by Andy McNab
They both waited, and I wondered if they felt even the slightest dread for their own safety as it dawned on them that the genie was out of the bottle, and there was no way out of this for them now.
‘So, because none of the other cadres know which cadre POTUS would be with, the first thing they will all have to do is to identify and authenticate the actual president. That will be done via a chip embedded under POTUS’s epidermis, which will be amplified by a radio frequency that is only used by the cadres, yet still they won’t know where their leader is because the frequency can’t be located.
‘Janet, Lawrence, those are the first components of the ledger – what happens to POTUS when the cadres deploy – but it’s only the start.’
67
‘Imagine the meltdown if it was known that the president of the United States was leaving their own country to seek safety on the other side of the world …
‘It would be taken by the homeland and the world as a sign that the USA had given up, and he or she had done a runner with the rest of the nought-point-nought-one-percenters to save their own skins. They would lose credibility, and if they lost that, they would lose power. And on top of that, down here, your country becomes a target if the cadres are deployed because of nuclear war.
‘Whether you like it or not, neither the US nor New Zealand will ever allow this secret to get out. Your government and theirs will stop that happening at all costs. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you? You two are expendable.’
I wanted that to sink in, just in case they hadn’t come to the conclusion themselves earlier on.
Lawrence was thinking big. ‘Not to mention the five million of us that would be vaporized.’
He understood. He got it. Then I did the just-to-make-sure bit.
‘So, you appreciate that your government is complicit, as it would have to be. The president leaving the US during times of a national crisis is a very big deal. If this secret gets out there, it could only have come from one of you.’
There was silence from all of us and I let the air clear. It was Lawrence who broke the false sense of calm.
‘Why aren’t you in danger, and why isn’t Charlotte? What about your whole group? Why aren’t you just lifted away by the Americans, never to be seen again? What about the ledger? Where is it now?’
I shook my head. ‘It’s safe – and always will be. That is why we are safe.’
They sat and waited: they wanted more. And it felt right to me that they should get it. They were in so deep anyway.
‘The reason why is that the ledger contains the name of every member, of every cadre, the positions they hold within the group, and even where they sit at their respective tables.
‘But Castro was only really interested in POTUS’s cadre. He had written notes, very detailed notes, on who they are, what they think about life, politics, love, even down to what they eat and why.
‘Some of the names were researched in even greater detail after Castro made contact with them. He had detailed their reaction to him expressing his willingness to be the linchpin between the cadre and the cognitive elite. He was nearly there, setting himself up as pope.
‘Castro’s handwritten notes listed what they have committed to him, and what he has given them in return.
‘Interestingly, money wasn’t the big motivator for the cadre, it was a view of the new world order that was in line with Castro’s – or the possibility of seizing or creating their own power.
‘For all Castro was, and wanted to become, I can’t take away from him the brilliance of his planning. No cadre member had any idea that Castro had been talking with any others. They thought they were the only one. None of the cognitive elite knew of the ledger’s existence, and what Castro had been planning. It was perfect divide-and-rule that any great politician or military genius would have been proud of. Until, that is, Parmesh learnt of the ledger’s existence.
‘Casper came to him wanting revenge. He explained about the ledger and a plan to take control of it. But then Parmesh let him see the light, the possibility of a better world, and taking control of the ledger became much more for Casper and Skye.’
I paused, but there was nothing coming from them.
‘But I won’t give you the names of the cadre, or where POTUS will be located down here.’
Janet flicked that one away with a wave of a hand. ‘Don’t want to know any more shit.’ Disgust was back on her face. For her, this was still about Richard.
But Lawrence wanted more. ‘Castro. What about him? He still walking about?’
I nodded and gave a little smile. ‘He knows he’ll be dealt with the same as anyone else if the secret is revealed – and please remember, that includes you two now. Besides, Charlotte has other plans for him.’
Lawrence frowned. ‘He joining Parmesh?’
‘No. She’s going to show him a better way of thinking about things, by joining us, not opposing. Just like she will with any of the cognitive elite who have leanings to Castro’s old way of thinking. It won’t be easy, but if it was, it wouldn’t be so important, would it?’
Janet hadn’t quite moved on. ‘Charlotte?’
I nodded, very proudly. ‘Parmesh discovered Charlotte. Nothing is thicker than blood. She’s got two big jobs to do, bringing the cognitive elite and the cadre on board, and it’s going to be hard. But she’s the Pope, the linchpin, and in any case, that’s what a crusade is all about, isn’t it?’
I decided not to add that we had the living memory of the hipster and the crew, and that Castro knew we had it. Charlotte had made contact with him and had told him when she held out a hand in peace. It was enough to stop him jumping up and down too much before he came round to our way of thinking. It would take time, but we’d get there.
The two in front of me were still processing the idea that Charlotte now controlled so much power. I wanted to get them away from that. ‘As for me, I’m just an adviser to her. But what am I to you guys? You made up your minds yet?’
I took a breath, waiting for an answer to come back to me. But none did, and that wasn’t good.
68
‘If you feel you need to arrest me, I understand. I get it. But please, please, please – think first of what will tumble down from above, on your own state, what they will do to you if any of this is revealed.
‘Instead, you know what? Why not join us? You’re both principled, both want to do the right thing, so why not come and be part of something that’s both of those things – and more?’
I looked at them and smiled, trying to be welcoming, trying to be as open as I could.
They looked at each other for no more than a couple of seconds, both raised an eyebrow, and then they burst out laughing. Fair enough, but it was what was going on inside their heads that I was more interested in. I would find out one way or the other soon enough.
I carried on with the pitch. ‘You’d be most welcome. We must never stand still because there’s much to do. Maybe you could help us.’
I studied their faces. ‘Lawrence, Janet, think what you’d be able to achieve with our resources, our connections, for the most powerful person on the planet, who will be in need of us. The chance to change the world for good, eh? A better world for Richard’s family? So that we can all say he didn’t die for nothing?’
There was no reply, no sign on their faces, so I left it out there in the air.
Janet stood, straightened her skirt, and nodded down at Lawrence, before pointing at the GoPro. ‘Give him the card. We can’t have any of this morning’s shit out there, can we?’
Lawrence leant across the coffee-table to open the camera. Janet turned and looked down at me. ‘This is not how it ends. I have a widow to go back to.’
‘I know, I get it. But is there anything we can do to ease the family’s pain? Maybe organize some way to ensure the grandchildren’s future? Ensure all their futures? We can do that. We have people who will be clever at creating a legal and plausible way of making that h
appen for them. We’re doing the same for Hector Estrella’s family in Manila. Whatever they need, they can have.’
Janet liked that.
Lawrence was up on his feet and the GoPro went into his jacket pockets, along with its tripod, making his suit stick out at the sides. I rose, and limped with them towards the front door. When we got there, I put out a hand to Janet, and she took it, as did Lawrence afterwards.
‘I know you had to come. I understand the frustration. I’m sorry that Mrs Rayner will never be satisfied with the explanation, but—’
‘But nothing. I’ll be back.’
Lawrence nodded. ‘We’ll both be back.’
I smiled. ‘Of course, any time. Come and stay here if you want.’
As I opened the door, the sun blinded us. The two of them reached into their pockets for their sunglasses and headed for their hire without another word.
I closed the door and set off at a limp, back towards the rear of the house. They were good people, trying to do a good job in unworkable circumstances. Just like Richard, just like Hector, they were caught in the middle of something they had no control of.
But at least they were both still alive.
69
I reached the concrete steps to the basement, which were now completely hidden behind a dark wooden door that blended with the colonial décor. It took me longer to get down the steps than it would have done before my injury, but I saw it as a good thing. It gave me more time to think about the first time I had met Casper and Jon. I imagined them running down this very flight of concrete shouting at me to stand still, already knowing what Charlotte was to Parmesh. They must have obtained her DNA from the missing hairbrush in the bag Jon had stolen from her yoga class. Very clever.
When Casper worked for Castro, he wasn’t yet married to Skye, but it was serious. It was her rage at what had happened to Casper that made her just as bent on revenge as he was. It was her idea to approach Parmesh and, just like Casper, she’d seen the light. Then she’d come up with the plan to infiltrate Castro’s empire to discover where the ledger was hidden.
They married; she infiltrated.
Down here below ground, everything was laid out exactly as planned. The nuclear-proof rooms with their own power, air-conditioned wall supply, communications, everything needed to lock down and be safe. Everything required to guarantee our survivability, just like POTUS, who would be tucked away in a purpose-built bunker just outside Wellington. From here, Charlotte would be the linchpin – the Pope – between the cognitive elite, POTUS and his interagency cadre.
I pushed open one of the dark grey steel doors into our common room. Sofas lined the walls, on which hung dozens of TV monitors, keeping a watchful eye on what was happening around the world.
Charlotte was sitting in one of the two chairs in a corner of the room, set back a couple of metres from the bare concrete walls. This was what we had ended up calling our memory area, and it was here that we had sat to memorize the ledger. Every line, every detail. I could even draw the sketches of the seating plan of who sat where, and why. And the reason? Charlotte had decided there had been enough killing over bits of paper. So, once we were a hundred per cent sure that we had both memorized every detail of every page, she had burnt it. The ledger no longer existed. No one could ever find out where it was, and kill for it.
We had sat here, day after day, and these days we still both came down here to keep that memory on its game. To anyone watching, what we did might look like meditating, but it wasn’t. It was going through the secrets page by page in our minds.
Positioned around the two wooden chairs were the tripods and cameras of a holoport. She used it to talk to others of the cognitive elite to make them feel at ease about the changes. Parmesh had gone, but the crusade went on. With the knowledge Charlotte possessed and, more importantly, her blood-line, she was most definitely the Pope.
From the depths of this basement, she had also made contact with members of the cadre to explain the predicament they were in now that Castro no longer held any power, and that she had the details of what they had been getting up to with him. It wasn’t a threat, but rather a hand outstretched in peace. The linchpin to the cognitive elite had changed, the purpose of the cognitive elite had changed, but they could still be part of it. She would give them the faith to change: they need not worry. For now, all they had to do was make sure that everything returned to normal. No more police, no more media.
But that wasn’t the reason Charlotte was down there today. She was there for something very different: she was watching the living memory of that very first meeting in Queenstown, her brother agonizing as he tried to work out whether or not he should tell her about their relationship.
I sat on one of the sofas, waited a minute or so for it to finish. As I did so, I ran through the first couple of pages of the ledger again in my head.
Charlotte stood and took off the goggles and headphones. I gave her a stupid half-wave, and couldn’t help noticing there was a tear in her eye, as there always was each time she watched it. But, as always, she didn’t try to wipe it away.
She headed towards me, eager for news.
‘How was it?’
I got up and stepped closer. ‘It was good. They know. It felt right to tell them.’
I gave her a smile, along with the answer to her next question.
‘They’ll be back. They’re curious.’
She beamed. ‘Good.’ She walked towards the door, and as she passed me, her fingers pushed into my shoulder. She knew I couldn’t keep balance on my bad leg, and as I fell back into one of the sofas she laughed her head off and waved backwards at me. ‘You need to sort that leg out, limpy boy. See you when you’ve finished. I’ll make tea.’
70
My memory work took an hour and a half, as it always did. I could have done it in less, but I made sure I went through every page slowly, even if my mind wanted to jump ahead a couple of sentences because I knew them so well. It was imperative I could recall it word for word and every single detail of every diagram.
I was standing on my bedroom balcony, overlooking the inlet that was bathed in brilliant sunshine before a cloud came over and knocked it out for a bit, then moved on, and Saraswati, about two kilometres away, glistened in its rays once more.
I smiled to myself as I thought of the crew running round fending off gulls. Although we had access to some of the best brains in Silicon Valley, there still wasn’t a device on board to send out some frequency to repel the little shits. Or big shits – Charlotte and I had often laughed about the dive-bombing attack Parmesh had suffered on deck. But even more than that, we knew that in the laughter there was a lesson. We may have everything we needed for the crusade, but we mustn’t get above ourselves. If we allowed that to happen, we would fail. We had to keep our feet firmly on the ground.
I thought about the Js and their drones. James and Jamie, or whatever their real names were – I’d never found out but hoped to soon – had long gone. Their armoured drone system had been bought by the US and Israeli militaries, and they were now probably sitting on the very large decks of their very own yachts or balconies at their houses in Atherton, and almost certainly flying mini versions over their neighbours’ gardens to check for young couples ‘jamming’.
They were still with us in spirit, of course, and now, with their new-found wealth, they were also part of the cognitive elite. They were coming down here in a couple of months to buy a sheep station between them. The rules for foreigners buying or building residential property in New Zealand had changed: in general, only residents and citizens could buy homes to live in, but if you had the right representation and deep enough pockets, other investment opportunities were available.
I had been a very happy man when they told me their plan. I liked them a lot. Well, more than liked: they’d saved my life and made it possible for Tony to be with Maureen.
In other news, Parmesh’s family had been in Scotland during the raid in Atherton,
a trip Kyle and Parmesh had planned deliberately because they didn’t know how it would all play out. Kyle, of course, was part of the crusade – he was then, and he still was now. Very much so. Everything that Parmesh had worked for now belonged to Kyle and, because of his allegiance, also, in turn, to the crusade.
Charlotte and I had bonded with Kyle and the kids these past few months. I’d been worried that Charlotte would take on her own name and start morphing into something different, especially when Kyle gave us joint seats on the board, which was now under his control. I couldn’t help wondering: would the old family name help her carry on Parmesh’s dream? I needn’t have worried. She didn’t even consider it. Just as she had told Parmesh, our mum and dad were her parents, and I was her brother. That said, she certainly had the Subramanian genes. Her life was now focused on the crusade. It was as if she’d found her calling in life, and it had made her metamorphose into this amazing person I admired and felt so proud of. She was radiantly happy, yet she still retained the old Charlotte. The strengths she had in combining and blending her old and new lives kept on astounding me. Simon, for example: she had set him up with a studio, a lifelong supply of paint and canvas, and left him behind. It was just as well: he was going to need the practice. To date, he had sold only a single picture – and that was one Charlotte had spotted on eBay and I had bought anonymously.
The sky was completely clear of clouds and the sun was beating down, so I went back inside to my bedroom to pick up some sunglasses. On the way, I stopped and looked at the wall above the dresser, where the framed New Zealand hundred-dollar bill Charlotte had presented to me now hung. We’d finally got round to having them framed about a month ago. Until then they had sat in glass tumblers on a shelf in the comfort room in the basement, and there was a constant fight between us as to which bill belonged to whom. Of course I let Charlotte win. She was probably right, anyway.
