The Sacrifice Area
Page 31
That was a very safe and crafty response, Logan thought. He’s concerned about surveillance. The place could be bugged, and Glass was definitely aware of the possibility, unless, of course, he’d taken countermeasures. That, too, was a real possibility. The man wasn’t stupid. He had worked in this field, even if marginally, but he knew how the people they were up against operated. Better than Logan did. What the hell, he and Turner might be setting me up to talk. Now that’s an unsettling possibility. “Have you been in Response Team employ since you arrived here?” he asked Glass.
“Did Turner say that?” Glass did not seem perturbed or taken off guard by the question.
“No, but I heard it mentioned. Is it true?”
“I try to maneuver through many different fields of expertise with the sole purpose of gathering information. The reason for coming to Essex was exactly as I said: to uncover the details of the Pine Haven Project and the cause behind the subsequent accident. If it was an accident. Pine Haven is like a gift that keeps on giving, like the Philadelphia Experiment or the Montauk Project. Even Roswell. It is yet another myth that can be continually spun and generate interest, and I will be considered the expert in the field. I have publishers lined up for the book I’m writing about Pine Haven, even though I haven’t uncovered all its secrets. What I possess are tantalizing tidbits that can be strung along to form an interesting mosaic. Over time, I can probably generate another book or two down the pipeline and a number of articles. It’s a cash cow—not that I need the money, but there is always the prestige. Think of it, Joe. You and Natalie are the only two nongovernment, nonmilitary people, just ordinary citizens, who managed to penetrate the frontier of a forbidden zone. That in itself is worth something to listen to. And I was the guy who put it all together and set the plan in motion. I won’t be leaving Essex anytime soon; in fact I rather like it here, even though Turner has me under house arrest. This is my torture, you see. Being so close and still not knowing the final, absolute truth of what actually occurred at Pine Haven. I will have to rely on imagination and inventiveness for the time being, and the exciting narrative of what you and Natalie witnessed during your time there. I expect you to provide me with a detailed account. Natalie mentioned a number of things, but I would enjoy hearing your take. Something detailed.”
“There was an industrial accident. People died. Let the Air Force choke on all its secrets.”
Glass laughed. “Don’t you believe it. There is so much more, and I can’t let it rest. I want so much more, but I will have to remain content with what I already know and what we tried to achieve. No one will ever get inside the exclusion zone ever again. It will remain a mystery. A sacrifice area.”
Already Glass was reimagining his part in the entire aborted, failed affair, Logan thought. It was Natalie’s show, her motivation all along. If anything, Glass was an obstacle to an agenda Natalie had cobbled together to save Creech, whatever that relationship was supposed to be, and it had nothing to do with him. They would never have gotten inside Pine Haven without her; or Creech, for that matter. But still, Glass had a story to tell. Logan wouldn’t deny him that. “Whatever you do, just keep my name out of it,” Logan said and got up to leave. Glass followed him to the front door.
“Hear from you soon, yes?” said Glass.
“There’s one more thing. The story about the cysts growing on cattle in the area. That hoof-and-mouth cover story. Is any of it true? Henry Bock claimed to have heard it from Natalie. He said some kind of creature was growing inside the cyst. Henry even had a nuclear resonance image of the thing on his computer. Where did the story originate?”
“I heard it shortly upon my arrival when interviewing the dairy farmers with property on the outskirts of the exclusion zone. I talked to a vet. I contacted a government source who didn’t reveal anything outright, but there was some concern. Protocols would have to be enacted, but it was rare. That’s what he told me, and I guess Natalie passed it along to Henry. I can’t make claims to its veracity. This source provided the image, but I didn’t consider it at all revealing. Whatever Natalie said to Henry Bock, well, he simply ran with it.”
Logan said goodbye and climbed into his Toyota. He hadn’t committed to providing Glass with a detailed report on what had occurred while they were inside the exclusion zone. He felt it would be in his best interest not to say anything. Let Glass make something up; he was going to embellish the story, anyway. Logan also didn’t bring up what Natalie had said about Creech, that she had bargained for his escape from Pine Haven: Creech would help her get inside the fence, and she would help him put as much distance as he could between him and the Tacticals and his work for the Response Team, the DoE, and the Triumph utility. It’s what lay at the crux of his own dilemma: spiriting Creech out of Essex, having information on the cause that got him killed. Possibly he was responsible in more than an oblique way for the glow boy’s death. Not that he foresaw any of it happening. Maybe he should have turned them both in to the colonel that night. No sense whining about it, he thought; he got three large for not ratting them out. Natalie had certainly told Glass what happened and held him responsible, even blamed him. Why else would she shoot him? Somewhere along the line, somebody was going to talk about the events of that night, if not Natalie or Glass, in order to broker a sweet deal for themselves. Turner had pieced it together but didn’t have concrete proof. Too many people knew and eventually somebody would talk. Not Frenchy though, even if Turner managed to get his hands on him. He wasn’t the squealing type, of that Logan was confident. And if Frenchy didn’t talk, then neither would he. If it wasn’t a death sentence, then it would be damn close to one.
At the moment, none of it worried him. There was something else that antagonized Logan, and he hadn’t become aware of it or realized its potential significance until only a couple of days ago. He had been in the shower and felt a small lump on his back. He’d had to contort himself and use a small mirror to get a good look at it. It was a pea-sized growth on the very upper portion of the left buttock, about two inches from the base of his spine, in the lower lumbar region. There was no redness or discoloration, no suppuration of any kind. That’s why he’d asked Glass if the cyst story was true. In the intervening days, sometimes the growth had tickled or stung, but for only a moment. He even thought he felt something squirm deep within the tiny nodule, but he couldn’t be sure. Was something terrible gestating within the sac of keratinous material, some reptilian creature that was a mutation from the Pine Haven experiments? Was his proximity to the Ouroboros the cause of this affliction, or was it just the contact with the space within the exclusion zone? An exposure to contamination? Were Tacticals getting sick? If they were, nobody was going to say.
He was intent on having the lump checked out, but not here in Essex. Maybe he should go visit Bridgett and lay it all out to her. She and Todd must have a family doctor or know someone at the university research center where they work. Either way he couldn’t let it go for too long. People were making moves: Turner, lawyers, Glass, even Natalie in her own self-defeating way. Once the cyst grew to the size of a walnut, as Henry had described, then he knew he would be in for some big, serious trouble. Maybe the government would ship him secretly to Plum Island and watch how the thing developed inside a human until it came bursting out of his ass. If any of what he heard was true, then his business with Turner and the Response Team would seem rather inconsequential.
At that moment, he felt overwhelmed, beaten, totally fucked. As hot acid squirted throughout his churning stomach, Logan shouted aloud, “Life is the biggest joke ever played out on the human race.”
He headed back to his house in the Station to await the arrival of the New Year.
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