Wired

by Francine Pascal

  Hot tears gathered behind her closed lids and a jagged lump rose in her throat. Just then, Gaia heard a shuffling sound and felt the bed quake slightly. A hand touched her forehead. Mom? No. It was Skyler. She felt him slide under the covers and contour his body around hers, his chest against her back, his knees folding into the angle of her legs. He was still dressed. She wondered if she should open her eyes and look at him, but she continued to feign sleep, wondering where this was leading.

  Then suddenly, she felt a warm weight on her. Skyler’s left arm circled around her middle, his elbow nestled in the crook between her hip and ribcage. Gaia felt strangely reassured by the gesture. It was as if his arm were mooring her down, preventing her from spi-raling off into the nightmare void. Gradually, her panic subsided and her thoughts became less and less tormenting, until they finally took on the fuzzy, garbled quality of pre-sleep.

  Gaia reached up and placed her right hand on Skyler’s forearm, before finally drifting off.

  Gaia—Fatigue Syndrome

  A SMATTERING OF RAINDROPS SMEARED the ink on the battered computer printout in Jake’s hand. Great, he thought Just what I need.

  He’d already wasted two vital hours walking Broadway and Amersterdam, checking each of the Columbia University dorms for one Skyler Rodke—rich pretty boy and possible kidnapper. Too bad he didn’t hit the 114th Street student housing first. Just his luck to find the guy in the last possible place.

  He headed down the block, verifying the addresses against the list in his hand. Eventually he stopped and stared at a somber red-brick building. This is the last one, he thought, crumpling up the paper and tossing it into a nearby wrought-iron trashcan. Skyler has to be here.

  Skyler Rodke. Even his name sounded like a soap opera scandal waiting to happen. Jake’s fingers opened and closed into fists, eager for the chance to collide with Skyler’s salon-product enhanced skin and reshape his Prince William nose.

  “Easy,” Jake whispered to himself, digging the blunt points of his right knuckles against his left palm. He had to be cool about this. He was there as an operative, not a boyfriend. Going Jet Li on the guy would screw up the mission.

  He could only hope Rodke picked a fight first.

  He had this friend once, a karate buddy. The guy dropped out of classes at the dojo because he came down with some sort of chronic fatigue virus. He said it was a disease he would never get rid of. It just dawdled around in his system, waiting for his body to get the slightest bit weak. Then it would spring into action, making his joints ache and his muscles floppy, until the guy just had to go to bed for a couple of days or weeks, waiting for it to pass.

  At the time Jake didn’t buy it. It sounded like some cockamamie cover story. The guy was probably too lazy or chicken to put in the required effort for black-belt status and just didn’t want to face the truth.

  Now Jake believed him. He, too, felt like he was also carrying around a pernicious little germ that liked to kick him when he was down. He was infected with Gaia Moore. And it wasn’t a one-time thing either. He was a Gaia carrier, a victim of Gaia Fatigue Syndrome.

  Once Gaia had come into his life, nothing had been the same. It was as if some small scrap of her inhabited his body, set up shop, and rewrote his chemical code. His priorities did a complete Chinese fire drill, rearranging themselves into a basic, fixed list: Gaia, Gaia, eat, sleep, Gaia.

  It wasn’t just that he was in love with her. That was way too crude a term. This was more sweeping and uncompromising, more … disease like. At times he felt giddy and feverish with devotion to her. Other times he felt pulled down by her, wearied by all the turmoil in her life that was now seeping into his own.

  But there was no escaping it, no purging Gaia from his system. As weird as she’s been behaving lately, she was part of him now. To cut her out he’d have to destroy himself. Besides, he didn’t want to be free of her. He loved the messy, aching, maddening ride that was Gaia. He’d never felt more alive in his entire life. Gaia had given him a purpose, a calling, a brand new realm to exist in. He couldn’t help feeling that everything that ever happened to him had led him to this—to her.

  If only something would lead him to her now.

  A group of students came scurrying up the sidewalk, holding bags and jackets over their heads to protect against the rain. Jake fell into step behind them, matching their hurried pace. By now he knew the drill. He followed them up the concrete steps underneath the arched stone entrance. One of the girls at the head of the group pulled out her key card and swiped it through a black box on the exterior wall. With an irritable buzz, the front door opened and the group filed into the yellow-lighted lobby.

  Jake grinned. No one gave him a passing glance as they shook water off their jackets and headed toward the elevators. He was proud he’d developed this little infiltration system on his own. It was so much easier than shouting through the outside intercom, as he’d had to do at the first couple of dorms. Plus, it made him feel like a real agent—using his wits, blending in with the crowd.

  At the other side of the foyer, a man in a security guard’s uniform was sitting behind a gray laminate counter. He barely glanced up as Jake approached.

  “Can I help you?” the guard asked.

  “Yes,” Jake said, leaning against the counter. “I’m looking for a girl.”

  The man frowned.

  Great, Jake. Brilliant opening. Now he thinks you’re the world’s lamest playboy. “I mean… I’m looking for a particular girl—a friend of mine,” he tried again. He took a breath and launched into his rehearsed explanation. “You see, there’s been an emergency in her family and I need to find her, but she isn’t answering her cell phone. All I know is that she’s out with a Columbia student named Skyler Rodke. Would he happened to be listed at this dorm?”

  The guard nodded slightly for a few seconds, as if he needed extra time to process the information. Then he sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Hang on. Let me check the registry.”

  Jake drummed his fingertips against the gray laminate as the guard sluggishly typed commands into the computer. Come on, come on. All sorts of things could be happening to Gaia. He resisted the urge to leap over the counter, shove the guard out of the way, and search the log himself.

  Eventually the man pushed back his chair and turned back toward Jake. “Sorry. There’s no one by that name listed.”

  “What?” Jake leaned forward and gaped at the monitor. “No way!”

  A group of students shaking the rain off of themselves in the lobby paused in their conversation to stare at him, tipping Jake off to the fact that he was probably raising his voice. The guard held up a warning hand. “Back away from the computer, sir,” he said with sudden authority.

  “I’m sorry,” Jake said, lowering his voice, “It’s just… I’ve got to find her, and I’ve already tried all the other dorms. Are you sure you got the name right Rodke? R-O-D-K-E?”

  “I’m positive,” the man replied. “There’s no Rodke and no Skyler anything listed. Now if you’ll excuse me,” he added with a nod toward the exit, “I have some work to do.”

  Jake took a few aimless steps away from the desk, shaking his head in disbelief. This couldn’t be happening. He’d tried everywhere. All that work, all that effort, and he was no closer to finding Gaia than he had been three hours ago.

  What now? What the hell was he going to tell Oliver?

  “Excuse me?”

  Jake looked up. A pretty redhead with stick-straight Avril Lavigne hair was leaning toward him somewhat cautiously.

  “I couldn’t help overhearing,” she said, meeting his bewildered gaze. “Are you looking for Skyler Rodke?”

  “Yes!” Jake rounded on her. “Do you know him? Do you know where he is?”

  The girl swayed backward slightly, her eyes widening in alarm. “I … I know who he is, but I don’t know him. He goes to Columbia, but he lives off campus.”

  Off campus? The thought washed through Jake’s mind, scrubbing it clear.
Of course! Why hadn’t he realized that before? A guy like Skyler would have his own place. He’d never stoop as low as dorm life.

  “Where? Where does he live?” His restlessness was back, tightening his fists and amplifying his voice.

  The girl kept her gaze on him, but turned her body away, dearly sorry she’d ever approached him. “I don’t know. I’ve just heard he has a fancy apartment somewhere. It’s just the talk. You know? People talk about him”

  “Right,” Jake said, nodding distractedly. Then he placed his palms together in a prayer-like gesture. “Thank you! You saved me!”

  “No problem” the girl muttered before hurrying back to her friends by the elevator.

  Jake bounded back to the front counter. “Excuse me?” he asked the guard. “Could I borrow your white pages?”

  The man gave a frustrated huff and slid the giant book toward Jake who immediately began leafing through it.

  “Roddenberry … Roddick … Roditi …” he mumbled as his finger slid slowly down the page. “Yes! Rodke.” There was a John out in Queens, a Sarah with a Chelsea exchange and then a bunch of “Rodkey” spellings. No Skyler. Not even a half-anonymous S. Rodke with a Manhattan listing. Nothing.

  Jake slammed the book shut and returned it to the guard with a mumbled “thanks.” Then he walked back out the front door into the rain.

  Gaia was someplace close, he could feel it. But he had no idea how to get to her. He was like a rat in a maze of dead ends, and a fragrant block of cheese was sitting just beyond the walls.

  Gaia please, he urged silently, straining to seek out her mind through the walls of the nearby buildings. Please just answer my messages. Call me. Before if’s too late.

  JAKE

  This or obably never happens to real undercover operatives. Or at least it shouldn’t—not to the good ones anyway.

  I know how it’s supposed to unfold. I’ve seen all those spy movies where the hero saves the world in thousand dollar suits. Watching them—I just knew that could be me someday, disarming the bad guys and knocking them senseless. Then carrying the hot blonde to safety only seconds before a bomb exploded in a supernova of fire and smoke.

  Only lately I’ve had the nagging suspicion that I’m quickly becoming the Barney Fife of the undercover world. Obviously I’m not cut out for this after all, since I seem to have all the spy instincts of a garden slug.

  Oliver is counting on me to find Gaia. Gaia needs me. And I’m letting them down.

  I never realized just how freaking hard this spy stuff is. Where are the scared informants whispering vital information to me from out of the shadows? Where are the clues? A bookbag or scuffed tennis shoe or some other Gala-like debris pointing the way to her hideaway? I could use a cryptic S.O.S. message on my answering machine or a taunting riddle from the baddies—anything to use as a starting place in this whole screwed up cat-and-mouse game.

  The guys I watched never made mistakes. James Bond never burst into someone’s ¡air only to find a group of women playing Mah-Jongg. “Very sorry. Pardon me. Please carry on.” Eliot Ness never nabbed an innocent bystander or aimlessly wandered the city streets for hours.

  Even Oliver would never be stuck in neutral like this. He’d have located Gaia in under ten minutes. I know he wants me to do it, since Gaia’s still freaked into thinking he’s Loki again, but obviously I don’t deserve his faith in me.

  So I’ll make a deal with the Cosmos. Forget my earlier dreams. I don’t need to be a big hero. I’ll just settle for this: to locate Gaia in one piece before anything awful happens. The rest you can take from there.

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  I LIKE STAYING WITH SKYLER.

  IT FEELS SAFE. SECURE. WORRY FREE.

  THE PFRFFCT SITUATION, REALLY.

  NOW HE’S FORBIDDEN ME TO LEAVE THE HOUSE.

  I LIKE THAT, TOO.

  BECAUSE SKYLER ALWAYS HAS MY BEST INTERESTS IN MIND.

  FEARLESS™

  … A GIRL BORN WITHOUT THE FEAR GENE

  DON’T MISS

  FEARLESS #34 FAKE

  COMING JULY 2004 FROM SIMON PULSE