“Not that I know of,” Lendra answered. “Though I wouldn’t be surprised if the President orders them in.”
Jeremiah nodded slowly as he drove, obviously planning his next move. Lendra, studying his face, decided that Eli was right. Jeremiah could be her greatest asset. With him, she could run CINTEP. Without him, she might not be able to hold the agency together, especially if Jeremiah actively worked against her. Eli believed Jeremiah would find her irresistible if she played him correctly. But he was sharp enough to spot any false approach, so she had to make herself actually want him. She had to convince herself that she was infatuated with him. Not a difficult thing to do.
Lendra contemplated Jeremiah’s comment that Eli was just stringing her along. Could that be true? For a while, the only sound in the van was the hush-quiet purr of the engine and the humming of the tires on the rough road, punctuated by the occasional rush of a vehicle bumping along in the opposite direction.
“There’s the exit for Crescent Township,” Jeremiah said as he slowed to a stop. The road stretched northeast off Highway 52. Another group of soldiers had set up a checkpoint there. Once again Jeremiah handed over his Identi-card. When they saw the presidential authorization, they quickly waved the van through.
Jeremiah turned right. Up ahead potholes and fallen brush left the road barely passable.
“So what’s our plan?” Lendra asked. “Go straight to the shelter?”
“Let’s visit the famous statue—Emerging Man. I need to think.”
“Eli won’t be happy at the delay.”
“That’s the spirit.” Jeremiah winked at her. “Always a silver lining if you look hard enough.”
Lendra nearly opened her mouth to comment, then thought better of it. She needed to prove to Jeremiah that, in her own way, she was as tough as he was, and she deserved to be Eli’s successor. If Eli was playing her, he’d regret it. She’d promised herself she’d run CINTEP one day and no matter what it took she intended to reach her goal.
Chapter Nine
While Major Sims directed the last few homeless men through the DS-9000, Colonel Truman monitored Captain Baynes’ progress searching the town and Captain Lopez’s progress through the woods east of the shelter. So far, there was no sign of Devereaux. Truman rubbed his eyes, trying to keep the fatigue at bay. He fingered his wedding ring, wondering yet again why he continued to wear it. He and Emily had been strangers for years now. Though they still shared the same house, they lived separate lives—she with her protester, vegan friends; he with the Army. The only thing holding them together was their daughter, McKenna, who lived in Portland. They saw her twice a year.
The scanner beeped and Major Sims said, “That’s all of them so far, sir.”
Truman stopped twirling his wedding ring. “No matches, obviously.”
“None, sir. No major anomalies, either.”
“That’ll be all, Major. Detail a squad to man the DS-9000, then move the Porta-cell behind the shelter. I don’t want it out front where every passerby can gawk at our prisoners. Also, let’s get soldiers posted at the nearest intersections—north and south. Make our presence known but not too intrusive. You know the drill.”
After Major Sims began her assigned tasks, Truman poked his head into Sister Ezekiel’s office, where she and Dr. Mary sat chatting quietly. “We’re finished for the time being, Sister.”
Sister Ezekiel said, “For the time being? What does that mean?”
“I’ll have to check with the Attorney General, Sister, but I’m sure we’ll be here for a while yet.”
Dr. Mary said, “And in the meantime we just ignore that monstrosity in the lobby? I don’t think you appreciate the delicate nature of these men’s psyches. They’ve already been scarred by society. They don’t trust authority. And now you do this to them?”
“Do your best, Doctor,” Truman said. “I can only apologize so many times.”
He backed out of the office and made for Weiss’ mobile command center—a reinforced panel truck crammed with communications equipment. The Attorney General remained a mystery, staying largely in his mobile command center, seldom interacting with the troops. He was supposed to be charismatic but, except for the speech he’d given inside the shelter today, Truman had seen nothing of that side of the man.
Weiss sat before a bank of monitors, checking various world events. He waved Truman inside the truck. “I assume you had no luck?”
Truman shrugged. “We can’t find him if he isn’t here. Have you considered that our information was wrong?”
Weiss sighed melodramatically. “Of course I’ve considered it.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to question…”
“Quite all right, Colonel. I’d much rather have you question authority in the pursuit of truth than blindly follow some fool.”
The colonel straightened himself another millimeter. “Thank you, sir.”
“I tell you, Colonel, I have a feeling about this place. Devereaux’s grandfather was one of the sculptors who created that statue. His ancestors are buried in that cemetery to the southeast. What about known associates, or pseudos? Any of them show up on the scanner?”
“No, sir.”
Weiss nodded. “We’ll give it a few days. Track down as many of these homeless men as we can. Were you ever briefed on the Battle of Rochester?”
“No, sir. I’ve heard rumors, of course. And I couldn’t help but notice as we came through the town that there had been some sort of firefight there. But no hard facts.”
Weiss rubbed his eyes with his hands. “Rochester is where the pseudos were engineered. It was the perfect place for a top-secret project. After the Susquehanna Virus decimated the city, only a few die-hard civilians remained behind.”
“And the pseudos were engineered for Mars?”
“Exactly. But something went wrong. They went crazy. We had to send in the Elite Ops. I don’t have all the details of the battle, but the pseudos were driven back into the Mayo Clinic. Then the Elite Ops suffered some kind of malfunction to their systems. And President Davis elected not to send them in after the pseudos. He was afraid they might contract the virus. And he figured if the pseudos came down with it, well…we’d already written them off.”
“So Cookie Monster is definitely a pseudo.”
Weiss nodded. “And there are more of them out there.”
The sound of Bach filled the air: Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring. Weiss’ PlusPhone. Weiss held up a hand to indicate that the colonel should remain where he was before answering his PlusPhone out of Truman’s view.
“RC,” he said with a smile. “How are you?”
Who was RC? Truman wondered.
“Gray Velvet. Smooth as ever. A couple things. First, did you know Jeremiah Jones is on his way there under orders from the President?”
“He’s already passed through the last checkpoint,” Weiss answered.
“Really? You haven’t arrested him?”
“On what charge?”
“Kidnapping, assault, conspiracy to commit terrorism. I don’t care.”
“I have to follow the rule of law, RC. Find me some proof and I’ll arrest him.”
“Very well. Second, I’ve sent four Elite Ops troopers your way.”
Elite Ops? That meant Carlton Security. Richard Carlton. Truman stared at Weiss, but the Attorney General kept his attention focused on the PlusPhone.
“I don’t need your Elite Ops, RC. I’ve got Colonel Truman here with his troops.”
“Sorry, Gray. Again, orders from the President. You know why. Don’t worry. They’ll be keeping a low profile. You won’t even feel their presence. Are you alone?”
“I have Colonel Truman here,” Weiss said. “You can speak freely.”
A slight pause.
“I have concerns about Jones. We both know he abducted Jack Ma
rschenko. If you can’t arrest him, you should at least put him in custody.”
“I’ll consider that, RC,” Weiss said. “Later.”
Weiss disconnected the PlusPhone, then looked up with a tight smile. “Colonel, I realize I’ve been somewhat distant these past few weeks. I’ve been wrapped up in this whole Devereaux thing. I’ve also been observing the way you handle your soldiers. You’re doing a damn fine job.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“I know you think this might be a waste of time, Colonel. I might feel the same way in your shoes.”
“It’s not that, sir. It’s just that if he’s built these terrible bioweapons, why aren’t we sending the entire Army after him? Why aren’t we calling in the FBI, the CIA, the NSA?”
“Remember Al Capone?”
“The gangster?”
Weiss nodded. “We—the government—couldn’t convict him of racketeering, so we took him down for tax evasion. Devereaux is going to be the same way. We might never prove he’s developed these bioweapons. They’re probably prototypes, so small they’d fit in a container the size of a fingernail. They could be hidden away or disposed of very easily. No,” Weiss shook his head, “the only way we’re going to stop Devereaux is by arresting him for treason for the vile things he’s said.”
“But if the weapons are out there—”
“I’m betting Devereaux’s still got them. If he’d handed them over to the pseudos, they would have used them already. That’s why we need to get to Devereaux quickly, so he won’t have a chance to begin large-scale production. We’re going to go down as heroes, Colonel—like Eliot Ness.”
“I just want to stop him, sir, before innocents die.”
Weiss put his hand on Truman’s shoulder. “You’re a good man, Colonel. Now, remember, we don’t want to start a panic. We’re here to arrest Devereaux for treason. Let’s keep the bioweapons thing on the Q.T. Oh, and one more thing.” Weiss turned to his computers and called up a picture of a man on one of the monitors. “Have you ever seen this man before?”
Truman stepped forward and eyed the man in the picture. A youngish man with an ordinary looking face—except for the eyes—brown, with a hint of green. They looked at the camera intensely: the eyes of a predator.
“No, sir,” Truman said.
“That’s Jones. He’s a CINTEP ghost. I’m sure you’ve heard of the ghost program.”
“Yes, sir. Assassins and spies.”
“And he’s one of the best.”
“Is he here to assist us, sir?”
“I doubt that. The President already informed me that she doesn’t want me to pursue Devereaux any longer. My guess is that he’s here looking for Devereaux, just as we are. He and I also have a bit of a history. He blames me for some bad things that happened to him in the past.”
“I can distribute photos to the troops. We can keep an eye on him.”
“Yes, do that,” Weiss said, sending the image to Truman’s PlusPhone. “I can’t arrest him. But I want to know where he is, what he’s doing.”
“Yes, sir.” Truman forwarded the image to his troops with a note to keep an eye out for Jones.
“How are the searches going?”
“Captain Baynes is nearly done checking the townspeople but Captain Lopez has found it slow going through the forest, sir. It’s going to take days to get through all those woods. More troops would speed up the process. Too many of my soldiers are tied up securing the perimeter. I was thinking of leading another detail into the area.”
“You think that’s a good idea? You’re running the whole show here.”
Truman shrugged. “Assuming I still have your permission to speak freely, sir, it burns me up when top brass stay home and let other people do the dirty work. I need to know the lay of the land myself.”
Weiss nodded once, crisply. “Of course. You’re absolutely correct. I can see why General Horowitz is so high on you.”
Truman’s face warmed with the praise. He said, “I’ll leave Major Sims to man the DS-9000. She’s better at that technical stuff than I am anyway. The sooner we get all these men profiled, the sooner we can get out of Sister Ezekiel’s hair.”
“Very well. Is the good sister causing problems?”
“No, sir. I’m sure she’d like us to leave, but she’s been very cooperative. Still, she might know more than she’s telling us.”
“I agree. She’s a wonderful woman. A real saint. And I adore her. But I think Devereaux’s here and he may have already contacted her. If he has and she’s hiding him, she will have to be punished, nun or not.”
“The doctor’s a bit feisty too.”
“Yes.” Weiss pursed his lips, tapped them with a forefinger. “What do you make of her?”
“Intelligent. Assertive. No-nonsense. I rather like her, sir.”
“Something about her bothers me. I can’t put my finger on it. I’ve just finished running a search on her and come up with damn little. A clinic in Los Angeles. Before that, a hospital in Phoenix and a stint at a low-income facility in San Diego. Medical School at the University of Iowa. Never married. No credit problems. Almost no credit history at all. Very unusual.”
Truman stood with his hands locked behind his back, unsure how to respond to that.
“All right, Colonel,” Weiss said, “off to the woods with you. Let’s round up these homeless men.”
* * *
Truman led a detail of soldiers east, toward Rochester and the Susquehanna Virus. From aerial reconnaissance, he knew that the original woods petered out several thousand feet away. Beyond that lay a development of high-end homes, a suburb of Rochester, abandoned along with most of the city twelve years ago when the virus escaped.
Afterwards, a group of fundamentalist Muslims proclaimed that the Susquehanna Virus was a punishment sent by God to destroy the Christian infidels. The previous year, Truman remembered, a group of fundamentalist Christians issued a proclamation that God had triggered a massive earthquake in Iran as vengeance for that nation’s largely Islamic population.
Truman reached the end of the woods, where the ground sloped away to the abandoned development below. He stopped and stared. Beside him, Lieutenant Adams said, “Whoa,” as she came to a halt. She was the youngest officer in Truman’s command, almost the same age as his daughter McKenna.
The neighborhood looked like something out of a horror movie: the remnants of beautiful mansions barely recognizable, as if someone had attacked the development with mutant vegetation. Every house had been at least partially destroyed. Foliage grew up inside homes, breaking through windows and roofs—every wall still standing bent and twisted under the pressure of the heavy growth. Piles of rubble mounded up where half a dozen homes had once existed; their owners must have bulldozed them to prevent them from becoming havens for undesirables—vandals, addicts, gangs and terrorists.
The side roads looked impassable, trees sprouting up through cracks in the asphalt, wild grasses and shrubs invading from the yards on either side, leaving only narrow trails that wound snakelike off to the north and south. The main street east had fared a little better. Rocks and cement blocks filled potholes, and the foliage that grew up through the cracks had been trampled by foot traffic. But as he watched, not a soul moved. The place looked completely deserted.
To the north, Truman could just make out the imprint of a golf course, which mostly held the encroaching weeds at bay. Genetically modified grasses, no doubt—designed to grow slowly and inhibit common pests like dandelions and creeping charlie. Yet the grass was gradually losing the battle: now waist high and going to seed. A row of cherry-pear trees bordered the course, their sweet fruit nearly ripe. Truman had a fondness for cherry-pears not shared by his wife. Emily refused to buy anything not organically grown. And she only purchased pre-genetically modified foods. So Truman often took his meals at the officers’ club, wh
ere he could order cholesterol-friendly steak and cherry-pear pie without a lecture from his wife.
A crow cawed three times, then lifted itself into the air and flew off to the southeast. A gray squirrel scampered up a tree. Underneath the musty odor of decaying vegetation, Truman detected the smell of burnt wood.
He signaled his team and they moved down the hill, then east along the main road, where everything felt crowded: branches snaking toward the center of the street, occasionally plucking at their uniforms as they passed. The lurking presence of the houses, half hidden in dark shadows behind trees and out-of-control shrubs, gave the neighborhood an eerie feel.
“I don’t like this,” Adams said as she shook her head. “I’d rather be fighting terrorists. This place is spooky.” She pointed to a house overtaken by a large maple growing up through its center. It had a shattered glass roof, twisted metal framing embedded in a host of branches. The structure’s golden walls pushed outward in the middle as if in the process of being blown apart by an explosion. The house looked like it might fall at any second. Adams shook her head. “Have you ever seen anything like that before?”
“I have, actually,” Truman replied. “There was a time when the rich built homes around trees.” He once visited a wealthy classmate whose home contained a greenhouse over sixty feet tall, which surrounded a magnolia tree genetically altered to bloom five times a year. A growth-stunting agent prevented the tree from outgrowing the greenhouse. A long spiral path led up from the ground floor. Guests, encouraged to walk the path, searched for bluebirds the classmate imprisoned inside. Truman had almost become physically ill at the blatant excess flaunted.
This golden maple house looked like a lesser version of the one Truman remembered. And now, with the owners long gone, the maple had resumed its normal growth pattern, bulging beyond the confines of the greenhouse, taking the roof and walls with it.
Truman motioned for Adams to continue forward. She took a dozen steps, then halted again and pointed to another house, mostly fallen in on itself. One dirty gray stucco wall leaned at an impossible angle, its base four feet off the ground. The branches of several trees stuck through its broken windows, tilting the wall so that it formed a canted roof. It looked as if it might plummet earthward at any moment but it was no doubt stronger than it looked. Someone had obviously camped under its cover recently, for smoke drifted up from a fire pit and garbage lay strewn about.
The Susquehanna Virus Box Set Page 11