24 Declassified: Operation Hell Gate

3. THE FOLLOWING TAKES PLACE BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 11 P.M. AND 12 A.M. EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME

Jack stared through the windshield at the dozen hostile faces surrounding the car with what he hoped was a neutral, nonthreatening gaze. The black Mercedes was gone, the missile launcher stashed in its trunk still a threat to innocent lives. Yet Jack was compelled to thrust that dilemma aside for the moment.

Rather than challenge the youths and risk a fight he might be able to avoid, Jack placed both hands on the steering wheel to convince the men he was unarmed. “Look, I can explain this. My name is Bauer. I’m a Federal agent—”

“You’re a fuckin’ Fed?” cried the big man with the lightning tattoo. He smiled, revealing a gold front tooth. “All the more reason to bust your head for trying to jack my ride.”

“Look,” Jack continued. “Just let me go and we can work this out—”

Someone ripped the door open. Strong hands moved in on Jack to strike him. He guessed that only two or three men were actually assaulting him. The rest of the group stood back and watched, shouting encouragement and enjoying the show.

The men on Jack slapped at him. Jack stayed in the car, didn’t resist — not yet. Instead he tucked his head in his chest and curled up on the seat into a defensive ball, protecting his soft spots — along with the Glock in his belt. His left arm covered the shoulder holster where he’d slipped the dead marshal’s gun after he’d lost his own. He would need both weapons soon. Then he felt and heard a crack. Someone had swiped at his head with a bat or stick. It was a glancing blow, or he would have been dead instead of seeing stars.

The men dragged Jack out of the vehicle and dumped him onto the pavement. He rolled, dodging kicks, to their frustration. Finally the big man with the lightning tattoo bent down to pry his arms apart. Jack kicked him in the groin with all his strength. A scream cut the night and Jack lashed out again, seizing a handful of the man’s long braids. He used them to drag his head down and strike it against the pavement, stunning him into silence.

Jack backed against the car and rose, Glock in hand. Most of the crowd scattered then, ducking behind cars or fleeing into the street. But five men stood their ground, whipped out guns of their own. If they’d fired just then, Jack would have been a dead man. Instead they began to wave their weapons around in an absurdly threatening manner, hurling insults and threats.

“You want to start shooting, mother—”

“Hey man, go ahead, you pull your trigger and we’ll pull ours—”

“You gonna die, asshole, ’cause you don’t know who you’re messing with—”

They were untrained, unskilled, not particularly bright, but they made a lot of noise. Punks, not professionals, but they had him outgunned five to one. Jack knew from experience standoffs like this never lasted long. Someone always got impatient or scared or stupid or all three. And no matter how the situation ended, someone was bound to end up dead.

Jack had to break the impasse, the only way he knew how. He raised the Glock and aimed.

Georgi Timko knew the four men were trouble the moment they walked into his tavern.

Up to that time, it had been a quiet night, by Tatiana’s standards at least. Some fists were thrown early in the evening, but the tussle was dealt with by Alexi, the bar’s three-hundred-pound bouncer and veteran of the failed Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Both Olga and Beru were making nice tips from eager young men who tucked dollar bills into their skimpy G-strings, whether they were dancing on stage or serving drinks on the floor. The pool tables were both crowded, and the clientele — mostly bikers from a Queens “motor club”—were generally behaving themselves while consuming copious amounts of beer.

Icing on the cake for Georgi this night — the satellite broadcast had just ended and the Bulgarian soccer team, heavily favored in the match, had lost to the Armenians — which meant a big payoff for Georgi, who almost always bet on the underdog. He’d brewed some tea in his private samovar in celebration.

Then, eight minutes ago, the men in the long blue coats arrived and spoiled Georgi’s evening. They’d come through the door silently, not speaking to anyone, not even one another. They ignored old toothless Yuri, who always sat by the entrance nursing his beer, hand extended to anyone who entered in the hope someone would spot him another one.

Without even a glance at Beru, who swayed topless on stage to some mindless hip-hop song, the men sat down together in one of the booths along the wall. With a professional eye, Georgi noted that’s exactly the place he would have chosen. From that booth the men could watch the crowd at the pool tables and keep a watchful eye on Alexi near the cash register, and Nicolo drawing beers behind the bar.

Olga sauntered over and tried to engage the men in a little flirtatious banter, but failed to elicit more than a mumbled demand for a pitcher and four mugs— another bad sign.

Now the men had finished their beers and were stirring. They stood when Georgi rose from his chair behind the bar to fill his teacup at the steaming samovar. As the men approached him, Georgi turned his back to them as he sweetened his tea. He could feel their eyes watching him, and the base of his spine tingled — one of the many danger instincts he’d acquired as a juvenile delinquent in his native Ukraine thirty years ago.

In those days the dangers were the police or the KGB — a branch of the Soviet intelligence apparatus directed against Western espionage, but always eager to imprison a fellow member of the Soviet brotherhood for dealing in U.S. dollars, which Georgi and his peers in the mob did on a regular basis — how else was one to grow prosperous in a Soviet state were the national currency was worth less than the paper it was printed on?

Fortunately for Georgi, America was fertile ground for the kind of criminal enterprises he’d practiced in the old Soviet Union. So when the Iron Curtain rose and the KGB files were opened to the public, certain information Georgi had provided to the secret police came to light. That information proved damning to Georgi’s rivals in the Ukrainian Mafia, many of whom were sent to Siberia. A few others — particularly nasty sorts, in Georgi’s estimation — ended their lives facedown in a filthy prison shower, a KGB officer’s bullet placed behind their ear, solely on the evidence he had provided.

Unfortunately, those men had relatives, friends, and criminal associates. When the truth was revealed, many sought revenge — and so Georgi was forced to emigrate in a hurry.

Here in America, he was able to start anew in a less economically repressive world. In America the police were much less of a problem, and a fascist organization like the KGB nonexistent. There were, of course, dangers. But here in America, here in Georgi’s adopted country, that danger came courtesy of four young gangsters wearing dusters on a warm summer night.

Georgi shot a glance at Alexi. The bouncer seemed prepared, his beefy hand poised to reach for the bulge in his safari jacket.

Well, I certainly hope he’s ready, Georgi mused, though at times poor Alexi is a little slow.

Georgi always had a soft spot in his hard heart for veterans of the Afghan war, though he despised Russians in general. Only now, at this tense moment, did it occur to him that his compassion might cause his death this night.

So be it.

With a degree of fatalism, Georgi Timko sniffed the steaming mug of tea as if it were his last. Then he turned to face his assassins.

That’s when all hell broke loose — but not the way Georgi expected it.

Suddenly the tavern’s thick, glass block windows exploded inward in an avalanche of broken shards. On the ceiling, a light fixture shattered in a shower of hot sparks, plunging much of the bar into darkness. Two spider-webbed bullet holes cracked the smooth surface of the wall-sized mirror behind the bar. A third whizzed by Timko’s brow, to punch a hole in the stuffed buffalo head mounted on the wall.

A final shot smashed a gallon jug of Jack Daniel’s, and in the silence that followed, Georgi listened to the rich brown elixir drip onto the scuffed hardwood floor.

As the echoes faded, the patrons who’d thrown themselves under tables when the shooting started now stumbled to their feet. With angry shouts they crowded around the single exit as they all tried to escape the building at the same time.

The punks were stunned into paralysis when Jack fired the Glock into the crowded tavern. Jack was careful to keep his shots high, far over the heads of the patrons inside.

Instantly, a dangerous horde of furious customers poured out of Tatiana’s. Jack dropped the empty Glock and held up his hands.

From the bar’s doorway, a biker with a long oily ponytail pointed at the gun-toting young men. “There they are! There’s the bastards shooting at us!”

The punks bolted, vanishing among the parked cars. Jack stood alone, hands raised. The bikers approached, not friendly.

“What the hell are you doin’?” one yelled. He drew a police special from his pocket.

Jack kept his arms raised, but if they searched him, they would find the other gun — and more. Suddenly a sustained barrage of automatic fire discharged inside the darkened tavern. Then the bartender burst through the front door, running full tilt for the street. He only made it a few steps before a stream of 9mm slugs chased him through the doorway, tearing bloody red holes in his back. The bartender staggered for a moment, then pitched headfirst onto the concrete.

When he saw that, the biker with the police special turned tail and ran, too, as yelling men and two screaming women in thongs and high heels stampeded. Engines roared to life all around Jack. Cars, trucks, motorcycles, until the noise drowned out the chattering guns.

Inside the tavern, the shooting continued. The automatic weapons’ fire was first met with single shots from a large-caliber handgun. Then Jack heard a familiar sound, easily recognizable from his service with Delta Force in Eastern Europe — the distinctive crack of a Soviet-style AK–47 assault rifle.

Jack found the choice of weapon intriguing. It also occurred to him that Dante Arete had sent the shooters inside that tavern personally. That might mean that the assassins’ intended victim was involved in whatever plot was unfolding. This person might even know something about the missile launcher, and the two men who had driven away with it. If Jack was really lucky, he might capture one of Arete’s assassins alive, and possibly find out where Dante was holed up.

So while fleeing vehicles sped away from Tatiana’s Tavern, Jack drew the Browning Hi-Power from his shoulder holster and moved cautiously toward the building.

Ryan Chappelle caught up with Nina Myers and Tony Almeida at Jamey’s workstation. Jamey was watching a map grid on her monitor. Dante Arete’s GPS beacon blinked intermittently. Meanwhile Nina was attempting to interface with the DEA’s database and Tony was tracing the license plates Jack had read off.

“We’ve finally heard from the FBI,” Ryan announced. “The New York office has issued an arrest warrant for Jack Bauer.”

Jamey exploded. “That’s crazy. What are the charges?”

“The murder of two federal marshals and the wounding of an FBI pilot. Aiding a fugitive to escape federal custody, one Dante Arete.”

“Ryan, that’s ridiculous and you know it,” Nina said.

“I’ll admit it sounds far-fetched,” Ryan conceded. “But Special Agent Frank Hensley survived the airline crash; he’s talking to his bosses and that’s his story.”

“Are there any other survivors?” Tony asked.

“Besides Jack and Dante Arete? Just the pilot, and he’s not talking.”

“The FBI keeping him under wraps?”

Ryan flashed his displeasure. “He’s in a coma, Tony.”

Almeida bristled at Chappelle’s tone. “Hold on a minute, Ryan. You sound like you believe the FBI’s version of what happened.”

“I don’t believe and I don’t disbelieve anything. I’m waiting to be convinced—”

“But you heard what Jack said. He’s innocent and you know it,” Nina argued.

“I don’t know anything,” Chappelle replied. “Until another witness steps forward, what happened is open to interpretation. What happens next is up to you. You’re going to have to convince me that what Jack Bauer said is true—”

“Convince you?”

“Yes, Tony. Convince me. Because I’ll be the one who has to turn around and convince the Secretary of Defense that Jack Bauer hasn’t gone off the deep end.”

Georgi Timko cowered under a table; another toppled on its side served as scant protection against the 9mm bullets whizzing around the room. Still clutching the warm cup in his fist, he gulped reflexively, scalding his tongue.

From somewhere inside the shadowy tavern, lit neon blue from the sign outside the shattered window, old Yuri was still plugging away at the remaining assassins. The ancient AK–47 rattled, muzzle flash bright. Georgi could hear spent cartridges bouncing on the floor following each carefully timed burst.

Georgi smiled, remembering the surprise on one assassin’s face when the old man who begged for pennies at the door suddenly pulled the assault rifle from its place behind a loose wall panel. Before anyone could react, Yuri stitched a bloody line of holes up the gangster’s chest with an opening burst — hey, not so “toothless” after all. The dead man still lay where he fell, head askew, eyes staring blankly. The Uzi he had brought with him lay just out of Georgi’s reach.

Another Uzi fired, the burst shattering what remained of the mirror, which came crashing down behind the bar. Georgi hugged the dirty floor, cursing his laxity in not wearing a firearm, or fetching one when the four assassins first stepped into his establishment. Instead he trusted his employees to handle things. Now Nicolo was dead and Yuri was cornered, though the old man was still fighting valiantly. Poor Alexi had not fired a shot in a long time, and Georgi feared the worst.

He shifted his position in an effort to reach the Uzi on the floor. His movement elicited a burst of fire that chewed up the floorboards and shattered a chair near his head. Yuri answered the shots with a burst of his own, drawing the assassins’ fire away from his boss with the last of his ammunition.

Georgi Timko cursed. He wanted to protect such loyal men, but feared he’d already cost them their lives. Only luck or a guardian angel could save them all now.

Jack Bauer had slipped to the back of the tavern and used a metal Dumpster to get a boost to the flat tar roof. He waited until he heard shots. Then he peered through the skylight, into the darkened tavern. By the blue light of the neon exterior, he counted three shooters — someone moving right under him was using the AK–47. Arete’s men, the two left standing, fired 9mm Uzis from behind splintered pool tables. Jack saw three other shapes from his vantage point— two on the ground, the third sprawled across a table. A pair of those men were Arete’s; Jack recognized them from their dusters. The third was unknown to Jack, and most likely dead.

Jack ducked away from the skylight, leaned against the satellite dish while he contemplated his next move.

He had to capture at least one of Arete’s men alive. The only way to get information fast was a rough interrogation of the suspects. He was certain he could quickly break any of Arete’s punks — if they had any useful information.

Jack also wanted to speak to the person or persons Dante Arete sent his hit squad to assassinate. Jack didn’t always subscribe to the dictum that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but right about now he could use an ally on this coast to make up for the deficit of CTU support he was facing. And if Arete wanted someone dead, it was probably because he knew something that could hurt the gang leader. Jack wanted a part of that as well.

In the tavern below, a short burst from the AK–47 was followed by a hollow click on an empty magazine — the shooter was out of ammunition. Arete’s men knew it, too. Like shadows in the blue neon glow, they slipped out from behind the pool tables and moved to flank the defenseless man.

Jack balanced over the skylight, reloaded his weapon. He shot through the glass and dropped into the middle of the tavern. Jack landed in a crouch in front of a startled gunman. The man raised the Uzi and Jack fired, blowing the top of his head off.

Jack ducked under a broken table and rolled as the other man fired on him. The shots kicked up splinters from the floor.

“Give up and I won’t hurt you,” Jack cried. He was answered by another burst — which also ended with an empty click.

Jack leaped to his feet and leveled his weapon. The man in the blue duster looked up fearfully, then let the weapon fall from his grip.

“Step forward and I won’t—”

Suddenly shots filled the tavern as a long burst tore the man in the long coat to bloody pieces. Jack whirled to find a heavy-set man facing him. The man instantly dropped the Uzi and threw up his arms when his eyes met Jack’s.

“You must help me,” Georgi Timko pleaded. “That son of a bitch over there shot my friend. I…I think he’s dying.”