McConnell Air Force Base
Jared, you have to deal with this.”
“Ah. What was the name again? He called himself Ali La Pointe, that’s all I know.”
“You’re in direct contradiction with Imam el-Tariq of Dearborn. In fact, it’s his testimony that he chose you specially to act as Juba’s facilitator, as he got acclimated to the United States. According to him, you spent more time with Juba than anybody. And if anybody knows Juba’s secrets, it would be you.”
“You know, I think I need a lawyer.”
“I would agree with that, but, unfortunately, you signed that right away. You’re here all by your lonesome. Your choices are somewhat limited.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Silence is not an option.”
“What are my options?”
“We can remainder you to Detroit, and the general prison population at the state penitentiary at Kinross. My goodness, I hope that doesn’t happen. The results would not be pretty.”
“Or?” said Jared.
“A case could be made that, in assisting Juba, you became an accessory before the fact to all his crimes. Since one took place in Israel, the Israelis, who are very interested in Juba, could demand extradition, for interrogation by their intelligence services.”
“Ouch. Okay, so what’s your deal?”
“Same as the one you’ve got. You go this afternoon to the courthouse and testify before the grand jury. That gives DEA license to pick up Raúl Menendez. You testify against him in a court of law. He goes away. You go into Witness Protection. All that stays the same. However, upon your testimony this afternoon, you are flown to a heavily guarded FBI safe house, also on military property, and you give us everything you have on Juba. I mean everything. No playing cute, as you did with DEA. We will go over it time and time again. We will medicate you, as your permission to do so will be part of the deal. We’ll go deep hypnosis. You will also work at length with the finest police sketch artist in the world, and you will give us a good portrait of the sniper. And if we feel you’re holding back in any other way, the interrogation will become sterner. And if we fail to stop him and he commits whatever mission he was sent here to commit, that will go very hard on you. When it’s all done, we’ll loan you out to the Israelis, and any other country—Malaysia, for example, or the Philippines—that has suffered at Juba’s hands. Then back to Kinross. If there is a ‘then.’”
Jared sighed, signaling epic self-pity at the horribleness of what was happening to him. It was so wrong. He didn’t realize that it was just the world routinely, mercilessly, rotating on the fulcrum of the innocent and the idealistic.
“See,” he finally said, “Menendez is shit. He doesn’t matter. He tried to kill me. I was nothing to him, so turning on him, that’s cool. It’s kind of fun. Juba is different. He’s part of the cause. I don’t care about Islam, really, but I do care about the shit that my people suffer. I don’t believe in Allah or Yahweh or Jesus H. Christ, any of it. But those people are so fucked by everybody, and nobody talks for them except the Jubas.”
“If you become older,” said Gold, “you will perhaps see the wisdom in moderation, mercy, and simple courtesy. The bold warrior archetype, so impressive to youth, will reveal himself to be psychotic, utterly corrupted by the flame of his hatred. It’s fine to have heroes of force, but you will learn that it is not fine to have heroes of evil.”
“No doubt you’re speaking from the heart, Mr. Gold, but one man’s evil is another man’s heroism. I’ll take what’s coming.”
“You poor kid,” said Chandler. “You’re shipping yourself to Hell.”
“Do they get Netflix there?” the boy asked but was unable to laugh at his own joke.