by Ran Weber
I heard a vehicle come to a stop next to me. I kept looking at my cell phone and heard a car door open and then slam shut.
“Where is it?” Jim asked.
I looked up and rummaged in my left pocket. I stood in front of him, and took the tiny USB stick out of my pocket and handed it to him. He snatched it and examined it closely. “Everything is so miniature nowadays.”
I said nothing. Nash sat in the car parked next to us, ignoring me. It was mutual, I didn’t have the time or the inclination for chit chat with him, I wanted to get back and continue digging through the data.
Jim turned on his laptop and loaded the USB stick. His face lit up. “Get into the back seat,” he ordered me. Nash looked at me, bored. Jim read through the data and passed the laptop to Nash, who reviewed the data carefully. Jim leaned back in his seat and folded his hands behind his head. “Looks good. What can I tell you, Nash?”
“Absolutely not,” said Nash, scrolling through the data on the laptop. “Unfortunately, Jim, there’s almost nothing here,” he paused. “You know Harvey won’t approve this operation. I suggest…”
“Nonsense,” Jim said, snatching the laptop off Nash. “I’m approving the operation. It’s impossible to wait even one more day, they can destroy evidence. I’ll assemble the crews, we’ll meet there tomorrow at 6:30 AM. Yoav, this had better be real. “
“Completely,” I said, satisfied.
49
Westwood, Los Angeles
A starless black sky hung over Farhan’s office. He tugged at his black mustache and gave a little pat to his belly, the food here did not agree with him. He hated Los Angeles and prayed that this abominable mission would end soon, so that he could get back to his business.
“He has nothing,” Farhan said. He sat in a simple black leather executive chair and looked through the glass window at the lit-up city before him, lost in thought.
“Are you sure?” The question brought Farhan back to the discussion.
“One hundred percent sure,” Farhan said, turning to face the room.
The young man looked at him with a smile and folded his hands over his chest.
“Ali, you do not believe me?”
“I didn’t say that,” said the young man, and smiled.
“But you thought so. A little respect, Ali, it won’t kill you,” Farhan said. “In general, you’ve been worrying me lately. You’re getting too close to the Americans, learning their sordid ways, going around the clubs, buying too many things. You’ve become a slave of that which is material, Ali. This is not what we learned from the sages.”
“Don’t you worry about me,” Ali answered. “You’d better examine yourself, Farhan. So far, you’re screwing up the mission. I could have gotten hold of the codes in half the time.”
They were both silent.
“So, what do we do?” Ali asked.
“They’re putting a bit more pressure on him,” Farhan said.
“You said he didn’t have the code.”
“He can get it,” Farhan said. “I’ve known Avi for a long time. If he has no alternative, he’ll use a spoon to dig a hole under the Pentagon and obtain the code.”
Ali smiled.
“You don’t understand,” Farhan said. “For Avi, money is paramount. A little extra money, a little more pressure, and the code is ours.”
Farhan swiveled in his chair and looked out the window. “A disgusting city, everything is filthy,” he pointed to the black sky. “You can’t see anything in this place, not even one star. It’s polluted.” He shifted his gaze toward the city itself. “Thousands of dots twinkle and move restlessly. A city of lunatics. It’ll all be over soon, God willing.”
50
15th Street, Downtown Los Angeles
7 AM. Jim, Nash and I hid behind a large GMC truck. The officers of the LAPD special police unit were deployed around the warehouse. The sun had risen a few minutes earlier and the area was clear. A single helicopter circled in the air at some distance, securing the possible escape routes. Two agents were stationed on the other side of the warehouse – this I heard on the radio.
Large gates blocked the entrance to the warehouse, a giant one-story structure. There was no choice but to break the lock on the main gate of the warehouse. According to the data on the computer there should have been huge quantities of weaponry, mostly undeclared. Judging by the sheer volume of weapons transferred there, and a quick estimate of the size of the warehouse, there had to be underground floors, or at the very least the possibility couldn’t be ruled out. If there were such floors, one had to be extra careful. I handed Jim and Nash the lists of equipment they were destined to find. Nash wasn’t impressed by the list, and explained that there were many tricks in this business and that he wouldn’t be surprised if things looked a little different in reality.
The rays of the sun lit up the big warehouse. I was suddenly filled with anxiety, perhaps they were right? Perhaps I should have listened to Rami and exercised more caution. I saw the unit’s officers occupy key positions. A police sapper broke through the large gate with a tiny, carefully placed, load of explosives and the police officers stormed into the warehouse. There were muffled shouts on the radio. I tried to see what was going on over there. Commotion – it sounded like everyone knew the drill. Jim didn’t seem excited, he waited like me and looked on at the warehouse. Nash shook his head and hissed at me, “I really hope you know what you’re doing.”
The minutes went by slowly. One team was stationed behind the warehouse in case someone tried to escape. On the roof of the warehouse, to our left, I saw a sniper who had recently settled there. I tried to get a sense of what was going on from Jim, but he was unreadable. Nash turned away from us. It must be here, I reassured myself, all the data indicated that.
A young man in large sunglasses and even larger headphones made his way in our direction. He moved to the beat of the music, ignoring his surroundings. Jim watched him, interested. When the young man approached the warehouse, one of the agents stopped him and motioned for him to move away in the opposite direction. The young man argued with the agent, gesticulating. Another agent approached. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but the words I picked up from the young man were ‘freedom of movement, I’m fed up with fascism, and go do something real with your life.’ A few seconds later he was persuaded to go back the way he came.
Going by the message board this was clearly it. This was the main meeting place – the Foretellers’ headquarters. We needed to seize the weapons, to prove the connection to them and to put an end to this whole miserable affair. I looked at the forces Jim had recruited for the mission and felt relieved. When Rami hears about the kind of force that can be mobilized here with relative ease...
One of the police officers approached us quickly. “Agent Jim?” He asked. Jim tensed and stepped closer to him. “What’s going on inside?”
“Nothing,” he replied.
“What do you mean by nothing?”
“The warehouse is completely empty, wiped clean. There’s nothing there. It looks like it’s been that way for a long time. The guys are trying to take fingerprints, but it seems that the place was carefully cleaned at some point, not recently.” The police officer looked at me for a moment and then looked back at Jim.
“Nothing!”
“Well, we found one thing, on one of the desks. It’s something for Yoav Sharff.”
Jim gave me a quick look.
“What is it?” Jim asked.
“A note.” Jim unfolded the note wildly and threw it at me.
“Gentlemen,” he said on the radio, “retreat. I repeat, the mission is called off, retreat.”
Jim and Nash got into their car and drove up to me. Jim rolled down the window and stuck his head out. “You won’t get off scot free, sir,” he said, and drove away quickly.
I stared dumbfounde
d at the note. “For Yoav Sharff” was written on one side of it. The other side said “Good morning. Tic Tac.”
51
Schetritt Industries, Downtown Los Angeles
I felt terrible. It was the greatest defeat in the mission so far. Someone had tricked me, I thought, someone who knew exactly what I was going to do and fed me this information. I had no idea who it could be. I didn’t know what to do or how to explain to Rami that I had circumvented him and failed. If at least I had succeeded. I knew that Ehud was waiting for this moment, perhaps it was him. I assumed that Jim and Nash were taking a lot of heat because of me and probably wanted to finish me. I was certain that Rami, if he had not yet heard, would be very angry. And Schetritt? If Schetritt finds out that I had led the Feds to break into his warehouse, that would be the end for me, I was sure of it.
I went into the office, my head lowered. I tried to avoid eye contact with the other workers, not that I had a deep or significant connection with any of them. I hurried to my office. As I approached, I saw that the door was open. “You can come in,” I heard a voice from within. I went in and closed the door behind me. Schetritt sat at my desk and Ben stood next to him.
I looked at them, stunned. I assumed that this moment would come but I didn’t think it would come so fast. I wanted to start explaining or making excuses but I had nothing to say, my mind was completely blank.
“Give me one reason not to kill you,” Schetritt said, fidgeting. “Like… Now.”
Ben drew a gun and shoved it onto my neck. I felt the cold metal and the pressure exerted on my neck. Don’t show weakness, I thought, dogs smell fear.
“You may sit down,” said Schetritt, signaling to Ben to pull back with the gun.
I sat down opposite him.
“You see,” he said, “it’s so bizarre that you would do such a stupid thing, that I’m thinking – a hacker the likes of him, there must be something there, he must have some idea or direction. He can’t possibly be so stupid. So, before I instruct Ben to kill you – or kill you myself, just to vent a little – I’m thinking maybe you have an idea, some reason for me not to kill you. For the time being, at least.”
I couldn’t answer. Ben gave me a light tap with the gun. “Answer.” I looked down, there must be a way out.
“Do you know what question nags me the most?” asked Schetritt. “More than the general business of how I trusted you and you betrayed me? The question is who are you and how did you get here.”
“My name is Yoav Sharff,” I recalled prisoner training, repeating the basic details and not revealing more information. “I own a computer game store in Tel Aviv. I am also a hacker and I participated in the hacker challenge. Ben decided to offer me the job and that’s how I came to be here.”
Schetritt applauded. “Bravo! What a performance!” He turned to Ben. “Wasn’t that an impressive performance? We have all the basic facts, we can breathe a sigh of relief.” He stopped for a moment and said, “Ben, are you convinced? Is it just me?”
Ben smiled and shook his head.
“It turns out that Ben was not convinced, either,” Schetritt said, and his expression hardened. “Maybe try again.” He signaled to Ben and Ben held the gun to my throat. I felt suffocated.
“Are you a federal agent?” asked Schetritt. “I don’t think you are. Perhaps you’re a Mossad agent?”
My heart missed a beat. I looked directly into Schetritt’s eyes.
“I checked with my contact in the Mossad,” said Ben. “He had no idea who Yoav Sharff is. I gave him a photo and he confirmed that it was indeed Yoav Sharff and for all he knows he has a failed computer game store in south Tel Aviv.”
I remembered Rami’s words, we don’t exist officially. Nobody knows of us, for better or worse, maybe it will play in my favor. I felt a little encouraged, realizing I had what he needed.
“Get that gun out of my face, Ben,” I said, grabbing his arm. Schetritt looked at me, surprised, and ordered Ben to move.
“You asked a question,” I said, looking at Ben, who had moved away from me and was massaging his arm. “I thought you wanted an answer.” I looked straight at Schetritt.
Schetritt nodded. “Think hard, kid, that may be the last question you ever hear, the answer better satisfy me.”
“You asked why not kill me.”
“Right.”
I felt that I didn’t have much time to think or plan, so I spat it out. “I can get you the codes, Schetritt, those that the Foretellers can’t get.”
“What are you talking about, exactly?” asked Schetritt sternly.
“Hacking the Los Angeles Times. I know you hacked the other two papers and you need the Times now. That’s where I come into the picture. I have no doubt that I will be able to do what no hacker has been able to do for you.”
It turns out that when your life is at stake, you employ all the sales methods you’ve ever come across. Once a businessman told me that when he returned from the airport in his car, a man jumped into the car at a red light and sat down behind him and threatened him with a knife. The same businessman also dealt in sales, but he said that in those minutes he became the best salesman he ever knew. I looked at Schetritt, the scales seemed to be tipping in my favor.
“Hacking the Los Angeles Times?” Schetritt asked in astonishment. “Do you really think you’d be able to perform this phase faster than them?”
“Certainly,” I said, “much faster than them. Both hacking the Times and getting you the final codes.”
Schetritt deliberated. “What do you say, Ben? Is it worth keeping him alive and seeing what happens? Or ought we just kill him?”
Ben shrugged.
“You can step out, Ben,” said Schetritt.
Schetritt got up and sat on the desk. “Schetritt hates getting screwed over,” he said. He grabbed my arm and twisted it. The pain was unbearable, I thought he was about to pull the joint out of place. “You see, the only course of action available to me in order to relieve myself of what you did, is to repress it.” He let go of my arm. “My shrink says I take things to heart too much. He says I have to learn to let go, to trust people. I don’t know, perhaps he’s right. What definitely is true is that I need those codes and I need them now. As for you – I’m still thinking about what to do with you. I’ll discuss it with Ben. Don’t count on having too long to live. Do things that make you happy, you know, those things people think they’ll still get around to doing,” he concluded, and left the room.
52
Lucky Strike Bowling Lane, Hollywood Boulevard, Hollywood
“It’s not going to work,” Farhan said, tossing the bowling ball gently into the lane. The ball moved in a slight arc and knocked out half the pins.
“Trust Ali,” Ali replied, sticking three fingers into a ball and swinging it in the air. “I know Jews, only money speaks to them. I’ve already gotten hold of one.” He threw the ball quickly into the lane and knocked out all the pins with great precision.
“Congratulations. But how does this bring us any closer to Yoav? I didn’t get the impression that he’s the kind of guy.” He picked up the ball and looked at Ali.
“Farhan,” Ali said, “I have my methods.”
“Methods, some methods,” Farhan muttered.
“You never trust me,” Ali protested angrily. “Always with this nonsense. I’m telling you, Yoav will be in our pocket. You have Ali’s word”.” He launched an angry ball that missed the target by a hair’s breadth.
“The leadership in Tehran is expressing impatience.”
“So, deal with it. Putting pressure on me is not going to advance things any faster,” Ali said, covering the distance between him and Farhan.
“They want to send out al-Quds agents.”
“There is nothing the Revolutionary Guards can do here,” Ali said sharply. “They don’t understand the delicate relati
ons.”
“I’m tired of hearing about your delicate relations,” Farhan said, throwing the ball as hard as he could, knocking down all the pins. “You’re not here to organize a cultural exchange or a fashion show. Get results or we’re both in trouble.”
***
Jim stared at the screen. “There’s something here that I don’t understand,” he muttered to himself. “There has to be...” He lit a cigar and dialed Nash. The phone rang but Nash wasn’t answering. In the meantime, Jim had a minute to stare at his three children smiling from the photo on his desk. He opened his e-mail while waiting for Nash to answer and saw a message from his ex-wife: “Jim, sorry I didn’t bring the kids round, we’re on a weekend in the mountains. Don’t worry, you’ll see them soon.” He poured himself a little whiskey.
“Is there any news about Schetritt?” he asked anxiously when Nash finally answered. Loud music blasted on the other end of the line. “Jim?” Nash asked. There was a lot of noise around him. He motioned to his wife that he’d be right back and went out to the balcony. He was a little tipsy and almost stumbled on his way out.
“No, it’s Santa Claus. Are you alright?”
Nash paused and took a deep breath before answering. “Me? Definitely alright. And no, I have nothing new to report about Schetritt. I’m at a party, I don’t think the guys here know him,” Nash giggled. When he got no response, he added, “I’m with my wife at a party with friends. It’s Saturday night, as you might be aware. What are you doing working now?”
“I’m always working.”
53
Schetritt Industries, Downtown Los Angeles
“Come,” Ben ordered and extracted me from my desk.
He walked quickly, stuck his keys into his right pocket and muttered something. I couldn’t make out what exactly.
I tried to catch him up in the corridor. “What’s going on?”