It was a prescient decision. As they stopped at the edge of the lawn, examining the signals, it became clear that the signal strength peaked as the device was brought closer to the grass in front of them. When the sensor was raised upward or pulled back into the wilder grassy field, they crouched in, and the signal dropped. It was a small drop, but it was real.
“Pressure sensors,” said Houston.
“Pressure sensors?” Lopez asked.
Fields nodded. “Yes, in the ground. They sense weight, and trigger at a cutoff. Usually, in a place like this, you’ll set it above that of local wild animals so that you don’t get a wolf or possum tripping your system ten times a night. But any weight approaching human averages, and it trips. If we walk across this grass, we’re blown.”
Great, thought Lopez. “Now what? We didn’t bring our balloon on this one.”
“Balloon?” asked Fields.
“Never mind,” said Houston. “Well, what do you do when you can’t walk?”
Fields grinned. “You crawl.”
“Right,” she said. “So, we start out here, on our bellies, and worm our way in.”
The absurdity apparently had no limit. Here they were, breaking into a rural Virginia farmhouse to confront rogue CIA killers, crawling on their stomachs along the way. Not what they prepared us for in seminary.
The pace was slow. Paranoid, they tried not to place too much weight on any one portion of their body — knee, palm, or foot. It made crawling very difficult and exhausting. They nearly had to slither like snakes. After ten minutes, they had crossed most of the distance.
“The signal’s dropped to nothing,” grunted Fields, as they neared the house itself. “I think we’re past the sensors.” Testing his conclusion, he stood up. Nothing happened. Lopez and Houston followed suit, and the three moved quickly alongside the walls of the building.
Fields scanned several windows and doors. All showed signs of multiple security mechanisms in place. Houston suggested that they move on and keep looking in the hope of finding another hole in the system.
They did. A single door near the back of the house was dead to the scanners. The security systems seemed deactivated. Fields smiled.
“Good to have a second set of eyes,” Houston noted, nodding toward his device. “I need to get me one of those.” She removed a pistol and handed it to Lopez. He recognized it as coming from the men he had killed in Alabama. “Taxpayer-funded Glock, safe action. Make sure you have a full grip on the trigger to engage the mechanism,” she said, shaking her head. “Still no chance to teach you anything about firearms.” She raised her Browning and cocked it, glancing at Fields. “This time, I’ll lead.”
She flattened herself against the wall next to the door and placed her hand on the doorknob. Lopez stood in place beside her, adrenaline spiking and sending a rush of energy through his frame. The gun in his hand felt like a living creature, ready to attack. The moment was now.
“Drop your weapons!”
The command came from above. Lopez looked upward quickly, dismayed at what he saw. From several second-floor windows, on their right and left, guns were pointed at them. Suddenly, the door opened, nearly knocking Houston over as the doorknob was yanked from her hand violently. Standing in the doorway was a young man with a shotgun aimed at her.
Houston darted like a cobra to the right, angling her upper torso to the side of the gun. Grabbing the barrel with her left hand, with her right she struck the butt of her gun sideways into the face of the man by the door. The blow smashed him in the right temple, disorienting him, and he unconsciously loosened his grip on the weapon. Houston yanked it out of his arms and slung it to the ground away from the house.
Two more barrels were pointed at her from inside, and to prove a point, a rifle shot blasted a hole in the ground next to her feet. Houston instinctively spun around, seeking another route to escape, and Lopez turned with her. They froze, Lopez unbelieving. Houston sighed and finally dropped her weapon. Jim Fields was aiming his gun at them. They were surrounded.
“I knew something smelled wrong about all this,” she said bitterly. “You bastard, using Fred Simon’s name like this.”
“Hello, Judas,” came a voice rounding the corner of the building. The voice belonged to a tall, thin older man whose gray hair reflected the moonlight brightly as he approached. He tipped his head toward the false Agent Fields. “Judas specialized in double-agent missions. Agency-assessed sociopath by the shrinks. Very convincing actor. And he gets a lot more than thirty pieces of silver.” Judas said nothing but continued to train his weapon on them.
Houston eyed the approaching man coldly. “Well, I’ll be damned. James Farnell, former deputy director of the Counterterrorism Center. From what I’ve read recently, now going by the handle Nexus. Good name. Dramatic. Egomaniacal. I thought you’d joined your pals at Blackwater after the admin change. I guess you had other plans beyond golf with Cofer.”
Nexus eyed her with amusement. “Agent Houston. We’ve been looking for you a long time. Father Lopez, please, put the weapon down.” Lopez hadn’t realized he was still holding the gun, his shock so complete at this betrayal. With a disgusted glance at Judas, he tossed it to the ground. Nexus bent down and picked up the firearm, smiling back at them. He motioned to the door, where several men with automatic weapons flanked the path. “Won’t you come in?”
52
“You both have made our lives very difficult. The consensus is that I should have had you killed at the beginning. A miscalculation on our part.”
Lopez and Houston sat in the center of a living room in the farmhouse. They were separated by a small coffee table, each at opposite ends, several guards pointing automatic weapons at them. On one side, next to a large window, two older men stood. Nexus was one of them, and he led all the discussions. On his right was a man who looked mildly familiar to Lopez, one he assumed was a mid-level CIA manager. He just couldn’t place the face with a name.
“You bastards haven’t exactly made life easy for us,” spat Houston. “Did you know Francisco’s a documented pedophile now? That was a nice touch. I’m a national security threat and known the world over now as the whore of CIA! After all my years serving my country, you bastards have turned it against me!”
“Whether you understand it or not, Houston, you are a threat to the nation,” hissed Nexus, his tone threatening. “In your efforts to assuage your emotional pain from your unrequited love, you are threatening a very important program that has protected the United States for over a decade!”
“How low will you go, Farnell? Do you have wiretaps of our conversations? Is nothing sacred to you people? Privacy? Right to free speech? Right to life?”
“All rights are subject to constraint in times of war! And what people like you don’t understand is that we are at war!” Nexus paced back and forth, gesturing angrily.
Houston didn’t back down. “And a soldier can fight honorably or dishonorably, Farnell! You have betrayed the nation, the principles it was founded on. You have dishonored the flag! You have shamed America. You are the traitor, not me!”
Nexus held a gun out, pointed at Houston. “Let me explain the nature of your situation, former CIA Agent Sara Houston. We have complete power over you and your new consort. By the way, seducing a priest — Eve would have been proud. Maybe you are a whore. We will kill you tonight. We can do so quickly, or we can do so less quickly.” His eyes seemed to burn with a crimson light.