by JA Huss
“What kind of shit?”
“Papers. Like newspapers. Clippings, and photos, and documents. Mostly just people’s personal shit. Marriage licenses. Health records. Wedding photos. Nothing that really said, This is it. This is why we do this crazy shit every month. But then I went looking for patterns. Like… why was this newspaper, from this day, saved, and the next day wasn’t? And why all the war photos? Like thousands of war photos dating back to World War I. And why these health records? Why these people? Because some of them seemed too random. I just couldn’t make the connection until you told me about your rat.”
“No,” she says, putting on her serious face. “I don’t think that’s right.”
“Why? What other reason could this stupid group of über-rich assholes have for funding wars? Because I know that’s what they do. I’ve heard enough and seen enough to know that part is true. Why do they need conflict?”
“Oil?”
“I thought that too, but most of the conflict happens in countries that don’t have oil. Oil countries have money, which means they have armies, which means they don’t let people come in and fuck with their good thing, ya know?”
“Umm…” She huffs. “Iraq, anyone?”
“Besides that. I think that was about something else, actually. But regardless, Iraq doesn’t count. I didn’t find any pictures of Iraq. And only a few in Afghanistan. Mostly they’re dirt-poor places in war-torn Africa and Asia. Places we don’t really hear about over here.”
“Refugee camps. The one topic no one wants to talk about.”
“Exactly. And what’s the first thing they give to people when they start filling up refugee camps?”
She frowns. And it’s a deep, grave, sad frown. She whispers, “Medical attention.”
“And shots, right? Vaccines, maybe? Or antibiotics? But what if it’s not a vaccine or an antibiotic? What if it’s something else?”
She looks down at her hands. Shakes her head a little. “Something else like what?”
“I dunno. You’re the scientist. What could be in those shots?”
She lets out a long breath of air. “Honestly, I don’t know. I’m not really a scientist. I’m just a glorified lab tech. But if you’re insinuating that we have some kind of vector to deliver… I don’t know. Gene splices, I guess. Then… no, Johnny. That’s a bunch of science fiction.”
“How did you change your rat?”
“That’s different. It’s a rat. Not a human. We don’t do things like that on humans because we’re a lot more complicated than a rat.”
“We don’t do things like that?” I say. “Really? Then what the fuck were they doing with those pregnant women in that lab, Megan?”
“I don’t know.”
“Something illegal, right? Something they can’t do in the US for risk of exposure. And I mean in the literal sense, obviously. Since that place had a biosecurity level four containment facility. I looked that up while you were sleeping, by the way. I looked at a map. Only thirteen of those high-security labs even exist in the US. About an equal number in various European countries. Two in Africa. Two in Australia. Half a dozen in Asia. But you know what country was missing on the map I saw?”
“The Bahamas?”
“The Bahamas. There’s no public record of a level four facility in the Bahamas. And we don’t need to speculate that they were running trials on humans there. We saw it.”
“We don’t know what it was.”
“I have the data. We could look. You might recognize something.”
“Oh, God. Now?” She sighs and I can tell she’s exhausted. But beyond that, this is too much right now. It’s overload. It’s heavy. It’s… sad. For so many reasons, but mostly because like it or not, whatever they’re doing, we’re both a part of it.
“No. We don’t have to look now.” I sit up in bed, pull my pants back up, then grab her shorts and toss them to her. “But I do want you to look at something else. Put those on and come with me.”
CHAPTER TWENTY - MEGAN
Johnny Boston holds my hand as he leads me up the stairs to the living area, and keeps a hold of it as we make our way up to the deck and around to the bow of the yacht. Despite all the crazy shit that has gone down in the last few days, and despite—maybe not overlooking, but definitely putting aside to think of later—the fact that Johnny is a cold-blooded killer… I have an unfamiliar sense of calm inside me.
I might need therapy to understand this calm. Because I have obviously been through some traumatic events and these experiences have messed up my innate sense of morality, or compassion, or possibly even my whole fucking identity, starting with my humanity.
Because I am drawn to him. I am drawn to this violent, most likely psychotic man whose only purpose in life is to extort billions of dollars from rich people every month so they can use it to fund some global, diabolical plan that will change the world forever.
“One second,” Johnny says, letting go of my hand. “Just sit here.” He points to one of the two sun loungers built into the top of the yacht’s hull. “And don’t move. Don’t look at anything. Don’t wander around. Don’t do anything. Just sit. I’ll be right back.”
I nod and smile at him as I ease myself down into the sun lounger. The back has been propped up and once I’m settled I relax a little and spend the few seconds of silence I have before he comes back to try and make sense of how I feel.
I could see him and me as partners. Not like, sexual partners. Though that would happen if we stick together. And not like business partners either, because let’s face it, I have no business anymore. Not after what he just told me. I’m through with science and I’m pretty sure he’s through with banking.
But like…I stifle an irrational laugh… partners in crime.
Literally.
Except… is it crime? Is it crime when the powers that control us control everything else too?
The world has gone murky. My reality is no longer clear. Hell, nothing about my past, present, or future makes any sense at all.
Was I involved in something evil? Did I do this? Am I responsible?
Do I come off as grandiose, and possibly narcissistic, by even asking this question? Like… do I have some inflated sense of self-importance? That I, one twenty-something woman with no college degree, let alone actual letters at the end of my name, could change the world in such a dramatic and life-altering way?
People who live in the normal world would say, “Yes, Megan. You’ve gone off your meds. There is no way that you can change the world. You’re no one. You mean nothing. You have no purpose other than to follow directions and do as you’re told.”
And honestly—I stifle yet another irrational laugh—that’s probably my best-case scenario. Believing that line of shit is probably the only thing that saves my dark, filthy soul.
Because OK. Sure. On the outside I am just one woman. Just one, semi-intelligent woman who has a knack for gene splicing and who more than likely stumbled upon a new protocol that can change the lifespan of, at the very least, rats—but also possibly humans. But I didn’t mastermind it.
I didn’t come up with the grand plan.
There. That’s what I was searching for. That right there.
This is not my plan. I am just a player in the game. And an unwilling one, at that.
But what kind of player?
I’m not a pawn, that’s for sure. Pawns are the contributors. They pay for everything but have no real power.
I’m more important than a knight, though. If this was a game of chess Johnny would be a knight. As a banker he’s not worth much to the king but he has special powers hiding in the background.
Which would make me either a bishop or a rook.
In chess, bishops are very powerful when they come in twos. This makes me pause because I am part of a bishop pair, aren’t I? My father and I are a very powerful pair.
I will tuck that thought away to think more about later because as alluring as a pair of bishops is, a
pair of rooks is so much better.
The rook is really the piece you need for the endgame and I’d like to be a rook. And if I were asking myself these questions a few weeks ago, the thought that I am a rook would be very grandiose. A few weeks ago I was nothing but today…
Everything has changed.
The ladder of power. It’s a deceptive term because it implies you have to climb upward. It’s a vertical change of position. You start at the bottom and rung by rung you work your way up.
But what if… what if you could skip a few rungs? What if you could pair up with just the right person—say a banker. A banker who comes off as a knight but is really a rook in disguise. And what if there were two such people? A researcher teams up with a banker and together they unleash their hidden rook tendencies and become something new.
Obviously the king is the piece you need to win a game of chess. But the king mostly just stands around looking kingly.
The queen is the real threat.
But two rooks can beat a queen. Two rooks can, in fact, win the game on their own.
Here’s the problem. I have no idea who the queen is.
Suddenly the muted sound of underwater is all around me. Johnny comes around the starboard deck. “There,” he says. “Sorry it took me so long. I haven’t piped music out here before.”
“Is this music?” I ask, relieved to be drawn out of my thoughts. I’m not in the right headspace to think long term right now. I’m still wrapping my mind around everything that happened today.
“Music of the sea,” he says, scrambling up to the sundeck and extending his hand. “This yacht used to belong to some guy who was into whales and he put in this underwater microphone to catch their songs. But it’s just to set the mood. The real show has no singers.”
I take his hand and allow him to pull me to my feet. “Mood for what?”
“I’m gonna show you. Come here.”
He leads me over to the very front of the bow and then starts crawling across the top of the hull. “Come on. We’re gonna dangle our feet like kids.”
“OK,” I say. And that inappropriate laugh I’ve been stifling suddenly comes out. “I’ll be a kid with you.” And I scramble after him. Wondering what the hell he’s got planned here.
Also noting that Johnny Boston might be making a romantic gesture.
He dangles his feet over the side and grabs the stainless-steel railing above his head. Then one hand darts out to steady me when the yacht tips upward from an errant wave, and pitches me backwards a little.
“I got you,” he says. “And just FYI, if you did fall in, I’d go in after you. That’s part of our deal, should you choose to accept it. So don’t worry about that.”
“Did I look worried?”
“No.” He grins. “But you do look distracted. What are you thinking about right now?”
“I’m thinking about you, mister. And what you’re up to. What this whole thing is about.”
“Look down.” He grins.
So I do. And I gasp. “Holy shit. Wow.”
Below, in the water, and all around and inside the waves splashing against the boat, is the neon-blue light of iridescent plankton. The waves excite them, making them glow when they crash against the hull of the yacht.
“You’ve seen it before, I know you have. This place is your home,” Johnny says. “I know it’s nothing special. But I noticed they were active earlier and figured you’d like to see it.”
“Damn,” I say, gazing down at nature’s light show. “Be careful, Mr. Boston. Your soft side is showing.”
He breathes out a laugh. Like he’s never heard his name mentioned in the same sentence as “soft side” before. “It’s nice though, right?”
“It’s very pretty. And the sound of the water… this might be the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me.”
“Romantic,” he murmurs. “Ah… yeah. Maybe?”
“No maybe. I’m positive. No date I’ve ever been on involved this much thought.”
“Maybe you’re dating the wrong guys?”
“I probably am.”
“Are we dating?”
“I don’t know.”
“Should we date?”
“Also unsure.”
“What’s holding you back?”
I look at him like… seriously?
“It’s the whole killer instinct thing, right?”
I almost guffaw. “Definitely part of it.”
“They were bad people, Megan.”
“So you say. But what if I had been in there? I’d be dead now.”
“You weren’t in there. You’re not a part of that. And just so you know, I didn’t kill the girl in the hazmat suit. I kinda get it, OK? She was as innocent as one can be in the Way. So I let her walk out of there.”
“What’s gonna happen to her now?”
“I dunno,” he says. “I’m not sure. But we’re not going to kill her. Maybe… transplant her over on Key West and give her a place to stay. Let her figure it out.”
“I’m the one who came up with the fountain-of-youth rat, remember?”
“Yeah, but you didn’t do it on someone’s orders.”
“One,” I say, holding up a finger to tick things off. “That’s worse. Because I can’t even excuse what I’ve done by pretending I was just taking orders. And two”—I hold up another finger—“I’ve done lots of other very questionable things in the name of orders.”
“So have I. Both taking and not taking orders. I mean… today is a perfect example. No one told me to come down here and start fucking shit up, let alone start killing people off.”
“So why did you do it?”
“I told you. There’s something big going on here and those people in that lab were the ones doing it.”
“OK,” I say, holding up a hand. “First of all, thank you.” I smile and bow my head a little. “For this. The light show, the underwater music, the sex.” I grin at him. “The talking. All of it. I’m… I mean, I like you. OK? I do. You’re hot, you’re smart, you’re a goddamned dangerous bad boy the likes of which I’ve never seen before. But all that goes both ways. You’re hot-tempered too. You’re so smart it’s calculating. And you’re more than bad-boy dangerous, Johnny. You’re… you’re… how do I put this?”
“Insane?” he asks, tilting his head to look at me.
“No. Insane is too simple of a word. You’re more than that. It’s like… you’re so smart and careful, how do I trust you?”
He draws in a breath, staring at me. Eyes narrowing just a little. But somehow, some way, the neon blue of the water below gets caught in the diluted grayness of his eyes and makes them sparkle.
And see… this? This isn’t fair. No man this dangerous should look this beautiful. He’s like a sea anemone. The beauty is a warning. It captivates you and draws you in just so it can eat you for dinner.
I start to get lost in his eyes but then realize he’s waiting for me to continue. “That speech you gave me earlier? All that bullshit about how you can’t take it with you. How none of this matters. How death is the only real choice we get in life.”
“What about it?”
“Was it bullshit?”
“Why do you think that? Did it come off as bullshit? Was I less than sincere?”
“What?”
“What?”
“Stop it.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing!”
“You’re being… reasonable.”
He raises his eyebrows at me. And see? This is what I mean.
“Because then, later,” I say, desperate to make my point before I get an overwhelming urge to let him fuck me again, “you went on and on about how the Way wants to live forever and my rats are the key, and those people in the lab were working on that, and blah, blah, blah. And it was so perfectly planned, Johnny. It was such a flawless fucking argument. I mean, kudos, really. The way you set it up and then went in for the kill to gain my trust? Absolutely perfect.”
He points at me.
“If you say one word about me saying fuck I will scream.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“But you wanted to.”
“So what’s your point? You don’t like me?”
“I do. I mean, maybe?”
God, I really want to like him. I could get lost in this man. But that’s the part that scares me. He’s one of those people who runs you over and then picks you up and drags you along with them. And I’m just not sure I want to be in that kind of relationship.
And I can’t tell him this because he’s too smart. He’s too calculating. He’ll come up with another nineteen-part story that he will unleash on me over the course of the next twenty-four hours to make it look like it was all spontaneous. And then he’ll spring something on me while we’re… I dunno, swimming with glowing dolphins or scuba-diving with octopuses or some shit. And I’ll swoon all over his hot ass, and forget that he’s a diabolical killer, and…
Yeah.
Get lost in him. I’ll get lost in him just like that.
“Well.” He laughs. “That was… kind of adorable.”
“What?”
“I mean… you,” he says, shaking his head at me. “You just… and then… and the way you…” He shrugs. “I just like it. I like all of it.”
I just stare at him.
“Did you ever swim in it?”
“What?”
“The plankton? When it glows like this? Did you ever? Because you grew up on an island so I get it. This isn’t anything special or new to you. But I’ve always wanted to swim in it so I’m just wondering… why are you looking at me like that?”
