Under normal circumstances the drive from Dieppe to Berlin took roughly ten hours. But that was for an average human being driving under normal conditions. Bad Allah made a mockery of that estimate, driving at night when the roads were less crowded, along with his disdain for brakes and his fondness for the gas pedal, and managed to shave two hours off the eleven hundred kilometer journey.
The team stopped long enough for gasoline, bio breaks and nothing more. Anything eaten or drunk was purchased in a motorway shop and consumed in the van moving at a high rate of speed. By the time they spotted the Fernsehturm, the infamous television tower erected by the former German Democratic Republic, jutting up out of the misty light of the five AM Berlin skyline, they were less than fragrant and the van’s interior was clammy and rank. But their spirits were strong.
Some more than others.
Maggie had wanted to begin questioning Kafka as soon as they got on the road but Kafka was still in a state of physical and mental shock from the beating SDAT had doled out, not to mention the Mace which left him reeling and disoriented. He was given a couple of Vicodin out of Dieter’s bag of treats and a blanket and spent the trip curled up in the rear seat behind Maggie and John Rae, snoring while the vehicle hurtled along. His bruised face was shiny in the muted street light as they pulled into the former East Berlin.
“Bellard’s welcoming party sure did a hell of a number on him,” John Rae whispered.
“And now it’ll be twice as tough to coax him out of his shell,” Maggie said. Especially with Kafka’s parents being held by Jihad Nation and the fact that Kafka failed to execute Dara.
“It’ll take some work,” John Rae said. “That’s for sure.”
John Rae leaned back in his seat, clasped his hands behind his neck, stretched himself out. Vertebrae cracked. “Well, we have possession of the ball now.”
“Thanks to you and your buddies,” Maggie said.
“Take a minute and pat yourself on the back.” John Rae looked over. “We’ll get settled into our safe house in Berlin soon.”
Then she could drill Kafka for intel. There wasn’t much time left if she was going to disable Abraqa. “Walder is going to have to give his full approval if we end up in some sandy spot south of Syria. This look-the-other-way thing works for small stuff, but not a rescue op in the Middle East.”
John Rae eyed her. “And you think that’s where this is headed?”
“If we want Kafka to talk, he’s going to insist on getting his parents out. I would. A rescue op needs to be an option.”
John Rae frowned, seeming to think that over. “Walder will have to push everyone to sign off. For that you’ll need to give him a nugget first. Something juicy out of Kafka.”
“I know,” she said. “And then I need to convince Ed to let me tag along.”
“Hold your horses, Maggie. Don’t get ahead of yourself.”
Maggie thought about that. Ed wasn’t gung-ho about her running with John Rae’s crowd. The more she did, the more he risked losing her to Field Operations. And without her, Ed’s fledgling Forensic Accounting team would die a slow death. Truth was, she still liked that part of the job.
But getting anything done always came down to politics.
“Well, the view makes up for the décor,” Maggie said, looking out of the industrial windows of an empty office of a derelict warehouse built at the beginning of the last century. Pre-morning light cast a pall over the river Spree on her left, along which the Berlin wall once ran, and on her right the abandoned Betriebsbahnhof-Pankow railway station, forbidding in its decay. The history of the Cold War in one look. The walls of the office were in a state of decomposition and the smell was one of severe damp, which explained the mold. Posters of leather goods still remained on the walls.
“The meeting is about to start, Ms. de la Cruz,” Helga, the field op admin, said in a German accent.
Maggie took a sip of instant coffee and turned to the center of the large room.
Tapping into the keyboard of a Mac on a folding card table was Helga, the admin, a woman in her forties with a shiny platinum blonde pageboy, a black denim jacket and a pair of high-heeled boots. She had been dispatched by Berlin Station to assist the operation.
John Rae was stretched out in a folding metal chair, giving Helga the once-over when she wasn’t looking. Maggie realized she was just a little jealous. Another good reason to nip whatever had happened between them in the bud.
Kafka was crashed out next door in a former secretary’s office on a cot, with Dieter and Bad Allah taking turns to watch him. It made sense to let Kafka recover from his ordeal. He’d be more compliant and it put the agency clearly in the good cop role. But Maggie still hadn’t forgotten Kafka pulling a gun on her or the fact that he had seriously wounded an SDAT agent. Or that the woman who had lured him here, Dara, a person Maggie had grown quite fond of, was now dead.
She’d be nice. For now.
She walked over to the table, pulled out a folding chair across from the Marlene Dietrich look-alike, feeling grimy in the clothes she had worn for too long, whiffing of Mace. Her hair felt lank, bordering on greasy, her skin shiny. A real fashion plate.
“Let’s do it,” Maggie said, sitting down.
Helga positioned the laptop’s webcam so it centered on Maggie and fired up the chat window using Black Canyon, the latest in encryption conferencing tools, and split the screen into four. After she dialed in, the upper left corner of the monitor showed Ed, looking not-too-rumpled as it happened, being that it was still early evening the previous day in San Francisco. His famous too-wide yellow power tie was halfway down another blue Oxford shirt that Maggie knew to be extra-large, to fit his equally sized frame. A cloud of blue cigarette smoke enveloped him. She’d get him to quit smoking one of these days.
In the upper right corner Director Walder appeared, dour and humorless. Nothing new there. He wore his permanent frown, haloed by frizzy thinning hair.
“Do we have a quorum?” he said.
They all agreed.
“Status update on Abraqa, Agent de la Cruz?”
“You want to do this, John Rae?” she asked.
John Rae shook his head, leaning back in his chair again, hands behind his neck, closing his eyes to listen. They had all gone too long without sleep.
“We have the asset in our possession,” Maggie began, “thanks to some nice work by John Rae and two contractors.” She went through the proceedings of the last eight and half hours.
“All above board?” Walder said, rubbing his face.
“Everything in conjunction with Executive Order 12333,” she said. Meaning that no one was killed and only necessary force was used.
“And where is the asset now?” Walder said.
“Getting some badly needed rest. That will hopefully make him easier to interview.”
“Let’s get started on the interrogation,” Walder said. “As soon as this call is over.”
Maggie wasn’t sure that was the best idea although she was more than anxious to get things rolling herself.
“Can we talk about next steps?” she asked.
“Not until we know what we’re dealing with,” Walder said. “I’m not going cap in hand to NCS brass unless we get some decent intel out of Kafka.”
She noticed that Ed, her boss, had not said a word, merely puffing away while he managed to project his worst grimace. He was pissed, feeling sidelined by the whole operation he had initially authorized but had been taken away, first by SDAT, now by Walder. She couldn’t blame Ed. But she focused on the reason for all of this. Dara. The Yazidi genocide.
“John Rae?” Walder said.
“Yo,” John Rae said from his chair.
“Ah, so you are still there. I didn’t see you on camera.”
“That’s because I’m nothing special to look at.”
“Do you have anything to add?”
“It doesn’t sound like you’ve gotten any feedback yet from Bellard over reappropriating the asset,” John Rae said.
It was official, Maggie thought wryly. Kafka was now “the asset.”
“That means Bellard hasn’t decided what to do yet,” Walder said.
“Or he’s still trying to get out of that damn van,” John Rae said.
Walder actually divulged a smile. Maggie was impressed by John Rae’s level of rapport with a man who scared the crap out of most of the Agency.
“What are your plans, John Rae?” Walder said.
“Going to stick around here and see what Magg—Agent de la Cruz—needs.”
Telling his boss what he was going to do. Maggie could learn a thing or two.
“What are you thinking, John Rae?” Walder said.
“Wondering if we’ll need to take this party down to the Casbah.”
“Iraq?” Walder tapped his pencil on his desk pad. “I’m not sure about that. Let’s see if the asset tells us something good, then we can decide. Anything else?”
“I’d got the two people Maggie mentioned on an unofficial contract payroll,” John Rae said. “I took the liberty. They’re guarding the asset as we speak. I also ran up some van rental fees.”
“Just get receipts,” Walder said.
They signed off.
“And that’s how you manage your boss,” John Rae said to Maggie. “Strike or be stricken.”
“Not bad,” she said. “Not bad.” She made eye contact with Helga. “Is there anywhere to take a shower, Helga?”
“I wasn’t going to bring it up, Maggie,” John Rae said.
Helga didn’t respond to John Rae’s joke. Maggie shook her head.
“We have a hotel room not too far from here,” Helga said.
“I’m thinking of our guest,” Maggie said. Although she was never one to turn down a hot shower. She had brought her bag up from the van so had a change of underwear.
“We need to keep this on the down-low,” John Rae said. “No wandering.”
“I’ll have a Giga tent brought in and set up,” Helga said. “Portable water heater. Towels and soap. It will be functional.”
“A Giga tent it is,” Maggie said. “And Kafka will need some toiletries and clean clothes.”
Helga got out her tablet. “I’ll need his sizes.”
“Let me find out. When can we get a doctor here? To take a look at him?”
“No,” John Rae said. “I don’t want Kafka milking it. We can use that for barter later.”
“Bullshit,” Maggie said. She said to Helga, “I’d like a doctor, please. Soon.”
“Since it’s short notice,” Helga said, “it will have to be a nurse.”
“That works,” Maggie said. “Can someone go out and get some food? Middle Eastern? Make sure it’s halal—kosher.”
Helga wrote that down.
“Jesus, Maggie,” John Rae said, “I want to be your prisoner.”
“In your dreams,” she said.
“The hostess with the mostest. But I’ll take some chow, too, Helga. I’m sure the boys will join us as well. And yourself, of course. Do you have any good dining stories you can regale us with?”
Helga gave a small smile, made entries. “Who do I bill it to?”
“The usual,” John Rae said.
“Of course.” Helga left, already making phone calls.
“Maggie,” John Rae said. “You ready to wake up sleeping beauty?”
“Let’s wait until things are set up and he’s been looked at and had a chance to clean up,” she said.