Li now clicked through the associated camera footage from most recent to oldest. Li’s high-end equipment could scan the video fairly quickly with high clarity. The morning footage showed nothing of note, and he had already reviewed some of this footage, looking for a camera at the point where Peng’s and Elizabeth’s paths had crossed.
The next cameras were on his commute home from the night before. Nothing seemed strange there either. A couple of the in-house cameras showed Peng in the front gate office doing his typical work. There was footage of him outside with the gate guards, but nothing of note. Now up to the lunch period of that day, he scanned the cameras that picked him up on his way to lunch. There was one camera which picked Peng up at a distance on a sidewalk showing him walking towards the camera. Farther back in the image, Li noticed a foreign woman round the corner on the same path as Peng. When Peng passed under the camera, the recording stopped, having lost its quarry. Li could see the foreign woman better in the final image but her hat mostly blocked her face. Something was tickling Li’s paranoia, and he switched over to the main recording database from that same camera.
All cameras in China recorded continuously, 24/7, 365 days a year, but in a flagged search for a specific person, it pulled only associated portions of the recordings with that person in view. Now in the camera’s complete recording database, Li found the point on the recording where Peng disappeared from view. He continued scanning forward as the woman continued to approach the camera, hoping she would move her head so he could see her face. As she passed under the camera without revealing her face, Li swore loudly to himself. Suddenly Li’s mind clicked, and a charge went through his body as things fell into place. Could this woman be Elizabeth Parker? The hat would explain why her trail had gone cold yesterday since it would have hidden her face from the cameras. The foreign woman’s voice on Peng’s profile saying “excuse me” - could that be Elizabeth’s voice?
It was 11:00 when Li entered the interrogation room where Peng had been sitting for a couple of hours. The sparse room included only a rectangular table and three chairs. Sam had been hanging back in Peng’s mind, not making his presence known, and had been feeling Peng’s anxiety growing the longer they sat in the room. Peng’s internal dialog was racing frantically, trying to think what this might be about. He was worried it had something to do with the strange events he had experienced over the past few days, which he still didn’t understand. If so, how could he explain something he couldn’t make sense of himself? Sam felt the intense emotions associated with facing Li which, upon a little mental rummaging, were not from direct experience but Li’s reputation. Peng’s impression of Li was that of a brutal person whose only guiding principle was protecting ZG and its occupants at the expense of all else.
Looking at Li now, Sam saw a man of typical Chinese build - thin and fit, not overly tall or muscular. Dark hair and an officer’s green uniform but no hat. There was extreme confidence in the way he carried himself as he walked towards the table where Peng sat. Li took the chair across the table from them upon which he placed a folder. When Peng made eye contact, Sam sensed a dark malevolence. Sam knew instantly Peng’s impression was far too kind, and Peng was about to find out the real nightmare behind the rumors.
Li sat staring at them for a few long, uncomfortable moments before forcing what Sam thought was supposed to be a smile. It was the smile of a predator. It was what a crocodile would look if it tried to smile, Sam thought.
“How are you, Peng?” This was a brusque question, not friendly banter.
“I’m fine, sir,” Peng got out without revealing too much shakiness in his voice.
“I don’t think so,” Li said in a clipped raised voice.
Sam could feel Peng coming slightly unhinged, the chemicals of fear starting to flow through his body.
“YOU WILL TELL ME EVERYTHING!” Li yelled slamming both fists on the metal table.
Peng was now trembling visibly. He worked his mouth to say something but nothing came out.
Li pulled a picture out of the folder in front of him and showed it to Peng. “Who is this woman?” Li’s voice was still loud but not shouting.
Li’s eyes were now hyper alert, watching Peng’s every move, looking for tells that would betray him.
If it had been possible, Sam would have trembled slightly at the sight of Julia’s face looking back at him in the picture. How was this possible? The picture was from the afternoon of their initial arrival. It was a good quality closeup of Julia’s face. Sam couldn’t make out where she was in the picture but she was outside somewhere.
Counter to Sam’s response, Peng actually relaxed a little at the sight of the picture; he really did not recognize the woman and thought maybe this was just a mixup.
“I don’t know this woman, Commander,” Peng responded with the beginning of some confidence.
Li placed the picture back in the folder and picked it up, he stood and dismissively said, “Well, that is what we will find out,” then turned and walked out of the room.
Just as the door closed behind Li, it reopened again as two men in fabric masks entered. One carrying what Sam would say looked like an old-fashioned doctor's valise. The other man carried a large wooden box with electrical wires connected to it.
The two men put Peng through a series of tortures, first electrocuting him via wires connected to his ears. Secondly, by pushing sharp metal spears under the nails of the two larger toes of his left foot. Eventually pulling off the two toenails and then flattening them with a heavy metal hammer.
The men encouraged Peng to tell them what his involvement with the woman in the picture was while they methodically moved through their machinations of persuasion. Peng was ready to say whatever he had to to make the pain and torture stop. But he knew falsely admitting to knowing the woman would only lead to more problems. So Sam watched as Peng endured. What at first was a simmering fire in Sam’s being became a roaring inferno which Sam felt could only be extinguished by justice against the progressing ruination of the good man who was Peng. Worst of all, Sam knew this was his fault.
The two men finally put away their tools and left the room at which point Commander Li returned. Exhausted from the screaming and the pain, Peng sat limply, his wrists and ankles still bound to the chair.
Li sat opposite Peng again and laid a folder on the table. Opening the folder he told Peng to look at him. As Peng managed to raise his head, Li said, “I have two more pictures for you,” and he held one in each hand so Peng could seem them. “Perhaps you know these two people,” Li oozed sadistically as Peng immediately broke down and began to sob recognizing his wife and young daughter.
“Commander, I don’t know the woman in the picture,” Peng blubbered out between sobs. “There is a mixup, I am a dedicated Party member. I would never do anything—” Peng dropped off, losing all hope.
This had become too much for Sam and he was seething with hatred towards this evil devil Li Kung. Had he not been bound to the chair he would have been across the table introducing Kung to some torture of his own. The strength of his reaction surprised Sam, and he tried to get it under control as he knew he had to think strategically about the bigger picture. Julia was clearly in danger at this point and while he desperately wanted to avenge the pain inflicted on Peng, he realized the depth of his reaction was also because of the knowledge and guilt that it was his fault that this was happening to Peng. A generally good person with a wife and child had suddenly had his life upended and most likely terminated, or at a minimum redirected down a darker path solely because of Sam’s actions.
“We have taken them, Peng, and I will keep them as long as I need to until I find out what is going on,” Commander Li said and then left the room.
A masked person entered the room. Sam could tell it was one of the torturers by the blood splattered on part of his shirt. He pulled out a sharp pair of scissors and Sam felt Peng tense in expectation but instead heard the snick of plastic being cut and the release of
the pressure where the restraints had been. The scissor wielder then walked out of the room and left the door open. Apparently they were free to leave.
37
SITTING AT THE DESK IN her hotel room, Julia pushed the send button on the sat phone. She waited for the digital noises to progress through their song as the phone attempted to connect her with Brian back in Virginia. It was half past one and Julia had just returned from the restaurant where she and Sam were to have connected. She had eaten slowly, waiting for Peng and Sam to show up for lunch and make the reverse transition. However, by 1:00 they had still not arrived. Julia and Sam had arranged for a 5:00 backup meeting in front of the Forbidden City if, for whatever reason, Sam did not show for lunch. Julia was hopeful that his absence was a good sign of Sam’s progress inside ZG, and she was now using the rest of the afternoon to get caught up with events on the home front.
There was a click followed by the crisp sound of Brian’s voice.
“Hello stranger, how is ching chong?” said Brian.
“Said the white racist American,” replied Julia.
“Ouch, sorry. Maybe my timing was off….chong ching?”
That one elicited a smile from Julia. “Alright, how are things going with the team?”
“Pretty good, most of the team have gone home for now. Our main effort is on Jerry and trying to get him enough resources, which is actually proving to be the hardest part.”
“And I thought DARPA could make anything happen…unlimited resources,” Julia retorted mockingly.
“Jerry is definitely testing that theory. We can’t seem to get enough computing power to satisfy him. We have five supercomputers from various agencies which we have begged and pleaded to get. We are paying IBM and a couple other large companies for time on some of their machines, and we are in discussions with a number of universities to try to get access to some of their computers also. The problem is, people have time booked on these supercomputers months out and we’ve had to move mountains to get what we have so far,” Brian said, getting serious.
“I guess that makes you Paul Bunyan then,” Julia said, taking her turn to lighten the mood with a bad joke.
“The problem, as Jerry has laid it out, is this is not a race that you can win coming from behind. China has had large-scale computing as a main focus for a long time. Probably starting with their efforts to control the internet and what their citizens see. Just putting something like that together is an immense accomplishment and China also has the advantage of absolute control of all the resources in their country. You can see this in their Five Year plans that come out—” Brian trailed off.
“—every five years.” They both said at the same time getting a chuckle from them both.
“Right. Well anyway, it’s pretty impressive on some levels. If they decided they needed to develop flying attack bugs, they could marshal the forces of the entire country. Operating like a gigantic company, they could get it done so much faster than the U.S., which could only do something like that in a time of war.”
“Well, in the case of our flying attack bugs, I imagine they have to limit involvement to trustworthy and secretive institutions which might make them more limited than we think.”
“Could be. Either way, they are way ahead of us, and Jerry is going to get us going in the right direction, but we need to slow them down and make them go backwards even,” Brian said sounding very serious now.
“We’re working on it, but it looks like it's going to take a little time to get where we need to be,” Julia said. “The Slip is inside ZG for the second time in two days and he missed our lunch time rendezvous today which hopefully means he is getting somewhere. I am reconnecting with him in about 3 hours and will find out then.”
“Let’s hope you’re right. For all our sakes,” Brian said, the weight of their burden evident in his voice.
The line was quiet as they both reflected on the absolute catastrophe that would manifest if they did not succeed.
“Let’s hope Brian. Talk to you soon,” Julia terminated the call and tried to do the same with the thoughts of failure that had begun seeping in.
After her call Julia decided to go for a run in the hotel gym to burn off some nervous energy and help pass the time until her second rendezvous window with the Slip. She ran a quick 3 miles, just enough to flush her system with endorphins and clear her mind before making her way back to the room. Halfway down the corridor Julia’s calm was interrupted and her heartbeat spiked again at the faint sound of her sat phone’s unique ring.
“Hello,” Julia breathily answered, still a little winded from her run and her hurried effort to get to the phone..
“Julia, I thought I wasn’t going to get you,” a stern sounding Paul Greenfield said.
“Just getting back to the room from—” she got out before being cut off.
“Julia, you will probably start seeing, or actually maybe you won’t where you are, news reports of unexplained deaths in the U.S. The first reports of new attacks are just coming in from the field and also the public. It is something different from the virus attacks; we are guessing nerve agent at the moment. There are already some confirmed deaths and many more admitted to hospitals with symptoms that fit. The news outlets are all over this one and it looks like things could blow up over here.”
“Oh my God, Paul!”
“I am directing you to advance whatever leads you have as quickly as you can. Barring life or death, take any risks necessary. There is a full cabinet meeting with the President that I will be attending in a few minutes and I have to imagine that military retaliation is going to be put on the table. Disabling these attacks from the inside might be the only way to avoid a full scale encounter.”
“We haven’t even confirmed that China is behind this Paul, how can military retaliation be on the table without confirmation?”
“I’m anticipating the President will be expecting that I have that confirmation—”
“Paul, we are just making our initial forays into the ZG compound, we don’t—”
“Julia, do whatever you have to and do it now. Keep me updated.”
“Yes, sir,” then the line went dead.
38
WHEN NOBODY APPEARED TO STOP him, Peng continued out of the interrogation room, down the corridor, up some stairs and out of the building. His body ached from the damage he had endured, and his two smashed toes sent lightning bolts up his leg with each step.
Peng was overwhelmed by the events of the past days. He felt emotionally numb, probably in shock. His normal, predictable life had been upended in a matter of days. His wife and only child had been taken from him and wouldn’t be returned until he could explain what he didn’t understand himself. He was isolated and helpless.
Peng hobbled to the gate office and grabbed a roll of bandages and a bottle of painkillers from a first aid kit. He took these items and headed directly to the toilet under the watchful gaze of his boss.
Sitting in the stall he swallowed a handful of the pills which were for headaches and minor aches, hopeful they would at least take some of the edge off. Peng then took off his shoe and sock and wrapped the bloody purpling masses that were his two biggest toes, together with the other toes, hoping the bandage would force the remaining good toes to support the mangled ones.
Looking at his watch, it was a little before five, time to go home. He was suddenly overcome by sadness as he imagined walking into his apartment and not being greeted by his wife and child. Home was his family, without them it was only a collection of small rooms. The sadness quickly became anger and then surprise as his mind was invaded once again.
Making his presence known for the first time, Sam took control and said, “Sorry for what has happened to you, Peng, and sorry for what is about to happen. All I can say is there are events at play that affect thousands, maybe even millions of people. I’m not doing this to harm you.” He then pushed Peng’s consciousness backward and winced as the full brunt of the physical pain affe
cting Peng’s body now become his own pain. Sam clenched his jaw against the agony while making for the exit. Sam walked out of the complex and then took a left towards the Forbidden City instead of heading toward the train.
39
KUNG’S PROXIMITY ALARM ON HIS phone went off, and he picked it up, already sure of who had triggered the alarm. “What the fuck, this guy has balls,” he said to himself as he watched in disbelief as the two dots moved closer on his display. The phone rang in his hand, with a different tone, breaking his trance. Putting it to his ear, he listened for a moment before replying, “As soon as it is clear that they are there to see each other, arrest them both, call in backup - NO MISTAKES!” Li stood, his body visibly shaking with predatory adrenaline. Sliding on his uniform jacket, everything was moving in slow motion. He became singularly focused on how he was going to break his quarry as he headed to the interrogation rooms beneath the main building.
40
AS SOON AS JULIA SAW Peng she could tell something was very wrong. He was limping badly and trying to walk faster than necessary. All Julia’s senses flipped to high alert and she started scanning the crowd for pursuers, watchers, anyone who stood out.
She forced herself to walk slowly in the general direction of Peng. Not directly toward him or showing any intention that could be recognized by onlookers. The square was large and they were separated by 100 yards or more. Julia continued to scan the crowd, moving her eyes behind her sunglasses but not turning her head. She wanted Sam to maintain what she would call “operational control” of the situation until she was brought up to speed. She wanted him to maintain the option of breaking off if he needed to, or initiating the integration. Sam had information Julia did not have, and he needed to be in command of the situation.
The Slip Page 12