This is my entry in the Crime and Punishment 2024 event. Many thanks to
TheNyxianLily
for editing and critiquing this story, and providing encouragement.
The story is an homage to '60s secret agent films of the completely unrealistic kind. It features a lot of killing and violence, so if that's not your thing, you might be happier with one of my previous submissions.
If you want to get fully into the mood, I suggest you put a Shirley Bassey song on after the first scene, and look at silhouettes of naked women while it plays.
The bitingly cold air whipped past Jacqui as she fell. And fell. And fell.
Below, on the snow-covered ground of northern Japan, she made out the shape of the Gihei compound, though she had to keep wiping snow from her goggles. The bare stone walls and tiled roofs rushed up, the lights spilling their lambent glare on the frozen ground. The lonely trees around it grew too, from pin-pricks to blobs, to large shrubby obstacles. Jacqui pulled the rip-cord on her parachute, and felt the jolt as air filled it, before gliding silently to the ground inside the compound walls.
She gathered up the white parachute and hid it behind a rock. There were a handful of guards walking the walls, but they were watching outside. From the looks of it, they were more worried about the cold, breathing onto their hands. Jacqui, in her white cat-suit and with long blonde hair, was difficult to see against the snow. She slipped to a door in the compound and waited before it with her Beretta out, feeling the chill seep through her clothes and into her muscles, and then her bones.
Eventually the door opened, and Jacqui pointed the pistol at the besuited man who had opened it. In her upper class English accent, she said, "Satoru, you took your time." She lowered the gun. "Let's get moving."
He moved aside to make way for her. "I'm sorry. The building's hard to move through tonight. They've moved up the schedule. Gihei's going to fire the missiles tonight."
Jacqui was already moving through the concrete corridors, gun at the ready, welcoming the warmth of the building. "Then we have no time to lose." Behind her, she heard the unmistakable sound of a Walther PPK being cocked. She was glad to have Satoru at her back again. Rounding a corner, they found themselves face-to-face with four guards in yellow jump-suits, Madsen M-50 submachine guns carried across their chests. Jacqui and Satoru were expecting to meet opposition, whereas it was a regular patrol for the guards. The pistols spat death twice each, and the guards collapsed to the floor without firing a shot in return.
Satoru said, "Both head shots, Irons? You never change."
Jacqui stepped over the bodies with barely a glance. "A shot to the forehead is instant."
She stopped at the top of a balcony, looking out over a vast command centre. There were banks of top-of-the-range computers, their large tape reels whirring back and forth, lights blinking. Between the computers walked technicians and scientists, like ants attending to their nest. At the far end, talking to his aides, was Gihei, immaculate in a mustard suit.
Satoru came up behind her and handed a pair of grenades to Jacqui. "I'll see you at the escape boat."
She turned and smiled at him. "Yes. Then we can both get back to England and some sun."
With that, they both removed a pin from a grenade, and sent them spiralling into the room below. There was a wait for a couple of seconds, and then they exploded. Pandemonium followed. Klaxons whined, and workers scurried for cover. Gihei picked up a rifle and started firing at the pair, while more yellow-clad guards rushed into the room. Jacqui and Satoru fired again and again. Guards fell below them, and they threw their remaining grenades, destroying more guards and computers. There was no way the missiles could be launched now. The guards fell back, realising they were beaten, but Gihei kept firing, the bullets burying deep into the concrete around Jacqui. When her last clip was emptied, Jacqui leaped down from the balcony, landing lightly on her feet before rushing Gihei while he reloaded. She knocked the gun from his hand with her fist, then kicked his knee, buckling it and sending him to his knees.
"I surrender!" he shouted, his hands high.
Jacqui picked up his rifle and finished loading the round into it, then pointed it at Gihei's head. "Would you have let the innocent people in the cities your missiles targeted surrender?"
His jaw moved up and down, as though searching for an answer, but no words came out. A bead of sweat trickled down his forehead. Jacqui squeezed the trigger gently, and Gihei lay still.
"Irons," Satoru's voice came from behind her. "I've caught her! I've caught Honoka."
Turning, Jacqui saw he was dragging a woman beside him. Honoka was breathtakingly beautiful, and Jacqui's memory raced back to long nights of enjoying her body.
"You can let her go, Satoru. She wasn't with Gihei through choice. We should take her to the escape boat."
Satoru's knuckles whitened on Honoka's arm. "No, she was Gihei's second. We must kill her!"
Honoka stared in horror at Satoru, then turned tear-streaked eyes to Jacqui. "Please, Jacqui. You know that Gihei held me here against my will. You can't let this man kill me."
Jacqui raised the rifle, pointing it first at Honoka, then Satoru, then back and forth.
"Irons," said Satoru, "we've worked together since your first mission. I've earned your trust."
Honoka said, "You promised you'd protect me. You've saved me from Gihei, but just to be killed now?"
Jacqui pointed her gun at Satoru. "Let her go. Put your gun down."
Satoru said, "Please, don't do this. You're making a mistake."
Jacqui kept the gun on him. "Don't make me force you."
With a curse, Satoru released the girl and dropped the gun.
Honoka rushed to stand behind Jacqui. "Thank you so much. I knew I could trust you."
Jacqui looked at Satoru down the barrel of the rifle. "If I let you go, will you leave Honoka alone?"
She never got her answer, because a dagger appeared in his chest, a bloom of red spreading beneath it. Jacqui spun and rolled, a second knife, held in Honoka's hand, slashing the air where her head had just been.
She came up into a kneeling position, her rifle levelled. But Honoka dashed between the wrecked computer consoles, and out through a door. Jacqui raced to Satoru, but she could see that there was nothing that could save him. She held him in her arms, his blood hot on her hands.
"I'm so sorry, Satoru. I should have trusted you."