Instinct (2010) Read online

  ‘Will you please stop that?’

  Andrew did as he was told. He was now so frightened and miserable he felt like a slight and tiny version of the boy he was when he left England.

  The situation he found himself in became even more crushing when he remembered how excited he had been when the journey began. The moment those two big men approached him at the school gates, fixed him with those serious eyes and explained in deep American accents that they needed his cooperation, he felt important, like he was part of something real and grown-up.

  That feeling multiplied when he climbed into the wide, dark car and it sped off through the rain. As he rolled through the gates of RAF Marham, he was fizzing with the thrill of it all: the blistering roar of the landing jets; passing through security with nothing more than a salute; and the sight of the fighter planes, toy versions of which he still played with.

  But then he met the other man, the one who took him on a long, long flight to somewhere called Guantanamo Bay; the one who didn’t let him pee until they left the plane; the one who forgot to explain how scary take-off and landing were, and didn’t seem to notice when Andrew shook with fear at the screaming engines.

  Bishop was a dismal child-minder: uncaring, uninterested and keen to keep his homeward journey unchanged despite the passenger he was looking after. Eight hours on a large, noisy plane slipped into another six on a smaller, even noisier one and, despite the sensation of the new experiences and places, thirteen of Andrew’s fourteen hours of travelling had been as dull as stale bread.

  And he wanted his mum. From the moment the two soldiers had left him in the driving rain with Bishop, trepidation had started to dissolve the excitement. But he had no one’s hand to hold, no one’s arm around him to pull him close and reassure him that, despite the way it looked, everything was going to be OK.

  By the time the second plane skidded to a landing in the jungle, he was tired, lonely and fed up with so many strange new places. He didn’t know when it was going to end, but that was all he wanted.

  Bishop had hurried him into the small white building, down the elevator and into his quarters, where he had kept him out of sight since their arrival.

  That was a day and a half ago.

  Andrew’s interest in Bishop’s DVD collection had waned dramatically with the passing time. Sleep had been choppy hours snatched on a couch, and he was now leafing through old operations manuals and playing with the lid of a memory stick for want of something to do.

  ‘Mr Bishop?’ he asked softly.

  Bishop grimaced at the inconvenience of having his work interrupted yet again. ‘What?’

  ‘When am I going to see my mum?’

  Bishop looked up from the report he was writing. ‘Huh? Very, very soon, I promise. Just hang on a little longer. Oh, what? Oh, don’t cry! Don’t cry, Andrew! For heaven’s sake.’

  He couldn’t help it. Bishop had given him exactly the same answer on both planes, and several times since. Andrew had now stopped believing it.

  Bishop had no idea how to deal with this situation; he had thought it was going to be easy. Keep the kid shut away while he finished the admin reports, then wait for the team to bring his mom back from operations. If a demographic as dim as the world’s au pairs could manage it, then it should hardly prove beyond the ability of a man who finished twelfth in his class at MIT.

  But of course it did. Caring for a ten-year-old who had been parted from his mother was as complex as separating spiders’ webs in the dark, and Bishop’s feeble efforts were hardly making the best of things. And now the boy was crying, so he had to do something more than simply ignore him. It was time to make a phone call.

  ‘Taj? Patch me into Hawk One ASAP.’ As he waited, he did his best to pretend there was no small boy sobbing in his office.

  ‘Hawk One, this is Bishop, state your ETA please … OK, thank you.’ He replaced the receiver.

  ‘Andrew, Andrew, hey, hey, hey … your mom is going to be here in exactly one hour. How’s that?’

  Andrew wiped his nose on his blue school jumper.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Bishop.’

  After a pause, he returned to fiddling with the memory stick, and Bishop prayed for that hour to pass at speed.

  10

  The Spartan was losing altitude again. The soldiers looked out at the trees below and started to put away their magazines and iPods. Laura’s pulse quickened. She checked the view in every direction through the small window next to her, trying to take in as much of the surrounding area as possible. But even when they had descended beyond the clouds all she could see was jungle: dense, spinach-green treetops interrupted by patches of mist that clung to the broad leaves like wisps of white cat fur. It could certainly be Venezuela. It didn’t matter. Just as long as Andrew was down there somewhere.

  The wheels crawled to a stop at the edge of the tarmac. This was the cue for the soldiers to jump out of the side of the plane and fan out across the grass, stretching and groaning their way back to life. Despite her desperation to see Andrew, Laura was last to disembark, her movement to the exit blocked by soldiers who considered their comfort more important than anything the civilian could want.

  The sun screaming into her face, the first thing Laura noticed was the heat. It was stifling, thick and close, something she had not experienced since an expedition to gather red-ant samples in Ecuador. Shielding her eyes, she looked for Webster, who was by the pilot’s door making his mandatory check of the flight log. Seeing her, he hurried through to the end of the list and returned it to Madison.

  ‘Sorry about that. Andrew’s just in here,’ he said, ushering Laura towards the unassuming white building fifty yards away at the edge of the grass.

  As they approached, the door opened, and there stood Andrew, looking around for any sign of his mum. Laura had thought about him so intensely over the last day that the sight of him released a thousand emotions at once.

  ‘Andrew!’ she called.

  At first his view of her was blocked by the soldiers, but then he spotted her sprinting legs and started running himself.

  When they reached each other, they hugged so hard it was all Laura could do to keep her balance.

  ‘Thank God you’re all right,’ she whispered.

  Andrew held her tight for a long time. When he finally broke off the hug he still gripped her hand.

  ‘They didn’t hurt you, did they?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Good,’ she said, putting her arm around his shoulders.

  ‘Where have you been? They said you were helping out with some insect stuff, but they wouldn’t tell me anything else.’

  ‘I’ll explain everything later,’ she said, in a way that suggested concern.

  ‘OK,’ Andrew replied, a brief pause indicating that he understood.

  He looked up at her, squinting at the sunshine. ‘I missed you.’

  ‘I missed you too.’ She gave his hand a squeeze.

  A figure dressed in the improbable formality of a slightly oversized white shirt and black cotton trousers had followed Andrew out of the building. He now stood a few feet away, content to allow the moment of reconciliation but not keen to let it continue indefinitely. At a pause in their conversation he moved forward a little further to cast a shadow over Laura’s eyeline, causing her to release Andrew’s hand and look at that uncomfortable, forced smile again.

  ‘Mr Bishop,’ she said, as if she were dragging the nails from his fingers.

  ‘Dr Trent,’ he replied evenly. ‘Welcome to MEROS.’

  ‘Thank you, but we’re not staying.’

  Bishop nodded with a degree of contrition. ‘I do apologize for the circumstances of your arrival. Truly. If there had been any other way …’

  ‘Any other way?’ The steam was rising off her words. She glanced down at Andrew, who returned her look with a quizzical one of his own.

  ‘Dr Tre
nt, I am genuinely sorry. On reflection, I did the wrong thing. Of course, the two of you can return on the next flight out of here, and we’ll never bother you again.’

  ‘That’s incredibly generous of you.’

  ‘But as that might take a little while, perhaps there’s some way in which I can make it up to you.’

  ‘Mr Bishop, if you know of anything that can compensate me and Andrew for what we’ve been through in the last two days I will be phenomenally surprised.’

  ‘I understand. I’d feel the same in your position. OK, well, you can wait for the plane out here if you like; one of the soldiers will be happy to get you something to eat and drink. But I have to warn you that refuelling will take a while, and then the pilot has to rest after flying for so long. Could be a good few hours in 40 degree sunshine.’

  Laura glowered at Bishop. She could already feel her light English skin prickling with the heat. The humidity made the air feel almost solid, and the discomfort invaded her pores. Looking at Andrew, she knew they wouldn’t last long out here, and she couldn’t face another three hours sitting on the plane just yet.

  Reluctantly, she followed Bishop into the small white building. As she walked, she took Andrew’s hand. He immediately took it back and stuffed it into his pocket, a pleasingly normal gesture.

  Bishop led them through the double swing doors of brushed steel and past Taj, who was leaning over his security desk. He offered a small wave of greeting, which Andrew returned, as they moved on past two sets of cameras to another set of steel double doors. The security system required Bishop to type in a pass code, allowing the perfect metal rectangles to slide apart with the merest of hisses. The next set of doors was opened by a pass card, and the set after that by a fingerprint scanner. They now stood in front of the elevator. Bishop ushered Laura and Andrew inside. There were no numbers to press. Instead Bishop swiped his card, the doors closed and the lift plunged downwards as if nothing were slowing its fall. This movement was accompanied by an appropriate noise, like that of driving in a tiny car at the same great speed.

  ‘This goes on for miles,’ Andrew said to his mum in a half shout.

  ‘497 feet to be exact,’ added Bishop.

  The elevator continued to drop for what felt like the time it would take to reach the centre of the earth. Bishop tried to break the frostiness with what he thought was a reassuring smile, first for Andrew, then for Laura. Neither effort managed its intended effect, more the exact opposite.

  The elevator slowed then came to a halt with a grinding groan which always managed to unsettle new arrivals.

  Strangely, it was brighter down here than it was on the surface. As they were led from the elevator, Laura and Andrew blinked hard and tried not to feel like a couple of stains on a hotel bedsheet. Bishop led them to his office, opening the door with his thumbprint.

  ‘Now, Andrew, if you wouldn’t mind making yourself busy with a movie, your mother and I have a few things to discuss in private.’ Andrew sighed and walked through the door to Bishop’s living room.

  For the umpteenth time since he had arrived, he rifled through a collection that ran from Apocalypse Now through to Zoolander. Laura took Pulp Fiction out of his hand, replaced it with Close Encounters of the Third Kind and followed Bishop into his office.

  11

  On the surface, Webster was supervising the unloading of the equipment. He knew the flight had been longer than usual, so he didn’t mind the soldiers taking their time and stopping for frequent cigarette breaks.

  ‘So, Major, who’s the civilian?’ asked Mills as he lit up a Dunhill.

  ‘You know better than to ask me that.’

  ‘She sounded like a Brit to me. You thinking you might want to butter her muffin, Mills?’ Garrett said. Everyone laughed except Mills.

  ‘Well, no offence to those of you who can get five hours of debate out of one episode of American Idol, but at least she might be able to manage a decent bit of conversation,’ Mills said, upping the poshness of his English accent a notch.

  ‘Reckon so,’ said Garrett, extending her southern twang in return. ‘Say, Mills, do Brits keep a stiff upper lip when they’re giving blow-jobs?’ More laughter.

  ‘Look, Garrett, I know you might find this hard to believe, but if it wasn’t for Great Britain, you’d still be picking shit out of your arses with twigs.’

  ‘Yeah, and if it wasn’t for us, your name would be Fritz and you’d be wearing lederhosen,’ said Jacobs.

  ‘Fuck off, Jacobs. Our part in the Second World War was considerably …’

  ‘OK, everyone, calm it down. It’s been a long few days. Let’s just get this stuff humped and packed,’ said Webster.

  For a while the only sounds were the clattering of crates and the occasional grunt from the soldiers. Then Webster went down in the elevator, and the rest of them took his absence as their cue to drop whatever they were carrying and prop themselves up against it to take in some rays. Now that the boss wasn’t around, they wondered if they could get anything out of his lieutenant.

  ‘So, Carter, who’s the chick?’ asked Van Arenn.

  Carter made a zip motion across his mouth and tipped his wide-brimmed hat over his eyes.

  ‘Come on. You know we’re going to find out sooner or later.’

  ‘Let’s make it later, Van Arenn. Besides, the major never tells me anything. I only know what he told all of us: Laura Trent, bug lady. Beyond that, I don’t know, and until something happens that changes my routine, I don’t much care.’

  They lay in silence until Garrett spoke.

  ‘Seems pretty obvious to me anyway. She’s here to replace the dead man.’

  12

  Bishop’s office was messier and homelier than Laura had expected. Of course, there were no windows, but she was surprised to see a dark, fraying Persian rug covering a wooden floor. She liked his large oak desk and the deep leather armchairs and wide rectangular meeting table that matched it perfectly. Three of the four walls were covered from top to bottom in varnished bookshelves, used more for the storage of disorganized piles of paper than the books they were designed for. The last wall was covered in a gloomy Rothko print that seemed perfectly suited to its environment.

  Without being asked, she sat down and looked challengingly at the man who had organized the kidnapping of her son.

  Bishop arranged himself thoughtfully in his chair, as if there was a degree of spontaneity to what he was about to say. He had been through this conversation, or a version of it, on enough occasions to know just the right words to use and how to deliver them but, with the kid involved, this one was going to be more delicate than most.

  ‘Dr Trent,’ he said eventually. ‘First and foremost, I must reiterate my apology. This has all been very sudden, and I understand that you have barely had a chance to catch your breath. You have had to suffer the kind of anxieties that should not deliberately be placed on anyone’s shoulders, and for that I apologize again. Hopefully, it will become clear why we had to act in such an unfortunate manner. For what it’s worth, Andrew has been fine company. He’s a great kid; you should be very proud.’

  ‘Look, Mr Bishop –’

  ‘Steven, please.’

  ‘Look, take it as given that I understand how sorry you are, that you didn’t really want to abduct my only child and send me on some military mission to God knows where to see giant wasps. If you want to tell me about what you do here, fine. Otherwise, I’ll just go back upstairs and wait for the next flight home.’

  ‘Sure, of course, mea culpa. This must be very perplexing for you. One minute you’re researching aphid breeding patterns at the British Entomological Association, the next you’re in Afghanistan wondering what we’ve done to the common wasp, and now you’re here.’ He realized he was waffling again and sped up.

  ‘You are in the office of the Chief Operating Supervisor – me – of the MEROS facility at Colinas de Edad, approximatel
y forty miles from Venezuela’s Brazilian border.

  ‘Brief history: we were set up in 1998 by a cooperation of NATO countries to research the possibilities of genetically altering insects for military purposes. Of course, you’re aware that nearly all genetic entomological research has been for the purpose of improving agricultural conditions, providing insects that can wipe out pests, pests inclined to prey on each other, that kind of thing. Well, there came a point when people were getting pretty good at that, even back then, so some bright spark at the University of Idaho submits a paper on the application of transgenic yellowjackets in natural pesticides …’

  ‘Yes. Dr Paul Rober. That’s a seminal work. I studied it for my PhD.’

  ‘Exactly. Well, I don’t know if you noticed, but buried on page 124 was a small paragraph about isolating the part of the genome responsible for the greater aggression in wasps.’ Laura nodded.

  ‘At the same time, at the University of Wisconsin, another doctor, who I’m not at liberty to name, was making some quite considerable headway in the area of manipulating the scale of insects. Those papers may not have reached you, because it is the Pentagon’s practice to keep a very close eye on certain research. It’s obvious when you think about it: some guy in the University of Nowhere invents some great way of turning chicken skin into an intercontinental ballistic missile – they want to keep that all to themselves. As I’ve been told on many occasions, there are only so many advantages you can get in these troubled times, so it’s a good idea to keep your eyes open.

  ‘Anyway, the Pentagon gets hold of Rober’s research a little too late to keep it hushed up, but the findings at UW are buried quicksmart because some brainiac saw the possibilities in putting these two breakthroughs together.