"Hey, Lyse."
The smallest member of the shore party looked up, her grin a white crescent in an otherwise darkened face. "Nick. Son of a gun, you're still alive."
Eschewing what he expected to be the protocol of clandestine meetings, Lysette Lyon threw her arms around him. Somewhere behind him, he thought he heard Irene clearing her throat.
"You sound surprised."
She withdrew after a moment. "Pleasantly so. We've been monitoring all kinds of radio traffic. You've definitely stirred up a hornet's nest or two."
"I was only aware of one. Germans."
"The Russians are talking about you too, both military and something else. A code we haven't been able to break yet. Face it; everyone knows you're here. The sooner we get out of here, the better." She gazed past Kismet at Irene and her father as they moved to join the reunion. "I see you got what you came for."
"Not quite. But I'll have the Golden Fleece in two days. What I need right now is for you to get them—" He jerked a thumb casually in the direction of his companions, speaking softly so that they would not overhear—"somewhere out of the way until I can get it."
"What's going on, Nick?" Irene touched him on the shoulder as she came to a standstill beside him. Kismet couldn't tell if she was harboring jealousy toward Lyse's unexpected presence or merely curious.
"I'm entrusting you and your father into the care of my friend Lyse. She works for the-"
Lyse quickly cut him off. "Ah-ah, Nick." She then addressed Irene. "We're just some concerned folks, looking out for our fellow citizens abroad."
"Right. Anyway Irene, I want you and your father to stay with Lyse while I go after the Fleece."
"My father should go with you," Irene agreed, addressing Lyse. "He's suffering from fatigue, and God only knows what else those bastards did to him. Is one of you a medic?"
"I'll get him some medical attention," promised Lyse.
Irene nodded. "However, Nick, I am staying with you."
"Absolutely not."
"Think about it. Everyone knows we're together. You said you were afraid that someone in the village might be an informant. You're bound to raise suspicions if you show up without me."
"She makes a valid point," Lyse intoned.
"Stay out of this." He turned to Irene, but she was already forestalling him. "Face it, Nick. As long as we're together, no one will be any wiser."
His retort fell silent. He knew that her logic was sound, yet the thought of exposing her to further risk filled him with dread. "All right," he relented. "It will only be for a couple days. Lyse, we'll be back here in exactly forty-eight hours. If all goes as planned, we'll have the Golden Fleece. Then you can get us all out of here."
"I think it would probably be better for you to plan on exfiltrating through normal channels," Lyse opined. "You've got the documentation. If you two vanished from here then popped up back in the States, people would notice and it might cause an embarrassing situation."
"I would personally find it a lot more embarrassing if I got killed trying to smuggle the Fleece across the border."
"I thought you were in the business of protecting sovereign claims to these relics?"
Her question was rhetorical, but still gave him a pang. It was true; he was doing the very thing he sought to prevent as part of the UN Global Heritage Commission. It had been easy enough to justify, at least to his own conscience; the Fleece wasn't simply a valuable relic, it was potentially very dangerous. It might also be just the thing he needed to gain the upper hand on the Prometheus group.
Lyse did not wait for him to answer. "All I'm saying is you should plan on leaving through the front door, whether or not you find the Fleece."
"I'll find it."
"Fine. When you do, we'll go from there. Deal?"
Kismet narrowed his eyes, suddenly suspicious. "You're up to something, Lyse. I can tell."
She raised her hands in a gesture of innocence. "Moi?"
Kismet nodded, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Lyse didn't disappoint.
"Well, there is one thing, but it's nothing you're not already aware of."
"Go on."
"It's just that things are heating up here, Nick. Even you'd agree that you're working under somewhat dangerous conditions."
"I've had a busy couple of days," he said equivocally.
"It might be a good idea for you to tell me what you did with the information from the statue, right now. If anything were to happen to you, that data might be lost forever."
Although he had been expecting the request, it triggered an unexpected realization that caught him by surprise. "I don't believe it," he whispered hoarsely, more to himself than to the CIA operative. "You're giving up on me."
"Nick, please. We need that information. There is a new kind of arms race heating up, and we need to know what the other side is up to."
Kismet barely heard her. "You don't think I'll find it," he accused, then amended: "Your people — CIA, or whoever you work for — they don't believe me. You're just humoring me until you get the information. Then what? Leave me out here on my own? Or just turn me over to the Russians and let them quietly dispose of me?"
Lyse started to protest, but closed her mouth without speaking. She glanced at Irene and her father who looked on, uncomprehending, then looked back at her two accomplices who waited apprehensively by the raft. "Walk with me."
They stepped a few paces away from their companions. Lyse then moved close to Kismet and began speaking in an urgent whisper that was barely audible over the lapping of the sea. "Damn it Nick, this has gone far enough. I've jumped through too many hoops for you. What you're doing by withholding that information is treason."
"Treason," he echoed, loud enough for the others to hear. "You don't get it, do you? If you let Grimes get the Golden Fleece by not helping me, you're the one who will have sold out our country."
"You said it yourself. The Fleece is a fairy tale."
"Grimes doesn't think so."
Lyse shook her head and rubbed her eyes, like a weary parent unable to reason with a wayward son. "We think this whole affair with the Golden Fleece is a smokescreen designed to distract attention from the real reasons Grimes has defected. He probably wanted your help to lend more authenticity to the illusion."
"Bullshit."
She ignored him. "Grimes doesn't care about fairy tales. He's pissed off at the Pentagon for giving him the boot, not to mention for backing down from Iran and North Korea…Hell, he‘d like to pave all of Asia. He hates the President with a passion. And it turns out he's been getting chummy with a German defense contractor, who also happens to be a leading figure in their Nationalist Party. This is all about money and revenge, Nick."
"Ans I'm just a pawn in some political game?" Kismet accused. "His pawn and yours. Believe it or not, that doesn't surprise me. What I don't get is why you've gone along with me so far. Why not just arrest me for withholding the information you need? It would have been a lot easier."
"No kidding. If you had any idea how much the President has authorized for this little jaunt of ours — well let's just say that if it ever got out, he could kiss his Presidential library good-bye."
"Then I repeat: Why go along with it until now?"
"Because you still have something we need," she explained, her voice growing taut, as if tiring of the argument. "And you have to give it to me now."
"You would go to all this trouble just to get the information on that memory card?" Kismet shook his head. "I find that hard to believe."
"You shouldn't. People died to get that information out of Germany. You said you thought it was research for some kind of bomb, right? Well it is. It's a formula for a super EMP bomb. I don't really understand the details, but I know that whoever can make a weapon like that could rule the whole planet. We, meaning everyone from the President down to me, think that getting it before the Germans, or anyone else, is worth any expense or risk."