For a fraction of a second I can see Yuri in the place of the guy giving me the third degree. I’m thinking, Filthy cop, but I say I don’t really understand these scholarly words. I add that I went along with it all the best I could. My life was unfolding in a closed circuit. I would change my identity the way I changed my shirt. As far as my family was concerned, I was a businessman. It was the explanation for my sudden fortune, it justified the extravagant salary deposited every month into the account of the director — who happened to be me — of a front that belonged to the Circle. I moved into a magnificent house, with garden, swimming pool, and all the trimmings. I lived like a prince. But in a permanent state of anxiety. The Residence was worse than the Army. Any discussion outside the order of the day was off-topic. Questions were forbidden, dangerous. We all tried to outdo each other when it came to showing our loyalty to the Commander. It was a contest in obsequiousness. We reveled in our degradation. But I didn’t want to get my hands dirty… I beg your pardon? You want me to repeat that? I told you I didn’t want to get my hands dirty. That’s right, sir. You want me to explain? And yet it’s simple, I never killed anyone. Never, do you hear me? Except as a soldier in the field of battle. You’re at liberty not to believe me. What did you say? I was training others to kill? Not at all, sir. I was training people how to use combat materiel and cutting-edge technology. Those were my fields of expertise. You want me to remind you whom I was training? You want to know whether the volunteers from other countries were potential suicide bombers? The kind who blow themselves up on buses and subways and kill innocent people? Could be. To be exact, I would even say definitely! Are you satisfied? But it wasn’t my remit to keep up with what those guys got up to once their training was over. No, that wasn’t my problem. It was their problem and that of their hierarchical superiors in the operational sector. It wasn’t my signature authorizing their missions. What? What do you mean afterwards? What was my remit? You have it in the miles of paperwork there before your eyes. Twice I was put in charge of the so-called sensitive personnel. In other words: I trained the personal guards for the Supreme Commander’s inner circle. Then I joined the exclusive committee of the Commander’s personal representatives. In charge of security in penal institutions. It was my job to renovate and oversee the technological installations. As the Commander’s representative I automatically became the coordinator between Military Security and Intelligence. In fact, the Commander wanted to clean up both of those mammoth administrations before absorbing them into the top-level sector at the Residence. My role would be to oversee the drastic purges within these organisms. This decision was a consequence of the growing number of spectacular escapes by political prisoners who were considered a risk to the system. There was a scandal when a former highly placed official, now disgraced, escaped from Ravine. In broad daylight. It triggered a crisis among the country’s leaders. Because an escape necessarily implies complicity among the personnel. At the top of the ladder, it goes without saying. In other words, those who have the right keys. The prisons of the Theological Republic, reputed to be the best-protected places on earth, had become regular sieves. My job consisted in beefing up the security of the installations. Padlocking the bastions of power. Making them impregnable, the way they’d been in the past. The way they should be. The technical aspect was child’s play. Unmasking the traitors, the scum who were responsible, that was another story. I could turn a blind eye to the trafficking, which the guards organized, of drugs, medications, books, or pencils, why not. But to allow the escape of traitors or political prisoners who were viewed as terrorists — never again.
My brain is overheating. I translate the Colonel’s words with sickly slowness. My tongue is furred, my mouth is dry. I had him repeat the last sentences, wondering how I myself got out of there. Who helped me escape from Ravine, since no one paid for my escape? No one had the means to pay for my freedom. Who had the right key to let me run away? How did they get it? To whom do I owe my life? Who is the man my mother qualified as providential? Where is he today? Questions I had pushed aside, had tried to forget. In order to have a life again. And now they are pouring down on me, assailing me. Oppressing me. I should never have agreed to take this assignment. I’m not going to manage. It fills me with fear. The fear of losing my job. The Colonel repeats, It requires astuteness to unmask the high-ranking officials involved.
Astuteness, or even genius. Prisoners and jailers, from the guard to the warden by way of the judges and lawyers in the pay of the powerful, I had my eyes on all of them. Advanced technology is infallible, and in my domain I’m unbeatable. I assured the Commander that very soon everything would be back to normal.
I set up what was needed, where it was needed, to spy on prisoners, jailers, wardens, judges, and court-appointed lawyers. I wove my web. A network of opaque waves, which made them — individually and all together — audible and visible at all times. No one could escape my vigilance. Every one of them, from the greatest to the most insignificant, was under surveillance. Day and night. At work. At home with their families. At home in their beds. Whether they were sleeping or fucking. Visiting family or friends. When they were traveling. By car. By train. By plane. On camelback. Wherever they were, they were under my control. After a few months had gone by, over one thousand seven hundred people had fallen into my net. Guards, wardens, judges, torturers… From north to south, from all over the country, by way of the capital, the arrests were multiplying in number.
That was my last position. I had decided it would be the last. Even though the job allowed me to travel. As a businessman, I went around the world. Russia, Japan, Korea, China… Beautiful countries. Unforgettable scenery. Fascinating discoveries. I was amazed by the incredible variety of cutting-edge items. The latest in espionage equipment. Miniature devices… What did you say? I don’t understand. What do you mean by instruments of a particular kind? The ones used for brutal interrogations? Do you mean instruments of torture? I swear, you are obsessed! I already answered this question. In the first place, it wasn’t my sector. In the second place, we didn’t need to go abroad to get devices like that. Our correspondents delivered them to us. Russians, Chinese, Koreans… Consultants who were officially appointed by their respective governments. There were also the unofficial consultants. Arms dealers are increasingly trading in interrogation technology software. Something of a cynical pun, I agree. But significant. And I’m not the one who invented the term. I am only using it in an attempt to be precise. Software means maximum efficiency without any drawbacks. No collateral damage. Not a trace on the body.