Virtual Vandals

Chapter 20

A shouted command rang out, and all of a sudden, brilliant lights lanced through the early evening dimness. The gangbangers ahead scuttled aside like roaches caught on the kitchen floor. The lights advanced at a walking pace. Matt made out the shapes of four Humvees, accompanied by figures on foot toting heavy rifles.

Matt caught a flash of green from the newcomers’ clothing. But these weren’t Buzzard reinforcements. The green came from the fatigues of U.S. Marines.

Behind the guard detail, lights flashing, was a fire truck! The driver honked his horn, eager to get on with the job of dousing the flames.

Matt suddenly found himself blessing the idiot who’d launched the grenade and set the house on fire. True, it had acted like a gigantic signal flare, drawing in all the Buzzards searching for them.

But it had also drawn the firefighting team from the Navy Yard!

And since the fire was in a supposedly derelict area, the powers that be had sent a Marine escort in case there might be trouble.

The Buzzards had been temporarily taken by surprise. Still, they outnumbered the Marines by a good ten to one. They could try to overrun the troopers and still attempt their big knockover.

But the Humvees had to have radios. If they could warn the Marines — get the word out….

Matt turned to Luc and Caitlin. “Come on. We’ve got to tell them what they’re stepping into. What’s going on.”

He stepped away from the feeble refuge of the steps and walked into the gleam of the headlights, his hands up.

Marine rifles snapped in his direction, but Matt kept walking forward, making sure his empty hands were visible. “You’ve got about two hundred gang members ahead of you,” he warned. “They’ve massed here—”

“For an attack on the Gardens at Carrollsburg,” Cat Corrigan interrupted, stepping past him. She, too, kept her hands in the air. “They kidnapped my friends and me. I’m Caitlin Corrigan, the Senator’s daughter.”

“Smart girl,” Luc muttered.

Matt glanced at the other boy.

“Word of the kidnapping must be out by now,” Luc said. “The soldiers will have to take her seriously.”

Matt was about to explain that they were Marines, not soldiers, when he caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye.

As the standoff developed, Rob Falk must have crept up through the shadows to the steps of the row house that the escapees had just left. Now he rose up out of his hiding place, the old M9 pistol he’d taken from Serge Woronov in his hand, his eyes glittering.

“Oh, no, bitch,” he gritted. “You’re not wrecking everything I’ve worked for.”

At the same time, a Marine yelled, “Get down, you young idiot!”

Luc had taken off in a wild leap to stop Falk — but he was also blocking the Marines’ line of fire!

A shot did ring out — from Rob’s gun. But he didn’t hit Caitlin. He hit Luc.

The French boy cried out, spinning and clutching his arm. He staggered, but somehow stayed upright — still blocking the Marines. But he lurched toward Falk with the stiff-legged gait of a zombie out of a horror movie. His left arm hung useless, dripping blood onto the cracked pavement.

His right hand, however, reached out hungrily for the gang’s computer whiz. “You — won’t — hurt — Cat!” he growled in short, painful gasps.

Luc made himself a perfect target — and he was everything Rob Falk hated — a member of an in-crowd, from the land of privilege — and the land of diplomats.

Rob aimed his gun toward Luc. Matt could hear frustrated growls from the Marines trying to aim their rifles, trying to find a clear shot at Rob without hitting Luc and Caitlin. If he didn’t stop this — and now — it would mean the start of a general firefight.

He forced his tired legs into one last run, a wild dash that launched him into the air. “Falk!” he yelled.

Matt didn’t know what would happen. Rob was just an amateur at gunfighting, which meant his actions were completely unpredictable. If Rob had been a trained shot, he might have taken care of his aimed target before turning to Matt.

Instead, Rob hesitated, his aim flicking between the oncoming Luc and Matt, who was now hurtling toward him.

He didn’t even have time to get a shot off before Matt tackled him. They hit the pavement with bruising force. Rob wriggled like an eel, trying to escape and shoot again. Matt held onto Falk’s gun hand, grinding down on the wrist until the weapon fell from Rob’s fingers.

When Matt kicked to send the pistol skidding away, Rob’s free hand came up like a set of claws, going for Matt’s eyes. Matt ducked, punched his opponent, then spun him around so he lay on his belly. He forced Rob’s right arm behind his back and dragged him up, applying painful pressure until the bones creaked.

Rob cried out, but Matt held him on his feet, maintaining the come-along hold. He backed up, keeping Rob between him and the rest of the Buzzards. If they wanted to shoot, they’d have to risk hitting their pet genius.

Marine riflemen closed in around them. “What’s the story here?” a sergeant asked.

“I’m a Net Force Explorer,” Matt explained between gasps. “If you contact Captain Winters through the Net Force Washington office, I think he’ll vouch for me.”

He may be furious, Matt thought. But he should still vouch for me.

“This is the man with the computer know-how to breach the security system at the Gardens at Carrollsburg. Whatever you do, make sure his friends don’t get him back.”

The crowd of gang members surged like a restless sea. They knew that if they lost Rob Falk, their whole plan would fall apart. But they were unwilling to go up against the rifles aimed against them by the Marines. If it had been police facing them, they might have made a try at storming the line. But not Marines.

Matt had finally backed up to the parked Humvees. He gave a sigh of relief as he saw a Marine lieutenant on the mobile radio. In the distance, they already heard the skirl of oncoming sirens.

The sergeant passed on Matt’s message and the lieutenant contacted Net Force, and soon helicopters were in the air overhead as well.

It was over.

Inside the rectory of the abandoned church, Captain Winters shook his head. A full Net Force criminal investigation tech team was at work, going over the weirdly mis-mated system Rob Falk had put together.

Matt had been right. Without Falk, James and his warriors had been unable to pull off their big robbery. James himself had been on the other side of the desolate zone, leading his people in a gunfight against Serge Woronov. The Balkan diplomat’s son hadn’t made it to the elevated parkway. But he’d taken refuge among the concrete pilings, trading shots with James and a crew of Buzzards.

Serge had actually been wounded and was down to his last two bullets when the cops had arrived. James had fled in inglorious retreat, along with his gang. An all-points bulletin was out on them.

The other gangbangers had tried to vanish, but police, Marines, and Net Force operatives had rounded up most of them. Some of the Buzzards had held onto their guns, others had ditched them, but one thing was sure. The gang’s fighting force had taken a major hit this evening.

Captain Winters came over to Matt. “Our people are finding unbelievable things on those wired-together hard drives,” he said. “But then, there were a lot of things in this whole case that I’d have never believed.”

It wasn’t much of an apology for not listening to Matt’s early theories about the virtual vandals. But frankly, it was more than Matt had expected.

“Then, on the other hand, I would never have expected you to take such an irresponsible, dangerous…downright stupid course of action,” Winters went on. “Single-handedly going undercover with no backup and no way to communicate — who do you think you are? The Spawn?”

“Captain, I left a datascrip with everything I knew on it. It had everything I found out—” Matt began, but Winters cut him off.

“If you only knew how many gravestones that could be carved on! We found your file after you went AWOL from school, Hunter.” He gave Matt a glare that could have melted steel. “It was useless because Falk and the other vandals had already disappeared. The real nitty-gritty stuff that we’d need to save you, you didn’t find out until you were a prisoner, now did you?”

“But I did escape, Captain,” Matt pointed out. “I used the training I got in Net Force Explorers to get out of there.”

“Oh, yes, I heard all about your adventures from Woronov and Valery while they were being patched up.” Winters hesitated for a second. “And from Ms. Corrigan.” He shook his head again. “Some of those lamebrain stunts — you’ve certainly proved one thing, Hunter. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, especially if you’re trying to apply it.”

Winters sighed. “I guess there’s only one thing to do about it. We’ll have to sign you up for advanced Net Force training, if only to keep you off the streets.”

“Sir?” Matt couldn’t believe his ears. Advanced training, or “boot camp,” as the Explorers called it, was usually reserved for guys years older than he was. It would probably require his parents’ approval. But he thought he’d be able to convince his mom, and she’d talk to his dad.

“Thank you, Captain,” he said.

“Don’t thank me,” Winters told him. “By the time you’re through, you’ll probably think you’re going through the tortures of the damned. I’m just hoping it takes care of all that excess energy you seem to have.”

Matt could feel his face getting red. “Nothing happened between Cat — Caitlin — and myself.”

“Nothing, huh? Other than getting kidnapped and shot at? I see that you decided to protect her once you knew she was involved in this mess.”

Matt shrugged, his face going redder. “I did what I thought was right — at the time.”

“So did Luc Valery, I guess,” Winters said shrewdly.

“Yeah. I saw him talking to Cat. He finally made up his mind about whether he really liked her.”

“Not that it will do him much good,” Winters said. “The Valerys and the Woronovs will all be returning to their respective countries. Mr. and Mrs. Savage have already brought young Gerald’s body home. The State Department is hard at work pulling the necessary strings. And unless I miss my guess, Senator Corrigan will probably lock his daughter in a closet until she turns about thirty.”

Matt gave a ghost of a grin. No more pictures of Cat Corrigan in the society holos. That would be a switch!

“We do have a promise, however, that she’ll testify — if it becomes necessary.”

That made Matt grow more serious. “What’s going to happen to Rob Falk?” he asked.

Now it was the captain’s turn to shrug. “He’s in custody, under continuous observation so he won’t…do anything to himself. Certainly, he’ll have to face a psych evaluation. The tech people here tell me he truly is a genius. But he planned some pretty terrible things—”

“And did a few — including murder,” Matt finished grimly.

Captain Winters didn’t disagree. He simply started talking about another subject. “I think the Federal Government is going to start taking more of an interest in these ring-town gangs. They’re a problem for other cities besides Washington.”

“And that will probably be the only visible result of everything that happened,” Matt said.

“After State, the Justice department, and a couple of other agencies — including Net Force — are done, I suppose so.” Winters looked at Matt. “Were you expecting a medal?”

“No!” Matt said, surprised.

“Then look at it this way. You helped avoid a four-way international incident, saved a lot of people from some very rough treatment at the hands of the Buzzards…and kept some very nasty technology out of some very dirty hands. Unfortunately, only a handful of people will know what you did to avert a major disaster.”

“And in return, I get a chance to bust my butt in advanced training,” Matt said.

Captain Winters nodded. “The best possible punishment for success — it’s the Net Force way. You got a problem with that, Hunter?”

Matt found a slow grin creeping across his face. He shrugged. “I guess I can live with it, Captain,” he said.