Note on transcription: The following is an accurate and true excerpt of the audio file entitled “Richter June 3,” extracted from a Proton Drive cloud account confirmed to belong to Zorya (a.k.a. Zero) Koval and submitted as evidence to the record (Case: CFD-881823) on September 23, 2030. The voices on the recording have been officially identified as Koval and attorney Mr. Werner Richter (MA BBO: 625555).
Zorya Koval: Listen to me. This part’s important and you’re not listening. … It wasn’t at the Correspondents’ Dinner. We were at a dive bar in Georgetown and Senator Mallory’s chief of staff didn’t say he’d kill me; he said he’d have me killed. Which is w—
Werner Richter: And you believed the threat.
Koval: I’m here, aren’t I? At a lawyer’s office? And also, before you ask, I know what his words were and the way he said them as a fact because every conversation I’ve had for the last five years has been recorded, and I’ve listened to this particular recording like a teenager’s favorite track on—
Richter: Massachusetts is an all-party consent state. By the way.
Koval: —on repeat. And the creepiest thing is that his words were without anger and delivered with a casual malice reserved exclusively for Beltway douchebags destined for Dante’s Eighth Circle.
Richter: Which circle is that?
Koval: Where you’ll be too. … The one with a bunch of different ditches where people who committed fraud are punished with fire or tar or disease or having their heads turned backwards, which, honestly, could be worse. I like to picture Josh being split from head to crotch with a sword by one of the demons—but he’d more likely be in a fire tornado, which is where fraudulent counselors went. But point is that he said, word for word, “I’ll have you fucking killed.” And then he shrugged. That part isn’t on the recording—but he fucking shrugged! And then he let the threat land within a comically theatrical sip of his Malibu-diet, which was not exactly—
Richter: Malibu-diet?
Koval: Yeah. I dunno. He either can’t handle a proper drink or he does that thing Johnson did, drank mostly water while everyone else got sloshed. But, again, to my point—his words left very little room for interpretation. Had he gone with, “I’ll fucking end you,” or, “I’ll bury you,” even a recorded message might be defended, later contextualized as a professional threat, explained away as a very, very funny but obviously misrepresented joke and it’s my fault if I can’t take a joke. But to have me fucking killed provides a clarity that I’m certain he regretted in the following days.
Funny part is the whole thing didn’t shock or concern me in the moment. I get threats all the time. All the time. Part of the job. The first time a politician threatened my life, yeah, I was shocked, frightened, without words, all the emotions you’re supposed to feel when a person with actual power tells you, veiled or not, that they’d end your existence if you don’t do what they want you to do. But I dunno—as with anything, you get used to it, and then you start recording the threats.
And by the way—by the way—to your previous point, I’m well aware I can’t “use” the recordings for anything legal. That’s not why I have them. And I’m only telling you because you’re my fucking lawyer, or my family’s lawyer, so just—please. Just for a moment. Don’t lecture me.
I didn’t come here because of the threat on my life. I’m here because they broke into my apartment. They locked my dog in the hamper for fucksake. He shat all over. They broke the watch my grandmother gave me when I turned sixteen. They cut the straps on every one of my bras like fucking creeps. They took my first edition of On the Road. Which was my dad’s. Which had been my dad’s before the— I mean. Do you think they needed that? Do you think that was what they were fucking looking—
Richter: There’s a lot of emotion here.
Koval: Why wouldn’t there be? They kicked me out. Landlady didn’t need this kind of trouble. I had to move to Vienna, Virginia, speaking of circles of hell. Anyway. What I was saying was—I keep recordings because the words someone chooses and how they say those words, those things matter. And when I write the truth, as a journalist, I need to impart an incident or interview exactly as it happened, otherwise it just becomes a recollection, a memory, an opinion of the past. And I don’t deal in opinion. Do you understand?
Richter: I understand.
Koval: Good.
You know it’s odd. I haven’t been to a funeral in a long time. So many people die, and I haven’t been to a funeral in years. I never understood why people plan for their own funerals. Why would my funeral be my problem? Wasn’t my parents’ problem. Their funeral. That one was on me. Do you have any water in here?
Richter: Table behind you. Are you free to tell me why Josh threatened you?
Koval: Thanks. And yes, I can tell you. It’s the whole reason I’m here. The reason he threatened me is because— No one cares about much anymore. Campaign embezzlement. Bribery. Shit, only Democrats care about adultery, which, just funny that those who claim to value the sanctity of marriage most could not care less when the most basic tenet of that promise is broken.
The reason he threatened me is because Senator Mallory’s wife, Cynthia, was on a flight manifest. A flight into St. Petersburg. And I know you know why that’s a problem. Because you know power is a family business. The right hand does all the shaking while the left hand wipes the ass. Senator Mallory stays clean over here, while his wife sets up resorts built with slave labor and Qatari oil money in Estonia. But the manifest is just the beginning. I have other connections, other sources.
Richter: On record?
Koval: Of course. Having sources on record is my job. That’s all I deal in. Sources. Gossip. Connections.
People treat gossip as bullshit. But it never is.
Sure, recollections are embellished, inaccurate. But rarely are they wholly false. When I hear a rumor, I can tell its inertia immediately.
And I know Mallory would have me killed. But I also know he doesn’t want to. It’s not preferred.
The apartment thing a few months back was just a warning. It’s what they do to say they can get to you. No one wants to have to kill someone. It’s bad for business. It’s a lot of work. It takes time away from accumulating money and power. And time and money and power are what people want. Unless they’re psychopaths. Which is always possible. And which is why it’s valuable to learn how to spot a psychopath. Usually, psychopaths are the people you hire to do shit. Killing or torturing or whatever. The people who hire them—most of the time they’ve simply trained themselves toward immorality.
I mean, sure, it’s all a spectrum. The psychopath spectrum. Everything’s a spectrum. Gender. Sexuality. Autism. Depression. Intelligence. Psychopathology. Nothing is binary.
And whatever my special spectrum cocktail is, that’s what causes me to not just let this go. Because that’s the answer, isn’t it? Letting it go. Forgetting about it. Going on my way. Doing a job. Having a life. Starting a family. Buying a house…
But why I’m here is— The Potomac won’t publish my piece on Mallory. And I want you to look around corners I haven’t or can’t. What should I do? What options do you see?
Richter: I’ll give my opinion, but I want you to understand that this is not legal advice. This is an old friend of your dad’s giving you an opinion. (Pause) I need you to say it verbally.
Koval: Yeah. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. I understand.
Richter: Three options. First, publish independently and deal with the consequences on your own. Two, do nothing. Drop it. Three, sell it to Mallory. It’s extortion but if you go through, say, the Gazette…
Koval: Let me make sure I understand you properly. I can—one—publish a story lambasting one of the most powerful senior members of the U.S. Senate without the protection of the company that owns the publication for which I work.
Two—neglect to execute the single most fundamental requirement of my profession.
Or three—Sell it as a catch and kill to an outlet that supports a guy indirectly supporting and funding iniquity.
With the first—I—I don’t have the power to protect myself. I don’t have Jason Bourne skills to fight back. I don’t have money. So, it’s not wise to publish this with zero protection and cross my fingers they don’t kill my dog next time.
But I also, besides this work, I rank very low on the Spectrum of Meaning. Of purpose. I lack any purpose other than this, other than Truth, other than holding others, especially those in power, accountable and not allowing them to lie to themselves.
So really, I’m incapable of letting this go. I can’t. That’s not a choice for me. There’s nothing else to do. I must do this. I’m compelled. Unalterably compelled towards chaos and peril.
…
Sorry. Thank you.
You know— You know what makes me saddest about my parents dying? That I never got to know them as an adult.
As we get older, we learn who we are. Doesn’t mean we become comfortable in the person we find. I mean, it’s not like we stop comparing ourselves to other people, stop trying to fit in, to change. It’s not that we cease to be disgusted by our own actions. But! But—we do accept that we do things because the world has set us to react in certain ways, to make certain choices in certain circumstances that could not have been otherwise. And I don’t mean that as fatalistic or deterministic as far as the future is concerned. Because I look back and I know it would have been impossible to make any single choice other than those I’d made.
…
I dunno.
Your third option is interesting. Sell it. It dies. I make a dime. Mallory lives on. Everyone wins. That’s the idea?
But Truth.
Truth doesn’t win. Which is par. Which is human. Which is the way of the world.
Which I also don’t love.
Your idea, though, gets at something essential: Power is slippery. You have to constantly adjust your grip to hang on to it while others are clamoring to jar it from your grasp. Competitors, enemies, even your friends. So maybe… Maybe I don’t need to fight back. Maybe I just need to realign the interests of a few specific people.
Richter: Mmm. Sounds like a hazardous tactic.
Koval: Hazardous tactic. Yeah.
…
Yeah. Good term.
…
You know. Nietzsche wrote—I can’t remember exactly but he said something like, “The secret to get the most out of life is to live dangerously, to build your cities on the slopes of Vesuvius.”
Richter: He also signed notes as “Caesar.”
Koval: Yeah…well…well…I’ve um…
Thanks for fitting me in. No. No, don’t get up. I appreciate the friendly advice, for your take on the whole, you know, situation.
Richter: Zorya…
Are you okay?
(No audible response.)
Can I help in any way?
Koval: I dunno…
I guess—I guess you could get a plan in place for my memorial. Just, you know, in case.
End of transcription.