The Infected [Books 1-6]

by P. S. Power

  "Crap, Penny... how long have you been here?" Her voice was slightly tense sounding, but not that bad, for her. Not after a shock like that.

  "Not that long, a few minutes. Is this the third attack like this?"

  The Director adapted quickly and shook his head.

  "No, there have been others, ones that match the profile at least, the claw patterns and so on. Those were mainly the political enemies of Hooper however and came in slowly, over the course of two decades, this is very different. We have witnesses for one thing. It might not be the same person doing it, but it seems strange, doesn't it? This is the fourth one in this current chain however. All in the last month."

  "OK. Other than saying that it's strange I have nothing to add. Well, that and that I'm not leaving until that food is gone." She got ready to insist, but the lady in front of her made short work of it, since they clearly didn't want to discuss whatever was coming next with her in the room.

  To assure that the Director suggested that she head down to floor nine and see if Brian was actually managing to keep from re-breaking his hand.

  "You know how he is, always going off to save people. Not that he gets a choice, but I doubt it will hurt his feelings if you go to see him about it."

  Smiling she stood to leave, since she got the real point. They didn't want her to spy on them.

  Like they could stop her?

  She left anyway, since she doubted that she really wanted to know what was coming next anyway. If they didn't think she should hear it, that probably meant it was pretty bad, right? That or it was about someone she knew. That almost got her to stay, but since she doubted it was in regards to her, she left them to it and went to see if her friend needed help, being injured and all that.

  Chapter seven

  Brian was covered with blood, and standing in the middle of the hallway, about fifteen feet down, to the left of the elevator. There was an arm splint on the floor and an awkwardly held hand on his middle. Penny noticed that he was wearing his standard black military fatigues and tennis shoes with his black nano-mesh armor on under it. That stuff was incredibly cool, but so hard to get that no one would bother for her, she didn't think.

  "So... do you need to go back to medical?" She had to check him for wounds, but didn't really want to touch him if it was possible. He'd underreport though, so it was important to look for signs of injury. None of the blood seemed to be coming from fresh cuts at least and his face and hands looked untouched, even though the right one was badly bruises and swollen still. "Or go climb in a shower?"

  She picked up the splint for him, which for some reason got him to start walking toward his room. Number four, which was only about two doors down from where they stood. It was one of the good rooms too. Bigger than hers, and with the best shower on the whole floor. It had multiple spigots in it and blasted you from all sides. She'd been in it once, with Marcia and Brian. That had been a little awkward, since he could see her the whole time. At least until they'd turned the lights off. That way they could pass secret messages without being noticed on camera, the water covering the words and the darkness taking care of the pictures well enough for them.

  "That second one. Can you take that for me? I need to report this, but it wasn't anything that big. A small riot and attempted lynching. All regular people though. Even the boy they were going after. I tried to explain that having a hunched back wasn't a super-power, but no one really wanted to listen to that. The blood only came from a couple of people. They'd decided that me not being armed must mean I was helpless. That turned out to be wrong in this case. The rest ran, after that."

  She looked at him and just followed him into his room, having been there before a few times, even in the last months. He didn't go out of his way to include her now, but he wasn't a total jerk about it all either. True, he'd been busy in the last few weeks, splitting his time between his regular work and his new girlfriend, but before that they'd hung out on occasion. Normally with her feeling a bit out of place the whole time.

  Now it was suddenly easier somehow. That seemed to be because Brian, for all his awareness of her, was making sure not to notice her too much. Just enough really. He spoke to her, but didn't make a lot of eye contact. It made him seem nearly shy, but that worked to help her feel a bit more at ease.

  "Shower first though, I'll leave the door open so we can talk."

  That was kind of new, and required a bit of shouting to be heard, but the effort was nice enough and being in a different room made things no harder for her than most social interaction were.

  "So, I have a date of sorts tomorrow, with Mary's friend Elizabeth. She's that healer from Hobbs' world? She's been trying to fix me, a little at a time. I have to say that it's working pretty well. I'm almost a hundred percent now, except the hand. So, what have you been up to? Seeing anyone?"

  It was a strange question, but didn't sound that way, it was the kind of thing that people really asked you after all, wasn't it? Your friends at least.

  "You know me, all work, all the time. It isn't that no one will volunteer for it, but they don't remember it later. That leaves me basically sneaking up on people and abusing them in their sleep, or while they're getting it on with someone else. It lacks a little, but that's my lot in life." She'd never mentioned any of that part of things before to Brian and kind of expected him to either take it as a joke or to scold her, but instead there was just silence for a bit.

  There were sounds of washing then, and water pouring off of a body. An in shape and naked form, glistening under the warm water...

  "Did you really have sex with Denis?"

  Now the voice sounded a bit more curious than was probably proper, but she sighed and nodded, getting ready to feel embarrassed. She told him though. All of it.

  "I even went down on him... and he could barely feel it. Then later he forgot the whole thing. Makes it hard to have a relationship, you know? Not that I want one with him in particular, since I'm still not all that sure he won't relapse into being a complete asshole, but it's pretty much like that with everyone." Except for Brian, of course. Which was still something that she just couldn't do at all.

  Thankfully her naked buddy didn't mention that part of things. It had to be clear to him that, if she could do anything with him, she would have, right? She had a functional dating and sex pool of one person in the whole world, a guy that she knew would have done pretty much anything she needed him to. At least before. He was pretty loyal too and Penny hadn't met the new girlfriend, so had no clue how she'd respond to things like that. Her wanting to share him.

  Before that though...

  Only it was hopeless. She couldn't even get herself to go into the bathroom to look at him, since she knew that he'd see her do it.

  She heard low talking from the other room, the words sounding a little strange then, higher pitched and like it was coming from a girl. Then Brian stopped the water and called out.

  "Hey, Pen, could you give me a hand here? It's a bit of a hassle trying to dry off with one hand. I can do it, but Dharma said I should ask. I can manage if you don't want to."

  That got Penny to blink.

  "Wait... That was Dharma? The Ghost that hangs around with you? I... think I heard her. Can she say something else? Maybe over here by me?"

  The room went silent for a minute but then she heard something, a very low sound that seemed to come from right next to her.

  "You can hear me? Awesome. Nothing against Christian and Brian, but it's getting a little old, only having two people to talk to. If you really can hear me, that is."

  "I know how that is. But, yeah, you're a bit faint sounding, but I can hear you just fine. At least if you're this close to me. Are you yelling?"

  She thought she heard very soft laughter then.

  "You bet your ass I am. Right in your ear too. This is great. Let's be friends. We can hang around and haunt people. I have some wonderful ideas for that."

  "OK. Let's do that then. Right now I guess I nee
d to help dry Brian off and all that. Which won't be awkward at all."

  "Cause you're so hot for him?"

  That got her to make a face, since Brian could hear both sides of the conversation without even trying, being a completely invasive monster like he was.

  "Shut up." She felt her face grow warm, but she went into the other room to find the naked man and used one of the very soft IPB towels on him, ending with his right hand, since they had to be completely dried off before he could get the splint back on, or else it would cause problems for him.

  "Thanks Penny. I need to get some clean clothing..." A towel got held in front of himself, as if she hadn't been right there with him naked for the last several minutes. She followed him, since he wasn't getting dressed again on his own, not easily at least. It took a bit to make happen, but she tried to stay professional about it and he worked to make certain he ignored her as much as possible.

  It was about the strangest thing that she'd ever done, but it sort of worked, after a fashion. He ended up back in his armor, and dressed all in black again. She had to tie his shoes, and then work the splint onto his arm, with the armor under it, but his right sleeve rolled up, to get it out of the way.

  "Oh, what's the situation with the Christmas show?"

  "Holiday Special." He corrected instantly, a forced smile on his face. "We're hitting everything we can, even if Glen Gillis thinks that's selling out. Alan Brown is mainly in charge of it for now, getting us some funds and all that. We actually have forty celebrities signed up already for it. I don't know if it's going to be good or not, but it will be different and filled with famous people. We're shooting in July, in California, at the main studio. So you have four months to figure out what you're doing for it."

  "Props. Glen already said I should. Alan seconded it. I think they like me. The idea is that I won't foul up too many shots, I think."

  "Good plan." There was a moment of hesitation then and his uninjured arm came out, giving her a half hug, which he didn't hold long, or mention after it was done. It had been a long time since anyone had done something like that with her on purpose, knowing it was happening. Feeling the contact. Not paying too much attention to her at the same time.

  "I need to get to the gym. Just walking today, but I can't afford to get totally out of shape, not just for a broken hand. We should hang out soon. Do something fun."

  Then, mercifully, he stopped talking and suddenly walked away, as if forgetting her. It wasn't real, but he had it down pretty well, didn't he?

  Dharma however stayed with her, a fact that Penny didn't realize until she was back in her office again, wondering what kind of vacation people would like.

  "Maybe you could rent an amusement park for a day? There are some small ones around still, permanent things that don't do a lot of business. I always loved those, but a lot of the uglies can't go, since the norms always freak out. Carnies tend to get along with people though, especially if they have money to spend. If not they'll just stab someone, so, you know, our kind of people."

  It was a point and not a bad idea. She even found one that was near a private camp ground and a waterfall that could be hiked to with just a few hours of walking. Everyone was in good enough shape for it. True, people might object to seeing a horde of Infected on a nature trail, but she decided that she didn't really care about that.

  "What do you think? I mean, would you want to go to something like that, if it was offered?"

  The ghost girl didn't say anything for a bit and Penny wondered if she was gone, but after a bit there was a loud grunt. It sounded almost bestial.

  "Yeah. That would work. They have those little cabins even. That would mean getting two things though, so that makes it harder. Unless you just close them down and take over for the time you want it. I can't really go though. I'm kind of tied to Bri-bri. His own little security blanket. Not that he really needs me much anymore, but I'm well and truly stuck. I can only get a few miles away from him. I pretty much feel and see everything he does. It makes the evenings a bit intense, let me tell you."

  She didn't explain what she meant, but Penny got the idea. That's when Brian met with his girlfriend. Odds were they weren't just trading back-rubs.

  There were numbers for the camp ground and the park, but it was a bit late, so she sent e-mails instead, not really expecting to hear back anytime soon. It was a bad idea to actually just take over a person's business, but if they pushed her too far, she'd give it a hard look. After all, it was illegal to discriminate against the person for being Infected and that had to go double for a government agency. It just wasn't worth fighting about most days, since it caused people to hate you more if you forced them to do things.

  At five she closed the room up, the ghost girl still chattering with her as they walked down the hall. It was kind of interesting, since she couldn't see the other girl at all. Almost like she wasn't there, which meant that she felt very at ease with her. If Becky had a problem with shyness, it didn't show at all.

  "So, what's the deal? You were pretty much telling Brian that he should bang you earlier. Not that he'll let himself realize that was the point. Not now. Aren't you into him?" There was needling to the words, which wasn't lost on her.

  "First mode crap. He can see me, I get shy when people know I'm there. Social anxiety, so it gets worse in crowds. But most of the time it isn't a problem, except with him. I like him a lot, actually. I just can't stand him. Does that make sense?" She got ready to go over it again, but the girl laughed.

  "That is fucked-up! You want to bone the B-man, and he'd do you in a heartbeat, but you can't do it if he knows you're there? You poor thing. That's about the worst thing I've ever heard that didn't involve death or eating corpses." There was a strange tone to the words then, almost as if the ghost was screaming at her to be heard, but trying to be calm and thoughtful at the same time. "You should work with your other buddy, Mark, and see if he can help you learn to control for that. Brainwave control or whatever it takes. You should at least be able to learn enough to get a date. I mean... that info is inside Brian's head and all that. I don't know the specifics, but just being in here means it's probably important."

  It wasn't a horrible idea, not on paper. It probably wouldn't work though, even if Becky was using some kind of psychic power as a resource for the information. It was hard to learn to control things like that, wasn't it? Everyone said so.

  Except the ghost in her ear, who started to pester her about it a little bit. It was teasing in nature, but she kept saying the same thing over and over for about a minute before Penny caved.

  "Fine, fine. I'll see about that after dinner. If he says no, I blame you though. Forcing me to be rejected by Mark like this... Geesh. He's really busy you know."

  It was taco night, which was her least favorite meal. It wasn't horrible, since everything was always well made when Janine cooked, and she could eat the food once she had it, but she had to get up and grab all the ingredients for herself normally, since it was too hard to get people to pass things properly and they didn't dish things up at the food window for that one.

  Everyone was there, so Penny went to the other room with her plate, listening to them talk, sitting on the sofa in the common area, away from the intercom, so that she could actually speak to everyone else. It took yelling for her to get that done, but it meant she wasn't as hemmed in, sitting with them all. At first she just ate, as people chattered a bit, but after a while Brian cleared his throat.

  "So, Mark... Penny wants to know if you'd help her learn to control her first mode? At least that's what I heard from a certain ghost girl."

  The other voice was softer, since Mark always sat near the far end of the table, away from where the silver box had been set on its little stand.

  "Sure. I have time. After dinner?"

  Penny knew she had to answer, her internal sense of angst going higher than it should have been, since everyone was listening, even though not seeing them helped loads.

 
"That would be great. I don't know if I can really do it, but it's a good idea." She hoped so at least.

  The rest of the meal, thankfully, had nothing to do with her at all and while she had to run the plate back in and clean up the shreds of lettuce she'd left on the cushion, she was back out by the time Mark got there and started to set up a strange box on the table in the center of the room.

  "All right, I don't know if this will work, but the idea really isn't that hard. You come sit in the chair here, I'll hook you up and then you watch the lights as I talk to you. Try to do what I say, and notice when things change. The more relaxed you get, the lower the little bars go. The trick will be making them all vanish."

  She was good at that, of course. Making things vanish.

  It took about an hour, but she got the things to go down a tiny bit, as Mark talked her through things. She wasn't a sudden master of it, but he did seem to think that doing the same thing daily for a few months might help a bit. She had to admit that she felt a lot more calm already. It was like she'd taken a sleeping pill or valium. She was a bit limp and slow feeling, compared to how she normally was.

  "Wow... So, so I carry around that much tension all the time do you think?" She didn't explain what she was thinking, but there was a slow nod from the man next to her.

  "Oh, sure. The level of muscle tension that you started with is pretty much like a regular person flexing on purpose. Even now you're not all the way down to what most would consider normal. It's probably why your power stays on full blast most of the time. I... you don't have to do anything later, do you? I want to try something." He vanished before she could speak, but came back about five minutes later with a small Asian woman in a blue scrubs and white and black checked tennis shoes. They were coated with something that made them shiny. It was a unique look. Penny wondered if she could do that too, but decided not to bother, since no one would notice it at all. They were cool kicks though.