Why did I feel like he was making this my problem? “But can’t you just track down that one guy who was after me and at least end my connection to this whole thing?”
John shook his head. “Jonas Furnis’s operatives are everywhere. They operate all over the world and represent forty-three nationalities that we know of. The only thing they have in common is that they are willing to kill or die to protect the environment. And this guy—we know his name, but he’s vanished by now. The problem is that you have not. They know you can identify him. They know what kind of car you drive, they have your license plate number, and they likely have your address. You are not safe. At all.”
Steven got up and started pacing the length of his desk. “You’re sure it’s them? I agree it can’t be a fluke, I mean, if he followed her and is a known operative for Jonas Furnis. And the Fibonacci thing. God, they love their Fibonacci. They call it the code born of nature—you know, the pineapple, the pinecone, flower petals, or whatever.” He ran his right hand through his silver hair repeatedly, adding the finger comb to the beginning of a series of shudder, shudder, punches. “They are going to come after her. They know . . . I can’t keep them from kidnapping . . .”
Wait. What? “Kidnapping?!” I wanted to shake him.
John became strangely calm in the face of his boss’s flipping out. There was no levity left to him, no smile, half or otherwise. “Kidnapping is their specialty. Kidnapping and torture, really.” He turned away from Steven, now collapsed in his desk chair with his head in his hands.
I noticed for the first time that the fist he’d been making with his left hand was not a fist at all. It was just a fingerless palm, perfectly square. I tried not to stare, but sometimes staring has a mind of its own.
John lowered his voice as if he didn’t want to upset Steven further with the details. “Jonas Furnis is well known for their kidnapping tactics. If they want someone, they will find them and take them, no matter how they are protected. Sometimes the kidnappings are ideologically motivated, but sometimes they’re more strategic to protect the organization from exposure. Like in your case.”
Uh, freaking out here. “What do they do with you once they have you?”
“They torture you and brainwash you. Or they kill you. No one, well almost no one”—he turned away from Steven even farther—“comes back as they were.”
“I really don’t want to know. But, Farrah, how old are you?” Steven asked.
“Seventeen. Eighteen in June.” There I go again.
“Oh Jesus.” Shudder, shudder, punch.
I Love My Country. It’s the Government I’m Afraid Of.
By dinnertime—and, yes, I was starving—my parents arrived and were fully debriefed. Dad was somber and seriously concerned for my safety, but there was a flicker behind his eye that told me that he was delighted. Over the past few years, it had been painful for him to watch me hide out. As much as he wanted me to have a fun and normal life, I wondered if he felt the strain of the charade as much as I had. My gift is much like his and has always been a serious source of bonding between us. I always suspected that he felt like he’d lost me during those years that I pretended it didn’t exist. At this moment I could tell he was proud that I had been right, and he was proud that I was being taken seriously by the freakin’ FBI. Mom, not so much.
“So, you’re telling me there’s an organization of terrorists out there who now wants to off my daughter for having added up some numbers on the television?” She was incredulous.
“She broke their code, yes. But they could easily make up another one. And they can find another way of disseminating their messages. It’s more that Farrah can positively identify this guy. He must be higher up in the organization than we believe if he wasn’t told to just slam his car into hers, killing them both. They must need him for something . . .” John clued in to the fact that he was freaking my parents out. “We may never know what. But we are prepared to protect Farrah at all costs.” Nice save.
“You are going to rip Farrah out of school at the end of her senior year so that she can live holed up in some FBI hideout . . . My God! It’s only two weeks till the prom!”
John jumped in. “The agent assigned to the case will have the support of the entire Terrorist Task Force to keep Farrah safe, but they will be more or less camping out until this is over. We are convinced that your daughter is in extreme danger and that she needs to be hidden until this terror ring is disbanded and, well, we think her gifts would be of great use to us in making that happen.”
Shoulders back. I’m da man. Dad caught my eye and winked at me.
“Can’t you at least put her up in a hotel while she’s hiding? The Peninsula has a great reputation for service, and the spa is . . .”
John cut her off and managed to stay completely professional. “The terror cell in question has very little regard for the safety of innocent bystanders. Putting a target in a hotel would be endangering everyone in the vicinity. We must keep her in a remote, secure, and substantially less luxurious location.”
Steven jumped in with, “And we are going to have to do more than hide her. If Farrah vanishes, they will know that we have her and they will come after you for leverage.”
Mom had had enough. “So, how do you suggest we hide her and protect ourselves at the same time? Do we all go into hiding? This is ridiculous.”
“No, Mrs. Higgins, we have to fake a kidnapping. They’ll think one of their own people took her. It might buy us enough time to find them.”
John immediately picked up on the plan, like this was something they did all the time. “Jonas Furnis is very careful about direct communication within the organization, as they know that the FBI and every major government are tracking them. They generally operate by communicating with high-level spies that they have placed in key government jobs and then use that person as a central hub of information. Even that communication is coded to an absurd degree. Our hope is that their communications are convoluted enough that they won’t figure out that none of them has kidnapped Farrah before we can find them. We will send police and press to your house in the morning. We will send an agent to spend the night with you in case there is any activity before then. Unfortunately, there won’t be time to get Farrah a change of clothes before we go into hiding . . .”
“That won’t be a problem,” Mom said, rolling her eyes at me and my uniform.
“This shouldn’t take more than a week, during which time you two are to play the distraught parents of a kidnapped teen.”
Dad elbowed Mom. “The role of a lifetime, hon.” She ignored him.
John sat down in the chair across from Steven’s desk and folded his arms as if he were done and quite satisfied with himself. “So, I guess that’s it. As soon as we assign someone to Farrah, they’ll be off.”
Steven, quiet until now, got up and walked around his desk. “John, I think I am going to give you the job this time.”
John was really surprised. Hadn’t they ever let him out of the building? “But, sir, I’m not . . . I’m only . . .”
“You’re the perfect guy for the job. Now all of you say your goodbyes and get out of here.”
I’d Rather Be Home in Bed
As it turns out, the Federal Building on Wilshire Boulevard is a hub for hideouts all over the West Coast. When John and I were ready to leave, we were escorted to a fourth elevator bank that took us to the twelfth floor, no stops. We were silent as we rode up with a uniformed security person who was acting like he was protecting an armored car full of cash. His eyes darted right, then left, then right again, as he scanned the moving elevator car for intruders. When the doors opened, he motioned for us to stay inside until he had visually checked the area. Having satisfied himself, he stepped aside so that we could walk out into yet another lobby.
A middle-aged woman in a navy suit stood to greet us. “I am Hannah Devine, and you must be Farrah and John.” John and I smiled and nodded and shook her hand like a couple of trained
monkeys. It occurred to me just then that John knew nearly as little about what to expect as I did. He’d probably heard about where we were headed, but this was his first field assignment. “I was charged with assembling your survival kits, but frankly I’ve rarely been given so little time. I hope you find everything to your satisfaction, and if you need any—Oh, it’s time for you to leave now.” She turned to see the frame on the door behind her light up into a bright red.
The mute security guy pushed the door open and quickly pressed his thumb into the print reader on the inside wall to hold it open. He motioned for us to hurry up, so we each grabbed a small black duffle bag from Hannah’s outstretched arms and followed him. He keyed some numbers into the pad above the print reader and the door slammed shut. A few more numbers and a pair of metal elevator doors slid out of the walls and met to completely enclose us in a silver box. The security guy spoke for the first time. “You might want to hold on to something.”
I lightly grasped the handrail behind me, and John did the same. He rolled his eyes at me, the first sign of levity since we’d identified Creepy. The elevator started to descend, a little more quickly than normal. Then it started to accelerate so fast that I was sure we were no longer connected to any elevator cables at all. And how could we be falling so far? We’d only gone up to the twelfth floor.
We stopped abruptly, and I stumbled a little. John grabbed my upper arm to steady me and then immediately let go. We started moving again, this time sideways and fast, like we were on a train.
John wasn’t surprised about this at all. “We have entered the Subterranean Transport Network. We are about a half mile below-ground. This elevator car will now take us to our secure location.”
“Which is . . . ?”
“I forgot to ask.” John cleared his throat to get the attention of the security guy. “Um, sorry, I forgot to ask. Where exactly will we be hiding?”
“I have been instructed to leave you in an interior compartment of building six in sector 312.”
John shrugged and translated, “Downtown L.A., abandoned warehouse. It won’t be terribly comfortable, but they’ll never look there.”
“It’s also my responsibility to collect any traceable electronic devices at this point. FBI-issued cell phones are fine, but any others must be relinquished at this time.”
John turned to me. “You have a cell phone?”
Hmmm. Yes. “No, I left it at home.” I was on my way to some mystery hideout for God knew how long. I wasn’t about to relinquish my oak tree photo and end up in a straitjacket. I made a mental note to put it on airplane mode as soon as we got there. I leaned back against the elevator wall and reached into my back pocket to switch it to vibrate.
After about thirty minutes, the elevator stopped and started to move up toward sea level. When the doors opened, we were in a windowless, rectangular room, maybe twelve by eight feet. The security guy held the doors open for us to cross the threshold and started to show us around. There were two mismatched upholstered chairs in front of an old TV, a small table between the chairs, and literally nothing else. With a flourish, he opened a small cupboard with two deflated twin-size blow-up mattresses and two sleeping bags. “Would you like turndown service now, or would you like to do it yourself later?”
Ah, everyone’s a comedian, even the security guy. He and John shared a little chuckle at his joke, like this was our honeymoon suite at some fine hotel. It was actually pretty funny, but in spite of myself I turned bright red. I hadn’t quite thought this whole thing through logistically. Was I going to be shacked up with John in a windowless room, sleeping next to him and sharing a bathroom? Was this even legal? I’m sure my parents must have thought of this and had decided to trust him. But based on what, a thirty-minute meeting?
They were both looking at me, no longer laughing and potentially reading my mind. “Farrah, we are only going to be here for a week or so. I know it’s grim, but the only thing that matters is that you are safe.” John sounded like he was reading from a script.
“Sure. And do we get rations of dried food and Tang?” I was mostly trying to change the subject, but it was a legitimate concern.
Security guy smiled. “No, that part’s pretty good. The elevator car that brought us here will come by three times a day, unmanned, and deliver food and documents as necessary. John, you can just text special requests to 4352, and depending on who’s running the kitchen, you might get lucky. Other stuff like toothpaste and clean underwear should be in your survival bags.”
I was red again. Did that guy say “underwear”? Am I going to have to discuss my personal hygiene with these people? My mind raced through all the possibilities for mortification.
Security guy shook John’s hand as he got back into the elevator, a bellhop just looking for a tip from the newlyweds. “Nighty-night.” Ugh.
John could tell I was about to freak out, so he tried to make everything seem really normal. “Wanna watch TV? Or should we just go to sleep? I’ll put it on and then see if I can get in touch with the kitchen. Do you want a snack or anything?” I could tell by the tone in his voice, sort of the way you talk to a puppy, that he was terrified that I was going to start to cry again.
I got my mattress, pressed the green button for automatic blow-up, lay down, and pretended to sleep until I eventually did.
If Reality Wants to Get in Touch, it Knows Where I am
So that’s how I ended up in this warehouse, sitting on this understuffed chair, watching the news break about my kidnapping on an antique TV. John was sitting on the other chair, taking in the rest of the five o’clock news. He switched the channel to another network to catch the tail end of my mom’s dramatic exit back into the house.
“She seems more like a Farrah than you do.”
“Everyone seems more like a Farrah than I do. It’s called irony, and the best part is that she’s named Rebecca. Wouldn’t I have made a better Rebecca?”
“Natalie.”
“What?”
“You seem more like a Natalie to me. Like Natalie Wood or Natalie Cole, a little more mysterious.”
That’s the last word I’d ever use to describe myself because for the past eight hours every thought I have jumps right on the brain slide and flies out of my mouth. Like right now, for instance: “It seems to me that ever since I failed to stop eight people from being blown up, every thought I have flies right out of my mouth. I suspect it’s shock, but I wouldn’t call it mysterious.”
“I don’t know. There’s something mysterious about you; maybe you don’t even know it. I don’t meet a lot of kids who spend their spare time hunting terrorists.”
Kids. Did he have to keep saying that? There I was in my best-fitting jeans with my best-fitting white T-shirt about to lie down and go to sleep next to a twenty-one-year-old man for God’s sake! I felt less like a kid than I ever had.
After we’d finished a Coke, a turkey sandwich, and three episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond, the reality of our situation started to sink in. This had been the first day of who knew how many that we were going to be stuck in that room. I looked around at the four gray walls, the corner bathroom complete with both a toilet and a sink, and our two makeshift beds. It was a little hopeless.
“Wanna play cards?” John reached for his survival pack—really just a duffle bag, but I imagined there were tons of Bondesque gadgets in there. A deck of cards seemed a little low-tech.
“I’ll play gin.” He dealt us each seven cards on the tiny table between our chairs. I tried to adapt, as I am a ten-card gin player, well, since I was three. We played silently, one word uttered every five minutes or so: “Gin.”
After I’d beat him twelve times in a row, he put his cards down and looked at me suspiciously. “You count cards too?”
“It’s not different from any other random pattern. I mean remembering a sequence of numbers, colors, and letters that has passed by leads you to a probability of what the next card is going to be. It’s really pretty easy. F
or me.” I was surprising myself. I would normally have let someone beat me at gin to avoid having this conversation. Especially someone who was becoming more relaxed and a tad bit hotter every second. But don’t get any ideas—it’s not as if I had suddenly experienced some metamorphosis and, like a caterpillar breaking free to reveal its true nature as a butterfly, I was finally being my true Self. It’s more like I’d already let my SAT scores out of the bag, and I knew I was going to be stuck here for a while. I didn’t want to beat the terrorists to the punch by dying of boredom.
“It’s all so crazy, isn’t it?” I was kind of thinking out loud.
“I agree it is all crazy. But which part are you talking about?”
“The terrorists wanting to kill me. So that I won’t stop them from protecting life. I guess a forest or a stream is more defenseless than I am, but not by much. I mean, how many people do they have to kill to save the planet?”
John shrugged. “I don’t know, but we’re doing a lot of damage. I read that Americans are using like 21 million barrels of oil every day. We’re going to blow through a lot of resources in the next ten years.”
“We are about 309 million Americans with a population growing at 1 percent a year. So that’ll be 341 million people using 23 million barrels of oil per day in ten years.” It sort of slipped out.
John stared at me in amazement. “Do you hire yourself out for parties?”
“Yep, that’s why they call me Party Girl.” I laughed for the first time, even though it was at my own inside joke. This was sort of fun, showing off for a person who wasn’t my dad.
A Girl Named Digit Page 5