Sergeant James Wardlow squinted his pale blue eyes, trying to peer through the veil of darkness. A muted squeal eked out as his booted foot eased onto the brake pedal of the police issue Ford Interceptor. A wrought iron fence was held fast with a padlocked chain, blocking the alley. A single, mercury vapor streetlight burning further inside bathed the alley beyond in a pale, ghostly green. Dented dumpsters hugged a cinder block wall on the left. The boxy bulk of an early seventies Bronco squatted at the far end. The spare tire affixed to the tailgate peered out like a watchful eye.
Schofield’s ride, Wardlow thought. Good. The fucker’s home.
The Bronco’s dark green paint was rendered almost an inky black by the harsh light overhead. Wardlow had taken a ride in it once about a year ago.
He hated every second of it.
It didn’t smell right. It didn’t roll right. The thing had been converted to be electric, yet if you popped the hood a façade inside still looked like the real deal. It was supposed to be the best of both worlds, old looks and new tech. To Wardlow it was a simple, unforgivable perversion of classic American iron.
“Barnes,” Wardlow said, low voice rasping like a knife blade over whetstone. “Breach that fucking gate.”
Barnes nodded and leaned his muscular bulk forward, skin almost as dark as the police issue duffel his hand disappeared into. Finding what he’d been looking for, Barnes released the door handle with a thunk and shouldered open the passenger door.
The dome light overhead glared to life.
“Kill that light,” Wardlow barked over a shoulder. “How many times have I told you pukes to keep that fucking light off. It’s like…”
“…a beacon to the enemy,” Delgado and Reyes intoned from the back seat. Delgado reached up with a black gloved hand and stabbed the off button.
The interior fell into darkness once more.
Wardlow shook his head, deepening the folds of his neck. How he’d got stuck babysitting the Taser Brats he’d never figure. He was a good cop. Some might say a fucking great cop. Respected, if not exactly liked. Hell, he knew he had sharp elbows. He’d never been the political type. But one bad call had put him on the very shitty end of an incident review board. Considering his years of faithful service, they’d given him a choice. Get some therapy, join a new pilot program as team leader and put those years of SWAT training to good use or hit the bricks. No badge, no pension, no thanks and fuck off.
What hurt the most, Wardlow thought, was turning in my sidearm to keep the badge.
So he’d joined SWNR, Special Weapons Non-Lethal Response, as if there’d been any other choice. It was some special program dreamed up the mayor that fell under the umbrella of SWAT, but without any of the clout or respect. Nicknamed “Swooners” by regular SWAT, whenever Wardlow and his team rolled up, everybody would suddenly get the vapors and start falling into each other’s arms.
No shortage of comedians on the force, Wardlow thought with a shake of his head.
Most cops thought this little experiment by the mayor would tits up as soon as it proved to be a non-viable alternative to standard policing methods, which might put Wardlow back on a track to his old job. He’d joined up, swallowed the shit that ran downhill with a grin to keep his pension intact.
But he wasn’t going to therapy.
He’d eat a bullet before ever getting his head shrunk by one of those fuckers in psych. Some dork in a sweater vest would try and reduce him to a blubbering mess and call it a breakthrough. Captain Eckland had pulled a few strings and gotten Wardlow off the hook. Because Eckland knew what Wardlow knew. What every good street cop knew.
Therapy was worse than death.
Humid air and the fetid odors of the Los Angeles historic core filtered inside. Wardlow made a sour face. Somehow, it always smelled worse at night down here than during the day.
Barnes hopped outside with a pair of stout bolt cutters clenched in one massive fist. The night vision goggles mounted on his tactical helmet banged against the door frame and he cursed as the faint blue glow from the eyepieces winked out. He yanked the NODs off his helmet and gave them a shake before dropping them on the seat and leaning back inside the cab, a lopsided smile on his handsome face. “Sorry, Sarge.”
“Every fucking time,” Reyes said from the back seat next to Delgado, her dark eyes glinting with exasperated humor in the dim light.
Wardlow waved Barnes off then scanned the two younger operators in the rear-view mirror, checking for jitters. They were suited up in black tactical gear and body armor, headset mics curving down over one ear. A large patch with the letters SWNR was Velcroed to the front of their body armor. Reyes’ large, slightly bulbous eyes made her appear a bit turtle-like under a helmet sized a tad too big for her. Delgado’s left eye was twitching, causing the large mole on his cheek to tremble. Other than that, they seemed okay, if not exactly icy. He didn’t blame them. Wardlow didn’t feel exactly secure doing a no-knock breach and clear with non-lethal weapons, but it wasn’t his call.
The whole thing was a fucking joke anyway.
Standard operating procedure dictated that a very lethal SWAT team would be posted at strategic points around the location in case of escalation. On their way down here, Wardlow had driven past a BearCat Armored Tactical vehicle parked further up the street. The backup SWAT team inside was prepped and ready for Wardlow and his team to fuck up before moving in.
It should be me in that BearCat, he thought bitterly.
Wardlow considered the words of the SWAT commander earlier during the pre-brief for this little party crasher. He’d described it as a standard search and seizure, expecting little to no opposition. It was only one man.
The SWAT commander was dead wrong.
Alex Schofield was a clever bastard, resourceful and skilled and not to be underestimated. Wardlow knew that better than anyone. Schofield had designed the non-lethals his team carried, TX-11s, and trained him in their use. When Wardlow raised a hand to relay this information, he’d been ignored. His hand was still in the air as the commander turned on his heel and everyone surged to their feet.
That had stung worse than he’d thought possible. Wardlow forced his mind back to the task at hand.
Schofield.
With a sigh, he recalled the first time they’d met. Wardlow had hated Schofield immediately. Typical ex-military guy, confident and quiet with a short-trimmed beard and dark hair. No tattoos though, which was strange. Most ex-mil swinging dicks he’d met were tatted up to their high and tight haircuts. There was something about Schofield’s eyes that had always bothered Wardlow. Something flat and dead there.
Spooky.
Rumor had it Schofield had lost his shit years ago in Iraq or Afghanistan, swearing off lethal force ever since. Wardlow didn’t like killing either, but when it was down to you or them, he’d pull the trigger every time and never look back.
It was a good kill, Wardlow thought, bile scalding the back of his tongue. No matter what the review board had decided.
Barnes cut the chain and slung it aside before swinging the gate open and hopping onto the running board. Wardlow urged the Interceptor forward past barred windows until the front bumper pressed against the Bronco with a creak before killing the engine. His team flew into motion, doors swinging open before they cross stacked on either side of a featureless metal door set into a red brick wall. Barnes and Delgado on the right, Wardlow and Reyes on the left. Barnes already had a small, slender device about the size of a TV remote held up near a keypad mounted on the wall. It was a digital breacher. The sight of it made Wardlow frown.
“Remember your training, Barnes,” Wardlow hissed. “The door. Always check if it’s open first.”
Barnes flashed a sheepish grin before pushing on the door. It didn’t budge. He lifted the breacher to the keypad once more. A twelve-digit readout on the device flitted rapidly through several code combos performing what was known as a “brute force” hack. It was anything but brute force. To Wardlow, the goddamn thing looked like a chintzy hand-held video game.
The veteran cop missed the days of energetic breaches, back when an entry ram or size thirteen did the job just fine. And Barnes was just the man to do it. Towering over six and a half feet and built like a linebacker, the big man could’ve knocked a building down, let alone a door. He was wasted on breach duty, relying more on electronic trinkets than good ol’ muscle and bone. But that’s how it was these days. So many people had smart locks and were less likely to sue for damages if the police simply hacked the lock instead of smashing it in.
Wardlow shifted his gaze to Delgado and Reyes.
These two on the other hand were too damn little for this kind of work. They most likely couldn’t pass the regular SWAT exam but SWNR had different standards. Lower standards. But he had to admit to himself, Delgado was fucking smart and Reyes, tiny as she was, was usually the first one through the door.
Chihuahua syndrome, Wardlow thought.
“Breach effective,” Barnes said in his deep baritone. The readout on the breacher flashed three times before resolving into a series of red glowing letters.
F A H * Q U.
The door popped outward an inch. It was pitch black inside.
“Target’s on to us,” Reyes said, her full lips creasing into a frown. “Call it in.”
Wardlow ignored her. “Delgado, get eyes in there.”
The younger man nodded before slipping a slender object from loops stitched into his sleeve. Delgado balanced it in the center of his palm as two sets of nearly transparent wings unfolded with a snick, flexing before vibrating into a blur. The drone resembled a large dragonfly, its greenish metallic body reflecting dim pinpoints of light as it rose into the air and hovered. Delgado pointed a finger and the drone shot through the slender gap in the doorway as he pulled a phone from his breast pocket and gazed down at the screen. A faint bluish glow lit up his face.
“I got link up. Switching to infrared.”
“See anything?” Wardlow asked.
“It’s a big open room, there’s a bunch of motorcycles. Something all over the floor too, looks like…shit.”
“There’s shit all over the floor?”
“No.” Delgado shook his head. “Signal lost.”
“Walls too thick or something?”
“Interference. From what you’ve told us about this Schofield guy, it’s most likely an RF jammer.”
“Call in SWAT,” Reyes said, her voice insistent. “If it’s a jammer and we go in, coms are fucked.”
Wardlow’s heart began to pound.
What the fuck?
This was nothing compared to other shit he’d seen after twenty years on the job. After pulling riot duty early in his career, Wardlow had been hit with bottles and rocks, shot at, pepper sprayed and kicked in the testicles. Later after joining SWAT, he’d been on more breaches than he could count. Some nasty ones too. Perps going down in a hail of bullets. Sometimes taking cops with them. With a sudden chill it hit him.
Schofield was in his head.
The first time he’d seen the man in action at the training facility had been a shock. Wardlow had never seen someone move like that. Surprise, kill, vanish Schofield called it, except the kills were replaced with non-lethal take downs.
On those other raids, Wardlow had been one of many highly trained and heavily armed men. Now it was just him and some fresh boots with a bunch of fucking ray guns. His jaw clamped down involuntarily before he spoke.
“Proceed as planned,” Wardlow said.
Wardlow moved to the door as Barnes, Reyes and Delgado stacked up behind. “And because of Barnes’s big ass head killing his night vision, we go in lights blazing. The target may know we’re here but we still got a job to do. Check hard corners first but move fast. Clear that funnel and don’t get bottled up. On me.”
Wardlow flicked on the light mounted atop his TX-11 and slipped inside. He peeled left with Barnes as Reyes and Delgado shifted right. Rifle mounted lights pierced the gloom as they swept over the large space. Weaving through several dozen motorcycles parked there, Wardlow noted with a salty expression there were no Harley Davidson's. Just Triumphs and Ducatis and Japanese junk thrown in just for good measure. If Wardlow hadn’t known better, he’d have thought the owner of these bikes was a craft beer swilling snowflake hipster in skinny jeans.
At least they smell like gasoline and oil.
A loud snap echoed off to the right. Reyes hopped on one foot with a large rattrap latched onto the tip of her boot before kicking it off into the dark.
“Careful,” Reyes said, “there’s rat traps everywhere.”
“Stairs,” Wardlow said, moving to the far wall. Peering up the stairwell, his light was swallowed up by the gloom of the second floor. He climbed the steps, slowing as the burn in his legs increased. Barnes almost slammed into his back and Wardlow gave him a sharp look before reaching the second floor and kneeling to cover the others as they took up positions nearby.
Sweat beaded on Wardlow’s seamed face as he scanned the second floor. Their lights swept over several large industrial machines. Their bulky shapes cast distorted shadows that capered across the scuffed wooden floor. Wardlow recognized a drill press and what he thought was a milling machine or maybe a lathe, along with other machines he couldn’t identify. It’d been a long time since high school metal shop. They looked more like ancient relics left over from the early industrial boom. At one time state of the art, now just hulking reminders of when people worked with their hands and took pride in that fact.
“Cover our six,” Wardlow said to Barnes. “Nobody gets up or down. You two with me.”
“On it,” Barnes said, peering up the stairs to the third floor.
“Sarge,” Reyes said, her voice tight. “At least two team members should stay together at all times.”
“Quote procedure to me one more time,” Wardlow growled, “and I’ll pull your lungs out through your asshole.”
Wardlow spun and shuffled up through the cluster of strange machinery, the tang of rusting iron strong in the air. He could see Reyes and Delgado’s lights spear the darkness on either side and he grunted with satisfaction.
Up ahead, a large work bench was covered with various electrical components and half-finished projects. Some looked like they were possibly guns or launchers, others were tangled wires and metal components. Robot parts littered one end of the table. Arms, legs, a creepy looking head with dark holes for eyes.
La Brea Dynamics, Wardlow recalled.
Schofield had some kind of deal with them and he sometimes used the robots as targets during press junkets or meetings with investors. He also used them in training scenarios, jumping out from behind a desk or a doorway. It was creepy how they moved and Wardlow didn’t like them one damn bit.
There were several 3D printers as well, their print beds empty, extruder arms folded as if in prayer. Looming over the workbench were rows of bare wood shelves stacked high with books and thick plastic binders. Wardlow scanned some of the titles in the dim wash of his light as Delgado disappeared behind the shelving for a peek.
Practical Electronics for Inventors. The Electrical Engineers Black Book. Gray’s Anatomy. The Anarchist Cookbook.
“Clear,” Delgado said from behind the shelves.
“All right, let’s move. Third floor.”
Wardlow hustled back through the ancient metal machines. He was almost to the stairs when he noticed only one beam of light had joined his from behind. He turned and saw Reyes staring back at him, but no Delgado.
“Delgado, come in.”
“The jammer,” Reyes said. “No coms, remember?”
Wardlow scowled, opening his mouth to bark at her again before he stopped short, eyes returning to the stairwell entrance in front of him.
Where the hell was Barnes?
A low whump rattled the workbench before rumbling through the floor, disturbing the dust motes drifting in and out of their flashlight beams. A ragged shriek pierced the stuffy air, sounding very much like Delgado had screamed out Wardlow’s name.
Reyes dashed back across the room, pivoting to illuminate the area behind the shelves. Wardlow struggled to keep up, air wheezing through his dry mouth as his heart raced. He joined her a moment later, his light merging with Reyes’ where it stabbed at the bare floor.
What the fuck is going on here?
Something dropped from above, glinting like a shiny nickel before striking the floor with a wet slap. Wardlow and Reyes swung their lights skyward.
It was Delgado.
His lifeless body dangled fifteen feet above from one of the metal beams that bisected the ceiling. A thick black cable was cinched tight around his chest, tucked under each arm. The cable fed into a complex gear and pulley system mounted to a reel about the diameter of a vinyl record. Wardlow stared in confusion before he figured it must be one of Schofield’s non-lethals, configured to be some sort of automated snare.
Fucking Schofield, Wardlow thought as his face flushed a deep red.
“Oh God,” Reyes said, her light beam shaking slightly. “Is he…dead?”
The young man began to hitch and kick before coughing with a rattling wheeze as spittle rained down in a shimmering cascade.
“Wardlow!” Delgado screamed, voice high and reedy. “Get me down!”
His slender limbs flopped like a marionette controlled by a drunken puppeteer.
“Are you injured?” Wardlow said, resisting the foolish urge to tell him to hang in there.
“Yes, I’m fucking injured!” Delgado said, eyes gleaming in the glare of their lights.
Wardlow turned to Reyes. “I got him. Get back outside and call this mess in.”
They both spun as a deep, muffled voice called out Wardlow’s name from above before cutting off.
“That’s Barnes,” Wardlow said. “Delgado will keep. Reyes, on me.”
Reyes nodded, face stern as she lifted her weapon.
They trotted back through the hulking machines over to the stairs, Delgado waiting for them to return.
“Too slow.” The younger woman pushed past Wardlow and rushed to the third floor before crouching behind a low wall at the top of the stairs for cover. Wardlow was too frightened to be angry, his heart galloping with a spiky thud as he knelt down on the step below her.
Reyes leaned forward and peered around the bottom of the wall, leading with the barrel of her TX-11. After panning her light around, she leaned down and spoke into Wardlow’s ear.
“Bed, nightstand and wardrobe in the center. Small gym in the corner. Barnes is zip cuffed facedown off to the left, appears to be breathing. The target is sitting in a chair about fifteen feet away with his back to us. Black pants and hoodie. I’m guessing it’s a trap.”
Anger flooded Wardlow’s body at the thought of the big man being taken out so easily. “No way. Schofield’s gassed out after fighting off Barnes. Let’s take the fucker.”
Reyes sighed as she moved aside before following Wardlow up the stairs. They aimed at the seated figure in the chair, flashlight beams seeming to spear him in place.
“Alex Schofield!” Wardlow bellowed. “Show me your hands!”
The figure in the chair rose slowly to their feet, hands held high. There was something strange about the hands. They were deep black in color, slightly shiny.
The figure spun to face them.
Wardlow and Reyes fired, tagging the chest with about half a dozen shots each. Miniature lightning bolts arced between the electrode studded rounds clinging to Schofield’s chest.
It wasn’t Schofield.
The face was matte black, like a mask, the two eyes like inky black wells. A company name emblazoned across the sweatshirt read: La Brea Dynamics Robot Design team.
Jesus, Wardlow thought as he stumbled back, a cold sweat breaking out on his skin as those bottomless black eyes found his.
The robot pivoted then leapt through the air, tackling an equally shocked Reyes. She slammed to the ground as her rifle spun off into the dark, the robot on top of her. She screamed and struggled as the machine tightened its arms around her torso and splayed its legs, a perfect lateral press. Wardlow hustled over and tugged at the robot with shaky fingers, but it held firm.
“Get this thing off me, Wardlow!”
A wave of nausea swept through him as his mouth filled with saliva. The room shimmered before tilting hard to the left. Wardlow stumbled back a few steps before a white-hot flash ripped the world away.
He crashed to the ground half a second later.
As Wardlow’s diaphragm hitched, a deafening ring resounded deep within his ears. Needles danced along his skin with alternating waves of ice and fire.
“Sergeant James Wardlow of Special Weapons Non-Lethal Response,” came a familiar voice from off in the shadows. A moment later Alex Schofield strode into the glare of Wardlow’s rifle light where it lay nearby on the floor. A small blue pistol was in one hand.
That goddamn lightning gun of his, Wardlow thought.
Schofield’s dark brown eyes flashed before going flat. “Kinda funny they sent you guys, actually.”
Schofield knelt and leaned in, his bearded face coming into view. The black eye of the pistol seemed to pull at Wardlow like a miniature whirlpool.
“You’re…” Wardlow wheezed, face waxy and pale, “under arrest, you arrogant fuck.”
“Glad to see my training wasn’t wasted,” Schofield snorted before his face turned hard. “You caught me at a really bad time, Jimmy.”
Schofield raised the pistol and a bluish white bolt leapt from the barrel. Wardlow’s body jerked, a curse trapped behind his teeth as he lost consciousness.
