I fear you will have to reschedule, General. Ms. Resnik is unfortunately coming down with a very nasty case of the same flu that kept her husband in bed this morning.
—Cough. What can I do while I recover?
—You can help the General make a list of potential domestic sites.
—Where are you going?
—Chantilly, Virginia. We should have satellite surveillance of any facility large enough to house a missile silo, or a small army. Who is that at the door?
—That’s Amy … something … She’s a civilian employee.
—Is she supposed to be here?
[She’s cleared. She works in Comms.]
Let her in … What can we do for you, Ms.… Amy?
<I’m terribly sorry to bother you, but your cellphone won’t work with the room secured. I had a gentleman on the phone who said an … Interpol Infra-Terra Red Notice—wow, that’s a mouthful—popped up on facial recognition in Helsinki. I have no idea what that means, but he said you’d like to know. > Thank you very much, Amy. You can go now.
—What is it?
—A very busy day, Ms. Resnik.
FILE NO. 1532
TRANSCRIPT—FINNISH CUSTOMS INTERROGATION
Location: Helsinki Airport
—I t … t … told you a hundred times already. My name is Mar … Marina Antoniou.
—And what are you doing in Helsinki?
—I don’t be … believe this. I’m not doing anything in … Helsinki! I have a c … connecting flight. What time is it?
—Almost 19:00.
—Gamoto! I’ve already missed my plane. I’ve been in this room for sss … six hours. Can I go now?
—Soon. You can take the next flight. Where are you flying to?
—There is no next flight. The next one is tomorrow. And you have my ticket in ff … in front of you. I know you’re asking the same questions over and … over again to see if I ch … change my story, but this must be the tenth time you’ve asked, and it’s written down right here: New York City, so is my name. It’s a plane ticket. I can … can’t go anywhere else with it. If you plan on qu … questioning me forever, you should at least find something I could p … poss … ibly get wrong.
—These are just routine questions. Airport security has been increased and your boarding pass was selected at random.
—Why don’t you tell me what’s … really going on? You don’t select people at random to spend a day being inter— —I only have a few more questions … for security reasons.
—No! You don’t. You ran out of que … questions four hours ago. Can I get some coffee?
—Soon.
—You keep looking at your watch. Are you waiting for someone?
—He is waiting for me … He did not offer you anything to drink because you would not be allowed to leave this room and he did not want you to soil yourself.
Thank you, young man. You can leave us. I know I need not remind you that you may not discuss your encounter with this woman with anyone. You can, however, discuss your promotion with your superior when you exit this room.
Alyssa Papantoniou. You do not seem surprised to see me.
—I had a feeling you might be coming.
—New passport? Antoniou. I am impressed.
—They told me to make the lie as cl … as close to the truth as possible.
—Why Marina?
—My … my mother’s name.
—Hard to forget. The Russians taught you well.
—They also told me you’re t … trying to frame me for the Sre … Srebrenica massacre. Don’t you think that’s overreaching?
—Is it?
—You think I would kill people for some … outdated notion of ethnicity?
—To be frank, Ms. Papantoniou, I have absolutely no idea what you believe is worthy of torture or death.
—Torture? I would never purposely inflict p … pain on anyone. You really don’t know me at all.
—I am the first to admit it. I do not. But you had no compulsions about submitting Ms. Resnik to, shall we say, very unpleasant procedures.
—I never wanted her to suffer! I’m not some psychopath who burned ki … kittens as a child. I never took … pleasure in hurting anyone.
—You are telling me you had absolutely no part in the events at Srebrenica?
—How can you … ? Do you know what happened during the Bosnian wars? Or did you just watch the new … newspeople get all the names wrong?
—I have no firsthand knowledge of the Bosnian war. I was present during the Kosovo war.
—So you know the difference between a Serbian and a Serb, a Bosnian and a Bosniak— —Croatians and Croats. I am aware of the difference between nationality and ethnicity. What does this have to do with your involvement in ethnic cleansing?
—My parents, they were s … scholars. They met at a conference. My father came from Orthodox Serbs. My mother was Romanian, Catholic. Somehow, that made her a Cr … Croat in the eyes of everyone in our town, except for the Croats, who called her a Gypsy. My sister had a Mu … Muslim boyfriend. I was an atheist. We were all Bosnians.
—Your point?
—I wouldn’t have known which side I was on.