Burgess shrugged carelessly as he indicated his glass eye, but Press wasn’t fooled. This man still cared very much about that loss. “What happened in Costa Rica put an end to my field-mission days.” He grinned, but it, too, wasn’t a genuine expression. “So Uncle Sam found me a new niche.”
Press grinned nastily. “Hire the handicapped.”
“You’re a funny guy,” Burgess told him with a sour look. He glanced out the window and appeared to study the buildings that went from camouflage-patterned to cinderblock to white paint as they rolled past. “Used to be a man could make an entire career out of knocking off communists. Times are a lot thinner since the Iron Curtain came down.”
A corner of Press’s mouth twisted. “No offense, Burgess, but maybe you ought to catch up with the nineties. From a military viewpoint, aliens are the growth industry now.”
Burgess’s chin lifted and his eyes hardened, his entire appearance just a little too much self-satisfied to make Press entirely comfortable. “Oh, I’m on the cutting edge, Lennox. You just wait and see.”
Before Press could respond, the sedan swung into a parking slot outside a bunker-style building with a discreet sign and logo matching the one they’d seen a few moments before. The BioHazard 4 building looked like any of the others on the base, a small square block attached on one side to a whitewashed, oversized version of an airplane hangar.
“Welcome to Monroe Air Force Base,” Burgess said as the driver released the security locks on the sedan’s doors and the three men climbed out. Press started to say something cutting; then choked it back and laughed instead.
The idiot driver had pulled into the handicapped slot.
“Okay, I’m intrigued,” Press said as he followed Carter Burgess down the most recent of a series of long corridors. He paused before a door marked EMERGENCY ARMORY and watched as two uniformed military guards hefted several boxes onto a table, then proceeded to unload a cache of M-16s and Mossberg 590 shotguns. He couldn’t see any farther into the room. “Since when does a bio-facility need an armory?”
“We’re like the Boy Scouts, Press.” Burgess’s voice was a little glib and Press looked at him sharply. The older man only shrugged and gave him an enigmatic smile. “You do remember the Boy Scout motto, don’t you? Always be prepared.”
“I was never the Boy Scout type,” Press countered.
Before he could say more, an airlock door slid open with a muted whoosh. Burgess stepped through and Press followed automatically, not particularly surprised at the high-tech equipment and the med-staff and biologists—all female—scattered around the bio-environment. “This is BioHazard Four,” Burgess announced.
Press nodded, then saw that even the small contingent of SWAT guards were all women, and all armed to the eyeballs with 9mm H&K MP5A3s. “What—” he began, then his voice choked off.
“Jesus Christ!”
These days, Press’s own weapon of choice was a small, concealable Glock 26 9mm. He yanked the gun from beneath his arm without conscious thought, raised it and aimed—
Sil.
It was only the shock of seeing her, of knowing somewhere deep in his subconscious that the creature in front of his eyes was safely restrained, that let Burgess snatch the weapon from Press’s hand without getting himself killed in the process. “Put that thing away, Lennox,” the colonel snapped. “You won’t need it here.”
Inside the confines of a glass-walled set of rooms that reminded Press of a human-sized hamster cage, the new Sil-creature sat cross-legged on a comfortably upholstered hassock in front of a built-in television set. To Press’s shocked eyes, she seemed to be utterly fascinated by a commercial on the screen—some stupid thing with an animated leprechaun dancing around the rim of bowl full of cereal and twittering “Frosted Lucky Charms—they’re magically delicious!” Still paralyzed, Press saw the alien woman cock her head to one side like a dog trying diligently to understand its master’s commands.
“Magically delicious,” she repeated, her voice echoing softly over a speaker system in the laboratory. Suddenly she blinked as if something had interrupted her chain of thought, then turned her head and saw Press and the colonel. The television forgotten, she stood gracefully and moved to the glass of her enclosure, her head lifting as she reached outstretched hands and pressed them against the glass. A chill ran across the nape of Press’s neck as he realized that she was actually smelling them through the walls of the habitat.
Sense returned abruptly and Press wheeled on Burgess. Furious, he grabbed the military man by the front of his coat and shook him as hard as he could. “You glass-eyed son of a bitch,” he growled, his face nearly pushed against Burgess’s. “You grew another one!”
“Lennox, calm down—”
“Why?” Press demanded. It was all he could do to keep his fist from drawing back. “Tell me why!”
“What the hell are you two doing in here?”
That voice . . .
Press released Burgess with a shove and spun, stopping short at the sight of the so familiar face. A hundred, no a thousand, memories crashed together in his head—love and laughter and fighting, then bitter pain at the end of a relationship gone bad. And the worst of them all, involving a relative of the she-creature watching everything with keen interest from behind a glass barrier a few feet away. “Laura?” he asked stupidly.
Laura Baker ignored him and directed her icy words to the man at his side. “You know the rules, Colonel Burgess. No men in the lab.”
Burgess stood stiffly, unaccustomed to being chastised. “We have an emergency here, Dr. Baker. We can take it outside if you like—”
Laura’s laugh was cold and disgusted, her expresssion rigid. “It’s a little late for that, don’t you think? You’ve already contaminated the atmosphere. But please—let me say thank-you for wasting two years of work inside of thirty seconds. Your forethought and ability to obey biohazardous instructions are truly amazing.” She glanced over her shoulder at the habitat, where the young woman inside still stood at the glass, studying the men with shrewd interest. “Great,” Press heard her mutter. “So much for a controlled environment.”
Press finally found his voice. “I can’t believe you’re involved in this bullshit,” he said incredulously. “Of all the people who should know better—”
“Dr. Baker is in control of this facility,” Burgess told him as Laura folded her arms and scowled at both of them. “It was under her direction that the alien was re-created.”
He shoved the Glock back into its holster, but Press could feel his face grow hot. “That bitch killed friends of ours, for God’s sake,” he hissed. “How could you breed another one. How?”
For a second Laura looked at though she might shout at him; then her face softened. “It’s different this time, Press. Half of her alien genes are dormant—”
“Oh, great,” he said angrily. “Sil Lite. I feel much better!”
“Her name is Eve,” Laura snapped, “not Sil. And this is not the same creature. We’ve dampened her mating instincts, strictly avoiding the presence of testosterone in this laboratory.” Her mouth twisted and she sent another look of resentment toward Colonel Burgess. “At least until you two brainwaves barged in.”
“This has got to be the most insane thing I’ve ever heard you come up with.” Press turned and would’ve pounded his fist on something, but he couldn’t find anything that looked like it wouldn’t break. “What if she gets out?” he yelled instead.
Laura’s response was amazingly calm, considering how completely freaked out Press felt right now. “She won’t. But if she does, we have that.” She turned and gestured across the laboratory to a gleaming gold control console affixed to the wall. Next to it stood another of the female guards with an unconventional American Arms twelve-gauge slung over one shoulder and a standard-issue Beretta 9mm in a holster at her waist; one hand rested on the console and the hard-faced woman’s attention was exclusively focused on the habitat and its occupant. Spray-painted
in the usual black military stencil across the side of the control box were the words TETHER MECHANISM. “It’s an electronic tethering device,” Laura explained. “One step off the premises and a toxic capsule will explode in her brain. She’ll die instantly.”
Press gaped at her, then looked over at the creature still gazing fixedly at them from the habitat. He didn’t like the look of . . . seductiveness painted across the Eve-thing’s features, but there was still the fact that she—it—seemed disturbingly human. “So what happened?” he asked finally. “I knew you were ambitious, but at least you used to have a little soul.”
Beneath the shining strawberry blond hair, Laura’s face and her china-blue eyes blazed. “You thick-headed jerk—who the hell do you think you are, coming into my lab and questioning my motives? You—who have all the conscience of a rattlesnake!”
Press opened his mouth, but Burgess stepped between them. “Both of you, knock it off,” he barked. “You know we have a national emergency on our hands, and you will work together—that’s a direct order from the Pentagon.” He stared at them, and both Press and Laura finally dropped their gazes. “You killed one of these aliens before,” Burgess continued. His voice was flat, devoid of emotion or concern for the female life-form still watching them avidly from across the laboratory and who could no doubt hear their every word. “Do it again.”
The three of them automatically turned toward the glass enclosure. Press felt himself clenching his jaw and forced himself to relax, despite the awkward silence that followed Colonel Burgess’s brutally direct order. He pulled his gaze away from the habitat and made himself look at Laura again, who finally met his eyes. He gave her a sarcastic smile and allowed himself one final bit of derision.
“You heard him, Laura. Piece of cake.”
7
Whistling along with the radio, Dennis Gamble pulled his Explorer into the private driveway of Patrick’s Georgetown townhouse. Bright red, loaded with enough extras to jack the price up to where no normal Joe Schmoe could afford it, the four-wheeler had less than two hundred miles on it and was a comp, courtesy of Ford Motor Company. No fools there; they’d jumped on a tie-in between space exploration and the name of their best-selling product immediately. Wait till Patrick sees this baby, he thought gleefully. Me and Air Mikey—this’ll teach Mr. Conservative what endorsements can do for a guy. After all, a fellow had to plan for his future.
Dennis shut off the engine and climbed out, careful to set the car alarm even in this area—if this vehicle was a babe magnet, it would also draw attention from other not so desirables. It never hurt to take precautions.
A quick glance at his watch and he knew he was right on schedule. When they weren’t flying around the universe together, he and Patrick always met at Patrick’s townhouse on Tuesday mornings, when they’d buzz off to their favorite health club for a game of racquetball. After working up a good sweat, they’d have a long, hot session in the sauna, complete with about half a dozen other regulars and at least an hour’s worth of guy talk, covering topics that ranged from cars—today Dennis planned on monopolizing that subject to which woman had been the hottest one on the exercise floor that particular day.
That was always a heated discussion, and the memories brought a grin to Dennis’s face. He and Patrick made a great-looking pair on that racquetball court, which was on the lower level of the club and surrounded by an overhead glassed-in walkway. They were both in tip-top shape and competitive as hell; the walls shook with the energy of their games and their shouts of enthusiasm and verbal sparring were guaranteed to draw an audience—mostly female—to the windows. While Patrick had eyes only for Melissa, Dennis had no reservations about taking advantage of the hero worship that had surrounded both of them since their return from the Mars landing mission.
Taking the stairs three at a time, Dennis rang the bell and waited impatiently. He was itching for a workout today, feeling the strain of too many hours in too many meetings. He hated being stuck indoors—how the heck did people survive in those grueling nine-to-five office jobs? He’d go nuts in that kind of rut, and maybe a similar feeling made Patrick instinctively shy away from the prospect of a permanent political career. What faster way was there to get pinned behind a desk and the accompanying mounds of paperwork than as an elected official? The idea made Dennis shudder.
He rang the bell again and rechecked his watch. Damn, where was Patrick? They had reservations on the court, and while Dennis didn’t doubt for a moment that the club wouldn’t hold the slot for them—after all, this was Patrick Ross and Dennis Gamble—he hated being late.
Backing up to the edge of the small concrete porch, Dennis tilted his head back and inspected the front of the building. Everything was shut tight despite the cooler-than-average, beautiful weather—Patrick probably had the air conditioning on automatic and didn’t want to fool with raising and lowering the windows. There was, however, an air of desertion hanging over the place, and the longer Dennis stood there, the more convinced he became that Patrick simply wasn’t home. He rang the doorbell a third time just for giggles, but he didn’t believe anything would come of it. Something must have come up and Patrick hadn’t been able to reach him—belatedly, Dennis remembered that he hadn’t turned on his cell phone all morning.
He stood there for a moment more, then shrugged and headed back to the Explorer. He’d give him a call later on; no sense dialing up Patrick now unless he wanted to talk to the answering machine.
He heard the chime of the doorbell all three times that it rang, understood what it was and what the sound meant in some part of his brain that had remained detached from whatever was misfiring right now in his mind and his body. Sick, so very, very ill—he couldn’t stand or walk, probably couldn’t even crawl. And talking? Answering the persistent call of that doorbell? Not a chance. All he was good for right now was sitting in the corner of the master bedroom upstairs with one hand on the window sash while Dennis walked away, sweating and shaking while some kind of unidentifiable fever raged inside him. If only he could’ve reached out to his friend, asked for help, somehow let his longtime partner know that something was horribly wrong . . .
But he couldn’t.
He’d tried, fighting so hard to speak against something he couldn’t comprehend, a physical feeling of restraint that wrapped around his muscles and kept him pinned to that spot on the carpet and prevented him from so much as knocking against the windowpane to let Dennis know that he was inside. There was a strange, selective binding around his throat, one that kept his vocal cords paralyzed and soundless but still allowed air to wheeze in and out of his windpipe. His vision was skewed, fragmented. Gone was the rich red-and-blue Southwestern design of his home—everything in the bedroom, from the yellow-pine furniture and his football trophies to the framed photographs of his family and Melissa—had taken on a twisted, unnaturally brownish-gold tinge that made it look dark and wet. And so much pain, pulses of it spiraling through his insides and head, jabbing along his nerve endings like unseen lightning. It made him want to do nothing more than pull off the clothes that seemed to be cutting into his skin, stretch out his arms and legs and fingers, reach on and on and on until he got beyond even the boundaries of his own flesh.
But he didn’t.
He wouldn’t.
Now that Dennis had gone, the belt around his throat loosened and disappeared. He’d wakened this morning covered in blood, and the pain had already started, blotting out the reason that should have sent him to the police; he’d climbed into the shower instead and washed it away, searching vainly for the wound that must’ve been the source. Cleansed, he found nothing, and logical thought afterward had been blotted out by his suffering. Now he groaned and sucked in a lungful of air, feeling his voice gather strength, fueled by the agony, ready to just let go—
But . . . no.
He wouldn’t.
Patrick Ross didn’t know what was wrong with him, but he wasn’t about to give in. He was a fighter, damn it, a Un
ited States astronaut and a hero. Whatever this was, he knew he could beat it. He had to.
He bent his head and bit savagely into his knuckles to keep silent the screams within.
8
“If this wasn’t so frightening, I’d be laughing right now,” Laura said.
Settled on the driver’s side, his eyes fixed on the road, Press said nothing as he drove a government-issue sedan past the familiar checkpoints within the boundaries of the National Space Exploratory Group’s facilities.
‘‘I feel like I’m reliving an old nightmare.”
‘‘Oh, come on,” Press quipped. “Our relationship wasn’t that bad.”
“Bad is a relative term,” Laura replied gloomily as he pulled to the curb outside the Goddard Flight Center’s main building. She unbuckled her seat belt and started to climb out, but Press’s hand on her arm made her stop.
“You seeing anyone?” he asked softly.
“That’s none of your business.”
But she’d waited just a measure too long and she damned herself as one of his eyebrows raised. “Oh, let me guess,” he said. All the gentleness had gone out of his voice. ‘‘He’s got family money and he’s tall, blond—after me, you’re probably ready for a change—and handsome. He’s got a Ph.D. in B.S. from M.I.T., a weekend house in Connecticut, he jogs a whopping two miles every morning, and I’ll bet he even he drives a BMW. Oh, yeah—and sleeping with him is about as exciting as watching mold grow in a petri dish.”
Laura felt her cheeks flush in spite of her determination not to let Press get to her. Still, she managed to keep her voice steady as she pulled free of his hold and got out of the car. “You never fail to surprise me, and this time is no exception. The return of the male chauvinist pig—I thought your species became extinct in the late eighties.”
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