Dark Days

  DARK DAYS: Against The Clock - prequel

  Copyright © 2017 Charlie Moore

  Sydney, Australia

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the copyright owner and publisher except for brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This is of course a work of fiction. None of the characters are real. I have however, gone to great lengths to bring different elements of reality together, mixed with a healthy dose of creative license to bring you characters, action sequences and compelling storylines which fuel the fast paced read you're so generously committing your time to.

  My dear readers, fans and friends, for your valuable time, I thank you.

  For my editor and good friend, Mary Harris, you have taught me, shaped, and molded me into the writer I am today. Thank you.

  To my Tactical advisor and friend, Perry, thank you!

  To my lovely wife, thank you for putting up with the hours of loneliness, so that I can write. Thank you for the patience and understanding you so elegantly practice when I don't listen to what you're saying while we talk - so I can dream of my characters and the action they are about to be thrust into. Thank you for your endless support.

  DEDICATION

  For my dear daughter.

  All the things we do now, are for you and your brother.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue - “Darkness waits in the shadows of light.”

  Chapter 1 - “How do you kill the walking dead?"

  Chapter 2 - “For some, there are many deaths.”

  Chapter 3 - “A person without fear is a person without limitation.”

  Chapter 4 - “Poker is never about the cards.”

  Chapter 5 - “Dying only matters to the living.”

  Epilogue - “The truth is there, hiding beneath a bed of lies and deception.”

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  PROLOGUE

  “Darkness waits in the shadows of light.”

  THE BOOK OF SEEKAY

  Two days earlier.

  03:18:20

  Shirin pushed the knife deeper into the man's leg.

  The man howled. She stared intently at the blade. Watched it as she twisted it left, then right. She didn’t acknowledge his screams. She stared blankly at his leg as it twitched and strained against the bindings that held him firmly in place.

  Tears ran down his cheeks. Sweat glistened on his skin. Shirin's glare met the desperation in his eyes with blackness. She felt nothing. His suffering had only begun.

  “Eighteen months ago…” She looked up from the knife buried in his leg. “A federal agent… Norwest Highway… Do you remember it?”

  Shirin watched him shake his head urgently.

  “The agent was Harry Reyes.” Her hand squeezed the grip of the knife. “My husband.” She saw his eyes grow wide. “Yes, I’m Shirin Reyes.”

  The man froze.

  “You’ve heard of me. Good. So you know why I’m here.” Shirin pulled the knife from his leg and watched as the man's’ blood dripped from the blackened blade.

  He sobbed, “I didn’t know. I swear! I didn’t know.”

  “You provided the hardware. The weapons that killed him. I don’t care if you didn’t know.” She thrust the knife deep into the man's upper thigh.

  She waited for his screams to stop. “You’re going to die today. You know that. But what you may not know is that when you’re dead, I’m going to find everyone you care about, and I’m going to kill them too.” She watched as the weight of her words sank in. His face paled. “I want the man who pulled the trigger. I want the person who ordered the hit. Give me something I can use to find them, and your death will be the end of your debt to me.”

  03:41:09

  Shirin walked through the open door of the remote estate to a sea of dark clouds moving slowly across the sky. She didn’t turn back. The destruction behind her simmered. The smell of death, of cordite, of rage, clung to the walls in a heavy mist.

  She dug the cell from her pocket and thumbed in the familiar number. It was answered on the third ring; the man’s voice was thick and raspy. “Shirin?”

  “I have a name.”

  “Send me the details, I’ll look at it in the morning, I’m going back to bed.”

  “Find them. Now.”

  “Shirin…”

  “Find them, Marcus. Now.”

  “And what about the Agency? You have a mission, right? You think they’ll just not notice you skipped out?”

  “I don’t care.”

  “Shirin, this vendetta, it won’t get Harry back.”

  “Find them, Marcus.”

  “They’ll blacklist you if you go offline. Shirin, you’ll be blacklisted. You know what that means.”

  “I don’t care!” Shirin mounted the motorbike. “These people took him from me. I won’t stop. I can’t stop.”

  “And if you die in the process?”

  She paused, her hand hovering over the ignition. Flashes of the past assaulted her. “He suffered, Marcus. He suffered, before he died.” She hit the ignition. “I’m going to kill every last one of them! And anyone else who tries to stop me.” She kicked the gear into first, dropped the clutch, and pulled on the accelerator.

  CHAPTER 1

  “HOW DO YOU KILL THE WALKING DEAD?”

  THE BOOK OF SEEKAY

  13:18:40

  Deputy Director Zelig stared at the monitor on his secure phone. The incoming number was blocked. The voice that challenged him was distorted. His relationship with the man on the other side of the line, strained.

  “Your commitment is not in question.” The voice seemed to mock him. “Our concern lay in the lack of confidence we have in you resolving the breach to our security. It has been eighteen months, and still you have not identified the person who leaked information to Harry Reyes.”

  Zelig flinched at the accusation. He never apologized, never admitted fault, or failure. He waited for the voice to get to the point of their call.

  “You assured us Shirin Reyes would not be a problem… We just received a report from Madrid. One of our local suppliers was found dead in his home. His sizeable security team, dead. He was tortured. A female matching Shirin Reyes’ description was seen in the vicinity. Street cameras confirm an 80% match to facial recognition. Can you account for her whereabouts two days ago?”

  Zelig rubbed at his forehead. How did they know?“ She was on a job in Salzburg. She went off grid.”

  “And you were going to report this to us, when?”

  “When she was reacquired.”

  “You still have not located her?”

  “We picked up her trail. I have a man assigned.”

  “And his brief?”

  “Termination order.”

  “Only one man?”

  “One of my best. He has a support team in play.”

  “And if she gets to him first?”

  “The Director signed off on the order. It won’t come back to me.”

  13:19:52

  Shirin stepped from the elevator, turned right, and followed the corridor through a large open-design space filled with grids of cubicles. She walked in long strides and ignored the sounds of the bustling office around her.

  At the end, she turned left, saw the closed office door. She tested the doorknob; locked. She knocked firmly; no answer. She glanced to the side; nobody peered over the edge of their partition walls. She knocked again.

  She hear
d the lock mechanism unlatch. The door opened inward an inch. A man peered through the space, his face creased with intensity. She caught the flash of his shoulder holster.

  Shirin moved instantly. She brought her silenced pistol up from her side in a fluid motion, thrust it under his chin and fired. Red, white, and grey splattered from behind his head.

  She pushed the door open, shielded herself behind the bulk of the door, extended her left arm into the office, aimed and fired. Another guard stumbled back and fell. She slipped into the room, quietly closed the door behind her, and aimed at the man behind the desk.

  “Stand up.”

  The man gaped; he stared at the gun pointed at him, then he glanced at the bloodstains on the walls, back to the gun, to his men on the ground, to the gun.

  “Stand up. I won’t tell you again.”

  Shirin locked the door behind her. Her aim stayed true. She moved across the room in four strides.

  The man pushed himself up from his chair. Words stammered from his mouth. She didn’t understand them. She rounded the large desk, lowered her aim, and fired.

  The man rocked off balance. Shirin holstered the gun, moved quickly, and caught him as he stumbled. His eyes flared wide, his face showed disbelief, his lips moved and incoherent whispers fluttered out.

  Shirin guided him to the floor. She kept her face close to his. Their eyes locked in an intimate embrace. “Try to breath. In, out. Good…you’re not dead yet. I can save you. But you don’t have long. The bullet tore a hole through your liver. At the moment, your body is going into shock. In a few minutes, the pain will be so intense you’ll beg me to kill you. Within the hour, you’ll be dead. Unless I call an ambulance.”

  Shirin guided his hands toward the wound. “Press down. It’ll slow the bleeding.” She leaned over to the desk, pulled the phone down to where he could see it. “Do you want to live?”

  The man gasped in small breaths. Color drained from his face. He nodded.

  “Good. Tell me what I need to know, and I will call the ambulance.”

  The man nodded.

  13:22:52

  Adam Dark crossed the busy road between the flow of traffic. He glanced up at the multi-story building in front of him, jumped up onto the sidewalk and headed for the front entrance.

  He held the cell phone firmly against his ear, “Julie, I’ll do my best… Yes, I know I missed the last one, the last few. I’m heading into a meeting. If everything goes well I’ll be there early. Meet you there.”

  Adam crossed the foyer and picked up the pace toward the bay of elevators. “I’m just getting in the elevator. Call you when I’m on my way… Yes, dear, I won’t forget. 3:00 p.m., parent teacher meeting, I’ll be there. Love you.”

  He waited for a response. Heard the dial tone, looked at the phone display: call ended. He frowned, thumbed in the code to cancel the SIM diversion and pocketed the cell. He pressed the ninth-floor indicator button, watched the digital display change; one, two, three, four…

  He opened the attaché case, withdrew the black Glock from its front compartment, reached into his jacket pocket, retrieved a cylindrical tube, and screwed it onto the end of the barrel. He returned the pistol to the case, adjusted the collar of his shirt, and waited for the lift to pull up on the ninth floor. The door chimed open; he stepped casually out of the elevator and into the din of the busy accountancy firm.

  Schematic plans indicated the contact’s office suite would be to his right. He whispered into the concealed microphone attached to the collar of his shirt, “On scene. Confirm ready to proceed?”

  “Team in play. Proceed.”

  Movement to his right caught his attention. He glanced over his shoulder, felt his instincts tingle at the base of his neck. A woman turned the corner, headed for the elevator bay.

  His stared at her face, it wasn’t disguised, it was Shirin Reyes. She looked back at him, held his gaze. There was a sadness in her face, an anger, a look of determination. She kept her stride. No sign she recognized him. He noticed the pistol in her right hand, saw it move upward in a shallow arc.

  Shit!

  He dived sideways through the open elevator doors, slammed against the farthest wall of the cabin, jumped to the control panel, smacked his palm against the button to close the doors, and scrambled to the attaché case in the far corner of the lift. He pulled his pistol from the front compartment, slid against the edge of the open doors, extended his hand past the opening, and fired two blind shots toward her direction.

  The doors hissed closed. He sensed her running forward. A bullet ricocheted off the edge of the doorframe. He angled his pistol to aim through the narrowing opening. The doors closed.

  “She’s on scene! Repeat, target is on scene.”

  13:24:52

  Shirin ran toward the elevator bay and dived toward the control panel. She slammed both buttons. The doors didn’t open. She looked at the digital display; it was headed down.

  She holstered the pistol behind her waistband, dug her fingers into the rubber seals at the centre of the double doors, and pried them open. She grunted in effort as the hydraulic locks weakened and gave way. The elevator shaft was dark; the whine of the motors echoed in all directions, the greased cables glistened in the dim light. She looked over the edge and saw the cabin continue to move past the floor below.

  She reached for her gun, stepped to the edge, and jumped.

  13:25:41

  Adam hit the buttons for all floors below the fourth. He tucked the silenced pistol behind the small of his back and smoothed out his shirt. “Control, confirmed sighting. Target is on scene.”

  “Copy that. Were you compromised?”

  “She just tried to kill me. Does that count?”

  The lift descended past the eighth floor.

  “Where is she now?”

  A loud thud smacked into the roof of the cabin. He looked up. “Trying to finish the job.”

  Three bullets crashed through the internal access hatch in the ceiling.

  He searched above him for any sign of where she was positioned. He adjusted his aim and fired into the ceiling. He moved to the edge of the confined space, aimed to the side of the access panel, fired a double tap, stepped to the opposite side and fired another short volley. Three bullets smashed through the ceiling and dig divots into the floor to his side. He returned fire.

  13:25:58

  Shirin leaned from her perch on the metal purlin, extended her arm, fired another volley into the cabin, balanced on the metal framework, paused over the access panel, fired at the lock, and jumped.

  The hinged panel gave way under her weight. She fell straight down, fired continued volleys into the cabin, landed on her feet, rolled to the side, located the man, sprang from her position, and slammed into the man as he turned to face her.

  She deflected the movement of his gun hand, spun into his body, extended her elbow, felt the impact, lifted her weapon toward his midriff, and pulled the trigger.

  13:26:29

  Adam saw the elbow too late. The blow stunned him for a moment. He saw her gun rise up into his ribs, heard the distinct click, empty! He ducked, feigned left, lurched right, pushed his shoulder deep into her sternum, pushed and lifted her violently back into the far wall. She bounced off the wall, landed on her feet, and pounced forward straight toward him.

  He raised his gun, saw her flip forward, felt the heavy blow to his forearm, was aware as the gun fell from his hand, saw the heel of her boot loop over his defenses and whack the side of his head. He stumbled, saw her move into him fast with a knee to his thigh. He rolled his leg with the blow. She jabbed, he pivoted. She pushed forward with a jab, hook, uppercut. He caught her elbow before it struck his face, grabbed her forearm, pulled hard toward him, threw a right cross. She ducked, he continued the momentum, pulled her off balance, and thrust her into the wall.

  Her shoulder dropped. He felt her fire a left hook toward his neck. He lifted his shoulder, blocked
the blow, raised his knee in a sharp thrust forward, connected center mass, followed with a left cross.

  13:26:49

  Shirin ducked left, felt the impact of the man's blow into the wall. She shifted her weight, drove her knee into the inside of his thigh, changed direction, looped an uppercut under his defending arm, and struck him under the chin. She ducked low, pounded an elbow into his exposed ribs, another uppercut, a straight cross. She twisted, spun, and delivered a vicious spinning kick. She felt the blow whack the side of his head, watched him stumble back, and jumped forward with a straight lunge kick to his sternum. She moved forward as he bounced off the closed double doors. Another lunge kick. Her boot connected hard into his sternum. She spun, dropped, and drove a looping roundhouse kick to his exposed front leg. She saw him collapse to one knee. She pounced forward, lifted her knee and drove it into his face. He fell back.

  The double doors of the cabin hissed open. Shirin glanced at the electronic display. Fourth floor. She looked back at the man. He fell into the opening, his legs flayed out inside the lift, his torso and arms spread out into the foyer.

  She looked behind her, found his gun on the floor. She picked it up, ejected the magazine, inspected it. Enough to do the job. She pulled the slide on the barrel, one in the chamber. She slammed the magazine into the grip and stepped toward the man. He crawled, disoriented, into the foyer. She followed him.

  She looked at him, raised the gun, and squeezed the trigger.

  Movement to her right caught her attention. She dropped to her knee, rolled backward into the cover of the elevator as a volley of bullets sprayed the wall behind where she had been standing.

  Inside the elevator, she stood tall, tucked behind the edge of the door, hit the Close Doors button, held the pistol close to her chest, peered into the foyer, and waited.