The Fellowship bc-2

by William Tyree

  She gingerly eased back into the cushy leather seat. The soreness wasn’t diminishing, but she was getting used to it.

  “Feel like talking?” Speers asked.

  “Okay,” she consented, although she could already tell that he was about to deliver some bad news.

  He told her that he had sent the passports of the men who had assaulted her in Seattle to Arunus Roth, at DNI Headquarters in McLean, as well as to Blake Carver, who was following up with leads on the ground in Rome. Then he told her about Suk Kenyatta, the UN envoy who had been murdered in Geneva. He paused a moment, worrying that he had overwhelmed her with too much information.

  “Nathan Drucker,” she said. It was not immediately clear to either of them why she said it.

  “What about him?” Speers said patiently.

  Her eyes rolled upwards, left and then right as she strained to piece the memory together. The association came to her slowly. “The name S. Kenyatta was written in one of Drucker’s notebooks. I’m sure of it.”

  Speers opened his attache and began sifting through the stacks of loose notes. He couldn’t see anything. “Do you mind?” he asked, as his finger grazed over the reading light button. He had sent copies of everything to McLean and Rome, but had yet to process all the loose pieces they had gathered from Drucker’s house. Everything was happening so fast. In a perfect world, they would have weeks or months to piece together all the data points they had discovered over the past several days.

  He soon found them among the stack. Six pages of hierarchies. Hand-drawn, barely legible, with entire sections scratched out. Notes and Bible verses written in the margins. And even the names, most of them, were simply surnames. Only occasionally did they contain a first initial.

  Speers handed her the pages. The feel of the yellow notebook paper between her fingertips seemed to jog her memory.

  “Drucker was trying to piece together a Fellowship org chart.”

  Ellis began telling him what she could remember. She sputtered, losing her train of thought frequently as she remembered what had led her to board the flight for Seattle in the first place. She found the name “V Borst” on one of the pages and pointed to it. It was near the top of Drucker’s power list, near Gish and Preston.

  “Okay,” Speers said. “And you thought she was in danger?”

  Her thoughts drifted for a moment. She felt weightless for a moment until the sound of Speers’ voice brought her back. “No,” she said. “How could I know that? I was hoping she could tell me who might have wanted Gish and Preston dead. I was hoping she could tell us where her daughter was.”

  “That would have been nice,” Speers agreed. “Unfortunately, we have no clue what happened to Mary Borst after her plane touched down in Rome. It’s like she vanished into thin air.”

  Speers switched on his phone and called McLean. Ellis listened as he told Arunus Roth that he wanted to match every name on the list to the identity of a public figure or scientist, and he wanted it by the time they touched down in Rome.

  Ellis’ head throbbed again. She shut her eyes. The vision of Borst’s body hanging overhead returned to her. She was talking. She was trying to tell her something important. Ellis concentrated hard, trying to push away the white noise of her mind. She reached deep, trying to access the memory. It was like reaching into a deep, dark space. There was something down there, but it was too slippery to pick up.

  Rome

  Father Callahan was late. Carver sat on a park bench overlooking the Tiber River, drumming his fingers on his knee. The priest had messaged him an hour earlier, telling him that he had new information about the Vatican break in. The American had quickly agreed. Anything that could lead him to the whereabouts of the Holy Ossuary, or the zealots trying to protect it, could be the break he needed.

  A cool breeze rustled the trees overhead. Carver eyed a couple holding hands on a park bench. Was it just him, or did they look a little old to be such enthusiastic lovebirds? When he watched them kiss, though, and saw the mutt-like mug on the guy, his doubts disappeared. They had to be in love. Not even the most dedicated spy could conjure up that much passion for a face like that.

  He went over the details of his conversations with Callahan in his head. Although the priest had always been short on details, they had at least confirmed his instincts about the Vatican Intelligence’s pecking order. The Vatican’s philosophy when it came to choosing popes seemed to be the older, the better. That way there was less chance of any real change.

  Apparently the same could be said for the Vatican’s choice of Intelligence chief. The only person Callahan could have gotten the name Sebastian Wolf from was his nemesis, Heinz Lang. And he was as old as the hills. In his 80s, at least.

  But he assumed that Callahan wouldn’t have shared any critical details with Lang. He would have given him only what he needed to show value. Such was the way of double agents. Likewise, he had thrown Carver not a steak, but a bone, and he would no doubt be hoping to get a scrap in return.

  He thought back to the morgue, when Detective Tesla had shown them the bodies of the gunmen. He remembered Nico’s observation: I thought it was curious that Father Callahan kept referring to the bodies as victims. Tesla never used that word to describe them.

  A black van cornered onto Villa Della Conciliazione, squealing its brakes as it accelerated.

  A chilling thought hit Carver. If Lang had given Callahan orders to locate Sebastian Wolf, why would Lang wait to see whether Carver would share the intel with him?

  He wouldn’t. He would just take the asset who could find Wolf.

  The priest was now nine minutes late. Suddenly concerned, Carver got up and began heading back toward the palazzo.

  The priest had arranged their hotel reservations. Carver had performed a bug sweep, but only on their initial check in. And it would have been easy enough to eavesdrop from an adjoining room.

  He pulled out his phone and dialed the palazzo. Nico answered on the third ring.

  “Hey,” Nico said, “Great news. I found the motherload on — ”

  “Not another word,” Carver said. “Power down. We’re checking out of the room.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve got a bad feeling. Pack your things. We have to relocate.”

  “Hang on a sec. Someone’s at the door.”

  He heard Nico’s footsteps as he laid the room receiver down. Carver shouted into the phone. “Nico? Wait! Don’t answer it!”

  Carver quickened his pace as he passed two bronze-winged victories at the Ponte Vittorio Emanuele’s north end. He now had a partial view of Villa Della Conciliazione, and its row of embassies, shops and the palazzo were on the other side.

  Nico had still not returned to the phone. The street was illuminated with a soft yellow hue. It wasn’t crowded like it had been in the morning, but there were still scattered groups of tourists, clergy and business people about. Carver pocketed his mobile and launched into a full-out sprint.

  He quickly reached the Vatican Radio Building near the east end of Villa Della Conciliazione. At a distance of two city blocks, he spotted Nico’s unmistakably lanky, pale frame as he was shoved into the black van. Carver ran at a blistering pace, focusing in vain on the license plate as the vehicle sped away.

  Macabre visions flashed before Carver’s eyes. Nico hung by his wrists. Blood pooling on the hardwood floor beneath him. Eyes bulging. Shoulders popping out of their sockets.

  He pushed the dark ruminations away. That didn’t fit the pattern. Nico was not in the Fellowship. He didn’t even know Sebastian Wolf.

  His senses heightened, it seemed as if he was suddenly aware of everything around him. A delegation of government types exiting the Brazilian consulate across the street. A group of clergy leaving the Antico Caffe. A monsignor stepping outside the Order of the Holy Sepulchre at the far end of the palazzo. A pair of Vatican policemen standing leisurely at the end of the street, smoking cigarettes. And just as it seemed that Carver was going to lose the
vehicle for good, he spotted his saving grace — a large group of nuns crossing the Piazza Pio XII, the polygon-shaped arc directly in front of the massive oval of St. Peter’s Square.

  It was evident by both their zeal for their surroundings, and their pristine white habits, that they were not local nuns. They were pilgrims here on a trip of a lifetime. None of the roughly three dozen sisters paid any attention to the black vehicle careening their way. Only when it began to honk did any of them snap out of their wide-eyed wonder. Those that did see the vehicle froze in the crosswalk.

  Only someone with Carver’s conditioning could have heard the vehicle gearing down over the sound of his own breathing. Even if the driver was brazen enough to kidnap a felon in federal custody, they weren’t stupid enough to take out a bunch of nuns.

  As Carver gained ground on the SUV, he attracted the attention of the Vatican police. They stood upright, not quite understanding the situation, but clearly sensing the disturbance in their touristy atmosphere.

  He was just 30 yards away now, close enough to the SUV to see that it had no rear license plate. As it cleared the throngs and began to pull away, Carver had a decision to make. If he pulled his weapon from the shoulder holster under his jacket, he might be able to shoot out a tire, and if he was very lucky, kill the driver. But besides possible civilian casualties, there would be a cost to rescuing Nico by force — full exposure to the Vatican police.

  The policemen were armed, and there was a good chance that the armed policemen would take him for a madman, or a terrorist, and take him out. There was also a good chance he would be wounded and subsequently arrested. Speer’s voice popped into his head: Your status is completely deniable. That had been made very clear. The American government would not claim him. Even if he told them that he was working for the Director of National Intelligence, Speers would have no choice but to deny it.

  One thing was clear. He wasn’t going to be able to find the Black Order from within a prison cell.

  The van accelerated as the police stepped in to guide the remaining nuns out of the path of oncoming traffic. The windows were tinted too dark to get a last glimpse of Nico Gold.

  *

  There would be no going back to the palazzo. Although Carver rather liked the new suits he’d bought in Munich, retrieving them was hardly worth a bullet in the brain. Besides, everything he needed to find Nico Gold existed on the mission cloud.

  He would have to ensure his freedom first. The Vatican police were moving across the square now, straining their necks to track Carver’s movements over a swarm of tourists. Callahan had been right. After the burglary in the Apostolic Palace, they were on high alert.

  Technically speaking, Carver had done nothing wrong. There was no crime in chasing a vehicle down the street. But if the police caught him, and chose to pat him down, they would quickly find an unregistered, concealed firearm under his jacket. By the time he talked his way out of the holding cell, Nico would be dead. And so would untold political leaders as the war between the Fellowship and the Black Order raged on.

  One of the policeman tapped his earpiece and looked up, motioning to a Swiss Guard stationed high on the city walls. The guard’s elevated position made him the perfect spotter. Carver had to get out of his line of sight, and fast.

  He changed directions and walked into the middle of a tour group that was moving toward an exit in the Vatican walls. Stooping slightly to blend in among them, he went with the flow until they passed underneath a massive archway. Several meters above him was the Passato, the elevated walkway where popes throughout the ages had fled the Royal Palace for the relative safety of Castel Sant'Angelo. Before him was Via del Mascherino, a bustling thoroughfare lined with restaurants, shops and apartment buildings.

  He looked at his watch. He was supposed to meet Prichard and Seven in an hour. It was a good thing that they had set their meeting place ahead of time. Even if he managed to escape, he was going to be unreachable for a bit.

  When the group was free of the city walls, Carver bolted right into a corner gift shop, where he saw a black baseball cap with the papal keys imprinted on the front. He grabbed it from the rack, pulled it over his scalp, and laid a 20 Euro note on the counter without stopping for change. He exited a side street that was scarcely wide enough for a scooter and walked casually down the street with his hands in his pockets.

  He sprinted until he came to the next big street. There he removed the SIM card from the phone Father Callahan had given him and crushed it under the heel of his shoe. Next he removed the battery and dropped the remaining hardware into a rubbish bin.

  Now free of Vatican City, he walked north, looking for a communications store. He had to get in touch with Roth.

  *

  Carver knew that his freshly purchased prepaid phone would never meet agency security standards, but at least he knew that it hadn’t been tampered with since leaving the factory. He headed toward Via Crescenzio, dialing Arunus’ cell phone number from memory.

  Roth answered. “Hello?”

  “It’s me,” Carver said. “I need help.”

  The kid hesitated. “Sorry, bro, can you please authenticate?”

  “Don’t call me bro!”

  “Okay, okay, Carver. What’s up?”

  “Listen carefully. I need you to do a remote data wipe of all classified documents on Nico’s machine.”

  “Are you all right?”

  Carver had no time for small talk. He had just 20 minutes until he was due to meet Carlisle, Seven and Prichard. “Repeat back to me what I just said.”

  “I need to completely wipe Nico’s machine.”

  “No,” Carver corrected. “Just sensitive information. Leave all non-classified docs, the OS and any software.”

  Nico had been taken, not killed. That implied that his captors wanted something from him. They wanted Wolf, and they wanted his help finding him. Carver had to be careful not to wipe the entire machine. If that happened, they might kill him.

  “Just the classified data,” Roth repeated. “Got it.”

  “First I need you to give me permission to access the mission cloud on this device.”

  “Okay. Hold on.”

  In less than a minute, Carver’s new phone buzzed with the arrival of a text message that used a single-use link to the cloud location, where he would be able to access his credentials.

  He spotted a cab slow to the curb in front of him. A pair of girls stepped out. Carver slipped into the back seat before the seat cooled, telling the driver to take him to the Trevi fountain, where he was to meet his MI6 counterparts.

  By the time the cab stopped at the next traffic light, he was able to log into the mission cloud on his new phone. He clicked on the RFID icon that Arunus Roth had set up, which launched global map. Carver watched as the map quickly localized to a satellite image of Rome.

  A blinking dot showed the location of the tracking chip in Nico’s arm. He was near the opera house, and he didn’t appear to be moving. That could be bad, Carver realized. It could mean they were already interrogating him. Nico had never been trained for this sort of thing. If he was lucky, the Black Order would hold him while they waited for someone of authority to conduct the interrogation.

  With the matter of Nico’s tracking device solved, he looked in the mission cloud’s upload folder, hopeful that Nico had been uploading his work continuously throughout the day.

  The Deconsecrated Church

  Rome

  The goon touched the tip of the knife against Nico’s ear. The pain was followed by a warm sensation that spread into his ear canal.

  “I’m working, I’m working!” Nico began typing some java code into a notepad screen. The effort seemed to satisfy the goon, who retracted the knife, turned away and skulked back to the shadows.

  He stood before a concrete slab, where his computer was jacked into an old-school Internet cable. His upper arms were swelling from the beating they had given him. His captors were surprisingly young. Barely ou
t of high school, Nico guessed. The one in charge of minding him wore a black T-shirt and utility pants with the pixilated digital camouflage patterns that had been used, most ineffectively, by the U.S. military for a decade before being finally phased out. Nico had done his best to avoid looking directly at either man’s face, so as not to give either another excuse to kill him. He knew only that his minder was clean-shaven, with muscle-bound arms and wire frame glasses. A plain wooden cross hung from his neck.

  Even from the shadows, the goon was watching Nico’s every move, ensuring that he didn’t send a message to the outside world.

  All Nico knew for sure was that they were in some sort of crypt that felt ghostly and unloved. Judging by what he could see from the battery-powered lanterns, the frescos had been pried from the walls long ago. On the far wall, a Chi-Ro — an ancient Christian symbol that fused a cross with letters — was all that was left of its former inhabitants.

  There were two sarcophagus-size bays on the wall to his left. Bits of stone and marble were crumbled around the edges. Whoever had been buried there had been exhumed and taken elsewhere.

  Behind him, a rope dangled from a pulley somewhere in the rafters. Anchors had been set up on a sort of concrete platform so that the ropes could be tied off. Nico wished he didn’t know what those were for. Carver had shown him the crime scene photos from D.C. and Seattle as an incentive. Just knowing they were meant for him made it difficult to concentrate. He’d lived the last few years in fear of being extradited to Saudi Arabia, where they’d cut off his hands at the wrists. Now this.

  Nico’s first mistake had been answering the knock at the palazzo suite. He’d been expecting a piece of cheesecake from room service. His second mistake was pretending he didn’t know Italian. For that, he had taken a beating, although the goons were careful not to damage his hands or face.