Bhang took a different approach.
Upon his elevation to minister, Bhang had appointed somebody he could trust and who was technically capable—his brother Bo Minh—to design and build a better mousetrap. What Minh invented was now being experienced firsthand by Chang. The device was called the “dragon.”
The dragon was simple enough: forty-six stainless-steel probes that pressed front and back against the subject, from head to toe. The probes were intelligent, that is, they performed a variety of functions depending upon the individual probe. First of all, at their most basic level, the probes monitored in real time all life functions of the subject—heart rate, brain activity, lung and heart pressure, levels of various chemicals in the bloodstream, oxygen levels, breathing rate.
These readings were then run through a sophisticated algorithm that had been written after studying more than one thousand individuals in a controlled setting, telling both lies and the truth, over a period of two years. Through this two-year data repository of minute-by-minute reactions, Minh and his team of statisticians, physicians, scientists, computer engineers, and design engineers knew exactly what lying looked like across a complex spectrum of physiological attributes. What they learned is that liars have a wide variety of strategies and physiological reactions, depending on time of day, levels of hunger, levels of exhaustion, and a number of other factors. There was no single way to know if someone was lying. However, there was a finite physiological library of reactions during the lying process—eighteen in all—across all people. Minh and his team discovered that in physiological terms, there are eighteen different kinds of liars, no more, no less.
Once they understood how to identify a liar with one of the eighteen different patterns, they then charted the transition from a state of lying to the state of telling the truth, in precise physiological terms. They mapped each of the eighteen types and, in this way, mapped the precise physiological transition to the truth. They learned that some liars will move to the truth with pain. Others will not, but those liars could be motivated in other ways, such as with drugs, sleep deprivation, hunger.
Thus armed with more than twenty-two terabytes of data, Minh and his team designed an algorithm that was capable of analyzing an individual’s various physiological attributes, determine if he is lying or telling the truth, and, if lying, could place them in one of the categories, then administer the most effective way to compel the subject to tell the truth.
The dragon automated the entire process.
Each probe had a different role. Five of the stainless-steel needles, for example, monitored heart activity. Two injected synthetic opiates, heroin derivatives, while four injected different types of neurotoxins designed to cause pain. Ten probes could send electric jolts, and six produced small flames barely visible to the eye but hot enough to char the skin.
Perhaps most important, all probes moved inward, pressing against the subject, sandwiching him in tiny increments, every time a lie was told. This was what Minh referred to as the “dragon teeth.” A subject could feel the immediate effect of his own lies. Eventually, if enough lies were told, the individual being interrogated could be punctured straight on through, in forty-six different places. So far, that had yet to occur, as the algorithm had proven incredibly effective at getting the truth before that occurred.
On this day, in Santiago, Chile, it didn’t matter to anyone except the algorithm what specific type of liar Chang was. But he was lying.
Chang was alone in the lab. A camera was attached to the ceiling, hanging ominously down like a spider from the rafters, aimed at him, filming him, then delivering the live feed to Beijing. Speakers in the wall delivered the questions.
Chang was drenched in perspiration and his skin was ashen, a product of more than sixteen micro injections of heroin and three injections of a synthetic neurotoxin made from a derivative of household bleach. In addition, he had three large pink marks—one on his neck, another on his testicles, and still another on his left ankle—where the dragon had sent a series of white-hot flames.
Most conspicuous, however, was the wallpaper of reddish dimples, like the outside of a golf ball, that was arrayed across his front and back, as the device moved ineluctably inward, slowly crushing Chang as he attempted in vain to spin his magic tales.
His capture at Valparaiso Airport had been routine. They were waiting for him when the jet landed. Chang would never know how Bhang had found him out so quickly. During the trip to Santiago, the ministry agents hadn’t said a word. As he was driven to the ministry laboratory, bound and gagged in the back of a van, he’d asked himself if there was something he could have done differently. Perhaps he should’ve remained in Argentina and gone into hiding. But even that would’ve been futile. They would’ve found him, sooner than later.
“Why did you run?” came the voice from the wall.
Was it Fao Bhang’s voice? He’d never actually heard Bhang speak. He sounded polite, like a schoolteacher.
“Answer, please.”
“I don’t know,” said Chang.
A small needle injected something into his neck. Burning pain erupted at the point of injection and flamed out. Chang screamed.
“What happened to Hu-Shao?”
Chang said nothing.
“Where is Hu-Shao?”
“I don’t know.”
The probes moved in, just slightly, while at his ankle a small torch flared. Chang screamed.
“Why didn’t you make contact?”
“I did. I made contact—”
A flame shot out from a different probe, at the lower part of Chang’s back. He screamed.
“You were escaping. You’re lying.”
“I was going to call from Valparaiso.”
The probes moved in, pressing a little harder against his skin.
“Stop lying. Where is Hu-Shao?”
“I told you, I don’t know.”
He felt and heard one of the probes puncture skin above his stomach. Blood oozed out from the puncture wound.
“Where is Hu-Shao?” asked the voice, calmly.
Chang looked up at the camera, resigned.
“He’s dead. Raul killed him.”
“How?”
“He shot him in the head.”
“Where?”
“In the field. He knew Hu-Shao was going to kill him.”
Chang’s eyes drifted to the camera.
“It was your fault,” he added. “All of you. If you’d just left it alone, it would all have been done, as we were trained to do. Instead you told Hu-Shao to kill the mercenary. Why? Why did you do this? Just kill me.”
The probes tightened, sandwiching him, while a shot of something cold entered through a probe at his neck. Suddenly, a burning pain riveted him as the neurotoxin entered his bloodstream.
“Where is Hu-Shao’s body?”
“At the ranch. On the ground. His head is destroyed. We were going to carry him out.”
“Did I hear you correctly?” asked the interrogator, anger and shock in his voice. “Hu-Shao’s body is—”
“On the ground,” said Chang. “The American was shooting at us.”
“Andreas?”
“Yes.”
Chang felt warmth, as a tiny dose of heroin was administered, a reward for telling the truth. He shut his eyes and tried to forget where he was. Somehow, he knew it was to be the last moment of pleasure in his life.
“He shot Raul in the stomach. We had to leave the body on the ground and run.”
“Is Andreas still alive?”
Chang remembered the sight of Andreas, firing his weapon at the Gulfstream as they took off. But he could be dead now. That was what he told himself.
“I don’t know.”
“Was Andreas alive when you last saw him?”
“Yes.”
“Did you fire at him?”
“Yes.”
“Was he hit?”
“I don’t know.”
The probes moved in slightly, pinching.