Welcome to Promise City

by Greg Cox

  Diana had no ready response. That’s because, Tom realized, we both know she’s right.

  “If you’d like to leave a message, press one.”

  Kyle swore in frustration. He stabbed the keypad on his cell phone. “Dad, this is me again. Kyle. Give me a call as soon as you can, okay? I’m going nuts here.”

  His father’s voice mail beeped back at him.

  “Crap!” Kyle angrily threw the phone across his office. It smacked down between the cushions of the couch on the opposite side of the room. He paced restlessly, pulling on his hair in frustration. It had been hours since he’d squealed to his dad about the GOC and that closed plasma center, and he hadn’t heard anything since. He’d tried his dad’s home phone, his work phone, his cell phone, even his email address, but just couldn’t get hold of his father. Diana wasn’t returning his urgent calls either. Hell, he’d even tried calling his dad’s new girlfriend, Meghan Doyle, without any luck. Why isn’t anyone getting back to me? Are they deliberately cutting me out of the loop?

  “Better hope nobody checks your phone records,” Cassie scolded him. She sat behind his desk, paging through a photocopy of the White Light prophecies. “Might have a hard time explaining to the folks around here why you kept calling the director of NTAC.”

  Kyle was in no mood for her lectures. “Is that the best advice you can offer right now? In that case, maybe you should just leave me alone.”

  A knock at the door interrupted. The door opened a crack and Susan Meldar, Kyle’s personal assistant, poked her head into the office. “Kyle?” Concerned eyes looked him over. “Is everything okay in here?”

  To his embarrassment, he realized that his outburst a few moments ago had been audible even through the door. “We’re fine—I mean, I’m fine,” he corrected himself. “Sorry about the noise.” A casual shrug dismissed the incident. “A little too much stress, you know?”

  “Anything I can help you with?” Susan volunteered. She still looked a bit worried about Kyle’s state of mind. “Maybe a cup of herbal tea?”

  He shook his head. “No thanks,” he said, mustering a weak smile. “Seriously, I’m fine. Just got some family stuff to deal with, that’s all.” He tried to laugh it off. “You know how crazy parents can be.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” she said before retreating back into the hall. The door clicked into place behind her. Muffled footsteps headed back to her desk.

  Kyle breathed a sigh of relief. Great, he thought sarcastically. Now I’m starting to lose it in front of the staff. Some shaman I am.

  “That was smooth,” Cassie teased him. It seemed like she was always with him now, never giving him a chance to think by himself. “You need to watch your temper, Kyle. People look up to you here. You need to set an example. “

  “Thanks for the tip,” he said irritably. Crossing the room, he retrieved his phone from the seat cushions. Irrationally, he checked his messages again, even though only a few minutes had passed since the last time he’d checked them.

  Nothing.

  He resisted an urge to hurl the phone again. That’s it, he thought. I can’t stay cooped up here any longer. I need to know what’s going on.

  The copy of the prophecies mocked him. For all their wisdom, they didn’t contain the info he needed right at this very moment. They were no help at all.

  Just like Cassie.

  There was only one place left to turn.

  Jordan, he thought. Maybe Jordan knows something.

  He’d promised his dad not to mention any of this to Jordan, but that was before he and Diana had dropped off the face of the earth. I don’t have to tell Jordan the whole story, he rationalized, but maybe I can pry some information out of him without tipping my hand. It’s worth a try.

  Anything was better than suffering in suspense one more minute.

  His mind made up, he exited his office and walked briskly down the hall. To his surprise, Cassie didn’t try to stop him. Perhaps she knew better than to try and talk him out of it? The carpeted hallway was bustling with activity as his fellow positives went about their business, attending to the rebuilding of Seattle and, by extension, the entire world. The hubbub of numerous phone calls and conversations testified to the vitality of the Movement. A framed portrait of Jordan hung upon a wall. Muzak, performed by the Promise City Boys’ Choir, played softly in the background. The preternaturally gifted singers hit notes that even castrati would have balked at.

  Kyle felt strangely self-conscious. How many people had heard him erupt before? Was he just being paranoid, or could he really feel dozens of eyes targeting him as he strolled past the various cubicles outside his office? Susan Meldar watched him warily from behind her computer. Her hands were nowhere near the keyboard; she searched the Web just by waving her fingers at the screen. A group of chatting coworkers, socializing around the water cooler, fell strangely silent as he walked by them. He stumbled over a bump in the carpet. For all he knew, someone was reading his thoughts at this very moment.

  It took all his effort just to act like he had nothing on his mind.

  Jordan had the corner office at the end of the hall. As usual, two bodyguards were posted outside. Galloway could induce blinding headaches and seizures just by looking at someone. Quinn could smell gunpowder and other explosives from hundreds of feet away. Neither man moved out of the way as Kyle approached.

  Kyle played it cool. “I need to see Jordan.”

  “He asked not to be disturbed,” Galloway said without too much attitude. Kyle had first met the man in Evanston a year ago. He had been with Collier since the beginning.

  “Even by me?” Smiling broadly, he pulled rank a little. “C’mon, dudes. I’m Mister Prophecy, remember? Jordan always has time for me.”

  The guards looked at each other, then stepped out of the way. They were used to Kyle coming and going pretty freely. “Okay,” Quinn relented. “But make it snappy.”

  Kyle found Jordan at his desk, conversing via a headset. Rain pelted the picture windows behind him. A flat-screen television set, mounted to one wall, cast a phosphorescent glow. The TV was set on mute. Jordan used a remote to flick through various cable news channels as he spoke on the phone.

  “Good, good. Glad to hear that our friend has been recovered. Just remember, we need to hang on to our asset now that he’s out of the box again. Under no circumstances should our present allies be allowed to retain possession of the individual in question …”

  Jordan noticed Kyle’s entrance. A flicker of annoyance flashed across his bearded features. “Excuse me,” he said to whomever he was talking to. He looked up at his visitor. “Now is not a good time, Kyle.”

  He glanced again at the TV screen. Kyle saw that the closed-captioned broadcast was reporting on a citywide blackout in Philadelphia. He gave Jordan a time-out signal. “Anything I should know about?”

  “Not at all,” Jordan replied. “I’m merely negotiating the release of a political prisoner on the East Coast. But I really don’t have time to chat now.”

  Kyle didn’t care. “Just a quick question,” he said apologetically. “What do you know about something called the Global Outreach Committee?”

  “Is that all?” The name did not seem to put Jordan on guard. “It’s a minor publicity initiative. To promote promicin-positive coverage overseas.” He gave Kyle a puzzled look. “Why so interested?”

  “No real reason,” he lied. “Just saw the name on some paperwork. Wondered what it was all about.”

  Jordan sighed impatiently. “I’m sure somebody on the tenth floor can fill in all the details for you, but, honestly, you should not be wasting your time and energy on such minutiae. We have plenty of talented PR people disseminating our message to the masses. You need to focus on the big picture instead. That’s your true purpose.” His gaze darted back to the TV screen. “Now then, I really need to get back to this call.”

  Kyle wasn’t done yet. “One more thing. I don’t suppose you’ve heard from my dad this afternoon? Or Diana
Skouris?”

  “Believe it or not, Kyle,” he said with a trace of irritation in his voice, “I don’t spend every waking hour obsessing over what your father and his partner are up to. If you’re having problems with Tom for some reason, I suggest you work that out with him, not me.”

  Kyle felt like he was getting the bum’s rush. “You brushing me off, Jordan?”

  “Not at all.” Jordan sighed again, more wearily this time. “But, alas, my gifts do not include stopping time in its tracks.” He adopted a more conciliatory tone. “Perhaps we can discuss this later?”

  “Yeah, sure,” Kyle said sourly. He realized he wasn’t going to be getting any more out of Jordan. He turned his back on his mentor and walked away. “Later.”

  Jordan let him leave. “Please shut the door behind you.”

  Fuming, Kyle marched back to his own office. He slammed the door shut, not caring anymore who might hear. His dad was missing, maybe even in trouble, and he was the only person who seemed to give a damn.

  Cassie was waiting on the couch. “Calm down, Kyle. Just let it go.”

  “Easy for you to say,” he snapped. “You don’t have a father. You never did.”

  “Ouch,” she said, looking hurt. “That was unkind.”

  He instantly regretted his words. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t take this out on you. This is just tearing me up inside.” Guilt added to his anxiety. “I gave Dad that address, Cassie. What if that was a big mistake, like you said? Suppose he’s in danger because of me?”

  She got up and took his arm. “You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself. You’ve done everything you can.”

  “Not yet I haven’t.” A sudden decision gripped him. Pulling free of Cassie’s grip, he snatched his winter coat from a rack by the door. He pulled it on in a hurry, then rummaged through his desk until he found the address of the plasma center. “I’m going down there myself.”

  Cassie reacted with alarm. “That’s not a good idea!”

  “Oh yeah?” he challenged her. “Why not?”

  She got between him and the door. “It’s not safe.”

  That wasn’t good enough. “How come?”

  “You don’t need to know that,” she said stubbornly. “Just believe me, you shouldn’t go there. It’s too dangerous.”

  “Then maybe you ought to help me out a little more!” The bitterness in his voice surprised him and he took a second to calm down. He didn’t want to argue, especially when he really needed her on his side right now. He took her gently by the shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Please, Cassie!” he begged hoarsely. “Don’t you understand? I’m all on my own here. Until I find out what’s going on, I can’t trust anyone at NTAC or in the Movement. You’re all I’ve got left. I’m counting on you, please!” His eyes desperately searched her face. “Do you love me or not?”

  “That’s not fair, Kyle,” she protested. “This isn’t about us. It’s about what’s best for you—and for the future.” She cradled his face between her hands. “You’re too important to the Movement. I can’t let you put yourself in jeopardy for your father’s sake.”

  “Tough. ’Cause I’m going anyway.” He swung her out of the way, then stepped past her toward the door. “Which means you can either stay here and sulk, or you can help me stay alive.”

  She glared at his back. “You wouldn’t!”

  “Try me.”

  Quaking with frustration, her fists clenched at her sides, she watched impotently as he took hold of the door-knob. He opened the door and left her behind.

  “All right,” she said petulantly. “You win!” She hurried after him. “But you owe me one!”

  NINETEEN

  THE PLASMA CENTER was in a bad part of town. Kyle glanced around nervously as Cassie grudgingly led him down a dingy alley behind the derelict building. A cold rain drizzled down his neck. Dark clouds obscured the fading sunlight. Greasy puddles spilled over onto the pavement.

  “For the record, I’m doing this under protest,” Cassie reminded him. A vintage fur coat and mittens protected her from the cold, or at least presented the illusion of doing so. Her entire wardrobe was just as fictitious as the rest of her. Kyle sometimes wondered what part of his unconscious mind picked out her clothes and accessories whenever she appeared to him; they always seemed to suit the occasion.

  At the moment, though, he had more pressing questions on his mind. “My dad is here? And Diana?”

  “Yes, but we’re going to have to be sneaky about this.” She slunk up a short flight of steps to a loading dock at the back of the building. She kept her voice low, even though nobody else could hear her. “There are four dangerous people inside, and they’re not going to be happy to see you.”

  Kyle joined her at the back door. He wished he had thought to bring a weapon of some sort, although he had no idea where he would have found one. Jordan frowned on guns in Promise City; he preferred positives to rely on their abilities instead. Fat lot of good that does me now.

  “The lock is broken,” Cassie revealed. “Your dad’s handiwork, as it happens. But you can’t just barge in. You need to wait until the right moment, when the people inside are distracted and looking the other way.”

  Kyle shivered upon the loading dock. He hugged himself to stay warm. “And how am I going to know when that is?”

  “That’s what I’m here for, silly.” Cassie lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Now listen carefully. Here’s what you need to do… .”

  “We have promicin!” Grayson declared triumphantly. He waved a metallic wand under Carl’s arms, like an airport security employee scanning a potential passenger with a metal detector. A thin electronic cable connected the wand to a handheld air quality monitor. Grayson stared at the monitor’s illuminated display. “Carl is definitely exuding promicin from his pores. I’m detecting roughly three hundred sixty parts per million.”

  Abby clapped her hands. “We did it! Finally!”

  “I knew it would work!” Carl sat atop the vinyl couch, his legs dangling over the side. A terrycloth bathrobe hung open, exposing his bare chest. The IV and electrodes had been detached from his body. He rubbed his arm where Rosita had injected him with promicin earlier. His uncanny resemblance to Danny continued to unnerve Tom. Now that, mercifully, the real Danny’s body had been wheeled back into the freezer, it was easy to forget that the young patient was an imposter and not really his nephew. Danny seemed to have risen from the dead, just like Jordan Collier.

  This is a nightmare, Tom thought. And it’s just getting worse.

  Carl looked at Tom, who was still strapped to a couch beside Diana. He frowned impatiently. “How come he’s not reacting yet?”

  “The effect is seldom instantaneous,” Abby observed. “I didn’t develop my own ability until days after I was infected. Plus, it’s possible he still has too much ubiquinone in his system.”

  Tom prayed that was the case. Am I infected already, he fretted, or are the U-Pills protecting me? According to Kyle, he was doomed to become positive. Was today the day that prophecy finally came true?

  “Easy enough to find out,” Grayson commented. He put down the sensor wand. “A simple blood test will measure his ubiquinone levels and tell us if he’s positive or not.” He nodded at Rosita. “Would you do the honors?”

  “Of course, Bernard.” The Filipino woman rolled a metal cart over to Tom’s couch. She extracted an empty hypodermic needle from a drawer beneath the cart, along with gauze and other supplies, and laid them down on a sterile silver tray. She rolled up Tom’s sleeve and tied a rubber tourniquet around his upper arm. A pudgy finger palpated the vein at the crook of his arm until it plumped up. She swabbed it with antiseptic. “You have good veins.”

  “Thanks,” Tom said wryly. He strained once more against the restraints binding his wrists and ankles, but with no luck. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  “Don’t worry,” Abby assured him. “Rosita used to work as a phlebotomist here, before it went out o
f business. That’s how we found out about this place.” She strolled over to observe the procedure. “You’re in good hands.”

  That’s debatable, Tom thought. Before he could say as much, however, he was startled to see Kyle creep into the room from the rear, the same way he and Diana had. Confusion and hope both bounced around inside his brain. What’s he doing here?

  Raising a finger to his lips, Kyle edged along the back of the donation floor toward one of the unoccupied couches. Tom grasped that his son was going for the guns Carl had carelessly deposited there earlier. Unfortunately, the weapons were all the way across the floor. Could Kyle make it there without being spotted by Abby and the others?

  Tom’s face froze as he struggled not to betray his son’s arrival. With luck, his momentary flash of surprise would be taken as anxiety over his impending bloodletting. He resisted a temptation to look at Diana, who had surely spotted Kyle as well. At the moment, all eyes were upon Tom, so that his captors had their backs to Kyle. I’ve got to keep it that way, he realized. Long enough for Kyle to get to those guns.

  Rosita’s hypo was poised above his elbow. “You’ll just feel a pinch.”

  The needle penetrated his skin. As promised, it only stung a little, but Tom screamed bloody murder anyway. “Ow! What the hell are you doing to me?” He grimaced in mock pain. “You call yourself a phlebotomist!”

  “Don’t be a baby,” Rosita scolded him, sounding mildly offended. The Vacutainer tube filled up with blood. “That was a perfect stick.”

  “What a wimp!” Carl sneered.

  Grayson headed over to collect the blood sample.

  “This is monstrous!” Diana added to the uproar. No doubt she realized what he was up to. “You’re like Nazis, performing obscene medical experiments on human subjects. You should be locked up for good!”

  “Jesus, Diana,” Abby exclaimed. “It’s just a stupid blood test. Don’t be such a drama queen.”

  Rosita withdrew the needle from Tom’s arm. She pressed a cotton ball down on the puncture site. “There! You see, that wasn’t so bad.”