Tag - A Technothriller

by Simon Royle

  Maloo had been watching for anyone checking in to the Nineveh and they’d picked up Mariko and her last transmission from Cochran before she’d created the encounter with Mark. They’d reacted quicker than he’d thought they would, and it showed the intensity with which Cochran was tracing him. To put a trace on the nephew of the Director of UNPOL took guts and was indication of a fierce attention to detail. The blocks he’d put in Mark’s mind should be good enough to resist a Truth Treatment in the White Room so anything they could do up here wasn’t a concern. As far as Mark knew he really was Jonah, so his truth was his safety.

  He glanced at the time in the bottom left of his primary Devscreen. 10:20am. He still had a lot to do. Gabriel leaned forward in the Biosense in front of the Devcockpit and pressed his eyes shut with his fingertips thinking back over the path that had brought him to this tiny room on the Moon.

  Gabriel shook himself from his reverie. Thinking of Mark, his mood brightened. He was proud of what his brother had become, despite and against all the odds, he had made humanity’s choice. Blood is blood and the blood of a proud line of people ran in Mark’s veins. Although it placed him in great danger, it didn’t fail him when it had been called upon to do the right thing.

  The Zumar blood ran strong in him, and Gabriel thought how much it must burn Sir Thomas to see the face of Philip Zumar as that of his own nephew. Or did he take some kind of perverse pleasure from knowing that the son of Philip Zumar and his wife Mariah, lived the lie of being his nephew? Gabriel didn’t know and really didn’t care. Whatever Sir Thomas thought was only of interest in how it might be used to bring about his death.

  His primary Dev pinged. “Gabriel?”

  “Yes, Maloo,” Gabriel said.

  “How did it go?” The image of Maloo in the tunnel overhead talking to him on the Devstick came through with incredible clarity but then Gabriel had installed the Devs here himself and hadn’t spared on the cred needed to get the best high-def Devs there were. The comms were on a local grid and not connected to anything. The two men were free to talk normally.

  “Well, Cochran reacted faster than we thought she would but other than that, it went as we planned, Maloo. He’ll do it, and if he is really lucky he’ll succeed. What time are we leaving? Is everything under control?”

  “We’re on track. How long for you to pack? We’ve got to get to Peary before 3pm. I’ve set us up in a titanium freighter bound for the Congo. It’s straight in and it’ll be a hot bumpy ride, totally hardcore, but we should survive.”

  Gabriel chuckled at Maloo’s throwaway line about surviving re-entry, but knew they really were in for a ride they’d remember forever, if they survived it. He began packing some of the peripheral equipment around the cockpit.

  After taking a long drink of water, he said in an even voice, “I’m more worried about being in a sealed box with you for eight hours. What did you eat for breakfast?”

  Maloo, which means thunder in the Aboriginal language, lived up to the name he had been given by the tribal elders in response to his loud and long farts as a baby. The tribe was the one that Gabriel had joined on leaving Darwin as a boy, Maloo being his boyhood friend and blood brother. “Well, don’t just stand there laughing, get over here as fast as you can, and help me get this stuff stowed away.”

  “I’m on my way. Couldn’t you get anything faster than a golf cart?”

  “Hey, don’t knock the golf cart. It represents the only six hundred and fifty-four yard hole-in-one in recorded history, at least according to the guy who sold it to me.”

  “OK, I’ll see you in about ten.”

  “Maloo?”

  “Yes, Gaz?”

  “What did you find out about Mariko?”

  “Um, she’s OK. She’s just been manipulated into this by Cochran, but she’s not evil, far from it.”

  “OK, and make it eight. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

  Gabriel took a look around the room. He’d been here on and off since he’d busted out of Level Ten. When they were done packing he’d get Maloo to sanitize the room while he packed the buggy they’d use to drive to Peary. They’d bought a disused buggy and repaired it so that now it looked, complete with serial numbers, exactly like a BHP mining utility vehicle, one of thousands traversing the Moon’s surface. The buggy would allow them to trav as far as Peary and then they’d board the ore freighter to the Congo. A straight long burn followed by a fast hot re-entry. He hoped the suits they’d bought would hold up. The freighter wasn’t designed to carry humans, but the box built into its guts and the titanium ore it was carrying should provide just enough protection from the heat.

  He took a last look at Mark, his arm dangling by the side of his Siteazy in Super.

  Chapter 18

  What’s in a Name

  UNPOL Headquarters, Deep Trace Operations Room, 188th floor.

  Saturday, 14 December 2109, 4:45pm +8 UTC

  Cochran called the meeting at 4:45pm with a soft voice command to the Dev.

  The message from Cochran hit their Devscreens. “Full review of Case #JM-2109, 5:00pm, Conference Room 35.”

  Dominique ‘just call me Dom’ Signora couldn’t believe it.

  What a bitch, he thought, and with a scowl and shrug, turned to his colleague and fellow trace partner, Martine ‘Marty’ Shorne, and said, “Calling the meeting just when we’re going back to our Envs. What are we going to do about Fatima’s party?”

  She just lifted her eyebrows in reply, and feet sprawled out in a huge vee in front of her, chin on her small chest, arms folded, she continued to scan the Devscreen. They’d been working together for over three months, him joining straight out of the Academy and her transferring into Trace Operations from Large Commercial Crimes Unit (LCCU).

  She looked like she was asleep, but she was wide awake. It was just her style. In this team everybody had their own style - usually it only outed after you’d been in the team for a while - a style that would fit, that evolved into and synced with the other styles in the team. Marty came fully loaded with hers, and the team evolved and revolved around it.

  Marty brought her knees up and her legs together, and pushing her hands into her spine, rolled onto her back in the Siteazy. She straightened her legs out and pushed back with her head until she was standing on her head, arms out straight and legs dead straight. She held the position for a count of fifteen and bringing her hands into play, slowly lowered herself in an arc over the back of the Siteazy.

  “Let’s go,” she said, and turned for the door.

  The meeting would be held in the executive conference rooms on the two hundred and forty-second floor. Marty held out her hand to Fatima who slowly walked from her Devcockpit in the south west section of the room to the door where Marty was waiting. Taking Fatima’s hand she nodded at the others and with the door sliding open they stepped out of the Cave. They all hated this part of their contribution.

  Cochran stood at the head of the Clearfilm table, Marty sat opposite Cochran, with Dom and Fatima on her left and Stanislav on her right. She sat cross-legged on her Biosense knowing it annoyed Cochran and knowing that Cochran wouldn’t do anything about it.

  Marty didn’t like Cochran. She knew the type: ruthless and selfish, overachievers with no interest in morality. But there was no need to call a meeting at this time. They could do this tomorrow. Cochran called the meeting to show them what a dedicated contributor she was and how she was totally committed.

  And she is, totally committed to herself, thought Marty as she sat listening to Cochran’s intro. Now she’ll pick on Stanislav with his stutter knowing she freaks him out, she thought.

  “Stanislav, can you give us a run-down on the illegals that our runner was running?” Cochran asked and sat down, swiveling sideways in the Biosense and crossing her legs. Stanislav stuttered under stress. He was brilliant at spotting something where there was nothing in the ether and being able to translate what it meant, but he was incapable of speaking to Cochran.

&nb
sp; Marty didn’t like what was going to happen, so she said, “Sharon, before coming into the meeting, the team and I have discussed what we think has happened here and we’d like to present those ideas to you and then go and enjoy Fatima’s birthday party which is today. We can go over the objectives you set for us, of course. However, we believe that our time would be more productively employed if we focused on a new angle. Would that be acceptable?”

  Cochran continued looking at Stanislav who had gone bright red and was darting glances at Marty as if to ask her to come and rescue him, then she swiveled to face Marty smiling. “Well that would depend on the plausibility of your presentation and the credibility of your evidence, but I’d like to hear what your ‘new angle’ is, so please go ahead.”

  Marty pushed herself off from the table and the Biosense rolled across the space behind her until she was facing the Devscreen. She called up a static image on the Devscreen that covered the far end of the room in huge quarter circle. The image started moving and showed two men walking together, one with his head bowed and his hands in the pockets of his outers as he talked with Bo Vinh. As he talked, the two men suddenly stopped and the one with his hands in his pockets waved and smiled in the direction of the camera Dev. A little boy ran out to him and jumped up into his arms to be lifted high, but the man protested, laughing and telling the boy that he was too big to be lifted that high anymore. The little boy jumped up and down until the man picked him up, and standing together with Bo Vinh, they posed for the camera. The image stilled on the two men and the boy.

  Marty said, “The little boy is your runner. He’s ten in this image. The man walking with Bo Vinh is Philip Zumar, the boy’s father. We know nothing more about the boy other than he disappeared and was presumed dead by authorities in Byron Bay in the Geographic of Australia. We have, however, found out a lot about the boy’s father, Philip.”

  Cochran, turning her Devstick end-over-end on the table, her lips pursed together in a chaste kiss, said, “Go on.”

  Marty didn’t turn around and sat cross-legged, her back silhouetted against the image of the three people on the Devscreen. She touched the Devstick clipped on her belt and the image changed to another image of Philip Zumar only as a much younger man.

  “Philip Zumar was a firebrand activist in the early sixties.” The Devscreen changed again, bringing up a slew of images, while Marty continued speaking in a soft voice telling the story of Philip Zumar. As each topic changed, the Devscreen enlarged one of the images and displayed it wall-length on the screen in front of them.

  “He was married to a fellow activist Rebecca Oriata Hamilton. In 2063 she gave birth to a son, Gabriel Alexander Zumar. Gabriel was lucky to be born – his mother had already contracted leukemia as a result of her work supplying food to people on the edges of the nuclear-ravaged world. His poems about her death are particularly poignant. Philip kept his son by his side at all times after the death of his wife. He retreated from his activist life and instead focused on the child. This is when he really began to write. He was twenty-six going on twenty-seven at this time, and this is when he met Bo Vinh.”

  The Devscreen had enlarged an image of a list of writings by Philip Zumar. The titles ran from the floor to the ceiling.

  Cochran felt a deep sense of unease settling into her stomach. This case had just taken an even more serious and complicated turn. Anything to do with Bo Vinh could potentially be linked to his assassination and that was a path that Cochran wanted nothing to do with.

  “I see. Thank you. Please go on,” said Cochran, the slightly crisp tone unavoidable with her increasing unease and irrational irritation at Marty’s back.

  “Bo Vinh and Philip Zumar met at one of Zumar’s readings in New Paris in 2064. There were no cameras allowed. It was a condition of the reading. Philip Zumar was notoriously image-shy, so we don’t have any image of the actual event. However it is reported that when Zumar finished reading Bo Vinh crossed the room and gave him a hug, the tears of their cheeks mingling. That last phrase is actually a quote from a later poem that Zumar wrote to Bo Vinh on his birthday, shortly before Bo Vinh was assassinated on the 1st of January, 2075.”

  The Devstick in Cochran’s hand was turning ever more rapidly as she grew impatient with Marty’s diatribe. Each time Marty referred to Bo Vinh the weight of unease crept up a notch in Cochran’s gut.

  “Wait a minute, before you go on, just to appease my growing concern at the irrelevance of all of this, how do you make the connection between Jibril and this Gabriel boy, who disappeared thirty-six years ago?”

  “Jibril is Arabic for Gabriel. Muraz is an anagram of Zumar. The house where Jibril Muraz was registered was 61 Sholle Street, Paddington, London. That was also an anagram for 16 Holles Street, Paddington, London, the birthplace of Lord Byron in –”

  Cochran interrupted again, “Wait a sec, this Lord Byron, who’s he? What does he have to do with this? Does he have something to do with Sir Thomas?”

  With difficulty, Marty stifled an urge to laugh, and said, “Uhm no, Lord Byron was born in 1788. He has nothing to do with Sir Thomas, however Byron Bay was the last known sighting of Gabriel Alexander Zumar.” Marty waited to see if Cochran was going to interrupt her again. She cocked her head slightly to one side.

  For some reason this little move made Cochran flare up inside with a hot flush of rage, but she suppressed it saying in a tight, clipped voice, “Continue.”

  Marty waited. The room filled with silence. As the seconds went by the silence increased in volume. Marty’s head straightened, her body immobile. Cochran licked her lower lip. The three other members of the Gang of Four swapped furtive glances. None dared look at Cochran.

  “Continue please, Marty.”

  “Philip Zumar and Bo Vinh became good friends. They collaborated heavily on Bo Vinh’s masterpiece ‘We are one tribe’, which as you know became the foundation for the popular vote movement that swept the globe in the mid-sixties. Zumar insisted that his contribution to the work should remain unknown, however it was made known by Bo Vinh himself who later said, that actually the work was more Zumar’s than his.

  “With the popular vote accepted globally and countries abandoning their sovereignty for the sake of a single global nation, Bo Vinh stepped into the limelight, becoming our first Secretary General of the United Nation and remaining in that role until he was killed. Zumar faded out of the limelight. The only other image we have of him is this one taken at Bo Vinh’s funeral. It’s indistinct because he is so far back in the crowd. But it is him.

  “Bo Vinh was assassinated on the 1st of January 2075. About ten months after Bo Vinh’s funeral, Philip Zumar disappeared. This was the 6th of October 2075, according to Sir Thomas’s case file. His partner called Sir Thomas for help in finding him. In the transcript of the call she says she thinks the disappearance is something to do with Bo Vinh’s assassination.”

  “He has a new wife or has his old one suddenly cropped up from the dead as well?” Cochran asked with a bite in her voice.

  Marty ignored the sarcasm and smiled to herself. She’d really gotten under Cochran’s skin this time.

  “He never married this woman. Her maiden name was Mariah Claire Foster, but she gave birth to a son on the 23rd of September 2075 at two in the morning. The birth was registered and a PUI assigned to a Mark Anthony Zumar, father, Philip Zumar, mother Mariah Claire Oliver.”

  “She was related to Sir Thomas?”

  “Yes, she was his wife, or his estranged wife – by this time they had been separated for over a year, but by all accounts they were still on favorable terms.”

  “I see.” Cochran’s voice had lost its bite with Marty’s latest revelation. “What happened to her and the baby?”

  “Sir Thomas’s report, he was Director of Special Operations Executive at that time, stated that he found Philip Zumar’s yacht floating forty-five kiloms off the coast of Byron Bay and there had been no indication of foul play, so 'death by suicide or accidental drownin
g' was recorded as the coroner’s verdict. The report stated that during the time UNPOL was searching for Philip Zumar, the woman, boy, and baby disappeared. After investigating but finding no trace of them, Sir Thomas presumed his wife had also committed suicide and probably taken the children with her. Despite global alerts being put out, they weren’t found and Sir Thomas’s opinion became the recorded decision.”

  “And now you think this Gabriel, or someone using his identity, has transferred his anger at the death of his father to Sir Thomas? Is that it?”

  “Yes, something like that – it really is the only explanation.”

  “But why go to all the trouble? Why didn’t he just kill or have Sir Thomas killed?”

  “Because he wants to make him suffer. In his talk with Jonah, he says, ‘You probably think I am crazy’. This is transference – deep down he thinks he is crazy, but transfers that emotion to Jonah. There are other lines in the discussion between Gabriel and Jonah that give us an indication of his thoughts, which are ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t be asking such personal questions so early in our relationship, but then I feel as if I have known you for so many years’ and, ‘Will you request God to strike me down for my sins, or having sought repentance of Him, shall I be saved as you were vomited from the great fish’s mouth onto the shores of Nineveh?’ The Devscreen had changed to the image of Jonah naked in the room with Gabriel. It switched focus from Gabriel to Jonah and back again. Something about the image made Cochran feel uncomfortable but she couldn’t put her finger on what it was.

  “For someone who is supposedly crazy, the capture and escape were an extremely well put together plan and well executed. Hardly the mark of someone who is crazy.”

  “On the contrary, people who are obsessive can be extremely detailed in thought and action. Their lunacy is in the premise they are acting upon not in how they accomplish those actions.”

  “What is the significance of the meeting with Jonah Oliver?”

  “It’s a threat. Jonah Oliver is Sir Thomas’s last surviving relative, so as Gabriel has lost his family he is telling Sir Thomas that he can touch Sir Thomas’s family in the same way.”