Parallax

by Jon F. Merz

He was in a room. He saw the bed. A television set. A bureau.

  A hotel?

  "Something's happened," he said quietly.

  "Describe it to me."

  "I'm in a room."

  "What kind of room?"

  "I think it's a hotel room."

  "Why?"

  "There's a bed. A TV. A bureau."

  "Is anyone there?"

  Frank looked. He saw something flicker at the corner of his mind's eye and moved his attention to the bathroom. "He's here."

  "Who is?"

  "The man I saw the other night."

  "What man?"

  "I saw him when I left you the other night. I recognize him now."

  "What's he doing?"

  Frank frowned. The man was seated in front of the sink. A large bag sat next to him on the floor. He was doing something to his face. In the mirror Frank could see the man brushing something on his skin. A photo lay propped up off to the side.

  "Look around, Frank, what do you see?"

  Brushes. A lot of them. They reminded Frank of the one time he's been to Gia's apartment. Her makeup kit in the bathroom.

  "They look like your makeup brushes. He's got a lot of them."

  "What else?"

  Powder. Bottles and vials on the sink. The photograph. Was he a make-up artist? Frank described the things he was seeing.

  "Are you sure they're makeup brushes?"

  He looked again. Now the man was using one of the on his face. "Yes."

  "What's he doing now?"

  The man had picked up the picture and appeared to be studying it. Frank looked at the picture. A man's face stared back at him. He didn't recognize him.

  "I think he's trying to make himself look like someone else."

  Then Frank saw the gun. The silenced Beretta. In .22 caliber. He breathed out audibly.

  "What's the matter?" Gia's voice calmed him.

  "He's got a gun. Whoever this guy is, he's up to no good. He uses the same kind of gun I've used before."

  "What kind is that?"

  "Beretta. With a suppressor. It's popular as an assassin's weapon."

  "You think he's an assassin?"

  "No idea," said Frank. "Just telling you what I see."

  "Do you see anything else lying around?"

  Frank turned away from the bathroom and moved out into the room. There were plenty of drawers in the bureau and desk but how could he go through them? He couldn't use his hands. There must have been something in there.

  "How do I look into the drawers?"

  Gia paused. "I don't really know. Maybe think about them being open already and see if you can see into them that way."

  "Okay."

  Frank relaxed deeper and imagined the drawers being open. A mass of swirling images instantly filled his head. Wavy lines and colors.

  Clothes.

  He exhaled again. "Okay."

  "You see something?"

  "I see clothes."

  "Go to the desk."

  Frank moved to the desk and stared down at the drawer. Again, like he had melted through the surface of the desk, he could see inside it. He grinned.

  "Definitely a hotel room."

  "Why do you say that."

  "There's a bible in the drawer."

  "Where is this hotel room?"

  "Boston. He's here in this city."

  "You're sure?"

  "There's a Yellow Pages in here as well."

  "Okay. What else."

  "Papers."

  "What's on the papers?"

  "Wait a minute."

  "What's wrong?"

  "He's doing something."

  "What?"

  In Frank's mind he could see movement in the bathroom. He went back to the doorway and watched the man cleaning up the sink. His back was to Frank. When he turned around, Frank saw him and almost gasped.

  "What's wrong, Frank?"

  "He's done it."

  "Done what?"

  "Made himself look different. He doesn't look like the guy anymore. He looks like this man in a picture by the sink."

  "Who is the man?"

  "I don't know. I've never seen him before."

  "Go back to the desk, Frank. I want to know what's on those papers you saw."

  But as Frank stood there, the man came out of the bathroom.

  And walked right through Frank.

  "Jeez."

  "What?"

  "He just walked right through me."

  "You're not there, Frank. Remember that. He can't see you or hear you and even feel you. Just concentrate and stay with it."

  But Frank was watching the man. He'd stopped. Immediately after walking through the space that Frank stood, the man had stopped. He turned now and looked back at the area.

  Does he see me?

  Frank waved at him.

  "What are you doing?" Gia's voice.

  "Trying something."

  But the man did nothing. He just continued to stare.

  Frank thought about hitting him in the jaw. But he didn't.

  Finally, after a minute of doing nothing, the man merely smiled and then turned back to the hotel room. He sat on the bed and flipped on the television set.

  "I'm going back to the desk," said Frank.

  "What happened?"

  "I'm not sure. But I think he might have just figured out I was there."

  "How could that be?"

  "Maybe he's got headaches, too," said Frank.

  "Go to the desk. Tell me what you see."

  Frank moved around the man who shifted as he did so. Frank's vision had become so clear he almost really felt like he was in the room with this man. Whoever he was.

  "I'm at the desk."

  "Look inside."

  Frank melted into the desk. He could see the Bible and the telephone book again. A few pens lay scattered about.

  And a sheaf of papers.

  "Okay, there are the papers."

  "Can you read them? What's on them?"

  Frank stared.

  "Shit."

  "What's the matter?"

  "They're folded up."

  "Imagine them unfolded. Imagine them laying flat and right on top of the table so that you can see them and read them clearly."

  Frank stared hard at the paper.

  Nothing.

  "It's not working."

  "Try something else."

  "What?"

  "I don't know."

  "Some help you are."

  Frank went back to staring at the papers. He could almost pass through them if he concentrated. He could see the writing. It was upside down. He could see some kind of image at the top of the pages. It looked like a logo.

  A seal?

  He sighed. "I can't do it. It's too difficult."

  "Okay. What's the man doing?"

  Frank turned. The man had just flipped off the television set. He was looking at the desk where Frank stood.

  "He's looking right at me."

  "Does he see you?"

  "I don't know. I think he might sense I'm there."

  "Be careful, Frank."

  The man walked toward him. Smiling.

  He opened the desk.

  He took out the papers.

  He spread them out.

  And looked at Frank again.

  Frank watched as the man pointed at the papers. Frank looked down.

  He saw the seal. He recognized it.

  "Oh my God."

  "What's going on?"

  Frank looked back at the man. He was still smiling. He pointed at Frank. He brought up the Beretta - Frank hadn't even noticed it.

  The man aimed it right at Frank and made a gesture as if he'd just shot him.

  Frank almost jumped.

  The images vanished.

  Frank sat up.

  He was covered in sweat. Gia sat on the edge of the bed looking at him her face creased with worry. "Are you okay?"

  "He saw me, Gia. He knew I was there."

  "You
're sure?"

  "Yeah, he just mimed like he was going to shoot me."

  "Did you see the papers?"

  "He showed them to me."

  "He what?"

  "He must have known what I wanted to see because he went to the desk and pulled them out and opened them. I saw it, Gia. I saw the seal."

  "What seal?"

  "I can't believe it," said Frank. "It was so real. It was so clear. Everything seemed so crystalline. It had to be real."

  "Frank, what seal did you see? What are you talking about?"

  "On the papers. At the top of them. Of each one."

  "What?"

  "The Seal of the President of the United States."

  Chapter Seventeen

  Things, decided Stahl, were getting interesting.

  He'd never been much of a believer in the occult or psychic phenomenon before, but even he had to admit that recent events were causing him to reevaluate his previous belief system. Somehow, something had caused some sort of link between Stahl and this man.

  Whoever he was.

  In a short span of time, this mystery man had also figured out how to tap into Stahl's wavelength at will. It gave him the ability to peer psychically over Stahl's shoulder. Just like Stahl had done with him the other night.

  He frowned. That meant a serious lapse in operational security.

  Something Stahl could not afford.

  His zest for precautions had helped save him, however. He smiled and wondered if the bait had been swallowed whole. Only time would tell. One way or another, this mystery man would make his presence felt.

  So why not call him out?

  Why not drop the gauntlet and issue the challenge? Two professional killers in the same city was not a good thing. Even if the bizarre link hadn't been formed, Stahl knew they would bump into each other eventually. That was life for you. All those little ironies - it was how the gods kept themselves amused, he suspected.

  He glanced into the mirror and smiled. He hadn't lost his touch that's for sure. Years away from his skills with make-up hadn't dulled his technique. The face staring him back was a perfect rendition of the man in the picture.

  He grinned, wondering if the other assassin thought the man in the picture was Stahl's intended target. He wasn't, of course. The man in the photograph served another purpose. An important one, granted.

  This might actually work, he thought.

  Tomorrow, he'd reapply the make-up and do the dry run at the target site. That would be the first test. And then later on, when the time was right, he's return to the target site again.

  Stahl used remover to take off the chunks of plasticene and latex from his face. He ran the water hot, soaped up five times and finally freed his skin's pores of the last vestiges of the cake makeup.

  He checked his watch. Time for a walk.

  Downstairs he headed out into the January cold and felt the wind's sting snap against his face like a leather strap. Stahl wandered down to Boylston Street, following it into the heart of Copley Square and then moved out towards Boston Common.

  He strolled past an assortment of singles bars, sports shops, shoe stores, and huge crowds clogging the streets.

  At Arlington Street, he paused and examined the window displays at Shreve, Crump & Low, Boston's oldest jewelry store. They seemed to be focusing on Valentine's Day already, with red hearts and lace decorating each display.

  Pearls were apparently big again this year.

  And Sapphires.

  More importantly, the reflections in the tiny window didn't show anyone behind him looking suspicious. Stahl was under no illusions about his security. Right now he felt reasonably certain that the single biggest threat came from the man with whom he was linked.

  He straightened up and crossed Arlington Street, continuing to walk toward Downtown Crossing. The Four Seasons Hotel lay on his right hand side. Stahl took the side street it straddled and walked toward Park Plaza.

  He saw the heavy-duty navy blue Chevrolet Suburban and grinned.

  The advance people were already here. They'd probably been here for a few days, working in concert with the local Boston office to prep for the president's visit to town.

  He glanced at the nearest sewer and saw it had been welded shut already by the Secret Service. A block up, he could see where the post office box had been removed.

  And the president's entourage would have already commandeered the iron gated interior-parking garage. He didn't look up but he knew there might even be the advance spotters for the sniper teams watching him.

  Stahl just kept walking.

  He appreciated the timing of the operation. Especially since it coincided so well with a presidential visit. Sometimes, things actually did work out.

  He thought about Karen as he turned left and walked behind the Four Seasons toward the Transportation Building in the theater district.

  So many years had passed since they'd been together. He remembered seeing her for the first time - the way she'd been so eager to kill. She'd been green back then. A complete novice at the job. Stahl had been working for a few years already. He was seasoned. Mature. They fell into their roles as teacher and student. And the attraction developed from there.

  It happened a lot like that. Other operatives had talked about it before. Stress and the pressure of working in close contact with someone invariably produced feelings that needed to be acted upon.

  Stahl saw it only as a sexual release. Get rid of the pent-up combustion and then get back to the job at hand.

  Apparently in Karen's mind, it had been something else entirely.

  Stahl sighed. He didn't like leaving loose ends like Karen around. Her emotional instability could easily compromise him if she felt particularly vindictive one morning. Of course, if she ratted him out, she's also be compromising herself in the process. But then again, she could always drop an anonymous dime and tie Stahl up long enough to bring him under intense scrutiny and also miss his target window.

  That was another thing Stahl could not afford.

  After all, Alois' health - his life dammit – depended on Stahl successfully completing his mission. And there was no way he'd ever allow someone like Karen to mess that up.

  StillÉ

  He didn't want to have to kill her.

  And simultaneously he found it tough to blame her for falling in love with him. She'd been young back then. Young and ice-cold deadly when she wanted to be. Stahl couldn't refute the fact that he'd been drawn to her in some way. The sex-under-pressure thing might have been his mind's own justification for falling for the temptation in the first place.

  And they'd had some real fun during their time together.

  Who knows what might have happened if things had turned out differently?

  They might have really fallen in love.

  They might have wound up living together.

  Karen might have even been Alois' mother.

  The loud boom of a truck backfiring snapped Stahl back to the reality of his life. He gave a slight nod of thanks to the truck, knowing that while a relationship with Karen might have worked, it might also have not.

  We could be dead by now, he thought.

  Another breeze snapped his collar down. Stahl adjusted it and stopped.

  A pinprick of chill ran along his spine up by his neck.

  Movement.

  Behind him.

  Out of flow with the rest of the people on the street.

  He paused and made a show of adjusting his collar again.

  He hadn't sensed anyone earlier.

  Coincidence?

  No such thing, he reminded himself.

  He continued walking.

  Ahead of him, he spotted a garage that had been in the same place for years. What made it particularly useful was the fact it was situated on its own half block island of property. A sidewalk encircled it. Stahl could walk around and backtrack on himself.

  Hopefully, he could figure out who was following him.

&nb
sp; He headed past the car wash sign, digging his hands deeper into his pockets and hunching his shoulders up against the stronger wind. He resisted the temptation to glance back. Professionals never did that. It alerted the surveillance team. It told them they'd been burned already. And it also confirmed any suspicions they might have.

  The best way - the way Stahl had been taught - was to simply act like he had no clue he was being followed. Most normal people are so clueless about their surroundings, they'd never think twice about being followed. Stahl would behave the same way.

  As he walked he tried to figure out who was behind him. Who could pick up his trail without his noticing? Certainly not the local Boston Police. He wouldn't even be on their radar screen.

  The FBI?

  It was a possibility if his passport or some other document had raised an eyebrow. But then again, in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, security was now at the point where if you were suspicious, they'd simply haul you in on the spot. No covert surveillance.

  Stahl sighed - September 11, indeed. Pitiful actions by a deranged bunch of morons and cowards, he thought. Stahl had no illusions about his own standing as an assassin. Some of the jobs he'd done in the past might have easily been mistaken for terrorist actions. But Stahl never killed innocents. And certainly no children.

  And being the assassin that he was, Stahl took all the risk. He stood alone, operated alone, and achieved results on his own. The old man had once complimented him on his courage.

  Maybe he was.

  Terrorists knew nothing about courage. After all, what was so brave about killing 3,500 civilians?

  Not a damned thing.

  Stahl went after military and leadership targets. Those were who you had to target to get results. Plunging a plane into a skyscraper, killing thousands, orphaning thousands more, and destroying everything in the process might have looked awesome to the lobotomized fools Al Qaeda attempted to recruit, but Stahl knew better.

  It was cowardice, pure and simple. And Stahl felt quite certain Allah would not have been pleased one damned bit.

  Still, what else could you expect from a bunch of cave-dwelling Neanderthals who'd never taken the time to truly study their enemy properly? If they'd been smart, they would haveÉ.Stahl smiled. Well, they weren't smart and that was that.

  The hell with them all.

  He reached the first corner.

  Turned.

  And bolted.

  He dashed up the sidewalk on the other side of the building, sucking in cold air as he dodged pedestrians. He had to round the other corner and get in behind the tail before they realized what he'd done.