Game Changer (30 page)

46

Daniel Eisen and Yosef Mizrahi
managed to corral the twenty members of the
Danbury Evangelical Fellowship inside the mess hall well before dusk,
confiscating all c
ell phones and other electronic devices.

The structure had a rustic, unfinished appearance, but it was spacious
and vaulted
—
plenty large enough
to house groups many times this size
—
with a steeply pitched roof and three sets of handsome wooden beams
forming giant As inside.
 

The church group put up no resistance, as expected. Given they were all
unarmed inside a building with only one entrance and up against two men clearly
comfortable with automatic weapons, Eisen would have been surprised if a group
of twenty Navy SEALS would have done anything more than surrender.

He and Mizrahi demanded silence from their prisoners. When a few failed
to get the message they underscored their seriousness by shooting off a few rounds
from a Maxim 9
—
the first semiautomatic
handgun with a built-in silencer
—
inches
from their heads.

“Anyone else want to speak?” barked Eisen. “Because our next shots won’t
miss. Nod if I’ve made myself clear on this.”

Twenty heads bobbed up and down in unison, and the room fell silent, other
than a few sobs and the sound of panicked breathing.

Mizrahi proceeded to link each of the twenty prisoners together in a
loose chain of over a hundred zip-ties, providing a few feet of slack between
each of them to allow for movement, but no chance for escape. Twenty people
linked together was such an unwieldy jumble of humanity that as long as they
were kept away from knives and other sharp objects they could use to free
themselves they barely needed watching.

Finally, the two men took turns raiding
the bunk beds in surrounding cabins for mattresses, hauling twenty into the
mess hall—although calling them mattresses was being generous. Thin plastic cushions
would be a better term. They tiled one corner of the mess hall with the light
blue pads, each slightly longer and wider than a grown man.

Sleeping would be awkward, but
there was enough play between each person that they should be able to manage it—low
quality though it might be.
 

When these preliminaries had been
attended to, Eisen and Mizrahi alerted Kovonov, who had waited in the Land
Rover, working on his laptop supercomputer. Kovonov calmly sealed this
revolutionary device, invented by a team at Mossad and unavailable outside of
the corridors of power in Israel, inside a cushioned clamshell case and strode
into the mess hall like the CEO of a top technology company taking the stage
for a product launch.

He stood silently before the prisoners
for several minutes, projecting command and building their anticipation.
Finally, he walked in front of one outgrowth of this twenty-celled organism, a
young, frightened woman wearing jeans and a yellow T-shirt.

“What’s your name?” he said softly,
knowing everyone would strain to hear.

“I’m Jeanine,” she croaked out.
“Jeanine Farrar Bubick.”

Every man and woman in the room was
transfixed by the scene playing out before them.

“Are you scared, Jeanine?”

She nodded, and several tears
escaped the corners of her eyes.

“Don’t be,” said Kovonov, his voice
now louder and more definitive. “I can’t tell you details of what’s going on
here, but you have nothing to worry about. I promise you. Who is in charge
here, Jeanine?”

She looked uncertain. “Ah . . . you
are.”

Kovonov laughed. “I should have
seen that coming,” he said. “Good answer. You’re right, of course. But I mean,
who’s in charge of your group here?”

“I guess it’s Pastor Lewan,” she
replied. “Rich Lewan.”

“Which one of you is the pastor?”
said Kovonov calmly while his two associates stood guard near the door, not
even bothering to raise their weapons at this point.

A man in his late forties with
thinning hair and a kind face raised his hand. “I’m Lewan,” he said softly.

“Hello, Pastor,” said Kovonov,
retreating from the woman named Jeanine and locking his eyes on the group’s
leader . “Sorry to interrupt your retreat, but I’m afraid it had to be done. Let
me explain what’s going to happen here. In a moment I’m going to give each one
of you a very small injection. A pinprick really. I know this sounds scary, especially
since I won’t be telling you what it is. But I can assure you it’s totally
harmless. You have more of a chance of getting sick from a vaccination.”

From the fearful expressions around
the room, this assurance was not effective.

“After that, we’ll be administering
questionnaires to each of you, one by one, in the nearest cabin. We’ll cut you
loose one at a time, and I’ll have you wear a skull cap I’ve developed, with
leads that will rest on your skull and forehead. Again, this is harmless. It’s
basically a lie detector. Not perfect, but better than the current state of the
art.”

Kovonov smiled. “Not that I’m
worried. You really won’t have any reason to lie,
since we’ll be asking routine questions. No secrets or incriminating
information. Nothing more than details of your backgrounds and your opinions on
a range of issues.

“Then we’ll reintegrate you back into the chain,” he continued. “While
this is going on and after, we want you to be as comfortable and happy as
possible. I understand these aren’t the best circumstances, but I know if
anyone can make the best out of them, this group can. So we’re going to kill
all Internet signals and give you back your phones, Kindles, and other
electronic devices. As well as your bibles and any other physical books you
might have brought.

“Then we’re going to sit tight for two days, during which time we hope
you can relax and enjoy yourselves as much as circumstances will allow. We’ll
cut you lose and reinsert you periodically as your need for bathroom breaks
arise. But you’ll be left alone as much as possible. We’ve brought plenty of
very good food
—
so no one has to
be on cooking duty. I’m sure it’s better than what you’ve been eating.

“Finally, at the end of this period, we’ll question each of you again.
Same skull cap, same questions. Cooperate and we’ll be on our way. Don’t
cooperate and we won’t hesitate to kill you all. Sorry to have to be so blunt.
I know you are all good people, but the stakes are high here, and we’re fully
prepared to do what we have to do.”

Pastor Lewan’s face maintained a remarkable serenity. “We’re a
peace-loving group,” he said evenly. “And since you’ve given us no choice, I
can assure you that we’ll all cooperate.” He shook his head sadly. “But it’s
not too late to change your ways. Leave now and we’ll forget this ever
happened. But continue on this path, and you’ll have to answer to a higher
power than just us.”

Kovonov smiled wearily. “Maybe so,” he replied. “But I’m prepared to
cross that bridge when I get to it.”

47

The next day, Mizrahi relieved Eisen and assumed his
colleague’s post near the mess hall door. It wasn’t exactly guard duty, since
the door was chained and padlocked, and they had set an AI to alert them if the
surveillance videos of the inside showed anything potentially worrisome. But
Eisen had thought it prudent to have one of them close enough to act in
seconds, if necessary, if an escape plan did suddenly materialize.

Eisen found Kovonov sitting in front of the farthest
cabin from the prisoners, on one of the many wooden folding chairs the church
group had brought with them. He was drinking a glass of wine and watching a red
squirrel cling to a nearby tree as if defying gravity.

Eisen unfolded one of the chairs leaning against the
cabin steps and sat facing Kovonov, while his boss poured him a goblet of his
own.

They sipped wine and discussed strategy and the latest
intelligence gleaned from their searches of US databases, and finally got
around to the virus Kovonov had obtained.

“I have to ask,” said Eisen, “how did you manage it? How
did you get Dr. Acosta to engineer the virus for you? I know you’re the master
of neurotech, but even so, it doesn’t seem possible.”
 

Kovonov considered how much he should say. Eisen was
the only high-level player on his new team whose loyalty hadn’t been elevated using
his neurotech advances, who hadn’t been turned into the ultimate fawning sycophant.
Kovonov had wanted to leave him untouched, to see what level of loyalty he could
command without manipulation.

And Eisen had
earned
special treatment. The man had originally come to
him
, long trying to convince him to go rogue, to ignore Wortzman
and Kish when they refused to unleash every tool at their disposal to defeat their
enemies.

At the time Kovonov had been weak. Even though he shared
Eisen’s views, he had been too loyal to his superiors, too afraid to take steps
he knew in his heart were required. Ironically, before his weakness had
suddenly changed to strength, his fear to courage,
he
had refused
Eisen’s
entreaties.

Now he had concerns that
Eisen’s
resolve was weakening. He feared that his most senior lieutenant might now be unwilling
to take the steps that Kovonov had identified as being vital to a full victory.

The evangelicals talked about being reborn, and Kovonov had
personal experience in this regard. But he had not been born again into the
service of Jesus Christ. He had been born again into strength and pragmatism.

He knew that Mossad agents back in Tel Aviv thought he had
gone mad. And he couldn’t deny that this designation might be technically
accurate. But so what? The fear and empathy embedded in “normal” human wiring
were nothing more than shackles, preventing men from reaching their potential,
from doing what needed to be done.

But now he was free, his regulator blasted open.

He wasn’t delusional, he knew that. He wasn’t even paranoid,
since the threats he was now addressing were all too real. So let those with
lack of vision,
weaklings
, think he
was crazy. He preferred other terms. Superior. Revolutionary.
Evolutionary
.

 
So should he
tell his secrets to Eisen? To a man who had been ahead of this curve, at least
at one time.

Why not? he decided finally. He had perfected Matrix
Learning, cracked the brain’s code, and developed the ultimate neurotech
toolbox. So Eisen was well aware of his genius. But he was also justifiably
proud of the brilliant and creative way he was able to deploy these new tools
to achieve his ends. So why not gloat? Why not put his full superiority on
display?

“All right, Daniel, I’ll tell you,” said Kovonov
finally. “But don’t repeat this to anyone else.” The others didn’t know they
had been manipulated, and he didn’t want them to have reason to suspect they
might have been.

“Of course.”

Kovonov had strengthened the loyalty of his followers
back in Switzerland before they had left Israel, using the original technique,
under the guise of Matrix Learning. But he had only tested his new, more
portable approach on a small handful of subjects: two men in Switzerland, Yosef
Mizrahi, Dr. Carmilla Acosta, and Kevin Quinn.

When Quinn had escaped from the mansion in Princeton,
Kovonov had been eager to capture him. Not only to extract a painful revenge on
the man responsible for saving a monster from a well-earned death, but to
gather the kind of data the living weren’t quite ready to provide. But as disappointed
as he was that Quinn had managed to dodge his experiments, Carmilla Acosta was
proving to be quite a valuable case study in her own right.

 
“Dr. Acosta was
one of the few researchers who had the bandwidth and expertise to be able to do
what I needed,” began Kovonov. “Since I’ve been flash-educated with a PhD level
of genetic engineering, I knew it was possible, but it would take someone truly
gifted in the field. Since Carmilla had also developed a revolutionary DNA
synthesis technology, and was at least marginally screwable, she was the
obvious choice.”

Kovonov was pleased by Eisen’s attentiveness and eager
expression. The man seemed well aware he was getting rare insight into the thought
processes of a true virtuoso.

“Once the smart dust was in place three weeks ago,” he
continued, “I began. First, I implanted a set of strong false memories in her
mind. Memories of knowing me for almost two years.
 
Memories of my generosity, good humor, and how
she had sought me out, rather than the other way around.”

Kovonov paused to watch the red squirrel he had
spotted rush down the tree trunk and scurry off into the undergrowth. “Turns
out the mind has a sort of filing system,” he continued. “A specific person becomes
associated with a specific neuron, or neurons, which fire whenever this person
is considered. Think of these as neuronal addresses. I found the Dmitri Kovonov
address in Carmilla’s brain and linked any firing at this location to the reward
centers of her brain. In a nutshell, I caused her to become powerfully addicted
to me.

“I also implanted memories of times we were together
that never happened. Of romantic walks on the beach. Of me engaged in selfless
sex, relentlessly committed to satisfying her needs before my own. Memories tied
into the same regions of her brain that are triggered when she has a powerful
orgasm.

“At the same time I mimicked the brain structure of
those in romantic love. A time when passion becomes an irresistible force, and lovers
are willing to walk off a cliff for the objects of their obsession, can’t stop
thinking of them.”

“Impressive,” whispered Eisen, only now getting a
sense of what was truly possible.

“Once you’ve cracked the brain’s code, human beings
are nothing more than puppets. After one session of manipulation she was convinced
she had known me for years and was in love with me to the point of obsession.
The few times I did screw her during the past three weeks, for my own enjoyment
and to add reinforcement to the virtual memories, I upped her sex drive to
ridiculous, insatiable levels.”

“The dream of mankind throughout the ages,” said Eisen
wryly.

“You have
no
idea,” said Kovonov, looking shell-shocked just from the memory. “Not
recommended for anyone with a heart condition.”

Eisen grinned. “Okay, so you make her obsessed with
you,” he said, getting back on track. “She worships you. But what about the
virus?”
 

“I implanted memories of multiple conversations we had
over the months about a sister of mine who doesn’t exist. A sister suffering
from ever-worsening, inoperable epileptic seizures. I had Carmilla remember
that she had come up with an idea that might help this poor girl. That she
could construct a virus capable of seeking out and interacting with exquisitely
specific neurons and brain regions, the epicenters of the seizures.”

A broad, self-satisfied smile crossed Dmitri Kovonov’s
face. “She wasn’t suspicious of my motives because she remembered it being
her
idea, that she suggested to
me
. Then I provided an electronic file
with the exact specifications I wanted to achieve, and had her remember she had
gotten this after consultation with my sister’s physician.”

Eisen shook his head. “Truly brilliant, Dmitri. Seems
I haven’t fully appreciated the potential of the technology.”
 

“The obsession she had for me drove her harder to
perfect the virus than any other motivation ever could. She told me she worked
on it around the clock, abandoning almost everything else.”

“Well done,” said Eisen.

Kovonov nodded. He took a sip of wine and reflected on
where things stood. Dr. Carmilla Acosta had done well. But assuming the virus
performed as he expected, he had to decide how to clean up after himself. He
could have her killed, but then there would be an investigation. She was
too high profile, with a big discovery about
to be released. Why take any chances she left something behind that led to him?
Something he had missed.

The simplest solution was to erase all of her memories of him, the ones
he had implanted and the ones that had been formed the old-fashioned way. But
as he considered this further, inspiration struck.

Because there was another option he could try first. One that had great
appeal to him.

One that would allow him to discover just how powerful his tampering had
really been.