Weaponized (2 page)

N
eil O’Donnell sits at his desk and pours himself a Jack and ginger, raises his glass to a framed shot of Lech Walesa, and then goes a few inches to the right and stops at the one of Stalin. Neil’s not a Communist, but he loves the way Stalin’s photo kills conversation the minute someone walks into his apartment.

His desk is his mind made manifest. Envelopes opened but their contents never read. Magazine back issues featuring his most searing articles. A boneyard of half-smoked cigarettes. He can’t concentrate long enough to finish a whole one.

He turns around and rests the drink on his treadmill, a relic of a valiant attempt at clean living, then gets up to fetch his computer from the bedroom.

Tangled in electric-blue sheets, bathed in the fluorescent glow of his fish tank—which is completely devoid of aquatic life and consists solely of cacti, coral, and sunken treasure—is his intern, Katie, a nineteen-year-old journalism student at the New School. Neil unplugs his laptop from the outlet on his side of the bed, and Katie stirs.

“When are you going to get some new fish?”

“Never,” he says.

“Why?”

“The fish were a test.”

“What kind of test?”

“Doesn’t matter. I failed it.” He runs his hand through her raven hair. “Go back to sleep.”

Neil has a predilection for—actually, correct that, an addiction to—fucking his interns. He looks good for his age: thick, curly hair; skinny body in a uniform of ripped jeans and T-shirts preaching irony. But his fuckability bona fides come courtesy of being a bit of a rock-and-roll cyber-muckraker. And that’s what makes the leftist undergrads look at him like some kind of sexual Ellis Island. You’ve got to fuck Neil O’Donnell when you’re in New York if you want to be taken seriously at the next WTO protest.

Truth is, politically, Neil would label himself a Zen anarchist. In fact, he’d tell the Progressives after a few whiskeys that people had to worry about the health of the Left when its most prominent mouthpieces were an ex-rightist formerly married to a gay oil tycoon, and a socialist billionaire who’d sunk the British pound.

Neil started out as a freelance political journalist, contributing pieces to the likes of
Mother Jones,
the
New Republic, Rolling Stone,
and
Vanity Fair.
But he got sick of the lag time between his articles and the events of the real world, got sick of his big stories becoming sad commentary instead of
news
. He wanted his stories delivered moment to moment, fresh and uncut. So he became one of the first big-league bloggers, posting news in real time, making it a living, palpable thing. He had gotten his undergraduate degree at MIT, and no, he had to keep telling the interns, he didn’t study with Chomsky. What he studied was international relations and computer science. So setting up the site and networking and server was no problem. And besides, he had all-around tech genius Kyle West, his college buddy, helping him out free of charge.

Neil bankrolled the site out of his own pocket and luckily it moved into the black before he went red—but, man, was it was close. Now he’s got on-site advertisers; he’s got
sponsorship,
as he puts it. He’s got a whole army of freelancers who sit in their apartments all day waiting for something to happen so they can upload it instantly. He has his own media fiefdom, which he runs out of his two-bedroom in Greenwich Village while frequently naked and even more frequently drunk.

He lights a cigarette, watches the smoke coil around the bare bulb in his ceiling fixture, hears the steel-cello chirp of a connected call, and knows exactly who it is.

“How’s my favorite exile?” Neil says when he sees Kyle’s face in the corner of his screen. “Today the day you’re gonna tell me where you are?”

Kyle’s voice is low, suffused with fatigue. “Safer you don’t know.”

Neil puts out the cigarette. “I can’t help you if I don’t know.”

“You
can’t
help me. Not only can’t you…you
shouldn’t
.” Kyle exhales hard. “See the news today?”

“Yeah.” Neil nods. “Waited to hear from you. Wanted to give you some breathing room.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me this was coming?”

“I didn’t know.”

“Bullshit,” Kyle says. “You’re the king of alternative media.”

“When it comes to you, no one tells me shit. Look at my site…one of my freelancers posted the article. When it comes to you, man, I’m in the dark. They’re afraid I might leak it back to you. I’m—you’ll love the irony of this one—considered a security risk.”

This has been a sore spot in Kyle and Neil’s friendship for the past year. Ever since Kyle became permanent front-page news, Neil’s been forced to sit on the sidelines, to farm the story out to freelancers. Too many people know about their shared history; know they were college roommates, know they remained best friends, know Kyle put up some capital to help Neil start his site.

And this kills Neil,
kills him,
because he’d love nothing more than to be out there eviscerating Chandler in print. Taking down guys like Chandler is the reason he got into the news business.

Kyle snaps his fingers, nothing rhythmic, a nervous tic. “What do you think?”

“Of what?”

“Of what to do. Can we do any damage control?”

“You’re already damaged.”

“Why are you talking to me like this?”

“Like what?”

“Like you don’t care.”

“’Cause I’m trying to hold back how much I do care. Because you’re not the only one with insomnia…you’re not the only one in exile.”

“Why are you upset? I’m the one who just got creamed.”

“I haven’t seen my best friend in a year. I don’t know where you are…”

Kyle tries to focus Neil. “My question was, what do I do now?”

“Same thing I told you on day one. You never should have gone to work for Chandler. Guy’s most printable nickname is the Prince of Darkness.” Neil picks up the half-smoked cigarette and relights it. “Remember the article I posted. The one about how on the eve of the Baghdad invasion Saddam sent out an urgent telegram. He was willing to make oil concessions, to let the UN in and inspect? He capitulated to all of our demands. And who does Saddam send this telegram to? Not Cheney…not W. …not Rummy—he sent it to Chandler. He
knew
Chandler was the one with the power to stop the war. And you went and fucking worked for him.”

“Where is this getting us?”

“Nowhere. This is me venting my frustration with you.”

“I can’t believe the legs this story has…”

“And you
really
shouldn’t have run.”

“What do you mean? I’m named in suits by Judicial Watch, Truth and Justice Watch, the ACLU…top of that, I was handed subpoenas from two different Senate subcommittees. I’m facing, at minimum, two years of jail time for contempt of Congress. I’ve been accused of helping to transform America into a fascist state. What did you want me to do? Sit on the couch and wait it out?”

“It made you look guilty, running.”

“I should have stayed and fought?”

“If you didn’t do anything.”

“I
didn’t.
That’s why I ran.”

“Right…”

“I’ve told you a thousand times, I did my
job.
That is all. I worked on weapons proliferation.”

“Then come home, man. Come home. You
are
missed.”

“I can’t.”

“You can. Cut a deal with the government.”

“They’re not offering.”

“Make
them
an offer.”

“Stop acting like this is some fucking choice I have.”

“You need to make a deal with someone. It’s your only option.”

“It’s not.”

“Kyle…you worked in DC. You know this. Somewhere, someone wants to cut a deal.”

“Chandler is the government.”

“Then why is he on TV being grilled?”

“Public relations. Why do you think he agreed to show up? Does he look worried to you? This is a dog-and-pony show. They
asked him
to show up. He gave them his permission to do this to hide the really big issues.”

“Make a deal.”

Kyle exhales.

“I know that sound,” Neil says. “Means you think, somehow, you give it another year, this shit’s gonna blow over. Listen to me. Chandler put a live tap on every telecom circuit…and you’ve been accused of building the network to slice through everything his taps sucked up. You think this is blowing over? Even England, CCTV capital of the world, thought a live tap was nuts. They backed off. This makes Bush’s FISA scandal look merely indecent. Reach out. Make a deal. Or don’t reach out and make a deal. Just come home.”

“Minute I get off the plane in the States, they’ll throw the cuffs on me. I’m obstructing justice with my absence.”

“And I’ll be there for you, with a lawyer, and then I’ll run an exclusive.”

“No way, man…I’m not some martyr.”

“Why’d you do it in the first place?”

“What?”

“Go work for Chandler. Why? You had to know how it was gonna go down; everyone around him has a habit of self-immolating.”

“I thought I could make a difference…maybe.”

“Right. Change-the-system-from-the-inside kinda thing, am I right?”

“Right.”

“But at what cost?”

“Right,” Kyle says.

Then the call goes dead.

K
yle signs off Skype, closes the window with Chandler’s testimony, logs onto one of Neil’s feeder publications, and is greeted by a color photograph of himself wearing a tuxedo that could charitably be called ostentatious. He remembers when the photo was snapped. Chandler was in the habit of holding seasonal banquets in his own honor. This particular fete celebrated his philanthropic endeavors, and Kyle was there to introduce several disadvantaged teenagers who would be summer interns at one of Chandler’s sixteen companies.

Kyle looks at himself in the tux, clean-shaven, hair sculpted, genuine grin, and he shudders at what he must look like to most people these days. Above the picture, the headline shouts:

“From Revolutionary Son to Corporate Fascist: Kyle West in His Own Words.”

Kyle sees all the trigger words below: born in Palestinian training camp…grew up in East Berlin under Stasi protection.

The feeling starts again. The heart squeeze, the arterial tightness, the cold sweat.

He slides open the balcony door and gets, instead of air, a gut punch of heat and haze.

The sky is pregnant with rain, ready to pop. The sun presses down like an anvil. Two bougainvillea plants rest on the balcony, one on either side, dying. Their plumed purple faces have turned pale.

A branch of heat lightning bisects a cloud.

April certainly is the cruelest month.

Kyle rests his hands on the metal railing and then withdraws them in shock. He can’t believe the surface has soaked up so much heat this early in the morning.

He peers over the rail at the Mekong River. The lifeblood of the Khmer people. The water is a shade of rusted brass stained by silt carried in from Laos. Houseboats bob along, ramshackle materials, collage art as shelter. Gnarled doors, beach towels as curtains, rusted roofs, NGO-donated tarps, bullet-riddled plaster walls, torn screens, empty oil drums for furniture.

Several houseboats have been pushed together to form a floating village. The suburbs of the postapocalypse, a hellish atoll.

His skin starts to burn.

A naked child stands on a jagged metal plank jutting off the side of a houseboat and pisses into the river. His mother—a land-mine victim, Kyle assumes; she’s missing her right arm and foot—pulls the laundry off a clothesline running between her boat and another. The father dumps their waste into a welcoming wave.

Fishermen are caught in the Mekong’s version of morning gridlock. Some have floated farther from the dock than others, and Kyle can make out only the shadows of their straw hats, dozens of Tom Sawyers steering splintered wooden boats. Fishing as a family business. Fathers steer, sons paddle, wives and daughters unfurl nets.

He feels the first buds of cold rise on his skin, signaling a deeper burn.

He puts on his sunglasses and tries to find a thought to hold on to, to ride out. His thoughts go in circles now. Extended exile opens the door to that habit. Actually, it opens the door to
two
habits: endless reflection and alcoholism. He tries to remember what his favorite philosopher in college—E. M. Cioran—said about exile; something about it beginning with exaltation and ending in tuberculosis and masturbation.

He raps his fingers against the railing, decides to head out to anywhere with people. It doesn’t matter if he can’t understand what’s being said. He needs sound, needs to hear speech.

H
eat shimmers on tin roofs. Everything’s gone aqueous, doubled.

Kyle sprints out the back door of the hotel. He needs to keep moving, feels as if he’s exploding out of his skin. Staying embodied is his main challenge these days. He wants to burst out, to become free of himself.

Across the street, there’s a makeshift village of slum houses built side by side, no breathing room between. The shanties seem to wilt in the heat and lean on one another for support, a series of dislocated shoulders. Laundry stretches from window to window. A hunk of steel—probably the side of a building at one point—stands before the structures, the gateway to a cardboard kingdom.

But what dangles from the top of the steel stops him dead.

Ropes of human hair tied into perfect individual ponytails and drying in the sun like smoked meats. All the hair is the same length and color: dark brown and long enough to reach the small of a woman’s back. It looks like the work of an executioner bored with lopping off heads and searching for a new thrill.

Kyle drifts, wonders where all the hair is going, then decides he doesn’t want to know. There are some truths that don’t enlighten, and he figures the ultimate destination of the hair is one of them.

He moves down the street, passes a shirtless teenager dragging an overflowing sack of iPhones and iPods, the weight too much for his growing bones to bear.

Kyle rounds the block, and a line of tuk-tuks compete for his attention.

“Where you go?” a driver calls, following him.

“Central Market.”

“Get in.”

“No, no…it’s only ten minutes to walk.”

“It’s too hot. You die in five.” The driver slows down. “Fifty cent. I take you anywhere.”

“I’m…”

“People die in this heat. Especially American. You not made for this.”

The driver has a salient point. Kyle gets into the tuk-tuk, a small motorcycle attached to a separate passenger carrier complete with a ramshackle roof.

“Wha’s your name?”

“Jim,” Kyle says. Every day he tries a new one.

“Sok,” the driver says. “Today my birthday.”

“Happy birthday.”

“Every day my birthday. I born in the jungle. Khmer Rouge come and take everyone there. No one knew what day it was, what month, year, nothing. No calendar. I was born in no time.” He laughs. “Have lots and lots of birthdays.”

Kyle sinks into the back of the tuk-tuk.

Born in no time.

That’s his existence in Phnom Penh boiled down.
No time.
He’s lost twenty pounds of muscle since he touched down here, lost his resolve, his desire to get off the ground, his will to re-create rituals from home, those moments that personalize one’s world.

But the most crushing loss has been losing his ability to write code.

Kyle’s always felt that language, not the body, is the true prison house of the soul. When he lost coding, he lost his Edenic native tongue. Now he’s forced to rely on the same words everyone has to work with.

Thus far, he’s not impressed with the results.

He starts to drift, losing consciousness with his eyes open; like watching himself on television.

The traffic snaps him back to the present right about when Sok decides to pulls a double-lane cross and merge, using his horn as an exclamation point.

Driving in Southeast Asia is always dangerous, but Cambodia (and, in particular, Phnom Penh) is considered the crown jewel of potential catastrophe.

Two lanes of traffic on one side. Another two lanes running parallel. And no barrier to separate the flows. If people don’t like one side, they simply swerve onto the other.

No signals, no warning; punk-rock driving, all attitude and swagger. Cars, motos, tuk-tuks, lone cyclists, hotel shuttle vans, freewheeling pedestrians, trucks hauling timber or waste all flow together in a motley mix, crisscrossing from one side to the other.

If one can be called an expert on such conditions, Sok deserves the title. His strategy seems to be driving straight up the middle and honking belligerently until someone lets him in.

They pass a tuk-tuk filled with tourists holding out their cell phones and recording the drive, living through the lens. They’ll experience the trip when they get home. The ultimate authentication: sitting before your laptop with a glass of wine and watching yourself on vacation.

Sok swerves around a police truck with a water tank attached to the back. An officer stands at attention, holding a hose and power-washing fresh blood off the highway.

The tuk-tuk continues on, passing crumbling French architecture that survived the Khmer Rouge. Buildings like royalty in exile. Rococo palaces in disrepair, facades blasted. Ferroconcrete, glazed balconies, art deco, alien artifacts of former colonial status. The cracked jaw of a lost kingdom. And below these imposing structures, the Cambodians living like moles, so poor they hide under houses.

Sok drives on the wrong side of a city bus, then hammers on the horn as a bunch of Buddhist monks in flowing saffron robes cross the street, chanting.

Kyle taps Sok on the shoulder. “You can stop here. This is good.”