The Magpye: Circus (32 page)

"What's that supposed to mean?"
hissed Able, keeping his voice down as the gunfire from outside
ceased.

"There's too many people trying
to take the shot," replied Malcolm. "You've got a head full of
coppers, Able, and they all want to be the one to pull the
trigger."

Able's head filled with a
cacophony of complaints from the ghosts.

"If you think I'm letting some circus act call the
shots
…"

"Green Beret, five years.
Sniper training."

"Citation for marksmanship,
tactical training."

"Enough!" hissed Able. "If we
don't get our act together we're dead! We're dead, Marv's dead, and
Cane wins."

Able's head cleared of noise
for a moment.

"I can settle this," said
Malcolm as, without warning, he released one of his preciously
guarded memories and let it play out in Able's mind. Able couldn't
be sure what he was seeing. It was dark and everything moved too
fast. Gunfire, shouting, breathing muffled by a gas mask, the world
seen through two orb-like eye pieces that distorted everything and
painted the world in green and orange. Bodies, piling up, left and
right. Men, women, children, all cut down by the most ruthless and
efficient gunfire. Smoke. Flashes. Finally an insignia, stitched
into a uniformed arm that briefly crossed the field of vision. Able
didn't recognise it but that sent a shudder through some of the
ghosts that Able could physically feel. This was Malcolm, the real
Malcolm. Not the British guy who faked an American accent, not the
clown in a cowboy hat and boxer shorts. Not a trick shot. Not a
marksman. This was the real Malcolm, and he was a stone cold
professional killer.

"That's my pedigree," said
Malcolm. "That's why I'll call the shots."

Able heard the hotel room door
open, slowly. Footsteps moving gingerly in.

"Can't see him
…"
whispered the intruder.

Able pulled his second gun
silently from the holster.

"Check the bathroom."

"You check the bathroom."

The footsteps turned.

Able slowly moved from his
stomach onto his knees.

"It should be a cop taking
these shots."

The voice was Terry Cooper.
Able knew enough about him to know that he'd say anything just for
the feel of his finger on the trigger now. He was a born fighter,
Able needed him, and owed him, but right now he felt like a trigger
happy liability.

The door of the bathroom was
kicked open. Shots fired at random.

"Shit."

"He's got to be in here
somewhere."

"Maybe he went back out the
window."

The footsteps moved closer.
Able felt the now familiar tightness in his arms as his muscles
locked, receiving too many signals. He knew he could shut them out,
and he should be able to let just Malcolm in, but he didn't want to
risk splitting his concentration between the real world and the
world in his head. He'd been wrong, this wasn't the carefully
balanced and orchestrated world of the circus. This was a free for
all.

It was Rosa Blind's voice that
finally cut across the others and gave Able the answer.

"Let me do it," she said. "I
can organise these trigger happy idiots."

Able felt Rosa's mind impress onto his. The cool order, the
mechanical structure. The efficiency of a machine. She was right,
she could do it. Able smiled underneath this mask. Adam King had
been right about her. Rosa Blind
was
dangerous. Very,
very dangerous.

Before the footsteps could move
any closer, Able stood, his guns raised.

This time, instead of his arms
locking, they moved with a speed that was beyond anything he had
ever experienced.

Malcolm took the first shot,
putting a bullet right between the eyes of the nearest intruder.
Cooper took the second, a square shot to the chest that sent the
already dead intruder rocking back on his heels. Nutt took the
third, using Able's off hand, tagging the second intruder just
under the chin, the force of the shot almost tearing his head off.
Rogers fired last, putting three bullets into each man in a neat
triangle formation.

The bodies hit the floor,
lifeless and ragged.

Able released a lungful of air,
slowly.

"I'm not sure I brought enough
bullets."

Holstering his pistols, Able
picked up the discarded sub-machineguns from his two would-be
killers as he crossed the room. In his head, Rosa managed the flow
of information as each and every ghost offered up their skills,
memories, and even their senses to Able through her. They saw
everything, every detail, and analysed it in an instant.

"I'm an army," murmured Able as
he reached the door of the room, swinging freely on damaged
hinges.

He felt the dark creature, the
Magpye, stir inside him. It was pleased.

Able walked out into the
corridor.

"That's far enough."

At the far end of the corridor,
guarding the elevators, a pack of Kingsmen were arranged into rows
like a rifle battalion. Able could see the sweat on their faces as
they kept their weapons trained on him with trembling hands. Most
of them looked like kids. The smart criminals had found places to
be that didn't put them right in the firing line, it seemed. All
except one, of course. One smart criminal, with a mind unlike any
other, and a smile like a shark with knives for teeth. Jack
Taylor.

"It's time for me to kill you,
Mr. King."

White bumped his car up onto
the kerb half a block away from the casino. The street was murky
with smoke and dust and the flames from the fiery hulk of the blimp
painted everything with an orange flickering light. It had looked
different on the television in White's hotel room. Smaller. Face to
face with it, there was no doubting the enormity of what the man
White knew only as Magpye had done.

"Fuck me," White murmured, "He killed a fucking
building
."

Getting out, he kept his weight
on a cane. The leg was still painful. The lack of depth perception
was inconvenient. Everything else just ached. But none of it
mattered. Right now, in White's gut, there was something that he
never thought he'd feel again. It was small, and fragile, but it
was there.

It was hope.

Maybe, just maybe, Magpye was
crazy enough to pull this off.

White waded through the crowds
of gawkers, flashing his detective's badge when a shove in the back
or a crack from his cane wasn't enough to part them. It seemed like
every other person in the crowd was holding up a phone, snapping
pictures or taking grainy, shaky video. White smiled. Cane thought
he owned the media, but times were changing. This was the media
now.

That was when the tiny fragile
thing in White's stomach spoke with a tiny, fragile voice and gave
him an idea. Everything that was happening here was being streamed
and uploaded and posted at the speed of light, faster than Cane
could ever hope to control. This was something that Cane couldn't
buy and couldn't bribe.

It was time for Owen White to
tell his story. The real story.

Reaching the police line, he
ducked awkwardly under the yellow tape and hobbled towards what he
guessed was the command vehicle. The burning front section of the
airship had cut off the front doors to the building. There were
other exits, obviously, but for some reason no one had been
evacuated yet. While the fire raged, fire engines were backed up,
revving their engines and sounding their sirens periodically as the
chief fire-fighter argued with the SWAT captain.

"It's a fire, we put out fires,
that's what we do. Now let us through."

"It's a crime scene, and a
hostage situation, maybe even a terrorist attack. You go through
when I say you go through."

"What's the problem here?" said
White, butting into the conversation.

The SWAT captain recognised
White immediately. There wasn't a officer on the force, regardless
of rank, that hadn't know Owen White before what had happened at
the paper mill. Since then, and since White had turned Kingsman,
his status had only increased. Regardless of rank, he was second
only to Garrity in terms of power in the police force now.

"No problem, detective, just
putting this hose-jockey in his place."

White eyed the chief
fire-fighter. In his mid-fifties, shaven headed, a scar running
across his forehead. He had the steely look in his eyes of a man
who has picked his spot and is sticking to it, no matter what. The
fire service weren't as deeply corrupted as the police, White had
learned, unless you were talking about the parts that dealt with
fire regulations or could help you hide a meth lab or two.
Surrounded by cops and journalists, White realised he might be
looking at the only other honest man here.

"Let them through," said White.
It wasn't a suggestion, it was a command.

The SWAT captain took White by
the elbow, pulled White to one side.

"Listen, detective, maybe you didn't hear but we've got
orders from the top. The real top. Nobody does anything without
Garrity's say so and he ain't
said so
yet."

White wrapped his free hand
around the SWAT captains collar and pulled him in so close that
their noses almost touched.

"Garrity isn't here. I am. And I
… just… said…
so
."

The SWAT captain swallowed.
Some scum-bag a hundred yards away in his cross-hairs was one
thing. Owen White, up close and personal, was a different
proposition. Bum leg and one eye he might have, but this was a guy
who had gone toe to toe with Cane King and Jack Taylor on the same
night. Most people didn't have legs, or eyes, at all after
that.

"If Mr. King finds out, I
…"

"If Mr. King wanted his casino
to burn to the ground, I'm sure he would have said so. Now let them
through."

White pushed the SWAT captain
away and hobbled off, back to the police line and towards the
nearest journalist with a camera without a King Media logo on it
before there could be any further argument.

"You there, are you live?"

The journalist couldn't have
been more than twenty-five. Blonde, green eyed, and with a deeply
earnest expression. A truth-seeker, if ever White had seen one, or
at least someone who knew how to look like one for the camera. It
didn't matter. She was getting the scoop of the century because she
was nearest and White's leg was started to hurt like hell.

"We're live," she said, stepping into shot and pulled her
cameraman with her towards White. "We're live
with
…"

"Detective Owen White," replied
White, staring straight down the camera lens. It was a lot like
staring down the barrel of a gun, except guns tended to kill you
quicker and more painlessly than television could.

"Owen White?" asked the journalist. "
The
Owen
White?"

"Yes, this is Owen White. I'm
standing outside the King Casino Hotel. What we have just seen is
not an act of terror, but the work of one man. One man who has been
operating in the shadows for too long. A man with blood on his
hands, a man responsible for countless crimes."

White took a deep breath. He
could feel other lenses trained on him, drawn magnetically to his
voice. There were even some King Media cameras drifting his way,
eager journalists arguing furiously with unseen producers over
earpieces and through mobile phones. Beyond them, even the crowd
had turned their attention to White. He saw the tiny eyes of
countless mobile phones trained on him. The eyes and ears of the
world, for a moment, turned away from the flames and looked
him.

"The name of the man responsible
… is Cane King."

The corridor was wide enough
for four people abreast and ended in a wider space in front of a
bank of six elevators. Taylor had his men lined up in two rows, the
first group crouched down or on one knee in front of the others.
Able stood in the middle of the corridor, half a floor away. The
corridor was dotted with occasional tables, small sofas, and a few
odd recesses. The angles were tight for his opponents, but wide for
Able. Twenty to one, but a maximum of eight shooters at once
realistically, and then Taylor. Able wasn't going to let Taylor get
away with taking a stray bullet. Dealing with Taylor was
personal.

Able raised his guns. Malcolm,
Nutt, Rogers, Cooper. Four pairs of eyes, already placing shots
before the triggers had been pulled.

"Screw this," spat Taylor. "Cut
him down."

Able fired first, the
sub-machineguns letting out three shots bursts as he alternated
from his left hand to his right. The first three bullets took out
one of the shooters in the second row, splattering those around him
with blood and sending his body toppling backwards towards Taylor
with only half a head and no face. The second three were spread
across the bottom row, hitting chests and abdomens squarely.

Able moved before the first
shot was fired from the other end of the corridor, putting his head
down and rushing towards the first piece of available cover.
Bullets zipped past, scorching the air as Able dropped and skidded
on his side towards a small sofa. A shot thudded into the other
side of the thing, the bullet rushing through and grazing Able's
cheek.

Able fired blind, another three
shot burst that somehow found its mark.

"Magda, I need to move
fast."

Bursting out from behind the
sofa, bullets zipping past again, Able flipped through the air,
head over heels, and landed safely in a recess in the wall
opposite. He could see Taylor from this angle, standing with his
hands in his pockets and watching as his henchmen pumped round
after round into the walls either side of Able.