The Bad Guy Wins in This One - Chapter Thirty Two (Kevin)

Kevin Knight decided he really needed a vacation after this. Good time to visit Gravitas and see how retirement really was. Stalking and killing young handicapped girls just wasn’t his style. Especially since he’d just killed a girl who could have been useful to them for a mission that shouldn’t have happened in the first place.

It was a cover up job with too many variables that could go wrong, and it was just supposed to distract from a cover up job that had gone off almost perfectly. Despite all his time searching, their inside sources said Hargrave had next to no proof that the events surrounding Sunlight city’s destruction was anything besides what they’d fabricated it to be. Much less any sort of evidence that Black Rain still existed or any of its former members were involved.

This debacle though… he could scarcely imagine threatening Mirkov would turn out well and it sounded like one of the kids escaped the assassination point. The kid whose real identity he didn’t know yet other than that Tasha said he was definitely not Steven Foster like he pretended to be. What’s worse, there was no confirmation that Patrick was dead either. Dammit, must I do everything myself? he’d wondered.

Despite his complaints, he followed his orders faithfully as ever. He was fortunate that his target was wheel chair bound. Momo’s eyes often had difficulty distinguishing faces and the girl was using a device to periodically change hers. If she’d been able to slip through a crowd as easily as a normal person it would have made this task incredibly difficult.

Fortunately, she could not slip away too easily and it was simple matter to follow her once she’d made her way out of Steve’s mansion. He couldn’t help but laugh at how easily she got passed the government personnel assigned to keep an eye out on her, even with a wheel chair. Admittedly, her other bodies helped her, but it still amused him. She’d brought her real body to a van; her copies helped get her into it and then got into the front seats.

She never heard a thing when he’d slipped in after her. It was a tricky bit of work getting in before they closed the door without running into her more able bodies. But occasionally being a small guy was actually a good thing and Momo behaved admirably, clutching tightly to his head. He’d waited in the back until the mike in his ear quietly said Hargrave was dead. Then he’d waited a few minutes more.

His orders were to kill her as soon as he was told Hargrave bit it, but he wasn’t sure what killing her would do to the copies. He did not fancy being driverless for any length of time while going 70 miles an hour. So he’d waited until she’d pulled over. He wasn’t sure why she’d pulled over, whether it was just to switch vehicles or if her grip on the copies was waning.

Tasha told him that when they’d tested the boost on May to see what would happen, she’d been able to control all of her clones simultaneously for a little over forty minutes. After that she slowly started losing control of them. One by one they’d dropped unconscious every four or five minutes until only the original remained.

Maybe May stopping the car was as simple as her taking precautions to avoid having a surprise detour into a ditch on the highway. Part of him had wanted to wait to find out. Part of him thought it would make more sense to wait until her boost wore off so there was no chance she could transfer her consciousness to another body. But he’d expressed that opinion to his higher ups when they told him the plan and they’d said to kill her as quickly as possible.

So instead of satisfying his curiosity, he’d put a bullet through the back of the driver’s seat. May’s body at the wheel had barely gotten her seat belt off when it jerked forward, dead. To her credit, May drew her gun almost instantly and blind fired over her shoulder where he’d been a second before. But Kevin knew not to fire from the same location twice and had already crouched beneath right behind May’s wheel chair. Her main body wouldn’t have been able to get an angle on him even if she’d known exactly where he was.

He’d placed his gun right at the back of her head and fired. Time to see if her clones all drop dead. A bullet ripped through her main body’s chest and clipped his arm. Guess not yet. Dammit, I told them this might happen.

He fired back through the passenger seat, but May’s other body was already out of the car. Bullets came in through the side of the car, punching holes through the metal like it was tissue paper. Good weapon, he’d noted from his now prone position on the floor. If he’d still be in a crouch, there was no place he’d have been able to escape taking a hit. He very narrowly avoided one as it was.

The gunfire was causing Momo to freak out, so Kevin stopped relying on his eyes. Predict her actions. She’s good, very good. But that means she won’t risk checking back in the vehicle until she’s certain I’m dead. The only way to do that would be to…

He jolted up just as bullets went through the floor beneath him and returned fire. This time he heard a yelp of pain. He emptied the rest of his clip in the direction of the yelp and then listened carefully for any movement. When he heard none, he carefully opened the Van’s door. He still waited a moment, then switched clips, reached down and gave a couple of blind shots. He heard a thud that told him they impacted something.

“Sorry Momo,” he murmured, grabbing his companion by the tail and hanging him over the door ledge just to be sure. He’d breathed a slight sigh of relief when he’d seen the body through Momo’s eyes. It’d been a long time since someone came that close to killing him. He radioed in to his superiors. “Mission complete, but be advised she may still have copies in play.”

“Noted. As always, your mission proceeds have been wired to you. We have another one for you tonight if you’re up to it. Should be fairly easy.”

Kevin’s furry companion was trembling slightly, back to nesting in Kevin’s hair. “I’m not sure Momo’s nerves are up for another one tonight.”

“Two million dollars. The target is in a coma in a hospital a fifteen minute drive away.”

Kevin paused. Two million dollars for a low risk job that shouldn’t take more than an hour? What aren’t they telling me?

“Ok, I’ll bite, if you tell me why you’d pay so much to get rid of someone in a coma.”

“We don’t want you to kill her. We want you to take her. You will need to find a way to transport her without turning off her breathing apparatus. The boy impersonating Steven Foster escaped the assassination attempt and we believe this girl may be of importance to him. We want to have leverage.”

Leverage? Kevin wondered. Does that mean the plans to kill them all have changed? Interesting. He looked around the nearly deserted truck stop they’d stopped in and saw an eighteen wheeler parked about a hundred yards off. It was the only other vehicle around besides the van. A plan began forming in his mind.

“Fine, I’m in.” he’d said. But after this, I definitely need a vacation. Visit Gravitas, then spend some time on that island I just bought. Yeah, it’ll be fun.