Connor inhaled deeply, glancing back toward his screen. He attempted an egotistical smirk that was meant to reassure his protégé, but he instead adopted a more ambiguous expression. “That’s what they promised, isn’t it?” he replied, injecting enough mockery into his voice to be mistaken for confidence, and Orion seemed to accept that he wasn’t lying. But the truth was that Connor didn’t know. The other two assets—three, he corrected himself—on the books resided at Plum Island, while any minorly talented candidates were released back into the general population after training. In his opinion, Orion wouldn’t require the same level of supervision as Angel, Antithesis, or Echo, but it wasn’t his decision to make. Perhaps he could put in a recommendation for Orion to live with his sister in Greenport, where the facility staff lived and he himself maintained an apartment.
The arrangement wouldn’t necessarily create a conflict of interest: Most of Connor’s job was spent on the road, traveling from one site to another for his investigations, and the apartment wasn’t his primary residence. Legally, that honor belonged to his mother’s former house in Ohio, one of the few ties he’d maintained with her, as it was also the only link he had to his father. The newlywed couple had bought the house during happier times, and when his father had died, his grandmother had moved in to help pay the mortgage and had eventually assumed both the loan and the title. The house was currently rented out to a nice family and would remain so until Connor was ready to make it his permanent home. His mother had no legal rights to the income or the property.
In contrast, his Greenport apartment was a home of convenience. It was fully furnished yet able to sit empty for weeks at a time, and it would be ready to receive him without advanced notice. When he had to report back to headquarters or had no cases to work, he resided comfortably in the mostly empty duplex. It could be a nice change of pace to have friendly neighbors, and it would allow him to more easily keep in touch with the Starr siblings.
He decided to push the thought from his mind and concentrate on the task at hand. He nodded toward his screen, where the connection had finally completed. “Now this time, you’ll be the one selecting the case,” he continued. “When I picked Succubus, I’d filtered out several factors to make it easier to teach you, but that didn’t work too well, yeah?” He chuffed. “So, this time, you’re going to pick the case, and I’ll guide you.” His grin widened as he watched Orion shift uncomfortably. He couldn’t characterize why his partner’s agitation amused him; perhaps he’d missed out on having a little brother to torment, so Orion had become his surrogate. Nevertheless, his duty was to train the younger man, and the best way to learn was to throw him in the deep end while holding a lifesaver.
Orion stood, reluctantly switching places with him, and settled into his new seat. Connor reviewed the utility of the database features, particularly the search function, and allowed Orion to explore on his own. Unsurprisingly, he filtered out any incident that implied the involvement of a pyrokinetic, and he tried to restrict the flagged activities to a single borough. Connor made the recommendation to select an apparent serial offender as that kind of profile provided more opportunities to train Orion; several linked incidences increased the chances of clues and witnesses left behind by the perpetrator and therefore improved Orion’s likelihood of formulating a good lead.
Moments later, he was relieved that Orion had accepted his recommendation, as the first unsorted result was an unsolved case from 2012. The passage of Hurricane Sandy had caused the East River to overflow, flooding several nearby areas with raw sewage and dredging up garbage from the city’s deeper recesses. Along with the debris an anomalous desiccated body had appeared. Modern forensics had refuted the possibility that it was an ancient mummy, as had the preliminary inquiries with local museums. Yet, the apparent mummification of the body had still been deemed unnatural and not due to accidental environmental conditions. Given the state of the city at the time, the curiosity had been noted, filed, and forgotten by authorities, save for the bureau. The details should have brought to mind Jody Barles and her ability to remove life from her victims, but instead, his mind jumped to his vision of an agonized Orion being drained of color, and he was eager to dismiss the case to work on something less troubling.
The next few sorted results were more amusing. One was a man who’d filed multiple times for disability, citing limb amputations following industrial mishaps over the years. These accidents—each with a different company—had been substantiated, as had his medical claims. However, each disability application had listed the same right arm as the casualty appendage, which was why the initial data entry clerk had flagged the individual. However, Connor and Orion agreed that the construction worker was most likely committing insurance fraud rather than being the beneficiary of extraordinary regenerative abilities.
Their next rejection was a slew of exotic animals appearing all over the city, from subway tunnels to the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Animal Control had confirmed that the wayward beasts had escaped from city zoos, but they had been unable to explain how the fugitive animals had appeared in such diverse locations over the years, particularly when there had been no witnesses, and none of the parks had ever reported a break-in or even suspicious activity. While the two of them agreed that the case was strange, there were not many clues to follow, and they gave it a pass.
Instead, Orion settled on a seemingly innocuous but outrageous accusation against an unidentified Flushing pedestrian who had used a tree to kill a passing motorist by impaling her with a branch and then crushing the vehicle she was driving with the crown. This incident had been tenuously connected to an eyewitness account from over a decade earlier that involved a man being skewered by a sapling after threatening a teen who’d run into him. Both accounts had alleged that the arboreal growth had been rapid and that the offending trees had not previously existed.
Orion scowled. “Why wasn’t this better investigated?” he asked derisively, scoffing at the lack of comprehensive detail in the report. He was being rudely introduced to the inadequacies of open case files after his expectations had been unreasonably set by Connor’s high closing rate.
Connor casually pointed at the top of the screen, indicating the date of the most recent incident. “Busy year?” he observed sardonically. “Or maybe because there were ‘probable tornadoes’ that could explain the vehicle crash. It’s only one man who’s making a claim to the contrary, and the same can be said in 1997.” He chuckled cynically, which was reminiscent of his derisive attitude toward the paranormal. He’d interviewed a fair share of nutjobs throughout his career, but he’d always been careful to prescreen his interviewees to keep out the true crazies. His witnesses had always been seemingly normal, well-adjusted people who’d seen one abnormal event that had been supported by outside evidence. Though this case was strengthened by two separate accounts, it didn’t give off the correct vibe, and Connor remained skeptical. “Are you really going to believe a real-life Poison Ivy is going around mugging people when there are actual crimes out there to be solved?”
Orion regarded him with confusion. “But you know there are Others.”
Connor shrugged. “Yeah, but that doesn’t mean we have an unlimited budget,” he replied reasonably. “That was the year of Deepwater Horizon. We spent most of that year chasing down the Vanguard.” The younger man’s frown deepened with concern, and Connor nodded, confirming VSION’s involvement. From his understanding, it had been a long, exhausting year, and he was almost certainly glad that he’d been in the process of enlisting rather than working for the bureau at the time, because things had only gotten worse. He began ticking off his fingers. “After that, it was Fukushima, and then it might have been a rogue tornado or something…” His subsequent grin was dripping with arrogant condescension. “VSION keeps us quite busy when we aren’t chasing down Others. That’s why you’ve got to learn how to do this so you can work during the down time.”
- - -
The sun had set several hours ago, and dinner had long grown cold. Charlene and Timothy had already eaten, the latter having prepared the meal on his day off, and the dishes had been washed and put away. It was not unusual for Cassie to miss meals—she was a brooding teenager who was looking to rebel—but the time for their wayward child to return to the house was drawing near.
Charlene knew the night scene in Waynesboro was incomparable to the city to which Cassie was accustomed, but the young woman still pushed her boundaries and found activities to occupy her time. Orion’s curfew for her had been midnight, but the Vickers had reduced it to eight, and Cassie seemed to appreciate the structure and discipline, because she rarely broke it. She’d returned even earlier in the evening following her visit with her brother. Overall, Charlene was unconcerned about the teen’s whereabouts. Nevertheless, she kept an eye on the time as she went about the house preparing it for final closure for the evening, tidying the living room, and preparing her bag for her daily commute to Washington, D.C.
When curfew came and went, Charlene decided to give her charge a generous grace period of a half hour before becoming angry; trust was important to maintaining a relationship, especially with a teen, and Cassie’s good behavior of late should be rewarded. However, this did not mean she wouldn’t find out where Cassie was or why she’d been delayed in the interim.
She retrieved her password-protected work phone from her travel bag and dialed the on-shift surveillance team. Like every other graduate from the BSI training program, Cassie was followed on a daily basis by professionals who monitored her behavior; if she had a relapse or, worse yet, an incident with a civilian, their orders were to contain the situation and remove the threat to Blackout by any means necessary. This team was how she’d known that Cassie hadn’t started the shack fire, and she’d taken the opportunity to foster trust with Orion Starr—their newest asset—by pretending to contact him first to express her concern over the incident. He’d remained ignorant of her close connection to the BSI and her secondary duty as his sister’s handler.
When the surveillance team failed to answer, Charlene’s concern began to rise, though it was not yet more than mild unease. She decided that the grace period had ended and called Cassie directly. Predictably, her charge behaved normally and ignored the phone call, so Charlene utilized her secret weapon: She’d downloaded a locator app onto Cassie’s phone, which was the real reason she had been allowed to keep it after she’d been grounded; it was easier to track a wayward teen when the device they always carried could be altered to remotely broadcast their location.
The cell phone reported its location as Eden Avenue, which was the residence of Felix Buchanan, her fellow internee for the shack incident. Since she knew Felix’s father worked the night shift, she didn’t want to disturb him just yet over a minor misstep and opted to phone the son directly to give him a chance to explain. Felix also ignored his phone, and when she called Cassie a second time, she used the signal Orion had taught her: Call, text, and then call again. It told Cassie she was needed urgently and would be in serious trouble if she did not answer the second repetition. When she again failed to answer, Charlene’s motherly instincts kicked in, and she redoubled her efforts, phoning the surveillance team more insistently.
She tried to reassure herself that Cassie was behaving like a normal teenager: She was out late testing her curfew and had relapsed into her previous city behavior. Orion repeatedly apprised them that his sister had a habit of sleeping over at a friend’s house without asking permission first or informing him but that his connections with parents allowed him to keep accurate tabs on her. While Waynesboro might not be as exciting as the city, similar behavior wasn’t out of the question. It was also equally possible that Cassie had finally noticed the tail that headquarters had placed on her and had ditched them, either realizing their purpose as government operatives or, given her run-in with the Vanguard, assuming that the team was trying to forcibly recruit her.
When Charlene failed to contact the on-shift team through the primary number, she opted to call the alternate line and was connected with the off-shift leader within seconds. “Special Agent Parker,” he answered.
Charlene smiled, hoping her apology would translate over the line. “Hey, I know you’re not on shift anymore, but I can’t get a hold of Ayala or Foster,” she said. She sounded like a suburban housewife, which she supposed she was in a way, and she hoped that her worry was unwarranted. “Do you think you can give them a try?”
Parker yawned. “Sure, give me a minute,” he replied. She could hear the quiet beeping of his personal phone and its subsequent ringing over her connection. “Having trouble with the girl again?” he asked casually.
“Yeah,” she replied more calmly than she felt. Perhaps it was only maternal instinct that encouraged apprehension to gnaw on her subconscious, but it was more likely because the night was venturing toward memory and déjà vu. They had been unable to locate their son, who would have been Orion’s age by now, after his graduation celebrations, and after a long night of missed phone calls and search parties, the police had discovered his totaled car in a ditch. While she doubted the same situation had been visited upon her foster child, the memories still crept into the fringes of her mind and colored her thoughts. “She’s breaking curfew,” she continued lightly. “I think she’s over at the Buchanan boy’s house, but I want to make sure before I head over there.”
Parker made a noncommittal noise as he waited for his call to complete. There was silence on the line for several minutes until he commented, “That’s weird.” His voice was suddenly deeper, a cross between annoyed and perplexed. She could hear more electronic noise, implying that he was still using his personal phone and might have been texting. “They’re not answering me either,” he explained. “Give me the address. I’m gonna collect Agent Barton. We’ll check it out and get back to you.”
Charlene forced her smile to resurface; the short exchange had only worsened her increasing fears. Nevertheless, she stated the location given by the app and hoped for the best.
- - -
Fear is a powerful thing. It can hold a person in place, making them absolutely immovable, or it can pump one full of adrenaline and allow the impossible to happen. Cassie experienced both ends of the spectrum during her ordeal. The dour man walked her to the car and then coated her wrists and ankles with his disgusting gel, which felt surprisingly insubstantial despite its rigidity and refusal to permit any play with these restraints. She was stuffed in the trunk, where the initial helplessness of the situation kept her immobile and the darkness invited her to release her emotions. She’d seen another man shot, close enough that she’d felt his blood drying against her fair skin. She could not voluntarily remember the first time she’d taken a bullet as well—it was just a blank space in her mind when she tried to consciously recall it—but now that it had occurred again, she didn’t think she could ever forget. Felix was the third person she’d seen injured in front of her in less than a year, and he’d been her friend, which deepened and personalized the trauma even further.
She cried for a long time, feeling the car bump along a road at high speeds, and when she’d exhausted herself, the car’s motion lulled her into an uneasy sleep. When she awoke, she was sore yet refreshed, and her mind had cleared: She would not be a victim; she would fight back. She determined that she could not escape her situation immediately. She wasn’t certain that she was entirely immune to fire, and her training at Plum Island had failed to address this possibi
lity, so reaching into the engine block to manipulate it into combusting the vehicle would be a poor choice when she was trapped within its trunk. Even if she were fireproof, she couldn’t be certain that the vehicle would come to a safe stop, and a crash would almost certainly kill her.
Instead, she focused on what she could do after being freed from the trunk. She couldn’t run until she was freed from the strange viscous fluid, and she knew that her ability wouldn’t directly work on her captor; instead, she’d have to be alert for an escape opportunity and take it when it was presented. She could use her ability to cover her flight, despite its initial inability to protect her.
Two men removed her from the trunk: the dour, mostly well-dressed man who’d abducted her and a tall, lanky man with a goofy grin who leered at her. She shivered, briefly overcome by greasy uneasiness in the latter’s presence, and then she forced herself to concentrate, focusing on her surroundings instead of on him. She’d dealt with perverts at Hallowed Grounds, and she told herself there was no difference now.
There were rows upon rows of metal shipping containers stacked tall to obscure the skyline, and despite the cover, she knew she was back in the city. There was no mistaking the familiar sounds and smells and especially the lights reflecting off the smoggy haze to create a second horizon, but it was difficult to precisely determine her location. She was led to a warehouse and noted its number even though it meant nothing to her now.
The interior was sparsely lit, and several people milled about the warehouse stacking and moving boxes under the watchful eye of a short man in a suit. He must have heard their entrance, for he turned their way and smirked handsomely. “Ah, wonderful! I see you have been successful,” he said by way of greeting. He gestured at one of his underlings, signaling them to take over supervision, and he approached the trio.
Operation Blackout Page 41
