Excerpts from the short story
The CIA Exposed - The T.A.R.P. Cover Up
by
Ernest Bywater

MY INVOLVEMENT

One Monday Night, I'm sitting in the lounge room watching a TV series on conspiracies, they're featuring the CIA tonight. I nearly killed myself laughing at it. Don't get me wrong, the CIA are an arrogant lot with a total disregard for anyone except themselves. But a bigger bunch of bunglers has never been accumulated in one organisation, ever.

That organisation has more holes in it than a sieve. All during the cold war the quickest way to tell something to the KGB was to tell four CIA agents, odds were that one was a KGB informer. When they started experimenting on people in the 1950's it became public knowledge within a few months. It was 50 years for the papers to be declassified, before the full details were known and acknowledged by the CIA and the USA government. Their attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro, talk about bungling fools. All without any White House, Congress or the Senate approval. Most are bureaucrats who've trouble finding their own bums with a road map and a tracking locator. The few good agents in the CIA are out in the field collecting information, none are assassins or cold killers, and they go to great lengths to stay out there away from the idiots in Langley. When some fool credits the CIA with a successful conspiracy assassination it's laughable. If they blamed the FBI, DEA, or Justice Department it would be plausible, but not the CIA. It should be called the Centralised Idiots Agency.

Near the end of the show the phone rings and I answer. It's an old friend Max, who I haven't heard from since he vanished in 1994 - some strange people were looking for him at the time.

Laughing Max says "G'day Deadly, you're a hard man to find. Took me two days to track down your number. You watching that comedy about the CIA? Ridiculous ain't it. Interested in making a few grand turning some records into a presentable story for me?"

Smiling I reply "I thought you were officially dead by now. Yeah, I'm watching that CIA garbage, it just proves my favourite saying 'Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.' Writing for you, OK. But I want the money up front before you vanish again. What's it about."

Max says "Oh, I'll let you work out what it's about when you see it. I'll send you a package with a bank cheque for five grand and a DVD with copies of various e-mails, diary entries and some video clips. I want you to turn it into a story and get it published somehow. I'll be happy if all you do is get it on the Internet. You will have total editorial control as I won't be in contact again. Is it a deal?"

"It's a deal." I replied "Since you won't be reading the final draft, aren't you afraid I won't just take your money and run, or write crap."

"I know you'll write well, those tech manuals you did were good and I've seen the training notes on your web site." He responds, "You're honest. I know if you say you'll do it, then you'll do it. It may take some time but you'll do it."

Laughing I say "Thanks for the vote of confidence. You got my address."

Max says "Yep, you should see the parcel in a few days by mail. And, before you ask, I won't tell you where I'm or what I'm up to. Get it from the info I send." And hangs up.

Later that Week

On Thursday I receive a small parcel with a DVD, a cheque, a contract, and a letter from a solicitor asking me to read, sign and return the contract. I read and sign the contract and then check out the DVD. Lots of e-mails and interesting stuff but not a thing that could be used to write a story that's worth paying the five thousand dollars he sent. I was interested in the fact that such a small and well wrapped package had been damaged in transit and needed retaping. First time in the three years I had lived at that address that a parcel had been damaged. More interesting was that I couldn't work out how it got accidentally damaged that much. Maybe I'm just getting paranoid.

Friday morning I take my usual weekly 56 km (35 miles) drive into town to buy groceries and do some business. As usual I end up at the local MacDonald's for lunch at 12.15 pm. Gives me time to get my lunch and seated before the place becomes crowded with all the schoolies from the two high schools just up the road - the seniors are allowed out for lunch and nearly all the girls end up at Maccas. Makes for nice scenery while eating.

About 12.25, with the place very crowded, three young ladies in the sports uniform of the Catholic school ask if they can sit at my table. Naturally, being a gentleman, I say they can and start admiring their charms. One of them, a petite brunette sitting opposite me, soon gets my attention.

Softly she says "So Deadly, I hear you're very good at playing cards."

Looking at her closely I know I've never seen her before. Sure, I'm lousy with names but I always remember the face - just can't put a name to it. Since she knows my old nickname, I'd not used it in the three years I've lived around here, I decide to up the ante and say "Only if it's at a poke-her party." They all laugh.

She replies with "Do you think you can still handle three or is two your MAX?" Out of the corner of my eye I notice the blonde beside me is slipping something into my shoulder bag that's on the seat between us.

I respond with "Oh, I think I can still handle three, but just in case what say I start with the blonde. I prefer blondes because they get so dirty easily - but are fun to get clean again. And it is easy to see what they're up to, or down to as the case may be." They laugh again.

The brunette sys "It's a pity we can't hang around to find out."

I reply with "That's OK, next time we can sing 99 Luftballoons."

Smiling she says "I'm glad I met you and to see that we understand each other. Take care, take extreme care." They pile their rubbish on the tray and drop it in the bin as they leave. I do the same.

From there I go to my chiropractor, afterwards I head home. Making sure to obey all the speed laws etc. If Max needs to go to these lengths to get me the info, then I'm not taking any chances. On that thought I go home via a different route taking me through a small town that is only 16 kms (10 miles) from home to buy some milk and ice-cream.

That night I rebuilt an older computer and viewed what's on the two large USB thumb drives that Max sent me; and became really paranoid.

Saturday morning I rebuild that computer again with Windows XP. I set up a sequence of disconnecting the hard drive in that machine each time I used it to work on Max's real stuff. I'd plug in a third thumb drive with a minimal Linux installation and boot from that. I kept the thumb drives in a hidden coat pocket and they never left my side. Each day I would spend some time on that computer working on the stuff that was on the DVD and make like I was earning my money with it, I'd also spend some time working on the USB drives. Every time I left the house I took great care in driving, had numerous near misses with idiots cutting me off and the like. I also worried about the car when it wasn't in my sight. Even took precautions to see if the house was being visited while I was out, found it was. Paranoid was becoming my middle name - more like my only name.

It took several months but I finally finished the story that Max wanted from the material he sent. What follows is Max's story written from his point of view, and I've done my best to imitate his style. Some of the story's aspects are very frightening and others very heartening. It does show that some people still do stand up and die for supposedly outmoded ideas like freedom, personal liberty and what is right - God bless them.

....................


Some CIA agents have managed to track me down - usually I just convert them. With no corpse or witnesses there is nothing to investigate. Just another damn stupid city slicker lost to the wilderness, somewhere in the Rockies. Maybe the bears got him. One was replicated in the Swiss Alps and the CIA is still trying to work out how and why he went there, and how he got killed.

My bank accounts in Switzerland and the Cayman Islands are left alone at present. I have lawyers in New York who get shipped a few diamonds for sale and they credit the money to my San Francisco bank account. I have to pay for the satellite television and Internet somehow. Two lovely slaves, TV and high speed Internet, what else would you need?

AFTERWARD

Naturally, all this is fiction, sure it is, it has to be or I wouldn't be allowed to write it. The CIA would stop me, they would assassinate me wouldn't they?

PS: Hey Max, hope you like the way it came out, this was the best I could do for you.

NB: This story is subject to the copyright rules of the Berne convention. The characters portrayed in this story are just that, characters in my story, of course. Any similarities to real people are purely coincidental and unintentional. The characters and situations portrayed are pure fantasy, naturally.