by Michael Priv
“Be tourists for a day or two, check into a hotel, we’ll find you,” Liran instructed, as the bus let us off by an interesting-looking pagoda. After a hurried handshake, Liran took off with his crew in a van that was waiting for him, leaving us on the sidewalk.
“ Now what?” Linda turned to me.
“Look at this place! Nice.”
“I love it too!” Linda agreed. “Let’s walk.”
“Let’s.”
We simply started walking in a random direction. Although still an authentic place in many ways, with pagodas and Asian-looking architecture, signs of change peeked at us from almost everywhere— gas stations, laundromats. We walked past a sign “Baker and McKenzie Law Offices.” Sivutha Street, where we were let off, was the center of the city. Lots of guesthouses, restaurants, jewelry stores, handicraft and woodcarving shops—no lack of interesting things to look at.
Thus, carried by the flow of foot traffic, we ended up in the Old French Quarter. The smell of good food enveloped us, a savory reminder that it was past lunchtime. Taking a couple of turns at random, we found ourselves on Pub Street, alive with small restaurants, cafés and bars, serving every kind of food under the sun. Some places exuded class and style, and others were not stylish at all. Exotic. Eclectic. What should we eat? Venturing deeper into the bowels of the place, we got lost in the alleys lined with small shops and glutted with cheerful crowds.
“What would you like to eat?” I asked Linda.
“Let’s take the first place we come to, you know? Let’s surprise ourselves,” Linda suggested.
“Can’t go wrong,” I agreed. “Let’s eat at the next dive.” The next dive turned out to be a burger joint, The Banana Leaf. Throw me into the veritable epicenter of exotic international cuisine… a “Banana Leaf” burger joint. That couldn’t be right. Surprisingly, their Croc Burgers did indeed strike a chord, as did the Happy Hour Every Hour, the location in a side alley in the middle of the shopping area, a balcony to watch the throngs of happy shoppers and rubbernecking tourists, and good beer. Nice place.
“ Excusez-moi!”I called out to a pretty Cambodian waitress zooming by with a couple of orders of burgers and fries and two largish bottles of brown ale on a tray. Ah, stout!
The two of us finally settled down at a table with our burgers outside on the street, alive with bicycles, happy people, rickshaws pulling carts with gawking tourists—some of them looking around in a peculiar, kind of detached way that follows brain overload, I guess. They couldn’t quite digest all the visual stimuli.
“ Buy flower?” A tiny voice brought me out of my reverie. A little girl, about eight, in a bright dress was offering Linda a rose. I liked her smile and the intelligent alertness in her eyes. Precious. I paid for the flower and made the girl stay a few minutes longer.
“What’s your name?” I asked, feeling happy.
“Chea,” she answered with an even brighter smile.
“Do you go to school, Chea?” Linda asked.
“Yes.” She nodded eagerly. Then added, looking away, “But not all time.” “Sometimes?” Linda offered.
“Yes, sometime.” Chea lit up again. “You Americans?” “Yes, we are,” Linda replied proudly.
“You very pretty,” she told Linda.
“Thank you, you too,” Linda replied.
“You know Justin Bieber?” Chea asked, making big eyes.
Damn little Canadian brat. Even here? “No, we don’t. Sorry,” I replied. Chea got the cutest little pouty lip and walked away. Adorable.
“Chea!” Linda called after her. The little girl returned. “How much money in American dollars would you need to not miss school for a whole week?”
Chea thought about it, furrowing her eyebrow. “Ten dollar!” she finally concluded. “Here is three hundred dollars for you. Please put it away. Yes, just like that. Give it to your mom. How many weeks of school do you owe me?”
“Thirty!” Chea fired back brightly.
“Correct. Bright girl! Give away all these roses to the tourists and go home, okay?” Linda hugged her and let her go. The waitress, Darany, recommended The Garden Village Guest House right off Sivutha Road, in close proximity to Sok San Palace and the famous Old Market. The place was geared toward budgetconscious travelers, which we both preferred to be at the moment, leaning toward a great backpacker atmosphere and friendly, informal staff to the stiff luxury of the Sheraton. Friendliness. What else do weary travelers need? That and the all-day fifty-cent-draught beer on the rooftop terrace. Unpretentious, to be sure, but not dinky, the place was three stories. Our room was nice, full of flowers. We found the restaurant to be rather decent, too. A buck a day each got us “grandma” bikes to roll around town.
After a fun-filled day at balmy Siem Reap, a sudden knock on our hotel door distracted me from a long-awaited shower. It was a hotel messenger with a note. A cab was waiting for us outside.
39
Our instructions were to check out of the Garden Village, collect all our meager belongings and get into the cab. The cabby, a Cambodian of undeterminable age, took us to a nice part of town, Psar Leu, where nightlife was in the process of unfolding. The scene already looked promising. We stopped by a dignified plaque with the English writing “Buddhist Literature Research Center Kingdom of Cambodia” by the entrance. This center occupied a part of the first floor in a three-story building. The rest of the building was taken by a hotel, the Khmer Princess Inn, with a restaurant on the first floor right next to the hotel lobby. The center, hotel, and the restaurant all had separate entrances.
The driver ushered us into the hotel lobby to the check-in counter and promptly disappeared without getting paid. The clerk greeted us with a cheerful, “Mister and Missis Harris! Well, hello! Welcome to Khmer Princess Inn. You’re all checked in already. Room 203.”
The alert clerk’s eyes quickly checked us out. A security pro. I was getting used to this. The clerk yelled into the open door of an office behind him, “Ismail, take our guests and their luggage to Room 203, please. Here is the key.”
A kid, younger than me, not an oriental, must really be an Arab, took our suitcase and walked us to the elevator. We waited for a while for the decrepit elevator to arrive.
“Two-oh-three’s on the second floor, right?” I asked. “That’s okay, we can walk.”
“Don’t worry, you will,” Ismail answered mysteriously. “Wha…” I started, but Linda’s shove shut me up. The elevator arrived. We walked into the cabin. The bellboy clicked something behind the handrail, exposing a fingerprint reader. He pressed his thumb to the reader briefly. Unexpectedly, the entire back wall of the elevator slid aside, revealing a corridor that ended with a staircase. I immediately spotted two cameras on the ceiling, one pointed at the elevator and the other at the stairway. We walked out of the elevator, the wall slid closed behind us, and the elevator started up slowly without us, clinking and clanking.
We took the stairs down a couple of levels and found ourselves in a large dining room with rows of tables and serving lines. Liran greeted us there as old friends.
“What is this place?” I asked.
“This is the School. I’m the Security Chief here.”
“I feel secure already,” Linda exclaimed, beaming.
Liran grinned back at her.
“A school?” I asked.
“Yes, we call this place the School.” Liran said. “Not ‘a school,’ “The School.’ And capitalized.”
“ TheSchool? Peterson is theTeacher then?” “ You got it. I need to brief you on something. Have a seat.” We sat down at a table. There were no people in the dining hall as it was late already.
“This location is a secret. The whereabouts of the Teacher is a secret. No ‘need-to-know basis,’ no if’s or but’s, no options. This is always a secret. I am disclosing this to you now because it is my job. Your job is to never talk about this to anybody. No exceptions. People’s lives depend on it. Do you understand?”
We nodded. Sounded a bit
overdone to me.
“You know why that is?” Liran asked.
“Why?”
“Because his work is too important and too dangerous. We don’t want any incidents. He does have powerful enemies, like the Guards and even the Priests. Norm knows what I’m talking about.”
I nodded. “We met two of the Priests. Complete lunatics. Although they didn’t seem to be a threat to Brell, I mean the Amibrotos. They couldn’t care less.”
“ That might not be a true statement at all.” The genuine concern in Liran’s eyes made my stomach tighten. “You know what they’re up to?” Liran asked us.
“They’re running a racket here on P-3, right?” I replied. “Right. You think they’d want the Baltizor Confederate High Command to find out and send a mission here to extract them? The Teacher is setting spirits free. These people could talk. See the connection? But, listen. Even if those idiots don’t care today, what if they changed their minds tomorrow? They are psychotic. Do you think they’d hesitate to wipe us all out, if they decided to? You’ve met Roberts and O’Hara. Nobody wants to bet everything on their good graces, right?”
Made perfect sense to me. The words “good graces” and “Roberts and O’Hara” didn’t even belong in the same sentence. “Hey, when can I see Brell?” I asked.
“All in good time,” Liran replied evenly.
“Anything else we should know?” Linda asked.
“Any space in the School is open to you. You are free to explore anything you want, provided the doors into those spaces are unlocked. But,” Liran said, raising his finger and eyebrows, “do not try to open any locked doors. You will find all the doors unlocked, except for a couple of emergency exits and the rooms with lessons in progress—simply not to disturb the parishioners during their lessons. A lesson is really a spiritual therapy session. It is strictly between the Teacher or an Assistant and the parishioner or a seeker.”
“So there are parishioners and there are seekers? Two different types of visitors?” Linda asked. “Yes, you, for example, are not parishioners, are you?” “What would we have to do to officially enter the flock?” I asked.
“Fifty thousand US dollars a year in addition to the usual full background and security clearance, among other things.” I whistled. Spiritual healing didn’t come cheap. I supposed people wouldn’t join if they weren’t getting enough benefits from this to justify the expense. Intriguing.
Liran showed us around a bit and then escorted us personally to our room 203 on the hotel’s second floor.
“Aren’t you worried about hotel staff blowing your cover?” I asked Liran. “ Joking now? Did you really believe this was a normal hotel? These are all our facilities. The hotel, the restaurant, the Buddhist Center—all just a cover. The entire building is ours. Nobody is ever allowed in this hotel except our staff, parishioners, and qualified seekers, like you. The restaurant is open to the general public very seldom and only by invitation. The Buddhist Center conducts lectures and seminars occasionally as a cover and also to contribute to Buddhism. We like Buddhism. It has a lot of truth to it. So, we help them in our own way. But this whole place is just us.”
“Got it now, thanks. So, Ismail and the clerk are members of the Church too?” I couldn’t believe it. “ Absolutely. Not just any members. My boys, the security staff.” “You guys used to be the MPs, right?”
“Not all of us, but there are also other people in security here who were not the MPs or even the A5B,” Liran explained. They trusted one-life convicts with security. Unbelievable. Then I remembered that I trusted Linda. Linda was different. Other convicts were nothing like Linda, were they? A sudden thought struck me that the convicts, whom I despised so much, were by and large good people.
Room 203 wasn’t half bad. Nice size, a fully stocked fridge, a TV, good-sized bathroom with a large shower. We tested the shower immediately. Good news—plenty of room for two. We always liked to shower together. The bed was next in line to be tested. It turned out to be perfect as well.
40
Next morning, early, we were sitting in the same dining hall on Level Minus Two, as it was called here, a rather large and pleasant hall that could comfortably fit a couple hundred diners, none too flashy but tasteful and well-kept. The disco ball, strobe lights, and colored stage lights under the high, black-painted ceiling indicated that the dining room was occasionally used for parties. Liran, Linda, and I had coffee with pastries. I also had eggs Benedict and Linda had a fruit salad. The food was good. The breakfast was served buffet-style, no waiters.
“If everything is free here, do you guys survive only on membership fees?” I asked Liran. “ Everything’s free, even the vending machines, but only after you’ve paid the membership fee, as you said. Seekers do not pay membership fees, but they pay for their services in advance. An average visitor, who isn’t a member, prepays at least five grand for a week’s visit here.”
It didn’t sit well with me. “ Safe to say, this is only for the filthy rich, like us, right, Linda? Most other people are struggling to stay afloat, they can’t afford any of this.”
Liran shook his head. “Yes and no. You see, guys, lessons improve abilities. These people are making tons more money now than they used to. The more lessons you go through, the more able and happy you are and the more money you’re able to make. It’s all about happiness and freedom which is also a financial investment. Any other questions?”
“When can we see Brell?” I asked.
“When he wants to see you, that’s when,” Liran replied. Made sense. “What’s an Assistant?” I asked.
“Teacher’s Assistant,” Liran replied casually, sipping his coffee. “There is only one Teacher, but he’s trained hundreds of Assistants. Some of them work with us here at the School, taking care of the parishioners and the seekers. Most are spread all over the world, some running their private practices.”
The dining room started filling up with the breakfast crowd. Although no longer hungry, out of curiosity we lined up at the buffet serving line behind an odd, constantly arguing couple. A pleasant, middle-aged, chubby Indian woman, wrapped in a red sari, was on a polite, yet passionate offensive against her opponent, a scrawny blond teenager with acne and a huge Adam’s apple. I listened in.
“No, no, no, Kevin, please,” the Indian woman vehemently insisted with a lilt. “You have to take responsibility for your negligence and short-sightedness. You must!”
“I amtaking responsibility. Please stop making a scene. I agree with everything you say.” The youngster was obviously uncomfortable, glancing around nervously, his Adam’s apple vigorously moving up and down in his throat as if Kevin was unsuccessfully trying to swallow it.
“No, you’re brushing me off, Kevin. I do not feel acknowledged in my grievances.” “ Daevika, please stop. People are looking. You know my strategy was the war of attrition. I was the supporter of Maximus, I really was. But that’s not how the Senate saw it. Oh, no. I was dead against the frontal attack at Cannae, dead against, you hear me? I said so many times in the Senate. Especially after Hannibal pulverized us at Trebia. So? Did anybody listen? It’s all politics to them, just their usual dance of jibes and scoring points.”
“You see what you’re doing? Still rationalizing. That’s not taking responsibility, Kevin.”
The kid, Kevin, shook his head in frustration. Several other attendees listened in with interest. Nobody interfered. “ Yes, excuses,” the Indian woman continued. “It’s all their fault. But you were in charge at Cannae. You, Kevin! I lost over two thousand men! Half of my legion, butchered by the cursed Nubians. Where were you? You ran away to escape capture. You! Ran! Away! Do you even understand?”
“You are the one not taking responsibility, Daevika. You got half of your legion killed off and now you’re blaming me?! Where were you as the legion commander?”
“Why did you choose to fight in the open against much stronger Carthaginian cavalry? And didn’t you see the diagonal echelon formation in their fr
ont center? They were strengthening the flanks! Why? Did you think of that? Why did you order the short front and greater depth formation, rendering half the army useless? Such incompetence! This is completely unacceptable, Consul Varro!”
“I’m not Consul Varro!”
“Yes, you are!”
“This boy is Consul Varro,” I heard an elderly gentleman explaining with a British accent—way too loud—to an elderly lady seated at a table. “She lost half of her legion because of him.”
“ What Varro? The Roman Varro? That pompous idiot?” the old lady attempted to clarify at the top of her lungs. “My God, did we rim that scoundrel’s ass at Cannae! He ran away crying like a little girl.”
Both Kevin and Daevika stared at the old lady.
“Pardon me,” I politely interjected. This was getting out of hand. “Are you talking about a Roman battle from long ago?”
“Very long ago,” Kevin agreed, downcast. “Some twenty-five hundred years ago.” “ Maybe about twenty-three hundred years ago. Not very recently,” agreed Daevika, simmering down a tad. “I dug up the whole thing in my last lesson and recognized Kevin as our top general. It’s upsetting, you know? Damn Nubians. So much suffering because of his—she pointed at Kevin with a righteously accusing finger—incompetence. Hannibal was a master of the pincer maneuver, you know?”
“And may I ask about you?” I inquired politely.
“Me?”
“Yes, you. Daevika, isn’t it? Have you ever made a mistake, Daevika? Seeing how angry you are, I just thought I’d ask. Good to have finally met a person who never made a single mistake in trillions of years.”
“I’m not angry because of his past mistakes but because of his constant excuses right now.” “ I get it. Undoubtedly, Kevin will burn in hell for this. Fire and brimstone, rest assured. Getting wiped out by the enemy must have been very frustrating.”
“ Talk about frustrating!” Kevin exclaimed. “You don’t even begin to understand the politics behind it. I was framed and used as a scapegoat by the Senate!”
“Excuses again,” Daevika snapped back. “You should be ashamed of yourself!” “Enough!” Liran ordered in a firm tone of voice. “We all have battles to fight, Daevika. He fought his the best he could. You think it was easy to deal with the Senate? Look me in the eye and swear that you’d do better.”