Kings of the Night
Page 25
*****
“You have got to be shitting me.” That’s all Jason has been saying for half an hour, and it’s getting kind of dull. AND. I’ve run out of cigarettes, and really, in the middle of the night, in the middle of a secret room in the middle of a secret hideout in the middle of a secret field there isn’t really anywhere to buy extra cigarettes. I’ve tried making subtle comments to The General about how good his cigars look, but he now keeps looking at me as if I’m crazy or gay, so eventually I give up. I may light my t-shirt and see if I can smoke that in a minute.
And all Jason can say is “you have got to be shitting me.”
“Now” smiles Sara, “you understand what I mean by the edge of science.” Jason nods, dumbfounded. They have just come back in to the metal meeting room from a small, concealed door in the side wall, a door that I wasn’t invited to go through, but when they come out, Jason’s eyes are white and wide and his face is white and pale. “What did you see?” I whisper to Jason, but he’s acting as if I wasn’t there, they all are, as they take their places back at the table, and all look at each other, like all have a secret that I don’t share. Which I guess they do.
“Now” says The General, “as you understand, we have enough reason to believe that this is credible.” Jason nods silently. “What did you see?” I’m whispering, urgently. “What did you see?” I keep glancing at the small, impenetrable door that led to who knows where, who knows what magic. It’s shut, sealed, almost as if it didn’t exist, but I look at it as if whatever is behind it may seep out, reveal its secrets that I wasn’t allowed to share.
“Shush!” whispers Jason impatiently. Sara looks annoyed. The General looks like he doesn’t care. “Please” I whisper. “I need to know.”
“Believe me” says Sara, “you don’t.” I feel cold.
“And,” The General says, “therefore, to complete our mission, we need, clearly, to isolate this phenomenon, and neutralize it.
“Yes” says Jason, “but how?”
“We need Draman” says Sara.
“We need him to explain it to us” says The General.
“Then we need a reversal procedure” says Sara.
“Which we can apply to Starr and everyone else” says The General.
“Until we have him, we need to be very careful with them” says Sara.
“We don’t know how it works, and we can’t afford for their essences to transfer to someone else” says The General.
“So it’s imperative that we keep them alive” says Sara.
“And keep them isolated” says The General.
“Which is why they are in the isolation zone” says Sara.
“And that they will stay there until we have decided what to do” says The General.
“We’ve sent an elite team to apprehend Draman” says Sara.
“We know very little about him, but with our new technology, we’ve been able to approximate his location” says The General.
“And compile some facts about him, including a picture” says Sara.
“Which is all detailed in this file” says The General, magically producing a file, and pushing across the metal table towards us. Jason takes the file and turns it round to face us. It has a brown cover and is completely blank, except for the words “Zoltan Draman” written in bold black letters in the middle. I can see Jason’s hands tremble as he opens it, to reveal a single sheet of paper. There is some writing on the paper, a few words there, but I can’t concentrate on them because I’m staring at the picture. Because it’s a picture of my brother, Mike.