“You know, to see if I’d go along with you or turn you in. They like to play games like that.”
“Who? Obviously not the North Koreans.”
She shook her head. “Obviously. But I wasn’t lying when I told you that they never show themselves.”
As before, she spoke without any noticeable tells. Either she was the most convincing liar on earth, or she was actually telling the truth. He shook his head, trying to resist the seductive urge to believe her.
She’s trying to play me, trying to get me to reveal something. What?
Information.
There was something his captors wanted and if they wouldn’t tell him what, wouldn’t even ask the question, then it could only mean that they expected to learn it simply by observing him.
He had been wrong about this being a cat and mouse game. There was no cat. Just a maze through which he was being forced to run so that his captors could learn… what?
Information.
The only way to beat them, to figure out who they really were and what they really wanted, was to change the game. Instead of information, he would give them disinformation. He would have to become someone that he was not.
“Well, if you’re satisfied that I’m not a plant, maybe we can put our heads together and come up with a better plan for getting out of here.”
“Seriously? After what happened last night?”
“I’m not going to stay here,” he said, and that wasn’t a lie. “I will get out of here, or die trying.” He took a breath. “I have to get back to Jade.”
“Jade?”
“Jade Ihara. My girlfriend.”
Her response was almost too perfect. “We’ve all got people waiting for us back home.”
“Jade needs me. I need her. I’d go through hell itself to be with her again.” He tried to inject the appropriate amount of emotion into his voice so that they would believe this, the first of many lies he planned to tell. He was a little surprised by his own sincerity.
That had been two days ago, and he felt no closer to understanding what was really going on. He was beginning to question his underlying premise; had he given his enemy too much credit for cleverness?
I should have kept going that first night.
But no, he knew better. He was right about everything. It was all a game, a test. He had confused them at the plane. They had been waiting for him to try something… to reveal the extent of his knowledge and abilities. Would he try to fly the plane out? Call someone on the radio?
But why? That was the question that still nagged at him. Why? What did they want?
Information.
Okay, Professor. You’ve always prided yourself on being the smartest guy in the room. Figure this one out. Start back at the beginning.
The plane. Flight 815. Why had they taken the plane?
It occurred to him only then that he had lost track of that particular thread. He had only gotten mixed up in the investigation because Roche’s publisher had been on the missing plane. And it had only been after he had tipped his hand, in a very roundabout way, that Sousa had hit him with the tranquilizer and then arranged his abduction.
Hypothesis: Roche was close to exposing their operation. His obsession with Changelings had unwittingly uncovered something else. An ongoing intelligence operation. A highly placed mole in a government agency. A changeling of a different sort….
He shot to his feet, ran outside the little cabin, but stopped after only a few steps, looking around at the other huts, the handful of people roaming between the rows, idling away the days of their captivity.
Carrera’s voice reached out to him. “Pete? Everything okay?”
He stared at her for a moment, but then he started forward again without answering.
“Pete!” He heard her footsteps pounding the earth as she raced to catch up, then quieting as she fell in beside him. “Pete… Sorry, Professor, what’s up?” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Oh, my God, you’re going for it aren’t you?”
He continued to ignore her, striding purposefully past the huts, passing into the woods without hesitation. Carrera did not repeat the question, but maintained a curious silence as she kept pace with him.
He reached the runway a few minutes later but instead of following it to the idle plane as he had before, he crossed to the other side and kept going, pushing deep into the crowded evergreens. Though he tried not to show it, he was wary now. He was being unpredictable — that was his intent at least — and the response to his actions would be equally hard to anticipate. They might continue watching as they had before, or they might send out the goon squad and zap him into submission again. His gut told him they were more interested in seeing what he would do, but he was going to be ready if and when the guys with tasers showed up again.
Halfway down the far side of a wooded hill, the forest opened up to reveal more signs of human habitation — not an ad hoc containment area like the camp where he had been held, but an actual neighborhood with houses and paved streets that branched and looped, and sometimes dead-ended in cul de sacs. It looked exactly like a suburban housing development, with at least two hundred separate homes, perhaps more. There were small parks, a few large buildings that might have been auditoriums or churches, though strangely, there were no cars on the streets, and no roads leading away from the community. Like the camp of huts, the neighborhood was an island in the middle of a sea of trees.
He risked a glance over at Carrera and found her staring, not at the suburb, but at him. He pointed down the hill. “You don’t look very surprised to see that?”
She said nothing.
“Should I keep going?” he asked.
She spread her hands in a noncommittal gesture. “You seem to have it all figured out.”
“Vinnytsia.”
Her brow furrowed in confusion.
“Early in the Cold War, the Soviets built a mock American town in Vinnytsia, Ukraine to train deep cover agents in how to behave like Americans. They spoke only English — American dialect. Drove American cars, ate American food, listened to American music and read American magazines. All so that their sleeper agents would be able to blend in seamlessly with the American population.”
“You think the Soviets are behind all this?”
“Why don’t you tell me who’s behind it? You took that plane. God only knows how many other people you’ve taken over the years. Brought them here to populate this little farce so that your agents would be able to insert themselves into the real world. Who will I find down there? The real Jeanne Carrera? Maybe the people who were really on that plane?”
“You think I’m—”
“Don’t bother denying it. We’re way past that. Gerald Roche got too close with his Changeling conspiracy. If enough people believed him, started questioning whether their elected leaders had been replaced by doubles, there was a chance — remote, but there all the same — that something would come out, and then the dominoes would start to fall.
“I’ll admit. I’m still not clear on why you took that plane. If all you wanted was to shut Roche up, it seems like there were easier ways to accomplish that with less risk and a lot less collateral damage. Did you just need live bodies? Shanghaied extras to make the training scenario more believable? Or is there something else you needed? Someone else on that plane? Something you needed Parrott to tell you?”
He took her silence for a tacit admission of guilt. “So, let’s see if I’ve got this right. You’ve been doubling people, probably for a while now. You start with someone who’s a close physical match, do the rest with stage make-up. Mission Impossible stuff. Maybe even cosmetic surgery if there’s time for it. But looks aren’t everything. Your imposter wouldn’t last ten seconds in a conversation with someone the subject actually know — close friends, relatives, lovers. You could learn a lot about someone from discreet surveillance, but what you really need is an immersive environment. A place to both train your agents and observe your subjects. Your own little Vinnytsia.