Deep State ds-2

by Walter Jon Williams

  “It’s a very large perimeter, I’m afraid,” he said. “It’s difficult to guard it all. They could have gone under or over the fence; they might have come in by small boat.” He gave a sigh. “They might have faked some ID. Or the ID may have been real-there are thousands of local civilians who work here at the aerodrome.” Determination crossed his features. “At least we can hope that they won’t escape.”

  Yes, Dagmar thought. Let’s hope.

  When she stood to leave, Lincoln rose and joined her. He put a hand on her arm before she could reach for the doorknob.

  “We’ve got to tell them,” Lincoln said.

  “I’ll do it.”

  “Are you sure?”

  She nodded. He released her arm and she opened the door and went into the hallway where the Brigade waited. Helmuth and Magnus, she saw, had returned from Limassol and joined the others.

  They all looked at her, and suddenly Dagmar couldn’t say a word. She could barely look at them. Lincoln waited barely two seconds before he spoke himself.

  “Wordz,” Lincoln said, “has been murdered. Briana was shot at but got away.”

  Dagmar saw them turn to her in shock. Her eyes skittered away from theirs.

  “The killers knew exactly where to go,” Lincoln added, “and that indicates a very dangerous security breach. So in the course of the next few hours, we’re going to be asking you some very serious questions, and I would appreciate truthful answers.”

  A moment of clarity descended on Dagmar. Someone had pinpointed her, had pointed out her apartment to the assassins. Had set her up, and Judy as well, to be murdered.

  She rather doubted that person was going to start telling the truth about it now.

  Lincoln, Alvarez, and Vaughan conducted the interrogations. Those who weren’t being interviewed were given police escorts to their apartments, to pack their belongings and carry them away. Dagmar didn’t think she could face the crime scene, so she stayed in the police HQ while two very kind policewomen volunteered to get her things.

  After the interrogations were over, the Brigade was carried in police vehicles to the ops center, where without sleep and without cheer, smelling of unwashed bodies and uncertainty, they attempted to do their normal day’s work. The hallway to the bathroom was full of personal possessions fetched from their apartments: their personal electronics were stored in metal lockers outside the secure area.

  The Brigade stared dully at the screens as they caught up on the news.

  The Izmir slaughter had outraged the Turkish nation-the government story had been unconvincing even before it had been shown to be an absurd lie, and the videos and pictures of the massacres were all too available to anyone with access to a computer or to foreign television. Angry posts had appeared on political Web sites, pictures of the dead on lampposts and street corners, copies of the wanted posters everywhere. The junta had failed entirely to keep ahead of the story.

  A massive demonstration had spontaneously organized in the city of Konya, where Anatolia’s center of conservative Islam was marked by a green-tiled conical tower that stood above the elaborate tomb of Mevlana, the great poet who had founded the Whirling Dervishes. Lincoln and Dagmar had avoided setting any actions in Konya in order to avoid accusations of being religious reactionaries. But the city’s residents had managed to mobilize themselves, and it was a vast, angry stream of thousands that circled the city’s brown stone Alaeddin Mosque, stopping traffic on the semicircular boulevard and filling the mosque’s shady park, shouting slogans and singing patriotic songs. They carried stuffed animals and boxes of Turkish delight, memorials to those who had died two days before.

  Lincoln and Dagmar had planned the first series of hit-and-run demos to show the population that it was safe to defy the government. Ironically, it was the demonstration where people were killed that had outraged the people to the point where they were organizing themselves into large actions.

  It took at least a couple hours for the police to work up the nerve or gather the reinforcements to deal with the demo, and when they charged the demonstrators they were met with a storm of rocks, bottles, and other improvised weapons. Flowers of pepper gas blossomed among the trees of the park. There was resistance-videos had actually been uploaded by people sitting in jail cells, people whose phones had not yet been confiscated. Dagmar guessed that a few hundred people, at least, were clubbed to the ground and arrested or-if they were lucky-carried in handcuffs to a hospital.

  Most of the protestors seemed to have simply found an exit once things got dangerous. They were all networked-only a few would have had to find an actual way out and alerted the rest by phone or electronic text.

  The demonstrators didn’t have the capability to upload their images real-time, so Dagmar had to search online sources for videos that had been posted hours after the event and try to arrange them in some kind of chronology. Ismet and Lloyd had to translate all the dialogue. All the cumbersome difficulty only added to the frustrations of the day.

  Eventually the videos were cataloged and a narrative superimposed on the action. The narrative had to do with freedom-loving resisters in pitched combat with faceless totalitarians and may have possessed only a tangential resemblance to reality-for starters, Dagmar had no idea whether the demonstrators, taken as a whole, were any more committed to democracy than the current regime or would, if given power, set up an equally authoritarian state but with a different agenda. Yet her narrative would serve for present purposes, and the better-quality videos were sent out to the usual media outlets, while the rest were duplicated and catalogued on Web sites hosted throughout the world.

  Dagmar worked amid a leaden cloud of despair. It was not just that Judy had been murdered; it was not just that Dagmar worked in a room with someone who had betrayed her; it was not merely that her entire project was now ringed with violence-it was the certain knowledge that her own nerves were not up to coping with any of this.

  She could sense panic fluttering in her heart. Sour-scented sweat gathered in the hollow of her throat. Phantom movements in her peripheral vision seemed forever on the verge of resolving into images of Indonesian rioters armed with cleavers, Jakarta police with shotguns, thick-necked assassins from the Russian Maffya. Her mind seemed on the verge of exploding in a bubble of fire, just as the Ford had exploded on that cool Los Angeles night three years before.

  Somehow the nightmare did not manifest. Somehow she managed to do her work, think her thoughts, interact with her posse. Somehow she kept herself from crumbling.

  Lincoln had spent the morning in his office, talking on the phone or sending encrypted messages to his superiors. He came out at midafternoon, just as Dagmar figured that Rafet and Tuna were landing at the Ankara airport. She was working the Gmail accounts she shared with them, to tell them that Judy had been targeted by assassins.

  “Traitor may have given names, dates, and descriptions to the authorities,” she wrote. “Make certain you’re not under observation and proceed with caution.”

  She’d argued for canceling the action entirely. Lincoln had overruled her.

  “Excuse me, everybody,” Lincoln called. The tapping of keyboards ceased; faces turned to Lincoln. Even Ataturk seemed to be paying attention.

  “We’ve got new rules,” Lincoln said. “For the rest of our time here, you will be escorted and guarded by RAF Police or other military personnel. You will not travel without a guard-if for some reason a guard isn’t available to take you somewhere, you are to stay where you are, and call for assistance at a number I’ll give you.

  “You will no longer have access to your own cars. We don’t want anyone putting a bomb under one of them. If you need a ride somewhere, one of your guards will drive you.

  “No one will be leaving RAF Akrotiri for any purposes whatever, save as our mission requires.” He looked at Helmuth. “No more barhopping in Limassol, I’m afraid.”

  Helmuth looked as if he was going to comment, then shrugged.

  Maybe h
e figured he could amuse himself by corrupting his bodyguards.

  “You are all being moved to a single apartment block,” Lincoln said, “where you will be under guard twenty-four hours per day. You will be free to move around the aerodrome, provided you have proper escort.”

  Byron raised a hand.

  “When I took on this job,” he said, “I didn’t agree to be shot at.”

  “You haven’t been.”

  Byron reddened. His pinched face turned resentful.

  “I’ve got a family waiting for me in the States,” he said. “I’m not going to risk coming home in a box.”

  “Follow instructions,” Lincoln said, “and that won’t happen.”

  Angry Man banged a fist on his desk.

  “This isn’t in my contract!” he said.

  “I think that you’ll find that it is,” Lincoln said. “If you like, we can go into my office and look at it together.”

  Byron had turned a brilliant scarlet. His eyes seemed ready to pop from his head. Dagmar wondered if he was going to have a stroke.

  “Fuck that!” Byron said. “You can’t stop me from leaving!”

  Lincoln considered this for half a second.

  “I think that perhaps I can. And in any case I have legal options-there’s a substantial financial penalty if you walk off the job, as I’m sure you know.”

  Byron glared but had no answer. Lincoln turned to Dagmar.

  “Briana,” he said, “can I see you in my office?”

  Dagmar gave Byron what was meant to be a sympathetic look, then followed Lincoln into his office. The room smelled of stale coffee.

  “Close the door, please.”

  Lincoln sank into his Aeron chair as Dagmar shut the door. She took her own seat and watched as Lincoln took off his metal-rimmed shades, closed his eyes, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

  “I’m in charge of quartering you all,” he said, “and I thought I’d ask what kind of arrangements you want. I could put you in an apartment by yourself, but I don’t know if you’d be comfortable living alone.”

  “Put me in with Ismet,” Dagmar said.

  Lincoln lowered his hand and opened his eyes. The blue irises seemed washed out, and his lower lids sagged down his cheeks, revealing crescents of red flesh.

  “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” he said.

  Dagmar sighed. “Oh, Lincoln,” she said. “Is it that I’ll be living openly with a guy, or-”

  “No,” Lincoln said. “Nothing like that.” He reached for his glasses and adjusted them over his temples.

  “It has occurred to you,” he said, “that it was one of our own group who set you up to be killed?”

  She looked at him levelly. “Yes,” she said. “That thought had crossed my mind.”

  He nodded.

  “I take it,” she said, “that no one rushed to confess.”

  “It’s possible the fault might lie somewhere else,” Lincoln said. “Someone on the British side. The people who quartered you in the first place, for instance. Someone in the base commander’s office. None of them should have known who you actually were, but there might have been some talk, or a document left out of the safe at the wrong time.”

  “Good luck proving that,” Dagmar said.

  “It turns out there’s a polygraph on the base,” Lincoln said. “To deal with security issues, and to vet the civilian workers.” His mouth quirked. “I’m kind of surprised. The Brits-and Europeans generally-tend to think of polygraph evidence as voodoo.”

  “Do you?” she asked.

  He gave a silent snarl. “Sometimes voodoo works.”

  “I thought polygraph evidence wasn’t admissible in court.”

  “We’re not going to take the person to court,” Lincoln said savagely. “Or if we do, it’ll be a very private court, which will reach a very private judgment.”

  “Well,” Dagmar said. “Tomorrow the polygraph guy will likely find out something. But tonight I’d like to sleep with Ismet.”

  “Dagmar,” Lincoln said. “Ismet is a suspect.”

  She was exasperated. “I don’t think he-”

  “His mission cratered,” Lincoln said. “He went missing for hours, completely out of contact. He never called in-never even sent a text message. He said he destroyed the SIM card on his phone, but we don’t know that.”

  Indignation seethed in her blood. “He was pinned down!”

  “He could have been captured.” Insistently. “He could have been threatened with torture and turned.”

  Dagmar spoke with icy logic. “He flew here the very next day. He didn’t have time to-”

  “When you turn someone,” Lincoln said, “you get him back to his normal life as soon as possible, before he has a chance to reconsider and before anyone misses him.”

  Dagmar’s mind whirled. “That is absurd,” she said.

  Lincoln shrugged. “Maybe,” he said.

  “The killers!” Dagmar said. “Are you saying that the assassination was set up after Ismet was turned-if he was, I mean? In less than thirty hours? I’m not the professional here, but I’d imagine those sorts of ops require a little more planning time.”

  Lincoln gave a controlled nod.

  “Normally,” he conceded. “Unless you’ve got the team already prepped and they just need a location and an order to go.” He gave an uneasy shrug. “No lack of nationalist fanatics with guns over on Turkish Cyprus.”

  “It still doesn’t sound very likely. Not if they have to plan to get through a secure perimeter.”

  His tone turned savage. He made a cutting gesture with one arm.

  “It doesn’t matter what’s likely. It only matters what’s possible. I’ve got to take every possibility into account!” He spread his hands. “Otherwise, we’re wrecked.”

  Dagmar considered this.

  “Aren’t we wrecked anyway?” she asked. “This operation is no longer covert. Bozbeyli can reveal what he knows whenever he wants, and show that all the demonstrators are nothing but foreign puppets. And instead, he decides to kill us.” She waved a hand. “Why is that?”

  “I…” Lincoln hesitated. “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe we’d better start trying to work that out.”

  “I would like to do that-” Lincoln picked up papers from his desk and waved them. “But I keep being distracted by mundane tasks, such as the necessity of finding places for you all to sleep!” He dropped his hand and the papers to the desk with a thud. Then he sighed, shook his head, and lowered his voice.

  “I was going to ask if you wanted to share my suite. I’ve got a spare bedroom, and it’s in a very secure building normally used by visiting VIPs. That’s probably why they didn’t try to whack me.”

  Dagmar’s temper faded. She dropped her hands into her lap.

  “That’s very kind of you,” she said. “But I’d much rather have my own place. And whether Ismet is officially my roomie or not, I’ll be spending the night with him.”

  Lincoln put on his glasses, reached for the papers, and made a note.

  “Done,” he said. He looked at her from over the rims of his glasses. “Now that it’s morning in the States, I’ve got to call Judy’s mother and tell her that her daughter is dead.”

  Dagmar tried to speak and failed to find the words. Lincoln’s blue eyes seemed to bore into her.

  “She was here working on a game,” Lincoln said. “An ARG, for the Turkish market. She was killed in what we believe to be a case of mistaken identity.”

  Dagmar nodded dumbly.

  “Just in case anyone asks,” Lincoln said. He made a flipping gesture with one hand.

  “I think that’s all,” he said.

  She rose and left the room and walked back to ops. The Lincoln Brigade was mostly finished for the day and were quietly packing up their drives and running the bar-code stickers under Lola’s scanner. Dagmar checked the clock on the wall, then went to her own office and sent out the day’s spam.

  Welcom
e to Cankaya Wireless Network. Customer service is our most important product! We work constantly to expand our network throughout the Turkish-speaking world.

  Anyone signing up to our network in the next month will be entered into a special drawing. Prizes may include cash, a beautiful scarf, or a box of lovely greeting cards! The next drawing will take place by noon on Thursday!

  She had just hit the Send key when her office door opened and Helmuth slipped in. He wore an open-necked shirt and a jacket and trousers of linen. He sat on the brown metal chair and waited for her to acknowledge his presence.

  “Yes?” she said.

  He gave her a hooded look. “Dagmar,” he said. “What the hell are we doing?”

  There were any number of commonplace responses she could have given him, but she didn’t bother. She knew well enough what he meant.

  “Jesus, Dagmar,” Helmuth said. “We’re getting people killed. We got Judy killed.”

  “I know,” Dagmar said.

  “Now we’re in protective custody, stuck in an apartment building surrounded by guards with guns. We’re prisoners.” Helmuth leaned across Dagmar’s desk and spoke in an urgent whisper: “Dagmar, we’re game designers. This isn’t our job.” His hands groped the air as if he were physically searching for words. “Our job is to be cool, to make things cool. We can’t make killings and riots cool. We’re amateurs and we’re fucking everything up.”

  Dagmar couldn’t disagree. “What do you want us to do?”

  “Leave,” Helmuth said. “Just leave. Go home.”

  Dagmar looked down at her desk. “What does Richard think?”

  “He’s your happy Zen warrior. He just sits at his desk and makes up koans and pretends to be a ninja. He’ll do whatever you tell him.” He sighed. “You should just quit. That’s all.”

  “Like Byron?”

  Helmuth’s mouth quirked. “Byron’s afraid for his skin. I’m afraid for the people we’re putting in danger.”

  “Wouldn’t they be in more danger if we left?” she said.

  He gave her an appraising look. “I’m also afraid for your safety. And your soul.”

  Dagmar didn’t have an answer for that. She tried to speak, failed.