Barry Eisler: Requiem for an Assassin

Where the hell was he? A small room, maybe ten by ten. Wood walls. Fluorescent lights. Nothing else to go on. He felt like he was rising and falling and thought it was because he was woozy, but then he recognized the rhythm for what it was. He was on a boat, and the movement he felt was of swells underneath him.

Who had taken him? Whoever they were, they were good. They hadn’t wasted a second once the blond guy engaged him. The flankers were ready and knew exactly when to move in. Coordination like that showed not just skill, but the kind of unit confidence and cohesion you get only after a lot of training together. These weren’t freelancers. They’d worked together as a team before.

He wondered if that asshole Jim Hilger had something to do with it. He’d sensed as much in the instant before he blacked out, and he’d learned to trust his instincts on these things. First answer, best answer, that was usually his experience. And now that he was awake and thinking, he saw there was some logic behind that initial, unconscious conclusion. The coordination and skill, for one thing, that felt like Hilger. After all, the man had been Special Forces and then CIA before going off the reservation. And there was a motive that could explain things, too. He and Rain had killed two very bad men in Hilger’s network, one an arms dealer, the other a terrorist trying to buy nuclear matériel, forcing Hilger to go to ground in the process, and it was possible the man was the type to hold a grudge. Yeah, this was probably about Rain, too, otherwise why didn’t they just kill him outright in front of the Bintang? Why run all the extra risks of a snatch? Well, whatever, he’d find out who did it and what they wanted soon enough.

He was furious at himself for being stupid enough to get nailed like this. He’d waited too long, that was his first mistake. He hadn’t checked his perimeter until the blond guy asked for his help, when he should have checked it from within the store, or, failing that, then as soon as he’d stepped outside. Dumb, just fucking dumb. If he’d seen those guys standing around in their helmets, he would have gone to code red with an extra two seconds to spare, before they’d even gotten a chance to move on him, and that would have made all the difference.

And he shouldn’t have gone for the knife immediately when he saw something was off-that was reflex, to reach for a weapon, but there it was the wrong reflex. He should have moved first, moved off the X, the killing spot, made them react, chase after him, whatever. He would have had plenty of time to get to the knife, and hold on to it, after that. Wasn’t that one of the things John was always telling him? Move. Never give them a stationary target. Sometimes he felt like Rain was lecturing him and bristled at it, but he had to admit the man knew what he was talking about.

He wondered how they had traced him. Well, there were a lot of ways they might have learned he was in Ubud, if they had enough resources. From there, they probably deployed a watcher at every grocery store in town, knowing he would have to show eventually. When he did, someone used a radio or a mobile phone to alert the others, and they converged on the Bintang while he was inside. When was the last time he’d been there? Four days earlier…no, five. So they’d probably been in town close to a week. Had he seen anyone who set off his radar? No, but there were always tourists passing through Ubud, and besides, if these guys were in helmets and on motorcycles, they would have been damn near impossible to spot.

At least one of them must have been driving a van. They’d injected him with fentanyl or Rohypnol, something like that, that was the sting in his neck. Shove him into the van after knocking him out, and they’re off before anyone could intervene or even be sure what was happening. Change vehicles somewhere close by, then head for the coast where they’d moored the boat. Which pretty much brought things up to date.

He took a deep breath. All right, he’d fucked up. Hard to argue about it at this point. But there was no use beating up on himself-he had a feeling someone else would be taking care of that, and more, soon enough. Being demoralized would only make it harder for him to keep his shit wired tight.

And he could keep it tight, he knew that. It wasn’t how far you fell, it was how high you bounced-his dad had once told him that and he’d never forgotten it. If he could survive sniper school, he could survive anything. He could certainly survive this, whatever it was. He just had to remember who he was and what he was made of. He had to hold that close and not let them separate him from it.

He waited a long time, silently telling himself jokes he liked. That one he’d told Rain about the bear was great. The guy didn’t like to laugh much, which made it all the more satisfying to get to him. When Dox got out of this, he’d be sure to tell Rain the one about kabunga. That would be apt, under the circumstances.

He reminded himself from time to time that the waiting was part of it, part of how they hoped to wear him down, with uncertainty about everything, who had taken him, what this was about, where he was, what might happen next, when it might happen. He’d been trained to resist interrogation, and knowing what to expect was half the battle. He was pleasantly surprised, even bolstered, to realize the training was really helping.

After what he estimated was three hours, the door to the room opened. The blond dude, who he recognized from the parking lot, came in first, followed by a scary-looking bald guy, and then a smaller specimen who looked way too young to be mixed up in any of this. The bald guy and the young one he assumed had been wearing the helmets in front of the Bintang. He heard another set of footsteps, and sure enough, there he was-Hilger, just as Dox had suspected. Okay, check off the who box. Why and where were still open.

The four of them stood around him, observing him silently. About fifteen seconds passed.

Dox yawned. “If this is nothing pressing,” he said, “I’d like to ask you boys to give me another twenty minutes or so to continue my nap. I’m sure you didn’t mean to, but you’ve interrupted me.”

He chuckled, enjoying fucking with them while he could. He might not be able to keep it up, but half of what they planned to do to him involved the infliction of dread, and damned if he would accommodate them by actually feeling it.

Not unless he absolutely had to.

HILGER SLID a wooden chair over and sat facing Dox. He observed the big man for a moment, as silently and dispassionately as a scientist studying a microbe. He wanted Dox to understand that he viewed him not as a man, but merely as a subject, the focus of a series of impending if/then sequences that meant nothing to Hilger other than his desire for a certain result.

“I’m going to make this as easy for you as I can,” Hilger said, his voice low, his tone reasonable. “There’s no need for you to suffer, or even to be uncomfortable. The information I want isn’t going to compromise anyone. It’s not going to put anyone in danger. It’s just going to enable me to contact someone. That’s all.”

Dox smiled. “The ladies in my little black book wouldn’t be interested in you, amigo, I’m sorry to be the one to tell you. They seem to prefer their men handsome and virile.”

Hilger sighed. He’d seen men in Dox’s position before, many of them. What they all had in common was fear. What differed, what was interesting, was the way they tried to cope with it.

Some men, faced with torture, would bluster. Some men begged. Both types were really two sides of the same coin: their focus was the interrogator, and because of this they tended to crack easily. As soon as they saw that their bluster and begging were useless, that they couldn’t make a human connection that would stop the pain and torment, their psyches folded and information began to spill out.