Pushing past a fern, he spots another camera, shoots it out, and as he feels the weapon kick in his hands, has a realization.
He cannot do what the Uzbek is asking. He will not do what the Uzbek is asking. It is not in him to do it. Perhaps once, a lifetime away, he was the man who could do it. But that man did not have his life, did not have his dream, did not ever imagine a woman like Dana, who would love him, too. His job? He is the wrong man for this job.
He will leave the dirty bomb as it is, unarmed, inert. The Uzbek is a liar, and nothing he says can be trusted. As much as Gabriel wishes to believe the Uzbek’s assurances, and through them believe that he matters, that loyalty matters, he knows better. Loyalty matters little to men like the Uzbek, and perhaps even less to the Uzbek’s master. They are men from that other lifetime, and there, in Odessa, only one thing ever mattered.
Money.
There is no money to be made in getting them out alive. That is an expense, that is not a profit. The Uzbek has never intended for them to leave the park. That is enough to make the decision for him. Gabriel has promised himself he will get through this day, he will put all this behind him, and he will reach Dana again. He will return to his dream, and then he will contact the Uzbek through their secret e-mail account, and he will tell him it is over, it is done. He will tell the Uzbek that he wants nothing more of him or his master, and that he knows enough to know too much. Leave me alone, Gabriel will write, or else everything I have done, everything I know of you, I will give that information to the authorities.
I’m done, he thinks. Done with all this.
Gabriel fishes out his radio, hesitates before keying it. Jonathan Bell took the radios from the bodies back at Wild World Live! — he knows that. Any transmission he makes, it could be overheard. They have to switch the coms.
Abruptly, Gabriel breaks right, sprinting toward one of the clusters of mushroom houses near Smooch’s Park. Betsy stays on him, helps him at the locked door, the two of them kicking at it together before they manage to snap the lock free of its plate. It’s warm and still inside, and Gabriel is almost frantic, urgent.
“What are you looking for?”
“Phone, there’s a park phone. Here.” He scrabbles the molded plastic box open, pulls the handset free, puts it to his ear. There’s a dial tone, and on the inside of the box’s door, a listing of numbers. Running his finger down it until he finds Hendar’s Lair, and he pulls out his radio again, jabs the transmit button twice, then twice more quickly, hoping everyone listening in understands. Hands the radio to Betsy.
“Get the cameras, make sure there aren’t any cameras,” Gabriel says, and then he dials Hendar’s Lair, listens to the phone ring.
And ring.
And ring.
Until finally, Vladimir answers. “That you?”
“It’s me. Our coms are compromised, nothing on the radio, you understand? We use the landlines. You have a cell phone?”
“I have a phone.”
Gabriel rattles off his number. “Call me back.”
He slams the handset down. He feels out of breath, tries to shake it off, to calm himself. In his pocket, his cell phone begins to vibrate. He frees it, answers.
“Matias, what the fuck is going on?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll explain in a bit. What’s your status there?”
“Everything is good. These deaf kids know how to stay quiet.”
The satisfaction, the new confidence, the resolve, all of it trembles, threatens to collapse. Gabriel feels as if his throat is knotted, the adrenaline flooding his system. The beat of his heart speeding, the hunger of his quickened breathing. He is abruptly, acutely aware of the muscles in his right forearm, how they control his hand, how his hand holds the phone, how his thumb rests at the side, along the volume control.
“What did you say?”
“They know how to stay quiet.”
Gabriel swallows. “How many of them?”
“Six.”
“You have seven.”
“Yeah, there’s a park girl with them, knows how to sign. She’s a mouthy one, I keep telling her she doesn’t shut up, I’ll give her something else for her mouth to do.”
Heat blazes up Gabriel’s neck. He is aware of Betsy just outside the door, scanning for more cameras, listening.
“We don’t…” Gabriel begins, doesn’t trust his voice, stops. Clears his throat, then tries again, saying, “We don’t have time for that bullshit.”
“Fuck, I know that. Maybe we can keep a couple of them for later?” Vladimir laughs.
“I’m en route. Keep your hands off them. I mean that.”
“I was joking,” Vladimir says.
Gabriel thinks maybe he isn’t.
It takes another fourteen minutes before they’re at the mouth of Hendar’s Lair, another seven cameras dead along the way, with Gabriel taking just long enough to reach Charlie One and Charlie Two separately over the park phone, telling them that their coms have been breached. From here on out, Gabriel tells them, we use the park phones or our own cell phones.
Now Gabriel ducks the chain, climbs over the treasure chest-themed carts stacked in a line at the platform. Music plays, variations of Hendar’s theme, much louder than Gabriel has ever heard it before in the absence of crowds and the running of the ride. At the entrance of the tunnel, multicolored lights swirl and yellow, wicked eyes shine in the darkness.
“Tell Vladimir to come out here,” Gabriel says. “Take over for him inside. I’ll keep watch.”
Betsy says, “That Uzbek shit, he’s going to fuck us, you know that?”
“I know that.”
“You’re going to let him?”
“I am not. No, I am not. Go get Vladimir. Don’t touch the hostages. We’re going to need them.”
Betsy nods in understanding. “Yeah. That’s good.”
The man heads down the tunnel, following the ride’s track, disappears into the darkness. The music breaks, Hendar growling, his voice rising, seductively dripping poison into the ear.
I smell you…I hear you…I see you…always nice to have someone drop by for a bite to eat.…
Another growl that turns into a rich, sinister laugh.
Come in, come in. There’s so much I want to show you…so much I want to teach you. Why else would you dare enter my domain? I know what you want, and I will give it to you. I will teach you of power. Come…if you dare.…
A growl, then a roar, and screams that Gabriel always assumed were from guests, and now realizes are also part of the sound track. He turns to the control console, wondering if there’s a clearly marked way to shut it off, just to mute it for a moment, and his eye catches on the flickering black-and-white images relayed from inside. Like all the enclosed attractions, Hendar’s Lair has on-site monitoring, similar to the surveillance out of the security office, but local to each ride.
Gabriel looks at the tiny square images, the whites too bright to accommodate the dimness within, and of the eight screens, six show him nothing, just empty trackway. But two of them have angles on the hostages, and he can see Betsy now speaking to Vladimir, gesturing. The cameras are nowhere near as high-resolution as the ones he left in the command post, but he sees what look like six teenagers, seated on the floor and in a line, and a seventh at the end, knees drawn to her chest and an arm around the shoulders of a young woman beside her.
Dana.
Of course Dana. It had to be Dana, and even though the video is blurry, void of detail, Gabriel is certain it is she. The way he was certain the moment Vladimir said the kids were deaf.
He looks at her on this monitor, thankful she cannot see him. Thankful that she does not know he is here, his part in all this.