by Dima Zales
Nick and Jean are waiting for us in the surgical waiting room, and they’re the only people there. The big men are occupying two of the cheap, uncomfortable-looking chairs and flipping through yellowing magazines with last year’s headlines. This windowless room must be a low priority for the hospital staff in charge of restocking magazines.
Nick’s greeting is more monosyllabic than Jean’s, but only by a narrow margin. I wonder if they’re trying to live up to some kind of bodyguard stereotype. So far, they’re succeeding.
We sit down, and I grab a magazine from the pile on the decrepit-looking end table and pretend to read while I take another stab at navigating the labyrinth that is the hospital Wi-Fi. In the meantime, Ada uses her entire mental capacity to engage the two brutes in a semblance of conversation.
“Jackpot,” I mentally shout at Ada and Mitya. “I found two security cameras in the operating room.”
I access the first one, and my blood pressure spikes as I take in the room with its masked surgeon and slew of faceless helpers. Muhomor is barely recognizable with the mask over his face, and the hospital cap covering his signature hairdo is extra depressing. A green sheet covers his poor body, somehow making him look thinner than usual—almost frail. The second camera shows a gaping red hole in the back of his getup, with bright light streaming down at it from the special surgical lamps. I can see the grisly details of the surgery, and I let my eyes wander around the room, focusing on anything but the gore to avoid fainting. My chest aches even more, and guilt gnaws at me as I think of all the recent jokes I made at Muhomor’s expense, not to mention the stuff I told the shrink. “This is so bad,” I mumble to myself in Russian.
“Hey, he’s alive,” Mitya says from somewhere. I guess I accidentally transmitted my thoughts, or Mitya overheard me through Ada’s Share app. “Don’t mourn him yet. It’s bad luck.”
I shake my head in an effort to clear it. Though I didn’t think Mitya had a superstitious bone in his body, he has a point. In the Russian culture, it’s a bad sign to cry on the behalf of someone who’s sick; it’s believed that those who do might contribute to a fatal outcome. Though I’m even less superstitious than Mitya, for Muhomor’s sake, I decide not to tempt fate and calm down.
“He’s a fighter,” I say, trying to believe my own words. “I’m sure he’ll make it.”
“Are you hungry?” Ada asks, whispering out loud in my ear, and I could kiss her for the change in topic. It refocuses me, and though I can still see the operating room in my peripheral vision, my stomach shocks me by rumbling so loudly that Nick chuckles.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” Ada looks from my belly to Jean and his partner and says more loudly, “What about you, gentlemen? I’m about to go get some food. Would you like me to get you anything?”
To Ada’s chagrin, Nick and Jean ask for two meals that are the antithesis of veganism—not a surprise, given their meaty builds.
“An oatmeal for me,” I say out loud before Ada can start debating nutrition with the two muscle-bound bodyguards. “With lots of nuts if they have it.”
Mr. Spock’s vocabulary is still severely limited, but he knows the word “nuts.” Through EmoRat, he expresses his excitement about the possibility of nuts. Incidentally, he also knows the words for a bunch of other treats, his name, both with the Mr. honorific and without, and the phrase, “Fresh air?” He loves that question, because it means he can jump into my pocket and hitch a ride outside.
“Ada, get some extra nuts on the side and some raisins too,” I mentally add, knowing full well that the word “raisins” was understood and appreciated by the little schemer too. “Mr. Spock wants a snack.”
As I suspected, at the mention of raisins, his second favorite word of the day, Mr. Spock exudes excitement and begins bruxing in anticipation.
“Okay.” Ada looks pacified by my choice. “I’ll be back soon.”
I watch Ada walk through the room and into the hallway. When she enters the elevator, I put down my magazine and turn my attention to Nick and Jean. “I haven’t seen you guys at the gym lately,” I say.
My mention of the gym brings warmth to Jean’s eyes, and in a booming voice, he says, “Been busy. I’ve seen you practice with Gogi, though. You’re not bad, for a civilian.”
“Thanks,” I reply while writing a mental message to Ada and Mitya that says, “I need more distraction than this glacial conversation.”
“What?” Ada replies instantly. “You don’t find talking to Tweedledee and Tweedledum intellectually stimulating enough?”
“Sorry to interrupt.” Mitya’s Zik message is full of anxiety. “I’ve been looking through the hospital cameras, and there’s something you need to see.”
Mitya sends a link, and when I click it, every part of me, tips of hair included, freezes in fear.
Chapter Fourteen
The view through the camera is familiar. It’s the elevator we used to get to this floor.
A group of three men walk out of the elevator and look around furtively. One walks up to the nurses’ station near the corridor entrance and says something to the nurse. I can imagine what he said since it probably wasn’t all that different from what Ada and I recently told the nurse: “We’re here to wait for a patient.”
“Sketchy person alert,” Einstein says loudly three times—once for each man on the screen.
“I knew that this time,” I mentally reply to the AI as my adrenaline levels skyrocket. “Pull up their profiles so I can read them.” To Nick and Jean, I say sharply, “Someone is coming for me. Be ready.”
In the moment it takes me to load the screens into my AROS interface, I compose a Zik message and send it. “Ada, leave the hospital if you haven’t already. When you’re outside, get as far away as you can.”
“I’ll give Ada the rundown and make sure she gets to safety,” Mitya says. “Don’t waste any brain bandwidth worrying about anything but the men coming your way.”
“Okay,” I reply. “Just get her out. If you have to, tell hospital security she’s a dangerous psycho and they need to throw her out ASAP.”
“I’ll make sure she gets out,” Mitya promises grimly. “Don’t worry about it.”
I wish it was so easy not to worry about Ada, but I have no choice. Screens with faces and words show up in front of me as Einstein provides me with the profiles I requested.
I have to hand it to Jean and Nick. They don’t waste time asking needless questions. In the brief time it takes me to read the bios, the two bodyguards are already up and reaching for their guns.
I reach for the place where my gun should be, but I remember I ran out of bullets and lost it earlier today—probably a good thing, since an unlicensed gun would’ve been hard to explain to the emergency responders. Still, I wish I had it now, as the profiles tell me a crucial piece of information.
These men work for Vincent Williams.
Aside from that, the profiles tell me what I could’ve guessed. These are dangerous people. One, Keyon, did time for murder, and another, Broderick, also served time, but for racketeering. The third man, Cristiano, isn’t a criminal, but that doesn’t make him any less dangerous. He served in the Exército Brasileiro—a branch of the Brazilian army. For now, I shelve questions such as “How did they find me?” and “What’s Vincent’s beef with me in the first place?” Given how my last meeting with Vincent Williams’s men went, I hiss out loud, “Nick. Jean. The men you’re about to face work with the fucks who put Gogi in the hospital.”
At the reminder that his comrade’s hurt and that he’s about to get a chance to even the score, Nick’s eyes glint with Joe-like homicidal glee. Jean’s face is harder to read, but both men take the safeties off their guns and launch into motion, performing maneuvers that remind me of police procedurals. Nick slides against the wall adjacent to the corridor and aims his gun at the entrance, while Jean herds me behind him and as far away from the entrance as possible. Once Jean is satisfied with our position, he points his gun at the ent
rance too.
My pulse hammering, I watch the AROS view and whisper the bad guys’ movements to Jean until the three attackers get out of the camera’s range. Then I search the Wi-Fi network for another viewpoint, but the closest one I can locate is the security camera right above my head, showing me an extra few inches of the corridor compared to my eyes.
“Have the rat peek into the corridor,” Mitya tells me after I share the reconnaissance problem with him. “You have an app that shows you what he can see.”
“This isn’t the time for cruel jokes.” I imbue my Zik retort with as much righteous anger as the interface will allow. “He could get squished.”
“Wow. Ada has you whipped,” Mitya grumbles. “You’re treating a lab rat like a person.”
“If you want to be useful, tell Joe what’s happening,” I reply tersely. “Maybe notify hospital security and the cops of what’s going on.”
“I already notified hospital security and the cops. Now, regarding Joe.” Mitya’s reply is slower than his usual telepathic messages. “Ada and I were debating if we should distract you with that part.”
“With what?” I didn’t think my adrenaline level could go any higher, but I was clearly wrong. It’s so bad that my hands are shaking and Einstein pops up an alert about my stress levels on my AROS screen.
“A picture is worth more than words.” Another link accompanies Mitya’s message. “This is a camera view into Gogi’s room.”
When the screen pops up, I recognize the outside of Gogi’s room. Only there are two large men there fighting Joe. Their movements are so fast they appear blurry through the cheap security camera.
From the broken-looking wrist of the larger of the two attackers, I can guess Joe recently disarmed him. A gun is on the floor. The slightly smaller attacker is bending over to grab it, but he meets Joe’s knee instead.
“Why doesn’t Joe have his gun out?” I message Mitya. “Did he not get a chance to take it out, or did they snatch it from his hands somehow?”
“Focus on your own problems,” Mitya retorts. “According to my calculations, your trouble is about to start.”
Mitya is right. I enable the Recorder app to capture everything so I can review it later and prepare to focus on my own attackers.
This is when an object flies into the room from the corridor.
Since my thinking is fast, I’m probably the first, if not the only, person in the room who has time to process what the object is and what’s about to happen.
It’s a grenade about to explode.
Chapter Fifteen
“Grenade!” I try to scream, but the word doesn’t come out because the explosion goes off.
Jean’s body slams into mine with the force of a baseball bat hitting an ant.
Despite Jean’s body blocking me, my retinas get blasted with a supernova-bright light that’s about as pleasant as seeing a million camera flashes go off at once.
With my vision gone, my ears get assaulted next. The grenade’s boom feels like Thor banged his Mjolnir hammer against my exposed eardrums.
It’s as if someone dropped me on my head and then drove over me with a pickup truck.
“Judging by what I saw through the camera, it was a stun grenade,” Mitya comments telepathically. “That means that, in a moment, the attackers will barge in.”
“I’m going back to the hospital,” Ada intrudes. “Mike might need my help.”
“Don’t—” I start, but Mitya beats me to it.
“You will do no such thing, Ada,” he snaps. “You need to get farther away. Stop this. You’re distracting him, and he’s already concussed.”
With colossal effort, in less than a nanosecond, I mentally look through the camera above my head.
Jean looks as stunned as I feel, but Nick seems to have fared much better. Must have something to do with his SEAL training.
One of the attackers becomes visible in the corridor. My brain is jumbled, but I believe this is Keyon, the murderer of the bunch.
Before I can warn Nick somehow, the big bodyguard realizes we have company and aims his gun at approximately where Keyon should be in a moment.
Even through the ringing deafness in my ears, I hear the gunshot. I hope that means my ears aren’t permanently damaged.
Keyon grabs his chest and falls to the ground. Before I can allow myself to whoop in joy, Keyon’s partner, Broderick the racketeer, comes into view. A warning is about to leave my lips when Broderick shoots Nick in the face.
Nick falls, but the shooting has brought Jean out of his confusion—at least enough for him to unload his gun in the direction of the corridor. Since I still can’t see anything with my eyes, I’m pretty sure Jean can’t either and he’s just shooting blindly. Still, Jean must be lucky or well trained, because a bullet hits Broderick in the neck. The man clutches the wound in what I hope is his death throes.
“One left,” I scream, though I doubt Jean’s ears have recovered enough to hear me.
Jean begins to reload.
I really hope Cristiano, as a guy who served in the army, will be careful after seeing his comrades killed. If he moves slowly, his hesitation might give Jean the few precious seconds he needs to load his gun.
Without much will on my part, my attention goes to the camera overlooking the elevator, and I watch the elevator doors open.
People dressed in hospital garb run out pushing a gurney—which sort of makes sense. They might be here to rescue any survivors of the explosion. I wish these were hospital security guards or cops instead. Didn’t Mitya summon them?
What I see next doesn’t make any sense, though. The remaining people in the elevator are wearing suits.
“Is this a dream?” I ask Einstein in panic.
“No. You’re conscious.” Einstein’s reply holds no trace of humor.
In case this is a pre-cog moment, I ask myself, “Is this really happening?”
However, I’m still where I am, and the suits are still there. I briefly wonder if a dream might include Einstein saying I’m conscious, but I decide it’s unlikely and focus on the camera input.
I count at least four suited men, but when I try using facial recognition on their angular faces, nothing happens. In two cases, I get an excellent look at their features—enough that I’ll remember them in the future—so I know the lack of recognition isn’t some issue with the camera’s angle. These men must not be in any of the facial recognition databases—a feat that seems close to impossible, as that means, among other things, that they have no social media or DMV records.
Moving on from the mystery of their identities, I take a closer look at the strange weapons in their hands. They’re reminiscent of Nerf guns.
As though they rehearsed the most efficient way to storm out of the elevator, the group of Suits heads toward the corridor leading to my waiting room.
I mentally blink, but the camera view doesn’t change, and people in suits are still rushing down the corridor, out of view.
Jean is done reloading and points his gun at the wall. He must think it’s the room’s entrance, but he’s about twenty-five degrees off.
“Jean!” I scream in his ear.
The big man doesn’t flinch, so I grab his arm to redirect his aim.
My world explodes again, but I fight to stay conscious, understanding what just happened. Blind and confused, Jean must have mistaken me for a bad guy and elbowed me in the face.
I slide down the wall and cradle my poor head in my hands, unable to peel my secondary gaze from the two camera views.
The last attacker, Cristiano, runs into the room and fires at Jean. Jeans shoots where he was aiming, at the wall, and misses Cristiano.
Cristiano fires another shot, and Jean falls on top of me.
Cristiano approaches. I think he intends to push Jean off me and put a few bullets in my head.
Even if I had the strength to grab for Jean’s gun, it’s way out of my reach.
I realize this is a situation when the brai
n boost can play a cruel trick on me and make my last moments feel subjectively longer. I debate saying goodbye to Mitya and Ada, but decide against it. Ada might do something crazy, like rush back in. Instead, I take a moment to check on Mr. Spock and find him still alive, though deaf and blind like me. He’s managing something I thought was impossible.
He’s even more frightened than I am.
“Slide into my pants and hide behind my leg,” I order Mr. Spock through the EmoRat app. “If he shoots me in the chest, he might hit you.”
Cristiano is in the middle of the room when I see the first suited figure walk in. The suited man raises the weird weapon—a Taser.
Unaware of the people behind him, Cristiano takes careful aim at me, his features impassive, like he’s about to snap a picture of me with his phone. His finger twitches on the trigger—and the tallest Suit shoots.
Cristiano convulses and collapses to the ground. One of the medical personnel runs up to the fallen Cristiano and injects him.
A square-shouldered Suit approaches the pile that is Jean and me and aims his Taser at my exposed leg.
“No—” I try to scream, but the weapon’s sharp prongs reach me and my whole body convulses. Every muscle gets jolted and paralyzed at the same time.
I barely register the guy with the syringe come up to me and prick my flesh in the same careless fashion as he did with Cristiano a moment ago. For some reason, my biggest concern is whether he used a different syringe and needle.
“Did you see all this?” I frantically write to Mitya. “What the hell is going on?”
“No idea.” Mitya’s reply is equally panicked. “But the Tasers imply they want you alive.”
I glance at the camera view where Joe is fighting for his life. No people in suits have interfered on my cousin’s behalf. It’s hard to tell whether that’s good news, but at least he’s still alive and fighting.