Reboot

by Larry Buenafe

  “Okay, girlfriend. Hey, it’s a good thing I have one arm left. Otherwise you wouldn’t have anything to grab onto.”

  “But I’m not… oh, a joke, I get it.”

  We picked up our pace, and in a couple of minutes were at the back of the large group of protesters. As they shouted and chanted, we edged along toward the smaller group that we had identified as at least part of the leadership for the protesters and dissidents. We were still at the back of the crowd, but were just about to slowly and casually we make our way into the center, when a low, commanding voice from behind us said, “Don’t turn around, don’t make any sudden moves. Turn to the right and walk until I tell you to stop.”

  19

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  CONVERSATION WITH SRB, SVC, AND EXTRACTION PLAN COMMITTEE

  121452 08:34

  -All right, enough with the ‘technical reports’. Let’s hear the actual extraction plan. I need a good laugh after breakfast.

  -(SRB) Yes, ahh, (IG) was instrumental in developing the extraction plan, so if you don’t mind, I’ll throw it to him.

  -(IG) Yes, thank you, thank you. It is an honor to present our plan.

  -Before you begin, (SRB), I need to meet with you privately after this. (SRB nods)

  -(IG) As is obvious, extracting Dr. Taylor will be exceedingly difficult. After careful consideration of the known factors, we have identified a couple of weaknesses that we can exploit in our attempt. We know, for example, that after the jet leaves in the afternoon, the number of staff on premises is greatly reduced. The fact that they are geographically isolated can work in our favor as well. The wired communications…

  -Okay, this is stuff we all know. Cut to the chase, give me the main beats.

  -(IG) Um… yes, very well. The plan is to create two separate disturbances around the perimeter to distract the outside security forces, fly in two VTOL drones at ground level altitude to avoid detection as soon as the distractions pull the security forces away, and have them fire EMPs to take out the electricity of the main compound. Just behind the drones will be four more VTOLS with specially trained agents. They will enter the facilities and take out any electronics the EMPs miss. Our agent on the inside has provided us with a detailed map of the extensive underground facilities and the location of the father. They will use gas and flechettes to incapacitate any staff in the facility. The biggest thing we have in our favor is that the Americans think no one knows they have taken him to Area 51, and they have gone out of their way to maintain business as usual there. They believe that anyone who is interested in him still thinks he is at the naval base in Florida. I understand there are some Bright Hand agents near the naval base who are making themselves a little conspicuous to give the impression that we are surveilling it, is that true?

  -(SVC) That is correct.

  -(IG) Very good. So, we locate the father, extract him via VTOL, move him quickly via the Bright Hand underground network, and ultimately return him to the Bright Hand headquarters. Where is that, by the way?

  -(SVC) That’s need-to-know only.

  -All right, so aside from innumerable details, that’s it?

  -(SRB) That’s the only plan we have that doesn’t result in a large loss of life.

  -Okay, seems doable. Let’s adjourn, my stomach is grumbling. Yes, I know I just ate breakfast, so what? (SRB), (SVC), with me, please. Everyone else, thank you for your work.

  ****

  W e froze for a moment, then turned and did as the voice commanded. “Ava…” I hissed.

  “Just do as he says for now. We don’t want to make a scene in front of all these people, anyway.”

  I made eye contact with Cheri as we ambled casually away from the crowd and toward a series of buildings adjacent to the three large government structures. “Just keep your eyes forward and keep walking,” the voice said again in a low, casual tone, and this time I noticed three things: the voice was coming from above us, so the person was tall, he was speaking English, so he probably knew we were English speakers, and he had what sounded to me like a British accent.

  “Walk between these buildings, and at the end turn left,” he commanded, and we continued. I could move fast enough to neutralize anything this person could do to me, but he might hurt Cheri before I could stop him, so I better just go along with him for now… he might have a gun pointed at her back, so I don’t want to make any sudden moves… not yet, anyway… not out here in front of everyone…

  At the end of the space between the two buildings we came to what amounted to an alley between the backs of the tall buildings, and we turned left as directed. Twenty-five meters ahead of us was a small group of people leaning casually against the walls of the buildings; they all stood as we rounded the corner and faced us.

  Oh, boy… what’s going on here? Are we going to have to fight our way out? And how much fighting can Cheri do with one arm? I know she has skills, but still…

  Then Cheri giggled, elbowed me, and pointed back over her shoulder.

  What the… then I felt two big hands on my shoulders, and I spun around to find… Hassim standing there, laughing like a crazy person.

  I glared at Cheri and growled, “Did you know?”

  Between giggles and giving Hassim a high-five with her good arm, she said, “Of course. I recognized his voice right away, but I assumed he had a good reason for wanting us to act casual, so I went along with it. If I had thought we were in any danger, I would have taken him out.”

  “So, I’m the only one who didn’t know what was happening?”

  I covered my mouth and whispered, “Ava, did you know?”

  “I know all and see all, sonny boy. I didn’t want you to overreact, so I said nothing. So sue me.”

  Sue you? You’re not even a real person… oh, boy…

  Hassim, still laughing, said, “Sorry, my friend, I needed to get you over to this location and I didn’t want to raise suspicion from the military and agents in the crowd. I suppose I was just a tad overly cautious. Extremely convincing disguises, by the way. If I hadn’t seen you before, Ms. Kim, I would not have picked you out. Lucas, I have never seen you in this disguise, and I would not have recognized you at all if you were by yourself. And sorry, Ms. Kim, not that I don’t have a great deal of respect for your skills, but you would not have taken me out. I am who you think I am, but not just that. Here, look at me, sorry, my bloody ID.”

  He was wearing the same clothing as when we met him in Pakistan, including the Pink Floyd shirt and faded military jacket. He reached into a pocket inside his jacket, but stopped short. “Oh, where are my manners? First, a proper hello.” He held his arms out and hugged Cheri tight, then reached out his hand to shake with me. “I remember that you’re uncomfortable with most physical contact, but let’s shake, anyway.”

  He produced what looked like a slim wallet from his jacket and flipped it open. Inside was a metal plate:

  0247

  I had no idea what that meant, but Cheri’s eyes were bugging out. “Shut the front door! Is this real?”

  Hassim, his face now appearing serious to me, said, “It’s not our normal practice to reveal our identities, but this is a special situation, obviously. Sorry for the put-on back in Pakistan, but I would have been ready to act if it had been necessary.”

  Cheri smiled up at him, and reached into her cheek with her index finger, flexing the inside of her cheek out to reveal her Bright Hand tattoo.

  Hassim clapped and raised his hands as if in victory. “I knew it! I bloody knew it… I told me dad you had to be Bright Hand. No one else would have the tech to do what you two did. How about you, Lucas? Are you Bright Hand as well?”

  “Umm… no, I’m… I’m my own thing, I guess.”

  He gazed at Cheri, and she grinned and put her hand on my shoulder. “He’s his own thing, all right. There’s no one like Lucas. He’s what all this is leading to. If we get out alive, that is.”

  “Well, if what I’ve heard is true, I reckon you’re ri
ght. Come on, I have some people to introduce to you.”

  “Well, wait a minute. How did you end up here where we are? How did you know we would be here? What do you know about why we’re here in the first place?”

  “That’s rather complicated… me, my dad, sorry, that’s a hard one for me to get used to… anyway, he is… he has certain connections… and he’s taken quite a personal interest in your situation. He… he was advised of the US requiring you to do this mission, including the timeline. I’ve been here for a couple of days… we anticipated that your strategy would have to include getting dissidents to side with you, and the most important ones are here in Brasilia, so we assumed that you would come here soon. Luckily, we were correct; otherwise we wouldn’t be standing here chatting. I made inroads with the leaders of the resistance movements. I told them someone would come who could help them in ways no one else could, so I hope you have a good plan. Otherwise, they might take issue with me.”

  Both he and Cheri chuckled at that, but I didn’t get the joke. Of course, they’ll be unhappy with him if he tells them something that isn’t true… oh, boy…

  Pointing to the group of people waiting down the alley, he continued. “I have done some of the footwork to ease the way just a bit. That’s how this group in front of us came to be here. So, although I’m MI-6, I’m on leave at the moment. I’m not here on official MI-6 business. I’m here to help you. At your disposal, so to speak. Shall we meet our new friends?”

  20

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  CONVERSATION WITH SRB, SVC

  121452 09:06

  -I assume you know that we’re not following that plan. Where is (IG)?

  -(SVC) His hologram signal came in from his home, just outside Lima.

  -We have eyes on him?

  -(SVC) Of course.

  -(SRB) Um… you want to tell me what’s going on here, then?

  -What’s going on is that you haven’t been watching him like I directed you to. (SVC), have him brought down, now. I want him here ASAP.

  -(SVC) Consider it done.

  -(SRB) What the bloody hell?

  -I told you he might turn on us. He’s been negotiating with the Americans, for money, or at least he thinks he has. We’ve been monitoring his communications. He’s been clever, sending coded messages with delivery boys to another location. We’ve been intercepting the communications and posing as the Americans, so we have him red-handed. Unless he has another means of communication to the Americans, perhaps telepathy or some such nonsense, they don’t know of our plans, but he almost ruined it for all of us. I assume you had no idea, eh?

  -(SRB) Well, no, I… of course not. He’s doing it for money? I thought he was the richest man in Peru. How else did he get in the bloody LFP?

  -As I remember, you advocated for him, didn’t you?

  -(SRB) No, not that I remember… just a minute, what are you trying to say?

  -I’m not trying to say anything. Sit your British arse down and get comfortable. I want you here when he’s brought in. This whole ridiculous charade is distracting us from the kid, by the way. (SVC), we have any snacks out there?

  ****

  W e walked toward the group of five young adults waiting down the alley for us, and they looked like an interesting mix of people. Three women and two men; two of the young women were dressed in business clothes, a lot like what Ms. Perez used to wear when we met her on Alexy’s ship, the other one in casual street clothes. One of the two men was also dressed professionally, in a three-piece suit, the other in colorful shorts and t-shirt.

  As we reached them, Hassim smiled and said, in Portuguese, “These are the two I told you about. Don’t let appearances deceive you. They are here to free Ms. Kovitski, aid the overthrow of President Leitao, and to put Ms. Kovitski in her rightful place. We will only use first names for these two; they would like to remain just as anonymous as me, hence the disguises. This young lady who looks like a young man is Chi, and this young man who looks like a teenage girl is Lucas.”

  As always, my ability to read expressions was weak, but I would say surprise was the feeling I was getting from the Brazilians. They looked at us, then at one another, and one of the young ladies in a business suit shrugged her shoulders and stepped forward.

  She was a solidly built lady, with a short, angular haircut and what seemed to me to be a lot of makeup on. In a professional-sounding voice, she said, “We speak Portuguese in Brazil mainly, but I assume it would be easier for you if we speak English, and all of us here can speak English. Our mutual friend has gathered us together to meet with you. We’ve been waiting for two days for you to arrive, and when he spotted you this morning, he contacted us to meet you here. My name is Pedrina Rossi; I am a human rights attorney and have been trying to work from the inside to get Ms. Kovitski released, but that will never work. Our ‘president’ is a want-to-be dictator; he is ruining our country and there is significant public opinion against him, even amongst the military. We feel confident that, if we could free her, the military would turn on President Leitao, and without them it would finish him. Our friend has assured us you can get her freed. I don’t know how you will do it, especially seeing you in person, but perhaps you can tell us your plan.”

  She reached out to shake hands, and shook in a firm, practiced manner. She was obviously the leader of the group, and the rest came forward to introduce themselves in quick succession. Jose Silva, the man in the business suit, was a military executive; Eloa Oliveira, the young woman in street clothes, was the leader of one of the dissident groups; Izabel Souza, the other young lady in tight business clothing, was a clerk for the vice president; and Antonio Costa, in shorts and t-shirt, had been a personal aide to Ms. Kovitski and was now involved in organizing the constant protests.

  Over the next thirty minutes, we outlined our plan, and as we did, there was a lot of head-shaking and crossed arms amongst our new friends. “Sorry, please, I don’t mean to be rude. You have described a beautiful plan, but how exactly do you intend to accomplish what you have described? No one could do this. Please, help us understand so we will know there is a reason to hope,” said Antonio Costa when we finished, running his hand through his long, wavy hair.

  A huge grin on her face, Cheri stepped forward. “You are all consumers of information, I assume. Have you heard of the near-miraculous rescue of the American ambassador in Pakistan?”

  Each of them nodded, and Jose Silva, in a deep, raspy voice, said, “The descriptions we get from the outside are filtered for most people, but in my position, I am ‘need to know’, so I got the actual story. It sounded like a fairy tale, to be honest.”

  Cheri pointed to Hassim and said, “He was there. Was it made up?”

  “Oh, no. If anything, I would say they downplayed it in the news.”

  She put her hand on my shoulder and said, “We got him out. Lucas and I. You may have noticed I’m missing an arm. I lost it on that mission, so it reduces my participation just a bit at this point. You have never met anyone like Lucas, though. All we need from you is to get him into the prison at Goiânia, and to be ready with the military when we get her out.”

  “The military will turn on Leitao when they see her. They are ready to turn on him now, they just need the right kind of push, and that would do it,” growled Jose Silva, his dark eyes gleaming. “Listen, we are all patriots. We love our country, and we will do anything we can to restore it to order for the people, for everyone. Not just the rich or the rulers. Everyone.”

  Now all their eyes were shining. “Can you really do it?” asked Eloa Oliveira, while wiping a tear quickly from her cheek.

  I covered my mouth and whispered, “Ava, can we do it?”

  “We wouldn’t be here if we couldn’t, sonny boy. Like I’ve said before, if you die, I die, and I plan to live forever.”

  I looked up into their anxious faces, and pulling the blonde hair from my wig out of my way, said, “Watch this.”

  I heard Cheri whisper, “
Oh, here we go,” as I crouched; I sprung into the air, did three flips, and landed forty meters behind the stunned group; I pointed my right fist at a garbage can next to the Brazilians and fired a quick laser pulse, cutting it in two steaming halves.

  “Okay,” Cheri giggled, high-fiving Hassim. “When do we start?”

  21

  DIRECTOR’S NOTES

  CONVERSATION WITH SVC, SRB

  121452 13:11

  -What’s the status on (IG)?

  -(SVC) He holed up for a time, but we have him now. To answer your next question, no one entered or left during the time he hunkered down, and we had shut off all electronic forms of communication, so we don’t believe the Americans were tipped off.

  -You don’t believe. When will he be here?

  (SVC)- We have him in route to our jet now. He should be sitting here at about 20:00 tonight.

  -Oakes is supposed to meet with the kid tomorrow in Brazil, yes?

  -That’s correct.

  -As soon as he does, I want him here. Let’s see if he can verify what the Americans know. (SRB), you see what kind of mess we have? And, you expect me to believe that you knew nothing about (IG)?

  -(SRB) Blimey, how would I know? I told you from the start, espionage is not my bloody game. You’ve crossed the line. You’re going past caution and into paranoia, mate.

  -Hm. Perhaps. Still, trust but verify, eh? On another subject, (SVC), I understand that Oakes used (JR)’s son to round up people who can help take some of the burden off the kid in Brazil. How’s that going?