Chapter Thirty-Nine

Arya

Paris, France

Nighttime

"H anging in there, Arya?" Thorn asked. "We can take a break."

"No, we can't," she replied. "You need to understand what's going on, right?"

"Yes," Lynx said. "So we can make plans on how best to protect you. The better our picture, the better our plan."

"Out of self-preservation, breaks aren't a good idea." She looked straight at Thorn. She really had become, since her hearing was damaged, very good at reading expressions. Thorn was conflicted.

"I think this is a balancing act," he said. "We need the information, and we don't want to push you too fast or too far."

"No way to tell, though, is there?" She pulled her gaze away from Thorn's to ask that of Lynx.

"Unfortunately, that's correct."

Arya turned back to him. "Better out than in, right Thorn?"

He shook his head. "In this instance, I don't know. I think you're going to have to be the one who sets the pace."

"Okay. I'll keep that in mind. I'm not…there's a lot. It's not organized in my head. It's kind of like a kaleidoscope." Stress pulled at her forehead. A headache lurked in the wings ready to fill her head with a gonging cacophony. She thought her time for being helpful was probably short lived.

"I'm going to ask you about your relationship with a series of men. I don't know all of their names. I have their photos. When I show them to you, if it causes you too much distress, you'll tell me. Will you promise to do that?" Lynx asked.

Arya licked her lips and nodded. She tightened her grip on Thorn. She wasn't willing to let go of this anchor. He seemed to understand because he said, "I'm here. I've got you."

"Can I sit up a little?" she asked. She put her free hand to her forehead and was surprised that her brow was cool.

Thorn pressed a button to raise her head, then spun around to sit next to her. They were shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, thigh to thigh. He left one foot on the ground. The other dangled off the edge of the bed, keeping things fresh and clean.

He never let go of her hand.

"Okay, the first two pictures. Do you know these men?" Lynx posted pictures of the men who kidnapped her.

"Dr. Petrov is the balding man. Dr. Sokolov is the other one. The blond."

"When did you first meet them?" Thorn asked.

Arya swallowed. "Well, I was at a conference. I was meant to give a talk about whale communication, but these two kidnapped me before I was able to speak."

"This was the Zoology and Animal Behaviors Conference in Sacramento, California?" she asked.

"Yes." Arya paused. "That sounds right. Sacramento is right. I met George Matthews at the conference. He was taken by gunpoint at the same time I was."

"This George Matthews?" Lynx put up another picture.

Arya stared at that one for a long time. Her brain stuttered. "This could be him. He was younger looking, the George Matthews I remember."

"Do you know why they took you away?" Thorn asked.

"Then? No. Later, I learned that they needed help developing CHAMP."

Lynx said, "I'd like to understand more about champ."

"Explain it? Do you have a scientific background?"

Thorn focused on her with a steady gaze. "I have a fighting background. I worked for the Navy as a SEAL. Does this have to do with the Navy? Did they put you in danger?"

Arya scowled. "Why would you think that?"

He swept his thumb over the worry lines on her forehead. "Relax. Breathe." He seemed to wait until he was satisfied that she had calmed the flood of anxiety a bit before he said, "You were going to testify in court about your whale studies, and how the Navy affected marine mammals with their sound waves."

"That's right, I was. But George and I were kidnapped before that happened. We were both supposed to report about our findings of how the naval soundings harmed the ocean mammals."

"You were both kidnapped before the trial. And you were held. And George was not?" Lynx asked.

"He was a prisoner. We were there for a very long time. Years, it seems. But my time perspective is warped. We escaped together." She tilted her head to the side. Something about that wasn't quite right. "We were forced to work together on their projects."

"Champ?" Thorn reminded her.

"CHAMP is Counter-electronic High-powered microwave Advanced Missile Project. But that's not where we started."

"Do you want to tell me what happened when you started?" Lynx asked. "What happened after they took you from the conference?"

"We were blindfolded and moved. There was a flight, I know that. We were taken to a place that was cold and very lonely. There were no other people or houses. It snowed all the time. They told me I was in Siberia, but I have no idea if that was right or not. I have no idea where I was." Arya could feel hot tears dripping down her face. But she ignored them. "They wanted me to use my science to help them build a weapons system." She laughed, and it tasted bitter next to the salt of her tears. "I'm not really a weapons kind of person. You might say that is rather opposite of where my heart lies. But they…hurt me very badly. And they had captured my sisters in Syria. They were holding them prisoner. If I misbehaved, they would not just punish me, but they would punish my sisters in kind." Her chin wobbled. "They're probably dead now. I wasn't able to do what was asked of me." Arya set her focus on a small stain on the wall. "Yes," she whispered, "probably dead."

"Can you tell me your sisters names?" Lynx's voice pulled her back with a jolt.

"Polla was my older sister, and Habiba was the middle sister. They had been scientists, too. They were very bright, very lovely women."

Lynx put up two pictures of women in hijabs.

Arya reached out to grab the screen and stared wide-eyed at the pictures there, drinking them in.

"The woman on the left is Dr. Polla Khouri. She is working in Munich as a physicist. She sought asylum from Aleppo at the beginning of the war. This picture was taken last night."

Arya gasped and started shaking.

Thorn reached his free arm around her and pulled her tight against him.

"And the woman on the right is Dr. Habiba Khouri Schmid. She is working as a geneticist in Geneva, Switzerland. She lives there with her husband and two children. Another child is on the way. That picture was also taken yesterday. Neither woman was captured at any point. And neither woman was ever hurt in retaliation for anything you did or did not do."

Arya couldn't believe it. Could not wrap her thoughts around the relief of this. "I have nieces and nephews?" she was able to gasp out.

"Just nieces." Lynx smiled. "I'm sorry we don't have their pictures for you." Lynx gave Arya a moment to assimilate that information.

A moment wouldn't do it. A lifetime might not be enough to do it. To let go of the fear and guilt. To let go of the pain and anguish. They had been fine all along, despite the recording that had been played for her. And now that Arya thought about it, she knew that sound waves could be altered. Her captors had tortured her physically, but probably worse, they had tortured her mentally.

"Ready?" Lynx asked.

Arya nodded. She felt weirdly out of her body, disconnected.

"The two Russian scientists used the idea of your sisters being hurt to get you to work for them. CHAMP was later. But can you explain to me what it was?"

"Yes, they wanted to develop a weapon that was supposed to be used instead of traditional firepower. It was supposed to be as effective as a nuclear weapon without hurting buildings."

"Just taking out all of the warm-blooded animals?" Thorn asked with a nod toward Lynx.

Arya just stared at him wide-eyed. In her mind she was too horrified to contemplate a sound weapon that would take out all warm-blooded creatures in a space. That would be apocalyptic, and to stop such a thing, she would have allowed them to torture her and her family to death. What were the options? To take out whole swaths of populations? Horror coursed along her nervous system.

"Breathe," Thorn reminded her, and she took in a great gulp of air, held it, and thrust it out with as much power as she could muster. She did it again. And again. And again, until her brain started to function.

"The first thing they wanted me to develop was a shield. This shield was to be carried by the riot police. It was to make it so that the protestors would not be beaten or shot, but simply that the sound it emitted was painful enough that it forced them to leave the area."

Lynx change the screen. "This?"

There was an article written in Russian. It said the pension riots in Russia were getting out of hand and the Russian government was deploying new weapons to contain the rioters. One of the items was a sonic riot shield that immitted sound waves that were physically torturous and would drive back the crowds. People with unprotected ears could be permanently damaged by the effects of the subsonic sound waves.

"That was a theory. A prototype," Arya said. "They must have started to manufacture them." Her gaze scanned down the article. "Developed by Dr. Petrov and Dr. Sokolov, who were given medals of valor by the Russian government."

"That article came out recently," Lynx pointed out. "But they must have been in production for a while for the police to get a supply in place and train their forces."

"These are very dangerous weapons, and they could hurt friend or foe alike. I'm sure the training was extensive," Thorn said.

"Time is a nebulous concept to me right now," Arya whispered. "I can't put my research on the calendar for you. I'm sorry."

"You're doing just fine," Lynx encouraged her. "What happened after you had the sonic shield prototype ready?"

"Next, they wanted George and me to work on another riot weapon, one where you could shoot the sound at a pinpointed opponent."

"And you were able to do that?" Thorn asked.

"Not the way they wished. Sound waves radiate out. So it's not like shooting a bullet – getting the gun on target, pulling a trigger, shooting a round, and having it hit someone specific. I wasn't able to figure that out, and I discovered that kind of weapon did the same kinds of physical damage on all the people, in say, a space as big as an office-sized building."

"Let's move away from that for a moment. I don't think knowing your exact research will help us right now. Let's talk about George. He was held prisoner with you?"

"Yes."

"You saw him daily?" Lynx asked.

"No. I saw him sometimes. Every couple of weeks. I was told he was in a different facility, and he'd be brought in so we could compare out research notes."

"He was tortured the way you were?"

Arya stared at her lap. Was he? "I assumed he was…I don't know. I never saw anything. We were watched carefully when we were together, so we were cautious to speak only scientifically. I do know that when he didn't comply…when he failed…when he tried to make mistakes to slow down the work, they would come in and beat me. They had a video camera. They wanted George to see that his behavior hurt me, very badly. And…well I tried very hard to comply so neither George or my sisters were hurt."

"Do you know what happened to your hearing, Arya?"

"Yes, it was an accident. I was explaining the issues with pinpointing the weapon. I went into the sound proof room to adjust the experiment and someone set off the subsonic sounds. I heard an odd noise. And then everything changed. My ability to hear. The tinnitus. The confusion. Short term memory loss. Uhm…disequilibrium."

"And what happened next?"

"I was in my bed one night. George was able to get my door unlocked. He said he was going to escape and asked me if I wanted to come with him. Of course, I did. I was willing to risk anything at that point ? my life, my sisters' lives. Anything . They had told me more about the weapons they wanted me to develop after CHAMP, a low frequency infrasound that would explode blood cells?" Her eyes stretched wide. "Wait! Is that the apocalyptic weapon you mentioned, Thorn? Taking out mammals and leaving infrastructure? I didn't line those up. It was – I didn't." She shook her head vehemently. "I didn't even want them to have CHAMP?"

Lynx interrupted, "Arya, George asked you to escape. Were you successful?"

"He drove us through the night to a small field. There was an airplane, and we stopped to eat and have something to drink, waiting for the morning light. I fell asleep. When I woke up, I was in the hospital and DuBois was there with George. That's Dr. David DuBois, who is absolutely not my father."