The Deaths of Tao (15 page)

“It’s lovely,” she replied, “but why did you get it?” She got into the car and inhaled that fresh new car scent.

Marco got into the driver’s side and pulled away from the lot. “The bracelet has a microphone and monitoring device. If your life signs fluctuate past a certain point, the audio channel opens up and a tracker kicks in. So if you have been knocked unconscious, I can come to your rescue as fast as possible.” He turned to her. “I’m your security now and I take that role seriously. We’ll go over the ground rules over dinner and a nice glass of wine.”

They went to dinner at the iconic 1789 restaurant, housed in an old federal building in the affluent Georgetown part of the capital where, over dinner and several drinks, they went over the protocols of her protection. He would pose as her boyfriend for all public functions and would never be further than a klick away any other time. Marco was exact on every minute detail, from her positioning when they walked together to what their emergency rendezvous points were. By the time they were on dessert, he had combed through every part of her daily routine.

“So here’s the deal,” he said as he drank his bourbon. She noted that it was his third glass of a particularly expensive bottle of Glen Garioch and wondered how someone on Prophus salary could afford it.

Old money. Lots of it. Marco’s family once reigned over the Duchy of Brittany. Ahngr has been with his family for almost a thousand years.
 

“A rich kid who fights for fun?”

You would be surprised how many bored wealthy young men choose this path.
 

“Boarding school must really be dreary.”

“Sometime this week,” Marco continued, “I’m taking you through your paces. You will need to understand not only my role as a bodyguard, but yours as my ward. If I’m taking a bullet for you, it had better be for the right reasons. I also need to know how well you take care of yourself. Your file says you only took basic training. As a civilian host, that’s usually all that is required.”

“I’m a political operative,” she said stiffly. “Fighting and all that jazz I leave for you roughnecks. Tomorrow’s going to be a little tough to fit in my schedule. I kind of help run a country, you know.”

“We’ll see about that,” he grinned. “We’ll call it a first date. Paula did tell you to follow my instructions. I believe I have rank in this matter. Your file says you used to be a gymnast?”

“In high school,” she grimaced. “Twenty years ago.”

“And you haven’t maintained yourself since?”

“I’m not that out of shape,” she felt insulted. “I did the Wisconsin Ironman a few years back.”

“As spectacular an accomplishment as that is, unless you plan to jog away from the next Genjix you come across at a meandering pace, you will require more training,” he replied.

Jill had a bad taste in her mouth as they left the restaurant. She sat in his little Roadster and brooded. She already had three people’s worth of work on her plate. The last thing she needed was a personal trainer filling up her busy schedule. Well, he could try his best to bust in on her time, but she had her priorities. Still, she admitted it might do her good. A little brushing up couldn’t hurt, could it?

Reserve judgment on how little that brushing up is not going to hurt you until you have experienced it. I knew Marco’s father. If the man is half as crazed about calisthenics as his father was, we are in trouble.
 

And she was.

 

THIRTEEN

Taiwan
 

The next ten million years were called the Time of the Gathering. Those of us who were found were sent out again to search for others who were still lost. Slowly, the hierarchy of the ship reorganized. The Grand Council built a kingdom of primates in what is now known as Africa, and sent out searchers through migratory animals to seek more Quasing.
 

I was one of those searchers. The odds of finding another were low. To find one of our kind within a thousand years was considered a great success. I personally found twenty-four. I was not a good searcher.
 

Tao

 

Roen landed at Taiwan Taoyuan International shortly after ten, three days late on his promise to Wuehler. It had been a long, draining flight. He was delayed in Los Angeles, missed his connecting flight in Tokyo, and forced to go on standby for six hours. Wuehler must be frothing at the mouth.

It is not all bad. You got to miss having to unpack and set up the safe house, though you probably got the worst bed.
 

“Probably have me sleeping in the bathtub.”

Taoyuan was a busy hub and the lines were long even at this time of the night. It took almost an hour to get through customs and pick up his luggage. By the time he was finally ready to leave the airport, it was midnight and he was in a decidedly crappy mood.

Taiwan, like many subtropical islands this time of year, was very wet. The instant he stepped out of the air-conditioned airport, the humidity smacked him in the face and beat on him until his body dripped like a leaky faucet. After five minutes standing on the curb, his shirt was saturated with sweat. Roen’s time with the Prophus had taken him from the ice peaks of the Himalayas to the deserts of northern Africa, but nothing ever bothered him as much as the tropics. He didn’t have, as Tao often said, the pores for this sort of climate.

“These austerity measures suck. I’m on a world-saving mission. I shouldn’t have to fly like a common pleb.”

Our apologies, Mighty World Savior. Would you rather travel like a peasant or run out of bullets and armor?
 

“There has to be something else we can save on other than transportation.”

Taco Wednesdays at the office were already cut.
 

“I miss tacos.”

Hailing a cab and figuring out how to get to the Shilin district in Taipei proved to be challenging. Unlike many Prophus agents who were fluent in several languages, Roen was completely ignorant of the Taiwanese language, and though most locals spoke Mandarin, his knowledge of Mandarin consisted mainly of important phrases like “where’s the bathroom?” and “hello, you are beautiful, and I am single”. Luckily, being a former Chinese emperor, Tao was able to help him through some of the trickier questions, though truth be told, Tao’s Chinese was dated by some eight hundred years. Roen ended up sounding like a bozo speaking in an archaic Ming Dynasty dialect. By the time he stepped out of the cab at the Shilin Night Market, he was starving and irritated at the entire world.

Taipei was famous for night markets that ran, as their name suggested, all through the night. Roen passed by throngs of people browsing the many booths and stores that lined the narrow streets. Here, street vendors sold anything from all kinds of foods to plastic toys to bootleg DVDs.

His senses were overwhelmed by the sheer size and magnitude of the market. The most interesting thing he saw by far, though, was the food. Between racks of raw chicken claws, glazed sugary cherry candy on a stick, and flavored shaved ice desserts, it seemed he could find everything here. From fried cuttlefish to small ghastly looking black eggs, much of the food here looked like it came from another planet. And almost everything smelled great. There were more than a few times when he had to stop and stare, mouth wide open, at some of the strange contents on the carts.

It might seem strange to have a safe house in such a high-traffic place, but these areas usually made the best safe houses. There were so many people milling about that it was easy to lose oneself in the crowd. He sniffed the air as he passed by a particularly repugnant-smelling stall.

“What is that?”

I believe the locals call it stinky tofu.
 

“Name certainly fits. Smells like road kill.”

It is supposed to be delicious. They say the stinkier it is, the better it tastes.
 

“Then that tofu must taste like filet mignon drizzled with cocaine. I guess that’s the first thing up to bat. I still haven’t met a delicacy I couldn’t stomach.”

Except durian.
 

“Ugh. That foul fruit is the devil!”

Roen passed several other unusual smells. Some made his mouth water while others kicked up his gag reflex. His stomach was making a ruckus though. Airplane food didn’t satiate a guy who regularly consumed upward of four thousand calories a day. Still, he decided to forgo a meal until after he reported in to Wuehler. He didn’t want to antagonize the guy any more by getting caught scarfing down food when he was already three days late.

It took another twenty minutes of wandering through the maze of stalls before he found the entrance to the sub-level market. He went down the steps two at a time and entered another market similar to the one above, but even more cramped. The stalls were minuscule here and the corridors so narrow they reminded him of a submarine.

His pace slowed to a crawl as he elbowed and pushed his way through the throngs of people in narrow sewer-like passages. Eventually he got turned around and lost. Roen finally found where he was going when one of the men on the squad found him wandering aimlessly in circles. In a pissy mood, he nearly kicked the hinges off the safe house door and trudged in. He dropped his bag on the ground and looked around. Things went even more downhill from there.

The cherry on top of the entire night’s fiasco was that the safe house was a total dump. Now, a safe house disguised as being run-down was expected. Safe house exteriors were supposed to look like places no one stayed in. Gone were the days when they were ski resorts nestled on top of the Alps or penthouse suites located in five star hotels.

The interior, however, was another matter. Roen expected these havens to have weapons, medical supplies, two exits, a communication system, and a stocked fridge. That was the minimum. However, he also expected a clean room, a warm bed, a hot shower, and enough space to house all the personnel. This was where this dump was woefully inadequate.

The agent in front must have notified Wuehler because the grumpy old guy was sitting in a chair in front of the door like an angry parent waiting for his kid who had snuck out in the middle of the night. Roen walked into a room the size of a small truckers lodge and was taken aback by five pairs of eyes staring him down.

We might want to consider an escape plan.
 

“Hi?” he said with forced cheerfulness.

That probably was the wrong expression to come in here with. Wuehler’s teeth grinded so loudly the entire room could hear them. Faust, standing behind Wuehler, kept his face neutral, but he was suppressing a grin. At least someone thought it was funny.

“I expected you to be a day or two later than promised. Somehow, you exceeded even my lowest expectations. I didn’t think that was even possible. Yet I can’t say I’m surprised.” Wuehler began. “Just because you’ve been stuffed down my throat doesn’t mean I have to put up with your insubordination.”

Be civil. Remember, you owe him one.
 

Roen swallowed a snarky remark and took the rest of Wuehler’s berating with as much dignity a full-grown man could muster. It was his bad after all; he had missed his self-imposed deadline. Besides, butting heads with your commanding officer usually led to unpleasant jobs, like all-night guard or latrine duty. Wuehler wouldn’t make a host clean the toilet, would he?

Just to be safe, he appeared properly chastised when Wuehler was done. “You’re right. Circumstances had changed on the ground and I was delayed. I would have contacted you except for the radio silence. Please accept my apology and, on my honor, I will follow your orders to the letter for the duration of this mission.”

Not too shabby. I almost bought that.
 

“See, all that money I lost in poker went to a good cause.”

Still a far cry from an Emmy.
 

Wuehler seemed taken aback by Roen’s sudden capitulation to his authority, his prepared words stuck in his mouth. He gave a stiff nod and motioned to the back. “Stow your gear. You got second watch tonight.”

“Good ol’ second watch. And thus my punishment begins.”

At least you can get some dinner first. We are pretty hungry after all.
 

Roen perked up. That was a bright spot. Now in a little bit of a hurry, he plopped his stuff down and raced out of the safe house before Wuehler could say anything else. He had about three hours before first watch ended. A good soldier kept his stomach full. His porker days were behind him, and Tao had long since stopped regulating his diet. It was something he now did on his own. Still, it was hard to maintain his diet while on missions, so he didn’t bother. Besides, exotic cuisine was one of the few joys of traveling.

Faust caught up with him as he left the claustrophobic underground market. “Getting a bite?”

Roen grinned. “Going native and trying that stinky tofu.”

Faust made a face. “Passed on it the first day. Haven’t built up the courage to try yet.”

A few minutes later, the two sat on rickety plastic stools at a counter and snacked on the hideously smelling tofu over a plate of veggie pickles. It was delicious. By then, the crowds were thinning just a bit, and the two caught up on old times. When he had first met Faust, things were quite different. Roen had just learned how to shoot a gun, and Faust kept him from panicking during his first firefight. In return, Roen saved Faust’s life by chucking a rifle at a Genjix sniper because he momentarily forgot how to reload a clip. The two had kept in touch ever since.

That felt like a lifetime ago. Roen was now a deadly host with a reputation within the organization as a maverick, often disobeying orders and going off on his own. Faust had faithfully followed Wuehler and was on the short list for peaceful or voluntary transition. Those were pretty rare these days though.