The Heritage Trilogy - 02 - Luna Marine by Ian Douglas

Author:Ian Douglas
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction
ISBN: 9780380788293
Publisher: HarperCollins e-books
Published: 1999-05-31T23:00:00+00:00

SIXTEEN

THURSDAY, 26 JUNE 2042

Interrogation Room 12

Joliet Federal Prison

1445 hours CDT

The FBI special agent was different, this time, not Carruthers, but a small, dark-haired man with a worried accountant’s expression. He had a large-screen executive PAD open on the table as they led David in. “Dr. Alexander?” He stood, and offered a hand which David refused. “I’m Bill Twiggs. We need to talk.”

“Not without my lawyer present,” David replied.

Twiggs sighed. “Dr. Alexander…David, this is not a formal interrogation. We need your help.”

“That’s what Carruthers has been telling me for the past month. I am not going to use my friends as, as intelligence sources.”

“All I want you to do is read this.” He turned the PAD so that David could read what was on the screen.

The header was David’s own Net address. This was a message sent to him, which someone else had intercepted electronically.

MY DEAR DAVID:

DO YOU REMEMBER OUR CONVERSATION ON THE THIRD NIGHT OF THAT CONFERENCE IN ATHENS? WE WERE AT THE HOTEL POOL, AND YOU WERE WITH THAT ENTRANCING WOMAN NAMED DANI OR DANIELLE, OR DONNA, I FORGET EXACTLY. WE TALKED, YOU AND I, ABOUT SOMETHING OF TERRIBLE IMPORT.

IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT WE TALK AGAIN, OLD FRIEND. A DIRECT VID CONNECT WOULD BE BEST, SCRAMBLED, ENCRYPTED, AND SECURE. SEND IT VIA THE USUAL ROUTE. I’LL ARRANGE TO HAVE IT RELINKED HERE.

YOUR GOVERNMENT MUST KNOW WHAT I HAVE SEEN HERE. PLEASE LINK IN PERSONALLY AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE. MOST URGENT!

JEAN-ETIENNE

David read the message through twice, his mind racing. His first thought was that this was some sort of a trick, that the FBI was baiting him with this message in an effort to set up the backdoor intelligence line they wanted him to establish with Jean-Etienne.

The more he thought about it, though, the less likely that seemed. The message header proved it had arrived encoded, so someone had broken that code before delivering the message to him; they didn’t need him for that. The reference to the Athens conference, well, how could the Feds know that much detail? His attendance at the conference was a matter of public record, but they wouldn’t know about Donni, unless Donni herself had been a spy.

Despite himself, he smiled at that small stab of paranoia. Just because you’re paranoid, the old saying went, it didn’t mean they weren’t out to get you. Still, Donni, a graduate student spending a year in Greece, had been anything but a government agent. He would stake anything on that, including the nights they’d spent together in bed. Besides, she’d been in the pool, a nude and gaily playful water nymph, when he and Jean-Etienne had had that particular conversation.

He remembered the conversation well, too.

“David, we intercepted this message through our court-ordered tap on your home-computer system,” Twiggs said. “We know that you have been in communication with Dr. Cheseaux in the past…as recently, in fact, as the tenth of April, just before your departure for Luna. We would very much like to know what has Dr. Cheseaux so worried.

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