The Infected [Books 1-6]

by P. S. Power

  It took about two minutes to explain the whole thing, and other one for him to write down a note to himself on the project idea.

  "I'm eating first though. Otherwise I might not get the chance. That's just the way things work around here. Most days."

  "Sounds like a plan. Enjoy your lunch. Thanks, by the way. I know it's a hassle, but not everyone is as lucky as I am." The odd thing there was, she realized, that she meant it. She could go anywhere she wanted and no one in the world would give her a hard time about it. Penny Cooper could do anything and get away with it. A whole lot of people had it harder than she did.

  It wasn't the way she normally thought of things, but it was kind of true anyway. Yeah, it was hard for her to get a date, one that would remember it later at least, but that was just an obstacle, not a curse.

  Getting back to her own meal she found that it was something like beef stroganoff, and actually done fairly well. The meal was simple, but hot and the salad was good, with lots of other things, not just lettuce and tomato.

  Mark frowned at the plate as he ate though, and shook his head.

  "The main dish is fine, lacking a good accent flavor though, which means most people will find it a bit bland. No side dishes though? Granted, the salad can count, but it seems like it's lacking something. Bread, maybe some rolls? A vegetable might have worked as well. A bit traditional, but you know, that just means we know it will work."

  Penny took another bite of the dish and thought for a second before speaking.

  "The accent is the sour cream, isn't it? It seems good to me. I could use some bread. What kind of veggie would work with this anyway? Beets?" She was trying to be funny, but Denis blinked and Mark nodded at her.

  "OK, I'll give you the sour cream, if Penny can notice it. Beets... That's an interesting idea at least. Almost no one uses those anymore. Nice purple color too. Maybe pickle them first? That would work on the show. Good idea."

  He ate the food anyway, even if he was being a bit too hard on Denis about it all. He was, when it came to culinary things, a snob. That was probably why he was so good at it.

  She didn't have anything like that at all in her own life. What did she even do? Kill people? That wasn't really skill though, it was more just that no one could stop her. She wasn't even a great spy or thief really. She was about as good as a person could get at those things, sure, but it was built in.

  Sort of.

  It reminded her to try and get better at that stuff. Take some pride in her work. If you were going to do something, it paid to try and be the best at it, right?

  That thought reminded her that, for the moment at least, she had a new job to see to, so the next hours were spent alternating between pushing food on Marcia and making certain that Lobo was going to have a pretty darned nice vacation. It took some doing, but she managed to arrange for it all before quitting time, even with a two hour long work out in the middle of the day.

  That meant that when Lancaster came to get her after dinner, she was feeling decently well satisfied. After all, she had a new phone that would let her make calls, a computer for e-mail, which actually worked for her the same way it did for anyone else and she hadn't been bored at all for almost the whole time.

  The big Agent smiled and seemed to be laughing, inside, when he found her sitting on the sofa in the common area, just outside Jason's office, near the intercom. That linked her to the television room on the fifth floor and to the dining room, but no one was there to chat with her at the moment, which was fine. Brian was missing, again, and Mark actually had a mission come up. A kid dangling from a bridge had been saved. The Golden Gate. That meant that Mark had hopped on a bicycle and rode the whole way, in his null time thing, which had to take months for the man. Just to pull some teen boy up so that he wouldn't fall into the water and die.

  It was easy to forget the amount of work that he put into doing anything like that sometimes, because it was instant as far as everyone else was concerned. It had to be lonely though. That soul crushing kind of thing that ripped at the very core of a person's being. Like being in a prison alone, no matter where he went.

  It was why he needed a plane flight back, since it would take him a lot less time, from his viewpoint, than going the other way would. He had to collect food as he went too, since he couldn't buy anything, but he always left an invoice for it, so the IPB could reimburse people for what he took from their shops and pantries. It was all good and stuff. Penny smiled, thinking about that part of things, knowing the she would have just cleaned people out. After all, if they can't catch you, it isn't a crime, right? They deserved those things, because they could take them.

  It was the pirate way.

  Speaking of which, now that she had a computer she could rip things offline to watch too. That was a mistake that the industry had made a long time back, calling people that stole things online "Pirates". It was too cool sounding. The only way they might have messed that up more was calling them "Copyright Ninjas". No, if they wanted to keep that particular activity down they should have come up with a term that implied anyone doing that was Infected. That or a pedophile. "Copyright Child Rapists" didn't make a lot of sense, but she was damned sure no one would want to be one.

  Luckily for her that wasn't the case, wasn't it? Not that she needed that much music, but it was always good to try new things. She needed a hobby anyway.

  Lancaster cleared his throat, which got her to blink, since as far as he knew he was speaking to an empty room.

  "Penny? Are you in here? We have a new mission. It's kind of time sensitive." Again he seemed slightly amused by the idea for some reason, which seemed out of place for the man. He wasn't normally jovial, not as a rule.

  "I'm here, on the sofa. What's the situation?" She managed to sound almost like a real girl and everything, since they were alone and he hadn't known she was there. It was kind of nice, since he left her feeling a bit warm and fuzzy inside. "Do we need to hit the airfield? I should pack... Really, I guess I should have a bag ready to go all the time now, shouldn't I? Can I get some fresh body armor? Mine has an impact on it. Three really. I don't know if I get a new one each time." It hadn't really hurt, but that was due to the quality of what she'd been wearing, she thought. That or she was tougher than it seemed most days.

  "Yes. Let me make a note of that. As to the mission, I need you to sneak into Agent Burke's room and tie balloons to all of his weapons. It's his birthday tomorrow, so this will be a night op. It's Bridget Chambers' idea, but I'd rather not have her being shot in the middle of the night, while sneaking into his bedroom. It would make for annoying paperwork and then he'd go around wondering if she was trying to sleep with him. Plus, she's out of town right now. Think you can pull it off?"

  She climbed to her feet and nodded, thinking about it.

  "I need the gear and a room number. He's an agent, so I have to guess that he'll lock his door at night. Do I have a key for it? If not I should probably get in place as soon as possible. Do you think he'll set booby traps?" It was meant to sound funny, but Lancaster nodded, as if she were being totally reasonable.

  "I have the things ready for you. As to traps, you need to go in with the assumption that he actually will have things like that set up. Combat veteran, so explosive charges aren't out of the question."

  So it was kind of like a training mission? That made sense. Who else was she going to really practice against? The only thing harder to do would involve sneaking into and out of the cells on floor thirteen and she didn't really have a reason to do that, that she knew of.

  "OK, I'll go in with him then, so I can see what he's up to. Oh! Can I get some night vision goggles too? That would be awesome."

  It took an hour for her to get in place, just waiting with a pack on and standing outside the man's door on the eleventh floor. The agents didn't all have rooms here, but Burke was a permanent feature on the base. He mainly handled the Chambers family, which had a lot to do with un-ruffling feathers and passing out pats
on the back, sometimes in public. He was high profile because of that, for an unpowered agent. No one in the press knew his name, but they had pictures of him, standing behind Prime or Impulse at photo shoots. He was also kind of like Team One's Lancaster, Penny thought. They didn't need as much handling on a personnel level that way though, did they? No, they were the good kids, always playing nicely and dressing just right for any occasion.

  Suck ups, mainly. It was how they got their nifty jobs.

  It took some pretty decent timing to follow the man in, and she nearly fell over a trip wire that he stepped over, about three feet inside the door. That let it open, but he did it without turning on the light first. It was only the mere hint of him slowing down that got her to freeze first herself. The place was kind of bland inside, without a lot of personal things around. Some pictures, mainly of Team One, along with a brown haired girl that looked to be about fifteen or so in a slightly nicer metal frame, that was hanging on the far wall. She wasn't great looking, but she did seem to have a tiny resemblance to the man. Probably his daughter then.

  Her pack wasn't heavy, but it had the needed supplies. A container of helium that should be good for seventy-five balloons, a bag of those in several colors and several hundred meters of ribbon, as well as little plugs to make filling and tying off the things easier. She also had some scissors, a sharp knife and a pair of high end night vision goggles. That turned out to be a good thing, since the man turned in no more than fifteen minutes later, after setting up a small obstacle course of wires all over the place.

  Not, she noticed, hooked up to explosives, but to physically triggered alarms. If they went off, he'd definitely know that someone was there. Given who he was, that would probably mean he'd shoot at her too. Agents, after all, be crazy.

  She also had to think that it wasn't exactly something normal, since the alarms were fairly new, the boxes for them still on the counter of his little kitchenette. That he got a kitchen, with a stove, fridge and sink made her feel a little jealous for a bit. After all, she didn't get any of that, did she? It was like a real apartment or something, instead of a hotel room. The point was, the man was guarding himself against a birthday prank for some reason.

  And he had a better room than she did.

  She took a position near the bedroom, trying to be good and wait for him to fall all the way to sleep before doing anything. That was the hard part, the waiting. It had to be done though, since she understood that the man knew that someone was coming for him. He probably suspected it would be the other Agents, or Bridget, but they'd outsourced. If that was the case it meant that he probably didn't always live in a minefield of tripwires at least, which left her feeling a little better about the man's sanity.

  She schooled herself to silence, trying not to be noticed on any cameras, not anymore than a floating pack would be at least. He'd know who'd done it, later, when he reviewed the footage, but just in case he had something she couldn't see set up to alert him first, she needed to be careful.

  That being the case she went slowly and did the living room first. It was hard, since it meant searching for weapons. He had them hidden all over the place, taped under the tiny kitchen table, behind the television and its stand, and behind the books of his fairly anemic looking library shelf. Not shelves, it just had the one, with just enough books to hide a single, decently large, handgun.

  It took hours to find them all and then attach a red ribbon to them, with a floating balloon. The tripwires kept her on her toes too, since she nearly fell over two of them at different points. The bathroom wasn't wired at least, but the kitchen area was. He had three weapons in each space, all hidden pretty carefully.

  There were more in the bedroom, and it was pretty clear that he was either a very light sleeper or faking it, since his breathing was wrong most of the time. She kind of thought there were guns under the mattress and pillow, but she left those for last, since he'd most likely notice a ribbon or balloon being directly over him, eventually. In all it took nearly until four in the morning to get it all done, and she got out just after that, deciding not to stay and watch him wake up. Her mission hadn't been about observation, just getting the task done. Besides, she had time for like, a whole two and half hours worth of sleep now. Penny didn't want to miss out on that, did she?

  Of course that meant she overslept a bit and had to shower in a hurry and rush to work without breakfast, taking the stairs, which was dangerous. She ran them, trying to limit her time there. It might not work every day as far as risks went, but she didn't see anyone, so there was that, for now. That reminded her of a few things, like trying to find out if the Team Two people were back yet, or if Proxy was. That part always worried her, when he left, since it meant a fight, ninety-plus percent of the time. On a few occasions he hadn't come back for days on end, too, which was even worse. Normally he was back inside an hour or two though.

  She could have knocked on his door, or checked the gym, but she didn't want him to think she was looking for attention. It was such a balancing act there.

  Instead she went to the restaurant and picked up some French toast for herself and donuts for Marcia. Who wasn't in at all at first. It was only the second day, so she didn't know if that was strange or not, but she kind of thought it wasn't, since the woman walked in quickly about half an hour later, stopping when she noticed the tray of things on her desk.

  "Penny?"

  "Here. Good morning. That's the first snack, so get it down quickly. You seem hurried, what's going on?"

  "Oh, not much. Photo shoot later this morning. I have to be there. 'Go Team One' and all that. This afternoon we have a party. Agent Burke's B-day. Good man. Have you met?"

  Penny nearly denied having even seen the man, but she realized that this probably wasn't some kind of huge thing really.

  "Spent the night with him." After a half second she felt her face grow warm. "Um, putting balloons all over his room while he slept. Lancaster made me do it. Tied to all the weapons he has hidden out. At least the ones I could find. I kind of doubt I got them all."

  "Heh. Cute. I mean, he'll hate it, but that's funny. We don't have a lot on tap today other than that however, so we'll have to see what comes in. I heard that you might be taking off to D.C. soon? The Maggie Lawrence detail?"

  It was hard to remember how monitored they all were at times, until someone said something that obvious. Penny grunted.

  "So I hear as well. I think Brian just wants me to keep an eye on his granddaughter. Make sure she's not having too much illicit sex or doing the drugs. You know, if we don't have a lot coming in we should all go for a hike later. Take a pack and pack a lunch, that sort of thing. You, Lancaster and Brian, if he ever returns."

  "Oh, currently in medical. Managed to break his left hand up pretty well. He'll heal, but he's on reduced duty for now. I'll let him tell the story, but it's almost a joke, I'll warn you now. He is not feeling good about it." She grinned and started trying to read some files on her desk.

  "You can read and swallow at the same time Marsh. Don't make me try and stuff bits of food in your mouth while you aren't looking. You'll probably bite me and I want my fingers, thank you very much."

  "Yeah, yeah. You do know food sucks for me, don't you?"

  "I get that. Take your medicine and don't be a baby about it. It sucks, but it isn't hurting you, doesn't taste bad and won't make you sick. A lot of people have it worse. Eat. You can tell me what Team Two is up to at the same time."

  "Oh, that. They managed to take the guy down. It wasn't a good situation, but didn't take long. Tobin used his song to disorient the man and then Lauren ran in and clapped him over the ears. Fatally. The man shot some kind of destructive ray from his hands. It was a waste. His girlfriend found out he was Infected and... Well, you know how that goes. He didn't have that bad of a first modality even, I don't think. It was just a case of a man losing it, under pressure. Once they go though, we don't get a lot of choice. It's pretty tough to control a class four or f
ive like that."

  "Crud. Is everyone all right? Emotionally I mean?"

  "Don't know. We try to run people past psych, but I don't normally go and visit with them. Too busy most days. You have time though, why don't you look into it? You can handle one on one things pretty well, right?"

  There was a moment of silence while she thought about her answer.

  "Really, it varies from person to person. Women are generally easier than men, hot guys are the worst, especially if I like them. Anything over five people is too much, at least if they know I'm there. There have been some problems with the ear pieces that way. It never occurred to me that anyone would actually wear the things. It's almost like I'm special or something."

  That got a nod, but no response, since the woman actually bothered to eat a donut. She did it in several large bites, clearly trying to get the thing finished as quickly as possible. Like it was a chore. They looked pretty good though.

  "I can try though, talking to people. I'll go do that in a bit, if anyone is awake yet."

  It was kind of clear that there wasn't a lot to do that day. The day before had been hectic, but now things were almost relaxed, with no apparent crisis hanging over them. It probably just meant they were missing the real trouble though, didn't it?

  She found Charles, the Team Two leader, sitting in his office, filling out paperwork. There was a bit of a sneer on his face as he worked, his mustache covering it, but only a little. He needed an ear piece, which she provided for him, being the kind soul that she was.

  "Sparks? It's Penny."

  The man looked up but didn't jump, simply blinking and closing the folder in front of him. She'd peeked already but it was just a review of the dining hall expenses. It cost a lot to keep the entire team going, it seemed.

  "Penny! Is everything all right? Emergency, or... is Poures pulling out on the jet trip?" That last bit actually got the guy to wince a bit.

  "Not that I've heard. I'm just here to do a post mission interview with the people involved in yesterday's action. Basically just to make sure they're handling it all right. It isn't a big deal though, just something Ms. Turner asked me to look into. To keep me busy, I think." It was the actual case, but the man in front of her rolled his eyes.