Strangers

retired eight years, and my instincts aren't what they once were. But I have a very bad feeling about this. Drop it, Pablo. Don't see her again. Don't try to help her any more."
        "But, Alex, I've promised her."
        "I was afraid that'd be your position." Alex folded his tremulous hands. "Okay. The Azrael Block… It's not something that Western intelligence services use often, but the Soviets find it invaluable. For example, let's imagine a topnotch Russian agent named Ivan, an operative with thirty years' service in the KGB. In Ivan's memory there'll be an incredible amount of highly sensitive information that, were it to fall into Western hands, would devastate Russian espionage networks. Ivan's superiors constantly worry that, on some foreign assignment, he'll be identified and interrogated."
        "As I understand it, with current drugs and hypnotic techniques, no one can withhold information from a determined interrogator."
        "Exactly. No matter how tough he is, Ivan will spill all he knows without being tortured. For that reason, his superiors would prefer to send younger agents who, if caught, would have less valuable information to reveal. But many situations require a seasoned man like Ivan, so the possibility of all his knowledge falling into enemy hands is a nightmare with which his superiors must live, whether they like it or not."
        "The risk of doing business."
        "Exactly. However, let's imagine that, among all the sensitive knowledge in his head, Ivan knows two or three things that're especially sensitive, so explosive that their revelation could destroy his country. These particular memories, less than one percent of his knowledge about KGB operations, could be suppressed without affecting his performance in the field. We're talking here about the suppression of a very tiny portion of his memories. Then, if he fell into enemy hands, he'd still give up a great deal of valuable stuff during interrogation - but at least he would not be able to reveal those few most crucial memories."
        "And this is where the Azrael Block comes in," Pablo said. "Ivan's own people use drugs and hypnosis to seal off certain parts of his past before sending him overseas on his next assignment."
        Alex nodded. "For example… say that years ago Ivan was one of the agents involved in the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II. With a memory block in place, his awareness of that involvement could be locked in his subconscious, beyond the reach of potential interrogators, without affecting his work on new assignments. But not just any block will do. If Ivan's interrogators discover a standard memory block, they'll work diligently to unlock it, because they'll know that what lies behind it is of enormous importance. So the barrier must be one that cannot be tampered with. The Azrael Block is perfect. When the subject is questioned about the forbidden topic, he's programmed to retreat into a deep coma where he cannot hear the inquisitioner's voice-and even into death. In fact, it should more accurately be called the Azrael Trigger. because if the interrogator probes into the blocked memories, he pulls that trigger, shooting Ivan into a coma, and if he continues to pull the trigger he may eventually kill the subject."
        Fascinated, Pablo said, "But isn't the survival instinct strong enough to overcome the block? When it comes to the point that Ivan must either remember and reveal what he has forgotten or die… well, surely the repressed memory would surface."
        "No." Even in the warm amber light of the floorlamp beside his chair, Alex's face appeared to have gone gray. "Not with the drugs and hypnotic techniques we have these days. Mind control is a frighteningly advanced science. The survival instinct is the strongest we've got, but even that can be overridden. Ivan can be programmed to self-destruct."
        Pablo found his champagne glass empty. "My young lady-friend seems to have invented a sort of Azrael Block of her own to hide from herself some extraordinarily distressing event in her past."
        "No," Alex said, "she didn't form the block herself."
        "She must have. She's in a bad state, Alex. She just… slips away when I try to question her. So, as you know this field, I thought you might have a few ideas about how I can deal with it."
        "You still don't understand why I warned you to drop this whole thing," Alex said. He pushed up