Blink of an Eye: Beginnings Series Book 8 (25 page)

“
I don’t think, but good job. Henry!” Frank looked out to Henry who checked the target. “Any hits?”

Henry checked out the fake snipers
. “Frank! He hit one! In the leg but he hit one!”

“
See, Dean.” Frank gave a firm pat to his back. “You did good. You fired ten shots and got one hit.”

“
It sucks.”

“
No it doesn’t. You’re blind and ... you’ve never done this before. One out of ten is good. Hell, I have men who their first time up here without blindfold didn’t do that.”

“
Really?”

“
No.” He snickered at Dean’s moan. “But ... you still did good. Ready to try again?”

“
You know what?” Dean smiled and raised the gun. “Point me in the right direction again, Frank. I’m ready.”

<><><><>

If anger was lava spewing forth from a volcano, then Quantico would have been Pompeii with the amount that George was putting out. He stormed, not wanting to speak to anyone. Having just received, through Morse code, the word they had failed in yet another attempt at Robbie the day before. What had made matters worse for George is that he didn’t hear a word of it from John Matoose. It had been days since he had personally spoken to John Matoose and it fueled any fire already breeding in George. John knew George couldn’t contact him. It would give away George’s location if he did. George figured something had to be going on with John, something that prohibited him from making his daily call. Perhaps he was found out, but George knew if that was the case, he would somehow know about it. Tightened security around the Communications room would stop John, but it wouldn’t stop George because he was certain, without a doubt, that he could get his message through on the first of the month when the system regenerated itself for thirty minutes and received no signals. That was when George would contact John, three p.m. that day. Unlike his typical transmissions on the first of every month where George would send information to John, this time, if he hadn’t heard from John, he would send him something else.

Irritated and in no mood for any excuses
, George went to where he knew he could always hear what he wanted to hear, his labs. George did hear what he wanted to hear, that in no time, part one of two could be launched with success. It was what George was building for, his final attempt at the elimination of Beginnings. Final because he was certain that this plan would work with maximum loss of lives to Beginnings, and minimum loss of lives to George. Even though Beginnings was a hangnail in size compared to the hand George had on the East. They were untouchable, protected by the walls of security around them, and the gold mine they had beneath of them, a gold mine that their ignorance hadn’t even tapped the surface of.

But he would break them eventually
. He was positive of that. Then Beginnings could become one more stop of George’s in his ‘bring them in, train them, spread them out’ large world he was creating. Growing by the day in size, though large in numbers, George was still at a loss because he knew an army of a thousand strong—without hope and without fight inside of them—could not defeat an army of a hundred with spirit. Perhaps that was another reason, a big reason, George had so much difficulty defeating Beginnings.

<><><><>

They sat in a field two miles south of the Living Section and three miles north of the mobile lab. Frank and Dean, amongst the high grass, were finishing off the lunch that Frank had brought out there for them to eat before continuing on.

“
Will Henry be back?” Dean asked, finishing off his sandwich.

“
Nope.” Frank took a hit of his cigarette.

“
We’re all the way out here, Frank.”

“
We’ll walk back, it’s not that far.”

Dean listened to Frank as he blew out his smoke loudly
. “You know, Frank, I can’t believe you of all people are smoking.”

“
And you won’t say shit, Dean.”

“
No, I won’t.” Dean brought his knees up to his chest, dusted off his hands, and wrapped his arms around his legs. “You do know, Frank, health-wise ...”

“
Dean.”

“
But as a doctor ...”

“
Dean.”

“
It’s just that you’re so fit and so healthy ...”

“
Dean!” Frank snapped. “Please.”

“
If I’m gonna keep this secret, can I at least know why you started smoking?”

“
It’s just that ... it’s ... things are stressful, Dean. You know that. You have this virus to contend with. Me, I have this place to protect. There are so many outside forces I deal with on a day-to-day basis that a lot of people don’t know about. I deal with it, it’s my job, but ... I’m allowed to worry. Smoking kind of calms me. Three things calm me, sex, which I’m not getting, smoking, which I’m doing, and drinking, which I’d prefer not to do.”

“
So you’ve quit drinking?” Dean waited for an answer. He only received silence. “OK.” He paused again. “Answer me this. Did you start smoking to stop the drinking?”

“
No ... well, sort of. I guess.”

“
It’s not working, is it?”

“
Dean, I’d rather not talk about this with you.”

“
OK, OK, It’s just ... it’s very typical in the old world standards. People who quit drinking, or who have a drinking problem ...”

“
I don’t have a problem.”

Dean raised his hand
. “I’m not saying you do. I’m saying that it’s a typical switch, one for the other. Sometimes it helps but it doesn’t work. Get it?”

“
Yep.” Frank took another hit of his cigarette.

“
People say that you have to want to quit drinking in order to quit. Medically, I don’t buy it.”

“
Dean. Where are you going with this?”

“
Nowhere,” Dean stated. “But know, it’s OK to smoke if you’re using it to give up drinking. It’s OK to go that route. It’s proven medically that smoking will help. Just remember, if you can’t ... if you find yourself unable to quit the drinking all together, there are other ways we can go, aside from just your willpower. Because some people, no matter how strong they are, may need a little more help.”

“
That’s not me,” Frank spoke defensively. “I like having a drink. I can quit altogether. I just don’t want to.”

“
Good. But if you would ever find yourself in that position, and I know that’s not you, but if you do ... let me know. Medically speaking, there are ways I can help and no one has to know.”

“
If I would find myself in that position, which I won’t, I appreciate the thought.”

“
Yes well, just like I’m not saying anything about the smoking, you can’t say anything about that offer I just made. People could talk.”

Frank smiled
. “People will talk. Shit, we were throwing darts last night.”

Dean began laughing
. “Last night we hit Josephine with the darts and today we nearly hit her with the car.”

“
Yeah but she’s senile. Who’s gonna believe her?”

“
Frank?” Dean softened his words and became serious, “Can I ask you something? I need you to answer me honestly. Why are you helping me? Why are you putting so much time into helping me? You are really putting a lot of time into it.”

“
I’m not done.”

“
Why?” Dean asked with passion. “We are always at each other’s throats. Even with good times between us, we’ll revert back to that. You hate me. You’ve always hated me.”

Frank was quiet as he tossed out his cigarette
. “There’s a fine line ... and this goes no further than this field or I’ll fuckin kill you. There’s a fine line, Dean. Just know, I don’t hate you. This, you being blind, it killed me. It’s wrong and like everything else, I want to make it right. As far as always hating you goes, I think it was the fact that you have always threatened me. Not your size, mind you, because you’re like two feet tall.” Frank reached into his pocket and pulled out another cigarette. “But you were everything I wasn’t. You had Ellen right away, and I always wanted her. You’re smart, really smart. You save lives. And people, they like you.”

“
Well know, Frank, you’ve always been a threat to me too. You’re everything I wanted to be too. And I am talking about your size. You’re big, strong, and you just go in and do it. Without thought and with your heart, you do things. I may save lives, but so do you. Let me tell you, the way you save lives deserves a lot more credit than you get.”

There was awkwardness between the two of them at that moment
, one never there before. A sense of respect that Dean had for Frank, and Frank had for Dean, was known for the first time ever in all the years they had known each other. Both of them, at that second, didn’t want to admit ... they wanted out of that moment.

Frank stood up
, brushed himself off, and grabbed the small sack. “Enough mush. Put it behind us and never bring it up again. Deal?”

“
Deal.” Dean felt Frank’s hand on his arm and with its guidance, he stood up. “Now what? Are we walking home?”

“
Yep.” Frank tossed the sack over his shoulder. “Now.” Frank walked behind Dean and turned him. “You are facing town. Do you hear the noise coming from there?”

“
Yes.”

“
Good. So do I. Don’t move.” Frank placed on his blindfold.

“
What are you doing?”

“
Walking blind like you.”

“
This ought to be interesting. So, do we just follow the sounds?”

“
Yep.” Frank walked to next to Dean. “Like I said, we’re facing town. It’s straight ahead two miles. Follow the noise. See you there.” Frank started walking.

“
See me ... Frank?” Dean reached his hand out to his side where Frank spoke to him last. “Frank?” He turned around. “Frank!” All he got was a distant ‘bye, Dean’. “Shit” Dean brought his hand to his head. “He left me here.”

<><><><>

“What do I do, what do I do?” Ellen spoke to herself, looking at the computer screen, waiting for her analysis of her recent batch results that she had mixed together. “Lie? Probably.” With her feet on the counter, she brought the pocket tape recorder she used for Dean’s dictation close to her mouth. She pressed record and spoke into it, “Results are taking an awfully long time, Dean. Of course if I didn’t do this dictation, you wouldn’t know. I can press the button to pause. Like now.” She stopped recording ... “Oh he is just going got kill me. But what does he need to know? I won’t tell him I screwed it up. I’ll lie. Yeah.” She cleared her throat and pressed record again. “I’m still waiting on those results, Dean. Of course, you and I both know what they are gonna be, the same old, same old. How can it not be when it’s the same old thing right? Hey, have I told you recently that I loved you.” Ellen watched the screen, glad at that second, even though it wasn’t right, that Dean was blind. He wouldn’t see her screwed up results in the analysis history of Agent Seventeen. “Dean, I was thinking we ought to give this thing Agent Seventeen a name. What do you think? It works, not without some side effects, but it works. We have to give it a name, because I am tired of calling it Agent Seventeen. Speaking of agents, I almost spilled that rack of shit we got from George. Boy, would we have been screwed if I did that. Not only would we have not any more strand one virus to work on, but we wouldn’t have those two extra does either. Sorry, my hand hit the rack when I was reaching in the fridge. And speaking of those two doses, Dean ...” Ellen lowered her feet to the floor and sat forward. “What are we going to do with them?”

There was a long moment of silence as Ellen heard the beep of her completed results
. Just as she was about to do her big lie, she did something else. She screamed. Ellen screamed so loudly, so shrilly, it could have broken the microphone of the tape player right next to her mouth. “DEAN!” Another scream. “DEAN! Oh my God! Hold on.” She turned off the tape player. “Shit. This can’t be right,” she spoke excitedly, then shrieked and smiled as her fingers clicked the keyboard. “It is!” She grabbed the player again, speaking in to it rapidly, “OK, here it goes, I was thinking about something else when I was mixing the batch of Agent Seventeen, Dean, and I inadvertently put in two percent of hydrochloride instead of two percent of Hydrometholide. Wait, don’t yell. I caught myself during the mix and I added the Hydrometholide also, knowing full well that it wouldn’t work but I didn’t want to waste the batch. I figured I’d run the test anyhow, waste the rabbits, and lie to you about why the batch didn’t work on them. I ran the preliminary test and, Dean ... Dean ... guess what? We have tried the hydrochloride before instead of the Hydrometholide but we never tried the combination of the two. And ... instead of our slow conquering of the virus sample with the initial saturation being forty percent, I had an initial saturation of eighty-three percent. No shit. Eighty-three percent! Ten minutes, Dean. Ten minutes and the host virus was completely saturated by our agent. WHEW!” She shrieked. “OK, testing the bunny time. I’ll inject one-half a cc into our day-three rabbits, seeing how they are the farthest along, and I’ll get back to you. If these results are right, we should see a drop in body temperature in a few hours instead of twelve. OK, bye.” She shut off the player then turned it back on. “I’m so brilliant.” Stashing the tape player in her lab coat pocket, Ellen flew into the special lab. She immediately grabbed the sample batch and, in her excitement, began to fill three syringes to test on the rabbits.