Crossing the Line (9 page)

“This is a bad idea,” a woman to his left said. “Especially given the nature of Elton's original mission. And on top of that, we'd be sending her to China, a country with a history of assisting North Korea. The only way we could make it easier for her to pass on information is if we dropped her in KATO's headquarters.”

Simmonds spun around to face her. “This is no longer a discussion. Agent Jocelyn Steely is going to China to retrieve Agent Travis
Elton tonight.” The room was dead silent. He scanned every face, waiting for someone to challenge him, but no one seemed that stupid. “I need the room. Agent Steely and I have some details to discuss.”

The room emptied slowly with disgruntled mumbles that I couldn't completely make out. The only person left was Cody.

“Agent Mathers,” Simmonds said, “that means you too.”

Cody nodded and turned to me. “If you come back without him, I'll end you.”

I took a step closer, drawing myself up to my full height. I knew what it meant to execute a mission. I knew how to be in charge. “The list of people in this place who want to kill me is getting longer by the second, so you're going to have to take a number. But how about you let me do my job while you're waiting for your turn?”

He was readying a comeback, but Simmonds cut him off. “Mathers,
now
.”

Cody's mouth tightened and he backed out of the room. Once he was gone, Simmonds closed the door firmly behind him and sat at his desk. I glanced behind him at the missions map and noticed a red dot on the lower edge of China. I could guess what the color meant.

I sat on the edge of the chair, getting as close to him as I could, trying to contain myself. An agent was hurt—one of their best. It wouldn't look good to seem too excited. “I'm going on a rescue mission.”

He nodded and slid a file across the desk. “Elton was sent to a Hong Kong science lab to retrieve data the Chinese stole from KATO about a month ago.”

I saw where he was coming from. “You wanted to know if KATO has been working on something without tipping them off.” I smiled
lightly, appreciating the approach. “And the best way to do that is by taking intel someone else already successfully stole.”

“Exactly.” He laced his fingers together across the desk and met my eyes. “Elton should have been on his way back hours ago, but he missed his extraction. We don't know what happened to him or if he's even alive, but it's your job to find him and bring him back.”

I flipped through the file feeling more relaxed than I had since I first got to the IDA. Preparing for a mission was something I was used to, and being on one was the closest I'd ever come to feeling free. “What do we know?”

“Very little,” Simmonds said, “which is why rescue missions are against protocol. We lost control of the security feeds when Elton was in the building, which has never happened before. We were able to regain them, but it was too late. You'll have go back to the initial intel site and try to track him from there.”

I nodded a little too eagerly. “I can do that.”

Simmonds studied me for a moment. “This is dangerous, Jocelyn.”

I rolled my shoulders back, prepared. “I've gone on more dangerous missions with less intel. I'll be fine.”

“Dr. March wants to see you before you leave. You're getting on a plane once you're done.”

I nodded.

Simmonds opened a desk drawer and pulled out a small earbud. “Here's our comm system. It's also a GPS. It goes deep in your ear. You have to push it to talk, but if you're offline for more than fifteen minutes it kicks on automatically unless we know you're going dark.”

I took the earbud from Simmonds and studied it. I'd never had this kind of support from KATO. They were big on their agents being
able to handle field situations on their own. As long as they had the drug, they knew we'd come back. “I take it Scorpion doesn't have his anymore?”

He nodded grimly. “According to Walter, it must have been smashed about twelve hours ago.”

“Who's Walter?”

“He's our tech expert. You'll be working with him too. He can hack almost any security system or computer.” Simmonds leaned in. “Stay in touch and report back what you find. We'll have an extraction team in the air tracking you and waiting for your signal to move in.”

“Okay.” I kept going through the folder, then I glanced back up at him. “I'm going to have to tell KATO about this. As far as I know they're not tracking me directly, but if they get independent intel that I was in the field, they'll pull me back for not keeping them informed.”

Simmonds nodded. “Fine. Find a way to get to a computer and tell them what you have to.”

“Okay.” I nodded once more. He didn't have to say how important this was. I gathered the file and headed for the door.

“And, Jocelyn.” I turned back around to find Simmonds wearing one of his more serious expressions. “Good luck.”

I gave him a small smile. “Thank you.”

No one had ever said that to me before.

D
r. March was waiting for me when I arrived at the medical wing. She gave me the usual visual inspection. I hadn't thought about my torso since Cody showed up at my door, and now I was trying to keep March from noticing. The adrenaline rush had taken over, and all I could feel was the familiar pre-mission excitement. Some of the happiest moments I had ever had working for KATO were right before a mission. They'd send me out for days at a time with just enough of the drug to hold me over until I got back. No one was looking over my shoulder or checking up on me, and I knew I had the skills to pull off whatever they asked me to. It was a feeling I was getting increasingly desperate for.

“How are you?” Dr. March asked once I was settled into an exam room.

“I'm doing okay,” I said.

She looked at me skeptically. “I want to give you a physical and an acupuncture treatment before you go. I'm told this won't take more than a few days, but I want you to be as symptom-free as possible.”

She pressed on my side before I was prepared and I winced. Her eyes darted to my face.

“It's fine.” I looked her right in the eye, hoping to back my overly insistent tone.

It didn't work. Her eyebrows tightened in concern as she slid my shirt up. “Jocelyn!” I wanted to pull away, but I didn't have anyplace to go. She pressed again, harder, and I clenched my teeth together to hide the pain. “How did this happen?”

I shook my head. “It doesn't matter.”

She pursed her lips and leveled her gaze at me. “Lie down.”

“They're just bruised. I can handle it.”

“I get that this assignment is a big deal, but I'm not signing off on a mission while there's a chance that you're bleeding internally.” She was firm. “I won't put you out in the field to die.”

I bit my lip and lay back. She pressed on my stomach and ribs, with me cringing slightly, but in the end Dr. March determined that my injuries were superficial and not enough to hold me back.

Afterward, I stretched out, ready for the acupuncture treatment. When I was done, she signed my paperwork and left me to find my way out. I stopped in one of the side offices to let KATO know about the mission. There was also a response to my earlier post, impressing upon me the importance of keeping them updated if the IDA learns anything else about their operations. Now I knew I wasn't paranoid; KATO
was
working on something.

As hard as it was, I did my best to put all of that in the back of my head. I had a more immediate mission to worry about, and KATO couldn't be a priority right now.

 • • • 

There were a few other agents on the trip with me, but no one I knew. Once they gave me the miniature tablet I'd need and showed me what it could do they kept their distance, which was fine with me. I had read over the mission file at least ten times on the plane ride over.
It didn't matter that I was rescuing one of my least favorite people. I barely had the time to appreciate the fact that the golden boy of the IDA managed to get himself in trouble. He was my mission now and that's all that mattered.

After landing close to Hong Kong, I transferred to a helicopter. I had a parachute strapped to my back, the address of Scorpion's last location memorized, and a backpack with everything I'd need around my chest. I leaned out of the chopper's door and pushed off, letting the exhilaration take me to the ground as the hot wind slapped my face.

It was dusk when I dropped over the outside of the city, and landed on top of a building. I hurried to the street and moved between the crowd and buildings, keeping my head down. Speed and agility had always been my greatest strengths, and even though I was out of shape, it wasn't all lost. I pulled a hat out of the backpack and tugged it down to my eyebrows. Walter was supposed to be disabling the cameras as I went, but I wasn't leaving anything to chance.

I stopped across the street from the science and technology skyscraper and pulled out the miniature tablet I'd been given on the plane. “Command, I need the blueprints to the building.”

The comm in my ear was quiet, but after a second the screen on the tablet blinked and the blueprints appeared. According to the mission file, the intel Scorpion needed was on the twenty-sixth floor. Since the information in the building was highly sensitive, I had no doubt security was going to be pretty tight. My best chance to get to the twenty-sixth floor undetected was through the elevator shaft.

I pushed my comm in. “Command, can you take the security system and cameras offline for four minutes?”

“Just tell me when, Viper,” Walter said, his voice gruff and annoyed.

“What's the weakest point of entry?” I asked.

“The back service entrance.” Every answer he gave me was short, to the point, and laced with irritation.

I moved to the side of the building and peered around the corner at the door. It had a camera on it. I set the timer on my watch for four minutes. “Cut the cameras
now
.”

“Clear,” he said. I started the timer and hurried to the door. It took me seven seconds to pick, and if it weren't such a complex lock I would have been in quicker.

The service elevator was twenty feet away. But first I had to take out the burly security guard who was staring at me. He moved toward his radio, but I was next to him in seconds, twisting his arm behind his back and pinning him to the wall. He started cursing in Cantonese, but I didn't waste time retaliating. He was stronger than I was, and if I gave him a chance to think, I'd never make it out. I took my free hand and drove it into a nerve in the back of his neck. He dropped hard.

I didn't waste another second looking for anyone else. I sprinted down the hall to the service elevator, which got me as far as the third floor. From there I jumped on the regular elevator, and pushed the Chinese figure for twenty-five. I popped the roof hatch and pulled myself up and out onto the top of the car. When it came to a stop, I pried the doors above me open and climbed to the twenty-sixth floor. This way when the system went live again the floor below me would be searched first, buying me some extra time.

I hurried down the hall to the room and pressed on the door
handle, but it was locked. “Command, I need lab 2685 unlocked. It's a key fob entry.”

The voice in my ear stayed quiet but the red light flashed green. I threw the door open and ended up in a lab. I glanced at my watch. I had thirty seconds before the system turned back on. The lights in the lab were off, but I stood quietly in the doorway, listening to be sure I was alone.

“Where are the cameras in here?” I asked Walter.

There was a brief pause, and when he spoke I could hear the exasperation in his voice. “To the right of the door. In the corner.”

I scanned the room and grabbed a towel, then jumped up on the counter and covered the camera. I needed to be gone before security came to investigate.

I turned on the light. It was a risk, but it also meant I'd get out of the building faster. I took in the situation. Tables were overturned, computer screens cracked, and broken glass sprinkled the floor. Based on the struggle, it looked like Scorpion had made it at least this far, but I had no way of knowing whether he'd managed to get the intel or not. I gave the room another pass. There wasn't any trace of blood, which meant he was either taken or killed off-site. It was strange that the room had been left this way.

“Viper, you've got security on your floor.”

I pushed my comm in. “Copy.” I hurried to the window, ready to break it, but before I could I noticed a small flashdrive lying on the ground right behind a shelf.

“They're at your door,” Walter said.

I crammed the drive into my pocket, hoping Scorpion had transferred the data, then threw a chair out the window to break it. The
glass hadn't even hit the ground when I pulled my rappelling rope out of my backpack and locked it into place. I jumped out the window and slid down the building, tugging the rope just as a swarm of security guards surrounded the window.

I booked it away from the building, maneuvering through the busy streets. “Command, the Hong Kong police are going to get an emergency call. If you could make sure it doesn't make it to them, that would be great.”

“Goddamn it, Viper!” Walter yelled in my ear.

“Can you do it or not?” I asked as I dove into an alley and behind a Dumpster.

The sound on my comm went quiet for a moment, then Walter tapped back in. “It's taken care of.”

I let myself relax against the wall for a moment to get my thoughts together. I didn't get more than ten seconds before Walter interrupted me. “Viper, what did you find?”

I recapped the new intel for him.

“So, you failed the mission,” he said.

“I didn't fail,” I said, hissing into the comm. “There's more to this.”

“Then what's your plan?” He had been brisk and impatient this whole mission, but now it was at its peak. I would have punched him if he were within reach.

I thought for a moment. “Can you send me security footage from right after Scorpion went dark and a copy of the security workers' manifest at that time?”

“What could you possibly need that for?” Walter asked.

“Just send it to my screen,” I said. He was sitting on the edge of my patience, but he had the sense not to respond.

When my data screen changed, I did a quick count of the manifest, then flipped through the security feeds and did a head count. The numbers matched. “We don't have any security footage from anywhere around the building at the time, right?” I asked.

“If you've read the file—”

“That plus the fact that all the guards who are supposed to be on shift
were
means that it wasn't an inside job. No one cleaned up that room because no one working there realized they'd had a break-in. Whoever took Scorpion knew he was coming and had the resources to shut down city security.” I was thinking out loud for Walter's sake—to make sure he knew how good I was. “I need a list of all buildings in Hong Kong that are owned by the government—either directly or through a shell company. I need addresses, building purposes, everything you can find.” Whoever took him wouldn't have taken him far. They didn't have a lot of time to plan, and they'd have to work with what was close.

His annoyed huffing and puffing filled my ear. He didn't trust me, and his hesitance was enough to make me snap. “Everything'll be on your tablet in a few seconds,” he said.

“Thank you.” He had all of the locations inputted into my GPS map. One was less than four blocks away. According to the list it was purchased by a front company for Chinese intelligence. It hadn't been used in years, and I had no doubt that was where they were keeping him.

I ran the distance to the building, taking back alleys, avoiding the streets, and making sure I stayed away from any route a brave security guard might take if he decided to come after me. I stood across the street from the office building Walter had sent me to. It appeared
to have about ten or twelve floors. If it hadn't been used in a while, my guess was the security was probably lacking, but I had Walter check on it anyway.

“It hasn't been updated in years,” he said. “But it doesn't matter. From the looks of things there isn't any real power running to it. There's such a low output it's probably from a generator.”

“Will they get some kind of alarm if the door to the roof is opened?” I asked.

“Yeah, it looks like the generator is strong enough for the most basic security measures.”

Perfect. Now I just needed to be sure I was in the right place.

I found the infrared scanner on my tablet and passed it over the building. The upper floors were completely clean, but the bottom floor was a different story. There was a cluster of five people standing around a door on the first floor. They were huddled toward the edge of the building, most likely standing in a stairwell. The door didn't seem to have a room behind it, which meant it had to lead to the basement. There were only two reasons why five people would be guarding a basement door in a supposedly abandoned building: They were either protecting something or guarding someone.

Scorpion was alive.