Aiden believed him. Yet according to his father, someone had been secretly accessing his medical and school records early on.
Pinsey continued. “By the time of the adoptions, Colonel Jenkins was near death from pancreatic cancer. The legwork fell to Dr Cho and I.”
Shaleah came down the stairs and entered the living room. Pinsey gazed at her with concern. “Is Bobbie all right?”
“The girl is fine. She got herself too excited and made a little mess. She’s gone to bed. I’m gonna clean things up.”
Shaleah retreated to the hall closet for a bucket and cleanser. Pinsey watched her return upstairs.
“My live-in housekeeper. My wife passed away a few years ago. Things were rough for a while, trying to take care of Bobbie on my own. Shaleah’s been a godsend.”
Aiden recaptured the old man’s attention. “You must have some idea what quiver did to those babies, how it changed them?”
Pinsey sighed. “We remained in the dark. Neurologically, there were no alterations in brain functioning, at least none that were measurable. But as it turned out, there were… side effects.”
The old man retrieved an envelope from the credenza and handed it to Aiden. It was addressed to Pinsey. The return address was a post office box in North Platte, Nebraska.
“This was sent to me three years ago.”
Aiden opened the envelope. The letter was handwritten in a beautiful cursive script. The stylish presentation contrasted sharply with the writer’s bitter tone.
Keats leaned over Aiden’s shoulder to read along.
Dr Pinsey,
I’ve learned you were one of the assholes in charge of Tau Nine-One back in the good old days, when experimentation on helpless infants was in vogue. I want you to know how your nasty science project screwed up my life.
The letter went on to describe how the infusion of quiver caused the writer to suffer random manifestations of organic gelatinous matter.
That sounded like Aiden’s experiences with one exception. The writer’s manifestations apparently were alive when they appeared.
When I was old enough to understand what had been done to me, I vowed to find every one of you Tau bastards and mess up your lives like you messed up mine. Lucky for you my hormones aren’t in such a rage these days. Still, every time I suffer a manifestation, I feel like a freak.
I’ve never believed in life after death but I hope I’m wrong. I hope there’s a hell and you and the rest of your Tau Nine-One bloodsuckers will be plunging straight into it. So, in conclusion…
Die soon, you motherfucker!
The letter was unsigned. Aiden handed it back to Pinsey. He resisted an urge to tell the old man that he pretty much agreed with the writer’s sentiments.
“Do you know which quiver kid penned this?” Keats asked.
“Not at first. I wrote back, admitted how awful I felt about what we’d done. I never got a response. Even though Dr Cho and I were ordered to destroy all the adoption files, between us we’d directly arranged for the seven placements, and this turned out to be one of mine. I was able to do some online follow-up and determine that a quiver kid I’d originally placed with a couple in New Jersey ended up moving to Nebraska.”
Pinsey returned the letter to the credenza. When he spoke again, his words were tinged with sadness.
“Magenta. She was a beautiful child. Very bright, very playful. Even at infancy, she was somehow more gregarious than the others. We were supposed to refer to the babies only by their color names. But in Magenta’s case, some people at Tau defied that edict. They called her Princess.”
Pinsey’s eyes misted over. He turned away, dabbed the moisture with a handkerchief. Aiden drew him from his reverie by asking him to explain the earlier comment about symbolism.
“Isn’t it obvious? The three of us mutually agreed that we should use six babies for the experiment.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Three of us – six babies. In other words, three sixes. In the book of Revelation, 666 represents the number of the beast, the Antichrist.”
Aiden glanced at Keats, who looked equally surprised by Pinsey’s bizarre conclusion. Aiden tried to shoot down the religious interpretation with a simple fact.
“But the experiment didn’t involve six babies. There was a seventh one. White, the one they called the anomaly.”
Pinsey’s features underwent a subtle change. Until now, his expressions had suggested sadness and guilt. But a more disturbing emotion now took hold, one Aiden recognized from his experience in that West Virginia garage.
Fear.
Pinsey withdrew a wooden cross from the pocket of his coveralls and clutched it tightly. Whatever unsettling emotions Aiden’s words had triggered, the old man’s faith was serving as an antidote. Lowering his head, he murmured a short prayer. Aiden caught a few words. It sounded as if he was asking God’s forgiveness.
“What is it that scares you?” Aiden demanded. “Is there something about White you’re not telling us?”
Pinsey took a deep breath to steady himself and met their gazes. He seemed to have regained his poise.
“White was referred to as the anomaly because he served as the control for the experiment. He came to us much later, when the babies were about nine months old. He never received an infusion.”
“We know all that. You didn’t answer my question. Why does talking about White scare you?”
“It doesn’t. You’ve misunderstood.”
“I don’t think so. How does White figure into your 666 symbolism?”
“He doesn’t.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Pinsey’s face hardened. “It’s clear neither of you share my faith. Further discussion on the subject is pointless.”
Considering how open Pinsey had been about the experiment, his sudden stonewalling seemed curious. Aiden found himself wondering why the old man had revealed so much to them in the first place. Why abandon years of secrecy and divulge Tau Nine-One’s secrets to total strangers?
Clearly, he was consumed by guilt. It was possible he’d been on the cusp of confessing his sins for a long time and had just needed the right impetus to come clean. Yet his outpouring had begun right after Aiden had revealed that Red was torturing and killing quiver kids.
Comprehension hit like a firestorm. Woven into Pinsey’s disclosures was an even deeper secret, something he’d been fighting not to divulge.
Aiden lunged from the sofa and raced up the staircase, ignoring Pinsey’s entreaties to stop. He reached the second-floor landing just as Shaleah emerged from a room. The housekeeper slammed the door behind her and blocked the entrance.
“Is that the bubble room?” Aiden demanded.
Shaleah shook her head. He knew she was lying.
Pinsey and Keats appeared behind him. The old man was furious.
“You have no right to go traipsing through my home!”
“I know what you’ve been hiding all these years. Your daughter is a quiver kid. That’s why you revealed Tau Nine-One’s secrets to us. You’re afraid Bobbie could be Red’s next victim.”
Pinsey’s anger melted away. Sadness took hold.
“Which one is she?” Keats asked.
The old man shook his head, unwilling to answer.
Aiden pressed on. “We know it’s not Magenta. So it has to be either Gold or Cyan.” He recalled what Marsdale had said about one of the babies being a slow learner. “She’s Gold, isn’t she?”
Pinsey gave a resigned nod and turned to Shaleah.
“It’s all right. Open the door. Let them see.”
TWENTY-SIX
They entered the bubble room, a small windowless space devoid of furnishings. A discolored paintball helmet hung from a nail hook. The checkerboard linoleum floor, plain gray walls and ceiling were smeared by long-hardened chunkies in various shades of brown. One spot on the left wall remained soft, the stain glistening under the bluish light of an inset fluorescent lamp. Bits of the latest
chunkie dripped from it at a glacial pace.
“Your daughter calls them bubbles,” Aiden concluded, moving closer to examine Bobbie’s most recent manifestation. “You’ve trained her to come in here when the urge strikes her.”
Pinsey gave a weak nod. “They usually manifest directly in front of her and shoot away from her body to splatter. I once used a radar gun to gauge the velocity. Close to 75 miles per hour.”
“Sometimes there’s backspray,” Shaleah said, gesturing to her stained smock, then pointing to the paintball helmet. “I wear that to protect my face.”
“How often does Bobbie make a bubble?” Aiden asked.
“These days, only a few times a month. She’s learned to recognize the subtle signs that one is imminent. Heightened emotional states are often the trigger. I suspect your presence excited her. Usually, she’s able to make it up here in time.”
“Did quiver cause her handicaps?” Keats asked.
“No, she was diagnosed with likely developmental issues at birth. That’s one of the reasons she was chosen for the experiment. It was hoped that quiver’s IQ boost could work on someone with such deficits, perhaps enable her to lead a more normal life.
“That wasn’t to be, of course. But Bobbie’s handicaps didn’t stop my late wife Gloria and I from falling in love with her. Gloria was one of the nannies who cared for the babies. When they were put up for adoption, we jumped at the chance.”
“Did you mention anything about your daughter when you wrote back to Magenta?” Keats asked.
“Only that I had a child with a disability.”
“When did Bobbie’s manifestations begin?”
“The first one happened just shy of her sixteenth birthday.”
Aiden had been twelve when his chunkies had started. The onset of puberty likely had been the trigger. Given Bobbie’s developmental issues, it was possible she’d hit puberty later.
“Any idea what this crap’s made of?” Keats asked, gesturing to the walls.
“A mixture of common elements and compounds bound in a polyepoxide material.”
“Epoxy.”
Pinsey nodded. “That accounts for their initial stickiness.”
“Are Bobbie’s alive like Magenta says hers are?” Aiden asked.
“Not as far as I’ve been able to tell. If they are, they terminate upon impact. However, close to one-third of the periodic table is represented, including the CHNOPS sextet.”
“The what?”
“Carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, sulfur. The elemental ingredients for life.”
That was similar to what Dr Jarek had discovered about Aiden’s chunkies.
“Who else knows about Bobbie?” he asked.
“Only Shaleah.”
Keats questioned Pinsey about the other adoptions. “We need to know where all of them were placed.”
“As I said, Dr Cho and I divided the process between us. She took care of four adoptions. I only have details on the three I handled.”
“Your daughter, Magenta and…?”
“Blue.”
Aiden flashed disappointment. Blue had been tortured and slain in London. He’d been hoping for information on Red or one of the others still unaccounted for.
Pinsey read their frustration. “Although Dr Cho and I didn’t officially communicate about the adoptions, I once overheard her mention that Red had been placed with a wealthy California industrialist.”
“Got a name?” Aiden asked.
“Sorry. But is there anything else you can tell me about him? About Red?”
“Other than that he’s a murderous psychopath?”
Pinsey looked ill. “Do you think he’ll come after Bobbie?”
“If he finds out about her, I’m afraid so.”
“Stay alert,” Keats suggested. “Watch for strangers in the neighborhood. Come up with an emergency escape plan and put together a go-bag. Anybody raises the hackles on the back of your neck, get your daughter and your housekeeper away from here fast. The three of you go somewhere where you’re not known.”
Aiden agreed with the advice although he doubted it could protect Gold against Red and his ruthless mercs. But perhaps Bobbie’s handicaps would serve to keep her safe. It seemed logical that Red was only interested in eliminating quiver kids who posed some unknown threat to him, and it was hard to imagine Bobbie falling into that camp. Then again, Blue had been a hardcore drug addict. That hadn’t stopped Red from killing him.
Aiden provided Pinsey with descriptions of Red and Nobe. Keats did the same for Kokay, the electronics expert who’d been with Nobe during the railfans incident.
The old man led them back down to the living room. But Aiden hesitated at the top of the stairs.
“I need to see Bobbie again. Alone.”
Pinsey wasn’t pleased. “She’s probably asleep. She’s often tired and naps after a bubble.”
“I still need to see her.”
“Why?”
Aiden decided it was time to come clean about his identity. “I’m a quiver kid.”
The old man froze. When he found his voice, it was spiked with fear.
“Which one?” he whispered. “Which one are you?”
Aiden considered lying and saying he was White just to see Pinsey’s reaction. Would the old man raise his cross like a shield? Maybe douse Aiden with holy water in the manner of a priest confronting a vampire?
He didn’t have the heart for such cruel deceit. “I’m Green.”
Pinsey looked relieved.
“I gather that you also suffer the manifestations?”
Aiden nodded. “A bit different but same basic concept.” He headed down the hall before Pinsey could mount further objections.
The room at the end was Bobbie’s, her name printed on the door in block letters. It was unlikely Gold had any useful information. Still, Aiden knew he had to try.
The door was ajar. He entered.
Plain white walls were decorated with various posters, including several of rockets and NASA space vehicles. A mobile of the International Space Station hung above the single bed. The room reminded Aiden of his own childhood passion. Did Bobbie Pinsey also fantasize about piloting spacecraft into the unknown?
She was awake. She sat at a small desk with her back to Aiden, intently writing in a loose-leaf notebook.
“Hi Bobbie. What are you up to?”
She whirled and brightened into a smile. “I listed the first season of The Dick Van Dyke Show. See! I put a checkmark for each time I watch an episode. Some of them I’ve seen ten times or more!”
Aiden leaned over the desk, pretended to study the notebook. “Looks like you crushed it.”
Bobbie frowned and examined the notebook’s spine. “No, it’s not crushed at all.”
“Never mind,” Aiden said, gesturing to the poster-clad walls. “I used to like rockets a lot too. At one time I thought about being an astronaut and piloting spaceships.”
“Don’t you think about it anymore?”
“Not so much.”
“I wouldn’t want to fly in spaceships. I’d be scared.”
“Yeah, me too probably. But listen, Bobbie, I’m curious about something. Do you ever write in your notebook about your bubbles?”
Bobbie frowned. “Daddy says I’m not supposed to.”
“Do you ever dream about them?”
“Uh-uh.”
“What about other kinds of dreams? Like, for instance, did you ever have a dream that maybe had a certain color in it? Like maybe the color gold?”
Bobbie looked puzzled for a moment then burst into giggles. “That would be funny!”
“Yeah, I suppose it would be.”
She jumped up from the desk and did a back flop onto the bed.
“I’m going to try it!”
“Try what?”
“I’m going to go to sleep and try to dream about the color gold!”
She folded her hands across her chest and squeezed her eyes shut, as if wil
ling herself into slumber.
Aiden headed for the door. Bobbie obviously could be of no help. Still, with what they’d learned from Pinsey there was a ton of new information to process, along with a plethora of new questions.
What exactly was quiver? What had it done to them and for what purpose? Why did he, Bobbie and Magenta – and probably Red and the rest of the original six as well – possess somewhat different manifesting abilities? And what was it about White that so terrified Tau’s Nine-One’s former director of research?
No answers were apparent. But Maurice Pinsey certainly knew more than he was letting on, particularly about the seventh quiver kid.
Aiden reached the hallway. He was about to shut Bobbie’s door behind him when she spoke.
“Singularity beguiles, transcend the illusion.”
Aiden spun around. Bobbie’s eyes remained closed, her mummy-like posture suggesting deep sleep. Yet her tone was more self-assured, more adult-sounding than the utterances marking her waking life. Equally stunning was that Bobbie’s altered voice was the same one that spoke to Aiden in his green dreams. But he had the impression the words didn’t originate with Bobbie. Someone – or something – was speaking through her.
“Bobbie, what did you say?”
She stirred but didn’t open her eyes.
“Bobbie!”
She popped awake, grinning madly. Leaping out of bed, she rushed back to the desk.
“I made a mistake! I watched ‘The Twizzle’ episode twelve times, not eleven!”
“What was that you said when you had your eyes shut?”
Bobbie shrugged and put a new checkmark next to “The Twizzle” in the notebook. Aiden repeated his question but she just frowned. She seemed to have no recollection of having uttered the words.
Deep in thought, Aiden returned to the living room. Pinsey was scowling.
“I hope you didn’t upset my daughter.”
“She’s fine. But she said something strange. ‘Singularity beguiles, transcend the illusion.’ Do you know what that means?”
“Bobbie often says odd things. Probably something she picked up from that TV show she’s obsessed with.”
Aiden was pretty sure the words didn’t come from a sixty-year-old sitcom. “Did Bobbie ever utter that phrase before?”
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