Wired - Douglas E. Richards [123]
The helicopter banked, reminding the prisoners they were tearing through the air at great speed to an unknown destination, something easy to forget given the near perfect stillness of the opulent, enclosed cabin. “How did you know you would be able to find us when you needed to?” asked Desh.
“This is where the need for you to get seriously injured in Iran comes in. We ordered a military surgeon to add a few implants in addition to fixing you up. The orders came from the highest military channels. He was told this was being done because you were a known traitor.” Alan smirked. “He was even told you had set up your own men.”
Desh lunged forward in fury, his neck catching enough of the wire in front of him to draw blood, if only shallowly. “You sick bastard!” he screamed, his rage finally spilling out.
Alan Miller continued calmly as if Desh’s outburst had never happened. “The surgeon implanted a tiny, remote homing device on your elbow, just under the skin. The device was designed to lie completely dormant until pinged by a coded signal, upon which point it would activate. You could scan for bugs all you wanted when it was dormant and it wouldn’t register. While the bomb in Kira’s head was a bluff, the advanced receivers Putnam told you about are very real. As Kira well knows, when you’ve taken one of her pills, improving electronics becomes child’s play.”
“So you could have captured us at any time David was with me?” said Kira in shock.
“That’s right. But after you avoided capture, I didn’t want to reacquire you too quickly. You two had to have some time to bond.” He paused and watched blood slowly roll down Desh’s neck with fascination. “When you escaped from the safe house, I was forced yet again to alter my plans. I had planned on the two of you remaining prisoners for several days there and then arranging for your escape, with Putnam being killed in the process.” He shrugged. “No matter. I was able to make some adjustments and everything still worked out as planned.”
“You still don’t have the coordinates,” said Kira defiantly.
“Don’t I?” said her brother, smirking. “The homing device wasn’t the only thing the surgeon in Iraq implanted when he was operating on Desh. He also gave him cochlear implants—one for each ear. It’s a standard procedure for people deaf or very hard of hearing. Only the implants he received were silicon-chip based recording units. They record digitally and can be downloaded to a computer for playback.” He sipped his drink and smiled. “They have a finite battery life and only record from ten to eighteen hours, depending on the amount of input, so I had these set to be activated by my signal as well.”
“And you activated them within the past ten hours, I presume,” said Desh.
“Right you are,” said Alan happily. “Using the homing device I had implanted, I easily tracked you to Putnam’s house. After all my painstaking planning, at long last I had created the perfect storm.” He gazed at his sister smugly. “A man you trusted and were falling in love with. A credible threat to species survival. And you convinced that you had but minutes to live.”
Much of the fire had left Kira Miller as the realization hit her with full force that this monster had won. And she had dutifully played her role as the perfect little pawn. She glanced at her bonds and the razor wire at her throat. Escape was impossible. And even if she could escape, what would she do? Would she kill her own brother?
She clenched her fists. This wasn’t her brother, she told herself forcefully. This was a twisted imposter. Believing this was the only way her psyche could survive a betrayal this vast. Her brother had died in a fire in their childhood home. The monster in front of her was a complete stranger.
“The finishing touch to my masterpiece,” continued Alan, “was for you to think your arch-enemy was dead.”
“Why?” said Desh.
“If Kira suspected a powerful enemy with access to her treatment was still at large, she would have been far less comfortable disclosing the GPS coordinates.