Terrorbyte

by Cat Connor

  “Ellie,” Lee whispered. “Get over here.”

  “What?” I whispered as well, only because there was so much light I was sure they would find us any minute.

  “We could be heading into serious trouble: this doesn’t lead outside, it’s a lit tunnel. On the other side of this small doorway is a proper-sized tunnel.”

  “Do it.”

  Praskovya looked at me. It was one of those long penetrating looks that members of my team liked to use. He was starting to fit right in. He followed it with a question: “How much of that is your blood?” Carefully his fingers reached for something on my shirt. He pulled back with a sticky, bloodied Post-it note in his hand. I saw it and wondered how sticky those things were to survive what I’d been through, although most of my mind was still trying to decipher what he’d said to me.

  “Of what?” We didn’t have time. We had to get out of there.

  His voice was more gentle than normal. “Ellie, your shirt is soaked through, that bandage on your arm is soaked through.”

  “Let’s not worry about it; let’s get through this door into wherever the hell it leads.” Everything seemed distant. It felt like the kind of distant that wasn’t good. Everything slowly drifted out of focus, until I could no longer make out clear shapes through the haze.

  Mac touched my shoulder. I knew it was Mac, ’cos that’s what he did to get my attention; he always touched my shoulder like that; gently. “Mind your head,” he whispered. “Follow Lee.”

  I did, we crawled through the doorway into the more spacious tunnel beyond. There was a brighter light coming from the end. I expected to see mom again. As we stepped through the opening at the far end into the brilliantly-lit room, a voice echoed back down the tunnel, creating waves in the light.

  “Medic!”

  I’d stepped through into a movie set. We were in a war movie. Yes, that was it; we were in a war movie and had just escaped from Stalag 17. I turned to see Mac. His makeup was so realistic. Whoever they had doing the makeup on set was amazing. His head wound was so real and the blood was super realistic. I wondered what they made the blood with; it had to be some kind of non-toxic substance that reacted just like real blood. What an awesome movie. Someone called my name. I just wanted to see how this movie ended before we left. I heard my name again. Then again. This time it was more insistent and followed by an instruction.

  “Ellie, wake up!” Someone said something about a cowboy.

  No, they were wrong, it wasn’t a cowboy movie. It was a war movie. All I asked was to see the end. The light faded, dammit, I was going to miss the end. One word escaped the dimming light and found my ears. “Goodnight.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Flesh And Bone

  I sank into the misty place between reality and the dream world. I’ve been here before, I thought, as I stood on top of a cliff. From my vantage point, I viewed the surrounding countryside. Teetering on the brink of sliding down the cliff, I grabbed a branch from a ragged dogwood next to me. It creaked ominously. I sat down on a rock. It felt safer to sit. A river meandered below, curving gently between the hills and fields.

  Memories mingled among wild flowers; straggly dogwoods poked spindly branches at the more robust rhododendrons. Old oaks sprawled gnarled limbs into a makeshift canopy. Underneath the oak, violets nodded in the welcome shade.

  I breathed peace.

  Insistent voices reached me. They floated on the warm afternoon breeze. I couldn’t see anyone walking up the steep incline. I chose to ignore the voices. I didn’t want to leave this place.

  The breeze rippled the water and tousled the wild flowers. I watched in awe as it tipped and nodded through the fragrant field, leaving in its wake a list of the dead, written in pretty purple flowers. I read each name, mentally ticking it off against my memorized list. The wind wrote three names I hadn’t seen before. Carefully, with much concentration, I visualized a black marker pen and blank white paper. The pen began in the middle of the paper and wrote the new names. A blue bloodied note poked out from under a patch of violets and I read the words, ‘People like you shouldn’t procreate.’ I hadn’t seen that note before. Slowly the violets grew over the note, covering the words in a purple shroud.

  The voices from before grew louder and more annoying, telling me to return to where I belonged. I listened to the louder, more commanding of the voices as it instructed my being to return and awaken. I stood, using the dogwood for support, while the wind tore across the surface of the river, swirling the water and blowing across the meadow, destroying the names. Leaves flew from the old trees, whipped to a muddled frenzy by the wind.

  There was little point in staying.

  Carefully, watching my footing, I made my way back down the narrow path to the growing voices.

  “Ellie?”

  I felt warm, firm pressure on my hand. I didn’t need to open my eyes to know Mac was holding my hand.

  “Ellie.”

  I didn’t want to open my eyes but I knew Mac needed me to. My eyes flickered, I caught sight of Mac. My eyes flickered again; it was hard to catch them open and make them stay that way. Nausea rose in waves. I liked it better in the dream place. My left eye opened. Mac sat next to me holding a white container.

  I smiled. He knew I’d feel sick. I must’ve had an anesthetic. Mac smiled at me. He nestled the container next to me, then gave me a sip of icy water from a plastic cup.

  “Thanks,” I think I said. I hope I spoke.

  “You’ll feel better soon.”

  My eyes closed; there was something I had to remember. The piece of paper. I searched my dream for the piece of paper and the names. I hadn’t felt any urgency before, in the field of violets, regarding one of the names, but I did now.

  “Stacy Eberhart,” I hoped I was right.

  “Who is she?”

  “Find her, Mac, before the Unsub does. She’s next.”

  He stood up and left the room. I listened to his footsteps fade as he walked away. I focused inwardly, recalling the other two names from the list. Hoping Mac would hurry so I could tell him who they were. While I waited, I inspected my arm. A clean white dressing covered the wound. I lay still, trying to decipher the messages my body was sending. They weren’t pain messages; discomfort seemed to be the closest description. Yes, that was it, my back felt uncomfortable in a few places. Why would my back feel like that?

  Footsteps approached, I looked up to see Mac at the end of the bed and realized the dirt and blood were gone. He no longer resembled an actor in a war movie.

  “Lee’s working on finding the woman,” he said.

  “There are two more: Andrea Coleman and Cynthia Cobham.”

  Mac wrote the names down without batting an eyelid. It was easy working with Mac. He never showed any great surprise at the unorthodox ways by which I came by information. I’m sure it could all be explained logically. I just wouldn’t know where to start.

  “I’ll have someone track them down. About the first woman, you got anything close to a location?”

  “No. Run her name through the Foundation, I think you’ll find her there.”

  He nodded and smiled. “That’s what I told Lee already.”

  “I got questions.” I held my hand out for the drink I saw on the night stand next to me. Mac held it for me, I sipped the cold liquid through a straw and it soothed my raw throat.

  “Ask.”

  “My back: why does it feel peculiar?”

  He sat next to me, put the glass down and then spoke, “You had two deep stab wounds, and by sheer luck you escaped serious internal organ injury.”

  I let the information sink in. It wasn’t easy getting my somewhat befuddled head around two stab wounds. I tried recalling the events from the drive to Fort Belvoir until Mac found me. I couldn’t; there was nothing there.

  “Stab wounds.”

  “Yes.”

  “The war movie?”

  He laughed warmly. “I wondered what your mind would conjure upon
seeing soldiers and medics.”

  “No movie then?”

  “No. Caine had someone triangulate our position from the GPS in the cars and our phones. He called the base, told them there was a problem … that we needed access to the base and were bringing EMS.”

  I knew there was something really important I needed to ask but it wouldn’t come. “Say that again?”

  Mac repeated what he told me.

  “I can’t remember as much as I should be able to,” I confessed.

  “You will.”

  I did remember being shot at and not enjoying it very much. “Okay. So what happened to the people who were shooting at us? Random shootings aren’t supposed to happen even on a military base … someone must’ve seen them?”

  “There was apparently no sign of them when the Military Police arrived. They did find spent shells.”

  I leaned back on the pillow, putting light pressure on my upper back. It throbbed a bit.

  “And presumably the man I shot?”

  “Yup.”

  More memories kicked in. “I don’t get how they disappeared from the area. They had to go back the same way they came in because sooner or later the roads converge at one intersection.”

  “There was a military checkpoint set up at the intersection of Deakyne, Swift, Johnson and Warren.”

  “And they disappeared? Two cars and at least three armed men cruised through a checkpoint set up precisely to stop anyone leaving the area? What are the chances that someone on that checkpoint knew them and waved them through? Or at least one of those men was an officer? Maybe even the person who drove my car in.”

  “We’re on it, Ellie. Fort Belvoir is conducting a full investigation and has agreed to keep us informed.”

  Even so, I was not filled with confidence. At least two people from the base were involved, possibly more.

  “Did you find out which gate they took my car through?”

  “We have someone talking to all the duty personnel at each gate. We will have a list of all traffic on and off the base within the hour.”

  I smiled. “What do you need me for again?”

  Mac kissed my cheek. “We’d be lost without you.”

  “You okay? How’s your head?”

  “I’m good, a few stitches, nothing major.”

  Leaning back wasn’t helping. I sat up too quickly, and then waited for the spinning to stop. With the spinning under control, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed.

  “What are you doing?” Mac asked.

  “Getting up.” I thought that was obvious. “This is not comfortable and I have things to do.” I looked down at the hospital gown I wore: not the best thing to be walking about in. “I need clothes.”

  “Oh, no, you don’t.”

  “Fine, I’ll go like this.” Tentatively, I planted my feet on the cold floor and stood up. Both wounds in my back pulled. At least I knew where they were now. Slowly I straightened up properly. It felt good.

  I grasped the back of the gown closed with my left hand, trying not to become tangled in the tubing that ran from my arm to an infusion pump next to the bed. “Can I at least have a jacket?”

  “You are staying here,” Mac said. He sounded like he meant it.

  “No. I’m going to the office.” I had the most eccentric thought: I didn’t know where I was. I considered in all reasonableness that it might take me a while to get to the office, being lost an’ all. It was going to be tricky negotiating obstacles like getting in and out of the car with this infusion pump dragging along behind me.

  Footsteps sounded outside the door and stopped. There was a knock and the door opened. Lee poked his head around the door. “Hey, get back into bed!”

  “No,” I replied. “What do you want?”

  “Mac,” he said.

  “Well, come in and talk to him then.” Just what I needed: a diversion.

  Lee ambled in, closing the door behind him. “You got your work cut out for you, Mac.”

  “Seems so. How can I help?” Mac positioned himself between the door and me. Sneaky. Trapped!

  “There isn’t a Stacey Eberhart registered with the Foundation. I’ve run her name through everything I can think of and no hits. I’ve searched all the sound-alike variations … then I tried running the name Stacey. There is a Stacey Averhart … did you mean Averhart? Is that who you meant?”

  Dammit! Did I say it or spell it correctly when I told Mac? Maybe there was a different spelling. I focused on the piece of paper in my dream. The names jumped off the page in bold, black lettering. Duh!

  “Sorry, I’m an idiot. It is Averhart.”

  Lee pulled his phone from his pocket. “I’ll be back.” He hustled from the room, phone poised, to make his call. I knew he wouldn’t be going far, just far enough to use his cell phone but close enough to get back here if required.

  I stepped back closer to the bed, leaning my hip on it. “I got it wrong!” I’m almost never wrong. How shitty was that? I’d risked her life because I didn’t get her name right.

  Mac’s arms encircled me ever so gently. “You’ve just come out of an anesthetic. It’s hardly surprising you got the name a little screwed up.”

  I got it wrong and wasted valuable time. She could die now, because they didn’t get there in time.

  “Where are we?”

  “Get back on that bed and I will tell you.”

  I fought a horrible sinking feeling and scanned the room, looking for familiar curtains and paintings. I didn’t recognize anything. Whew! We weren’t at Mac’s parents’ house. As I sat back on the bed, I acknowledged what a huge relief that truly was. The walls and medical equipment suggested we were in a medical facility of some kind.

  “Tell me!”

  “We’re in a medical center in D.C.”

  “Not military?” That was real fear in my voice. I really didn’t want someone coming after me unchallenged.

  “No.” He smiled widely. “Normally I wouldn’t consider this to be a safe place at all, but it’s not military and we were short on options.”

  Intriguing. “Where in the District are we?”

  “In a small southeast medical center.”

  Now I was smiling. “It’s doubtful they’d look for us here.” It was hard to miss the humor in our situation. Even the police didn’t like coming here. People who lived in the southeast of D.C. didn’t like walking around alone during the day, let alone at night.

  “If that tickles you, you’re going to love the next bit.”

  “Tell.”

  “The local gang has set up a perimeter, just in case. Seems the FBI have done some good things down here.”

  Gingerly, I lay back. It was a long time ago. Back when I was new on the job, my very first case with Delta, I investigated the disappearance of five young girls in the southeast. D.C. police were getting nowhere; the parents accused them of not caring and doing nothing. People were scared and believed no one would investigate because their kids weren’t important enough. Police called us and we stepped in. Until then they hadn’t even linked the disappearances. And there I was all new and fresh and believing I could change the world. I waded in and did my job. I got to know the parents, the families and the kids; I went to the funerals and I cried.

  “We did a job is all.”

  “No one here has forgotten, Ellie.”

  Just as I considered our fate, the door opened again. A pretty woman with short, tightly-curled hair and wearing pink scrubs entered.

  “Agent Conway, good to see you’ve joined us on this fine Saturday morning.”

  I knew her. It took me no more than a few seconds to recall her face, name and how I knew her.

  “Tallulah.”

  She smiled as she checked my pulse. “We never thought we’d see you back here. Guess we hoped we’d never have to.” She checked my temperature, blood pressure and dressings.

  “Any chance you can remove this tubing?” I caught movement from the corner of my eye. It was Mac tryin
g to tell the nurse to disregard me.

  “Yes. Your vitals are stable and your color is coming back.” She ignored Mac and took a kidney-shaped dish from a cabinet on the counter. Within seconds, the canula was gone from my arm, replaced by a piece of cotton wool stuck down with Micropore tape.

  Freedom! “Thank you for the hospitality.”

  She squeezed my hand. “We have one less evil to worry about because you cared.”

  She left the room, leaving a hint of a floral perfume and the memory. Her daughter was one of the missing girls. We found her dead and beaten eleven-year-old body stuffed in a sewer pipe. I was the one who’d told Tallulah. That case took several months to bring to fruition. We’d had a higher-than-expected level of cooperation from local residents. During the case we even dabbled in voodoo at the insistence of one panicked parent. Maybe it was desperation, but I was willing to try anything. Something worked and led us to a fifty-year-old white male, who worked as a sales representative or account manager or whatever the term is now. He was a candy company representative. Candy. I don’t eat chocolate bars anymore.

  I blinked away the memory.

  “Have we got somewhere to work?”

  “Yeah, in the doctor’s lounge.”

  “Clothes?”

  “You’re not going to try to leave?”

  “Nope.”

  “I want you to swear on my life.” Mac paused. “Show me your hands, I want your hands in plain view before you swear.”

  Wow, he’s playing hardball. “I can’t believe you’d think I’d try crossing my fingers.”

  “Show me and swear.”

  I placed both hands on the bed, fingers spread. “I swear!”

  “Thank you; your clothes are in the closet. I had Praskovya go for them while we waited for you to come out of surgery.”

  Always thinking ahead, that’s my boy. The closet as it turned out was more of a locker, but it did contain my clothes: fresh jeans, a clean shirt, a small bag with toiletries and underwear.

  The thought of Praskovya rifling through my drawers picking out clothing and undergarments made me feel a little uneasy. It’s not that I thought he was the type to linger where he shouldn’t or anything. He was a professional. He was just like us. I was failing at convincing myself. It did feel wrong. Even if it’d been Lee or Sam it would feel wrong.