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  HOSTILES: Book Three of the Diane Pembrook Series

  Copyright © 2019 by Ethan Johnson.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  To access the author’s complete catalog, visit:

  http://officialethanjohnson.com

  Book and Cover design by Ethan Johnson

  Cover photo: Michael Vitek

  CHAPTER ONE

  Diane Pembrook peered through her rifle scope at a lone figure standing on the waterfront beside a four-story brick building. The man took a long drag on a rectangular device with a bright blue indicator light at the opposite end, then held his breath momentarily before exhaling a puff of colored smoke. Diane started to squeeze the trigger, then paused.

  “Asset sighted and locked on, Miss Pembrook. Your objective is to terminate the target.” The voice was oddly soothing yet firm in her earpiece.

  “I’m aware of my mission, sir.”

  “Then explain your hesitation. You are useless to us if you have lost your nerve.”

  Diane swept her scope across the riverbank to another man walking toward the building, barking orders. The scope only allowed her to see him clearly at long range, not hear what he was saying. She didn’t care. It was a language she didn’t know. She anticipated his next three steps and pulled the trigger. Blood exploded from the other side of his skull and the man dropped to his knees, then onto his chest. Three of his underlings drew their guns and pointed them in all directions, calling out to each other.

  “No sir. Target terminated.”

  Diane crouched down behind an air conditioning unit on the roof of the Spee-Dee Supply building across the river from her slain target’s operation and reloaded her rifle. As she removed the spent cartridge, her mentor’s voice filled her ear once more.

  “Your intel stated the target would be stationed closest to the waterfront, near the building.”

  Diane shrugged and slid a new cartridge into the rifle. “The intel sucked.” She rammed the bolt closed and smiled. “Obviously.”

  “We will debrief you later. Proceed to the extraction coordinates.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said, and crept toward the edge of the roof opposite the one she had fired from. She knelt down and picked up a length of cable attached to a grappling hook. She slung her rifle across her back and wound the cable around her left hand, then her right. She counted to three, then jumped backward off the roof, letting the cable unravel from her right hand first. She squeezed her left hand into a fist and spun her body a half-turn around before her back slammed into the side of the building. Her teeth chattered as she made impact.

  Diane looked up, then opened her hand to let the remainder of the cable spool away. She dropped four feet to the ground and bent her knees to absorb the impact. She produced a pair of dark goggles from a hidden compartment on her left thigh and strapped them on. Diane flicked a switch on the goggles and saw the landscape in an unworldly green. Bright lights made her eyes tear up. She shielded her eyes from a nearby streetlight and ducked into an open garage door.

  Diane crept behind a row of neatly stacked boxes. She peeked through gaps for anyone who might compromise her escape route. A forklift sped by and vanished into the bowels of the warehouse. Diane patted her right thigh and considered ejecting her sidearm as insurance against discovery. She shook her head. Stealth, Diane, she thought. Nobody else needs to die. She frowned at that. Okay, Sapphire, but she’s not here right now.

  Diane’s thoughts were interrupted by a loud voice. “Yo!”

  She sucked in her breath and reached for her sidearm activator. Diane’s hand hovered over the switch, unsure if she was discovered or if she was misreading the scenario.

  “Yo! What the hell is this bitch, huh? What’s this bitch doing all up in here?”

  Diane flicked the switch and accepted delivery of a 15-round semi-automatic pistol, fully loaded and oiled. The barrel gleamed under a dangling fluorescent lamp. Neutralize the threat, then escape. Nothing fancy, she told herself.

  Another male voice called out from further away. “Now what?”

  “Why’s this here for PDX? I need Advance! Advance gots to go! Who put this bitch here?”

  The second man huffed. “I did, Mike. PDX is picking up in half an hour. Advance is coming tomorrow morning.” Diane caught sight of the men. One smacked a sheaf of papers. “Priorities, dude.”

  The first man snapped the papers out of the second’s hand. He skimmed it up and down, then threw his hands up in the air. “Man, Harry’s playin’ me.” His voice raised dramatically. “Yo! Harry! Why you putting Advance ahead of PDX for? PDX gots to go!”

  “I said PDX wasn’t ‘til tomorrow,” said a third man.

  Diane lowered her sidearm and backed away slowly. The men argued amongst themselves. Diane found another exit door across from her. She waited for the voices to move further away, then she scrambled across the shipping floor to a gray door labeled as EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY.

  She put her sidearm away. The secret holster retracted and incorporated neatly into her armor, making it virtually undetectable. Diane crouched down and mapped out her next three moves. She counted down from five under her breath, then pushed the emergency exit door open. A shrill alarm pealed throughout the warehouse. The first and second man ran around the corner. The first man yelled his disapproval of the alarm being tripped.

  Diane had sprinted across the floor to another hiding place. A pile of boxes stood on a pallet, waiting to be shrink-wrapped. She pressed her back against the shipment, waiting for the third man to limp toward the other two.

  “Man, Abe, what have I been telling you about sneaking smoke breaks? You think you’re slick, but you mess around, and that alarm goes off. Every time. That’s what I’ve been saying my whole life.”

  “Oh, bull, Harry. Abe had nothing to do with this.”

  “He sure did. Every day, I tell him, man, you got to wait until break time like the rest of us. Every day. He just does whatever he pleases, man. Someone ought to write his stupid ass up. That’s what I keep telling Kevin, every day. My whole life, man, I’m always having to keep everyone in line.”

  The second man snorted. “That’s you, Harry, mister rulebook.”

  Diane raced toward another collection of white boxes, then slipped through a brown door that led to a series of offices. She lifted her goggles and blinked a few times as her eyes adjusted to the harsh interior lighting. A woman sat at a desk with her back to Diane, focused on a tablet.

  Diane slowly reached down for her sidearm, then thought better of it. She spotted an exit door a few paces away. She determined that if she moved quickly enough, she could slip out before the woman turned to spot her. She held her breath and observed the woman, who in turn tapped at the screen, engrossed in her work.

  Diane nodded and hurried to the exit. As she reached for the doorknob, the woman stood up abruptly and aimed a handgun squarely at Diane’s forehead. “Freeze,” she said. Diane raised her hands slowly and smirked.

  “Dammit.”

  Red lights flashed, and the room went still. Her mentor, known simply as the Masked Man emerged from one of the walls and shook his head. Despite his mask being nearly featureless, even lacking eye holes, Diane was certain his mouth turned down into a disapproving frown.

  “Miss Pembrook,” he said softly, “not the result we were hoping for, hm? Significant
room for improvement.”

  Diane lowered her arms and sighed. “No, sir. Yes, sir.”

  The Masked Man held up a gray control wand in his gloved hand and squeezed a button. The room shifted and spun as the areas Diane had passed through since shooting her target on the rooftop ran backward at double speed. Diane watched herself run backward, duck, crouch, and jump six feet up to coil a length of cable around her hand. The Masked Man reset the scene to the moment when she sighted the decoy target on the waterfront. Diane stepped back from her holographic form and crossed her arms, marveling at how real it felt in the moment, completely overlooking the sliding plates and adjustable risers that sold the illusion of height and distance while remaining confined to what amounted to an empty warehouse.

  “It all started well enough,” he said. “You chose a good vantage point without being overly obvious. You correctly identified the decoy and zeroed in on your assigned target.” Diane’s target dropped from a single gunshot to the head. “Your rooftop escape was unremarkable, but adequate. Serious errors of judgment followed immediately.”

  Diane surveyed the scene and grimaced at three other routes she could have chosen instead of the warehouse. She covered her eyes as she created the diversion with the emergency exit. She chastised herself for not simply taking the opportunity to escape the warehouse and proceed to a more suitable hiding place, such as a shipping container that sat at the edge of the parking lot. In the time it took the workers to reach the door, she noted, she could have been laying prone behind the container.

  The scene ended with the woman at the desk pulling a gun on Diane. The Masked Man tapped his forehead. Diane nodded sullenly. He didn’t have to say a word, she thought, but he was going to anyway.

  “Tonight, you are grateful for tactical simulators, I trust,” he said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  He gestured to the tableau of Diane bested by a female security guard. “Do I need to belabor the obvious? Or is this correction enough?”

  “I have learned my lesson, sir.” Diane hated seeing how close she was to getting shot down like a common sucker.

  The Masked Man paused, then nodded. He pressed another button on the wand and the scene dissolved, leaving them standing in a large room with bulletproof padding around the edges. “Then we shall continue. I expect to see marked improvement in this next scenario. Loading sequence forty-two alpha five bravo. Objective: survival. Acceptable threshold: five minutes, eighteen seconds.”

  He stepped away from Diane. She found herself standing in a dark alleyway. She summoned her sidearm to her waiting right hand, then slipped on her specialized goggles. Three men advanced from the end of the alley. She looked over her shoulder and found herself boxed in at a dead end. She thumbed her safety and aimed for the center hostile.

  None of this is real, she told herself, but when the center hostile raised his gun to fire, she squeezed off three rapid shots and struck all three, either in the head or chest. She advanced from her disadvantageous position and kept her gun at eye-level.

  Diane put her hands to her knees and caught her breath. The room returned to its unassuming state with the touch of a button. The Masked Man tapped his right temple and nodded. “Twelve minutes, nineteen seconds, Miss Pembrook. Well above average.”

  “Thank you, sir,” she panted. “There were too many of ‘em.”

  “Indeed. And that is by design. As a seed for future growth, I will tell you there are alternatives to direct engagement. Still, in terms of sheer force and ingenuity, this borders on exemplary. I suspect it will be used in other training scenarios.” He tapped his temple again. “But that is of no concern at present. You may clean up and depart. Your services are not needed for the remainder of the evening. Make the best of your down time.”

  Normally, Diane felt she would be hurt by his airy dismissal. She’d done things with three magazines an army couldn’t have done with thirty. She nodded and smiled. This meant she could tend to business of her own, business that couldn’t wait.

  “Thank you, sir. See you next time.”

  “That sounds plausible,” he said, then exited the simulator without another word.

  Diane hurried to her changing room and removed her body armor. She stepped into the shower and turned up the jets. She enjoyed feeling the sweat and dirt from her intensive training session slide down her bare skin and into the gleaming drain. She lathered up her hair and applied copious amounts of body wash before rinsing everything away, followed by patting herself dry and dressing in her street clothes. She picked up her bag and proceeded to an empty room with a brushed steel door.

  She closed the door and sat on a wooden bench. She looked around the room and wondered what route it was taking. She barely felt it move. Occasionally she felt her stomach tug as g-forces grabbed her or leaned over as the room made a sharp turn. Moments later, the door popped open and Diane stepped into a hallway in the Cranston Towers. The door closed automatically behind her and fused into a shining metal wall. Diane shook her head.

  She walked briskly toward the lobby, intent on ordering up a car from her trusty concierge Kernan. She wondered if he slept under his desk, for as often as she saw him at his post, assisting residents with various needs and wants. She felt a wave of calm wash over her as she approached the busy atrium. Kernan would get the job done, she assured herself. Kernan was a wizard with—

  Diane stopped abruptly and scrunched up her face at the sight of another man in Kernan’s regular spot. Unlike well-groomed Kernan with his floating eyeglasses, this man was only barely meeting the employee dress code. His shirt was half untucked, and his blazer was held closed with a single button that threatened to pop off at any moment. The man let off a hiss of air before saying with more than a hint of annoyance, “Yeah?”

  “Where’s Kernan?”

  “Off.”

  Diane found the curt reply especially off-putting. She took a moment to compose herself and focus on her goal. “Oh? How nice for him. Listen, uh,” she scanned his name tag hastily, “Bert, I need a car.”

  The man looked down at his name tag. “Bertram,” he said with a huff. “Nobody calls me Bert.”

  “Sorry,” Diane said. “It must have gotten covered by a wrinkle in your blazer. Bertram, I need a ride to the hospital.”

  Bertram ran his hand down the front of his blazer. “It’s not wrinkled. And I can’t leave until my next break. I only get fifteen minutes, though, and I’m not supposed to give people rides, I think. There’s no way I’ll make it to Mercy Landing and back in fifteen minutes.”

  “Huh? No, I meant, I need a car service ordered up.”

  “Oh, well if you need a taxi, just go out front and to the right. Walk about thirty feet and you’ll see the pickup zone by the trash can.”

  Diane felt irritation buzzing in her brain. She wanted Kernan, not Bertram. And she damn sure didn’t want a taxi. She reminded herself to be like Alexa when she was faced with a difficult situation. Alexa Charlevoix was cool under fire, unless she had been drinking. Diane hadn’t been, but after an intensive training session, her patience was wearing thin. She took a slow breath then said, “I wasn’t asking for a taxi, Bertram. I was referring to the car service that Panther Division residents use.” She flashed her ID. Bertram suppressed a yawn.

  “Right,” he said, “the taxi spot is right out there. If you need help just holler for one of the guys in the red vests and they’ll show you where to wait.”

  “Panther Division, Bertram. Police. You know, shoots bad guys? That’s me. I don’t use taxis, Bertram, I use my car service. Kernan knows. You know too, right?”

  “Well, if he calls the station to send a car over that’s something you two cooked up. We have a taxi pickup spot. If that’s not good enough for you, walk.”

  Diane began to shake. She clutched her ID and fought the urge to let loose with a verbal assault so blistering Bertram would need several reconstructive surgeries to recover from. Incompetence was the last thing she needed rig
ht now. Somebody was going to pay dearly for this, she vowed.

  She took another slow breath and gave Bertram a thin smile. “What’s your last name, Bertram?”

  “I can’t give that out. I can give you my employee number if you want, but that doesn’t change the fact the taxi pickup stand is out front.”

  Diane nodded. “Okay, what is it?”

  “Uh, it’s, um, one G like George, A like apple, fifty-two.”

  Diane noticed a sticky note with that code for reordering office supplies taped down to a section of his desktop. “Got it,” she said.

  “Really? But you didn’t write anything down.”

  “It’s okay. I know where to look for it if I need it again.” Diane spun on her heel and walked away fuming.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Diane summoned a taxi and headed directly to Trauma One. She scowled at the looming edifice as the autonomous vehicle dutifully shuttled her to the main entrance. The intensive training session she had just endured took her mind off Lyssa, but now she grew anxious to reach Lyssa’s bedside and find out if her condition had improved.

  Upon her arrival to Trauma One, Diane marched directly to the registration desk. She tried to inquire as to Lyssa’s whereabouts, but was directed to a self-service terminal near the entrance instead. She tapped at the screen impatiently, groaning at the need to select her language choice before continuing, then huffing at the realization that Lyssa wasn’t her girlfriend’s real name. She typed Dorcas into the FIRST NAME field one letter at a time, then frowned at it when she finished. Dorcas. It was a strange name, to her. She wished Lyssa had changed her name legally when she had the chance.

  DELANEY, D was returned by the trauma center database, with a status of IN TREATMENT. Diane sighed and cleared the search with a final tap. She picked up her bag and slung it over her shoulder. She shuffled into the waiting area and found a comfortable chair.

  As the night wore on, the chair became increasingly less comfortable, to the point of unbearable. Diane stood up and walked slowly around the waiting room, smiling thinly to anyone who caught her eye and gave some sign of greeting, whether a head nod or a spoken word. She wandered over to the self-service terminal and ran a new search. DELANEY, D. was still listed as IN TREATMENT. Diane glowered at the time. Lyssa had been in treatment for nearly two hours. She wondered what more needed to be done if the poison had been neutralized, as Doctor Greenberg assured her it had been.