by Dusty Miller
“There are one or two packages.”
“Ah, yes, I see that.” The lady cleared her throat, still staring directly at Liam in the marsh. Liam doubted if she could actually make him out. “Ian has been held up…ambushed. He says he has them surrounded.”
“How many are there?”
“Ah—a half a dozen, anyways. You know him, he always exaggerates.”
“Shit. Look. My sled’s gone, I don’t know where it is. These guys must have a boat somewhere.”
“Okay. Orders?”
“Keep an eye on the mouth of that bay. Try to find that sled. They must have a boat ashore along here somewhere. Maybe around the corner, maybe on the far side. I’m going to need a bit of time here.” Liam’s sled might be fifty metres away, it might be fifteen hundred.
He didn’t think it was much further than that. After clambering up through the swamp and the boulders, he wasn’t quite sure you could get there from here. He was really going to be hurting tomorrow.
“Roger that.”
“What about Ian?”
There was an audible chuckle over the encrypted link.
“I wouldn’t want to be them guys right about now. He says the car’s a mess.”
Liam laughed softly, wondering exactly how many leeches he would eventually be pulling off. At least one, he judged, as he watched the thing clamber up his dry-suit leg a few inches above the muck. The trouble was that every itch and tickle magically transformed itself into another leech, most likely imaginary. There was something inside the suit with him though.
“And why is that?” He couldn’t help himself.
He had to ask.
“For one thing. He’s just gotten the damned thing paid off.”
Ian’s insurance was going to skyrocket.
“Damn.”
“What?”
“The best way out of here is back the way I came.”
He was looking at a sheer rock face, sloping at a good seventy degrees, and there was dense brush showing above that.
“That’s okay. You’ll need a bath anyways.”
“Yeah, laugh all you want. I’m glad someone’s having a good time.”
***
It was the dream again.
“How long do you think this can go on, Mister Kimball?” And then that hoarse chuckle, and from somewhere off to the left, sitting on a chair that squeaked with every little movement, that hysterical giggle from the one Liam always thought of as Flaky. “Surely this must bore you. If I may be so bold?”
There was this shock when the glowing coals of a cigar hit your back.
“I have to admit it bores me, yes, even I, Mister Kimball. So debasing, so demoralizing to the individual, don’t you agree, Liam?”
You knew it was coming, but they had you strapped face down on the table. Three or four people in the room at all times. There was no hope of escape. One look at that burning, yellow ochre landscape just outside the room, was enough to tell you that much.
“Honestly, Mister Kimball, I think of my people, and of course myself, and it seems that we will be scarred for life by our own actions here today. Surely you would be the first to spare us this evil, my good friend and colleague?”
There was the sickening stench, the noise as your flesh sizzled. What was particularly disturbing was the fact that they were leaving the ash on the end as they smoked, allowing it to grow longer and longer. They were all puffing away. There was something about that exquisitely fine crushing sensation as the ash crumbled against your open flesh, the heat of the ember fast approaching a hole that they had already used innumerable times.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk, Mister Kimball…”
The enemy, a Middle Eastern terror group actively seeking the Apocalypse, according to all of their literature (which was extensive), apparently smoked the finest Cuban cigars. Ultimately, this led to their undoing. It was very hard to get them there from Cuba. Their taste in cigars had been their undoing.
Working their way up and down his spine, the pain was never-ending. Your body jolted against the restraints with every application. The cold douche of the water when they boarded him (every other day) hit the scars, or suppurating wounds rather, like hot acid. When another session, another day was done, his only relief was the short trip outside to the box. They would put him inside and he would wait, shivering in the darkness, praying for sleep or unconsciousness. When they took him at night, especially going home, it was a minute and a half of blessed heaven, to look at the stars and feel the cool night breeze on your sweat.
Every muscle, every bone, every cell and every fibre of his being ached.
His stubbornness was what had saved him. Unofficially, his captors, members of a Middle-Eastern terror group, were working for the Chinese in return for certain small favours—hi-tech anti-aircraft weapons for example. The Chinese would deny it, of course.
It had been a conscious decision not to break. To break would bring relief, an end to the torment. They would kill him sooner rather than later. This would happen only after they were satisfied that they had wrung every little thing that they possibly could out of him. His only hope, if there was any hope at all, was to stay alive as long as possible and that meant to suffer.
This was, Liam suspected, the root cause of his current sabbatical, which was meant to be a low-key operation. Keep him busy, but take off some of the stress for a while. That was the idea.
They simply didn’t believe it.
Liam says he didn’t break.
We have no evidence that he did break—quite the contrary.
The few remaining enemy combatants, extensively debriefed, some of whom appeared to be cooperating fully, all said the same thing, and marveled.
Liam Kimball didn’t break.
The trouble was that the Ministry, the Circus, didn’t believe it.
There was a kind of psychopathy there, at least that was his impression—the only thing that he was ever likely to have to go on.
An impression.
Liam Kimball didn’t break, therefore he must be a psychopath. Psychopaths were dangerous to employ, and difficult to control. They were glad enough to get him back. It sent a message to others who might find themselves in similar circumstances. It was a promise kept.
We won’t forget you.
We will come for you.
It was like he was being tested again. This one was supposed to be a nice, easy job.
They were keeping mum on any conclusions drawn. He had been wondering if he would, or even could take a desk job. He was wondering if anything like that would be offered. The Ministry was watching him from afar. That was a foregone conclusion. The trouble was that there was nothing that wasn’t sensitive and confidential in that environment, and Liam was not well-suited to running errands and filing minutiae.
He’d had plenty of time to think, and thinking had probably saved his life as much as his innate stubbornness. His career was definitely on hold.
The box still gave him nightmares.
Minutes, hours, or days would pass. His prison was made out of shipping pallets. The boards were maple, about an inch thick. They were nailed on with a gun. They were wired and nailed together at the sides, with two skids for the roof. They’d stapled a piece of clear plastic sheeting on the top and that was his home. It was five and half feet long, possibly four and a half high. It was shot and clipped into a rough concrete pad with powder-driven nails. This was so he and it could be hosed down once in a while. He was fed and watered once a day, thin cold soup of some indeterminate kind that tasted mostly of cabbage and maybe a bit of soap. It had that grey-water look to it, and yet they wanted to keep him alive. A couple of raw potatoes or carrots once a week were considered a treat, and he couldn’t help but agree with his captors on that one.
He’d lost thirty pounds in a very short time, and yet they still kept him alive.
That much was clear, otherwise why not just do it?
They kept him alive for some purpose. So he ate the
soup and tried to live on, one minute at a time. At the time, he had thought endlessly of killing himself, but he was under constant watch.
It was all he could do, to suffer, to live on, and ultimately, not go mad.
That was the sorriest of clichés—afterwards. Once he got home.
Once he’d survived.
Once he’d seen a few of them in the dock and one or two of them in hell…
They wanted the Apocalypse after all. Why not give it to them.
And maybe he really had gone mad. Was that what they were all thinking?
If so, why not just come out and say so?
They were all standing around his bed, looking down on him with long faces.
The faces were fuzzy, the voices soft and indistinct. The cold hard board had turned into a soft warm bed. It all faded away and he was awake. Just like that, back in reality.
That was all that Liam Kimball remembered of his dream. It was nothing but a sick jumble of thoughts and fears. He was all twisted up in the soggy wet blankets, streaming with sweat and shivering in the open air. The bedroom window was open a crack and it was near dawn.
He looked at his watch.
Four-thirty-seven a.m.
He knew he would be unable to sleep again. Tossing and turning until morning would just be pointless.
The dreams had some meaning, but they were an irritant as well. A man had to have enough sleep. Promises to himself were very often lies made up on the spur of the moment. He had to admit he’d been eating better.
All that fresh air, eh?
Last night, he’d taken a couple of over-the-counter sleeping tabs, just something mild. Going to bed early in the hopes of sleeping ten hours straight had been his first mistake.
Damn.
He swung his legs out of bed.
London time was five hours ahead and he needed a quick consultation with Frank.
Hopefully the little effer was in.
Chapter Eleven
“God, it must be early over there.” Frank Steadman, his control, sounded peevish. “What happened, did you shit the bed?”
Steadman was Head of the North American section and personally sitting at the Canada Desk, which could be a bit of a sinecure at times. It was such an orderly place. It was not a hotbed of espionage per se. This operation was an exception. This one went back a ways.
As Frank always said, the set-up takes forever but the spike is over in an instant.
Frank brushed a hand through nonexistent hair and looked up at the row of clocks along the long south wall.
“Sorry, but I didn’t much want to speak to the Old Man.”
“Watch it, Liam.” Big F’s voice came over the phone and Liam winced.
Putting him on speakerphone was one thing. Having the Old Man in the room was another.
“I’m going back. It took all day to get what was presented as a search and rescue, ultimately the recovery, of some dead and missing canoers. If that’s a word, sir. Sirs.”
“Canoers or canoeists.” Big F, ever the stickler for detail. “Either one is good.”
The Ontario Provincial Police, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Ministry of Defense, had all been involved in the recovery and cover-up operation. All it took was a few calls back and forth, back and forth between London and Ottawa. London to Espanola, Ottawa to Espanola, Espanola to London, back and forth.
“Yes, our Canadian friends are all very impressed with you, young man.” Big F again.
Liam sat there shaking his head. It was very early, and if he could only get going. A text message from Ian indicated that he had eluded ambush. He had hitchhiked back without incident. Ian was holed up awaiting instructions. Or helpful suggestions, Liam wasn’t quite clear which. The message might have been garbled. Ian was simply being rude, or he had been wounded and was in shock or something. Jenkins, with an Airstream trailer parked a few miles away, at least had a buddy. The pair of them might be in danger, or they might still be unremarked. He needed to talk to them as well.
“I’m going to need a replacement sled.” A quick and dirty search had revealed the enemy’s boat, an inflatable with a hundred and fifty horse motor.
There was nothing cheap about it, all top of the line equipment.
Their street clothes, shoes, wallets and money were recovered, along with phones but no computers. All of it would be examined by the technical branch.
His own boat was become a thing of mystery, off to join the ghost fleet somewhere. He could almost see it, cruising the planet’s oceans and providing a living to the ancient mystery broadcasters and perhaps even a few pulp writers of this world.
They’d stashed theirs in dense brush pretty much the way he had done with his own boat. They might have been (must have been) waiting for the perfect opportunity. They might have been (probably were) changing positions as required, hoping to catch him with his pants down. It was difficult to see it as anything other than an out-and-out hit. Their boat had carried submarine sandwiches for lunch, a cooler, beer, water, and all the essential items for their cover. Two guns and spare clips were found carefully hidden ten metres from the boat. They had been stuffed down a crack in between boulders and covered with twigs, dead leaves and a bit of moss.
Two big strong boys would have been enough to lift their object.
“Your new sled’s on the way.” Little F. “What with all the helicopters, rescue boats, men in big boots and heavy slickers tromping about, we can just drop that out of a chopper anywhere you want. It should be there within a couple of hours.”
The tourists would find it entertaining, and the local newspapers, one or two regional radio stations, would have something to talk about in two official languages. It would be a nine-day wonder, the drowning of two tourists from some place no one had ever heard of. It might not even exist, thought Liam. Just a name on a map, and the more remote, the better.
“That’s the best we can hope for.”
Liam agreed. It was just icing on the cake at this point. He needed coffee, he wanted to talk to Ian and there was still all the usual stuff in the daily intelligence packet. The sooner he got something to eat and the sooner he got out the door, the sooner it would be over.
If only life were that simple, he thought.
The trouble is that it never was—or should he say the trouble was that it never is?
Either way, he’d better get going.
He rang off, and punched in the next number.
Ian answered in seconds from his base at Jacksons’ Cove Resort. He and the side-kick had a trailer parked there.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“I could ask you the same question.” Liam pulled back the curtains, not seeing too many people about but that was no guarantee.
He could have sworn they still had a bug in his eaves-trough, for example. The phones were pretty secure in and of themselves, being in good-guy territory. That’s not to say someone couldn’t be bought somewhere.
“Just the highlights, Ian.”
“I’ll zip that over as soon as I’ve got it written up.” The encryption was good, with the same proviso, in that there was always that human element.
“Other than that.”
“I’m available. I have the GPS, all I need is a time of rendezvous. I will bring a friend.”
“That’s very wise. Let me talk to my buddies and I’ll get back to you. We can do lunch.”
Liam went on to talk to Jenkins. Again the conversation was short and cryptic.
Jenkins and her partner would watch their backsides and try and keep up with their own search. Like him, they were wondering about more manpower.
At this point in time, they must assume that everyone was a target.
His next step was to open up the files and see what they were presenting him with.
Jenkins felt she and her partner might have been observed. The people paying interest fit a certain profile, but at this point they would need to watch them a little more (and they
them) to confirm this. It was a question of how and whether they might give it away in a positive fashion. She had some ideas on that but it could wait. They could always leave a laptop lying around, was Liam’s initial thought.
The next thing was to read Ian’s text and look at his pictures.
The text described the incident with the Land Rover. The fact that he had either been followed or predicted, his pattern known, was significant. The vehicle was swept for bugs and transponders regularly. He hadn’t done it that morning when he set out with the equipment. If someone had stuck a transponder on the car during the brief window of opportunity between one sweep and the next, they had taken it off again when wrecking the vehicle. He hadn’t noticed any tails, but that wasn’t to say that it couldn’t be done. Either way, they knew him and took their shot at an opportune moment. Far from town, no witnesses, and a dead-end logging road that might not see another vehicle for days or even weeks.
He was of the opinion that he had not surprised them in the act. He would have heard them, smashing windows and tearing off mirrors. No, they were lying in wait—and removing the transponder (if such was the case) showed some planning. They had put some thought into it. Like Liam, it was a hit, and a fairly professional one. As to other methods of tracking him, perhaps London and other centres might work on the question. His vehicle would be closely examined, but he doubted if they would find much. In his assessment they were professionals. With lead scattered all over the forest, but no shell casings on the scene, they might get something from the chemical composition of the slugs. They were using brass-catcher attachments on the weapons, otherwise there’s no way they could have recovered them all in that brush, that terrain.
They might have been thinking of that, as they hadn’t shot up the Land Rover. They also might have been thinking of talk—a vehicle brought into a local wrecker’s yard, all shot up, would arouse all kinds of talk.
The enemy doesn’t want that any more than we do, in Ian’s assessment.
A forensics team was out there or soon would be according to Ian. There was much food for thought here. The best thing to do with the Land Rover would be to tarp it up and trailer it to a secure warehouse for examination.
