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Tim woke up alone the next day. He looked around to see if there was any evidence that Pam had been there, but there wasn’t. The only thing that had changed was that Tim was now naked. His sweatpants were on the floor, his t-shirt under the pillow. Tim did smell bacon being cooked, so he assumed that Pam was making somebody bacon and eggs.
By the time Tim was dressed and made it downstairs, Toby and Sebastian had arrived and were seated in the kitchen.
“Coffee, Tim?” Pam asked.
“Please,” Tim replied.
As Tim sat down, Toby got up. “Don’t leave on my account, Toby,” Tim said as the other man headed for the door.
“Oh, he has plenty to do today,” Sebastian remarked as Toby went outside. Through the window, Tim saw Toby get into the SUV and drive away. He wondered where he was going.
“Would you like some eggs and bacon, Tim?”
Pam was certainly playing the role of the dutiful wife, but Tim was not buying it, despite their love making the night before. Tim knew that Pam would do anything to get what she wanted.
“So, Tim, did you make any progress on you poison device?” Sebastian asked once he was sure that Toby had cleared the room.
Tim figured that Pam had already told him something, but now that they were together, he might as well bring them both up to speed. “I think I have a working prototype.” Tim paused and looked down, seeing the fork that he had been working on the night before placed in front of Sebastian. Tim had discussed his progress on the device with Pam after her post-dinner rant. She had apparently brought the fork up from the basement in order to try it out on Sebastian.
“So?” Sebastian wanted to know as he picked up the fork.
“And it simply needs to be tested.” Tim watched Sebastian put a forkful of scrambled eggs into his mouth, thinking about how fat and stubby his fingers were.
Sebastian did not appear to notice the two small needle pricks, but he soon began to rub his numb fingers. Tim looked at Pam, who was smiling. “Fingers a little numb, Sebastian?” she said as Sebastian began to examine his right hand.
“Excellent,” Sebastian said as he continued to look at his hand. “Assuming that you indeed have not poisoned me, and this numbness will go away at some point.” Sebastian was now shaking his hand vigorously. Pam must have applied a lot more Xylocaine than Tim had.
“No, you have not been poisoned, but I’m beginning to wonder about the numbness,” Tim said, half joking.
Sebastian picked up the fork and looked for the two small needles. “I just don’t see them,” he commented.
“They are actually bigger than you think, but the lacquer does a good job of obscuring them,” Tim remarked.
“Well, I’m impressed,” Sebastian proclaimed. “Pam?”
“I’m impressed as well, Sebastian. I believe it’s time to call Bob Ajacks.”
The name Bob Ajacks was a pseudonym the three had used over the years for the man or woman in charge of the operation. This was the person who made the major decisions. Most of these individuals held a public position with the Agency, which meant that everyone in Congress and the news media knew that they worked for the CIA, so it was important not to casually mention their names when discussing any operation. Usually, only the case officer knew the real identity of Mr. Ajacks.
“That’s great, guys, and I hope it all works out for you. In the meantime, I would like to get home.” Tim knew that this was probably a little too much to expect, of course, since Toby had gone off somewhere and he doubted that Pam would give him a ride to Baltimore. Tim typically liked living without the expense of owning a vehicle—but he sure wished he had one now.
“Tim, why don’t you plan on spending a couple more nights here with Pam?” was Sebastian’s very nice way of telling Tim that he was not going anywhere. “Toby may not be back for a day or so.”
Tim was beginning to think that all three of them would be hanging out together for an undetermined amount of time. Just like back in the old days, he thought.
Pam began to speak. “Tim, I feel that it is important that you hear the entire purpose of the operation, and then perhaps everything will begin to make more sense. Ajacks will tell you about that tonight.”
Wow, what a big-time spy operation, Tim thought.
Well, at least it didn’t seem like Pam or Sebastian were planning to kill him anytime soon. But Tim did firmly believe that one or two of the three would be dead by the time this was all over, and he had no intention of being the dead guy.
Mr. Ajacks was scheduled to make an appearance after sunset, which figured to be between 7 and 8 p.m. These types of managers almost never came over to your house or office in the daytime. “Democracy Dies in the Darkness” was the new slogan of the Washington Post. He’d originally thought it was silly, but it was beginning to make sense, at least in a literal kind of way. Everything decided in Washington seemed to occur in the dark of night, and it certainly was not a democratic process. In addition, the concept was not limited to the confines of Washington, D.C. Geographically speaking, it included the entire state of Maryland, the District of Columbia, and everything in Virginia north of the Rappahannock River. Within this area, you had (in no particular order): the NSA, the US Naval Academy, Camp David, the CIA, the FBI Training Academy and Laboratory, the DEA, the Quantico Marine Base, Fort Detrick, Fort Belvoir, Fort Meyer, the Pentagon, and Mount Weather.
The list of facilities went on and on, as did the secret deals made there. Deals that affected US policy worldwide, all occurring within a 50-mile radius of where Tim was developing his killer fork. And no one voted on any of this, he thought.
Tim had returned to the basement to continue his work on the fork and gain some distance from Pam and Sebastian. He had not been around other spies for five years now, and he was finding that he really did enjoy his new life.
The basement television was turned on, muted, and Tim looked up to see the President in a photo op with the leader of North Korea. It seemed like just months ago that the New York Times had reported that North Korea had developed an ICBM capable of carrying a nuclear warhead to the US continent, or at least to the west coast, yet here were these two leaders sitting side by side, smiling. Tim certainly did not have any new trust for North Korea, but at least the two sides were talking with one another, which was a vast improvement...yet, to many in the media, something was wrong. Although the media had a hard time explaining exactly what was wrong with the President having a summit, it did not stop them from criticizing it. However, no one seemed to be too worried about North Korea at this point.
Tim had no problem with the media, although it did appear that most outlets had become rather one-sided. The current President was certainly different than the usual politician, and he could understand why many found him so objectionable. He seemed to lack the usual filter of professional politicians. It was not that the other politicians did not have similar views as the current President, but they knew when to shut up. What made that even worse to many in the press was that the President did not seem to care about their opinions. In fact, he seemed to relish their condemnation and disapproval. That in itself was somewhat history-making, but also dangerous. Each time the President disregarded some new media outrage, the press would up the ante. To Tim, this made Nixon and the sixties seem like a picnic.
At 6 p.m., Darrel came down to the basement and opened the gun safe. “Hey Darrel, what’s going on?” Tim asked.
“Hi, Mr. Hall. Nothing much,” Darrel answered. He pulled out two M16 rifles and four clips, and Tim heard the familiar sound of the bolts being pulled back to make sure they were operational.
“Extra help coming over tonight?” Tim asked.
“No big deal,” was Darrel’s response.
The fact that Darrel was a man of few words was not surprising to Tim. Most good security guys didn’t say a lot, which was really what you wanted. Talkative people were easily distracted.
Darrel grabbed the two rifles and headed back upstairs as Pam yelled, “Tim? Ajacks will be here soon, so you need to get ready.”
“Okay, be right up,” Tim answered.
He’d almost said “Be right up, honey”—but he’d caught himself just in time. It amazed him how easy it was to fall back into married life.
Tim grabbed a can of aerosol fingerprint powder that he’d found while he was rooting around in the chemical cabinets the day before. He walked over to the gun safe and sprayed the powder on the combination keys. It was apparent that only the keys 4 and 5 had been entered, which meant that any combination of those two numbers could be pressed. He knew that typically you had only three tries to get in. A fourth try would lock you out. To make matters worse, one or two wrong passcode attempts would alert Pam that someone was screwing around with the safe. Therefore, Tim figured that he had one try. If that was wrong, then he could just confess that he was playing around with the safe. Pam would probably accept that explanation, but she would become suspicious if it happened more than once.
His best guess was that Pam was using 5454 since that would be the easiest for her to remember. He was correct. The safe beeped, and the door opened. Tim took a quick look at the guns, closed the safe, and headed upstairs to meet Mr. Ajacks.