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20 DECEMBER 2016
MOSCOW, RUSSIA
THE BLACKBIRD SLUMPED IN THE FRONT SEAT OF THE ROLLS-ROYCE PHANTOM with his head cocked back against the headrest. A pink iPod sat in one of the cup holders in the center console. It was well worn, evidenced by the nicks and scratches and the places where the finish was flaking away. The screen, dull but working, flashed when the next track started to play.
[div class="ipod"]SHE'S GONE
HALL AND OATES
ABANDONED LUNCHEONETTE[/div]
The music spiraled out of the iPod through the jack plugged into its base. It then shot up the length of white wire that curled about the knobs and switches on the console and into the AUX input of the car stereo. As the song filled the car, he looked down at the iPod and for a brief moment allowed himself to remember the girl it belonged to. "Mila," the Blackbird said. Then came the pain, that familiar ache in his chest when he thought about her.
He twisted the cap off a miniature vodka bottle—one of those bottom shelf brands that could strip paint—not the kind the owner of a Rolls-Royce Phantom would drink. He brought it to his lips and downed it, letting the vodka slip past his tongue and down his throat. Everything it touched was set afire.
His phone started buzzing in his jacket pocket. He flipped the clamshell open and on the screen was the message, TWO MEN ARE COMING TO KILL YOU. A second later, another message comes through. 60 SECONDS. The Blackbird's eyes scouted ahead of the vehicle. His was the last in a line of luxury sedans that sat parked on the street out front of of an upscale restaurant named Café Pushkin.
There was a valet attendant freezing his ass off by the entrance under the canopy. His hands were stuffed in the pockets of his big coat and its hood was pulled over his head, making it hard to see his face. Not him, the Blackbird thought.
He looked at the rearview and side mirrors, darting back and forth between the three. Just a few feet beyond the car, the bleak night swallowed everything in black. His heart was pounding fast, too fast, and combined with the alcohol it was making him lightheaded. He nearly threw up when a set of headlamps broke through the gloom and shined in the driver's side mirror. Few cars were on the road tonight. The heavy snow was keeping most people inside. It could be another rich asshole without any sense coming to eat with the other fat pigs, but the headlamps didn't look right to the Blackbird. They were dingy yellow and the shape reminded him of the old Soviet clunkers.
That cold thing returned to his gut like an old friend and made him move quick. He stuffed the iPod under the seat, out of harm's way, then opened the glove box. Empty liquor bottles spilled out of it onto the floor, and more followed after he seized the SIG Sauer P220 from the inside.
He racked the slide and returned his eyes to the side mirror. The lights grew bigger and brighter. He could feel sweat on his brow. He tugged at the black tie, loosening the knot, and released the top button of his collar.
Light filled the interior when the clunker moved from the street to just behind the Rolls. There was an uneasy stillness. The headlamps didn't shut off. The Blackbird went back and forth between the two side mirrors. The lights made it hard to see, but he caught a flash off the metal trim when the driver side door swung open. In the opposite mirror, he could just barely see the outline of the vehicle's passenger door sitting ajar, then shut closed. The lights flickered as two silhouettes walked past the headlamps.
The music faded out, and for a moment his ears were overwhelmed with the thump of his heart and the air sucking in and out of his chest. One outline was holding back by the rear tire on the passenger side. The other crept closer and closer, up along the driver side of the car, with a small gun held out front. That's when the Blackbird heard the building guitar feedback clawing out of the speakers. It was Mila talking to him.
He took one long, deep breath to settle his nerves and then leaned to the side, arching his back over the center console. His head was pressed into the leather passenger seat, angled so he could see down the sights of the SIG Sauer and out the back driver side window. He waited, till the silhouette of the first shooter's head appeared on the other side of the glass.
The downbeat of Magic Carpet Ride hit and the Blackbird pulled the trigger. The muzzle flashed when the .45 ACP bullet sped out the chamber. It blew a hole in the window and tore into the target like it was a melon, spraying the insides into the air. As the that outline dropped out of sight, the Blackbird had to move fast, because the rear window exploded in a hail of supersonic bullets came ripping into the car from a machine pistol. Glass sprinkled through the air and stuffing exploded from the seats as he ducked out of the door and landed on the street in crunching snow.
He twisted on the ground to kick the door shut just as the second shooter moved up to the passenger side window. Bullets peppered the door and whizzed over him into the street, sending sparks flying when the lead skipped across the asphalt.
The rattling shots ceased while the shooter reloaded. The Blackbird rolled to his side as an empty magazine hit the sidewalk. He aimed his gun under the chassis and fired two shots. The first careened off the concrete curb. The second blew through one of the man's ankles. Bullets rattled off, spraying aimlessly into the sky as he collapsed to the sidewalk. His painful screams carried down the block after the echo of gunfire dissipated.
The Blackbird got to his feet, but stayed low, moving along the side of the Rolls-Royce to the body of the first shooter. The man laid by the back tire, face buried in red slush, with an apple-sized hole in the left side of his head. His leg was twitching and dancing to the Steppenwolf blasting out the car's blown-out windows. He was still clutching a MAC-10 in his hand.
The Blackbird tucked his SIG-Sauer in the waist of his pants and picked up the machine pistol. He brushed the wet snow off the gun and moved to their vehicle. The old engine was still rumbling and pumping dark smoke out of the tailpipe. He checked the front and back seats of the car and found it empty. That's when he heard a voice coming down the block. He turned on a dime to catch the valet rushing to help second shooter. Automatic shots cut up the valet's torso, staggering him backward until he fell out of view.
Frost exhaled from the Blackbird's lips as he put a shoulder into the car's fiberglass body and eked his way around to the its rear. He neared the curb and rested his head back against the tail light, then slowly craned his neck left to peak around the car. The shooter was pulling himself up on one leg, using the Rolls-Royce to carry his weight. His other foot was hanging lifeless from his bent leg. Blood was seeping through his sock and sneaker, and dripping to the ground.
"Tell me who sent you and I might let you go," the Blackbird shouted down the sidewalk. The shooter wheeled around. He fired off his hip a wild blitz of bullets that went wide from the recoil and riddle the side of the building. He spat into the air and shouted words that the Blackbird didn't understand, but he recognized the language. It was Chechen.
"Have it your way," the Blackbird said through clenched teeth. A far out guitar solo wah-wah'ed from the busted-up Rolls-Royce as the Blackbird bent around the tail light and stood in the open. The shooter flashed a satisfied smile and directed his gun, but when he pulled the trigger, the pistol didn't fire off ear-screaming bullets. Instead, it gave a soul-crushing click.
His hopeless eyes dropped to the end of his gun. He kept pulling the trigger in dismay. "You should have kept track of all those bullets you wasted," the Blackbird said of the pathetic sight while he made his way coolly toward the shooter. He snatched the empty gun and flung it into the street, then grabbed the Chechen by the shirt and threw him easily to the ground.
"Fuck you, I won't talk," the shooter said, this time in Russian. The Blackbird clicked his teeth and said, "I know." He aimed his gun at the man's face and squeezed the trigger, unleashing the entire magazine of the machine pistol in one and a half seconds. Skin and muscle tore away, then bits of skull splintered and burst like wood in a chipper. Blood and brain matter sprayed on the wall above like a Jackson Pollock painting. The Chechen still had one eye, and it was staring up at the Blackbird, blinking uncontrollably, as the body slumped over to the left and spilled gore on the sidewalk.
The MAC-10 dropped to the ground and the Blackbird said, "It's been many years since I killed a man." He was fishing a cigarette from a crumpled pack. "After Mila went missing, I murdered many, many people trying to find her. Men, women, children—anything that walked or crawled in my way. But eventually, I accepted that she was dead, and so I left that world behind."
He lit the cigarette with a gold zippo. "I knew one day someone would come for me. Part of me wanted to die. I could have let it happen. I'd be in that car right now, looking like you, but Mila would not have wanted me to die like that. She would have wanted me to fight, and now that I stand over you, looking at that dumb expression on what's left of your face, I realize how much I have missed this."
Music was still pumping out of the shot-up Rolls-Royce when the Blackbird turned his back on the Chechen. What glass was still clinging to the passenger window frame shook free when he yanked the door open and went inside for the iPod. It was safe, still under the seat where he had left it. He pulled the aux cable, killing the music, and left the wire behind. As he stood from the car, he felt his phone buzz again in his pocket. He took it out and looked at the message.
GOOD WORK.
He typed WHO ARE YOU? and waited.
Voices pulled his attention toward the restaurant. A few foolish people were coming out into the snow to see what had happened. All of them in their expensive suits and lavish dresses, with their hands over their mouths in horror. It was the bodies that pulled their attention first, but there was a moment where all eyes were suddenly locked on the Blackbird.
He dropped his cigarette and crushed it under his shoe, then started to turn, but a familiar voice stopped him from leaving. The old man's name was Symeon. He was short and overweight, with a horseshoe of white hair the circled around his bald head. The Rolls-Royce belonged to him. The Blackbird was his driver.
Symeon pushed through the gawkers and rushed to his car with panic in his eyes, paying no attention to the dead valet he had to step over the kid. He screamed seeing the car, putting both hands on the top of his head, and wailed.
The Blackbird said, "Symeon, go back inside where it is warm and safe. You do not belong out here."
The old man looked at him with red in his eyes. "I want fucking answers, Anton. That car cost me five hundred thousand euros."'
"They wanted to steal the car," the Blackbird said. "I said no. Should I have let them have it?"
Symeon pointed at the machine pistol on the sidewalk. "What is that, a fucking uzi? What car thief carries an uzi?" Then he started shouting. "And if they wanted to steal it so bad, why did they shoot it to fucking pieces?!"
"It's a twisted world we live in, Symeon."
The old man jabbed a fat finger at him. "When I hired you, you told me you were out. You lied to me. These men came for you and destroyed my fucking car in the process—that makes you responsible, Anton. And so help me, you will fucking pay to get that car fixed...or else. I know people, too, you fucking kogut!"
Idle threats didn't concern the Blackbird. Instead, he was focused past the old man, to the bystanders retreating back into the restaurant. Several of them were on the phone, reporting information to operators on the other end. The Blackbird was considering his exits when his own phone vibrated. The message read, POLICE ON THE WAY. ROYAL AURORA HOTEL. SUITE 702. He slipped it back into his pocket and said to Symeon, "This has been fun but I must go now. Me and police, not a good mix."
Symeon barked at him. "Don't you walk away when I am talking to you." He took a swipe at that pink iPod the Blackbird was always carrying around. The reaction was swift and violent. He grabbed Symeon by the throat and squeezed hard. His eyes bulged from their sockets and saliva started to bubble from his lips behind hisses of air as he tried to pull the hand away from his neck. All hope drained from his face as it turned plum purple.
The Blackbird said, "Rich pig is still pig, and I am a butcher." Symeon's heavy body was thrown aside like it was nothing and he skipped across the sidewalk before sliding next to the dead Chechen. When he rose up, gasping for air, it was with a face full of bloody slush.
The Blackbird went quickly to the clunker car and climbed inside. He pulled a set of earbuds from his jacket and slipped them in, then plugged them into Mila's iPod and hit play. It dropped on the seat next to him as drums thumped in his ears. George Harrison crooned, "I got my mind set on you," as the car pulled out into the street and squealed down the road away from the scene. His heart raced and his fingers white-knuckled the steering wheel. He let out a big horse laugh when the police lights appeared as tiny flashing dots in the rear view mirror. At the end of the block, he made a hard right. The car fishtailed in a quarter circle, but then the tires caught traction and it roared forward to disappear down the side street.
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