The car made a turn onto a lovely street lined with graceful Mexican fan palm trees. There was no wind, and they looked painted against the blue sky.
“Then let it burn,” she said fiercely. “Please, John, let’s burn it all down.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
MANDARIN ORIENTAL HOTEL
NEBOVIDSKÁ 459/1, MALÁ STRANA
PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
APRIL 26, 11:53 PM LOCAL TIME
We took showers at Violin’s hotel. Separate showers, which was different from the way we’d cleaned up after some past assignments. There is a strange politeness that comes over people who were once lovers and now found themselves in a confined space doing ordinary things. Eyes were averted most of the time, there was a lot of courtesy, a lot of “please” and “thank you.” Like that. Except every once in a while we’d both become aware of it and exchange a look, a smile, a brief laugh.
When it was her turn in the bathroom, I sat down with a MindReader substation laptop and uploaded every bit of data I’d found on flash drives and CDs. There was a lot of it. And I had to hand-scan some papers. The MindReader uplink fritzed out on me twice, and I had to reboot to get it to send. After that everything ran smoothly, and Bug’s team was ready to receive it, triage it, and forward it along to different experts within our extended DMS family.
Some of the data was forwarded to Dr. Acharya, a celebrated specialist in biomechanical technologies. Acharya was not yet an official part of the DMS, but he was one of several multidisciplinary brainiacs being considered to replace Hu.
I was deeply conflicted about Hu’s death, because he had been far from my favorite human being, and it’s fair to say that I liked him a lot less than some of the bad guys I’ve shot, stabbed, and run over. He was a class-A dickhead … but he was our dickhead. Hu was beyond brilliant, and his conceptual understanding of cutting-edge science kept the DMS way out front. Since his death we’d worked with a number of experts, but we hadn’t yet found anyone who could fill Hu’s shoes. Never really thought I’d miss the little bastard.
“Can we get Acharya on the phone?” I asked.
“Sorry, no can do,” Bug told me. “He’s out in Washington State at this big super hush-hush DARPA event. He’s consulting with all the top experts on military applications of nanotech and robotics. They have this incredible security protocol in place for the whole camp. No phones of any kind, no Wi-Fi, no personal laptops, nothing. All communication requests have to go through the White House. How crazy is that?”
“Well, this is moderately important, Bug. I mean … nanotech and chemical slavery?”
“You know that and I know that, Joe,” said Bug, “but it’s not happening on U.S. soil or in any of our current spheres of influence. The new president’s still unpacking, and the Department of Defense is nearly as wrecked as we are. Ever since Kill Switch, the levels of security around things like the DARPA camp have gotten to the point that even a four-star general has to get permission in triplicate and countersigned by the Joint Chiefs to send an email to his own mother. It’s nuts, and it’s the kind of overreaction that creates a lot more problems than it solves. Besides, it’s being run by Major Schellinger—and you know what she’s like.”
I sighed. Major Carly Schellinger was nominally U.S. Army but actually on the payroll of the CIA. She oversaw a lot of the most highly classified field testing of advanced technologies and was known for being humorless, unapproachable, unkind, and inflexible. Schellinger also swung an extraordinary amount of political weight, and I’d seen generals defer to her. To be fair, she has overseen most of the practical applications of advanced technology in the past ten years, including the High Energy Laser Mobile Demonstrator, which has the capacity to emanate a 10-kilowatt missile-killing energy laser from a mobile vehicle; SWARM, a deadly flock of coordinated roach-size explosive microdrones; combat autonomous-drive systems for mobile robot gun emplacements; and the electromagnetic railgun, which has a muzzle velocity of Mach 7.5 and a range of a hundred and twenty-four miles. She gets the geek squads and the think tanks to perform at max output and then drives development through prototype variations to field-ready rollouts in record time. She’s also old money, and her family has been interbreeding with most of the other old-money defense contractors since someone filed the patent on the first bow and arrow. A battle-scarred old full-bird colonel once told me that he would rather try to pass a live porcupine through his own colon than try to get Major Schellinger to deviate from her personally orchestrated security protocols.
“Well … call her,” I told Bug lamely. “Use your charm and nerdish good looks.”
“She’s Satan in the flesh.”
“Try and sweet-talk her. Oh, hey, while I have you,” I said, “I’ve been having all kinds of problems with MindReader lately. The upload gizmo was funky, and it took me forever to log into the network tonight. What’s going on?”
“I don’t know. Everyone’s bitching at me about that today.”
“Violin says that MindReader’s getting old and senile.”
“She can bite me.”
“Be nice,” I said, but he hung up on me.
I ordered food from room service and trolled through the data while I waited. It was some pretty horrific stuff. If I was feeling any lingering guilt about the lives we’d ended, it melted away as I read. Not only had someone found the science we thought had been destroyed; they’d upped the game. The nanites that had been introduced into the game worked like microscopic processing plants to manipulate the brain chemistry of every slave worker, making them dependent on new doses. If they ever escaped and tried to get clean, the nanites would then migrate into the brain and attack the pain receptors. The victims would be plunged into a world of mind-rending agony from which there was no possible escape short of being caught in an electromagnetic pulse. They would very likely be driven insane and probably kill themselves to stop the pain.
It was horrible. This was twenty-first-century science. I wanted to believe that when we torched that lab we wiped out the entire organization. Yeah, I wanted to believe that.
But I’m just not that naïve.
CHAPTER EIGHT
PLAZA DE LA CONSTITUCIÓN
MEXICO CITY, MEXICO
APRIL 27, 11:51 AM LOCAL TIME
The man parked the truck as close to the plaza as he could get. He opened the door but didn’t get out. Instead, he lit a cigarette and watched the madness.
The crowd had been building for days and was now pushing three hundred thousand. The noise from fifty different bands and all those happy voices created a joyful thunder that covered the entire town like a cloud. Some of the bands were on stages, but most were strolling musicians in little groups of two or three or four. The revelers were adorned with bright-colored embroidery and beadwork, with jewelry and extravagant hats. The man had no idea what holiday this was, and didn’t much care. It was fun to watch.
A small pack of laughing children ran past, chasing one another, dodging and ducking out of reach in an improvised game of tag whose rules seemed to change depending on who was “it.” The kids were dressed in old clothes that showed signs of use and had been patched and repaired many times. One boy had expensive American-made basketball sneakers, but they were ancient and patched with ragged strips of silver duct tape. The kids were skinny and dirty, but they were all happy in the moment, caught up in the immediacy of their game.
The man took a drag and exhaled slowly as he watched them. One boy—the one with the taped shoes—caught his eye and stopped a few feet away.
“Buenos dias!” he cried, and then held out a hand, asking for something. Anything. Begging is rarely specific. The man studied him with narrow-eyed appraisal, then dug into his pocket. The other boys, alert as wolves, caught the movement and flocked around the first boy, jostling for position, wanting and needing to be close enough to grab a coin. The man removed the silver from his pockets, saw that there was a little over a dollar’s worth in American coins, and to
ssed it high. The boys rose like hungry koi, their colors swirling, as they lunged for the money, elbowing and hip-checking their friends to snatch nickels and dimes and quarters out of the air.
Laughing aloud, the man flicked his cigarette into the street, jumped down from the truck, and walked around the kids, who were now wrestling one another for the last coin. He went to the back of his small panel truck, unlocked it, and pushed the roll door up. He unhitched the metal cargo ramp and pulled it out, placing it just so on the ground at the best angle for removing cargo.
“Okay,” he said aloud. “Playtime.”
Immediately a dog walked out of the shadows of the truck. It was big and barrel-chested, with a bull neck and the blunt face of a mastiff. It came down the ramp with surprising care and delicacy, taking small steps until it was on the blacktop. The man nudged it to one side with his thigh, and the dog lost its balance and skittered for a moment before righting itself. It didn’t bark or snap at the man. A moment later a second dog came down the ramp, then two more. All four were identical except for embroidered vests in different festive colors—red, blue, orange, and yellow.
The children stopped fighting over the coins—each having rightfully been claimed and pocketed—and stared at the dogs. The duct-tape boy leaned close to a companion with whom he had been wrangling over a nickel ten seconds ago and spoke in a confidential whisper. The other boy nodded. Whatever they said was lost on the driver, whose Spanish was indifferent.
“Hey,” said the man, “any of you kids speak English?”
They all swore that they could, though that was mostly a lie. Like most poor kids in tourist towns, they knew enough English to work their street scams and to beg for money. But the duct-tape boy said, “I speak some little.”
“Yeah? Good,” said the man. “What’s your name?”
“Israel Dominguez,” said the boy.
“Israel,” repeated the man, amused. “Nice. Well, tell me, Israel, do you like dogs?”
“Oh, yes, very much like! We have un perro pequeño—”
“English, kid,” the man corrected.
“We have a little dog. Su nombre es … I mean, his name is El Cerdo—pig, because he is muy gordo. Very fat.”
“Do your friends like dogs, Israel?”
The boy was immediately cautious, wanting to cooperate but not willing to share if there was some money involved. The man could read that on the kid’s face, and he admired the self-preservation. It was always good to look out for oneself. He always had.
“Maybe they do,” said the boy.
“Would you and your friends like to make a few bucks?”
Israel stiffened. So did the other kids. They all knew that word. Bucks.
“Oh, yes. Very much. How much?”
“You see my four pups here? You know what they are?” asked the man. The boys all shook their heads.
“These are party dogs. You know what that means?”
None of them moved, but their eyes became wide in anticipation of learning something new and amazing.
“They do tricks,” said the man. “That’s why I brought them here. They know all the best party tricks, and, let’s face it, there’s one hell of a party going on around here. Am I right?”
“Yes, señor,” agreed Israel. “There is much party here.”
“Now listen closely,” said the man as he reached into his back pocket and removed his wallet. The kids watched with absolute fascination as he opened it and withdrew a thick sheaf of bills. He looked up and did a quick head count, and then peeled off eleven ten-dollar notes. American currency. “I’ll give you and every one of your friends ten dollars each if you’ll do me a favor. And there’s an extra ten for you, Israel, because I’m making you the boss. What’s the word? Chefe? I’m making you the chefe, Israel. You get twenty U.S. dollars.”
The boys stared at him with huge eyes. Ten dollars was an incredible amount of money to them. The man had driven through the suburbs of this town. He saw the hovels these people called home. These kids were all half-starved, and ten bucks would buy a lot of tortillas and beans. Ten bucks was huge money. Twenty dollars was impossible.
“Do you want to earn that money, Israel?”
“Yes,” said the boy quickly, his voice cracking a little with excitement. The other boys all shouted agreement, but the man patted the air to make them quiet down. The adults passing by cut looks at what was happening, and a few even stopped to watch, but the man ignored them. The boys did, too, except for the occasional uneasy glance for fear of seeing a parent or a cop.
“It’s easy money, kid. All you have to do is take my party dogs into the plaza.”
The boy frowned, looking at the huge dogs.
“Oh, don’t worry,” the man said, laughing. “I told you, they’re friendly. They won’t bite. They’re part of the entertainment.” He turned to the dogs. “Isn’t that right? Give me a wag.” All four dogs wagged their tails. “Okay, knock it off.” The wagging stopped. “See how well behaved they are? Now, all you need to do is take the dogs to the best places.”
“Best places…?”
“Sure. I want you, Israel, to pick the spots where there’s the most people. I mean really packed and popular places, you understand what I mean?”
The boys nodded.
“Then you leave a couple of your friends with each dog. You make sure you pick the right spots, Israel, because I’m counting on you.”
Israel nodded, though he looked confused.
“Then I want you to take the last dog with you to the best spot of all.”
“But … why?”
“So we can all make some money, kid. Mucho dinero.”
Now they all stared at him like attentive schoolchildren. A shrewd look crept into Israel’s eyes, and it was clear that he was getting the idea.
“The perros will do … tricks?” he ventured.
“Right,” said the man. “They’ll do lots of tricks and people will love it, and they’ll throw some coins. Maybe pesos. I want you to collect all the money, you understand? All of it. And then when the party’s over I want you to bring it back to me. I’ll count it, and then you get ten percent. If you don’t cheat me, I’ll give you a bonus.”
“I would never!” cried the boy, raising a hand to swear to God and the Virgin Mary.
“My dogs won’t like it if you cheat me.”
“I swear, I swear.”
The man grinned at him. “Okay, then that’s all there is. You do that and after a couple of hours we’re all going to have a lot of money. If you’re really good at it, we can do it again tomorrow. What do you say, partner?”
He held out his hand, and after a moment’s hesitation Israel took it and shook. Each of the other boys shook it, too. The man gave them some additional minor instructions and handed out the ten-dollar bills. The children stared at the bills and then stuffed them away in secret pockets where even their parents wouldn’t find the money. The man had Israel make teams out of the ten other boys, and had the members of each team let a particular dog sniff their hands. Each sniff resulted in a single sharp tail wag. The dogs went and stood with the boys on their team.
“Vamoose,” said the man, then to the dogs he said, “Go play.”
Looking dazed, scared, and excited in equal measure, the boys and the mastiffs departed and were soon lost inside the huge crowds of holiday revelers. The man lit another cigarette and leaned against the truck, smiling contentedly.
“Like fucking clockwork,” he said to no one in particular.
He finished his cigarette, returned the ramp to its position, pulled down and locked the door, got in, and drove away. It took nearly an hour to make his way through two miles of party traffic. When he was out of the city, he found the closest highway and drove off at high speed. He pulled into a small village seventy-three miles east of the town, parked the truck on the street, closed and locked the door, and walked around the corner to a little hotel. He ran up two flights of stairs, entered a room, t
hen locked the door behind him. He opened a desk drawer and removed a thin laptop, loaded a program, and waited as the screen filled with four smaller windows. Each one showed the swirling, dancing, laughing, singing throng of people at the celebration. The crowd was so thick that it was nearly impossible to see anything. The angle of the camera was low, aimed upward. On one of the screens, he saw a skinny boy with silver duct tape on his shoes. The camera angle changed and jolted and spun in a circle. It was dizzying to watch, but the people in the area laughed and applauded and threw coins at the dancing, twirling dog.
It made the man smile.
He fished in his pocket for his cigarettes, kissed the last one out of the pack, lit it, watched the crowds as they watched the dogs. Caught glimpses of the ten street kids. Everyone was having such a great time. He watched the screen and saw one dog’s point of view as it trotted around the edge of the crowd, saw the laughing people wave at it, blow kisses at it, laugh at the thing. The camera showed the dog going in through the open door of the police station at the edge of the plaza.
“Release the hounds,” the man murmured, and laughed. “God, I always wanted to say that.”
He pressed the Enter key. There was a flash of bright white and then all four screens went dark. No sound, no other images. He was left to imagine the sound of the explosions. He sighed and leaned back in the chair, enjoying the menthol tickle of the smoke as he took a deep, contented drag. Then he got up and turned on the TV, channel-surfed over to the news, and waited for the story to break. Maybe someone caught it on a cell camera. Maybe one of the news people would have footage. After all, with everyone having a cell phone, somebody had to have caught one of the four dogs exploding during a festive celebration.
It would be nice to watch.
“Good doggies,” he said to the empty screens.
CHAPTER NINE
IN FLIGHT
OVER THE ATLANTIC OCEAN
APRIL 27, 3:32 PM MID-ATLANTIC STANDARD TIME
Dogs of War Page 4