Bryce was doing a modified push-up: one arm on a forty-five against the wall was the best he could manage. As he did so, he performed an assessment—the captain of a ship ordering a battle damage report. His right arm was swollen, but feeling had come back to that hand. He could move the fingers, maybe enough to grip a ten-pound weight. His ribs remained extremely sore, restricting certain movements. The most promising development was his right foot—he could almost bear full weight, although walking remained a challenge.
He was fast becoming a student of outside sounds. He heard a pulsing wind rattling a window in the main room, whistling under the weather stripping of a door. He’d heard such sounds before, mostly in recent weeks. The Russian winter announcing its arrival. From where he stood, it changed little. His cell was as cold as ever—the floor had been like ice since he’d arrived, a permafrost rink worthy of a Zamboni.
He was finishing his third set of exercises when he heard voices nearing the door. Ivan and Mengele approaching. Bryce caught a few words: they were discussing what they would do when they returned to Murmansk tomorrow night. Tomorrow. A shift change was imminent.
The voices closed in, and Bryce quickly worked the hood over his head and dropped to the floor. A clank as the door unlocked—in the acoustics of the cell it sounded like a dry-fire on the empty chamber of a gun. He sensed them come in, something scraping on the floor behind them. A chair?
Wind moaned in the background.
He was lifted up roughly, pain searing through his ruined right shoulder and ribs. They planted him hard on what felt like a folding metal chair, then drew his legs straight. Just when he was expecting the worst, some new manner of agony, he felt warm cloth being pulled over his ankles, which were still raw from the removed shackles. They lifted him enough to tug what felt like a pair of prison pajamas over his hips, then dropped him back into the chair. His hood was ripped off, and he made a point of averting his eyes. He blinked and squinted like a man who hadn’t seen light in months.
Bryce didn’t know what to make of it. They’d never before removed the hood for a session. He looked up haltingly.
For the first time, he had faces to go with the two things he’d memorize about each man—their voices and their dented steel-toed boots. Ivan was short and neckless, a soccer hooligan haircut and three-day growth of beard. His hands were hirsute and meaty. Wearing a wrinkled track-suit, he looked like a short-order cook on his day off. Mengele was taller, more angular. He moved like a scarecrow whose frame had come loose, an image accentuated by baggy pants and a long-sleeve shirt with breast pockets. His hair was brown and limp, the bangs cut using a ruler, and his mouth bristled with bad teeth. Beneath all that was a prominent jaw. Bryce took the abstract liberty of overlaying it with a bulls-eye. A rare feel-good moment.
He kept his eyes on Mengele, who was clearly in charge of the four-man detail, and had acted as the primary interrogator. His eyes gave nothing away—they were hard and impenetrable, a sclerotic bulkhead separating whatever lay behind. A corollary to Bryce’s earlier thought came to mind: not only were his captors leaving indelible marks, they were now letting him see their faces. Further damnation of his prospects going forward.
Surprisingly, Bryce saw none of the usual implements. Was this the beginning of some new phase? Mengele held what looked like an iPad in one hand. Bryce had no idea what to make of it.
The Russian came closer, hovered over him for a moment. Probably expecting him to waver. Bryce kept a level gaze—or as best he could with one good eye. He caught a slight whiff of citrus, dish soap he supposed—neither man seemed like the body lotion type.
Mengele’s lips twisted into something near a smile, although without the usual supporting tics—no creases beside his mouth, no crinkles outside his eyes. Nor did the smile match his gaze, a separation of body and soul that was probably a lifetime in the making.
He said in his usual decent English, “First, I should complement you, Congressman. You have proved unusually stubborn.” His voice had the resonance of a belt sander. “Of course, you have given us most of what we wanted. Still, I think there might be more. I’m sure you imagine it your duty to be obstinate, to insert misinformation, but we will get everything in the end.”
Bryce lowered his eyes to the man’s midsection, as if to avoid eye contact. Mengele was wearing a wristwatch, a cheap Timex with a plastic band. It was 9:02 p.m. The date was January 3rd. He wore a belt, a military item with a brass clasp. No jewelry. He shifted to Ivan. No watch, simple leather belt, wedding ring on the appropriate hairy knuckle. Now there’s a lucky woman.
“Still,” Mengele continued, “there is something you should be aware of. To begin, have you deduced where you are right now?”
Bryce hesitated. Never before had the sessions been conducted in a conversational tone. The shift in tactics made him wary. All the same, he decided to play along. “No idea,” he lied, the map in his head narrowed to a thirty-by-thirty-mile box.
“You are in Russia. The precise location is immaterial, but suffice to say you are extremely isolated. As you will remain.”
“Russia is now in the business of kidnapping American politicians?” The accusation was dimmed by his delivery—his jaw was severely swollen, causing the words to slur.
Again, the secluded smile. A secret soon to be shared. “Business? No, that would not be sustainable. You, however, are a unique case. I’m sure this will surprise you, but your absence has not been noted.”
Bryce didn’t know what to make of that.
Finally, the iPad was brought to bear. Mengele called up a video, hit play, and turned the screen toward Bryce.
He saw footage of himself arriving on an elevated stage in front of a crowd, climbing the stairs on a trot and waving like he was in a parade. The crowd noise was dense, echoing around the venue—and now echoing in a prison cell thousands of miles away. Bryce recognized the signature enthusiasm of a campaign rally, everything fervent and choreographed. It appeared to be a large event, yet, oddly, he didn’t recall it. Did that imply he was having memory lapses? Had too many blows to the head fogged his brain?
“Note the date in the corner,” Ivan chipped in, a toady eager to twist a broken arm.
Bryce looked, saw December 18th. Little more than two weeks ago, if Mengele’s watch was to be believed. They’re screwing with you, he told himself.
“I’m not impressed,” Bryce said. And truly he wasn’t. He’d had more than his share of intelligence briefings, so he knew videos could be expertly doctored. “Deep fakes” that looked legitimate to the untrained eye.
“Let me show you another, then,” said Mengele.
A second video came to the screen, similar to the first, yet with a better view of the crowd. He saw thousands of people—what would be a fair percentage of his entire congressional district. Many were holding up signs, a blue background with bold red-and-white lettering: Ridgeway for President.
Bryce felt the first tug in his chest—one that had nothing to do with cracked ribs.
Then, tauntingly from the Russian, “And perhaps this one.”
This time what Bryce saw sent bile rising in his throat. He was looking at himself in a close-up shot. His right arm was in a sling as he stood in an intimately familiar setting: the path leading to the front door of his house. Behind him on the front step were Sarah and Alyssa, arms around each other’s shoulders. It was all Bryce could do to hold back tears. As the video ran, he began speaking to the camera. Except it wasn’t him.
“This morning we witnessed an attack against the heart of America…”
Bryce listened to words that made no sense whatsoever. A delicately nuanced speech he’d never given. Attack against America? He noted the date stamp: November 11th last year, Veterans Day. The very day, in the early morning hours, that his world had imploded. His private Pearl Harbor, when he’d been abducted from the W&OD Trail. All suspicions of digital trickery washed away like a failed levee, swept into oblivion by the flood of unassailable images. His family. His home. He himself. All of it, somehow, fitted into a story that was pure fiction, yet one that was playing out before his eyes.
When the video ended, Mengele lowered the screen and looked at him triumphantly. In the way a victor regards the vanquished.
“Yes, of course,” he said. “You are wondering how this could be … how you are seeing yourself do and say things that never happened.”
Bryce didn’t respond. But then, how did one react to an alternate reality?
“America’s great weakness,” Mengele philosophized, “is the structure of your political system. With your constant elections, such a high turnover in governance, your leaders never think … what is the phrase?… long term. We Russians hold an advantage in that respect. Our leaders, whatever you might think of them, remain in power for extended periods. This strategy, as it relates to you, goes back a very long time.” He handed the blanked tablet to Ivan who tucked it under an arm. Mengele continued, “I will tell you how this all came to be. What you have just seen, indeed what you are so intimately a part of, is an operation that began nearly forty years ago…”