Commandos (11 page)

An austere interior opened up in front of her. As she moved on through the corridor, she could hear faint sounds of music playing somewhere inside. She checked every room on her way, but the source of the sounds were nowhere to be found. The old-fashioned Earth household seemed to be luring her with the rhythm of old Italian songs. She stopped for a moment to try to hear the lyrics. It had been so long since she’d last had a chance to listen to music or to dance. The last time must have been when she’d still been a child. She listened, trying to recall her memories. Suddenly, the calm melody took up a harsh, modern tone that would wake a dead man. Jo shook off her nostalgia. She could now hear that the music was coming from somewhere in the back, from some sort of a basement it seemed. She looked around for a flight of stairs going down. Soon she found a curtain in a hallway concealing a passage leading downwards. She began climbing down cautiously, pressing her hands against her ears. The lead singer’s screams and screeching were a torture to her sense of aesthetics. She reached a door and gently pushed it open. She saw a woman lying on a sofa, listening to music strong enough to ensure she would have no awareness of the outside world whatsoever.

The woman’s eyes were closed. She only noticed Jo’s presence after Jo brutally switched off the stereo system by ripping the cable out of the wall. Here, in Old Cairo, everything still worked as it did a century before, even sound systems. The music stopped suddenly; the silence seemed almost deafening.

“
Che cazzo vuoi
! What the fuck do you want?” The woman jumped to her feet and stared furiously at Jo, who needed a moment to realise the woman had spoken in a foreign language.
It’s not that bad
, she thought. She still remembered Italian, Russian, even French, so she decided to respond in the same language.

“
Sono
Joanna Starska, Komandos,
cerco
Magdalena, hacker – I’m looking for Magdalena, a hacker.” She reached out her hand to introduce herself. The woman seemed intrigued, especially since a commando was not a common sight in these parts.

“
Nessuno sa dove e
– no one knows where she is.” She shook Jo’s hand and nodded at her. “Milena
Giovani, informatore
.”

Milena sat in a chair and put her feet on the table. Jo looked around. Her attention was drawn to a display of photos pinned up on the sordid wall.

“When was the last time you saw Magdalena?” she asked, still studying the photos.
The woman reached into her pocket and pulled out a joint. She lit it up, drawing on it, holding the smoke in her lungs for a long time, as if not planning to exhale at all. When she finally did, her eyes became strangely blurred, as there were tears in them, even though she was smiling. This was not the stage of uncontrollable laughter yet, but that was sure to come later. Milena glanced at Jo somewhat apprehensively. As a commando she greatly outranked a simple informant like herself, but she’d never liked being interrogated and she had a feeling this would not be much different.
“
Un anno fa
– a year ago – after that the authorities pressed her too much.” Milena drew on the joint again. She would have to make it through this conversation somehow. “She had to take off.”
Some used to say that drugs were once a tool used by capitalists trying to subjugate societies and make them even more dependent on their whims, sometimes through nothing less than destroying their brain cells. At one point they’d been intentionally introduced to schools to take hold of as many young people as possible, nowadays drugs were not much more than a means of entertainment and not an overly popular one for that matter.
“
Pressione?
Pressure?” Jo asked, slightly surprised.
“
Si
.” Milena smiled, sensing the woman was not too well informed. “She was working on some secret plan of getting a commando into the terrorists’ US computer network. I helped her some…”
Jo was growing increasingly interested in what the woman was saying.
“David…” It was not hard to guess.
“
Si
. She was going to disguise him as one of them. It worked and the authorities started pressing on her to do it again with other operatives, but she refused and came back here. That’s what they say anyway.” She approached the woman and held the joint out to her and Jo took it. As she drew on it, Jo felt all the physical pain she was still feeling after confronting the gang drift away. Her lungs protested in a violent cough. It must have been a while for her… maybe. She looked back at the photographs on the wall. Each of them was of Milena wearing shabby jeans and a fuck terrorists t-shirt.
In some, she was standing with her parents, in others with some men and yet in some… Jo drew closer, intrigued by one of the photos. Milena was embracing a woman of impressive size, probably weighing way over a hundred kilograms. Her short, dark hair was dyed red at the ends and she wore a large pair of black framed glasses. She was also wearing leggings and a stretched sweater, making her slightly too spaced-out for the scene. The two women seemed to be on very friendly terms and were clearly enjoying themselves. Jo then surveyed the photo’s background. There was a building right behind the two. As she looked closer she managed to decipher the name ‘Emir’. Probably a hotel of some sort… and located right here, in Old Cairo. She took one more hit of the joint and handed it back to Milena.
“How far away are the terrorists?”
“I’d say some 20 kilometres to the north, near old Giza at the foot of the pyramids, but they have plenty of men in the centre already.”
“Is Old Cairo in the hands of the terrorists?” Jo’s surprise was beginning to lose the battle with the drug. Her pain was all gone and with it her stress and worries started to become less and less significant.
“You know what Magdalena’s like.” Milena snorted. “Anything for a thrill.”
Jo thanked the woman for the information and left. Her next step was obvious. She needed to get to the centre, right into the area controlled by the terrorists, to the ‘Emir’ hotel. Provided it was still there.

* * * *

After landing in the mountains, Levi and the commandos covered the craft with camouflage netting. They drank insane amounts of water as the African heat was really getting to them. The temperature had already reached forty degrees centigrade.

The collected their bags, water and all necessary equipment and headed towards Freestation. The base loomed in the distance, surrounded by a tall, metal wall. They’d all memorised its layout. Here were two roads leading to the station – the main tarmac access road and a secondary, dusty one located on the side. They had chosen the latter and were now marching towards the base at a brisk, military pace.

“You have your electronic IDs I hope?” Levi made sure just in case. “They won’t let you in without them.”
They reached into their pockets and produced the badges. Then, without a word carried on down the road. At first, Levi’s greatest concern was David and how he must have felt having barely escaped from Earth only days before, now walking its sandy surface once again. Soon, however, his thoughts drifted towards Atlantis where the UN Defence Council was in session right now. He closed his eyes and walked on automatically, trying to get a telepathic glance of the base.
He saw thirty-three men entering the conference room, all wearing the same black trousers and black sweaters or jackets. Most of the men were over fifty, but some of Levi’s peers were also among them.
Representatives of exercised joint control managed to do so in concord, despite their varied origin. They were also the ones who had the small group of trackers at their disposal, their errand boys. They were the elite, granted the authority to decide the future of the planet, elected to save it from the terrorists, be it through direct engagement or indirectly, using the newest technologies some of them were working on. When everyone was seated, one of the councilmen stood up and said, “Tonight, terrorists are planning to launch an assault against our last remaining military base in Africa – Freestation.”
After these words everyone froze, listening attentively. Although they had long been aware of the situation, they still could not help wincing at the fact.
“We know this, thanks to a transmitter planted at the enemy’s US headquarters by one of our commandos.”
Everyone nodded. It had taken months of hard work to plant the transmitter and attune it to the data transmissions which would allow its connection to the fastest computer on Atlantis.
“Our programmers,” the man went on, “have managed to change the data generation codes and upload the altered data into their system. Should they not discover it, they will fire at themselves, at Old Cairo, an almost deserted city, long controlled by the enemy.”
His last words seemed to be news to most of the councilmen. It stirred faint smiles of hope on their faces. However, the speaker had not yet finished. Their struggle was about to become even harder. One of the senators rose and motioned the room to quieten down before he spoke.
“There are four of our commandos currently on Earth, in Old Cairo.” Evidently surprised, most of the gathered the international community over the military forces and politicians seemed not to have known of Levi’s unauthorised flight with his friends. “The attack must be postponed until they have safely returned!”
Everyone spoke at the same time, trying to take part in the suddenly erupting discussion. The chairman needed a few moments to restore order. After the voices calmed down, he expressed what he believed to be the opinion of a majority of the councilmen.
“Our action is of top priority. The commandos’ duty was to remain here and follow orders. Since they elected to act against our direct instructions they will suffer the full consequences of their actions! They will all be expelled from the force!”
The senator tried to retort, his voice becoming increasingly impulsive.
“Gentlemen, we departed from such fascist methods long ago! We teach our soldiers that a modern commando is more than just a killing machine, that he’s a human being and a humanitarian one for that matter, capable of following not just reason but also his heart. His knowledge is his only advantage over the enemy. We cannot lose our best soldiers!”
The room grew silent.
“If they manage to survive and return to the base,” the chairman finally spoke, “the council will decide their future.”
The session was coming to an end. The commodore felt unforgiving sunlight on his tired face again, as it wrinkled with experience. He was standing in front of the Freestation gate and his companions were looking at him, puzzled by his sudden exhaustion.

* * * *

The car’s GPS guided her towards the address she’d found on the city map. As she pulled over by hotel Emir, she saw not as much the building she remembered from the photo but rather its remains. She jumped out of the vehicle, ignoring the sounds of shouting and gunfire heard from some distance.

She gracefully jumped over the fence, trespassing on the building’s grounds. She was surprised to see that it now housed a regular dive, full of Arab men, cigarette smoke and dust. The air was so thick that she could barely see the men’s faces. To make it worse, she soon began to choke on the smoke.

As soon as they saw her, the men began to crowd around her. With every passing second they became more insolent, touching her and reaching out to tear off her clothes. Jo was overwhelmed, completely unable to fend them off. She realised that unless she found a way to resist, they would soon jump her. She knew with terrifying certainty that she was only a step away from being raped. As she felt panic taking hold of her she suddenly spotted Magdalena emerging from the back, not a moment too soon.

She freed Jo from the men’s aggressive advances and pulled her towards the back door leading to a small room. Jo needed a moment to calm down and breathe normally again. The woman offered her a glass of water.

She drank it down greedily before she lifted her eyes to her rescuer. There could be no doubt. It was Magdalena.
“Hello, Joanna.” Her voice seemed worried. “You’ve come all this way to be raped by a gang of horny Arabs?”
“No. I’ve come all this way to get my life back.”
Magdalena offered her a slice of bread.
“What are you doing here?”
Jo looked at her intensely. She took a bite with the sudden realisation of how long it had been since she had tasted real bread. She felt tempted to close her eyes and savour it for a moment, but there was no time. It was a truly lucky break to find Magdalena so fast. Now she had to convince her to upload her memories back to her brain.
“I’ve had my memory wiped and I want it back.”
Magdalena laughed. She reached for a beer bottle on the table and took a gulp with a long-time alcoholic’s proficiency.
“How much was erased?”
“About five years.”
“Meaning you don’t remember me.”
“Sorry…”
“Maybe that’s for the best.”
Jo got up and walked closer to Magdalena. Even though she was rather fit herself, she looked like a weakling compared to her.
“Please, help me…” She reached into her pocket and produced the disc which she handed to Magdalena. The woman examined it closely from every angle.
“Jo, there are things here you didn’t want to remember, something you could not live with. This is why you decided to erase it. Trust me, I know you. You’d never do something like this without a reason.”
“I know. I understand all that, but right now I feel completely empty inside, like a vegetable, breathing day in and day out, not knowing who I am, who the people around me are. That’s much worse than any bad memory I might have.”
“Try to understand, Jo. It’s much more complicated.”
“Please…”
Magdalena didn’t let her finish.
“You may be feeling a void inside now, but it’s a chance to build your life anew, to relearn yourself and the people who care for you. It’s a chance for a normal life. If I upload these memories you must have been desperate not to have, I will only make things worse for you. You’ve been hurt… many times.” Jo was alarmed. She pulled out a picture of herself with Alec, her only clue, and showed it to Magdalena.
“It’s about him isn’t it?”
“You have no idea how bad this is. It’s much more complicated than you think, trust me. It’s better that you don’t remember…”
“Listen…” Jo was beginning to lose her patience. “You speak as if you know everything about me.”
“I do know you quite well, but that’s not all. I erase my memory from time to time as well. Many of us do, even though it’s illegal. This war has been too long. Many people want to forget about the world they live in.”
“I’m sure this is what I want. I want my memory back. I want to know the truth. Maybe I didn’t think it would matter so much to me, but now I just want to be myself again. I want my identity.”
Magdalena looked at the disc in her hand. She knew Jo did not have the access codes; otherwise, she wouldn’t have travelled all this way just to get to her.
“All right.” She soothingly stroked Jo’s hair. “But remember…” She looked her straight in the eyes. “…You asked for it.”