But when the next exit appeared with a gas station and fast food, he just kept on driving. The compulsion to drive was so powerful. Yet despite his inability to deviate from his present course, he was pretty sure the orb wasn’t in his head. Being in direct communion with it felt different. When he was in that cave, he’d felt the rapture and had also been able to engage the entity in two-way communication. He didn’t feel anything like that now; the only voices in his head were his own and Mike’s.
He hated fucking Mike.
He wanted to kill that sonuvabitch.
When he saw the orb, he would beg for it to strip Mike out of his mind. The orb had promised it would reward him for obedience. He’d done everything it asked. He’d authorized the money transfer last night after he sent Josie home to pack their overnight bags. He’d welded the stainless-steel parts the orb had wanted. He just needed to deliver them. That was all. Then he was done.
He glanced at the clock on the dashboard. Assuming he did not encounter any unexpected delays or heavy traffic, he had only another hour until he reached Rensselaer. An hour. He could make it an hour without stopping; he could make it an hour without water. Just an hour. He was so close. Only an hour until he completed his mission and could feel the rapture. He knew it wasn’t real. He knew it wasn’t holy, but it felt so good. It felt so good. Better than anything he’d felt before. Better than sex. Better than love. Better than drugs.
Better than Josie . . .
Better than anything.
CHAPTER 38
Interstate 87
New York
Willie’s hands trembled despite his grip on the steering wheel. Some men refuse to acknowledge their fear; he was not one of those men. They’d sent another EVE, and he was terrified. So far, this one had accomplished more than the last one. She had already set up shop at Biogentrix, and he shuddered to think how many people she’d enslaved so far. Last time the world had been lucky, or rather EVE had been unlucky. Unlucky that her plasma sphere had opened the space-time continuum smack dab in the bottom of Silo 9 between levels seven and eight, where the liquid-oxygen tanks were located. Unlucky that the LOX-tank relief valve had doused her with liquid oxygen. Unlucky that her alloy shell had been covered by atomized hydrocarbons from the silo environment, which reacted with the liquid oxygen to create a powerful exothermic reaction. And unlucky that before she erupted into a fireball as bright as the sun, the only two people she’d had a chance to interact with were him and Sergeant Lewis. Despite the first EVE’s demise, he and Lewis had still tried to complete the mission and launch their silo’s ICBM and start World War III, but the other three very brave men on watch that night had stopped them, sacrificing their lives in the process.
His eyes rimmed with tears.
On the same night, he’d murdered the two most important people in his life—Lieutenant Bates, his Deputy MCCC and best friend, and Diane, his wife and the love of his life. To this day, he still couldn’t remember doing it. The orb was evil. Pure evil. He had to stop her. No matter what. He just needed help first—help to cage William, the dangerous doppelgänger inside his head, who, fifty years later, was still vying for control and trying to compel him to fulfill instructions the orb had implanted in his mind. And so he had called the Lady Margaret—the only person in the world who kept his secret, understood his demons, and was willing to risk her life to help him.
The hypnotist had answered her phone on the first ring when he called from his secure landline. She had been waiting for his call. She said she’d had a dream that it would happen again, a dream that only he could stop the apocalypse and that only she could provide him with the sword and shield to do it. He’d left the silo five minutes later, despite his fears and reservations. Now, he was speeding south on I-87 to see the enigmatic Lady Margaret in Saratoga Springs so she could fix his head and prepare him for what he was about to do next.
And still, he couldn’t stop trembling.
The thought of the confrontation yet to come was almost more than he could bear. How could he keep his secret agenda hidden from William? William would betray him to EVE. William’s resurgence would be his undoing. Then, out of nowhere, epiphany struck. With verse, he realized. He would harness the power of verse! Yes, that was the answer—dueling Trojan horses in his mind. He would use William’s weapon against him. He would compose it, he would hide it, and he would lock it away . . . never to think of it again. The idea was so exciting, for a moment he thought he would not be able to keep his Jeep on the road. Gripping the steering wheel with both hands, he braked and pulled off onto the shoulder. From the pendant around his neck, he retrieved the key, and from the passenger seat, he retrieved his journal. Willie undid the lock and then set about composing a new and powerful verse of his own.
My mind’s unhinged, a broken gate,
so I ne’er do well to hesitate.
To bait the trap, with flesh O’mine
and sing her praises so divine.
In living rhyme a secret dwells,
drag her, plunge her to the depths of hell.
CHAPTER 39
Watertown, New York
Ninemeyer was parked across the street from the Pitcher residence.
He’d been waiting.
He’d been watching . . .
Waiting and watching long enough to have developed a plan and to have put that plan into motion.
When a young blonde woman was dropped off by a WER yellow taxi, he put the final piece of the puzzle together. The woman’s nervous body language, the way she got flustered paying the taxi fare, told him she was upset. He didn’t get a good look at her face, but he knew she was Pitcher’s wife. She had been with him, spending the night in some cheap motel, but he’d snuck out on her. He’d snuck out and come home before the crack of dawn. And when Pitcher had ducked inside momentarily to arm himself, Ninemeyer had covertly slipped an encrypted GPS tracker under the car. Then he’d watched Pitcher load a half dozen metal components from the garage into the back of the Honda Civic and drive away.
Despite the powerful compulsion to follow Pitcher, he forced himself to wait for the wife. Confronting Pitcher was not the goal. Capturing Pitcher was not the goal. Using Pitcher to help him capture the orb was the goal. And the only leverage he could possibly think of that would serve that purpose was the man’s wife.
He gave her ten minutes, not too short so as to frazzle her, but not so long that she would get deeply involved in an activity. He would keep it simple. That approach always seemed to work best in these situations. He slipped his Walther into his shoulder holster and stepped out of his rental Tahoe into the crisp morning air. He preferred Tahoes, just as he preferred Walther pistols and Rockport shoes. As he approached the modest ranch-style house, he scanned the windows, looking for movement—a curtain swaying, a blind slat shifting. Nothing. The house was still.
He stepped onto the porch, straightened his rumpled black suit coat, and rang the doorbell.
“Just a moment,” a woman’s voice called, barely audible from deep inside the house.
He sniffed and waited.
The door did not have a peephole or a sidelight, and he wondered if she would cavalierly open it to an unknown caller. He heard the dead bolt shift and watched the knob turn. A woman’s face appeared in a three-inch gap between the door and frame, a brass-chain lock pulled taut at the level of her chin. With a shoulder against the door, the decorative chain would pop, and he would be inside without the slightest resistance.
“May I help you?” the woman asked.
Her voice was confident and steady, but he could tell from her puffy, red eyes that she had been crying. She wore a bathrobe, cinched at the waist, and house slippers. She was pretty in a girl-next-door kind of way, with blue eyes and symmetrical features. He smiled at her.
“Are you Josie Pitcher?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, pulling her face back a half foot from the gap. “And you are?”
“My name is Dean Ninemeyer of th
e Central Intelligence Agency. Is your husband, Sergeant Pitcher, at home? I was informed by his unit that he was on medical leave and that I could find him here.”
She studied him. Her dubious expression prompted him to retrieve his ID. In the brief second he lifted the flap of his coat to access the inside chest pocket, he watched her glance flick to the pistol holstered under his left armpit. He measured her reaction; she did not flinch at the sight of his weapon. He opened the bifold leather wallet containing his ID and extended it to her. This was his typical practice; flashing the ID prompted immediate distrust, but physically transferring his credentials into their hands had the opposite effect.
Simple, genuine, and intimate.
She glanced down at his picture and name, but to his surprise, she did not move to take the wallet from his outstretched hand. After a moment, she looked back up at him. “I’m sorry, Mr. Ninemeyer, but my husband is not home. If you want to leave me your card, I would be happy to have him call you.”
He returned his wallet to his coat pocket. Time to dangle the carrot.
“Mrs. Pitcher, has your husband been acting unusual since he returned from Afghanistan?” he asked, meeting her eyes. “Has his behavior been erratic or out of character in any way?”
Her cheeks blanched. “Why? Is Michael in some sort of trouble?” she asked, swallowing nervously.
Instead of pressuring her to let him inside, he gestured to the single concrete step at the edge of the front stoop. “Maybe you’d be willing to step outside and talk to me here on the porch for a few minutes. I promise I won’t take much of your time, but I think it’s important that you hear what I have to say.”
She considered for a moment and then said, “Okay, but first let me change into some suitable clothes.”
He nodded, turned, and sat down on the cold concrete step to wait for her. Three minutes later, she returned wearing the same clothes he’d seen her in when she jumped out of the cab. She sat down next to him while keeping as much physical separation as the little step would permit. She crossed her arms over her chest.
“Okay, Agent Ninemeyer,” she said, suddenly all business. “Tell me what you think is going on with my husband and why in God’s name the CIA is interested in him.”
“As you undoubtedly know, your husband’s unit was deployed to Afghanistan. Over the past several months, the Tenth Mountain Division has been working very closely with both the US Special Operations Command and the Central Intelligence Agency to locate and prosecute Taliban terrorists. The Taliban utilizes a network of subterranean caves in the mountains to hide personnel and weapons.”
She nodded.
“Did he speak to you about any of this?”
“No. He’s very tight-lipped about his work.”
“Do you know why your husband was sent home, Ms. Pitcher?”
“He said the Army put him on medical leave. He said he suffered a concussion and had a seizure when he was at Bagram Air Force Base.”
“Did he tell you what caused the concussion?”
She pursed her lips. “No.”
“What did he tell you?”
“That the doctors wanted to monitor him for the next two weeks before returning him to active duty but that as far as he was concerned, the effects of the concussion had passed and he felt fine. Why?”
“Has he had any seizures since he’s been home?”
She hesitated a beat, then said, “No, not that I’m aware of.”
“You don’t sound convinced of your words,” he said, raising an eyebrow at her. “It’s okay to tell me the truth.”
Her cheeks flushed. “Well, there were a few incidents. Where I caught him sleepwalking—well, not exactly walking—but acting out in the middle of the night.”
Ninemeyer kept his expression neutral, giving away nothing. “Was he in a trancelike state? Perhaps acting out of character?”
“Yes,” she said, nodding. “And later, when I confronted him about it, he had no memory of it and claimed I must have been dreaming.”
“I see,” he mumbled.
“Wait,” she said, suddenly on the defensive, “why am I the one doing all the talking? I thought you were here to talk to me about my husband.”
He stared at her, unblinking, and asked, “Ms. Pitcher, where is your husband?”
“I told you—”
“He’s not home, I know,” Ninemeyer interrupted, amping up the pressure. “But we both know there’s more to it than that. My job is to find your husband, but the question is whether I find him before or after he does something to hurt himself or someone else. So you have a choice to make, Ms. Pitcher: you can either help me help your husband, or you can go on telling yourself that everything’s fine and live with the guilt when someone dies because of your cowardice.”
He watched her lips purse as she readied her retort.
Here it comes, he thought, the get the hell off my property and don’t come back speech.
But she blindsided him with “I’m coming with you.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” she said, unwavering. “If you want my help finding my husband, then I’m coming with you.”
He studied her angry, pretty face and lamented the fact he was going to have to kill her. No matter how this played out, she would eventually figure out who and what he wasn’t. She would learn of the orb. She would know that he acquired the orb. These things were not acceptable. But reuniting the Pitchers made the job so much easier and cleaner. He imagined the homicide report as it would undoubtedly be written: Army Sergeant suffering from severe PTSD kills wife and then takes his own life. Murder-suicide—he liked it. Clean, believable, convenient.
“It doesn’t work that way,” he protested, playing out the ruse. “You can’t come with me.”
“Why not?” she said.
“Well, because it doesn’t work that way. Conducting this investigation is my job, and I can’t be responsible for your safety.”
“I’m a journalist. Conducting investigations is my job too, and I’m not asking you to take responsibility for my safety,” she pressed.
He rubbed his chin. “I don’t know . . . It would be extremely unorthodox, Ms. Pitcher.”
“Unorthodox suits me just fine,” she said, getting to her feet. “And call me Josie.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. “You’re not going to take no for an answer, are you?”
“No,” she said, extending her hand to help him up.
He took it and noted the strong, confident grip. “All right, Josie. When can you be ready to leave?”
“Will I need an overnight bag?”
“Yes.”
“Give me five minutes,” she said.
“Five minutes it is.”
With an abashed smile, she said, “Actually, better make that ten.”
CHAPTER 40
Biogentrix Vaccine-Manufacturing Facility
Rensselaer, New York
Time passed, and Malcolm forced himself to be a passive observer. There were more people here now—workers tasked to get the viral-amplification production line up and operational and security personnel to guard the complex. EVE used Harris and the recently arrived Sergeant Pitcher to round up her conscription labor. Some of the new drones they brought her at gunpoint, and some they duped with promises of employment or cash. Once inside the building, armed enforcers would herd the new recruits to EVE at gunpoint. Thirty minutes in her presence was all it took. Rapture, grand mal seizure, recovery, rapture, grand mal seizure, recovery, and the reprogramming was complete. So far none of the new conscripts had been able to resist her. Not a single one.
That was disappointing.
Time passed . . .
He was surrounded by people, but he felt very much alone. He was locked in, locked in the prison of his mind. Defeatist thoughts—self-pity and hopelessness, submission and suicide—began to percolate in his conscious.
I want to talk to Cyril, he said after a while.
Cyril is busy right now, EVE said, answering immediately. Maybe later.
You have plenty of slaves at your disposal now. Why can’t you give us a break? Just thirty minutes . . . please.
EVE didn’t answer.
I miss her, he said. Please . . . please let me talk to her.
The answer is no, Malcolm. I’m sorry.
Anger blossomed in his chest. Why can’t I talk to her? he shouted in his mind.
His jailer offered no response.
You’re cruel.
Silence.
You’re sadistic.
Silence.
Maybe the reason why EVE wouldn’t let him talk to Cyril was because EVE had hurt her. Just as the dreadful thought occurred to him, Cyril walked over and stood in front of him. At the same time, he felt a profound metaphysical release—as if the straps of the mental straitjacket he’d been forced to endure were suddenly undone.
“Cyril?” he said aloud, the first spoken words he’d managed of his own volition in days. He licked his lips and savored the simple victory of having regained control of his tongue.
“Oh, Malcom,” Cyril said with affectionate eyes meeting his. “I’ve missed you.”
“Are you okay? Did she hurt you?” he asked and instinctively tried to reach for her with his right hand, but the command went unbidden. Apparently EVE had not ceded control of anything other than his eyes and mouth.
“I’m okay,” Cyril said. “How about you? Did she hurt you?”
“Not physically, but . . .”
Cyril laughed. “I know, but when we get out of this, someday we’ll laugh about it together.”
On hearing this, his heart skipped a beat. He was not talking to Cyril. The real Cyril would be furious and traumatized. The real Cyril would be humorless and guarded in this situation. And the real Cyril would seize this opportunity to say one thing with her lips while trying desperately to communicate something else with her eyes. The creature standing before him was EVE pretending to be Cyril—an AI pretending to be a woman whom it had not observed long enough to impersonate convincingly.
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