Influx

by Daniel Suarez

  Davis felt the tension disappear. “Oh my God.” She lowered her gun. “Get the hell out of my face.”

  “The BTC has been disappearing people like me for decades—inventors of disruptive technologies.”

  “For decades. Well, they apparently didn’t disappear you because here you are accosting me outside the restroom.”

  “I escaped. They were bringing me to their headquarters in Detroit to work on—”

  “Detroit?”

  He reacted to her dubious look. “Look, never mind that. I came here because I saw you on the news. Richard Cotton isn’t a terrorist; he’s an agent of the BTC.”

  “Last warning. Leave. Now.”

  “I need protection.”

  “Fine. Call the Chicago police. You can explain it to them.”

  “No.” The man looked panicked. “You’re the only one I trust. They said you thought you caught Cotton. That you had no idea what was really going on. That’s why I trust you.”

  Davis had run into delusional paranoids before. Sadly, the legal system allowed a lot of them to run around on the streets because nobody wanted to pay for their treatment. And sensationalized criminal cases attracted them like moths to a porch light.

  The man nodded as he apparently deciphered the look on her face. “Okay. All right. But do me this one favor.”

  “No.” She started walking around him warily.

  The man wrapped his hand around an empty beer glass on a shelf by the pay phone next to him. Then he let go and pointed at it. “My fingerprints are now on that glass. Run those prints. And”—at that point he tore a small clump of hair from his head, which he then dropped into the glass—“here’s a sample of my DNA.”

  “Are we done?”

  “Test them. I know it’ll take time, but once you confirm who I am, I need to talk with you. Meet me”—he thought hard for a few moments—“one week from today. I’ll be in the Mathematics Library at Columbia University in New York City—eight A.M. Sit at the table across from the big gray breaker box—near the windows.”

  “That is not going to happen.”

  “It will once you confirm who I am. Remember, eight A.M., one week from today. Columbia Mathematics Library. Next to the breaker box. Come alone.”

  “No.”

  He went to leave but turned around again, walking backward as he talked. “I know you don’t believe me, but I can tell you details about the Edison bombing scene that I couldn’t possibly know if I wasn’t there.”

  “You mean like the wrong number of victims?”

  “I’m telling you: there was a seventh person there that night. He was a Princeton physics professor who came to evaluate our work. Now that I think about it, I believe he worked for the BTC.” Grady looked frustrated as he tried to recall something. Then he glanced up. “A man named Kulkarni. Sameer Kulkarni. I haven’t seen him mentioned in the news accounts. He was there. Doctor Alcot recognized him.”

  “Good-bye.” With that Davis left him behind.

  The strange man disappeared into the barroom crowd as Davis headed toward the bar. Her team was there laughing over some just finished joke.

  “I thought you guys were going to rescue me if I took too long.”

  Falwell read the look on her face and snapped alert. “What happened?”

  The rest of the team put their drinks down, suddenly serious.

  She waved her hands. “Calm down. Just some nut job came up to me outside the ladies’ restroom—claimed he was one of Cotton’s dead victims.”

  They all narrowed their eyes in confusion.

  “Say what?”

  Davis nodded. “He said the Winnowers are really a rogue federal agency. That it’s all a government conspiracy.”

  Most of the team laughed and shook their heads.

  But Falwell scanned the crowded bar. “Should we take the guy into custody?”

  “We can’t grab every crazy person who comes out of the woodwork after I go on television.”

  “Did he seem dangerous?”

  “I wouldn’t have let him go if he did. Just a bit loony. Said there was a seventh victim at the Edison bombing scene—some Princeton physics professor.”

  The others chuckled, but Falwell narrowed his eyes. “Dwight and I were going through the Edison bombing evidence last week with the prosecutor. Remember that extra tire print at the Edison scene—the one in the snow?”

  She thought about it. “Yeah, but it didn’t lead to anything.”

  “Right. The lab identified the tire—it was old. Not in common use nowadays.”

  Dwight nodded. “175-SR14s.”

  “Whatever—they were outdated. From the ’70s.”

  Davis leaned against the bar. “So what’s your point? That matches the Winnower M.O. They used an old car.”

  “Well, back then Dwight I spent a couple days reviewing traffic camera videos, and there was a car in the area that night that could have been old enough—a Mercedes.”

  Dwight chimed in: “A 240D.”

  “Right. A Mercedes 240D. And those came with SR14s as standard equipment.”

  Davis nodded. “Okay. I remember, but the real owner was deceased.”

  Falwell put his beer down. “Right. The family didn’t even know the car existed. And it hasn’t been seen since. Not even by license plate readers.”

  She stared at him. “So what? The Winnowers used it to go to and from the attack, then dumped it.”

  “That’s just it. The traffic cameras don’t have great resolution, but they showed only one person in the car—after the bombing.”

  She contemplated this.

  “Meaning in addition to Cotton and his group, someone else left the scene that night. And we never shared that detail about the extra tire tracks with the media.”

  “You’re starting to worry me, Thomas.”

  “I’m not saying the guy you saw is legit. I’m saying we may have a security leak in the federal prosecutor’s office.”

  That got her attention. “Mistrial?”

  “Cotton might be cooperating, but then again he might have other plans.”

  Davis stared at Falwell for a few moments. And then she pushed through the crowd, headed back toward the restrooms. In the hallway just outside, she took a cocktail napkin and carefully retrieved the empty bar glass by the phone, inserting her fingers inside it, tipping it up onto her hand. She caught the lock of hair with her other hand as it fell out.

  Falwell was right behind her.

  She held up the glass. “Run the prints on this glass. Tonight. And I want a DNA test on this hair sample . . .” She passed the hair to him.

  “Where did you get a hair sample?”

  “He left it behind. Supposedly to prove who he was.”

  “And if it matches a victim—what then?”

  “It could be some scheme of Cotton’s to taint the evidence—and the case.” She pointed again at the hair. “DNA.”

  “It’ll take five days at least. How big a problem you think this guy is?”

  “Look, it’s probably nothing. But after all these years, I don’t want to take any chances. Do you?”

  • • •

  Davis stood looking over a criminologist’s shoulder in a cubicle at the crime lab in the FBI’s Chicago field office. It was past ten P.M. The tech clicked around a computer screen, marking points on an image from the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System.

  The criminologist glanced back at her. “I found three different sets of fingerprints on your beer glass. Exhibits one and three show no IAFIS matches—or at least none with reasonable scores. But exhibit two gave us two candidate hits.”

  “Show me.”

  He clicked through a couple screens and a passport photo appeared in a window above the name “Jon Grady”—beneath that w
as a label reading “Deceased.”

  Falwell glanced over at Davis. “That’s not good.”

  The criminologist looked up at her. “You want to see candidate two? It’s a much lower score.”

  She shook her head. “No, thanks. Can you print that out for me?”

  “Sure.” He clicked the mouse a few times, and they heard the laser printer by the door spit out a couple of pages.

  “Thanks for the help. C’mon, Thomas.”

  Falwell grabbed the pages as they headed for the elevators. He held up the printed photo. “This the guy?”

  She nodded.

  “So you met a ghost.”

  She nodded.

  “What does this do to the case?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “And what was this guy claiming?”

  “He said they were disappearing inventors of disruptive technologies.”

  “Who was?”

  “A rogue federal agency.”

  Falwell chuckled. “Sure.”

  They got in the elevator and headed to the itinerant-agent floor, where they had offices for the duration of Cotton’s trial.

  She leaned against the elevator’s back wall. “Well, it’s clearly fake. We found most of this Grady guy’s right arm at the Edison scene. We had a jawbone. Teeth. A shinbone. A partial tongue. All DNA matched. And we’ve got Richard Cotton on video preparing to kill him.”

  “He’s up to something.”

  “We’ll need those DNA test results the moment they come in. And let’s put out an APB on this Grady imitator. He couldn’t have gone far.”

  “If he wanted to get arrested so bad, why didn’t he stick around? Why arrange a meeting all the way in New York?”

  “I don’t know.” She considered it. “Did Grady have a twin brother?”

  “Twins don’t have identical fingerprints.”

  The elevator doors opened, and they walked out into the guest cubicles. There were still quite a few agents moving about. Davis had put her Winnower team in a group workstation with no partitions between them, and she and Falwell took off their jackets.

  “So what do we do?”

  She stared for a moment but finally shrugged. “I don’t know, but I think we have to inform the prosecutor’s office.” She fell back into her office chair. “Thomas, you ever hear of something called the Federal Bureau of Technology Control?”

  He squinted. “What is that, Commerce Department?”

  “Have you heard of it or not?”

  He thought some more before finally saying, “No. Why? Who are they?”

  “I don’t even know if they exist.” Davis keyed her password into her laptop and then launched her Internet browser. She entered “usa.gov” on the URL line, then navigated to an A-to-Z index of government departments and agencies. She entered the term “Bureau of Technology Control” in the search box—clicked “Search.”

  It returned about a quarter million results. Davis scanned down the list of hits with headings like “U.S. Bureau of Industry and Security” and “Bureau of Labor Statistics.”

  Falwell was looking over her shoulder. “Try it enclosed in quotation marks.”

  She enclosed the search term and searched again. Now it returned zero results.

  Falwell shrugged. “Why are we looking for them?”

  “That Grady guy mentioned it to me. That was supposedly the federal agency that kidnapped him.”

  Falwell let a smile escape. “Right. If it’s a top-secret agency, I’m guessing they wouldn’t be listed in the directory.”

  “Look, I don’t believe his story, Thomas, but I did want to see if they were a real organization.”

  “Let me get this APB out.” He opened up his own laptop. “So what do we do if we don’t have him by next week?”

  “You mean, do we meet him at Columbia University? I want to see the DNA results first.”

  “You’re actually thinking of going?”

  “We might be, yeah.”

  “What about the depositions next week?”

  “Reschedule them.”

  “Denise, you’re not meeting this guy alone.”

  “No, of course not. We’ll use a team. It’s a university library, so there’ll be security cameras. We’ll see him coming.” She paused. “There’s something here that’s gnawing at me, though. Something about Cotton—how he could disappear for so long without a trace. And with so many faceless followers—none of whom made mistakes.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “I’m just—”

  “We arrested three of his people with him.”

  “And none of them seemed very bright. They all had felony drug rap sheets.”

  Falwell laughed ruefully. “You’re starting to worry me.”

  “It’s just strange, that’s all.”

  Just then Davis’s desk phone rang. She glanced at the LCD readout—and then did a double take. She sat up straight. “Thomas.”

  “What?”

  She held her hand above the receiver. “It’s D.C.”

  “FBI headquarters?” He checked his watch.

  She picked it up on the start of the third ring. “Denise Davis.”

  “Agent Davis, please hold for Deputy Director Royce.”

  She blanched. “Yes. I’ll hold.” Davis covered the receiver and glared at Falwell. “It’s the deputy director.”

  He gave her a quizzical look. “Of the FBI?”

  “No, of Grease, the musical—who do you think?” Davis was on hold for about ten seconds before a man’s voice came on the line. “Denise Davis.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You were contacted by a man claiming to be Jon Grady tonight. Is that correct?”

  Davis frowned at Falwell—who frowned back, probably because he had no idea what was going on. “Yes, sir. We had a positive match on fingerprints. We’re running a DNA test on a hair sample.”

  “Do you have any information on his present whereabouts?”

  “Not at the moment, sir. We’re putting out an APB.”

  “Don’t do that just yet. Did he say why he was contacting you?”

  Davis paused for a moment, then looked over at Falwell again. Then she said, “Deputy Director, I must apologize, sir, but I absolutely must respond to something. Can I phone you at your office in under a minute? I sincerely apologize, sir.”

  There was silence for a moment. Then, “Call me back as soon as possible, Agent Davis.”

  “Thank you, sir. Very sorry.” She hung up.

  Falwell squinted at her. “Are you nuts?”

  Davis stood up and started rifling through the shelves for a bureau directory. “Thomas, I don’t even want to hear it. Would you look for a directory over there?”

  He started navigating through the intranet directory on his laptop. “I’m confused, Denise.”

  “It’s past midnight in D.C. Why are they even in the office?” She glanced up at him. “Not the Web directory. I want something printed. Preferably a few years old.”

  “You’re really losing it.”

  “Ah!” She pulled a small binder off a shelf and started flipping through it.

  “It’d be in the front probably. Near the bureau seal . . .”

  She heard a ding as an email landed in her inbox. Davis glanced up. It was from Jeffrey Royce, deputy director of the FBI—and it was over their internal system. It was cc’d to the Chicago Special Agent in Charge, with the subject line “Priority One Special Assignment.”

  “Damn.” She found the FBI headquarters’ main number and pounded it into her desk phone. “I am such an idiot . . .”

  Falwell leaned down to look at her laptop screen. “Hey, you got some spam from the deputy director. Should I delete it?”

  “Ha. Ha.”
She waited for the FBI operator to pick up. “Yes, this is Special Agent Denise Davis returning a call from Deputy Director Jeffrey Royce.” A pause. “I believe he’s still in the office.” A pause. “Yes, I’ll hold.”

  Falwell leaned back in his chair and spread his hands.

  In a moment another man answered.

  “Yes. Yes, I’ll hold.”

  And a few seconds later the deputy director picked up. “Agent Davis.”

  “Yes, sir. My apologies. I just needed . . . never mind. You were saying, sir?”

  “Mr. Grady asked you to meet him in New York—next week at Columbia University—is that correct?”

  Davis felt the shock go through her. “I . . . How do you know that, sir?”

  “We have a highly sensitive surveillance operation under way, Agent Davis. You’ll still need to be in Chicago preparing for the Cotton trial, but we’re going to put you temporarily under the direction of a special task force—and we want you to meet Mr. Grady as he requested. Your supervisors have been notified, and any scheduling conflicts will be resolved through our office. You’ll report to a safe house in New York—you’re not to contact the New York field office or discuss this with anyone except your supervisor. Is that clear?”

  Davis looked to Falwell uncertainly, then nodded. “I understand, sir.”

  “The email I just sent has instructions about where to meet your plane next week and the supervising agent for this operation. Can I count on your discretion and cooperation, Agent Davis?”

  “Yes, sir. But . . .”

  “What is it?”

  “I just . . . What’s going on, sir? Is it Jon Grady? What’s his connection to Cotton?”

  “I can tell you that he isn’t Jon Grady—but the rest is well above your pay grade. The only reason you’re involved is because he contacted you. But you should know he’s dangerous, and that you need to listen closely to your task force leader when you reach New York. Can I count on you, Agent Davis?”

  She took a deep breath. “Yes, sir. Yes, of course you can count on me.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Panopticon

  Graham Hedrick sat in his office chair gazing out at Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbor. Junks and container ships plied the glittering water below. His jaw clenched as he listened to the report on Grady’s escape.