He grimaced in pain.
***
As Samuel rested half asleep against the sofa, Eve grabbed the backpack and sat on the floor. "Let's see," she mumbled, removing the computer, the small safe box, and AJ's flash drive from the bag. She turned the box over in her hand and pulled the tiny latch on the front. It didn't budge. She typed a few number combinations into the keypad. Nothing happened. No clicking noises. No beep.
"Did you ever get in touch with your hacker cousin?" she asked Niles, who’d returned after a half-hour away.
"Not yet."
She studied the safe box, her brow furrowed in deep concentration. How the hell do I open this thing? She tried the tiny latch. It didn't move.
Niles shook his head. "I think it's time you give up on that thing."
"Well, it was worth—"
A cracking sound stopped her mid-sentence. She examined the box and noticed a long fracture line along the center.
Niles tore his gaze away from the computer screen and looked at the safe box on Eve's lap.
So stupid. Why didn't I think of this ages ago?
Gently squeezing the box again, she smashed it just enough to make the fracture widen. Worried about accidentally smashing the flash drive within the box, Eve rolled her shoulders and applied a small amount of pressure. A second later, the tiny latch clicked and popped up.
Smiling, Eve lifted the hood of the safe box.
"No fucking way," Niles said, loud enough to wake up Samuel. "That was solid metal." He came from the desk and sat next to her to get a closer look at the contents of the box.
Inside the box was a flash drive nearly identical to the one AJ had retrieved. It was affixed to the floor of the box by a blue twist tie, the sort used to tie plastic bags. She untwisted the tie and removed the flash drive.
Rushing to the desk, she stuck it into the computer's USB port. One folder, labeled "Salazar," appeared on the otherwise blank computer screen.
Niles placed his hand on her shoulder and pointed at the screen. "What's that?"
The word "Salazar" had appeared at the center of a gray screen. Before she could make sense of what had happened, the word disappeared and was replaced by another screen displaying only a small gray button with the word "Welcome" on it. The button flashed.
"I have no idea." She clicked on the flashing button, and a page came up that resembled the previous screen of folders. There were two documents, marked "1" and "2." She clicked on document "1," and it brought up a twenty-page report, authored by Salazar. "Special Project Report, Part Two: Purpose, Market, and Findings," she said aloud, reading the title of the document.
They scanned the pages of the document, their eyebrows retreating farther and farther into their hairlines as they read page after page. Her heart thudded against her chest when she saw the name "Forest Sherman." After finishing the final page, she closed the file and opened document "2," a spreadsheet containing fifty items—company and organization names, contact information, and dollar figures that ranged from millions to billions of dollars.
She skimmed and re-skimmed the page several times before it all came together in her mind. "Oh, my God."
Samuel sat up, watching the two of them from the other side of the room.
Eve closed the document and the folder. She ejected the flash drive and inserted AJ's flash drive. Once more, she clicked on the folders and was met with the password box. "Fuck. How do we get in?"
Niles sighed. "I tried every password I could think of. I don't know."
"I can open it," said Samuel. He was sitting next to the sofa and holding a laptop computer now. "I have an application on my computer that should be able to access the files."
Eve rolled her eyes. "I'm sure your SPI-issued computer has a lot of applications like that, but—"
"It's not SPI-issued. Do you think I'd be carrying that around so they can track me? It's my personal computer."
"Oh," she replied. "In that case." She removed the flash drive from her computer and handed it to Samuel.
They sat next to him and stared at his computer screen as he inserted the flash drive.
"Give me a second. Sorry, my computer's not as fast as it used to be." With one hand, he typed something into a box that appeared, and more screens popped up and vanished. Then, the screen she'd seen before appeared followed by the password box. The password box disappeared and, suddenly, the screen displayed the name of the company, Generate, Inc., in large block letters. "We're in," said Samuel, standing up and taking his laptop to the desk. He offered the seat to Eve.
She sat and squinted at the small circular logo at the bottom left corner of the screen. It looked familiar. "That's Salazar's logo."
"Are the two companies related?" asked Niles. The next screen displayed two documents, labeled "1" and "2." "They're duplicates of the documents on the other flash drive. Maybe they're the same company."
"Or Generate, Inc. is a subsidiary of Salazar's company," said Eve, opening the files.
"So, does all this mean what I think it means?" he asked.
She shot him a wary look. "Maybe I'm paranoid, but I have a feeling they're trying to figure out how to create or reproduce our ability. To sell it. Spies who can literally be invisible. Can you imagine a hotter commodity?"
He sat up straight. "Wait a minute. That spreadsheet is a list of buyers, isn't it?"
Eve nodded. "Potential buyers maybe."
"You don't think the product is available yet, do you? They haven't figured out how to reproduce our ability?"
"I don't know. But I bet SPI sent operatives to retrieve these flash drives because it wants the information for itself. If one of these companies has figured out how to create or reproduce the ability, we can intervene before it goes on the market. That's why SPI sent us on field missions to get these drives. It all makes sense now. If we can stop SPI from getting its hands on the information—"
"And expose them in the process," Samuel said, cutting in abruptly. "We win."
They turned to him.
"Exactly," said Eve, smiling. "Pack up. We're taking another little trip to Chicago tomorrow."
***
Eve and Niles sat in the corner of his favorite dive bar, a noisy hole in the wall in the heart of Germantown. They took turns taking shots of tequila while he regaled her with stories about all the places where he'd tended bar in the city. The normalcy of the evening was a welcome change to Eve, although her mind lingered on SPI. What were they doing to Zoey and Gabe right now? Were they still alive? These questions haunted her, and she tried to push them aside.
"You know I was a schoolteacher before all this," she said, her words slurred as she leaned across the table and dropped her hand on top of Niles'. "I was just a normal, underpaid high school English teacher. Nobody special."
He laughed. "I highly doubt you were ever normal."
"No, really. I was struggling to pay rent, dealing with past-due student loans, all that typical bullshit. Really. It was all so cliché, to be honest," she said, grinning stupidly. "I guess except the part where I was involved with a married couple."
Niles burst out laughing, and she joined in. They slapped the table, laughing loud enough to turn heads.
"Sounds complicated," said Niles, still laughing.
As the laughter faded, Eve fell silent and stared at her hand gripping the empty shot glass. For a moment, she felt Zoey's lips against her neck and Gabriel's arms around her. She smiled. "It wasn't. Actually," she said, mostly to herself. "It was so easy. I never loved anyone the way I loved them. You know they asked me to move in with them when I was struggling with bills? I was too stupid to say yes. Could've avoided all of this by just saying yes."
"Why didn't you?"
"Pride. Jealousy."
"Jealousy?"
She motioned her agreement. "I think at first I was jealous of Gabe, jealous that Zoey chose him. That she married him. But then, the more I was with them, the more they showered me with love, the more I realized
I was wrong. It was possible to love two people at once, and she loved us both. She chose both of us."
Niles regarded her with an inquisitive expression. "That couple you visited on the night of the..." he trailed off. "They're who you're talking about?"
She continued staring at her hand, hoping he wouldn't see the tears forming in her eyes. "I pulled them into my shit. They're suffering because of me. I don't even know if they're still alive."
"I'm sorry, Eve," he said, grasping her hands across the table.
“Probably if I’d done like Agent Grobeck said and kicked my useless father out of the family home, I could’ve set myself up financially and never needed to take the job at SPI. What can I say? I don’t make the best decisions.”
He regarded her with a sympathetic look.
“I probably will kick him out whenever I get out of this mess,” she mumbled. She looked at Niles and tried to smile. I came out for drinks, not therapy. Get it together, Eve. "Hey, you want to do another round of shots and then get out of here?" she asked, hoping her voice sounded light-hearted.
For moment, he stared at her with the kindest eyes she'd ever seen. At last, he smiled and held up his hand to flag the server.
***
Just before dawn, she woke to Niles' incessant snoring. Sitting up, she groaned and looked across the room at Samuel on the pallet. His wounded arm lay awkwardly at his side. She got up and, hoping not to wake him, lightly placed her hand on his arm. It was warm and moist.
As she closed her eyes, she thought about how the wound on her neck had healed instantly. How had she done it? If she cut herself again, would the wound heal? "He could do everything," she murmured, repeating Agent Yu's words from her dream. What does that mean?
Samuel's eyes blinked open and shut twice before he opened them wide and stared at her. "What are you doing?" He looked at his arm when she released him.
"Sorry," she said, shaken out of her daydream. She stood. "I was looking at your—"
"My arm..." Samuel pulled the bandages from his wound. He sat upright and rubbed the spot where the skin had been torn from the bullet. The skin showed no signs that a bullet had ever pierced it.
They locked gazes.
Holy shit. I didn't do that. I couldn't have—
"What are you?" He scooted to the headboard and away from her. "Look, it was weird enough during training when you could hear my thoughts. Then I find out you're...unkillable, and somehow strong enough to crush metal. And now this?"
Eve stared at his arm, not believing her eyes.
"You're not like the rest of us, are you?" asked Samuel, a mix of fascination and fear in his eyes.
"What's going on?" Niles yawned. He squinted at them.
Samuel held up his arm, his eyes fixed on Eve. "She healed my arm."
At that moment, Eve spotted something sparkling on the blanket and picked it up. Her hands shook as she examined the tiny bullet that had a minute earlier been lodged in Samuel's arm. There were flecks of blood on it.
Niles' eyes flitted from Samuel's arm to Eve. "Is it true, Eve?"
She turned to him, still in a daze, and holding the bullet up before her.
When he noticed the bullet in her hand, his mouth dropped open. "This is some X-Men shit."
Eve was speechless.
13
Her arms propped up on crutches, Olivia Yu hobbled down the hallway, hoping not to run into Grobeck. She wasn't in any mood to deal with his condescension, which had reached a fever pitch ever since he'd had to send emergency medics to her home after Cooper's unannounced visit. He'd made no attempt to disguise his intentions of treating this incident as an outstanding debt she owed him.
Agent Yu's patience was waning nowadays, and over and over she had to remind herself of her plan. In a week or less, she told herself, she'd have everything she needed to ruin him.
"Don't rush, Olivia. You're almost there," she told herself as she entered AJ's cell. "You can do this."
Dried blood lined the corners of AJ's mouth, and her right eye looked darker and puffy.
"Are you all right?"
Sitting upright in the chair, AJ scowled at her. "What do you think?"
Agent Yu rested the crutches against the door and ran her fingers through her hair. She removed a large hairpin, put it between her lips, gathered the crutches again, and shuffled to AJ. "It's a recording device," she said, handing the hairpin to her. "See? If you look closely at the open tip, there's a tiny switch. When you push the switch to the right, the hairpin starts recording. You can see a faint blinking red light."
AJ brought the hairpin close to her face and flipped the switch.
"Do you see it? The red light? Put the pin in your hair, close to the front where it can record everything in front of you. Agent Grobeck will be visiting you again for more questioning. See if you can get him to talk. Massaging his ego usually does the trick. I'm interested in what he has to say about Mauricio Candela."
"I have to endure more of this?" her voice cracked. "All he did was slap me around and ask about Eve."
"I'm sorry. I didn't have the device until now. It would've been useful to have him recorded doing that to you."
"You mean beating me?"
Agent Yu lowered her eyes. "When we get this recording, we'll have him."
"What does that mean? For me."
"It means I'll have the authority to get you out of here," said Agent Yu. "Like I said before, you'll be free."
"And if there's nothing useful on it? If I can't get him to talk about Mauricio?"
"Then, I'll have to find another way to get him, without your help," replied Agent Yu, sighing.
AJ frowned. "Which means what?"
"You'll be free, Miss Taylor. Regardless of what information you get on the recording. I give you my word."
AJ stuck the pin in her greasy hair and rolled her eyes. "I don't know why I'm trusting you."
"Because you're smart," said Agent Yu, looking at AJ one more time before shutting the door.
Crutches clinking against the floor, she hobbled to the elevator and pushed the up arrow. As it opened, she rushed past some colleagues. When she arrived back at her office that looked more like a large utility closet than an office, she picked up the phone and called Agent Grobeck.
"I'm off to a meeting. What do you want?" he answered.
"This'll just take a moment. I'm trying to finish up my report on Zoey and Gabriel Ellis, but I realized I need to talk with Doctor Thomas. I believe she did their psych eval...?"
"Yes, that's correct."
"Well, I can't find her contact information..."
"Check with my assistant. She can give you Doctor Thomas' information," he said, and then there was a click.
After obtaining the doctor's office number, she called her own assistant. "Creekmur, can you turn the cameras off outside Doctor Thomas' office?"
"Sure thing."
"Oh, and get me the code to her office, will you?"
"You're not going to tell me what this is about, are you?" he asked.
"No. It's best that you don't know."
"Of course," he said, with a bored sigh.
***
To Agent Yu's relief, the hallway was quiet outside Doctor Thomas' office. To avoid being seen lingering outside Doctor Thomas’ office, she decided to stop at the end of the hallway. Gingerly, she rested the right crutch against the wall, reached in her pocket, and pulled out a small strip of paper. It contained the six-digit number Creekmur had given her. Scribbled on the back was a username and password.
She glanced around to make sure she was alone and looked at the two cameras. "Hurry up, Creekmur," she mumbled, tapping her feet against the concrete floor. When her phone buzzed, a message that read "Done" appeared on the screen. She slid the phone in her pocket. Thrusting her arm over the crutch, she rushed to the doctor’s office and dialed the code into the box.
After a click, the door opened. The spacious, airy office was bare, except for a desk in fron
t of a large window overlooking the dingy street below. "I get a damn closet, while Doctor Evil gets a view of the city. Figures," Agent Yu muttered.
She shut the door and made her way to the desk. On the desk, there was a small laptop, a couple of manila folders, and two framed photographs of Doctor Thomas presumably with her husband and daughter.
As Agent Yu sat, the crutches fell to the floor, causing quite a bang. She cast a frantic gaze at the door and realized she'd forgotten to lock it. Hit with an even greater sense of urgency, she turned to the computer and clicked the power button.
When the welcome screen appeared, she entered the username and password that Creekmur had provided. "Thank you, Creekmur," she said as a screen of file folders appeared.
She conducted a simple search for Zoey's and Gabriel's names, bringing up at least a dozen documents sorted by date. The most recent document contained Doctor Thomas' observations of the couple since Agent Grobeck had moved them from the Chicago facility. Skimming the document and looking for any mention of the facility, she scrolled down page after page. "Where are you?"
A moment later, she stopped at a section where Doctor Thomas was discussing Gabriel Ellis' responsiveness to Agent Grobeck's new enhanced interrogation methods. Prolonged solitary confinement.
"Bingo."
After saving the document onto a flash drive, she closed the folder and shut down the computer. Crutches under both arms, she bolted out the office to a nearby empty restroom and locked the door.
Leaning against the door of a stall, she puzzled over what she'd learned. "We only take high-risk terrorist suspects to the Galena facility. Grobeck can't think these people are that important. What the hell isn't he telling me?"
When she emerged from the restroom, she saw Doctor Thomas entering a code into the box outside the office.
Agent Yu inhaled and approached the doctor, careful not to look suspicious.
"Agent, can I help you?" The doctor's smile revealed coffee-stained teeth.
"I'm glad I ran into you. I'm trying to finish up my progress report on Zoey and Gabriel Ellis, but I have some quick questions about them. Is now a good time?"
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