Fred winced as he hauled his right leg out of the minivan.
"Thanks, Jane," he said with a slap on the side of the car.
Fred did not like having to depend on someone else for a ride, but he had to choose: pain meds or drive himself too and from work.
He chose the painkillers.
He crutched his way into work, using the handicap button to open the doors.
Samantha and Mike were waiting for him in the lobby, by the elevators. Both were grey as ghosts.
"Hi, Samantha," said Fred. "Hey, Mike. What's up?"
"Corporate Security has asked for outside help," said Mike.
"Okay..."
Reaching for Fred's bag, Samantha said, "It's bad."
All three of them boarded the elevator in silence. It was a short, awkward trip to the third story.
A young man with an arrow-straight posture and an inexpensive black suit was waiting for them when the doors opened.
"Mr. Juniper?" said the new figure. "I'm Alex Bradley. I'd like you to come with me."
Alex stepped to the side, making a quarter turn and gesturing toward a conference room in one smooth, obviously-practiced maneuver.
Inside, Fred found more faces he didn't recognize.
There was a young woman. She was pretty, with a triangular face and long, dark hair. To her left was an empty chair. To the left of the gap were two men of indeterminate age. They both had short, brown hair. The one closest to the young lady was wearing a green polo shirt. The man to his left wore a jet-black teeshirt with no logo. It looked expensive, though.
Alex began circling around to join his cohorts. "Have a seat, Mr. Juniper," he said. Then he took his place in the empty chair separating the young lady from the two men.
"What's all this about?" asked Fred.
"Your company requested our assistance when they - I'm sorry - when you and Mrs. Cromwell uncovered some very suspicious activity. Things have become increasingly worrisome since that time."
Fred opened his mouth but before any sound could come out, the man held up his finger.
"Who are we?" asked the man.
Fred nodded.
"Well, you already know my last name. I'm running this investigation. I work for the FBI. Supervisory Special Agent Alex Bradley is my name and rank but you can call me Alex if you want." He waived at the woman to his right and added: "This is Amanda Mason. She's with Homeland Security."
Amanda smiled. "People call me 'Mandy'," she added.
Fred instinctively turned his head to his right, expecting an introduction to the two men sitting on Alex's left.
"You can call me 'John'," said the man immediately next to Alex.
The man to John's left simply said, "'Eddie'."
Alex reached down below the plane of the conference table. "You uncovered a serious problem in your company, didn't you, Mr. Juniper?" He gently laid pale yellow folder in front of him and began fishing through it.
"I don't know. We knew it didn't seem right. Was it serious?"
A picture slid across the table and came to rest almost squarely in front of Fred. It showed a man slightly hunched over as he walked into a deli seemingly linked to an Eastern European ethnicity. His head was clean-shaven but he had a long, graying beard.
"Have you ever seen this man?" asked Alex.
Fred looked at it for a while. He held it up close to his face for a better look. Then he shook his head. "I don't think so."
"Are you sure?" asked Mandy.
"I don't remember him."
"That's strange," said Alex. "He lives across the street from you."
Fred jolted back a little at that idea. He wasn't the most neighborly person but he thought he knew everyone on the block.
"We starting looking for him a long time ago," said Alex. "Apparently, he rented 751 High Mountain Lane for more than two years. Under a false name, of course."
"I'm surprised you've never seen him," added Amanda.
"Seems like there's more," said Fred.
"After you found this," Alex paused, "this thing that 'didn't seem right,' you went on a hunting trip."
"Is that a question?"
An empty smile from Alex was the answer.
"Why did you go?"
Fred shrugged and said, "I had tags."
A tiny snort escaped from John's nose. Fred thought it might be the smallest expression of mirth humanly-possible.
"Were you worried about something? Is that why you left?"
"No."
"So you just left because you have the tags."
"That's right."
Another picture slid across the table.
"This man?"
"That's Kramer."
"He took you to the hospital after you fell, right?"
"No," said Fred. "He just called Search and Rescue then waited with me and kept me awake until they were almost there."
"So that was the last time you saw him, right before Search and Rescue picked you up in the middle of the woods?"
"Yes."
"What kind of rifle were you carrying?"
"A Remington 700."
Eddie smiled a little.
"What kind of round?"
"You don't know?"
Alex smiled; another hollow, little shadow of a thing. "Fred -" he began. "Can I call you Fred?"
Fred nodded.
Alex continued. "Fred. We have a process."
Fred nodded and said ".308," but pronounced each number so it sounded like "Three oh eight."
"You fired it how many times?"
"Once. I hit a buck but I had to give him up."
Alex nodded and scrawled something on a piece of paper obscured by the pale yellow file folder. "That must have been very frustrating," he said.
"It is, now. Then, I was mostly worried about surviving."
"If you had a hunting partner, you wouldn't have been so worried, would you?"
"No."
"Do you normally hunt alone?" asked John.
Fred shook his head. "No," he said, "but my usual partner couldn't go, this year, and, like I said, I had the tag."
"That usual hunting partner is...?"
"Edmond Martin. I can give you his number if you don't already have it."
Without looking up from whatever he was writing, Alex said, "That would be great."
"Have you seen Mr. Kramer since you got on the helicopter?"
"No."
"Do you remember what kind of rifle he was carrying?"
"No."
"You're sure you've never seen this man," Alex used the butt of his pen to tap on the first picture of the man he said was Fred's neighbor.
"If he's lived across from me for years, I must have seen him," said Fred, "but I don't remember. What does he have to do with this?"
"We'll get to that."
"Why are you here? Isn't this overkill?"
With a twinkle in her eye, Amanda said, "That's what we thought."
"When a company contacts the FBI about a data breach...that's not unheard of," said Alex. "When they go straight to the Department of Homeland Security, that's a little unusual." He leaned back in his chair and brushed the butt of his pen lightly against his eyebrow. "When one of the two people who reported the initial incident has a 'hunting accident' right after the breach is reported to Homeland Security, that's the kind of coincidence that gets our attention."
Fred hadn't thought about it that way, before, and it must have shown.
Alex chuckled softly. "You hadn't considered this, already, I take it? We decided to take a look. We found some interesting things. We found your buck."
Eddie chimed in. "The coyotes got to it. Nothing to save but the antlers. They're a little chewed up, too. Sorry."
Alex began to roll his eyes. It was an imperceptibly-quick gesture and Fred didn't notice. "Surprisingly interesting, though," he said. "There was a bullet there that I'm sure will corroborate your having shot that deer. Want to know what else we found?"
Fred shook his head, slowly.
"We found pieces of another round and a nice pit in one of the big the rocks below the trail you were on where it hit."
The blood drained from Fred's face.
"You saying..." Fred paused to swallow. "Are you saying someone intentionally caused the trail to collapsed?"
"No," Alex laughed. "How amazing a shot would that have been?" He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the conference table. "I'm saying I think someone missed you and just happened to collapse the trail underneath you."
On some level, Fred had known that was where the conversation was headed for a while, maybe since he woke up in the forest. The echoes all seemed wrong and he never could place what that meant...or maybe he just couldn't face it. At least one of those echoes wasn't an echo at all.
Alex continued with: "Falling off of that switchback might have saved your life, Fred. Would you like to guess what else we found, Mr. Juniper?"
Fred couldn't quite get past the previous implication.
"Mr. Juniper?" prodded Alex.
Finally, Fred answered "What? What else?"
Another picture slid across the table. It was gruesome and Fred recoiled a little at what it depicted. "We found your neighbor."
Amanda added: "The bullet that killed him is a little harder to analyze...some kind of high-tech thing that breaks into really fine pieces after it hits. I'm sure we'll link it to a weapon, eventually. Somehow."
"I can get a warrant to test your rifle," added Alex.
Fred guffawed at that. "You won't need it. We can go get it, right now."
Alex cleared his throat and said "That's nice of you. I'll send someone to pick it up, tonight. As I was saying, I can and will have your rifle tested but I don't expect to learn anything from it."
"What do you want with me, then?" asked Fred.
"I have three bullets, a body, and a broken leg to sort out," he began. "They're all connected with what looks like someone trying to steal some credit card numbers. That doesn't add up unless there's another piece."
"Okay."
"I think someone thinks you know what the extra piece of the puzzle is. They think you know something or might be close to discovering something; Something very dangerous to them. If I'm right, you and Mrs. Cromwell won't be safe until Homeland Security knows it, too." Alex narrowed his eyes. "Do you know what it is, Fred? What it is you're not supposed to tell us?"
"No," Fred stammered. "No," he tried and failed to shake it off. "No. I- I'll think about it. Maybe get together with Samantha."
"I'd like you to coordinate your communications with Mrs. Cromwell through us, whenever possible. John and Eddie will work with you both. They're like you. Please make sure one of them is with you whenever the two of you work together."
Fred furrowed his brow.
With a hint of reassurance, Alex added: "As I understand it from John and Eddie, here, you solve puzzles for a living. At least...that's part of it. This is a puzzle, too. A different kind of puzzle, Mr. Juniper. One with deadly consequences.
"Amanda - 'Mandy' - and I need to manage this very carefully. We need to do that so we can get to the bottom of this, for our own safety, and for yours as well."
(continued here)
