False Flag

by Jack Slater

  “Very well.” Nash smiled, sitting opposite Lam and smoothing his suit pants to buy himself some time to think.

  He knew that he had to play this encounter with exquisite delicacy. The US relationship with China had been heating up for years, and America’s long period of dominance as the world’s only superpower was seeing its first real challenge in almost three decades.

  By most metrics, China was exactly that: a superpower. It was a country with well over a billion citizens, more than two million active military personnel, hundreds of ships, dozens of submarines, and countless thousands of missiles. In a single three-year period at the start of the decade, China used more cement than the US had done in the entire twentieth century, building homes and cities, roads and hospitals for a population whose time on the world stage had come. It was an astonishing statistic, and one that chilled Nash’s bones.

  The twentieth century had been America’s. But there was no divine guarantee that this would hold true forever. America’s dominance had been paid for in blood. Nash knew that it was his job to ensure that her decline was not soaked in it.

  The president cleared his throat and punctured a silence that he was uncomfortably aware had begun to build. “First of all, Mr. Ambassador, may I convey my deepest condolences for the loss of your country’s aviators. I can assure you that we are doing everything possible to locate the bodies. If a retrieval is feasible, we will undertake it, and return your men for burial.”

  Lam inclined his head. “My thanks, Mr. President. Please pass along my condolences also, to the families of those lost today.”

  “Thank you, Ambassador. Now”—Nash grimaced—“perhaps we should attend to the equally pressing business of how we can step back from the precipice of conflict.”

  Lam remained quiet, displaying only an expression of mild interest on his face. Nash soldiered on regardless. In truth, he was angry, though he hid the rage bubbling inside him with the consummate skill of a trained politician. He was angry that the Chinese had so recklessly buzzed the Nimitz, when precisely this sort of escalation—accidental, yet deadly—was the obvious risk.

  He was furious too, that the Chinese had so far said nothing about the loss of almost three dozen US satellites in orbit over the Asia-Pacific region—a loss that Nash’s new director of central intelligence, George Lawrence, assured him was attributable to weapons controlled out of Xishang Satellite Control Center.

  In private, just as in public, they were evasive not just about the precise details of what happened, but their own responsibility for it.

  Nash had half a mind to scream and shout, to let loose the pent-up, acidic frustration boiling in his gut. But he did not. He exerted an iron force of will, controlling that desire. The American people had elected him to be a statesman, not a demagogue—and he intended to honor that trust.

  And most importantly of all, Jason Trapp deserved the time to ferret out the truth. If there was one man that Nash believed could do so, it was the lethal CIA operative known as the Hangman. He swallowed the last of his rage.

  When he spoke, his voice was calm, yet unmistakably firm. “Ambassador Lam. At this moment, in addition to the Nimitz carrier strike group, the US Navy is sending two additional strike groups to the region. Our naval and air force assets are on high alert.”

  Lam’s reply was clipped. “We are aware.”

  “Then you must understand that our two countries find ourselves in a precarious situation. Another misstep like today, and it may not be so possible to pull back from the brink.”

  “I agree.”

  “Then, Ambassador, I propose a truce. A cooling-off period, if you will. I will instruct my military to conduct no operations within what you refer to as the first island chain. In return, however, I need something from you.”

  Lam inclined his head. “Pray tell?”

  Nash stood, walked to his desk, and opened the first drawer. From it, he retrieved the image taken by the amateur astronomer several hours before. He walked back to the ambassador, and handed him the picture. “Do you know what this is?”

  Lam squinted, and Nash was almost inclined to believe it wasn’t an act. He handed the image back. “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage.”

  “This image was taken late last night. The air force tells me that your military refers to it as Project Songbird.”

  Nash studied the Chinese ambassador intently for any sign of recognition as he revealed that particular piece of information. There was none—but then again, that meant nothing. The job of the Chinese ambassador in Washington DC was a plum assignment, and given only to the best of the best. Lam was too good to be ensnared by a trap like that.

  “I don’t recognize the name,” Lam replied calmly.

  “The device is designed to destroy my nation’s satellites in orbit. All of them. And we believe that it was activated in the past forty-eight hours. Mr. Ambassador, my country will not stand for the weaponization of space. If China does not deactivate this weapon immediately, then we will be forced to act.”

  “Is that a threat, Mr. President?”

  “Not a threat,” Nash said, biting back a wave of irritation that Lam was giving him nothing in return, and worse, that he was allowing himself to rise to the provocation. “A warning.”

  Lam stood, his expression inscrutable. “I took this meeting out of courtesy, Mr. President, and out of respect for you personally. However, I regret to inform you that my government has ordered the drawdown of all non-essential diplomatic personnel from our embassy and consulates across the United States.”

  For a second, the President was unable to respond. He stood and conspicuously did not offer to shake the man’s hand. He replied with tight, pursed lips, “Be advised, Ambassador. If Songbird is used, I will treat it as an act of war. And it will be a war that you cannot win.”

  Lam shook his head sadly. “Unfortunately, Mr. President—neither can you.”

  34

  The North Korean guards had hosed Eliza down before locking her into the laboratory ward with the other test subjects, the powerful jet of water washing away the blood and the urine, assaulting the scabs that had begun to form over her wounds, bruising already tender flesh. The chill of the water had been a shock, but in a way, Eliza welcomed it. It woke her up, the ice water flushing adrenaline through her system, making the pain fade away.

  The two men took her into the ward wearing no more protection against whatever terrible virus was being tested on the eight innocent people inside than a fragile facemask, of the kind you might see commuters wearing on any public transport system in Asia. Eliza had filed away the detail for future reference. She did not understand why they would be so casual about the threat of contracting a disease that could surely end their lives.

  Were they vaccinated?

  She pondered the question, lying on a camp bed that had been added to the cramped room, chained to it—unlike the rest of the other prisoners, who were only restrained by one limb—by both her left ankle and right wrist. She was barely clothed, and as she stared up to a camera dome mounted on the ceiling, she wondered who was watching.

  But Eliza felt no shame. Only a burning desire to get out of this hellhole, and to visit justice on the monsters who had incarcerated her within it.

  The question was—how?

  The restraints that held her to the camp bed were Eliza’s lowest priority. Her free left hand dangled off the side of the mattress, out of sight of the overhead camera—and it was very busy indeed, working away at one of the thin links of metal which made up a latticework that supported the mattress.

  “How long have you been in here?” Eliza asked softly, directing her question at a woman in the bed to the right of hers: a plump Chinese girl with short black hair and red-rimmed eyes. She spoke in Mandarin, assuming a Beijing accent.

  She needed to understand what was taking place here before she could fashion a plan to stop it. It was plain that the eight—now nine—inhabitants of this ward were test s
ubjects for a biological weapon. Eliza had been given a basic grounding in nuclear, biological and chemical warfare at the Farm, and while in the Russian’s office she’d absorbed enough details to paint at least a narrow picture of what he was working on.

  Yet the unknown answers to a barrage of questions frustrated her. Why had her guards seemed so lax about entering the laboratory—displaying no signs of fear?

  Why were the test subjects divided as they were: a pair of Caucasian men and women, and a matching pair of ethnic Chinese?

  What was the significance?

  But most of all, Eliza needed to understand how much time she was working with. As far as she could tell, none of the eight currently displayed any symptoms of disease. But how long would it that last? And how long before the microbes that were doubtless breeding in her bloodstream at this very moment, burrowing into her cells and turning millions of them into bio-reactors spewing poison into her veins, turned homicidal and finished her off too?

  How long before, as the North Korean colonel had threatened, she was choking on her own blood, the immune system beaten, her cells disintegrating? Would she have enough time to get out of this place and warn Langley?

  Because, Eliza realized, that was all that mattered. She didn’t want to die, she never had, but if her death could serve some greater purpose, then at least it would not be in vain. She clenched her jaw and realized she was staring at the Chinese girl next to her with a fierce intensity. She blinked.

  The girl returned Eliza’s gaze blankly. The CIA operative took a different approach, speaking calmly, as if to a child. “Can you tell me your name?”

  The sound of her voice prompted another of the captive women to begin weeping, as one or another of them had been doing on and off since Eliza had entered the anodyne laboratory ward. Though the girl next to her seem to flinch at the sound, Eliza did not mind. She had no doubt that a listening device—or devices—accompanied the camera watching them at this very moment, and anything that could help disguise her intentions was fine by her.

  The girl’s cheeks were stained red, but she looked exhausted, as though she had cried herself out. “Chen,” she finally whispered.

  Eliza smiled. “That’s a beautiful name, Chen,” she whispered back, keeping her voice low. “How are you feeling?”

  Chen’s voice cracked as she replied, “Scared.”

  “Yeah,” Eliza admitted, “me too. But it’s going to be okay, I promise.”

  Chen shook her head. “I don’t think so,” she replied in a beaten voice. “I’m going to die here.”

  Eliza paused, not knowing how to reply. The truth was, Chen was probably right. They would both die here, never leaving this observation room again. Never knowing what had killed them, or why. But she couldn’t think like that. She couldn’t stop fighting. Not while there was still a chance. Not while she still had the strength to go on.

  She smiled. “Maybe. Or maybe we can work together, Chen. Find a way out of here.”

  The Chinese girl stared back with the body language of a beaten, starved dog. She was on the verge of giving up, that much was obvious. Whether or not the mysterious virus got her, something would—even just her body simply shutting down, giving up, unwilling to go on. But Eliza needed the girl to fight. She needed to fan the flames of hope inside her.

  “Do you have a family, Chen?” she asked. “Someone outside of here who’s waiting for you?”

  Chen nodded, a single tear streaking down the path carved by many others. “A boyfriend,” she whispered. “I’ll never see him again.”

  On the opposite side of the narrow path between the two ranks of camp beds, the side of the observation room nearest the glass partition, one of the Chinese men got to his feet, fists clenched, and howled a bitter cry of defiance. The chain around his arm rattled as he shook his fist, a line of red sprouting around his wrist as the metal bit into the man’s skin.

  Chen’s head turned to the unexpected sound.

  “Stay with me,” Eliza said quickly, needing to retain the young girl’s attention. “Chen, I need you to tell me how you got here. Can you do that?”

  The girl’s head turned back, away from the tormented cries of pain from the man now sobbing on his knees, beating against the glass with his free hand. It was as though she was glad for the distraction—happy to have something to take her mind off the reminder of the peril she found herself in.

  “I live in Dandong,” she said. “With my boyfriend. We share a condo.” Her eyes filled with tears at the memory.

  Eliza wished she could reach over and grab the girl’s hand, but the length of chain attached to her right wrist was too short to allow it. “It’s okay,” she crooned.

  “I went to dinner with a friend,” Chen added, biting back her tears. “And then —” Her face creased with confusion, as though searching her memory banks for a clue as to what had happened next.“— I woke up in the back of a truck. I thought I had an accident, but…”

  Chen had been kidnapped to order, Eliza realized. Snatched from the streets of her hometown and brought across the border from China. But the question of why her still rankled in the CIA operative’s mind. If there was one thing the North Korean regime was not short of, it was political prisoners of their own, upon whom to test a biological weapon. Why run the risk of leaving loose ends?

  Glad the girl was talking, Eliza followed up with another question. The one she truly needed an answer to. “How long have you been here?”

  The question visibly stumped the Chinese captive. She shook her head anxiously, as though nervous about disappointing her newfound friend. “I don’t know,” she whispered. “How can I tell?”

  Eliza grimaced, then softened her expression at Chen’s reaction. It was a good point. She turned the problem over in her mind. “Tell me about the routine,” she said. “How often do they feed you? Do they turn the lights out?”

  Chen‘s expression was curious, almost hopeful. “It’s always light. I try to sleep, but it’s hard. Doctors come in every”—her face scrunched—“every few hours, maybe. They take our blood, check our temperature. Do you know what they are doing to us?”

  Ikeda shook her head. She had a very good idea what was happening in this place, but the last thing she needed was to terrify the young Chinese girl any more than was absolutely necessary. Especially now she had her talking. “And food?”

  Chen’s nose wrinkled. “Five meals, maybe six. It’s disgusting,” she confided. “I can’t eat it.”

  Ikeda’s face softened. “You need to. Keep your strength.”

  Chen nodded quickly. “Okay, I will.”

  The sound of weeping began to fade away, replaced by great long, snorting sobs, and then nothing at all. Eliza sat up, shielding her face from the camera overhead and the glass partition with a sweep of an arm, as though she was running her fingers through her hair, and pressed one finger from her restrained hand to her lips. Chen nodded softly.

  Ikeda lay back, wondering what on earth to do. She let her left hand fall back to its earlier position and kept working at the thin metal wire. It was weakening, and she knew that before long she would be able to break away a short piece, which she could use to unpick the lock on her cuffs.

  But it was too soon.

  If Chen was right about the number of meals, which was a stab in the dark itself, then that meant the test subjects had probably been here for three days, maybe four. Ikeda knew that viruses had varying incubation periods. If she remembered her classes at the Farm right, Ebola became symptomatic somewhere between eight and ten days after infection. Marburg was quicker, averaging only five.

  She chewed her lip, nose breathing in the acrid disinfectant tang of the processed air in the sealed observation room. In truth, she was no closer to an answer than she had been before. Ikeda might have guessed how long her fellow prisoners had been kept here, but she didn’t know what virus was being tested, whether they had been infected immediately, whether the virus had been modified.

/>   Eliza knew that, for now at least, she only had one viable course of action. She needed to wait, to observe the patterns of activity inside this facility. Who entered the observation room, and how often. Whether the scientists were guarded when they entered—and if so, by how many, with what weapons. Until she knew, resistance was—as so often—futile. She needed to bide her time and wait for the perfect moment to strike.

  Overhead, the strip lighting buzzed, a constant backdrop to the sniffing of the prisoners, the squeaking of the beds and the rattling of their chains. The black camera dome stared down like an ominous, vengeful god. Always waiting, always watching. Who was on the other end? What could they possibly want?

  And the longer she lay there, the more a creeping dread began to play in the shadow lands at the edges of her mind. She could picture the killer inside her, preying on her immune system, waiting for her to weaken.

  It was a killer that Ikeda could do nothing to fight.

  And a ticking clock, counting down to the moment where, like her freedom, even her will to survive would be taken from her.

  35

  Deputy Director Mike Mitchell was on edge.

  As Trapp’s scheduled check-in time drew closer, Mitchell took to wearing out his shoe leather, pacing up and down in the sub-basement beneath Langley that he had turned into a command post to support the efforts to hunt down those who had supported VP Jenkins’ failed coup earlier that year. Now it was the nerve center for another effort entirely, and one that was far more critical.

  Occasionally, Kyle Partey would glance up from his computer screen and follow his boss’ relentless, anxious movement with his eyes before returning to work. The third man in the room, Dr. Timothy Greaves, didn’t once look up from his monitor.

  Mitchell checked his watch. Five minutes to go. If Jason Trapp had survived his insertion into a country with which the United States was still technically at war, then he would shortly reach out to Langley, using an encrypted connection bounced off a Japanese communications satellite, since American assets over the region were still patchy.