Deena Riordan: Indelible Ink Part 12

"I'm worried about what might be happening to these people in our custody. I mean, I get what happened in the past. The military and the government didn't know what they had on their hands. But now they do." Pel stopped a good distance from the room. "These Incubators that we're tracking down? It's not really their fault someone tampered with their wiring."

"So we don't bring the girl in? We let her stay out there and kill whoever she wants?" Garrett said. "She's dangerous and unpredictable. It doesn't matter what's making her that way." Garrett considered the things Leonard had said about imprinting and focusing on the first person nearby when the power emerged and what that might mean for Deena. "Who do you suppose might have been the first person that Deena saw when these powers broke for her? Who do you think controlled her?"

They didn't have time to finish their conversation, as Rice interrupted. "We've got a possible sighting. We need you two to go check it out."

31.

From a nearby hill, Morgan and Wallace stared down at the stopped train. They weren't alone. The hill was just off of a secondary highway and a dozen or so curious people had stopped to look down at the scene. What they saw was a common, everyday pa.s.senger train with several large rips across the roof and sides. Various law enforcement agencies surrounded the affected car; FBI, local police and sheriff's officers, and others were rapidly multiplying in number. Two deputies stood near the onlookers from the hilltop vantage point.

"Think they got her?" Wallace asked.

"You mean caught her? Nope."

"Killed her, then?"

Morgan squinted as the sun glanced off of another car pulling off the road. "Doubtful."

Brandt stepped through the crowd and approached Morgan. "Why are you just standing here?"

Morgan looked back at their SUV. "We should get going. We aren't going to learn anything standing up here. We might as well a.s.sume she's on the run and start looking for her."

"How far could she get on foot?" Wallace asked. "It's only been, what? An hour?"

"This jacka.s.s is slowing you down. You work best alone, and there's no reason to change that now," Brandt leaned in through the open window of the vehicle. Morgan sat down and slammed the door. "Get rid of him." Morgan looked over at Wallace.

From the back seat, Mr. Hector's voice chimed in. "No! The more the merrier. Let's all go look for the pretty girl."

Wallace pulled back onto the road as the monkey's cymbals began.

CLANG!.

"Morgan? h.e.l.lo? Where are we going? What's the plan?" Wallace asked.

Shutting his eyes and taking calming breaths, Morgan held his hand out the window to feel the wind blow across his fingers as they sped north into the mountains.

Wallace's baritone voice broke Morgan's calm. "Can we talk about what happened back at the coffee shop? Was that necessary? I mean seriously? We're trying to keep somewhat of a low profile here," Wallace asked. "That kid was cool with letting it go after you slipped him the cash."

Morgan had always been little intimidated by Harper's handler. Probably for the same reason many people made him nervous, the proximity. He loved to be miles away from people, loved the silence when it was allowed. Here, in the confines of the vehicle he could see the man's thick muscles straining against his tight jacket and in the dark skin of his hands gripping the wheel. He could picture the man getting angry and reaching over and strangling him easily.

"Exactly. He seemed a little too cool about things. It had to be done, he'd seen our faces and if anything went bad, he could've pointed us out to the police or whoever came looking into the whole thing with Deena." Morgan felt it was as good a reason as any and would stick long enough for him to get back out on his own.

"Look..." Wallace began.

"I don't want to talk about it anymore. It's done. We move on." He folded his arms in what he hoped looked like a gesture of finality, but he was actually calming himself by feeling the guns strapped under his arms. It was relaxing, a.s.suring. Let him try to strangle me with those fat hands, he said to himself.

"Marsh is going to s.h.i.t monkeys when he hears about it."

Morgan looked over at the man behind the wheel and stared at him hard. "You gonna tell him?"

"Even if I don't, do you think he won't find out? You don't think two dead people in a burning coffee shop won't make the news?" Wallace shook his head.

"Local news, maybe. We're pretty far away from home. No reason he should care about it, unless someone makes him care about it." His fingers tensed on the guns under his jacket.

"Anything in the bag?" It was obvious to Morgan that Wallace was uncomfortable with the conversation.

Morgan took his hands out of his jacket and opened Deena's backpack at his feet. He shuffled through what little there was; just trinkets, candy wrappers and paper. "Nothing. Not a f.u.c.king thing. Except of course for your useless tracking device that I'm a.s.suming is woven into this thing somewhere." He stared at the faded tag inside that said where to return it, if someone found it.

Wallace slammed on the brakes and brought the vehicle over to the side of the winding road. "Listen. If it weren't for my "useless" trackers we wouldn't be this far and we'd have no idea where the girl has been at this point." He stuck his finger in Morgan's face. "What the h.e.l.l have you done? Let's see, killed a couple of people that have nothing to do with this, and burned down a coffee house." He put his hands back on the wheel and sighed. "I say we call Marsh, tell him we found the bag, but no girl and we drive a straight line from here to L.A. and hope we find her before the law does, or some other interested party." He grabbed the gearshift and started to put it back in drive.

"Does this address mean anything to you?" Morgan held up the tag for him to see.

Wallace thought about it. "Tallmadge, California? That's where the girls are from originally."

"Are you listening to this?" Morgan's mentor growled from the back seat. "This incompetent a.s.shole is deliberately trying to ruin this for you."

"And you didn't think to mention that? How far away is it?"

"No idea," Wallace said. He reached into his jacket. "Let me map it on my phone."

Mr. Hector yelled from the back seat. "He's got a gun. He's going to shoot you."

Morgan put his hand on Wallace's arm. "Just a sec."

"What?"

"You know their home town pretty readily."

"I have their files memorized."

"Their hometown would've been a good place to start looking for Deena. Why didn't you mention that earlier?"

"f.u.c.k you. This should've been easy. Meet Ramirez at the train station and it's all over. There wasn't any reason to suggest other options. We knew where she was."

"Ly-ing..." Morgan's mom said from the back. Morgan turned to see her wedged in the seat with Brandt on one side and the monkey and Mr. Hector on the other. "What?" She said. "I can't have an opinion? I should just sit here and be silent?"

"Yes. All of you, shut up," Morgan said.

"Who are you talking to?" Wallace asked.

"You shut up." Morgan pulled one of his pistols and leveled it at Wallace. "You know that's where she is, don't you?" A thrill came over Morgan as he said that. Like a door had been opened to him that was locked before.

"No."

His ex-girlfriend joined in. "He does, you know he does."

"Why do you know about their home town?" He picked up the bag again and read the address. "4468 Southmoore Lane? You have everything at your fingertips up there in your mind. Ring any bells? Tell me." He felt a smile coming on.

Wallace shook his head no.

Morgan lowered the gun a bit and pulled the trigger. A bullet ripped through Wallace's right leg and lodged in the door.

Wallace cried out and leaned forward to clutch at the wound. A dark spot of blood quickly formed on his pants around the wound. Wallace continued yelling as Morgan got closer and leveled the gun at the man's head this time.

"There's a reason you know that stuff, isn't there?"

Wallace nodded his head before he cleared his throat. "We thought Avi and Deena had a thing going on. I planted trackers on both of them."

"Did they?"

"Yeah. They were meeting at the home where the girls grew up."

"In Tallmadge," Morgan said.

"Yes."

"Everyone but you knew it all along," Mr. Hector said. "Morgie was the last to know!"

It made sense to him suddenly. There was no reason for them to go. "So Marsh knew this. And, what, he already sent a crew there?"

"You and I can't be everywhere at once. He was just covering all his bases."

It felt good to shove the barrel of his pistol harder against Wallace's head. "I should've been able to make that decision. I have this gigantic brain in my head that I use to do my work. I make choices. Not you. Not Marsh."

"All right. What do we do now?" Wallace choked out.

"We? What we?" Morgan looked around the SUV. "Do you see anyone else here but me?" Morgan asked. He pulled the trigger, killing Wallace instantly in a brief cloud of crimson and gray matter. Morgan breathed a deep sigh of relief at once again working alone. It felt like a crowded room had just been cleared. He wiped his arm off where some of the blood had blown back on him. It took him a moment to recover his composure and once he did, he calmly and efficiently moved around to the other side of the vehicle, yanked Wallace out and tossed the man over the nearby guardrail. He watched for a moment while the body tumbled through the brush and the trees, before disappearing beneath the cover of the leaves.

Morgan sat in the driver's seat and rolled his head back and forth trying to work out a cramp in his neck. It began when he tensed up; waiting to make his move on Wallace was stressful, and it was bothering him to no end.

Mr. Hector looked up at him from the pa.s.senger seat. "Can't you just stop this? Walk away now before more innocent people get killed."

Morgan looked down at the little teddy bear now sitting in the pa.s.senger seat, with the buckle latched around him. "You think Wallace was an innocent bystander in this? He was just as guilty as anyone else. More so, if he was actually planning on killing me."

"You don't know that. You gave him the answers you wanted to hear and he fed them back to you. He had no choice." Mr. Hector looked as disapproving as a plush animal could.

"Don't listen to him," Brandt said from the back seat. "You did the right thing. Between this and the coffee shop, I think you're really starting to take charge here. You're going places now. You know exactly what the girl is going to do and where she'll be."

Morgan smiled. He did finally feel in charge of s.h.i.t for once. Usually he took orders happily, that's how he made his living; he got a job, found the subject and killed them in the manner suggested by the client. Today he'd killed who he wanted, how he wanted and got the job done.

Still, the girl hadn't always done what was expected of her.

"Marsh is going to be very appreciative. He'll turn to you now," Morgan could see Brandt's face in his rearview mirror. "Better still, he'll trust you."

Morgan nodded again and activated the car's communication system. The small screen revealed itself on the dash. "Dial Mr. Marsh," he said. As the sound of the phone ringing began to emit from the speakers, he felt a smile of pride force the corners of his mouth open wide. He struggled to make his voice a little more somber before someone picked up on the other end.

32.

Garrett gripped the seatbelt that crossed his lap. If there were any armrests, he would have held on to them for dear life. The plane was apparently too small for that. He took one glance at the California countryside sliding by below them and that was enough for him. He didn't need to look again. The prop plane dipped and rose against the air currents every other second it seemed to him.

"Don't tell me you're afraid of flying. That's crazy," Pel said.

In the cramped seat next to him, Pel was playing some game on her phone. "Shouldn't you shut that off? Don't they make you turn off phones when you're in an airplane?" Garrett asked. "Shut it off."

"Nah. We're fine. A little Angry Birds never crashed one of these things. Besides, I switched it to airplane mode."

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?

"We're fine," Pel said. "You seriously can't handle flying?"

"I'm fine with jets. Jumbo jets. Big planes. Widebodies. This thing runs on a tightly-wound rubber band." Garrett stared at the back of the pilot's head to make sure the man was watching where they were going. "I'm not cool with that."

After she closed the game, Pel brought up some doc.u.ments on her tablet. "I did a little research into some things that Leonard was talking about," Pel said. "You know there are a lot of parasitic insects that can change the behavior of a host?"

"You're thinking someone put bugs like those into these people? On purpose? I don't know. That sounds far-fetched. Can't there be another explanation for this behavior?" Garrett asked.

Pel flipped to some images of bugs and enlarged them. "I don't know, but the bug thing is possible. Look at this one. It's a Maculina Rebeli." She handed the tablet to Garrett. The screen showed a beautiful b.u.t.terfly with bright, colorful markings on its wings. "This thing? It puts out some kind of smell that makes ants think it's one of them. It's so effective, that the ants will take care of the b.u.t.terfly's larvae."

Garrett looked at the b.u.t.terfly and considered what something like that could do if applied to humans. Could a person be fooled into not knowing who their friends and enemies were?

"This one's my favorite. It's really gross," Pel took the tablet back and flipped to a new picture. "This is the Emerald c.o.c.kroach Wasp. She's kind of nasty. She paralyses a c.o.c.kroach with her sting, and then stings it again in a specific part of the brain. The wasp then chews off part of the roach's antenna and completely hijacks its brain. The wasp makes the roach go back to her nest, lays some eggs in the roach's stomach which later hatch and the young eat the roach. The whole time? The roach doesn't care. Doesn't act like anything is out of the ordinary."

"Just lets it happen?"

"Just lets it happen," Pel said. "Something about the sting to the brain."

The image Pel pulled up was pretty gross. It showed a wasp chewing on a roach. Garrett wasn't really interested in seeing the video that Pel offered to show him. "So, you think this gives credence to what Leonard said? The fact that there are some nasty bugs that can make other bugs do stuff?"

"I don't know. There seem to be enough examples to show it could be possible." She started flipping through the file some more. "There's another bug in here that tricks rats into not being afraid of cats. That's weird, right?"

Strange science was one thing, but plausibility in humans was another. "Yeah. Definitely weird. Hard to prove though, if everyone dies when the thing is taken out of them."

"But, I mean, can these people be held accountable if they're being pushed to do these things?" Pel got silent as she flipped through the pictures and played the videos she'd saved. Her face contorted in disgust, but she kept turning to the next and the next. Garrett wanted to laugh at her, but he'd grown to accept and enjoy his younger partner's idiosyncrasies. A sudden drop in their alt.i.tude brought Garrett back to the here and now. "What? What happened? Are we going down?"