The French Connection Ch. 01

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"How are you feeling?" Elizabeth asked as Goth Girl Kathy woke up and stretched. Leonard Lotz was still asleep. Kathy had fucked his balls off the night before; even the 'gray viagra' had not been adequate for Leonard to keep up with Kathy.

"Okay." said Kathy. "Pretty good, in fact. Hungry. Let's get some breakfast. Is there a McDonald's nearby?"

"Probably," said Elizabeth, "but they serve typical French Continental breakfasts like the rest of the places do." They got dressed and went to find some food. Elizabeth told Kathy her plan.

"That's dangerous." said Kathy. "You could end up dead."

"I'm going to end up dead, anyway, if this doesn't work." said Elizabeth. "But you'll be my bodyguard, and take care of anyone who tries to sneak up on me..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Melina was wearing all-black athletic wear, running as if she were a jogger through the streets of Paris. But it was not just for exercise; she was trying to make sure she was clear of Paul Claisson.

The guy had stuck to her like glue. He'd said that his orders were to accompany her and protect her at all times. She'd told him to back off in stronger terms, wondering if she should just kill him. Then he went to the bar and picked up two women, finally leaving her, Melina, alone.

Now, the next morning, she had snuck out of the hotel and 'disappeared' herself in the great and beautiful City of Light in the pre-dawn dark. She had received a note under her door that said "You are being tricked and set up." then gave the name of a café and a time of the morning. It also had a couple of extra words, which Melina knew could only have come from Goth Girl Kathy, though Kathy could not have been the one who actually put it under her door. Was this a trap itself? she wondered. She decided to take the risk.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"You wanted to see me?" asked Melina as she came up to the two women in the back part of the café.

"Yes." said Kathy before the surprised Elizabeth could answer. "Have a seat." Melina sat down warily, her eyes sweeping over the café and out the windows.

"They sent you to kill me." said Elizabeth, in the Troy tradition of figuring out things quickly, and understanding Melina's showing up here and now. "What they did not tell you is that you're in the same world of hurt. They want you to kill me to stop the flow of guns to our Jewish friends. But either they will kill you afterwards, or trick the Israelis into doing it for them."

"I believe you." said Melina. "The question is, how do we get out of this? If I don't kill you, they'll either want to know why, or they'll kill me anyway. I've already got this Claisson fool watching over me. Is he the one that is supposed to kill me after I kill you?"

"No. Claisson is not the one." said a voice behind them. The women looked up in stunned suprise... into the gray eyes of the Iron Crowbar.

"How the hell---?" asked Melina.

"Let's just say 'The Friends of the Iron Crowbar' have intervened on your behalves." I said. "Let's get out of here, if your friend Leonard won't shoot me in the next two minutes. Claisson will catch up to you soon..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

We were in the back room of a Japanese noodle shop that served Asian dishes and also sold rice and other Japanese food items to Parisians. Leonard Lotz had joined us.

"Here's the deal." I said. "Claisson was sent to make sure you do your job, Melina, and also to help set up Elizabeth by making contact with her for you if that was needed. And if for any reason you fail to kill my sister, he's supposed to finish the job and make sure she's dead. But what they did not tell you, is that they've sent another person, as well."

"His name is Waddell." I said. "He was in league with Dana Fox, Les Craig, and other rogue FBI Agents. He fled to England, then came here to establish contacts with Islamists and Neo-Nazi groups. He's the one we've got to flush out and eliminate."

"How?" asked Kathy.

"My problem," said Melina, "is that he and Claisson must see and confirm that Elizabeth is dead, or I'll be dead, or 'disavowed' and never see home again. How do we solve that?"

"And solve that with me still breathing?" asked Elizabeth. "I'm sure I can find better ways to die than be murdered by the CIA."

Kathy was peering at me. "Why do I have the feeling that you have a plan for this, Commander?"

I smiled at her. "Don't I always?" I said, as I peered at her, making my own observations...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Claisson was nervous. He'd knocked on Melina's door three times, ostensibly to ask her if she wanted to go to breakfast. There had been no answer. He was trying to decide if he should contact his superiors, or wait longer. Then he heard the door to Melina's hotel room open then shut.

He went next door and knocked. Melina answered. She was sweaty, as if she'd just come back from a run. "What?" she asked harshly.

"Uh, I wondered if you wanted to go to breakfast." said Claisson. "I'll contact our superiors for updates, then we can get some coffee, yes?"

"Sure." said Melina. "I'm going to take a shower first. I'll knock on your door when I'm ready."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Notre Dame de Paris. Just before noon, Paris time, I stepped into the great and ancient cathedral. Going down the dark central aisle, I looked up at the arches, the beautiful stained-glass windows, wondering just how human beings were able to build such an incredible structure.

Notre Dame is an active Catholic Church, and the nuns were trying to close it for one of their services. When I saw an elderly nun coming straight for me, I bowed, said "Excusez-moi, ma mère.", and fled for the front doors. Well, I got to see inside, anyway...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

As Melina led Paul Claisson down the avenue, she stopped. "Let's get some noodles." she said, as if it were a sudden thought. They went inside and got bowls of noodles. Melina wolfed hers down. Claisson seemed nervous, and not hungry.

"So, when and where do you want me to make the contact?" he asked.

"You know Paris better than I do." said Melina. "What's your suggestion?"

"The Jardin des Champs-Élysées." said Claisson. "It's near the Embassy, we can go there immediately after the... well, it's an ideal place. She'll think it's open and safe."

"Sounds good." said Melina. "Okay, we're going out the back way. Follow me." She got up and went into the back areas. Having to react quickly, Claisson followed.

As he followed her into the empty back room, he was too late to react to the figures that rushed him. Kathy had a blanket over his head, cutting off his vision and his yelps. Elizabeth had his arms behind him with her Aikido skills, and Leonard Lotz applied the cuffs. The captured Claisson was quickly moved into the basement room.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

9:00am local (Town & County) time, Tuesday, March 20th. KSTD was covering the announcement in the City Hall atrium as Town & County Council Member Loran T. Michaels came up to the podium.

"I am here to announce that I am changing my plans, and I'm running for Mayor as a Republican." said Michaels. "The People of the Town & County need an alternative, a reasonable alternative, to the cowboy politics of Daniel Allgood. I am that steadfast, reasonable alternative."

Meanwhile, at the A.M.E. church, flanked by the Rev. Joseph E. Williams and rapper T. Square, Town Assemblyman Eldrick X. Weaver, a tall, slender, middle-aged black man, stepped up to the KXTC microphone. "Today," he said, "I am announcing my candidacy for Mayor as a Democrat..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The Arc de Triomphe is the landmark arch at the northwest end of the Champs-Élysées, built by Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte. What a lot of people don't realize is that France's Tombs of the Unknown Soldier(s) are underneath the Arc. The American equivalents are at Arlington National Cemetery. I paid a quick visit and paid my personal respects. After all, my Michaux ancestors emigrated from France to the United States...

Then I walked down the famous Champs-Élysées itself, towards the Place de la Concorde. My eyes were hidden behind sunglasses, and they were looking in every direction, seeing where the cameras were, where the security people were hidden, stuff like that. Most citizens would never see what my practiced law enforcement eye was observing...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Claisson was tied securely to the chair, which was tied securely to the radiator against the wall. Melina was alone in the room with him.

"Okay," she said, "things are just not right here. This is the worst-run mission in the history of the Company. You sticking so close to me endangers both of us, and the mission. Our hotel rooms next to each other... just plain imbecilic. So... you are going to tell me what is really going on here."

"I don't know what you're talking about." said Claisson. "As I told you, I'm here to help you set up your kill. She knows me much better than she knows you. And yes, I'm here to chaperone you."

"Why?" Melina asked acidly. "I don't need chaperoning. And why didn't they just assign you to the kill? Why send me at all?"

"Because I'm not a killer." said Claisson. "I've never been a killer. It's not in my blood, and it's not what I'm trained to do."

"You are lying to me." Melina said. She took a small leather billfold from a pocket along the ankle of her black sweats. "I am going to find out the truth." With that, she took out a syringe full of a blue liquid, and injected Claisson in his upper back with a small amount of it.

"AAAUUUGGGGHHHHH!!" he screamed as the excruciating pain ripped through his body...

Part 5 - We'll Always Have Paris

We were at Corcoran's Irish Pub - Bastille, near the Élysée Palace. Elizabeth, Leonard, Kathy and myself were enjoying... what else... beers.

"I must admit, Iron Crowbar," said Leonard Lotz, "you amaze me. If this comes together, it'll be the best-conceived plan since the Nazis overran France in 1940."

"It helps," I said, "that the Superintendent de La Préfecture de Police de Paris (8e Arrondissement) was, as a younger man, attached to the French Embassy in a foreign nation not to be named. He was captured and held hostage for ransom by a radical pro-Marxist group, and the Government refused to talk to the radicals. However, an intermediary stepped in and arranged for the French man's safe return in exchange for a large sum of money. That intermediary's name was... Dr. P. Harvey Eckhart."

Elizabeth's eyes crinkled in amusement, and Kathy gasped in happy understanding. Then the two women exchanged a glance, and Elizabeth excused herself to 'powder my nose'. Normally women do that together, so when Kathy did not go with Elizabeth, I understood what that meant.

"Leonard," Kathy said, "go get us some more beer, or go to the restroom or something."

"Gotcha." said Leonard. "Just don't tell him all of my sex secrets."

"From what I've heard," Kathy said, "he probably could teach you a lot in that category." Leonard smirked, then got up and headed up to the bar.

"Interesting." I said. "Your leather vest under your jacket... armor sewn into the back, but not the front."

"Whatever happens," Kathy replied, "I won't take an arrow, or a bullet, in the back."

"I do appreciate you putting that arrow into Mr. C's back." I said.

"Is that why you're helping me now?" asked Kathy, peering at me.

"That's some of it." I said. "Keeping my sister alive, and bringing my ex-wife home to her children is another part of it." I saw a flicker of emotion in Kathy's tired eyes, of sadness.

"Listen," said Kathy, "no matter what happens here, in a few months a letter will be arriving for you. Would you please... make sure it gets to my sister?"

"Yes, I will." I said solemnly. I peered at her again. "Yes... I see why you came to visit your family at Christmas."

"Not much gets by you, Mr. Iron Crowbar." said Kathy, peering back at me. "You know, your hair-brained schemes are a lot like Ned's were... just a lot less reckless."

"And Elizabeth?" I asked, not really wanted to be reminded of Ned right now.

"Well," Kathy said with a knowing smile, "we'll always have Paris..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Monsieur Claisson regretfully expired." Melina said, after she'd joined me at a table near the others but separate, beer in hand.

"Did he say anything?" asked Leonard Lotz.

"Oh yes, he talked." said Melina. "I have his codes to transmit messages to the Embassy, if you want me to do that, Don."

"That'll depend." I said. "What did you learn?"

"He admitted, under duress," said Melina, "that his mission was to make sure I did kill Elizabeth, and then he was supposed to kill me and then go back to the US Embassy."

"Where they would kill him and send him home in the diplomatic bag." I said. "Did he say anything about anyone else? Waddell?"

"No." said Melina. "I asked several times, and he finally just said that if they had anyone else in on it, they didn't tell him. And he may have been right. The drugs were really fucking him up by that time."

"Those drugs of Ned's worked pretty well, eh?" I asked.

"Better than I expected them to." said Melina. "I've held on to them for years, never tried them before. Now that I've opened the sealed vial, they'll start to break down. So I hope this was the right time, and that it was worth it. By the way, how did you know I had them?"

"Process of elimination." I said. "The CIA doesn't have them, and desperately wants them. Kathy never had them, nor did Elizabeth. And you knew where the underground lab was. Q.E.D."

Melina gave what was for her a half-smile as she arched her eyebrows. "Not much gets past you." she said. "Except I have the feeling... that something in your plan here is off. Sure you haven't missed anything?"

"Quite the contrary." I replied. "As long as you make sure to miss Elizabeth when you shoot. Lotz will be playing the role of Claisson, and Kathy and I will be looking for Waddell while you're targeting Elizabeth. Once we spot him, we can take him out... or you can, if he's in your range and sights."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"And this just in!" said Priya Ajmani at 9:30am local time, breaking into the morning shows. "The Jan Camp lawsuit is wrapping up. Both sides have rested their cases, and closing arguments will begin shortly!"

"Legal experts say that Lead State Attorney Glenn Alberts has to 'hit a home run' to have any real chance of winning this case for the University, and to overcome several 'unforced' technical errors he and his team have made during the course of the trial..."

"Wow, talk about incompetent." said Teresa as she and Cindy watched in Cindy's office. "I'm surprised Don hasn't been ranting about it."

"I think Don knows what's really going on with that." said Cindy. "Anyway..."

"Anyway?" Teresa prodded. Cindy had stopped short, having what looked like one of Don's reveries.

"Uhhh..." Cindy said, snapping out of it. "I just had this huge... feeling. Hit me in the face like a Red Brooke jab. Something's going on with Don..." She said no more as she tried to focus her mind and pierce the veil...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Melina was perched on an upper floor of the Théâtre de la Ville, which adjoined the Jardin des Champs-Élysées, a Remington 700 rifle in .308 Win. caliber in her hands. It had a large cylinder on the end, a silencer that would absorb enough of the sound-barrier-piercing noise of the bullet to not draw the immediate interest of persons nor audio-detection devices. She was watching the garden below as she kept herself hidden from view.

On the ground floor below, Kathy and I were looking all around for any sign of the turncoat FBI Agent, Waddell. So far, we'd seen no sign of him, no sign of anyone taking an active interest in the man in a trenchcoat approaching the older woman in the garden.

Melina saw the man, who looked just like Paul Claisson, but was really Leonard Lotz, well disguised. Elizabeth was a master of disguises, for both herself and others, Melina thought to herself, and it was too bad her talents had been wasted on a criminal smuggler.

She got ready to fire the fatal shot. She was using a concrete flowerpot to steady the weapon, and so was in a kneeling position, instead of a less-defensible prone position.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"No sign of him." I said. "Nothing at all. He should have made his appearance by now."

"Maybe he won't show." Kathy said quietly.

"He will." I said. It was time.

"Kathy, go upstairs." I said. "Keep in the hallway behind where Melina is, and watch out for Waddell. If you see him, press that button on that pager I gave you, and I'll come running."

Kathy nodded and took off for the stairs. I waited a long moment, taking one final sweep of the area, then unzipped my bag to have access to my swords. Then I went to the stairs that Kathy had climbed a moment before...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

*POP!*

The sound was still pretty loud as Melina fired at Elizabeth in the garden below. She saw the woman fall, and the man come forward and hover over her.

"Well done." said the man, coming out on the balcony where Melina was. He was watching through binoculars. He then turned to her and said "I'm FBI Special Agent Waddell." He exhibited his FBI badge with his photo on it. "I'm here to take you to the Embassy. Quickly now, disassemble your rifle. The Police are coming."

Indeed, French police officers were scurrying out to the fallen woman and the man attending her in the garden. Melina began disassembling her rifle.

"Why did they send you?" asked Melina. "And where is Claisson? Why isn't he escorting me----" She looked up, and into the barrel of the 9mmP semi-auto pistol that was in Waddell's hands.

"There's been a change of plans." said Waddell. "I'm the 'Cleaner', here to clean up this mess entirely, you fucking kike bitch!" He aimed the gun.

"NOOO!" yelled Goth Girl Kathy, hurling herself in front of Melina.

*POW!*

The bullet struck Kathy square in the chest. She staggered back, into Melina's arms, and they both went down in a heap, Kathy lying on Melina.

"Touching." snarled Waddell, sarcasm in his voice. "That's five extra seconds for you to live. Hope you enjoyed it..." He aimed again...

*** TO BE CONTINUED. ***