The Fusion Cage

XVII

‘Let Lopez go,’ Ethan recalled, staring at the photographs. ‘We’ve already lost track of Amber.’

‘The younger woman who was with you,’ the militant said. ‘How tragic.’

‘She’s just a child,’ Ethan said quickly, aware of the sweat soaking his skin. ‘Are you going to just let her die at the hands of people like Huck Seavers?!’

The militant’s features tightened as sheet lightning danced behind his dark eyes.

‘Die?’ he snarled with a wide grin of fury. ‘She’s been taken to Huck Seaver’s personal home in a gated compound in the city, in a limousine, no less. She will be sipping fine wine as we sit out here in the baking desert searching for scraps to feed our children.’

‘Her father is on the run,’ Ethan snapped back. ‘This is about things far bigger than you can possibly imagine!’

‘Enlighten me.’

Ethan shook his head as he closed his eyes and spoke almost mechanically as he recounted what had happened and why they had travelled to Saudi Arabia. The militant listened for a long time, watching Ethan with his dark eyes and his arms folded until, finally, Ethan finished and the militant looked at Ethan for a long moment.

The man’s jaw creased in a broad smile and he glanced at his companion.

‘So, you are the victim of a conspiracy by corporate leaders of, what was it, MJ–12? And they are here to kill you, and your friends, all because this Stanley Meyer invented a device that makes oil useless?’

Ethan nodded, and the militant looked over his shoulder at his bearded companion and smiled broadly.

‘I think he’s been watching too much Hollywood films, no?’

The bearded militant smiled as Ethan’s interrogator turned back to him and produced an elegantly carved blade that he examined as he spoke.

‘Americans,’ he uttered. ‘Your presidents demand from the world honourable leadership, the dignity of your people, justice and liberty for all, and yet they then smile and shake hands with Saudi princes who take our country’s money and spend it on luxury yachts and cars and private jets while we sweat in poverty. You rally against terrorism and yet supply Israel with arms with which to subjugate and torture Palestine. You decry injustice, yet prop up a corrupt House of Saud that is stealing our wealth from beneath our deserts and punishes, brutally, anybody who dares demand equality in this land.’

Ethan managed to drag his eyes away from the blade, looking instead at his captor.

‘I don’t make or agree with United States foreign policy.’

‘I believe you,’ the militant said. ‘But it matters little. You see, my brother was a journalist who tried to expose the rotten core of our beloved House of Saud. When he was arrested, he was tried without jury in a court and sentenced to life imprisonment and one thousand lashes. I’m told he made it to about three hundred before his heart gave out. Where was your country’s liberty and justice then? We sent images of his body to your news networks, but they wouldn’t show the pictures of his remains on your western television networks because it might offend.’ The militant suddenly grabbed Ethan’s hair, yanked it back until it hurt and pressed the blade against his throat. Ethan felt the cold steel touch his skin, felt his pulse throbbing against the blade. ‘Are you offended, right now?’

Ethan peered at the man and his voice sounded thin in his own ears.

‘I was asked to search for Meyer by the Defense Intelligence Agency.’

‘Why did they ask you?!’ the militant shouted, spittle flying into Ethan’s face. ‘Why would you care?!’

‘Why wouldn’t I?!’ Ethan snapped back. ‘Show me a country where the leaders follow the will of their people! It never happens! Half of America would like to see Israel out of Palestine and who knows what else, just the same as you! We’re people, not politicians, and killing me or any number of Americans won’t change the ways of any member of Congress or the Senate because they don’t damned well care! They’re all making too much money to give a damn about you, me or anybody else! So go ahead, kill me, blow some more innocent people into oblivion, because the only damned thing that’s for sure is that it’ll never fix any of our countries problems, idiot!’

The militant held the blade still, transfixed by Ethan’s outburst, and then he abruptly stood up straight and nodded to his companion. The bearded man left the room. Ethan watched as his captor opened a bottle of water and drank deeply from it, quenching his thirst until the bearded man returned with another captive, likewise hooded and bound.

‘Release him,’ the militant ordered.

The bearded man yanked off his captive’s bonds and pulled the hood from his head. Ethan saw an elderly man blink dust from his eyes and struggle to focus on his surroundings. He looked at Ethan in surprise.

‘Who is this?’

The militant looked at Ethan. ‘Apparently, he’s looking for you.’

Ethan stared at the thin and bespectacled figure, his features drawn and lightly touched with greying stubble.

‘Stanley Meyer?’

‘Who are you?’ Meyer demanded. ‘What do they mean you’re looking for me?’

‘I’m with the Defense Intelligence Agency,’ Ethan said, flushed with relief that he was finally talking to another American. ‘Amber is with us.’

‘Amber?!’ Stanley gasped in horror. ‘She’s here?! Where?!’

‘Huck Seavers has her,’ Ethan replied, and nodded toward their captors. ‘You can thank these guys for that.’

Stanley glared at the militants. ‘My daughter, is this true?’

The militant nodded. ‘She escaped us.’

Ethan blinked in confusion as the militant moved behind him and began loosening the restraints from his wrists.

‘Is what this man has claimed the truth?’ the militant demanded of Ethan. ‘What was his device called?’

‘A fusion cage,’ Ethan replied as he stood and looked at Stanley. ‘We know what happened in Clearwater.’

Meyer staggered sideways and propped himself against the wall. ‘My God, we had to flee, to leave Amber. We tried to find her but there was no time. I never thought that… she would come so far.’

‘She held out,’ Ethan promised. ‘She’s okay. I don’t know what Seavers will do, but I don’t think that he has murder on his mind.’

‘Huck Seavers is a coward, a slave to greenbacks,’ Stanley snapped. ‘But you’re right, he’s no murderer. But it’s not him I’m worried about.’

‘Majestic Twelve?’

‘Who?’ Stanley asked.

‘Long story,’ Ethan replied as he glanced at their captors and took a gamble that they might be willing to listen to Ethan now. ‘You’re abducting the wrong people. Stanley’s work could cause the fall of the House of Saud, give you what you’re fighting for.’

‘That depends on what you think we’re fighting for,’ the militant growled. ‘The only reason you’re still alive is because you told exactly the same story as Stanley here. Either you are both equally insane, or you have something that I want.’

‘I told you,’ Stanley said wearily, ‘I don’t have a fusion cage, but I can build one for you. I just need the parts, and your promise that you’ll build more of them and distribute them to the people for free.’

Ethan looked at the insurgent, who was frowning at Stanley. ‘So you’ve said, but why would you do this?’

‘Because we’re not all oil — guzzling megalomaniacs,’ Stanley replied wearily, Ethan guessing he may have been trying to convince his captors of this for some time. ‘If you’d only let me build the damned thing, you could have had a dozen of them by now.’

The militant sighed and glanced at his companion as he left the room. ‘Americans, you are all insane.’

‘We figured you’d be abducted by insurgents eventually,’ Ethan said to Meyer. ‘Coming here was a bad idea.’

‘It was all I could think of,’ he replied. ‘To come somewhere where even America would find it hard to track me down.’

Ethan turned as Lopez was led into the room by a Saudi woman dressed from head to foot in a burqua, only her dark eyes visible. Lopez’s hair was in disarray where a hood had recently been removed. He saw the concern writ large across her face as she hurried to his side.

‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

Ethan nodded, felt warmth spread through his chest and down into his belly as he smiled at her.

‘I’m fine,’ he said, and then looked at Stanley Meyer. ‘Who are these people?’

‘This,’ Stanley said, ‘is the leadership of Saudi Dawn, a protest opposition group dedicated to exposing the corruption of the Saudi regime. They grabbed me two days ago.’

‘If the Saudi authorities knew what you’ve achieved and they got hold of you, that would probably be the last anybody would see of Stanley Meyer.’

‘I’m more than aware of that,’ Meyer replied, somewhat affronted. ‘But then I’m sure that Huck Seavers and all of the other bloodsucking corporate entities who would like to see my device eradicated from existence would also be unlikely to think that I would come here. It was a good idea, while it lasted.’

Ethan glanced at the Saudi Dawn militants. ‘While you’ve been hiding out with these guys, Seavers has somehow managed to track you down. He abandoned us with the intention of us dying at the hands of enraged Saudi protesters, and it would have looked like nothing more than another tragic militant attack on Western journalists.’

‘You were nearly torn to pieces,’ the nearest militant said. ‘I might have been one of them, were it not for Stanley’s devotion to his cause. He kept saying that Seavers Incorporated was behind his woes, and so we checked them out. You showed up a day later.’

‘Along with Amber,’ Stanley said. ‘Is it possible to get her back?’

‘Our escort prioritized her safety at our request,’ Ethan admitted. ‘As soon as they got her clear, they took off. We inadvertently assured her capture.’

‘You were acting in her best interests,’ Stanley replied without the slightest hubris. ‘Which is more than can be said for Huck Seavers.’

‘We need to get her out of there,’ Lopez said. ‘There’s no telling what Seavers will do to her.’

Stanley Meyer perched on the edge of a tired looking table and shook his head.

‘He won’t hurt her,’ he replied without concern. ‘At least I don’t think that he will. Huck Seavers is the archetypical corporate monster, the embodiment of the American dream. He inherited his fortune and empire from his father and, to his credit, he has successfully grown the business over the years and gained huge respect for his abilities as a businessman.’

Ethan’s blinked in surprise. ‘You sound like you actually like the man.’

‘Like? No. Have respect for, have sympathy for? Yes.’

‘Sympathy?’ Lopez echoed. ‘He just abducted your daughter, a teenage girl who has travelled half way round the world to find you.’

Meyer smiled fondly as he stared into the distance, clearly thinking of Amber.

‘Amber always was an adventurous soul, an outdoors woman and livewire. I’m constantly surprised that she wants to become a lawyer and not a soldier or a pilot or something. But you have to see this situation for what it really is. Huck Seavers is not a murderer, he’s a businessman and he’s way out of his depth. He’ll offer Amber money, and keep offering it to her until she takes it, which I dearly hope that she does.’

‘You want her to sell out?’ Ethan asked.

‘Of course I do,’ Stanley said. ‘This is my battle to fight, my decision. I’m an old man, Mister Warner. All the money in the world won’t keep me alive for long enough to really enjoy it, but Amber could live a life of luxury for decades and still enjoy my device should I ever get it out into the public realm.’

‘Damn it!’ Lopez cursed. ‘I knew we should have taken that offer!’

Meyer looked at her curiously.

‘We both turned down twenty million bucks in favour of finding you and resolving all of this,’ Ethan explained. ‘It wasn’t easy.’

The two militants stared at Ethan with sudden amazement and perhaps even a hint of respect.

‘You turned down twenty million American dollars?’ the militant asked.

‘This asshole did,’ Lopez uttered contemptuously as she jabbed a thumb in Ethan’s direction.

Stanley watched Ethan silently for a moment with an admiring smile touching his old features, but then the gruff exterior fell back into place.

‘Idiots, both of you,’ he uttered. ‘There’s no good reason for you to have not sold out. You could have taken the money and run, that would have been the smart thing to do. No sense in getting heroic about it.’

‘I think I’m going to faint,’ Lopez mumbled.

‘It’s done now,’ Ethan replied. ‘Tell me what you’re hoping to achieve out here.’

Meyer gestured to the militants watching them in silence.

‘What it turns out, clearly, that I couldn’t in Clearwater. These people live in the greatest oil producing nation on earth,’ Stanley explained, ‘and their Royal Family takes the lion’s share of that wealth while they live in poverty. They are sick of the inequality, of the arbitrary use of Sharia Law to silence dissidents, of America’s support for a Kingdom whose leaders are essentially corrupt and greedy. I was wrong to trust the people of Clearwater, because they did not truly appreciate what I was doing, and they sold out at the first opportunity.’

‘Twenty million dollars,’ Ethan replied, ‘so we heard.’

‘Hard to blame them,’ Stanley admitted, ‘but they could have had so much more. But these people here in Saudi Arabia and others like them, the poor and the weak and the abused, are those who would most appreciate what it is that I’ve managed to create. It will be these people and others like them who will spread the word of my device with glee, because they understand what it’s like to have nothing. They know that passing on my device for free, so that nobody can profit financially from it, will benefit others like them across the world.’

Meyer smiled as he looked at the heavily armed militants.

‘The meek truly shall inherit the Earth,’ he said finally, ‘for they outnumber the strong by billions. They will ensure that my Fusion Cage is distributed among the masses, for it is in their own interests to do so, and the act of kindness will also cause the collapse of the House of Saud.’

Stanley looked at Ethan, the smile still broad on his features.

‘This is where the end begins, Mister Warner. The end of greed, the end of corruption, the end of energy wars and pollution: right under the noses of those who most want that all to continue. All I ask of you now is to help me protect my daughter. I will shoulder any further burden of risk alone.’

Ethan glanced at the militants, who had watched the exchange in silence.

‘You guys really want to get back at your royal leaders?’ he asked. ‘If we can liberate Amber Ryan, then Stanley here will be able to give you the device that will render them powerless. Do you have any idea where Amber is, right now I mean?’

The lead militant nodded slowly.

‘I know where she is,’ he replied, ‘and I know what will happen to her next.’