by Keith Hughes
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: Duplicate Danger
Tuesday, June 8, 2010, 9:44 a.m.
Deciding where to dump a body was a delicate thing. Even with his experience at various murder sites, Ness had never considered the idea such an activity engendered. Obviously, finding a location to place the evidence without being seen became a key factor. In an urban environment, that became a difficult task, as few locales lacked eyes either organic or mechanical.
Only a few ticks of the minute hand had passed since they had subdued Harrison at the Walmart, and the driver still lay passed out in the back of the van. Ness parked behind a medical office a few blocks south of the shopping center. It was closed for the day, which made it an ideal location for their purpose. Angie opened the van's rear doors, and Ness struggled to roll Harrison’s inert form out the back. His back ached in a familiar way, reminding him of the trouble they had pulling the driver’s dead weight from his seat a few minutes earlier. Man, this guy is heavy.
Angie pulled from outside, and in spite of the resistance of the driver's weight, they were eventually able to slide him out the back to land heavily on the pavement. Ness hopped out of the van, grabbed Harrison's arms, and pulled him toward another set of dumpsters. They bound his wrists and ankles with plastic restraints Angie had found during her search of the vehicle. Ness left the sleeping driver behind the rusty containers, pretty much hidden from the road. As Angie closed the rear doors, he glanced along the alley to ensure that no one from the far end would see what they were up to.
A spray of warm liquid on the side of his face gave Ness his first indication of something gone wrong. A coppery smell he was all too familiar with assailed his nostrils. He spun to look at Angie and staggered to a stop. She was standing at the rear of the vehicle with an expression of terror on her face and a horrifying gash in her throat. Blood spat from the wound in arterial pulses, each one weaker than the last. Ness had been covered in Angie's blood, stained by the essence of her life. His insane counterpart from the future was standing behind her, grinning with triumphant glee as his wife bled out.
Stunned, Ness could only stare at the gore as Angie slumped lifelessly to the ground. He resisted his biting grief and instead transformed that debilitating emotion into a paroxysmal ire focused on his doppelganger. He scowled at his double even as he used his PDA to disappear. Ness pulled his own device out and set it to jump back one minute then took a position close to where his demented self had stood and tapped the button.
Seconds after he arrived, Ness saw the ragged man appear before him and bring the gleaming blade to bear. Angie was standing with her back to them, unaware of either of them. Ness lowered his shoulder and body-checked the madman into the rear of the van. His future copy gave an oof as he bounced off the metal.
“Goddamn it, stop trying to kill her!” Ness shouted. He gripped the dingy shirt and punched him across the jaw. Something clattered to the ground, and he looked to see a chef's knife.
“Angie must die,” Future Ness wheezed.
“What happened?”
Angie's voice pulled Ness’s attention from his double. Her eyes widened as she took in his blood-splattered shirt and face.
“This guy,” Ness said, indicating the groaning man he was still holding with a jerk of his head. “He managed to kill you again.”
Angie paled, clearly deducing that the blood covering him was hers. The would-be assassin took advantage of the distraction and pulled free. Before Ness could react, he had his PDA in hand and tapped the screen to disappear again.
“Crap,” Ness said.
“Indeed.” Another copy of him came to stand beside Angie. It was his original self, the one he would return to when he finished his jaunt in time.
Ness gave the couple a quick wave with a bloody hand. “Be seeing you.” He tapped his PDA screen.
Suddenly, he was standing next to Angie, clean of her blood. Once again, he had two sets of memories, one in which Angie had been killed, and the other in which she had been saved. Am I going to fill my head with duplicate memories if I keep doing this? How many horrific scenes of Angie dying can I accumulate before the weight of them drives me as insane as the older me?
Ness mentally shunted the questions away. Each time he used the device, he trod new ground, and like all explorers of the unknown, the ultimate ramifications of his actions could not be predicted.
They were only a mile or so from the Walmart, and Ness wanted to get some more distance from the Things before Intellisys located the van. He did not want to risk the vehicle having a tracking device, though Harrison seemed to be telling the truth. They might have to gamble, however, as having transportation was infinitely better than relying on buses and cabs. Sliding into the driver's seat, Ness sniffed as an unpleasant odor came to him.
Angie sat in the passenger’s seat with the Walmart bag in her hand. She took off her flats then pulled a pair of sneakers out of the bag, ripped the tags off them, and put them on. With a contented sigh, she sat back and regarded her new footwear.
“If I’m not mistaken, you made that guy pee his pants,” Ness said as he put the van in gear.
Angie looked over at him a little guiltily. “I kind of lost it, huh?”
Ness glanced back with a small smile. “Well, you looked like a Valkyrie having a bad day,” he said as he pulled the van out of the alley and back into traffic. “Fortunately, Thing Three couldn't see much of your face.”
“Why?”
“Because if he'd gotten a good look at your expression, he would have lost what little bladder control he managed to hang onto.” Ness gave her a wry grin. “I was glad you were mad at him and not me.”
Ness chuckled, but Angie did not. She looked tense and flustered, and he couldn't blame her, given that she had multiple people trying to do her harm. When she wiped tears from her eyes, he squeezed her shoulder. It was a poor substitute for the hug he sensed she needed.
“Seeing the pen, knowing it must contain the poison your double told us about, brought that reality alive for me. It would have happened, but for him.” Angie shuddered. “I became so unbelievably scared and angry, and in an instant, I wanted to lash out.”
Ness took her hand in his. She gripped his fingers and gave him a tearful smile.
“Guess it's a good thing I'm on your side,” she said.
“I'm thankful for that every day.” Ness’s serious tone had fresh tears welling in her eyes.
Seconds passed as they sat in silence, listening to the traffic as Ness drove along the city streets.
“So what do we do with it?” Angie indicated the EpiPen stuffed in one of the cup holders and safely ensconced in a clear plastic storage tube.
Ness frowned. It was such a simple device yet represented so much pain and suffering. “I don't know. We should probably keep it,” he said.
“Well, be careful with it. It's activated,” Angie said.
Ness shot her a questioning glance.
“The pen won't dispense until the safety cap is removed from the end,” she explained. “I took it off.” Angie sounded a little sheepish, as if ashamed of her former bloodlust.
“Ah,” he said. “How did you know to do that?” Having never seen such an apparatus before, Ness had no idea how it worked.
“My roommate in college suffered from severe allergies and had her medicine in a similar pen. She taught me how to do it in case I ever needed to administer it to her.”
“So inside the black tip...”
“Is a needle,” Angie supplied.
Ness looked at the pen uneasily. Even with the soft-looking rubber tip covering its deadly sting, he felt dangerously exposed to the toxin it held.
“Now that we've stolen the bad guy's van, what’s next? Wanna go parking?” She grinned and gave him a lecherous look.
Ness laughed. “I mainly wanted information from Harrison, not a vehicle.”
“Well, we got both,” Angie said. “What do we do with them?”
“I don't bel
ieve Intellisys can't track this van,” he answered, “but I don't want to give it up, either.” He paused to deliberate. The problem of the vehicle could be easily solved, but the ramifications of what Thing Three had told him were going to be harder.
“They're trying to reproduce Dr. Bertrand's work, and it sounds like they're getting close to doing so. Which explains why Karl was going to kill us in the woods,” Ness said. “Since we are the only people who have any idea of what John is capable of, thanks to what my double told us, we have to be the ones to stop him.”
“How are we going to do that?” Angie sounded skeptical.
“Well, I'm open to suggestions, but as I see it, we need to solve two problems.”
“Which are?”
“One, removing any data from the Intellisys computers regarding Dr. Bertrand's research and anything they've learned since then. And two, destroying whatever devices they've managed to build.”
“Not to mention breaking into the Intellisys building and dealing with the gun-waving lunatics there,” Angie said sardonically.
“Well, yeah.” Ness grinned sheepishly. “We do have an ace up our sleeve, as it were.”
Angie looked quizzical, and he showed her Karl's ID card.
“Well, it's a start,” she said.
They fell silent as they contemplated the other issues they needed to address once they were in the building. Ness had the advantage of having been there before, and it was extremely convenient they were using Dr. Bertrand's lab, as he knew its location. The destruction of devices should not be a major problem, although he wanted to do more than smash them to pieces. He could do nothing about the data issue. Even with Angie’s knowledge of computers, he doubted she knew how to handle that task.
“I believe I know someone who can help with removing the data,” Angie said, as if she were reading his mind. “A guy from work. From what I’ve heard, he spends his evenings playing Neo.”
Ness grinned. The Matrix was one of his favorite movies.
“Can you trust him?”
“Well, he's hardly the type to turn me in to the police.” She gave Ness an impish look. “Besides, if Suzette is right, he has a little crush on me.”
“Oh. Him.” Ness frowned at he stared at the traffic, and his knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel with ferocious spirit. Angie laughed, a sound he could never get enough of, and it relaxed him a little.
“Don't worry. I don't suppose he would know what to do if I threw myself at him.”
Ness grunted dubiously, then an idea struck him. “I might know of something we can use to destroy Intellisys's devices. Let's get a nap and go shopping for what we need.”
“I've got to hand it you, Ness. You sure know how to tell a girl what she wants to hear.”
“It takes years of experience, my dear.” He spoke with mock seriousness and drew forth another tinkling laugh.
Ness knew this time with Angie was the calm before storm, and he kept his focus on her so he could enjoy it thoroughly. Possibly neither of them would survive their visit to Intellisys. That happenstance filled him with only half as much fear as it undoubtedly should, and he swore to do whatever it took to see them both through. But an inner niggle of doubt led him to pray that it lay within his power to keep his promise.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: A Missing Ride
Tuesday, June 8, 2010, 10:03 a.m.
The sounds of mechanics at work dimly filtered outside the closed auto-repair bay doors. No one was waiting outside for service, so no one witnessed Earnest and Reed bursting out the door at a run. They stopped in the middle of the lane and looked both ways for Harrison but saw no sign of him in any direction.
The clerk at the auto counter had remembered Angie Relevont. She had bought a pair of sneakers, which stuck in his mind since he usually sold oil changes and tires.
“Where is she?” Earnest had demanded. At first, the revelation had created excitement at the prospect of ending the chase, but that had turned to frustration. Earnest jogged along the alley to check behind the nearby dumpsters.
“Where's the van?” Reed retorted.
Shit, how did I miss that? “Good question,” Earnest growled. He yanked out his cell phone and dialed Harrison's number. His heart sank when he heard a ringing sound coming from the dumpsters.
Dammit. He approached the sound of the familiar ring tone but discovered it was coming from underneath the container, so he closed his phone and got on his knees. There in the shade lay Harrison's cell phone. He slid his arm into the narrow space, ignoring the filth his fingers brushed, and grabbed it. Reed peered at it curiously as Earnest regained his feet.
“Do ya reckon they killed him?”
Earnest grimaced and took a quick peek inside the dumpster.
“Who knows? If they did, they didn't dump the body here.” He sighed. They were stranded, and he would have to call Karl. It was highly doubtful that his boss would be happy with the turn of events, and he would have to endure however much grief the German gave him. With a sigh, he opened his phone and dialed Karl's number.
As usual, Karl answered almost immediately. “Morgenstern,” he said curtly.
“Reed and I came out of the store to find Harrison and the van gone. I found Chris's phone under a dumpster,” Earnest reported.
Karl said something in German that Earnest assumed was a swear word. “Scheiss.”
One of these days, I've got to learn me some German swear words, Earnest mused, so I'll know what he's saying. Besides, it sounds cool to curse in another language.
“What kind of people do I have working for me? How can one of you be captured by a couple of clueless civilians?” Karl demanded.
The volume hurt Earnest's ear. He decided not to point out that Karl had been captured by the same pair only an hour ago.
“What do you want us to do?” he asked, interrupting Karl's tirade.
The volume of the German’s response ensured that even Reed could hear the tone of his voice, if not the words. The former soldier smirked at Earnest as if to say, “Better you than me.”
Karl stopped talking, obviously trying to calm himself. When he spoke again, his voice was more controlled, if a trifle strained. “Does the van have a tracking device?”
“No, it doesn't,” Earnest answered. “It's a security Bravo vehicle — no ties to Intellisys.”
“Wunderbar,” Karl said. “I will send a car for you.” He sighed. “Meanwhile, I try to track the van with traffic cams.”
Earnest closed his phone and told Reed that a car would be sent for them. He deliberated whether Harrison was still alive. His coworker had also become an occasional drinking buddy. Though Earnest generally tried to stay detached from the people he worked with, he had broken his rule and had built a friendship with Harrison.
He turned back toward the door leading inside, waving at Reed to follow him. The Walmart had a Subway in the front, and all the chasing and shouting made him hungry. “Let's get something to eat,” he said over his shoulder to Reed.
“Sounds good,” Reed rumbled.
It was the one thing they could agree on — grabbing a meal whenever they had a chance. Of course, the détente would end as soon as they finished their five-dollar foot-longs, but for the moment, it would do.
* * *
Random images of vehicles at various intersections displayed and disappeared on Karl's screen as the software searched through archives from traffic cams and stoplight sensors. He had the program looking for Harrison's van, trying to get an idea of where the Relevonts may have taken it. Thus far, the search program had not found anything. Karl spun his chair around to look out his window. The view was a nice perk, one he did not take advantage of often enough. Of course, he would prefer to be out in the field, hunting for the couple himself, but so far, they had no leads. Karl sighed.
Like Santa Claus delivering a much-sought-after toy, the computer beeped, and an image filled Karl's screen. The photo had been taken from a stoplight sensor s
howing the van driving south on Mound Road at the Nineteen Mile Road intersection. A small portion of the screen showed enlarged detail of the license plate, confirming that it was the correct vehicle. He modified the search parameters to match their route, and before long, he saw another photo from a traffic cam at Mound and Eighteen Mile. They had crossed the intersection, and the right turn signal was on. They appeared to be turning into an alley behind a medical office.
“Wo ghest du hin?”
Though his prey's destination remained unknown, he had enough information to give his little soldiers a place to start looking. He reached for the telephone just as it rang with an incoming call. The small LED readout displayed John Fletcher’s name. Karl frowned but answered the phone.
“Karl Morgenstern,” he said into the handset.
“What's your status on acquiring the Relevonts?” his boss demanded. He sounded tense and aggravated.
Karl grimaced. He had not yet told John about the latest mishap, and he doubted the volatile CEO would take it well. He decided to utilize a technique many corporate workers resorted to when things went awry: covering his own butt.
“We have narrowed down their probable location and are closing in on them.”
“And how long before you acquire them?” John sounded suspicious.
“I… uh… do not have an exact time…”
His boss interrupted his wafer-thin excuse. “Stop already. I’ve heard a lot of status reports during my career, and I can tell when someone is bullshitting me. You have one chance: the truth, or your job.”
A deep inhalation did nothing to calm Karl’s electric nerves, but he forged ahead anyway. “We had a setback.” Karl strove to keep his voice unruffled. He hoped if he stayed calm, perhaps John would as well. “While Williams and Reed were searching the store, the Relevonts overpowered Harrison and took the van. But we have located the vehicle, and recovery operations are underway.”
After a long pause, Karl's hope for a quiet conversation died. John was building to an explosion of Vesuvius-type proportions, and Karl felt dreadfully like Pompeii.