by Tony Bulmer
Karyn gave a soft laugh. She took a shot from the hip flask and sat back in the plastic stacko-chair, watching as his eyes drooped south, heavy with booze and prescription meds. She sat in the chair a long time, the events of the past 24-hours swirling endlessly in her head. She meant to head back to the tiny little cabin she had been allocated, but the thought didn’t much appeal. Instead she dozed off in the chair, her head lolling very slowly to the side as she kept watch at Detroit’s bedside.
Time slipped away into the ocean night. Minutes, hours, maybe even days passed, in an unsettling nightmare of mal-ordered time. The mists of the creatured night swirled around her, and all at once, Karyn became aware of a dark figure, silhouetted against the dull institutional glow of the corridor. The figure hovered in the doorway. She imagined she saw her father standing there, in full dress uniform, one hand resting on his holstered pistol. The vision floated silently for several moments and then just as suddenly as it had appeared, it vanished into the encroaching night.
55
Faz Huq Villa
Lauren Whitaker stood in the doorway of General Faz Huq’s palatial study. She was covered in cuts and mud. Her hair was a wild mess, and the filthy sheet she had wrapped around her nakedness hung from her body, wet, soiled and beyond repair. The brightness room caused her to peer myopically. The scene was shockingly civilized if somewhat bizarre. Lauren stared in wonder at the gilt décor and menagerie of grizzly animal heads. The room was surreal and overpowering, it swirled around her.
The general looked at her with concern, his eyes flickering greedily over her body, then darting away, assessing the party of white uniformed servants who accompanied her. “What are you waiting for? Warm blankets for our guest, and hot tea, with honey and lemon.”
Lauren Whitaker staggered forwards slightly and was promptly stabilized, by the white gloved hands of the general’s attendants.
“My poor dear, where on earth did you come from? Wandering the night like a specter—do you not know that night is a dangerous time for a young woman such as yourself to be roaming the countryside?”
Lauren was guided, by the servants, towards a sumptuous leather Harvard chair, where they made a great deal of fuss about seating her and placing cushions strategically around her to make her more comfortable.
Lauren had driven herself beyond the limits of exhaustion and now that she had reached sanctuary she was overcome with fatigue.
The general stepped closer and examined her, his mind spinning double time, trying to figure not only how the Whitaker woman had escaped, but how in the hell he was he going to handle the situation now? Killing her was the most obvious solution to such a nasty inconvenience, but even better, he could use her—he had in his possession a very useful bargaining chip—if the situation was finessed—handled with subtlety and intelligence, there was no doubt that this most inconvenient visitor could be turned into an advantage of the most lucrative kind.
Lauren Whitaker slumped back in the leather chair, trembling uncontrollably. “They kidnapped me,” she said feebly. “They are terrorists. They have guns. They were going to rape me and kill me.”
The general peered more closely at her. Under all the filth and grime, this feisty American was certainly most attractive. He stared at her some more, ogled her shapely legs as they protruded from the filthy sheet. He suppressed a lascivious smirk. No doubt Tomur and his men had forced themselves on this nubile young temptress—compelled her to commit acts of a quite unspeakable kind. The general licked his lips tentatively and said, “You poor dear. You look as though you have gone through a quite nightmarish ordeal. But you can rest assured that it is over now.” He gave her his most charming smile.
Lauren rose forwards in the chair, her blue eyes filled with panic. “But they are coming! They are right behind me—very soon they will be here. We must hide and prepare ourselves for their attack!”
“Nonsense my dear. You are quite safe. I am sure this whole episode is some frightful misunderstanding. I tell you what we shall do. We shall have a delicious cup of tea and then, if you feel strong enough, we can talk through events, so that I might better understand how I can be of assistance to you. And whilst we do that, my servants will prepare a hot bath and a suite of rooms for you.”
“A hot bath? But I have to get out of here, I have to get back to my husband.”
Faz Huq offered her a cigarette from his jeweled case, “Your husband? And where might he be?”
“I don’t know,” said Lauren weakly. She accepted a cigarette gratefully, with trembling fingers even though she hadn’t smoked in years.
The general took a deep, thoughtful breath and offered her a light. “If we don’t know where your dear husband is to be found, an early reunion might not be possible. Tell me my dear, what is your husband’s name?”
Lauren frowned. Hadn’t everyone in the entire world heard of her husband? She drew on her cigarette and said, “Truman Whitaker, of course. He is the Secretary of State of the United States of America—we were in China attending a social event.” She paused tearfully, attempting, to order the bewildering events in her mind. “We were attacked by a group of men—they killed the ambassador they—”
The general lit his cigarette and held it high, as he regarded his unexpected guest thoughtfully. “My goodness—”
“Lauren—My name is Lauren.”
The general nodded thoughtfully as the servants brought in a heavy loaded tea tray, complete with bone china cups and a stand of iced cakes. At length, after watching the tea being poured he said, “Well, Lauren, that is quite a story. But I must say, I am mystified as to how you might have found your way to my door. You do know where you are don’t you?”
Lauren shook her head very quickly, her blue eyes filled with tears. “They blindfolded me, drugged me. At least I think they did, everything seems like such a dream. I woke up in this place,” she stammered. “I have no idea where I am, or even how long I have been here.” She gulped her tea.
The general gave her a kindly smile, raised his cup and saucer before him and took a gentle sip. He savored the tea. The smile faded. “You are in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.”
Lauren rattled the cup back into the saucer. She reached out to place it on the table that stood next to her. But her arms wouldn’t reach. The table seemed to be moving away, somehow—growing smaller.
The general sat and watched her without comment.
She looked at him, sitting motionless—watching as the entire room began to swell and grow around her, the hideous heads of the decapitated animals bending now, turning to stare at her too.
“The tea,” she said. “So sweet—and yet so bitter.”
The cup and saucer slow motion crashed to the marble floor, breaking apart into a thousand kaleidoscope pieces.
“That would be the opium,” said the General. “Have you ever had opium tea before?”
But the world was swimming away from Lauren now, moving in a slow comfortable arc, as an endless veil of blackness closed down around her.
56
The Admiral
They hadn’t managed to capture all of them, but the ones that did get pulled from the sea were talkers. Jack Senegar and Admiral Kane watched the interviews from the control room. The surviving crewmembers of the Maharashtra were a nasty looking bunch, ragged and swarthy and dirty looking. The exception was a frightened-eyed Information technology graduate from Karachi, who said his name was Jamal. According to Jamal it was the secret police—the ISI who had forced him to take a trip aboard the Maharashtra. They told him he should make a documentary of events aboard the ship and upload the footage to the Internet, by way of a microwave uplink. Jamal knew he was in trouble. As he was talking his eyes bobbed around in their sockets, glistening wetly, like he was going to break out in tears at any moment. He looked thin and nervous and just smart enough to know what kind of trouble he was in, but not so smart as he knew how he was going to get out of it—if at all.
The a
dmiral peered at the closed circuit monitor and cursed in disgust. “A bunch of lousy throwbacks, that’s what they are, every one of them too stupid or desperate to realize what they were signing up for.”
“So we throw them back—after we have disseminated their blabbermouth confessions to the world’s media.”
“See that’s why I like you Jack. You are resourceful and unscrupulous, the kind of man I like to have around when we are facing down a DEFCON 1 kind of morning.” The admiral turned to his ever-present assistant, a sandy haired lieutenant named Parker and said loudly, “You hear that? We are going to throw them back. I want you to see that carried out.”
A look of Zen calmness flowed through Parker’s features. He paused, turned his head very slightly to the side and enquired, “The ocean sir?”
The admiral shot a glance at Jack Senegar then turned back to Parker. “What the hell are you blathering about Parker?”
“You mentioned that I should throw them back Sir. I merely intended to clarify whether or not it was the ocean that you intended me to throw them back into?”
“What kind of inhuman monster do you think I am Parker?”
Parker remained silent, his face a mask of frozen inscrutability.
The admiral raised his eyebrows—“We repatriate our Pakistani friends to prayer-mat central, but feed them up first would you? They look like they just walked out of some panhandling TV advert for the starving unwashed.”
Parker made a snappy salute and about faced, double-timing it out the room like his life depended on it.
The admiral turned to Senegar and said, “Looks like we give our friend the general a call, and lay our cards on the table, tell that hairy little dwarf the way things are going to be.” The admiral leaned over the communications gantry and roared, “Get me General Faz Huq of the ISI on the blower immediately, if not sooner.”
Jack Senegar looked into the closed-circuit monitor. Jamal didn’t look like some Koran thumping Jihadi. He looked frightened, like he was going to burst into tears at any moment. Senegar frowned and said, “We have to finesse this. The general has more hands than a Hindu deity and he plays fast and dirty. Every play he makes comes straight from the bottom of the pack. If we are going to call him, we are going to have to throw down the big cards.”
“I like where you are going with this laddie. If you ask me, it is high time we hurt some bad people.”
“All in good time Bill. First, we need to have a little chat with Kalam Khan.
The admiral gave a snort of disgust. “That ineffectual buffoon isn’t fit to call himself Prime Minister. Pakistan is nothing more than a sham democracy. It is the black-turbaned Mullahs and the gangster hill tribes who call the real shots in that prayer-mat paradise they call a country.”
Jack Senegar’s eyes narrowed, the edges of his mouth tensing very slightly. “Anyone ever tell you that you missed your true calling at the State Department?”
“Those lily-livered government nancy-boys on Capitol Hill are fit for nothing but a napalm enema and you know it Senegar.”
The edges of Jack Senegar’s mouth tightened still further. “They didn’t just blow the ship to make us look bad, they blew it so as we wouldn’t find the EMP weapon.”
“You know what Jack, maybe they don’t have another one. Neither of the other freighters you fingered had anything on board. We searched those pirate hulks from top to bottom and came up with zilch. I can’t keep doing that Jack. Do you have any idea how many freighters sail out of Pakistan every day of the week?”
“Matter of fact I do.”
“Then you see the problem.”
As the two men considered the gravity of the situation a communications Ensign called up from the lower level, “Admiral, Sir. We have the communications patch you requested coming through on the jungle wire.”
Jack Senegar and the admiral sat back in their chairs, as the comm’s screen snapped into life and General Faz Huq appeared, beaming like the heavens were raining gold.
“Gentlemen, what a true delight, that you should seek my counsel—perhaps the two most important men in America. I am honored, indeed privileged, that you should reach out to me in this time of great upheaval, so that you might offer your apologies for the quite unprecedented attack on the Maharashtra, a sovereign ship of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
The admiral leaned forwards, his lips twisting viciously. But, Jack Senegar spoke first. “Spare us the social niceties Faz Huq. That little pleasure cruiser of yours just dropped off an EMP bomb in Mumbai India. Question is, where are the others?”
Faz Huq sat resplendent in his fine white dress uniform, his smile undiminished by the allegation. His eyebrows rose fractionally and said, “Pakistan is a nation of peace. I can assure you that we have no such weapons in our country. I do however understand that America has many EMP weapons. Perhaps the very same criminal elements that sank the Maharashtra initiated the most unfortunate attack on the city of Mumbai?”
The admiral leaned in. “We picked up your people General. Turns out they weren’t quite as ready to die for the cause as you thought they were. On the contrary they were very talkative.”
The general was unperturbed, his expression smug and dismissive. “The Internet is a marvelous thing. It disseminates news as it is, unvarnished by big government lies. I watched the footage of your illegal seizure and destruction of a sovereign vessel of Pakistan. Your actions were grotesque and quite unjustified Admiral. I have no doubt that this flagrant breech of international law will see the free minded peoples of the world rise up in protest against the over-reach of America and its crusader allies.”
Jack Senegar nodded. “You surprise me General, and I confess that I am a little disappointed too. There was a time when you ran a tight game. Back in the day, you would have known every inside detail on this nasty little conspiracy. Now, it would seem that someone else is running the show—The Chinese perhaps?”
“The Chinese?” The general drifted forwards very slightly in his seat, his voice pitching upwards with indignation. He recovered very quickly, sinking backwards in his chair. “I am sure Mr. Senegar that our Chinese friends are beyond reproach. Pakistan values the friendship of the People’s Republic of China almost as closely as that of the United States of America.”
“I just bet you do,” growled the admiral from behind his teeth.
The general seemed not to hear this. Instead, he drew himself up in his seat, as he said, “As proof of the rich and enduring friendship between our two countries, I would like to bring you happy news of Mrs. Lauren Whitaker, wife of your most respected Secretary of State Truman Whitaker.”
Jack Senegar and the General remained poker-faced, neither man turning to look at the other. “What news?” asked Jack Senegar quietly.
The general flashed the brightest of smiles. “Apparently she was kidnapped by brigands of the most unscrupulous kind. They spirited her away and held her captive. Luckily my people were able to rescue her and bring her to a place of safety.” The general’s face glowed with superiority. “Don’t worry gentlemen. She is quite safe. Resting here in my personal villa.”
The hard lines on Jack Senegar’s face grew suddenly deeper. “Your personal Villa? I know it well. My people will be over directly.”
“Not so fast gentlemen, a favor surely demands a favor in return,”
The admiral thumped his fist on the table and snarled, “I will do you a favor you sniveling rat, by letting that comment ride. Because, if I thought for one second you were trying to pull some kind of demand, or otherwise throw the personal safety of Mrs. Whitaker in to jeopardy—well, you can rest assured that there would be consequences.”
General Faz Huq gave a flat smirk. “Consequences? How worrisome.”
Jack Senegar steepled his fingers and gave the general a shrewd, dangerous look. “You know something, I didn’t realize, until very recently, that you were a golfing man General.”
“I despise golf,” scoffed the general rudely.
“It is a pointless relic of British Imperialism. I would have thought you Americans would be of a similar opinion, given your historical subservience and subsequent emancipation from the shackles of the British Empire.”
“I like to watch it on television,” said Jack Senegar. “I find it relaxing. In fact I saw a very interesting match just recently General, one I am sure you would be interested in.”
“I doubt it,” snapped the general.
But Jack Senegar wasn’t finished, “Dubai is one of the best new golfing destinations in the world. It offers the serious golfer an opportunity to compete at the very highest level, and I understand the hotels are fantastic. The hotel Al Muntaha on Jumeirah Beach for example. You would love it General. It offers just the kind of luxury that a man of your status demands. You should pay it a visit. It is very popular with the Chinese clientele in particular—you have a lot of Chinese friends, don’t you General?”
The general’s smirk had vanished. He was looking pale and distinctly bilious. His fingers fidgeted with an object that was out of shot. “I have very many friends Senegar, in all kinds of unexpected places.”
Jack Senegar smiled, nodded. “Like you said earlier General, the Internet is a marvelous thing. It never ceases to surprise me how fast news can spread. Now, Mrs. Whitaker, I am sure she is having a real whale of a time in your esteemed company. But as you can imagine, that husband of hers is anxious to see her back. So, with your permission, I will send my people over to pick her up from that dinky little landing strip you got, out back of that chateau of yours.”
The general made a choking noise.
Jack Senegar didn’t hear it. He said, “I will thank you in advance for your kind hospitality General. Be sure to lookout for any intelligence that comes your way regarding the missing EMP bomb, won’t you now?”
The general made an unintelligible noise that may or may not have been assent. “I am to expect your visit soon?”
“Very soon indeed. You will see that the lady is safely and courteously escorted to the rendezvous. I know that you will. I can rely on you, can’t I General?”
