James Knapp - The Silent Army

Whoever he was, he wasn’t alone. Two revivors in body armor climbed out of the back. I began to doubt I would be coming face-to-face with Michael Heinser, but whatever they had set up for me, it was going to have to do. I cut the engine and got out of my car, walking toward the man.

The revivors stepped in front of him and met me halfway. One of them looked me up and down until its scanner found the badge inside my jacket. It turned to the man.

“It’s him,” it said.

The man removed an electronic device from his jacket and held it up in front of me. After a few seconds, it emitted a sharp beep.

“You’re bugged,” he said.

“I know better than to try that. Anyway, you shut down the JZI.”

“This is independent of the JZI,” he said, moving closer. He held the device close to my left eye, and it beeped again.

He turned the device around so I could see the screen. A snapshot from a tissue scan was displayed there. I could make out the corner of my eye at the edge of the screen. There was a tiny speck there that stood out as a bright white dot.

“What is it?” I asked. He looked at me skeptically.

“You don’t know?”

“No.”

He looked at the screen again, then switched off the device.

“I believe you,” he said. “The device is nearly microscopic. It could have been delivered through casual contact without your feeling it or knowing it. It piggybacks onto your JZI’s systems, so as long as that’s offline, the bug is cut off from its source.”

The bar.

“What’s the matter? Are you not used to a woman touching you?”

The blue-eyed woman with the wool hat who showed up at the restaurant; she planted it when she stopped me in the bar. It was a setup.

“Someone is spying on you, Agent Wachalowski.”

Ai was hedging her bets, then. She’d been watching since that night. She knew what I found at the Rescue Mission clinic. She knew Heinser’s name, and that I’d traced him to Heinlein Industries. She knew about the Buckster interview too.

“I used a magnetic pulse on it; it’s destroyed,” he said. “When you leave the campus and your JZI reinitializes, it will not come back online. You should be more careful.”

The man waved at the revivors, and they retreated. They moved back toward the jeep but didn’t get in. They stood in front of the grill and waited.

“Sorry about all this,” he said. He held out his hand, and I shook it. “As you can see, we must be careful. I’m Anan Bhadra. I represent Heinlein Industries.”

“I thought I was meeting with Michael Heinser,” I said. “Where is he?”

“Unfortunately, Mr. Heinser is out of the country on business at the moment.”

“When is he due back?”

“It’s hard to say, but in the meantime, I’ve been sent to make a statement and to answer any questions you might have.”

“Out here?”

His face didn’t change, keeping an even smile as the wind ruffled his suit jacket. I had expected them to hold back, but even so, it was a hostile reception. They had me at a big disadvantage; with no JZI and no line of communication to the outside, there was no way I could verify whether he was telling the truth about Heinser. By the time we were finished and I was back outside their perimeter, he could be in the air, if he wasn’t already.

“We have become aware of several handheld nuclear devices whose whereabouts are currently unknown,” he said. “Heinlein is a high-profile target.”

“You’re saying this is a security measure?”

Bhadra shrugged, without saying one way or the other. It didn’t matter; he had his instructions. I wasn’t getting inside.

“We were able to verify that someone at the Rescue Mission facility attempted to contact Mr. Heinser several times,” I told him.

“I don’t believe Mr. Heinser would have received such a call on either his private or business lines.”

“It was a wireless line, leased by a Second Chance arm called the SCO.”

“I don’t believe Mr. Heinser is a member of the Second Chance organization.”

“He’s not, but for whatever reason, he had the phone in his possession and the calls were made to him.”

“Can you prove that?”

“I don’t have to prove it. I know it’s true. I also know that the bombs used to destroy the Rescue Mission Clinic, and the others, were almost identical to the one used to destroy the Concrete Falls recruitment center.”

That ruffled Bhadra’s feathers. His cool demeanor slipped a notch.

“There were Heinlein employees at the Concrete Falls site, Agent Wachalowski. Do you have any idea—”

“I’m not suggesting Heinlein was behind the attack. I think that whoever hit the recruitment center was there to hit Heinlein Industries. I think whoever did it then set themselves up at the Rescue Mission Clinic. What I don’t understand is why. That’s what I want you to explain to me.”

The rain started up again, misting over the tarmac. Bhadra signaled to one of the revivors, who approached and handed him an umbrella before returning to its spot. He opened it as the rain picked up, then moved closer so that it covered both of us.

“This is off the record, Agent.”

“Mr. Bhadra, I am conducting an ongoing investigation into—”

“I’m not asking, Agent Wachalowski. I am telling you. This is off the record. Neither your JZI implant nor any other recording device you may be carrying will work here. If I or anyone from Heinlein Industries is asked about this later, it will be denied.”

He stood there, waiting for my reaction. It was clear that if I didn’t agree to his terms, the discussion was over.

“Go ahead,” I told him.

“I can’t comment on why Mr. Heinser’s name was in the Rescue Mission directory, because I don’t know,” he said. “However, I can say that what you found there is connected to the incident at Concrete Falls.”

“You knew about what was going on at the Rescue Mission Clinic?”

“No. We didn’t know about the facility, but there have been concerns that someplace like it might turn up.”

“Concerns?”

“A specific piece of technology was at the Concrete Falls center the day it was attacked.”

“What kind of technology?”

“I can’t disclose that—”

He stopped short as I stepped in and grabbed him by the shirt collar. His eyes went wide as I hauled him up onto his toes, and he dropped the umbrella.

Immediately, the two revivors at the jeep began to close in. I drew my gun, and Bhadra flinched as I fired a single shot. The pop echoed down the tarmac as the revivor on the left spun around, spraying an arc of black blood from the side of its neck.

“Stop!” Bhadra shouted, holding his hands near his face. The second revivor held its position while the one I’d shot collapsed face-first onto the ground, blood pooling around its head.

“There are eleven nukes somewhere in the city,” I said, putting my face close to Bhadra’s. “Eleven nukes. Don’t stonewall me, Bhadra. Do you understand?”

“What are you going to do?” he asked, his hands still near his face. “Shoot me?”

“I’ll place you in Federal custody, and before I’m done, I promise you, you’ll tell me what I want to know.”

“You’ll never get me to the perimeter, Agent.”

“Answer me. What was Heinser involved in?”

“We don’t know,” he said. “I would tell you if I could. He was involved in something, but we don’t know what. They’ve put him out of reach as a precaution. They don’t have any specifics.”

“I want to talk to him now.”

“You can’t, Agent. He’s gone. You won’t be able to reach him, not in time to help you. I’m sorry.”