Sorry everyone, but I'm not actually going to be able to host a radio show tonight. I will, in all likelihood, be driving all through the night with my merry band of con goers, coming back from LibertyCon. It'll be seven hours before I drop off some of the people I'm with, and I crash at his place, before getting up the next morning and starting all over again.
Anyway, today, in place of a radio show, I have to give you this special warning:
has launched. It is live. It's alive. A-LIVE I TELL YOU! AHAHAHAAHAHAHAAH.
. You can buy them cheap when you can. Because this deal will only last until July 1. So, hurry. Or you
is ... It ate up ten years of my life, and the best use I have ever gotten out of my Masters in History outside of writing biographies of older vampires.
But here you go, here's the next chapter. When you're hooked,
You'll note this one is a little shorter than usual. Sorry about that. But a little Sean goes a long way.
. You have been warned.
Chapter IV:
A Pious Mission
The summoning had been easy.
After all, it was merely, “We lost a target in Rome,” on a cell
phone. He was then given information about the contact, and his
travel information.
Scott “Mossad” Murphy
allowed his mind to drift over the information he had been given.
According to German Intelligence, a terrorist on the Mossad hit list
had been found in Rome with two bullets in him. It looked like a
professional killing, and Mossad didn’t kill him.
And, since it’s Rome,
they decided to send in their golden goy,
he thought. He looked
around the Roman landscape and wondered, Gee,
it’s not like a blue-eyed, dark blond Irish Catholic from Boston
will stand out in Rome! What have my superiors been smoking?
Murphy couldn’t argue. As a
Catholic, he had strong Goyim Brigade contacts in the area, so it
sort of made sense. But still, if bullets were already flying, King
Saul Boulevard should’ve known better than to send him.
Now all he needed was to meet
his German contact at the alfresco restaurant. Murphy had only been
given a contact phrase, and nothing else. At least he would get some
fresh air while he waited.
Murphy caught his reflection
in the restaurant window. His mix of brown-blond hair had effected
profound confusion among his enemies, and the various dyes he
employed made him excellent for work around the world. His skin was
pale, and his eyes were dark enough blue to be considered a dark
brown with improper lighting, which he always managed to find in the
West Bank. He wasn’t that tall, almost like he had suffered from
slight malnutrition in his youth. His build was due to habits formed
during his previous existence as an accountant. He was very thin,
which his family had always thought to be a genetic aberration, given
that both of his parents and all of his five siblings—older and
younger—had been tall basketball players.
He sighed. I’ll
make do. There’s gotta be some tourists somewhere.
“Is this seat taken, or do
you have a wife?” asked a rich, female voice. The voice was young,
but over twenty, and had notes out of Barber’s Adagio.
She also said the magic
words. Murphy
turned in his seat.
The woman standing next to him
was about 5’7”, and wore a charcoal-black turtleneck over deep
gray slacks—dress so professional she could have been on her way to
see the Pope. Her light pink lips were curled into a smile, which
made her glittering amber eyes light up. Her eyes were slightly
almond-shaped, set above gently sloped, obviously Slavic cheekbones.
Her hair was a deep brown laced with flecks of dark gold, and the
ringlets stopped about the middle of her well-endowed breasts—full
enough to be noticeable, but not intrusive.
Scott Murphy felt his jaw
begin to slacken, and automatically regained his composure. “I’m
not sure if you want the chair, it looks a little dirty to me,” he
replied. The chair was as shiny as polished silver.
She smiled, eyes glittering.
“I know it does. I’m used to dirty, I come from Germany.”
Really? Can’t hear the
accent. “How is
the weather this time of year?”
“It’s snowing,” she said
as she slid into the chair with grace. It was May.
Murphy opened his mouth and
moved his lips, but no sound came out. He paused, rubbed his lips as
though entering into deep thought, and slid his fingers up his face
to rest on his cheek. He mouthed one more time.
She scanned his mouth,
reading, “Do you read lips?”
“Yes,” she answered.
“Do we need to exchange
names?” he mouthed.
“We’ll be working
together,” she replied, mouthing the same way. “So I’d guess
so.”
He offered his hand. “Scott
Murphy.”
“Manana Shushurin. Call me
Mani.” She squeezed his hand lightly. “What have you been told?”
“Someone died, and we’re
supposed to keep watch on someone… I hope you’re not the spy.
You’re too dazzling. You’ll attract attention like you have
flares attached to you.”
“That’s the point. I’m
considered the perfect spy.”
Scott Murphy blinked. “The
perfect spy is a gray colorless little man whom no one would notice
if you tripped over him … which is sort of why they call me that
around the office.”
She beamed. “Exactly. What
were your thoughts on first contact?”
“That you’re too pretty
to be a spy …” He stopped and chuckled. “Point taken.”
She nodded. “We were also
told you attract no attention; I can be a diversion.”
No kidding; you’re a
weapon of mass distraction.
“Can you be inconspicuous for, I don’t know, the majority of the
mission?”
She took out a cap, one
usually seen on muggers in old “Foggy London” movies, and set it
so the sweatband stopped just over her eyebrows. No one could see her
face unless she was looking right at them.
“Not a bad adjustment,” he
admitted. And
it would be hard for
someone to report what she looked like, even if they stared right at
her … and they will be.
She nodded. “Thank you.”
She studied him for a moment with those brilliant brown eyes. She
looked over his hands, his arms, his face. She took him in, and then
took him in again. “May I ask, why did they send you?
Sorry, but—”
“I don’t look Jewish?”
he joked. “I’m Irish Catholic.”
She cocked her head to one
side with curiosity. “And yet you’re in Mossad…?”
Murphy shook his head. “First
of all, we just call it ‘the Office.’ We never call it … by
that name. As for me … Well, you heard about John ‘Taliban’
Walker Lindh? An American who went to Jihad University in Yemen?
Well, I decided that we needed one for our side—” he started
talking again, “—and I joined up.”
The waiter set down his
cappuccino and walked away. Without even looking to see if he was out
of earshot—which he was—Murphy continued. “Let’s just say,”
he mouthed, “that I had a good view of the World Trade Center on an
unfortunate day.”
Shushurin cocked her head,
admiring what seemed to be Murphy’s own built-in radar.
A pipe appeared in his hand,
and he held it up, waiting for her approval. She nodded. He lit up
and let the smoke drift up, briefly letting his mind flit back to the
morning of September 11, 2001. “Anyway, what about you? Shushurin
sounds odd for a German.”
“East German,” she
answered, as though it sufficed for an explanation.
“Ah, Russian father?” He
thought a moment, considering the history of the area, and the border
shifts over time. “Or is it Polish?”
“It’s from Lvov. It used
to be part of Poland, then Russia. Do you carry a weapon?”
Murphy shook his head. “I’ve
always been better at just spycraft. I can improvise.” He stopped
mouthing his words as the waiter drifted closer to them—“I can
make use of almost anything they have here for all sorts of”—as
the waiter drifted away behind them, he started mouthing as soon as
the waiter was out of earshot—“weaponry.”
Manana cocked her head. “I
have to ask, how did you know he was out of range?”
“It’s a gift,” he
mouthed to her. As he talked, he continued making hand gestures like
an Italian Jack Benny, always able to hide his mouth from possible
lip readers in the room, but making it seem natural. “As I said, I
don’t do guns—as soon as you use, you lose. I’m never
violent.” He emphasized that with a sharp cutting gesture. He
leaned forward. “So, what’s the mission? Who, exactly, has died?”
“Ashid Raqman Yousef.”
“I hope he wasn’t related
to Ramzi Yousef,” he joked.
She moved forward, allowing
the world to imagine that she was merely about to kiss him across the
table. “He was.”
Murphy didn’t show his
visceral, gut-jerking reaction. This
could be bad.
In the early 1990s, Ramzi
Yousef had taken the first major swipe at the New York City World
Trade Center. Before there had been Osama bin Laden, there was Ramzi
Yousef. Even though that bin Laden had already started his career,
next to Yousef, bin Laden had looked like a rich playboy who wanted a
play at jihad, a mere Gucci terrorist. Yousef had made grand plans
for terror across the planet, even making detailed plans for killing
Pope John Paul II.
“What was Ashid Yousef
doing here? I know
his brother wanted to kill the Pope, they found the plans on him when
they caught him, but—”
She smiled, almost reading his
thoughts, and squeezed his hand to cut him off. “Yousef was doing
research. The BND kept an eye on Yousef. He spent weeks going back
and forth from his hotel to the Vatican Library. Then he died. Two
shots, very professional. One day, Ashid made a phone call to Iran,
and woke up dead.”
Murphy blinked. “Odd. That
sounds more like an Office hit than anything al Qaeda would’ve
done.” Murphy continued. “Could friends of his
have hired someone to kill him? It’s unlikely, but a
well-disciplined terrorist takedown of one of their own? They’d
sooner steal a page from The
Godfather,
invite him back home, and work him over there. It’s either that or
it was a CIA hit, but even that makes no sense; the CIA would kidnap
him, or follow him around until he led them to someone higher up in
the chain of command.”
Shushurin nodded, reached out
and touched his arm to complete the illusion of intimacy. His eyes
brightened in response. “Is there another possibility?”
Murphy took her hand in his.
“It was a rush job. It needed to be handled immediately. Which
means he was either going to run and talk to someone, or about to
compromise an attack.”
“Could they have spotted our
tail?” she asked.
He squeezed her hand right
back, hoping that they would both go unnoticed as they continued with
the charade. “This is Rome, not Moscow rules. They don’t have
counteragents trailing our tails, which means that Yousef would have
had to have spotted and reported your people. Unlikely if he was sent
here to do research;
I mean, if he knew how to empty an assault rifle into the Mall of
America, he’d be out in the field, doing
it, not locked up in some vault.”
“Vault?”
“The Vatican Archives—a
large, fully stocked, fully furnished vault. My only question is,
what was he doing?”
*
Wilhelmina Goldberg blinked at
the priests and nuns in the Vatican gardens. The short Secret Service
Agent didn’t even look away from the bizarre sight in front of her.
“Tell me they’re not doing what I think they’re doing.”
Giovanni Figlia grinned
broadly, looking like a male Italian fashion model as he kept one
hand in his black slacks, and gestured with the other. “Tai chi.
His Holiness wanted them to do this, if only to keep in shape. It’s
only twenty minutes a day, as voluntary as the rest of the hour.”
Goldberg raised a brow. “Rest
of?”
Figlia nodded. “We’ve
hired someone to train our ‘citizens’ for self-defense. His
Holiness wants to be certain that if someone shoots at him, anyone
who feels compelled to attack the shooter could do so safely.”
Hashim Abasi frowned in
thought at the idea. The Egyptian cop looked at the elderly nuns, the
pudgy and middle aged priests, and shook his head. “Surely, you’re
joking. The odds of such a thing happening—”
“Oh?” Figlia asked. “You
mean an apprehension by one of our fine, upstanding nuns?”
Abasi bowed his head. “Of
course.”
“The first person on John
Paul II’s would-be assassin was a nun, right before a Swiss Guard.
Luckily, the shooter didn’t mind being taken without a fight.
Should it ever happen again, only with a suicide bomber, the Pope
wants our people to have a chance.”
Goldberg nodded her obviously
dyed blonde head. “Not bad. They’re a replacement for CATs – a
Counter Assault Team, what we use to support a detail when it comes
under fire.” She frowned, revealing worry lines all over her mouth,
as well as her forehead. “Given the size of Vatican City, there
isn’t much need for a mobile CAT. Training civilians isn’t a bad
idea, if your trainer is smart enough to teach them when to approach
and when to run.”
He nodded. “Si,
Signore
Ryan is very good about that.”
Abasi unbuttoned his tan
jacket and slipped his hands in the pocket as he watched the Vatican
residents continue to go through the motions. The Egyptian counted
them and tried to decide how effective they would be. “And where,
may I ask, is your trainer from? American Special Forces?”
“No. While loro
sono molto bene—”
Figlia paused, and began again, remembering to stay with English.
“These are ordained priests and nuns. We will not have them carry
guns.
Our objectives
needed them to learn how to disarm and disable someone. Special
Forces do not have the luxury of taking prisoners. This man teaches
mostly Krav Maga, but uses other techniques as well.”
Goldberg was intrigued.
Protection that
avoids killing?
“Who’d you get?”
Another big grin. “I’ll
introduce you.”
They approached as the final
tai chi position was taken. The trainer saw them coming and said
“Tempo finita.
Take cinque.”
The trainer took a step off of
a box and shrank a foot. While he moved with the lazy grace of an
egotistical cat, and beamed with a charming grin, something was …
off. He was in his late twenties, but he gave the impression of being
younger, just in the way he walked, and how he looked at them with
his electric-blue eyes—Goldberg had only seen that color once, in
the middle of a particularly bad lightning storm. They stood out even
against his pale skin and stark black hair.
“Hey, Johnny, come
stai, mio
amico?”
he said grandly.
Figlia tried not to smile.
Rusty phrases like that were as far as this man’s Italian went, and
calling him “Johnny” instead of “Gianni” was typical of how
he handled Italian. “I wanted to show you off. Meet Hashim Abasi ,
Egyptian police, and Villie Goldberg, U.S. Secret Service.”
The shorter man nodded and
shook hands with each. “Charmed. Sean Ryan, of Sean A.P. Ryan &
Associates.”
Goldberg cocked her head.
“Aren’t you a security company? American?”
He nodded with a big grin, the
bright eyes nearly glowing. “Yes, ma’am. Have you heard of me?”
She cocked her head and closed
one hazel eye, studying him a moment. He was basically neat –
professional haircut, clean cut, business casual dress … Her eyes
shot open as it occurred to her.
“Oh, crap!” she blurted.
Sean Aloysius Patricus Ryan
barked a laugh. “Yup, you’ve heard of me. Normally, I would say
don’t believe anything you hear, but one of my employees is
ex-Secret Service, so in your case, I would think you can pretty much
believe everything.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the
priests and nuns. “Don’t worry, though. I’m just teaching the
civvies how to hold their own without killing or being killed. You
can have Gianni’s boys and girls, I don’t deal in such things.
Heck, I barely deal in this.”
Abasi glanced at him askew,
still lost about the conversation. “Odd to hear you say that. If I
may ask, what were you before you did … this?”
“Hollywood stuntman.”
Abasi’s
deep brown eyes almost popped out of his head. Sean Ryan laughed.
“Now you know why they got me—I was trained how to hurt people
without really
hurting them, something the Fathers and Sisters need to learn.”
Abasi laughed. “With their
bare hands, I suppose?”
Sean paused, turned, and
walked back to the box he’d been standing on. He opened it and came
back with a small black cylinder in each hand. He flicked both
wrists, snapping the cylinders outward—they telescoped into
tactical batons. He touched the butt of each baton together and
twisted, locking them in place to form a seven-foot staff.
“I figured it would just be
easier to teach them previously approved methods. I mean, if a
medieval monk could use a staff without being excommunicated, it
shouldn’t be a problem now.”
Goldberg raised her hand.
“’Scuse me, isn’t this a little much?” She looked at
Commander Figlia. “Your Pope seems to take a great interest in
security. What is he, paranoid?”
For the first time, Figlia
scowled. “Let us take a walk.”
They walked for a minute,
making certain that they were far enough away from Abasi and Sean to
be out of earshot. The head of Vatican security slipped his hands in
his pockets, and made certain to keep his movements careful and
controlled. “Tell me, Special Agent Goldberg, what do you know
about the Sudan? Before the North-South split of 2011.”
She shrugged. “Arab
Muslims killing or enslaving black Christians.”
“Si. You
know the nearest, strongest, non-Muslim government? Uganda. The
strongest religion? Catholicism. Archbishop
Kutjok was the most hated clergyman in the Sudan. They tried to kill
him twice, and that was before he became Pope. He’s terrified of a
suicide bomber in the middle of Saint Peter’s Square killing dozens
in an attempted assassination. He wants me
to make sure that doesn’t happen, and you
to double-check me,
and Sean Ryan to make sure that innocent
civilians aren’t
helpless
civilians. In the Pope’s world, all life is sacred, a gift from
God, and no one
is exempt from that. Trust me, he’s less worried about his death
than the deaths of those around him. He knows the risk he takes every
time he steps outside, and he finds it an acceptable price to pay for
doing the work of God. But he doesn’t believe it’s acceptable
that people should die just because they gathered to see him.”
*
Sean Aloysius Patricus Ryan
watched Figlia and Goldberg walking away, and once they stopped, he
started reading their lips.
“Hollywood?”
Sean sidestepped to square
himself with Abasi, still reading lips around the larger man. “Yes,
it was a family business. Now it’s security.”
Abasi leaned over, blocking
Sean’s view of the other two—but Sean had already gotten enough
details.
“What made you qualified for
this sort of work?”
Sean looked at the Egyptian
straight on, and quickly analyzed him. Abasi was big and bulky,
without moving awkwardly. He certainly lifted, but he would probably
take a second or two if Sean needed to drop him. Abasi’s
tan suit was well tailored, and probably new—which was
unsurprising, given the nature of his assignment would include making
a good impression to a foreign country. Abasi looked 35, but was
probably older, though Sean would have usually laid money on the
reverse being true.
Sean gave him a broad grin.
“I’m a mick. I beat people up for fun, doncha know?”
Abasi smiled. “I am sure my
wife would have liked that.” Too
bad she’s dead, Abasi
thought.
Sean chuckled. “I always
knew the Irish would marry anybody.” He hesitated a moment. “Or
is it that anybody will marry the Irish?” He gave a casual shrug.
“To tell the truth, I have a few connections here and there that
keep me just one step ahead of everybody else. That and a Kevlar
suit’s all I need.”
Abasi looked at the young man,
studying his form and how he held himself. He was relaxed, almost
languid, but in the way that a panther was lazy. The grace of a
well-fed predator. “I somehow doubt it is that simple.”
Sean grinned. “Is it ever?”
And, if you've done that....
Sean Patrick Ryan is one of the first characters I ever created. I was going to have him be larger than life, and life kept one-upping me. He would be unstoppable ... okay, he could be stopped, he was going to die. I had that planned out. He was two meters tall, one wide, and had an affinity for blowing things up. Sometimes with fusion bombs....
When I started A Pius Man, I was only going to have three central characters, and some side players. There would be Giovanni Figlia, Villie Goldberg, and Hashim Abasi. That's it. Father Frank Williams would be suspicious looking, as would XO and the Pope. Okay, we'll have a subplot with the Mossad. That's it.![A Pius Legacy: A Political Thriller (The Pius Trilogy Book 2) by [Finn, Declan]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51NCf2LqCaL.jpg)
.... Okay, fine, you can drive a car. You can't do anything wrong by driving a car.
