The Infected [Books 1-6]

by P. S. Power

  “Crandall. I can see that. He’s tough and could blend with some hair dye and sunglasses. Lauren… I agree she should be there. We might have to decorate her like a flag or something, which actually might be a good look, that or something in a nice cream color to match the Whitehouse? The kids love her though, so that will probably work. I also think we should get Martin Joabs out for this. Being able to tell who might be lying would be a great asset. If he’ll do it I mean. I know that he’s getting ready to retire, and I don’t want to jinx him or anything.”

  It took a while to come up with a full team, but everyone was satisfied enough, at least from what they said. Charlot clearly thought sending anyone from Team Two was a mistake, but even the Director thought it would work if they were willing to play down their natural appearances a bit. The first team was going to head out immediately, from both the base and the hotel where they were. It meant losing Scott though, so he could go with his daughter, or Marcia thought that would be the case at least.

  Scott didn’t… and neither did Charlot. She told them that with a bit of pride in her voice.

  “Scott’s needed here for the time being and so, I think, am I. Bridget isn’t a child anymore, and she knows how important this mission is. She’ll be fine.” If there was worry in the words anywhere it didn’t show.

  Bridget nodded.

  “Yeah… I’ll…” Swallowing visibly, she looked at Lauren. “I’ll take Level with me and Ink. We can set up the first watches. I wish we had Penny with us though, but I get we can’t take all the cool people with us. Not at first. We’ll do fine.” She sounded like she believed it, even though she still probably wanted to kill Lauren. That hadn’t just gone away after all and wasn’t related to impulse control issues. That was just anger, like anyone might have felt. Hatred maybe.

  If they could work together though, it might help them repair their friendship. Not exactly the situation Marcia wanted to try it in, but hey, she didn’t have much choice. It was all about covering their collective asses now and if that’s what it took, then it would just have to work.

  That was enough to get people back to work, or in some cases, off to bed, since it was nearing two in the morning by the time they were wrapping up. She had to call in the bus that had brought them to the hotel, which meant that Sammy, the man that had passed them the original notes from Morris showed up, dressed in a flower print shirt and unshaved, like he’d just crawled out of bed.

  It took about ten minutes to get Christian out to meet the man, shaking his hand warmly and talking smoothly the whole time, even though she was cleaning his mind out in regards to everything he knew about Cal. It was embarrassing, but Marcia had kind of forgotten about the guy. If he knew anything at all, it would be worth doing. If not, well, it was a pain for Chris, and she’d be sure to let Marcia know that. It made her feel better knowing what was up anyway, which hopefully would be enough for everyone.

  The woman didn’t say anything, letting the man drive off with the others, getting all the way out of the parking lot before speaking.

  “He isn’t in on anything, but Morris had them meet at a shopping center a few times, trying to recruit him I think. Sammy there didn’t get it. Not exactly the brightest person on the planet. Not evil either, so I think we can deal. These meetings took place before Sammy was hired by the Food Network as a driver, however, which states that someone involved knew that he’d be hired. At one of the meetings he met with Morris and a man that was just called Lyle. From what I’ve picked up from you, Lancaster and Reyes, it’s the man you know as Mic? From your old team? Not that useful, but I have this…” She had to get something to write on from the front desk, but they gave her a pen and a small pad with the hotel name on each sheet.

  “It’s the license plate number of the car he was driving. Probably a rental but…” She yawned hugely, patting her mouth as she did.

  Marcia did it too, grinning afterword. The darned things were contagious if you didn’t fight them. Chris closed her eyes for a moment and waved at her.

  “I’m going to bed. Anyway, if you can find out the rental company, they might have information you can use? A long shot, but it’s better than nothing, I’d think. I’ll try to make time to hunt your old friends down directly tomorrow. I can’t do it right now. Too tired for clarity.” Then, without saying more, she turned and left. It was the kind of thing she did, related to her first mode, Marcia thought. That or being so rich God took out loans from her when he ran short.

  She ran the paper to Lancaster, so that he could run the plate, and explained how they got the information. Pulled from the man’s mind it was likely several times more reliable than if he’d told them the number himself. It was part of Mind Reader’s powers. She could find what was there, if she looked hard enough and knew enough to find a person. That part was difficult for her, since what she needed was more of a sense of who the person was, not a description, but maybe enough people around her knew the right people to narrow it down? If so that would help a lot. If she could find Weathers or Mic, they might break the whole thing open and actually learn what the heck was going on.

  If not, maybe they could use the rental car information to do it? One way or the other, hopefully something would break fast. It was killing her to have this hanging over them all like it was. She hated mysteries. Mainly because they so seldom reflected real life. Things weren’t this kind of complex jumble most of the time. Real mysteries were hidden things generally, but were really simple once you figured it out. Almost boring. This might be that way, but so far it was taking them through too many steps for a really elegant plan. On the good side that meant more places for whoever was behind it all to mess up.

  Of course that only worked if it was someone capable of making mistakes. If it was Braid, Marcia had an odd feeling they were just kind of screwed.

  She got her own bed that night and slept pretty well, all things being taken into account. No one snored too much and they were left alone until nearly eight in the morning, when a pounding came from the door. She shot up, bounding out of bed, getting to the door first, ready to fight if she had to, but used the peep hole to see who it was, expecting Lancaster.

  It wasn’t him. Not at all. Instead it was Alan. The cooking guy with glasses.

  He might have been there to ask her to breakfast, or even ask Warren, but he wasn’t. She got that instantly from the clipboard he held. He was talent on a show, but for some reason did a lot of organizing too. She’d have to ask someone about that if she got a chance. She pulled the door open, not realizing her oversized shirt was riding up until she followed his gaze down to her underwear. He fought for eye contact after a bit, smiling cheerily.

  “Good morning. Is this Warren’s room? I didn’t know you two were together. Thought he was gay to tell the truth. Well, rumors and all that. He’s needed in chalet two in an hour, doing a breakfast demonstration? I do have the right room, don’t I?” He ignored her as she corrected her clothing, but turned as she did it, using his body to shield her from the view of people opening their doors to see what was going on. Too many combat vets for them to let banging go ignored.

  “This is the place and no, we’re not together. We just didn’t have time to book more rooms and came with a large crew, so we’re sharing. We have Penny Cooper in here too. Um, the invisible one? She’s single if you’re interested.” She wasn’t really thinking about what she was saying, which was due to tiredness and laziness on her part. Alan had certainly taken the time to check her out though the moment before, even though he was polite enough about it. So he probably wasn’t gay.

  Her head smacked into the wall suddenly, her whole body shifting to the left.

  She laughed as Alan looked concerned.

  “God Marcia, why not just offer me up for sex while you’re at it.” She sounded angry enough that Marcia didn’t do that, just waving her right hand at the air.

  “That’s her now. Don’t worry she doesn’t normally try to bash people’s head
s in. Anyway, Warren… I’ll get him up and going. What’s this about a chalet? Is the one of the fake kitchen set things or is there a little house out back I don’t know about?”

  Warren stumbled over, pulling his shirt back on, making him look a lot less homosexual than the situation should have. Apparently he’d gotten warm in the night. It wouldn’t have been that big of a deal for her, except Conroy walked up to the door just in time to see it. His face went a little flat, but that couldn’t be helped. No one wanted to see their ex with someone new, especially a younger person like Warren was. It wasn’t what was going on, but explaining it all would be awkward in the moment. They could at least do that in private. Later. After they all got out of this thing alive. If that was what happened.

  She couldn’t trust it. There was just a little feeling in the back of her mind that she was about to lose someone that she loved. Or liked at least. She already had, though Morris and Harpo weren’t exactly on her Christmas card list, they’d been friends of a sort once. People that she’d trusted her life to, back when even a stray bullet could take her out. Whatever they’d gotten themselves into, it was bad. It didn’t take a genius to figure that one out. Even having a rogue CIA agent after them meant they were sticking their fingers in where they shouldn’t and Marcia was beginning to wonder if Wilson was really legit. Normal people doing normal things, even illegal stuff, didn’t get that kind of attention. Not as a rule. You could rob banks and art museums all day long, and the CIA wouldn’t care.

  The worst part of the whole thing was that she didn’t know if the others could be gotten out of it, or if they were a part of it. Most of the time that was a simpler thing to answer than most of the television watching public understood. The spy shows had complex plots with people forced to take illegal actions to save others. A bad guy often turned out to be an innocent good person forced into a position they didn’t want to be in. It was what this was being made to look like even. Most of the time people got caught up in things like that because they were crooked though, nothing else. All the guys knew enough to not be easily taken in too. They’d been trained for it, to resist tricks and cons. To prevent themselves from being turned against their will. That meant it was probably something that they’d all planned, worked on together and were trying to use the rest of them for.

  As patsies for an assassination maybe? She didn’t know, but the thought haunted her. People could change, but for all her old buddies to turn against their country so blatantly… It just didn’t seem right. Like a trick. She knew those men. Or she had. A long time before. It was hard to remember that, since she’d been busy the whole time. It was all still so fresh in her mind that it felt like it had just happened, but that wasn’t the case at all.

  Even Conroy, standing in front of her with a slightly cold expression looked old and worn now. She still loved him, but soon it would go from just looking a little wrong in public to being hard to explain if they were out together. He could already have passed as her father and in ten years that would be grand dad. Not that she cared, but he might. He’d always been a lot more sensitive to what people thought about him than anyone had guessed. He affected a casual look, with his long hair and lumberjack clothing style choices, but it was an act. One meant to get everyone to think he wasn’t dangerous.

  He was probably the most deadly regular human being Marcia had ever met that didn’t have nuclear codes or an army to call on. Not a large one at least. It wouldn’t shock her to find out he could call in a few companies at need though. People still owed him favors after all. A lot of them.

  “Conroy, can I get with you for a few minutes? In here is fine. We can chat about something while Warren changes. Penny, I need you for this. Do you have an extra ear piece around?” It was just an idea, but why not?

  “Um, sure. For…” She trailed off. That made sense, being that Alan was still at the door, even as he moved to let Conroy in.

  “For Mike. We’ll leave Alan alone for now, if that’s all right? Though you two can do lunch sometime or something? Maybe tomorrow? You should clear that Alan. Say about twelve?” She was kidding and Conroy smiled about it, understanding what she was doing. Alan just flipped his schedule over and shook his head.

  “How about two? We have Chef Boyer doing a two hour show on soufflés; I don’t want to miss that. Would that be all right Miss Cooper?” He spoke to the room as if he actually believed there was something there. It was both cute and correct. Most people didn’t manage that kind of thing very well at all.

  “Um, sure.” The man couldn’t hear her, so Marcia translated for her.

  A few seconds later Alan was gone and Warren was off in the bathroom. Mike’s head bobbed a bit, which he didn’t seem to notice and then Penny spoke, just a little loudly for some reason.

  “How’s that? Can you hear me?”

  He covered his ear with a hand, dipping a single finger in to check what was there. He pulled it away after a few seconds wincing at the loud sound made from touching the microphone there.

  “Time delay?” He’d always been quick to understand new things.

  Marcia explained it quickly and got him to sit on the edge of the bed with her. The unmade bed. At least there were two of them, both with matching floral print quilts and soft tan blankets.

  “I’d like you to train Penny. It means staying at the IPB at least part time, but she needs it for field work and it really should be someone that can do it as a full time activity, which the rest of us just can’t. We can get Brian Yi in on it for some things, though he has his own work too and doesn’t know everything Penny needs to learn. Assassinations, spy work, demolitions, sneak and peek, the whole thing. She’s a natural. I told you how she took out Morris and Harpo? She can do that to almost anyone on the planet if she wants. Until now though, without these ear pieces, we haven’t had any way to really communicate with her like this. She’s been with the IPB for years, but this is close to the first time we could make something like this work. What do you say?” He might say no, since it meant being around his bitch of an ex, she realized. Or he might even say no because it was a lot of work, trying to figure out training for someone you had not real feedback on. Almost impossible. It was one of the reasons Marcia wanted him on it. He was good and had trained most of the others that she could get to do it at one point or another. Even Brian, though that had only been for a week or so.

  He tilted his head and made a soft humming sound.

  “I don’t know. Is it something you want to try, Penny? It will take a lot of self-motivation to get it done, probably a lot more than most people have to put forward. If you want to do it, you’ll have to be your own harshest critic, because no one else can really do it for you. Not yet at least.” He didn’t explain that, but he waited for an answer instead.

  “I guess. Not to sound like I don’t want to, but, I mean, killing people isn’t… It’s not something I want to do. I don’t want to let anyone down, but I’m not… I mean, I guess I am a killer, I just… don’t want to be.”

  The older man nodded and held out his hand to shake, which after a few seconds moved on its own.

  “Good enough. We can do training to make you a hardened killer, that isn’t a problem. Heck, half the video games on the market should work just fine for that. They’re designed to be brainwashing tools to make it easy to kill. Besides, it’s the rest of the things that will probably be the most valuable. I say we give it a shot. We’ll stay at your place for the first bit, and then move to various locations for the rest so we don’t get bored. For now, well, why not enjoy your vacation? Grab some friends and go to the beach? Marcia and I have some things to discuss. Private things that would make a proper young lady blush no doubt, so…” He gave his most charming grin and waited again. He was good at waiting.

  Penny sighed.

  “Cast out again. I suppose I could get some breakfast and see if Brian and Karen want to go. Too bad Bridget couldn’t have stayed. Is… this, the training thing, why you wanted
me here Marcia? Instead of at the Whitehouse I mean. I don’t know what I could add there, but it would be neat to see the place.”

  “Nope. We may have an actual mission coming up. The same reason we want you to have training is why you’re up for this too. We might have to track people, or even end up in a shootout. For that matter, we need to make sure you have a vest. No one can hit you on purpose, but that doesn’t mean that stray bullets will bounce off. I should have done that before. We don’t have anything here, but as soon as possible I’ll get you something. In the mean time hide behind solid objects if the bullets start to fly, OK?” She held her own hand out, and saw it move, but couldn’t feel Penny at all. It was weird.

  “OK. I think I’m allergic to lead anyway.”

  “Who isn’t?” Conroy shrugged and waited for a reply, but Marcia beat the girl to it.

  “I’m not.”

  She really wasn’t. Well, possibly if she ate it, but otherwise, not at all. Unlike most Infected with extra invulnerability, she was armored on the inside too, but she could possibly digest poisons. She’d never really worked up the nerve to try it. If that didn’t work, then the only way she had left to die was drowning or smothering to death. Neither one sounded fun. Not that she was planning to die any time soon, but if it came up, she really wanted a way out that wouldn’t involve choking to death. Even that might not hurt now, but she’d nearly drowned as a child and the memory still haunted her.

  They waited for Penny to leave, following Warren to his event, since he promised to feed her and being invisible burned a lot of calories. As soon as the door closed, Conroy ran his right hand through his hair and suddenly looked tired.

  “What the hell Marcy? Do you have any clue what this is really about that you just haven’t told me? Cutthroat said that all we have to go on for certain is a car rental? He has Reyes and Burke running that down while he gets a few hours sleep. I can see why someone would want the old crew in on an assassination, they’re all pro’s at it, but why keep the rest of us out? Just because we wouldn’t try to take down POTUS? I wouldn’t have thought any of them would either. No one even tried to feel me out on the idea.”