Invasive Procedures

by Aaron Johnston

  “I didn’t do it for you,” he said. “I did it for Wyatt.”

  “I know,” she said. “That’s what makes it all the more wonderful.”

  He said nothing, only nodded his head slightly. Then she leaned against Dolores’s shoulder and in moments fell asleep.

  The tapping on the driver’s side window woke Frank. It was morning. He sat up and saw the old man in coveralls standing outside the truck, smiling. They were parked in a field. Frank vaguely remembered pulling off the road after nearly falling asleep at the wheel.

  “You folks all right?” the man said.

  “Where are we?” said Dolores, coming to.

  Frank turned the ignition and started the truck, startling the old man. He backed up as Frank waved politely and put the truck in reverse.

  “What’s happening?” said Byron.

  “Where are we?” Dolores said again.

  Monica and Wyatt woke as Frank bounced back onto the road again. How long had he been asleep? Two hours? Three? It couldn’t have been long. Dawn was just breaking. Frank shook his head. Stupid. Shouldn’t have pulled over.

  Soon they were among the early commuters creeping into LA from the San Fernando Valley.

  By eight o’clock they were taking the Wilshire exit and circling back toward the Federal Building. As they turned right onto Veteran Avenue to head for the Federal Building’s parking lot, a line of congested traffic brought them to a stop. A roadblock had been set up ahead, manned by half a dozen BHA agents in biocontainment suits. The agents stopped each car that approached and looked inside it before waving it on.

  “They’re looking for something,” said Monica.

  Three cars up, an agent squatted down next to the driver’s window and looked inside. In his hand was a piece of paper featuring the photo of a person’s face.

  “Not something,” said Frank. “They’re looking for someone.”

  The agent determined the car he was inspecting clean and told the driver to continue on.

  “I got a bad feeling about this,” said Monica.

  “Yeah,” said Frank, “me too.”

  The agent moved to the next car, leaving only one car between him and the truck. He motioned for the driver to roll down the window, and then Frank saw the face on the photo.

  “Hey, that’s you,” said Monica.

  “Then they’re looking for us,” said Dolores. “We’re saved.”

  “Hold on,” said Frank. He backed up a foot, cranked the wheel, and gunned it. The truck did a U-turn, narrowly missing a car headed north, and turned east onto Wilshire.

  “What are you doing?” said Dolores.

  “Are they following us?” said Frank.

  “No,” said Monica, “I don’t think so. Another car turned around also.”

  “Hold up,” said Dolores. “Somebody want to tell me what’s going on? I thought we were going to the BHA. Now we’re running away from it?”

  “They were looking for me,” said Frank. “They knew I was trying to come back to the BHA and were trying to stop me.”

  “But why would they want to do that?”

  And the answer came to him the instant the question was posed. “Irving,” said Frank. “Of course. Has to be.”

  “Who?”

  “Director Irving, head of the BHA. Galen said that Director Irving had been helping him. Maybe the Healers are still in contact with Irving. If so, they could have informed him of our escape and asked him to use the BHA to stop us from reaching the countervirus.”

  “Wait a second,” said Dolores. “You said the BHA was the one place on earth where we would be safe. And now you’re driving away from it? No, let me out of this truck.” She reached for the passenger door handle, but it was locked.

  “Stop,” said Frank. “Just relax. Let me think.”

  “Think?” she said. “Think? All we been doing is walking and thinking.”

  Frank accelerated, weaving among the traffic heading east on Wilshire Boulevard.

  “But I don’t get it,” said Byron. “How did this director mobilize the entire BHA against you?”

  “I don’t know,” said Frank. “He could’ve told them anything, made up all kinds of incriminating intel against me. He’s the director. Who would disbelieve him?”

  “Maybe we’re being paranoid,” said Monica. “Maybe we’re getting upset over nothing. Maybe they were looking for you because they want to help you.”

  “If they wanted to help me,” said Frank, “they’d be looking anywhere but the BHA. The Healers are the only people who knew we were headed back to the BHA this morning. And that roadblock was expecting me.”

  Monica rubbed her eyes, looking defeated. She knew he was right.

  “But what if you talk to them?” said Byron. “What if you tell them you’re innocent of whatever it is you’re being accused of? Maybe all you need to do is give your side of the story.”

  “And what if that doesn’t work?” said Frank. “Who’s to say they’ll even permit me to give my side of the story? They could be under orders to detain me immediately. Maybe Irving told them I’m a bio risk and should be quarantined. I do have the virus. That would be an easy story to prove.” He shook his head. “No, Director Irving’s too smart. He would have anticipated my trying to exonerate myself. Count on him having a plan for it.”

  “He’s right,” said Monica. “There’s no time to take that risk. Your chips could be triggered at any moment.”

  There was a silence. To mention the chips was to mention Nick and Hal. And no one seemed ready to broach that subject. Frank had said it before: there’d be time for mourning later.

  “What if we all go in together?” said Byron. “It’ll be our word against his. There’s four of us and only one of him.”

  “Galen only mentioned Irving,” said Frank. “There could be others. I have no way of knowing how deep the Healers’ penetration is.”

  Byron pounded a fist onto the dashboard, startling everyone. “Then we got no options. There’s nothing left we can do.”

  “Hold on,” said Frank. He took a sharp right and began a wide loop that took him to Westwood Park, a lavish city park behind the Federal Building. He found a parking space in the back corner away from other cars and killed the engine. “Stay here. Don’t get out for any reason.”

  “Where are you going?” said Byron.

  “Inside. If I can get to the countervirus—”

  “Whoa whoa whoa,” Byron said. “Inside? Are you out of your mind? You just can’t waltz into the Federal Building. You said they were looking for you. If the director is working for the Healers, he’ll have the entire agency against you. Besides, how can you possibly get in and out without infecting anyone?”

  “I’m open to other ideas.”

  No one had any.

  “Then stay here. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  Frank got out, scaled the park fence, and dropped into the back of the Federal Building’s expansive parking lot. Taking a breath to steel himself, he ran toward the back entrance, not having the slightest clue how to get inside.

  31

  INFILTRATION

  The Federal Building parking lot was six acres of tightly packed vehicles. Frank ran behind a row of cars, keeping low and using them for cover. He paused once he had the building’s back doors in sight. Getting in, he realized, would be impossible. There were six agents standing guard at the rear entrance. Each agent wore an armored biocontainment suit and carried heavy weaponry. Two more agents stood beside a BHA assault van parked along the entrance road. Plus, there were the six or so agents still manning the roadblock on the east end of the parking lot along Veteran Avenue. It was a fortress.

  Frank crouched behind a car, his mind racing. There was no way he was getting inside.

  The back doors of the building opened, and Frank squinted, trying to get a better look.

  Agent Carter exited the building, his helmet tucked under his arm. The other agents greeted him, and Carter snapped
his helmet into place and cocked his weapon.

  Of course, thought Frank. Carter. Galen had apprehended him in the rest home before taking me.

  Frank had assumed that Carter had been disposed of, that Galen would consider him an obstacle best removed. But Galen had seized control of Deputy Dixon’s mind, hadn’t he? What would stop him from seizing control of Carter’s as well? Frank had only been spared the same fate because Galen had bigger plans for him.

  And what about Riggs? Where was he? Was he under Galen’s control, too? There was no way to be certain. The only safe assumption at this point was that all this firepower was intentional. Frank was a target. Healers had lost confidence in him as one of Galen’s successors and now were using the BHA to have him removed.

  Frank looked down at the gray suit he was wearing. He looked a mess—torn, muddy, and grass-stained. He wouldn’t get past the agents dressed like this. But if he had biosuit, he could contain the virus inside and use the suit as cover to get in the building.

  The BHA van was parked forty yards from the rear entrance. There would be a spare biosuit in it. The only problem was, there was no way to get in the van without the two agents currently crowding it noticing.

  What he needed was a distraction.

  He looked at the car beside him. It was heavily dented, and a sheet of plastic was taped where the passenger window should have been. He maneuvered around to the passenger side, ripped away the plastic, unlocked the door, and crawled inside.

  It was a stick-shift. He got into the driver’s seat, opened the driver-side door, and put it in neutral. Then, pushing off the asphalt with his left leg, he slowly backed the car out of the parking space and turned it ninety degrees. The van and agents were another row of cars over, so he was still obscured from their view.

  Leaving the car in neutral and staying low, he straightened the steering wheel, got out, and crouched at the front bumper.

  Then he pushed.

  It took a few yards for the car to pick up speed, but soon it was going without his help. He moved away and hid behind another car as the five-speed rolled down the row at a brisk clip.

  It smashed into a Mercedes parked fifty yards away, and a car alarm went off. It couldn’t have been more perfect.

  Several agents ran by as Frank remained hidden. Then, when it was clear no others were coming to investigate, he crept to the van. Both agents were gone, and from this side of the van he was hidden from the building. He opened the back door and crept inside.

  The spare biosuits were kept in an emergency containment kit in the rear. He put one on, snapped on the helmet, and fastened the utility belt. It had the standard accouterments: an aerosol sedative, a box of small plastic containment bags, a small first-aid kit, an empty holster. He looked for a gun but didn’t find one, then switched on his comlink.

  An agent’s voice, shouting over the whine of the car alarm, sounded in his ear. “—inside the car, sir.”

  “Are you sure?” Carter’s voice said.

  “Affirmative. Rods are red, sir. No question. I’m getting V16 all over the interior.”

  Frank shuddered. He was still hot with the virus.

  “Roger that,” Carter’s voice said. “I’m on my way.”

  Frank watched through the windshield as Carter and three more agents ran down to the crash site, leaving only four agents at the front entrance. It was now or never.

  He went out the back of the van and then jogged with confidence around it toward the building, giving the illusion that he was running up from the crash site. The four agents seemed to pay him no mind and in fact were leaving their posts to get a look at the commotion in the parking lot. Frank kept his head down and stayed a distance from them without giving the impression that he was doing so intentionally.

  One of the spotted him. “Hey.”

  Frank stopped, his heart pounding.

  “What’s going on down there?”

  Frank rested his hands on his knees, pretending to be out of breath, but mostly keeping his face out of sight. “V16,” he said in a slightly deeper voice. “Think I got a leak in my suit. Need to check it out.” Hoping that was a sufficient response, he jogged to the door and went inside, relieved that no one tried to stop him.

  A particularly jumpy security guard greeted him in the lobby. “What’s going on out there? Is it him?”

  Frank kept his head down and turned on his exterior mike. “Sir, please stand back. I have a biohazard here.” He held out a closed fist, and the security guard recoiled, eyes wide with terror.

  Frank hustled to the elevator and pushed the button. The door opened, and he stepped inside, realizing instantly that he didn’t have the key the elevator required.

  The security guard watched him with pained fascination from the farthest point in the lobby.

  “Officer,” Frank boomed. “I don’t have my key. I need to use yours.”

  “I can’t do that without clearance,” the guard shouted back weakly.

  “Then let me put it this way. In my hand is a Level 4 pathogen capable of instigating an epidemic not seen on this planet since the black plague. Now, unless you don’t mind your eyeballs turning to jelly while we wait for this clearance, I suggest you give me your damn key.”

  A bulky ring of keys slid across the waxed tile floor and stopped at the elevator. Frank reached down and picked it up. “Thank you.”

  He inserted the correct key, and the doors shut. As the elevator descended he realized he needed to do a little more planning. What was next? A BHA security guard with a contaminant rod. And beyond him, what? A door that required both a card key and retinal scan. And beyond that, a room filled with fifty people and the director of the agency. Perfect.

  Okay, you have no weapon. No card key. And two useless retinas. Think.

  The elevator stopped, and the doors opened. A smiling guard turned to face him.

  “Before you do anything,” said Frank. “Hear me out.”

  The guard started, jumped back, and scrambled for his radio. Frank had no choice but to snap the aerosol can from his hip and spray him in the face. The guard’s eyes rolled back and he crumpled to the floor.

  Frank found the guard’s card key, then dragged him by the ankles down the corridor to the BHA entrance. He swiped the card key and then got his hands under the guard’s arms to lift him.

  A red light emitted from the retinal scan, and a computerized female voice said, “Error. No retina detected.” Then the light shut off.

  Great. So he’d have to get the guy up there and then swipe the card.

  With great effort, he hefted the guard to a semi-standing position. But he needed both his hands to do so, and the guard’s head kept lolling to the side, away from the scanner. Finally he opted for pressing the guard against the wall and holding his head in place with his own head. Then, using his knees for additional support, he swiped the card and quickly reached up and pulled the guard’s eyelids open.

  The red light emitted and the female voice said, “Error. Please look directly into the light.”

  Frank pulled the head away and saw that the man’s eyes were still rolled back. Damn.

  He shook the man’s head. That didn’t work. Then he delicately put his gloved finger to the man’s eyes and moved them manually. The guard looked straight ahead with a deathly stare. Frank pressed the head against the wall again and swiped the card. The light emitted and the door opened.

  Frank gently lowered the body to the floor then stepped through the doorway. There was a buzz of activity in the command center, as always. If he kept his head down, maybe they would ignore him, maybe he could blend in.

  Frank descended the stairs and soon realized that an agent in full bio-gear was too unnatural a sight here in the command center to avoid notice. The agents here were analysts, dressed in conservative business suits, not biogear. Right now Frank stuck out like a sore thumb.

  One by one the analysts looked up from the computer terminals as he passed. A few stepped out of
his way. They were all watching him.

  Head still bowed and moving briskly, Frank saw one of the analysts run into Director Irving’s office. A moment later Irving himself emerged, hands in his pockets, standing in Frank’s path.

  “Dr. Hartman, this is a surprise. I can only assume you’re here to turn yourself in.”

  Frank looked up. The room was quiet. Everyone stared at him.

  “I know about you, Irving. You gave the Healers information. You set me up to be taken.”

  Irving laughed. “Do you really think anyone in this room is going to believe a word you say, Dr. Hartman? After all the evidence we’ve gathered against you?”

  “What evidence?”

  “That you were assisting the Healers. George Galen made you an offer you couldn’t refuse. It must have been quite a sum for a man of your talents.”

  “You said evidence, not baseless accusations.”

  “We took a Healer into custody,” Irving said, his voice rising. “He’s been quite a source of information. He told us how you murdered those two homeless men, how you burned them alive just because George Galen instructed you to. What had he called it, a test of your allegiance? And he told us where we could find the bodies, too. We brought them back to the morgue. I could take you to them now, but something tells me you wouldn’t be too surprised by the sight of them, having set them ablaze yourself.”

  Frank was stunned. The Healers were laying it on thick, using Hal’s and Nick’s corpses to their advantage.

  “You’ve made a mockery of this agency, Dr. Hartman. May God have mercy on your soul. Agent Atkins.”

  To Frank’s right, Agent Atkins raised a pistol. Frank didn’t move.

  “Escort Dr. Hartman topside where Agent Carter will take him for further questioning.”

  Frank held up a hand up to Atkins. “Wait. Listen to me. Carter and Director Irving are working for the Healers.”

  “Agent Atkins,” Irving said. “Remove this man from the premises, by extreme force if necessary.”