Wish You Were Here (1.10)

the tables turn

He was taking it personally.  That's the only excuse for such a mundane choice of approaches to offing me.  A failed mugging, and a club to the head?  Why wouldn't he break out the hellfire right off the bat?  Because he wanted it to be intimate, wanted to get up close and personal, to toy with me.  Well, I showed him the kind of man he was dealing with.

Surprised at the sudden turn of events, he didn't even have the sense to ditch his weapon.  Dumb, dumb, dumb.  Though he may have been unnaturally fleet-footed when possessing the upper hand, he wasn't so quick when caught unawares, and carrying a – what was that?  A crowbar?  Length of steel pipe?  It didn't matter;  it was working to my advantage now, slowing him down.  My head may have been starting to sting, but a bit of pain wasn't about to keep me from tracking this monster down.

Breathing heavily, tearing through moonlit alleyways, my lungs were about to climb out of my goddamned throat.  With each breath, I could feel them clawing their way a little further up the soft flesh of my oesophagus.  But I kept going.  I was thinking about the terror.  It drove me.  His terror.  The terror I would bring when I caught him.

Giving chase, I witnessed him flicker out and back into existence several times, each time triggering an intense wave of nausea and awful muscle cramps in my own mortal shell.  Enough to make me stumble, to lose a bit of ground.  Not enough to force me to give up, however.  I kept on him, refusing to give him opportunity to focus on whatever diabolical machinations he had at his disposal.

Closing in.  Little prick.  I registered a loud clang as he finally thought to ditch his weapon, letting it fly into a brick wall.  But it was too late; he was growing tired and I was right behind him.  There was a desperate shuffle of soft shoes on gravel and the metallic rattle and clatter of chain link.

All at once, my hands were on the back of his light suit coat, pulling him off of that fence and hard onto the ground.  I kicked dirt in his eyes, throwing him further off his game, and my hands were at his throat crushing his Adam's apple.  Causing damage, that was sure.  I could feel his evil heart beating faster and faster in his carotid artery.

“Please—” he pleaded.

But I wasn't hearing him.

With each punch to his face, I was pushed closer to absolute abandon, only planning to stop when he either took his last godless breath or I grew tired.  I had him, I thought.  I really had him.

He went limp, stopped trying to defend himself, and I broke to wipe my bloodied hands on his white slacks.  I rose, standing over the brutalised monster, drawing my Browning to finish him off, and indulged in a moment to fancy the slight glimmer of pale moonlight in the shiny mess of groaning flesh that was his face.  Truly, he'd messed with the wrong guy.

I levelled the Browning and took aim.  Peering down the barrel, across the sight, I saw a slight twitching from the mess of his face where a mouth once was.  Something was growled, long and slow, in a language some primordial part of me immediately recognised as one indefinitely old and equally unholy.

Suddenly weakened, my insides, all of my organs, contracted violently, while my consciousness madly fluttered like a dying flame.  Then there was a deafening blast as the fabric of time and space tore all around me, and just like that, I felt twelve tons of steel, a veritable tractor trailer, slam into me.  Heat on my face, all over me.  A sheen of sweat broke out across the whole of my ravaged flesh.  I smelt sulphur mixed with my own flesh burning.  I heard it sizzle like a steak.

When I opened my eyes he was gone.

Wish You Were Here (1.9)

briefing room

The place was a small, hot, dimly lit back room of a nondescript dry cleaner's in Manama with clean white walls; the only adornment was a white clock, ticking, displaying the wrong time.  There were no windows, but there was a simple door with white-frosted glass filling the top half.  I could barely make out the shadows of some backward lettering: CUSTODIAL.

I was bored.

“You sure you wanna do this?” Agent Conrad asked at last, with practised bravado, arching a dark manicured eyebrow.

I smirked.  “As sure as I've ever been, boss.”

At a small table in the middle of the concrete floor, the agent and I sat across from one another, a flowery lamp drooping impotently between us, and an empty tin ashtray sitting unused, new, off to the side.  Agent Conrad, a hotshot up-and-comer: his suit was too new, his tie likely making its first outing.  His obvious greenness aside, I knew it could only be a lack of seniority which would see a man heading up such a remote branch office.  My eyes flitted from this manboy to the corner of the room where a stylized fan's blades rotated lazily.

I had already briefed Agent Conrad about my impromptu visit to Bahrain, and had nothing left to say.  I took a sip of lukewarm coffee, and we traded a few idle remarks about the heat.

“Love to be a fly on the wall back at headquarters right about now,” Agent Conrad clucked, shaking his head.  “So close to breaking this case, and we've got one agent hellbent on going maverick.”

I folded my arms across my chest, leant back in my chair, and measured the man before me.

“You happy here, boss, doing everything by the book, playing by their rules?”  I surveyed the tiny, stiff room.  My eyes met his.  “You've one life,” I continued, “and if you're not doing exactly what you want, then what's it all for anyway?”  I stood up, readying to leave, returning my hat to my head.  “If you found out today that your time was up, would you be happy with the life you lived on this tiny ball of mud?  I know I would be.”

Wish You Were Here (1.8)

airport dreams

Dear god.  I had drifted off, only to awake still curled into the tiny, unforgiving, plastic chair of an airport waiting area.  Same insipid song playing.  Muzak.  Same faceless waitees beside me.  Same ache in my back.

What is there to say about airports?  Nothing that hasn't been said before.  Cold and utilitarian.  The careful illusion of sterility.  Everything built with functionality in mind  leaving creativity by the wayside.  Shrines to the uninventive.  More a sepulchre, perhaps, for an architect's deceased imagination.

I took a sip of substandard coffee from a cheap paper cup.  Leafed through some pages of notes.  I was beyond anxious.  Would Lagan still be waiting for me in Bahrain when I arrived?

Two hours more, and I had explored every explorable deplorable inch of that colourless structure.  Spelunked through the yawning caverns of souvenir shops.  Reconnoitred the vast stretches of duty-free stores.  Traversed the wilds of the food courts.

I was ready to board, and ready to be bored on a whole new level, for the wan surroundings of an airport can't even compete with the totally bland interior of an airplane.  There, once past the invasive searches, the accusing eyes of security, I would be subjected to a higher plane of boredom.  Films of yesteryear, screened for appropriateness.  Tasteless gin.  Even more tasteless company.

On the plane, hunched into that polyester-clad, stain-resistant seat, I immediately closed my eyes to troubling images of cursors blinking and untyped pages, thoughts of unwritten reports and things not yet checked off of my growing bucket list.  Seat up, buckled in, passed out, I was ultimately subjected to horrifying nightmares of demonic robots giving chase, all glowing, red eyes and sooty, black breath.  Forever running and getting caught.

Lagan was there, around every corner, provoking, ridiculing, luring, always careful to remain one step ahead.  Images of that awful mouth, unhinged and open wide, laughing and laughing and laughing.  Then there were flies.  Swarms of them.  Hard to breath as they enveloped me in one diseased mass, tasting, nipping, consuming, slowly rendering flesh from bone.

Thirty-five thousand feet above nowhere, I awoke in a panic.  No leg room.  Numb limbs.  Screaming babies.  Hell.  Hell.  Hell.  My eyes opened to a headache inducing yellow light, panicked lungs filled with fake, opaque air, and the grotesquery of a stewardess's counterfeit smile.

“Another gin, sir?”

I smiled, shook my head, and shut my eyes, my ears locating the manufactured melody of a piece of soft piped-in Muzak.  On the wings of these artificial notes, I tried to relax, still packed into a steel tube hurtling through the blue, blue sky.  Going elsewhere.  Always elsewhere.  Hoping beyond hope that hell would, indeed, wait.

Wish You Were Here (1.7)

wish you were here

Back in New York City, I was at my desk contemplating my next move, absently watching a fly buzzing madly, trapped in the space between two windows.  Sonofabitch.  I took a draught of whiskey from my glass, and my chair creaked, breaking my reverie.

There was a noise in the hall then.  Slight, barely perceptible.  My hand rested on the cool steel of the Derringer atop my desk, finger tensing on the trigger.

A key turned in the lock, and I relaxed hearing the tumblers give way.  There was a slight rap at my door.

“Come in,” I said, wearily.

The door creaked.

Goddamnit, I thought, I've got to fix that.

“Mr Turner?”

“Julie?”

Light footsteps across creaking floorboards.  “Today's mail,” she said, placing it on the desk before retreating.

I waited for the door to close, waited for the deadbolt's click

Three pieces.  I flipped through them in the dim light of a banker's lamp.  Hydro, Ma, and – what's this?

A post card: the Bahrain Financial Harbour, her grand towers glowing a beautiful turquoise beneath a pitch sky.

Flipping the card over, I was met with four words in a strangely familiar, but curiously stylised scrawl: Wish you were here.  I couldn't help but smile, and my finger flew to the intercom.

“Julie, book me on the earliest possible flight to Manama.  Call headquarters and let them know I'm leaving, and that I'll touch base with them when I get there.”

“Certainly, Mr Turner.”

“And Julie?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Leave my light suit out – it can get a little hot there this time of year.”

“Will do, Mr Turner.”

“Oh, and one more thing, Julie.”

“Sir?”

“Leave my Kevlar and Browning Hi-Power out, as well.”

“Of course, Mr Turner.”

“It sure can get a little hot there this time of year.”

Wish You Were Here (1.6)

a slight reprimand

“You lost him?”

“Yeah, I lost him.”

I bit my lip, thinking, eyes darting to the side.  I glanced up, studying the ceiling tiles for a moment, before lowering them to stare at the digital recorder between us.  Agent Morrison waited, robotic, her straight platinum hair tied back in a utilitarian ponytail.  She waited for me as though she knew, like she was expecting, a change in responses.

“Rather,” I continued, “he lost me.  Whichever.”

One corner of her austere lips twitched ever so slightly, signalling veiled bemusement.  She jotted something down in her notes.

“These things happen,” I said.

Glancing up at me, she flashed a quick, cold smile before resuming her note-taking.

“Even the best make mistakes,” I went on, tugging nervously at the fabric of my slacks.  “Who do you trust?”  I puffed my cheeks, and exhaled a big breath of stale air I didn't even know I was holding.  “Who do you trust?” I repeated.  “Who can we trust?”

Agent Morrison simply kept writing for a moment, then stopped, purposefully dotting her last sentence before setting down her pen.  She carefully lined the pen up so it was parallel with the edge of her notebook, which she then closed with equal intent.

Locking her grey eyes on me then, she reached across the table to turn the recorder off.  She leant forward ever so slightly.  I'm sure the colour drained from my face.

“You don't trust anyone.” she coolly answered.  “When you're tracking someone who counts shapeshifting amongst his repertoire, you don't trust anyone.”

Wish You Were Here (1.5)

gross misrepresentation

Istanbul, three weeks into my trip.  She could have been anyone.  I don't know.  Lack of sleep combined with rattled nerves made for a dangerous cocktail, I suppose.  In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have trusted her, but I'll chalk it up to a learning experience.  There's a certain type of woman your archnemesis keeps as company.  Stay away from her.  She's no damned good.

I met her down by the docks in a place Lagan was known to frequent.  Drinks were consumed, trust was gained, and before long, a few of my dollars met the wallet of a loose-lipped bartender.  He pointed in her direction: a dark-haired beauty with ashen skin, and eyes of coal burning from within.

“Her,” he hissed disdainfully, his lip curled.  “I heard he keeps company with her.  That one with the black hair.“

“Know anything about her?”

“I know that if she did not ever come back in my bar again I would not be upset.”

She was his type all right, and I've never been given a reason to distrust a bartender.  I made eye contact, brought her another bottle of Efes, and prayed she spoke English.

“Merhaba,” I said.  “Speak English?”

Squinting, she eyed me up and down, and my mind was peeled open like the top of a soup can, while I was hit by an unexpected bout of vertigo.  I gave my head a good shake.

She parted her lips to speak.  “Got a cigaret?” she asked.

That voice.  English.  Cockney accent, I was sure.

“London?” I casually enquired.  “East End?”

“Yeh and naw” she answered. “More like southwest.  Now, 'ow 'bout that smoke?”

I sapped open my silver case of rollies.  “Roll my own.”

“Don't care,” she replied, and grabbed two, putting both between her pert lips.  There was flame, and my mind twitched, a record skipping, a screen flickering.  A flame appeared to issue forth from elsewhere igniting both cigarets.  She puffed on one, and offered me the other.

“Uh, thanks,” I mustered.
           

A condensed version of the evening: a few hours spent in the darkened corner of the bar, me maintaining a view of the room with my back against the wall, and she not caring about a word I said.

“Lagan,” I repeated once more.  “Arthur Lagan.  Sometimes goes by Artie?”

“Never 'eard of 'im.”

My brain felt kneaded like a hunk of bread dough.  We were at a standstill.  And perhaps she really didn't know him.  I was increasingly convinced she wasn't trying to hide anything.  That accent – she could have disguised it if she desired.  Her easy admission of being from London.  And she'd already admitted to why she was here: to have a good time.  Perfectly reasonable for a young woman such as she.

“I'm gonna jet,” she said at last.  “It's getting late.”

“Listen, I'll walk you home.”

A squint turned her eyes into two alluring, bottomless black slits.  She smirked.  “Got another cigaret?”

“Yeah.”

“I'm in Levent.”

A walk from one world to another, the maze of old winding streets in Bebek led to the shining new glass towers of Levent.  Talk turned easily from academics and a yearning for travel, to Bogazici University and the trials of campus life, to the Bosporus and the difference between Europe and Asia.

At some point, I skipped out of consciousness for what seemed like only a split second, and when I came back, the girl was kissing me.  With her tongue in my mouth it was hard to speak, but with some effort I was able to push her back a little.  I asked her what she was doing.

“What do you think?” she asked, pulling me close.

She mashed her lips into mine, sticking her tongue back into my mouth.  Things were hot, and I don't simply mean in a lusty sort of way.  It was quite literally hot.  I was burning up, scorching, from the inside out.  My blood was actually rising in temperature, my brain matter cooking.  In retrospect, it sounds so awful, but there is no denying that at the time I found myself absolutely, undeniably, uncontrollably excited.

Kissing me frantically, violently, she turned us around, and I wound up with my back against a crumbling plaster wall just inside the mouth of a shadowy alley.  Dust and dirt clumps rained down upon our heads and shoulders.

Listening for noise, I found only her heady breath in my ears, and managed once again to push her face from mine.  Asked her if we should talk first.  Get to know each other.

“Don't speak,” she breathed.

I stopped trying.

My back roughly scraping the wall, the girl manically sucking at my neck, I threw my head back and found the sky framed between rooftops.  My eyes met the moon there, remaining fixed for an eternity as this strange girl's tameless growls filled the whole of my soul. 

A grainy film clip still loops through my mind of the next scene: she, walking away into the moonlit street, smoothing her dress, wiping her mouth on the sleeve of her cardigan.  Trying to call after her, I found my voice hoarse, unable to make a sound.  She rounded a corner and I stumbled trying to follow.  With bruised pride, my bloodied knees uncooperative, I stood swaying for a moment, lost.

Back in the street, I lost her in a boisterous crowd where the main drag splits in Levent.  I stood there like an idiot, wildly scanning around – making an easy mark of myself.

I didn't even see it coming.

The shuffle of feet through the crowd, soft shoes grinding sand into the concrete.  Shattering like glass in my mind's eye, a vision of a white casual suit set against hellish, leathery wings.  Time stretched, and eternity broke into a long, drawn-out, yawn.  There was a slow motion turning of my head, just enough so the ensuing blow landed as a painful strike on the jaw instead of a potentially killing blow to the base of my neck.

*

I awoke in the back of an ambulance, face and pride pummelled.  Was he there?  Was he there the whole time?  At the bar?  The walk home?  During that kiss.  I rolled over, violently vomiting onto the medic's shiny shoes.  I puked past the point of spilling yellow-green bile onto the floor, purging until there was nothing left but dry-heaves.

What was my first mistake?  Trusting the bartender.  Trusting that girl.  Trusting anyone.

An anxious rifling of pockets found my wallet gone.  Goddamnit.  A short prayer.  Please no.  Yes, my passport, too.  So stupid.  I'd have punched myself in the face if I could've lifted my arm, if I could've only made a fist.

Wish You Were Here (1.4)

liaison

I could mention our organisation's name, but it wouldn't mean a thing to anyone.  No fancy acronym.  No celebrity recruiters spilling platitudes on the airwaves.  No government funding.  Sure, there have been loose associations with the more apparent organizations.  Sure, we've been party to some of the more famous or infamous operations.  Throw down any government or military acronym you can think of, and I'm sure we've done business with them – even if the average recruit off the street doesn't know about it.  But you won't find mention of us in any leaked documents, and we've never had to deal with a high-profile defection.

Walking through a too-trendy old quarter in Istanbul, Turkey, I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to check my GPS one last time.  Tiny tables littered the pavement populated with blissfully unaware normals sipping strong black coffee out of tiny white cups.  Exactly the type of naïve scene which never failed to make me feel a little heavy of heart.

Turning down a depressingly narrow side street, claustrophobic, devoid of natural lighting, my feet walked towards what passed for our branch office: a little café tucked away beyond a crumbling stone vestibule.  Little more than a walk-in closet, really.  I quickly flashed my badge at the pert barista manning the counter, and muttered the password.  Through the kitchen, and past a door marked KILER – 'pantry' in my native English – she led me down an uncomfortably cramped set of wooden stairs, where I bid her adieu, and rapped seven times on the steel door in a rote pattern.

It wasn't long before I heard three deadbolts unlatch, the door creaking open to expose the expressionless face of Agent Parker, all steel-rimmed pince-nez glasses and five o'clock shadow.  He silently passed me a bulging, sealed manila envelope through the crack in the door, before shutting and bolting it.

Remote agents.  Odd bunch, I thought, but they make the world go 'round.

Climbing the stairs, I examined the package's contents.  Physical photographs and notes, and a couple memory sticks.  Half of my work done for me in advance, Agent Parker would have been busy these last couple days collecting data on Lagan – leaving the fun stuff entirely up to me.