” Dillon stabbed the Glock against the man’s cheek. “Answer me — at least you’re still alive…”
Dillon felt something across his left cheek.
His hand instinctively lifted, blood dripped from his fingertips.
“Shh-” He began as he hit the ground and two more bullets whizzed overhead. Dillon shimmied across to the cover of a large exotic looking plant, teeth gritted, shock starting to register in his system.
This sniper’s bullet had carved a strip from his cheek, only just missing his eye.
Dillon breathed deeply, calming his racing heart.
Too close for comfort, he thought.
“Fuck!” He breathed.
“You got an answer yet, Ezra, or whatever your name is?” He said through the ringing in his own head.
The sniper’s bullet entered the back of the man’s skull, punching its exit through his right eye. Death was instant, the man’s left eye staring unseeingly ahead, his body deflating, going limp as he slumped forward. And then he was still…
Dillon’s face looked grim.
“Son of a bitch,” he said out loud.
He crawled across the villa’s garden, across the debris caused by the bomb blast, moving towards the entrance gate. He could hear sirens. The fire service and police. Could he trust the police? He doubted it.
And then he saw them — coming from the water. The small power-craft raced for the shore and beached, four Assassins jumped down onto the white sand and sprinted at speed towards the villa. Silenced Uzi mini sub-machine guns spat out their lethal payload in rapid automatic fire and Dillon found himself back inside the devastated living room of the villa, ducking below the trajectory of both the Assassins’ and the sniper’s bullets and — thankfully — a little shielded by the piles of rubble and upturned furniture.
He could sense them closing in.
Dillon tossed another sphere; the metallic globe bounced from the deck and rolled down the steps.
He heard a single gasp.
All four Assassins ran for it.
The explosion was silent, but the shock-wave re-arranged the garden. The whole world seemed to have gone mad as Dillon repositioned himself by the open window. Dillon’s sharp eyes spotted the Assassins. Steadying his hand on the ragged glass-edged sill, Dillon levelled the Glock and began to fire.
Three, four, five, six bullets.
When the dead man’s click sounded, he switched magazines, and took a step back into the room, dropped a sphere into the middle of the room and leaped through the window.
Several things happened at once.
The sniper stood up from its cover on the beach and Dillon raised the Glock and placed two bullets into its chest.
Three more black-clad Assassins slid around the corner, carrying silenced Uzi mini sub-machine guns.
The sphere detonated.
Dillon was thrown violently against a wall as debris spat from the hole in the wall; even as the chaos erupted Dillon swung himself around and unloaded another full magazine towards the three Assassins.
Then he ejected the empty magazine and slotted a fresh one in. His ears were still buzzing as he slid under the deck and moved steadily along the full length of it, and after breaking through the screening, emerged onto the beach to the amazement of a few onlookers who were standing, mouths agape, staring at the blazing villa that he had suddenly vacated. Fire bellowed up into the air and thick black smoke started to drift across the garden and onto the beach.
Dillon glanced around, then sprinted for the nearest cover, an upturned rowing boat, switching magazines in the Glock as he ran. Seeing the automatic in Dillon’s left hand, the onlookers fled from the area. From behind the wooden boat he saw the police squad cars and two fire tenders pull up on the service road fifty yards up the beach, sirens blaring and lights blazing.
Dillon ran up the beach, away from the emergency services, shoved the Glock back into his waistband and walked as quickly as was possible, without bringing undue attention to himself, out of the hotel complex.
He was functioning on instinct now. All six-cylinders running at full throttle and turbo charged for good measure.
He moved past the 4x4 jeep that he’d arrived in earlier, deciding to return for it a little later. Quickly scanning the tatty old vehicle for any obvious signs that it had been tampered with.And then walked off along an unmade service road, keeping his demeanour casual and relaxed. It was then that he spotted the two large blacked-out SUV’s turn into the road some distance away and start coming towards him. He dived over a low wall and watched the blacked out off-road vehicles go roaring past.
Bad, thought Dillon.
Really bad.
As the SUV’s turned towards the hotel, Dillon started to run, boots crunching on the gravel, his intention was to move to a vantage point he’d noted on his arrival located on the other side of the resort. From there he could bide his time — he would wait and watch…