by James Frey
“Oh my God,” she said. “What are you doing here?” She jumped up and gave me a long hug. I hugged her back, but things weren’t the same as they’d been. I’d changed. Maybe it was planting the invitations with Kat at my side. Maybe it was the train ride to Baghdad. But somewhere along the line, I had changed, and I wanted to see Kat in front of me, not Mary.
“I got caught at the hotel. Someone in the government—the American government. I don’t know who it was, but I had to sit there for two hours while he interrogated me.” I let go of her and slumped down into a chair.
“What did you tell him?” she asked, sitting across from me.
“There was nothing to say that he didn’t already know. Eugene ratted us out. He spilled everything. This guy knew about Endgame and the Players, and he knew our plans to meet at the plaza.”
“How did he find you?”
“He found the Minoan—I don’t know how. Maybe Eugene still had the dossier on her. He was supposed to go with me and Kat.” I looked around the room, frustrated, and then stood up and walked to the kitchen sink to wash Kat’s blood off my hand.
“Well, everything has gone to hell here,” she said. Her voice was ragged, and she didn’t look much better. “John was supposed to find you—”
“He did.”
“So you know about Tyson?”
“Yeah. Someone on the train heard about you and Tyson. You’re wanted.”
She seemed shaken, not her calm, happy self. “Lee died too. That was just now—well, maybe an hour ago. Tyson died at the hospital after getting shot while we went after the Koori, and then Lee went with me and died fighting the Mu.”
“You’ve killed two Players?” I said. “Wow.”
“Yeah,” she said. “The Mu was staying at a hostel next to one of those small neighborhood police stations. She got Lee right in the head. He didn’t have a chance. It was just the blink of an eye and she got him. I got this.” She pulled up her shirt to show me her stomach. There was a white bandage with a red spot in the middle.
“You got shot?”
“Grazed. And then I killed her, and had to escape past the police. I killed the cop, too. He never saw it coming. He thought I was just one of the kids staying at the hostel.”
“You just shot a cop?” I asked, my stomach turning and visions of the sheriff coming back to me.
“Of course,” she said. “I was fighting for my life. She killed Lee.”
“But you said the cop thought you were just one of the kids at the hostel. Innocent.”
“But he saw my face,” she said. “What was I supposed to do? Bruce and I learned in Mexico that you don’t leave witnesses.”
“But you said he didn’t witness you.”
She stood up and came over to me. “Mike, what is this all for? You knew we were going to war with these guys. You can’t have imagined that we were just going to talk our way out of anything.”
“Couldn’t I?” I yelled. “You kept emphasizing that this was not about killing Players; it was about stopping them. John had me write up the sales pitches. Did you even try that with the Mu? What about the Koori? Or did you just go in shooting first and asking questions later?”
“Come on, Mike,” she said. “Grow up. We did target shooting every single day. We practiced stacking up at a door and making a hostile entry. We ran the mountains. We did obstacle courses. Did you really think all of that was so that we would be in better shape to talk?”
“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I did think that we were going to talk, because that’s what we said we were going to do. That’s what John said, and it’s what Walter said, and it’s what you said. And you know what? It’s what Kat and I did with the Minoan.”
“And how did that go for you?”
“We ended up having to kill her,” I said, turning off the water and drying my hands. “But we gave her a fair chance. She knew why we were there, and she had a choice. We didn’t just ambush her.”
“And now Kat is at the emergency room,” Mary said. “And we still have seven Players to kill. Still no word from Barbara and Douglas—they were going for the Olmec—or Molly, Henry, and Phyllis—they were going for the Harappan. We’re getting murdered out there, so maybe you’d better start to act like this is the war that it is.”
“You lied to me.”
“Lied? Mike, you are such a—”
“What? Such a what?”
“A child. I used to think that you joined Zero line for me, but I was wrong. You joined because you’re a Boy Scout. You really thought we were going to end this all peacefully, and you could go back home like nothing had happened.”
“I didn’t think that. I killed that sheriff. I robbed that bank.”
“Then what? You thought that you were going to retire on some remote farm somewhere and live the quiet, peaceful life of a hero? You probably imagined me right there beside you.”
“Mary,” I said through gritted teeth, “you’re old news. Kat and I are together now. I don’t need—I don’t want you.”
“Oh,” she said, and then stopped without saying anything else.
“Yeah.”
Her voice was quieter now. “What did I ever do to you?”
“You left me. When I thought I needed you most. And . . .” I looked out the window and then moved back to the chair by the door. “And then I realized that I didn’t really need you. You did your job. You got me into this mess. You got me to believe, and you were right—Endgame is real. But we have very different ideas about what to do about it.”
“The Players are killing us,” she said, still standing where she was, not turning to look at me. “I wish we really could talk our way out of this.”
“You weren’t expecting that?” I asked. “You thought that going in like cowboys, shooting everyone we see, was going to work? At least Kat and I had realistic expectations. We knew that we were going up against killers. Assassins. We knew we were outmatched. You had too much faith in a couple of ex–Green Berets.”
“Bruce was a vet. He wouldn’t tell me how many he killed, but he said he could remember every face.”
“I always see the sheriff.”
“The Mu didn’t look like a killer. She looked like a kid.” Mary turned to face me. “We thought it would be easy. I had a clean shot and I didn’t take it. I didn’t want to shoot so close to the other people in the hostel. I thought I was being kind.”
“What hospital is Kat in?”
“I don’t know the name of it,” she said. “Walter found it on the map. He said it was just a mile north. John took her there in a cab.”
“Is John still with her?”
“No,” she said, and crossed the room to pick up the walkie-talkie. “They’re trying to kill the others. Walter and John are. I was supposed to wait here and alert them if anyone came back.”
“Where did they go?”
“John is after the Olmec, and seeing if he can find out what happened to Barbara and Douglas. Walter is going for the Shang. I was supposed to tell the next group back to go to the Nabataean.”
“Call them and tell them I’m going for Kat. I’ll call you when I know more.” I picked up someone’s backpack and dumped out its contents onto the floor, and then I put one of the spare walkie-talkies inside.
“Okay.”
CHAPTER FIVE
“Mike!” Kat said, sitting up on her hospital bed. “I thought . . . We thought you’d been caught.”
“I was,” I said. “Eugene ratted on us. There was somebody waiting for me. He knew everything.”
“If he knew everything, why did he let you go?”
“He didn’t. I escaped.” I sat down on the stool next to her bed. “How are you?”
Her arm was splinted and wrapped in an Ace bandage.
“They say I’ll need surgery. I still can’t move my fingers very well, but I was afraid all the tendons were cut. They’re not. Well, not all of them. And either way, I’m not supposed to try to move them. That’s the reason
for the splint.”
“Where are the others? Mary told me that John had been here with you.”
“He brought me in, but we have to get to all the Players. We might have missed some already. What time is it?”
I checked my watch. “A little before ten.”
She shook her head. “We still have so many Players to stop. We can’t be sitting around here.”
“You need to heal.”
“I’m done here,” she said. “I’ve already been stitched up, and now all I’m waiting for is to be discharged.”
“What did they say about my stitches?” I asked with a little laugh. “Do I have a second career as a nurse?”
She rolled her eyes. “They weren’t happy. They didn’t know what to make of it. They asked why I would have you do that instead of coming to the hospital.”
“Were they suspicious?”
“No,” she said with a little shrug. “I think they just thought I was a stupid American. I pretended not to speak any German, or even understand much of their English, blaming it on their accents. And you know John—he can lie his way through anything. He made up something about being foreigners and not understanding the German health-care system. He took the blame on himself, and they believed every word.”
“What did you tell them about how you got hurt?”
“Kitchen accident. He was holding a knife and turned quickly and didn’t know I was standing there. Again, they just thought we were dumb.”
“Well, can you go?”
“I want to, but I need the pain meds that they’re going to bring me when I get discharged. Then we can get back into the action. According to John, things aren’t going too well.”
“They’re not,” I said. “We’re being taken apart piece by piece. But we’ve got five, maybe six—John and Walter are out again. We’re still waiting for the others to report in, but I don’t have high hopes. Douglas and Barbara are out together, and they haven’t had as much training as the rest of us. John went out after them. They were the business managers and forgers. I don’t think they’re as prepared. Molly and her team haven’t come back either.”
“Damn,” she said. “Barbara and I were close. She’s not going to make it; I can feel it.”
“Don’t think about that. I’ve got a walkie-talkie in my backpack. I don’t want to pull it out right now, but when you get discharged, we’re supposed to check in and get our next assignment. My next assignment, I mean. You’re going back to the safe house.”
“No way,” she said. “We started this insanity. We’re going to get it done. I don’t want to let all of our efforts go to waste.”
“You can’t even hold your gun.”
“I’m coming with you,” she said. “We’ll figure out what we’re supposed to do, and we’ll make a plan, and I’ll do what I have to do.”
I looked at her arm and her pale skin. She didn’t look well.
“Hey,” she said, gesturing to the TV. “Turn on the sound.”
There was a news anchor sitting at a desk, the words MÜNCHEN GEISELKRISE on the screen next to him.
I turned on the sound, but he was speaking in German and I couldn’t understand anything.
Kat was watching intently, and she began to translate for me as we watched.
“They’re saying anywhere between three and twelve Israeli athletes are being held hostage. The terrorists are members of the group Black September—Palestinians from Jordan. The body of Moshe Weinberg was found naked in a hallway. He was shot to death. He was a coach. Another person—ringer? I don’t know that word. He was also shot. Black September demanded the release of two hundred and something Palestinian prisoners. They gave the deadline of nine o’clock, but that time has passed, and this is still going on.”
“What about our attacks on the Players?” I asked. “Have they said anything about that?”
“Not yet,” she said.
“It won’t be long.”
As we waited, I told her everything that had happened to me this morning—told her everything that I knew about the agent who’d detained me, and told her about meeting Mary back at the safe house. She told me about how she and John had decided to leave the park and go to the safe house. After he unwrapped the gauze on her arm to wash it, he saw how bad it was and made her go to the hospital.
“I wanted to wait for you,” she said. “I wasn’t going anywhere, but I started to get really dizzy, and John said he thought I was losing too much blood. I don’t know if that was it. It might have been shock.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m glad you came here. I’m glad you’re getting help.”
A few minutes later the doctor came back in. The two of them talked for a while in English, and she sat up and smiled. She didn’t look nearly as sick as she had when I’d first gotten there. He gave her a bottle of pills and told us we were free to go.
Outside, we stopped on a park bench, and I pulled out the walkie-talkie and called in. Mary answered almost immediately.
“Kat’s out of the hospital,” I said. “Where do we stand?”
“John couldn’t find the Olmec,” she said. “No word from Walter. Bakr is gone. He wasn’t assigned to any team yet, but I get the feeling he skipped town. Molly came back.” There was a pause. “Henry and Phyllis are dead, and they weren’t able to kill their Player.”
“Who were they after?” I asked.
“The Harappan,” she said. “He’s still at large.”
Kat took the radio from me. “Mary, this is Kat. Any word from Barbara?”
There was a moment of heavy static, and then Mary spoke. “Barbara and Douglas haven’t reported in yet. John was going to look for them when he went after the Olmec, but he hasn’t found any trace.”
“We’ll go to the plaza,” Kat said. “See if we can find them.”
“John told me to send the next group after the Nabataean.”
“Don’t you think the Players are going to be at the plaza?” Kat asked. “That’s where the invitations told them to go. It’s a little late in the morning for them to be still waiting in their hotel rooms.”
“You can go for it,” Mary said. “But be aware that there will likely be a heavy police presence there.”
There was more static, and then we heard John’s voice. “Just off the plaza is a café called Siegfried’s. Come here, Mike, Kat.”
“Ten-four,” Kat said.
She handed the walkie-talkie back to me, and I collapsed the antenna and turned it off.
“If we’re just going to the plaza to wait for Players to show up, this is going to get violent and dangerous. I don’t even know where the sniper rifles are—probably back at the safe house.”
“I left my gun there,” Kat said.
“Here.”
I looked around to see if there was anyone watching us. No one was. I took out the Colt revolver I swiped from the agent and handed the gun to her.
“I haven’t ever practiced shooting with my left hand,” she said.
“Neither have I,” I said. “But this is just in case. Don’t plan on being the one who needs to shoot.”
She put the gun in the large pocket of her jacket. It wasn’t a great option—the gun was heavy, and it was obvious that she was carrying something in there—but at least it was concealed.
Kat stopped someone on the street and asked the fastest route to the plaza. We followed the directions to a bus stop and waited about fifteen minutes. By noon we were being dropped off at the Olympic center. It was eerily quiet, and a sign posted at an information kiosk said that the games were being delayed due to the ongoing crisis.
There were still a couple dozen tourists walking around, and some were even sitting at the concrete sunburst.
“Who’s that?” I asked Kat, taking her good hand in mine. “The kid in the red hat.”
“It could be the Harappan,” she said.
He was just sitting there. Not moving. Not reading. Just observing. Our eyes met for a minute, and it wa
s all I could do not to look away. But I kept my eyes on him for a few lingering seconds, trying not to appear suspicious.
“What do we know about the Harappan?” I asked.
“That’s where Molly, Henry, and Phyllis went. I haven’t read his dossier. He killed Henry and Phyllis.”
There was another possible Player sitting on a patch of grass beneath a large pine. She didn’t appear to be paying any attention to us, or to the Harappan. She was just reading a book casually and calmly.
“Who’s left?” I asked.
“Well,” Kat said, thinking. “The Harappan. The Donghu. Nabataean. Sumerian. John was supposed to take the Olmec and Walter was going after the Shang. Agatha didn’t spot the Aksumite at all yesterday; Rodney, Jim, and Julia are likely dead. They never came back. Who am I forgetting?”
“We got the Minoan, and we know the Mu, Cahokian, Koori, and La Tène are dead. That’s everybody.”
“And we’re cut in half. We don’t know where most of our group is.”
A door to a café—a café that was closed—opened and we saw John. He waved to us, and we turned and went toward him, leaving the possible Players in the plaza.
“Hey, guys,” he said as we got close. He looked awful. Exhausted, sweating, and covered with little droplets of blood.
“What’s going on?”
“We tried to get you on the radio. We have the Aksumite.”
I frowned. “I thought the Aksumite didn’t come.”
“That’s what we thought,” he said, closing the door behind us. He was out of breath. “But he showed up. Looking for us too. He knows all about Zero line. He must have killed Rodney, Jim, and Julia, and then came after the rest of us.”
“Did you kill him?” Kat asked.
“Not yet,” John said. “We want to know what he knows.”
“You’re interrogating him,” I said.
John led the way to the kitchen of the café. The Aksumite was there, bleeding from his head. He was young—younger than Raakel. I guessed maybe 15. Hands and feet both tied. But he was wiry and looked tough. And he was smiling at us as we entered.
Walter had his sleeves rolled up, showing the Green Beret tattoos on his arms.
