Mitchell turned on the shower as hot as he could take it, stepped inside and let the heat relax his tense and aching muscles. Steam soon filled the glass shower stall. Dipping his head under the falling water, Mitchell thought about what Mister Satomi had told him about his uncle’s secret papers. The more he thought about it, the more he became convinced that they were the key to finding out what was really going on. Turning the faucets off, Mitchell stretched out his frame and then grabbed a towel to dry himself. After wrapping his towel around his waist, Mitchell walked back into his room, flipped a light on, and grabbed his cell phone. He pressed a number on speed dial. Mitchell waited a couple of seconds until General O’Reilly answered the call before quickly filling him in on what had happened since he arrived in Hong Kong. He changed topics. “Sir, could you ask the intelligence department if they could look into Unit 881? I’ve never heard of such an organization and would like to know what they were doing on Matua Island before the Soviets overran the island in 1945.”
O’Reilly said, “I’ll get them researching the unit right away. Tammy is busy making your flight arrangements to Mongolia. She’ll forward them to you within the hour.”
Mitchell thanked his mentor, hung up and then let out a deep yawn. His mind, freed from its myriad questions, finally caught up with his tired body. He crawled under the covers and was asleep in seconds. It was the last decent sleep he would get for days.
23
With a warm glow on her face, Atsuko Satomi rolled away from Gabriel Cypher and reached for a half-empty flute of champagne on the nightstand beside their bed. Taking a sip of champagne, Atsuko smiled and turned her head to look over at her lover, who lay on his back, smoking a cigarette, with an oddly serious look on his face.
“What’s wrong? Did I do something to displease you?” said Atsuko as she pulled up the black silk sheets to cover her naked body.
“No, you did nothing wrong, my love. I’m sorry; my mind was elsewhere,” replied Cypher.
He had earlier received the news with considerable sangfroid that Taro Satomi still lived and that two of his newest assassins had been killed in the attack. In just over a week, he had lost almost half of his handpicked killers. Still, regardless of the cost, there could be no loose ends. His favorite, known only by her first name, Tara, the abandoned daughter of illegal East African refugees, found selling her body on the streets of Rome, had been in charge of the mission. He could tell in her voice that she felt responsible for the failed attempt to kill Taro Satomi. Comforting her, Cypher gave her a new mission. He wanted her to hunt down whoever was responsible for interfering in their affairs and kill him. Cypher had decided months ago that anyone remotely connected to the operation would have to be eliminated. Even Atsuko would have to go. However, for now, she was a warm and welcoming distraction.
As the third and youngest son of Octavius Cypher, the aging patriarch of the family business, Gabriel Cypher was free to conduct his affairs any way he pleased. His two older brothers were senior vice-presidents in the company, both vying to control the business once their father passed away. He was a gifted child with an IQ that far exceeded those of his classmates in his private school in Zurich. Easily bored, Cypher was declared a sociopath by the family doctor when he was in his early teens. After university, Cypher moved from one project to another, always treating the people involved as disposable. It was only when he met Atsuko Satomi and learned of the weapons developed by Japan during the war did his restless mind finally focus on a project that he deemed worthy of his time and talents.
“What are you thinking about?” said Atsuko as she cuddled up next to Cypher. She couldn’t decide if she was truly in love with the man. Unlike the two other men that she had been with in her life, he stirred something animal-like deep down inside her. It was a feeling of excitement and danger entwined together, and she liked how it made her feel. Her only reservation was Cypher’s relationship with his assassins. All female, they were never too far from Cypher. She could see the look in his eyes when he spoke with them; it was almost sexual. He looked after them, and they followed his every word with a fanatical reverence that Atsuko found disturbing.
Turning his head to look into Atsuko’s eyes, Cypher said, “I was just wondering why you insisted on being kidnaped in such an ostentatious manner? You could have simply disappeared from your hotel room, and no one would have been the wiser.”
“That’s the point. Why go to all that trouble and not add a little theatrics,” said Atsuko. “Besides, I wanted my father to suffer and be humiliated in front of the whole world.”
Cypher never understood Atsuko’s bitterness toward her father. It ran deep, deeper than any family disagreements he had ever come across. His family had its problems too, but he chose to simply ignore his family and get on with his life.
Atsuko propped herself up in bed and studied Cypher’s face. Something else was eating at him. “What else on your mind, Gabriel? I know when something is bugging you, so what is it?”
“I was thinking that it would have been beneficial to have had all of the original plans for the weapon in our hands before we began our operation,” said Cypher.
Atsuko bit her tongue. She’d told him months ago that he was agreeing to something with the North Koreans before he was ready to proceed. His mania for secrecy saw his people working on individual parts of the project, not the whole. It practically ensured that a project, as complicated as this, was going to run into technical problems. Only she and Cypher knew all the details.
With a practiced smile on her face, Atsuko said, “I never realized that there was a microdot on the back of one of the pages, or you know that I would have made a copy of it as well.”
“It’s not your fault. How were you to know?” said Cypher philosophically as he ran a hand through Atsuko’s hair. “I have it now and that’s all that matters.”
“I took a look at the information contained on the microdot. I am sure that it will help correct the problems you had with the first test of the weapon. The Russian scientists they had working on their device were geniuses. Their calculations done without the aid of modern computers are simply astounding. Had they been alive today, your project would have been completed weeks, if not months, ago. The men you have working for you are good, but lack the skills to think outside of the box.”
“With the new information, I am sure we can get back on track.”
“When do you test it again?” asked Atsuko as she reached over to the nightstand to pour two fresh glasses of champagne.
“In a couple of days’ time,” answered Cypher, taking a glass from Atsuko. “I have instructed the technicians to run several more computer simulations with the new calculations before we try field-testing the device again.”
“A wise move. Hurrying things along before they are ready could lead to another failure and you cannot afford to let your client down.”
Cypher picked up his Rolex wristwatch and looked at the time. “Speaking of my client, we need to get cleaned up. He’s arriving in an hour.”