Page 120 of Nobody's Hero
‘I would have killed the Australian anyway,’ Tas said. ‘The man never shut up. Kept going on about how wonderful Australia was, despite having lived in Poland for twenty years.’
Koenig grunted. Australians were weird like that. Spent their entire lives bragging about a country they seemed desperate to escape. He figured it was something to do with the water going down the toilet the wrong way.
‘But you’re right, I killed Konstantin and Cora because I didn’t want them to suffer. They didn’t know what it was we’d brought into the country. They thought it was a nerve agent. Only Miss Wexmore and I knew it was nuclear rods. By the time we got to San Diego, they’d had too much exposure to the rods.’
‘I’m sure they’ll write folk songs about you,’ Koenig said.
‘Theywillwrite folk songs about me. Half the world will feign sympathy, but the other half will call a public holiday. No more bully in the playground.’
Koenig didn’t respond. The biggest dog in the pound was never popular.
‘This is suicide,’ he said. Weak response.
‘I’m already dead.’
‘Not for you. I mean for whoever provided you with the spent fuel rods. That stuff has a signature. It’ll take our guys twelve hours to identify the nuclear plant they came from. We’ll be at war with that country twenty-four hours later. A month after that it’ll only exist on historical maps.’
‘Speak softly and carry a big stick?’
‘It’s not a joke, Jakob. The US willhaveto retaliate.’
‘Against whom?’ Tas said. ‘The theft of the fuel rods has been reported. The relevant authorities have been notified. In two hours, Reuters will have it. Soonallthe news agencies will have it. The accusations will fly, but ultimately everything will lead back to me. The bank accounts are all in my name.’
‘You had seed money, though,’ Koenig said. ‘You and Margaret needed a float to get this done. Someone funded this.’
‘Eighty million. Chump change for one of the world’s three thousand billionaires.’
‘It can still be traced.’
‘Itwillbe traced, Mr Koenig. All the way to an American citizen. Driven by greed, not ideology. He thought he was buying influence. A favourable ruling on some strip-mining laws. Over the next few months, the details of my transgressions will be leaked. Your government won’t be able to control the narrative. The world will believe the story we’ve put out. They’ll believe America was attacked by a lone wolf funded by one of their own. There’ll be no country to retaliate against.’
He threw back his head and howled.
Koenig recognised it for what it was. The final scream before you went over the top. An adrenaline-fuelled way of steadying the nerves.
It was time.
Tas was making his run at the Hoover Dam.
Chapter 129
Tas hauled in the anchor. He took one of the outboard engines out of neutral and into forwards. He rotated the tiller. The engine went from grumble to growl. Koenig felt the deck vibrate. Like he was sitting on a massage chair. He was too low to see anything other than the sky, but he knew the boat was sailing towards the dam. The clouds were moving. Koenig wondered if there would be any warning. He wasn’t expecting thekooouuuueeeeof a Second World War bomb. Those bombs had whistles attached to weaken enemy morale. As they dropped and accelerated towards the ground, the pitch changed due to the Doppler effect. Civilians on the ground could hear the bombs, but they didn’t know if that was their last moment on Earth. It was a way of terrorising the people you didn’t manage to hit. As if war weren’t cruel enough. The missiles the F-35s fired were state-of-the-art. They wouldn’t whistle. Koenig thought he’d just go from being alive to being dead. No big bang. No flash of light. From flesh and bone to red mist.
What a pedestrian way to die, he thought. Waiting. Helpless, like a rabbit in headlights. And there wasn’t anything he could do to change it. Nothing out of left field. No oil-filled Coca-Cola bottles. He was naked and he was immobile. He was weak with blood loss. He was unarmed and he was unlegged.
He’d hoped either he or Carlyle would shoot Tas from the water; in his wildest dreams he hadn’t thought Tas would drag him on board, unconscious. Strip him naked. Take his Fairbairn– Sykes. He should have concealed a weapon. The suture needle from the Gulfstream’s first aid box could have been hidden in his hair. It could have been pushed into his skin, all the way up to the needle’s eye. He’d seen prisoners do it with paperclips. Used them later to open their restraints.
He thought back to his training. Multiple instructors from multiple countries and multiple backgrounds – kind of like the convergent evolution of the chipped-stone blade Tas had been babbling about earlier – had told him that the only difference between an object and a weapon was intent. But Tas hadn’t even given him that chance. He kept a clean deck; there wasn’t anything to hand. Nothing he could use as a weapon. No anchors. No boat hooks. Not even rope. He pressed backwards against the cabin door, but it didn’t budge.
Tas had done his job well.
Unbidden and unwelcome, part of Reinhold Niebuhr’s Serenity Prayer popped into Koenig’s mind.Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.Alcoholics Anonymous used it. It seemed apt. It anchored AA’s core message: you cannot control everything. Andtryingto was the reason you were addicted to mood-altering substances. Which was ironic, as Koenig wouldn’t have minded a drink. A cold bottle of Sam Adams. Maybe two. He’d have to settle for the next best thing.
‘I’ll have that cigar now, Jakob,’ he said.
Maybe he could send up a smoke signal.
Tas didn’t respond. It seemed like he was concentrating. He was looking forwards with his hand resting lightly on the tiller. Nothing but small adjustments. Appeared they were headed in the right direction. Koenig thought Tas would want to attract the F-35s before the boat reached the canyon that led to the dam. Ecological-disaster-wise, it made sense to blow up his spent nuclear fuel rods where the water was deepest. Koenig figured Tas was five minutes away from going full throttle.