Night Moves by Tom Clancy, Steve Pieczenik Page A

But you do want clarity."
"Yeah."
"Well, being a Buddhist doesn't get in the way of that. In fact, it helps. But we'll get back to that later, too. First things first. The nature of your injury?" "They say I had some kind of stroke."
"Fine, we can deal with that."
"I'm glad you can."
"Not me, we. Jay." He tapped his right temple with one finger. "Our brains have a lot of built-in redundancies. You get a short in one spot, it's entirely possible to reroute the signal to a place where the wiring is better.
You might not even need that, but we'll see. I'm going to ask you a series of questions, you respond however you like."

"Okay."
"What is eighty-seven minus thirteen?"
Christ--arithmetic ?
"Yes, arithmetic. To start out." He grinned. Jay sighed. When you're at the bottom, the only way you can go is up. "Seventy-four," he said.
"And who is the President of the United States ... ?" Sunday, April 3rdStonewall Flat, Nevada "What have we got, Julio?" "Sir, not much. We've come up with some bloody pieces of scorched bone, something that looks like burnt hair, and a couple of teeth.
Whatever he had in that car did a job on him. I doubt they'll ever find all of him." Howard sighed. Yes, indeed. He wasn't looking forward to writing this report. "All right. Finish the trailer, leave two men to watch the site, and we'll get the lab boys out here. Pack it up and let's go home."
"Yes, sir."
Howard looked at the crater where the target's car had gone up in the blast. This wasn't the plan, but at least they had taken him down. The man had been a professional killer. Aside from whatever else he had done, Reader was in bad shape, and three others were wounded enough to need hospital time. The target deserved to be questioned and imprisoned for a thousand years, but this would have to do. Quick and rough justice, Howard could live with it. He turned away and headed for the Humvee. Julio had been right to keep the air conditioner turned up. It was hot out here and getting hotter.
Damn, he hated this.
In his burrow, Ruzhyo tried to sleep. It was hot, and he was exhausted, but he couldn't relax enough to drop off.
He had considered wiring the trailer so that it would go up with the car, but had decided against it. Perhaps somebody could get some use from it. It had been, for what it was, a good home for him. And more importantly, anybody who remained behind to watch would surely use the place for shade from the hot sun, or even go inside to run the air conditioner. From inside, there was no window that looked directly upon Ruzhyo's hiding place; he had made certain of that.

By now, they would have found the remains of what he had left inside a sterilized and vacuum-sealed
plastic carton for them to find: Leavings from a barber shop's trash; several uncut bones, raw meat, and blood mixed with anticoagulant made from rat poison, all from a pig. And the final touch, a human skull from a high school biology skeleton, stolen and wrapped tightly inside the pig's scalp, packed with the pig's brain. Such things would not fool a pathologist for an instant, but someone who had just seen a car blasted to smoking bits might think the fragments of bone and blood and brain human.
And they might think so long enough to allow him to escape. Nothing was certain, but it was a chance. The cameras showed men getting into vehicles and leaving. They would post a guard, probably no more than two or three soldiers. It would be hot, and the guards would remove their helmets or some of their armor or go inside the trailer. When they did, he would be ready. They would have checked the trailer for explosives and, finding none, would feel safe. Pistol held loosely in his hand, Ruzhyo tried again to sleep. Even a few minutes would be good. He was so tired.
Sunday, April 3rdLondon, England MI-6 HQ looked just like any other modern office building inside. Michaels wasn't sure what he'd expected, especially given that Net Force HQ also looked like some typical corporate