Ripped Open (The Infected: Ripped to Shreds Book 2)

by P. S. Power

  Rather, it was, in that Brian had a small room on the fifth floor, near the front. That was what he’d asked for, not needing much. Karen had a three room suite however, in one of the two nice buildings. Even being in trouble for drinking and not doing her job for almost half a year, she was being given special treatment. Mainly, it seemed, because everyone figured that if the word ever got out that they were treating Lady Glory like they did the rest of them, they might be publically lynched. Most, but not all, of the Team One members had that kind of thing going on. It was a bit strange, but Argos had a room on the top floor of her own building. A five story walk up. Right next to Brian’s room, as it turned out.

  Jason’s point, when she cross referenced things, was all about making it seem like there was no super special team on the base. It was refreshing to see, not that Cin would have been bothered by the man getting one of the better spaces for himself.

  Without much subtlety at all Karen veered off the instant that she knew Cindy was going to get home safely. She also pulled Brian along with her, not wanting to risk leaving him alone with a needy and desperate Cindy. Who, after all, had every right to grab the man up. At least to Karen Young’s way of thinking.

  “Goodnight.” She waved at them, and got one back from Karen. Brian chuckled a bit, but the computer screen over his head was counting something down. That wasn’t going to take place until the next day, nearly fifteen hours later.

  Still, having the data there like that, it would be foolish to not research things. Not that she wasn’t going to do that in bed, drifting off into sweet slumber. If they weren’t going to be nuked, then she would be better off having some rest than not. If they were, then she was running around screaming and trying to leave, but borrowing trouble made very little sense to her. Not about this kind of thing.

  So Cindy showered, brushed her teeth well, and crawled into bed, just in case sleep was going to be happening for her. Oddly, once she managed to get into Brian’s head, and do a deep reading of why there were numbers counting down, it wasn’t that hard to do the rest of what was needed. It was an emergency, and kind of a huge deal, since it was about a terrorist attack in New York City. Not a large one, but big enough that Brian going off alone to fight it wasn’t really going to work this time. Not because he’d be hurt, though that was a risk in his line of work.

  No, it was that there were three separate points of attack to come, all at once. Proxy was only one man, and while he could teleport, that didn’t allow him to fight fifteen people with more than a half mile between each five-person group. What probably would have happened, and still might, would be that the one IPB agent would show up to stop the combination of bombs and handguns in one location, leaving the other two with a real death toll.

  The man who organized the whole thing wasn’t one however, when Cin managed to locate the right book, based on what Brian was going to be encountering later. That took crossing over to Trivia and using her brain and powers to work out who was thinking the right things to put them in the City the next day. Dying. That was actually a lot more people than Cin would have expected.

  So working things down she managed, over the course of an hour, to find the correct person, a fifteen-year-old girl. Aabroo Muhamad. The others in the thing with her were equally young, but their plan was really solid. Enough so that people were going to die, if Cindy didn’t do anything about it.

  So she was torn. Inside a battle raged on for about ten minutes over the issue. After all, it wasn’t her job to protect everyone from death. No one really could do that anyway, and if they could, it still wouldn’t be up to the slightly reformed serial killer to do it.

  On the other hand, going into work in the morning with an action plan, and specific names and locations of all the players would make her look good with the higher ups. Maybe even enough so that she could push back the threat of impending death another notch or two. Bank enough goodwill so that when she eventually screwed up and killed the wrong person, people might cut her half an inch of slack. Growling a bit, she got up, and took a deep breath.

  Then, in her soft pink pjs and running shoes with no socks, she stumbled back toward her computer station. That was in the main office building, and the night air was chilly enough that she kind of wished she’d thought of that first, and just gone in the morning. Wearing her tan jacket.

  That meant, an hour later, feeling grumpy as fuck, she used the desk phone at the front of the place to call Karen Young. It should have been Dave, of course, but he didn’t have a phone yet. Behind the front desk there was a young woman that looked normal enough, but wasn’t real. She was one of Rigsby’s friends. An energy projection. This particular one could read minds, though her appearance was totally different than the last time they’d met. June.

  The search for the right name required a bit of work, but that was the price of being cool like she was. Cindy waved at her a bit, and then held up a fifteen sheets of printed paper and a thumb drive that held all the data she’d put together.

  “Hey. Can I use your phone? I need to bug some people. If I can’t sleep, neither can they. At least the world should work that way.”

  June, sporting black hair and a nose ring today, along with nearly black skin, nodded.

  “Sounds fair to me! What’s the situation?”

  “Terror attack on NYC in about twelve hours. This will let Homeland pick up everyone involved, and find all the proof they need, in order to prosecute. Kids doing it. Teens.” She could go on, but June just got her the large and bulky secured line and passed it to her.

  “Do you need anyone’s numbers?”

  “Not that has a phone. We didn’t get Dave one yet. Hey, you could contact him though, right? Wake him up and have him jog over here, so that I can go back to bed?”

  It turned out that June really could do that. It just required focus and mental screaming, since Dave loved his sleep. Karen was easier in a way, but waking her up meant getting Brian, who was in bed with her. It nearly did, at any rate.

  “Nah. Tell him to sleep. We shouldn’t need him for this. Not now. This is the time for the new outreach program to go into action.” She liked the sound of that, and given that she wasn’t part of that, she could skate as soon as they were up on what was going on.

  Ideally. The big issue there was that, after a yelp and a hang up, Karen started to act like a grown-up and called in all the correct people, considering it was a possible life threatening situation. That meant Marcia Turner.

  Cindy didn’t know if she was the kind that would put up with being woken up for psychic intel, but had to suspect that there was about to be some grumpy berating going on. Hopefully that could be turned on Dave and Karen. It was Lady Glory that had done it, but if they could blame the new guy in the mix, the one that wasn’t one of Turner’s best friends, that might be for the best.

  Interestingly, they all got into place at nearly the same time, with the Director looking ready to punch someone in the face. Her words were all business though, even if her hair was pulled back into a fairly sloppy ponytail and she was wearing only a robe. One that gapped enough in the front that the blue man had to be careful not to look at her too closely. It was just flannel, but on her it looked halfway decent.

  “What’s going on? I just heard terrorism. Is someone at the gates?”

  Dave surprised Cindy then, and spoke, his mechanical voice sounding smoother than normal.

  “We have intelligence that puts an attack in New York City in twelve hours or less. Mableton has names, addresses and locations for all the people involved. Three separate locations it looks like. We need to get with Homeland on this, and bring in the FBI, if I have that right? Some of the people are crossing state lines to do this. Just from New Jersey, but that counts. I’d say we need the ATF as well, but they haven’t exactly been team players in the past.” It was strangely informed, considering that he’d just gotten there as well, but Cindy got it.

  June had read the papers and then her mind,
and passed that to Dave while he worked his way over, because it was more efficient than making them all play catch-up on the fly. It also left him looking really on the ball, which was fair enough, since the man actually was.

  “Right. Good work. Let me look over the information. Karen, Wilson, you two get with the agencies in question. They may not act on this data, depending on how they feel about Infected people, so be ready to act calm, even as they seem like idiots. I have the numbers.” She glanced at Cin and gave her a blank stare. “How about some coffee? I don’t need any, but Dave and Karen are going to.”

  It was, of course, meant to be demeaning.

  That was so obvious to Cindy that she nearly growled at the woman for being a pain about it all. Yes, she was a killer. Certainly Cin was new… That didn’t mean that abusing her was going to play. She geared up to argue, and looked over Marcia’s head so that she could get dirt on her to help control the situation. That got her to pause.

  The words there were tired, and spoke of wanting to go to sleep, but also wanting to prop up her people in their new job. That meant making up for lost sleep. True, she wasn’t thinking about the fact that Cindy had been up for over a day already, but asking her to get the wakening brews wasn’t about putting her in her place at all. The woman had merely forgotten that the new girl wasn’t just part of the team. It was, of course, a temporary oversight on her part, but it really was what Cin was going for. Propping up the new outreach team, in their second real action. The first time they were going to be in action.

  “Got it. Coffee… Do you need anything to eat?” She glanced over and saw that Karen didn’t at the moment, even if she were a bit hungry, having been woken up like she was. The woman had just started a new diet, so shook her head.

  Dave on the other hand burned calories like they were going out of style thanks to his power. More to the point, he had an active force field around him, repelling physical forces, at that very moment. It wasn’t strong, but the tension was engaging things, and after about half an hour he was going to be starving if he didn’t get something.

  Marcia actually needed to eat as well. Not that she was hungry.

  That meant running off to the dining hall, because they didn’t have the right things in the office.

  Dave nodded, and looked sheepish, since he wanted to get along with everyone, but also needed to make a good showing.

  “That would be great, if it isn’t a problem?” He was about to explain the reason, but stopped when she faked a smile and nodded.

  “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Let me…” She walked out, moving quickly, since doing it slowly wouldn’t help anything.

  Getting food and coffee wasn’t hard there at least, even at midnight. The building even had cooks working at that hour, and there was a full selection of food laid out, so Cindy just made up a tray of things, mainly taking sandwiches, and getting food preferences, she picked up some peanut butter and crackers for Director Turner. She liked crunchy things, and the spread would add calories for her, which was what she really needed.

  No one in the well-lit building even bothered to look at her funny, which was nice of them, given her clothing choices at the moment. That was due to the fact that people did, often, show up in the middle of the night wearing whatever they threw on, or slept in. Technically, according to the thoughts of the man that was making certain the place stayed tidy and that everyone had what they needed, she wasn’t supposed to take food away on the serving trays.

  She nodded at it, and then yawned.

  “Emergency at the front office. I don’t normally eat this time of day. This is for Mr. Wilson and Director Turner. I need some coffee as well. For Ms. Young?”

  The man gave her a look, which was all about him not recognizing the names, and then nodded.

  “At once then. Do they have orders for their drinks? I can get some travel mugs for them.” He actually jogged off for that, and helped her set up what everyone wanted. Or in Karen’s case, felt that she had to have, which was black coffee with a little artificial sweetener. A liquid kind that the night man, Jonathon Karver, got for her when she asked after it. That was in the back, but had both a better flavor and no calories at all, which was what Lady Glory was going for that night.

  The man was quick, once she mentioned what was going on. He wondered how to get the tray back, but didn’t mention that she should bring it herself. Instead he just helped her get the beverages set up, including a special drink for Marcia, which sounded disgusting. That was basically just oil with sugar in it, for grit and calories. The woman needed them, and couldn’t taste or smell anything, making getting her to eat a problem at times.

  “Thanks Jonathon. I’ll see that the tray gets back. Probably tomorrow. As it is I’m about to fall down, myself. It will happen though.”

  “Very good, ma’am. If you need more, please feel free to call an order in. I can run it over at need.”

  That kind of made sense to her, now that she thought about it. The truth was, she’d never considered that they had that kind of staff there before. Ones that would, at least in an emergency, be willing to do things like that, even if it technically wasn’t their real job.

  “Thanks. I’ll make sure the others know that, in case I crash.” She left, quickly, since she wasn’t really lying about wanting to sleep. Given everything, that probably wasn’t going to be in her own comfy bed or anything like that. It was a shame, but her office had carpet on the floor and she had already slept on it a few times. It wasn’t pleasant, but it would leave her there where she could be easily found, if she were needed.

  The tray was heavy, but manageable, and got set down on the front counter, near June, before she dropped the thing. Looking around she simply used her eyes to find everyone. Marcia was in her own office, but Karen and Dave were in the room that Brian used for his own day to day work. It didn’t have a real desk, being set up as a meeting room with a table. Both of the new team bosses were at different ends of the thing, calling busily.

  Cutely, or perhaps annoyingly, the people speaking to Dave kept thinking he was calling in the terrorist threat at first. That forced him to explain each time, which slowed things down, but only a bit. The truth was that most of the people were up on the new program, at least in theory. They seemed to think that it was mainly about the IPB being there to help them at need, not the other way around, but… Terrorism got attention.

  That meant they were able to get attention and send off data, without too many problems. They were even able to get a combination strike team set up on short notice to go in and stop the attack. It was FBI and NYPD. That wasn’t an inspired combination given that they were both scrambling their closest assets, not the best ones for the job, but that was the nature of the beast. They were dumping things out almost without warning, and that meant scrambling and doing what they could, not doing it right.

  Cindy got to learn about that when a foot nudged her side, getting her to open one eye, seeing a towering Ms. Turner, still dressed in her robe.

  Not thinking she nodded.

  “You sleep in the nude? Good to know. I’ll try to get you more warning next time.” She was looking up the thing at the moment, which meant she now knew a lot more about Turner than she ever really wanted to.

  Much like her, the woman had no body hair. It was the popular look, so that was fine enough, but it was an odd way to be woken up. The woman didn’t even bother to do more than nod tiredly.

  “The people on the ground are about to go in. I was wondering if you could check for any traps, or anything like that? The more our people know, the better off we all are. We don’t need a bomb going off in a residential area, for instance.”

  Cindy had managed to get about five hours of sleep, she thought. It was just turning six, meaning it was still early morning in NYC. She felt grumpy, and a little sick from lack of sleep, but forced herself up anyway.

  “Yeah. I need the bathroom, then…” Her bladder probably would have forced her to get
up soon anyway, she realized. It hadn’t been that bad, while she slept, but now the middle of her being ached from the pressure.

  Ms. Turner didn’t even growl at her about it.

  “Get to that. We have about thirty minutes. Run.”

  She did, trying to keep in mind that the whole point was for her to look good. It was harder to keep in mind, when the inside of her mouth seemed to have been filled with a thick and foul tasting paste made up of things scraped from the bottom of other people’s shoes. She didn’t have time to handle that either, so would just need to suck it all up. On the good side, she could research things while on the toilet, and did. It wasn’t exactly glamorous, perhaps, but it got the job done, which meant she was able to locate the groups, and pass the right data to the right people inside twenty minutes.

  Each collection of young terror mavens had two bombs, but none of those were armed at the moment, being meant to be placed on a person. They had firearms, being mainly handguns, but they didn’t really know how to use them. Not with military precision. They were good enough to point and shoot at unarmed victims, but that wasn’t going to help them a lot against people with body armor on.

  Still, she knew which person would be exactly where, or at least their current location, and how they were armed at the moment. That didn’t mean they couldn’t, or wouldn’t grab things when invaded. Thankfully, no one involved was Infected, or had enough brains to consider that anything might happen before they took action. They’d been relatively careful, Aabroo Muhamad being bright for a young girl. Not smart enough to outthink super powers, but very few people would be.

  The operation wasn’t flawless, and they lost six of the kids they were going after. In gun battles, except for one of them who tried to run, only to be shot by one of the few NYC Police Officers who could hit a moving target on purpose. It was in the back, and that could be hard to hide, but the boy actually had snagged one of the bombs, even if the officer hadn’t known that at the time.