Robert Ludlum's (TM) The Bourne Initiative (Jason Bourne series)(73)

Disengaging, Boxer groped in the water for the gun, but it was nowhere to be seen. Hadn’t it sunk to the bottom of the tank? Bourne blindsided him before he could hope to answer that question. Bourne jabbed him in the ribs, then smashed the edge of his hand into Boxer’s rib cage. He heard a satisfying crack, and Boxer grimaced. But he was far from done.

Breaking away, he kicked hard, his heel making hard contact with Bourne’s left shoulder. Had the water not slowed the kick Bourne’s shoulder would surely have been dislocated. As it was, the burst of pain was followed immediately by a terrible numbness that traveled down Bourne’s left arm, leaving a trail of pins and needles.

Taking immediate advantage, Boxer grasped Bourne’s head on either side, slammed the back of it against the coping. Again and again. And then his forefinger jabbed at Bourne’s eye. It never made it. Struck from behind with the butt of his own 9mm, Boxer fell to one side. Bourne could just make out a blurred shadow of MacQuerrie. He must not have had a lot of strength. He staggered backward in the water, the effort of the one blow having done him in.

Bourne, his head in a muddle, black spots crowding his vision, drove the edge of his hand into the side of Boxer’s neck. Boxer’s head rocked like a bobble-head. Spinning him, Bourne wrapped one arm around his neck, placed the heel of his other hand just below the ear. Boxer, frantic, struggled mightily, but Bourne kept his grip, gave a sharp twist that broke Boxer’s neck.

He lay back then against the coping while Boxer’s body floated facedown in the water. Despite the shallowness, the chop was as frenzied as if from a school of feeding sharks. Gaining his equilibrium, Bourne waded past the body to the opposite side, where MacQuerrie sat in the shallow water, trying desperately to hold on to the coping. With the lights on he caught his first look at the client; it wasn’t General MacQuerrie.

Bourne, taken aback, said, “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Surprise!” the Angelmaker said weakly.

—



Bourne, arm around her shoulders, drew her away from the coping. Her face was pale, and there was a curious unfocused aspect to her eyes. “How long have you been under?”

“Long enough for it to make a difference.”

“You owe me an explanation,” he said. “But not now. We have very little time to get to General MacQuerrie and get out of here before we’re discovered.”

He pulled her out of the water, sat her on the coping before climbing out himself and snatching two towels from a pile in the corner. She swayed slightly as he dried her off. He’d been subjected to every form of interrogation technique during his Treadstone training. He knew what time in the floatation tank could do. At first you’re sure you can hold out, but then in the blink of an eye your nervous system goes numb, and you’ve slipped away from yourself. It doesn’t matter what other kinds of torture you’ve experienced, sensory deprivation is another animal entirely, one you cannot prepare for. Most methods of interrogation involve dealing with pain in one form or other. Techniques have been developed to handle pain, no matter how intense. They all involve carving out a private space for your consciousness that is inviolate and curling your essence inside that space while whatever is being done to your body goes on.

Sensory deprivation is different inasmuch as there’s no pain. Instead, there is a cessation of all feeling. You’re alone with yourself, and the lack of outside stimuli starts to distort your thoughts. Under these conditions, a private space is of no use, as your own thoughts make it porous.

This is what had happened to the Angelmaker. Whether her adolescent torture at the hands of Keyre made her more susceptible to sensory deprivation or it was due to a quirk in her personality was at the moment irrelevant: she had succumbed; her mind had detached itself from her body.

“Your clothes,” he said with some urgency. “Mala, where are your clothes?”

He took hold of her jaw, pulled her head so that she was looking directly at him. Her eyes looked like those of a junkie—the pupils pinpoints, despite the bright light. They wandered over his face as if tracing a route on a map. But she didn’t answer.

“Mala. Mala.” He leaned in, pressed his lips to hers. They were cold, trembling slightly, as if being affected by electric currents under her skin.

Jason.

He felt her “speak” his name through vibrations transferred from her mouth to his, and took his lips away from hers. Her eyes focused on him.

“In the locker, there,” she whispered hoarsely.

She pointed, and Bourne left her momentarily, though her torso was still rocking a little, as if she were someone who had been at sea a very long time.

He returned with her clothes, helped her into them. Then he toweled off and climbed into his.

“Can you stand?” He had helped her into her trousers while she was sitting down. He extended a hand, but she shoved him away.

“Cut it out.”

He stood back, checking the door he had come through every few seconds, while she struggled to stand. He could see that her knees were rubbery, but she was as strong of will as she was of body, and soon enough she was up, stalking back and forth beside the tank, her strength flooding back with each stride.

“Ready?” he said, and when she nodded, he led her to the door that gave out onto the short corridor to The Drowning Pool.

This third room was smaller than the others. On one side, an array of standing heat lamps were lined up like birds with bulbous beaks, all directed at one spot. Filling a sweat-and bloodstained wooden butcher’s table directly below them were a series of clamps, graduated from small to large, lines of files, scalpels, and a grouping of what appeared to be dental instruments, gleaming in the light from the ceiling overheads. On the other side, an industrial-size stainless-steel sink stuck out from the wall like the snout of an enormous hog. Beside it, a hose that could be attached to the sink’s spigot, a galvanized metal trough, a number of cotton cloths through which the water was poured onto the client’s face, and a table on which the client—in this case General MacQuerrie—was strapped.