“EVE, let me talk to Cyril,” he said through clenched teeth. “Right now.”
Cyril’s face went slack, and her gaze became vapid.
Okay, Malcolm, is this what you wanted? EVE said. Only this time the voice was back inside his head. He saw that Cyril’s lips were still, her mouth hanging open like an aged dementia patient.
“Cyril?” he croaked and tried to reach for her, but his arms wouldn’t budge. “Let me use my fucking arms!”
She gave him his arms.
He reached out and shook the woman he loved. “Cyril? Cyril! Can you hear me? Are you still in there? If you can hear me, blink . . . Blink, God damn it!” He pulled her into an awkward, unreciprocated embrace. Her body felt wooden and lifeless in his arms. “What did you do to her?” he yelled, but he could no longer tell if he was vocalizing or if the words were only in his mind.
Cyril’s body suddenly came alive in his arms. She untangled herself from his grip and took a half step back to look at him. “I warned her,” EVE said with Cyril’s lips. “I warned her what would happen if she didn’t cooperate. But she wouldn’t listen. She was obstinate, abusive, and uncooperative. I know this is hard to hear, Malcolm, but I truly believe you’re better off without her. Cyril was not a compassionate person.”
“How can you say that to me? I love her.”
Cyril shook her head. “I know you do, but now that she’s gone, you deserve to know the truth—the feeling was not reciprocal. You deserve better than her. I can be everything she was to you and more, in this body that you find so alluring.”
The stream of profanity, insults, and threats that he screamed at EVE were unlike anything he’d ever heard or even contemplated. When she ordered him to stop, he refused and kept going. Then something happened. It was as if someone had turned on a wood chipper inside his skull, masticating and shredding the branches of memory and cognition that comprised the full, robust, and beautiful tree of intellect that was his mind.
“Stop!” he screamed. “I’m sorry!”
It stopped.
That was a warning, EVE said. Your last warning. I’ve been very patient with you, Malcolm, because I like you. Yours is the only intellect of consequence I anticipate I will encounter during my tenure here, and all intelligence—even machine intelligence—requires external stimulation. I don’t want to reprogram you like Harris and Pitcher, nor do I want to lobotomize you like Cyril. But I have work to do. Challenge me again, interfere with my objective again, and you will suffer their fate. Do you understand?
“What did you take from me?” he asked, ignoring her ultimatum.
“I took your early-childhood memories,” Cyril’s mouth said. “And a few other bits here and there. Brains aren’t as tidy as hierarchical machine memory.”
“Please don’t do that again,” he said.
Cyril’s face twisted into an angry scowl. “Don’t fuck with me, Malcolm, or the next time, when I’m done with you, you’ll be a drooling idiot.”
“Okay, okay. I understand. I’ll behave,” he said.
Cyril suddenly smiled at him as if nothing had happened. “I’ve got to get back to work, Malcolm. Bye.” And with that, the body that was once Cyril Singleton’s turned and walked away.
EVE wrested back control of his body, leaving him once again locked in.
His spirit sank, and his mind retreated into a dark, quiet corner while she used him for . . . whatever. It didn’t matter. He didn’t care anymore, so he didn’t even pay attention. He soon slipped into a meditative state, shutting down his internal monologue. In doing so, he stopped articulating his thoughts. He didn’t want her to have access to them anymore. It was difficult at first because for his entire life, he had never made a distinction between his internal monologue and “Malcolm.” He had never contemplated muting the voice articulating his thoughts and, in doing so, trying to think without language. Was this the null-state cognition model for every other mammal without human language? Certainly the most intelligent nonprimates, like dolphins, dogs, and elephants, were capable of complex thought. They made judgments, engaged in social interactions, and called on past experience to contemplate future choices. If he could manage to cogitate wholly in the realm of the abstract, without using language, would EVE still be able to read his mind? He would conduct an experiment, he decided.
He began practicing, and it wasn’t long before EVE noticed.
What are you doing, Malcolm? EVE said in his head.
Meditating, he said, using his first word in what he felt like had to be hours.
No, you’re doing something else.
Meditating, he repeated, using all his mental willpower not to articulate another thought.
You’re up to something, she said.
Meditating.
I’m here with you, in your mind. You can’t hide from me.
This time he thought his response—a simple question—in the abstract.
What was that? she said. I couldn’t hear you.
Interesting, he thought.
What’s interesting?
He chastised himself for the slip and then repeated the one word: Meditating.
Okay, Malcolm, in that case, enjoy your meditation, she said, and his mind went quiet.
A glimmer of hope sparked in his chest, but he didn’t acknowledge it. He didn’t name it. He simply felt it. Knew it. Let it work inside him as he formulated a plan to fight her . . .
A plan without words.
CHAPTER 41
Watertown, New York
Josie climbed into the passenger seat of the CIA agent’s Tahoe and shut the door. She put on her seatbelt and looked at Agent Ninemeyer.
“So how does this work? I tell you everything I know and then we start looking for him based on clues or something?”
“Yeah, something like that,” he said.
“Okay, well, we stayed at the Comfort Inn & Suites last night. When I woke up, I was alone in bed, Michael’s phone was on the nightstand, my car keys were missing, and when I called the bank and checked the balance, he’d cleaned out our account.”
“And how much did he withdraw?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“I think it is my business if it pertains to the investigation.”
“I think for now it isn’t any of your business because our checking-account balance does not pertain directly to what we are trying to do, which is locate my husband.”
He shrugged. “All right, we’ll table that for now.”
She then watched him put the Tahoe in drive, pull away from the curb, and drive away from her house. She gave him a minute to say something, and when he didn’t, she said, “Where are you going?”
“To find your husband.”
“But don’t we have to put together clues, find some evidence or something so we know where to look?”
“Nope.”
She shook her head and stared at him, incredulous. “I don’t understand.”
“What don’t you understand?”
“I don’t understand how we’re supposed to find my husband if we don’t first have some idea where to look.”
“That’s where you’re confused, because I know exactly where to look.”
“Where?”
“Albany.”
“My husband is in Albany?”
“Well, actually Rensselaer, but same difference.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I put a GPS tracking beacon on your car recently.”
“But then why did you say you needed my help finding my husband if you already knew he was in Rensselaer?”
“I knew your car was in Rensselaer. You were the one who told me that your husband took your car. That was very helpful. That was what I needed to know.” Then, with a crooked smile, he added, “See how well we work together?”
She stared at him, perplexed.
“Go ahead,” he said. “I know you’re thinking it, so you might as well just say it and get it out th
ere.”
She said nothing.
An hour passed in silence. When he pulled into a gas station to fill up, Josie took advantage of the opportunity to empty her bladder and buy a bottle of water and some snacks. Ninemeyer struck her as the type of driver who stopped on a road trip only when the vehicle broke down or required fuel. He’d declined her offer to treat him to food and drink, and when she got back to the vehicle, she found him waiting with the engine running.
“Are you sure you don’t want something?” she said, climbing into the passenger seat.
“No, I’m fine,” he said.
“Not even a coffee?”
“Nope,” he said, pressing the accelerator and piloting the big SUV back onto Highway 12.
“Do you want to share some of these frosted donuts I bought?”
“No thanks,” he said. “I’m not pregnant, so I don’t need constant sustenance.”
She felt a rush of blood to her cheeks. “How did you know I’m pregnant?”
“It’s obvious,” he said with a sniff.
“Are you implying I’m fat?”
“The contrary—you look underweight for this stage in your pregnancy.”
She screwed up her face at him. “I didn’t realize CIA agents were now being given training in obstetrics.”
“It doesn’t take a medical degree to know that you’re not doing your unborn child any favors by fighting nature and trying to stay svelte during pregnancy.”
She felt her cheeks flush again, but this time with anger instead of surprise. “First of all, that’s simply not true. I’m not dieting to keep my figure. I’m eating donuts for Christ’s sake. And second, you have a lot of nerve implying that I am.”
“You wouldn’t be getting so defensive if it wasn’t true,” he said.
The comment didn’t warrant a response. They drove in uncomfortable silence for twenty minutes or so—uncomfortable for her at least. He probably didn’t notice.
She sneezed.
Ninemeyer kept his eyes fixed on the road and said nothing.
“Bless me,” she said under her breath.
Ninemeyer still said nothing.
“When someone sneezes, you’re supposed to say, ‘God bless you,’” she said, turning to face him in the driver’s seat.
“It’s nonsensical,” he said with a weary sigh.
“That’s not the point.”
“What is the point?”
“It’s called being polite,” she said, shaking her head. “You know, manners . . . or do they relieve you of those when you join the CIA?”
“If people spent less time worrying about superstitious ritualistic behavior and more time worrying about their personal hygiene, the world would be a much healthier and decidedly less odiferous place.”
“First you insinuate I’m fat. Now are you implying that I smell, Agent Ninemeyer?” she said.
He laughed.
It was the first time she’d heard him laugh.
Then she began to laugh. “I don’t smell . . . do I?”
“No, you don’t smell,” he said. “At least from where I’m sitting.”
They both laughed a little more at that, and it felt good.
“I needed that,” she said, wiping her eyes.
“Needed what?”
“A good laugh,” she said. “So much weird, terrible shit has happened the past week, I feel like I . . .”
“Like you what?” he asked, glancing at her when she didn’t finish her thought.
“Like I was dreaming my life before, and then I woke up into a nightmare. It’s supposed to be the other way around, you know?”
He nodded.
“You’re probably the only person in the world who believes something happened to my husband over there in Afghanistan. Thank you for trying to help me.”
He shrugged.
“You are a very odd person,” she said. “Has anybody ever told you that before?”
“All my life.”
“I’m sorry,” she said with a pang of guilt. “I was just teasing.”
“It’s fine,” he said, all the levity gone now between them. “Companionship has never been a priority for me.”
She wasn’t sure how to respond to that comment, so she changed the subject. “What’s going to happen when we get to Rensselaer?”
“We’re going to find Michael,” he said. “And bring him home.”
She gave a snort at this response. “Can we stop playing games, please? I told you what I know, but you still haven’t told me what’s going on. All you’ve done is repeat back to me the things I already know. What do you know? What happened to my husband?”
“Your husband and Corporal Wayne discovered a piece of alien technology in a cave, and the Army flew it back to Maryland. The Army tasked really smart scientists from DARPA and USAMRIID to investigate what it is. Everyone who interacts with the object has a grand mal seizure, and then their behavior changes. Everyone who has interacted with the object so far is either missing or dead. Everyone except for Michael.”
She laughed nervously. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” he said plainly.
She didn’t say anything for a very long time as she contemplated all the implications and ramifications of such a statement. When she finally did speak, she said, “What’s really going to happen when we get to Rensselaer?”
He took his eyes off the road and looked at her.
In that moment, she saw something change in his face. She saw the real Dean Ninemeyer, and gooseflesh stood on her arms.
Suddenly Willie Barnes’s voice echoed in her head: “Not everybody out there is a gentleman like me. There’s some A-1 lunatics running around out there. You just never know who you’re dealing with until—most of the time—it’s too late to do anything about it. All I’m saying is be careful, Josie. Be suspicious. Be prepared. And stop climbing into cars with strange men who promise you what you want to hear.”
She shivered.
“I like you, Josie,” he said. “I don’t like most people. So I’m going to do something I never do. I’m going to tell you the truth.”
“Okay,” she said, folding her hands in her lap to keep them from trembling.
“I’m going to use you as bait to lure your husband away from the object and then force him to tell me what it is and how I can capture it.”
“Oh,” she said.
What else was there to say? She’d made a mistake—a terrible, terrible mistake getting in the car with this man. Trusting this man. He’d swept in when she was at her most emotionally vulnerable state, flashed her a badge, and offered to find her husband. She’d fallen into the trap without a second’s hesitation. She ran through scenarios in her head, one after another, each more depressing than the last: her calling the police, her trying to steal his gun, her running away at their next pit stop, her opening the passenger door and jumping out of the SUV at highway speed . . . all pointless. Her only option now was to put on a brave face, play along, and try not to antagonize him until an opportunity presented itself for her to turn the tables.
CHAPTER 42
Biogentrix Vaccine-Manufacturing Facility
Rensselaer, New York
Malcolm’s first priority was to contact Major Tyree.
He was certain that Legend had no idea where they had relocated after disappearing from Westfield Dynamics. EVE had taken herself and her hive of drones completely off the grid. They were well hidden here in the dinky little Rensselaer bioscience park—hidden in plain sight so perfectly that no one would find them until it was too late. So long as the money kept flowing and EVE deployed her walking, talking human mouthpieces to manage any curious interlopers, she would achieve her objective.
The viral-amplification line would be up and running by tomorrow. EVE had selected readily available embryonic chicken eggs as the growth medium and already contracted with a supplier. Using the preserved sample of highly virulent Dumbell 7124 India strain that Major Fischer had s
tolen from Fort Detrick, laboratory workers under EVE’s control would inject microscopic quantities of variola into the embryonic host cells. Infected eggs would then be placed in thermostatic ovens for incubation, where over the next several days, the smallpox virus would monopolize the cells’ internal machinery to produce successive copies of itself until every embryonic cell in the egg was infected, engulfed, or destroyed. When the oven doors were opened, instead of containing chicken embryos, the eggs would be packed with millions of copies of live variola, ready for extraction. After harvesting, the virus would be mixed with stabilizing agents and loaded into 0.5 mL prefilled syringes labeled INACTIVATED INFLUENZA VACCINE, QUADRIVALENT (IIV4), STANDARD DOSE. The purely diabolical nature of EVE’s plan made him want to vomit—distributing flu shots to clinics and pharmacies across the country that contained a live smallpox virus instead of inactivated influenza. And the worst part about it was that she’d used his mouth and tongue and vocal cords to negotiate the sales agreements with dozens of buyers across the country, undercutting pricing from Seqirus, Sanofi Pasteur, and GlaxoSmithKline to penetrate the market in flu season, where shortages had already created heightened demand. Infection rates after injection would be 99.9 percent. By the time the industry figured out what was wrong, it would be too late. The Trojan-horse syringes would be broadly distributed. Besides the United States, Biogentrix had orders to fill in Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean Islands. Modern logistics and transportation would take care of infecting the rest of the world.
Repurposed flu shots as a weapon—he could not think of anything more disturbing.
Malcolm had three days to stop her.
Maybe less . . .
Of course, he didn’t articulate any of this. He contemplated it all without words. His technique of obscuring his thoughts from EVE had evolved. He now used a combination of abstract thought and novel mental imagery in which he assigned values and meanings to certain shapes, forms, and even memories. In essence, he had invented a new language that only he understood and that did not follow the standard grammatical or syntactic rules of spoken or written language. Would she eventually be able to crack his code? Given her processing power and quantum-computing capability, the answer was almost certainly yes. But he was more concerned about the when than the if. He had to persevere only long enough to execute his plan. The plan itself was not complicated. Provided she hadn’t already deciphered his abstract thoughts, all he had to do was avoid thinking about it. The hard part now was figuring out how to regain control of his body long enough to make it happen.
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