Christopher Golde
Chapter fifty one
The Sacrifice
Date: 11th September 2001 Location: New York, USA
“Your first visit to New York I believe Mr King?”
Sir Nigel Stansen held out his hand to welcome Jason King.
“Yes, and you are,” replied Jason, as he walked into the hotel room and a man in sunglasses and a black suit closed the door behind him? He stared at the tall elegant grey-haired man greeting him and accepted his extended hand as a matter of courtesy.
“I am Sir Nigel Stansen; we have obviously never met Mr King but I have spoken to you on the phone twice. Once as you may recall warning you of danger when you were in Tokyo and the other, two days ago to invite you here this morning before your scheduled meeting with Ieko Fujimo.”
“Yes,” said Jason, releasing his hand from the tall man's firm grip, “yes, I remember and by the way thank you for Tokyo.”
“Please, have a seat, Mr King,” the grey-haired man offered a seat on the sofa next to him, “would you like a drink of anything, tea, coffee?”
“Just a glass of water thanks,” replied Jason, as he sat.
Nigel Stansen looked at the suited man at the door, who immediately went to get a glass of water, then seated himself adjacent Jason.
“Mr King, first let me thank you for coming. I am the manager of a United Nations research team that has been looking into the activities of Ieko Fujimo.”
“And myself,” added Jason.
“Err…yes…”
The grey-haired Stansen obviously surprised at Jason’s awareness of their activities and that they had indeed been researching him as well.
“You are well informed, Mr King.”
“One of the benefits of being rich Mr Stansen,” Jason said with a smile, “after your help in Tokyo I made a point of finding out who could possibly have called me on my private line. A number that no-one else is supposed to have but those who are closest to me.”
“It was a last resort Mr King, I can assure you,” said the obviously embarrassed anthropologist, “we don’t usually get that involved but these characters are of concern to us and it would have been inconvenient to our cause to have lost you so early in the piece.”
“Well I am glad I am needed at the moment,” said Jason “let me know how I can stay that way, it may help to keep me alive a little longer.”
“As I said, Mr King, we usually adopt a policy of watch but don’t interfere, but again today we believe it may be necessary to take action or many thousands of people including you may die.”
Jason listened but remained expressionless.
“I don’t know how much you know about Ieko Fujimo,” continued Nigel Stansen, “but we do know that you are meeting him today in place of Bill Gatwick, the head of Macram and Fujimo is unaware of the change in plans. We also know that you believe he was responsible for two assassination attempts on yourself, the murder of at least another and the intended assassination of Mr Gatwick.”
Jason neither confirmed nor denied, maintaining an expressionless face.
“We don’t know what you expect to achieve by surprising him with your substitution, but no doubt you intend to throw him off balance and perhaps make him a counteroffer?”
There was a momentary silence in the room then Jason decided he would divulge their plan.
“Mr Stansen, I’m going to go out on a limb here and trust you. I don’t know why, perhaps it is because you have already saved my life once, perhaps I just sense something right about you.”
Jason took a sip of water while he made the appropriate dramatic pause.
“First let me give you some history that maybe you already know. At the beginning of two thousand, I had a meeting with Ieko Fujimo and Bill Gatwick. They intended to join forces to produce the world’s smartest computer chip. I was there because my company has a big financial stake in the chip manufacturing plant in Thailand. An agreement was reached that the partnership would go ahead and in the event of the death or demise of Fujimo or Gatwick, the other surviving partner would take control.”
Jason smiled as he remembered the reaction of both when he had put them his deal.
“It did not apply to me as I do not own my company, whereas they did. Later, after the meeting, Fujimo offered me a deal to get rid of Gatwick and run it between ourselves. I refused, I already had information before the meeting what Fujimo was planning to do with Gatwick. In fact, that is why I got involved in the first place.”
He recalled the trip with Pietta to warn Gatwick, it had been not long after they had first met.
“Fujimo had no idea that I knew and when I refused he seemed to take it, okay but then he tried to kill me. Today is the day Gatwick was to sign the final agreement with Fujimo. After today anything that happens to Gatwick, Fujimo has only my company to deal with.”
He wondered what sinister plan Fujimo would come up with to rid himself of his company.
“Gatwick wants the deal bad enough to risk it. He has a dream, as he says, and asked me to take his place in finalizing the deal.”
“You’re not afraid Fujimo will take you out instead,” asked Stansen?
“I don’t think he would in the open and anyway I think whatever his beef is with me, it is not about the business so much as his pride. My instincts tell me it’s something else.”
“I daresay your instincts could be correct,” said the tall grey-haired professor. "Now let me tell you something about Fujimo that you may not know.”
“I’ m all ears.”
“Fujimo’s uncle is a character called Haitaco Namura. He was the charismatic leader of a dangerous, so-called religious cult called ‘The Ong’. You may have heard of one of their more well-known exploits when they attacked the Tokyo subway with sarin gas.”
Jason nodded slowly beginning already to understand a whole lot more.
“When Namura was arrested, we believe Fujimo was ordered to take over. Namura also ran Futuretronics for the family and made sure Ieko took over when Namura’s brother, Ieko’s father, died. Now we believe ‘the Ong’ run Futuretronics and have almost unlimited resources to continue their terror.”
“And what is there objective do you know,” asked Jason?
“Prophecy,” answered Nigel bluntly, “they believe Fujimo is the chosen one and he will ultimately rule the world. With this deal with Gatwick, there is a good chance he could. But then along comes Jason King”
Sir Nigel Stansen looked expectantly at Jason and then continued.
“Our team which has been commissioned to look into predictions and prophecy,” Stansen hesitated, “as well as such things as what Fujimo’s cult is trying to achieve”
“Global domination or prophecy,” Jason asked, knowing full well the grey-haired professor did not want to have to reveal more than necessary?
“Uhh… both, I guess, yes both.”
“Continue,” offered Jason.
“Well… yes, well along with our team there are others. One team was a sub-branch sponsored by the Vatican.”
“The Vatican,” Jason said, nodding slowly.
“This team had a frontman, a priest by the name of Aldo Dominique. We believe he was assassinated by Fujimo’s cult and we believe the cult then got hold of information collected by Dominique’s team relating to you, and possibly others”.
“Really,” exclaimed Jason, genuinely surprised, “information about me. So that’s why he wanted to kill me, he sees me as competition. Is that it?”
“Well, true or not true that’s possible. We have recently retrieved copies of the information they stole and it could be interpreted that you could be competition.”
Jason sat there just nodding his head. He knew much more about that than Stansen realized after his journey to Tibet, but had no intention of sharing it with the scientist. Not yet anyway.
“Okay so why are we here today,” asked Jason?
“Well, we believe Fujimo has a plan to assassinate Gatwick after the agreement is signed. Fujimo will not want it to look like an assassination though, evidently, that would void the contract; right?”
“Yes that is correct,” confirmed Jason thoughtfully, “you are well informed.”
“We have our source, that’s how we found out about the switch you intended.”
“Go on,” gestured Jason, not really interested in Gatwick’s leaks too much.
“We have been watching Fujimo’s people now for months, in particular of late an especially distasteful character by the name of Akura Akita.”
Stansen put a picture on the coffee table between them and turned it to face Jason. Jason looked at Akura Akita. That was a face he would never forget, he could see the pure evil in his dead eyes.
“Akita was arrested after the sarin gas attack. He was one of the culprits who released the gas in the subway but was overcome by his own murderous deed. Some years later he escaped from a Tokyo mental asylum with the help of the Ong and returned to their ranks as an assassin with a new identity. He was kept in hiding by the cult but we have always known where he is. We thought it better to watch him than arrest him, as his replacement may not be known to us. Akita arrived in the U.S. six months ago with false identification, under the employ of Futuretronics. We have kept a close eye on him and disturbingly, he has been in regular contact with a group of Muslim extremists we know to be operating within this country’s borders.”
Jason’s eyebrows rose as he thought to himself.
‘A Muslim extremist, that was an unexpected option Jason hadn’t considered.’
Nigel Stansen produced another photo putting it next to Akita’s.
“The problem is he has only been talking to this one man, Bin El Sahid. He is a teacher and preacher at a New York mosque and we believe he has extremist sympathies. We believe Akita has been arranging money transfers for information but we can’t find out any more than that. When we found out your, or I should say Gatwick’s meeting was scheduled to be held in the World Trade Centre, alarm bells went off. As you will no doubt be aware, the World Trade Centre has been a target before and is to them a symbol of everything they despise.”
Jason nodded agreement. Stansen continued.
“If Gatwick were to die in a terrorist attack that seemed totally unrelated to either of them and proven to have been committed by a group of Muslim extremists, then there would be no suspicion and Fujimo would inherit the joint venture.”
Nigel Stansen paused, studying Jason’s reaction then continued.
“The problem is we haven’t got a clue what they will attempt and it is only conjectured they will today. We have seen no unusual activity, such as bomb preparation, but these extremists work in detached splinter cells, completely isolated from each other and usually connected only by one person. They are very clever these days at concealing communications and generally, the only warning we get is if we manage to get someone on the inside or detect the purchase, or transfer of large amounts of bomb-making materials. This time we have neither.”
“So what are you proposing to do,” asked Jason?
“We have already staked out the entire World Trade Centre South building, where you are meeting. Your meeting is on the 92nd floor are you not?”
“Yes,” confirmed Jason.
“We are not using American forces but French Intelligence forces.”
Jason looked surprised
“Our team has always used the French forces for our armed protective unit, as well as French Euro intelligent services. It is part of our mandate being primarily a European organization, to begin with. We find it to be very effective operating in many of the countries we do, like Africa and the Middle East. You will see anyway, the French are very good at what they do.”
“Okay, sounds reasonable,” agreed Jason.
“We will have French special ops all over the building and especially on the 92nd floor and in the car parks and entrances to the building. We have established links through the buildings surveillance systems, plus a few extras of our own. You will also be wired, if you don’t mind, and just be aware the Americans know nothing of this at the moment, we do not want to alarm them unnecessarily at the moment. If we did tell them their activity would be likely to alert Fujimo and we would rather control than prevent. If he doesn’t try today he will do it another day, possibly when we do not expect it.”
“That sounds fine,” said Jason, “let’s get to it, the meeting is at 9.00 am and it is already 8.30.”
“Good,” said Nigel Stansen, standing.
He nodded to the suited man who was standing back at the door to the room. He, in turn, spoke into his hand and immediately the door opened and in marched four more suited men with cases.
In five minutes they had fitted Jason with his communications and had shown him how to use it. Nigel Stansen stepped past two of the suited men and stood in front of Jason.
“Okay, you’re ready; just leave here as you came with your driver waiting out front. Go to your meeting as scheduled and we will be watching. Any sign of danger and we will have you out of there. Good luck!”
“Jason, there is one other thing you may not know.” The eyes of the kindly looking professor seemed to sadden. He looked at Jason for an extended minute. Jason waited.
“We believe it was Fujimo who took Julie Pearce last year.”
Jason’s heart skipped a beat at the name. It was a name he so often thought about. It was a love he felt he never quite got to have.
“I am aware of that,” Jason said softly looking at his own hand rather than into the eyes of the professor, “that’s what makes this all the harder to deal with.”
“You will then probably also be aware my team has been charged with the responsibility of finding out what happened to her.”
The professor could see the pain in Jason’s eyes.
“We haven’t given up and we haven’t stopped looking for her,” he said.
It had not been said just to make Jason feel better, it was genuine. They had found no trace of her and until they did Nigel’s team would never stop looking. He felt he at least owed that to her.
Jason didn’t look up. He straightened his cuffs and looked out the window of the hotel room. He had always believed somewhere she was alive and he too would never give up till he had proof otherwise.
Nigel Stansen held out his hand. After a moment Jason looked back at the professor then shook it and left.
Jason had arrived at the twin towers of the World trade centre at 8.45 am. He quickly located the massive South Tower and found the lifts that would take him to the 92nd floor. He had watched carefully to see if he could identify any of the French agents but if they were there, they were undetectable. The lifts were full of people arriving for work and once they arrived at his floor most people had already alighted. Of the remaining four people, two got off with him and he wondered which of the two was most likely to be an agent. There was a balding middle-aged man with a slight paunch, ‘not likely,’ he thought. There was the clean-cut young executive with blonde hair and chiselled jaw, ‘a possibility’, he thought.
Once off the elevator, he looked for an indication of where the office’ Slater and Jane’s solicitors’ might be and saw on the location board they were suite 85.
At suit 85 a receptionist with blonde hair and too much make-up for his taste asked him to enter immediately.
“Mr Slater is waiting for you Mr King; will Mr Gatwick be here soon?”
Jason didn’t answer her, just nodded and said thank you. He was escorted by the blonde to a meeting room, where waiting already was Ieko Fujimo, another man he recognized immediately from the picture he had just seen and another man in a suit he immediately guessed was Mr Slater.
Ieko Fujimo was very obviously shaken to see Jason enter.
“Jason King,” he stammered “this is most unexpected.”
Jason bowed, at which the standing pair of Fujimo and Akita responded immediately, bowing equally low.
Then Jason held out his hand to the unknown man and introduced himself.
“Jason King.”
“My apologies King San “cut in Fujimo, “this is Mr Slater.”
“A pleasure to meet you,” said Jason, “gentlemen, Mr Gatwick couldn’t attend today due to a family emergency and has given me an authority to act on his behalf. At that, Jason put his briefcase on the table and opened it, withdrawing a letter on ‘Macram’ letterhead from Bill Gatwick. Fujimo was too stunned to speak and the solicitor took the letter reading it carefully. He turned to Fujimo.
“It all seems to be in order Mr Fujimo,” said Slater handing the letter to the stunned Japanese businessman.
“I,” began Fujimo, whilst his eyes scanned the letter, “I am just surprised.”
‘I bet you are,’ thought Jason, to himself.
“Please have seat gentlemen, “offered the solicitor.
Until now they had remained standing but before Jason would sit, he turned to Akura Akita.
“I’ m sorry, we have not been introduced.”
Fujimo looked up realizing his discourtesy.
“I’ m sorry King San,” he apologized,” this is Mr Asahat; he is replacing my personal assistant, who is at this time unwell.”
Jason bowed slightly.
“Mr Asahat.”
Akita returned the gesture but said nothing. Jason once again looked into the dead eyes of a killer.
As Jason took his seat so did the others.
“Well, I believe we have an agreement to sign,” said Jason, as if eager to get on with the business at hand.
Slater the solicitor opened a manila file in front of him and passed a large neatly assembled contract to Fujimo, then another to Jason.
“You will find everything in order as agreed to previously,” said the efficient Slater.
Ieko Fujimo had not even looked at the document; Jason could see the cogs clicking over in his brain.
“Is this proper, Mr King to sign such a contract that is so important, instead of or Mr Gatwick,” asked Fujimo, to the solicitor, after a long silent pause?
Jason had been speed reading the contract and looked up at Fujimo.
“The authority is quite clear Mr Fujimo; Mr Gatwick has authorized Mr King to sign on his behalf. It will be completely binding on Mr Gatwick and his company Macram,” answered the solicitor, emphatically.
Fujimo looked at Jason. Jason could tell he was silently fuming that Gatwick had tricked him like this.
“Very well,” said Fujimo finally, he turned to Akura Akita and whispered something in his ear. The assassin stood, excused himself and left. Jason sped read the document while he wondered if Akita had been sent to change their plans or confirm them. He was now convinced Fujimo had intended to kill Gatwick today.
Once both men had finished looking over the documents Slater spoke.
“Then gentlemen, we can sign?”
Fujimo looked at Jason with a steely glare.
“I am ready King San if you are.”
“Let’s do it,” was Jason’s reply.
The two men signed each page in unison as the solicitor showed them where. They then swapped contracts and went through the procedure again. When they had completed it Jason noticed Fujimo glance at his watch. The solicitor gathered the contracts, he then witnessed both copies and put each into two separate a sealed pouches. Jason looked at his watch, ‘9.20 am’.
Akita re-entered the room and went straight to Fujimo, whispering in his ear. Fujimo stood quickly and said.
“Excuse me for one moment gentlemen; I have to attend to an urgent phone call. I will return shortly.”
At that, he and Akita left the room. Slater called for his secretary on an intercom and tall dark-haired middle-aged women with glasses entered as he was slipping the two contracts into two separate large envelopes.
“Mrs Davey,” said Slater, “there’s a courier waiting at reception could you give these to him, please. Mrs Davey left the room with the two envelops.
“As arranged by Mr Gatwick and Mr Fujimo, an original will be sent immediately to the head office of each company for safekeeping.”
“Can I get you perhaps a refreshment or coffee Mr King,” offered the solicitor to Jason?
“Perhaps a coffee,” replied Jason.
He felt uneasy about something but he wasn’t sure what it was. His animal instincts told him something just was not right but he was not sure if it was about leaving the building or staying. He looked at his watch again.
‘9.25 am, I guess there’s nothing much can happen while I’m here.’
Then there was some noise outside the door to the meeting room. Voices, loud voices! Slater the solicitor had ordered two coffees on his intercom and looked towards the door when he heard the noise outside. He went to get up when the door opened and in came the bald paunchy man from the elevator.
Behind him were two other men that were extreme contrasts. One was a large man in overalls with a hard hat and tool utility belt around his waist and the other was dressed in a uniform that looked like a security guard. The bald man from the elevator walked straight up to Jason handing him a cellular telephone. Jason put it to his ear.
“Jason, listen to me carefully, this is Nigel Stansen, the three men who are with you are French Secret Service, we believe something is about to happen but we are not sure what. Fujimo and Akita have disappeared and we can’t find them anywhere. There is a lot of chatter on the networks we monitor and we don’t want to take a chance, so go with my agents and do whatever they say, I will keep them informed.”
Jason stood handing the bald man the phone; he turned looked at the stunned solicitor and said
“Excuse me.”
He then turned to the three French agents.
“I’m all yours!”
“Messuir,” said the bald man, pointing at the two others.
The security guard turned to the workman and walked out. Jason followed and the bald man came behind him. The three went straight past the also stunned secretary and blonde receptionist and out through the front door of the office. Instead of stopping at the elevators they kept going, went past some restrooms until they came to a door that had a picture of a staircase and said ‘fire escape’.
“The stairs,” Jason asked, surprised, “this is the ninety-second floor?”
“Messuir, we do not want to get trapped in an elevator if a bomb should explode,” said the security guard, over his shoulder.
They entered the stairwell and started down. They were moving quite fast including the overweight bald man, to Jason’s surprise. In no time they had descended two floors and it was then that there was an enormous explosion. The whole stairwell shook so wildly that all of them except the bald man were thrown off their feet. Climbing back up immediately Jason looked upward.
“My god a bomb,” he exclaimed.
The bald man was talking into a small radio and yelled in French to the other two. The security guard grabbed Jason’s arm and they all began to run.
They jumped stairs skipping two or three at a time. Jason could hear a noise like a roaring hurricane coming from above. A door from inside the building opened suddenly and a person fell through burnt black and almost unrecognizable. Behind the burnt figure was another trying to push past and also burnt badly. A whoosh of hot air entered the stairwell and the French special agent dressed as the workman was level with the door and held up his hands as flames leapt through the gap.
All Jason could hear was the roar but he thought he could also hear the human agony. The sound was like a tornado. The bald man was yelling but Jason understood nothing. The stairs around them seemed to be crumbling or melting it was becoming difficult to see as his eyes were also beginning to burn. He staggered, he felt someone fall on him from behind. He could feel someone pulling at his arm.
‘What had Fujimo done,’ was the last thought Jason had before he lost consciousness?
Nigel Stansen looked out of the hotel room towards the twin towers of the World Trade Centre his mouth was open, a cellular phone still gripped tightly in his hand. A huge pall of smoke rose from the South tower. He had lost contact with the agents that were with Jason. His other agents in the building had been broadcasting frantically, some asking what was going on, others asking for instructions, others giving horrifying unbelievable accounts of how a full-sized jet airliner had just flown straight into the South Tower.
Nigel Stansen was stunned.
How could anyone possibly commit such a monstrous act, he struggled to come to terms with the scale of the events unfolding as he watched and listened. Little did he realize the worst was yet to come!
The king shall false promise make;
And talk just for talking’s sake.
And nations plan horrific war;
The like as never seen before.
And taxes rise and lively down;
And nations wear perpetual frown.
Mother Shipton 1488-1561