Korean Intercept

by Mertz, Stephen

  Galt climbed the stairs, two at a time, to a well-lighted landing. A carpeted hallway, lined with doors, stretched in either direction from the landing.

  A pair of Japanese men, wearing casual slacks and tropical shirts, stood before the first door to the right. Each man was of average Japanese height and build, but each had obviously spent more than a little time working out. Their muscles bulged beneath their T-shirts. One of the men was replacing the receiver of a wall phone. There was no doubt in Galt's mind that the man had just finished speaking to the bartender. He glowered at Galt.

  "What you want, cowboy?"

  Shoulder to shoulder, they blocked Galt's approach to the door behind them as if they were sentries. The second one sneered, as if dealing with errant Americans was nothing new.

  "No girls up here, buster. You go downstairs. Watch titty dancers. Get nice girl. Go next door. Good cat house."

  "I don't want a cat house," said Galt. "1 want to see Barney."

  "Barney," the first one repeated. "That funny name, cowboy. You go now, or you get hurt."

  The other one snickered. "No Barney. You Americans have strange names."

  "Don't we, though?" said Galt. "And you know what's even more strange? Barney Markee happens to own this den of iniquity. Now doesn't that make it even stranger that you've never heard of your boss?"

  The man on the left frowned. "Den of what?"

  "I said take me to him," said Galt quietly, "or I'll take myself."

  The one on the right snarled, "We take you, cowboy, out back and beat shit out of you, that's what we do."

  They came at Galt in unison, the one on the right bringing up his fists, which were adorned with brass knuckles. His partner swung a leather sap out and up from a back pocket, arcing it around at Galt's head.

  Galt clamped both of his hands like a vise around the wrist of the arm swinging the blackjack and shoved that wrist back so the sap sharply smacked the other man between the eyes with enough force to knock him off his feet, breaking his nose. Galt then brought the man's arm down across his raised knee. The crack! of the arm breaking was unusually loud in the confines of the hallway. The man dropped. He opened his mouth to shout his pain but, before he could, Galt released the broken arm, grabbed the man's head by either side and smashed his face into the wail. The man collapsed, sprawling across the carpet, next to his companion, a thin trickle of blood oozing from one nostril of his broken nose. Their ragged breathing filled the corridor. Galt turned when he sensed movement behind him.

  Barney Markee had positioned his wheelchair in the doorway. He regarded the fallen men as he fired a cigarette from a Zippo lighter. Then he shifted his gaze to Galt through a cloud of exhaled smoke.

  "Looks like I need to hire me some competent help. Hey, Trev."

  "Hey, Barney."

  Barney Markee was fifty-four years old, with owl-like features, a balding pate and deep, knowing eyes that were magnified by the thick lenses of his glasses. He had the gruff, authoritative manner of a big man, despite his diminutive stature in the wheelchair. Large-boned, gray-bearded, he possessed an easygoing personal style that, Galt knew, would have remained unchanged in the presence of the pope or a pimp.

  Footfalls clumped up the stairway, and another pair of bouncers arrived. They took one look at the situation and threw themselves toward Galt. Barney raised a hand, halting them in mid-stride.

  "Let him be," he commanded quietly. He indicated the fallen men. "Get these two out of here. They're fired. See that these bouncers bounce when you toss them out the alley door."

  "Yes sir, Boss," both men chimed in unison like harmonizing parrots. They each tossed one of the unconscious bouncers over a shoulder and trundled them away.

  Galt relaxed, stepping over to trade a firm handshake with the man in the wheelchair.

  "Thanks, Barn. Sorry about the fuss."

  Barney chuckled. "Hey, it's not like bonehead goons aren't a dime a dozen in this town . . . or anywhere else, for that matter." He back-wheeled his chair from the doorway. "Come on in, buddy. Help yourself to some coffee, if you dare."

  The office appeared at first to be a hodgepodge of male disarray, but was in reality a utilization of every available space for stacks of books and plants. A tawny-colored pet ferret left its cage, and came over to make a sniffing circle around Galt before returning to the cage, completely disinterested. Classic jazz filtered softly from unseen speakers. The office's most prominent feature was the enormous plate glass window that provided an ideal vantage point, a bird's-eye view, of the crowded, smoke-filled, raucous strip club interior below. The office was obviously soundproofed, creating a strange effect, thought Galt, like viewing a silent movie nightclub scene accompanied by classical music.

  Barney scanned the carnal madhouse beyond the glass. He frowned, emitted a growl of displeasure, and picked up a phone from beside a computer in a corner work area.

  Galt saw the same busy bartender he'd spoken to moments earlier. The harried man picked up the house phone next to his cash register on what must have been its first ring. Galt turned to a coffeepot to draw himself a cup as Barney commenced barking orders into the phone like a military field commander.

  "Those three sailors right in front of you," he snapped at the bartender. "They're fixing to tussle with those army guys next to them. I see it coming. Get some hostesses over there fast to level things off. And that jerk at table seven. I saw him pinching that lap dancer's titties just now, and that's a goddamn no-no. See that he's bounced."

  He didn't wait to listen to the chattering reply across the connection, which Galt could hear from across the room. Barney hung up the telephone receiver. He wheeled around to face Galt.

  Barney Markee had been struck by polio at age ten, and wheelchair-bound ever since. But this terrible illness, and life in a wheelchair, had in no way blunted Barney Markee's zest for life. It was much as when a blind person's system compensates with an increased awareness of his other senses. Trevor Galt III was to the manor born. Barney was from a far different background. His folks were live-in nanny and assistant to a rich family down the road from the Galts in rural Maryland. Barney's parents would have been called a maid and a butler in earlier times. They lived in a house behind their employers', and somehow Barney and Trev had become buddies around the age of eight. One of their favorite pastimes had been taking hikes in the woods around where their families lived. Barney couldn't do any serious hiking, obviously, but with Trev pushing the wheelchair, they'd make forays into the woods and have long conversations, discussing girls and movies and girls and what they would become when they grew up and, of course, girls . . . until that time came when they began actually dating girls instead of just talking about them.

  After attending college, Barney had gone on to work professionally and with distinction in the field of psychology before he dropped out, utterly uninterested in the "bullshit politics" of that profession, as he had informed Galt at the time. Blessed with an IQ in the genius range, Barney had gone on to teach himself computers, mastering them to such a degree that Galt had been instrumental in arranging a "working" visit by his best friend to Fort Huachuca, the little known U.S. military installation in Arizona that straddles the U.S. border with Mexico. Huachuca is home to the Signal Corps, the "AT&T of the military," which rapidly deploys to places like Kuwait and Kosovo during international U.S. military operations. Fort Huachuca also handled a high-tech covert surveillance "listening station" for intercepting communications, everything from eavesdropping on closed-door government meetings in Mexico City to tapping cell phone conversations between drug dealers in Bogota. Such electronic intel is automatically routed to the agencies concerned. Galt had so availed himself of the Fort's "services" that, by the time he was assigned to the White House, he had managed to isolate several glitches in the Huachuca operation. Though far from computer literate enough to have any idea of how to fix such trouble spots, he had recommended his old friend Barney for the job, knowing that there would be a
big enough government payday for his buddy to buy whatever lifestyle he wanted. After massive background checks, security clearances and the like, a process that had pushed Barney to being as grouchy and irascible as Galt had ever seen him, Markee traveled to the Arizona desert to not only fix those computer glitches but go on to completely overhaul and redesign the relay program software that rerouted encoded transmissions to Washington. The government drew on its best computer personnel for duty at Huachuca, and after Barney's overhaul, after witnessing this astounding self-taught computer whiz in action, the post commander had taken the unprecedented measure of requesting that he be permanently assigned in a civilian tech support role. The only roadblock was that, after his work was done, Barney had taken his fat paycheck and disappeared. That was the last time Galt had seen him, though Barney had given him this Tokyo address before dropping out of sight.

  Now, Barney replenished his own coffee cup and regarded Galt over the rims of his Ben Franklin glasses that had slid to the tip of his nose. He took a noisy slurping sip of the bitter brew that he had always referred to as rocket fuel. The man in the wheelchair regarded him with an owlish gaze from behind thick glasses.

  "So, did they give you a pass out of the White House basement? You're on the loose a long way from home, Trevboy." It was a name that Barney (and only Barney) had been calling Galt since boyhood.

  "I'm more than out on the loose, buddy," said Galt. "I'm off mission. I'm in the cold."

  "I have heard something about that, now that you mention it." Barney nodded to his PC. "I monitor the classified op tac nets the way some old boys back home monitor the police band for recreation."

  "I know. So what do you know about me that I don't know?"

  "For starters," said Barney dryly, "they're afraid you're about to start World War III. And I am not indulging in idle hyperbole." Barney's owlish gaze was dead serious. "I suppose you could conceivably know what you're doing"

  "Do you know about the shuttle?"

  Barney's glasses had slipped down to the end of his nose. He absently index-fingered them back onto the bridge of his nose, more or less. "I know everything."

  "And that," said Galt, "is why I'm here."

  Barney snapped his fingers like someone really disappointed. "Damn, and I thought you came all this way because you like the taste of my coffee."

  Galt glanced into his cup and winced. "Is that what you call it?" He finished the cup's contents with a slurp and set the cup down. "We can't let the bad guys get their grubby hands on that shuttle, Barn."

  "No one, as far as I can tell, is disagreeing with that."

  Galt grimaced. "But they're not doing a damn thing about it. The president seems to have his hands tied. The military is on alert, but we're not even sending in a search and rescue team while everybody knows the North Koreans and the Chinese are doing everything but leveling those mountains to find a trace of the Liberty and its crew."

  "You forgot to mention that the president's wife is not among the missing crewmembers."

  "Yeah, I guess I did forget that. Are you suggesting that Kate being one of the astronauts is clouding my mind?"

  Barney's shrug was one of nonjudgmental eloquence. "Just making an observation, is all." He nodded again to the PC. "I've been picking up plenty of traffic on you. They have a hunch that you've come to this part of the world."

  "I'm willing to bet that all of Tokyo is wired for my arrival."

  Barney chuckled. "And that's the kicker, isn't it? Because they know that you've got more ability than anyone they've got. Fact of the matter is, Trevboy, I've been half-expecting you."

  "And?"

  "What the hell do you think? They want you home. All is forgiven."

  "Right. World War III? Even if I make it home with my ass intact, it'd be a toss-up between which they do first, skin me alive or throw me into solitary for the rest of life."

  Another noisy coffee slurp from Barney. "I see that we eschew hyperbole in preference of stating cold, hard fact. Yes, that about sums it up from the comm traffic I've hacked into."

  "Our best hackers," said Galt, "told me that you're the best hacker in the world."

  Barney's eyes crinkled behind the Ben Franklins. "Excuse me for blushing."

  "And you were thoughtful enough to burn all of your bridges and completely drop out of sight after that payday in Arizona. I only knew where to find you because you told me."

  "I like living in Tokyo. I've been told that Occidentals can find Japanese politeness excessive and exaggerated. The Japanese regard Western displays of emotion, like the hello or goodbye hug, the kissing on the cheek between mere acquaintances, as vulgar and in poor taste. It's a communication gap that makes it extremely difficult for an outsider to tell what a Jap is really thinking, and vice versa. I find that to be a reassuringly civilized way to co-exist with those around me. And, of course," with a wry grin he indicated the plate glass window and the bar scene beyond, "a man can never see enough bare titty in his life, I always say."

  "You know what I'm about to say, don't you?" said Galt.

  Barney nodded. "You're about to point out that somewhere in this mix is someone who can bring down an American space shuttle. You intend to follow through by pointing out that they could just as easily take down a gimp buried away in Little Texas, no matter how many bodyguards he has." The man in the wheelchair flicked back his faded flannel shirt to reveal a pistol grip protruding from the waist of his cutoff slacks. He patted the pistol. "Don't worry about me. I'm not about to run from anybody." When he heard his own words, Barney laughed. "Guess I couldn't run if I wanted to."

  Galt forced himself to pour another cup from the coffee pot. The jolt of caffeine to his system restored the edge to his senses that had become mildly affected by jet lag and negotiating traffic in a foreign city. His lethargy was peeling away with each sip of Barney's bitter brew. "I need to contact General Tuttle. I need him over here with me, and I need access to his resources."

  Barney sighed. "Well, nobody ever said you lacked for ambition."

  "Every standard channel of linkage between me and the general is out. You know there's no such thing as a secure line. If I make contact with him, they have me."

  "So you want me to tap the general for you. You want me to contribute to starting World War III."

  "If we get rock-solid proof that the Liberty went down on North Korean soil, Pyongyang will cooperate. They won't start a war. They'll remember what happened to the Taliban in Afghanistan."

  "It says here. Okay, I can tap the general without leaving a trail. So what do I tell him?"

  "That I need some backup cover over here on the double. And there's something else."

  Barney sighed theatrically. "Ain't there always."

  "I'm trying to find a stripper."

  Barney guffawed. "Well Jeez, bro, I've got a whole building full of 'em." He indicated the plate glass window and the smoky bump-and-grind atmosphere beyond. "Take your pick."

  "Sorry, Barn, I appreciate the hospitality but I'm not talking personal use here, and I am talking about a particular stripper."

  "Then I figure that would be Connie Yota, if that's her real name," said Barney. "The Feds have been trying to backtrack that little sweetie ever since she took down their NASA scientist, but so far, nada. She seems genuinely not to know who she was working for. The club she claimed she worked at was here in Little Texas, but it burned to the ground a year ago and the trail appears to stop there."

  "For you, too?" asked Galt.

  "Okay, okay," said Barney. "I'll tap a few sources and see what I can come up with. What about you?"

  "I'm on the move. Matter of fact, I'd better be back to moving right now"

  "Uh huh. In other words, don't call you, you'll call me."

  "It's better for you that way," said Galt. "I don't want them backtracking you through me."

  "And 'them,' in this case would be, uh, who exactly?"

  "That's the problem. When we find that out, we'll be pip
ed into the core, into what's really going on here."

  Barney wheeled around to his computer terminal. "And your message to General Tuttle is to get his four-star ass over here to Tokyo ASAP."

  "I'll meet him tomorrow at the Meiji Shrine at twelve-hundred hours, Tokyo time."

  "Tomorrow, eh? Damn, Trevboy, I will be honored and consider myself amply compensated for my efforts on your behalf, if I can facilitate Pentagon brass dropping everything and hauling tail over here on your say-so." Barney's wise eyes crinkled. "And I'll bet he'll be there."

  "I'll need an update from the general at that time. I intend to be pretty much out of that loop until then."

  "Prudent," said Barney. "Very prudent."

  "And the CIA has an intel source on the ground somewhere in Hamgyong Province in North Korea. I want to know if that source has reported in yet, and the nature of that report."

  Barney palmed his mouse and began clicking double-time, following links on his computer screen. "Count on me, Trevboy."

  "I am," said Galt. "Thanks," and he let himself out.

  Chapter Sixteen

  He drove west out of Tokyo, taking the elevated Tomei Expressway toward the mountains beyond the city. Traffic was heavy, as it was twenty-four hours a day. Also, as usual, motorists in Tokyo maintained a constant bumper-to-bumper speed that seemed more like orchestrated activity than the vehicular madness of similar population-dense places like Rome or Mexico City.

  Night cloaked the world. Before long, the ocean of neon passing by beneath the freeway gave way to mile after mile of dismal gray, drab factories and danchi, whole square miles of tightly-packed, bleak apartment buildings. Eventually, this too dwindled to longer, uninterrupted stretches of darkness as the freeway reached beyond the suburbs.