by Karl Morgan
“Yes, he told me that yesterday.”
“Well, that’s all the corroboration I need,” Montoya said as he stood up. “Anderson, put our guest in a holding cell for now.” He walked over to the door and opened it, and then turned back to face Josh. “Son, I sincerely recommend that you turn state’s evidence against the Judah family. You’ll save yourself some prison time if you do.” He turned and left the room, closing the door behind him.
“You really screwed the pooch this time, Mr. Carpenter,” Sadie laughed. “I have never seen the director so upset. If you want to see your girlfriend again, you should take his advice.”
“So, everything I’ve done is a fraud, is that what you’re saying?”
“Obviously, none of those things are possible. Only a fool would take them at face value.”
“What about Agent Field and me suddenly showing up at a Denny’s in town when we were on an airplane thousands of miles away?”
“Don’t worry about that, Mr. Carpenter. Agents Field and Trance and the flight crew are on paid leave while we figure out if they were also involved in this deception.”
“What do you have against me, Agent Anderson? What did I ever do to you?”
Sadie smiled as she stood up. “It’s nothing personal, Mr. Carpenter. It is my job to uncover fraud. I know what is scientifically possible, and when I see something outside the realm of possibility, I find out the truth and prosecute the liars. Get up now and I’ll take you to your cell.”
“Agent Anderson, I don’t know why you guys are harassing me. I haven’t done anything wrong. Without charging me, you have no right to hold me, so I’m not going to any damned cell.” He stood up and said, “I’m out of here.”
On the other side of the one-way mirror, Agents Thompson and Franklin exchanged worried glances. Sadie put her hand on the grip of her pistol. “Mr. Carpenter, I’m afraid you have no choice in this matter.” Thompson and Franklin drew their pistols and ran for the door.
“Sadie, I don’t know why, but I want you to understand. Things are spiraling downward in the world. Terrible forces are about to unleash horrible disasters and nuclear winter on our planet if we don’t stop them.”
Sadie drew her weapon and pointed it at Josh. “That’s above my pay grade, Josh. Come with me now.”
Thompson and Franklin rapped on the door and flung it open, finding the room empty. Thompson pressed a button on the device on his collar. “Secure the building. We have a runner.”
§
Bright sunlight startled Agent Anderson and she instinctively squeezed her trigger finger but nothing happened. She looked at her hand and noticed her weapon had somehow transformed into a full martini glass. Josh Carpenter was still standing five feet in front of her, but was now wearing swimming trunks. Her mind was in shock and she began to tremble and rock back and forth. Josh rushed behind her and helped her to sit down on the sandy beach. He took the glass from her hand and she immediately covered her eyes. When she opened them, she saw she was wearing a red bikini. Waves lapped up on the broad beach. On the other side, small cafes huddled against the sea wall. “What happened?” she moaned. “What did you do to me?”
“I said I wanted you to understand, Sadie. Where do you think we are?”
“Dreaming, I have to be dreaming. Did you drug me? I don’t remember you touching me. I was about to blow your head off, and then we were here. Am I dead? Did my gun backfire or something?”
“Just relax, Sadie. You need to calm down. I’m sorry if this upset you,” Josh apologized.
“Can I wake up now? Why did you do this to me?” A tone sounded. “That sounds like my phone. Where is it?”
Josh pulled the phone out of a pocket and handed it to her. “Your suit doesn’t have any pockets, so I held it for you.”
She pressed the connect button and said, “Agent Anderson.”
“Sadie, where the hell are you? This is Andy Thompson. Ted and I saw the commotion in the interrogation room and rushed over to help. When I opened the door just now, no one was there.”
The color drained out of Sadie’s face. “Just a minute,” she said into the phone and then pressed it against her chest. “Is this really happening?” Josh nodded. “Where are we?”
“This is the city of Nice on the French Riviera.”
She took the phone to talk, but then pressed it against her chest again. “Are you serious?” Josh nodded and stood up.
“Mr. Carpenter says we are in Nice on the French Riviera.”
“What?” shouted the voice on the phone.
“Andy, I’ll call you back,” she said and disconnected the call, handing the phone back to Josh. “Now what?”
Josh extended his hand and said, “Come one, let’s get something to eat. I’ve always wanted to try the mussels and fries here. They are supposed to be the bomb.” He pulled her to her feet and the two walked over to the nearest café and were led to an open table.
§
Back in Washington, Agent Steve Trance left his home in suburban Alexandria and drove toward a small park several miles away. He kept an eye on the rear view mirror and doubled back more than once to insure that no one was following him. When he at last felt secure, he pulled into the parking lot, locked his car and walked into the park. Several women were there with their young infants, so Trance moved to a bench as far away from other people as he could find. He sat, took the newspaper he held under his arm, and opened it to conceal his identify and signal his contact. This part of his role was the most frustrating and terrifying and he hated the possibility of being discovered.
Time passed very slowly, and he read almost the entire paper waiting for someone who may or may not arrive. Then he felt someone sit on the other end of the bench, but did not lower his paper. “Hi, Steve,” a man’s voice said.
He folded his paper and was relieved to see Hammond Finch on the bench. “Mr. Finch, thank you for seeing me.”
Finch removed a thick envelope from his jacket pocket and set it down on the bench between them. “What did you want to tell me?”
Trance set his newspaper on top of the envelope and replied, “We have a real problem with that Carpenter guy, sir.”
“Tell me something I don’t know. Is that it?”
Trance related the events on the FBI jet, the disappearance of Agent Anderson and Carpenter from FBI Headquarters, and their sudden appearance in France. Finch showed no emotion or hint of discomfort. “Sadie is a good cop, Mr. Finch. She can’t be part of this.”
“I am beginning to believe my senior partner is correct. I need to eliminate the threat this Carpenter fellow poses to our mutual interests.”
Trance jumped to his feet, saying, “You shouldn’t be telling me anything like that, Mr. Finch. I can’t be involved in murder. Giving you information is bad enough. Who knows who might be watching or recording all of this right now?”
“Please calm down, Steve. No one is spying on you right now. I control the entire area.” He pressed on his hearing aid and said, “Show him boys.” Steve looked down to see five red laser dots on his chest. “That’s enough.” He smiled at Steve and said, “Please sit down.”
“You’re going to kill me, aren’t you?”
“No, of course not, my men are here to protect us both. That was just a little show so you know they are there. I always know who is around me. If the FBI was spying on you, you would never see or hear from me again.”
“What do you want me to do, Mr. Finch?”
“Just keep doing what you have been doing. Keep me updated on anything hot in the Bureau. Nothing more than that, unless a unique set of circumstances were to arrive where you could take care of Carpenter in self-defense. But I doubt that will happen, although it would be fortuitous.”
“Okay, sir. I’ll keep doing as you ask.” Trance stood, grabbing both the paper and the envelope. “Thank you.” He started to walk away.
“Oh, Steve, did you say Carpenter was in Nice, France?”
“Yes, s
ir, that’s what Agent Anderson said.”
Finch chuckled and said, “Perhaps fate is interceding on my behalf already. Goodbye Steve. We will talk again soon.” Trance waved slightly and headed back toward his car, conscious that the snipers were probably still tracking him. Finch pulled his phone from his pocket and pressed down the number one key.
After two rings, a man’s voice said, “Halo?”
“Good afternoon, Armand. This is Ham.”
“Hammond, it is a pleasure to hear from you. How is the family?”
“Everyone is well, thank you. By the way, I enjoyed meeting with your son, Henri.”
“He is a very ambitious man. Have you had a chance to review the gifts?”
“Not as yet, Armand. Everything is in our R&D lab now, but it goes without saying that we are extremely excited about everything.”
“Good. I’m glad your team is pleased.”
“Armand, I have just heard some news that I thought I should share with you.”
“Go on.”
“I was just told that Joshua Carpenter is in Nice.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes, sir, I was told he took a young FBI agent there quite magically.”
“Thank you for the information, Hammond. I’ll have some men look into it for me. Au revoir.” The line went dead. Finch began to laugh.
§
After their meal, Sadie and Josh were walking along the Rue des Anglais, the broad boulevard separating the beach from the row of hotels and leading from the city to the airport. “I’m sorry, Josh. I don’t know what to think anymore.”
“Don’t worry about it, Sadie. You were just following orders.”
“There is definitely something going on with you, Josh. The things you’ve done just aren’t possible. You know that, right?”
“I think I am on a mission to stop the wars.”
She stopped and stared at him. “Why you?”
“Sadie, I haven’t had these abilities very long, and they seem to be getting stronger by the minute. Someone or something is giving me these things for a reason.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. But I’ve been told that my goal is to save mankind and prevent global nuclear war.”
“Really? Who told you that?”
“Well, Chris Judah for one, and uh, well, I don’t really want to talk about the other.”
She put her hand on Josh’s shoulder and said, “You know, if you told me all of this in that interrogation room, I would have committed you to an asylum, no doubt about it. But now that I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, I have nothing to say but good luck.” She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek.
He thought about kissing her back, but then thought better of it. “Thank you.” Sadie’s expression changed from joy to horror. “What’s wrong?”
Two black SUVs pulled up next to them and stopped. Three men jumped out instantly. Sadie tried to grab Josh’s arm to pull him away, but before Josh could react, the first man pistol-whipped him on the back of the head, and he crumpled to the ground. The man then aimed his pistol at Sadie and shot her in the thigh, causing her to fall as well. The large pedestrian crowd began to scream and run for cover. The other two men grabbed Josh and threw him in the back seat of the middle vehicle. Then all three climbed into the trucks and they sped away, leaving Sadie grimacing in pain and holding her bleeding leg.
§
Josh awoke in a dark room. There were no windows, only a single steel door. His head ached, but he could not recall what happened. One moment, he was talking to Sadie, and now he was here. He pulled himself up to sit on the side of the small bed, and lasers of pain shot through his head and down his arms and back. He felt the back of his head and found a large lump. “I have to imagine myself sitting at home, and then I’ll be free,” he said out loud. He closed his eyes and imagined sitting on the sofa in the family room. He could even smell dinner cooking in the next room, but when he opened his eyes, he was still in blackness. Something was definitely wrong. Perhaps the injury to his head had short-circuited his powers? But there was nothing he could do now but wait and hope his powers returned.
He heard the sound of the lock tumbler turning. Then the door opened and a light was switched on. Josh closed his eyes tightly against the intensity of the bare bulb. He heard the door locking again and forced his eyes open. A man stood there holding a tray of food in his hands. He smiled at Josh and said, “Welcome, Monsieur Carpenter. My name is Armand Sattu and you are my guest.”
“Why did you kidnap me? What happened to Sadie?”
Sattu crossed the cell and placed the tray on a small metal table, and then took a seat on the lone chair in the room. “Those seem like minor concerns, Joshua. What do you really want to know?”
Josh noted that Sattu was wearing a perfectly tailored dark blue suit with a white shirt and red tie. He had a full head of long white hair, pulled back into a ponytail that hung halfway down his back. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Come on now, Joshua. You want to know why your special talents did not permit you to foresee this or to escape this room, isn’t that true?”
“I did think about that for a moment, but I thought it was due to my head injury.”
Sattu chuckled softly, stood and began to pace around the small cell. “The minor wound has no effect on anything. As well, you did not have the injury until after the attack was launched.”
“I don’t foresee everything, Mr. Sattu. But why can’t I escape?”
“Who assassinated the caliph of the Western Caliphate?”
“He was killed?” Josh gasped.
“Use your gift, Joshua. Tell me who did it!”
This was the first he had heard about the assassination, and now this Frenchman wanted him to explain it. He closed his eyes and thought for a moment, until a random thought coalesced in his mind. “The Central Caliphate captured three attack helicopters from the African Empire and used them to attack Tunis so the North Africans would think it was the Empire.”
“But wasn’t their deception uncovered when one of the helicopters crashed?”
“No, each helicopter had a self-destruct mechanism that would completely destroy any evidence of the nationalities of the crew.”
Sattu laughed out loud. “You see, Joshua, your gift is quite intact. The head injury had no impact. The attack on Tunis hasn’t even been reported by the Western Caliphate yet!”
Josh shook his head as though trying to shake out cobwebs keeping him from understanding what was happening. “Mr. Sattu, you seem to have all the answers, so why don’t you just tell me what you want me to know?”
Sattu laughed again, sat on the bed next to Josh and clapped him on the back. “You really need to get better at this, but I’ll help you this time. You could not foresee the kidnapping because this meeting was predestined. You and I have a strong connection, Joshua. You needed to see me to help you understand your destiny!”
“Which is?”
“That is for you to decide, my boy. As far as the woman is concerned, she was shot in the fleshy part of her left thigh by one of my men. Don’t worry. She has already received medical care and will be returning to Washington tomorrow. Your embassy has already retrieved her from the hospital and she is sleeping there tonight.”
“Why did you shoot her?”
“Joshua, of course I was not there. Perhaps it was not necessary, but FBI agents are well trained. Rather than risk the mission, the decision was taken to immobilize her and escape as quickly as possible.” Sattu moved to the small chair and sat down. “Now do you want to know why you cannot escape?” Josh nodded. “The power of your special talents is increasing very quickly, however, at this stage you can only travel within the physical universe.”
“That is crazy! This looks like the physical universe,” Josh said, rapping his knuckles on the stone wall.
“Appearances can be deceiving, Joshua. Please come with me to the door.” When they arrived, Sattu passed hi
s open hand over the doorknob and the lock cylinders began to move. Sattu pushed open the door and stepped aside so Josh could have a better view. Josh had expected a hallway, open room, or at least the outside world. What he saw was unreal. Everything was pure black, like a moonless night. Strings of multicolored light shot across in every direction, like a time-lapse video of traffic in a major city during a blackout. He stood in the doorway, transfixed by the impossible view. “What do you think?”
“Is this some kind of movie projection? It doesn’t look real at all.”
Sattu grinned and replied, “Well, actually, the cell is more of a projection than what is outside.”
Josh stepped away from the opening and asked, “Am I stuck here forever?”
“Of course not, Joshua, but I will leave you now. I brought you some food in case you get hungry. Take all the time you need here. When you have the courage, come outside and find me. I won’t lock the door.”
“You want me to go out there?”
“It’s the only way, Joshua.” Sattu walked out the door and it closed behind him.
Josh started to tremble and rushed over to the bed to sit down and avoid fainting. “Now what do I do?”
§
Tanks lined both banks of the Chambal River on the Indian subcontinent, with the army of the Eastern Caliphate on the west bank, and the Asian Republic on the east. Both forces added more units almost daily, and yet neither side was confident enough to start the hostilities. In the city of Jaipur, safely away from the battlefield, Caliph Hossain was meeting with his top generals to discuss the ongoing conflict with the Republic. “The current situation is not likely to improve, Your Majesty,” Field Marshall Ali said.
“Now is the time to attack, Majesty!” General Mustafa growled.
Hossain scowled at Mustafa and said, “I appreciate you desire to regain the lost territory, Mustafa, however, what are the odds of a quick victory?”
“Unlike the infidels across the Chambal, we have Allah to protect us, Blessed One.”