Bittersweet

I wake in a cold sweat, heart beating a rapid staccato in my chest.  My hand is cramped around the familiar grip of my 9mm, indenting my palm and fingers with its rubber striations.  I brush the damp braids out of my eyes and looked at the alarm clock on my bedside table.  4:30.

“Crap.”

The nightmare wasn’t anything new or unusual.  In fact, it was the same damn nightmare I’ve been having every night for the last five years.  You’d think it would grow less frightening.  The shrinks keep telling me it will pass.  They’re full of shit, and they know it.  I don’t know why I bother with them any more.

Going back to sleep tonight is a useless activity.  I’ve grown used to five or six hours of sleep a night.  I kick off the wilted sheet and swing my legs over the side of the bed.  Getting up is an ordeal.  It takes me a full minute to summon the will to stand up.

A cold shower helps sometimes with the shaking, sometimes it doesn’t.  By the time I get out of the shower, I’m shivering, but the uncontrollable terror is gone and the shakes with it, thank God.

I look at my reflection in the mirror over the sink and harden myself for the next day.  I’ve lost a lot of weight over the last five years, and my face shows it.  I’m thin, now, not like I was ever fat, but the lean muscle I have left is toned from hard use.

I tie my hundreds of thin honey-colored braids back with a hair thing.  I don’t think anyone actually knows what they’re called, little bits of elastic with cheap plastic doodads attached.  Even the packaging called them hair things.  My dark brown eyes have circles under them, not as bad today, nothing a little makeup won’t handle.

I pull on a sports bra and dress for the office: jeans and a black t-shirt with “I fling poo” stenciled in bold across the back, leather bomber jacket over the lot.  The 9 goes back in the holster where it belongs, on my belt.  My therapist would have conniptions if he knew I slept with the thing still.  What he doesn’t know doesn’t hurt him.

Today is a special day.  The last day.  I’ve decided to give it up, the chase, the hunt, the endless heartbreak of dead ends.  My boss gives me sickly sweet sympathy that I can’t stand.  He thinks I’m chasing a ghost.  I know better.  He’s out there still, I just have to find him.

They’re cutting me loose, really.  Half the team thinks I’m psychotic.  Maybe I am.  I hate walking into the office to face their stares.  To hell with them.  I can do better on my own.  I keep telling myself that I’ll stop, but I know better.  There is no rest for me until I’ve found him and delivered justice.

Justice is an interesting thing.  Miles of red tape protected Jerico Shiles, and the murderer of my husband and child got off with a bail he could have paid for by robbing a gumball machine.  The penalty really impinged on him too – he killed four more people in the following twenty-four hours before dropping off the radar.

Justice, I decide, has no part in this.  Revenge is what I am after.  Revenge for the senseless murders and the destruction of my life.  Jerico has it coming to him, whether he knows it or not.

When I find him again, revenge will be sweet.

The office falls silent when I walk in.  I throw my jacket over the back of my chair and sit down at my computer.  The boys stare at me like I’m some sort of ghost.  What the hell is their problem?  I’m hardly burned out.  I taught half these kids how to do their job, and if any of them think I don’t have it, I’ll spend five on the mats with him.

Maybe they don’t know what I’ll do on my last day.  I guess to these kids I’m a bit of a legend.  Four hundred plus arrests, two hundred kills.  I broke the last record years ago and stopped counting.

The computer finally boots up and I look at the job list.  The usual: high profile killers, petty theft artists, rapists, kidnappers, etc.  Nothing I haven’t seen a hundred times.  A name catches my eye and my heart stops.

“Jerico is on the list,” I say loudly.  I don’t remember standing up and my chair is on its back.  Nobody says anything.  Maybe that’s what they’ve been waiting for.

“Is this some sort of sick joke?” I demand, to no one in general.  Nobody answers me.  “Well?”

My boss comes out of his office and leans on the jam.  “No joke, Snake-eyes.”

Nobody has called me Snake-eyes for five years.  Snake, maybe, but usually That Dumb Bitch behind my back.

“What’s he up for?”

“Murder, first degree.  A security guard tried to stop him at a mall and he blasted the poor bastard with a sawed off.  Caught the whole thing on camera.  We got the warrant in half an hour.  No red tape this time.”

“When?”

“Ten last night.”

Shit.  Half an hour after I left the office.  They probably have been waiting for this moment since then.  I take a deep breath and pick my chair up off the floor.  “Where’s he at?”  I try to sound calm, but by my heart is racing.

“He fled to the north after he wasted the rent-a-cop.  Tracking information is in his file.”

Nobody said anything else while I thought it over.  I sat back down at the computer and pulled the file up.  My heart is still racing, I don’t know why.  He’s in the north, way up there.  His flyer probably ran out of fuel and crashed into the Wastes.  The visual the satellites pull up shows a column of smoke and a burned out area.  He crashed all right.  It’s snowing pretty hard up there, tracking will be impossible.

Someone walks by and claps me on the shoulder.  It’s Sebastian.  Nice kid, knows his stuff.  “See you at the range in ten?”  Business as normal.

“Sure, Seb,” I say automatically.  It’s a good idea, actually.  My hands are shaking again and I can’t type worth a damn.  I wonder what the shrinks would call this?  Hyper-something or other, probably made up on the spot.  They’re all quacks.

I lock the computer and throw my jacket back on.  People are still looking at me like I’m going to start flying or something.  I resist the urge to shout ‘I told you!’ and head for the range.  They all thought Jerico was long dead.

I eschew ear protection and goggles while shooting as a general rule.  You’re not wearing protective gear while in the field and if your reflexes are tuned to being wadded up in cotton, your grave will fill early.  Seb’s there already, taking his time going through setups.

“Hi.”  I say.  I don’t want deep, meaningful conversation right now.

Seb understands.  “Hi.”  He hands me a box of ammo and I set up next to him.

I pull the 9mm out of its holster and field strip it.  It takes me two minutes to clean it and put it back together again because my hands won’t stop shaking.  I have a full clip already and I slide it home with a satisfying click.

Seb calls up the targets and for the next half-hour I shoot holes in Jerico.  The blank forms all hold Jerico’s face for me, ugly, bent nose, stringy hair, and mottled skin with yellowing crooked teeth.  I still hate myself for letting him getting the drop on me and killing my family before I could do anything.

I’m shaking again, and Seb tells me to stop.  I do, but the urge to put holes in Shiles doesn’t.

Jerico isn’t going anywhere.  The whole quadrant where he is has been locked down and no flyers are anywhere near.  He’d have to walk a thousand miles through snow to get anywhere.  Even he isn’t dumb enough to try that.  He’ll stay near the crash site and hope to capture a ride back to civilization.  He knows we’re out to kill him.  You don’t murder the family of a cop then expect to live a normal life.

The prep for the hunt goes quickly.  I’ve done this a million times before.  The Wastes is an unusual place, but this won’t be my first hunt there by any means.  Seb volunteers to go with me and I’m glad about that.  He’s a trusty second.

My boss meets me at the pad and sees us off.  He’s glad for me, but scared at the same time.  He doesn’t say much, just some empty words of encouragement that I see right through.  He’s got a point, actually.  Jerico Shiles is not a nice man.

The satellites guide us right to the crash site.  We sit on a cloud a couple miles off and run the whole area through a scanner.  Nothing comes up.  Not that I’m surprised.  The crash site lets off enough heat to blur any signature a body would give.  Nobody said this would be easy.  Maybe this really will be my last hunt.

Our flyer has enough fuel to dick around for hours, so I don’t have a time limit beyond my own patience once I’m down on the ground.  Jerico will find me, I’m sure.  Seb will wait for me in the air.  The flyer is loaded, so if I go down, he’ll finish the job from the air.  Jerico won’t be getting away this time.

I zip up my jacket and sling the leather weapon harness over my shoulders.  It’s cluttered with all the odds and ends I’ve found use for over the years and weighs a ton.  I buckle it together then grab my rifle and nod to Seb.

He grins at me and drops the flyer into a dive.  Cowboy.  It is a textbook point-drop and I leap from the momentarily hovering flyer to the deep snow.  Seb pulls the flyer back into sky and I’m alone.

A katabatic is blowing and it’s bloody cold.  The crash is to my left, a smoking crater in the rugged ground, the snow melted for a dozen feet around it.  I crouch down in the snow and survey my surroundings.

It’s a wasteland, all right.  The few stumpy trees are loaded with recent snow.  Piles of rock, ragged terrain, all covered in a muffling blanket of snow.  The sky is iron above, the ground is ice below.  If Jerico is still alive, he’s miserable.  It almost makes me happy.

My body is moving almost before I register the gunshot.  I dive to the side reflexively and hit the ground rolling.  A blazing pain in my shoulder makes me cry out.  I haven’t been hit in a long time.  I look in the direction the gunshot came from and see a flicker of movement.

Jerico.

Forgetting the pain of my wound I get off the ground and start running after him.  It’s against regulations to continue the chase after being wounded, but I could care less.  This man is mine.  Jerico was on top of a ridge when he took his shot and it takes me a couple minutes to work my way through the snow to get to him, 9mm in hand.

I get to the top and find he’s gone.  I’m not surprised, Shiles was a coward last time too.  This time, though, he left behind a trail a blind man could follow.

I run as fast as I can as I forge my own trail a dozen yards to the left.  He’ll expect me to come directly down his trail and I don’t intend for him to get the drop on me again.  The trail goes for longer than I expected, and I start to get tired.  Running through two feet of snow is not easy work and my bleeding shoulder is draining my strength.

I top a ridge and find myself looking over a plain, an unusually flat piece of land, devoid of trees.  Likely, under the snow, its just rock stripped of covering in a landslide years ago.  Jerico is halfway across, heading for dense woods on the far side.  If he gets there, it’s over.  I won’t follow a man into a wood.  I’m not stupid.

I holster the 9mm and sling my rifle off my back.  It’s a custom deal, made light and sporting a bipod.  I belly flop into the snow and click the stand into place.  The distance isn’t that great but I take the time to dial in the distance on the scope.  I don’t want to miss.

Shiles is two-thirds of the way across now, making heavy going in the drifts.  I line my shot up carefully and squeeze the trigger.  The rifle barks and I see Jerico stagger, but he doesn’t go down.  No matter.  I work the bolt and squeeze of another shot.  Shiles jerks again, but keeps going.  The man must have body armor.  I pump three more rounds into him before he goes down in a spray of snow.  I watch through the scope for a couple seconds, but he doesn’t get up.  There’s a drift between us and I can’t see him from where I am.  It makes me nervous.

I don’t trust Jerico farther than I can throw him.

I get to my feet and jog through the snow to where he went down.  I’m not in a hurry this time.  Seb pulls up over the ridge and follows me a hundred feet over my head in the flyer.  He’ll see if Jerico tries to make a move.

I get to where Shiles went down and stop in surprise.  There is no body.  The snow is bloody all around, and tracks go everywhere, but Jerico isn’t in sight.  I wave to Seb, give him the signal that all is not well.  Seb waggles his wings and soars higher, looking for our target.

I hear the crunch of snow behind me and I spin, heart pounding.  As I turn I reach for my holstered pistol but my wounded shoulder betrays me and I miss the grip.  I stop, facing Jerico, heart in my throat.  He must have been hiding under some snow because he’s ten feet from me and I hadn’t seen him.  Clever bastard.

He’s bleeding from several wounds.  My shots hadn’t gone for nothing.  If I had just left him, he would have bled to death in the snow.  Go figure.

He has the sawed off in his hand and he’s smiling at me.  I flash back five years, it’s the same exact face, a little more haggard now, but I would recognize him anywhere in an instant.  It’s Jerico Shiles all right.

He recognizes me, as well he might.  I’ve probably haunted his dreams too.

“No shit,” he says, “you’re that dumb cop.”  Even his accent is disgusting.  I wonder absently where he was born.

“Jerico Shiles,” I say.

“Don’t make a move, lady, or I’ll kill your kid and your man.”  He laughs, sure he has me.  The joke is in horrible taste and makes me angry.  I have one hand behind my back, the other hanging limp at my side.  The cold has finished its work on my injured shoulder.  It’ll be useless until I get it fixed up.

I finger my belt behind my back.  I don’t remember what I have stashed back there.  A small grenade, originally made for a rifle attachment catches my attention.  I pull it loose and work the pin out with my thumb.  At this close range, its suicide but I don’t care.  If I die, he’ll die with me.

He’s talking, but I’m not listening.  Probably giving the usual ‘I’ve got you now’ speech.  I’ve heard it dozens of times.  This time, though, I don’t see an obvious way out of the mess.

Seb has the flyer hovering behind Jerico.  Shiles, the idiot, probably hasn’t figured out that its there.  I wonder briefly why Seb isn’t shooting, then realize I’m in the line of fire.  The flyer has the finesse of a drunk paraplegic playing darts with his mouth.  If he took his shot, I’d be dead too.

It’s up to me to get out of this mess.  For the life of me, I can’t see how.  The sawed off he’s waving around was home-made, probably by Shiles.  The barrel is cut roughly and way too short.  I can see the color of the shells he has loaded.

It’s sad, in a way, that it will end like this.  My life has been good, and I’ve helped in my way to forward civilization, such as it is.  I wouldn’t have done anything differently.   Except perhaps out-drawing Shiles five years ago.  That is the one thing I wish had gone differently.  At any rate, I have my chance to set everything right.

Jerico is making threatening movements with his sawed off and I start listening.

“Get your hands out where I can see them, whore,” he’s saying.  Spittle flies from his loose lips.  He’s detestable and my gorge rises to the occasion.

He’s calling the cards.  That’s all right.  I’ve always had good luck at the tables.  It remains to be seen if my hand is better than his.  I pull my hand out from behind my back and lob the grenade at him underhand.  The safety lever flies off with a quiet ping in the sudden silence.

I’m already diving to the side by the time Shiles realizes what is happening.  The roar of his sawed off and the thump of the grenade mingle into one.  I’m not sure what hits me, but I’m on my back in the snow, feeling the warm blood soak my snow jacket and stain the pristine snow around me the crimson color of life.

Windblown snow lashes my face as Seb lands the flyer next to us and leaps out.  I lift my head and look at Jerico one last time.  He’s as dead as they come, half his torso litters the snow behind him.  My head drops back into the cold snow.  I can’t hold it up any longer.

It’s hard to breathe.  Vaguely I wonder if my lung was punctured, then stop caring as my vision grays out and starts to tunnel.

To hell with justice, I think, as my vision goes black.  I’m aware of Seb shaking me, but I can’t feel it.

I’ve had my revenge.

I’d hoped revenge would be sweet.  I guess I was wrong.  My last thoughts are of all the things I could still have done had I lived.  I’m not afraid to die, I’m just not ready.

At best, revenge is bittersweet.