"He who digs a pit shall fall into it; and whoever
breaks through a hedge, a snake shall bite him."
Ecclesiastes 10:8
Tommy threw some wood into the fire and sat down in a folding lawn chair. He looked over at Laura, sleeping soundly on the blow-up mattress. He looked around and smiled. They were well set up here.
The camp had grown up badly, and he had walked past it twice before he finally found it. He'd had to half carry Laura most of the way, and with full pack, even in the kind of shape he was in, it hadn't been a picnic.
When they'd come up here every year when he was a kid, his family had kept the cabins up, fixing doors, windows, and roofs so that they could enjoy them from year to year. His uncles and father had kept the brush cleared out and the paths marked. No one had done that in years, and even the best cabin had obvious roof damage. He'd brought a hammer, nails and a tarp with him on that first trip in anticipation of damage.
Of course he'd had to make a ladder from pieces of trees he found lying around. He'd nailed the tarp along the edges, carefully covering the whole roof.
The cabins were small—just twelve by sixteen. He broke up a bunch of wood, brought it in, and started pumping up the bed which was the only thing he had brought with him besides the tools, tarps, bedding and food. Laura had been quiet, sitting and watching him as he worked. The trip and the hike had been rough on her.
Laura lay down on the bed as soon as he got it pumped up, apologizing for not being more help. She went to sleep almost immediately.
The door had a huge gaping hole in it, and the window was missing two panes of glass. Even though he'd kept the fire blazing and they had more than enough bedding, the first night they had still slept cold.
The next morning he dressed Laura's wound, made them some breakfast and went back to get the rest of the stuff from the car. By the second trip, he decided that he had definitely over bought.
That afternoon, using wood and panes salvaged from the other cabins, he fixed the window and the door.
Laura used the camp broom, and despite his protests, swept the cabin out using only her good arm.
Tommy turned the Coleman lantern off. They needed to conserve the fuel, and he could see just fine by the firelight.
He'd bought a shit load of oatmeal, raisins, coffee, dried beans, vitamins and salt, but everything else was in short supply.
The camp was on a creek, so they wouldn't want for water. He had been surprised at all the wonderful fold-up and inflatable camping gear you could get. He'd bought a hang up plastic bag, a solar shower, an inflatable shower stall, an inflatable sink, an inflatable bed, fold-up cookware, chairs, shovel, broom, etc.
He also bought way too much ammo for his gun, a wrist rocket slingshot, a small crossbow and twenty bolts.
He knew everything in these woods that was edible, and he could live here for the rest of his life if he had to. The bastards could try, but they couldn't out wait Tommy Chan.
The only thing that was really bothering him was that he didn't know what was happening with Spider. He leaned back in his chair and looked into the fire. He couldn't decide whether he wished Spider had told him more, or whether he wished she had told him less. The things he was imagining didn't leave Spider in very good shape.
Laura was still very tired, but then you really couldn't expect her to be doing flips. After all, she was diabetic and recovering from a gunshot wound. Still, it looked better today than it had the day before, so it was healing. Laura didn't complain, but he could tell she was scared and worried. She didn't understand why they were on the run. She was hurt, and she really wanted familiar surroundings and people. She kept talking about how worried her parents must be.
Tommy looked at the bare concrete floor. He remembered doing pushups on that same floor till his arms ached. These woods in which his cousins had played had been a survival course for him. The creek they had kicked, splashed, and had water fights in had meant hours of swimming back and forth till his stomach cramped for him. Still he had loved it here. Perhaps because it was a change of scenery, or because the whole family was together, or maybe it was just the overall feeling of peace you got from being in the woods far away from the mechanized world.
He felt at peace here now and felt guilty about it. Laura was upset, Spider was certainly not enjoying whatever-the-hell was happening to her, and he was happy because he was in the woods with his wife, camping with a bunch of new gear he was never going to pay for.
There was no rhyme or reason to the way they turned the lights off and on, and Spider had no idea how many days she'd been there, but they hadn't let her shower. It was dark, and as always the boy was making his way towards her. No matter how many times she shoved him away, he kept creeping closer. This night, or day, or whatever it was, was no different. The next thing she knew the boy was lying against her. She started to shove him away and then had a brainstorm. She couldn't talk to him because they would hear anything that was said. They couldn't contact each other telepathically because of the psychic disrupter, but . . .
Her back was to the window, the camera would only catch the boy's front. She started to trace out letters on his back slowly.
~Can you read this? Move your arm if the answer is yes.~
For a minute his arm was still, but then it moved. You bastards! I found a way around your shit again.
Spider smiled.
~Move your head for no, your arm for yes.~
He moved his arm again.
~Good boy! Did you burn anything for them?~
He moved his head.
~Good! Don't. Don't let them know that you have power. We can get out of here if we use our heads.~
He turned around then and wrote on her stomach. *I thought you didn't like me.*
Spider moved her head and wrote on his stomach. ~I can't let them know.~
*I'm scared.*
~They should be afraid of us.~
Robby didn't mind sleeping in the car. Of course, he'd spent weeks making sure that the car was as comfortable as most bedrooms. As for bathing in the sink in the men's room, with his bath box, it wasn't that much harder than jumping into the shower at home. He had learned a long time ago, and had pounded it into his siblings' heads that if a person really wanted to be clean, then they could get clean. It didn't take that much time or that much money. All it took was a little effort.
What Robby didn't like was not working; it made his days long and boring. He still had no clue how to get Spider Webb out, but he knew that whatever he was going to do, he was going to have to do it soon.
Every noon he had lunch down at the diner. He told himself it was because he was checking out the SWTF staff, but the truth was he spent more time checking Helen out.
He knew from what he was picking up from some of the lab coats that Spider was in the building in a highly secured section, and that she had a small boy with her. Other than that, most of the bastards were so dark you didn't want to stay in their heads long. Not if you couldn't kill them immediately afterwards.
It was odd; most of the security guys were OK. Some were a little gray, but most of them weren't black. The scientists, though, they were the bad fuckers. Twisted shits, every single one. Then there were the SWTF guys. They didn't come in very often, but when they did, they made Robby's blood run cold, and it was all he could do to keep from frying them. The grimy scientist guys rationalized that what they did was for the greater good—they were insane. But the So-what-if guys just liked the power they wielded and causing pain.
He went to the diner for lunch, and there was a Help Wanted sign on the door. It was his lucky day. Now no one would question his being there to watch either the So-what-if guys or Helen.
He walked straight up to Helen. "Anyone take the job yet?"
"You don't want it," Helen whispered. "It's minimum wage, and it's washing the dishes."
Robby shrugged. "I don't mind doing dishes."
"Then go talk to Rudy; he's in the kitchen. But don't say I didn't warn you."
Rudy hired him on the spot. Then he proceeded to tell him everything that was wrong with the dishwasher—which was basically everything. Robby worked through the lunch rush with it busted, and then brought his tools in and started working on it. By the time the evening crowd hit, the washer was fixed and the job was easy. At least it was easy for Robby, especially when he got to spend so much time looking at and talking to Helen.
He was caught up with his work and helping Helen with orders for the evening crowd when he walked in. He was a So-what-if guy—one of the ones that wore black—and when Robby looked at him he saw black, but the black was engulfing, surrounding the light. This was something that he had never seen before. This man was trapped—trapped as surely as Spider Webb was trapped. He wanted out, wanted redemption, and saw no way to achieve it. He wanted another chance, or at least a chance to make things right. He hated doing the things they made him do, and the thing that weighed heaviest on his mind at this time was that he was the one who had stolen the boy from his parents. Robby brought him a menu and their eyes met.
"What the hell are you looking at?" he asked Robby, jerking the menu from his hand.
Robby smiled back at him. "A very troubled man."
The man looked down at Robby's hands then, and Robby let him look.
"Just call the waitress when you're ready to order," Robby said and walked quickly away, sticking his hands into his pockets. That man might be able to help him, but he was going to have to be more careful. His hands would be a dead give away to any SWTF personnel who worked on "the project" as they all called it.
The man's name was Fritz, and Mark hated him. He was a bad, bad, man, with darkness all around him.
Every day they came and got him. They put the deprivation helmet on him, and then they carried him to this room. They took the helmet off, there was a bale of hay there, and over and over again they told him to burn it up. Over and over again he told them he couldn't. He could see them standing behind the glass, and he knew what he'd really like to burn up. He wasn't sure he could burn the hay even if he wanted to. After all, it hadn't hurt anybody, and he wasn't mad at it.
"All you have to do is try. Focus your mind," Fritz said.
"I am!" Mark screamed.
Fritz made a screaming, irritated noise then, a noise that Mark had only ever heard coming out of Fritz's mouth.
"Did she tell you not to do it?" Fritz asked.
"Who?" Mark asked.
"Damn it boy, you know who! The woman."
"Which woman?" Mark asked playing dumb; something he knew annoyed the hell out of Fritz.
He made the noise again. "Spider Webb. Your mother."
"You know everything she says to me," Mark said. "You listen to everything. She doesn't even like me."
"We know you're finding some way to communicate. How are you doing it?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. She hates me." He started to cry then. It wasn't hard to whip up tears when you really were sad and scared shitless. "I want to go home! I want to go home!"
"Worthless boy!" Fritz screamed. "Don't you realize that if you can't make fire you are of no use to us?"
"I want to go home! I want my mom!"
Don looked at the woman carefully but didn't dare get too close. He turned the high-powered hose on again. Fritz said it would dredge up nightmares and past memories that might help break her. Fritz said to knock her down every time she stood up. It didn't seem to be breaking her, though; all it really seemed to be doing was pissing her off real bad.
"You fucking bastard! If I ever get my hands on you!"
He hit her in the face and knocked her down.
Spider hit the floor hard, and they laughed—they all laughed. Then the interpreter asked her again in his broken English.
"American pig! Where is your unit?"
"Up your butt, you filthy bastard!" she yelled. She had just stumbled to her feet and the hose knocked her down again. She hit her head and the world spun.
One of the guards took her by the hair of the head and banged her head into the dirt till there was so much mud up her nose she couldn't breathe. She blew hard, blowing the dirt plugs from her nose, and then she grabbed the filthy bastard by the head and twisted hard and fast. He dropped like a rock. They screamed out, and then there were boots, and water, and darkness.
Spider pulled herself up and ran to the center of the room where the chain that held her was imbedded in the concrete floor. She grabbed it with both hands and started yanking screaming, "I'll kill you! You fucking rag headed bastard! I'll kill you!"
Don watched in terror as the chain started to give. He turned the hose off, there was a snapping sound, and she was free and running at him. Don headed for the doors, but no one was opening them.
"Jesus, God! Let me outtah here! Goddamn! Open the door!" He felt her hands grab the back of his shirt. "Oh dear God!"
The door opened and a crew of armed So-what-if guys ran into the room, but Don was already dead, his head smashed like a melon on the wall of the room.
The door closed quickly behind the crew.
Spider slung her palm into the nose of one man, driving it up into his brain. As she was grabbing his gun, three darts struck her at once.
Spider looked at them. "Oh fuck!" The gun rattled from her hands, and she fell to the floor.
Fritz looked at the tapes over and over again. "Amazing! Her strength is far greater than that of other test subjects. Her sense of balance, focal points—it really is amazing! I'd seen her looking at the chain before, but had no idea that she had been slowly weakening one of the links. Or that she would even be capable of something like this."
"Fritz, I asked you what we were going to do about Don's body," Francis repeated. She'd been hysterical most of the afternoon, and the last thing she wanted to see over and over again was her friend and colleague having his brain smashed out of his head.
"I'm having the bodies incinerated," Fritz said. "Same as we always do. Try not to be so sentimental. Don was a scientist, and he knew the risks."
"You should have had one of the goons doing it, not Don!" Francis cried. "That thing has killed three people since she's been here."
"They're morons, Francis. They have no idea what to look for—the subtle break in a voice, the gentle lift of an eyebrow . . . it takes a scientist to recognize things like that." Fritz turned away from the monitor and looked down at the scene below. "Ah! The mother and her child. It's a pity that the boy has no real power; all of his siblings have shown such promise. But he doesn't seem to have anything. The only plus to that being that it allows us to go all the way if we have to."
"She seems to have grown some attachment for the boy. She lets him sleep by her now. He brings her meals without being asked, and she thanks him."
"Still, I wonder if it will be enough for her to give up her friend," Fritz said. "It is a crying shame about Don. He had a brilliant mind. I will miss working with him."
"They were all screaming and running everywhere, what happened?" the boy asked his mother.
The woman smiled at the boy, then looked right at them through the two-way glass. "I killed a couple of the bastards. At this rate I ought to have everyone in the building killed off by late winter."
"If you aren't a little more cautious, that's just exactly what will happen," Francis told Fritz.
"Helen, ah . . . " Robby couldn't believe that he was stammering. He'd thought about it all week. "You want to go to the movies?"
Helen smiled at him. "You mean like right now?" she asked, putting away her apron.
"Well . . . yes." Robby said.
"I'd love to if we could go by my house first so I can change. It's only a couple of blocks away," she said.
Robby just nodded his head like a big dumb idiot and led the way out to his car. They got in and he started towards her apartment, without waiting for her to give him directions.
"So, you never have said. How long do you plan to stay here?" Helen asked. "In town I mean."
Robby shrugged. "I . . . I don't really know. I've got to hang around till . . . Well, till I get my business done, and then I'll have to leave—probably in a hurry."
Helen laughed. "You make it sound like you're some kind of gangster or something."
Robby laughed then. "I wish. At least that would be profitable."
"What are you doing, then?" she asked.
"I can't say," he said.
She squealed with delight. "I knew it! I knew it! You're an FBI agent and you're checking out those egg heads down at SWTF."
"I can't say," Robby said again.
"There're up to no good, aren't they? A bad bunch. Is it dangerous, your assignment I mean?" Helen asked in a hushed whisper.
"Helen, I really can't talk about it with you. I wish I could, but I have orders." They were given to me by a big ole dyke cop, but I still got orders.
"I'm sorry, it's just so interesting. I always knew they were up to no good. Right bad feelings you get from that whole bunch. This is my apartment."
Robby pulled over and parked.
"You want to come up with me? It will only take me a minute."
Robby nodded and followed her up the outside set of stairs to her second floor apartment. It wasn't a very nice building, but her apartment was clean, and she'd obviously done a lot of work on it.
"Sit wherever you like, I'll just be a minute."
She walked into another room and Robby sat down in the recliner and kicked back. His feet were a little tired from standing on them all day, but when all was done and said the dishwashing job was the easiest job he'd ever had.
"Your apartment is nice," Robby said.
"It's a dump, but it's home," she said. "There's some soda in the fridge if you want it."
"No thanks." Robby looked at the pictures scattered around the room. No doubt pictures of her family. It made Robby homesick for his own family. Made him wonder how the kids were doing. "Pictures of your family?"
"Yes. I come from a big family. Catholic—three sisters, three brothers," she said.
"I come from a big family, too. Welfare—three brothers, four sisters. We all have different daddies, and mother's a big time crack whore. I've raised them mostly on my own. I sure do miss them."
Helen walked out then fully dressed. She was brushing her hair over the front of her face and he thought it was the most spectacular thing he had ever seen.
"My family is kind of boring. Mama and Papa have been married forever. No one in jail, no one on drugs, all married with kids except me. I'm the baby." She stood up then, flipping her hair back over her shoulder. "So, you ready to go then?"
Robby stood up. "You're . . . you're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
Helen blushed. "Thank you, Robby."
"I'm sorry." He looked at his feet and then back at Helen. "I have a confession. I've never been on a date before."
Helen laughed, but not hatefully. She walked over and took both his hands. "Now that doesn't sound like the kind of thing I would expect an FBI agent to say."
"I never said I was FBI," Robby said.
Helen kissed him on the lips, then, and he kissed her back.
"What was that for?" Robby asked, trying to keep the stupid grin off his face.
"Now you don't have to spend the evening wondering if I'm going to let you kiss me good night."
She was with Carrie, and Carrie was with her. Their flesh melding into one being as they made love. She felt that love radiating through her body.
There was a loud noise, and she was in the trench. The sand was blowing—it was always blowing. She heard the whistling sound of an incoming scud.
"Look out!" she screamed and ran. The strength of the explosion sent her flying. Something wet and sticky hit her face. When she looked down at her feet, Carrie's disembodied head was staring up at her. She screamed and kept screaming.
Spider jerked into a sitting position, her breath coming in gasps. She quickly rubbed the tears from her eyes. She was shaking all over and covered in a sickly cold sweat.
"Are you OK?" The boy asked.
"No. I'm not OK. None of us are OK!" She jumped to her feet and started yanking on the chains that held her. The chain was about twice the size that the old one had been, and all she was doing was eating the skin off her hands.
"You bastards!" she screamed into the dark. She flopped onto her ass on the concrete. Sleeping on this shit was enough to give anyone nightmares.
"Go back to sleep, boy."
"You have a nightmare?" he asked.
"Yes, something like that," Spider said.
"My mom . . . well, the other . . . "
"She's your mom, kid," Spider said gently. "She gave birth to you, took care of you when you were sick, and changed your shitty diapers. She's your mother. All I did—and not on purpose—was supply an egg. An egg that doesn't get incubated doesn't hatch into a chick, and a chick that doesn't get fed and cared for doesn't grow into a chicken."
The boy laughed, and Spider thought about what she had said. She guessed it did sound pretty silly.
"So. What about your mom?"
"When I have a nightmare my mom has me tell her about my happiest thought. Maybe it would help if you told me your happiest thought."
Spider laughed. "I don't think it would be appropriate for me to tell a nine-year-old boy about my happiest thought."
"Why not?" Mark asked.
"Because my happiest thought has to do with sex."
"Oh," he said in an embarrassed tone. He lay down then and laid his head on her leg. "Spider, are you married?"
Spider thought about that a minute. "Well . . . kindah."
"You live with your boyfriend?" Mark asked.
"No. I . . . " She took a deep breath and decided to just tell him. "I'm gay, Mark. I live with another woman. Her name is Carrie."
"I thought so," Mark said matter-of-factly.
Spider shook her head. "Why did you put me on the spot, then? Why didn't you just ask me if I was queer?"
"I was afraid you'd be mad." The boy sighed. "Can we go back to sleep now? I'm tired."
"All right." Spider moved to lay beside the boy. "Mark?"
"Yes."
"When I was a kid about your age my brother Scott used to take me down to the park and we would play catch. One day a bunch of kids from the neighborhood were all going to play baseball. The kids my brother played with didn't want to let me play because I was too little, but Scott said he wasn't playing if I couldn't play, and so they let me play. I hit a home run that day, and our team won the game, and everyone said how great I was. That's my happy thought."
"It's a good happy thought," Mark said sleepily. "Now just keep thinking happy things, and if you go to sleep thinking happy things, you won't have any more nightmares."
It sounded like good, strong logic to Spider.
Robby woke up to the sun on his face and a warm female body in his arms. He hugged Helen tight and she woke up.
"Good morning," she cooed. She kissed his chest and then moved to kiss his lips. They kissed for a long time.
"I . . . I love you," Robby said when they parted.
Helen laughed. "You don't have to say that, Robby . . . "
"But it's true. I do. I love you, and I want to be with you the rest of my life."
"That's very sweet, Robby, but . . . Robby, I'm the first woman you've ever dated. The first woman you've ever had sex with. Don't you think . . . "
Robby kissed her lips gently. "I may be green, but I'm not stupid. I know how I feel, Helen. I know you—what kind of person you are. I know everything about you . . . "
"Robby, we just met . . . "
"Believe me, Helen. I know you in a way that no one else ever has or ever will, and I love you."
Helen looked at him. He was dead serious. "Robby, this is a little fast . . . "
"Not too fast for sex, but too fast to say I love you." Robby laughed.
He had a point there. She smiled at him. "OK. Sounds good to me." Helen lay down with her head on his chest. She could definitely deal with some attention from a really nice and very good-looking young man after all of the total losers she'd had in her life. Besides which, he was one hell of a lover. He seemed to know what she wanted and how to give it to her. Considering it was his first time that was amazing. Maybe this one was the one.
Robby wanted to ask her to marry him. Wanted to stay there with her. But Spider had given up everything to save his ass, and he owed her.
"Helen, you know . . . You know I have business."
"Oh yes. The strange and mysterious business." She giggled.
"Sooner or later the time will be right and I'll have to make my move. Could be tomorrow, could be next week, could be a month from now. I don't know when, but when it does . . . I will have to go, and I don't know how long I'll be gone. But I promise you the most righteous promise a man can make, that I will be back. If I'm alive, I will come back."
Now Helen had heard some lines in her life, but she just didn't think Robby was feeding her a line. It just sounded so much like bull shit that it had to be true.
"Can't you tell me what's going on, Robby?" Helen asked. "I'm just beginning to like having you around. I don't want you to leave even for a little while."
"I can tell you this much. The SWTF are bad people. A friend of mine figured out what they were up to and now they're holding her in that building trying to find out where I am. I have to find a way to get her out of there before they kill her. Then, together, we'll have to find a way to stop them, or my friend and I will be running the rest of our lives."
"That place is a fortress, Robby. You can't get in there. Nobody could."
Robby smiled. "I can get in. I just have to wait for a time when I can get in, get my friend out, and have us both live to tell the tale."
They had left her alone with the boy for two or three days, Spider couldn't be exactly sure how long. The only contact they had with the outside world was the food trays that were slid through a slot in the bottom of the door.
Now Fritz was walking in with six So-what-if guys. One of them she knew from Shea City. If he stayed true to his feelings there, he didn't want to be here now, and he proved his distaste for the proceedings by standing close to the door as if guarding it. Obviously separating himself from what was happening as much as possible.
Then there was the one that Spider had hit so many times with a hatred of Fritz that he now did nothing but snarl at the man. He certainly wouldn't be able to stop someone from killing Fritz.
Mark was smart; he moved close to Spider and stayed there.
"Come here, boy," Fritz ordered.
"Come get me," he said. He knew they were all afraid of Spider Webb and with good reason. If they got close, she could kill every one of them.
"Shoot her," Fritz ordered.
One of the men raised the weapon in his arm.
"No!" Mark screamed.
A white light arched, and Spider hit the floor. While she was convulsing, three men ran in and grabbed the boy. Spider convulsed on the floor a few more seconds, stopped, and got shakily to her feet.
"It's a nice little weapon we like to call the lightning bolt. Effectively, it is a tazer that can be fired from a distance. What do you think of it?" Fritz asked, looking at his nails.
"Don't play this game out, Fritz," Spider warned through chattering teeth. "Let the boy go. Keep this between adults, or at the very least between you and I."
"Tell us who the Fry Guy is," Fritz ordered.
"I don't know," Spider spat at him.
They strapped Mark to a chair. "Don't you care about the boy, Spider?
"Goddamn it! I don't know who he is! I told you that!" Spider said.
"Do it," Fritz ordered. They hit Mark with the cattle prod.
Spider slung herself to the floor and started banging her head on the concrete.
Mark screamed and cried because he was hurt and because he knew what Spider was trying to do.
"Stop her, stop her!" Fritz screamed.
They hit her with the lightning gun, but she had already successfully knocked herself out.
Mark watched as a team of scientist started checking her out. It was about ten minutes before one of them, a woman, announced. "She's given herself a fairly bad concussion, that's all. We'll administer an anti-inflammatory, and she should come to in a few minutes, but I can't promise she'll be much good. You know how they are with head injuries."
Fritz nodded, then looked at the boy. He smiled a smile that made Mark want to choke him. "See, boy? Your mother loves you enough to kill herself to protect you. But you tell her this when she wakes up. Tell her you're worthless to us because you have no power. Therefore you are expendable, and there is no reason for us to take chances by putting you back out there with the rest of the world. The only reason you are alive is for her. Tell her that if she dies, you die automatically."
Mark glared at him, a look of utter hatred in his eyes and thought, Spider's right, you'll screw up, and when you do . . .
"Did you hear me, boy?" Fritz asked in a growl.
"Yes," Mark spat back.
"And do you understand?"
"Yes," Mark said.
Fritz turned to one of the SWTF guys. "Leave the little bastard tied up. It will be good for him."
Fritz and Francis left, and the SWTF guys started to file out behind them.
The one with the prod hit the boy again, and Mark screamed.
Jason grabbed the guy by the collar and shook him.
"What the hell was that for!" Jason hissed in the man's face.
The man smiled and shrugged. "For the fun of it. It ain't like they're gonna let him live, anyway. He's a fucking freak; he ain't human."
"Don't do it again," Jason ordered. He left the room following the guy with the prod. His palms were sweaty, and he felt sick.
Mark was glad when he heard the door close. He started to cry. He knew they were watching him, but it wasn't the same as them being in the room.
Another crew of men came in and started putting Spider in a straightjacket.
"Leave her alone!" Mark screamed. "Leave her alone!"
"Shut up, kid!" one of the men screamed at him. "We ain't hurting her, just making it where she can't hurt herself."
Mark kept telling himself that they were going to get away. That they were going to get away and kill all of these assholes. It was the only way he was going to make it through whatever they were going to do to him next.
"Well, what have you got for me Denisten?" Carrie asked.
Justin looked at the woman. She was not nearly as attractive as he remembered her being. Her eyes had black circles around them and were sunk back in her head. Her skin was gray looking, and she looked like she'd lost a bunch of weight. Obviously, she was getting even less sleep than he was.
"It's not easy. Without drawing attention to the fact that I'm checking out the SWTF it's hard to get to those files. Harder still to do it without leaving any traces. So far I have found a kind of pattern. Seven cities keep cropping up in the files. Shea City, Washington DC, LA, Denver, Phoenix, Las Vegas and Seattle." He walked over and loaded the disk onto Carrie's computer. "If you'll look, you'll see that the numbers go up every five years. I'm assuming that by subjects they mean these hybrids. You can also see that they introduce approximately five new subjects to these areas every five years. Now I don't have a list of names, yet, but we do have dates of birth. If we match the birth dates to the cities . . . "
"We'll get a list of babies born on that day, and we'll be able to track them down that way."
"Bingo," Justin said. "We have a few problems—most relatively small—but one rather large."
"Problems, we don't need no stinking problems!" George said. Carrie and Justin turned and stared at him, he laughed nervously and shrugged. "Just trying to lighten things up a bit."
"Well, don't," Carrie said. "Go on, Denisten."
"First, I don't know how much the FBI knows. It looks like they started to investigate the SWTF and someone very high up the food chain threw out a red flag and stopped the investigation. The notes I've found with the files would certainly lead me to believe that they had no idea what they were looking at. If the FBI knows exactly what's going on with the SWTF, then they're covering for them. If they are, that means we're dealing with two government agencies, not just one, and the FBI has considerably more man power than the SWTF.
"Second, all of the agents that did the initial investigation on the SWTF met with unfortunate accidents. All either in the line of duty or under unquestionable, or at least unquestioned, accidental circumstances. No investigations. No arrests. No loose ends.
"And last, the crème de la crème. If you'll look at this list carefully you'll notice that these subjects have all been tested."
"What does that mean?" George asked.
Carrie sighed deeply. "If they know they are being tested, then they know what they are, what they're being tested for, and why. It means at least some of these human weapons may be willing participants in the program. It means they may be working for the SWTF. Which means my whole plan just got scrapped."
Denisten nodded silently, then added after a moment. "So, what now boss?"
Jason walked into the diner for lunch, although he was almost afraid to eat. He had never been so confused or tormented in his life. He openly admitted that he had done terrible things for the agency before, but torturing a nine-year-old boy was hitting a little too close to home for him.
The girl set the menu in front of him. "Coffee today, Mr. Baker?"
He just nodded and started looking at the menu. The girl came back with the coffee.
"Ready to order?" she asked.
"I'll just have the soup and some crackers, Helen." He forced a smile for her, and she smiled back and hurried off to fill his order.
Robby grabbed Helen in the kitchen and pulled her aside. "That man out there."
"Yes?"
"Give him this napkin," Robby said.
Helen nodded silently and took the napkin. She tried to make her hand stop shaking as she handed Jason his soup and crackers. She put the napkin down by his bowl. "Enjoy your meal." She moved quickly away.
Jason picked up his napkin and started to flip it open. But when he saw the writing, he quickly put it beneath the table and unfolded it over his lap. He looked down and read the note.
If you don't want the boy to die, meet me in the bathroom.
Jason took a couple of bites of soup, then he purposefully spilt a mouthful down the front of his shirt. "Damn!" he cursed and started wiping it off with the napkin. Then he got up, napkin in hand, and headed for the bathroom.
He walked in and heard someone slide the lock closed behind him. When he turned around to look, he found that he wasn't too surprised by who it was.
"So, you're the Fry Guy," Jason said. "I could turn you in and make myself the pride of the agency, get myself a healthy bonus, too."
"We both know you'd never get the chance," Robby said. "I know what's in your mind. What kind of man you are, and what kind of man you wish you were. You want to redeem yourself, and I can help you do that if you help me."
Jason nodded. He threw the note into the toilet and flushed. "OK, buddy. Tell me what you think I can do."
When Spider came to she was hanging from the ceiling in a straightjacket again. Not exactly the best position to be in. Mark was still strapped to the chair, and from the wet condition of his pants they had left him there quite awhile.
The door opened, and this time Spider hit the SWTF man on the other side hard.
As Fritz started to walk through the door someone in the control room screamed. "Fritz! We've got a breach and we've got psychic activity!"
About that time the SWTF man grabbed Fritz in a headlock. He was about to break Fritz's neck when one of the other guards hit him with a tazer. The only real plus being that it shocked the shit out of Fritz, too.
They hit Spider with the lightning bolt and hurried in, closing the door behind them. Spider realized that she had shot her wad and blown her one real shot.
"No more stalling," Fritz said rubbing at his throat. "Give us the Fry Guy."
The SWTF guy stood ready to hit the boy with a cattle prod.
Spider swallowed hard. "His name is Fred Brown. Lives on forth and Brooklyn in the projects."
"If you're lying . . . " Fritz started.
"All that would do is buy me a little more time," she said.
"And you can both stay right where you are till we're sure."
"You'll never take him alive," Spider said. "He'll kill you all before you even get close."
Fred had lived in the projects all his life and he knew the heat when he saw it.
He crawled out his window and up the fire escape onto the roof, and then he just kept running.
The SWTF crashed the door on apartment sixteen as their man on the street screamed into their comlinks. "He's up the fire escape heading for the roof!"
They went out the window and started after him. Neither one wanted to get too close unless they were sure they could squeeze off a shot first.
Fred heard something ping close to his head as he jumped over the edge of the building and started sliding down the pipe. These bastards were shooting at him without even screaming for him to give himself up! What was more they were using silencers, and the things they were shooting at him looked more like darts than bullets. What kind of heat was this? He took off down the alley, jumping the fence just as two more showed up. Damn! He couldn't remember having to run this hard since those two pigs had tried to chase him down. That Chink had damn near caught him that time.
Fred kept running.
"What do you mean they don't have him!" Fritz screamed into the receiver. "Well get him . . . Keep looking . . . It's not that big an area. Where could he have gone?" Fritz hung up he looked at Francis. "We won't know whether she's told us the truth or not if we can't catch the guy, and she knows that." He was mad. He didn't like it when he was played for a fool. The only thing worse was waiting around to have his foolishness confirmed.
"All we can do now is wait," Francis said.
"She's almost too clever," Fritz said, rubbing his throat.
"What do you mean?" Francis asked.
"I mean that if we let her live there is a very real chance that she will kill us."
"But we need her for the program. All her previously harvested eggs have been turned into embryos. If we're going to breed her to the Fry Guy . . . "
"We don't need her, we just need her eggs for the program. If she's dead, we can take all of them and no one will be the wiser."
"Such a waste," Francis said.
"She's served her purpose," Fritz said matter-of-factly. "She's more trouble than she's worth, and nothing we could do would control her."
"We've got to move now," Jason told Robby. They had met in the bathroom at the park. "She's given them some other guy's name, and when they catch him and find out he doesn't have any power they're going to torture and then kill the boy."
Robby nodded. He'd said good-bye to Helen, and he was ready to go—to get it over with one way or the other. "Did you get the stuff?"
"Yeah. Here." He handed a bag to Robby.
Robby pulled out the lab coat and put it on. Then he almost dropped the bag. "Jesus fucking Christ!" Robby said making a face.
"What?" Jason said in disbelief. "You run around frying people's brains and blowing them up, but a disembodied hand in a baggy freaks you out. Give me a big break."
"How is that going to help me get in the building?" Robby asked, making a face.
"The handprint. You're going to need the handprint to get in," Jason said. "You just hold it at the wrist up under your sleeve, and when you get to the door . . . "
"All right, all right, let's just do it."
Jason helped him put on the fake mustache and sideburns.
"How do I look?" Robby asked.
"You'll pass. Now, come on, let's go."
The guys at the front gate were easy. They looked in the car, but mostly it was their job to let the car in. If it had the right sticker, they let it in unless they had other orders. The guy at the front door kept staring at Robby; even after his palm print opened the door. He must have noticed some discrepancy in the photo that popped onto the computer as being Dr. Herbert Todd.
Jason was waiting behind Robby, and started bitching. "Christ on a crutch! Am I going to have to stand out here all night? Come on, I'm in a hurry here. I don't come to this dung hole for my health, you know."
The guy let Robby pass, and then passed Jason in.
"Follow me," Jason said and started walking.
They passed a garbage can, and Robby stopped long enough to toss the hand away. The building was a maze of corridors, and at every door—even to get on the elevator—a guard checked their badges.
Robby's insides flinched every time the elevator stopped and the doors opened. His gut was sure that he was going to be facing a wall of armed guards at any moment. Finally, the doors opened on the top floor, their ID's were checked again, and they started down a series of maze-like corridors. There was no way he could have found his way to Spider without Jason's help, and Robby told him so.
"Yeah, I'm a real prince," Jason said. They rounded a corner and Robby was looking at a big steel door covered by four guards. "She's in there, but don't go in that room. You go in that room and your power is neutralized. I'll stay here and cover your back."
Robby nodded. "Thanks. We'll meet you here."
Jason stayed there at the junction and Robby moved forward. Four guards and a door. He focused on them, and as their sins and transgressions flooded into his brain they started to fry. Sirens went off as the four men fell and Robby hit the door. It blasted open. He saw Spider hanging in the middle of the room.
"What took you so fucking long?" Spider asked him with a smile.
"Sorry." Robby hit her chain and she fell to the floor, landing on her feet.
"Hurry up, kid!" Jason screamed, and then Robby heard him firing.
Three guards ran in from a door on the left, and Robby fried them.
"Hurry up, kid!" Jason screamed again.
There was way too much gunfire coming from the end of the hall.
"Go help him. I'll be OK here," Spider said.
Robby nodded and joined Jason at the end of the hall. He killed two of them and the rest went running scared.
"Hang on, kid!" Spider yelled.
She kicked the wooden chair Mark was sitting in and it fell apart, allowing him to get free. Then he quickly undid the strings holding her straightjacket closed and helped her squeeze out of it. They ran out of the room, and as they did so Fritz—who had run out of the observation room—hit her with the lightning bolt. As Spider fell to the floor convulsing, Mark looked up at Fritz and smiled.
"I'm not worthless," he said.
Fritz looked at the boy in amazed fear, and then his brain exploded. Mark helped Spider to her feet.
"Go to Robby; he'll protect you," she gasped out.
He nodded and ran to the end of the hall where Robby and Jason were.
"We've got to hurry," Jason told Robby. "They've got suits to protect themselves from you."
"Spider, hurry!" Robby screamed down the hall.
Spider heard him, but she had things to do. She walked into the control room where six scientists stood huddled in the corner. One held a weapon in his hand, so Spider shot him with the lightning bolt, and as she walked up to the others, she crushed his skull with her foot. Reaching into the group, she grabbed the woman, Francis.
"You come with me. As for the rest of you assholes," she smiled and then pushed as hard as she could. "Kill each other."
As she ran out with the woman they immediately started ripping each other apart.
"Gee! I should thank Fritz for telling me just how strong my mental push was." They were stepping over Fritz's body then. "Oops! Too late! My little boy killed him."
Francis screamed as Spider drug her along.
Jason looked at her when she came to the end of the hall. "They're not going to let you go because you have a hostage. They'll shoot her just to get her out of their way."
"That isn't why I've got her," Spider said.
She looked at the woman and pushed. "You will stay with us. You will not give up our position."
"We've got to move, Spider. We're on the top floor and Jason says they have suits which will stop us from killing them."
"In that case . . . " Spider moved to the pile of bodies and picked up every gun she saw. She handed them out, giving Mark the lightning bolt because she had noticed it had no kick.
He shook his head. "I don't know how."
"You just point and pull the trigger, boy," Jason said. "It isn't that hard."
They heard what sounded like a troop of men coming. "Which way to the stairs?" Spider asked.
"This way!" Jason started moving—luckily away from the footsteps.
Spider had a brainstorm.
"Robby?"
"Yes?"
"Blow the hall behind us up."
Robby turned, and while walking backwards did as she asked.
Jason looked back at Spider. "You guys are some scary fucks."
A troop of armed guards wearing suits appeared in front of them, successfully blocking the stairway.
"Give yourselves up!" one screamed. "You cannot escape . . . ."
"Open fire!" Spider yelled. They filled the hall with a hail of bullets, and the wall of men fell like rain.
They ran over the bodies and headed for the stairs.
Spider kicked the door open and then jumped to the side. There were no bullets and no darts, so she looked around the edge of the doorframe. "OK! Let's go!"
"You're walking into a trap," Jason said. "They'll have men at every floor. They'll . . . "
"Never know what hit them. Just keep moving. Robby, keep a hand on that woman. We need her."
Robby nodded.
Spider jumped into the well.
"Spider!" Mark screamed after her.
"What the hell!" Jason started.
"Don't worry. She knows what she's doing," Robby said. He grabbed hold of Francis and started moving slowly, gun in hand.
Spider grabbed onto the rail on the next floor and waited.
Three men pounded through the door, thinking they were making a surprise attack, and instead ran into one.
Spider opened fire, shot all three of them and yelled up, "Come on! Move it! I can't hang here all day!"
She waited till they got there.
"Robby, seal the door."
Robby nodded and started the door on fire. The sprinkler system kicked in almost immediately.
"Your fire isn't going to last long, so move and move fast." She let go and dropped again. She almost missed the rail on the next floor, and while she was trying to get her head back together and her gun out, a team of men jumped out the door and she wasn't ready. So she let go and dropped again.
"Robby! They don't have on suits!" she yelled as she fell.
Robby let go of the woman and practically jumped down the stairs. He focused and fried the guys and then the doorway. The others had caught up with him, so he grabbed the woman again and kept moving fast.
Spider grabbed on and jumped over the rail. She kicked the door, ran into the hall catching the waiting guards unprepared, and started firing. Then she met the others on the other side of the door.
"How many more floors?" Spider asked.
"Three," Jason answered, "and the security is just going to get worse."
She heard a troop running at them from above.
"Robby, take out the staircase."
Above them the staircase erupted, spraying them with concrete and debris and sending two men down the well beside them.
"Let's move!" Spider said and ran into the hallway.
"What are you doing! The stairs are our only way out!" Jason said.
"Which is why they'll catch us if we go that way. We'll have to make another exit."
"The elevator," Robby said.
"Are you nuts? They'll know where you're going when they realize you've left the stairs," Jason said.
"They know where we're going now," Spider said. A troop in suits rounded the corner then, and they took off running. "Get us to the elevator!" Spider fired a gun in each hand as she ran backwards.
Several guards fell, and more ran away. The SWTF were only really tough when there was no way they could lose. As soon as you narrowed the odds they were out of there. Their ultimate cowardice in the face of danger was what she was counting on.
The troop guarding the elevator were wearing suits and carrying Lexan shields.
"Oops!" Spider said, coming up short. They'd told her that she had telekinetic powers in the days or weeks or however long she'd been locked in that room, and she'd wondered if she really did. "No time like the present to find out," she mumbled. She focused all her rage on the shields, and they went flying out of the hands of the guards with such force that Jason had to dance to the side to keep from getting hit by one. "Cool," Spider said with a smug smile and pulled the weapons out of the guards' hands the same way. She had a brainstorm. "Robby, hit the ceiling."
Robby hit the ceiling above the confused men hard, and it caved in on them. Not waiting for the dust to clear, they crawled over the bodies to the elevator. One of the men looked like he might still be moving, so Spider kicked him in the head hard enough to kill him. She willed yet another gun into her hand and frowned when she realized it had nothing in it but sleeping darts. Still, beggars couldn't be choosers. They dove into the elevator just as a hail of darts rained in around them. The doors closed and they were going down.
"What now?" Jason asked.
"We go down," Spider said.
"You don't have to be a genius to figure out that we're going down," Robby said nervously.
He looked at Mark. "Can't you help me?"
"I don't have anything left!" Mark nearly screamed. He was trying to be tough, but he didn't feel tough.
"He's normal for the project," Jason explained. "You're not. Why the hell do you think they want you so bad? They want to breed you to Spider."
Spider and Robby looked at each other and both made faces.
The elevator stopped between floors.
Spider sighed. "They're holding us here while they get set up."
"What do we do now?" Jason asked again.
Spider took a deep breath and held it for a minute. She really had no idea.
"I can fix the elevator." Robby pried off the control cover and started digging through the wires. "I can do it. I can make it move. What do you want to do?"
"I saw this in a movie once; it just might work in real life," Spider said.
They gathered at the bottom of the stairs in their suits and riot gear and waited. The elevator started coming down.
"They've by-passed the system! Prepare yourselves men; they're coming down." The commander had an absolute genius for stating the obvious.
The elevator stopped and they waited. Any minute now they could be staring death straight in the face. The doors opened and nothing happened. There was nothing—no one in sight—no one in the elevator.
"They must have gotten off! Gone back to the stairwell. Spread out! They could be anywhere!"
They started to move out in all directions, afraid to look and afraid not to. Kind of like thinking there was a venomous snake in your bedroom. You wanted it found; you just didn't want to be the one to find it.
Two guards, more intelligent than the others, or just less lucky, went into the elevator to check it out. They lifted the trap door on the top and Spider Webb jumped on top of them. A couple of well placed kicks, and they were down for the count. Jason and Robby jumped off the top of the elevator into it, then helped the boy and the woman down. They entered the now-empty lobby.
"I never would have thought that would work," Jason said.
"Between you and me, neither did I," Spider said.
A troop of men rounded the corner as they made for the front door.
"I can't kill the door guards," Robby told Spider as they ran towards the doors. The two armed guards were standing ready to fire, no doubt with real bullets. "They aren't evil!"
Spider was firing behind them. "An alligator isn't evil, either, but you'd kill it if it was trying to eat you."
"Good point!" Robby fried the guys blocking their way to freedom.
They ran out the door. Robby could see Jason's car just a few feet away.
Jason stopped at the doorway. Spider turned, saw him and ran back. She grabbed his arm.
"Come on, man."
"Can't," he said. "I've got a family."
She nodded. She knew what he meant. "Thank you."
"I'll cover your ass. Just go."
Spider ran to catch up. Robby was already in the car turning the key in the ignition. Spider shoved the boy and the woman in, and then jumped in herself.
As Jason saw the car take off he turned back towards the building. He kept firing, empting one weapon after another, right up till a bullet burned its way through his brain.
"Gates?" Robby asked.
"Break 'em!" Spider wasn't firing now. She was lying back in the seat.
"But . . . "
"Hit 'em, Robby. You're in command now." Spider reached back, pulled the dart from her butt, and threw it out the window. Then she was out.
"Everybody get down," Robby ordered. He crouched down in his seat, tried to ignore the guards firing real bullets at them this time, and shoved Spider down into the seat beside him as he crashed through the gates. The car made a strange hissing noise and started to lose power. He revved the engine, shifted into a lower gear, and hoped for the best.
He turned and glared at the gate, setting the asphalt driveway on fire. No one would be following them for a while. He saw the boy's hand touch Spiders arm. No worry there. But he kept a half an eye on the woman, not knowing how long whatever Spider had done to her would last. The car barely got them to the park. He loaded Spider into his car. Then he tied the woman's hands and feet up and stuck her in the back seat with the boy. She didn't even seem to notice. Finally, Robby roared off, reminding himself not to drive too fast.
As an afterthought, he pulled off the fake beard and mustache and threw them in the floorboards.
"Boy! Help me get this damn lab coat off."
"My name is Mark," the boy said quietly, and helped Robby take the coat off.
"Well, Mark, it looks like we're safe now."
"I don't think we're ever going to be safe," Mark said.
Robby looked around to make sure no other cars were around, then slung the lab coat into the floor boards, too. He had absolutely no idea where to go, so he just drove. As he passed the diner, he looked at it longingly and drove on.
"Don't be so negative, Mark. Put your faith in God and Spider Webb. We've got to beat them; we've just got to because nobody else can."