Surrogate Protocol

by Tham Cheng-E

  Microscopic neuro-transmitters implanted in his brain had tricked him into thinking that his victims were lying dead in the ward. They provided visual cues attesting to the authenticity of the thought and allowing the captain to virtually “see” Anton’s blood on the walls and sheets; the realism of its spray calculated by means of fluid trajectories and artificially projected through his optic nerves.

  But there was a peculiarity: the “bloodied” bed was now empty.

  The captain scrambled towards it, unable to reconcile the death of his victim with the sudden disappearance of the body. Acting upon instinct he looked beyond the window and beheld a dead man hobbling away in flight, and his bearded jaw fell open.

  “Nan da, omae wa?” he shouted—a harsh, guttural voice. “Tomare!”

  / / /

  Anton, still running, failed to realise that the sudden blare of the Japanese language was directed at him. Only upon the second shout of tomare did he venture a glance behind and see the captain staring incredulously back at him.

  In the panic Anton had forgotten to count as Amal had instructed him. He began scurrying up the incline double-speed, clawing desperately at the kudzu vines, his adrenaline-charged body paying no heed to sutured wounds that were splitting open in the effort. He anticipated the stab of bullets in his back and did not realise that Amal had jumped the captain.

  / / /

  Like a rabid beast Amal lunged. The captain, struck by a second round of shock from the resurrection of yet another man he had killed, was stripped of his senses and began screaming madly for help. A squad of soldiers rushed into the ward and Amal knew it was all over for him.

  “Anton, run!” he roared, stretching the last syllable for as long as he could until it was swallowed by a burst of machine gun fire.

  At the top of the bluff Anton burst into tears and pressed his thumb into the cricket clicker.

  / / /

  The butt of the Nambu pistol went off like a firecracker in the captain’s hand, scattering his fingers all over the ward and leaving a shredded stump on his right wrist. The captain, his lips calcareous and eyes bulging with shock, sank slowly to the floor cradling the terrible wound. To the din of frantic shouting and the clatter of boots, soldiers poured into the ward and leapt over Amal’s bullet-riddled body in aid of their captain, whose moan began rising steadily into a deranged, teary wail.

  It was such pity that neither Anton nor Amal witnessed any of it.

  30

  SEIZURE

  LANDON LEAPS FROM the bed and his opened journal, which has been lying upside down on his belly, slips to the floor. He feels the draft of the air-conditioning against his wet brow. Dr Peck stops the EEG recorder, picks up the journal and places it back on the bed.

  “Quite a bit of activity.” He scans a gridded landscape of electrograms. “Managed to retain any memories?”

  Landon shakes his head. He can’t explain the inclination to hide that his repository of memories is piling up. But he feels it’s wise to do so because he’d have a hard time convincing the doctor that his memories cover the span of a century.

  “You sure you haven’t had any trauma that might suggest something?” asks Dr Peck. “After all there’s the scars and you seem to be having rather…brutal memories.”

  “What did I do?”

  “Shouted, trembled.”

  “Was I saying anything?”

  “Garbled, as with most sub-conscious speech.”

  Landon actually finds relief in this. Or rather, could clearer speech have helped corroborate the veracity of what he might reveal? He steals a look at Casey and finds disgust and derision in her stare before she looks away.

  Freak, he can almost hear her say.

  But as much as the opinion displeases him it is honest and undisputable. It occurrs to him that if John has been lying about the cellular cybernetics he might well die one day without knowing the truth behind it. Or he could reveal the freak in him to someone else and get a second opinion on the marvellous true life of Landon Lock.

  His natural choice would be Cheok. But he knows it won’t do either of them any good. Raymond would be next in line if he were alive. That leaves only the doctor. But weekly therapy sessions over eight months is hardly sufficient time to know someone. He needs to find out if Dr Peck can be trusted.

  “Can we speak in private?” he asks.

  Dr Peck looks at him over his writing and then at his assistant. “Casey?”

  She lifts her chin and leaves the room without casting another glance at them, closing the door behind her. Dr Peck leans his elbows over the edge of his desk and wisely refrains from speaking. Landon takes another moment to steel himself, propping his arms stiffly against the sides of his chair.

  “Those pictures,” he nods at a pastiche of photographs pinned to a board behind the doctor. “Your grandchildren?”

  Dr Peck looks over his shoulder. “They live in Perth.”

  Landon finds it difficult to meet the doctor’s eyes. “I’m sorry if I haven’t been completely honest with you.”

  “Take your time.”

  “Do you think someone could live forever?”

  Nothing in the doctor’s disposition suggests incredulity. “Biologically?” he asks.

  “Yes.”

  “There are organisms called planarians,” Dr Peck explains, with the poise of an unbiased academic. “Their ability to regenerate their cells makes them resistant to ageing. There are studies being done on them but we’re still a long way from eliminating human senescence.” His gaze softens as he surveys Landon’s dour visage. “Why do you ask?”

  “I think I’ve been living longer than I ought to.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  “I have memories of a very distant past.”

  “So you’re remembering?”

  Landon nods.

  “How distant?”

  “Decades, maybe a century.”

  For a moment they study each other and Landon thinks he sees a glint of interest in Dr Peck’s aged eyes. The doctor’s lips part and there is hesitation before he speaks.

  “The drug tests came back. You’re clean.”

  “Nice to know.”

  “There’s another thing.” The doctor lowers his gaze to a document on his desk. “It says here you have azoospermia. In other words,” he says, pulling off his glasses, “you’re sterile.”

  The news fails to make a dent. Landon had anticipated worse. “I might have an explanation for it,” he says.

  “We should find a better place to talk.”

  It isn’t a reply that Landon expects. He watches as Dr Peck consults his schedule on his computer and jots a note in his diary. He then scribbles something on a slip of paper, tears it off and hands it to him. It contains a mobile phone number.

  “Give me a call on Friday after five. I’ll arrange to receive you at my home.”

  Landon’s heart swells with a flood of warmth. “You don’t think it’s ridiculous?”

  Dr Peck hoots in laughter. “Friday. Let’s talk more then.”

  / / /

  It is a regular weekday evening and by eight o’clock the Cantonment Police Complex is dead, the last of its staff having bled out to the subway station. The only detectable movements are the security cameras swivelling on their braces.

  John waits another two hours before he makes his move. Behind an electrical panel in a service shaft he closes the circuitry and activates a recurring, 12-minute video clip of an empty office. With that in place he works his way past the lobby and into the Intelligence Department. The card reader responds to his access pass and the glass door opens for him. The unlit office is silent, its air stale without the air-conditioning.

  Marco’s desk is located at the far corner of the room. A sudden flicker of a desk lamp sends John edging into a nearby workstation. Between slits in the partitions he sees a tall, studious young man shuffling documents by lamplight and packing them into a leather case, along with an empty pl
astic water bottle. He is wearing headphones and appears not to have noticed John as he shuts down his computer. He turns off the desk lamp and shuffles across the carpeted floor towards the lobby.

  Something white falls from his pocket.

  John hears the glass doors roll and the ring of an arriving lift. He creeps out of hiding and passes the workstation. A tag on a low partition reads: Julian Woo, Forensic Executive. Farther down the aisle John picks up what Julian dropped. It’s a lunch receipt, seemingly worthless until he turns it over and finds a single handwritten word.

  UNSAFE.

  A tingle radiates down John’s back. He drops the note into a shredder and races over to a row of workstations assigned to senior investigation officers, his nerves stretched too taut to consider who this Julian might be. The tag on the one that’s most secluded from the rest of the office reads: Marco Bey, Deputy Director, Field Research (Special Duties).

  Despite Julian’s warning, John still sets to work. He flips open a terminal and remotely accesses the CPU of Marco’s computer so it won’t leave any traces of log in. The remote terminal hacks the hard drive and retrieves Marco’s profile by means of a virus that self destructs upon completion of its task. It bypasses the computer’s firewalls in seconds and logs into a secured network. From there he clicks a nine-pixel-large corner of a police emblem and enters a Cloud. Another inconspicuous cluster of pixels inside the frame of a dialogue window brings him to a password-encrypted cache titled “Templog.”

  It is one of many CODEX profile repositories, and one to which Marco belongs. John navigates to a folder and browses through a list of names and serial numbers that would make no sense to the untrained eye. He accesses one of them and a mugshot of Landon appears, taken perhaps in the sixties. In a section of text he sees the name Qara Budang Tabunai, as well as a link to the profile of someone named Alpine-One. He clicks on Alpine-One and the borderless screen of the terminal fills up with a monochromatic picture of a beautiful young woman. She is looking into the camera with a pensive, lugubrious smile that John had frequently encountered in suicidal victims.

  It is her.

  Fear prickles his skin. The recognition is unsettling and ghostly. It’s the same woman at the café, and most recently outside his hotel room. Death had been that close. Inwardly he shudders at the date of the photograph—May 1955.

  His mobile vibrates and he dons an earpiece, and an urgent sounding voice cackles through. “Moonbeam! Tracker dispatched!”

  He plugs in a thumbdrive and works as he speaks. “We’re bringing the Chronie in, but I need time to get to you.”

  “Tracker is inbound I tell you! They’re going to do him. The residence. Come quick!”

  John checks his watch and looks at the download status. “Stick to the protocol; get him out and leave a message the usual way. I’ll get to you as soon as I can.”

  The voice replies with something inaudible and the line goes dead.

  John unplugs the drive, shuts down his terminal and berates himself for failing to download all the data he is supposed to. Marco’s computer stalls during shutdown. He waits, tapping his fingers impatiently on its cold, steely surface. The CPU indicator light flashes alive as the shutdown resumes. From the lobby he hears the ring of an arriving lift.

  He shuffles out of the cubicle and plants himself against the opposite wall, his chest constricting with the familiar grip of panic. The light on Marco’s CPU goes off and a long, slow breath calms him. Good. All he needs now is a good reason for snooping around an hour before midnight. He grabs a stack of files and walks to the glass door. He turns the corner of the wall separating him from the lobby and comes right up to Marco’s little pirate grin.

  They regard each other at eye level, both being of considerable size and height. Denied of audible speech, John questions Marco’s arrival by lifting his eyebrows. Marco keeps up his grin, waving and pointing towards something. John takes a moment to comprehend Marco’s gesture, then reaches over and tapping the door-release switch. The glass door between them hums open.

  “Thanks.” Marco winks his good eye. “Left my pass in the car when I got back from a meeting and the car keys are in my drawer.”

  John smiles politely.

  Marco holds out his hand. “I don’t think we’ve met.”

  They shake hands. John pulls out his pass from his breast pocket. “SCD,” he says.

  Marco squints at the name. “Bowen? I’m Marco. Thought you look familiar.”

  “We work in the same building.”

  “On a tough case?” asks Marco, his toothy grin melting into an expression of concern. “Terrible to be working so late.”

  “Yeah, the Sheik Didi case.” John holds up the case files. “Setting up a video conference with Interpol. Time zone problem.”

  Marco sympathises, shaking his head; his good eye, unblinking, remains fixed on John. “Turn on the lights next time you drop in.

  Wouldn’t look good to be seen snooping.” He draws quotation marks in the air at the word “snooping”. “Does umm, whoever you got the files from know you’re coming?”

  “Of course.”

  “All is well then.” Marco’s grin returns. “Good thing you’re here or I’d be rolling in hot shit.” He guffaws raucously and John joins in as naturally as he can.

  / / /

  The flame in the kerosene lamp is long and still. Landon doesn’t sleep. He sits in bed and riffles through one journal, then he tosses it and picks up another, his eyes travelling, groping for the revelations of a distant past. Vivian, Hannah and Clara are but one woman— that much he now comprehends. She is a relic like himself, one of many lives, and he must confess that the prospect of meeting her now carries a dangerous, irrational thrill.

  If she isn’t the one out to kill him then who is? John has assured him that the surveillance is just a precaution, though he isn’t convinced anyone would get here in time if something happens. Unless, he thinks, John wants me right where I am.

  The possibility frightens him. It’s like a nightmare where you flee to your parents only to have them turn into the very demons you are running from. But things have taken a different turn. He finds relief in having confided a part of himself to Dr Peck. CODEX alone does not own his secret. Now he has an ally and he intends to keep it because for once he might find the unhidden world on his side. He looks at the slip of paper bearing Dr Peck’s number and enters it into his mobile.

  He only has to wait until Friday.

  A stuttering honk sends him leaping out of bed and racing down the stairs. He throws open the front door to an arriving Datsun pick-up truck. He jogs across the driveway to unlatch the gates. The truck rumbles in and halts to a screeching jerk.

  “Whoa! What’s the rush?” he says, even as he rejoices over the company.

  Cheok pushes past him without a word. He marches straight into the kitchen, his short, beefy arms swinging wide from his swaggering stride. He checks the toilet, then the yard, does a quick round along the perimeter and returns to the porch where Landon stands waiting with a frozen half-smile. He then grabs Landon by his sleeve and hauls him into the truck.

  “Get in, we’re leaving now.”

  “Okay.” Landon lifts his hands. “You’re scaring me, man. Where’re we going?”

  Cheok doesn’t answer. He reaches for the ignition, checks the rear view mirror, and what he sees stops him cold.

  “What?” Landon asks.

  The gate is closed and latched, and its lock isn’t what Landon recognises as his own. Even then there’s a good chance the old hinges wouldn’t stand up to a reversing truck. Cheok twists the ignition. The engine stutters but doesn’t start. He bolts out of the vehicle and finds the dislodged fuel-injector placed neatly on the front bumper.

  Cheok draws a pistol. “Back to the house.”

  Landon cowers into the corner where two windowless walls meet. Cheok goes to the back of the truck and returns with two heavy, khaki-coloured vests and throws them over Landon. Th
en he crouches with his back to the wall, breathing deeply and slowly, the air whistling faintly through his nostrils. “I’m not a gardener,” he confesses.

  “I figured.” Landon watches him, wide-eyed. “You’ve been very convincing.”

  “I didn’t lie about everything.” Cheok swallows and sweeps his gaze across the house. “My wife—she lost her mind; the disease, you know. But we still share the bed, our time together at night. One morning I woke up—she dead already, beside me. Eight years ago.”

  Landon feels a throb of pain in his chest.

  Cheok’s fingers squirm restlessly over his pistol. “Don’t forget me, okay?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Write about me in your notebooks, okay?”

  “I write about us all the time! So I won’t forget our football games!”

  Cheok pulls the vests over Landon’s chest, gives him a thumbs-up and exits through the front door.

  Under the vests Landon stays so still his limbs ache with fatigue. An eternity later he catches spectral shapes flitting across the curtained windows, backlit by security spotlights that John installed on the lawn. He hears a composition of skids and steps that suggests a struggle. Fits of fear rack his body; he’s too frightened to offer aid, and fiercely hates his cowardice. From the window he thinks he hears a gasp. Is it death? His mouth goes dry, his heartbeat rushing in his ears.

  Then all at once the shapes disappear, and an eerie silence settles.

  It doesn’t last. Moments later the roof comes alive with a fretful pounding. He hears roof tiles crashing. A shape appears near the kitchen. Someone cuts the power and a stifling darkness swallows everything.

  Streams of white light erupt from the rear of the house, punching smouldering holes through wood and glass. Plasma and ozone scorch the air. The shots miss Landon by a mile but they induce such fear it triggers a seizure.

  Through the convulsions he hears screams: Amal’s, the bayoneted victims’. Someone approaches. The sound of muted thudding morphs into the clatter of military boots. He stares down the barrel of a Nambu pistol, and behind it he sees the bearded, vengeful countenance of the Japanese officer.