Act of Terror

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

Near Gettysburg

Quinn woke to nothingness. No light, no sound, no smell. He blinked, trying to clear his vision. Still nothing. Movement was hampered by some sort of harness around his waist. His arms were held wing-like by a similar strap, away from his sides. The faint taste of saline told him he was suspended in a warm-water bath-likely with Epsom salts to float him without effort.

A sensory deprivation chamber-an upright, coffin-like enclosure soundproofed and filled with enough warm water to leave only the victim’s head exposed. He’d spent some alone time in one during training. Some in his element had fallen victim to hallucinations less than an hour after going inside the box. Their instructor had pointed out that the more well-adjusted they were, the more quickly they would succumb. Quinn had lasted almost six hours, three times as long as any other member of his training element.

Every prospective combat rescue officer was sent to SERE-Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape-training in at Fairchild Air Force Base near Spokane, Washington. As a trained interrogator, CRO, and OSI agent, he’d attended advance training at Fairchild and at the Navy’s sister facility in Maine. Quinn was certain these two training cycles had taken at least a year off his life.

Having spent his youth in the wilds of Alaska, survival, escape, and evasion came easy to Quinn. There was little the enemy could throw at him during a pursuit that was more frightening than a nine-foot grizzly sow.

The R in SERE was a completely different story. The instructors had pointed out early in their training that the human mind was far more vulnerable to exploitation than the body. During times of extreme pain, the physical being simply shut down, in effect turning off its ability to feel inflicted stimuli.

Threaten pain and the mind takes over, filling in the blanks left by a skilled interrogator with all sorts of horrific details.

Quinn pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth, listening for the sound and feel of his own heartbeat. It was a technique he’d used to stay grounded when he’d been “captured” by PRONA-People’s Republic of North America-forces during training. There was a lot going on inside the human body and, with the mind turned inward, it was a pretty interesting place to visit.

Quinn had no idea how long he listened to his heartbeat and the gurgling of his own gut before the lid to the box came off. Harsh light clawed at his eyes and the heavy thump of a bass note assaulted his ears. Coming from an environment with no stimulation, the effect was like sandpaper on the skin. Hands grabbed at each shoulder and he was hauled out the top of the enclosure like a slippery fish only to be dropped unceremoniously on the ground.

Angry male voices barked opposing orders.

“Be still!”

“ON YOUR FEET!”

“Why are you here?”

“SHUT YOUR MOUTH!”

The shouting, combined with the pounding beat of the music, gave the impression of dozens of other men in the room. Quinn believed there were four. He recognized one of the voices and made a mental note of its position in the room.

Naked, he sat on the floor and did his best to ignore the screaming. He saw nothing but blinding white light. He focused, working to control his breath.

The blaring music suddenly stopped. A deep, disembodied voice came across some sort of loudspeaker.

“SIT!”

Quinn scanned the room and found a gray metal chair directly in the center of the glaring pool of light. Before he could move, the voice boomed out again.

“I SAID SIT DOWN!” Without warning a shadow strode from the wall of light and struck him across the thigh with a length of rubber hose.

Quinn scrambled for the chair, his leg on fire.

“TELL US YOUR NAME!”

Quinn coughed. Arms on the chair, he hung his head. If they knew who he was, he wondered why they hadn’t restrained him.

“You know my name.”

The rubber hose caught him across the left shoulder this time, coming from another direction. Quinn didn’t even try to deflect it.

“YOUR NAME!”

“Jericho Quinn. Captain, United States Air Force.” He gripped the chair, swallowing hard as the nauseating effect of the blow seeped into his bones.

“See?” the voice said, normal now, without the aid of a loudspeaker. “That wasn’t so difficult.”

Quinn nodded.

“Is this about Drake’s list?”

He heard a shuffle in the corner.

“Normally,” the voice said, “you’d have been struck for unsolicited speaking. Consider this warning my gift to you.”

Quinn nodded again, catching his breath.

“Now,” the voice continued. “Let’s get down to business-”

“Let’s do,” Quinn said, unsolicited.

When the punishing shadow appeared again, Quinn was ready. He grabbed the hose and wrested it from the attacker’s grasp with a quick flip of his wrist. Striking quickly, he felt the satisfying thud as the hose struck home. There was a heavy groan as the man collapsed into the pool of light.

Quinn spun, launching himself wildly into the light. He crashed into the wall, falling back to the concrete floor. A Taser crackled from somewhere behind him and his body went rigid as a board. Molten heat shot up his spine. Fingers clenched around the hose in his hand. Toes curled inward from the pulse of fifty thousand volts that coursed through his muscles.

When it came to being Tased Quinn had the advantage of experience. The moment the shock ended he rolled, sweeping the hose behind his back to break the hair-like wires that connected the barbed darts to the Taser itself. He scrambled to his feet, roaring as he heard another crackling sound to his left.

Muscles spent, the second jolt of electricity affected him exponentially more than the first. He fell forward, his rigid body bridged on forehead and the tips of his toes. His face slammed against the floor once the shock was over. Saliva and blood dripped from his mouth and onto the gleaming concrete.

Naked and exhausted past the point of caring, he lay still.

“Foolish, Mr. Quinn,” the voice said again from behind the light. There was almost a hint of pity in it. “I think this is enough for now. You should spend some time in the box.”

Black boots tromped toward him. Strong hands pinned his shoulders while someone slipped a black cloth bag over his head. Lolling from the two bouts of Taser therapy on top of his recent battle with the weather in Afghanistan, he put up no more resistance as they secured him back in the box.

They pulled off the hood before closing the lid. Scowling down at him was a bald man, a scorpion tattoo running up the side of his thick neck.

“I want you give you something to ruminate on,” the man said. “Before we turn out the lights, so to speak.

“We had a bit of a time locating Kim,” the man went on. “Until she made a phone call back to some friends in Alaska.” He grinned broadly. If evil had a face, this was it. “You should have trained her better than that, my friend. I am so looking forward to spending a little quality time with her and young Madeline. I know you’d like to stop me… It must kill you that you’re here… powerless…”

The box closed leaving Quinn alone, floating in the dark with the screams inside his head.