Carrie had an uneventful trip on foot and by U-bahn to the During Foundation's building. Nobody had given her a second glance in the burqa, in fact, most people had given her a wide berth. She hoped it wasn't her smell, from living on the run over the last few days, but that could have been the other reason. She was probably getting a little ripe. She wrinkled her nose at the thought as she walked to the parking garage entrance.
She ducked into the underground garage, and stepped under one of the stairwells. It was just before 8:00 AM, and Otto would be arriving at the building shortly. She pulled off the burqa, and rolled it up, and stuffed it into the canvas bag. Then she took out the brown wig, turned it to the right direction, and aligned it over her blonde hair, tied down in a tight bun. She was irked that Quinn had come right out and said it was ugly. It was a disguise. It wasn't supposed to be pretty.
Finished with her disguise swap, she thumbed a short text into the burner phone and prepared to press send. She'd set it up to go to Otto's personal number. She leaned on the wall impatiently. 7:45, and nothing to do but wait. Otto was as regular as a clock, though, and it would take an act of God for him to call in sick. If her intel was correct, he'd be here soon.
About ten minutes later, she saw Otto's car pull into the garage and park in his accustomed space, right next to the entrance to the secure elevator. Being his Chief of Security, she knew where every camera was in the building basement, and had aligned herself to stand where Otto could see her on emerging from the car, but where a camera would not. She sent the message.
Otto got out of the Mercedes, stood, and turned in a circle. His eyes finally lit on Carrie, and he walked towards her, expecting her to move towards him. But she didn't, just for waited him to approach her. Finally, he came within earshot.
"Carrie," During said. "I've been worried. Must we stand here?"
"It's the security cameras," Carrie said, looking up at Otto. "It's best if I stay out of them."
"So, they're still after you?" he asked, concerned.
"They think I'm dead, the people who are after me," she said, still scanning her surroundings intently as they talked.
"So you know who they are now?" Otto said.
"Yeah. And I know they're not going away. You see, I know who they sent after me… and I know who could have given those orders. At least, the general group of people. And those orders… they didn't make sense. But the bottom line is, Otto, I don't know who's really behind it. We're all just chess pieces, being moved around on a board," Carrie said. "I need to know who the mastermind is, or this will never be over," she clarified.
Otto frowned down at her. "What can I do for you?"
Carrie sighed. "I need you to get a message to Saul."
"Saul Berenson? I am afraid that he and I aren't on the best terms."
"Well, the same goes for me. The last time I saw him, he told me to go to hell, but I was able to give him some information that should have changed his mind. If you ask him for something, the odds are pretty good he'll give it to you. I mean, now he will," Carrie said.
"What am I to ask him for?"
"The complete set of documents that were stolen from Berlin Station. There is something in there that someone desperately does not want me to see," Carrie said.
"Do you really think he'll do what I ask, believe it's you who's asking?" Otto said, with doubt. "He thinks very little of me, Carrie."
"He will, if you give him this," Carrie said. She surprised Otto by grabbing his hand. Into his open palm, she placed a stick of Black Jack gum. On the label, Carrie had scribbled her initials, "CAM". Looking a bit befuddled, Otto nodded and put the gum in his pocket.
"I know I'm asking a lot of you," Carrie said. "But after that, I'll need a place to hide," she said.
"You have Jonas' cabin," Otto suggested. "Wouldn't that suffice?"
"No," she said, voice tinged with regret. "No, I don't have his cabin. I don't have him."
"You are… you were…" During started uncertainly.
"No," Carrie said. "Not anymore."
During sighed. "I'm sorry, Carrie. I'll do what I can."
"Thank you, so much, Otto," she said, taking his hand again. He clasped it warmly. "If Saul agrees, he can contact me at the number I texted you from. I'll expect word within 48 hours, whether he's working on it, he refuses, where he wants to meet, or what. No matter what, I'll let you know. After that, I'm onto Plan B."
"What is Plan B?" Otto asked, backing away from her.
"I'm not sure yet," Carrie said ruefully.
"I'll be in touch," Otto said. He walked off towards the elevator entrance, as Carrie turned and disappeared again into the shadows of the parking garage.
Several hours passed while Quinn lay alone on the bed, doped up on morphine, his fever down and his condition stabilizing. The blood transfusion had given him a real boost, but healing of wounded tissues took time, nonetheless. He was half-in, half-out, with his eyes closed, when he heard a commotion in Hussein's sitting room. He steeled himself, and when the bedroom door burst open, he relaxed as much as he could, and didn't move a muscle.
"Hey," a coarse voice brayed. "Hey. Are you an American?"
Quinn didn't respond.
"You a spy? Huh?" The voice came closer. Quinn poised himself to use what was left of his energy to defend himself.
Hussein pushed into the room behind the man, arms wide in and appeal, protesting Quinn's innocence. "What kind of spy lays nearly dead in an alley, hoping someone will bring him here?" he shouted at the invader.
"Huh? Answer me!" demanded the intruder. He shook Quinn by the shoulders, and it took all his restraint not to leap up and pop the guy's throat. But no, not in Hussein's home. It wasn't time for that yet. He concentrated on remaining limp and still, keeping his breathing even.
"He can't," Hussein shouted, pulling the hands away from Quinn. "I gave him a sedative. For the pain!" Quinn could hear Hussein rushing the man back out of his bedroom, and away from his patient.
He gave silent thanks to his good Samaritan, who had already done so much, for defending him as well. A time would come soon, though, that Hussein wouldn't be able to come between him and the thugs downstairs. He just hoped that he'd gain back enough strength to fight properly between now and then. Maybe even to come up with some way to thwart their plans, or destabilize their group. Also, he hoped that Carrie wouldn't get in the way, and get herself hurt or killed in the process. He could handle dealing with this scum himself, but with her involved, it got… complicated.
His stomach had been tied in knots, but after it quieted down, he surprised himself by being able to sleep again.
With the Burqa back in place, Carrie was able to move around the city unnoticed. It was amazing how easily a woman wearing a cover blended in, at least in a large, cosmopolitan city like Berlin. Even in her old neighborhood, she walked by her old newspaper kiosk, her grocery and Jonas' favorite bottle shop, her presence unremarked. She knew it was impractical to go to the apartment where she and Franny had lived with Jonas, or even pass by. It was the most likely place to be observed. But it was ok - she could get what she needed somewhere else.
She moved on to the storage lockers where her fallback kit was kept. She and Quinn had raided it for the items they needed, the ones that were easiest to carry, right after he'd brought her back from the cabin. But they hadn't taken it all. There was a case she hadn't even shown him.
Carrie let herself into the room and shut the door. She pulled off the burqa and opened the cases she had left here – and checked. Yes, the lockbox was still here. The hidden key was too. She opened the box and took what was left – about a thousand Euro. A couple of extra fake passports, in case they couldn't unsnarl this mess in a few days, and had to disappear. She even had a high-quality passport with a male profile. The plan at the time –just over a year ago - had been to have a fallback for Jonas. But she knew now, he would never need it. He wouldn't have come. An icepick twisted in her heart, considering how she had felt about Jonas, and how she felt now. She still cared – she always would. He was a good man. But he didn't love Carrie as she really was. It was something she'd have to accept, and move on.
In any case, the fake passport was still useful. They'd need a good picture, but this would work for Quinn, too. She bagged it, along with the money.
In the other case, she found another sidearm, her old reliable Beretta M9, still a favorite and probably the one she'd shot the most rounds with. She put on the shoulder holster, and strapped it in. Then she closed up the cases and put the burqa over the whole thing, and cautiously moved out.
Her disguise still in place, she headed back to the hideout that Quinn had taken her to, close to Hussein's neighborhood. She looked around carefully, and when she was sure she wasn't being observed, she let herself in. Pulling off the burqa, she locked up behind her, and looked around.
Nobody had been here since she and Jonas she had left, the day before. She wanted to clean up the place, in case someone located the hideout, and make sure that Quinn's identity and his toolkit wouldn't be discovered if someone did stumble on the place. She wrinkled her nose as she pulled the sheets off the bed, the now-dry blood crackling and sticking as she tore them away. These, and other identifying marks, items and tools, she put away, hid in the lockboxes around the room, and generally tidied up. She took some time and swept the whole thing, making sure that if anyone came through, they'd have a hard time associating the location with Quinn or herself. She wanted it neat enough that it looked like an abandoned hideout, not a current one. Finally, she took his sidearm and extra clip, as well as the laptop computer and power supply, and put them in the bottom of the canvas bag. He'd want those.
She looked around to see if there was anything else that Quinn might want, something personal. But of course there wasn't. There was nothing outside himself that he'd ever found important. At least, no objects. There were a few kitchen items, a coffee cup, a cutting board, all very generic stuff. But the cutting board reminded her. He had been wearing a boot knife the day he'd cut her loose from the bed, and cut his hand so he could fake her death. What an oddly sensual memory that was now: his touching her face. She looked around and found it, a seven-inch fighting knife with a fixed blade, as sharp as Quinn's tongue. It was as personal an object as she'd ever be likely to find, for him anyway.
Burying the knife deep in the canvas bag along with its leg holster, she scanned the place one last time. It was as clean, secure and anonymous as she could make it. That was a good thing. Maybe they'd need it again.
On the walk back to Hussein's house, Carrie took civilian sidewalks, not back alleys, and moved at a sedate pace, blending in with the local inhabitants. It was after noon, and she would be glad to get back to Quinn, and see how he was doing.
She accepted his re-entry into her life, as strange and jarring as it was, and assumed that whatever happened from now on, he'd be with her. It was amazing how easy he was to get used to. He was like a well-loved leather jacket, worn, and ready to slip back on again, even after years of being ignored. He was a perfect fit.
She knew she had better not push him to the back of the closet, though, not after what they'd been through. They had some serious talking to do, some of it left over from his fevered days in the hideout, some from the last night together, sheltering in Hussein's hospital bed, and some from several years ago. Yes, quite a few questions and some answers to find, maybe even some answers to give. One night on a tree-shrouded street, in the half-dark, he had come to sad, grieving vulnerable Carrie, and found the nerve to ask her to share his life. Kissed her. She remembered that one kiss better than two years worth of Jonas' lovemaking. But when they met again, he'd deferred, not wanted to talk about it. It was like it never happened.
But they both knew it had. And it was time to put that silence to rest. She trusted him, and was so glad to see him. She had been terrified to lose him, and gone hunting to bring him back. But there was more than that. She needed to find out how much more, and hear him say it: he had thought she was worth dying for. There was no way to downplay that, was there there?
She would find out soon enough. Without hesitation, Carrie walked up to Hussein's building, and started up the front steps.
