by Ethan Cross
Marcus moved down the stairs and past the guards from the CIA to the house’s dining room. Ackerman sat restrained in the center of the room. A black hood covered his face, and his shirt was bloody. Marcus pulled off the hood to reveal a swollen and beaten face.
Ackerman tried to grin, but his swollen cheeks made it impossible. “It’s good to see you, brother. I worried that you’d forgotten about me.”
“Who did this to you?”
“Mr. Craig, the tall blond from the CIA. I told him that he should at least buy me dinner before moving straight to foreplay, but he wasn’t amused. They tried to force me to talk.”
Marcus shot a look of disdain at the two guards seated in opposite corners of the room, but neither of them reacted. “What did you tell them?”
“Nothing. I told them that I would only speak with you. I can be a bit of a stubborn asshole at times. I think it runs in the family. You mentioned before that father sent you a videotape. What was on it?”
Marcus walked over to one of the guards seated in a corner. He said, “I need your chair.”
The guard’s eyes narrowed, but he said nothing and vacated the seat. Marcus pulled it over beside Ackerman. “You know that the FBI has the entire collection of the tapes showing you being tortured and experimented on when you were a boy.”
“Yes. I understand that they’re required viewing for the Behavioral Analysis Unit. Rather flattering.”
“They call them the Ackerman Tapes. But there’s a two-week period missing from them. Our father documented nearly everything, but then there’s a gap with nothing. A bit of a conspiracy theory has even developed about what happened during that time.”
“Have you watched the tapes?”
“Yes, and there appears to be a change in you between the time before the gap and after.”
“Maybe Father communed with the Devil.”
“No, but he did perform brain surgery on you. The tape he sent to me was of the two missing weeks. I think it was his way of authenticating himself. He explains that he wasn’t getting the result he wanted from you and had decided to resort to more invasive procedures. He intentionally damaged your amygdala.”
Ackerman said, “You can’t make an omelette without scrambling a few brains, but I don’t remember any of that.”
“Video doesn’t lie. The amygdala is the part of the brain that controls fear and governs a lot of other primitive instincts that we don’t fully understand. I did some research on other people who have experienced similar damage to their brains. In a study published in Current Biology by researchers from the University of Iowa, one woman with damage to the amygdala was unable to experience fear like a normal person. But not only can’t she feel fear like the rest of us, she’s somehow drawn to activities and situations that are dangerous and that she should be afraid of.”
Ackerman looked away. “I’ve heard enough.”
“Don’t you see what this means? The damage to your brain coupled with the abuse you experienced forced you to be drawn to pain and fear. You couldn’t help it. You didn’t have a chance. Maybe we can even repair—”
“No! You remember the story from the Bible when Jesus and his disciples came across a blind man, and the disciples asked who had sinned to make this man blind, him or his parents? Jesus replied that it happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. That’s me. I’m not broken, brother. Well, maybe I am, but I’m broken on purpose. I’m exactly who I’m supposed to be. I’m an instrument of fate. I’m the hand of God himself. I’m not just some lab rat stuck in a maze. I’m part of a grand plan. And so are you.”
They stared at each other for a moment until a knock sounded at the dining room door. Andrew came in and said, “Sorry to interrupt, but I was able to reach someone at the police station.”
Marcus asked, “So what happened at the Goodweather house?”
“They decided to sit on it for a while, and it paid off. Someone went in.”
“There’s a suspect in custody? Is it my father?”
“That’s the thing. SWAT went in after the guy, and it was a trap. Son of a bitch had set up nail bombs to greet the SWAT team. But then they searched the house, and the suspect was gone. Vanished like a damn ghost.”
“How is that possible?”
“Beats the hell out of me.”
Ackerman drew the attention of both men when he said, “Was there a crawlspace in the house?”
Andrew answered, “I don’t know. Why?”
“You should call the officers at the scene immediately. Father invariably liked to have an escape plan, and he always chose a safe house with a crawlspace for just that reason. He would fashion a coffin-like box that he would conceal in the dirt floor. You could crawl right over his little hideaway and never know it was there, unless you knew what to look for.”
“What are you saying?”
“Your killer never left. He’s still in the house.”
32
KALEB SAT ACROSS THE STREET FROM THE GOODWEATHER HOUSE ON THE HOOD OF THE OLD BUICK REGAL, SMOKING A CIGARETTE AND THINKING OF THE GOOD MEN WHO HAD DIED INSIDE THE HOME’S WALLS. Two of the SWAT officers had been pronounced DOA, and two others were in critical condition. And to top it all off, their killer had escaped.
Uniformed police officers had evacuated the surrounding homes, blocked off the street, and erected barricades—keeping civilians a safe distance from the house in case any more explosive devices were found. Neighbors and reporters had congregated on the other side of the barriers.
After the bomb squad pronounced the scene safe, the CSI teams went to work. Most of the other members of the task force had headed back to the station to pursue other leads. The Dunham kid’s time was almost up. Kaleb chose to stay behind.
Their failure wasn’t all his fault. He wasn’t even a lead member of the task force. He was just a grunt. Still, he felt responsible.
His phone vibrated against his leg. He checked the caller ID and declined the call. He didn’t want to explain anything to the Governor’s reps. He didn’t want to talk to anyone. His misery didn’t need any company.
*
It checked its watch. The LED display came to life with a hum and lit the interior of the box with an eerie green glow. The box was like a coffin, but it wasn’t afraid. It didn’t feel claustrophobic or experience any sensation that the walls were closing in on it. Although it felt like it should be scared—it sensed that at one time it would have been very afraid to lie in the small space.
It remembered the face of an old man, lying in a similar box. It walked up to the box and stared at the man inside. Tears were in its eyes, but it didn’t understand why. Its mother was there. She was sobbing and being consoled by another older woman.
The memory faded as quickly as it had appeared, but it had brought a strange realization. It had a mother. It had once had family and friends. It had once been alive. It had once been a real person.
Or had it? It couldn’t be sure. And even if a person with a soul had once dwelled within this husk, that being had moved on. It was empty. It was just a thing. A monster built to follow instructions or face the consequences of disobedience.
The master’s words came back to it. The master’s instructions. Words of life. What if the master had sensed its hesitation? The master saw all and knew all. Would it be punished for the memory? Would it endure great pain for questioning its existence?
It wasn’t sure, but it knew that if it didn’t carry out its task, then the pain would come. With the promise of suffering in mind, it pushed itself out of the coffin carefully. The lid of the box was recessed in the ground and covered with dirt to conceal it from the outside. It pushed the lid up and laid it gently to the side, as it had been told, just in case it needed to go back into its hiding place. Like a cockroach fleeing back to the shadows when the lights came on.
Sliding out into the darkness of the crawlspace, it waited and listened. It heard footsteps on the floor above, but it didn’t hear a
nyone inside the basement. It crawled to the access panel and pushed it open just enough to peer into the rest of basement. The lights were off. There was no sound except for the hum of the furnace and the flickering of the pilot light inside the water heater.
Carefully, it pushed the panel completely open and dropped onto the concrete floor. The master’s instructions had been clear at every step. They left no room for interpretation. It counted to thirty before moving any further and listened for signs that it had been discovered.
The creaks and groans of movement sounded on the floor above, but the basement was empty. It hadn’t been heard. It hadn’t been discovered. It was time to move on to the next step.
It checked the extended magazine of the H&K MP7 A1, screwed a long suppressor onto the end of the gun’s barrel, and activated the green reticle of the tactical scope. Then it moved toward the stairs to carry out the next part of its mission.
It was a guided missile. A bullet fired at a target. And its target was waiting patiently just above its head.
*
Marcus took the corner at high speed, sending the big top-heavy Suburban leaning onto its right wheels as its rear end kicked sideways. The GPS unit on the dash showed a clear blue line toward their target, and a mechanical voice announced their next turn.
“Kaleb still isn’t answering,” Andrew said from the passenger seat.
“Try the precinct again. See if they can reach anyone on the scene.”
Marcus veered in and out of traffic, their emergency lights reflecting off the surfaces of the other vehicles.
“Slow down,” Andrew said. “I prefer not to die a fiery death.”
“Just make the damn call!” Marcus yelled as the Suburban’s tires screeched around the next turn
*
It took the stairs with slow and calculated movements, hugging the side wall and being careful not to make a sound. It had memorized the layout of the house. The master had said that the police would focus on the room where the Dunham woman had died, so that was where the largest concentration of targets would congregate.
The master had said it should carefully choose the time to attack. Try to pick off isolated targets. Don’t make your presence known until absolutely necessary. Like a lion stalking a group of gazelle. Pick off those that stray from the safety of the herd.
The door at the top of the stairs opened into a utility room. The overhead light was off. It could see the washer and dryer in the ambient light from the kitchen. It stepped into the shadows of the utility room and took up position beside the next door.
It listened, ever patient. There was no reason to hurry or be nervous. Bullets didn’t get nervous. Inanimate objects didn’t worry about consequences or death. They had no life to lose.
Someone was working in the kitchen. It could hear their shoes scraping across the linoleum as they searched for evidence.
It ran down the checklist from the master and felt that the moment for patience had passed. This was the moment to attack. It swung into the kitchen, aimed at the head of the figure standing across the linoleum, then squeezed the trigger.
The target fell over the counter and slumped to the floor. The target wore a strange white plastic jumpsuit and a mask covered its face. The killer had been prepared to see this. The master had mentioned something about the technicians being dressed in Tyvek jumpsuits. The master had told it not to be alarmed by this abnormality. The suits, designed to keep contamination from entering the crime scene, would also restrict the movements of the targets and make them easier prey.
But it didn’t care about such things. It simply did as it was told. Easy or difficult had no meaning.
It heard more movement from the dining room. More targets. Its first strike had not alerted the others. It knew the master was watching and would be pleased. The others would fall easily.
But it had more instructions to carry out first. It dragged the body of the dead man into the laundry room and removed the white Tyvek jumpsuit.
*
Kaleb had just lit his fourth cigarette when one of the uniformed officers who had been maintaining the police barricade ran up to him with a phone in his outstretched hand. “Detective, you have an important call.”
He took the phone and said, “This is Duran.”
“Kaleb, it’s Andrew Garrison. Listen to me carefully. We’re a few minutes out from your location, but we have reason to believe that the killer may still be on site.”
Kaleb rolled his eyes. “Believe me. We checked that house multiple times from top to bottom. There’s no one in—”
“The crawlspace, Duran. The killer had a specially made hiding spot in the crawlspace.”
“We checked it.”
“It’s buried. Just get everyone out now and set up a perimeter.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll check it out.”
Kaleb clicked off, sat the phone on the hood of the Buick, and took another long drag on his cigarette. Then he slid off the hood and started toward the house. He would do as he was told. He would check out the crawlspace, but he didn’t expect to find anything and wasn’t going to be in a hurry about it.
His attitude changed when a CSI technician in a white Tyvek jumpsuit ran out through the front door. A mask and goggles covered the tech’s face and muffled a raspy high-pitched yell. “There’s someone in the house! Someone attacked us!”
*
Kaleb kicked through the front door, leading with his 9mm Beretta Px4 Storm pistol. Two techs were coming down the stairs on his right. “What’s happening? We heard screaming!” one of the techs said.
“Get out now!”
Kaleb kept his weapon trained on the next room as the techs moved past him. The door was closed. It was a heavy oak door covered in a dark woodgrain. He couldn’t hear anything from the other side. The door sat within a niche with no cover on either side. He would have to go in fast.
Taking a deep breath, he readied his weapon and kicked the door hard. It swung inward in a spray of splinters, the frame disintegrating. He rushed into the next room and dropped to one knee in a shooter’s stance.
A man and a woman in Tyvek jumpsuits lay on the floor. Pools of blood forming around them. They had each been shot multiple times in the head and chest.
Kaleb’s stomach churned from a surge of adrenaline. He fought the urge to retreat. He knew there was at least one more tech in the house.
He watched the kitchen door for movement. Then he heard footsteps coming from the front of the house, from the way he had just come. A uniformed officer joined him in the dining room. The officer cursed under his breath. Kaleb didn’t speak but met the man’s gaze and pointed toward the kitchen. The man nodded back, and they moved forward together. Kaleb felt much better having backup. Strength in numbers. Although that hadn’t helped the techs.
They swept into the kitchen. Kaleb went low and right. The uniformed cop covered the utility room. The kitchen was empty, and they repeated the procedure for the utility room.
Inside, they found the last tech. He had been shoved into a corner like a discarded bag of trash. His Tyvek jumpsuit was missing.
It took a moment for Kaleb to register what that meant. When he did, he cursed himself for failing once again. To the uniformed cop, he said, “Watch the basement, but wait for me to come back. Anyone comes up those stairs, you shoot them.”
Then Kaleb rushed back to the front of the house and out through the front door. The uniformed cops outside had set up a perimeter and were covering all the exits. Their guns swung toward him as he came out. He raised his hands in surrender. “Where did the techs go?” he said.
One of the the cops gestured to the other side of the street behind his car. Kaleb rushed over and found the two techs he had seen coming down the stairs. He asked, “Where’s the other guy?”
They looked at him strangely and one replied, “We didn’t see anyone else. We thought they were still in the house.”
Kaleb’s gaze darted around the neighborhood and
checked the faces of the crowd on the other side of the barricades.
“Dammit!” he yelled.
The first tech who had come running and shouting from the house had disappeared. Only it hadn’t been one of the techs at all. It had been their killer. And Kaleb had let the bastard run right past him.
33
“SO NEITHER OF YOU SAW ANYTHING?” KALEB ASKED.
The first uniformed cop wouldn’t make eye contact. He was young. A former military police officer who had done two tours in the Gulf. A black mustache hung over the older officer’s mouth and a large scar cut across his face, turning up at his mouth’s corners like a giant smile. Kaleb knew both men. Both good cops.
“I’m sorry,” the older officer said. “When that tech came running out, he headed for the ME’s van. We focused on the house.”
The white panel van with Jackson County Medical Examiner stenciled on its side in big gold letters still sat against the opposite curb. Kaleb tapped his pen against the pad of paper in his hand. He hadn’t written anything on it yet. “Give me something. Short, tall? Skin color?”
The younger officer shook his head. The older one said, “Short. Maybe five six, five seven. Skin looked dark, but everyone looks dark against the white of those suits. There was no light, and the face was pretty well covered up.”
“Okay, guys. Don’t worry about it. Just maintain the perimeter.”
A vehicle screeched to a halt on the other side of the police barricade. It was a big black Suburban. Kaleb gritted his teeth as he marched over to meet Marcus Williams and Andrew Garrison. Instead of telling the officers to let them through, he stepped over the barrier and met them on the other side. Both men gave him strange looks, but Kaleb moved past them, heading for the Suburban. He didn’t want to have this conversation with anyone else in earshot. “Let’s go for a drive,” he said.
He jumped up into the passenger seat and slammed the SUV’s door behind him. Williams climbed up behind the wheel, and Garrison sat in the second row. “I’m assuming that he already got away,” Williams said as he started up the engine and pulled away from the scene.
