Chimera

by David Wellington

  “Maybe I’ll just try saving his life,” Chapel suggested. “See how he likes that.”

  IN TRANSIT: APRIL 14, T+54:13

  Chapel did finally manage to get some sleep, after that. He put his head back on the seat and pulled a blanket over himself and he was out like a light.

  But he must have dreamed.

  He would never remember the dream. But he would remember waking up with one fact firmly in his mind, one thing that had nearly escaped his conscious mind, but which his subconscious mind had carefully filed away.

  “Ellie,” he said, as his eyes opened.

  Admiral Hollingshead had chastised Chapel for going to talk to Eleanor Pechowski. Except he hadn’t called her that. He’d called her Ellie Pechowski.

  She’d told Chapel to call her Ellie when he met her. Probably she said that to everyone who met her. Which meant Rupert Hollingshead knew Ellie, had at least made her acquaintance.

  Maybe they were even friends. Chapel had wondered why she was allowed to remain at large, knowing what she knew. Having as much exposure to the virus as she must have had. Hollingshead must have been protecting her this whole time.

  She had told Chapel something else, as well. She’d told him she’d been originally hired to work at Camp Putnam by a man in a uniform. A captain in a navy uniform.

  “Did you say something, Chapel?”

  It was Angel’s voice in his ear.

  “Angel,” he said, “can you tell me something about Admiral Hollingshead? Nothing secret. Just—when was he promoted to admiral?”

  “I doubt he’d want me answering that,” she said, “but . . . you could just Google it yourself, so, okay.” She worked her keyboard for a moment. “It was after Operation Desert Storm, in 1991.”

  Ellie had been recruited in 1990. Back then Hollingshead would have been a captain. In the navy.

  “Okay,” Chapel said. “Thanks.”

  He settled back into the seat and closed his eyes again.

  In his head the pieces fit together, revealing more of the picture.

  IN TRANSIT: APRIL 14, T+55:21

  The plane set down at Denver International Airport and before it had even finished taxiing to the terminal, cars were already moving on the tarmac, headed to meet them. There were three cars, all black late-model sedans with tinted windows. Anybody who saw them would know instantly they were full of security for some VIP.

  When the cars reached the plane, a trio of men in black suits and sunglasses poured out and took up defensive positions surrounding the cars. Each of them carried a shotgun in plain sight. They made a good show of tapping their ears and calling out status updates to each other.

  “They’re not bothering with a low profile,” Chapel said, as he and Julia watched the convoy approach. “That’s probably a mistake. A chimera on his own might not know what all this signifies. But the Voice will.”

  “You think that Quinn will attack during the transfer,” Julia said, because he’d filled her in on what he’d learned of Hayes’s itinerary.

  “I would, if I were trying to kill him. It’s when he’s most at risk. But there are ways of avoiding that—or even using this kind of display to our advantage. We could put the judge in a nondescript car, let Quinn attack the security detail and then have the judge’s car speed away in the middle of things.” Chapel threw up his hands. “But it’s not up to me. I don’t take charge of security until we reach this undisclosed location. I can’t give any orders until then, so I’ll just have to play this straight.”

  “I’ll keep my eyes open,” Julia said.

  “Ah.” Chapel turned away from the window and looked at her face. “About that.”

  Julia sighed. “You’re not taking me with you, are you?”

  Chapel tried to pick his words very carefully, this time. “No. I want you to stay here, on the plane. So you can be ready to get out of here at a moment’s notice. Chief Petty Officer Andrews is armed. I’ve already spoken with her, before you woke up. She knows that the CIA may attempt to get at you. Her orders are to try to get the plane out of here before they arrive—or to defend the aircraft if anyone tries to board it.”

  “Chapel—”

  “You’ll be safe here. This plane looks like a normal corporate jet, but it’s actually been uparmored. It’s designed to resist small-arms fire. I know that every time we separate something bad happens, but—”

  “Chapel, okay! I get it. You can’t take me with you this time.”

  “It would be kind of hard to explain to the judge what you’re doing here. I can’t really pass you off as my secretary.”

  Julia rolled her eyes. “I said I get it. I’ll stay here.”

  “You don’t seem very happy about it,” he pointed out. He’d expected that, of course. “I know you don’t like being left in the dark. The last time I left you behind . . . I can only say I’m sorry about that. I promise this time is different.”

  “It’s not that,” Julia said.

  “No?”

  “No.” She reached over and put a hand on his cheek. That he hadn’t expected at all. “It’s not that at all.”

  “What happened to our professional arrangement?” he asked, before he could stop himself.

  “Chapel, for a guy whose job is to keep secrets, sometimes you don’t know when to shut up,” she said. He saw in her eyes then that she was upset, definitely—but for once she was not upset with him.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, softly.

  “It’s what I see in your eyes. You’re leaving me here because you don’t expect to come back, yourself.” She looked down at her lap. “You think you’re going to die here.”

  “It’s not like I want to,” he tried.

  She pressed her face against his chest. “You could just say no. You could quit. You could tell them all to fuck themselves and then run away. We could run away.”

  Chapel stroked her hair. For a while he just held her.

  Then he whispered, “No. No, I can’t.”

  That wasn’t who he was.

  She nodded against his chest. “Chapel. You go do what you have to do. When you’re done, I’ll be here, waiting for you so we can fly off on our next big adventure. Okay? I’ll be right here.”

  They waited together in silence while CPO Andrews opened the hatch and readied the debarkation stairs.

  DENVER INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, COLORADO: APRIL 14, T+55:36

  One of the black-suited men was waiting for Chapel when he came down the jet’s stairs. The security guard did not offer to shake his hand. “Captain Chapel,” he said, in a flat voice, “welcome to Denver. We’re to take you directly to His Honor.”

  “Sure,” Chapel said. “He’s at the courthouse, right?”

  “My instructions are to take you to him,” the guard said.

  “Are you Reinhard?” Chapel asked.

  “I’m just here to take you to him,” the guard repeated.

  “Fine.” Chapel walked over to the nearest car. The guard at least held the door for him. “You’ve been given orders not to answer any questions, right?”

  “I’ve been given orders to escort you to His Honor,” the guard told him.

  After that Chapel kept his mouth shut.

  The three cars headed out of the airport and up a major highway toward the city. Outside the airport, broad fields cut by irrigation ditches lay yellow and bedraggled in the sun. The sky was huge. Chapel had been out
west before, and should have known to expect it, but still it was always a surprise. The flat land of the prairies meant you could see for miles in every direction, and that made the sky just look bigger than it did back east.

  The effect wasn’t diminished much even when the cars rolled through a zone of strip malls and old box stores, auto parts warehouses and colossal Laundromats, all of them looking dusty and worn. This part of Denver had no trees, just broad roads laid out in a perfectly square grid. The car rolled down Colfax Avenue, through a zone of strip clubs and bars, and soon enough Chapel could see the city’s handful of skyscrapers sticking up from the flat ground ahead of them.

  At the courthouse the cars pulled into an underground lot, and Chapel blinked as they left the sun behind. Someone opened Chapel’s door, and he stepped out onto concrete that stank of old motor oil.

  “This way,” the security guard said. He wore his sunglasses even indoors.

  Chapel was ushered up an elevator and through a small office where a dozen State Highway Patrol troopers were drinking coffee and talking about football. This must be the security detail he was supposed to take over, but none of them would even meet his eye. His black-suited escort didn’t let him linger in that office but directed him through and into a larger office beyond.

  Judge Franklin Hayes was waiting there for him, looking almost exactly as he had when he’d broken into Angel’s line to demand Chapel’s presence. The judge hadn’t shaved in a day or so and steel-colored stubble had broken out on his cheeks. He looked just as angry as he had when they’d spoken.

  “Took you long enough,” Hayes said.

  DENVER, COLORADO: APRIL 14, T+57:01

  Hayes steepled his fingers in front of him and glared at Chapel. “You’re seven hours late, Captain.” He turned to his security guard. “This is Reinhard, my head of security. He’s been in charge here since you refused to come earlier.”

  Reinhard was a big guy, broad through the shoulders like a linebacker, though not much taller than Chapel. He had a crew cut and a strong jaw, but his eyes were hidden behind dark sunglasses. Even without seeing his eyes, though, Chapel could tell the man was giving him the once-over.

  “Doesn’t look like much,” Reinhard said.

  Hayes chuckled. “Oh, Chapel’s got his qualifications. Director Banks was happy to send them along. He’s a war hero, Reinhard. Lost his arm in Afghanistan, fighting for your freedom.”

  “A cripple, then,” Reinhard said.

  “All the best military training. He served with the Army Rangers, that’s quite an elite force,” Hayes went on, smiling. The judge had the look of a career politician. He’d probably had acting lessons to be able to look so jovial and friendly. But his eyes gave him away. They were like chips of glass in his face. Hard and cold. “Of course, that was several years ago.”

  “He does look pretty old,” Reinhard agreed.

  “Come, come. He’s had plenty of time to mature and gain wisdom, let’s say.” Hayes put his hands down on the desk. “Plenty of time for that. He hasn’t seen much field service since he lost his arm, of course . . .”

  “So they sent you a desk jockey,” Reinhard grunted. “Huh.”

  “Are you suggesting he isn’t the best man for the job?” Hayes asked, a look of fake shock creasing his face. “Are you suggesting they could have sent someone better?”

  “Maybe one of the rent-a-cops who works over at the mall,” Reinhard said.

  Chapel fumed in silence.

  He understood this game. He knew what Hayes wanted to get across but was too slick to say outright. The judge hadn’t gotten as far in his career as he had without knowing how to lay on a good line of bullshit, but still make himself understood.

  He was saying he didn’t trust Chapel. He was also saying he did trust Reinhard, his own man, and that he wanted to keep Reinhard in charge and let Chapel play second fiddle here.

  Time to fix that.

  “Your Honor,” he said, “you’ll want to move to your left.”

  Hayes didn’t have time to ask why before Chapel’s pistol was out, held tight in his right hand and pointed at Reinhard’s throat. The security guard was smart enough to keep his hands visible and not flinch.

  “Take off your sunglasses,” Chapel said.

  “I’ll be damned if—”

  “Take them off now,” Chapel insisted, using his best officer voice.

  Hayes scooted to the left in his rolling chair.

  Slowly, using both hands, Reinhard reached up and took off his sunglasses. His eyes were a cold blue. They narrowed as he stared at Chapel. “You just bought yourself some trouble,” he said. “And you were already fully stocked.”

  “Shut up,” Chapel told him.

  A lamp with a brass shade sat on Hayes’s desk. Chapel grabbed it and shone the light directly in Reinhard’s eyes.

  “—the fuck,” Reinhard said, squinting, turning his face away from the light.

  “Okay. He’s clean,” Chapel said, and put the lamp back on the desk. “Reinhard, you go outside and find your men. Tell every one of them to remove his sunglasses and keep them off. Nobody’s wearing sunglasses today. You got it?”

  “Why the hell should I—”

  “The judge knows why,” Chapel said.

  Reinhard turned to look at Hayes, who just nodded. The security guard shook his head in disgust and stormed out of the office.

  Chapel holstered his weapon, then went over to close the door.

  “Huh,” Hayes said. “I hadn’t thought of that. If he was a chimera, his nictitating membranes would have closed, by reflex.”

  Chapel nodded.

  “I’ve known Reinhard for years,” Hayes pointed out. “You think I’m dumb enough to let one of the monsters join my team?”

  Chapel inhaled sharply through his nose. “I haven’t made up my mind yet how dumb you are,” he said.

  Hayes’s face started to turn red, but Chapel wasn’t about to let him talk. He would just spout more insults or threats, and that wasn’t getting them anywhere.

  “I’m here to do one job, which is to keep you alive,” Chapel pointed out. “Sometimes you may want to doubt my methods or to question my orders. Don’t. I’ve taken down two chimeras in the last two days. I know how it’s done. Reinhard clearly doesn’t even know what they are. He doesn’t know what to expect. He doesn’t know how dangerous they really are.”

  “He knows how to shoot,” Hayes said.

  “No. No, he doesn’t. Not this time. I don’t know where he got his training—if he’s ex-military or he just took a six-week correspondence course out of the back of Guns and Ammo. It doesn’t matter. Whoever taught him to shoot told him to always aim for center mass. That doesn’t work with chimeras. They have reinforced rib cages. You can put six slugs in a chimera, right over his heart, and it won’t even slow him down. You have to aim for the face. Their skulls are just like ours.”

  Hayes opened his mouth. He looked like he was going to say something nasty. But then he closed it again and just nodded.

  “Okay,” the judge said. “We’ve got a little time before the convoy is ready to move out. Why don’t you have a seat, so we can talk?”

  DENVER, COLORADO: APRIL 14, T+57:12

  “First off, let’s talk about why I’m here. The chimeras,” Chapel said. He kept one eye on the window. It was unlikely that Quinn would climb up the side of the courthouse to get to the office, but you never knew. “I’m
sorry I’m late getting here. But I wasn’t wasting that time. I’ve learned a great deal about them in the last two days.”

  “Oh?” Hayes asked.

  “I don’t know how much you’re cleared to know,” Chapel said. “But you do need to know what’s coming for you. It’s a chimera named Quinn. He’s supposed to be the strongest of them, and one of the most vicious.”

  Hayes turned around and got a bottle of bourbon out of a sideboard. He offered Chapel a glass, but he turned it down. “Maybe I don’t want to know some of this,” he said, pouring himself a healthy drink. His tough guy act had evaporated like summer rain on a hot sidewalk. Interesting.

  Chapel shook his head. “I’m not trying to scare you. But you need to understand how serious this is. The chimeras were given a list of victims. A kill list. For the most part they were allowed to choose their own targets. But this Quinn was given specific orders to come here. For you.”

  “Okay,” Hayes said. He sipped at his liquor. “Okay, but—why?”

  “That’s exactly what I’d like to know.” Chapel sighed. “Some of the names on the list make sense. The scientists who created the chimeras are there. People who worked at Camp Putnam. I notice you aren’t asking a lot of questions here. You know about Camp Putnam.”

  Hayes set his glass down. “Tom Banks is a personal friend of mine,” he said, meeting Chapel’s eye. “He gave me a briefing. One I’m definitely not cleared for. But he agreed with you—I needed to know.”

  Chapel nodded. He’d assumed as much, though he’d hoped there was another reason Hayes knew so much about the chimeras. “Some of the names on the list don’t make any sense at all. There are three people on that list who couldn’t possibly have been involved in the project. People with no connection to Camp Putnam. And then there’s you.”

  “Me?” Hayes said. “I’ve never been to that place.”

  Chapel shrugged. “Your link to the chimeras seems pretty tangential. But it’s real. You worked for the CIA at one point. You did yearly debriefings of people the agency wanted to keep an eye on. Specifically, you debriefed William Taggart and Helen Bryant.”