The Intruder

by Greg Krehbiel

  MacKenzie shook her head and suppressed a laugh.

  "She says she needs to see me," he explained.

  MacKenzie immediately lost her mirth and shared a concerned look with Hanna. They both shook their heads.

  "No way, Jeremy," Hanna said. "I don't trust her. Don't see her."

  From Dr. Berry. Please respond. I need to see you right away.

  Jeremy didn't know what to do, and he was beginning to fear that Dr. Berry could get a lot more information from him through her supervisory link than she had told him. He made a rash decision and cut the link. Hanna and MacKenzie were still looking at him, waiting for some explanation, but Jeremy had no time. He wasn't accustomed to managing his implant and talking at the same time.

  There was an almost immediate response over his implant.

  From Dr. Berry. This is not a game, Jeremy. Restore the link and come immediately to my office.

  He reset his mail server parameters to block all incoming messages from Dr. Berry. He fumbled about, looking for the right settings. He was beginning to get frantic, and Hanna and MacKenzie could see it.

  The three of them caught the eye of a passing policeman. He slowed his hovercar to watch what was going on.

  "What's the matter, Jeremy? What can we do?" Hanna and MacKenzie asked. Jeremy's eyes were darting back and forth, trying to decide how to reconfigure his implant so Dr. Berry couldn't get to him. He was so absorbed in what he was doing he couldn't even hear their questions.

  MacKenzie looked away for a minute while Hanna grabbed his shoulders and looked into his eyes. "How can I help you? What's the matter?"

  Jeremy looked at her with far away eyes. "She's getting really serious," was all he said before he was interrupted by another message.

  From Workstation 10 at the Berry Clinic. Order. Surrender yourself to police custody immediately.

  Did she know there was an officer nearby? How could she?

  The officer turned on his lights and got out of his car.

  MacKenzie finished whatever she was doing and grabbed Jeremy's arm. "Trust me," was all she said.

  From MacKenzie. Order. Content unspecified.

  Accept, Jeremy immediately replied. He knew he was in way over his head with the implant, and MacKenzie would know what to do. He watched as his implant performed a dizzying sequence of unfamiliar functions. All his mail and privacy settings were reconfigured. There was nothing for him to do but sit back and watch. Hanna realized that MacKenzie could handle the technical side of things, so she walked toward the policeman. He was an older man with a kindly face.

  "Hi, officer," she said in her sweetest voice, with just a hint of apology. "Thanks for helping out, but it's no big deal. We were at the Chocolate Bar tonight." Some of the desserts offered at the Chocolate Bar were intoxicating, and it was not uncommon for college students to get ill after a visit. The officer gave Hanna an understanding look.

  "You young ladies take care of him for me," he said, seemingly satisfied. He shook his head at Jeremy and walked back to his car.

  "No, not again," Jeremy groaned. He had rolled his head over the back of the park bench and was looking into the sky. The officer apparently thought he was having a wave of nausea from over-indulgence and chuckled to himself. But what pulled the color from Jeremy's face was what he saw.

  Another phantom was slowly cruising down the street about 100 feet in the air, scanning the ground, looking for something. Jeremy quickly got up from the park bench and sat under a tree, but as he did he saw another image coming up the street from another direction, several blocks down. They hadn't seen him yet, and the tree wasn't going to provide adequate cover.

  "I need to hide," he said aloud, eyes darting back and forth. Fortunately the police officer was in his car now and didn't overhear him. "There're two of them right now, floating along up there," he said, pointing discreetly up with his head. MacKenzie foolishly looked up, and the phantom noticed her. It stared down at the three of them for a moment and then dove toward them at incredible speed. The other, still a few blocks away, followed.

  Jeremy panicked. He got up and ran into the park, looking for somewhere to hide, darting from bush to bush. Hanna and MacKenzie followed as fast as they could. When MacKenzie caught up to him she just about screamed, "just close your eye. They're not really here. They can't hurt you."

  Jeremy stopped and stood up straight, closing his left eye. He gave a weak smile, but kept opening and closing his left eye. "It's no use," he said in a defeated tone. "I can choose not to look at them if I want, but they still see me. They're right here," he said, pointing just to his left and right. The ruse that he couldn't see them wasn't going to work anymore. The images were staring at him intently, studying his face. Jeremy plopped down on the grass in surrender.

  "What can I do?" he asked MacKenzie.

  "I don't know, Jeremy, but they can't do anything to you, can they?"

  "No, they have no substance," he said, swinging his arm right through one. It smiled at him and did the same, but it was not a pleasant smile.

  "Jeremy," Hanna said, looking around a bit nervously. "Doctors have the authority to have you committed to a hospital. If Dr. Berry knows where you are, she can have you arrested and sedated."

  "But how could she know," MacKenzie began, "unless ..."

  She didn't have time to finish. The three of them felt a sickening feeling in their stomachs as a police siren started to wail just half a block away. In a minute, the police officer stopped his hovercar in the middle of the street, just 20 yards away, and opened the back door. A huge German Shepherd stepped onto the street and stood at the officer's heel. They both walked toward Jeremy at a deliberate pace.

  "Run, Jeremy," Hanna said. "There's nothing else to do."

  Jeremy agreed, but he hesitated for a moment. He took Hanna's hand and looked into her face.

  She smiled at him. "Go, while you still have a chance."

  He squeezed her hand and then sped off like a deer.

  Jeremy was at the other end of the park almost before the police officer could respond. He pointed, whistled, and let the dog go. It shot off at a tremendous speed.

  Hanna and MacKenzie watched the foot race, terrified. Jeremy apparently knew he couldn't outrun a dog and decided his only chance was to lose him in the traffic on I Street. He ran in and out of cars, often coming dangerously close to a collision. But the dog wasn't fooled. Jeremy was recklessness, but the dog had absolutely no concern for itself. It was intent on its prey, and nothing else mattered.

  Hanna bit her lip and clenched her fists. It looked now as if it was just a matter of time. But suddenly the traffic patterns changed. A hovercar stopped, trying to avoid the dog. Another car swerved to miss the first car, bounced off a bus and slid sideways into Jeremy. He was thrown 10 feet onto the pavement and crashed into a light pole.

  Chapter 8

  "Listen to me. I know he checked in here. I was here when they brought him in," Hanna persisted. She was starting to lose her temper. Normally she would put a check on her emotions and back off, maybe even apologize and try to start over, but it was 3:00 in the morning and she had been through a lot in the last six hours.

  "Ma'am, I'm sorry," the woman at the information desk replied, trying to keep cool herself. "I've checked the records three times. There is no Jeremy Mitchell in this hospital. There has never been a Jeremy Mitchell in this hospital. I'm not disputing what you saw," she said, raising her hands as if to ward off a blow as Hanna again opened her mouth to talk. "If you say they brought him in here last night, I believe you, okay? They brought him in here last night. All I'm telling you is that I have no record of it."

  Hanna stood silent with her mouth open. After fifteen minutes of arguing with this woman, something finally made sense.

  As soon as she and MacKenzie had seen that Jeremy was okay after his collision, they discreetly disappeared in the crowd before the policeman tried to track them down for questioning. They hired a hovershuttle, darkened t
he windows and moved out of the way -- just far enough that they could keep an eye on things, then they followed the paramedics to the hospital.

  On the way, MacKenzie theorized about the technology that must be at work behind those ... images -- or whatever they were. Whoever could pull off all of that could easily change the admittance records at a hospital, Hanna reasoned. But they couldn't cover up everything. Nurses had to have seen him. Doctors had to have worked on him. She had to be able to find someone who could tell her what had happened and where they had taken him.

  "I'm sorry," she said to the tired woman at the information desk. "You've been very kind and I've been very rude." She turned and walked away before the relieved desk clerk had a chance to respond. Hanna picked one of the lobby chairs and collapsed into it.

  MacKenzie had left her hours ago. She was at her lab at the university, working on her theories about how to detect, or block, the images Jeremy had been seeing.

  Hanna felt profoundly alone.

  She sent Jeremy several messages, but he hadn't replied.

  How am I going to find him? she wondered, and absent-mindedly called up the hospital's hole location on her implant, seeking inspiration. She saw the hospital's staff roster and thought about sending messages to everyone on the list, asking if they'd seen or heard of Jeremy. It would be a rude thing to do, but she couldn't think of any other option, so she composed a generic letter. It took some doing to find the unique address for all the staff people -- names, of course, were not precise enough -- but she got through half the list before she fell asleep.

  * * *

  "Pardon me, Ma'am, you're going to have to come with us," the voice kept repeating in her dream until she realized it was not a dream and that she was being roused by two men in military uniforms. Hanna sat up quickly, and looked around. She was still in the hospital, asleep in the lobby chair.

  She had no intention of going anywhere with them. She stood up and headed toward the elevator, but they wouldn't have it.

  "Not that way, Ma'am," the younger one said. He was polite, but firm, and without laying a finger on Hanna the two men managed to turn her around and get her out the front door of the hospital. As soon as she was out the door she picked up her pace and deliberately headed away from the military vehicle that was parked at the curb. She didn't recognize the insignia, but she didn't expect to.

  The two officers got on each side of her, and two more came out of the over-sized hovercar. "I'm sorry, Ma'am, but you're going to have to come with us," the younger one said again.

  She turned around sharply and planted her foot on the sidewalk to emphasize her words. "I don't have to go anywhere with you, and I'm not. Good bye." She turned again and walked away. By this time the two men from the car were ahead of her. They made no threatening move, but it was clear that she was not going to get past them if they wanted to detain her. It was early morning and she didn't see any pedestrian traffic. Even if she screamed it was unlikely that anyone would hear her or try to help her.

  Hanna walked straight towards the two men who were waiting for her on the sidewalk, and then suddenly stepped to the side and ran on the street. She didn't fool anybody, and they had her surrounded again in a few seconds. The four men now formed a close wall around her and ushered her toward the car.

  She gave in and walked with them, wondering if it made any sense to make a break at the last second. There really wasn't anywhere to go, and she was sure she couldn't outrun them.

  "Before I get in this car," she said after one of the men opened the door, "who are you and what authority do you have to treat me like this?"

  "Special services, Ma'am," said the same officer, the only one who had spoken so far. Hanna remembered the designation: they were an investigative branch of the military that also performed special security functions, such as guarding heads of state. "We just want to talk to you."

  "And what if I don't want to talk to you? I don't have to talk to agents of the special services. What you're doing is illegal."

  "I'm also an officer with the Capitol Police," he said, unimpressed by her efforts to distract him but nevertheless showing her his badge. "You're not under arrest, and technically you can refuse to go with us, if you want, but if you decide to do that, I'd file charges against you for hindering a federal investigation. I can have that charge filed and approved in about a minute, and on that basis I can take you into custody. It's your choice."

  Hanna had heard enough about the special forces to know that they often cooked up stories like that to badger people into obeying them, but she also knew that when they had authorization from high up in the organization, they usually had all the legal details arranged ahead of time.

  She sneered at the man and got in the car.

  * * *

  "This is outrageous," Hanna screamed at her interviewer after the third consecutive hour of questioning. "I have told you everything I'm going to tell you, so let me out of this place." She had tried to send messages to Jeremy and MacKenzie, but ever since she had been taken from the hospital they had her in a communications black-out. The implants relied on radio signals to communicate with the hole, and Hanna had been cut off since she got into the car at the hospital, which was hours ago.

  More and more she doubted that her captors were actually special services agents. Once off the street, the official demeanor quickly disappeared. The room she was in now -- what she could see of it in the dark -- was not impressive. The floor was dirty, and her seat was rocking from legs not quite matching.

  "You haven't told us what we want to know about Jeremy Mitchell," the voice said again. It was such an irritating voice, a study in monotonous, atonal drone. She couldn't even see who was speaking to her, if it was a real person. The questioner might be in a dark part of the room, or it might be a computer-simulated voice. She was so sleepy and disoriented that she couldn't tell.

  After another half hour Hanna had had enough. She had tried to be reasonable with this thing -- it had to be a computer, she thought -- but it refused to respond reasonably. She made up her mind to ignore it and take a nap. Her last sleep had been long hours ago in a chair in the hospital lobby, and that hardly counted. She had been in this place far too long. As she tried to get comfortable in the small wooden chair, the droning voice kept talking, probing, prodding, searching for a way to draw her back into a conversation.

  * * *

  When Jeremy opened his eyes he was looking through a window at two palm trees bending under a stiff wind. The clouds behind them were very dark, almost black, and a few raindrops bespeckled the window pane. He remembered the mad race across the park, the dog, and the frantic game of dodge with traffic. He also remembered the shock of his collision with the car, and he had a vague recollection of emergency personnel tending him.

  He assumed he was in a hospital, but the window dressings seemed too domestic for that, and the furniture, as his eyes strayed from the window, seemed too homey. It was well-polished maple, and looked more like a private guest room than a room in a public facility. He wondered if this might be the style of recovery rooms in Society hospitals, but then he realized, seeing the ground extending beyond the palm trees, that his window was on the first floor and he could see two hovercars parked in a driveway out front. Everything spoke of a private residence.

  He propped himself up in bed to take a better look around, and then he suddenly realized something else: there were no palm trees in Washington, D.C. Clearly he had been moved, and moved a long way. But why? He lay back down and wondered if Dr. Berry had won. Was he in a mental institution? If Dr. Berry had reported him to the police, they certainly would have turned him over to her care.

  This spawned a new concern. He felt slightly drowsy, and it was unsettling to think that he might be on the "slow and dopey" drugs Dr. Berry had warned him about. Was he being treated for "implant psychosis"?

  The locator function on his implant should tell him where he was, anyway. But his implant didn't respond. A blank,
almost transparent desktop floated in front of him. It didn't respond to any network commands, so he turned it off.

  Jeremy's expression grew grim, and he began to look for an escape. He tried to sit up and get a better look, and then noticed the cast on his leg. Well, no more running for a while, he thought, and so much for an easy escape.

  Just then the door opened. Jeremy prepared himself for a struggle, but as soon as he saw his visitor, he relaxed.

  "So we're up, I see," an older woman said. She was about 60, Jeremy figured, somewhat heavy, and grandmotherly, with that kind of face that could be radiant with joy or stern with disapproval on a moment's notice. She wore a plain, pale blue dress, not unlike something Jeremy would expect to see on his own grandmother.

  "Where am I?" he asked.

  "You're in my home," she said. That sounded good, Jeremy reckoned. It was unlikely that patients in the lunatic asylum were farmed out to people's houses. "And I don't think I should tell you any more than that."

  "Why not?" he asked, somewhat indignantly. Who did they think they were, whoever "they" were who had taken him here, to cart him off somewhere and not tell him where he was?

  "I'm told it's for your own safety," she said, and then held up her hands in the universal "stop" sign. "I don't want to argue the point with you, young man, but they didn't even tell me your name, so we're both in the dark about your situation. I've been hired to take care of you until you're ready to be moved, and that's what I'm doing."

  Jeremy thought about that for a minute and then smiled at her. "My name is Jeremy Mitchell. I'm sorry. I shouldn't take it out on you."

  "That's okay," she said. "I'm sure you're out of sort. They tell me that someone will be by to speak with you this afternoon, so maybe you'll get your answers then. But in the meanwhile, you haven't had any solid food for a while, so eat this." She pulled a cart in from the hallway and set a serving platter on a table in the corner. A breakfast-in-bed tray appeared from somewhere next to it. In a minute she had him set up with beef stew, steamed vegetables, black bread, coffee and some sort of pudding. It reminded him of dinner back home.