“Why are we in Rome?” Not that he was complaining. He’d been locked away for several days in a safe house in the emptied-out Lake District before George had come to retrieve him. He’d been about to lose his mind looking at rain falling on green hills.
“We need a good twitcher. A nanobot twitcher.”
“Where’d you get nanobots? The people you work for don’t do nanobots, and I am not doing any biot bullshit. I saw what that did to Vincent.”
“Nanobots,” George reassured him. “We came across some, and a portable controller. Compliments of a former friend of yours.”
“Burnofsky?”
George laughed and didn’t answer. He rolled into the nearest seat and motioned Bug Man to buckle up.
Bug Man didn’t exactly miss Burnofsky. The old man was an unreliable, unpredictable, sometimes cruel degenerate. But he and Bug Man had played a great game. The greatest game Bug Man would probably ever play.
God, that was a depressing thought. Was it all downhill from here? He supposed that would depend on just what George here had in mind.
“What do you want me for?” Bug Man asked, but the question was lost in the impact of tires on tarmac. The jet rolled down the taxiway to a waiting car.
Bug Man walked down the steps to the tarmac—it was warmer out than it should have been for this time of year. Was Rome always warm? He had no idea. The sun was setting, and all he could see were featureless hangars and repair sheds. In the distance was a Fiat sign, and beyond that a billboard for what looked like a juice drink.
“I don’t speak Italian,” he said.
“You won’t need to,” George said. “Get in the car.”
Bug Man did not like that, the bossy tone. He needed to draw a line right here and now, before he was driven off to wherever. “Tell me what we’re doing here, dude.” When George looked evasive, Bug Man held up one hand, cutting him off. “No, man, now. Right here, right now. Enough playing around.”
George nodded, as if expecting this. As if he’d have preferred to do it somewhere else, but okay, if his impatient young friend insisted.
“The Pope,” George said.
“The Pope? The freaking Holy Father? The Pope? What about the Pope?”
“You know he’s in Rome?” The question was obviously insulting, spoken as it was with more than a trace of condescension.
“What’s with the Pope?”
George dropped the snarky look and got serious. “You are wanted by MI5. A word from them and every other intelligence and police agency on Earth will be looking for you. And of course, the Armstrong Twins want you dead.” He stepped closer, put his face right up close to Bug Man’s face, close enough that Bug Man could have told you the man’s toothpaste brand. “But forget all of that, because we have a fellow named Caligula. A charming name, I’m sure you’ll agree. He already knows your name. A single text from Lear to Caligula and your death is assured.” He held up an index finger. “I don’t mean that you will likely be killed. I mean that you will without the slightest doubt be killed. Caligula has never failed. Never.”
Bug Man swallowed. He knew the name. He knew the reputation. And he did not like the fact that Caligula knew what he was about.
“As to what you are to do, Anthony ‘Bug Man’ Elder, you are to retrieve a sample. A few cells. That is all. And then you will be free to go. We won’t protect you, but neither will we harm you. And you’ll be paid. A hundred thousand pounds.”
“Cells?” Bug Man asked with a dry mouth.
“Cells. A tissue sample. From the Pope. And it must be done quickly.”
“The Pope. Tissue samples.” Bug Man let this sink in. George waited, expectant, curious to see whether Bug Man would put it all together.
“Jesus,” Bug Man said. He let loose a short, sharp bark of a laugh. “Jesus bloody Christ on a cross.”
George got a dreamy look on his face. “See, Anthony, control is so much easier when you don’t require the victim to carry out complex actions. Reduce it to the binary and it’s all more efficient and effective.”
Bug Man nodded, seeing it—and fearing it. “You
don’t even need Caligula anymore. You just need a tissue sample.”
George threw back his head and laughed, showing teeth that had had many encounters with dentists. “I quite like you, Anthony. I’d have done this later, not here on the tarmac, but you’re such a clever boy.” He pulled a small plastic bag from the inner pocket of his jacket. From it he withdrew a vial and a Q-tip. “I’ll just swab the inner cheek, if you don’t mind.”
Bug Man did mind. He pulled away.