Chapter 14: Retribution

Alfred's terse words kept going through my mind and even intruded into my dreams. Again I woke up very early but was not the first to enter the kitchen. Lexa and Sabreena were already preparing breakfast, with coffee percolating, bacon sizzling on the large range with some rusks getting the heat treatment as well, the atmosphere peaceful. And yet, we all felt the underlying tension.

Immediately after our last cups of coffee we made excuses to the women and went to Alfred's suite.

"Bert, Wilbur has been there before. I will put him down in a pre-selected spot, no chance of discovery. He will enter my place and after he lets me know that everything is in order I will put you down on the building with him there to guide you in. I will follow soon after."

"Right, let's do it now."

Wilbur was gone in an instant and only a few moments later he spoke to us in a voice similar to that of early Alfred.

"Right, I am here, up on the roof already. Everything is fine. Send Bert."

Without any further ado I was plonked down on the rooftop of a medium-sized building in what looked to be a medium-sized town with only a few higher-rise buildings. Before I could say anything to Wilbur, Alfred appeared as well.

"Bert, this building belongs to me. I bought it when I found out about CareWell; it is slightly higher than theirs. Look over there, towards the east, you can clearly make out their logo in that fancy Old English lettering. They should all be there by now, but we will check to be sure. Come, let's go inside."

Alfred's set-up was on the top floor: a large room with almost the entire wall on the eastern side taken up by one large window. A row of computers with huge monitors and a few office chairs were all in the line of furnishing while on the right something suspiciously resembling a small field gun was poking its muzzle through a narrow section of concrete.

"Bert, the window is made up from interleaved glass, one way mirror of course, safe against bullets and electronic eavesdropping. That tiny cannon is Wilbur's pièce de résistance; we do our work from here. Let's get some cold drinks in here, more we won't need. I am asking you chaps again: are you ready to go through with this? No second thoughts? Now is the time to speak up."

I was getting impatient and very nervous to boot. I could not hide my apprehension from them. "Yes, Alfred, I am ready. We have to neutralise the bastards as we planned it. Wilbur?"

"Hell yes, Bert. I am right with you. Alfred is too. We all have so much to look forward to and looking over my shoulder all the time is not on my agenda at all."

Alfred nodded and booted his computers while Wilbur fiddled with his gun, explaining to me the laser-guided range-finding, powerful optics, other controls to do with his heavy matter and that this beauty was totally silent in action.

"Of course, the results will not be silent at all, rather the opposite, but the building will remain standing while its insides will be gutted completely. I love what it does."

On Alfred's screens the top floor of the CareWell building showed up in 3D. "Yes, Bert, this is MasterBuilder at work once more, after I infiltrated their network. Here, this is the office of C. Oh, good, his wife is there as well. We can do both at once. Shall we? C. to Patagonia? She to Burkina Faso? Right."

Alfred split the screen on his computer, the right half now showing a view of Patagonia in early summer. The depressingly bare countryside dotted with sheep, a primitive hut tucked away in a minor depression. Not a single tree in sight, a few small shrubs off to one side of the hut being all there was apart from coarse grass or scruffy-looking sheep.

"Watch now, guys. There he is. Right, you bastard, enjoy your stay."

We saw him standing in front of the hut, a look of utter bewilderment in his eyes, his mouth opening and closing. From his demeanour it became increasingly obvious that his senses started to leave him. He should be fine.

"Look, guys, do we want to gloat? He cannot get away. I checked him out finally last night, checked them all in fact, and they do not remember a single thing about our stuff. CareWell is blanked out too, but I did leave him his memory of the luxuries he used to enjoy. So let's pick up his nasty wife."

Alfred had made the necessary moves to enrol dear wifie with a section of the Peace Corps working with subsistence farmers in some obscure Sahel-countries. They were waiting for her and ready to put her to good use.

"Those are their words, not mine. They are strapped for volunteers since most of them run away in sheer desperation within the first couple of weeks. There she is now, let's leave her to it.

"Good news is the fact that even the philosopher broke down in the end. That's him, Bert. This is one of the smallest cloisters on Athos but the weirdest by far. They agreed to take him in, which is against all their rules by the way, after I sent them quite a substantial donation. Nevertheless, I will keep a close watch on these ungodly folk for a long time to come."

R. shuffled through the heavy portal without a single glance back and was heartily embraced by an overabundantly hirsute and obese Father Abbot. We could not smell him of course, but the philosopher most certainly did. He shuddered visibly and seemed to dwindle even more, yet without struggling in the least.

Wilbur had already paved the way for the accountant giving himself up. Some papers together with numbers and passwords for a few of his minor accounts had been forwarded to the FBI. They were very eager to put him away as intended. Bail was not considered in view of the obvious danger of him skipping when the full extent of his crimes became known. His nasty habits had become a prominent part of his file as well. They had locked him away already. One more off our hands.

Even though we were quite calm while we did it, we hated our task, squirming ever more the longer we were at it. In the end, Alfred took pity on us all and just plonked down the politician in Alexandra, one of the roughest townships around greater Johannesburg. Let him fend for himself there. Last we saw of him, he was retreating from a horde of nasty-looking pursuers, but couldn't tell whether his hands were clean or not. Good.

Somehow, neither of us liked to deal with the general. He was such a decadent piece of filth that we became stuck in our efforts of determining what would be best for him. In the end, Wilbur came up with a pleasant solution.

"You haven't disclosed the warehouses to anybody yet, have you, Alfred? Let's drop him in one of those and tell the proper authorities about it right now. That should do the trick. He will not be able to fight his way out of this jam. They will lock him up forever."

The general did try after all. Not that it did him much good, but he managed to make a splendid show of it, inadvertently, after part of the stored ordinance blew up with him.

Alfred had informed the Russian and Israeli embassies of the sergeant's impending appearance at the Sofia cathedral in Kiev first thing after arriving at this place, giving them ample time to play their games with each other. Alfred put I. down inside the cathedral. His arrogance left him the moment he took in his surroundings. However, he was the only one of the lot to accept his fate in good style, pulling a small automatic and blowing his brains out as soon as he noticed the various sinister groups closing in on him.