Tom Clancy's Power Plays 1 - 4

by Tom Clancy

  He was a narcissistic dabbler, interested in gratifying his own conceits, and would leap for the safety net of privilege if the consequences of his actions overtook him.

  ”Sawasdee. My place isn’t nearly as well appointed as Kersik’s residence, but, as a humble exile and outsider, it’s the best I can do.”

  This from Khao Luan himself. Seated at the head of the table, he raised his hands in the traditional Thai greeting, palms together as if in prayer, his fingertips just below his nose to indicate familiarity. On their previous meetings, Zhiu noted, he had steepled his hands lower and closer to his chest—the stranger’s wai.

  The significance of the gesture was not lost on Zhiu, and it admittedly distressed him … for was a man not measured in large part by his associations? Still, he returned it without hesitation. The time for misgivings was long past. And corrupt as his occupation might be, the Thai was without pretense and worthy of respect.

  “Please,” Luan said, indicating an empty chair on his right. “Make yourself comfortable.”

  Zhiu went over to the table and regarded him carefully. Round and balding, Luan had a smooth wide forehead, bow-shaped lips, and a light mustache and chin beard. His cheekbones were perfectly flat and covered with soft, shiny pads of flesh. He sat with his chair pushed back from the table, his short-sleeved batik shirt hanging out over his waist sash, straining at the seams around his big stomach, and unbuttoned at the collar to reveal a thick ring of Hmong silver. There were dark blotches of perspiration on his chest and under his arms.

  “The American,” Zhiu said, lowering himself into his chair. “Where is he?”

  Luan nodded toward the door in the right wall.

  “My friend Xiang and his sea wolves are keeping a close eye on him.”

  “Has he told you anything?”

  Luan was silent a moment before replying.

  “He’s been, ah, unable to communicate this morning, but I expect he’ll be coming around shortly,” he said. “Maybe then we’ll all learn what we want to know.”

  Zhiu darted a surprised glance across the table at General Kersik. “He was captured, what, four days ago?”

  Kersik brought his head up and down, a slow nod.

  “He’s a tough one,” he said.

  “No need to be concerned, we’ll get what we want out of him soon enough,” Luan said. He smiled thinly. “The White Lady has her ways.”

  Zhiu raised his eyebrows. “Heroin?”

  “They’ve scarcely been apart since we introduced him to her yesterday,” Luan said. “She’ll charm him into talking.”

  “It is barbaric.”

  “It is necessary,” Kersik said. “And preferable to some alternatives.”

  “As our prisoner should conclude for himself before too long,” Luan said.

  They were quiet. Zhiu found himself staring at the enormous pirate. He seemed somehow to exist in his own space, immovable and dangerous, his calm unfeeling eyes those of a Mesozoic creature poised to strike.

  “What I think ought to worry us is the woman,” Nga said.

  Zhiu shifted his attention to him. “Chu, is that her name?”

  “Kirsten Chu. She’s dropped out of sight. And there’s no telling what she’s discovered about our involvement with Monolith, or what sort of proof she’s taken with her. A tremendous amount of information could have been routed through her division of the company.”

  “I assume we have people looking for her in Singapore?”

  “And elsewhere,” Luan said.

  “Still,” Nga said. “It could hurt us badly if the Americans learn of—”

  “I’ve been trying to reassure Nga that he’s jumping ahead of things,” Kersik interrupted. “Let’s stay with what we know. This could have been a case of industrial espionage, having nothing to do with us.”

  “She’s repeatedly accessed Monolith’s most sensitive financial databases from her office computer terminal. Made dozens of telephone calls to the UpLink groundstation in Johor. .. and probably many more that can’t be traced because they went to a secure line,” Nga said. “Are you suggesting that we simply forget about her?”

  “You really must try to become a more receptive listener,” Kersik said. “Without the American to guide her, it’s likely she won’t know where to turn, or what to do with any documentation she might have. Probably she’ll surface on her own. If not, we’ll eventually find her.” He motioned toward Zhiu Sheng with a slow, gliding wave of his hand. “Let us put speculation aside, and get to the point of why our comrade has traveled here.”

  Zhiu nodded slightly. Despite his equable manner, Kersik was looking hard at him.

  “I’ve brought positive news,” he said. “Those I represent are prepared to supply whatever munitions you require. The high-speed boats will be more difficult to obtain, but should also be forthcoming.”

  “And the landing craft?”

  “You’ll have to settle for fewer than requested.”

  “How many?”

  “Three, perhaps four.”

  Kersik pinched the bridge of his nose. “The assault rifles, they’ve never been fired?”

  Zhiu knew he was thinking about their integrated silencers, which quickly became ineffective with use.

  “They are factory-new Type 85’s.”

  Kersik continued to look thoughtful. “We must be guaranteed prompt delivery. As you know, our window of opportunity is quite small.”

  “Any date we agree upon will be firm,” Zhiu said. “You have my word.”

  Kersik drew a long breath.

  “I’m concerned about how the reduced number of watercraft will effect our invasion capabilities,” he said. “It means revising the entire operational plan.”

  “Perhaps not as drastically as you might think. The attack boats are heavily armed. And the amphibious craft can be refitted to hold larger complements. Insofar as available manpower, there would likely be no difference at all. If you want me to go over the specific modifications—”

  “Later,” Kersik said. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Zhiu’s face. “Your government. What is its position toward our venture?”

  “Officially, nothing is known of it.”

  “And speaking practically?”

  “I can tell you there will be no opposition at any level,” Zhiu said, selecting his words with utmost care.

  Kersik nodded with satisfaction.

  “Yes,” he said. “That much is good news.”

  Zhiu let his eyes roam around the table.

  “I hope, then,” he said, “that none of you will object to the terms of payment.”

  Luan pursed his lips, reacting with predictable wariness.

  “Which are?” he said.

  “I’m obliged to require the full sum in advance.”

  “What?” Nga said, his eyes flashing incredulously. “You can’t be serious.”

  Zhiu remained very still.

  “We are asking for a great deal on short notice,” he said. * The suppliers have expenditures of their own. It is reasonable for them to expect hard currency in return for the risks they are taking.”

  “And what of our risks?” Nga said in a tight voice. “I’ve done much for you and the Zhongnanhai you represent. My bank’s international position could be irreparably damaged if things go wrong.”

  “That is very much appreciated. But, regrettably, this isn’t a situation in which my superiors can barter off a portion of the cost, or make any other concessions.”

  Nga bridled. “Forgive me, Zhiu, but it sounds to me as if you’re offering up excuses for PL A profiteers. How can you expect us to—?”

  “Enough,” Kersik interjected. “I understand your frustration, Nga. But we are compelled by certain exigencies, and must acknowledge that our needs are rather special.” He glanced at Luan. “What do you say?”

  The Thai hesitated a moment, then shrugged his chunky shoulders.

  “Attached as I am to my money, I nevertheless consider my portion of t
he expenses already spent, and suppose it makes little difference when I physically part company with it,” he said. “Let’s not bicker over what can’t be changed, and instead move on to important matters of planning. We’ve been so focused on Sandakan and what comes after, that none of us are talking about the data-storage vaults in the United States. They are essential to our success and at least as highly guarded as—”

  The door to the rice bam opened, surprising them. They fixed their attention upon Xiang as one of his pirates leaned through from the other side, addressed him in a low whisper, then withdrew into the bam, leaving the door ajar.

  Xiang tumed back around, looking straight at the Thai.

  “The American’s opened his eyes,” he said.

  The room went silent.

  Luan smiled slightly and cast an eager glance around the table.

  “Excuse me, brothers,” he said, heaving his bulk off the chair. ‘*I have to go to work.”

  He followed Xiang into the bam, pushing the door heavily shut behind him.

  TWELVE

  SOUTH KALIMANTAN, INDONESIA

  SEPTEMBER 22, 2000

  BLACKBURN CAME TO WITH A START, DISORIENTED, BATHED in sweat, clusters of black motes floating across his vision. His eyes were battered and swollen, his body throbbing with pain in a dozen places. Where was he? Why couldn’t he move his arms?

  He realized he was in a chair … slumped forward in a hard, straight-backed chair… and jerked to an upright position. Too quickly. Dizziness washed over him and his stomach contracted. He fought to push back the nausea, the taste of vomit rising in his throat. For several seconds it was touch-and-go, but then the sickness began to recede.

  He squeezed his pulsing eyes shut and sucked in breath after labored breath.

  Okay. All right. Let’s try it again. But slower.

  He rolled his head to relax the aching tendons of his neck, lifted it an inch or two—slow, slow—and opened his eyes again.

  Better.

  Blinking, he looked himself over.

  His shirt was bloody and torn. Had he been shot? No, no, he didn’t think so. There had been a bad tumble in the hotel stairway. Then that iron claw, or whatever it was, sinking into his arm. He’d been trying to get it out, and then somebody or something had hit him. And afterward .. . ?

  What had happened afterward?

  Max gulped down another mouthful of air. Come on, come on, what happened? He got little besides brief, elusive flashes, and wondered if he’d sustained a concussion from the blow to his head, or maybe the fall down the stairs. There had been long periods of oblivion alternating with moments when he half awakened and took in confused snatches of reality.

  At one point he’d been in a truck … the delivery truck outside the hotel. That was where he’d first been handcuffed, in the vehicle’s rear compartment. There had been a body back there next to him. A dead man, probably the original driver. He had been stripped of his clothing, and a mixture of blood and some other, viscous fluid was oozing from his ear. Max remembered lying there beside the naked corpse on sheets wet with gore … and that was all. He didn’t know how long he’d been kept in the truck or where he’d been taken afterward. Just had a vague sense of time slipping away. Then being lifted, carried a short distance, and dropped flat on his back.

  More time passed. He’d been in a close space, registered monotonous rolling, pitching movements. It had been like that for a while. Then a strong, freshening wind gusted over him. There had been a salt breeze. An abrupt realization that he was on a boat, they were transporting him somewhere on a boat …

  He’d slipped back into unconsciousness, awakened once somewhere else. Another truck? Another boat? It was no good, that part was almost entirely a blank. He could recall nothing about it except for having been moved yet again to what he supposed was his present location, a bam of some sort. It was wide and dim and stewingly hot with a thatch roof and steps rising to a loft. Both his wrists had been cuffed to the arms of the chair. The restraints were standard police-issue metal bracelets.

  His watchdogs were anything but cops, though. He’d recognized a few from the bunch that had pursued him at the hotel, including the big one, the one he’d first seen waiting in the truck, and who had come at him through the service door.…

  Blackburn felt his head clearing. With each interval of consciousness more of what had happened came back to him, his scattered bits and pieces of memory weaving into a coherent thread and drawing him toward a full recognition of his predicament.

  Here in the bam he’d been asked questions, mostly by the one who seemed to be in charge—Luan, that was his name. Asked questions and beaten hard when he refused to answer. But that hadn’t been the worst of it. Not by far. He had been through brutal ordeals before, and believed he could have withstood their interrogation for quite some time.

  Holy shit. These goddamned bastards came to the same conclusion, didn’t they?

  The hairs at the back of his neck prickling, he remembered the needle. How could he have forgotten it even for a second!

  Maybe, though, that was why his mind had switched itself off for a while. To provide a cessation from what was otherwise unavoidable. To spare him from thinking about the needle.

  The first time had been the roughest. They’d held him down, tom off his shirt sleeve, and jabbed the needle into the bend of his arm. Because he’d been struggling, the one with the syringe had botched several attempts at piercing a blood vessel. But eventually he’d succeeded, pressing the needle flat against his skin, inserting it down the length of the vein, drawing a little blood to make sure he’d gotten a good hit. And then depressing the plunger.

  Blackburn had made a small sound, a kind of moan, and slid back in the chair, his head nodding, his eyes rolling back under their lids. Wildcat tingles had rushed up his arm in what seemed to be a direct line to his brain, then widened out into ripples of numbing warmth that spread through his flesh and bones and viscera until he went slack. And the horror, the really overpowering horror of it, was that a part of him had welcomed the nullity it brought. He’d trained his mind and body to endure the severest punishments, but to have his pain drawn out of him in a great merciful whoosh like heaven taking a deep breath….

  Baifen, Luan called it.

  Chinese slang for heroin.

  She was a seductive bitch, and that was what they were counting on.

  His memories rushing back on him now. Max glanced at the inside of his left arm and saw the black and blue where he’d been injected . .. how many times? Five, maybe six. There were blisters under his elbow where the spike had slipped and some of the drug was inadvertently pumped between his skin and muscle. The first couple of times they’d shot him up, a ferocious rash had spread from his elbows to his shoulders and neck, but his system had adjusted, and the redness and terrible itch were slowly fading.

  Blackburn was still taking stock when he heard movement to his right. He looked up and saw one of his guards—he’d counted four of them in the dimness—step over to a door on the opposite wall, open it, then lean out to speak with somebody on the other side … the big guy from the delivery truck, who was also apparently his superior. When he came striding into the bam a moment later, Luan was right behind him.

  Here we go again. Max thought, steeling himself.

  He watched in silence as Luan moved to a table about six feet away, where his captors kept the heroin and works, as well as a water pitcher and small gas burner for cooking the drug. He saw orange flame spurt from the burner, saw Luan drop a chunk of the heroin into a spoon, then saw him mix it with some water and then hold the spoon over the heat.

  After perhaps a minute of boiling he dropped a cotton swab into the spoon, let it swell up with liquid, pushed the needle into it, and raised the plunger to filter the narcotic solution up through the cotton.

  “My friend, you have kept your secrets against much persuasion, but sooner or later you must tell me what 1 need to know,” Luan said, approac
hing with the hypo. He spoke English well enough, though his tongue kept bumping against the wrong syllables.

  Max sat there without response.

  “You will not compromise your honor by breaking your silence,” Luan said. Coming closer. “Your employers would be pleased with you. A man cannot be expected to tolerate more than you already have on their behalf.”

  Max said nothing.

  Luan shook his head. It had become something of a perverse, repetitive drill—the unanswered questions, the beating, and, once that failed, the junk. They were simply exploring their options. Max thought. Reasoning that sooner or later he’d either succumb to the pain or the desire for release. Insidious cocksuckers. Given intravenously, heroin rushed into the brain’s pleasure centers within seconds. Addiction would take a while, but the craving for it…

  That was the worst part, wasn’t it? The part his mind had cringed away from acknowledging, and the reason it had shut itself down.

  The craving had already wormed its fine but perceptible roots into him.

  Luan came another step forward.

  “I already know who you are, and who you work for, leaving only one thing unknown,” he said. ”What were you after. Max Blackburn?”

  Silence.

  “One last thing,” Luan said. “Tell me.”

  It occurred to Max that he would have been interested in hearing Luan answer that very same question… and that his ignorance on that score was a good indication Kirsten had managed to stay outside his tracking range. You dealt with the uglies of the world long enough, you came to understand they could rationalize the vilest actions imaginable … his present circumstances unfortunately being a clear case in point. Had they gotten her in their talons, they would have used any means available to squeeze her for what they wanted.