King Acid

20- ELSEWHERE PARTY

"Those wounds are new," said Atticus, pointing at Abel's wrists.

"He made them in the bathroom," intervened Conan. "Tried to cut his veins with a razor in the shower."

Atticus sighed and propped his back against his desk chair. He was face to face with a man who had been one of his biggest confidants on the other side of the world, now encased pathetically in a chair, staring at the floor in fear, his lips sealed, not so much out of secrecy, but out of shame.

"Who have you been working for all this time?"

"For everyone," whispered Abel without lifting his gaze.

"And what does that mean?"

"He's on the commies' payroll," intervened Seiber again, sitting with his legs crossed on the couch, cigarette in hand, displaying a coldness he only showed in private. "He told me on the plane. Wanted to put down in Benin to deliver your brother and the prototype to a country from the Soviet orbit."

"Is that true, Abel?"

Despite not looking an iota away from the ground, Abel felt Atticus' gaze stuck in his eyes like never before, as if forcing him by inertia to make a visual contact that never arrived.

"It is."

Atticus lit his fourth Davidoff that day. He gawked bleakly at the wisps that were born from his drags, very stable and well-defined at the beginning, blurring very slowly as they floated toward the ceiling. There was something poetic about them; they had deep parallels with life and the world, although he would never be able to put that thought fully into words.

"Something's not adding up here. Hijacking the plane and taking my brother, along with the Shadow, would've given you significant loot; but if you had just waited to get to HQ to turn me in, you would've taken not only my brother but also my arsenal, my prototypes, even my men. Ultimately, you would have taken over my whole Leviathan."

"That's right." Abel poked an impish smile without looking away from his nails. "That was what I planned to do from the get-go. But I had to change plans."

"Why?"

Abel swallowed for the first time.

"Because I've been betrayed."

Atticus raised an eyebrow. He had already suspected the situation was way more complicated than it seemed at first glance.

"By who?"

"By whoever claimed to be my link to Moscow. I doubled my intel and gave a copy to Conan and the other to him. I also told him Skyler was on the Papa Oscar Tango, so he could extract Skyler and take him to the other side of the Curtain."

"Wait." Conan sat up suddenly. "Could it be that mohawked Chinese?"

"I see you met him."

Conan looked at Atticus.

"He was an Interpol agent. They searched the plane under the pretext of seeking drugs or weapons."

"The inspection was real," surmised Atticus. "It was this man who raised the alarm and used the inspection as an excuse. But anyway, how did you find out he wasn't working with you?"

"He called when I was on my way to the Sea Shadow and told me he had very important reports I had to look into. When we met, he told me he actually worked for a third party and that he had to silence me. Hadn't been for that huge dog, I wouldn't be here."

"Let me get this straight," said Conan. "You've spent the last few years giving away classified intel to a guy who claimed to be passing it to the Soviets, but who was actually giving it to his boss, whoever he is."