Sorry for the long delay.
Chapter 12
Bond speed out of the city with Q nattering in his ear.
"We think they are heading north towards Milan."
"You think!? I need better than that Q! Come on! This is a big country I don't want to be heading in the wrong direction with M's life in the balance. Where did he come from? Does he own any property?"
"We are working on this Bond."
"WORK FASTER!" Bond screamed in frustration. "We honestly have very few scenarios where M does not come to physical harm. One: She could already be dead. Two; he will torture and then kill her. And three; which is bizarrely the most hopeful of all these terrible possible outcomes, would be that he assaults her but keeps her alive, healthy yet captive and living through repeated physical assaults. Is he mad enough to want to keep M as a trophy? None of these options are good and the only thing that can save her, is me getting there sooner than later!"
The end of the line Q and possibly Tanner were now listening with M. They remained soberly silent as they digested the information. Eventually M began to speak.
"007 do you really think that is what is going on?"
"Yes! Did you not allow for the possibility of her pulling someone from her past was in all likelihood an old lover or someone who definitely wants her to suffer? What lies did you believe to allow her to do this!? The collective knowledge she has, falling into the wrong hands wasn't dangerous enough for you to say no! Or were you spineless to her demands for some other reason?"
"That is enough 007. She lied to me! That is my excuse and I have air support at the ready in Italy to fly you home the moment you get to her."
"For your sake I hope she's unharmed M." Bond threatened. "I'm done after I get her safe. I know you've been expecting this. I'm too old for this shit now! If she lives I plan on living either with her or near her enough to protect her for the rest of her days."
"I see. I see that you are sentimental for her as I accused her of being for you."
"I certainly hope so...she means more to me than anything. Including my own life."
There was silence after that remark as those on the other end in London.
"Then bring her back safe Bond." Q said as he cut the line.
Bond gripped the steering wheel tighter as he headed North East, trying not to think of all the places in between Genoa and Milan where this Silva could take M.
M was alert as she could be with the sway of the car lulling her to sleep. The emotional events of the day draining what strength she had left allowed her to drift off only to be startled awake by a terrible dream.
The dream was the reality she was living now.
The woman beside her looked at her tentatively. "Are you alright?"
"Just a nightmare." It was in fact much later and dark outside. "Where are you taking me?"
"To one of his associates' homes."
"And that is where he plans on killing me?" M stated blandly.
"I assure you that unless he is mistakenly too rough, you will be alive for as long as he wants you to be."
"That is not reassuring in any way. You are a prisoner...what do I have to expect in the line of... torture?"
The lovely Severine paled and looked away as she fidgeted with her bracelet. This brought M's attention to the shiny object. M grabbed the girl's wrist and pulled it to her. "He's listening isn't he? Gathering information or revelling in my despair?"
Severine merely nodded as she attempted to take her wrist back but M continued looking at the bracelet and then more closely at the tattoo on the poor girl's wrist.
"He likes to collect things. Now you are one of those things." Severine said meeting M's eyes.
They pulled off the main road and on a twisting turning lane. They turned again to a long winding path up into the hills. "Where are we? Are we still in Italy?"
Severine nodded as they drove past a gate guarded by two armed men.
M would count six armed men so far including the two upfront driving and the two in the other car with Tiago. There would be more at the house, at least four.
Ten armed men seemed insurmountable for M but perhaps Bond could...but he had better be looking after Judith not chasing after her. Q and Tanner would be searching and dispatching a team. There was a unit at their disposal in Rome at all times that could be here in a few hours if they get a location on her.
That was M's challenge. To get the word out as to her location. If only she could take that bracelet from Severine and make it emit a signal. Maybe there would be landlines in the house that were being overlooked. It was amazing how often that was the case in the mobile phone age.
The car rolled to a stop in front of a large country home. It was made of stone and M could smell flowers and water on the breeze. Perhaps they were near a lake. A lake that would be overlooked as an escape route.
Severine ushered M into the house. It was beautiful and modern with a classical touch. This was not a very old home just a post war modern one meant to look much older. Once they entered the house, the smell of food hit M's nostrils and her stomach grumbled. She'd not eaten since breakfast and was famished.
Severine looped her arm through M's as she turned to await Tiago's grand entrance. Severine had other orders obviously, and pulled M up the grand curved stairs to the upstairs. He was not willing to face her yet. Nor was she ready to face him but still, it made her wonder...
"You must change before dinner. No doubt that you would like to clean up and refresh yourself also. We met Mr. Silva in his special den before dinner. There are some things he would like you to see and then maybe you will understand why you are here now."
"After speaking with you I think I already know why I'm still alive and it doesn't reassure me."
M entered the large nicely appointed bedroom and Severine guided her to the bath. A steaming bath had already been drawn by some servant who was not visible apparently. The scent from the flowers stationed around the room mingled with the vanilla scent coming from the hot bath.
M had to admit she looked forward to sinking into the large central tub.
"Disrobe and I will have your clothing cleaned and await you out in your room and get your clothing settled."
"What clothing? I only have what I currently have on."
"Mr. Silva has provided some essentials and a dress for this event. You only have an hour so please don't dally M. Silva hates when we are late.
M scoffed and waved her away. "I will take as long as I like."
"He will come get you. He is not a patient man." Severine said with a furrowed brow.
"And I am not a patient women, yet I've had to put up with all his smoke and mirrors today, haven't I?" M responded knowing that he could very likely hear everything they were saying while grabbing the robe Severine held out for her.
M looked along the floorboards as she was disrobing in the corner. Severine turned her head and held out a robe to M. M saw what she wanted in the corner. She casually moved towards it as she began taking her scarf and blouse off and tossing it onto the bed near Severine.
M kicked her shoes into the corner and bent to straighten them up grabbing the item she had hoped to find. She held it to her and she kicked off her trousers and did away with her undergarments. M pulled on the robe while placing her find in the large pocket.
"I will be back in a moment. Refresh yourself and hurry please."
M entered the bathroom and looked for what she needed and found the junction box for the land line she stowed in her pocket. The phone was in the corner of the room by the sink and hided from view just enough that if she were intruded on, it was not suspicious to find her standing there. M called the only person she knew could help her and spoke as quietly as possible.
"Q, It's M. Trace this call."
She left the phone off the hook as she tossed the hand towel over it.
The bath was wonderful, even though the thought of what she would be facing within the hour did continue to worry her. What was his game? How could she temper her anger and lead him to where she wanted in order to get away. The information he must have at his disposal must be understood and mapped back to the source. Hopefully Q branch would be up to the task.
M got out of the tub and wrapped herself in a plush robe. "Time to face the music." She said to herself.
Severine had a lovely soft grey wrap dress that was far simpler than the evening gown she wore. M was thankful that he respected that she was not a model like the woman before her and that comfort was the most important thing for a woman of her age.
"I am concerned that he knows my size so well. Even for the shoes."
"He hacked into your tailor and has everything on file. I purchased the clothing myself. I hope you approve."
M grabbed Severine's bracelet quickly and wrapped a wet towel around it to muffle the ability to overhear what she said next.
"Yes. It's lovely. I will bring you with me when I leave and hire you as my dresser." M said quietly smiling at her and then released her wrist. M needed to have her understand that she would take her so long as she cooperated.
Severine looked shocked and nervous but nodded slightly to M to indicate that she had no loyalty to Silva and wanted the chance to get out. She turned and walked over to the dressing table to arrange some creams and make-up as M got dressed. She quickly helped with M's hair and make-up and then they left the room and went downstairs.
M's stomach growled as they walked past the large open dining room and towards a room that looked oddly lit. It was as if the room was only lit by televisions flickering and changing colour in the dark.
Severine ushered her inside and stood beside her quietly. The two of them waited but M was far too shocked and busy looking at all the images on the screens from around the world but specifically London.
The main large television comprised entirely of the far wall of a sunken room in which there was a sofa, two chairs and a coffee table below the rise that you enter the room on. The large television flickered with images of her during different stages of her life as if a slideshow. How? Why? Did he actually believe that he loved her?
Private images of her and her family, friends, pets she had had in the past and different homes. Even some images from news clips and within MI6 itself flickered on the screens in moments and flash quickly to a new set of images. Her smiling at Nigel and the children from some candid family photographs. First days of school. Graduations. Births. Weddings. Her life flickered before her eyes. For the eyes of strangers! Those of a concubine and a completely obsessed mad man and whomever else he shared them with!
M was so surprised that as she walked down the few steps towards the screen she didn't even notice the bulk of him sitting in the middle of the sofa, arms stretched out over the back of the sofa, with a massive egotistical smirk on his face.
There was nothing M hated more than a smug man who was trying to dominate and intimidate her. She had to admit it was unsettling to see her life on the walls of the room as if she were a pin-up girl or target for assassination. Amazing how close these realities were to what was possibly going on in this room. How to play it to her advantage was the real question.
Tiago wanted her in the past and he obviously didn't have any issue with her age. Bond had been protesting much the same. This absurdity was all because they desired the power suit. The woman in charge. M understood that was a turn on for many men but Tiago...this was an obsession from long ago.
Then Tiago stood up and clapped his hands loudly, he smiled at her as if she were a long lost friend.
"Ah...Olivia...or should I call you M. Would that make you more comfortable?"
"Nothing about this makes me comfortable! Where did you get these images?" M was completely aggravated now. Seeing the images of her life for him to just sit there and watch on and endless loop was beyond unnerving.
"It is amazing what the youth of today store in the cloud. I believe your son made this for an anniversary of sorts. Then there are public pictures if you have face recognition software. I easily searched all the news sites and found CCTV images. Of course I actually believed that Olivia Mansfield was dead! And I never ever thought that they would reward you with the big chair just because of what you did to me. Finding you has finally given me direction and purpose."
Tiago moved towards her and embraced her strongly. Picking her up in his arms, as he squeezed and buried his face in her neck. "You are so tiny. I had forgotten."
"Let me down! Unless you plan on rudely squeezing me to death before dinner." M gasped. It was uncomfortable and she hated feeling his hot breath on her neck, with the full understanding the reason she was still alive.
Tiago put her down and looked concerned. M understood a lot more about him after the momentary panic on his face. He didn't want her hurt. He wanted her company and her acceptance. Fat chance of that! She could use this...hopefully.
Tiago took her hand and led her out into the hall for the dining room. The table was set for two. M looked over at Severine.
"No. Severine will eat with the others. It's time for you and I to get reacquainted." He held the chair out for her and she sat and draped the serviette across her lap.
"Tell me what this is all about Tiago?"
He slammed his fists on the table making her jump. "Raoul Silva is my name now. Please call me Raoul."
"Why?"
He looked at her and sighed as you would an exasperating child. "Because that is my name now!"
Tiago was trying to keep his anger in check but M could see the rage that stormed to life within him. It was a flash of uncontrolled rage bursting forth in only an instant. No wonder he was scared he had hurt her. He honestly doesn't understand his own limitations...his own strength.
"Fine. Raoul, what is this all about? I am no longer M so holding me for any reason is not a case of national security any longer."
"Ah but you would like to believe that wouldn't you. There are men I know who would pay handsomely for any information in that pretty head of yours. The inner working of the UK government concerning various areas of the world. Britain is still part of a larger network and has links to many other countries."
M scoffed. "That is not what this is about or you would have just had someone take me in London. This...was all too well orchestrated considering I had to spend more than a week to lead you out of hiding."
"You knew?"
"Yes. Well call it an educated guess as to why all this was going on. It was decidedly personal towards myself and…"
"And your new favourite agent. Bond, James Bond. That smug arrogant would be aristocrat. Yes...well there are plans in the works for James. And before you ask M, it's not of my doing. I would have just killed him and done away with him. But there are bigger, more miserable plans for that one."
"Mr. White?"
Silva clenched with the name. "That imbecile has angered too many on this side to live much longer."
"So it is someone else? Someone from Bond's past. You...you represent the black mark on my personal history. You were sent to destroy me and hurt Bond in the process." It had come to her suddenly. Tiago was not the mastermind. He was the dog sent to hurt her and separate her from Bond.
"I wanted you to recognize what you did to me. I see that you do if you guessed that it was me who survived. I have always wanted you and you knew it then."
M shivered involuntarily under his gaze. "I would have hoped that had changed over the years. You don't really…feel...anything for me other than anger mixed with misplaced obsession from my rejection of you years ago."
Silva laughed loudly. "You...you would see it that way. I only lived so that I could find you. When I couldn't...I built an empire for my own...but with aimless direction. I stayed away from your dreary little Island... because it reminded me of you. I thought you were dead. Q did a very good job of hiding you from view. I really believed you were gone...dead, during the time it took me to escape that Chinese hell hole you left me to die in. It took years for me to heal physically...mentally...well I will let you be the judge of that. You were always so judgmental and concerned about appearances. It must be a sign of your generation."
"Why?"
Silva looked confused. "Why what? Why I desire you or…"
M suddenly had the beginnings of a plan. "Why didn't you...come back to me then? As soon as you escaped the Chinese you should have contacted us for extraction! We would have gotten you out and back to London to heal and debrief. This would have been much easier if you had returned...to me then."
M was playing with fire but she had to make him think of this from a different angle.
"You...you would have come for me?"
"Of course I would have! You were...my agent. Even if they made me give you up to the Chinese we certainly would have wanted you back upon escape or release! We were told you died...and I...I...have had to live with that guilt...all these years." M looked down at her plate trying to appear despondent.
Silva stood peering down at her as if she was transforming into an animal before him. He paced the room pulling at his hair until he suddenly knelt before her chair.
"You would have come!?"
"Yes." M stated plainly. "I most certainly would have come for you...Tiago" M was desperate to convince him that there could have been another path for him.
"I have done the same for many agents over the years I've been M. I just wasn't looking for you until now." There was no overacted warmth or faked desire in what she said. She didn't want him to misconstrued and think that it was at all sexual.
Silva would take it however he wanted and M had no control over that. Silva grabbed her hand and kissed it moving to the floor at her feet. Kneeling he was still as tall as she was seated. "For me...for me...I never thought…"
"That six would treat you like any agent that escaped a hostile adversaries prison? Don't you remember that in training they said if captured it is your job to try to escape and get back to base somehow?"
"But you gave me to them?"
"I was instructed to do so."
"This was M's fault?" Silva said remembering the old man who had been a gruff commander in the war. "If he were still alive I would kill him!"
"No you wouldn't have, had you escaped and come home. You would have been treated for all your injuries and put back to work. Granted you wouldn't have become rich from it but you could have been comfortably placed in a new area or ended up in Q branch."
Silva collapsed back on his haunches as the shock of this different point of view sunk into his thought process. Years he had felt tortured and abandoned but that was based on what the guards in that Chinese hell told him.
"I was...wrong?"
"You forgot your training and whatever they did to you...got to you more than the obvious. You stayed in the east didn't you?"
"Yes. I have an Island off the coast of Japan, it was abandoned I made sure of that."
"Battleship Island?"
"Yes I made my home there in the ruins and I plan on taking you there to keep you out of sight."
"Why? I'm not M...there is little reason I need to be a prisoner."
Silva stood and began pacing again and M continued to eat her soup and bread. Servers interrupted them for a moment and brought the main course in. Silva sat down again and began eating and chuckling.
"You want me to believe this wasn't all your fault and that I shouldn't destroy MI6 for what was done to me. Clever girl."
"Believe what you want. I can only tell you the truth from my point of view. That is all anyone can do. From your point of view I abandoned you to the Chinese to die but in reality I was ordered to do that to allow the government a smooth transition of power. There is always someone to answer to and I was only a section head, not M at the time."
"What do we do now? Where do I take you?"
"You should release me and disappear again if you want to live. Stay out of MI6's way and don't put yourself in our cross hairs. If your interests stay above board and in the Far East, I see no reason for retaliation. You've suffered a great deal over the years Tiag...Mr. Silva at the hands of the Chinese. Please tell me you have at least caused them as much if not more problems than you have caused Britain?"
Tiago smirked and nodded. "I have. None that worked in that prison survived. None of the magistrates or lawyers or anyone in that fake courtroom survived. I could do as you asked and leave the crown alone but there is another condition of me staying in the east."
"Oh and what is that?"
"You."
"Me? You can't be serious. I'm too old for all this nonsense Mr. Silva and I'm in no way attracted to you and I told you that over 15 years ago. Nothing has changed."
"Accept that you are no longer married. You can no longer hide behind the supposed love you had for your husband. The man you slept with on the ship or your wayward agent who wants you. You could save all of Britain a great deal of intentional terrorism by my people and other organizations if you cooperate."
"So you want me to live with you as a what, a lover, a concubine...a bloody mother figure? I don't want to and you are not going to give me much of a choice are you? That's not going to be comfortable for me, so my only recourse is rescue if six comes and kills you."
Silva smirked as he took another bite of food. "I look forward to them trying. As for you my darling...I would rather you acquiesce but I am more than prepared to take whatever I want."
"I will fight you with all I have." M said sternly.
"I really...only what to give you real power and some pleasure if you would just let me. Realize how I feel about you. I will destroy your enemies without political interference. You will be richer and more powerful than the Queen herself!" Tiago said with exuberance.
"You do me a grave disservice thinking that I ever wanted anything like power and material things. I will not disrupt the world order just because of a petty personal grievance. Innocent people would be lost in the fall out and I never craved those things. I want to retire in peace and leave the new M to deal with the politics of the day."
"So we are at an impasse. I will win this one, this time M. You will be mine and…"
A servant came suddenly in the room much to the anger of his employer who was glaring daggers at him. "What is it now! Can I not get the peace and time I deserve with my beloved M?"
"Sir...I think you need to come...there is a disturbance…"
M couldn't help but smirk. "I think I know who that disturbance might be."
Silva glared at her as he threw down his serviette, stood and followed his man out of the dining room shutting the door. M could hear voices raised in argument and then shouts.
It could only be Bond. Who else could cause this much disturbance so quickly after her call.
To be continued...