"OK...go back to the extraction point right away...it won't be necessary, we still have the signal, but from now on, we'll have to follow it from afar...no, none of that. Don't scrap it or take it with you. In that no-man's-land, no one will find those remains...Yes, I know. Get away from there. We have much to do."
Ulrich hung up the phone with the same regality with which he did everything else. Virgil, on the other side of the desk, had long ago given up trying to elicit any information from his boss through his face. Ulrich was virtually the most inscrutable man in the world.
"Any problem, Mr. Seiber?"
"The operation's failed. Totally. A flat-out fuck-up," he replied with surprising sincerity.
"I guess Zill will be all pissed off about having to catch him now."
"On the contrary; they hate each other. I'm sure Zill will be glad to see the job through to prove himself superior to Celik."
"They hate each other?"
"Yeah. I intended it to be that way. That's why I can get the best out of them all the time. There's a competitive synergy among them, fueled by hate."
"Hate among hitmen," commented Virgil, nodding in admiration. "They cannot solve their differences by killing each other, so they do it by killing other men."
"That's why it's the best fuel."
Seiber, styled as always in his blue tie, rolled up his black trench coat sleeves and pulled out of his drawer a Lucky Strike he lit with a Zippo click. He put it between his lips and passed the lighter to Virgil, who tried to hold his own Caster cigarette between bands circling his fingers and wrist. During his convalescence, he had wondered if that animal's attack had been a stroke of karma because he sold data on Skyler Landau to different companies around the world behind his organization's back just to get some extra cash. In the end, he thought, that sicced beast's teeth were not worth the fortune he had accrued rapidly, no matter how considerable.
"Still hurts?" asked Seiber.
Virgil threw him a half smile, flicking the lighter on the tip of his cigarette with a sullen look.
"It was a miracle that dog didn't tear a finger off my hand. It pierced a vein in one of its bites. I don't know how I didn't bleed out in the car."
Leaning against the back of his chair, Seiber took a drag in a conspiratory mood.
"You did bleed out. None of this is real. You're in a hospital bed, plugged into an IV bag of isotonic fluids and clotting drugs right about now."
Virgil stuck his eyes in Seiber as though an immensity was lodged between them both. A dreary silence ruled briefly over the dark office, only to be struck down by the rough click Virgil made by removing the safety from his parkerized Beretta 93R, aiming it directly at his boss' impassive blue eyes.
"If you're right, then nothing would happen if I blow your brains out."
Seiber didn't move a muscle of his face, keeping the serenity of only those who have already had a gun pointed at them before.
"And if I'm wrong, you'll lose everything."
Virgil took a long drag in the middle of a mischievous smile.
"Luckily for you, you've trained me well," he said, putting the safety back on his gun and holstering it again on the inside of his jacket pocket. "If I were tripping from a cocktail of saline and tranexamic acid, it'd be a hell of a nice and smooth ride. But nothing freaks me out more than knowing Landau got away."
"Luckily for you, I've trained you well," replied Seiber before standing up and walking up to the door. "Come with me."
"Where to?"
YOU ARE READING
King Acid
Historical FictionA young man wakes up in the desert. He doesn't remember anything, not even his name. But he does recall the face of a young woman. And somehow he knows she is somewhere out there looking for him. He stands up over the dry sand and resolves to find...
