"What I'm here for is to offer Rick a chance to get out of his kennel." Karen didn't even look at me. "But if you two want to stay here and trade ancient war stories, be my guest."
Oh hell, no. If someone wanted to give me a chance to get out of this glass and silver prison, you didn't have to ask me twice.
"When do we leave?"
CHAPTER TEN
The answer to my question was: immediately. I barely had time to grab a go-bag from the room they had assigned me and report to stairs that led to the roof. Dmitri beat me there. The others showed up about ten minutes later.
I had tried multiple times to enter this stairway but hadn't been successful. It was blocked by a heavy, metal door, and you could only get access through a keypad. My skills were more of the tearing the bad guys to pieces variety and not the hacking my way out of prison sort. Maybe I needed to learn new skills.
Karen punched a code into the keypad and the door opened. I stepped forward, but she stopped me with an outstretched arm. "Wait."
She drew what looked like a key fob out of her cargo pocket and depressed one of the buttons with her thumb. Something in my cuff clicked and beeped.
"Now walk through."
Apparently, some of the security measures were not as obvious as a lock and key. I didn't want to know what would have happened if I tried to walk through without her deactivating whatever had just clicked and beeped.
"Let's go. Our ride's waiting for us at the top."
We headed up the stairs, a motley cast of characters, looking nothing like a team of MONIKER professionals on a mission. First, Dmitri in his khakis and button down shirt, loafers, and a cardigan sweater with leather patches on the elbows. Calix following, dressed in cargo pants, combat boots, and Rancid T-shirt, sporting a black trench coat that covered her back where she carried her ancient sword.
Then me. Jeans and T-shirt.
Finally, behind me, Karen. In spite of everything, I couldn't help but feel a frisson of excitement tinged with nostalgia with her at my back in her combat gear. Something had changed, but I would still rather have had her watch my six with the arsenal she carried, than anyone else.
About halfway up the stairs, the cold air began seeping down. I gulped at it, finally freed of the suffocating, burning silver.
We emerged onto a rooftop helipad; a medium-sized aircraft with no marking awaited us. The pilots signaled across the concrete, and Karen gave them the thumbs up sign.
"All right, let's go," she said. "Keep your heads down. Except you, Rick, you're short enough, you'll be all right."
Was that … a joke at my expense? I grinned like a fool. Karen didn't acknowledge it, just led the way forward.
The pilot had already prepped the aircraft for flight, blades spinning, engine thrumming steadily. We each hopped into the bird, and the copilot met us inside.
"Welcome aboard today's flight on this Boeing Vertol 234," she shouted over the engine noise, showing us the seat straps. "We'll be in the air for less than an hour. Don't touch anything, and if you're looking for in-flight service, you're on the wrong flight. Sit tight, and we'll have you at your desert destination in no time."
We barely had time to settle in before the pilot took off. The helicopter lifted vertically, then swooped forward, banking as we traveled just above the treetops. We flew out of the mountains, coming out over the Red Rock Desert, the rock formations undulating below us, glowing in the afternoon sun.
To the east, the flickering neon lights of Las Vegas beckoned. We turned our back on them, heading west out over the desert.
In the rush of escaping from the facility, the adrenaline started pumping, and I started to feel once again the old pre-mission excitement. We were rolling out, on the way, and if this team wasn't actually a team–or even close to one–the soldier in me didn't care.
But the change–even before we lifted off, I sensed it, butting against my senses. For one brief moment as we sped over the snow and pines, I tried to call it, hoping somehow that free of the facility, it would come.
The cuff not only threw up its familiar wall, but it zapped me good, too. When I flinched, I caught Karen's knowing stare. Shit. Did Calix know? I had no idea. Woman had her nose pressed up against the glass, watching out the window as we flew on our way.
The high desert eventually gave way to flat, boring desert, and a short time after, signs of civilization began to dot the ground. A long, winding road intersected the plain, heading straight to a larger, built up area.
Up front, the pilot started chatting on the radio, and I figured we must be getting close. Sure enough, about ten minutes later, the copilot popped her head back around.
"We're about five minutes from Twenty-Nine Palms," she shouted at us. "Make sure you're strapped in for the landing."
Worst in-flight entertainment ever.
On the ground, the heat slapped us in the face. The dry, hot air strangled me, and I wondered if anyone had packed an extra water bowl. With any luck, we wouldn't be on the ground long.
∞ ∞ ∞
My luck stayed about the same as it always does–completely shitty. We were supposed to connect up with a military flight that would drop us up north. Instead, an airman with a couple of stripes on his sleeve who couldn't have been much older than my pants came up to us, apologizing. Apparently, the plane we were supposed to take to Alaska had broken down in Hawaii and was delayed waiting on repairs. Would we be so kind as to wait in the hangar?
Broken down in Hawaii. I snorted. To my surprise, Karen twitched a lip.
"Lead the way, Staff Sergeant," she told the kid.
He led us to the hangar, and then to a room that had been thrown up inside. The accommodations boasted a few rows of plastic chairs, a refrigerator full to the door with generic bottled water, a couple of boxes of muffins and, against one wall, a stack of boxes of MREs. Yum.
Dmitri sat down in one of the chairs, crossed his arms, and immediately fell asleep sitting straight up. Karen disappeared somewhere, probably to go see about the details of our flight. I liked having someone else in charge of logistics.
I grabbed a bottle of water, about to follow Dmitri's example. Until Calix strode up, plopped herself in the seat next to me, picked up my muffin, and unwrapped it.
"Oh. Do you mind?"
"They're free," I told her. "Also, there are about five more boxes over there."
Either she misunderstood, or she didn't give a shit because she started eating it. Whatever. I lay down across several of the chairs, tucked the bottle of water under my head, and closed my eyes.
"Rick." Calix kicked the bottom of my foot.
"Jesus, what?"
"Karen says you dated her grandmother."
"I did not." Fine. I guess we were having a conversation. Without opening my eyes, I said, "Karen's grandmother was a woman of discerning taste and intelligence and would have nothing to do with me. Also, she was married."
"Is it true you were a Nazi?"
At this I opened my eyes.
Ignoring the look I gave her, she added, "And a werewolf?"
"Jesus Christ." Giving up, I sat up, rubbing my eyes. "That's cannibalistic biomorph. Get it right."
"Huh." She polished off my muffin, brushing the crumbs off her pants onto the floor. "The bit in the penthouse, and then at the house. I'm still not sure if I can believe what I saw. Is werewolf even the correct name?"
"What?"
"A lot of the knowledge has been lost, but I come from two families who believe in preserving tradition." As if to accentuate it, the familiar old blood and leather smell teased my senses.
"Two families?" Trying to follow this conversation was like walking up a down escalator. I didn't know which way to focus.
"Chumash on my mother's side. Okinawan on my father's," she said. "Although Okinawan by way of California by way of my grandfather joining the Marines to escape the internment camps in World War II, and my father continuing the family tradition."
"That's how you came to work he
re? Military?"
"Sort of." Throughout the conversation she kept her voice lowered, as if suspecting Dmitri was not exactly asleep. I'd bet on him following the conversation anyway. Man put the word "spook" in spooky.
"I met Karen when we attended a joint military school," she told me. "We hit it off, but after the class was over, we kind of fell out of touch. Few months ago, I broke up with a long-term girlfriend and decided to look her up. I needed a job, too, and the agency was hiring. It worked out."
Seemed plausible enough. So why did I get the feeling I'd missed something? Or she'd deliberately not filled me in on everything.
At that moment, Karen interrupted the conversation, walking up to where we were hanging out.
"Grab your shit. We've got another plane on the tarmac. It's going to take us up to Wainwright. We'll grab some transportation from there."
The woman was a miracle worker. Now if only we could shake her out of whatever state of mind Doctor G had imprisoned her in. Hopefully, once we were out in the woods, I would be able to help her remember herself.
∞ ∞ ∞
Although I'd planned to talk to Karen once we got on the plane, I fell asleep almost before we took off. The omnipresent silver of the Vegas facility had made for restless nights as the constant pain and mental disruption took their toll. The cuff on my wrist, although it blocked the change, at least didn't gift me with chronic insomnia. Speaking of which, the damn thing refused to respond to any of my attempts to figure out how to pry it off, and more than once it rewarded me for my efforts with a sharp electrical shock. Unpleasant.
It did move a little though. It wasn't welded to the skin. I might be able to dislocate my thumb joint. Possibly slip it off. If I got desperate enough or far enough away from the others to be able to do so without getting detected.
I woke up as the plane's landing gear hit the tarmac. Karen had arranged everything, including the rental of a four-wheel drive truck to make the drive out to the town. We transferred under the light of a thin, waxing moon. I stood for moment under the sky, basking in the sweet, crisp cold. Past the rank diesel miasma of jet exhaust, I caught the promise of the north country snow and pines under the moon.
The inability to change, to run, to feel the cold under my paws, ripped me apart. Especially after so many months wearing that form.
Calix paused as well, ignoring Karen's impatience and the hint she sent, turning the key in the ignition. The woman stood, mouth agape, staring up at the lights streaming across the sky. Without the benefit of the Überwechsel, they were rendered to me in shades of white and gray. But I could wait. The full moon was on its way.
"I've always wanted to see the northern lights," Calix murmured, more to herself than any of us.
"Hey, join MONIKER, see the world, especially all the cold, shitty parts of it," Karen told her, leaning out of her window. "Now get in the truck. We need to make time."
Dmitri got into the front passenger's seat without even calling shotgun. Typical. Calix grabbed the seat behind Karen, and so I sat behind Dmitri.
"Rick." Karen glared at me in the rearview mirror.
"What?"
"Roll up your window. Everyone else is freezing."
Grumbling, I obeyed.
"Good boy."
I shared my thoughts with her in the form of my middle finger where she could see it in the mirror. She ignored me and put the truck in gear.
Maybe I wasn't the only one who found the Vegas facility crazy-making. Maybe all she needed, too, was to get far away from the presence of the evil they were keeping in the basement.
Again, I wanted to talk to her, even with the others there. Since we were all in on each other's secrets. Or at least they were all in on mine.
But again, I fell asleep, not waking up until the sun rose and we were rolling up past the airstrip.
∞ ∞ ∞
"Man, you still look like shit."
Randall Tso greeted me outside the diner where Lara worked. She wasn't on duty, but he had agreed to meet us for breakfast, tell us what he knew about what was going on in town. It never hurt to have as much intel as possible. Dmitri demurred, and stayed with the vehicle.
"Eat me," I told him. Randall, that is. Not Dmitri.
"Eat shit?"
"Look who learned to take a hint."
He laughed out loud. "Who are these lovely ladies?"
I winced. I don't know anyone but Randall who would look at two pissed off Amazons, armed to the teeth, and refer to them as "lovely ladies." Please, please, please, do not let him make a lesbian joke. I do not need to be picking up pieces of my friend all over the street.
"Randall, this is Dr. Karen Willet, a friend of mine who works investigations for Homeland. And Agent Calix…" I realized I didn't know her last name.
"Just Calix is fine. Nice to meet you, Randall." She extended her hand.
"Thanks, likewise." As they shook, I recognized the half-stricken look on his face. It was probably a good thing Lara didn't come with him to meet us. Not that she had anything to worry about. Randall might lose his voice in the presence of a commanding woman, but everything about him screamed loyalty to his new family.
"Shall we go in?" It was my stomach talking. After sleeping as long as I did, I needed food in a bad way.
Randall held the door for the women, who accepted his chivalry. I attempted to follow them, but he went in front of me, leaving me to dodge the door as it closed behind him.
After we'd settled ourselves at the table and placed our order, Karen turned to Randall.
"Rick tells me you worked with one of our former agents, John Tell?"
That's all the encouragement the man needed.
"Yeah, he showed up–oh man, must have been two or three months after this guy disappeared on us." He jerked a thumb at me. "We had an open spot on the shift, and the guy needed a job. He seemed okay, knew his way around the work, didn't bitch and moan like a lot of the new kids, come up from whatever middle-class life they're trying to escape and don't like it that their dream of being an outdoorsman actually requires them to work outdoors, you know?"
I tried and failed to keep the snarky grin off my face. Karen and Calix just stared. It can take a bit of getting used to Randall's stream of consciousness blather. He paused for a quick breath and kept going.
"He worked out pretty well, too, but kept to himself, you know? I didn't even know his last name, I kept having to ask Lara–she knew him, came into the diner all the time, she said he said he hated eating alone, so he liked to come in here, order, be around people even though no one ever saw him actual talk to anyone."
At this point, our food arrived, forcing Randall to take a tactical pause to get the orders to the right people. Even before the waitress set the last plate in front of us, he was off and running again.
"Except for a couple of times, those Black Mountain guys were in here. Then I saw him talking to them. Or actually Lara saw him. She's not nosy or anything, but she really pays attention to her customers. Says it gets her better tips. I think she knows everyone in town by their first and last names–she's the one who told me his last name, did I tell you that?"
"We're getting a bit off topic here," Karen suggested. I grinned around a mouthful of bacon. She had no idea.
"Oh yeah, sorry." Randall shoved a heaping forkful of eggs into his mouth, chewed, and started talking while he was still chewing and swallowing. Lovely. "Anyway, Lara told me that she saw John Tell talking to the Black Mountain guys, which she noticed because like I said, guy never talked to anyone, but the most interesting thing–" He broke off, coughing. He pounded himself on the chest with his fist, took a sip of coffee, then dug his fork in for more.
"The most interesting thing?" Karen's tone was suspiciously even.
I buried my face in my plate. No way would I let her catch me grinning at her. Then I made the mistake of looking up at Calix. She caught my eye. The corners of her mouth quirked up, and then the two of us were dying of silent laughte
r, shaking with it.
"What is it with you two?" Karen glared at us, which made us even more hysterical.
Randall swallowed his eggs and continued without showing a sign he had noticed our little exchange.
"The most interesting thing was that Lara said they were speaking Russian."
Well. Talk about your anticlimax.
"And Lara, she actually speaks Russian, account of her folks moved here in the eighties, and they talked Russian at home, so she can't really speak it per se, but she understands it really well, and she said that the Black Mountain guys were really reaming him out, threatening him, asking him for information, telling him he better have something soon. Or else."
"Or else?" Karen asked.
"Yeah," Randall said. "They weren't real specific on that one. But I guess, you know, with what happened, we found out what that meant." He looked over at me. "That's what I meant by I thought that was some bullshit. Because of that conversation."
We ate in silence for a bit after he stopped talking, processing the information.
"Hey, listen," Randall said, finally. Silence was not his style. "I got a friend, works in the Sheriff's department. Which means they also work for the fire chief, the coroner, and the dogcatcher. You want me to call ‘em up? Ask to see the body?"
It was a weird kind of macabre offer. But we didn't turn it down.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
"Rick, hey, this is Agnes. Agnes, this is my friend, Rick." Randall waved his hand around. "And Rick's friends. How ya doin'?"
Agnes stared at Randall over the tops of her reading glasses. She manned the desk at the sole entry point to the municipal building. I estimated her age at about fifty years old. Her blond hair was cut short in almost a buzz cut, accentuated with a streak of some shading, and she wore a women's suit jacket with a small pin attached to the lapel. Looked like a fist grabbing something.
"What the fuck you want, asshole?"
Some friend. Randall smiled his goofy smile. The one he pasted on when he wanted to ask you to take his shift for him so he could go hunting. "These friends of mine knew the man who was found deceased in a terrible fashion just yesterday. I thought perhaps they could assist the local authorities in their quest to identify the body and perhaps bring closure to his poor family."
Vegas Run Page 8
