Time had slowed down when Stephane had been pointing that gun at me. I had concentrated on his trigger finger, since it was to be my executioner. My life isn't particularly exciting, but those few seconds were not long enough for my whole life to flash before my eyes. All that preoccupied me at the time was the tensing of the muscles in his finger.
Maria had saved my life. It had happened so fast that I still had trouble believing it.
The lift arrived. Once we had started moving up, Maria reached out and pressed the alarm button. The lift stopped.
"What the hell did you think you were doing?" she snarled.
Weakly I said, "Huh?"
She placed her hands on my chest, and shoved. "You were going to get yourself killed, you fool."
"Errr."
She shoved me again.
"You and Michaux weren't exactly doing much. Hidden behind a car. Fat use that was."
"We're trained for that sort of situation."
"Really? And what were you going to do? Lure him to the car, and slam the door in his face? If I hadn't come along, he would have gotten away again. With all that body armour, there's nothing you could have done. You couldn't even have gotten near him without getting shot."
"True. Your diversion gave me the time to cover the distance, but it could have cost you your life. Don't you understand?" she shouted, with her face nearly touching mine.
"Perfectly. But this time he wasn't going to get away, whatever happened. And anyway, it's not as if conscious thought was involved. When I saw you pinned down, I knew I had to do something. I couldn't help it. You---"
She suddenly cut me off. Her mouth covered mine, and smothered the rest of the sentence.
***
The ringing woke me up. As usual, I rolled over, but fell off the couch. My mind quickly got into gear. Of course, Maria had spent the night here. My bathrobe was on the armchair in front of the bedroom door, where Maria was sleeping peacefully.
The doorbell was still ringing insistently. Who could it be at this time of day? I thought to myself angrily. I then realised that I had no idea what time it was. My watch indicated eleven-thirty in the morning. Deciding that I couldn't blame anyone for coming around this late in the day, I calmed down and opened my front door.
It was Michaux, as fresh and smart as usual, albeit not in his usual uniform, but a black suit. "Good morning, Hugh."
"Morning," I muttered.
He smiled at me, and asked to come in. I grunted what I hoped was approval, and walked to the kitchen. I set the coffee maker, then turned round to ask him what he was doing here. He was sitting stiffly on one of the wooden chair around the kitchen table. I pulled out two mugs from a cupboard, and sat down opposite him. He picked up the one I had placed in front of him, and set it in front of another chair.
"I've already had a coffee, thanks. I'm all right."
I made as if to put his mug away, but he raised a hand and grinned at me mischievously. I let it be. If he was going to be difficult, I didn't have the energy to react.
"Michaux..." I began.
"Please, call me Fred."
"Ok, Fred. What are you doing here? Didn't you see enough of me yesterday?"
"Hugh, we've discovered several new things about what exactly happened yesterday. The picture is getting clearer."
"That's great. But I repeat: what are you doing here?"
"I'm coming to that, but I don't want to repeat myself. Why don't you go and wake up Maria. I'll pour your coffees."
My jaw hit the table. At least, that's the impression I had. Michaux was grinning that grin again. That messing about with the coffee mug was just for fun. He knew that Maria had spent the night with me.
"How?"
His laugh echoed around the kitchen. "Don't worry. I haven't had you followed, but I had my suspicions. You have just confirmed them for me. When you both disappeared yesterday in the hospital, I worked it out. I have never seen Maria as defensive towards anyone as she was with you during the course of the day."
Shakily, I got to my feet. I looked down at Michaux, and shook my head. He was unbelievable. No wonder he lived up to his reputation again and again. He was quick-witted, competent and, above all, observant.
"I thought I heard voices. A good thing that stupid doorbell has stopped ringing."
We both turned around. Maria, wearing one of my shirts, came into the kitchen and sat down in front of the mug we had toyed with. The grin on Michaux' face troubled me, and I flopped back down. He got up and served the coffee for us. Confused, I looked at Maria. She just smiled and shrugged. Maybe this wasn't the first time a situation like this had arisen.
Michaux sat down again and started his explanations. Maria and I sat there quietly listening to him, while sipping at our coffees.
He informed us that they had retrieved a chip from the pile of bodies in the hospital, and had come up with a tentative theory.
Wellens had been the boss of a criminal organisation that had helped the OPA and planned the robbery of a new prototype of a laser weapon that the Americans were going to present at the NATO conference. Four groups had been formed to capture each of the four pieces that made up the laser. Each group had taken their piece of the laser to some central location, where they handed them over to their boss, Wellens. Once he had collected all the pieces, he had moved it to a secret location that he alone knew. The plan must have been to meet again at the end of the day, and split the money.
Each time Wellens received a load, he would give each man a chip that somehow gave access to the place where Wellens had put the money. They would only be able to find the secret location if all five groups got together and compared the information their respective chips gave them. That must have been to ensure no one would run off with the whole load. It was all worked out, even assuming casualties. Since every man in a group got the same chip, as long as one man from each group survived to join the other groups, they would still be able to find the money.
It was still unclear how Stephane discovered where Wellens was to make the exchange with Grayson. However, as Hamlyn and I witnessed, he did find the hotel. He tried to obtain the location of the money paid for the laser, but Wellens was too stubborn. Once he had killed him, Stephane had to find Wellens' men, and put all the chips together. He knew where they would rendezvous to share information, and arrived before them. As each group arrived, he disposed of them. When he had been off, recuperating from night shifts, he had trained with Wellens and his men. They had given him weapons training, close combat skills and tactical courses. If they had only known.
Stephane had used his training to eliminate Wellens' men, albeit with the help of his body armour. That explained the scratches I had seen on his helmet. He had killed thirteen of the fourteen men making up the groups that stole the pieces to Grayson's laser. Of the last two to arrive at the rendezvous, one was killed, but the other managed to get away. However, Stephane had just killed his partner, so didn't need the spare chip. His troubles were not over at that point. There were indeed four teams to retrieve a piece of laser, but what he hadn't known was that there was another kind of chip. The group who had set up the defences for the OPA had received another chip.
"We still haven't figured out how Stephane got to them, but we found their bodies," Michaux said. "They were the bodies Stephane had been attending to in the hospital basement. That's where we finally caught up with him, and brought Wellens' plan to a complete halt. Now we know they each had a chip, but since Stephane destroyed all the evidence by eating them, we..."
"Eating chips?" I stuttered. "You were talking about microprocessor chips? Not fish and chips?"
"Yes, they were protein chips. Made entirely out of natural materials. Once he had swallowed them, his gastric juices destroyed them. Each man was also carrying an electronic notebook, which contained a map of the city. We think that they had to have all the chips in one location to decipher a message sent by Wellens, from his electronic notebook. Once deciphered, the me
ssage would relay information to be overlaid on the city map, indicating precisely where the money was to be found.
"Unfortunately, none of the notebooks received the message. Except one. The one Stephane was holding. When he saw us, he deleted the information. And ate the chips so that we wouldn't be able to retrieve the information."
"So, that's the end, then." I said.
"Yes."
Glancing at Maria, I added, "Not quite. I also found Stephane's notebook. He scribbled a little clue, seconds before we rushed him. Bum of Bag."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Yes, I know, but that's it. Bum of Bag."
Michaux' GSM chose that moment to ring. He answered it immediately, said "Yes, Ma'am, right away," and hung up. "I'm sorry, I have to go. Hugh, I'm leaving you one of the electronic notebooks with the map inside. You knew Stephane best, maybe you can make some sense of his clue."
"I'm afraid not."
"Give it a try, anyway." He stood up and started to leave, but paused at the door.
"Maria, I'll need to talk to you later. Hugh, I'll be in touch with you soon. All I'm asking is that you do your best."
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* * *
Chapter Twenty-Two
Nearly a year later.
The judge banged his gavel and announced the resuming of hostilities; hostilities against Stephane, of course, the only survivor of a ruthless gang of thieves who had joined up with a group of terrorists. He was feeling the full force of the law coming to bear with interest. Revenge was not far from most people's minds, and there had been several incidents when the police had escorted Stephane to the courthouse. Crowds, furious that such a sociopath could be given a fair trial, had attempted to overrun the police barriers and give Stephane their version of fairness: a lynching. The police, though, had been well prepared, and Stephane had entered the courthouse unmolested, physically, at least. There wasn't much they could do about the verbal abuse. This was, after all, a country where each citizen had the right to free speech.
As usual, he smiled on the proceedings in the courthouse with equanimity, unruffled by the bare hatred directed at him and what he stood for.
As one of the key witnesses, I was "one of the fortunate few who were able to attend the trial in person", as the press would have it. The "few" managed to fill the courtroom, and fortunate wasn't the first word that came to mind to describe the people here.
Impervious to the excitement exuded by everyone else, the families of some of the victims sat in dignified silence, trying to find sense in their relatives' deaths.
Alone with their grief.
That horrific day was still fresh in everyone's mind, even this long afterwards. Sadly, the death toll had in the end reached fifty-two. Considering the extent of destruction though, that was a very low number. It could have been far worse. No, it was absolutely amazing. Fortuitous circumstances had kept the deaths to a minimum.
The Castell building and the Central library had been completely empty at the time of their destruction. The traffic jam had prevented anyone from arriving on time. Seven drivers had died when those buildings collapsed onto the adjacent roads, and twenty-six had been injured.
Two of the buildings Stephane destroyed to kill me were office buildings, and were empty apart from four shift workers and eight early risers who always arrived before the rush hour. No one else had arrived at the office blocks, because they were in the traffic jam, and had remained with their cars.
The two other buildings contained small flats, but as it was afternoon when Stephane brought them down, not many of the residents had been in. It had been discovered that one man had stayed home because of a bad flu, and another worked from home.
Unfortunately, the last four buildings had killed the highest number of motorists. The traffic-jam had still been in full swing. Thirty-one of them had died to satisfy Stephane's thirst for revenge. These deaths were the hardest for me to come to terms with. In a certain sense, I was involved. Had I taken longer to leave the hotel, Stephane would never have noticed me, and forty-five people would still be alive.
The Bourgmestre had said, and the press had taken up on it, that the low death toll was due to the speed and efficiency of several city services, working together as one. For the first time in its history, the Transport Authority had successfully co-ordinated a citywide rescue plan.
What she and the press failed to state was that if the OPA's aim had been to destroy the city rather than grab our attention, we wouldn't have had a city left to talk about. For once, the Bourgmestre was commending us, and we weren't about to diminish that by spreading the truth.
The official death toll discounted the robbers. They had been forgotten now that Stephane had become the symbol of the evil that had gripped a whole city for twelve hours, a year ago.
"State your name."
"Stephane Bens."
He was back at the witness stand. This court case had proceeded somewhat unusually. Given the numerous crimes he was being charged with, he had been called up five times so far. Instead of having several trials for each crime, the city officials had decided to bundle all together, and get everything sorted out in one go, before the healing process began, and the citizens started to block out the painful memories of a single day in April.
"Where were you at precisely 14h30 on that day?"
Stephane's voice faded, and I turned to my thoughts. I wasn't here to see justice done or have my appetite for revenge satiated. This court would take care of it, whatever I did.
Contrary to my opinions about the Bourgmestre, I had a little faith in our justice system. It is weak and disorganised, inefficient and subjective, but in this case, I was convinced it would work properly. Despite its failures, it was the best we'd been able to come up with in four thousand years of recorded history. Anyway, as the only barrier between our so-called civilised society and barbarism, it would do.
It had to.
I was here for purely personal reasons. Stephane and the OPA made me wake up to reality. A harsh reality, that we all know instinctively, but hide away in the dark recesses of our mind. If we faced it consciously, we wouldn't be able to go about our daily routines. What is that simple truth that we have trouble accepting?
Power corrupts.
The people in authority, those we supposedly voted for with full knowledge and wisdom, didn't always see us, the public, as people. They saw us as little scribbled crosses in small printed boxes on white sheets of paper. They saw us only as votes.
As long as there was no political angle, we were as interesting to them as what came out of the backside of a dog. The Bourgmestre's treatment of the Traffic Authority when we were doing all we could to avoid a disaster was an example. That her position had now changed by 180 degrees, by commending us, made it all the more evident.
At the end of that fateful day, I had promised myself one thing. Never again would I be at the mercy of some self- serving authority lording it over the rest of us.
For that, I had to decipher the puzzle we had discovered eight months ago, in the hospital parking lot.
The chips.
***
The website was slow, but Akila waited patiently for the connection. Many people were following the trial via Internet, and, as usual, the capacity of the site had been overestimated. He read the latest update, but it contained nothing new. He checked his watch. It was lunchtime. Every day the judge called a short recess for the court to get a bite to eat.
To appease public opinion, the city authorities had found it necessary to connect the computer used by the court stenographer to the Internet. A translation program converted the shorthand into everyday English. There was no legal precedent for this kind of direct transcription, but since television cameras had been forbidden from entering the courtroom, something radical had to be done to allow the city's inhabitants to follow the trial.
Akila sat back and went over what he already knew. It had taken him some time to piece things toget
her, but there were still a few important gaps.
What happened was that someone --Akila was now convinced it was Stephane-- had killed Wellens. Then the British Secret Service had arrested Grayson and retrieved the laser. Akila himself had witnessed that.
His men had been used as a diversion, a very impressive and lethal one, but a diversion, nonetheless. Once they had served their purpose, Wellens had them eliminated so they could not, if caught, identify him.
Their deaths had been avenged, but until Akila put all the pieces of the puzzle together, their deaths would be in vain. The money Grayson paid Wellens was still out there somewhere. If Akila could find it, he could use that money to achieve at least a small proportion of his initial goals.
***
Despite many searches in the last few months, none of the money Wellens had received for the laser he sold had been found. None of the robbers whose bodies had been collected and taken to the hospital had any money on them. Every bike had been taken apart, and every piece carefully inspected, but all were empty. It had taken me a while to figure things out. The best I had been able to come up with was a theory that fit all the facts, many of which we had discovered in the courtroom.
Somehow, Grayson had learnt all the details of the transportation. When she came to Wellens for help, she provided him with all the information. At first, Wellens must have failed to come up with a plan to steal the laser without getting caught.
Then the OPA had come to Wellens with their plan. How the OPA knew who to talk to I didn't know, but I assumed that Wellens must have made a name for himself in the European criminal underground. The OPA needed inside information on the transport authority. Wellens had Stephane working for him on his days off.
The prosecutor had managed to dig up an awful amount of dirt on Stephane. I suppose that, given the circumstances, many doors that would have otherwise remained closed were opened for him.
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