The Alaska Escape

by K. B. Spangler

  Mare sighed. She was curled against me in a tight comma, arms wrapped around my body as if I could keep her from floating away. There was a panic attack lurking on the horizon. “You don’t want me to open a link,” she whispered. “My head’s not a good place at the moment.”

  “I know,” I said, as I smoothed back her hair. “We’ll deal with it together.”

  She took a deep breath, followed by another, and then I felt her cybernetic implant turn on.

  A link between two Agents isn’t just a form of unspoken communication. Outsiders call it telepathy, but that’s only part of it. We can hear each other’s thoughts, true, but we also pick up on experiences, sensations, and emotions. For example, while I don’t have breasts, if I’m in an open link with someone who does, I can feel it when a stranger accidentally-on-purpose runs their fingers over “our” nipple while pretending to hand us a glass of wine. And if the physical owner of aforementioned nipple gets righteously furious at this violation? Then I’m going to feel that, too, plus whatever my own brain and body decide to contribute to the emotional Wait did he just do what I think he did?!

  It’s great during sex. Seriously next-level stuff. But if you join a link with someone who’s barely holding it together? That’s hard on both of you, even when you’re prepared for it.

  When Mare opened her link, a world of repressed emotions crashed into me. Terror—Where is Pappy now? Is he okay?—Dread—Who did he kill this time? How do I get him out of this?—Practicality—How do I get someone like Pappy into a retirement facility? Why am I bringing someone like Josh to Alaska?—and…

  Wait a minute.

  “Hey!” I said, a fake protest while I pressed my hands against my heart, feigning a wound.

  Mare’s nose wrinkled. “If Pappy’s gone to ground, we might have to find him before the police do,” she said. “You’re not exactly the outdoorsy type.”

  “Truth,” I agreed. I’m a city kid, born and raised. I’m not the kind of person who finds solace in nature. Even squirrels have tried to kill me. Squirrels!

  She snuggled closer, twining her fingers through mine. The rush of emotions subsided slightly as I took some of the load onto my own mental shoulders. It always helps to know you aren’t alone.

  Still, she was worried. It was the bone-deep, honest worry for someone you truly loved, and nothing would ever make that go away completely. Worse, the dam had been broken. Even if we found her grandfather, she’d always be worried that he’d do something like this again. Worry and love went together like the sky and the color blue: some days there was a little less of one than the other, but even on the worst days you could still recognize that one was part of the other.

  We flew on together, into the night.

  Along the way, Mare used our link to show me images of the crime scene, police photos that she had sweet-talked from the local authorities. The incident had taken place in a small log cabin, with a messy kitchen in one room and a narrow twin bed in the other. Blood, of course, and the telltale marks of someone dragging a body away. There was also a deep mark in the wooden floor, about two inches long and stained red from where the blood had pooled. Pappy carried one hell of a knife.

  Lab tests were still pending, but the locals had completed the down-and-dirty basic blood type test, and whoever had been bleeding wasn’t Pappy.

  “Does your grandfather…” I began, before I realized that this conversation wasn’t suited for the hushed environment of business class. I switched over to the link so we could talk without scaring our fellow passengers. “When was the last time your grandfather got into trouble?”

  Mare’s mental voice was clear, even while the thick cloying ropes of exhaustion it hid tried to wrap around us. “Dad says he’s been on his best behavior the last few years. Couple of arrests for drunk and disorderly. Nothing too extreme.”

  “Good. That’s good…” I didn’t want to ask the next question. Fortunately, I didn’t have to. The benefit of being in a link meant that Mare could sense the edges of it.

  “No,” she replied. “He hasn’t killed anyone since that last time.”

  I nodded and held her close, and she broke our link so she could go to sleep and keep her nightmares to herself.

  That last time.

  Pappy had a reputation. He had been part of the Vietnam generation, shipped away from his wife and young son in Alaska to an entirely different ecosystem, courtesy of the U.S. military. He came back carrying more trauma than any single person had a right to bear, and vanished into the woods. From what Mare says, he tried his best to stay close to his family but he…couldn’t.

  He found gold, though. Literally. Like the prospectors of old, he spotted those small glimmering nuggets in the rivers from time to time, and would bring these to his wife and child, staying for an awkward dinner before disappearing back into the trees. Mare’s grandmother was a forensic accountant and didn’t need the money, but the gesture was important. It was the kind of love that said that even though Pappy couldn’t be there, they were always in his thoughts.

  There were other people thinking about Pappy’s gold, though.

  The worst of human nature comes out when there are no witnesses. Word got around that there was a lone man who knew where to find gold, and they would try to track him down. Sometimes they stumbled out of the forest and told anybody who would listen that Pappy was not to be bothered, ever.

  Sometimes they didn’t.

  Nobody asked questions, not until one wealthy woman started asking about her brother. She sold him to the local authorities as an innocent hiker. A body was found: no, five bodies were found! The so-called innocent hiker and his friends had laid an ambush for Pappy. There was a manhunt and a capture and a trial, and Pappy served some time, but not as much as he could have because the so-called innocent hiker wasn’t all that innocent.

  After that, Pappy got some press as “Alaska’s Rambo,” and he vanished back into the woods. Most people let him be, or turned a blind eye when those who tried to track him down disappeared.

  When Mare’s mother passed away, Pappy moved closer to civilization to be near his only son and granddaughter. Anchorage isn’t that big, and shares a border with Chugach State Park. Pappy built a permanent cabin right up against the treeline, one with running water and electricity and all of those modern conveniences. He did his best to be there for his family, and Mare loved him for it.

  Now he was missing.

  “We’ll find him,” I promised Mare.

  She gave me a gentle snore as we flew on through the night.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Anchorage in July is paradise on earth. The weather is perfect. The city is large enough to hum and small enough to walk. There are trees everywhere, flowers are blooming like they only have a single day to thrive before the end of the world, all against a backdrop of mountains that still have traces of white on their highest peaks.

  We didn’t get the chance to appreciate any of this. The moment we stepped off of the plane, we were greeted by a hundred silent staring faces.

  That was fine. That was normal. I’m famous, after all. OACET’s public relations guy does all of the talk shows, the Sunday news programs, the usual publicity rodeo. Also, Ryan Gosling had recently played me in the movie, and we had done the tour of the press junkets together.

  (That, by the way, had been fun.)

  So when I see a crowd of people, all of them staring in my direction and waiting for something? I tend to make assumptions.

  “Well! Good morning!” I said, as I stood a little taller. The extrovert high has always been a decent substitute for coffee. I haven’t needed to visit a Starbucks since OACET came out. “Thanks for coming to greet us!”

  The crowd ignored me. Or, most of them ignored me; a few rolled their eyes.

  “Doofus,” Mare said fondly, as she planted an elbow in my ribs. She gave a shy smile to the crowd. “Hey, guys.”

  They rushed forward, sweeping her into a wild, rolling hug. Mare we
nt along, laughing, greeting people by name. I caught snatches of conversation here and there—“Always knew you were going somewhere!” seemed to be the sentiment of the hour—with Mare nearly crying from relief.

  Then, silence, and the crowd parted to make way for a man with red hair. He was older, he was Irish, and he had Mare’s long face and green eyes.

  “Hi, Dad,” Mare said.

  It was the longest moment. It stretched out, a distorted break in the normal passage of time. Then, Mare’s father reached out and wrapped her up in his arms.

  Now, Mare started to cry.

  “I would have come home sooner,” she sobbed. “But—”

  “It’s okay, kiddo,” he said, his voice husky with his own unshed tears. “We already talked about this. You needed to be ready.”

  Our link was open, and the relief she felt nearly knocked me to my knees. Mare’s biggest fear was that the five years she had spent away from her father and grandfather might have resulted in a permanent quasi-estrangement, where they all kept trying to be a family again but never quite found their way home. It seemed like her father, at least, was willing to forgive her absence.

  (I’ll admit to a moment of self-pity. My own brothers had written me off as dead. Once news of our brainwashing had been made public, David had come to town for an awkward reconciliation dinner, but I never expected to hear from Leo again.)

  I took a few steps towards the wall, willing to drop out of the picture so Mare could have her family again—

  “Josh! Josh, c’mere!” Mare grabbed me and dragged me towards her father. “Daddy, meet Josh.”

  Mare’s father stuck out a hand. “Douglas Murphy,” he said, smiling in a way that implied he wasn’t quite happy to meet me. “I see you on the news so much, I feel as though I already know you.”

  “It’s my job to be a moving target, sir,” I said, only half-lying. His hand felt like hard work. “Don’t believe everything you hear.”

  “Never do,” he said, and then threw an arm around his daughter’s shoulders. “C’mon, we’re throwing you a little party in the conference room.”

  A few minutes later, we were in a fairly comfortable large room, with large tables in the center and couches lining the walls. There was a banner—WELCOME HOME!—and balloons, and a large cake with a pair of blue frosting sunglasses on it.

  Mare and I chose one of the couches and busied ourselves with a giant slice of cake. She was up and down, though, greeting those who dropped by to say hello. Her dad hovered nearby, not interrupting but also clearly unwilling to let her out of his sight.

  Finally, the crowd thinned as people left to get back to work. Mare took a deep breath and leaned back against the cushions, nervous contentment radiating along our link.

  “Did I mention I used to work here?” she said.

  “A few times.” I nudged another plate of cake towards her. “It’s great how they all remember you.”

  Her father, standing close enough to eavesdrop, chuckled. “They remember her because she turned this place upside-down. And you never actually worked her, Mare. You came with me for a Parent-Child work day, pointed out inefficiencies in our shipping logistics, and suggested new operational protocols.”

  Douglas turned to me and added: “She was twelve.”

  “They let me hang out here and help with the scheduling until I left for college,” Mare said in between bites of cake. “It was fun!”

  Her father shook his head. “We knew you were going to be big, Mare-Bear,” he said fondly.

  I leaned over and whispered, “Mare-Bear?”

  She jabbed me in my thigh with her fork.

  “Hey!” I complained. It hadn’t been nearly hard enough to break the skin, but now I had vanilla buttercream on my khakis.

  Her father glanced at me as I blurred the frosting with my thumb. “You’re taking him into the woods?” It was a simple question and the way he said it didn’t have any hidden layers, but…

  “Josh’ll be fine, dad,” Mare said. “I trust him.”

  “Good, good,” Douglas said. Again, simple words that were clean, straightforward…and heavily loaded. “Do you need to rest before you get started?”

  Mare shook her head. “I wouldn’t be able to sleep, knowing we’re so close but wasting time.”

  “All right. Your gear is in the car.”

  We grabbed our luggage, and he led the way towards a nearby employee parking lot. I noticed he had a limp, which started as minor and became more pronounced the further we went.

  “It’s why I’m not going with you,” he said, when he caught me staring. “Broke it skiing a few years ago. I can’t walk more than fifteen minutes without needing to rest. I’ve told the police about my father’s favorite local haunts, but Mare needs to check out the ones that are harder to reach.”

  “Pappy used to take us to the best spots,” Mare said, as we reached an ancient beat-up sedan. She accepted a set of keys from her father. “He loved secret places. There’s no way anyone could find them if you haven’t been there before.”

  “You’re going pretty far in,” Douglas said. “You sure you want to do this?”

  The question was aimed at Mare, but I got the feeling it was meant for me.

  “We’ll do what we have to do, dad,” she said.

  “All right,” he sighed. “Wish it could be me.”

  “I know, but Josh’ll keep any human predators away,” she said, as she popped the trunk and lifted out an old green hiking backpack. She opened the zippered top and began poking around inside. “And I’ll make sure we don’t run into wolves on the trail.”

  “Just…” Douglas seemed at a loss for words. “Be safe, okay? I want to spend more than fifteen minutes with my daughter.”

  “I know.” Mare rezipped the pack and slammed the trunk. She gave her father a quick kiss on the cheek. “We’ll bring Pappy home as fast as possible, and then we’ll go get some Arby’s.”

  “He can’t do fast food anymore,” Douglas said. “His cholesterol’s through the roof.”

  Mare winced. “Aw, no,” she said. “That was the best part of Saturdays.”

  “Time moves on,” her father said. “Now we do a salad bar at the Hilton once a month.”

  She shook her head and sighed, even as she pointed towards the passenger’s seat. As I got in, she said to her father, “Salad bars instead of roast beef. I’ve been gone too long.”

  “Your grandfather still sneaks some of that bacon topping when he thinks I’m not watching.”

  She sniffed. “That stuff is fake. I think it’s actually vegetarian.”

  His father put a finger against his lips.

  Mare laughed, started the car, and we drove off.

  As we pulled out of the parking lot, I caught sight of Douglas in the side view mirror. He was staring at me.

  “Hey, Mare?” I asked. “Was your father the kind of man who threatened his daughter’s prom date?”

  “Hah!” she cackled. “Of course not! This is Alaska. When you don’t like somebody, you don’t bother to threaten them first.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The plan was that we would start our investigation at her grandfather’s cabin and work our way into the woods. We could catch up with the status of the case with whoever was on duty at the crime scene. They were expecting us. We were federal agents. Hell, we were Agents! We shouldn’t hit any problems at all.

  I was not expecting to run into a man with a gun.

  Things started out fine. We drove until the streets ended, and then Mare turned so we could bump down a footpath that moonlighted as a driveway. We passed one checkpoint with a bored guard who radioed ahead as he cleared us through, and then came up on a small log cabin nestled into the hollow of a mountain’s foot.

  There was a tapping on my window, and I turned to see the business end of a gun pointed straight at my head.

  “Hands up,” the officer said.

  “Josh?” Even through our link, Mare felt terrified.
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  “Do as he says,” I replied, as I put my hands behind my head. “We’ll be fine.”

  I didn’t tell her I had started recording. I was reasonably sure the OACET community server wouldn’t be the archive of our last moments on earth. Better safe than sorry, though, even if that meant our fellow Agents would use the video to rain fire and brimstone upon some trigger-happy cops. We had already decided that if one of us was taken out for no other reason than because of what we were, vengeance would be swift and, above all else, obscenely bureaucratic.

  The officer popped my door, and gestured for me to get out.

  “I’m afraid I can’t,” I said, grinning at him. “Can I take care of my seatbelt so I can comply?”

  Here’s a tip: when working with cops, always tell them you want to comply. Compliance is magical. Always remember that please, thank you, and how can I make your job easier? are the levers which can move an intractable society.

  But sometimes even the most magic of words won’t work. If it doesn’t, the cop has already decided that they’re going to push back against you, no matter what you do or say. When that happens, you need to reassess the situation, as things are about to go bad.

  The cop shook his head. “I said get out of the car!”

  “Can I unlock my seatbelt?” I asked, still grinning.

  “Get out of the car!” He was angry. Angier far beyond what the situation required, with his face red and his hands shaking. This was dangerous.

  “Sir, I’m sorry but I’ve got my seatbelt on,” I replied, the grin plastered to my face. “If I can unlock it, I’ll comply.”

  “I said, get out of—”

  I didn’t let him finish.

  I struck out with one foot towards his knees. Shocked, he leapt to the side, putting me within reach of his gun. Then it was a matter of grabbing him by the wrist and controlling his hand, and his gun was mine.

  “I’ve called the local precinct.” Mare was moving as soon as the gun was out of play. “They’re sending another car. Do you have your handcuffs?”