They clung together.
‘Chris.’ There was something in Carla’s voice that might have been a laugh as well, and what she was saying made no kind of sense, but the way she held him that didn’t seem to matter much. ‘Chris, listen to me. It’s okay. There’s a way out of this.’
She started to lay it out for him. Less than a minute in, he was shouting her down.
‘You can’t be fucking serious, Carla. That’s not a way out.’
‘Chris, please listen to me.’
‘A fucking ombudsman. What do you think I am, a socialist? A fucking loser? Those people are—’
He gestured at the enormity of it, groping for words. Carla folded her arms and looked at him.
‘Are what? Dangerous? Do you want to tell me again how you murdered three unarmed men in the zones last weekend?’
‘They were scum, Carla. Armed or not.’
‘And the car-jackers, back in January. Were they scum too?’
‘That—’
‘And the people in that café in Medellín?’ Her voice was rising again. ‘The people you killed in the Cambodia playoff. Isaac Murcheson, who you dreamed about every night for a year after you killed him. And now, you have the insane fucking nerve to tell me the ombudsmen are dangerous?’
He raised his hands. ‘I didn’t say that.’
‘You were going to.’
‘You don’t know what I was going to say,’ he lied. ‘I was going to say those people are, they’re losers Carla, they’re standing against the whole tide of globalisation, of progress, for fuck’s sake.’
‘Is it progress?’ she asked, suddenly quiet. ‘Balkanisation and slaughter abroad and the free market feeding off the bones, a poverty-line economy and gladiatorial contests on the roads at home. Is that supposed to be progress?’
‘That’s your father talking.’
‘No, fuck you Chris, this is me talking. You think I don’t have opinions of my own. You think I can’t look around and see for myself what’s happening? You think I’m not living out the consequences?’
‘You don’t—’
‘You know, in Norway when I tell people where I live, where I choose to live, they look at me like I’m some kind of moral retard. When I tell them what my husband does for a living, they—’
‘Oh, here we go.’ He turned away from her in the narrow confines of the car. Outside his window, the wind whipped along the embankment, flattening the long grass. ‘Here we fucking go again.’
‘Chris, listen to me.’ A hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off angrily.
‘You’ve got to stand outside it for a moment. That’s what I did while I was in Tromsö. You’ve got to see it from the outside to understand. You’re a paid killer, Chris. A paid killer, a dictator in all but name.’
‘Oh, for—’
‘Echevarria, right? You told me about Echevarria.’
‘What about him?’
‘You talk as if you hated him. As if he was a monster.’
‘He pretty much is, Carla.’
‘And what’s the difference between the two of you? Every atrocity he commits, you underwrite. You told me about the torture, the people in those police cells and the bodies on the rubbish dumps. You put those people there, Chris. You may as well have been there with the electrodes.’
‘That’s not fair. Echevarria isn’t mine.’
‘Isn’t yours?’
‘It isn’t my account, Carla. I don’t get to make the decisions on that one. In fact—’
‘Oh, and Cambodia’s different? You get to make the decisions on that one, because you told me you do, and I read the reports while I was away, Chris. The independent press for a change. They say this Khieu Sary is going to be as bad as the original Khmer Rouge.’
‘That’s bullshit. Khieu’s a pragmatist. He’s a good bet, and even if he gets out of hand we can—’
‘Out of hand? What does that mean, out of hand? You mean if the body count gets into the tens of thousands? If they run out of places to bury them secretly? Chris, for fuck’s sake listen to yourself.’
He turned back. ‘I didn’t make the world the way it is, Carla. I’m just trying to live in it.’
‘We don’t have to live in it this way.’
‘No? You want to live in the fucking zones, do you?’ He reached across and grabbed at the leather jacket she was wearing. ‘You think they wear this kind of stuff in the zones? You think you get to jet off to Scandinavia when you fucking feel like it if you live in the zones?’
‘I’m not—’
‘You want to be an old woman at forty?’ She flinched at the lash in his voice. He was losing control now, tears stinging in his eyes. ‘Is that what you want, Carla? Obese from the shit they stuff the food with, diabetic from the fucking sugar content, allergies from the additives, no money for decent medical treatment. Is that what you want? You want to die poor, die because you’re poor? Is that what you fucking want, Carla, because—’
The slap turned his head. Jarred loose the tears from his eyelids. He blinked and tasted blood.
‘Now you listen to me,’ she said evenly. ‘You shut up and hear what I have to say, or this is over. I mean it, Chris.’
‘You have no idea,’ he muttered.
‘Don’t try to pull rank on me, Chris. My father lives in the zones—’
‘Your father?’ Derisively. Voice rising again. ‘Your father doesn’t—’
‘I’m warning you, Chris.’
He looked away. Cranked down the anger. ‘Your father,’ he said quietly, ‘is a tourist. He has no children. No dependants. Nothing that ties him where he is, nothing to force him. He isn’t like the people he surrounds himself with, and he never will be. He could be gone tomorrow if he chose to, and that’s what makes the difference.’
‘He thinks he can make a difference.’
‘And can he?’
Silence. Finally, he looked back at her.
‘Can he, Carla?’ He reached out and took her hand. ‘Yesterday I was on the other side of the world, talking to a man who might be able to kick Echevarria out of the ME. If I get my way, it’ll happen. Isn’t that worth something? Isn’t that something better than the articles your father hammers out for readers who’ll shake their heads and act shocked and never lift a fucking finger to change anything?’
‘If it matters to you so much to change things all of a sudden, why can’t you—’
The heavy throb of rotors overhead. The car rocked on its suspension. The radio crackled to life.
‘Driver Control. This is Driver Control.’
The rotor noise grew, even through the Saab’s soundproofing. The helicopter’s belly dropped into view, black and luminous green, showing landing skids, underslung cameras and gatlings. It skittered back a few metres, as if nervous of the stopped car. The voice splashed out of the radio again.
‘Owner of Saab Custom registration s810576, please identify yourself.’
What the fuck for, dickhead? The thought was a random jag of anger. Match me from the footage you’ve just shot through my windscreen, why don’t you? Instead of wasting my motherfucking time.
‘This is a security requirement,’ admonished the voice.
‘This is Chris Faulkner,’ he said heavily. ‘Driver clearance 260B354R. I work for Shorn Associates. Now fuck off, will you? My wife’s not feeling well, and you’re not helping.’
There was a brief silence while the numbers ran. The voice came back, diffident.
‘Sorry to trouble you, sir. It’s just, stopping like that on the carriageway. If your wife needs hospitalisation, we can—’
‘I said, fuck off.’
The helicopter dithered for a moment longer then spun about and lifted out of view. They sat for a while, listening to its departing chunter.
‘Nice to know they’re watching,’ said Carla bitterly.
‘Yeah.’ He closed his eyes.
She touched his arm. ‘Chris.’
‘Alright.’ He nod
ded. Opened his eyes. ‘Alright. I’ll talk to them.’
FILE#3:
Foreign Aid
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Two weeks.
For Chris, marooned on the fringes of the preparations, it passed like a waking dream. He lived a distorted copy of his real life, tinged in equal portions by nightmarish tension and an odd, unlooked-for romantic nostalgia.
Work was as he’d expected. He acted normal and watched his back. Troop movements in Assam, hostage-taking in Parana, and in Cambodia a handful of executions no one had foreseen. He handled it all with eerie calm.
At home, he dared not talk openly to Carla so they took up a bizarre dual existence, life in the house as if nothing had changed, set against hushed exchanges snatched in the secure confines of the Saab. Carla, somehow, had persuaded Erik and Kirsti to act together as the link with the ombudsmen, and she went regularly to the Brundtland to gather details from her father. Some kind of code was in use over Erik’s netlink, a fake reconciliation underway between the parents to serve as cover for the information Chris and Carla agreed in their hasty conferences in the car.
And here came the nostalgia, the bittersweet taste of something almost used up. The moments grabbed in the Saab had the tang of illicit sexual encounters, and once or twice even ended that way. And the rest of the time, acting out normality for any possible listeners, they treated each other with an abnormal tenderness and consideration. In both aspects of their new existence, they were getting on better than they had in months.
It was weird.
Two weeks, and the ombudsman came.
He disliked Truls Vasvik on sight.
Partly, it was the Norwegian thing - the same irritating aura of easy outdoor competence that he’d noticed in most of Carla’s friends on the few occasions they’d been up to Tromsö together. But more than that, it was the clothes. Here was a trained professional who, Carla claimed, earned at least the same as he did, and Chris could have bought the man’s entire outfit for less than he usually spent on a haircut. The grey wool of the jersey was stretched and pilled, the nondescript trousers were bagged in the knees and the walking boots had shaped themselves to Vasvik’s feet with constant use. The coat looked as if he’d slept in it. It only needed the carelessly-tied-back greying hair to complete the image of a teen antiglobalist who’d never grown up.
Which is exactly what he is.
‘Thanks for coming,’ he said guardedly.
Vasvik shrugged. ‘I should thank you. You are taking a far greater risk than I.’
‘Really?’ Chris tried to ignore the jolt Vasvik’s comment delivered to his stomach. The set-up had left him jangled and twitchy. A shrill part of him wondered if the ombudsman was trying to psych him out. ‘I would have thought we’d both be arrested pretty fucking rapidly.’
‘Yes, we would. But your government would be forced to release me intact. That much power we still have. The police might work me over a little while they have me, but it’s unlikely to be worse than some other close encounters I’ve had.’
‘Hard man, huh?’
Another shrug. Vasvik looked around the workshop and spotted an ancient steel bar stool shoved against one wall. He went to fetch it. Chris mastered his irritation and waited for the Norwegian to come back. Again, he couldn’t be sure if Vasvik was doing it deliberately or not. The ombudsman’s detached calm was impenetrable.
Out in the rest of Mel’s AutoFix, tools whined and screeched. The noise raked along his nerves. It hadn’t been easy, finding a safe place to meet, and even now he wondered how far he could trust Carla’s boss.
‘Well.’ Vasvik dragged the stool under the jacked-up Audi Mel had left on the lifter, and seated himself. ‘Shall we talk about extraction?’
‘In a minute.’ Chris prowled the space beneath the Audi. Extraction. The way the word hung there was another jolt in itself, like walking up to Louise Hewitt at the quarterly and asking her out loud if she wanted to fuck. ‘I’m still getting used to this. Maybe I still need to be convinced.’
‘Then we’re wasting each other’s time. I’m not here to talk you into something, Faulkner. We can live without you at UNECT.’
Chris stared at him. ‘Carla said—’
‘Carla Nyquist cares about you. I do not. Personally, Faulkner, I don’t give a shit what happens to you. I think you’re scum. The ethical commerce guys would like to hear what you have, that’s why I’m here, but I’m not a salesman. I don’t have to reel you in to get my name up on some commission board somewhere, and frankly, I have a lot of better things to do with my time. You come in or you don’t. Your choice. But don’t waste my time.’
Chris flushed.
‘I’m told,’ he said evenly, ‘that UNECT recruit people, scum, like me for the ombudsmen. That’s important, because I need a job. Now. Have I been misinformed?’
‘No. That’s correct.’
‘So we could end up colleagues.’
Vasvik looked at him coldly. ‘It takes all sorts.’
‘Must be hard,’ Chris taunted. ‘Working alongside people that disgust you. Putting up with such a low grade of humanity.’
‘It’s good preparation for undercover work. Living with the stink.’
The workshop Mel had lent them had been swept for bugs an hour ago, and there was too much metalwork going on in the other shops for exterior scanning to be possible. Still, there seemed to be an audience waiting as the pause smoked off Vasvik’s words. Chris felt his fists curling.
‘Do you have any idea,’ he said, ‘who the fuck you’re talking to?’
The other man’s grin was a baring of teeth, a challenge. ‘Why don’t you enlighten me.’
‘I have treated you with respect—’
‘You’ve got no fucking choice, Faulkner. I’m your escape hatch. You want out so bad I can smell it on you. Your shrivelled little soul has finally got tired of what you do for a living, and now you’re looking for redemption with no drop in salary. I’m your only hope.’
‘I doubt you earn what I’m used to.’
‘Doubt away.’
‘Oh yeah? Blow it all on clothes, do you?’ Chris stabbed a finger at the Norwegian. ‘I know your sort, Vasvik. You grew up in your cosy little Scandinavian nanny state, and when you found out the rest of the world couldn’t afford the same propped-up artificial playgroup economic standards, you never got over it. Now you’re out there sulking and throwing moral tantrums because the world won’t behave the way you want it to—’
Vasvik examined the palm of one hand. ‘Yeah, but on the other hand I didn’t watch my mother die of a curable illness and—’
‘Hey—’
‘And then go to work for the people who made it happen.’
It was like a lightning strike. The slow burning anger sheeted to split second fury, and Chris was in motion. Attack raged at the edges of his control. A Shotokan punch to the temple that would have killed Vasvik, had it landed. Somehow, the ombudsman was not there. The stool staggered in the air, tumbled sideways. Vasvik was a whirl of black coat and reaching hands, off to one side. Chris felt his wrist brushed, turned in some subtle way, and then he was hurled across the workshop on the wings of his own momentum.
He crashed into the bench, hands trying to brace. A sound behind him and something hooked his legs out from under him at the ankles. His face smashed the bench surface among scattering drill bits and bolts. Something sharp gouged his cheek in passing. He felt Vasvik’s weight on him and tried to kick. The Norwegian locked his arm up to the nape of his neck, grabbed his head by the hair and rammed it back down on the bench sideways.
‘Mistake,’ he gritted in Chris’s ear. ‘Now, you going to behave, or am I going to break your fucking arm?’
Chris heaved up once against the weight, but it was useless. He slumped. Vasvik let go suddenly and was gone. Somewhere behind him, Chris heard the ombudsman picking up the stool. When he got himself upright and turned, Vasvik was seated again. There was a faint beading of
sweat across the pale forehead, but otherwise the fight might never have happened.
‘My mistake,’ he said quietly, not looking at Chris. ‘I shouldn’t have let you get to me like that. In a Cambodian enterprise zone, that kind of giveaway’d get me a bullet in the back of the head.’
Chris stood there, blinking tears. Vasvik sighed heavily. His voice was dull and weary.
‘As an operational ombudsman, you’ll earn approximately a hundred and eighty thousand euros a year, adjusted. That includes a hazardous-duties bonus, which you can reckon on getting for about sixty per cent of the work you do. Undercover assignments, swoop raids, witness protection. The rest of the time they keep you on backroom stuff. Admin and forward planning. That’s so you don’t burn out.’ Another deep breath. ‘Housing and schools for your kids are free, accommodation and expenses while on assignment, you claim. I’m sorry for that crack about your mother. You didn’t deserve that.’
Chris coughed a laugh. ‘Told you I made more than you.’
‘Yeah, well fuck you then.’ Vasvik’s voice never lifted from the tired monotone. His gaze never shifted from the corner of the workshop.
‘Do you like it?’ Chris asked him finally.
The ombudsman looked at him. ‘It matters,’ he said, pausing on each word as if English were suddenly difficult for him. ‘You’re doing something that matters. I don’t expect you to understand that. It sounds like a bad joke, just saying it. But it means something.’
They faced each other for a while. Then Chris reached into his jacket and pulled out a plastic sheathed disc.
The Complete SF Collection Page 181