Origin - Season One

by James, Nathaniel Dean

  “Subtlety is the key,” Francis had said. “Go overboard and you draw attention. The trick is to choose one or two prominent features and change only them. Short of reconstructive surgery, there’s no better way to reinvent yourself.”

  To prove his point Francis had put on a pair of rimless glasses, then covered his hair in gel and combed a part along the side of his head. It was still clearly him, but someone asked to describe him was most likely to remember the glasses and the hair.

  Edwin Hollister and Charles Woodrow worked for a small property developer in Terre Haute, Indiana and were in Florida scouting for a little slice of the vacation homes market, Francis had explained. The cover was strictly for conversational purposes, should they end up seated next to someone particularly social, or one of those nervous fliers who couldn’t keep their mouths shut. That had turned out not to be necessary as the handful of passengers on the plane had been scattered throughout the cabin and the two of them had had several rows to themselves. To Mike, the experience had been nerve-racking, but Francis had slipped into character like a seasoned actor. Mike supposed a man who could kill an innocent woman – a pregnant woman – didn’t get nervous too easily. The idea was almost too disturbing to believe, but Mike didn’t think Francis had been lying about that. It made him both scared of the man and grateful to know he was in the company of someone who could handle things when the shit started hitting fans.

  Francis stirred him from his thoughts by tapping him on the knee. “Almost there. I need you to wait in the car while I go inside. I shouldn’t be long.”

  “Are you going to tell me who we’re visiting?” Mike asked. “Or is it a secret?”

  “It’s not,” Francis said. “But that’s not why I haven’t told you. Some people are quite touchy about who they do business with, and this guy is one of them. He’ll tell you what he wants to. It’s not for me to decide.”

  “An old colleague?”

  “Something like that.”

  They left the toll road and turned onto State Road 520. Five minutes later Francis turned left onto a road called Denver Creek Road. They passed several large houses and a small lake. At the end of the road there was a single-story house barely visible in the moonlight where the grass gave way to a thick forest of slash pines. Francis stopped fifty yards from the house and turned off the engine.

  “Don’t get out,” Francis said. “He’ll know we’re here, but not who we are. Until I’ve spoken to him it’s best to be cautious. The law here isn’t particularly kind to trespassers. Or fugitives, come to think of it.”

  Francis got out and walked down the road. When he was twenty yards from the house, he heard the soft clang of a rifle bolt.

  “That’s far enough,” a voice said.

  “I’m not looking for trouble,” Francis said and held out his hands to show they were empty.

  “Then you’d better turn around and head back to your car.”

  “I was hoping I might get a cup of coffee before I left.”

  “You won’t be the first smart-ass I’ve buried,” the man said. “Now get going.”

  Francis saw him. He was down on one knee at the corner of the house. The rifle was leveled in Francis’s direction, the man’s head hunched down to the scope.

  “Who sent you?” the man asked when Francis didn’t move.

  “No one. I guess you could call me the Grinch that stole the Christmas of ‘98,” Francis said.

  There was a long pause. The man raised his head for a moment, then lowered it again.

  “Nice try. I’m going to give you ten seconds; then I pull the trigger. Tell whoever sent you that I’m finding retirement every bit as pleasant as I thought I would.”

  “I still don’t know why you blamed yourself when Marilyn lost the baby,” Francis said and braced himself.

  The man rose and started walking toward him, the rifle still pointed forward.

  “You should have high-tailed it when you had the chance, asshole,” he said.

  The man’s voice trembled with anger. When he was only a few feet away he stopped and pointed the barrel straight at Francis’s head.

  “You’ve got some fucking nerve –”

  He stopped suddenly, his mouth dropping open in disbelief. “Francis Moore?”

  Francis took off the glasses and smiled. “Hey, Colonel. You look good.”

  “I don’t get it,” the man said. “I signed the report myself.”

  “Did you see who wrote it?” Francis asked.

  He considered the question. “Boomer. Was it Boomer?”

  Francis nodded. “Yes. I didn’t think you’d believe anyone else.”

  “Boomer hated you. Why would he cut you loose?”

  “We made a deal,” Francis said. “He stepped up and I walked. He only hated me because I was in his way.”

  “And I bought it,” the man said, looking at Francis with wonder. “Boomer’s dead, you know. Disappeared two months after you did.”

  “I know,” Francis said. “I cut his throat myself.”

  “What?”

  “You know as well as I do he was a maniac. He told me what you did after I – after I died.”

  “Threatened to do,” he corrected. “If I had done it we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t,” Francis said. “Still, I’d have liked to see their faces if you had.”

  The man didn’t answer. He was looking over Francis’s shoulder to the car. “Who’s your friend?”

  “An esteemed member of the FBI field office in New York. Now unofficially retired.”

  “Do I even want to know what you’ve gotten yourself into?”

  “I hope so,” Francis said. “I could really use your help.”

  The man sighed and looked back toward the house. “Get the car into the garage and come inside.”

  As he walked back to the house, the man who had once been his trainer and operator turned back to Francis. “Francis Moore, back from the depths of hell. I should have known it was bullshit.”

  “How did it go?” Mike asked when Francis got back in the car.

  “Not too bad.”

  One of the doors on the garage opened and Francis drove inside. There was a black 2006 model Ford Mustang GT parked in front of the other door with a double green stripe running from bumper to bumper. Their host was waiting for them in the doorway of the garage. Mike thought he looked at least sixty, perhaps a little older. Francis introduced Mike and the two men shook hands.

  “Reginald Stiles. I’ll let you know if I’m pleased to meet you once I’ve heard what you two are doing here.”

  Reginald led them into a large open-plan living room decorated in the style of a hunting lodge, complete with bear rug and trophy heads. There was a wide stone fireplace on one wall with several pictures on the mantelpiece of a much younger Reginald. In one of them he was seated in the front row of a group outside a sandbag bunker wearing green army fatigues. The plaque at the bottom of the frame said: A/75 LLRP – Quang Nam 1972. In another he was shaking the hand of Richard Nixon in the Oval Office dressed in the uniform of an army captain.

  Reginald pointed to the sofa, and they both sat down. “Can I get you anything to drink?”

  “I’ll take that coffee now,” Francis said.

  “And your friend?” Reginald asked, looking at Mike.

  “I’ll have something a little stronger if you’ve got it,” Mike said.

  “What’s your poison?”

  “Single malt?”

  “That I can do,” Reginald said and left the room.

  Mike noticed there was no television in the room. A bizarre turntable made of polished steel cylinders on a glass stand sat in one corner of the room next to a tall bookshelf filled from top to bottom with twelve-inch LP records. Small speakers were mounted in all four corners of the room. He was about to ask Francis a question when Reginald returned carrying a silver tray with two whiskey tumblers and a white coffee mug on it. He set the tra
y down, handed Francis the mug and offered Mike one of the tumblers. “Highland Park. I get it shipped over from the Orkney Isles.”

  Mike took the glass and sipped at it. It was clean and smooth, a far cry from anything he was used to. Reginald took a seat in one of two hand-carved rocking chairs that flanked the fireplace and picked up a pipe from the hearth. He peered into the bowl then used a long match to light it.

  Reginald exhaled a large plume of blue smoke, took a sip from his glass and looked at his guests. “So, what exactly is it that I can do for you?” he said. “Bearing in mind I don’t see the president very often these days.”

  Francis put down his mug. “Ever heard of Skyline Defense?”

  “Sure. It’s a research and engineering contractor. Belongs to some foundation in Austria or Switzerland. They do some stuff for the Pentagon, but they mostly work with NASA and the Europeans on satellite technology. I think they might have something to do with the shuttle program, but I’m not sure. Why?”

  “Skyline is part of the Karl Gustav Foundation, and it’s based in Zurich. Although I think it may be a front for something else, too.”

  “Every private foundation is a front for something else,” Reginald said. “Usually greedy shareholders.”

  “I’m not talking about that. I’m sure the fund is what it appears to be, but I think it’s also a base of operations for something a little more sinister.”

  “If it had anything to do with intel,” Reginald said, “I can assure you I’d know something about it. I’m more curious to know what an employee of the FBI is doing in my living room.”

  Reginald nodded at Mike. “It’s okay. Francis wouldn’t have said anything if he didn’t trust me to keep my mouth shut. So what are you doing here? I’m guessing you’re not on vacation.”

  Mike, who had no idea who Reginald was, didn’t know what to say. Francis shook his head to indicate he didn’t need to say anything.

  “He’s become a target,” Francis said. “So, incidentally, have I.”

  “A target for whom?” Reginald asked.

  “That’s what we’re trying to find out.”

  Francis told him everything, starting with the break-in at the Fed and ending with the meeting between him and Mike in New York. It took almost an hour. By the time he was done Reginald’s curiosity had turned to fascination. He had stopped Francis several times to ask questions and clarify details, and Mike was surprised to discover how many of the isolated events that formed the narrative Reginald already knew about. Mike, who had completely forgotten about the two missing kids in Vermont, listened with growing wonder as Francis described their trip across the border and into the Canadian wilderness. When Francis finished, Reginald stood. “Well, that explains the call from Weaver. Wait here.”

  Reginald offered no explanation, just walked out of the room.

  “He looks worried,” Mike said.

  “Aren’t you?” Francis asked.

  “I mean he looks frightened.”

  “Men like him don’t like mysteries,” Francis said. “It comes from a lifetime of being the one behind them.”

  “So where did he go?” Mike asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  Reginald returned two minutes later with a laptop under his arm.

  “You have a serious problem on your hands,” he said and opened the laptop.

  “Oh, Christ!” Francis said.

  The page was an online newspaper article in the Burlington Free Press. Francis recognized the diner in the picture. The headline read: Brutal Murder in Vermont Roadside Diner.

  “That’s not all,” Reginald said.

  The second page was from the Trois-Rivieres News. The article was in French. The title read: Local Park Warden Feared Missing.

  Francis got up and ran back to the car. He got his briefcase from the trunk and took out the satellite phone, then ran back through the house and out the front door. Mike followed him.

  “Come on. Come on!” Francis said. “Hurry up.”

  A moment later the phone beeped twice and Francis dialed. He listened for a second, then ended the call. “Shit! I should never have taken them there! What the fuck was I thinking?”

  “You were trying to protect them,” Mike said.

  “Not hard enough. I should have checked the papers myself long before now. All I’ve been thinking about is that damned hard drive.”

  “Isn’t there someone you can call?” Mike asked.

  “Yeah, he’s dead.”

  “You need to get in here right away,” Reginald said from the doorway.

  The phone next to the front door began to ring as soon as they came back inside. Reginald picked it up and said, “What have you got?”

  He listened for a moment, then said, “Okay. Where will they be taken?”

  Reginald grabbed a pen and wrote something on the notepad next to the phone. “I need you to find out where they’ll be moved and when. Call me back as soon as you know.”

  He put the phone down and turned to Francis. “They’re alive. The Quebec State Police called it in a few hours ago. Jesse Corbin was admitted to Saint Joseph Hospital in” – he looked down at what he had written – “in La Tuque sometime this afternoon. The girl is with him.”

  Francis breathed a long sigh of relief. “Who else knows where they are?”

  “The police called the U.S. Consulate in Quebec City, who called the FBI because they’re both listed as missing.”

  “Shit!” Francis said. “Who do you know up there?”

  Reginald thought about it and shook his head. “Nobody in that part of the world. Not anyone I’d trust with this.”

  Mike put up a hand. He looked like a schoolboy volunteering an answer. “I might be able to help.”

  Both men turned to him.

  “If the boy can be moved,” Mike said, “the State Department or the Bureau will charter a plane to the nearest airport and fly them both back to the U.S.”

  “They’ll be dead or missing again before that happens,” Francis said.

  The room went quiet as each of them considered the problem. Mike spoke first. “I’ve got an idea. It’s a little crazy, but it could work.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Francis said.

  “Do either of you speak French?” Mike asked.

  Five minutes later Francis put the phone down, closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

  “Did they buy it?” Mike asked.

  “I think so,” Francis said, but he didn’t sound very confident. “The police captain is going to call me as soon as they’re on the road.”

  Reginald came back into the living room a moment later. “It’s done. But it’s not going to be cheap.”

  “That doesn’t matter,” Francis said. “How long will it take him to get there?”

  “Four hours at least. He just left for the airport, but he’s going to have to file an emergency flight plan and he wasn’t too happy about the destination.”

  “This is really cutting it thin,” Francis said. “Shit like this rarely works out the way you want it to.”

  “Get ready for the hard part,” Reginald said.

  “What do you mean?” Mike asked.

  “Waiting.”

  Chapter 44

  Lake Commissaires, Quebec

  Friday 21 July 2006

  2200 EDT

  The co-pilot signaled to Eugene by pointing a finger down and tapping the air. Eugene moved to the door and slid it open. A rush of cold air filled the cabin and the co-pilot almost lost the map spread out on the control panel in front of him. Eugene leaned out, using his left hand for support. In his right he held the GPS tracker. There was a small screen on it with a red dot in the middle that flashed every few seconds. He looked down and pointed it toward the shore. When he moved it to the left slightly, the dot grew larger and began to flash more rapidly. He signaled for the pilot to move closer.

  When they were directly above the thin strip of pebble beach, Eugene held up his hand and the he
licopter leveled off. He swung back into the cabin, grabbed a large cylindrical bundle hanging from a harness in the ceiling and pushed it toward the door. When it reached the doorway, the tracks it moved on extended out several feet into open air. Eugene pulled a cord on the bundle and it fell, unfolding into a rope ladder as it descended. He picked up the submachine gun lying on the seat behind him and climbed out.

  He dropped the last five feet to the beach, pulled the tracking device out of his jacket and pointed it into the trees then set off at a slow run, adjusting his course as the dot grew larger or smaller. When it turned green and stopped flashing, he put it back into his jacket, unclipped a pair of thick goggles from his belt and put them on, then pulled the gun off his shoulder and pointed it straight ahead.

  He reached the cabin five minutes later and stopped twenty yards away, scanning the area through the night-vision goggles. When he got to the door he pushed it open with the barrel of the machine gun, sprang forward into a roll and came up on his knees in the middle of the room. Spinning around on his heels, he stood up and spotted the red flashing light on the floor.

  Eugene quickly found the tracks leading around the cabin and into the woods. When he reached the crater where the log pile had once stood he looked around for a moment, then walked over the lip and down the slope. He pulled the M16 out of the ground, examined it and threw it aside. At the top he stopped and looked down, then leaned over and prodded the arm lying next to the barrel of the machine gun. He found the rest of the body a minute later.

  Eugene fell to his knees, picked up the remains of his dead brother and leaned back, cradling the body in his arms, then turned his head to the sky and let out a scream of rage that pierced the silence of the still night like a bolt of lightning. His whimpers gradually changed into a pleading whine as he rocked back and forth.

  After a while he stood and picked the body up in both arms. He focused on the sound of the helicopter and followed it toward the beach. When he reached the water he put the body down gently and pulled a small hand-held radio from the breast pocket of his combat vest. A minute later the end of a climbing rope dropped to the ground a few yards behind him. Eugene tied it around his brother and began to climb.