by Nick Thacker
He didn’t dare move, as he knew the men wouldn’t hesitate to fight him back with their weapons. All he could do was stand and wait.
And observe.
He watched everything as they left the room — tried to see out the door, into whatever space was up and beyond. He tried to see if the men were armed in any other ways, but couldn’t.
And he tried to recognize patterns in the way they moved. How they held their heads as they walked — did they drag their feet at all or look down as they took steps?
All of it was information. Not all of it would be helpful or useful, but it was information nonetheless.
“Mr. Red,” Garza said, just before exiting the room. “You are free to move around in here. There is only one exit, and they will guard it every minute of every day. Even if you were to escape, your freedom means Dr. Lindgren’s immediate death.”
So she is still alive, Reggie thought. He grinned. “You think you’ll wait me out? That it? That I’ll get tired of pacing around down here, hungry, thirsty?”
“No,” Garza said. “I don’t expect you to last nearly that long.”
Reggie frowned.
“When I had my soldier shoot your girlfriend, Red, he did it with a rubber bullet from close range. That wound is still open in her back, and we intend to keep it that way.”
Reggie stiffened.
“The benefit of having a clean, open wound such as hers is that we can introduce new agents into it, without fear of immediate infection.”
Reggie stifled a breath. His throat caught, and he nearly stumbled.
“It would amaze you at how resilient the human body is, Mr. Red. Homeostasis is a wonderful thing. We are experimenting with just such a thing here and in my Philadelphia labs. The ability of the mammalian body to completely regulate its temperature, reverse foreign intrusion, and heal wounds is unlike many other things found in nature.
“But that work comes at a cost, Reggie. The human body doesn’t like foreign intrusion. As I’m sure you know, an open gunshot wound is a remarkably painful thing.”
Reggie tried to swallow, but found that his mouth was once again dry. He tried to speak.
“And I believe you will find that this chamber, while very effective at keeping outside noise to a minimum, is not entirely soundproof.”
No.
He balled his fists. Tried to force his legs to move. Nothing worked, nothing functioned. Come on, man, he told himself. You’re trained for this. You’re better than this.
But he knew it was pointless. The Hawk had captured him and brought him back to his nest, and there was nothing he could do to change that.
Nothing, of course, but tell the truth.
29
Victoria
“Hello?” she answered. Victoria sniffed and blinked a few times. She realized she hadn’t lifted her eyes from her computer screen for over an hour, and her contact lenses were itching.
“We know what you are working on, Ms. Reyes.”
Her hands immediately felt clammy. What the hell? “Who is this?”
“We politely ask that you cease your research into the subject and turn it over to us. We seek your help, and we will be requesting your in-person assistance soon.”
“Turn over my… cease what research?”
“You are treading water, Ms. Reyes. In a sea of sharks. And all it takes is one, tiny cut. The sharks will turn on you in an instant. Consider this the only warning you will receive.”
“What the f —”
The phone disconnected. Victoria held the earpiece on her hand for a few more seconds, then slammed it back onto the receiver. A piece of the cheap plastic broke and sailed across her desk.
“Was I just threatened?” she asked aloud. She sat up in her chair, pushing it backwards a bit, then looked around. She felt suddenly vulnerable, as if she were on display in a museum, and crowds were now gathering around and pointing at her.
But… her office door was closed, and the tiny window behind her desk had its shades drawn. No one could see her, and there was no one in the hallway walking around. She was alone.
She stood up, shaking her head. “This is bullshit. I won’t be threatened at work, by…” she had no idea who’d called, and she decided then that this would be her first order of business. She poked around on the school’s phone, straining to see the tiny LED letters, and tried to navigate the recent calls dialog. She’d never had to really use the phone for much besides answering calls — most professors, Victoria included, simply gave out their cell phone numbers to their students. She didn’t care about people having her number. Most graduate students were above late-night prank calls and if there was any information one could gather from her phone number alone, there were plenty of easier ways to get that same information.
So she’d never had to click through the archaic three-button system built into her office phone, and it took her a full five minutes to find the most recent caller. When she dialed the number, she was surprised to hear a familiar voice pick up on the other end.
“This is Patty, Department of History.”
“Patty?” Victoria asked.
“Yes — Victoria? How are you?”
“I — I’m good. I just… got a call from this number, I think.”
Patty laughed. “Well, I didn’t call, and I don’t think I know how to butt-dial on these dinosaurs we have for phones.”
Victoria smiled. “No, that’s fine. Is there… any way to check to see if someone routed a call through your phone somehow?”
“A way? Sure, I bet there is. A way for me to do it? Victoria, I’m 67 years old and just figured out how to use an iPad, and that’s got one button. This old thing has three.”
“I understand — no worries. I doubt we’d find anything, anyway.”
“Well, I’m sorry I can’t help more. You sound a bit shaken up, are you okay?”
“It — it’s just… I don’t know. I thought I may have missed a call or something and saw this number on my phone. Could just be an IT glitch.”
Using the ‘IT glitch’ line worked on any of the school faculty and administration that had been born before 1975, and Victoria used it whenever she needed a quick out. It had proven useful to explain her tardiness to meetings, why her biography had never been updated on the university’s website, and why her ‘required’ email blasts about the latest and greatest in religious history rarely were sent.
“Okay, Victoria. Sorry again.”
She hung up and frowned. Whoever had called had definitely routed their number through her administrative assistant’s phone, knowing that she’d never be able to find the original caller.
But they hadn’t disguised their voice, either. And the caller, a male, had used the pronoun ‘we.’ Was he working for a group? Or was he just trying to scare her into thinking so?
Should she call the cops? What could they do — start digging around her campus IT lab for the phone records? And she had little to go off of. She truly didn’t know what ‘research’ they were referring to. Her entire job, besides teaching, was research, and most of it was tangential and unrelated to her classwork.
Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. It hadn’t been an idle threat. The caller had assumed she knew what ‘they’ were talking about, and after Archie’s call…
It was all too much. She hated to do it, but she needed to make a call of her own. To a man she knew could at least point her in the right direction. She hadn’t seen him, or heard his voice, in over eight years. But now was the time. If he’d answer her call, she knew he could help.
She pulled out her cellphone once again and scrolled down to the ‘Rs,’ to his name.
Her name.
She hesitated for only a second before pressing ‘call.’ The phone immediately beeped and the connection began. She heard the ringing, and the screen lit up with her ex-husband’s name.
Calling: Mark Reyes.
30
Julie
&nb
sp; Archie Quinone’s voice rang through the video chat on the computer in front of Julie, awakening her. Both she and Ben had mostly slept through the last eight hours, until their pilot had landed in Barcelona, Spain.
From there, they had been shuttled to another, smaller plane waiting for them on the tarmac. When Ben had asked why they’d stopped in Barcelona for a plane change rather than a refuel, the pilot had shrugged. ‘I got orders to change planes,’ is all he’d said.
Ben and Julie had then crammed themselves into the back of a small prop plane and headed out over the vast expanse of the Mediterranean toward Rome. The in-flight WIFI had been replaced by a spotty cellular connection that the pilot had assured them was backed up by satellite, and that they should have no problem continuing their discussion with their team — he’d even tossed them a couple microphone-enabled soundproofed headsets and a splitter that could link directly to Julie’s computer.
Julie knew Ben would be on edge; he hated flying, and the smaller the plane, the more the fear grew. But he was here, and he — so far — seemed calm.
She turned her attention back to the computer and Archie’s face on it. She turned up her headphone’s volume slider and adjusted her microphone so Archie could hear her over the sound of the plane’s engine.
“There is a secret network of underground and elevated tunnels in and around The Vatican. The most notable one is called the Passetto di Borgo, and it extends about half a mile from The Vatican to the Castel Sant’Angelo. It was the escape route used by Pope Alexander VI, as well as Pope Clement VII during the Sack of Rome.
“The network has been used for clandestine intelligence gathering and trading, as well,” Quinones continued. “Runners bring news from outside the city’s walls into the Pope’s inner sanctum. Different groups over the centuries have used the tunnels for different purposes, but there is one constant that has always existed: those tunnels were created for, and are still used, for secret intelligence sharing, to and from the Pope himself.
“I will send you a map of The Vatican’s tunnel system to you. I need to find a copy in my library when we get off the phone, but please be aware that it is likely out of date. It was compiled thirty years ago by a Jesuit who worked there. Much of it is guesswork, and all of it is a patchwork of most likely locations.”
“Sounds promising,” Julie said, after a deep sigh.
“It is the best we have.”
“What exactly are we looking for once we’re in?” Ben asked.
“To answer that question, please see an image I have just sent you. It is a slide from one of the presentations I give in my Catholic Symbology course, and it is a collection of images depicting some of the symbols found in and on Papal bulls.”
“Bulls?”
“Correspondence,” Quinones answered. “Yes. From the Latin word ‘bulla,’ which means ‘seal.’ Each pope throughout history had a collection of wax seals they would use for their public and private letters, to authenticate their contents. Some of these seals were adopted by later popes, but each pope had a personal seal created exclusively for their private and secret use — very much like a pope’s personal logo or brand image.
“Usually the pope would adopt their own private seal that was based upon their public one — the same elements, perhaps, arranged in a different way. Some popes, like Pope Clement IV, we know adopted a completely different private seal, called the Piscatory Ring, or Ring of the Fisherman.
“There has been conjecture over the design of other popes’ private seals. It is believed that Pope Benedict XVI used a form of the Piscatory Ring that had been altered to stamp his private correspondence, but of course, we cannot know for sure.”
Ben and Julie leaned in toward the computer, and Julie opened a new window to find the image Quinones had sent.
Julie saw on the screen a collection of circular images, each labeled with the name of the symbol and a translation, or the name of the pope who had adopted the seal as his own. She recognized a few of the symbols found within the seals — the Christian cross, what looked like another version of the cross, and symbol of The Vatican itself.
“Right,” Ben said. “So the pope could dispatch a letter through the Vatican tunnel system and the recipient could verify its authenticity because of the wax seal on it.”
“Precisely,” Quinones said. “And considering that only people in the pope’s closest circle would be entrusted with the knowledge of the design of their private seal, they could be satisfied that their secret communication was safe.”
“Very interesting,” Ben said.
“It is,” Julie added. “So this is what we’re after? The pope’s private seal?”
“Yes,” Quinones said. “If we have the seal, we can forge a letter from the Pope to the Archbishop who is the head archivist at the Archives. From there, we should be able to get the information we need.”
“Meaning the Archbishop will send the Book of Bones back through the Vatican tunnels? What if the Pope and the head archivist have already been in communication about the Book of Bones? In that case, another request for the same thing would be suspicious.”
There was a pause. “It seems like a long shot, but if we craft the message correctly, we may be able to have the archivists themselves, through multiple requests, send us blocks of information. If we can spread it out and get the Book of Bones in pieces, we may be able to get enough of it to understand what it is Garza is truly after.”
Julie thought for a moment. Long shot, indeed. But it was all they had. At the very least, they would have the Papal Seal, the secret symbol that unlocked the Archives, in their hands. With that alone they could access a wealth of information.
If they could get the seal…
On screen, Quinones continued. “But as you have probably guessed, you will need to know which seal is the correct one. Many of the public seals have been converted to stamps, but I have it on good authority that the Pope still uses a true wax seal for his secret correspondence.”
“Do you know what it will look like?” Julie asked. “There could be more than one.”
“Indeed, there will be,” Quinones replied. “Besides the public, official seals and stamps of the office of the pope, there is said to be more than one secret seal. But there are a few clues that might lead us in the right direction.”
“Clues that will be obvious enough for us to find the right one?” Ben asked.
“I believe so. First, the private seal will be one with no writing. Every public seal has the pope’s name scrawled somewhere around or in the image. Being a public seal of approval, the pope is not trying to hide his involvement in these letters.
“Second, the current sitting pope is the first-ever Jesuit pope.”
31
Victoria
“Vic, what you’re asking me to do is… well, it could get me fired. Immediately.”
Victoria Reyes sighed and pulled the phone away from her ear. “I know. I’m sorry. I didn’t — I would never put you and your family at risk if it weren’t serious.”
Her ex-husband, Mark Reyes, the man with whom she’d shared five years of her life, was employed by the university as well. That’s how they’d met; her ongoing technical issues leading to her calling Mark’s office and requesting an in-person meeting. That meeting had gone from explaining POP and IMAP email servers to discussing variants on spam emails to sharing email addresses with each other.
And after a few of these emails, the pair met at an off-campus restaurant to share a beer and discuss their future together.
At the time Victoria had been working as a teacher’s assistant, working toward her undergraduate degree, and she had quickly become smitten with Mark.
They’d loved each other, but when Victoria grew up a bit and they realized that her career would always come before family, she reluctantly called off their marriage. Mark had been devastated, but he understood — he’d always wanted children, and to hear his wife finally admit that she wasn’t ‘that type
of person’ seemed to cause him grief as well as provide some much-needed closure.
It had surprised her to hear that he’d remarried fewer than two years later, and now he and his new wife had a one-year-old daughter, and there was another on the way. A small piece of Victoria’s heart caused her a pang of regret when she’d heard the news, but she still knew that her ultimate goal was something far different from settling down and starting a family.
“Mark,” she said. “I’m scared.”
Mark sighed this time. She heard shuffling — he was moving into a different room, likely his home office. “Hold on,” he said. “I need to remote in, but I’m going to use a VPN. It’s not foolproof, but it will at least keep anyone looking in off my back.”
Victoria was far from unintelligent, but networking and IT stuff was like a foreign language to her. “Uh, sure. Yeah, VPN.”
She heard Mark laugh. “It’s a — never mind. Sorry. Anyway, give me a minute to connect, and then it’ll pull right up.”
She’d asked Mark if he could figure out who had called her. Assuming the man had somehow hacked into the university’s phone system, there might be a chance he’d still used a hard-coded phone number to do it, which meant it might be traceable. At least, that’s what Mark had told her. She didn’t understand a bit of it, but he’d explained how it all might work, and then told her to call the police — they would be able to decide if and when a ‘technical takeover’ of the university’s phone lines was necessary.
But she didn’t want to wait — for one, Archie’s friends’ lives were at stake. Second, she feared that hers might be as well. She needed an answer, and she needed one far sooner than what the campus police could provide.
“Ok, I’m in. Hold on — there are… okay, I think this is it. You said the call came when?”