Crux

17 SURPRISE ENCOUNTER

Friday October 19th

“I’m not here to kill you, Martin.”

What? Holtzmann thought. The distortion was gone. This was a different voice. A voice he knew.

“I was hoping you could answer some questions for me,” his not-assassin continued.

Holtzmann opened his eyes. In the mirror he could see a face there, in the darkened back seat, where there hadn’t been one before. Headlights struck them from another car, illuminated the face for a moment. Dark hair, graying at the temples. Asian features. A face he hadn’t seen in months.

“Kevin.”

Nakamura nodded. “Who did you think I was?”

“I… I don’t know!” Holtzmann stammered.

Nakamura’s face was a mask in the darkened car, utterly still.

“I thought I was being mugged… carjacked…” Holtzmann went on.

“By someone who knew your name?” Nakamura asked. “Who snuck into your car while it was parked at DHS headquarters?”

Holtzmann’s heart hammered in his chest. He was that transparent. A professional could see through him in seconds…

Dear God, what am I doing? he thought. He said nothing.

“You don’t have to tell me,” Nakamura said gently. “We all know things we shouldn’t.”

Holtzmann swallowed, forced himself to breathe calmly. The car drove on down the dark highway, the lights of the DC suburbs sliding by on either side.

Nakamura filled the silence. “Six months ago, Samantha Cataranes was sent to Bangkok. You remember the mission?”

Cataranes? Holtzmann thought. This was about Cataranes?

“Yes. I remember.”

“You dosed her with Nexus 5 before she left. While there, during an op, she attacked ERD contractors during the attempted capture of Thanom Prat-Nung. Three days later, she attacked a team of SEALs, brought down a chopper, helped create an international incident. You remember all this?”

Holtzmann nodded. He remembered the chaos of that week. The botched mission in Bangkok. Dozens dead in the loft fire. The Nexus girl, Mai, among them. Ted Prat-Nung as well. Lane’s escape. Then the attack on the monastery. Su-Yong Shu’s death there. Nexus 5’s release. His own decision to try Nexus for himself… The discovery of Warren Becker dead of a heart attack, the next morning. He wouldn’t easily forget those few days.

“Why?” Nakamura asked.

Holtzmann blinked. “What?”

“Why’d she do it, Martin?”

“I…” Holtzmann fumbled over himself. “We think that Shu coerced her…”

“Could she do that? Coercion that complex?”

A memory flashed through Holtzman’s mind: Secret Service agent Steve Travers, in his suit and mirrored glasses, his hand coming out of his jacket in slow motion, the giant gun held there, the encrypted Nexus traffic between the shooter and whoever was controlling him echoing in Holtzmann’s mind. The world slowing even further as Holtzmann came to his feet and opened his mouth to scream that the man had a gun!

“Yes. Shu could do that.”

“Is there any evidence that she did?”

“There wasn’t any other explanation. We sent Cataranes out there with Nexus 5. It was a stupid move. Su-Yong Shu might have created Nexus. If she discovered who Sam was…”

“Is there any evidence?” Nakamura repeated.

“The evidence is how Sam acted. Kevin, you knew her. You mentored her. You practically raised her. She was loyal.”

More loyal than I am, Holtzmann thought.

Nakamura said nothing for a while. The car switched lanes of its own accord to fall in behind a long row of vehicles, then pulled up close to the one ahead, just inches from bumper to bumper, drafting, saving fuel.

“Shu’s dead now,” Nakamura said. “How would that affect Sam?”

Holtzmann brought his hands up to his face, closed his eyes for a moment, then pulled his hands away. “I don’t know, Kevin.”

“You don’t know?”

“It depends. How did Shu program her? Did she turn Cataranes into a puppet steered by remote control?”

In his mind the Secret Service man’s gun came out out out, and fired, and fired.

“…Or did she put in something more complex? Something deeper?”

Human missiles leveled the shooter, and Holtzmann turned, looking for the President. Joe Duran screaming in his ear, “How did you know, Martin? How did you know?”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Nakamura said.

Then the world exploded in Holtzmann’s memories, hurling him through the air.

“What?” Holtzmann said.

“If Shu turned Sam, she could have sent her back to ERD as a mole. Or whisked her and Kade off to China. Shu had to know the loft was an ambush, that it was a mission to get close to Prat-Nung.”

“I don’t understand,” Holtzmann said.

“Why did Shu let Sam and Kade walk into that situation, Martin? If she’d already turned Sam, then she knew the loft was an ambush. Shu was recruiting Kade, but she nearly got him killed.”

“Shu was trying to protect Ted Prat-Nung,” Holtzmann replied.

Nakamura shook his head. “No. Shu and Prat-Nung knew each other. She could have just warned him away.”

Holtzmann dropped his face back into his hands. He was so tired. So very tired. He could feel the aches starting again, the clammy sweating, the chills deep inside.

“I don’t know, Kevin.”

“Who had the most to gain?” Nakamura asked, almost to himself. “The way to find the cause of an event is to understand who had the most to gain from it.”

The car activated its turn signal, then switched lanes on its own, into the exit lane that would take them to Holtzmann’s home.

“Lane,” Holtzmann said. “Kaden Lane had the most to gain. He escaped because of Sam.”

Nakamura nodded. “Yes. That was my conclusion as well.”

And the movie started again in Holtzmann’s mind. The hot July day. The white plastic chairs. The President blathering on. The encrypted Nexus traffic. The Secret Service agent in black suit and mirrored glasses, reaching into his jacket…

“Could he do it?” Nakamura asked.

…The gun coming out in slow motion...

“Yes,” Holtzmann replied, sick to his stomach. “I think he could.”

… Coming out, out, out…

“One last question, Martin.”

Firing, firing. Muzzle flash and terrible boom. Human bulldozers striking Travers, the gun flying from his hand. Holtzmann ached so deep inside.

“Can you get it out of her?” Nakamura asked. “Out of Sam’s mind?”

Holtzmann thought of the cure experiments, the mice dead in their cages from every batch so far. Maybe the back door that Rangan Shankari had given them? That terrible, terrible tool. Could they at least use it to counteract whatever Shu had done to Cataranes? It was too soon to say.

“I don’t know, Kevin. I just don’t know.”

Nakamura nodded.

The car slowed as it reached the turn signal at the end of the exit. The doors made a thunk as they unlocked. In the rear-view mirror, Nakamura pulled the mask of his chameleonware suit over his face once more.

“Thank you, Martin,” he said with the deep distorted voice again. “I was never here.”

Nakamura opened the door just as the car came to a stop. He stepped out onto the curb, his silhouette fading to a moving pattern of shadow and distortion before Holtzmann’s eyes. Then the door closed, and the car made its turn, and Holtzmann was alone with his thoughts and his memories and his aching need.