Terminal Justice

by Alton L. Gansky

  “Yeah. From space.” Timmy turned the doorknob and walked in with David close behind. One wall of the room was filled with electronic devices that looked like VCRs. David had seen similar devices in the homes of his church members who had satellite television. The black boxes with blue LED indicators were the receivers and decoders. Judging by the number of units, the communications division must be tied into a dozen different satellites.

  “Hey, Timmy,” a resonant voice called. “You’ve already been here, man. Don’t you remember?” The voice came from an obese man with sagging jowls in the corner of the room. He was leaning back in a large, heavily padded executive chair and was reading the comic section of the San Diego Union.

  “Hi, George,” Timmy said with a wave. “No, I didn’t forget. I want to show David something.” The man looked David over quickly. David didn’t recognize him, but he hadn’t expected to. The last time David was in this room was at the beginning of the workday, not three hours into the evening. A different shift would be working at night.

  “Okay,” the man replied. “Say, I forgot to ask you earlier. Did you like that new Nintendo game I loaned you?”

  “Yeah, it’s real neat, but I can’t get past the second level.”

  “That’s okay. Just keep trying; you’ll get the hang of it.” The man turned to David. “Are you new around here?”

  “I started a few months ago,” David said, trying to sound pleasant. “Are you here all alone?”

  “Yeah. Normally, Hector is here too, but he’s got the flu. First casualty of the fall.”

  “Can you work alone?” David asked, hoping he didn’t appear too inquisitive.

  “Sure,” George replied, riffling his paper, “it’s all automated. I’m just here in case something bad goes down. Like the Dr. Rhodes thing. Occasionally, someone in the field needs an answer right away, then I can get pretty busy putting people in contact with other people. But most of the time it’s pretty laid back.”

  A beep emitted from the computer console. “Uh-oh, I must be a prophet. Here comes a call now.” George threw his paper on the floor and turned his attention to the monitor. “It routes itself, you know. All I have to do is make sure there’re no glitches. If there are, then I take the call myself and start playing telephone tag with whoever wants to reach whomever.”

  “Well, we won’t bother you,” David said. George waved nonchalantly. “What’s down here, Timmy?” David pointed down another hall that led from the communications room.

  “Offices,” Timmy replied.

  “Are those the offices with all the computers?” David kept his voice low. Timmy nodded. Casting a glance back at George and seeing that he was engrossed in watching the communiqué’s connections being made, David walked down the hall. The hall was short and had two doors on one wall. One door had a small plastic sign that read DIRECTOR, COMMUNICATIONS. The other door had a similar plaque that said PRIVATE. Have you been in here before, Timmy?”

  Shaking his head, Timmy said, “Uh-uh. It’s locked.”

  “I’ll bet that special key of yours will open it. Want to try?” Timmy shrugged, pulled out his key that dangled on his new Shamu key chain, and inserted it in the lock. Nothing happened. Timmy turned the key again, but still nothing. “Strange.” David said quietly.

  “Not really,” a husky, dry voice said.

  David snapped his head around and looked down the corridor. Standing there with her arms folded across her chest, a cigarette dangling from her mouth, was a middle-aged woman with a streak of gray in her hair. Her eyes were squinting against the rising stream of smoke that emanated from the tip of the cigarette. Standing behind her was George.

  “You can’t open it because the room is private—just like the sign says.”

  “Oh, hi, Eileen,” Timmy said, smiling. Eileen didn’t return the smile. “This is my friend David.”

  “I know who he is, Timmy,” Eileen said firmly. “What I don’t know is why he’s trying to get into a room where he doesn’t belong.”

  Timmy dropped his head. It was clear that he had picked up the anger in the woman’s voice. “I was just … just …”

  “That’s all right, Timmy,” David offered as he put his hand on Timmy’s shoulder. “She’s not angry with you. She’s angry with me.”

  “Why?” Timmy wondered aloud. “We didn’t do nothin’.”

  Eileen inhaled deeply on her cigarette and blew out a long blue stream of smoke. David felt the odd compulsion to remind her that smoking in office areas was illegal in California, but he didn’t think she’d care.

  “Actually, Timmy, I let my curiosity get the best of me. It’s always been a problem of mine. Something about closed doors piques my interest.”

  Neither Eileen nor George moved.

  “That’s my office you’re attempting to break into.”

  “That door says director of communications,” David said meekly. “Isn’t that your office? We didn’t go in there.”

  “I have two offices,” she replied curtly. “Not that it’s any of your business, now is it?”

  “Of course not,” David replied defensively. “But I think you are misunderstanding my intentions here.”

  “I’m not misunderstanding anything, Dr. O’Neal.” She approached David and Timmy slowly until she was only three feet away. David could smell the tobacco smoke, and Timmy coughed. She held out her hand and said, “May I have the key, please?” David removed the key from the lock and meekly handed it to her.

  “My Shamu key chain,” Timmy cried and stomped his feet.

  “There’s no need to upset the boy,” David said firmly.

  Eileen Corbin took the cigarette from her mouth with one hand and raised the key chain to eye level with the other. “Do you want your key and key chain back, Timmy?” she asked coolly.

  “Yes, it’s mine,” he stammered. “A.J. gave it to me.”

  “Timmy,” Eileen said, “this key is a big responsibility. You must always make sure that you use it only in those places where you work. Do you understand?”

  Timmy’s eyes were brimming with tears. “Yes. Yes, I understand.”

  “All right, I’m going to give this back to you, but I want you to promise not to do this again.”

  “I promise. I promise.” Timmy was hopping from one foot to the other with his hands stretched out before him.

  “Here you go,” Eileen said and dropped the key into his palm.

  “Thank you, Eileen, thank you.” Timmy stepped forward and hugged her quickly but backed away when the smoke caused him to cough.

  “Go back to your room,” Eileen said, “and watch some television. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Timmy was gone a moment later.

  “I suppose you have a few things to say to me,” David said.

  “Nope,” Eileen replied perfunctorily. “That’s not my job. I’ll leave that up to A.J.” David felt his heart stop. “I will, however, invite you to leave and not come back into my department.”

  David flushed and left without a word.

  22

  MAHLI STUDIED THE MAN IN THE MIRROR. HIS shirtless torso was slightly hunched, his eyes red with fleshy pouches beneath, his brow wrinkled. He had lost weight. Not because of the famine but because of weariness.

  “Tell me, Noonan,” he said to the young black man who stood just outside the bathroom door. The man was in his early twenties, tall, robust, and fiercely loyal. He had worked for Mahli since he was seventeen and had distinguished himself by doing what he was told without question. That undiminished obedience extended to his firing a .30-caliber machine gun from the back of a technical—a truck with a high-caliber machine gun mounted on the back—into a crowded gathering of a rival clan.

  “It goes just as you planned,” the young man said with a voice that seemed too shrill for his age and build. “On your orders we began to roll out truckloads of food from Marka, Mogadishu, Hobyo, Hafun, and Kismayu. The food was distributed near existing foreign-relief camps. The people
are very grateful.”

  “And the flyers?”

  “Distributed with the food, but many cannot read, so we shouted the news to them.”

  “Do they believe?”

  “Many do now; many more will soon.” The young man broke into a huge grin. “Soon everyone will know that the foreign food is tainted and that only the food you provide is trustworthy.”

  Nodding, Mahli returned his gaze to the mirror. Two weeks ago he had not stood with a stoop, nor had his face been marred by as many wrinkles. But the days were taking their toll. The planning and supervision had been tiring work, but that didn’t bother him. What weighed heavy on him was the memory of his brother kicking and struggling as he plummeted to the ground. The image played over and over in his mind. Someone knew how to find him and to deliver their message by killing his brother, Mukatu. There had always been that risk, but Mahli had assumed that he could and would strike back immediately. But he couldn’t. He had finally figured out that the only group who would be so brash as to challenge him was Barringston Relief. The attackers had all been white, and that ruled out rival warlords. They were the only ones with sufficient reason and resources to do the deed. He had killed that white female doctor months ago, and now the Barringston people had exacted revenge. His theory was verified by the man who had rented the helicopter to the foreigners. He confessed, after a torturous hour of questioning, that Americans had rented the craft and that they paid in American dollars. Mahli killed the man himself.

  His first impulse had been to slash and burn every Barringston camp in Somalia, but while that would make him feel good, it would also turn the tide of public opinion against him. He had worked too hard and too long to destroy his path to power and riches on impulse. He would take his revenge. He didn’t know how or when, but fate would give him the opportunity. And when it did, he would make his brother’s murderers squirm and die. He would savor every minute of that glorious day.

  “You have done well,” Mahli said, causing the young man to grin even wider. “Now go. I want every step of the plan to work perfectly. I hold you responsible. Succeed, and I will make you rich and powerful. Fail, and I will cut the heart out of every one of your family members.” The man’s grin evaporated immediately.

  There was a sick feeling in David’s stomach, an emptiness that had been suddenly and fully flooded with bile. But David knew he hadn’t been stricken with influenza or any other disease, unless guilt could be defined as an illness. From his seat behind the desk, he looked across his office to the tall figure standing in the doorway.

  “May I come in?” A.J. asked calmly.

  “Of course,” David replied meekly, struggling to maintain eye contact.

  A.J. walked slowly into the room and took a seat opposite David. As he sat, David noticed that he didn’t sit upright as he usually did. For that matter, A.J. looked tired, vapid. He slumped his tall frame in the leather chair and gazed at David.

  “I need to talk to you, David,” he said in hushed tones. “I think you know what about.”

  David nodded slowly and sighed heavily. He felt his face blush red. “Yes, I can imagine. If it makes things easier, I can have my things out of here by the end of the day.”

  A.J. looked puzzled then shocked. “Out? Do you mean quit?”

  “I thought that you might be thinking of firing me.”

  “Oh, no,” A.J. said shaking his head. “Nothing so extreme. We need you, David. I need you.”

  “But my behavior—”

  A.J. stopped him with an upraised hand. “Enough, David. I didn’t come here to fire you or scold you. I didn’t even come here to ask you what you were doing. I assume you had your reasons.”

  “Well …”

  “No, David, I don’t want to know. All I want to know is this: Can I trust you? That’s important to me—very important. You and I have traveled a lot of ground over the last couple of months. We’ve been halfway around the world and back. That creates a bond that’s hard to break.” A.J. squeezed the bridge of his nose with his hand and sighed. “I’ve been under a great deal of pressure lately, David. Sometimes the work is made unbearable by all the pain, hunger, and violence. It’s a heavy burden, a crushing burden at times. I’m able to endure it because of the people in this building. It’s their combined strength and purpose that makes it possible for me to get up one more day and do battle. I trust the people in our organization. I trust them with my life, and I trust them with the lives of the innocents who depend on us for an extra day or two of life. And—David, this is very important—I have to know that I can trust you in all matters and at all times.”

  “I’m not sure where to begin or what to say,” David offered.

  “Just tell me that I can trust you. I believe in you. I just need to hear that I can trust you in your own voice.”

  “But don’t you want an explanation?”

  “No, that’s not necessary.”

  Forgiveness. That’s what A.J. was offering. Unmitigated, undiluted, unpolluted forgiveness. The kind of forgiveness that doesn’t demand explanation, only repentance. It was the same kind of absolution modeled in the Bible, the same kind of forgiveness about which David had preached so many times. Now A.J. was offering it freely and without limits. How anyone could suspect A.J. of criminal behavior was beyond David.

  “Yes, A.J., you can trust me.”

  A.J. smiled a broad but strangely weak smile. “I knew I could, David. I knew I could.” With that, A.J. rose and walked out the door. The sight of the normally convivial man meandering away stoop shouldered fanned the fire of guilt in David’s belly. He decided then that the FBI and CIA were on their own. David would do nothing to further their illusion. If they wanted inside help, they would need to find it elsewhere.

  A.J. lay down on the couch in his office with his arm over his eyes to block the overhead lights.

  “Did you fire him?” Eileen Corbin asked acerbically.

  “No,” was A.J.’s brief reply.

  “It would be wise,” she said. “He could present a danger to us in the future. I have incriminating equipment in that room. Anyone with a little computer knowledge could have accessed it.”

  “I’m not going to fire him,” A.J. repeated.

  Sheila, who sat in one of the leather chairs near the couch, glanced at Roger then back to A.J. “I have to agree with Eileen. I don’t trust that preacher.”

  “I do,” A.J. said. “Besides, firing him would only make us look guilty. He has demonstrated his courage and loyalty. I won’t cut him adrift for one bad display of judgment.”

  “I still think—” Eileen began.

  “No, and that’s final,” A.J. snapped. “Now leave it alone.”

  “What could he have been looking for?” Sheila asked. “And who was he working for?”

  “The FBI and CIA,” A.J. said calmly.

  “What?”

  “The FBI and CIA,” he repeated. “We broke into a CIA computer. They know it, but they don’t know who did it. They suspect us because the pictures we stole were of areas in which we have work and in which one of our workers was killed. Since the crime occurred on U.S. soil, the FBI must investigate. David’s the new kid on the block and a former minister to boot, making him the likeliest candidate for recruitment. They probably played on his patriotism, speaking of national security and the like. David is a sensitive soul who easily responds to such appeals. Those people can be very persuasive if need be.”

  “How do you know all this?” Eileen asked.

  “Because it’s what I would do in their place,” A.J. replied wearily. “It’s not especially creative, but the plan is functional. Now he will turn them down flat before he will attempt to betray us again.”

  “How can you be sure?” Roger inquired.

  “Because I know David. I know him better than he knows himself. I didn’t build Barringston Relief by making bad decisions, you know.” Silence prevailed. No one wanted to challenge A.J.’s judgment.

  Roger
broke the silence. “I want to go back to Somalia and finish my mission.”

  “I know you do,” A.J. responded evenly. “I admire your zeal, but the answer is no. We got our point across when you and Sheila booted his brother out of the helicopter. I want Mahli’s head as bad as any of you, but things have changed. He’s feeding the hungry, and he’s the hero of the land. I know he’s no hero, and I know that he has some devious plan cooking in that twisted mind of his, but if we off him now we could destabilize the whole region. We’d be shooting ourselves in the foot to make ourselves feel better.”

  “He’s also telling the people that our food is poisoned,” Roger insisted. “They’re leaving our camps and refusing our help.”

  “And if we kill Mahli now, will that reinstate the people’s belief in us? Now is not the time to kill Mahli. There will be a time, and I promise you that you can do the job. But not now. Now if you folks don’t mind, I need a few moments to rest. I haven’t been sleeping well of late.” A.J. rolled over on the couch, turning his back to his three friends.

  “Oh,” A.J.’s now muffled voice intoned. “I want you all to leave David alone. Is that clear?”

  “I’m not sure that’s rational,” Eileen said.

  “It’s not, but leave him alone anyway. Got it?” They acknowledged his command. “Good. Thank you. I love you all. Now go away.”

  23

  DAVID WAS AMAZED TO SEE HOW FAST THE WORLD could change. Four months ago he and a handful of others from Barringston Relief had walked what was often dangerous ground in Africa. In Ethiopia they had seen heartrending scenes; Somalia, which they had not been able to visit, was a hotbed of civil war and warlords, a hotbed accentuated by hordes of homeless starving people. All that was in September of last year, now a new year had arrived and was only two weeks old.

  The new year brought interesting news, at least according to the San Diego edition of the Los Angeles Times. Sipping coffee and nibbling on an English muffin, David sat in his now usual booth in his now usual restaurant and leisurely perused the paper as he did each workday. In a special section of the paper called “World Report,” he read a lengthy article on East Africa. None of the news was news to him since he received briefings almost daily from the communications department of Barringston Relief.