The Blacklist--The Beekeeper No. 159

by Steven Piziks

  “Hey!” One of the drones turned. All the others stopped. Keen’s stomach twisted and fear sweat trickled down her back. Her mouth dried up.

  “Are you taking the replacement shift in the kitchen?” the drone asked.

  “Not us,” Mala said. “They’re coming along later.”

  Two of the drones looked at each other, then shrugged.

  “We are the Hive.” Keen tapped her chest.

  “We are the Hive,” everyone in the tunnel repeated. The drones turned and went on their way.

  When the others were out of sight, Mala and Keen both collapsed against the wall. Mala was giggling like a child.

  “That was great!” she said. “You totally fooled them!”

  Keen smiled grimly inside her mask. So Mala wasn’t entirely a Hive drone. There was a spark of rebel still in there somewhere. Not only that, Keen and Mala were sharing a moment, and it was something Keen could use. Her ability to get at Dr. Griffin seemed to be limited, but Mala was something else. The poor woman was clearly deluded, and the only way to help her was to destroy the Hive and get her out of here. For that, she and Keen had to become good friends.

  “Is this a sin to confess later?” Keen said, pushing the bond between them.

  “You’re awful!” Mala said. “I don’t think we should. Should we? Won’t Dr. Griffin know?”

  “I think we should keep quiet about it,” Keen said. “That won’t be a lie, technically.”

  “Okay.” Mala seemed less sure of herself now, and Keen wondered if she had gone too far. “Let’s go.”

  The tunnel opened into a cave that was only a little smaller than the big one out front. To Keen’s surprise, it had machinery in it—a forklift, a robot arm, more laboratory equipment, and a bank of computers that lined one wall in a manner eerily reminiscent of the Post Office. A pile of what Keen guessed were packing crates covered with canvas drop cloths sat against the opposite wall, and a large doorway at the back, one big enough to admit a good-sized truck, was screened off with camouflage netting. Keen caught a glimpse of moonlight through the weave. It was night outside, then. Her brain tried to reorient itself around this new information. How many days and nights had she been down here? She had no idea.

  “Is anyone in here?” she whispered.

  “Not at this time of… not right now,” Mala said. She strode to the pile of packing crates, which rested on pallets for the forklift. “This is where we make honey.”

  “I don’t understand.” Keen kept her voice low inside the mask, even though the great cavern was patently empty. The place seemed to swallow sound, and the grand space felt more like a church than a storeroom.

  “See?” Mala pulled aside part of a canvas covering. Keen’s fingers went cold. On the crate was stenciled a green circle. Within the green, three red circles orbited a fourth. Underneath were the words CAUTION: SARIN.

  “Making honey,” Mala said.

  Keen swallowed hard. “You’re making sarin gas? Like they used in Syria?”

  “Like the methamphetamine,” Mala said.

  For sale, Keen thought. Got a nice little weapons factory, don’t you, Dr. Griffin? Meth and weaponized gas for sale. ISIS must love you.

  “What are all the guns for?” Keen asked. “All the weapons outside?”

  “Dr. Griffin won’t let outsiders hurt us,” Mala said. “They are coming for us any day now, but we’re ready.”

  “Who’s they?” Keen said, keeping her voice low.

  “Outsiders. The government and its allies,” Mala said, equally hushed. “They’re looking for us. They know how powerful the Hive is. We have groups all over the country, and when we rise up, we’ll own the country at last. You’re lucky you got in when you did.”

  “All over the country?” Keen’s head was spinning. “You mean there are enclaves like this one in other places?”

  “Well, yeah.” Mala twitched the cover back into place. “Houston and New York and inside the Pentagon. And the International Space Station.”

  “The Space Station?” Keen was starting to feel like an echo.

  “Dr. Griffin has been running it from the start,” Mala said. “It’s why we have all this communications equipment. We need it—he needs it—to contact the station. He keeps the cameras off us and when the time comes, he’ll zap our enemies with the station’s laser beams.”

  Oh.

  The world righted itself and Keen was on firmer ground. The hallmark of a cult leader—create an us vs. them mentality, inflate the sense of the group’s power, make outrageous promises that can’t ever be proven. An awful idea came to Keen, and she asked the next question carefully.

  “Are we hiding here because the… end of the world is coming?”

  Mala blinked at her for a heart-squeezing moment. Doomsday cults were the most dangerous. They wanted to die, were taught to commit suicide, either by their own hands or by running into a hail of police bullets. Dismantling them was nearly impossible without all the members dying in some way. They also killed people who didn’t want to die.

  “Don’t be silly,” Mala scoffed. “Why would the world be ending?”

  “Oh, good,” Keen said, then took a little breath. I hate to do this to you, Mala. “I don’t want to die, you know? Like your friend Iris.”

  Long pause. Keen could see the news break over Mala’s face. Disbelief, followed by pain, followed by more disbelief.

  “Iris is dead?” she gasped.

  “I thought you knew,” Keen said. “The FBI found her in her bathtub. She was… I’m sorry… someone had killed her. They think it was to keep her quiet about something. Was it about you? You being kidnapped?”

  “Oh god.” Mala put her hands to her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes. “Oh, Jesus. I didn’t know. The Bodysnatcher promised no one would get hurt. That I’d just disappear.”

  “He must have figured Iris knew something,” Keen said. “Did you say anything to her?”

  “It’s my fault!” Mala pulled at her hair. “I told Iris I was leaving, but I swore her to secrecy.”

  Keen tried to hug her, but her hands were still cuffed in front of her. Mala leaned against her and sobbed. Keen could smell sweat in Mala’s hair.

  “The Bodysnatcher must have found out,” Keen said, pushing the point home and hating herself for it. “Maybe he got hold of your texts or something.”

  “Oh god,” Mala repeated. “No one was supposed to die. She was my best friend. The Beekeeper is—” She halted.

  Keen waited a heartbeat. “Is what?”

  “Nothing.” Mala stood upright and swiped at her cheeks. “It’s nothing. We are the Hive.”

  “We are the Hive.” But Keen saw the seed of doubt.

  “What are you doing in here?” said Dr. Griffin.

  Keen jumped. Mala squeaked. The Beekeeper was standing in the entrance to the tunnel with three drones behind him. One of them was Pug. The Beekeeper’s arms were folded and his face was a thunderstorm.

  “You aren’t supposed to be here,” Pug said with a dark frown.

  “I think it’s time you were both re-educated,” Dr. Griffin said. “Extensively.”

  Mala paled and looked ready to faint. Although Keen’s heart was pounding hard enough to shake the front of her jumpsuit, she stepped forward.

  “Don’t blame her, Beekeeper. It was me.”

  “Was it?” The Beekeeper leveled a hard glare at her.

  Keen lifted her chin. “I went off exploring and found this room. Mala came after me. She was just about to bring me down to you.”

  The Beekeeper turned his hard glare on Mala. “Is this true, child? Don’t lie, now. I’ll know.”

  “I… I…” Mala swallowed.

  Keen silently urged her to lie. After sitting through several of the Beekeeper’s circle sessions, Keen had come to the conclusion that his power to detect lies wasn’t omniscient. He was just a good guesser. But Keen couldn’t say that for sure.

  “Mala?” the Beekeeper said.


  “It’s… true,” Mala said. “I hate to rat out a fellow drone, but I followed her here. I stopped her before she damaged anything. I think she was just curious, Beekeeper.”

  “Please don’t do anything awful,” Keen begged. “I just wanted to see something besides the chipping cave and the cages. I’m so sorry.”

  The Beekeeper’s face was hard. “Bring her back to the cages,” he ordered the drones. “Mala, you should have caught this earlier and will have extra work duties in the coming days.”

  “Yes, sir,” Mala whispered.

  The drones hauled Keen to the cage room, where Ressler, Stuart, and John were already locked in.

  “Where have you been?” John asked. His bland face was pale, and lines were beginning to show.

  “Out and about,” Keen replied shortly.

  Once her door was shut, the Beekeeper entered.

  Stuart grasped the bars on his own cage. “We are the Hive, sir,” he said.

  “We are the Hive,” the Beekeeper said absently. “Elizabeth, I was most disappointed in you today. You were coming along splendidly, and then… this.”

  “I said I was sorry,” Keen said. “I want to learn, I do. I just… got bored. It’s a sin, I know. Please forgive me.”

  “Forgiveness must be earned,” the Beekeeper said, and Keen wondered if that was a rule, too. “During the next session, I think, we’ll take stronger measures. Meanwhile, Stuart, these are for you.”

  Pug opened Stuart’s cage and swapped out his thin foam mattress for a real one, thick and soft. He also gave him an extra blanket.

  “You will like these,” Pug told him.

  “Thank you, Beekeeper,” Stuart said, surprised.

  “Your sessions are going well,” the Beekeeper said. “Tomorrow your work shift will be in the Great Room.” And he left.

  “What did you do, Keen?” Ressler asked. He was pale and shaky, too. The imprisonment was showing on him.

  “I’ll tell you later,” Keen said.

  “I hate this place,” Ressler muttered.

  “Really?” Stuart tested out his mattress. “I’m quite coming to like it.”

  “Was that sarcasm?” Ressler growled. “Because I’m not in the mood for—”

  “Not at all, dear boy.” Stuart lay back with his hands behind his head as if he were in a fine hotel. A soft note entered his voice. “There’s less to think about here.”

  “What do you mean?” Keen said.

  “My—our—needs are taken care of,” Stuart said. “No money worries, no rent, no bills. And when I’m working, I’m not thinking about…” He trailed off.

  “Your wife—Vivian?” Keen hazarded.

  Stuart’s silence spoke for him.

  “How did she die?” Keen asked in her psychologist voice.

  A sigh from Stuart’s cage. “Not now. Not yet.”

  “I want the hell out of here,” John said. “And I can confess to that in that stupid circle tomorrow, and the next day, and the next.”

  “Tonight,” Ressler said. “We’re escaping tonight.”

  A pang went through Keen. Ressler wasn’t an experienced woodsman, and it didn’t seem likely he’d slip past the Hive’s watchful eyes. Not only that, but escaping would blow Keen’s opportunity to bring down the Hive from within. On the off-chance Ressler managed to get away and alert the FBI to their exact location, the FBI would lay siege to the place, resulting in a standoff every bit as bad as Waco. Worse, actually—the Hive had sarin gas and wasn’t afraid to use it. Keen thought of an army of FBI agents twisting and gasping on the forest floor, coughing up bloody foam as they died in agony. No, no, and no. She had to bring down the Beekeeper from within, and quickly.

  “Don’t, Ressler,” Keen said. “We need to stay here.”

  “Are you crazy? We need to get the hell out of this nutbag house of horrors.” Ressler held up a small object Keen couldn’t see very well because of the shadows in Ressler’s cell. “I managed to swipe this.”

  “What is it?” Keen asked tightly.

  “A way out,” Ressler said smugly. “Remember when I fell against that guard a while ago? That wasn’t an accident. Now I have his keys.”

  “Ressler—” Keen began.

  “You want to stay here?” Ressler interrupted.

  Keen bit her lip. She didn’t want to tell Ressler about the sarin gas in front of John and Stuart. The existence of a highly toxic, classified chemical weapon wasn’t something you talked about in front of civilians, especially criminal civilians. She needed to delay Ressler until she could find a way to let him in on it. But how?

  “Look, we need to talk about this,” she hedged. “But later, okay?”

  “When?” Ressler was already unlocking his handcuffs. They fell to his mattress with a soft thump. “We’re never alone.”

  That last was true. She tried again.

  “I need to talk with you about other stuff. Just… wait.”

  “Rules and regs, Keen.” Ressler sorted through the keys until he found a likely one and reached awkwardly through the bars to test it. It failed. “It’s our duty to escape as soon as possible. You know that.”

  “I’m with the young lady,” Stuart said. “It’s too risky. If you want to leave, just wait. Eventually they will find you.”

  They. The word wasn’t lost on Keen.

  “You won’t rat us out?” Ressler tried another key and twisted. The lock clicked.

  “Heaven forbid.” Stuart leaned against the bars. “Tomorrow I’m working in the main room.”

  Ressler slipped out of his cell. Keen whisper-shouted at him, “How are you going to get past all the drones?”

  “Easy,” Ressler said. “I’ll conk one out and take his mask. The others won’t know who I am until it’s too late.” He moved toward Keen’s cage, key outstretched. “Come on.”

  Keen snaked a hand through the bars and grabbed his wrist. “No.”

  Ressler’s blue eyes widened in surprise. “Are you serious?”

  “Don’t unlock that door, Ressler.”

  “They’ve gotten to you, haven’t they?” he said, shocked. “You believe it.”

  Keen wanted to protest that it wasn’t true. Then she saw it was her chance, and she took it.

  “We are the Hive, Ressler,” she said. “There is nothing else.”

  “Jesus,” he said. “I’ll get you out of here, okay? We’ll get some of the best psychologists to de-Hive you or whatever it’s called.”

  “Just go,” she whispered. “Before someone sees you.”

  “Take me with you.” John clutched at his own bars. “Please!”

  Keen retreated to the back of her cage. Stuart glanced at her and nodded in approval. She stared at him for a moment, then said, “You knew.”

  “Sorry?” said Stuart.

  “You knew about the Beekeeper and the Hive and how he operates before we got here. Before Reddington got here. You knew all about it. It’s why you came, isn’t it?”

  Stuart sank to his new mattress, looking incongruous in his green jumpsuit. Keen continued to expect him in a brown three-piece.

  “I said I wanted to get away. The memories are too much. The Hive will take them away. I made all my arrangements, and now I’m here. We are the Hive, you know.”

  Keen touched her chest. “We are the Hive.”

  Ressler, meanwhile, unlocked John the Bodysnatcher’s cage. He bolted out of it. Ressler stopped at Keen’s cage.

  “Think of Reddington. He wouldn’t want you in here, and he’s like a father to you. A twisted, bizarro-world father, but still. You coming?”

  “Go.” Keen turned her head away. “Don’t get caught.”

  “Let’s move,” John urged.

  The two of them ghosted up the tunnel and vanished.

  “That’s a pity,” Stuart said.

  “How do you mean?” Keen asked, trying not to worry about Ressler and failing.

  “It’s going to be difficult for you, working in that room all by yours
elf.”

  A commotion broke out down the hallway. Shouts. Screams. Thuds. The high-pitched zip of a taser. More shouts. Keen found she was holding the cage bars in both hands and pressing her face to the space between them, trying to hear and see. Her heart sang in her ears and her knuckles were white. What had—?

  A set of drone guards appeared dragging a semi-conscious Ressler and John the Bodysnatcher back into the cage room. Ressler hung between two drones and was bleeding from a split lip. Keen trembled with outrage and impotence inside her cage. What had they done to him? Damn it, she should have gone with him. John was struggling with his own guards, but to no effect. Behind them strolled the Beekeeper himself. The drones opened cages and flung both men inside.

  “I wish I could say I was shocked, Donald,” Dr. Griffin said through the bars, “but… well, you can probably guess how I’d finish that sentence. Every time we get a fresh batch, someone tries to escape at right about this stage in the process. Did you think I don’t know how this works? It’s quite orderly. You are quite orderly. The little boy in you was told by his daddy to escape, and so he tried. I don’t blame you for it, Donald. I admire you. But you must be corrected.”

  Ressler only groaned from his thin mattress. John glared sullenly. Keen bit her hands to keep quiet.

  “Here’s something else I know.” The Beekeeper tapped Ressler’s bars. “From here on out, it goes faster and easier. I suggest you sleep as best you can. Tomorrow we really start in. On all of you. We are the Hive.”

  Stuart tapped his chest. “We are the Hive.”

  Keen touched her own chest. “We are the Hive.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Raymond Reddington never paced. He never cracked his knuckles. He never twisted his hands or bit his nails. Every one of those behaviors betrayed fear or agitation, and he had ruthlessly quashed them, even when no one was looking. Instead, he indulged in very expensive twenty-year-old Scotch poured over ice made with energy drained from a star ninety-three million miles away. A long sip burned all the way down.

  “Don’t sweat it,” said Mr. Brimley from the loveseat opposite Reddington’s chair. He was leafing through a three-year-old copy of People. “Really. It’ll be fine.”