by Theo Cage
Rice sneered, felt his fist tighten on the man’s throat. He had never been so angry. He threw the guard to the floor and kicked him in the ribs. The guard rolled up into a ball and whimpered.
Rice fell back against the wall, unable to take his eyes off a man that represented all the abuse he had taken for weeks. He could easily kill him with his bare hands, but then what? He would be as twisted as they had become, taking the life of some useless cog in a heartless machine. For revenge.
It was the evil machine that needed to be torn apart. And the best way to do that would be to burn Richard Yang’s empire to the ground. Rice looked around. He was wary of moving towards the commotion down the darkened hallway. But if prisoners were in force, his best chance was to escape with them. They had strength in numbers. And they knew where the exits were.
He picked up his lantern and hurried down the hallway towards the commotion.
鬼
G H O S T
La Fayette Coast, Monaco
NZAMBI BENITTI WAS A 187 FOOT YACHT; sleek and long and low in the water. A staff of twelve maintained and ran the ship twenty-four hours a day.
Anchored off the coast of Monaco, along the La Fayette coast, a seven passenger Eurocopter had just disgorged two men and a woman onto the helo deck above the bow. A yacht tender was slicing through the swells bringing two more.
At the rear of the boat, sitting at a long glass table under the sundeck were assembled eight of the twelve invited to the meeting. Servers dressed in white nautical uniforms were serving wine and fresh Russian caviar.
High on the cliffs above the bay, standing behind a window protected by one-way tinting, stood a man in shorts and a garish golf shirt. He was focusing a long-range 300m lens attached to a Nikon D6 digital camera on the yacht below. He had already taken a hundred images and planned to take hundreds more. He didn’t know the identities of the men lounging on the deck chairs, except that his client felt it was important to thoroughly document the meeting. He snapped images of the helo as it lifted away from the pad, the men who disembarked, the host of the event who greeted them as they arrived on the lounge deck.
The Nzambi Benitti was the largest ship in the bay by far. The photographer could find no information on the Internet about the owner or the country of origin, although the name was South African. Google translated Nzambi as ghost. Based on other ships its size, the photographer guessed Nzambi would be worth between fifty to a hundred million based on the quality of the amenities on board. He was just curious. He wondered what kind of people could afford that kind of ludicrous luxury.
Now there were twelve people sitting around the wide table, shaking hands and smiling. Some were white, others brown, two black, one who looked oriental - Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese. He wasn’t certain. That wasn’t an area of expertise for him. He worked security gigs mostly—snooping, cell phone hacking, surveillance. However, this was the first time a client insisted on applying a plastic film to the glass windows of his suite. The guy was paranoid for sure. They met hundreds of miles away. No cell phone use allowed. No emails or texting. But the money was good, so he accepted the gig.
He stood up to arch his back, his eye off the camera lens for a few seconds, stretching with his hands on his hips when he saw the white dot high above the dark Mediterranean blue below. For a second or two he thought it might be one of those aberrations—a bright spot burned into his retina that flashed on and off, or an internal reflection on the window. He moved his head slightly and the point of contrast didn’t follow him so he knew it was something in the sky. Something that appeared to be both distant and close at the same time. The photographer’s visual brain puzzled over this contradiction for a further three or four seconds until the Hellcat missile plowed into the cliff face just below the balcony, detonated and instantly rendered the apartment into its component atoms and molecules, driving the fractionated elements and compounds out into the air above the bay at a speed of twenty-six thousand feet per second.
Unknown to the operator who guided the missile to its target, and the client who hired the Predator pilot, the photographer's camera was equipped with Wi-Fi and automatically uploaded each photo as it was taken into a commercial cloud account. Sixty-seven of those images made it into the storage account before the Nikon camera was vaporized.
. . .
HIROKU HAD JUST RAISED A GLASS of wine to his lips when the rumble of an explosion echoed across the bay. It was not a sound he was unfamiliar with, but the circumstances, the view, the locale were somehow discordant with the sound of rocket fire.
The man to his left, his host, a man of few words, didn’t disappoint. “A precaution,” he sighed, popping a cracker piled high with caviar into his bearded mouth. Two other guests across the table nodded ever so slightly as if this was not a topic for polite conversation.
Their host had a reputation. He was careful to a fault. He had never been mentioned in a media report; never been injured; never subpoenaed or arrested. He was proud of his accomplishments. Although, Hiroku thought, he does possess some advantages. He runs the Russian mafia—Solntsevskaya Bratva—and he virtually owns the police and the secret service and the government and the billionaire businesspeople who have ransacked the former USSR. But it is still an accomplishment to be proud of and does earn him the origination of the name: Ghost. Or you could call him Rasputin: the name he carries on his passport.
Sitting next to him is Mario, who currently heads one of the largest Mafia families in Europe—Camorra. And one seat over, already downing a glass of ridiculously rare merlot, the only woman at the table, Concepcion Vargas, the head of the Sinaloa Cartel.
Represented around the table were all of the major crime and terrorism organizations in the world today, sharing expertise, carving up territories, moving money internationally.
The Russian mob were experts in heroin production and human trafficking; the Mexican’s in cocaine and extortion; Hezbollah in infrastructure and politics; the Japanese Yakuza in technology; the Hells Angels in meth production and blackmailing; the Czechs in identity theft and Internet Fraud. Between the twelve powers on the council they were responsible for a trillion dollars in revenue. Larger than most countries. Their political clout was hard to measure as well.
They were meeting, as usual, once a quarter to discuss strategy and new business.
They had invited a special guest, a business partner who wished to own a seat at the table, to be part of the global organization known internally as Nzambi. He was offering unprecedented military support for their actions: literal control over all modern arms currently in place in dozens of countries.
He had brought an American F-35 fighter jet down out of the sky as proof.
His name was Richard Yang.
逃生
E S C A P E
Near Quinjang Prison
LUI SAW THE MAN PLODDING through a swampy corn field, favoring one leg, his left arm tucked up against his chest. He wasn’t Chinese; from what he could see in the dark, the man was too tall, his face gaunt, his head shaved. The notorious Quinjang was nearby, so he suspected the man was an escaped prisoner.
Lui was going to ignore the stranger, finish his trip home, stash the yuan he had made selling his peanuts to a local agent under his mattress, cook a nice duck soup on his new propane stove, then go to bed. But then the prisoner lurched forward and went down hard, hitting the mushy earth with his face. He didn’t look like someone trying to hide; the fall was clumsy and sudden.
The wai ren, the stranger, just lay on the ground, unmoving.
Lui stomped on the brake, rubbed the side window with the palm of his hand. The truck wasn’t his: the Mazda three-wheeler belonged to a nearby village farming co-op. It was almost as old as he was, built in 1968 in Hiroshima. The single cylinder blatted into the night, clouds of oily smoke clinging to the cab.
Where did the prisoner go? Lui creaked open the door and stepped out onto the gravel in his bare feet. He was cautious. This man could b
e dangerous, he could be shot or wounded. He had heard about the kind of treatment prisoners received, the beatings, the work camps. There were even rumors of organ harvesting. Like a wounded dog, this prisoner could be irrational, desperate, highly dangerous.
Lui crunched across the road and stared back at the field. The corn was already harvested, the stalks brittle and thin. The desiccated crop filled the field with an eerie desolation. Lui stopped again. The man had gone still. Lui lost sight of him. He continued forward, making his way through the brittle corn stalks.
. . .
RICE HAD FALLEN INTO A KIND OF STUPOR. He had walked for hours in the night, crawled into the brush several times when Jeeps from the prison passed. His initial energy was driven by pure adrenaline, but that was long gone. He was running on empty now. He buried his face in the wet ground. He was done, not sure if he was dreaming or on the verge of death. This soggy foul-smelling matt of rotting vegetation felt better than the concrete he had slept on for weeks.
He heard footsteps closing in on him, but he didn’t care anymore. One person approaching wouldn’t be a guard from Quinjang. This was likely a curious local who could call the authorities, but there was nothing Rice could do to stop him or wanted to. He was past taking on some innocent peasant.
The corn stalks parted by his feet and he heard a voice. An older man. He didn’t understand what he was saying. Probably Are you okay? Or are you alive? Maybe, don’t hurt me, I’m only here to help you!
Rice rolled over onto his back, opened both hands. I’m not armed, he signaled, palms empty.
The man knelt and with some difficulty, helped Rice to his feet. He was small, wiry, smelled like burnt charcoal and cooking spices. Rice started salivating. He hadn’t eaten real food in weeks. The man smelled like an Asian barbeque.
They stumbled back to the road together. The local man stopped and checked for vehicles in both directions, then helped Rice into the back of his ancient truck. The tailgate fell with a metallic crunch, echoing across the valley, sending chills up Rice’s spine.
Rice sat back on the worn wooden base of the truck bed, then rolled over onto his side, the side that hurt the least. The local man slammed the tailgate closed.
Rice felt the worn wood deck on his cheek. Peanuts came to mind. The truck smelled of peanuts. He didn’t know they raised peanuts in China.
Then the truck lurched to life, moved out onto the gravel road. He was probably being carted back to Quinjang. Rice felt the hopelessness of his escape. Then he thought of Britt, her belly round with his unborn daughter. It was too soon to give up yet. He still had some fight in him. He just needed some food.
Rice reached around with his hand, feeling for the edges of the truck bed. Maybe there was something he could use as a weapon. His fingers closed on a shell. He pulled the object to his face, peered at the shape in the moonlight. A small peanut. He pushed the food into his mouth, biting down on the rough surface, chewing the shell and the contents completely.
He hadn’t tasted anything that good in weeks.
处处
EVERYWHERE
Ghost City
TOSHI STARED AT THE KEYBOARD of his replacement laptop. He should be working but he was having a hard time concentrating. The kiss—if you could you call it a kiss—felt more like a physical threat, like a punch meant to be a warning. A punch kiss!
Toshi’s lips had bled. Who gets that from a kiss? Zerzy was insane. He couldn’t look at her; her body taunted him. What kind of messed up home life did this girl live through to be so damn frustrating. He grunted and slammed his fist down on the table.
Wey didn’t even look over. He was totally absorbed in improving their network security. The electronic moat they had built to protect the Three Sopranos from detection had to be faultless. What good was millions of dollars in crypto if you’ve got every cyber-attack group in the world looking for you? You’d have to live under a rock to escape them—a very remote, one-star, cold and uncomfortable rock.
Toshi tapped a few keys and logged in. It was there again. That infuriating message. His virtual reality program had been updated again; it was happening hourly. Some team of coders was adding tens of thousands of lines of code to his program. And do you think he could track the source of the modifications? He considered himself to be one of the best Net trackers around, but all he could discern was a generalized intrusion coming from everywhere.
Everywhere? That was the stupidest idea he had ever heard. That was one thing about the Net. It was point to point. A message, a bundle of bits and bytes, directed to a router, then re-routed to another. Rinse and repeat. Totally trackable right down to the pixel—with the right tools and knowledge.
There is no fucking everywhere.
He felt his lip, it was sensitive where Zerzy’s overbite had collided with his front teeth. He could taste her lip gloss. He shook his head. What had she done? Infected his brain like a zombie? Stolen his soul with one angry peck?
He knew what she was thinking. Or vazz thinking.
There you go, loser. You’re mine. Smell ya’ later.
Toshi checked the root directory on his server.
Holy shit! The main executable for Wasteland that he originally built in C language, was now at least four times the size it was yesterday. What had they done to the program? He was dying to know. But Toshi was still too afraid to run the program. He knew Zerzy would be alerted instantly. She was that type of team leader. Hell, she was that type of girl. But what if he just de-compiled the code? Took a look at what kind of spaghetti code these unknown coders had sweated away at.
He tried to run the decoder on the file. An alert box popped up instantly.
‘You want to play? You have to log in.’
Toshi stared at the glowing text on his screen. He wanted to scream. If his laptop wasn’t new—and so beautiful and so damned expensive—he would have thrown it across the room. These animals were messing with his property AND forcing him to pay-to-play. And by pay, he meant the drama he’d face if he suited up and directly disobeyed the Russian girl’s directive.
So? What would she do? Punch kiss him again? Just try it, he thought. He’d be ready this time.
美国
A M E R I C A
Near Quinjang Prison
THE CAB OF THE THREE-WHEEL TRUCK reminded Rice of the old communist China he knew from history: spartan, utilitarian and poorly maintained, the cracked plastic steering wheel vibrating wildly in the driver’s hands. The peanut farmer hung on like his life depended on it. And probably did.
A few kilometers away from the prison, the farmer had stopped the truck and invited Rice into the front seat with him. He seemed unafraid of the American, almost friendly. And he was speaking in English now. Excellent English.
As the older man drove, he shared his strong opinions about Rice’s country.
“There is no United States,” he shouted over the noisy two-banger engine. “Everything is dis-union in your country. Fractured states fighting for power. The same thing happened in Rome and it's happening there. You Americans have so many new enemies now: the Republicans, the Democrats, big pharma, big oil, the military, oligarchs and billionaires, special interest groups, climate change scientists, factory robots.”
Rice let him continue. He found the rant interesting: a different view from another side of the world.
“Americans think they can own the world if they just push hard enough, throw enough dollars around. You forget that democracy is dead when less than 50% of your citizens even vote. The public has seceded, surrendered. They don't care anymore: they have their cell phones they cuddle like soothers, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat. Everyone's in their own bubble. The United States is hundreds of million of states, hardly any of them even talking to each other.”
The farmer stepped on the gas, a long straight track ahead of them disappearing into the darkness. There were no streetlights ahead, only dark vegetation and the occasional spindly tree.
“And your en
emies don't take down buildings anymore or send in suicide bombers—that's so old school and it alarms people, wakes them up, gets them marching in the streets or emailing their Congress women. It forces politicians off the golf course and then they have to take action; they have to vote on legislation, pass laws and start expensive wars.
“A cyber-attack, on the other hand, doesn't create waves but can be doubly effective and damaging. It can blow up a major bank, steal a million credit card numbers, cost thousands of bitter employees their jobs and their pensions, destroy whole towns, disable defenses, cut power to hospitals, blow up gas pipelines, steal medical records—and what do you do when that happens? Nothing. Americans don't seem to care.”
Rice was surprised. Some of the things the man was saying were true. People didn’t seem that moved by online attacks that cost lives and billions of dollars.
“Your founding fathers said ‘Here is your New Republic. See if you can keep it.’ But you won’t be able to. It's too much work. There's a football game on. Talk to me when it's over.”
Rice said nothing, his eyes never leaving the road. They were on a single lane of thin gravel, bisecting dozens of small rice fields, the lowering sun smearing the glassy water red. Like vast pools of blood. The Chinese philosopher/farmer had his hands on the cracked steering wheel, ten and two, the truck vibrating like a rusty scow fighting a wayward wind.
“How do you know so much about America?” Rice asked.
“I read,” the farmer said.
“Online?” Rice asked, ready to be dismissive.
