Jo-el

Chapter 47 DON’T BE JO-EL

“You’re a sly fox, Dad.” Maggie said, back in the suite.

“I’ve got enough on my plate with you knowing everything, better this way. Hopefully I can keep him in the dark.”

“What now?”

“I think it’s time to go on the offensive. These guys are pissing me off.”

“Do you really think you can do this? I mean, rid the world of crime?”

“I’ve got some unique abilities; don’t you think? Once I’ve met with the President and he’s on board, these guys are going to be on the defensive.”

“Then what?”

“Meet with all the other world leaders, that’ll keep me busy and get them on board.”

“You’ve worked it all out, I’m impressed.” Maggie appeared to be drifting in my direction, I was pleased.

“It’s not going quite as smoothly as I hoped, but whatever does?”

Sally appeared without asking. She dressed down when Maggie was there, usually jeans and a simple top, today was green.

“More problems Jo-el.” I waited for her to continue. “There are twenty-seven people who have either Facebook or Twitter accounts claiming to be you, one of them just had his left hand severed.” The expression on her face asked, what do you want to do?

“Shit!” I swung around and threw my arms up. “Are you monitoring the others?”

She nodded. “Six are at risk, bad guys are headed toward all of them.”

“How close?”

Sally hesitated for a second, “first one will be at the Jo-el wannabe in three minutes.”

I smiled and changed into Jo-el. “Let’s go meet him.”

Sally showed me a small ranch house in the snow, a blue Ford truck was pulling up in the driveway. “The bad guy is in the truck.”

“Keep an eye on the other five, Sally, bounce me to the ranch house.”

I landed by the front porch just as the man in the truck was exiting the door. He was massive even inside his heavy coat. He wore a ski-hat, a tattoo of a knife was wrapped ominously around his neck. He saw me and froze. He knew immediately who I was and began to back away.

“Stay where you are.” I shouted. He stopped, I could see his hand reaching slowly into the deep pocket of his coat.

“Sally, activate the shield.”

“Already done, Jo-el.”

“Who sent you?” He didn’t answer. Instead he pulled the gun from his pocket and pointed it at me. I smiled. “If you fire that gun, I’m going to hurt you,” I told him. Problem was that didn’t compute, he was holding a gun at me, which in his mind was the winning hand. It’s hard to adjust your thinking, even when some dude appears out of nowhere right in front of your face. He fired twice. The bullets ricocheted off the shield. I felt a tap, nothing more. I was surprised to even feel that. But tattoo man was even more surprised. He fired four more times. Same result. I smiled, wider this time.

“Chop his gun hand off.” I told Sally.

“With pleasure,” I heard her say. I watched the result, it was the same as Yerchenkov, he didn’t feel it at first, he just stared at the gun and his hand falling to the ground, the blood spurting from the wound. Then the adrenaline subsided and the pain hit. He fell forward to his knees in the thin snow, grabbing at the wound, his eyes still staring at me. I heard the door of the ranch house open, I didn’t look around.

“I asked you a question?”

“Somebody called me, I don’t know who it was, fifty k.”

“I know who it was, Joel.” I heard Sally in my ear.

“Go find a doctor. Change your ways, next criminal deed and I’ll kill you.”

He left the gun and pulled the door of the truck open with his good hand, his bloody wrist was pushed into the arm of his coat. I stepped forward and picked up his severed hand, then I tapped on the side window of his truck, which he opened tentatively. I threw the hand onto the passenger seat, “they might be able to sew it back on.” I smiled. He drove away without saying another word.

I turned toward the front of the house. A young girl, maybe thirteen was standing in the doorway. “Shut down the Jo-el Facebook account, he was going to cut your left hand off.” Her face was white. She was speechless. I bounced back to the suite.

Maggie had viewed the whole episode on the disc monitor. “I can’t believe you picked up his hand and told him to have it sewn back on. He shot at you! That shows a sense of caring. Just weird.”

“It was an impulse,” I shrugged. “Sally, who sent that guy?”

“Intermediary, ultimate chain goes back to Verminov.”

“I just hate it when the only guy that gets hurt is the one at the end of the chain. Who’s next?”

The disc monitor screen flipped to a town that looked like France. “Ten to twelve minutes out, Bruges, Belgium. But there’s two more that are almost as close, one in the US and one in England.”

“Okay, let’s do them in order, but if the other two get close, knock them out, but don’t kill them. We need to send a message.”

I met the man in Bruges, a pretty little town, close to the English Channel, known for its canals, it went a little differently. He wasn’t carrying a gun just a knife. As soon as he saw me he spun around and ran back to where he had parked his little, red Fiat 500. All I did was whack him hard in the thigh and told him if he did anything criminal again I’d kill him. Sally had caused the next two to faint. I arrived at the man in Oregon, just as he was coming around, a pleasant suburban neighborhood, large houses, with manicured lawns. He was lying on the sidewalk, rubbing his eyes. When he saw me he jumped up and began running in the opposite direction to where he had parked. I whacked him in the leg then caught up with him. Sally told me he had murdered three people on contract kills, I felt no remorse when I lobbed off his left hand and explained why and what his future in crime would bring. He also left in a hurry, I didn’t even have time to suggest he might want to take his severed hand with him. Silly man. The fourth man was in London, it was dark. The area was Chelsea, high end neighborhood not far from the Thames river. The man was lying in the street with four strangers giving assistance. He’d fainted as he was crossing a road and had been hit by a London bus. Nothing for me to do, the bus had taken care of business.

After taking care of the last two I was back in the suite. Maggie had left, gone to see Adam.

“Probably wants to get laid” Sally said.

“Sally, that’s my daughter, don’t say things like that.”

“What, you think they’re not doing it?”

“Well, no, but fathers don’t want to hear it.”

Enough of this conversation. I realized I was supposed to return to see Pippa about the list of people who knew my identity. Sally confirmed she was still at home, fixing dinner for Billy. I bounced into the living area.

“I thought you’d forgotten about me.” Pippa said, still mixing something in a bowl.

“Busy,” I replied.

She turned to me holding a fork in the air, I could see liquid eggs running down it’s handle. An omelet. Nothing gets past me. “I was going to ask what you were up to, but I think I’d rather not know.”

“Do you have the list?”

Pippa replaced the fork in the bowl and turned towards me. “Alberton, Kale, Lambert, Grayson, you know all of those people. There is a guy from Homeland Security, Brian Sumani, an attorney, Felicity Denham and finally Sam Fitzpatrick, another CIA agent.”

“That it? What about the NSC, weren’t they meeting underground?”

“We never told them your real name.”

“What’s Kale up to, he wasn’t exactly a friend?”

“Watching from the sidelines. We know who you are, Jo-el. It’s a leadership issue now. We can’t control you, that’s the greatest fear. What do you want? Why are you here? It’s also a trust issue and we’re still trying to figure that out. I’m not sure you’re winning with your latest antics. Those business men you killed were big time contributors to politicians around the globe.”

“They were crooks; they were all planning to kill me. Initially there were eighteen, I eliminated ten, but eight have hidden in bunkers underground.” That wasn’t quite true, one was in Japan and another in Santiago, Chile, but Pippa didn’t need to know that. “You must know they’re crooked?”

“We have files on them and suspect a lot, but they never get close enough to the dirty work and the ones in the US have many legitimate businesses. It’s difficult to convict them.”

“Yea, well no need now.”

Pippa screwed up her face, “I think your approach is a little too vigilantism for the most of us.”

“I can prove beyond any doubt they are criminals and I will provide the information. You must have seen what they did to those two CNN people? I’ve been sorting out issues all day, those assholes were sending guys to cut off the left hands of the kids who set up false Facebook and Twitter account, pretending to be me. They are trying to turn the general populace against me. Clever, but it won’t work, I’ve sent some nasty messages back and once that reaches the underworld they won’t find a hitman who’ll scratch their asses.”

Pippa tried to look positive but the concern on her face was very apparent, “So, what else are you going to do?” she asked.

“You probably know I’m meeting the President tomorrow. I’m going to tell him everything. Did you tell the group about Cirion?”

Pippa nodded and smiled. “That was a revelation. The consensus was we need our leading scientists to hear what you claim, see if they could accept any of it.”

“I’m okay with that, it’s the right step. You know, Pippa, there’s something I didn’t tell you, the final piece of the puzzle, so to speak, why I’m here? But, I think I’ll tell the President first. It’ll be out soon enough.”

“So, you’re teasing me?”

“I guess. What are the team doing now?”

“Hiding, under massive protection.”

We stood staring at each other for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” Pippa said, her voice suddenly soft, she glanced down at Billy. Then took a step toward me.

“Don’t you dare, Jo-el.” I heard Sally in my ear.

I ignored Sally and closed the gap between us.

“I don’t believe it. Men! And I’m trying to be real. I hate you, Jo-el.”

I ignored Sally.

I kissed Pippa on the mouth and held her close to me for a while, then I pushed away gently, she understood. “I blew it, didn’t I?” she said.

“Maybe?” I smiled. “I have to go.”

I bounced back to the suite. Sally was gone.

“Sally,” I called out into the air. No response. I watched the people out of the window, going about their business. I felt suddenly alone, truly alone. It hit me how much I’d come to rely on her. I saw a young girl standing by a bus stop, eyes glued to a cell phone. Same thing I thought. “Sally!”