“I remember a morning sitting on my bed listening to a disembodied voice run through my head as some nameless technician drew my blood. It was so clear and so disturbing. He was struggling with the vein, and each time he missed, the voice became louder and more irate. After several attempts, I finally told him to stop. He ignored me, so I grabbed his arm. I could see the anger in his face, and the voice in my mind became furious. It screamed that all it wanted was to go back home, but I was keeping it here. The technician pushed my face into a pillow and brutally stabbed me with the needle. It was then, when I was trying to breathe through a pillow, that I realized that I had changed. I was thinking his thoughts, not mine. When he finished, and finally let me up, I told him I knew why his wife had left him the year before. He managed to hit me several times before the nurses pulled him off me.”
“Amanda, I’m so sorry,” Oliver said, stifling an urge to pat her hand.
“I survived,” she said simply. “Towards the end, they needed to figure out what to do with me. No one wanted to release a potentially infectious person back into society, but they had run out of tests to do, at least humane tests. Some of them wanted to push me, to find out how I survived, no matter what the cost. A few wanted to do even more. I listened as their thoughts turned into possibilities, and then into plans. I was mostly alone in the world, and it wouldn’t take much to make me disappear, just another casualty of an unnamed illness that had claimed the lives of an entire Red Cross relief team. They began to see me as less of a mystery and more of an opportunity.”
“That’s incredible,” Oliver said, but he knew it wasn’t impossible. Three and a half decades as a priest had driven home the point that man was inherently flawed and easily corrupted. In the hearts and minds of most people, the river of needs and desires ran much deeper than the river of morals and ethics.
“At the time it seemed incredible, but now, seven years later, it seems predictable. I was finally released. I think the CDC plans were leaked to someone in the military, because one day the doctors and nurses were removed by a squad of soldiers and replaced by the Army Medical Corps.
“I came back to Colorado Springs and the Flynns, and tried to pick up the pieces of my old life, but I couldn’t. I was different, and the more I tried to ignore that fact, the more obvious it became. Greg and Lisa sensed it, and they finally confronted me. I told them everything, from the experiments to the voices in my head. They are both very devout, and they seemed to find great significance in the fact that I had both survived and had been graced with this gift. At that point in my life, I had pretty much turned away from God. It’s ironic, but even after all I had just been through, I still had more faith in humanity than I had in God.” Amanda paused to let Oliver comment, but he let her continue. “Greg and Lisa can be quite formidable when they have their minds set, and they had their minds set on me rediscovering my faith in God. I told them that it never was a question of belief; it was a question of trust. I could never count on Him being there when I needed Him.” She paused again.
“I’m not going to deny that if God had interceded on your behalf, some of the terrible things that have happened to you wouldn’t have happened,” Oliver said, and then paused. “I believe that God is capable of anything, and on occasion, does suspend the natural laws for our benefit. Why He didn’t intervene when your husband and son died is a mystery, a troubling mystery, yes, but in the end, I trust in His mercy and righteousness.”
“You haven’t always,” she said pointedly.
Oliver smiled. “Stay out of my mind, young lady.”
She smiled back.
Oliver continued, “I didn’t say it was easy, and yes, I have on occasion lost my way, but with the help of the Holy Spirit, I have always managed to find my way home.”
“I’m happy for you, but for me, I’ve never really had a home.”
Oliver waited for her to say more. “Would you like to talk about this?” he finally asked.
“Not at all, Father. Maybe I will at some point, but not today. We have more pressing matters.”
“Fair enough. Why don’t you tell me why so many people are looking for you?”
Amanda gave a rueful chuckle and looked down. “Oh, you must mean the FBI, the CDC, and the Colorado State Police.”
“Why don’t we start with them?”
“All right, but for you to understand the whole story, I need to explain something first. This virus does more to you than just expand your awareness.” She paused and Oliver pondered the expansion of his own awareness. “It also amplifies the darker emotions that most of us try to suppress. It changes you.” Amanda began to stare blankly at something over Oliver’s shoulder.
“I see,” Oliver said to fill the growing silence.
“It’s a subtle, almost imperceptible slide into madness. For me, it was a growing sense of infallibility. I indulged myself and started to believe what the Flynns had been saying; only I added my own twist. I rationalized that if God, in His infinite wisdom, felt that I was worthy of such power, I was entitled to use it in any way I saw fit. What’s interesting is that before I was infected, I never would have had such thoughts. I had always been a little timid, never very sure of the decisions that I made or myself. Now suddenly, I could do no wrong. I had the divine stamp of approval.” Amanda’s voice had grown stronger, almost threatening. “There were other changes, and each one of them was neatly justified as well. I developed a desire to control and dominate others—aggressive tendencies that I had never felt before, and it was completely intoxicating. In time, it became more than just a desire; it became an addiction, a need. I actively sought confrontations and then began to create them, just to hurt people. Several times, I went beyond hurting them.”
Oliver tried to remain impassive, but the surprise showed on his face.
“I’m sorry that I’ve disappointed you, Father, but you should know from the beginning that I’m not a sweet, innocent little thing.”
“I don’t know what to say. You seem so unrepentant.”
“I’m not sorry for what I did, or for what happened later.” Amanda stared at Oliver with a face lovely enough to grace a magazine cover. “The truth is that I never harmed an innocent person, and when I started, I never intended to kill anyone. Hurt them, punish them, maybe, but not kill them.”
“That doesn’t absolve you. You hurt people, you killed people,” Oliver started to whisper. “To satisfy a need.” He couldn’t keep the judgmental tone out of his voice.
“It was a little more complicated than that, but in essence, that’s correct.” The disappointment on Oliver’s face was obvious. “Let me finish,” Amanda said.
“I’m listening,” Oliver said, knowing that nothing she was about to say would make what she did acceptable.
“About three months after I came home, I met a man named Ted Alam. He was an FBI agent who had worked with Greg on a couple of cases, and they were friends. I was staying with the Flynns at the time, and Ted came by quite a bit. A week before he died, the four of us were having a barbecue, but Ted seemed out of sorts. Lisa pressed him, and he passed it off as simple fatigue, but I knew that he was lying. For a few years, he had been selling information to a couple of Chinese officials. He had never given them anything of real importance, until now. He was about to pass them the security plan for the Port of Los Angeles, and he kept rehearsing the exchange in his mind. A week later, I followed him to Washington and the National Mall. It turns out that his contact was not actually a member of the Chinese government, or any government; he wasn’t even Chinese. He worked for himself and was selling the information to any interested party.
“I was so comfortable with myself that I never really thought through what I was about to do. Ted was a trained FBI agent, and the other man was, for all I knew, a trained killer, but I just walked right up to them with every intention of subduing them as painfully as possible. Before I could do or say anything, Ted saw me, grabbed his briefcase, and began to run. The other gu
y shot him in the back, and then he shot me in the chest.” Amanda touched a spot just below her right shoulder. “For some reason, I didn’t feel any pain. He was about to shoot me again when something inside me reached into his consciousness and tore through it. I ripped his mind apart.” Her whole affect changed, and a subtle smiled crossed her face. “I enjoyed it more than anything I had ever done before. He died as slowly and as painfully as I could manage. It was horrible and beautiful at the same time, and I loved it.”
Oliver stared at Amanda with wide eyes and a slack jaw.
The phone was ringing again, and Phil counted seven rings. Finally, the digital answering machine played his secretary’s greeting, and the office fell silent again. It would be another reporter asking for a comment. The governor, his father’s closest friend, was dead, and so was his murderer. The governor’s body was being flown back to Denver, but his murderer’s body was coming here, and everyone wanted to know how Phil felt supervising the examination of a man who had killed a close family friend. Apparently, not many people knew that Phil wasn’t capable of feeling much of anything.
After two dozen phone calls and interview requests, Phil understood why the Pueblo medical examiner had deferred to the Colorado Springs office. The media circus was in full swing long before Peter Bilsky’s body had arrived. His secretary, Linda Miller, stayed long enough to release a one-page comment describing Phil’s grief and commitment to the memory of the late governor, and then she went home, leaving Phil to face the onslaught alone.
Each of the other three pathologists in the department had called Phil and volunteered their services, trying to spare him the obvious emotional trauma, but he declined. It was his turn in the rotation, and he would not violate The Routine. He listened to the purring of his computer’s fan and wondered why everyone was making such a big deal out of this. It was true that the governor and his father had been close friends, dating back to the time they were both marines in Vietnam, but that had been before Phil was even born. It was also true that the late governor had been a partner in the small, but very successful, law firm John Rucker had started shortly after the two had finished law school. It was even true that the governor had been Phil’s godfather, but he had had no say in that decision. The emotional math of this situation just didn’t make sense.
His cell phone vibrated, and he checked the caller ID: Gregory Flynn. He wasn’t surprised. Even with Flynn’s old police connections, he was probably having trouble getting through the added security. “Phillip Rucker,” he said formally after opening the flip phone.
“Dr. Rucker, it’s Greg Flynn. We were supposed to have a meeting today. With all that’s going on, are you still available?”
“I have only about ten minutes for you, Detective, but I think it is important that we speak. I will clear you through security.” Phil abruptly closed the cell phone and used the office phone to clear the retired police officer through the front desk. Five minutes later, Greg Flynn was stomping snow off his boots in Phil’s outer office. Another minute passed as Phil waited for the knock at his door, and Greg looked around for Linda Miller to announce him.
“Come in, Detective,” Phil finally called from behind his desk, and his door opened tentatively.
“I see that Linda didn’t make it in today,” said Greg. He had known Linda Miller for over twenty years.
“She needed to leave early,” Phil said flatly.
Greg Flynn was six feet, but well over two hundred pounds. He was a powerfully built man, and even in his mid-sixties hadn’t yet developed a middle-age spread. As much as he was capable, Phil admired the detective. “Is it still snowing?” Phil asked as Greg stripped off his wet parka.
Greg smiled. “Small talk just doesn’t come naturally to you, Dr. Rucker; but no, it stopped a couple of hours ago.” Greg settled into the uncomfortable straight-backed chair that faced Phil’s unnaturally clean and organized desk. A wild thought crossed his mind, and he wondered how Phil would react if he suddenly reached up and knocked over the pencil case that sat neatly next to the empty in-box.
“At our last meeting, I mentioned that we had found a new virus in the brain of a man who shot his neighbor,” Phil said, and Greg nodded his understanding. “I think it may be related to the epidemic of violent behavior you spoke of.” Phil’s tone conveyed no emotion, no fear, and no concern.
Greg didn’t react. “Actually, I already knew that. I wanted to see you today so I could share with you what I know about this virus.”
“I suspected you knew more than you indicated. It is somewhat unusual for a police detective to query a pathologist about general autopsy findings without some specific concerns.”
“My daughter-in-law Amanda was infected with a virus seven years ago in Honduras. Everyone except Amanda died, but only a handful actually died from the virus. She said that the majority of the deaths were from suicide or murder. The federal government knows about this. They held Amanda for weeks after she was returned to the States, and they’ve been covering it up ever since.” Greg paused, but Phil’s neutral expression never wavered.
“When you say the federal government, do you mean the Centers for Disease Control?”
Greg nodded. “I have a name: Nathan Martin. He’s one of the department heads at the CDC. He tried to have Amanda killed.” Phil finally reacted by leaning forward in his chair ever so slightly.
“That’s a strange reaction to a patient,” Phil said slowly. “Why would Dr. Martin try to have Amanda killed?”
“Do you know Martin?” Greg asked suspiciously.
“I know of him, but I have never met him. His office contacted us this morning, asking for more information on this patient.” Phil tapped the notes on his desk. “We had sent them samples a month ago, and apparently they want to do some follow-up tests. It is somewhat of an unusual request.”
“So he knew already,” Greg said with disappointment. “Amanda exposed herself for nothing,” he added to himself.
“You still haven’t explained why Martin would want your daughter-in-law killed.”
“Perhaps I wasn’t being completely accurate or fair. The truth of the matter is that I don’t think he ever wanted her dead, but he did initiate a series of actions that spun out of control. Now she is wanted for the deaths of two people.” Greg’s voice communicated both regret and anger.
“So, did Dr. Martin believe that her violent behavior was a result of her infection?” Phil asked.
For a moment, Greg looked at him blankly. “No, you’ve got it all wrong. Amanda has never been violent, or even sick.”
“So she survived the infection without any ill effects. That would make her very interesting to Dr. Martin. If there’s a connection between her infection and this case, she’s even more interesting today. Do you know where she is?”
Greg Flynn stared at the inscrutable Phillip Rucker and didn’t answer.
“I can assure you, Detective, that you can trust me.”
“That may be the problem; I do trust you to do the very thing that you’re supposed to do, which would mean calling the FBI and the CDC. So, for now, let’s just say that I haven’t seen her in over a year.”
“At some point, it may be necessary to see her.”
“Perhaps under the right circumstances,” Greg said.
Neither said a word for a moment, both comfortable that all that needed to be said had been said.
“Was there anything else, Detective?” Phil asked after a reasonable pause.
“Actually, I was hoping you had a theory as to how this virus caused so many people to go mad.”
“I don’t have enough information yet to make any definitive statements, but it is possible. There are a number of infections, viral, bacterial, even parasitic, that are characterized by personality changes. The most obvious is tertiary syphilis, but even the ubiquitous herpes simplex virus has the ability to destroy the medial temporal lobes of the brain, causing any number of bizarre behaviors.” Phil felt a little uncomfor
table discussing bizarre behavior, but the small voice inside his own mind stayed quiet and didn’t offer any rebuttal statements.
“I see.” Greg shifted uncomfortably in the state-issued straight-backed chair that faced Phil’s desk. “So the virus destroys a part of the brain, and the person suddenly becomes unstable. That makes sense.” Greg shifted again. “How about the opposite? Are there places in the brain that if destroyed, or even damaged, would make the person more stable, or perhaps smarter?” he asked casually.
“There are certain neurologic conditions that respond to extremely well-placed lesions in the brain, but these are only used to control abnormal symptoms, not to improve a normal person beyond their baseline.” Curiosity began to creep back into Phil’s mind. “That’s a very unusual question, Detective, and somewhat leading.”
“I know a man, a priest, actually, who I think got sick, I’m guessing with this virus, and then he got better. I don’t mean he recovered from the infection—he actually got physically better. His heart became stronger, his body became stronger, and so did his mind. Do you think there might be a connection?”
Before Rucker could answer, his pager began to beep loudly. Greg jumped, but Phil didn’t react. “No,” Phil said simply, but he studied Greg very closely. The detective was obviously holding something back, and he didn’t think it involved a priest. “I don’t know of any infection that has the ability to improve the mind or the body.” Phil didn’t check his pager, since he knew who it was and what it was about. Instead, he scrutinized the detective a little longer. The pause stretched to several seconds, and Phil waited for Greg to say something more, or for his own Monsters to demand that he check his pager.
Greg abruptly stood, and Phil followed suit. “Thank you, Dr. Rucker. I know you are very busy, especially with all that’s happened. I’m sorry for your loss.” Greg didn’t offer his hand; Phillip Rucker didn’t shake anyone’s hand.
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