“Know that, too.”
Now Bruno turns to Wilson. “What was all the noise?”
“There was an incident.”
“I got that much,” Bruno says. “Was it an attack? Maybe some airline employee beating a customer, or—?”
“A false alarm.” Wilson frowns. There is something she doesn’t want to talk about. She nods to Chang. “Let me check on things next door.”
She steps out, leaving Bruno alone with Chang, who has retrieved his iPad. “Good thing you called. This is a global clusterfuck.”
“Thanks for rescuing me.”
“You’re doing fine—”
“Except for the fainting.”
She honors him with the full Chang, the sweet smile, the touch on the arm. Early in their yearlong relationship, Bruno had realized Chang possessed perfect control of her expressions and gestures; the best actor of the age. Combine this talent with startling beauty and it is a wonder she hasn’t been elected Emperor of Earth.
“What’s the deal with Ruteb?”
He gives her the highlights as he glances at the iPad and finds that Vindahl has not responded. “Wait,” Chang says, uncharacteristically surprised. “He’s a death researcher?”
“More precisely, a researcher into existence after death.”
Chang vanishes into her own iPad. Bruno can’t suppress a sigh, this simple gesture making him feel weak and old. Three years since the discovery of a mysterious lump in his neck—the first step in a series of tests and chemo news as terrifying as it was predictable.
The next stage, his crack cancer team lately informed him, is surgery that will probably result in the loss of his larynx. And the prospect of, at best, five more years of steady slicing and inevitable decline into a drugged fade-out.
If Ruteb is correct, Bruno at least possesses a soul—something that will survive after the slicing, dicing, and irradiating.
And this is the best scenario he can imagine.
Wilson returns. “Come on.”
Bruno steps to the door, but Chang stops him, indicating her iPad. “I’ve got to check in with Drew”—another attorney from the project—”and this whole after-death science sounds crazy. It may be an attempt to turn you.”
“Turn me how?”
“Away from the law, into some kind of foreign agent.”
Bruno can’t believe what he’s hearing. “Don’t you think this is too obviously crazy?”
“There is your particular … condition, Bru. Maybe they targeted you.”
“Our assignments are random. I could have been talking to any of a dozen other people who are hung up here.”
“Maybe they all had orders to use this shit on you.”
“That’s paranoid even by your standards.”
Chang just offers an indulgent smile.
* * *
In the next room, Ruteb is sitting at a desk much like the one in the other room, but now with the added bonus of shackles on his wrists. “That isn’t remotely necessary,” Bruno tells Wilson, who stands to one side, arms crossed, clearly nervous.
“He said he knew all about IEDs.”
“NDEs, actually. And you’re not supposed to be listening in, are you?”
Wilson stares, embarrassed yet defiant. “We thought he’d attacked you,” she says. “And I can’t remove the shackles until the agent in charge signs off.”
“Which will be—?
“The moment he gets done with—”
“The ‘false alarm’? Come on, Tania.”
“Give me a minute.” She leaves.
Bruno places the iPad on the table and sits across from Ruteb. “Sorry.”
Now Bruno is able to see the bruises on Ruteb’s left cheek, which looks swollen. “They finally got around to beating me.”
“Someone will be punished, believe me.”
“I will overlook it if I am freed, and can resume my work.”
Bruno taps the iPad. “Still waiting, I’m afraid.”
“There’s nothing to be done?”
“Something will happen when the agent returns with her supervisor.” He almost convinces himself.
“You are not well,” Ruteb says suddenly.
“At least I’m free to walk through the door.”
“What is killing you?”
Bruno has no intention of giving this client a tour of his private house of horrors. But, lacking other options, he offers the lowlights.
Forgetting the shackles and the bruises, Ruteb leans forward eagerly. “Mr. Bruno, the whole purpose of my research is to guide people in your situation!”
Bruno is getting angry now. “Do you want to get out of here or not?”
But Ruteb will not give up. “There are different kinds of death. There is … preservation of energy and form, but there is also annihilation.”
“I don’t understand.” Nor does he like any mention of annihilation.
Ruteb strains at his bonds. “Your soul has a physical presence. It exists in the universe, so it can be affected by physical forces. It can persist, it can evolve … and it can also be annihilated, obliterated. It can cease to exist.”
Now Ruteb takes a breath, as if the next statement costs him. “My brother’s soul was annihilated when he blew himself up. He vanished from the universe as if he had never been born. This is the fate of those who engage in terrorism.”
“Oh, now political acts affect the afterlife?”
“Only political acts that result in the annihilation of the self. The 9/11 bombers, for example—but also many of their victims.”
Bruno appreciates the grim irony of terrorists paying the ultimate price for their acts—vanishing from the universe. But hearing that their victims meet the same fate? Could the universe—cold and uncaring, yes—be so totally fucking unfair?
Given his current condition, he might actually consider this hideous argument. “So … those who were at Hiroshima.”
“Annihilated.”
“Firebombed in Tokyo and Dresden?”
“The same. If your body is vaporized, so is your soul.”
Bruno sits up straight. He recalls a phrase from the Civil War—a good death. Yes, some Confederate general, maybe Jackson or Stuart, mortally wounded and making his peace, passing into the Great Beyond to rest in the bosom of the Lord.
No annihilation there.
“What about dying of old age? Getting killed in a car accident?” He doesn’t feel the need to ask about dying of cancer at age thirty-three.
“It depends on your physical and mental state. A person who dies of old age while suffering from dementia is in the same state in post-life. Someone who dies from injuries that don’t annihilate the corpus will make a better transition.” Ruteb shakes his head. “This is very complicated. But it is known, for sure, that there are … hierarchies. Not all deaths are equal.”
A phrase that has been floating, unfocused, in Bruno’s mind, suddenly sharpens. “You’re saying there is no death neutrality.”
Ruteb nods.
“This is … horrifying.”
“I have not slept well since learning this.”
“Bet you’ve been careful about what you do, too.”
Ruteb looks glum. “I refused to get on an airplane until I realized that I faced annihilation if I remained in Jordan.”
“If this is true, it would change the way everyone lives.”
“Or dies.”
Both hear a thump, followed by a second and a third.
“They told me it was an exercise,” Bruno says. He glances at his iPad, which has cached a news bulletin, and now sees mention of a lockdown at LAX.
Bruno stands and knocks on the door. “Tania? Anyone?”
He feels a concussion through the door.
Ruteb feels it, too. “Please get me out of here.”
“I can’t undo those shackles. Believe me, I’ve tried.”
He is paralyzed, useless. His client is trapped; so is he while God only knows what madness is taking
place a few yards away.
He tugs at the table. “What good will that do?” Ruteb says.
“I want to move it away from the door.” But the table is bolted down. Bruno’s only defensive option is to reposition his chair directly behind the door, turning himself into a human shield—a phrase suddenly filled with new and disturbing meaning.
“Move back here,” Ruteb says. “If there is a bomb, you might die, but you will escape annihilation.”
Bruno leaves the chair wedged under the knob, blocking the door, then crouches down next to Ruteb. Nothing more on his iPad. His phone shows one bar, however, and he dials Chang.
And gets her voicemail.
“What about ghosts?” he says, surprising himself.
Even Ruteb is startled by the change of subject. “Ghosts are a type of morphogenetic field, we think. They are souls whose deaths were not violent enough to result in annihilation, but which carried some residual physical charge. Possibly emotional.”
“Unfinished business in life?”
“As good a description as any.”
All of this troubles Bruno, not for the outrageous subject and its horrifying implications, but because it detracts from his mission. Doing his job is what he was known for, even as a dutiful son covering for an alcoholic father and an unhappy mother. In college, in law school, he was always the note-taker, the test-giver.
At the firm, he has been the one to push for pro bono work for immigrants, even as he deals with his own health problems.
His phone rings—Chang, shouting over exterior noise. “Are you safe?”
“We’re still locked up. Where are you?”
“Off-site. Someone in Bradley Terminal jumped several agents and took their guns.” She paused, apparently listening to someone else. Back to Bruno: “That’s what they’re telling us, anyway. It could be an actual attack—”
Bruno is shocked to hear what has to be gunshots from one or more automatic weapons.
“Fuck,” Chang says. Bruno knows that his former lover never uses profanity unless terrified. “Listen to me,” she says, and even with the sad acoustics of his cell phone Bruno can hear how frightened she is. “We got some info on your man Ruteb. He apparently worked at some freaky-deaky place in Syria where they tortured people.”
“What kind of place? What did they do?” Bruno can’t help looking at Ruteb as he hears this.
“Ask him! Gotta go!”
The phone dies.
Ruteb’s head hangs. He surely saw Bruno’s face, and might have heard Chang’s words. “Torture?”
Ruteb’s whole posture screams denial. “Not me. Not my team. Years ago, yes, when our institute worked with the Soviet group. Their methods were extreme.”
He shifts now, and pleads. “We did monitor and observe many human subjects who were on the verge of death, and then died. But they volunteered!”
Fine, fine, Bruno thinks. But he wonders if Chang is right. And maybe this Vindahl person and the Lumina facility are bogus.
Even as he formulates this theory, he judges it stupid, too convoluted, too unnecessary. He is on his way to an alternate view when the there is knocking on the door. “Bruno!” he hears. Tania Wilson’s voice. He opens it to find her wearing body armor. “We’re getting out of here,” she announces, stepping over to Ruteb and unshackling him. “Do you have his papers in order? Bruno!”
Bruno has lost focus. His lack of energy again. He locates them. “Yes. Why?”
“We’re leaving the airport.”
“Is there some kind of attack? We heard explosions and a lot of gunfire.”
“I only know what I know and that ain’t much. Come on.”
* * *
Down the hall they go, Bruno in front, Ruteb behind him, Wilson in the rear, reversing Bruno’s route of four hours earlier. The other rooms seem deserted. In fact, the facility feels like an office building on a Sunday morning—which, Bruno realized, it is.
Bruno stops at the door leading out into the main concourse. “What’s the holdup?” Wilson says.
“Voices.”
Wilson slides forward and, as quietly as possible, opens the door enough so she can see.
She waits.
Ruteb says, “Why don’t we stay here? It seems safer.”
“Come on,” Wilson says. “Once you’re out that door, you’ve immigrated.”
Ruteb looks to Bruno. “Technically. But you will still be liable for detention, even prosecution—”
“Shut up, Bruno,” Wilson says, opening the door all the way. “Take yes for an answer.”
Bruno nods to Ruteb, too. Go.
* * *
The main concourse, with its ticketing and food court, is deserted, but scattered bags and other debris scream of a frantic flight. Bruno sees a pair of TSA agents in armor waving them to theoretical safety.
Crouching, Bruno runs. He feels as though he is back in Boy Scouts.
It only takes seconds to reach the TSA team. One of the escorts, a heavyset armed agent nameplated ESPARZA, points to Ruteb, saying, “Who is this?”
Wilson says, “None of your business,” which surprises Bruno.
And with no further conversation, they all run out the front doors of Bradley Terminal.
Bruno blinks in the bright midday LA sunshine. Nothing seems to be wrong … except that there is no traffic, no honking, only the overhead whap of helicopter rotor blades.
And not another human being in sight. “Where’d everybody go?” Bruno says.
Esparza’s partner, Nolan, grunts, more or less. “If they’re following directions they’re miles away by now.”
But Wilson is also amazed at the lack of people. “We simmed big evacuations but we never got anywhere near this empty.”
“We’ve had an hour,” Esparza said.
“We had a day.”
“We must have learned something.”
Bruno, Ruteb, and their escorts continue to move across the street, then into the relative shelter of the parking structure.
“Are we good here?” Wilson says. Bruno takes this to mean safe.
As does Esparza. “Better, still not great” he says. He is busy with a cell phone and earpiece.
There is a burbling from inside Bruno’s briefcase. His phone. “Sorry,” he hisses, pulling it out of his pocket and raising it to his ear.
“Is this Mr. Bruno?” It is difficult to hear outside, but is clearly the voice of a woman.
“Yes—”
“This is Hannah Vindahl. Your message said you’re trying to get Ahmed Ruteb out of immigration hell.”
“I do have him. We’re in a different kind of hell right now. Can’t really talk.”
Esparza and his unnamed colleague are staring at him. Even Wilson is shaking her head.
Ruteb, however, is eagerly gesturing toward Bruno, the phone, himself.
“I’m watching the news now,” Vindahl says. “You need to know … they’re probably trying to kill Ruteb. I … I’m on my way.”
Bruno wants to ask for more details, but the call ends as a flurry of gunshots crackles nearby, sending all of them crouching.
When it is quiet again, Bruno more or less whispers, “This is about him?”
Wilson looks at Bruno.. “Yes.”
He understands. Assuming the truth of Ruteb’s theories, believers of all faiths would brand him a dangerous heretic. “So we’ve got to get out of here.”
“About fucking time you realized it,” Esparza says. He has been popping over the barrier to scan the surroundings. “We should try the other side,” he says.
No one argues. All five of them start crab-walking, keeping the low wall of the parking structure between them and whoever out there is shooting.
Twenty yards deeper, they have rows of parked cars as shields and are able to move faster, though still carefully.
“Why didn’t you tell me they were after my client?” Bruno says to Wilson.
“Didn’t know until half an hour ago, and came to g
et you immediately.”
“Who is it?”
“Some outside group, maybe four or five people. We got one of them and he had your man’s photo and flight information.”
“Okay.”
“I’m really looking forward to knowing why.”
“You might not like it,” Bruno says.
They have reached the east end of the parking structure and another elevated roadway. Esparza is several feet away, talking quietly but precisely on his cell phone. Bruno hears him asking about evacuation and updates on time.
Ruteb sinks to his haunches. He looks spent, and who can blame him? “You’re almost out of here,” Bruno says. “Am I a hotshot lawyer or what?”
The attempt at lightness fails. Ruteb says, “This has been my life for four years.”
“We’re changing your life,” Bruno says, with optimism he doesn’t truly believe, especially given his own condition.
Then he hears Esparza saying, “Okay, okay, I guess we have to.” Esparza removes his earpiece, then taps quickly at his cell phone as he turns to Bruno and the others. “Here’s the deal. There are two trucks filled with high explosives, one that way about a hundred yards, the other on that side, maybe one fifty.”
“How did they manage to get past security?” Bruno says.
“I don’t fucking know. But whoever got them past, however they did, is talking to us.” He aims his phone at Ruteb. “They want him or they blow the place.”
“We can’t—” Bruno and Wilson speak as one.
Esparza waves his phone. “We aren’t turning him over. But the big problem is they’ve put a clock on this.” He glances at his phone. “Ten minutes.”
“How bad is it?” Wilson asks.
“If both trucks are filled with C-4 or anything like it, they will collapse this structure, three terminals, and leave a crater the size of a football field.”
“God, there are a couple of thousand people in every terminal.”
“We’ve been getting them out,” Esparza says, “but yeah, we could be looking at casualties on the order of 9/11.”
“Annihilation,” Ruteb says, his voice quavering.
Bruno is the only one who knows exactly what he means.
“What do we do?” Bruno says. “Doesn’t sound as though we can hide.”
The Vetting Page 2
