In the Grey

by Christian, Claudia Hall

  “I’ll tell you . . . ,” Steve said. Alex looked at him. “Just a few months ago, it sounded like sheer hell. How would I meditate with all that racket? When would I work out? How could I complete a full sentence? Today, it sounds like heaven.”

  “I know,” Alex said.

  She pulled the jeans out of the top washer one at a time, shook them out, and stuffed them into the lower dryer. She had her hand in the dryer when she felt movement near her. She instinctively turned.

  Steve’s knife sliced through her body armor and into her right chest. The tip of the knife hit her right shoulder blade. Instead of removing the knife, he reached around her and grabbed her Glock.

  Her left fist shot a straight-cross boxing punch she knew he wouldn’t expect. She smashed his nose. He fell forward, and she kneed him in the abdomen. He took the blow, but didn’t let go of the gun. She knocked him to the side with her knee. Falling, he pulled the trigger of her gun. Her calf extended and her foot managed to knock his arm away from his head. The bullet lodged in the ceiling.

  Her mentor, friend, and Sensei fell to the ground. She crouched down to him.

  “I’m so sorry; I’m so sorry; I’m so sorry; I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

  Pushed by adrenaline, she wrenched the gun from his hands and slid it across the room.

  “This is why they took you,” she said.

  “Days and days and days,” Steve whispered. “All I could do is shift the focus. Right side not left. Your father’s trick . . . Was that a boxing punch?”

  “Raz,” she said. “Were you surprised?”

  Steve fell silent. She rolled him over. He’d passed out like Cooper had. Whoever programmed Cooper must have programmed Steve too.

  The pain hit her like a truck. She fell onto her rear.

  Her movement had torn the knife wound. She was losing a lot of blood. Falling back, she remembered . . .

  FF

  She was standing in a corner of the Fey Special Forces Team vault. Wearing old style jungle fatigues, Paul had a handful of old books. He gestured to her with the books.

  “I don’t know, Alex,” Paul said. He put them into his wall cabinet. “I guess her father’s books are worth a lot of money. They’re originals. You don’t mind, do you?”

  “I don’t care,” Alex said. “Did you ask Joseph?”

  Paul shook his head.

  “Why not?” Alex asked.

  “He’d just tell me not to keep any of Cooper’s crap around,” Paul said. “But Cooper gave these books to me in the divorce settlement. What am I going to do with them at home? I thought maybe I could sell them at one of those old book stores here.”

  “Good call,” Jesse said.

  “I know just the place,” Alex said.

  FF

  She was sitting with her back against the door of the Fey Special Forces Team vault. Jesse’s body lay across her lap. The weight of his head pressed into the basketball-sized wound in her hip.

  She slumped forward. The cricket was talking, but she couldn’t tell what he was saying. She looked down at Jesse and smiled. If she had to die, it was nice to die with her friends around.

  A fist smashed into the side of her face.

  “Where is it?” a man’s voice asked in Arabic.

  She didn’t have the energy to defend herself. He hit her again. She looked up at him.

  “The book,” the man said. “Where the fuck is the book?”

  “Book?” she squinted.

  When he looked away, she glanced at where she’d stashed the large team journal. Screaming, the man swore and kicked at the crates around her.

  He hit her again and everything went black.

  FFFFFF

  Thursday, early morning

  November 25 – 3:09 a.m. MST

  Denver, CO

  Max woke with a gasp.

  “Alex!” He grabbed his shoulder. “Oh my God, Alex.”

  Flying out of bed, he ran to the closet. He grabbed a pair of fleece sweatpants and ran toward the door.

  “You fucking think you can lock me in the bathroom,” Wyatt said.

  Heavier and stronger than Max, Wyatt bounced Max against the wall.

  “What are you doing?” Max yelled. “Alex is in trouble.”

  Wyatt punched Max in the face. He picked him up and threw him into their bathroom. He locked the door.

  “You’ll think twice before you lock me in there again.”

  Wyatt took a step and passed out.

  FFFFFF

  Thursday, early morning

  November 25 – 3:11 a.m. MST

  Denver, CO

  Raz sat up with a start. Samantha rolled over to look at him. They were sleeping in her flower-lined bedroom in her flat next to the rooming house.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “I am,” he said. He touched her shoulder. “We have a big day. Go back to sleep.”

  Not sure what woke him, he got up to use the bathroom. The window looked down into the laundry room of the rooming house. He noticed the light in the laundry room before looking down to urinate. Leaning over to flush the toilet, he noticed what looked like someone lying on the laundry room floor. He squinted and shifted the sheer window covering.

  Sure enough. Someone wearing red Converse All Stars and blue jeans was lying on the laundry room floor. They knew so many people who wore those shoes, he couldn’t be sure, but the feet were about Alex’s size.

  “What’s going on?” Samantha asked.

  Raz turned around to see Samantha standing behind him. She wore a light-pink silk teddy. Her auburn hair fell in curls on her shoulders. He smiled.

  “Did you see something?” Samantha leaned over the toilet to look. “Are those feet? Oh my God, that has to be Alex!”

  “Would you mind horribly if I went to look?” Raz asked.

  “No,” Samantha said. “We should both go.”

  They ran back into her room and pulled on yesterday’s clothing. Raz checked that his handgun was loaded before nodding to her. She grabbed her new hockey stick from the rack by the door. They ran out the front door. Careful of the ice and snow, they jogged to the small sidewalk between the houses. They stopped at the rooming house’s basement door.

  Raz took out his key. The key didn’t fit the lock. He looked at the key and at the lock.

  “That’s weird,” Raz said. “It’s not even the same brand. I went through this door yesterday.”

  He thought for a moment and then looked at Samantha. She was staring into space.

  “Did they change the locks?”

  “Locks?”

  Samantha blinked. Her eyelids were like shutters. She blinked and blinked again. Her eyes went blank. Raz grabbed her shoulders and shook her.

  “Samantha!” he yelled.

  “You only care about her,” Samantha said.

  She pushed him away from her. Clutching the hockey stick tight, she bashed him in the head. He fell to the frozen sidewalk.

  “I can’t believe I let you do this to me again!” Samantha said.

  She stormed down the small sidewalk. She reached the front of her home before passing out. She fell face first in the snow.

  F

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Thursday, early morning

  November 25 – 3:16 a.m. MST

  Denver, CO

  Alex felt a small, cold hand on her face.

  “Are you dead?” a boy whispered.

  “Hector James?” Alex opened her eyes and saw his face. She smiled.

  “Should I take it out?” the child’s eyes were luminous in the bright laundry room.

  “Leave it,” Alex said. “You know what to do.”

  He gave her a sincere nod. He disappeared from her sight. She tried to get up. Groaning from pain, she lay back into the puddle of her own blood. She heard the door to her office close.

  Hector James reappeared. She felt the cold crystals of the coagulating agent fall, one crystal at a time, onto her skin.

&nb
sp; “Is it working?” he whispered.

  “I can’t tell,” Alex coughed.

  He emptied the packet around the knife.

  “Did you have a nightmare?” Alex’s voice came out in a thready whisper.

  He nodded.

  “Where’s your father?” Alex asked.

  “He stayed up late last night talking to that lady,” Hector James looked toward the door and then back at her. He leaned down to Alex’s ear, and said, “He fell asleep in the recliner in the living room, which he never ever does. He always comes to see Hermes and then to see me, and then gets in the big bed for sleep. We were sleeping in his room tonight too. I had a bad dream, and I came down and found him. He was asleep. I shook him, but he didn’t wake up. I think Daddy’s drugged.”

  “Probably . . .” Alex coughed.

  “Don’t do that,” Hector James said. “Makes the knife move and more blood and . . .”

  He gave her a sincere nod.

  “You got it though?” Alex looked at the boy. He nodded.

  “What do we have here?” Neev asked from the doorway.

  John and Cian’s older sister went to the corner and picked up Alex’s handgun. She frowned when she saw Hector James.

  “Run along child,” Neev said.

  “I will not,” Hector James said.

  “Please go,” Alex whispered.

  “No,” Hector James said. “You’re hurt and you need my help.”

  “She’ll kill you,” Alex wheezed. “Please. For me.”

  Hector James nodded to Alex and got up.

  “I don’t like you,” he said to Neev, and stormed out of the room. Alex watched Jesse go with Hector James to protect him.

  Neev watched him go and waited until the basement door slammed.

  “You have to admit that you’re surprised,” Neev said.

  Alex tried not to cough. Neev left the laundry room.

  “Why isn’t your office open?” Neev asked. “Your office is supposed to be open.”

  Neev found a laundry bin. Using more strength than Alex would have ever given her credit for, the woman dragged Alex off the floor and shoved her into the bin. Neev rolled the bin to the secure office.

  “Open this office,” the woman said.

  “Why?” Alex asked.

  “Do it this instant!” Neev ordered. “I did not go through all of this trouble to fail now!”

  Neev lifted Alex out of the bin and carried her to the security panel. Alex entered the code to signal the sergeant on duty at Buckley Air Force Base that she was in trouble. She covered her actions by falling forward to the wall.

  “Can’t move my . . . ,” Alex pointed to her right hand.

  Neev held Alex’s hand up to the panel, which launched an automatic call to the on-call desk at the FBI and her division at the Department of Homeland Security. The office door opened.

  Neev dropped Alex in the doorway and went into the office.

  As her body fell to the ground, Alex knew she was dying. A formally dressed cricket raised his top hat and bowed. Jesse returned and scowled at the cricket. With each passing moment, Jesse appeared more and more solid. She felt someone step over her. She opened her eyes.

  Hector James crept up behind Neev and shoved his taser at her behind. Neev screamed and spun around. Hector James’s taser caught her abdomen. Screaming, Neev fell to the floor next to her desk.

  “Yes!” Hector James cheered. He jumped up and down with excitement. “I did it! I did it! It worked! It worked! Whoo hoo!”

  He leaned his head back and gave a maniacal laugh.

  “Alex?” he looked around for her. “Did you see?”

  Seeing her lying on the ground, Hector James dropped his taser and ran to Alex.

  “You look like you’re dying,” the child whispered.

  “Not yet,” Alex pointed up.

  Eoin’s face appeared in the basement door window.

  “You have to open the door,” Alex said.

  “I can’t,” Hector James said. “It needs a key on both sides. I tried already. The security door, too. There’s no way he can get inside.”

  Dahlia appeared next to Jesse. A lovely woman in life, she looked like an angel now. She caressed Hector James’s face. Unable to see her, he looked to where she stood, and beamed.

  “Mommy would be proud of me,” Hector James said.

  “Yes, she would,” Alex said. “I am too.”

  Dahlia smiled at Alex.

  “How much time . . . ?” Alex asked Dahlia and Jesse.

  “Enough,” Dahlia said.

  “We’re here to remind you,” Jesse said.

  “Remember, Alex,” Dahlia said. “Everything depends on you remembering.”

  FF

  “The Gadfly?” Rebecca Hargreaves laughed.

  Alex was mashing potatoes, and Patrick was carving a turkey in the kitchen of her mother’s big house in Cherry Hills. It was Christmas or Easter or Thanksgiving or one of those family celebrations where caterers made the food and the family did the work. Her mother was dressed to the nines. Paul was wearing a suit that Gretel had bought him.

  “Yeah,” Paul was mixing drinks by the refrigerator. “Isn’t that weird?”

  “That’s very strange,” Rebecca said. She was folding napkins. “Have you read it, darling?”

  “Not my cup of tea, I’m afraid,” Patrick shook his head.

  “But you’ve heard of it?” Rebecca asked.

  Patrick nodded.

  “Alex?” Rebecca asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Cooper told me that her father spent a couple of years in New York City. He fell in with a group of Russian immigrants,” Paul said. “He just happened upon them one sunny afternoon on the way to the laundry. They were sitting on the stoop smoking. It was quite a crowd – Ayn Rand, George Gurdjieff when he was in town, Nate Brandon, and other Russian intellectuals. They met at an American heiress’s apartment. Sometimes, a bunch of hardcore Russian physicists would show up; you know, those guys they brought over after the war. They would get together to drink and argue about the fate of the world.”

  Paul laughed at the idea.

  “I thought Ayn Rand didn’t get along with anyone,” Rebecca said.

  “I don’t know that she got along with these guys,” Paul said. “But this was a kind of . . . home base, a sort of incubator for revolutionary thought, I guess. Anyway, Cooper’s father was kind of a celebrity with them because he was a test pilot. A couple of the physicists actually designed the planes Cooper’s father flew. This one guy . . . I can’t come up with his name, something with a V, he had an epic, four-week-long argument with Cooper’s dad. He gave Cooper’s dad this book to prove his point.”

  “But it’s from the 1800s?” Patrick said. Rebecca shook her head.

  “The book is an original printing,” Paul said. “Cooper said her father thought the guy was a nut, but didn’t want to offend this influential group. Of course, he died in one of their creations, so you’ve got to wonder.”

  “Not a group of folks I’d like to piss off,” Alex said.

  “Alexandra, really,” Rebecca said. “Who says ‘piss off’? Makes you sound crass.”

  Alex smiled at the reprimand. Patrick furrowed his brow to keep from laughing.

  “The book was very popular in the Soviet Union,” Paul said. “Here’s the kicker. It’s a lot like Atlas Shrugged.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s about revolution and love,” Paul said. “Personally, I think Rand stole most of her ideas from it, but . . .”

  Paul shrugged. Max and Erin came in the kitchen.

  “We set the table,” Max said. “What’s our next duty?”

  “Duty!” Rebecca pretended to be offended. “I thought you’d want to participate.”

  “Thinking, that’s what gets you in trouble,” Max laughed.

  “Max!” Alex said.

  Rebecca laughed.

  “What’s next, Mom?” Erin asked.

&
nbsp; “China,” Rebecca said. “It’s under the . . .”

  “I’ll get it,” Erin said.

  Talking to each other, Erin and Max left the room.

  “Well, I for one would like to read this Gadfly,” Rebecca said.

  “It’s in storage,” Paul said. Uncharacteristic of Paul, he looked Alex straight in the face. His dark eyes burned with intensity, “I took it to a couple of book dealers. They weren’t sure what to do with it. If you promise not to ruin its ‘buy-the-beach-house’ value, I’ll bring it the next time I’m in town.”

  “I promise!” Rebecca said. “Maybe if I read that, I can figure out what Alan Greenspan is talking about. That man can go on and on. He’s always ‘Ayn Rand this’ and ‘Ayn Rand that.’ She seemed like a bitter old prune to me.”

  “Me too,” Alex said.

  They laughed. The laughter lingered in the air as the scene changed. She was standing in a grey fog.

  She looked for Max, but he wasn’t there.

  She looked for Jesse, but he was nowhere to be found.

  “Max?” She walked into the grey mist. “John?”

  Her heart squeezed with loss.

  “Josh?” she whispered Raz’s birth name. She shivered.

  She felt movement around her.

  “Jesse? Are you here?” She yelled.

  The still, grey mist crept into her bones.

  “Max?”

  “Go to sleep.”

  Alex slowly turned in place. She saw only mist.

  Where did the voice come from?

  “Go to sleep.”

  The voice was right behind her. Alex spun in place. She blinked at the bright visage of the Blue Fairy.

  “Rest now,” the Blue Fairy said. “We’ll need your strength.”

  “The boy . . .”

  “My eye is on him,” she said. “Sleep.”

  Alex closed her eyes and was out.

  F

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Thursday, early morning

  November 25 – 3:19 a.m. MST

  Denver, CO