Control: Out of the Box (The Girl in the Box Book 38)

by Robert J. Crane

  Day was fading, and the cloud cover above had broken to allow a pretty orange glow to light the sky. It was hard to believe I'd been running around this city all day, though I was definitely feeling it. The adrenaline was pumping again – slightly. Hopefully enough to get me through this confrontation.

  No one said anything as I jogged along the reflecting pool, the waters nearly still under the sunny glow of the clouds. It wasn't hard to pick out where I was supposed to be heading.

  Fifty or sixty shadowy figures stood in front of the World War II Memorial, cast in shadow by the low, diffused sunlight. In their midst, standing tall above them, was Mr. Smokeskin, a head above the rest and in perfect position for a sniper to take his skull off. If that sort of thing had worked on him at all.

  Nobody on that side of the pool was moving, like, at all. Behind me, toward the Lincoln Memorial, a crowd was being held back by the police, and they had a normal level of chatter. A couple people shouted, SLAY QUEEN! A couple people shouted less favorable things. But there was chatter, there was breath, there was normality.

  On the steps to the World War II monument, though, it was like an eerie army was waiting to break loose on me. I traced a path along the edge of the reflecting pool, in no particular hurry since Mr. Smokeskin seemed to be waiting patiently.

  I stopped between the steps and the pool, looking up at him over the heads of the crowd. “You call, I came, and in thirty minutes or less. No pizza, but I brought you a lifetime supply of knuckle sandwiches. The fine print on them says that those who enjoy my fine knuckle sandwiches could see their lifetime greatly reduced, thus reducing the amount of such prizes they will receive, but–”

  “You talk...too much,” Mr. Smokeskin said in a grainy, rumbling voice.

  “I'm a woman, that's a pretty common, sexist complaint from dudes against us,” I said, deciding to push him a little further because...why the hell not? “Still, I showed up. Didn't keep you waiting forever, in case you were going to complain about that next. Though if you say one word about my hair, I'm going to shove that giant obelisk behind you straight up your smoky ass.”

  Mr. Smokeskin just stared at me. “Can you hear me?”

  I looked around, slightly theatrically. “Yeah. I'm not deaf. Why?”

  He pointed over my head, to the crowd and the police beyond. “Can you hear me? Do you see me now... Morris Johannsen?”

  “Sorry, I don't know who that is...” I looked around. “Is...is Morris here right now?” I stared at him. It. Whatever. “Are you Morris?”

  Mr. Smokeskin rumbled. “Morris Johannsen is the editor of the Washington Free Press...” He looked over my head, and I realized he was playing to the cameras, talking to someone who wasn't even here. “...And a member of the Network that is behind all these evils.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  Chapman

  JOHANNSEN: WHAT THE?! I just got doxxed on national television!

  KORY: Did you really, tho? Doxxing means exposing your name or your address or email or phone number. This was just you getting outed as part of our group.

  Chapman almost buried his head in his hands. At least it was Johannsen and not himself. Though this presented some new challenges. Johannsen knew everything about them, after all.

  Whatever. He'd deal with the implications later.

  BYRD: yeah can confirm it definitely went out on all channels lol your ass is hanging in the breeze

  So helpful.

  CHAPMAN: Someone needs to shut this thing down.

  CHALKE: Nealon's on it.

  “Great,” Chapman muttered. “That ought to fix everything.” He switched windows to Devin. “You got those cameras yet?”

  “Yes!” Devin shouted, and the window opened on Jaime's screen proffering the gateway into the camera system. He took it, zipping right in and opening up a clearer window. Now he had a bird's-eye view of Nealon staring from the reflecting pool to this sonofabitch who was threatening to expose them all.

  “Who are you?” Chapman muttered.

  “You...you talking to me?” Devin asked.

  “No – yes,” Chapman said. “I want to know what this thing is. Did you facial scan that crowd yet?”

  “Yeah,” Devin said. “No matches on the crowd around the...uh...creature? Not really sure what it is. I mean, I thought the thing that broke into our HQ was weird looking, but this–”

  “Focus,” Chapman said. “Scan the crowd that's being held back by the cops. And–” He froze, thinking. “Wait. What did you compare the faces of those hostages to?”

  “Anyone who's come in contact with Nealon since we started the FaceTrack web around her,” Devin said. “Plus her known associates. That was what you asked for.”

  “Expand the database,” Chapman said. “To all Socialite users – US first, then go international.” He leaned back in his chair. “Run the hostages through first, then expand to who's in the crowd near the Lincoln Memorial. I want a list of names.”

  “Well, okay, but,” Devin said, sounding a little abashed, “wouldn't it be easier to just use the location services hack in the Socialite app to ID the hostages?”

  Jaime froze. Once again, Devin surprised him by knowing something he shouldn't have about the app's backdoor capabilities. Sure, it wasn't a huge secret, but still...to hear it talked about casually like this by someone he was relying on...

  Whatever. He'd deal with Devin later, too. Once this was over, lots of accounts were going to get settled.

  “Do it,” Chapman said, as he turned his attention back to what was happening both on screen and in the Escapade app. Johannsen was having a meltdown, of course. Well, couldn't be helped, at least not right now. There were other, more important things afoot.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  Morris Johannsen

  It couldn't possibly get any worse.

  “Dear God,” Morris Johannsen breathed, torn between watching the television feed in the corner of his office and glancing down at the Escapade app on his phone, which he squeezed tightly in his hand.

  It was all falling apart. He'd just been called out – on national television, no less!

  Was it hot in here? It certainly felt hot.

  Johannsen was standing behind his desk, staring at the feed when the knock at the door almost sent him into a panic attack. Was that tightness in his chest?

  “What?” he shrilled.

  “Hey boss,” his secretary, Rita, said. She was a woman in her late thirties, and she had an almost pitying expression on her face. “Sorry to bother you, but...”

  Johannsen swallowed. “Have you any idea what you are interrupting?” His voice was high, even to his own ears. Such was his panic.

  She hesitated, glancing over her shoulder. There were a couple TVs in the bullpen, and yes, they were tuned, live, to the events at the reflecting pool. His own reporters were sneaking glances at him over Rita's shoulder. Whispering. Wondering about him.

  “What is it?” he cried plaintively. If only he could get her out of here and get back to the business at hand. He locked his phone, putting it down. The Network could wait. After all, none of them were facing being outed.

  Johannsen could barely see in front of his nose at this point. His breath was coming heavy, knees feeling a little wobbly.

  “There's a delivery for you,” Rita said. She looked like she wanted to turn and run from his office as fast as possible. “It requires your signature.”

  He took five breaths in three seconds. Was he hyperventilating? It seemed likely. “Not now,” he said, waving her off.

  Rita hesitated. “He insisted. Said you needed to sign for it...?”

  “I don't feel up to signing for anything right now!” Johannsen cried. “Just leave me b–”

  Johannsen wobbled as a stabbing pain shot through the center of his chest. He clutched at himself, trying to find the knife that had surely just been plunged there–

  There was no knife. No blood. His fingers came away wet, but only from the sweat
that already slicked them.

  Johannsen looked up, panicked, at Rita. His breath was gone, and he gasped.

  “Mr. Johannsen...?” Rita asked.

  Johannsen tumbled back into his chair, the frame squeaking under the sudden violence of his entire weight, and it slid back a foot. He twitched in the chair, jerking and spasming as the pain overwhelmed him, a hot blade plunged into his chest and twisted, turned, ripping through flesh–

  But there was no blood. His vision blackened at the corners, but it was all pain, all pain and no blood and he couldn't breathe–

  “Mr. Johannsen!” Rita shrieked from somewhere in the darkness surrounding him. “Call the paramedics! He's having a heart attack!”

  The last thing that passed through Morris Johannsen's mind before he tumbled off the chair and lay, dying, upon the floor, was the realization that at least he'd gone out before it had gotten any worse.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  Sienna

  “That's a new one for me,” I said, looking around, waiting to see what Mr. Smokeskin did next. He'd just named a member of the Network, after all, and that wasn't nothing. Maybe for an encore he'd name a few more. Make my job easier for once.

  “Do you feel the troubles settling on you, Johannsen?” Mr. Smokeskin said. Tendrils of black wafted off his bizarre silhouette. He didn't look human, but he wasn't entirely alien, either. He looked like something between; a man-like form with smoke and ooze composed of pure ebony. “Do you feel that black despair in the pit of your stomach now that everyone knows that you are one of the conspirators at the heart of this dark business?”

  “Wow, that's super dramatic,” I said under my breath, staring at Mr. Smokeskin surrounded by his hostages. The sun was nearing setting, and the orange tint that was being held back by the cloud cover lent the whole scene a surreal feeling, aided by the unmoving figures around my...foe? Probable foe. It had kicked my ass once already, after all.

  I wasn't going to start a fight until he indicated he was going for it, though I needed to do something about those hostages soon. We were being watched by the whole world, and I was supposed to resolve this situation.

  “Now you are exposed, Johannsen!” Mr. Smokeskin shouted to the heavens. “Revel in the misery your deeds earn you!”

  “Hey, uh...you mind letting some of those people go?” I asked, gesturing to the crowd assembled around him. “It's getting close to dinnertime, after all, and these fine people probably need to get back to their pods.”

  The response was immediate, though not from Mr. Smokeskin. The crowd, as one, looked directly at me.

  And their eyes glowed green.

  “Wow, that's creepy,” I said. “I'm seeing a lot of glowing eyes lately. Is this like a motif in my life right now? Curious because if so, I'd like to know what it represents. Is it an 'all-seeing eyes are always watching you' kind of thing? Because lemme tell you, I feel that.”

  “SILENCE.” Smokeskin's voice bellowed out. I almost took a step back it was so powerful. He looked right at me. “You stand between me...and them.”

  “...I do?” This was news to me. “Well, let me know and I'll move. I'm really just here for the hostages, you can have your fun with the Network for all the damns I give.”

  Smokeskin looked at me. His oddball, mind-controlled hostages looked at me, too, and I felt a little chill run through me. It was warm; the chill was out of place, and not prompted by the weather. Standing in the orange glow of sunset diffused by clouds, I stared at the hostages, who stared back at me, not remotely looking like they wanted to go back to their pods. At least not peacefully.

  I'd been here before, staring down a flotilla of mind-controlled hostages as a madman sicced them on me.

  Almost before the thought had completed, the hostages leapt into motion, as one, driven forward by a singular mind and toward a single target–

  Me.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

  Reed

  Eden Prairie, Minnesota

  “No...” Reed watched the television screen, riveted, just the same as everyone else in the office. The scene at the Lincoln Memorial was playing out in the worst possible way, the way that of course it would have. He'd known the moment he'd seen those poor people lined up in their little formation around the bad guy that it was going to go this way.

  “History repeats itself,” Augustus Coleman whispered from where he sat on the chair across from Reed. Jamal was next to him, Angel, Olivia and Eilish watching out in the bullpen. Scott had gone home early, and Kat was in LA. All present were silent, even as the action began on both the office televisions.

  Reed just closed his eyes rather than watch the mind-controlled hostages rush his sister, because it really was history repeating itself.

  “It's the Eden Prairie incident all over again,” Augustus said, as they all watched the figures flood toward Sienna, feral savagery evident in their faces.

  “And she's got less powers to stop them now than she did then,” Reed whispered, squeezing his eyes tight. He couldn't even bring himself to watch it all go wrong.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  Sienna

  Being bum rushed by a shit lot of hostages was not my idea of a fun way to spend my evening, especially when I really could have gone for a nice dinner at home, some Pad Thai and a glass of milk (no alcohol, remember).

  Not a plethora of angry, charged-up people running at me, screaming for my blood.

  And, oh, were they screaming.

  It was really quite bone-chilling. Or it might have chilled the bones in colder weather. It being a warm-ish summer night, the sound was doing plenty fine working my already tattered nerves all on its own, without any chilling effects.

  I fell back under the assault, retreating around the bend in the pool. Two leading members of the crowd rushed toward me like water overflowing the bounds of a boiling pot on the stove. They flooded around the edge of the reflecting pool, and I dodged their clumsy attacks, which amounted to rushing at me with hands extended.

  “Hey, guys, we really need to talk about this,” I said, dodging the next attack. Group of them, really, because the problem here wasn't any of the swipes or thrusts or hissing charges of any one of the members of this shadow mob on their own.

  It was that as a crowd, as a collective, they could surround me, beat me down, and give me the option of either laying down and dying or fighting back and killing...whoever these hostages were.

  Unpalatable. That's how I found those choices.

  If one were watching with a partially objective eye – or hell, even if one were blind and deaf and had the situation explained to them by Annie Sullivan spelling it into their palm, the symbolism would be obvious.

  It was The Eden Prairie Massacre, Part II: Wrath of Sienna.

  “No! No!” I shouted, my protestations having no effect on the swarming crowd trying to surround me. I was taking leaping steps back but they were coming at me hard around the edge of the pool, and I was completely cognizant of the crowd of gawkers penned up by the DC police at a “safe” distance behind me, camera phones still extended in the air to provide a view to the entire world of what was happening.

  Every step back I took brought me closer to the innocents in the crowd behind me, so I made a split decision and opted to leave the ground.

  A pivot and a backflip landed me in the middle of the reflecting pool. It was only about a foot and a half deep, and I splashed in up to my knees as I came down. I didn't fall over, though, so that was something.

  The hostages swarmed at the edge of the pool uncertainly, halting at the water's edge, and I wondered for a moment if I'd stymied them.

  Then they looked at the crowd to their left, and I knew I had seconds to act.

  “Hey-yahhhhhh!” I shouted, and charged toward the steps up to the World War II Memorial. Mr. Smokeskin was still standing there, waiting, his crowd having departed his side and left him all alone.

  My shouts drew the mob's attention, and they swarmed against the w
ater's edge as I took great, splashing leaps through the reflecting pool, sending mighty ripples in all directions as I stormed toward Mr. Smokeskin. No point involving the hostages, or letting them run wild into the crowd by losing their attention. I was loud, I was leaping more for purposes of drawing the eye than being efficient in my movement, every landing causing an immense splash.

  They watched me from the edge of the pool, leering, clearly unwilling to step down into the water with me. I covered the distance to the far edge and stopped, just a couple feet from the concrete surround. I stared up into the face of Mr. Smokeskin and glared. “What? Your mind control powers fail if you get your collectible minifigs wet?”

  He just stood there, still looking pretty large against the backdrop of the monument. There was no real expression to tell from his face, but he cocked his head at me. “You defend them.”

  “The Network? Are you freaking kidding me?” I asked. “I'm investigating them. You stole my evidence or I'd have already been all over them like reporters on an open bar.”

  He cocked his head the other way. “Do...do reporters heavily hit open bars?”

  “Yeah, there was a study about how their consumption of alcohol is off the charts – say, are we going to fight?” I put my fists up, more for theatrics. “Because I'm not trying to stand between you and the Network.” I turned my head to look back at the crowd with great significance. “I will stand between you and the people, though.” The crowd of his minions was inching around the pool, but they were not rushing toward me any longer.

  When I turned back, Smokeskin was right there, in my face, and he reached out, enveloping me, black tendrils tightly surrounding me. He said, loud enough for them to hear it on the other side of the pool, “You don't get it. The Network's purpose is consume the people – to use them. To lead them.”