Fires of Midnight

by Jon Land

  “Who’ve been disconnected from themselves, sometimes as a result of electric shock. Sometimes epilepsy or another seizure disorder. Apparent symptoms may be different but inside what’s going on is the same. This bark works inside.”

  Susan looked at him disparagingly. “Oral administration?”

  “Not quite. Watch.”

  Darkfeather poured a hefty portion of the reddish ground bark into a small black frying pan and added a half ounce of water. He stirred the contents briefly, softening the gritty texture of the bark, and then added the rest of the ounce. After more mixing, he fastened the pan into the wire holders placed low over the sweet-smelling fire inside the tepee.

  “Takes a few minutes.”

  “Then what?”

  “You’ll see.”

  Susan leaned over to inspect the pan’s contents more closely. Its texture had already changed from moisture-starved bark to a pastelike compound that looked like wet clay. Darkfeather placed another, much smaller amount of the bark in a plate and added enough water to turn it sticky. Then he rolled a wooden spoon about in the reddish muck until the curved end came away with a thick coating.

  “Know why I’m doing this, Doctor?”

  “You want to stir the contents heating up in the pan, but you don’t want any wood fibers from the spoon to disturb the chemistry.”

  “Very good,” the Indian said honestly. “There’s hope for you yet.” Darkfeather moved his coated spoon into the pan suspended over the fire and began to stir gently, careful never to bring the spoon all the way out of the mixture. The paste took on the texture of watery oatmeal. It bubbled in places, coagulated in others. Darkfeather tried to keep the mix as consistent as possible. As he did so, Susan noticed the smell for the first time. The first thought that came to mind was dried leaves being burned on an autumn day, until an almost sickeningly sweet smell began to permeate the tepee seconds later.

  “Aroma’s part of the therapy, Doctor,” Darkfeather explained. “Don’t ask me why, but breathing the vapors seems to work together with topical application in effecting healing.”

  When the contents were thoroughly bubbling, he lifted the pan from the wire slats and placed it alongside Joshua Wolfe’s midsection.

  “Okay,” Darkfeather continued, “here we go … .”

  He grasped what looked like a paintbrush from his open rucksack and dipped it into the bubbling bark-turned-paste. Then he brought the bristles down upon Joshua Wolfe’s exposed torso and brushed it first over the marks the prods had left. The boy cringed involuntarily when the paste met his flesh, whether from the compound’s heat or the effects of its contents, Susan wasn’t sure. Darkfeather kept smearing it on, looking like an artist at work on a human canvas, until the whole of the boy’s stomach and chest up to his neck were covered. Then he covered the boy’s face with it, massaging an extra amount in across his temples and squeezing it through his hair to his scalp.

  “I guess I shouldn’t ask how this works,” Susan said.

  “You can but I couldn’t answer you because I don’t know. And, like traditional medicine, it doesn’t always.” He leaned back and inspected his finished product. “We’ll know by dawn. Either way.”

  Thurman reached the fat man shortly after midnight, caught him munching on something and was glad when the fat man chose not to bring whatever it was into the conversation.

  “We’ve found McCracken,” Thurman reported.

  “Splendid. How?”

  “Calls made to a contact who’s en route to him now.”

  “I would have expected anyone working with McCracken to utilize more secure equipment.”

  “It’s the most secure available anywhere: he obtained it from us. It pays to hold on to the necessary ciphers.”

  “What about the boy?”

  “With McCracken, if he’s still alive.”

  “Either way, this must be finished. You’ll handle it personally?”

  “Of course.”

  “I have already arranged for the personnel required to eliminate the remaining traces at Mount Jackson. There must be no links back to us. No evidence any of this ever occurred. Understood?”

  “Clearly.”

  The fat man took a relaxed, easy breath. “You know, Thurman, I’m beginning to think we may salvage some measure of success, after all.”

  “We need to talk, Blainey.”

  Wareagle had found McCracken within sight of the tepee looking out over the vast fields of the reservation.

  “How are things going in there, Indian?”

  “Will Darkfeather is treating the boy with the old ways.”

  “Doctors know best … .”

  “That is not what we must speak of, Blainey.”

  Blaine caught the note of urgency in Johnny’s voice. “Go on.” “Chief Silver Cloud was expecting us.”

  McCracken shrugged. “Yeah, I got that impression.”

  “He expects others as well.”

  “Group Six?”

  “He is not sure.”

  “You think he’s right?”

  Wareagle’s gaze was noncommittal. “He was right about us.”

  A hot night wind blew past them. McCracken stiffened against it. “They show up, you got a plan?”

  “I do,” came the leathery voice of Chief Silver Cloud from behind them.

  Alan Killebrew came awake with a start and reached for his cup of bittertasting, overly strong coffee. Before him, through the glass of the observation room, the Level 4 isolation lab was deserted. Killebrew rolled his chair closer to the glass and ran his hands over his face. How long had he been sleeping? Long enough for someone else to have entered the lab to confirm the contamination he had reported? No. When they realized no such contamination had taken place, they would have confronted him for all the undue stress he had caused.

  Beyond that, he doubted anyone at the Mount Jackson facility would risk entering a contaminated area. He clung to the hope that his cover story would hold until Susan Lyle finally returned his desperate calls. She had told him to trust no one but her, hinted there was something more going on here she wasn’t ready to discuss yet. He had left a number of messages just as she had instructed him to, but none of them had been returned. Perhaps the CDC was responsible for her disappearance. Perhaps they would be coming for him next.

  Killebrew returned the coffee to the sill in front of the glass. The highoctane caffeine and the secret he was harboring had combined to turn him into a jittery paranoid. He realized that if there was any way other personnel could have watched him they would, just as a sanitation team would have stormed the lab if Level 4 hadn’t been sealed off from the rest of the complex.

  But that wouldn’t hold Dr. Furlong Gage, director of the CDC, back much longer.

  “Dr. Killebrew.”

  Gage alone had the codes that could open the magnetic locks currently keeping Level 4 inaccessible. So far Killebrew had given him no reason for activating them.

  “Dr. Killebrew.”

  Hours had passed, though, since their last conversation and Killebrew found himself out of both answers and explanations.

  “Killebrew!”

  Killebrew realized he’d been dozing again and snapped alert, jarred by Gage’s voice over the speaker.

  “Here, sir.”

  “You will vacate Level Four immediately.”

  “Sir, my readings—”

  “—do not jibe at all with the off-site analyses. If Dr. Lyle put you up to this, I want to know now.”

  Killebrew stiffened in his wheelchair.

  “If you are a party to what she is involved in, I suggest you own up while there is still time.”

  “I don’t know what you’re—”

  “Dr. Lyle is currently a fugitive from the law, Dr. Killebrew. I am asking you to cooperate in helping us uncover what damage she has done. I am told she purposefully contaminated the hot zone in Cambridge because she was involved in an unauthorized experiment.”

  Killebrew’s
mouth dropped.

  “It went wrong and she got caught,” Gage continued. “I am offering you a chance to save yourself, Dr. Killebrew. The proper authorities are standing by. The—”

  Killebrew slammed the disconnect button and steadied his hands on the wheels of his chair. This was worse than he or Susan possibly could have imagined. His gaze turned back toward the isolation lab beyond the glass.

  They want the organism. That’s what all this must be about … .

  There was nothing he could do about the bodies stored in another section of the complex. But he could destroy his own records and conclusions. Make them start from scratch and pray to God that Susan got the truth out before they caught up with her, too.

  First the doors. Short out the magnetic seals. Make them cut through steel to reach him. Buy himself a few extra minutes, anyway.

  All he needed.

  Chief Silver Cloud gazed into the west, toward the hills and past what the moon could claim from the night. “The Valley of the Dead,” was all he said.

  “An ancient burial ground, Blainey,” Wareagle explained, “built on the site of a legendary battle. Sacred and tremendously powerful.”

  “It has been a last line of defense for our people for centuries,” the old chief picked up. “It has advantages too great for any opponent to overcome. We are prepared for this. Since times long forgotten, we have been prepared.”

  “If battle does come, the landscape of the valley will give us what we need,” added Johnny. Some of the confidence drained from his face. “But there’s one catch, Blainey, and you’re not going to like it … .”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  “You want the duty?” Darkfeather asked Susan.

  “My pleasure,” Susan replied, hoping it meant he would leave her to start treating Josh on her own.

  “Okay here’s how it goes. In two hours, you need to apply a fresh coating of the bark over the initial one.” He placed the black pan containing the hardened paste between the two of them. “Reheat this until it softens and begins to bubble again. Clear?”

  Susan nodded.

  “You don’t need to put on as much this time and you don’t have to wipe the original layer off. It’ll look different smeared atop that layer instead of on flesh, but don’t worry. It’s strong enough to permeate right through. Clear?”

  She made herself nod again.

  “Check his vitals every twenty minutes and come get me if you think there’s a problem.”

  Darkfeather rebundled the contents of his makeshift rucksack, rose and slid through the break in the tepee. Susan had her hand on the medical bag he had left behind when the sound of his voice made her stop short of reaching inside.

  “It isn’t medicine or even the bark that will help him now, Doctor,” Darkfeather said, only his face visible inside the tepee. “Your spirit is close with the cub’s. Alone the two will join and he will feed off your strength. That’s why I’m leaving you alone with him. You have plenty of strength to spare.”

  Susan moved her hand away from his medical bag.

  “Sacred land,” Chief Silver Cloud elaborated for Johnny, “must not be defiled.”

  “You’re telling me we can’t kill any of them, right?” Blaine asked, even though the answer was clear.

  “Not if we expect the spirits who call the land home to aid us, Blainey,” said Wareagle. “Nor can we use any weapons not available to the tribe who fought the original battle.”

  “Bad guys won’t be up on the rule changes.”

  “Our advantage.”

  “They’re going to bring plenty of firepower.”

  “That is all the better,” broke in Chief Silver Cloud. “In the battle of legend, ten braves held off five hundred of the enemy long enough for the rest of the tribe to flee.”

  “That how many we’re going to have with us?”

  “We will have eight, Blainey. The two of us makes ten.”

  “All you will need, just as it was all that was needed in times before,” added Silver Cloud.

  “What about the rest of the village?” Blaine asked the old chief.

  “They are my responsibility. It will be now as it was then.”

  “You’re prepared.”

  “Part of surviving the present is reliving the past.”

  “Be nice if there was a future for us, too, after today.”

  Joshua Wolfe came around slowly. The first thing he remembered was trying to open his eyes. In that instant all of his other motor skills seemed to shut down. He could not feel his hands or feet, much less make them move. It felt like all his limbs were asleep at once. He tried to speak but his lips wouldn’t budge either, and his tongue felt bloated and swollen, his mouth like someone had taken sandpaper to its inside.

  “Josh? … Come on, Josh. Wake up. You can do it, I know you can.” A familiar voice, soothing and warm. He felt pressure on one of his hands, recognized it was someone squeezing. He made himself squeeze back, trying to summon the effort. When at last he managed to open his eyes he could make out the shape of Susan Lyle hovering over him, taking his other hand in hers now.

  “Can you hear me? Do you know who I am?”

  He muttered her name and watched the tears brimming in her eyes as the life drained back into him like water filling a glass.

  “Where am I?” he managed, turning his head to look about.

  “An Indian reservation.”

  “What?”

  “Long story.”

  “Doesn’t feel like I’m going anywhere anytime soon.”

  He felt Susan’s arms slide around him and draw him close. Josh feebly returned her embrace, not wanting to let go.

  “You saved my life,” she said when they finally parted. “You saved my life.”

  “Least I could do,” he managed in a scratchy voice. “You’re the only one who’s tried to help me since Harry Lime.”

  “There’s someone else now.”

  “Harry Lime’s friend,” Susan said after Josh had managed to sit up, crossing his legs gingerly before him. “He saved both of us back there at Group Six.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Outside. I can get him.”

  “No, not yet. I wanna just … sit here for a while.” Josh slid closer to the fire, seeming to notice the paste painted onto his exposed chest for the first time. “I’ve read about stuff like this. What is it, do you know?”

  “Some kind of bark.”

  Josh sniffed at a portion on his arm. “Strong.”

  “So long as it worked.”

  “Just like CLAIR,” Josh said.

  He stared at the fire for what seemed like a long time before speaking again. “I did a lot of thinking while I was inside Group Six. It’s what I do best, you know—think. I don’t know where it all comes from. I don’t know how I do it. At least I didn’t used to. Now I know about Operation Offspring. I know my parents were a pair of test tubes Dr. Haslanger put together. He could even be my father. I do take after him. We both have … ghosts. And we’re both murderers.”

  “That’s not tr—”

  “Yes, it is. And we both do what we do in the name of science and progress. Motivations don’t really matter, only results.” Josh wrapped his arms around himself, shivering slightly. “I wanted to make things better. I wanted to make a difference. I wanted people to … like me. Harry did and he’s dead. I know that now; I guess I did all along. You did and you were almost killed. McCracken might but if he couldn’t save Harry, why should I think he can save me?”

  “Because it’s what he does and he’s good at it.”

  “Just like I’m good at what I do. That’s why I let them catch me and bring me to Group Six. I needed a way to take care of myself, to keep them off me for good, hold them back. I would have told you about it as soon as we were out, but then …” He took a deep breath. “Nobody can save me, except me, and that’s just what I’m going to do.”

  “Sentence yourself to a life alone with only your obsession for company? It�
��ll follow you everywhere, determine everything. Believe me, I know.”

  “How?”

  “I’ve been there. I am there.”

  “Not where I am, not even close. If you’ve got a home to go back to, you’ve got a choice. I don’t have either anymore. Before Cambridge I still had a chance, but afterwards—no way. I can’t own up to what I did because it would just set more Group Six types after me. So what do I do? Go back to Fuchs and hide at Group Six, help him and Haslanger kill more people? I think you get my point. See, you were right about the existence of that second vial of CLAIR. I hid it in the Magic Kingdom where nobody will ever be able to find it except me.”

  Josh felt suddenly for the pocket of his jeans and relaxed when he found the vial of clear liquid he’d produced at Group Six bulging out from the fabric. “Thing is, it all comes back to that first poem I wrote that you liked so much.”

  “‘The Fires of Midnight.’”

  “I finally understand what the fires are and what they’re for. And you know what else?”

  “No.”

  “Midnight’s coming anytime I want.”

  McCracken turned when he heard the footsteps emerging from the tepee, expecting to see Susan Lyle instead of the figure of Joshua Wolfe stumbling almost drunkenly toward him.

  “I guess I should thank you,” he said, stopping a cold five feet away.

  “Don’t bother.”

  “I know who you are. Harry showed me pictures all the time. He said you were the best friend he ever had. That’s why you came to Group Six, wasn’t it? You were looking for the ones who killed him.”

  “Yes.”

  Tears started running down Josh’s cheeks and he brushed them aside. “Why’d they do it? Harry of all people … He’d never hurt anyone.”

  “They thought he could hurt them, I guess. Harry … couldn’t handle being alone. When he was with people he was okay. Like when he was part of the team during the war, or when he was with you. But after you left he lost touch a little. Ended up thinking you’d been stolen from him. He came to me for help. Wanted me to find you. Told me you were his son and that you’d been kidnapped.”