"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."

Abel sighed and put his palm to his forehead, squeezing his temples with his thumb and ring finger.

"His task is to collect data, and I take it he's got a network of informants for that. I shouldn't be the only one who he's pulled a fast one over by making them believe he's on their side, just to siphon their intel. I don't know; I was thinking about it while I was on the Sea Shadow. I guess the Interpol agent thing is to their go-to, taking advantage of their status as the world police. Thus, he has the impunity to go almost anywhere and make arrests or seizures, whatever his boss dictates. He must have several footholds in Interpol, someone to clean his trace."

"It's not that screwy," said Conan. "Our information suggests there are double agents working on many sides at Interpol. We have some moles there, too. In any case, this sidelines the possibility that the third party is some American service. If it was, you would've been arrested for treason long ago."

Atticus had remained silent, cigar in mouth, just listening to the distant echo of that conversation while staring off at nothing. Suddenly, he seemed to realize something. Something which betrayed a fear so intense he couldn't hold it in. Without a word, he grabbed the receiver on his desktop and put it in his ear while dialing the number of the aerodrome command post at full speed.

"Search the Papa Oscar Tango in depth right now. Unfold the carpets if you have to...Yeah...Keep me informed."

Upon hanging up, Atticus recognized Garrard's eyes, engaging him for the first time since he landed.

"The only reason they tried to kill you," said Atticus as he filled a glass of rakia and passed it to Abel, "is because they want to stave off the possibility of you sending a message to the Soviet Union informing them about my brother and me, thus giving them this location. So, we can also rule out the Soviets. It's clear that this third party's not interested in having another competitor in the race. The question is: Why would they do such a thing if you're theoretically their single element of contact with us?"

Satisfied, Abel took a sip of rakia.

"Because there's another element of contact. They put a transmitter on the plane during the inspection."

In light of that news, Conan rearranged himself on the couch and stubbed out with nervousness the cigarette on the ashtray.

"Atticus, I swear I didn't find anything..."

Atticus raised his hand as a sign of calm.

"It's OK, Conan. I got a plan."

At that moment, Seiber couldn't help but raise an eyebrow amid his astonishment.

"What the fuck do you have in mind?"

With self-sufficiency, Atticus leaned his head back against the chair and finished his glass of rakia.

"Let's just say we are going to move the party somewhere else."

At that moment, the phone rang. Atticus picked it up before the end of the first ring. "Hello...Yes...So soon? Yeah...No, no, leave it as it is, don't turn it off...In the same place, like you hadn't touched it...I'll take care...Yes, OK, thank you. Bye." He hung up, his gaze stuck on Seiber. "It was behind the doorknob."

                                             *****

That morning Skyler showed up immediately at the east end of the facility, adjacent to the airfield, as he had been informed on behalf of his brother. Before the outward-facing door, he found Seiber and a delegation of twelve soldiers, all wearing helmets and bulletproof gear.

"Something wrong?"

"You got the Kevlar on?"

"Yeah, Nadim just got it strapped on me, but he didn—"

"We gotta go," snapped Seiber urgently, sticking by Skyler's side and taking him by the shoulder.

The soldiers surrounded him in a closed circle while the foremost soldier opened the door to the outside. Everyone then began to walk in lockstep towards the Papa Oscar Tango, some yards beyond, which awaited them with its stairs deployed. Skyler noticed Seiber's arm tugging and pushing him back and forth as he and the soldiers stared around them, as if they were waiting for something to happen.

"Where are we going?"

"Just keep walking. Siraj and Nadim are coming, too."

"But what about all these bodyguards?"

"I'll straighten you out when we reach the plane. Step lively and get in."

"OK, Seiber, but there's no need to grab me by the shoulder and jerk me around like a criminal."

"I'm doing it to make it harder for you to get shot."

"What?"

"It's all your brother's idea. Come on, go up the stairs and keep your head down."