Authors: J.H. Kavanagh
‘We had our first loss in action a while back. This guy is on a trial deployment with Special Forces, takes a bullet but survives and is taken for treatment. He recovers but is acting strange, the chip and his behaviour all out of whack, and they try to fix him up. It looks like he’s going to make it but then he has a relapse and dies. After Martinez, everyone is pleased he’s out there in Europe under wraps and can be quickly and quietly dealt with, a hero just to the family and largely kept out of the press, out of a law suit.’ He takes a deep breath. ‘The chip comes back, code matches, DNA matches, the works…’
‘But you’re not convinced?’
‘I was until now, when, guess what, some young woman starts poking around and stirring up all sorts of rumours that this guy is alive and well. She’s absolutely certain that it’s him. I have some of my people check her out. She’s not a nutter; she’s a research scientist, good Spanish family, works for some biosciences outfit in Cambridge, England. It turns out she was his girlfriend while he was on the Brits’ Solomon programme. Don’t ask me how the hell…and she’s convinced he’s acting as the centrepiece in this latest big new Reuben Matzov thing – a goddam entertainment service for Christ’s sake!’
‘And you can’t discount that idea?’
‘I could if I believed a damn word of what I’m being told. But it’s all out of a secret facility in Poland. I don’t know who half these people are. This stuff is not on official requisitions. The geeks tell me they track the codes. But all that comes back is a bucket of ashes, a handful of bits and a ticket like a garage service record. They tell me that’s conclusive. What I say is conclusive is that there’s evidently someone running around out there who seems to resemble our man closely and who has a way to transmit every fricking detail of what he’s up to anyone who buys their service.’
‘And still no one is offering any plausible explanation as to how else this service is possible other than using stolen technology? What does the company itself say?’
Dooley is on his feet and pacing the room again. ‘I can’t exactly ask Matzov if he’s bought off one of my soldiers. He has people dreaming up bullshit to cover himself faster than my people can read it.’
‘There are no commercial precedents, no patents, no R&D history, no footprints at all?’
‘Squat. Just a signpost to China and a lot of bullshit about groundbreaking private research and intellectual property.’
‘And when you say that the prior breach resulted in code turning up in Asian devices, was that ever pursued? Was anything done? Was anything ever proved?’
‘It was Baytran Technologies selling the Asian consoles with our software. They are Matzov too. We could never close the loop on him though. At one point there were investigators all over his US defence supply business and several of his labs but a prosecution there would have meant him pulling out and probably would have cost Keeley Massachusetts. Baytran alone has fifteen thousand people around Lexington. And believe me, that bastard is devious enough to have had another go. In the end, Keeley blinked.’
‘There’s no way he could have taken it forward from that point himself?’
‘Oh, he’s trying. You don’t build that expertise overnight and he’s certainly been trying to buy it. He’s been sniffing around the market for neurosurgical talent for a while. We’ve tracked a few moves recently. Couple of guys from Mount Sinai we think went over to him, out of sight, reportedly: Korea then China. Frankly, there’s no doubt Matzov’s into this in a big way. He was missing a vital piece of the puzzle. And I think he came and got it. You’ll see it all in the files.’
‘What is The President’s disposition to it this time around?’
‘Good question. No one is happy about getting ripped off. Trouble is Keeley and all the National Security Council remember what my predecessor said; he was the one who claimed we were so far ahead in the early days and then had to buy in a billion dollar simulation programme from Europe that was obviously ahead of us. That’s how this whole mess got started, why we’re where we are. It didn’t make him a hero, kind of rocked the faith. So they’re cautious. Most of them know that Matzov is a snake but he has his influence there too. Keeley doesn’t want publicity, there’s no upside, but he will act on evidence. No committees, no time wasting. He’s prepared to issue a Presidential Directive. That, Lieutenant, as I’m sure you appreciate, means we have to fix it; quickly, quietly and completely, no matter what it takes.’
‘So, what, realistically, is a good outcome here, Sir?’
Dooley recognizes a lawyer’s manoeuvre and gives a knowing smile. ‘I need a positive ID that it’s our man in the middle of this. I need a confirmation of what happened. I need this cleaned up. We’ll deploy the right team to recover that boy one way or another and leave whoever is responsible one hundred percent incapable of doing any such thing again or of publicising what they have done. Best case is we do all that and we keep the lid on. We clear up behind us and you go on leave.
‘I suppose I don’t need to ask about the worst case.’
‘Hell, worst case is you don’t make it to Poland!’ Dooley laughs out loud and pushes forward a hand as big as a dinner plate. ‘Glad to meet you, Lieutenant. Read those files, there’s a cover story for your visit in there, talk to me tomorrow morning and we’ll get you up and running. You get me what I need. We have a lot of faith in you, son.’
Fifteen
He speaks slowly in good English, despite the heavy Spanish accent.
‘He’s been in here for three years. He could ask to be repatriated but he knows what to expect if he ever goes home. Lives like a king, bastard! Here he has connections, what we call enchufe, you understand? He knows people. In your country they know what he did – but…’
Slow walk up the long straight drive, flanked by wire. Pause at the big sign, La Roca, Prision. Take in the sky, hard with sunlight and the flat surround, bleached, swimming in heat. Into the courtyard and across the cobbles to the gatehouse. You walk slowly behind the squat, bull-necked figure of the duty officer. The officer marches on rubber-soled shoes that squawk a warning at each step. The guards behind are a mock-festive percussion of keys and metal accoutrements. You turn into a long multilevel gallery with wire nets slung along like ceilings between the floors.
‘This is D Block, Grade One,’ he says, ‘where they keep the high security prisoners: Algerian hit men, rapists, drug dealers, murderers…’
On the ground level you can count cell doors side by side, too close, like toilets. Now you mount the first level of metal staircase. The noise of clanging, banging metal is overwhelming. From this point on there are open sided cells on the first level and inmates hanging on the bars like baboons, two, maybe three in each cell. The guards bark out for silence, are ignored and press on with indifference. You are being paraded in your newly issued orange dungarees and the inmates clatter their appreciation on the bars, whistle and shout. You take the second staircase and the cacophony increases. These are the chosen ones and they get to take a closer look. You scan their faces, the studied attitudes, the leers, the enticements, the revelations, the threats, and the poses they strike for their second of contact. A steady stream of inscribed paper cups, rolled pieces of paper and assorted debris showers you as you pass. The body heat climbs out between the bars. The guards crack their sticks against the metal and at one point the duty officer ahead of you lunges sideways and pokes the tip of his stick savagely into shadow. He is obviously satisfied with the corresponding yelp of pain. We are headed for the end of the corridor and the last row of doors.
For anyone who’d seen the photos and footage of Charlie Two in the various earlier stages of his criminal and domestic career, the Charlie Two sitting on the bed in the gloomy two-man would be familiar but still a surprise. He has aged since the last pictures and the smooth tanned face and swell of muscles (pushing the swing, sprawled on the beach, posing on the Roller) has wrinkled, knotted and faded to an institutional grey. His face is deeply lined and his lips bluish. The come on then eyes that had stared out of the pictures now swim in guile and compromise. He doesn’t seem surprised to see you, doesn’t seem surprisable by anything.
‘So you’re the guy they’re so keen to make space for. Got a name?’ There’s the predictable smoker’s misfire in the delivery and, there it is, a hint of apprehension.
‘Joe,’ you say.
Charlie laughs. ‘Joe? Okay, Joe, how do you think it works around here? Did they tell you that? This isn’t the fucking West End. What’s with the mask? They never normally put two English in together. They can’t tell what you’re on about, see.’
‘I’m not in here for the conversation,’ you say and swing your legs up on to the bed. The room is just big enough to house the two beds, three feet apart and a wash basin and bucket in the recess by the door. Charlie has papered his side of the cell with magazine spreads and a smaller cluster of family pictures low down near his pillow. Your side is grimy blanks, where the wall has been stripped bare. You sit on the bed, draw your knees up and lean your head back against the wall. The room is humming. The background is still filled with the excited voices from along the corridor, now slowly fading.
Charlie is watching you. ‘They stripped you on the way in, right? Signed bits of paper? Promised to give it you back: money, fags? Course…they don’t. Unless you pay, savvy? I get anything I want in here. Here. You can pay me back later.’
He holds out some cigarettes, a new packet with one row organ-piped for an easy grab.
‘No thanks.’
‘Matter of time… Joey boy… matter of time’
There’s a piercing shriek from down the corridor and a stream of abuse in Spanish. You hear agonised syllables and the grunts of a body writhing under restraint. A chorus of whoops and baying imitations goes up all around and a renewed banging, metal on metal, drowns everything else.
Charlie’s expecting you to react and you close your eyes and stay still. The Escalon brings you his breathing in orchestral detail.
‘We need to talk about the girls, Charlie,’ you say slowly.
‘What?’
‘The girls: Melody, Susha…Kim. How old would they have been now? Melody would have been, what, sixteen now? Nearly grown up. Getting too old.’
You haven’t opened your eyes more than a slit but you can see that Charlie has sat up sharply, feel his eyes on you. ‘Susha would be more like thirteen, and poor little Kim, what, ten?’
‘Who the fuck are you? What are you here for? You’re up against a lot more shit in here than you know.’ The springs on his bed give and you take a peek to see him sitting forward. He thinks about standing but isn’t sure about that much commitment to a confrontation.
‘Charlie, I’m not here to fuck around. In a moment, as soon as those guards are back in front of the TV and these morons have settled down, I’m going to give you something to think about. You remember how to do that? I’ll need you to pay attention, okay?
He reacts more quickly than you would have credited. You hear the first hot fricative of abuse and then the weight of his body leaning over your knees and his hands at your throat. In a reflex, your hands steeple sharply between his wrists and you give him both heels in the guts, bracing your neck and shoulders against the wall. He reels back and folds where his bed frame catches the back of his knees. You’re up quickly enough to stop him rebounding and palm his head hard against the wall. When you step back he remains sitting, breathless and limp, on the bed.
‘Cunt,’ he mumbles.
‘We’re taking you out Charlie. Taking you to see the people you’ve been avoiding. That can be in one piece or as many as you like. Get out of order again and I’ll break something.’
Charlie glowers at you in silence, then laughs.
You laugh too. What do they read to come out with this stuff?
‘Sorry, man, I’m losing it. I need another mo to get into this tough guy crap. Can we take a break?’
A voice bellows ‘take five’ and Rees sits down on the bed. ‘Maybe I’ll have one of those fags after all.’ Charlie holds them out.
‘Wouldn’t want to stay long in this place for real,’ he says. ‘Did he really do all that stuff, Wanstead, Hackney, those little twins, like they say?’
Myron appears briefly at the door of the cell. ‘When you two are ready. Think we can do one more and then go for live? It’s way too hot to hang around in here. And let’s kill these lights, it’s still way too bright in here, we just want to make out Charlie’s outline. The voice sounded great. Accent is just right.’
Sixteen
Eva calls the Network One press office and asks for someone on the KomViva team. She tells them she wants to meet the man in KomViva. You and a million others, they say. Everyone wants to meet him. Everyone wants to know who he is. Thanks for your interest but KomViva will only accept a very limited number of people for personal encounters and those are chosen at random from applicants via the Premium Subscriber request line. Are you a premium subscriber? Can we offer you a special…?
Eva’s patience is not her strong point. Listen to me. I don’t want to find out who he is. I already know who he is. I said I want to meet him. I want to see him. I need to speak to him and he will want to speak to me. It is an urgent family matter. Do you understand me?
If you’d like to leave your name and contact details I can try for you but I can’t promise anything.
She gives her name as Eva and her mobile number. Of course nothing will happen. She waits a couple of hours. She doesn’t know who to talk to. She doesn’t want to discuss it with her friends. She wonders if she is being foolish. She can’t understand why he’d would be doing what he’s doing. She can’t imagine the circumstances that explain it. Something makes her cautious. It’s hard enough to believe he’s still active and simply being covered by military secrecy; she doesn’t believe that. It is another thing to believe his identity must now be a secret even from the military. That’s getting weird. She wonders what she has stirred up now but she doesn’t stop. She can’t stop. What can it matter if she goes high enough? If she speaks directly to people who already know? What if she speaks to Matzov? Eva reasons that there can be no risk in telling someone who must already know everything. Or can there? It doesn’t cross her mind to consider her own safety.
She searches on the web for an office for Matzov but after half an hour of looking has nothing. The best she can get is a senior VP in corporate Communications who crops up on various press releases. There’s a New York telephone number. When she calls she speaks to a secretary. Can you convey an urgent piece of information that needs to get into Mr Matzov’s hands immediately? The voice on the other end sounds hesitant. She can take a message for the press office. If you would give me your name and number and the nature of your information I will try to get someone to reach you back. In the meantime she would refer to the corporate website for general communications. She has no access to Mr. Matzov personally. She can’t say where his office is for sure.
Eva asks again for the woman’s name and repeats back as though writing it down: Melche Rosario Sanchez. OK Melche, it is now three-fifteen PM in the UK, which is where I’m calling from. When this gets to Reuben I promise you he is going to want an explanation for every second it has taken to reach him. Okay? Here’s what you need to tell him. You getting this down? You tell him that the identity of the man in KomViva is now known, yes? It is not secret any more. Tell him he can be sure of this. Tell him the name starts with the letter R – that’s R as in Rescue. You tell him that this information is about to go public. It will be posted on the internet in full detail. He is not going to want that to happen. But it is not too late to stop that happening. It is possible to do something about that if I hear something from him in the next eight hours. You got that? By eleven-fifteen tonight UK time – that’s six-fifteen New York time. Here’s the number, okay? She gives her mobile number. Repeat it back to me. Now tell me exactly what you’re going to do with that information and I want the name of the person you’re going to give it to.
Eva takes a deep breath. It seems overdue. Who is she kidding? She smiles at the Reuben bit. Come on, if she knew him she’d know how to get to him. She’ll think she’s just another nut. If she wrote it down at all it’s probably already in the bin. The website post had been an impromptu idea but suddenly seems a possible next step. Has she any photos that would be identifiable against the KomViva experience?
She pours another glass. She should be calling home now but she can’t take her mind off the call she’s had and the one she wants.