by Stephen Moss
Amadeu smiled once more and turned back to the show.
- - -
With the team leads sent back to their jobs, and Amadeu left to his devices as he alternately watched Big Foot or stepped virtually into it to join Mynd, Moira, and the team controlling the massive device, Neal and William walked away from shed.
They were elated. It was a good day, one of many they had enjoyed since the battle at Rolas. Not sweet enough to fully eradicate the bitterness of that terrible defeat, but enough for genuine happiness to show on Neal’s face.
“This will change everything here,” William said.
“Of course,” replied Neal, “loading times will be cut in half.”
It should have been their first project with the Dome, and in a perfect world it would have been, but the need to get the first Skalm airborne, and then to get the EAHL ready so it could help rethread their elevator to space had necessarily taken precedence.
“Less than half, in fact,” said William. “But the real benefit will come with unloading.”
Neal nodded appreciatively. Getting the huge finished products out of the Dome had proven even harder than getting the raw materials in, and they had been forced to spend precious time and resources each time patching and refinishing the golden inner-layer after they clumsily wrenched and pulled their first two creations out of their synthetic womb.
They walked in silence for a little while toward Neal’s plane before William spoke up again, his voice amplified by his custom-made exo-suit.
“Neal, if you have a moment, I wanted to talk to you about something we discussed last week.”
Neal turned to him, surprised on some level, but not really. He had hoped the topic would come up again, and feared it would as well.
“Yes, William?” he said in a curious but reassuring tone.
William took a visible breath then said, “If we wanted … if I wanted … to pursue, or even discuss pursuing, the avenue we talked about before … how might I go about doing that?”
Neal looked pensive. It was a very good question. With his extensive team adding skills and specialties every day from among the best and brightest minds in the world, it had been a while since he had to think about whether or not they had the ability to do something. If it needed to be done, he just gave the task to Madeline, or Ayala, or Jack, or William, or, if in doubt, to Minnie and Mynd, for them to deal with.
But this was more delicate than that, and he would have to proceed with care.
“Well, William,” he said, after carefully considering his response for a moment, “if you were to want to talk about options, then we would probably want to proceed with some discretion, both for your sake and for that of TASC as a whole.”
It was not nice to think about, perhaps, but he did not want it becoming public that he was encouraging, or even countenancing, voluntary amputations, however well meaning the work might be.
But William was no fool. He was not naïve enough to think that this would be anything other than a project that was strictly between them. But to a man with his condition, it was a possibility too tempting for him not to at least consider. The suit was too wonderful, and gave him the simple gift of mobility, something only those unfortunate enough to have lost could truly understand the joy of regaining.
But in the end it was just a suit, its incredible abilities only emphasizing his lack thereof, and William could not help but long for limbs that truly worked, even if they were not his own.
“If you will allow me,” said William, “I have a contact that may be able to help.”
One of Neal’s eyebrows rose in surprise, and William went on, “I worked with him at Oxford, when I was working on my robotics thesis. He was a specialist in robotic prosthesis, though one whose theories encouraged a more extreme measure of amputation than was accepted as necessary in most circles. It has held him back in many ways. But he is a brilliant man, in his way.”
Neal stopped and turned to face William, who also turned to meet his gaze.
“William,” said Neal, “if you want to pursue this, and I think it is both very brave, and potentially very important that you do, then give me this man’s name and I will see to it he is hired immediately.”
“Dr. Sudipto Ramamorthy. I can contact him now, if you will allow me,” said William.
Neal closed his eyes and opened his link, keeping William in the frame as he contacted Mynd.
Neal: ‘mynd, i need a new project opened for location at district two. this will be headed by william. he will have hiring and purchase authority, and reports will be coded for my access only. we will call it … ¿william, any thoughts on a what you want to call this?’
William: ‘¿how about ‘project vestige’?’
Neal nodded his agreement, both in the ether and in reality, and the two of them returned to the present.
“You will need a place for this doctor to work in, William,” said Neal, and William nodded. “May I suggest you set it well away from the main project center? It is a big island, and it is, for all intents and purposes, yours to do with as you see fit. I suggest you use the space available.”
Neal waved his hand out at the broad harbor. It was a beautiful place, if stark and very deliberately in the middle of nowhere. William followed Neal’s gesture across the dark blue water to the mountains that surrounded them. He had explored those mountains, in part in the exo-suit he now wore, but far more with the various phases of the Phase battle units he and Mynd were still working on.
Deep down he had few doubts left now that they had breached the subject. He was equal parts fearful and excited at the thought of permanently replacing his two atrophied legs. But what then? His arms? His weakening neck and facial muscles?
He shivered at the thought, and felt, with grim irony, as the suit made the movement real where his own body could not.
Chapter 11: Shockwaves – Part Two
The Slink landed in the quiet of night. It did not drop its passengers at altitude, as it had all those the months ago, before the war in Eastern Europe, but actually landed with them.
It would hide nearby, in the only hiding place it could rely on once the light of day came. After Ayala and her team had stepped free of the compartments that had held them secure for their long flight, it lifted once more.
Silent as the breeze upon which it floated, the big, hollow discus with its four stubby wings glided a few meters up into the night sky and then floated out over the deserted section of the Taedong River before unceremoniously lowering itself into it. The magnetic field rotors that span at its center worked as well in water as they did in air, and so it quickly disappeared beneath the surface in a whirl of sloshing water and was gone, there to await the team’s return once they were ready to leave.
Ayala checked her suit, as did her team.
Hektor, Cara, and Niels were fully recovered from their extraordinary mission in Moscow where they had played executioner to the usurping madman that had taken power there. They were also joined now by two Korean agents on loan from their South Korean allies as part of the cooperative approach to the investigation that Neal had agreed to with the Korean government.
All six were equipped with the latest battleskins, ever more evolved by hard-won learning. Ayala had considered sending the new Phase Nine battle avatars instead, but they could not risk what had happened to her recon teams in the Ukraine. They must be able to run subspace quiet, just in case they encountered resistance equipped with some echo of what Agent Pei had equipped his Chinese allies with before he died.
It was something that was looking more and more likely the further Ayala got into her investigation of the assassination attempt in New York.
But that was not the only reason that she now rescinded her three-part helmet and spoke to her team out loud. Two of its members did not possess the spinal-interfaces that would allow her to commune via subspace with them anyway.
“All right,” she said, in hushed but commanding tones, “I want equi
pment checks from all of you. Hektor, when you are ready, let’s set up the laser beacon and get our non-subspace comms online. Niels, Cara, perimeter guard, please.”
They had no reason to expect any form of militarized presence here, not like they had encountered in Russia, anyway, especially this far outside the city. For though Pyongyang was the capital of a twenty-five million-person country, it was a small and woefully underdeveloped city. Its stunted development was appropriate, perhaps, given the unfortunate nation’s state of health.
The population existed, for the most part, in a time capsule. Education and agriculture had receded to almost medieval levels under the oppressive Kim regime, as had civil liberties, with such things as freedom of speech and due process not even in the average local’s vernacular.
But amongst this oppression had grown an unnaturally strong military, spurred by equal parts paranoia and megalomania, and for that reason alone Ayala remained cautious.
Cautious, but still curious enough to come here. For all leads seemed to be pointing into the morass that was North Korea, or at least to the border of this strange place, and then vanishing into its foggy depths.
“OK, Jung, talk to me,” Ayala now said, turning to her two Korean allies. “We’ve gotten you to the Taedong, we’re up river, as requested …”
Jung Hae Chul, major in the South Korean Counter Terrorism Service, and his subordinate Captain Chin, glanced at each other furtively. They had spent their entire professional lives working to protect their home from their erstwhile cousins to the north, but this was only the fourth time either had been here.
Yet among their peers, that categorized them as experts, for transit to and from North Korea was a famously rare event.
For Jung especially, being here was a bitter pill, as he had spent the first half of his life trying to escape this very city, only to be co-opted into South Korea’s intelligence services once safe.
It was for that very reason, though, that he understood the need to protect the border, and even, if events required it, as they now did, to cross back into this awful place.
If he was caught, Jung faced certain death, but given the manner of their incursion he doubted that any of the rest of the team would suffer a much better end if they fell into enemy hands. So he locked eyes with his Israeli comrade and temporary commander and said, “We are indeed here, Ms. Zubaideh. An impressive machine.” He tipped his head toward the now submerged Slink, and Ayala nodded in acknowledgement.
The Slink was not a secret she showed to non-TASC personnel lightly, but, she knew, knowing of its existence would do little to help either her allies or enemies spot the stealthy machine when she needed it to get in and out of their nations uninvited.
“As for what is next,” Jung said, quietly, “I see no reason we would not follow our primary route plan now that we are here.”
She nodded, and then turned to the wider group, sending a tight ping over subspace to Niels and Cara to tell them to return. They had reconfigured their suit-to-suit comms to limit range to specifically the distance to the nearest team member, whose suit would then relay the signal to the next, and so on. It would limit the chance of Ayala and her three Spezialists being spotted, and still they would only use the comms when too far apart for simple verbal or visual commands.
As Niels and Cara returned, she spoke to the huddled team again. “Very well. We have successfully landed at Point Alpha. Hektor, if you have communicated our status back to Minnie, we are going to move off.”
He confirmed he had, and they turned as one to the river.
As they began to step into the fast-flowing water, she said, “OK, let’s close suits and engage breathers. Niels, you have point, the rest of you stay close. Jung and Chin, I am afraid we are going to have to hold hands.” She smiled and reached out to take Jung’s hand, who did the same to his colleague.
And so they dipped into the flowing Taedong, Niels first, quickly submerging. His helmet was now closed, a special rebreather parsed air to and from two small but highly pressurized tanks they each carried. They would not last long, maybe ten minutes at a time. But they could replenish them with small snorkels when they had to, allowing the team to move down the river and into the city proper without detection.
- - -
They arrived at their secondary staging point a little over an hour after departing the landing site and stepped gingerly ashore, guns already raised as they emerged from the water. Once Niels, Hektor, and Cara were confident that there was no one around, they gave the all-clear for Ayala to lead the two Koreans to shore.
After a long moment’s silence to adjust to their new surroundings, Ayala rescinded her helmet, indicating that the others should do the same. “Right. For those of you who are interested, we are now in beautiful Moranbong Park, and between us and the other shore is Rungnado Island, another generous gift to the people from the Great Leader.”
Her ironic tone brought smiles from the group, though less so from Jung.
“Hektor, I want you to find an innocuous place to install our comms station. You know what you are looking for. Cara, please assists Hektor and provide cover for him. Niels, perimeter sweep and eyes, please. Start at a hundred meters, but once you have fully mapped the nearby area for Minnie, please spread out. She will help you with setting the boxes as you go. Meet back here when done, or within twenty, no longer. I don’t want anyone wandering too far.”
Nods were the only response she received and the three Spezialists turned and left without further comment. Hektor would be looking for a tree with dense enough low foliage to hide their small laser beacon in its upper branches. The device, simple by TASC’s standards, perhaps, but still a dream to any field operative, would self-track to TASC’s pod satellites that now blanketed near-earth orbit, relaying their status and any relevant information Ayala wanted returned to Rolas via an all but undetectable tight-beamed laser.
It would only transmit, though, as they could receive all they would need directly through subspace without danger of revealing their position.
For Niels’s part, he would be placing small white boxes on trees and posts around their position, widely spaced, but in view of each other. The boxes would form a spiderweb of eyes and ears.
Ayala was quite proud of their camouflage, for they would hide in plain sight: their white, metallic outsides stamped clearly with a government insignia and instructions that it was not to be touched. They would use the regime’s own totalitarianism against it, and rely on fear trumping curiosity should anyone spot the small boxes placed out of reach and seemingly at random around the public park.
“As for you two,” Ayala now said to Jung and Chin, with her three team members off distributing their little toys around the park, “you should probably get your civilian clothing ready.”
“Yes, Commander,” said Jung as the two men set to removing and opening the sealed, hard-shelled packs they had clipped to their sides.
They contained simple clothing, requisite in its minimalism, and no more than it appeared to be.
They were brave men, Ayala could not argue with that, for they were going to walk out into the city with no more protection than their wits afforded them. Well, that and two small, antique-looking flip-phones, still a luxury in this city, to be sure, but hidden within them were a couple of tools that might help them in a bind, most notably a panic button and locator beacon.
“Our contact will not know when we are coming,” said Jung by way of passing the time, even though Ayala remembered this from the briefing, “but hopefully he will be ready for us. Either way, we cannot leave until dawn anyway.”
The city observed a standing curfew after dark. It was not strictly enforced, but if you wished to break it you had better have a good reason, have strong connections to the party, or be a member of the party yourself. While they might have faked such credentials, it would be far safer to wait until the madding crowd emerged once day broke, and lose themselves in the millions of ordinary people,
rich and poor, who called the city home.
“Of course,” said Ayala. “In the meantime, why don’t you try and get some rest. You have a long day ahead of you, and you should get any sleep you can.”
He looked at her skeptically, not of her trustworthiness, but more of his own belief that they would be able to sleep. Her answering expression was more understanding than he could have expected. “Jung, Chin, think of this little spot here as a safe haven. My team may be small, but do not doubt their skill, or the deadliness of their weapons. Please try to sleep, my friends. I will wake you when it is time for you to get ready.”
Jung and Chin were not unappreciative of the gesture. They nodded, and tried to get comfortable, their civilian clothes at the ready, but keeping on their lo-fi battleskins for now to protect them from the damp ground and chill air.
- - -
Saul Moskowitz: ‘so a guy is reading the paper and he sees an ad: talking dog for sale. well of course he calls and makes an appointment to go and see the dog, if only out of curiosity. so he gets there and the owner tells him the dog is in the backyard. the guy goes into the backyard and sees a mutt sitting there, looking very sorry for himself.’
Ayala did not tell Saul to stop, though she wanted to. She could not risk the chatter when in such a delicate location. But Saul had no such restrictions, so he filled the airwaves with his inane banter.
Saul: ‘-so i hear you talk-asks the man. -yap-replies the dog. –so, what’s your story?- asks the man. the dog sighs and says, -well, my first owner figured out pretty young that i could talk and sold me to mossad.-’
Ayala and Hektor rolled their eyes, but were unable to halt the endless stream from Saul’s dubious bag of jokes, so they listened on in silence.
Saul: ‘-so in no time mossad has me hanging out with bad guys and taking treats from visiting world leaders, if you know what i mean.- the man is surprised. -wow, that’s amazing,- he says. to which the dog replies, -it was, for a while, but then the p.l.o. figured it out and i had to stop. so i went to work at the airport to listen in on shady-looking passengers. i uncovered some incredible stuff, got a bunch of medals. it was really great while it lasted. but that’s all behind me now. now i’m retired.-