Headcase, p.29
Headcase, page 29
That’s a problem. I need it to be heavy or this won’t work.
Thinking quickly, I dump the plant into the seat of the chair and wheel it over to the drinking fountain. I twist the faucet around and push the button. Water shoots out onto the dirt. I keep the heel of my palm on the button, waiting for the pot to be full.
A distant scream. Maybe someone outside, excited to see the bomb squad turn up. We don’t have much time.
Soon the dirt is saturated. Mud trickles down the sides of the pot, soaking the seat of the wheelchair. I do some quick calculations—the diameter of the pot is about a foot, so it holds about twenty gallons. Twenty gallons of water would weigh two hundred pounds, but the dirt has displaced a lot of it. Either way, the tubes used by SWAT teams to break down doors weigh only thirty-five pounds. This should do.
The wheelchair has two handles. I ignore them, grabbing the rim of the heavy pot and using it to push the wheelchair up the corridor, towards the back door.
It’s heavy. Hard to get going at first. But the longer I push, the more momentum the chair has. It’s like charging a battery. I’m putting more and more energy into it, and it’s storing that energy. The wheels hum on the linoleum, spinning faster and faster. Soon I have to run just to keep up with it. The big leaves tickle my face as I sprint up the corridor, gritting my teeth.
When the wheelchair is almost at the door, I let go. The chair rockets along the last few feet without me and slams into the door. The energy I put in all comes out at once, the pot flying forwards off the chair, a wrecking ball made of ceramic and wet dirt. It works better than I could possibly have hoped, smashing a hole through the wood and flying out into the sunshine in a cloud of matchsticks. The pot doesn’t even break, landing on the grass with a rich bass thunk.
I stand in the doorway for a second. Freedom is just beyond. There’s no sign of the other patients—we’re facing the other side of the hospital, the ER and Maternity buildings ahead. But I won’t get far on foot. I need those keys.
As I turn back to help Harmony, there’s another scream. Closer this time.
‘What’s going on?’ a voice cries. ‘Someone help me!’
It’s coming from one of the bedrooms. Someone else has been left behind in the evacuation.
I push the door open. There’s Eli, strapped to his bed, extra tight, the way Kelly does it. Whatever sedatives he’s been given have worn off. He’s struggling like a cocooned moth but can’t break free.
‘Timothy,’ he says, seeing me. ‘Thank God.’
The fire alarm keeps wailing as I approach the bed. The straps are as neat as ribbon around a Christmas gift.
‘Get me out of this, will you?’ Eli says.
I’ve never seen his bare feet before. The toes are plump and pink. I squeeze one.
‘What the hell, man? Untie me!’
I run my fingers up his leg, feeling the muscles under his clothes. He’s warm. His taut belly, his soft pectorals, his neck, bulging with veins. His sweat is cloying. Soon my hand reaches his face. The cheek is one of the silkiest parts of the human body. I pinch it gently, watching it blush.
His eye—his real eye—is wide with terror.‘Jesus,’ he says. ‘Please, don’t.’ Don’t what, he doesn’t say. Doesn’t know.
I can hear Harmony coming, her shoes slapping the floor.
I lean down and open wide. Letting him feel my hot breath on his face.
Then I clamp my jaws shut.
Not on him. Just on the air.
Because I feel nothing. I know what I would have wanted to do to him in the past. But I don’t think I want that anymore. I can choose not to.
Eli stares, uncomprehending.
‘You know what?’ I say. ‘I think I’m cured.’
I walk out into the corridor to meet Harmony. My smile fades as I see her.
Because it’s not Harmony. It’s Ariel Wilcox, the CIA agent.
She’s pointing a gun at me.
CHAPTER 38
My life begins above the ground. What am I?
I raise my hands. But because I only have one, it just looks like I’m asking a question.
Ariel’s clothes are so nondescript that she might have typed plain-clothes agent into a search bar and bought whatever came up. Dark green slacks, a grey jacket, a black baseball cap. She’s wearing the kind of glasses you see in drugstores, and they don’t distort her eyes at all. Not corrective lenses, just a disguise.
‘Ariel,’ I say. ‘Thank God you’re here.’
Her lip twitches. She doesn’t lower the gun. ‘Glad I found you. Come with me.’
Kobald discovered the fake letter bomb less than half an hour ago. Wilcox must already have been waiting outside when the alarms went off. No time to wonder why.
I think through my list of options. It doesn’t take long. I can run, and she’ll shoot me in the back. I can throw a marker pen at her—it’s the only thing in my pocket—and I might just get it airborne before she shoots me in the front. Or I can go with her, and get shot in the privacy of an unmarked van. No version of events ends with me alive, which is the point. The CIA has finally decided that I’m a liability.
‘Your colleague already debriefed me,’ I say, stalling.
‘What colleague?’
If she thinks I’ve talked, she’ll need to keep me alive so she can find out who else she needs to kill. ‘Big guy,’ I say. ‘White, thirties, stubble, one eye.’
These are just the first details that come to mind. I’m not deliberately describing Eli. But he must think I am, must be listening, because he shouts, ‘Hey! Who’s out there?’
Wilcox’s head snaps towards the door. I take advantage of the momentary distraction to throw the pen at her face. She ducks and shoots at the same time, but I’m already running, at an angle, towards a spot three feet to her right. The bullet misses me, cracking against the doorway behind. I change direction, back towards her, and before she can pull the trigger again, I kick her in the groin. She grunts and crumples, loosing another shot at the same time. This time the bullet would have hit my arm, if I still had an arm to hit, but instead the muzzle flash just burns the side of my chest through my clothes. I swing a punch at her head, but she’s faster, lurching forward under the blow, and karate-chopping the side of my knee with her free hand. My leg folds, and I’m down.
Wilcox scrambles up and backs away, raising the gun. As she lines it up with my face, I go through my options again, which now takes no time at all.
She pulls the trigger—
But only depresses it halfway before Harmony slams a fistful of keys into the back of her neck.
The agent’s skull jerks so hard that her glasses pop off, and she hits the floor. Harmony wrenches her fist back, tugging the keys free. There’s blood on the blades, and a row of holes in the back of Wilcox’s neck. The agent squirms slowly, like she’s trying to get up but is glued to the floor.
Harmony is breathing heavily.
‘You okay?’ I ask, though it feels like she should be the one asking that question.
‘Yeah,’ she says, not taking her eyes off the fallen agent. ‘I found the keys.’
‘I see that.’
‘Who’s this?’
‘CIA agent. I guess I’ve been …’ I try to remember the term.
‘Burned,’ Harmony says.
‘Right. Burned.’
‘We should finish her off.’ Harmony reaches for the agent’s gun.
‘Don’t.’ I kick it out of reach.
‘Why not?’ Harmony is bug-eyed, quaking from the adrenaline.
I’m not going to stick around and treat Wilcox’s wounds, but I’m not going to bear witness to an execution either. I’m not even going to nibble on the body. That part of my life is over.
‘No time to explain,’ I say. ‘Come on.’
•
We sprint downhill across the grass. The ER is just ahead. There’s a parking garage beyond it. I know the ambulances are kept there, but I don’t know how well guarded they’ll be. Hopefully everyone will be distracted by the bomb threat.
‘I’ll drive,’ I say, as we run.
Harmony keeps hold of the keys, still slick with Wilcox’s blood. ‘Why?’
‘The Company has my face on file.’ It’s hard to lie while I’m so out of breath. ‘Any time a photo of me is wirelessly transmitted, they send out interference to block the signal. But you’ll need to stay out of sight in the footwell on the passenger side.’
‘Haven’t you been burned?’
I spit on the ground, panting. ‘Takes weeks to update the database.’
Harmony buys this. We slow down as we approach the hospital’s emergency entrance, and she tosses me the keys. I catch them. Not even tempted to lick the blades. Diaz deserves the Nobel Prize for Medicine.
We’re only fifty feet away when an ambulance pulls up in front of the ER. Two paramedics climb out, hurry around to the back and open it up. They pull out a gurney, the legs unfolding as it emerges, a wheezing patient tied to it with a mask covering her face. Bad luck for her. Good luck for us.
I rifle through the keys until I find the one with a sticker that matches the licence plate of the ambulance. As the paramedics push the gurney into the hospital I start running again, trying to get to the ambulance before Harmony does. I push the button on the key as I run. The lights flash and the doors click. I wrench open the door, climb up into the driver’s seat and close the door again. Then I hit the other button on the keys, locking the vehicle.
Harmony hurries around to the passenger side. I hear her pulling uselessly at the handle. ‘Timothy!’ she calls. ‘My door is locked!’
I put the key into the ignition and turn it. The engine grumbles to life, but I can’t move the shifter out of park. I remember from my FBI days that some police vehicles are fitted with an anti-theft device—the stick won’t move unless you touch a hidden lever near the brake. I feel around, and the ambulance has the same one. I release it, and shift into drive.
‘Timothy!’ Harmony is jumping up and down. I can only see the top of her head, bouncing in and out of view. ‘Open the door!’
The guilt twists in my guts.
‘Timothy!’ she shouts.
‘Sorry, Harmony,’ I say. ‘You’re not coming.’
‘What?!’
‘You have to stay here.’
‘Son of a bitch!’ she screams. Her fist slams against the glass. ‘You’re one of them!’
‘The doctors can help you. I can’t. Step back so I can drive.’ Plus, there’s a good chance that I’ll be dead by sunset. If she comes with me, she’s likely to die, too.
‘Open this door!’ She kicks it so hard that the ambulance rocks on its suspension.
‘Hey! You!’ One of the paramedics is back, sprinting towards the ambulance, gripping his own set of keys.
I release the park brake. The ambulance starts rolling. Harmony steps back just in time—I see her in the side mirror, staring after me with betrayal in her eyes. The paramedic runs down the hill after me, but the ambulance is gaining speed and he has no hope of catching up. Soon he realises it and slows to a jog, then a walk, as he shouts into the radio on his lapel.
I zoom down the hill, circling the hospital campus. The crowd of psych patients is visible, fifty yards away. I bow my head, even though they’re unlikely to notice that the driver is me at that distance.
The security perimeter from the bomb threat is up ahead. Someone has blocked the road with two-by-fours on steel stands, painted yellow and black, with the words ROAD CLOSED. There’s no other way through—trees have been planted on either side of the road. Two security guards stand on the blacktop, guns or maybe tasers on their hips. I can see more in the distance, blocking off other parts of the hospital. The police will be on their way, too.
I slow down, taking my hand off the wheel and stabbing at the buttons on the dash until I find the siren. The wail is deafening—I don’t know how paramedics can think clearly enough to drive. The light bar is going, too. I can see it reflected in the sunglasses of the security guards on either side of the blockade.
I hold my breath. I’m hoping they’ll instinctively move the barrier for an emergency vehicle. If they don’t, I’ll have to ram it, and I don’t know what kind of damage that will do to the ambulance. I won’t get far with a busted tyre.
One of the security guards moves towards the barrier, but the other blocks him. There’s an animated discussion. I stop the ambulance about twenty feet away, not sure what to do.
I see something move from the corner of my eye and turn to look at the crowd of patients gathered near the Behavioural Health Unit. Most of them are looking at the ambulance with the screaming siren. But three people aren’t. Dr Diaz, and two men I don’t recognise.
Grey jackets. Black baseball caps. More plain-clothes agents. I should have guessed that Wilcox didn’t come alone.
The agents are gesturing, asking Diaz questions, pointing at the group of patients and then at the psych ward. I can’t see their faces well enough to read their lips, but I can imagine what they’re saying. Timothy Blake. National security. Diaz’s face gets more and more alarmed as she listens.
The guards are still deciding whether to move the barrier. ‘Come on,’ I mutter and give them a quick blast from the horn.
The noise draws the attention of Diaz and the two agents. They all look at me.
As Diaz recognises me in the driver’s seat of the ambulance, I can see the moment she realises everything I told her was true. That I really was recruited by the CIA. That I really did come here undercover. That she’s had a cannibal in her office this whole time.
The look of horror transforms her normally calm face. It’s the same expression you see in photos of people stumbling away from the wreckage of the Twin Towers, people whose whole world had just turned inside out. The look of someone realising their safe, comfortable life was just an illusion—that they’ve been in hell alongside the devil this whole time.
The two CIA agents produce handguns from their jackets and sprint towards me. One of the patients screams.
The security guards are finally dragging the barrier aside, but too slowly. I floor the accelerator. The ambulance lurches forwards. There’s a thunk, thunk noise from behind me as two bullets hit the rear doors. Low. The agents are aiming for the tyres.
The security guards both leap aside and take cover as the ambulance clips the edge of the barrier, sending it flying. I hear a headlight crunch. Then I’m out, zooming onto the main road, hurtling towards the Loop.
I thought I’d be able to do seventy the whole way, but it doesn’t work like that. Even with the siren screaming, I have to slow down at every intersection, making sure I don’t get T-boned by some driver with their stereo way up. No signs of pursuit yet, but I’m sure the ambulance is LoJacked. The police will be able to track it via cell towers and GPS.
Soon I’m on a long, straight road, away from any heavy traffic. I let go of the wheel and push more buttons at random. Eventually I find the emergency radio frequency. Amid the usual chatter about fires, domestic disturbances and robberies, I hear a report about shots fired at the George Clark Red Memorial Hospital. A suspect fled the scene in a stolen ambulance. It’s implied but not stated that I was the one shooting.
There are reports of the stolen ambulance hurtling east on the I-9, towards Louisiana—but I’m actually going west. The CIA must be keeping the police off my trail, so they can dispose of me without any witnesses. I don’t have long. I take the wheel again and concentrate on driving.
Forty minutes later I screech into a driveway not far from the safe house. I jump out of the ambulance and run the rest of the way. Soon I’m pounding on the front door. ‘Zara! It’s me.’
This is a risk. If she’s still loyal to the CIA, she might open fire when I walk in. But I’m pretty sure she’s been burned, like I have. That’s why Wilcox was at the hospital, tying up loose ends.
No answer. I try the door. Locked.
I circle around the back and break in through the kitchen window. Everything is just as I left it. Sawdust around the front door to show prints. The mugs positioned just so on the kitchen counter. Power tools scattered around—drills, a nail gun, a saw. The builders could come back at any moment.
‘Zara?’ I call.
The house suffocates my voice, burying it. It’s the kind of silence that can only mean absence or death.
I check the bedrooms. The bathroom. All the cupboards. My stuff is still here, but Zara’s isn’t. She’s gone—in the wind, in CIA parlance.
I change my clothes and grab what I can fit in my pockets. My wallet, my key to this house, my watch, and the wig and the moustache, though I don’t have time to put them on right now. The CIA rushed the operation at the hospital, so the possibility that they’ve planted trackers in any of my belongings is vanishingly small. My phone is easy to track, so I drop it into the toilet.
The auto-injector full of fake blood isn’t hidden in my clothes anymore. It’s lying on the bed, in the open. Zara must have found it, and left it behind for me to take. Why? Not to track—if she’d planted a microdot on it, she would have left the auto-injector in its hiding place. Is it a gift? An apology?
I drop it into my pocket.
As I walk out the front door, I hesitate in the doorway. Even with Zara’s stuff gone, her presence lingers. A perfume in the air, so faint that I might be imagining it. I shake it off and leave, locking the door behind me.
I run back to the ambulance, get in, and drive it to the nearest strip mall. Once I’m there, I put on the wig and moustache before I climb out. Leave the ambulance parked behind a grocery store, the key still in the door. Sooner or later someone will take it for a joyride, assuming they find the hidden lever. The Company can chase them instead of me for a while.
I hail a cab. It takes a few attempts, because I still look poor. I keep my lips shut to hide my chipped teeth, but there’s nothing I can do about the sun-damaged skin. Eventually someone stops, and I tell him to take me to the nearest Greyhound station. He does. I pay cash and let him see me walk inside before he drives off.
