Field of Poppies
Santa Monica Storage turned out to be a long, drab building in beige, a row of sun-bleached orange roll-up doors facing a parking lot behind a dilapidated chain link fence. Entry was afforded through a small gate guarded by a length of PVC pipe painted with yellow stripes that swung obligingly out of her way. She saw no cameras anywhere.
Nadine pulled the nondescript car up to the tinted glass door. Only two other cars sat in the parking lot: a beat-up Tesla with a cracked front quarter panel and an antique Mini Cooper, an obvious aftermarket electric conversion, as pristine as if it had just rolled off the showroom floor. Through the door, an arctic blast of cold air greeted her. A woman looked up at her from behind a scratched and battered counter, bubblegum-pink hair framing a face studded with piercings. She wore a skintight shirt decorated with bright pink stripes and brilliant yellow neoprene shorts. “Yeah?”
“Locker 531?”
The woman jerked her thumb down one of several rows of lockers, crowded claustrophobically tight. “Thanks,” Nadine said, but she had already gone back to the video display on her lap, face blank with disinterest.
Locker 531 was near the end of the row farthest from the counter. An emergency fire valve that had probably once been red protruded from the wall, so stained with rust it seemed unlikely a prybar could move it. Nadine knelt on the cracked concrete floor and opened the locker. Inside, she found a large duffle bag of black ballistic nylon with two large straps. Nadine dragged it from the locker and slung it over her shoulder. The key stayed in the lock. The straps, long enough to let the bag bang against the back of her legs, dug into her skin. She waved to the woman behind the counter, who didn’t look up as she left.
Back in the GM, she set the bag on the passenger’s seat and unzipped it. A large shrinkwrapped cube of $20 bills filled most of its space, faded and worn beneath the transparent overwrap. On top of the bundle of cash sat a black handgun, several magazines, two boxes of ammunition, an old-fashioned handheld cell phone of the type Nadine saw in low-budget crime thrillers, and a neatly folded sheet of paper.
With shaking hands, she unfolded the sheet of paper. A bank chip slipped into her lap. She put the chip in the bag and read the elegant handwriting that flowed across the heavy, cream-colored paper in crisp black ink.
My darling Nadine:
If you’re reading this, I’m in jail or worse. God, that’s such a cliched thing to write, isn’t it? Ah well. You probably won’t ever read this, so my ramblings won’t matter anyway.
The phone is untraceable, or near enough. It contains one number. You can trust the person it leads to. He will help you. Go somewhere else. Start a new life.
I love you, my dearest. More than you will ever know. You have been such a blessing. I feel guilty dragging you into the muck and chaos. I know it wasn’t what you signed up for. I think about it late at night when I watch you sleep. You make little happy sounds when I wrap my arms around you in your sleep, did you know that? I don’t think I ever told you.
I’ll stop before I get any more maudlin. I guess I can say it all here, since you’ll probably never read these words. Thank you for being who you are, my love.
Anna xoxox
Tears blurred Nadine’s vision. She wiped them away with the back of her hand and picked up the phone. As promised, it had one number in the contacts list, labeled J. She fumbled at the buttons with clumsy fingers. The phone rang.
“Yeah.” A man’s voice, clipped, brusque.
“I’m…uh, I don’t know what I’m supposed to say. I’m Nadine. Anna gave me this phone.”
“Where is Anna?”
“She—” Nadine’s throat closed. “Gone.”
“We don’t have a lot of time, so I need you to listen to me and do exactly as I say. Got it?”
“Yes.”
“Get out of the car.”
“How do you know I’m—”
“Do it now.” His voice carried a hard edge of command.
Nadine stepped out into the heat, leaving her suitcase and the black nylon bag behind, phone still to her ear. “Turn around,” the voice said. “Face the gate.”
Nadine complied. “I don’t see anything,”
“Look down.” A bright red dot, hard-edged, danced on her chest. “So we understand each other. If you are who you say you are, we’ll get along fine.” A pause. “Why are you barefoot?”
“Long story.”
“Car next to you. Reach under the left front wheel well.” Nadine fumbled around in the wheel well of the Mini and came up with a black plastic box, clipped in place with a magnet. “Good. Open it.” A wireless keyfob lay inside. “Unlock the door. Take everything you need out of your car and put it in the back seat.”
Nadine complied, aware of the red dot that remained on her as she transferred her suitcase and the bag into the Mini’s compact rear seat. “Get in the driver’s side. Leave the door open. Hang up the phone. Put both hands on the wheel. Don’t take your hands off the wheel, understand?”
“Yes.” Heart pounding, Nadine did as she was told. Sweat clung to her skin. The mirror showed motion behind her. She gripped the wheel tightly, scarcely breathing. A moment later, a man stood next to the door, holding a strange, foreshortened rifle, a squat thing with a black scope, in his left hand, not quite pointed at her. To Nadine’s eye, it looked more like a sci-fi movie prop than a real weapon, compact and angular, magazine in the back. It and his cloak were the same mottled green. “Anna’s friend, I presume,” he said. “Jake Fox. How’d you meet her?”
“Underground dance party,” Nadine said. “Terminal Island.”
“What was she wearing?”
“I don’t remember. Uh…LEDs in her hair.”
He nodded. “This your car?”
“No. Mayor Tony gave it to me. Said it had a cloned police transponder.”
“Clever. Dangerous, but clever. Okay, here’s the deal.” He reached in through the window to tap the dashboard. His right hand ended in a mechanical claw, titanium prosthetic partly encased in mottled green plastic. Servos whined. “Start the car. Navigation is already programmed. Motel, room 114, bottom floor, near the back. Key’s in the glove box. I’ll meet you there.”
“Where are you going?”
“To get rid of this car. You have the fob?”
“I, um…it’s in the car.”
“Good. Don’t call anyone. Don’t talk to anyone. Follow the navigation. Go straight into the room. Take all your stuff with you. Lock the door. Wait for me.”
The Mini took her on a circuitous route, avoiding major roads, frequently turning down side streets for no reason Nadine could see. Eventually, they drove east, away from the heart of the city, through an endless jungle of strip malls and run-down industrial parks. The car pulled into the parking lot of an anonymous, generic motel and chimed. “You have reached your destination. Please assume manual control for parking.”
Nadine parked near the back next to a scratched, dented charger. The Mini beeped. A charging probe extended blindly from the battered charger.
As promised, the glove box contained an old-fashioned metal key attached to a large diamond-shaped tag of green plastic. She dragged her suitcase and the duffle bag into the room. Two double beds, a small refrigerator, coffee maker atop a scuffed particle board desk, a chair upholstered in hideous red with stuffing leaking from the corner. Nadine’s stomach rumbled. She opened the refrigerator to find it empty.
She looked around the room. Other than what she’d brought in, it contained no luggage, no sign that anyone else had been here. A folding door opened onto a tiny closet, empty hangers dangling from a wooden bar. She sat gingerly on the edge of one of the beds, its covers the same hideous red as the chair. A poster of a bland country scene rendered in oil paints hung on the wall in a simple wooden frame covered with peeling gold paint. On one wall, a narrow air conditioner hummed beneath heavy blackout drapes.
The day’s terror drained, leaving her blank and numb. She stared dully at the painting, a woman in a hat with a tiny blue parasol leading a child through a field of red flowers. The colors blurred and faded before her eyes, nothing more than shapes and brushstrokes. Part of her felt trapped in the tunnel, watching the grenade fall, the surprise on Lena’s face, the spray of red filming gray concrete over and over, a low-resolution loop of horror. “I wish—” she said aloud.
Wish what? Anna’s voice, startlingly clear inside her head.
“Wish I had never said to take Marcus to the hospital. Wish I’d never gone to see him and brought the police back to you. Wish none of this had happened.”
Wish you’d never met me?
“I—” Tears leaked from her eyes. “No. Not that. Never that.”
Your life is ruined. And for what?
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t know what?” The voice came from a shadow in the doorway, briefly eclipsed by the sun. Nadine blinked. Jake carried a small travel bag in one hand. He pushed a white bag toward her, held in the clamp on the end of his prosthetic. A cartoon animal decorated its front. “Food. Hope you like hoagies. Got some soda too. Or coffee, if you prefer. Who were you talking to?”
Nadine shook her head. “No one.” She opened the sandwich. Her mouth watered.
Jake sat in the chair, eyes narrowed. “Your face is all over the news.”
“Do you believe what they’re saying about me?”
“Does it matter?” He looked levelly at her until she dropped her gaze. “No. Not that it makes a difference. Anna paid me to get you out of the country in the event something happens to her, so that’s what I’m going to do.” He reached into his pocket and produced a passport. “Here. Melody Landry. Canadian citizen. You live in Toronto. Pass back and forth a few times a year on business, this time you were down here to see your grandparents. Your flight leaves in eight hours. Economy class, I’m afraid. Now, tell me everything.”
Between bites of sandwich, Nadine related the entire story: Marcus and the others arriving at the door, her visit to the hospital, the SWAT raid, the desperate flight to Tijuana Town, what happened after. “That fills in a few details,” he said when she’d finished. “Martin Taylor. Nasty piece of work.”
“You know him?”
“By reputation. Ex-military. Marines. Went private sector, ran a security company for a while. Some kind of CEO now.”
“He sure didn’t like it when I scratched his face.”
“You did what?”
“I gouged him pretty good.”
Jake leaned forward. “Have you showered?”
“What?”
“Showered. Bathed. Have you showered?”
“No. Why?”
“Let me see your hand.” He held out his mechanical arm. Nadine reached for him, hesitant. He took her finger gently between metal fingers, examined it closely. “Don’t move.” He pulled a folding knife from his pocket and flicked it open.
“What are you doing?”
“You managed to get his DNA. Careless of him.” He dug beneath her nail with the point of the knife, then took a small plastic bag from his suitcase and carefully sealed the scrapings in it. “Could be useful.”
“For what?”
“Don’t know yet.” He grinned unpleasantly. “This guy Marcus. What was wrong with him?”
“They said he got shot. His chest was covered with these little bristles, like cactus spines or something. I kept one.”
“Do you still have it?”
“Maybe.” She opened her suitcase, dug through her purse. “Yes. It’s in here.” She opened the pill bottle. The tiny sliver still lay inside. “Don’t touch it. The burning lasts for ages.”
“Interesting. Whatever that is, someone thought it was important enough to do a snatch and grab from a hospital. Risky. I would very much like to know why. May I have that? I know some people who know some people who might be able to analyze it.” He produced a bottle of pills from inside his pocket. With a few deft motions of his prosthetic arm, he shook out a couple of plain white tablets and handed them to her. “Take these.”
“What are they?”
“Beta blockers. Inhibit formation of emotional associations. You’re headed for PTSD if you don’t.”
Nadine swallowed the pills with a mouthful of warm soda. “Who are you?”
“Friend of Anna’s. That’s all you need to know.”
“Why do you care about any of this?”
“Because I’m a friend of Anna’s. I want to find out what happened to her. Call it professional curiosity. Get cleaned up and get some sleep. I’ll take you to the airport in six hours.”
Nadine showered under a real proper shower, rather than a tepid drizzle, for the first time since she’d fled Anna’s. Unreality settled around her. The day’s horror faded like the clinging remnants of a dream. She dried her hair with a towel and padded back out into the room. Jake sat with his back to her, the parts of his rifle spread out on the small table. Instantly, the fear and trauma poured over her again. She reeled.
“You should try to sleep,” he said without looking up. “You look like shit. It’ll be dark soon. You’re on the redeye to Toronto.”
“No,” she said.
“No what?”
“No, I’m not going.”
“Something wrong with Toronto?”
“I need…I need to know why. Why all of it. Why Marcus, why…why everything.”
He set down the part he was cleaning and turned to face her. “There is no why. It just is. There’s no grand design. There’s no great secret that will make any of this make sense. There’s just people doing shit. You and your friends did some shit that got you caught up in shit other people were doing, that’s it. Nothing you learn will make you feel any better. Best outcome you can hope for is to walk away, try to start a new life, maybe one day stop looking over your shoulder.” He shrugged. “Shit happens.”
“Why are you here?”
“Anna paid me. She said if you show up looking for help, I’m to get you out of the country by any means necessary. I saw you on the news, figured you’d be calling, got to the storage place ahead of you. Now it’s time for you to go.”
“What will you do?”
“I will admit to a certain curiosity. You’ve landed in something weird and dangerous. Might shake some trees, see what falls out.”
“Does the word ‘mirage’ mean anything to you?”
“You mean like water in the desert that isn’t really there?”
“No. It’s something Anna said, right before…before she died. Project Mirage. She found it in their computers. Texas, she said.”
“No idea.”
“Take me with you.”
He shook his head. “No. Out of the question. Do you even know how to use that gun in your bag?”
“You went through my stuff?”
“Of course I went through your stuff. I’m sticking my neck out for you. Have you ever used a gun before?”
Heat flared in Nadine. “You mean besides shooting two people today?” The hot spike of anger faded as quickly as it had come. “I honestly didn’t think it would work. Isn’t there supposed to be a safety or something?”
“Glock,” Jake said, as if that answered it. “Look, I’m not criticizing. You handled yourself well. But you’re standing here breathing right now because you were lucky. That, and Anna saved your life. That grenade, she hadn’t done what she did, it would’ve cut you to ribbons. Even with that, if you were standing any closer, you’d have gone white butterfly.”
“White butterfly? What does that mean?”
“Blast lung injury. The shockwave would’ve killed you. Point is, you got lucky. You capitalized on your luck, sure, but it’s luck that kept you alive. You aren’t trained for this.”
“Yeah?” The anger was back, a tiny ember of rage hot in her belly. “Those men I shot, were they trained? How about Dan-boy’s crew, were they trained?”
He spread the fingers on his left hand. “Listen, I was paid to do a job.”
“So do it. I’m not leaving. Fuck Canada, fuck Toronto. I don’t care, get it? My life is over. I will never stop looking over my shoulder. The world believes I am a terrorist. So what, I settle down? Buy a house in the suburbs? Get married? Wait for the cops to show up at my door one day? The last thing Martin said to me is I would die without ever knowing why. Well, fuck him. I need to know why. I’m not getting on that plane. I can either do this myself, and probably get killed, or do it with you, and maybe get killed. There is no path that leads to me getting on a plane to Toronto and trying to pretend none of this ever happened. You want to do the job you were paid to do? Keep me out of harm’s way? Take me with you or get out of my way.”
He spread his arms in a gesture of surrender. “Your funeral.”
“Fine. Where do we start?”
“We start with getting you shoes.”
The shoes turned out to be more complicated than Nadine expected. Jake refused to allow her to leave the hotel room. “There’s a hornet’s nest out there,” he said. “One camera identifies you and we’re done. Stay here. Don’t open the door for anyone and for God’s sake don’t talk to anyone.” He flicked open his knife, slit the plastic wrapping the brick of cash, and pulled out several bundles of bills. “I’m going to make some passes at some people I know, maybe get a line on an organic chemistry lab that understands discretion. Don’t go anywhere.”
Nadine paced the small room, shoulders tight with anxiety. She thought about Toronto and the promise, however implausible, of a new life. Toronto seemed a mirage, a phantasm of a life that had been taken away from her.
She flipped on the news feed. The same story dominated every channel. Police and SWAT cars surrounded a wall, colored lights crashing against dun stucco, as flames billowed from a warehouse behind it. The same footage played over and over again: cops swarming the encampment like angry ants, a brilliant arc of fire from ground to sky, the surveillance platform crashing through the roof of the largest building. “Gang leader with terrorist ties killed in police raid” scrolled beneath the video carnage.
Nadine shook her head, unable to grasp what she was seeing. Images flashed through her mind: Mateo in his top hat, Takeru in his room crammed with medical gear. Had they made it out? Were they dead? Were they in prison?
She jumped when the door came open. Jake came in with several large bags hung from his titanium arm and a large worn Army rucksack slung over his shoulder. He dumped them on the bed. “Got you some shoes. Hope you like Doc Martens. You need to dump that suitcase, it’s a giant screaming target on your back. Here.” He shoved the black rucksack and a smaller white plastic bag toward her embossed with the logo of a beauty supply company.
“What’s this?”
“Need to change your hair. Cut it shorter, dye it. Also a few wigs in there. Dazzle makeup. You’ll need to learn to use it.”
“Won’t that make me stand out even more?”
“Lotta people use it. It’s not that big a deal. You’ll stand out a lot less than you will surrounded by cops because facial recognition tagged you. Getting harder and harder to slip under the radar these days. You want to cut your hair or you want me to? Won’t fool computers, but you’ll be less likely to get noticed by human beings.”
“I can do it.”
A couple hours later, Nadine emerged from the room’s tiny bathroom, long black hair transformed to a short bob. Jake nodded in satisfaction. “You look like an anime girl.”
“I hate it.”
“You’ll hate prison more. Got you some new colored contacts. Ditch the ones you’re wearing and pair these to your implant. Get some sleep.”
Nadine curled up beneath the hideous red cover. In the space between blinks, the image cycled itself again and again: the tiny grenade falling, Anna leaping in that surrealistically graceful way she had, pink mist. Eventually, sleep dragged her down.