by Andy McNab
It was.
He sat on the end of the bed – or, at least, it looked like it. I followed, so we were both sitting and facing each other.
‘If I’m not embarrassed by our first product release, I’ve released too late, right?’
It was like he was really in the room. I hadn’t known what to expect, maybe some slow, wavy materialization, like in Star Trek, and then a hazy image that faded in and out.
Parmesh had his hair pulled back in a ponytail and was dressed in a green V-neck sweater, jeans and, no doubt, the world’s most expensive multicoloured Nikes.
‘So, Mr Egbers says you need to talk to me. Anything wrong? Is there anything I need to fix? Anything you want, just say the word.’
Parmesh was his normal self, from what I’d seen of him. Big smiles, big hand movements, which was strange through the goggles because they felt like they were coming too close to me. He became distracted by something to his left and beckoned someone in. ‘Hey, little baby, of course, of course.’
A small child in a pinafore dress and thick tights, who I knew had just had her fourth birthday, ran in and clambered onto his lap. I couldn’t help but think of my own two, and how much I used to love them doing exactly that. All they wanted was a kiss from their dad, and she was the same. Parmesh did as requested: he kissed her forehead and turned his attention to me.
‘Say hello to Mr Egbers and my new friend, James.’ He pointed over her shoulder in front of him, and I got an embarrassed wave and a ‘Hello’ before she was directed to Egbers and he also got a wave.
At last there was some humanity in the South African’s voice. ‘What a lovely dress.’
Parmesh finished off the introduction for me. It wasn’t needed, as I knew all about his family as part of my target research, but it was easier for us all if he just got on with it so I, in turn, could get on with what I wanted from him. ‘And this is Jing. It means “quiet, still, gentle”.’ Another kiss on top of the head. ‘And, as you can see, that is not the case!’
I waved back. ‘Hello, Jing.’
Parmesh gave her a kiss again, this time with encouragement to go and play with her sister.
‘She could hear you but not see, because she didn’t have the lenses on.’
I pointed to my chest with both hands, as if that was going to help the question. ‘But you can see me, right?’
‘Sure, you’re sitting in the chair.’
Then he realized what I was trying to work out. ‘Ah, yes, but you see me without my lenses on, right?’
I nodded.
‘Yes, I know. So cool, isn’t it? It only works with the lenses on, but you never get to see them. Face recognition takes care of all that. Even cooler is that you get instant memories. Mr Egbers – hiya. Morning.’
Egbers stood as he was addressed.
‘Can you show James what I mean after this?’
‘Yes, of course.’
He stayed standing as Parmesh switched his gaze to me, his tone still upbeat. ‘Mr Egbers tells me you have made some progress. So, James, what is happening? What do you need?’
My head flashed back to Richard disappearing into the darkness. I bet Parmesh hadn’t a clue how the progress had been made.
‘I have, and now I know I need help. This job is complicated.’
Parmesh nodded to himself. ‘Okay. Please elaborate.’
I explained what I knew so far about Sanctuary and the lack of knowledge by any one contractor. ‘It’s been constructed just like your house has, and that means it will take far too long in discovery, and I get that you want this done ASAP. And, of course, the more discovery that has to be made, the higher the risk of the whole operation being compromised. That’s something none of us wants, isn’t it?’
Even now, mid-conversation, I couldn’t stop what was happening in my brain. I couldn’t erase Richard being swallowed by the darkness. He flashed in front of me again and this time I heard the scream.
Parmesh was concerned. ‘James, you okay?’ He turned to his left. ‘Mr Egbers, can you please fetch James some water?’
I raised my hand, trying to show him everything was fine. ‘It’s okay, thanks. I haven’t had much sleep in the last couple of days, that’s all – trying to come up with a plan.’
Egbers materialized with a bottle from the minibar anyway. I looked at his expressionless face bearing down and thanked him.
Parmesh joined in with the gratitude. ‘Thank you, Mr Egbers. So, James.’ He leant in, wanting to hear more, elbows on his knees to come closer to me. It really felt like he was there in person.
‘With the information I have at the moment, I think I’ve found a way to get into Sanctuary, find the ledger, and get out again without them ever knowing – until they discover the ledger’s gone, or they eventually open up the tunnel.’
Parmesh’s smile broadened. He liked that one. ‘Tunnel? What do you mean? They have a tunnel?’
‘There’s an outbuilding that wasn’t on the planning details. The tunnel has been dug from the outbuilding to the inner wall of the basement. There’s a concrete bung, and then a gap between the bung in the tunnel to the wall, a two-metre gap.
‘So, what I need are three sets of skills. Technical first, so we can overcome any exclusion technology that the house possesses – and we have to assume that it does. Why wouldn’t it?’
Parmesh was nodding away and thinking about it.
‘The second skill is physical. I’ve got to get through that concrete bung.
‘And the last skill set I need is aesthetics. I have to get through that tiled wall to access Sanctuary, retrieve the ledger, go back through the wall, and replace the inner wall tiles from the tunnel side so nobody knows we’ve been there.’
Parmesh was enthusiastic. ‘That sounds cool.’
I had to agree with him on that one. ‘Physical, technical, aesthetic. But also I need skill sets that they can cross-over, because we don’t know what we’re going into. And that’s just to get in and out of Sanctuary – I still don’t know where the ledger is and how it’s protected. Are you able to tell me yet?’
Egbers interrupted from the settee. ‘Mr Mani, I think it’s too early to explain.’
Parmesh didn’t look at Egbers because it didn’t matter. He couldn’t be seen anyway.
‘Okay, so how many people are you thinking of? Are we talking just the first chairs or a full orchestra?’
I felt confident but I knew not to overstretch. ‘I need three people. I know them, and I trust them. They’re like me. But I’d have to make sure they’d want to work on this for me. Can I offer them the same incentive you’ve given me?’
He didn’t hesitate. ‘Sure – but I will have to take Mr Egbers’s advice and his guidance about the ledger. No, we do not know where it is held yet. We will soon. But how we are getting that information, I cannot tell you just yet.’ He smiled at me more intently to show there were no hard feelings.
I shrugged. No skin off my nose: all I needed was the detail.
Parmesh sat up and slapped his thighs, all smiles and happiness. ‘Of course, everyone will get their rewards. But collecting your merry band, and how you plan what you guys do, must be under Mr Egbers’s direction. You okay with that, James?’
It was going to happen regardless, so what would I do but nod and agree?
‘That is great, really great. How is everyone back at home? Sons, yes?’
I nodded, while worrying what was coming next. Maybe he knew exactly what the Templars did for him. ‘Yes, all good.’
‘That is great, James. And your sister – Charlotte? She good?’
‘Yes, Charlotte’s good. Everything’s fine.’
He nodded away to himself, slowly and deliberately, his eyes now focusing on the windows. He couldn’t see anything but sky at this height. Maybe he was on gull watch. Then, just as quickly, he was back with me.
‘You have to understand, James, if we get this right, one day there will be statues of you because of the amazing
thing you did for our world. We –’ his fingers pointed between the two of us ‘– we can do great things. We are all family now.’
There was a pause as Parmesh collected his thoughts and made sure his head was back to normal after his little outburst – or whatever normal was for someone like him.
‘Okay. James, it was great to see you and we will talk again soon.’ He brought his hand halfway towards a shake, then had second thoughts and laughed. ‘We have to get that glitch sorted out some time.’
I joined in the laughter as he stood and turned, then disappeared. I went to take off the goggles, but Egbers shouted for me to keep them on. He went to the black camera, pressed a button and, at once, the 3D playback commenced on top of the bedspread, in an area about half the size of the bed. The hotel room became miniaturized with all three of us in the room interacting, even Jing jumping onto her father’s lap and saying hello.
Everything was replayed before it then cut out and it was clearly time to take off the goggles.
Egbers sat back on the settee. ‘So – you’ve had the replay, you’ve seen the instant memory as offered. That is now deleted. Remember – everything you do, everything you say to these people, I will be in control. If you screw it up and your people get damaged because you have not controlled them, or they have compromised our crusade, that will be your fault. It will be because of you, because you’re the one who wanted them in. It will be your fault. Do you understand?’
I nodded. He was right.
29
It was past midday by the time Egbers and the Brit had packed up the holoport kit and left. While they’d worked, I’d tried to get my thoughts together on the best way to recruit the three people I wanted for the job – three people I could trust, and who I knew trusted me. That might change once I got them down here, of course, but there was no point in crossing that bridge before I had to. I had to be professional, and the best way of doing that was to remember that the most important thing about the three I had in mind was their own professionalism.
I picked up my mobile and called Charlotte on WhatsApp. I’d made sure Egbers knew I was going to call, and how I was going to approach these people.
Simon answered and I gave my normal apologies. I hated being the nice guy, but he lived with my sister, so what else could I do? At least he sounded awake. The TV blared in the background.
‘Sorry, mate. I’m still getting my timings wrong. It’s not too late, is it?’
Clearly it was. I knew it was midnight in York. He didn’t reply.
I followed him as he climbed the stairs and the TV died, then got the creak of the bedroom door and ‘It’s him.’
She was straight into her normal big-sister stuff, even though she’d just been woken up. ‘You okay?’
‘I’m fine. First, the good news. You did brilliantly finding out about that new-build.’ I fought to block the vision of Richard falling from the helicopter, did my best to remain calm and normal. ‘I’m so much in the good books, I’ve been given my own job down here on that very same build. No more than two or three weeks, but good money.’
Charlotte was impressed. ‘Wow, that’s great! But you’ll definitely be back here in time for Christmas, won’t you? We have the boys this year. Remember? They’re so excited.’
My brain had blanked that out. ‘Yep, of course. All good. But listen, I’ve got work for some others as well. Could be really good for a Christmas bonus. Do you know if Tony Bradley’s still about? Is he even still alive? I was also thinking about asking Gemma and Warren.’
‘I saw Tony last week in Morrisons. He’s very much alive, considering it was only six, seven months ago.’
‘He was always nagging Maureen to quit. She was so nice to us. Especially to you.’
‘Yep, but always smoking in the car with us in the back, remember?’
‘And with the windows closed.’
Charlotte gave a very low ‘Aw, yeah, but still a lovely woman.’
I cut in. There was still more I needed to know and I wanted to get this bit over with as quickly as possible. ‘I think Gemma moved away from home. Joyce and Gerry, they’ll know how to get hold of her, and Warren, well, he’ll be at home, won’t he?’
Charlotte was doing her normal ‘Okaaay’ as she waited for the punchline and the inevitable request for help.
‘So I was thinking … could you call them, tell them I’ve got some work down here, and it’s worth fifty K each? No more than a couple of weeks.’
I’d plucked the number out of the air but it seemed to do the trick.
‘That’s some job! You got any work for me and Simon down there?’
We both laughed. She, because she knew I wouldn’t be after a bookkeeper; me, nervously, because I wanted to keep her out of danger’s way. As for Simon, it would probably interfere with his artistic contemplations. ‘No, I need masters of form, not bean-counters and a shit painter.’
It got a laugh out of her. ‘And after that you expect me to help you?’
‘You wouldn’t have it any other way. Can you get them together for a conference call? Quick as you can. Flights paid, business class, nice hotel, nice Christmas bonus, what could possibly go wrong?’
‘Only you would know that, wouldn’t you?’ Maybe I was trying too hard to be upbeat. ‘You okay, Parker?’
‘Yes, m’lady.’
‘Okay.’ She knew not to go on. ‘So you want me to sort them out and get a call together with you?’
‘That’s about it. How’re the boys?’
‘All good. Pip didn’t get the job but she’s not too down about it. Mum came round for lunch at the weekend. She actually remembered who you were. She was asking about you.’
‘Quite right too. One more thing.’ I heard a big sigh. ‘Hurry up with that call, will you?’
‘Only if you send me those pictures you promised.’
She was still laughing as she cut the phone dead.
I sat on the end of the bed where Parmesh – or his hologram – had sat, and started to worry again. Had I done the right thing? Bringing people here on a lie and expecting them to help when they learnt what they were really down here for? What if they said no? What would that mean to Egbers?
I felt shitty about everything, including having asked about the boys. I’d made it a policy never even to speak to them while I was away because I didn’t want to lie to them. I knew my thinking was all fucked up and illogical when it came to them, but I wanted something between us that wasn’t based on a lie, that was clean – pure, even.
I sat there trying to find the heart to justify this little bit of cleanliness after very likely putting others at risk. But what other option had I had?
I fell backwards onto the bed, my eyes drooping with exhaustion, and liking the feeling very much. I would soon be rid of the guilt for a few hours, and that was good enough for me. I’d take any relief I could get. Besides, it was going to be a busy night.
I brought up the mobile to my face, its glow just a little too bright for me to focus clearly. I’d better send those Akaroa pictures or I’d never hear the end of it.
30
It was getting dark on Speargrass Flat. Somewhere up ahead, on the same track where we’d met a couple of days ago, I’d be meeting the Js. I needed to have another look at the outbuilding, maybe find a way in, even investigate the entrance to the tunnel. Ever the optimist, right? A worried optimist. But the more I knew, the less I would worry.
They weren’t there. It was only twenty long minutes later that a set of headlights carved their way up the hillside and their 4x4 finally drew up alongside my Toyota. I wasn’t happy, and not only because they were late: this was supposed to be as covert as possible and they’d been on full beam and now kept their sidelights on.
James jumped out of the driver’s seat and Jamie went round, opened the tailgate and unpacked their child.
James was all apologies. ‘Sorry, man. The power’s down in Queenstown. They’ve had an outage.’
Jamie had clearly enjoyed the experience. ‘Hah, it was like a real-life zombie apocalypse. The whole town down – stop signs out, people wandering around in the dark with flashlights. We should go back down and film it. Make a crazy zombie film.’
From our vantage point I could see sporadic pinpricks of light in the darkness of Speargrass Flat, but thankfully none in the area of Sanctuary.
James had his ice-cream tray strapped over his neck and as the screens came to life they illuminated his face. ‘Yeah, the radio news guy was going crazy. Said it was all about the energy company not investing, fat cats making big cash while everyone sits in the dark. The outages keep happening, and the politicians do nothing about it. Makes me kinda feel at home.’
The drone came to life in the red glow of the sidelights. James got suddenly animated, too. ‘Mr Mani? When the time comes he’ll be putting stuff like that to rights. Know what I’m saying?’
I did. And in a way I hoped he would. Somebody had to sort things out.
Jamie approached with a thick black nylon webbed belt that he buckled loosely round my waist. ‘Don’t worry, man – it works. I use this all the time.’
‘You do this all the time? What – for fun?’
He held the belt out at my waist so it didn’t fall into the dirt. ‘Hah, sure, don’t worry. This Mark Three dude can lift a combat soldier, even wearing all that army stuff.’
That was a lot of weight. Body armour, ammunition, water, it all added up. I decided not to tell them why I thought this was a great piece of kit, but anything that got a damaged body out of the fight was a very good thing in my book.
Jamie told me to keep hold of the oversized belt around my waist, then went back to the drone. James took over the instructions.
‘All you’ve got to do is be cool. Just hang there, man, and enjoy. This is a neat idea of yours.’
The drone was now above us, lost in the darkness but low enough for James to have to raise his voice. ‘You’ll be directly under the camera. We’ve got infrared, so all’s good, man. We’ll let you down on the concrete, you do your thing, call when you’re ready to be picked up. Dig?’
