Christopher Brookmyre (2 page)

Yeah. Oops, huh?

Seemed like a compelling idea at the time. Her own private act of post 9-11 anger, prompted largely by the war in Afghanistan and not at all by her parents' marriage disintegrating. Afghanistan. That's where they were bombing. What the hell was there to bomb in Afghanistan? Wouldn't they have to send some army engineers over there to build some shit first, kinda to make the bombing runs worthwhile? Nineteen of the hijackers were Saudis. Bin Laden was a Saudi. The money was Saudi, the ideological pressure was Saudi. So let's bomb Afghanistan. Fuck that.

She shut down a power station near Jedda and halted production in two major oilfields for close to eight hours. It was embarrassingly easy. In fact, if it had been even slightly harder, maybe she'd have stopped to think a little more about just what the hell she was doing. It didn't even take very long, nor was it a particularly cute or elegant hack. She just enslaved a couple of home PCs somewhere in Kuwait and used them as bots to orchestrate a crude, worm-led, denial-of-service email attack. This predictably led the on-site techs to shut down and reboot all but the core operating systems required to keep the station online, conveniently isolating and identifying the masked ports she needed access to in order to
really
screw things up. There was predictable panic at the business end over motive, perpetrators and what the attack might be a precursor to. Al Qaeda? Iraq? Israel? The US? Calls were made, denials issued, intelligence sources tapped. Fighter jets, she later learned, were put on standby in at least two countries. But while all this was happening, some uber-geek in Finland, hastily retained by an oil company, was following a clumsily discarded trail of evidence all the way back to that notorious global aggressor, Canada.

What do you mean you never heard about it on the news?

Embarrassment stings far less if there are fewer observers, and international embarrassment is no different. Neither Canada nor Saudi were ever going to look good over this one, and they knew it would be mutually convenient to write off their losses and cover it up. Countries did it all the time, though it was easier when it was unilateral. A couple of months back, for instance, the US had misplaced a Harrier jump jet, and decided that avoiding scrutiny of the circumstances was worth more than however many million the hardware would cost to replace. Lessons were no doubt learned, private apologies and assurances granted, but, officially, nothing happened, a position that ironically might have been harder to maintain had they actually apprehended the perpetrator.

Nobody heard about it on the news, though that didn't mean nobody knew. Bett sure knew, like he knew oh so many things, and he knew early enough to tip her off that she was hours away from being arrested. Ah, yes,
there
was a memorable little interlude. Was she ever done wishing she could experience those fun few moments again, as she contemplated what some petulant keystrokes had wrought for herself in the big, wide world. He informed her by email, attaching copies of confidential correspondence, transcripts of briefings, damage reports, estimates of financial implications, projected costs of security upgrading and increased insurance premiums. A lot of very powerful, very important and very serious people would be looking for retribution over this, and that was just at the Canadian end. It looked like the last screaming tantrum of her teen years was going to hamstring her adulthood. She could see college disappearing from the horizon and prison looming up in its place. She could see a weary and crushed version of herself released in five to seven, subject to restraining orders forbidding her access to computers, the one thing in her life that she knew how to make sense of. She could see a long career in waitressing, serving coffee to the people who actually mattered, before slouching home to a shitty apartment filled with laundry and regrets.

Bett had offered a way out. Taking it was only marginally less scary than what she was already staring down the barrel of, involving, as it did, disappearing from her old life with just the clothes on her back (and doing so within an hour of receiving the email), but as far as decisions went, it was a no-brainer. Not quite the career trajectory she'd once envisaged, but things had worked out a lot more colourfully than the future had looked from her old bedroom. She had a great apartment in a beautiful village in the south of France. She had a good job with an excellent salary, plus health and dental. The only niggling flaw was there was no fixed term of contract and nothing in the small print regarding how you went about leaving. Oh, and it occasionally involved killing people.

To Lex's relief, Som at last stood up straight, the flight case gently righting itself as he relieved it of his weight. He jumped up and down on the spot a couple of times and wrapped his arms around himself.

'I hope this place we're hitting has central heating,' he said. 'Wouldn't have to worry if it was a hollowed-out volcano. The top-of-the-range ones have a pool of boiling lava for the evil genius to dispose of dissenters and broil burgers at masterplan-launching parties.'

'This isn't cold,' Lex told him. 'Try winter in Ontario some time. You should have more layers on too.'

'I didn't expect to be standing out here more than a couple of minutes. Plus, we'll have to change when we get there. Bett would have mentioned clothing at the briefing if it was an issue, wouldn't he?'

'I don't know,' Lex replied. 'Maybe he did. I wasn't listening. I thought it was your turn to pay attention.'

'No, I traded with Armand. I have to pay attention next time. Armand?'

'I'm sorry, l fell asleep,' Armand said with a shrug. 'l'm sure he didn't say anything important.'

'Where is Bett anyway?' Lex asked.

'Probably taking a bath,' Armand told her. 'You leave that man unoccupied for any length of time and psshh! He's in the tub.'

'Hey, he's the boss,' she reasoned. 'Guy owns a mansion with half-a-dozen bathrooms. Maybe he figures he's gotta get his use out of all of them or he's wasted his money.'

'Whatever makes him happy,' Som said, stamping his feet on the flagstones.

'He's Bett,' Lex reminded him. 'Nothing makes him happy.'

'Okay, whatever makes him marginally less belligerent.'

'He's got this forecourt bugged, you both know that?' Armand warned, casting his eyes melodramatically towards a nearby fir.

'Seriously, is he around?' Lex asked again. 'Because it doesn't look like anybody's home. Or are we meeting him there?'

'That's a negative,' Som said. 'Nuno's meeting us there. I'm pretty sure I heard Rebekah say we were gonna pick up Bett in Aix.'

'In Aix?' Lex asked, a little dismayed. 'This place is in the Alps. If we're picking up Bett en route, we'll be lucky to get there by lunchtime tomorrow. Are we planning to hit it in daylight, is that the deal? What would be the point of that? Who the hell hits a place like Marledoq in the middle of the afternoon?'

'Maybe that
is
the point,' Armand suggested, smiling. 'Why pay anyone to guard it during office hours if the thieves and marauders only work the late shift?'

'You've been around Bett too long. You're starting to sound like him with that disingenuous bullshit.'

Som rasped his lips and shuddered.

'Day or night, we're not going to get there at all if the wheels don't show up. Where is she?'

'Why don't you wait inside if you're cold?' Lex suggested, prompting him to glance back bitterly at the mansion's sturdily locked storm doors.

'Yeah, very funny. But I'm gonna go sit in my car if she doesn't show soon. What's the time?'

'Seven minutes past five,' Lex told him.

'She's cutting it fine,' Som said. 'You know what Bett's like about punctuality.

"Late is what we call the dead",' he quoted.

'She's not late yet,' Lex observed. 'She was only going to Nice, to pick up our ride, she said.'

'She said that much?' muttered Som. 'Favouritism.'

'Our ride?' asked Armand. 'What's wrong with the old charabanc?'

'Maybe it wouldn't stand up to her hot driving skillz,' Som suggested, emphasising the
z
for Lex's benefit.

'I'm not so convinced about that,' Armand said. 'Have you seen her in that new Beetle?'

'Yeah,' Lex agreed. 'I saw her driving out of here yesterday and it was rocking like it was being boffed by an invisible Herbie.'

'A bit rusty with the manual transmission,' Armand mused. 'Not unusual for a visitor recently arrived from the United States,' he added archly, alluding to the typically shady provenance of Bett's latest appointment.

'Yeah, well, whatever her story, Bett wouldn't be calling her "Transport Manager" for nothing,' Som insisted. 'Hey, what time's it now?' he then asked.

'It's . . . ' Lex started, but stopped herself as it occurred to her that Som could not possibly have come out on an op minus a timepiece. 'Why don't you look at your own watch?'

'I don't want to roll up my sleeve. Too cold.'

'You're a pussy, Som,' she told him. 'A shivering, pitiful Thai pussy.'

'Thai pussy
beaucoup
good,' he responded in a hammy accent. 'Love you long time.'

'It's nine minutes past,' she told him, mainly to stop the routine going any further.

'Shit. Doesn't augur well for Rebekah's first op,' he stated.

'She's not late yet,' Lex reiterated. 'Not for fifty seconds, least-ways.'

'Well, I don't see any headlights.'

'Maybe her killer skillz let her drive in the dark,' Lex told him, emphasising the
z
herself this time.

'Shhh,' said Armand. 'Listen. Do you hear that?'

'What?' asked Som.

Nobody said anything for a few moments, allowing them to hear a low bassy sound, distant but getting incrementally louder by the second.

'You gotta be kidding me,' Lex declared. She stepped further out into the forecourt and looked around, but saw only black night beyond the avenue of trees. Still the noise grew nearer.

'No way,' said Som.

'Thirty seconds,' Armand remarked, standing away from the flight cases and looking towards the house, from which direction the sound was approaching. Less than ten seconds later, the black shape of a helicopter swooped upwards into sight above the building and circled the property once by way of signalling intention to land on the gravel. The three of them stepped back towards the house, Lex taking a moment to rest Som's flight case down flat before making her retreat.

She looked at her watch again. The chopper touched down at nine minutes and fifty-four seconds past five.

'She's six seconds early,' Lex reported to Som above the storm of the rotorblades. 'Oh ye of little faith.'

'Transport Manager,' Som called back. 'Very funny. I guess she meant Nice as in Nice Cote d'Azure airport, for a charter. Wonder who she hired to fly the thing. Somebody who can keep his mouth shut, I hope.'

The front cabin door opened and out stepped Rebekah in a black one-piece jumpsuit, her blonde hair fluttering untidily in the wind where it spilled from beneath her helmet. She slid open the door to the passenger cabin and strode towards the flight cases. Given their cue, Lex, Som and Armand came forward again and joined her in loading their equipment. Directly underneath the blades, the noise was too intense to allow any verbal communication, so an exchange of gestures conveyed that everything was in place and they were ready to board. Som eagerly climbed in first, followed by Lex, deferred to by the bowing Armand. Rebekah then slammed the cabin door closed and returned to her seat at the controls. It was far quieter inside, but the noise level increased again as the blades accelerated in preparation for take-off. A voice cut across the growing whine, carried clearly over embedded speakers along both sides of the cabin.

'Good evening everybody and welcome aboard this Eurocopter Dauphin AS365N2 travelling to Marledoq via Aix en Provence. We will be leaving very shortly, so please fasten your seat belts and place all personal items, including handguns, tasers and plastic explosives, securely in the hatches provided. We ask also at this time that you stow all mobile phones and personal tracking devices, and that passengers with laptops refrain from hacking any mainframe computer systems as this can interfere with our navigational instruments. We would like to take this opportunity to say thank you for flying Air Bett, and that we appreciate you have no choice.'

The stop in Aix was brief, little more than a touchdown. The chopper landed in a car park on the perimeter of a light industrial estate outside the city. A solitary figure stood motionless on the black-top beneath the yellow sodium of street lights, Flanked either side by aluminium cases. Frost had enveloped all but one of the four cars lined up closest to the abutting low-rise building, windscreens and bodywork glinting as the chopper's lights passed over them. Bett began walking forward as soon as the wheels met the earth, leaving the cases where they stood. Without prompt, Armand opened the door and climbed out, moving with brisk but unhurried steps to retrieve Bett's luggage. Bett climbed aboard, ignoring Som's proffered hand-up, and took a rear-facing seat directly behind the slim partition separating the passenger cabin from the cockpit. He glanced emotionlessly at his watch: they were dead on time. As ever, this didn't appear to be any source of particular satisfaction, though Lex had nothing to compare it to. Thus far in her experience, Bett's vaunted displeasure at ever being behind schedule remained at quantum level. Armand handed up Bett's cases to the waiting Som, who stowed them, as Armand climbed back aboard and closed the cabin door. Then Bett gave the most cursory hand signal through the perspex window panel to the attentively waiting Rebekah, and they were off again.

They were on the ground less than ninety seconds.

Nobody spoke, in conspicuous contrast to the relentless back-and-forth bullshit between Som and Armand on the flight to Aix. It was an observed silence, and slightly tense for it. It was always like this when Bett took his place, like a schoolroom hushed by the intimidating presence of a strict and respected teacher. Nobody would speak until he did first. Once Bett set the tone, other conversation could and would resume, if appropriate. Until he did speak, however, it was impossible to know what that tone would be. He sat silently as they ascended, impenetrable seriousness in his eyes as he stared out into the night.