by James Codlin
“If you change the cycles of chemically induced sleep and true REM stage three sleep, two things could happen while you have him in the pod. The first: rather than staying in the cortisol-induced state of high readiness, he’ll slip into another stage in which he is still ready to flee or fight, but with hydrocortisone, epinephrine, and norepinephrine blood levels at almost normal levels. Heart rate and brain wave activities will be reduced, and he will be able to sustain this state of physical readiness for a long time. The memories will not be as vivid—they won’t be as strong in his subconscious memory. He’ll figure out they are fake memories.”
“And the other possibility?” Serrano asked.
“He’ll move into the third mechanism, which is exhaustion.”
“So he’ll just sleep soundly?”
“No,” Father Silva replied. “It rapidly brings on physical deterioration and psychosis.” Silva gestured toward the file on the desk. “I’m already seeing some psychotic symptoms. Think of it as a car battery. When the battery goes dead, you can trickle charge it, which takes more time, but you’ll get much longer service from the battery. Or you can give it a hot shot, which charges it instantly, but a short time later the battery won’t hold a charge at all. You’ve been mixing hot shots and trickle charging, and your battery is already somewhat damaged.”
“Doctor, it is you who doesn’t understand,” Serrano said. “Ibarra has to be repentant tomorrow morning so we can have the auto-de-fé tomorrow night. And he needs to be completely repelled by the sight of any of his friends or relatives. There is no more time.”
“If you run him through another cycle in the pod, there’s a good chance he’ll be a vegetable when you remove him,” the doctor declared.
“And that’s unacceptable,” Serrano replied. “It needs to look genuine. Not like coercion.”
“But all of this mind alteration has been coercion. We all knew that from the beginning.”
Serrano jumped to his feet and came around the desk. He bent over at the waist, putting his face in Silva’s. “I don’t care if I can’t use this ‘battery’ anymore—he only needs to last another 24 hours. Tomorrow morning I want him coherent, compliant, and most of all, penitent.”
“All right, Father,” Silva said, rising to his feet and maintaining eye contact. “The only way for you to hope to achieve that is to take him back to his cell right now and let him sleep normally until you need him tomorrow night. No more time in the pod!”
Serrano stared at the other priest a long time. Finally he picked up his phone and gave an order.
*
Dennis and Nicolás stood under the arches at the front of the Municipal Palace, looking out into the expanse of the Central Plaza of Mexico City.
“There’s no doubt about it,” Dennis said. “They’re setting up to televise live whatever is about to go down here.”
The two men watched workers setting up a semicircle of steel grandstands with a platform in the center raised high above the stone paving. On the rooftops of each of the presidential palace on the east side, the main cathedral to the north, and the houses of Cabildo and Ayuntamiento to the south, workmen toiled with equipment and cables. Nicolás was lost in thought.
“Nico, what’s happening here?” Dennis asked.
“Lenin said the Inquisition is remaining true to history. Martín’s trial is going on right now—and probably for some other high-visibility ‘heretics’ at the same time. Of course, they’ll all be convicted. And the sentence will be death by fire.”
Prinn stared at him. “My God, man. This is the 21st century—people don’t burn at the stake.”
“No,” Nicolás said, thoughtfully. “You’re right about that. Everything they’ve done so far has been based on historical precedent, but with a modern, high tech twist. I imagine the ‘bonfire’ will be something new, but it’ll be aimed at having the same cleansing effect. The purification by fire the Inquisition believed—believes—will bring on the Millennium of Christ’s rule on Earth.”
Dennis put binoculars to his eyes and looked again at the rooftop work. He studied each of the emplacements. When he lowered the binoculars, he said, “Lasers. High powered industrial lasers used to precision-cut very hard materials.”
Nicolás nodded grimly and said, “You head back to the com center. I’ll keep a watch here and call you with any updates.”
*
Carolina mopped her forehead with a bandanna as she glared at the cell phone on the table. Her head ached from the echoing roar of the more than one-thousand men confined in the steel building—laughing, shouting, cursing, and bellowing. She snatched up the device and accepted the call the moment a tone sounded.
“Yes?” she said.
“Commander Delta?”
“Yes, tell me.”
“We’ve lost Nico.”
“Lost him?”
“We think he’s gone from San Juan Diego.”
“Did he know you were following?” she asked.
The man hesitated. “We don’t know.”
Carolina cursed loudly. “He was supposed to be back here by now with the television technician. We’re supposed to have a global broadcast ready to go in Kourou when we invade!”
She was met with silence and she swore again.
“Fine. We go without him. I’m moving the Specter force to the river crossing—we’ll be there in two hours. Make damned sure that colonel in Guiana knows it.”
“Yes, Commander.”
Carolina shuffled through papers on her desk until she found the schedule for reconnaissance satellites. She had 30 minutes until the next overflight. She removed a satellite phone in its original packaging from her backpack and walked outside where she turned it on and dialed.
“Yes?” a man asked over the phone.
“‘Basque homeland and liberty.’”
There was a long silence. “Carolina?”
“Yes.”
“How did you get this number?”
“I still know supporters.”
“They must have also told you that I quit.”
“I was a burnout too, but now I have an opportunity bigger than any we ever dreamed of in the ETA.”
Another long pause. “Is anyone I know with you on this… opportunity?”
“Only me.”
Carolina heard a long sigh over the phone line.
“Listen,” the man said at last, “you were my best understudy. I wish… I wish I could recover our old fire and passion. But I have a nice quiet life here in Mexico. People respect me. I don’t have to live in fear anymore.”
“You don’t understand,” she said. “This is sure to bring Spain to its knees. We can gain true independence!”
Silence. Then, “Bietan jarrai, Carolina.”
“‘Keep up both,’” she repeated bitterly. “The snake and the axe. I was sure I could count on you.”
“Good bye, Carolina.”
The connection broke.
Chapter TWENTY-SIX
Colonel Lavigne had a feeling. He had felt it before when the Legionnaires had been deployed overseas—once in Mauritania during the Western Sahara Conflict, again in Zaire while restoring order in Kinshasa, and a third time in Afghanistan. Outwardly Lavigne looked calm, but inside his diaphragm ached slightly and there was a tingling sensation around his hairline. Each time he had felt this way, an attack had come—swiftly and violently.
Below the helicopter he could see the sun glinting off a small river and shattering into points of light as the reflected beams hit the dense foliage. Is that where the enemy is? he asked himself for the hundredth time that day.
He answered his own question. If they were crossing that river right now, they would still have a one-week march through the jungle to get to the space center in Kourou. But he knew something was about to happen.
Where? And when?
*
Martín Ibarra felt closer to true consciousness than he had in quite some time.
A lifetim
e ago? A week? A day?
His existence had been a collage of gauzy, out-of-body sensations through which dreams of his family, friends, and lovers appeared and disappeared like a movie being streamed forcibly into his mind. All of the visions had ended with him being denounced as a Jew by those closest to him.
Gina.
His brother Nico.
Professor Lenin.
David Broch.
But now—was it day or night?—was a bit different. For the first time in what felt like eons he could manage thoughts about things other than the images and sounds that had been unspooling repeatedly within him.
He had a vague recollection that he had heard a voice—tinny and distant, but intelligible—that had come from under his pillow. Who had that been? His captors playing with his head? He recalled the voice being thick with a distinct accent.
British?
No.
Australian?
Yes. That was it.
Keeping his eyes shut and moving very slowly, he slid his hand under the pillow. There were objects there.
A tiny, rubbery, plug-shaped item.
A tube the size of a fountain pen.
A small metallic square.
A small package on a kind of strap.
They were real.
He heard the muffled voice again. “Marty, this is Dennis Prinn. Tap your pillow twice if you can hear me.”
Martín considered the command. He scratched the pillowcase twice with his fingernail.
“Okay,” the voice said. “Is there anyone in the room with you? Tap once if no, twice if yes.”
Martín listened carefully and tapped once on the pillow.
“Okay. Marty, listen carefully. Take the earplug that’s under your pillow and push it deep into one of your ears. Doesn’t matter which one. You’ll be able to hear me much more clearly, and it’ll be hard for anyone to see it.”
Thinking of the security camera, Martín slowly moved his hand under the pillow, seizing the plug in his fingers. He pulled it out and pushed it into the ear that was pressed against the pillow.
The Aussie drawl was now crystal clear. “Can you hear me? If the volume is set right, tap the pillow twice.”
He tapped twice.
“Good,” Dennis said. “There’s also a microphone the size of a postage stamp. Hide it somewhere inside your clothes and as close to your head as possible so I can pick up your voice and the sounds around you. The cylinder is a television camera. Point the end with the lens and we’ll be able to see what you’re pointing at. Plug it into the battery pack for the camera—it goes around your waist and under your clothes.”
Martín again put his hand under the pillow, felt the small square and pulled it out, keeping it hidden from the security camera. He felt a sticky substance on one side of the thin square, picked it up, and placed it inside his T-shirt at the collar.
He cleared his throat several times.
“Good on ya, Martín! I read you loud and clear. Don’t take the camera and battery pack anywhere you might be searched. If they’ll be taking you somewhere soon, tap once for no, twice for yes, and three times for ‘don’t know.’”
Martín thought a moment. He bumped the pillow three times.
Suddenly, out of the fog of troubled memories came a wave of clear thoughts.
The rocket at Kourou.
Satellite.
Nuclear weapon.
The rebel force sweeping east from Venezuela.
The expanse of jungle Martín had seen as Major Valencia flew him to Cunani, Brazil.
Impenetrable jungle, he had thought at the time.
Impenetrable, he thought now.
The rebels would not sweep into French Guiana through Suriname. The rebel forces Nicolás commanded were a feint—and somehow Martín was convinced his brother didn’t know it. The attack would come by sea, straight to Kourou.
Nico was a pawn.
Martín almost leaped out of the bed, but fought to keep himself under control and motionless. He now had communication from the outside world, but how could he use it to talk back to the outside world? Speaking was impossible with the surveillance camera and microphone always listening and watching.
Code?
Morse code.
He had learned it during his CIA training, but had considered it useless. It had been so long ago. What were the letters?
He rolled over, facing away from the security camera, and moved his hand up his shirt to the collar area until it was just above the microphone that he had affixed to his skin. He scratched his fingernail along the shirt’s fabric, and a long scraping noise emitted on the other end.
Methodically, he began.
*
Dennis had the speakers on and they all listened to the long scratching sound. There was silence, and then finally a short and a long scratch. A moment later there was another long scratch. The short and long sound again.
Dennis and Gina looked at each other.
“He’s communicating,” Dennis said. “Morse code, right?” he said into the microphone. “Tap twice.” There were two distinct taps. “Go with it, Martín, I know it.”
The first letter was A followed by T, another A, then a K.
“Attack?”
There were two taps.
“Okay, Martín. Next word.”
Dennis listened intently. “K, O, R, O,” he said into the microphone. The others shook their heads. “Koro? We don’t know what that is, Marty. A place?” Two taps, followed by a series of fast scratches.
“You want to do that one over,” Dennis said. “K, O, V, like Victor?”
Another series of scratches. “Start word again. K-O-U-R-O-U… end word. Kourou?”
“Attack Kourou,” Dennis said, and got two taps back. “We heard about that—” Dennis stopped himself mid-sentence and winced. He had nearly said from your brother. “Um, you know something we don’t?”
There were two taps and then the scratching began again. “A-T-A-K N-O-T F-R-O-M J-U-N-G-L-E B-U-T S-E-A.”
*
Martín Ibarra had his arm draped across his eyes. He was still blind, but no longer to the point of total blackness. The fluorescent lights overhead produced a light gray haze through his eyelids. He thought about the coded messages he had just sent to Dennis Prinn, whoever he was.
If Prinn contacted President Ishikawa, the message would go nowhere. And would the French believe him? Or had they figured it out for themselves and reinforced the garrison?
His head ached from thinking this through. His thoughts during the last few hours had been convoluted and terrifying. When he pictured Gina Ishikawa’s face, all he saw was a sneer. His memories of her body conjured up episodes of her looking at him with disgust at having been defiled by a Jew.
Martín shook his head, refusing to go further with that train of thought. Instead his mind splintered and branched and then settled upon Teodoro Lenin.
Lecturing, pontificating, denouncing.
What had he denounced?
Marranos.
New Christians.
Conversos.
Martín saw his professor vituperating loudly from his university lectern and then quietly, clandestinely, leading a fifth column from his home. A cadre of students—disciples of a learned professor.
All against Judaism.
Denouncing Jews.
Martín moaned out loud, and his thoughts splintered again and found a new focus: Nico.
There was Nico, a proud revolutionary—no! Instead he pictured his brother as haggard, bent, and broken.
His brother loathed himself.
Why?
Because his revolution was lost?
No, that wasn’t it—that was an old memory. There was another memory, so clear now, but somehow faulty. Like one photographic image superimposed imperfectly over another.
His mind settled upon the vivid memory. It had to be true.
His brother loathed himself for being a Jew.
Martín’s b
rain echoed with a guilt and self-detestation so deep and so wide… and all because he was Jewish. Where were these thoughts coming from? He tried to recall having ever felt this way about his heritage.
He wasn’t religious—he had only a superficial knowledge of Judaism and never went to temple. But he also seemed to recall, faintly, that he had once felt pride about his heritage—that the diversity his history represented was honorable and strong.
But these new feelings were so clear and overwhelming.
Martín wrapped his arms around his head and squeezed as tightly as he could, trying to exorcise the demons that possessed him.
*
The lieutenant from the signal corps verified that the voice encryption on King Carlos’s phone was working correctly, saluted, and left the room. Carlos keyed a number in Burgos, and on the third ring a voice said, “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“When will we have the confession and auto-de-fé?” Carlos asked without preamble.
“Uh… yes, Your Majesty, we believe the confession will be forthcoming soon.”
“When, damn it?” he demanded. “There are other events predicated on this.”
“Your Majesty, we’re doing the best—”
“Get him on video now.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
*
Father Serrano’s cell phone rang once, and he answered immediately.
“Yes?” he said.
“Get him on video now.”
“Not yet, he’s having to assimilate—”
“Father, this is the cardinal, and I order you to get the video confession now.”
The line was broken before Serrano could reply.
*
Guards threw open the door to Martín Ibarra’s cell and descended upon him before he could react. A nurse followed behind, producing a syringe from a leather bag. He quickly swabbed Martín’s arm and administered an injection.
One guard held Martín down while the other yanked Martín’s pants off and then pulled the yellow and green sanbenito over his head, roughly tugging it down over his T-shirt. Martín was hauled into a sitting position and the pointed sanbenito hat was placed on his head. Each guard took hold of an arm and hoisted Martín to his feet.