Hybrid, p.9
Hybrid, page 9
“Crystal, sir.”
Within ten minutes, Patton had the names and room numbers of both drivers. He couldn’t decide whether he appreciated the trust the desk clerk had shown him and his gold detective’s badge, or whether it was just another sign of how far away from home he really was. What a cynic you’ve become, he admonished himself, confusing good faith with naïveté. Still, he had always enjoyed the give-and-take with the more worldly and skeptical big city dwellers.
Johnson appeared by Patton’s side and craned his neck to read the two names scribbled on the notepad. “Two middle-aged males: a Texan and a Bulgarian. What do you suppose a Bulgarian is doing in Colorado Springs in the dead of winter?” Patton asked himself.
“The academy,” Johnson offered. “We get a lot of foreign visitors. Most of them are affiliated with the Air Force. Either theirs or ours.”
Patton looked up from his notepad at the slight policeman. He was five feet eleven and couldn’t have weighed more than a hundred and thirty pounds; the name “Barney Fife” flashed through Patton’s mind. “Well done, Johnson. Maybe I should have you follow me around and introduce me to all the local customs and peculiarities.” He tried to sound sincere, but by the young man’s expression Patton was certain that his comment only added to his insecurity. “The Texan makes more sense. I doubt someone would fly half way around the world just to kill Mr. Van Der.” Patton paused. He was investigating a murder now; something along his three-mile trek had changed his mind. He dwelled on that thought, but his subconscious hadn’t finished sorting through the situation. “Room 341,” he said simply and took off for the elevators.
It took Patton about half a second to rule out Edwin Reese as Rucker’s witness/assailant/murderer. Reese was not the middle-aged male that the desk clerk had promised. He was older than God, and, with the arthritic bend in his back, wasn’t even five feet tall.
“Yes, that’s the car we rented,” the octogenarian said in a very loud voice. “My daughter is meeting us in Denver.” He was in no mood to be disturbed or, apparently, to put in his teeth, or put something on other than undershorts. A frail, white-haired woman appeared at Edwin’s side.
“Please excuse Edwin. He is mostly deaf and completely deaf when he doesn’t wear his hearing aids. I’m his wife, Clara Reese.” Her voice was calming after the gruff Edwin. “Is there a problem with the car?”
“Probably not, Mrs. Reese, but can I ask if anyone drove the car this morning?” Patton turned on the charm.
“Yes, I moved it to this side of the building so Edwin wouldn’t have to walk so far.” She had a friendly voice with a prominent North Texas accent that made her draw out every last syllable.
“Did you sweep off all that snow?” Patton cocked his head to the side and clicked on his two-hundred-watt smile, playfully patronizing her.
“Goodness, no. I paid the man who carried our bags to warm up the car. I think he cleaned it off for me.”
“Is it possible he drove it, maybe to heat it up a bit?”
“I don’t think so. He was terribly busy . . . Well, I suppose it’s possible.” Confusion added to the lines in her face.
“And you said that he works here, downstairs?”
“Yes, the hotel manager arranged for him to bring our bags down to the car.” She was trying her best to be helpful.
“Were you planning on going on to Denver today?” Patton asked.
“Yes, we are. Our daughter has a house in Grange.”
“I doubt you’ll get out of here today. The interstate is closed, and I don’t think it’ll open before tomorrow.” Patton felt sorry for the woman; she was barely able to function herself, and appeared to be the primary caregiver for her irascible husband. “Why don’t you give us your daughter’s name and number, and we’ll let her know that you’ll be spending the night here and that everything is all right.” A little of the small-town attitude was seeping into Patton.
Clara carefully and shakily wrote out the information about her daughter and gave it to the detective, who immediately handed it to Johnson. Patton thanked them and left for the lobby, Johnson in tow.
“Do you think it might be the bellhop?” Johnson asked breathlessly, jogging down the hall, trying to keep up with Patton.
“I don’t know, but it sure wasn’t Edwin or Clara. I don’t want you to forget to make that call to their daughter. Do it while I’m talking to the manager and our helpful bellhop.” Patton emphasized the term. He couldn’t remember the last time he had heard anyone referred to as a bellhop.
They reached the stairwell, and Patton began to pound down the metal stairs. Johnson hesitated as the entire structure rocked and clattered with each of Patton’s footfalls. “Move your ass!” Patton’s voice echoed up from below, and Johnson forced himself onto the landing. He paused only for a moment and then made a headlong dash down the swaying stairs. Patton was already through the door and in the lobby before Johnson reached safety. He ran for his boss, all dignity lost.
“Afraid you were going to fall?” Patton laughed as his junior caught up.
“Things were mov—”
A pop, and then two more in rapid succession, interrupted Johnson. Patton’s hand didn’t wait for instructions from his brain; he had his weapon out even before he consciously recognized that the shots were fired from a standard-issue police thirty-eight.
Chapter 9
The snow had slowed Amanda’s progress, but it would equally slow any pursuit. She had passed a few police cars along the way, but none of them seemed to notice or care about her.
It had been almost an hour since she left her aunt, but her words still rang in Amanda’s ears. She would find whoever was spreading this new virus, tear open his mind, and perhaps kill whatever was left. The prospect excited her, and she had to consciously ease her foot off the accelerator. Almost as if on cue, her cell phone went off.
“Good morning, Greg.” Amanda tried to project a confident and playful tone.
“You’re on your way here aren’t you,” he said without preamble.
“I gather there’s a reception party waiting for me. They sure don’t waste any time.”
“Honey, this is serious. There are two agents up by the Harrisons, and they’re not exactly being covert, which means there are probably a lot more sneaking around. Somebody with real pull wants to see you bad. What did you do?”
“I e-mailed Martin.”
“That son of a bitch from the CDC? Why would you do that? He’s the last person in the world you should be talking to.”
Amanda smiled. She loved Greg’s paternal tone. She knew that he would protect her, even with his dying breath, from anybody or anything that could harm her, and that included herself. “I had to give it a try. He’s the one person best positioned to help. Besides, he’s going to find out very soon and come after me anyway.”
“Then there is no point in you coming here. Just turn around and disappear,” Greg pleaded.
“I can’t,” she said.
“I’m sorry for calling you. I never meant for you to get involved.”
Amanda could hear the anguish in her father-in-law’s voice. “Greg, I already knew something was going on; you just helped to bring it into focus. Someone is spreading a virus, and that same someone is looking for me. I would rather meet him on my own terms.”
“Why haven’t you told me about this before?” Greg asked. Amanda saw something in his mind. For most of the last seven years, she had restrained her ability around family members, but this particular thought was so powerful that Amanda couldn’t avoid it.
“You’ve seen him,” she said.
“I’ve seen someone, and Lisa has seen the same person several times as well. It’s probably just Internal Affairs making sure that my retirement is not too comfortable.”
“You don’t believe that and neither do I,” she answered. “I’ll know more as soon as I see you.”
“Amanda, don’t be a fool. If you come anywhere near here, the FBI will be all over you.”
“O ye of little faith, with a wave of my hand, they will all disappear.”
“Amanda this isn’t funny,” Greg rebuked her.
“What’s wrong with you, Greg?”
He waited a moment before answering her. “There is a priest in our parish. I’ve known him for a few years. He’s a good man—at least, I thought he was a good man.”
“Greg, you’re babbling.”
“It seems he has abilities similar to yours and has managed to conceal them for I don’t know how long.” Greg paused, but Amanda remained quiet. “He said he saw you early this morning, and that you were looking for someone to kill.”
“He’s wrong,” Amanda said rather unconvincingly.
“Honey, we can’t do this again. The last time . . .”
Amanda cut him off. “I gave you my word, and I’ve kept it,” she said sharply. “I am coming home to find the man who is purposely spreading this infection. I will tell you now that I will do whatever is necessary to stop him. You can’t ask me to do anything less.”
“Even if you do it for the right reasons, it’s still murder.”
Amanda didn’t respond. She didn’t want to argue with Greg, especially over a cell phone. “I should go, Greg. It’s starting to snow, and traffic is picking up. I’ll call you once I get in, and please don’t worry about me.”
“I will always worry about you, Amanda. Please be careful.”
Over the next half hour, the snow worsened. Travel was being discouraged, but no one seemed to have listened. There had been three multi-car accidents within a twenty-mile stretch along I-25 before the road was closed. Amanda had been lucky; she had been able to follow three huge snowplows into Colorado Springs a little after nine. The Highway Patrol finally directed her off onto a downtown exit. The surface streets had been plowed and sanded, so the going became a little easier. Her first order of business was to find a place to stay. For more than six years, she had successfully evaded the FBI by assuming the identities of others. She was surprised how easy it was. Even with the additional scrutiny over the last few years, Amanda could effortlessly become half a dozen different people. She had credit cards, driver’s licenses, and bank accounts—everything a normal person would need to move through society without arousing suspicion, including getting a hotel room.
“Good morning, and welcome to the Hilton,” the desk clerk greeted Amanda with a tired smile. Normally, she would have preferred a place with a lower profile, but all the low- to medium-range hotels were filled with stranded travelers.
“Morning!” Amanda returned the smile and read his nametag and his mind in the same instant. David Ruiz was twenty-seven, married with three children, all boys. He and Sophie, his wife of six years, had just moved into a new house, and David was working two jobs to manage the mortgage. Sophie was a legal clerk, and David’s greatest fear was that he would lose her to a better provider. Normally, he was home by this time, but the rest of the hotel staff was having trouble getting in, so David had volunteered to stay for a while. He needed the extra hours almost as much as he needed the gratitude of his boss. He was a good, decent man, which made it all the harder to accept that he was infected.
“How long have you been sick?” Amanda asked. She could have pulled the answer directly from his mind, but that would have required an active search, and she didn’t know how he would react.
“About a week. It’s just this flu that’s been going around. I think I picked it up from one of my kids.” He seemed somewhat embarrassed by his haggard look. “I’m pretty much over it now, but last week was pretty rough.”
“So you’re getting better?” she asked, her voice too high for casual conversation.
David paused and looked at Amanda. She realized that she had slipped out of character and he had picked up on it. “I can assure you that I’m not infectious.”
She stared at him with a blank face. His embarrassment changed to curiosity, and then just as fast to the special, viral-induced brand of anger that Amanda was all too familiar with. He stared back at Amanda, his rage building. He tried to fight the rising fury, but the more she stared at him the harder it became for him to control himself.
She regretted having to do it but, just before he exploded, her mind reached for his and enveloped it. David responded by screaming and grabbing his head. She tried to be as gentle as possible while sifting through his mind. It took seven seconds before Amanda retreated back into herself. By that point, David was on the floor, howling in agony.
“Are you okay?” Amanda leaned over the counter, back in character. It took him a full minute to register that someone was talking to him.
“Huh? What?” He looked back up at her, wondering who she was and why he was on the floor.
“I asked if you were okay. You slipped on something, and I think you hit your head.”
He climbed back up to the counter, dazed, and still confused. “I’m fine, I’m fine,” he repeated. He looked at Amanda as if he had never seen her before. “Are you checking in?”
“You were about to give me the room key.” Amanda’s comment was more instruction than answer.
He looked down and found a room card and a sleeve with the number 456 scrolled across the top. “Oh yes, I’m sorry. Please excuse me. I’m just getting over a cold, and I’m moving a little slower than usual.” He handed her the card. “It’s room 456. Go through the lobby and take the elevators to your left. Do you need help with your luggage?”
“No, thank you,” Amanda answered. She walked away, leaving David Ruiz with a headache and a five-minute memory gap. She reached her room, dropped into the chair by the window, and called Greg.
“Hello,” Greg answered on the first ring.
“I’m here,” she said quickly. “It’s not the same virus, but it’s close. The clerk downstairs has been sick for a week. If it was my virus, he would be dead by now. I’m fairly certain that this is a mutation, and that’s why people aren’t dying by the thousands.”
“What about the violence? Is it related?”
“Absolutely.”
“Do you know who’s doing this?” Greg’s voice was rising in excitement.
“Not yet. I can feel him, he’s close, but for some reason I can’t break through.”
“So how do you find him?”
“I don’t know, but I’m worried that we may be too late. What do you know about viral infections?” Seven years and the internet had turned Amanda into an expert on viruses and special pathogens. In particular she followed the work of Nathan Martin and his department closely for any word on EDH1.
“Nothing more than not to shake someone’s hand after they’ve sneezed into it.”
“Aggressive viruses kill so quickly that any outbreak generally burns itself out. A slower-acting virus has greater infectivity. Moderately sick people still walk around; they go to work and the mall. And some shake a lot of hands. Thousands could already be affected.” Amanda wondered how many travelers Ruiz had infected in the last week, and how many those people had infected once they left. “We need help, and it’s not going to come from Atlanta.” Amanda quickly summarized her exchange with Martin.
“Our Chief Medical Examiner is brilliant but somewhat unusual. I can start with him.”
“It might be more effective if I talk with him.”
Greg laughed loudly. “I think if you met with Phillip Rucker, we wouldn’t be able to get him out from under his desk for a week. You better let me handle this.”
“All right,” Amanda said. “Greg, I really do need to see you and Lisa.” Aside from Emily, they were her last real contacts with humanity. “Let me find someplace safe, and I’ll call you back with a location. ’Bye.”
Amanda put her phone away and let her mind drift. The killer was frustratingly close, but he remained shrouded. If she could find him, she could extract every thought from his mind and quite easily take what was left of his life without ever getting up from her chair—except, she couldn’t find him. His presence was all around her, but trying to snare him was like trying to grab a handful of smoke.
Her mind came back around to the early morning conversation with Greg. His parish priest had abilities similar to her own? It wasn’t possible; she would have been aware of him long before now. Could he be the one that was spreading the virus? The man who was seeking her? The killer?
There was no way of knowing without seeing him, but first she needed some sleep. It had been over forty-eight hours since she had last slept, and while her need for sleep wasn’t great, her body did need to recharge every once in a while. Two hours, I can afford two hours. She turned back the sheets, stripped down to a T-shirt and panties, and fell into the bed. She was asleep before her head hit the pillow.
***
It was the same dream; it was always the same dream. She was walking along some sugar-white beach in the early evening twilight. She was alone—not by herself, but alone. There wasn’t another human being left on the planet, or perhaps the universe. Either way, she didn’t care. Nothing else had changed. Everywhere she looked, the world was the same; the birds sang as she kicked up the sand, waves lapped at her feet, and the wind blew through her hair. Off in the distance she heard her dog bark. Mittens, her mottled and often mangy mongrel dog from childhood, now a sleek golden retriever in the prime of life, ran towards her with a smile on her face. She had a look of sheer contentment, and Amanda realized that she too was completely content. She bent down to greet Mittens, who lapped at Amanda’s face relentlessly. She was naked, but it didn’t seem to bother Mittens, and as they were the only sentient beings in this entire universe Amanda ignored her nakedness. Besides, Mittens was naked, too. Amanda felt liberated, free from more than just clothes. The worries, the responsibilities that had crushed her all her life were gone. She ran, jumped, and wrestled with Mittens for hours, and the sun never set. She was both child and adult, fused in some strange synergy that only dreams can produce.
