Justice Ch. 05: And Justice For All

They seemed to accept what he told them and left. Nervous, he finished filling the tank and jumped on the motorway heading north. He looked in his rear view mirror and thought he saw a vehicle following him. Nerves? Paranoia? Perhaps. But he wasn't about to take any chances and give them a reason to target him.

The drive back north was long and nerve-wracking -- even more so than usual. He kept a lookout for cars following him, unusual clicks or hums on his phone, or other hints that Graeme's goons or the security people were keeping an eye on him. By now, he realized that he is very much on probation and understands that THEY want to know if he will cause... trouble.

They probably figure if he lays down and gets walked on over Cynthia's first "assignment," that he had basically accepted being a "cuckold" for the company. Fat chance of that happening, he snorted. But what can I do?

He finally got back to the yard and turned the lorry in. His next order of business -- a beer at his favorite pub. He thought he saw a car follow him, and noticed that it parked across the street from the pub. Whoever they are, let them waste their time following me, he thought.

He got out of his car, went inside where he used the loo and ordered a pint of his favorite brew. Then he went outside where he could enjoy a smoke in peace.

He was brought back to reality by the sound of a man's voice.

"'Scuse me, pardner. Mind if I join ye?" the man asked. He looked up to see a tall, lanky man in western clothing, complete with a floor-length duster and a beat-up western hat. He looked like a character straight out of an old American western movie. Gobsmacked, he had a difficult time forming a response for a few moments.

"Yeah, sure. It's a free country," he said, wondering why the man chose this table, since most of the others were empty. The man sat down, placing a pint of beer on the table.

"Mind if I... smoke?" the man asked in a thick Texas accent.

"Not at all," Derek said, trying to get used to the man's strange accent. He had heard Texas accents before in the movies, but that was nothing compared to actually hearing it come out of someone's mouth. He couldn't help but wonder if the man carried a six-gun as well. Or two. The man pulled out a pack of cigarettes, took one for himself, then offered one to Derek. He looked at the pack and saw it was simply marked, "JOP."

"Go on, it ain't gonna bite ye," the man said with a smile. "Mah own special blend. Worked on it for years before I finally got it right." Derek slowly took the offered cigarette. He had never smoked an American cigarette before and wondered for a moment if it was safe. The man pulled a match out of a small box, scratched it on his jeans and held it up for Derek. After he lit his cigarette, the man lit his own and took a long draw.

"Ain't nothing quite like a good beer and a smoke to end the day," he said. He took a long swallow from the mug and set it back on the table. "Not bad. Barkeep says it's a local brew. Name's Peace, by the way. Justice O. Peace. Mah friends call me Eli," he said, holding out a hand. Derek took it and shook the man's hand. He started to introduce himself but Justice stopped him.

"Let me guess," the cowboy said. "You be a Derek Smith, am I right?"

"Yeah," Derek said. "How did you know?" He saw the star on Justice's shirt and wondered if the man was a police officer. "Are you a policeman or something?" Justice smiled at that.

"Nah. I was a lawman once. Long time ago. Rode with some of the best," he said. "You look like a good man, Derek. Decent, honest, hard-working, put yer family first. Been driving for Acme what, five years now?"

"Yeah," Derek said. "You sure you're not with MI5 or something?" Justice laughed out loud at that.

"Not even close, pardner. I work for a much... higher authority. I can tell a lot about a feller just by looking at his eyes. And you look like a man with something gainin' on him. What's gainin' on you, Derek Smith? I bet it's a woman, ain't it?" he asked. "And not just any woman." Derek looked at him.

"How'd you know that? What are you on about?" he asked, surprised. And what did he mean, something's "gaining" on him?

"I seen that look hundreds of times in hundreds of men over the years," Justice said. "It's yer wife, ain't it?" Derek looked down, embarrassed. "No need to feel shame, son. You ain't the first it's happened to, and ah reckon you won't be the last." Derek looked at Justice before responding.

"It bloody well shouldn't have happened at all," he said angrily.

"Yer right, it shouldn't," Justice said. "But it has, hasn't it. And worse yet, the sidewinder who did it to ya bushwhacked ya, didn't he? Made it so ya couldn't even set things right."

"Yeah," Derek said. "You see that in my eyes, too?"

"Partly. I've had dealings with these snakes before. Thought we done cleared them out. Reckon we didn't," Justice said.

"You've dealt with Acme before?" Derek asked.

"Yep. Darn near two years ago. Course, that was before the company broke up, sold off most of its international holdings. You wanna know the worst part?"

"What's that?"

"It was over the same thing you're going through right now," Justice said.

"They've done this before?" Derek asked.

"Sure have," Justice said. "Ah thought they'd have learned their lesson. Reckon they didn't. So, what do you say? You up to making things right?" Derek looked at the cowboy and saw sheer determination in his face.

"Yeah," he said. "I'm up to it."

"Good," Justice said with a smile. "Don't you worry about a thing, pardner. We'll get yer situation under control before ye know it," he said as he stood up. Derek looked up at him.

"Why me?" he asked.

"Why not you?" Justice asked. "Yer one of God's children, ain't ya?" Derek remembered how his mother used to take him and his sister to church every Sunday. He hadn't gone to church since he married Cynthia, however.

"I'd like to think so," he said. "But I haven't been to church in years."

"That don't matter none," Justice said. "It's what's in yer heart, not where you plant yer rear end on Sunday morning. All God's children deserve justice. Don't you agree? Besides, a friend of mine asked me to do a favor."

"Who was that?" Derek asked.

"Don't worry. You'll meet him soon enough," Justice said. "Reckon I'd better get going. I'll be in touch." He smiled as the strange man tipped his hat, then turned and walked away. Derek watched the tall man walk away before taking another sip of his beer.

A few seconds later, he thought he heard the man yell, "Hiyah" followed by the sound of hoofbeats. He looked around but didn't see anything and no one else seemed to notice the sounds. Maybe I'm hallucinating things now, he thought. What the bloody hell is going on? He finished his beer and left the pub for home.

...

About 170 miles south of Sheffield, in a building on the bank of the River Thames, John Smith sat at his desk going over a set of spreadsheets. He was about to call it a day, when Mike McGregor, one of his teammates, tapped on the door.

"Hey, Mike," John said. "What's up?"

"You got a few minutes, mate?" Mike asked.

"I was just getting ready to collect Houston and go home for the day, but I suppose so. What's up?"

"You know that Acme driver we talked to earlier today?" Mike asked.

"Yeah, what about him?"

"Looks like he just made contact with one of your countrymen. Got the whole thing on video," Mike said.

"One of my countrymen? An American?" John asked. "Are you absolutely sure of that?"

"Oh yeah," Mike said.

"Let's go take a look," John said as he got out of his chair. He grabbed his tablet and followed Mike into another room with a large monitor on the wall. An operator sat in a chair along one wall. Roisin Callahan, the team leader, sat at a desk in front of the monitor. She looked up as Mike and John entered the room.

"What have you got?" John asked.

"This," Roisin said, motioning for the operator to start the video from the beginning. After their meeting with Derek Smith earlier that day, two agents followed him back to Sheffield, then to the pub. They captured the encounter with the strange cowboy on high-def video, and managed to get audio, using a parabolic microphone.

The three of them watched the entire meeting between the two men and listened to their conversation. When the encounter was over, Roisin turned to John.

"Any idea who that man is?" she asked. John shook his head.

"No idea," he said. Roisin put a video capture of the man's upper body on the monitor.

"Facial recognition can't get a lock on any of his features," she said. "We've reached out to see if anyone by that name or fitting that description entered the UK recently, but so far, there's nothing."

"What's that on his chest?" John asked.

"Looks like a badge of some sort," Roisin said.

"Can we zoom in on that?" Roisin turned to the operator and the image zoomed in close to the badge. The operator made a few clicks with his mouse and the image began to come into focus. They saw a round badge with a star in the middle. The word, "Texas" was inscribed at the top and the word, "Ranger" ran along the bottom. In the middle of the star was "Co. B."

"Texas Ranger?" Mike asked. "He's a bit out of his jurisdiction, isn't he?"

"I'll say," Roisin quipped. John opened his tablet and did a quick search. When he found what he was looking for, he showed it to Roisin and Mike. "What's this?" Roisin asked.

"That badge he's wearing isn't a modern Ranger badge," John said. "That one looks to be from the late 1800s. Modern badges look like this," he said, pointing to the image on his laptop. "Do me a favor and zoom in on his face," he added. The operator complied and they looked at the enlarged face on the screen.

Something about this face and the name "Justice O. Peace" nagged at the back of John's mind, but he couldn't quite put the pieces together. Then he remembered something and his face went white. Mike noticed John's reaction.

"You okay, mate?" he asked. "You look like you've just seen a ghost."

"Maybe I have," John said. "Is there more to this video?"

"Yes, there is," the operator said.

"Let's see it," John said. They watched the strange man exit the pub only to vanish. No one on the sidewalk seemed to notice. The three of them looked at each other, shocked.

"What the bloody hell just happened?" Mike asked.

"You didn't see this before?" John asked. Mike shook his head.

"No. We watched to the point where the two of them separated. We didn't go any further," he said.

"What's the time between frames in this video stream?" Roisin asked.

"With this surveillance gear? About a millisecond," the operator said.

"No human can move that fast," Mike said.

"Maybe he's not human," John said, a part of his rational mind not believing he just voiced what some of the others were thinking. "Get me some digital stills, please," he told the operator. "As high-def as you can." The operator nodded his head and set about capturing the best images he could, saving them as digital files.

"What are you thinking?" Roisin asked.

"I'd like to send these images to my boss at Alpha Sector. If there's any information to be found on this guy, they'll either have it or they can get it. With your permission, of course, Roisin," John said. Roisin thought for a moment and looked back at the monitor. She finally nodded her head.

"Do it, John," she said. When John got the image files, he composed a quick email to his boss in the States, Regis Carlisle. Once the secure email was gone, he closed his tablet down.

Later that evening, as John and his wife, Houston, basked in the afterglow of their lovemaking, John's tablet dinged, letting him know he just received an email. He picked it up and saw it was an email from Regis, also known as "Alpha One." The email was addressed to him, Mike and Roisin.

"Plan for secure Skype briefing on subject 'Justice' to be held at 8:30 am tomorrow your time -- R."

He responded, and saw replies from both Roisin and Mike. He shut down the tablet and wondered what Regis had found.

"What was that?" Houston asked.

"We have a Skype briefing with Alpha One at 8:30 in the morning," John said. "This ought to be good."

...

Derek was still in a state of shock that night when he went to bed. Who was that strange man he met earlier? Really? He finally fell into a fitful sleep, and woke up when his mobile buzzed at 2:45 am. He looked and saw it was a text from Cynthia.

"I'll be home later this evening," she wrote. "Luv U. Miss U." He snorted as he read the message, then tossed the phone back on the nightstand without responding. Yeah, right, he thought to himself.

...

At the same time, about half a world away on a ranch in Texas, Amos and Danni Jones had just finished bathing their two young children and were dressing them in their pajamas for the night when they heard a knock at the door.

"Would you go get that, please?" Danni asked her husband.

"Sure," Amos said, giving his pregnant wife a kiss as he got up. He went to the door and saw his grandfather standing on the porch.

"Grandpa, come on in," he said. "You know you don't ever need to knock." Eli smiled as he hugged his grandson.

"Well, I jes' like to be polite," he said. Just then, two bundles of joy came running into the room in their pajamas, having heard the distinctive voice of their Grandpa Eli. Danni followed them into the front room.

"Grampa!" they exclaimed, holding up their arms. Eli smiled as he scooped up the two young children.

"Well, ah see yer getting' ready for bed. Reckon yer momma would let me tell ye a bedtime story?" Eli drawled.

"Of course," Danni said with a smile. Eli smiled back as he saw the pregnant woman.

"Ah see yer about to have another young'un," Eli said, giving Amos a wink.

"Yeah," Danni said. "You'd better talk to your grandson about that," she added with a smile. Eli laughed and bounced the youngsters already in his arms.

"Story, grampa, story, please?" the young boy, William, begged.

"Of course," Eli said as he made his way to their bedroom. "Have ah ever tol' ya about Bill McDonald? Why, he was one of the most famous Texas Ranger Captains of all time. Rode with him fer a spell. He's the one who gave me this badge, in fact," he added, showing them the Ranger badge he always wore.

"After the Brownsville Raid of 1906, it was said that he'd charge Hell with a bucket of water if he had to," he said. The children's eyes grew wide as they listened to their grandfather.

"Wow," William said. "What happened to him, Grandpa?"

"Well, he died of pneumonia in Wichita Falls in 1918. You know what they put on his gravestone?"

"No, what?"

"Something he once tol' me. 'No man in the wrong can stand up against a fella that's in the right and keeps on a-comin'.' Ah never forgot that. Don't you ever forget that either," Eli said.

"I won't, Grandpa," William said. Eli nodded his head.

"Now, you two close yer eyes and git to sleep, y'hear me?"

"Yes, Grandpa," the youngster said. The girl, Elizabeth, smiled and held out her arms.

"I love you, Grandpa," she said. He smiled and hugged her, giving her a kiss on her forehead.

"And I love you too, sweet pea," he said.

"I love you too, Grandpa," William echoed. Eli hugged him and kissed him on the forehead as well.

"Ah love you, too, son," he said with a smile. "Maybe next time I'll git here a bit earlier and we can all go fishin', okay?" The kids smiled and nodded their heads. Eli got up and left the room to join Amos and Danni. Amos met him with a bottle of beer and the three of them stepped onto the back porch, where the two men lit up a cigarette.

"So, what's going on, Grandpa?" Amos asked.

"You remember that incident with Acme about two years ago?" Eli asked.

"Yeah, we remember," Danni said.

"Well, it looks like they're up to their old tricks again," Eli told them.

"I thought they broke up, sold off most of their holdings," Danni said.

"They did," Eli said. "'Cept one of their overseas branches is still operating." Danni and Amos exchanged glances. They never forgot that incident two years ago.

"Anything I can do to help, Grandpa?" Amos asked.

"Not right now, son," Eli said. "'Sides, ah don't think them Brits would appreciate you bringing that Winchester of yers."

"That didn't stop us back then in Albania," Amos said.

"That was a different situation, son," Eli said. He looked at Danni before continuing. "You reckon there's anything you can do? Legal-like?" Danni shook her head before speaking.

"I'm afraid not, Grandpa," she said. "I don't know anything about British law. And even if I did, I doubt anyone there would listen to anything I'd have to say."

"Ah was afraid of that," Eli said.

"I'm sorry, Grandpa, you know I'd do whatever I could to help," she said.

"Ah know, Danni," he said.

"I can ask around. Maybe someone can make some inquiries for me," she said. Eli nodded his head.

"Anything will help. Much obliged," he said. "Now, tell me about mah newest grandchild."

...

The next morning, John, his wife, Houston, Roisin, Mike and Ross Carter, Roisin's supervisor, gathered in a briefing room that included a large monitor on the wall. The secure Skype connection had been made, and the craggy face of Regis Carlisle, John and Houston's superior in the States, appeared on the screen. He peered at the group through his one good eye before speaking.

"Well, about damn time you woke up," he said with a grin.

"Good morning, boss," John said.

"Good morning, Alpha One," Ross said. "Did you have any luck with that info John sent yesterday?"

"As a matter of fact, we did," Regis said. "I take it you had no luck with the facial recognition?"

"None whatsoever," Roisin said. "There's also no record of his entry into the UK."

"I'm not surprised," Regis said. "We had no luck with facial recognition, either. However, our team expanded their search and they came across something very... interesting."

"Interesting? How, boss?" John asked.

"It seems, John, you and your team has managed to get photo evidence of a man who's supposedly been dead since about 1864," Regis said. John and the others were shocked at that revelation.

"That's impossible," Roisin said.

"Ordinarily, I'd agree with you," Regis said. "Our team decided to match the images you gave us with archived photos. We found two matches. The first is dated in the 1860s, during the Civil War. The second is dated 1892. It seems your photo is the first time his face has been captured in more than 120 years."

"So, who is he?" Ross asked.

"If what we found is accurate, his name is, or was, Elijah Jones. He served in the 8th Regiment of Indiana Cavalry. He made Sergeant shortly before he was shot dead during Sherman's March to the Sea," Regis said. "Here's the first photo."

An image of the man filled the screen. John remembered seeing the image once before, after reading about a new historical site opening up in Texas. There was no question the man in the photo was the same man they had seen the previous day. That's where John had seen the man's face.

"You said there's another photo," John said.

"Yes, this one is dated 1892," Regis said. The screen showed a group of men on horseback, all of whom wore a badge. A circle was drawn around one of the men.

"What's this?" Mike asked.

"Texas Rangers," Regis said. "To be precise, it's Company B, Frontier Battalion, commanded by Captain William Jesse McDonald, one of the most famous Ranger captains in history. The man circled is our guy Jones. Although he used a different name, the man circled in the photo is definitely him. To the best of my knowledge, this is the last photo of him -- before yours."