The Sanctuary (39 page)

“It would be a fair point if a lot of effort was going into preventing aging, but it’s not. Very few people are actually working on it. Scientists aren’t exactly motivated to go into that field. Government gurus, church leaders, and “deathist” scientists tell them it’s not possible, and even if it were, they keep telling us it’s not something we should want. The media’s quick to jump on anything that sounds promising, which has the effect of turning any serious enterprise into an apologist joke. Any serious scientists considering the field are—rightly—worried about being lumped in with the army of charlatans out there selling youth and getting nominated for the Silver Fleece Awards. They know they won’t get funding the minute they mention their work has to do with antiaging—they don’t even use the word anymore, it’s now cloaked under the term
longevity medicine
. They’re worried about working on something that, if you’re going to prove it works on humans, takes decades to show results, which can be hugely disheartening when the odds are you’re going to fail, and if you’re going to be mocked along the way…You’re a geneticist. Would you go into it?”

Mia shook her head glumly. It was too close for comfort. Her whole field, it seemed, was a minefield these days.

“You see my point,” he went on. “You know how the government feels about your line of work. They’re not even ready to back stem-cell research. Same goes for the Church. So the funding and the incentives aren’t there. But things are changing. The new megarich are getting older. And they’re interested. They don’t want to die unnecessarily. And to figure out something like this either happens by fluke, or with a lot of hard work and a lot of money. How much did we spend on the Manhattan Project? On putting a man on the moon?
On the war in
Iraq
?
Doesn’t seeing if we can fix the human body and eradicate the diseases and ravages of old age deserve one-tenth of the same funding? One-hundredth even? We don’t even have that. Do you know how many people die of age-related diseases every day?
One hundred thousand.
One hundred thousand deaths a day.”
He paused and shrugged. “Maybe it’s worth thinking about.”

He set his drink down and gave his words a moment to sink in. “Don’t get me wrong. If that’s what this hakeem’s working on, I’m not saying he’s justified. His methods are beyond insane. He’s a monster who deserves to be drawn and quartered. But maybe—just maybe—what he’s after isn’t that insane.
And if it isn’t, imagine what would happen if it were discovered.”

Mia finished off her drink and sat back. She was drunk with the possibilities. “I think I’m starting to understand his level of commitment. If he thinks it’s even remotely possible…” Her face brightened with a realization. “He’s got to be desperate to get his hands on that book.
Which might give us an advantage in getting Mom back.
”

“Absolutely.”
Kirkwood
paused. “Have you discussed this with Jim at all?”

She shook her head. “Up until an hour ago, I wasn’t really sure there was anything to discuss. Why?”

“I was just wondering what his take on it was. We’ve only talked about the operational details of what was going on.”

“He thinks the guy’s working on a bioweapon. Maybe he should know about all this too. I’ll call him in the morning.”

Kirkwood
winced with discomfort. “I’d leave it. It doesn’t really affect his plans.”

“Yeah, but if this is possible, if that’s what the hakeem is after…maybe it changes things.”

Kirkwood
’s expression darkened. “Not in a good way, as far as getting Evelyn back is concerned.”

Mia felt a sudden ripple of worry at the sudden seriousness of his words. “What do you mean?”

Kirkwood
looked away for a moment, weighing his words. The frown hadn’t left his face as he leaned in. “Think about it. Jim’s a government agent. If there’s something like this out there, if they know that’s what the hakeem is really working on…what do you think they would do? Hand it over to a lunatic? Or keep it under wraps?”

C
orben’s remark took the hakeem by surprise and
paused
him, if only for a moment. “And your help and patronage is supposed to be even more attractive to me than your government’s, is that it?

Corben looked up at him, his voice calm and unwavering. “I was asked to find you.
To track you down.
But that was four years ago. A lot’s changed since then.” He adjusted his position slightly, trying to alleviate the discomfort of the harsh soil.

“The WMD mess crippled us,” he continued. “
Intelligence report
became a dirty word, synonymous with White House fabrication. It turned us into pariahs. The antiwar movement and the press savaged us. People got fired or shuffled around, my boss included. Priorities changed. Everyone was busy backstabbing and pointing fingers and scurrying around trying to save their own
asses,
and a lot of stuff got lost in the mix. Your file was one of them. The Agency lost interest.”

“But you didn’t,” the hakeem observed drily.

“I wasn’t sure. The odds were that you were a waste of time, a wild-goose chase. You were running experiments, you had all the resources and human guinea pigs you needed, but I had no idea if you’d been successful in your work. And you’d pulled a mother of a disappearing act. I would’ve let go.
Moved on.
But there was this symbol, carved into the wall of one of your cells.
The snake, the tail-eater.
Data-mining hadn’t turned up anything on it that was relevant, but when I did some old-fashioned digging around through our archives in
Langley
, I found something.
An old file, long forgotten.
A report from an Agency man in the
Vatican
.
A memo about an old case from the eighteenth century involving the tail-eater symbol, a false marquis, and a prince who believed the man hadn’t aged a day in over fifty years.” Corben noticed the hakeem’s jaw take on a sharper, more pronounced line. “And it made me wonder if you were just another quack—God knows, there are enough of them out there—or if you were really onto something. So I kept an open mind. You know those detectives who can never let go of an unsolved case that marked them? You were mine. If any of this was real, it was my golden ticket out of the sleaze pit of intel work, a big fuck you to the ungrateful and self-righteous bastards in D.C. who are more than happy to use us and then hang us out to dry, a way to ride off into the sunset sipping Cristal in the back of a Maybach.”

Which was, at least until that phone call to Abu Barzan, the truth.
Now, though, Corben was no longer sure the hakeem was the most direct route to the fountain of youth, if there was such a thing at all. Not until he knew what the mystery buyer knew. But he didn’t want the hakeem to know that. Not yet, anyway. Not if he wanted to get back to
Beirut
in one piece.

“After
Baghdad
,” Corben concluded, “I got posted out here.
Kept my eyes and ears open, in case something popped up.
And here we are.” His tone hardened. “No one else knows about your involvement. No one’s aware of the link. They just think this is about smugglers fighting over the spoils of war. It’s what I’ve made them think. And I can keep it that way.”

The hakeem glanced away, nodding to
himself
almost imperceptibly, seemingly processing his captive’s words.

“What do you think you could you possibly offer me that I don’t already have?” he finally asked.

“Oh, I can think of a number of things. Access to our
intel
, to our resources.
Research.
I can also provide you with a safety net. I don’t know where you’ve been holed up since
Baghdad
imploded, but this part of the world’s not the most stable, and if it blows up around you again, you might want to relocate somewhere less…distracting. I can organize that.
New papers, a new identity.
And if you do have something the world wants, something people will be willing to pay big bucks for, then I can be your front man. I can be your beard and legitimize it. And you don’t need me to tell you there’s a lot of money to be made.”

The hakeem remained poker-faced, staring down at Corben as he brooded over his words. After a short moment, and in the same dismissive tone, he simply said, “I don’t think so,” and motioned to someone behind him.

A ripple of alarm coursed through Corben. He strained to see what was going on, but couldn’t. “What do you mean, you don’t think so?”

A man appeared from the direction of the car, carrying a small briefcase. He flicked it open and held it up, its lid facing Corben and masking its contents. The hakeem dipped into it. When his hands reappeared, they held a syringe and a small bottle. He gave the man behind Corben an indignant, indifferent nod. The pockmarked man reached down and grabbed Corben, pinning him in place while the hakeem plunged the needle into the small bottle and filled the syringe with its contents.

“I mean you’re going to tell me where the book is, my men will bring it to me, and then I’ll decide about whether or not to let you live.”

“There’s no need for this, I’m telling you—”

The pockmarked man hit Corben in the gut, punching the air out of him. He felt his arm being twisted into position, a tourniquet quickly applied below his shoulder, as the hakeem leaned in, squirting an air bubble out of the syringe.

“Where’s the book?”

Corben’s eyes locked onto the needle. “I told you I don’t have it.”

The hakeem injected Corben. Seconds later, the searing sensation rocketed through his veins, turning his blood into lava. Corben screamed out from the pain, the hakeem hovering over him, watching him with detached curiosity.

“Where’s the book?”

“I don’t have it,” Corben yelled back.

The hakeem pushed the plunger further in. “Where’s the book?” he rasped.

Corben’s skin felt as if it were frying from the inside. His eyes were blurry, drowning in tears. “In
Turkey
,” he blurted. “The book’s in
Turkey
.”

The hakeem pulled the needle out.

The burning receded, as if it were vaporizing itself out of Corben’s fingers and toes.

“Go on.”

Corben took a deep breath, his body still shivering from the drug’s effect.
“Farouk, the Iraqi dealer who came to see Evelyn.
He didn’t have it with him. He was just brokering it. And the dealer who has it is on his way to deliver his whole stash to another buyer.”

That last part ignited the hakeem’s interest visibly.
“Another buyer?
Who?”

“I don’t know.”

The hakeem held up the needle threateningly.

“I don’t know,” Corben insisted. “He wouldn’t tell me. I tried to counterbid, but the other buyer bid even higher.”

He hadn’t wanted the hakeem to know about the other buyer and cursed inwardly, noticing that the hakeem’s mind was clearly thinking the same thing he was, desperate to find out
who
the other interested party was.

“Where is this exchange taking place?”

“I don’t know yet,” Corben said grudgingly. “We’re tracking him. It looks like he’s spending the night in
Diyarbakir
. The trade’s going down tomorrow.” He scowled at his captor. “If you want that book, you’re going to have to work with me on this. I’m the only one who can get that information from our
intel
guys, and if I don’t show up at my desk in the morning, all bets are off.”

A faint smile played on the hakeem’s lips. “Oh, I’m sure you can get the information by phone. I can’t imagine CIA agents having to punch in every morning.
Just as long as you don’t forget to make your sign-in call.”

The hakeem was well-informed: He knew of the Agency’s routine requirement for field agents to call in at specified times every morning to confirm they were okay. Corben watched the hakeem as he thought things through for a moment, before adding, “What excuse were you planning to use to justify your little excursion to
Diyarbakir
?”

“I was going to be checking out someone Farouk called.
Without mentioning the book.”

The hakeem nodded. “I want that book,” he said firmly. “And even more than the book, I want to know who the other buyer is. I’ll get you to
Diyarbakir
without your people knowing about it. But in the meantime, I’d prefer to keep you close. If you need a way out later, you’ll be able to say we grabbed you from your apartment and forced you along.” He fixed Corben intently. “Take my men to wherever this exchange is taking place. Bring me back the book and the buyer, and we can talk about our future. Do we have a deal?”

Corben’s eyes hardened. He nodded. He didn’t have much choice. The man was, if anything, methodical.

There was one more issue to discuss. “What about the woman?
Evelyn Bishop?
You heard the ambassador’s announcement. It would strengthen my hand if I get her back at some point.”