Placebo (14 page)

Two miles from the center, I'm able to reach Fionna.

“Jevin, I've been trying to get ahold of you since yesterday. What happened?”

“No cell reception up here in the mountains.”

“So you didn't get the files I sent you?” She sounds exasperated.

“No. What did you find?”

Her tone changes. I can tell she's calling to someone across the room. “Maddie, put down those scissors and let go of your brother's ponytail!”

I hear a faint, disgruntled “Yes, ma'am.”

The joys of being a mom.

I motion for Charlene to pull the car to the shoulder so we can make sure we don't lose the connection.

“Here's what I found.” Fionna is back on the line with me. “RixoTray isn't just working with the Lawson Research Center. They're working with the Pentagon. DoD.”

“Really.”

“Yes, it has something to do with the president's speech tomorrow
and with Kabul, the suicide bombing attempt earlier this week. The guy who was going to blow up the mosque.”

I hadn't heard anything about that. “What happened?”

“There's not much to tell, just that a suicide bombing attempt was unsuccessful. The media isn't saying much. A couple al-Qaeda cell members were killed. There are differing accounts of how many.”

I couldn't see how that would have anything to do with what was going on here at the center, but if there was a connection, the timing of the bombing attempt in Kabul and the confrontation with the thug here last night might be more than coincidental.

“You should hear Xavier,” she tells me. “He's all over this. Conspiracy stuff, you know him.”

“I can only imagine. What else?”

“A few things. That's the big—” Here she stops again, calls away from the phone to her kids: “I'll be there in a minute. Just stick the noodles in the pot and cover it.” Then she's back on the line with me. “Late lunch. We had a field trip this morning.”

She's in Chicago, where it really would be a late lunch. I would've called it an early supper. “No problem.”

“Anyway, I was about to say, the files might be too large for you to download to your phone. You'll need to use my FTP server.” She gives me the info I'll need to log in, but it looks like I'll have to wait to get the files until I can use my laptop after the meeting with Dr. Tanbyrn.

Charlene taps the clock on the front console of the car:
We need to hurry.

2:18 p.m.

I give Fionna the quick rundown of what happened last night: sneaking into the center, meeting the assailant, Charlene getting injured. Before I can tell Fionna about today's tests, she asks concernedly about Charlene, “Is she alright?”

“Yes. Do you want to talk to her?”

“Yes.”

Charlene unequivocally shakes her head no.

I hand her the phone.

She glowers at me, then speaks to Fionna. “Hey . . . Good.” I try to fill in the blanks, guess what Fionna might be saying: “How's your arm? Are you sure it's not serious?”

“Yes . . . Fine . . . Okay,” then Charlene hands the phone back to me.

Five words. That's it. Less than ten seconds.

This woman really does not like talking on the phone.

I accept the cell, tell Fionna, “It's me again.”

“Xavier's done getting the B-roll for you. He offered to slip up there, meet with you two tonight, catch up.”

“I'll call him. Set something up.”

Now it really is time to go.

“So you mentioned the guy looking through the computer files . . .” Fionna seems to be anticipating what I'm about to ask her. “Let me guess, you want me to dig around, find out what he might've been searching for.” It was more of a conclusion than a question.

“Searching for or deleting, yes.”

“I had a look at their files before you went there, Jev. You know that. I didn't see anything suspicious.”

“Take another look. Go deeper. Explore the military connection.”

A pause. “Alright. Lonnie's looking for a little extra credit. I'll get him on it.” Lonnie is her seventeen-year-old son. Not even out of high school yet, and already he's presented twice at DEFCON.

We end the call, and only after I'm lowering the phone do I realize that I didn't get a chance to tell Fionna about the test results, about my entanglement with Charlene. It doesn't look like there's enough time to call Xavier right now, but I text him, tell him I'll call him later this afternoon after our meeting with Tanbyrn. I leave out the news about the watch for the time being. Later I'll drive down here again, download the files from Fionna, and fill Xavier in.

Charlene pulls onto the road, does a U-turn, and takes us back toward the center for our appointment with Dr. Tanbyrn.

5:27 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time
33 minutes until the fire

Riah locked her apartment and left for her meeting with Cyrus, the twins, and the person named Williamson, whom she had not yet been able to identify. Yes, it was a little early, but if she got there before the twins did, she could spend a little time talking with Cyrus, find out more about the connection with the Lawson Research Center.

As she climbed into the car, she was thinking about all she'd learned over the course of the day concerning Dr. Tanbyrn's research in Oregon, and she was becoming more and more curious about exactly what the video Cyrus was going to show them would contain.

Cyrus watched as the beautiful
Ampulex compressa
made her move.

She flew toward the cockroach and they seemed to battle for a moment, curling and twisting and tussling with each other, the cockroach trying to escape, the wasp trying to make her first sting.

And then she did—with a quick flick she inserted her stinger into the roach's spine, into its central nervous system. In only seconds the cockroach lost control of its front legs and collapsed.

That was the first sting, the one that paralyzed the roach just enough to set it up for the second sting.

The one into its brain.

The venom of this second sting was a dopamine inhibitor. It wouldn't stop the roach from moving, but it would stop it from moving under its own volition. Once this venom was injected, even after the venom from the first sting wore off and the roach had control of
its legs again, it would not try to run away. It would be completely under the wasp's control.

Now she wrapped herself carefully and tightly around her prey's head so that she would be able to slide her stinger into the precise spot she was looking for. Just a millimeter to either side and she would kill the roach. She had to get it right the first time, but evolution had taught her what to do.

Truly remarkable.

Of course Cyrus was aware that this was an act, not a genetic trait; neither was it a behavior that she was able to pass on to her offspring. Inexplicable, yes.

So be it.

She knew how to do it, so instinct must have taught her.

But now, as he watched her position that stinger, he thought again of the astonishing precision of this act. How could any wasp ever develop these two separate venoms, know to look for this type of a roach in the first place, then know exactly where to make each of the stings? She wouldn't be able to reproduce unless she could do all of this, so how could this knowledge ever be passed on genetically? It was almost enough to make a person believe that there was a designer behind the process of natural selection.

But would the benevolent deity that religious people believe in really design something like this? A wasp that could create, for lack of a better term, a zombified cockroach to use as a living host for her offspring?

A god with a streak of sadism, sure, but a loving one? That seemed incomprehensible.

The wasp pressed her stinger against the roach's head.

Inserted the stinger into its brain.

Injected the venom.

And waited for it to take effect.

Charlene guides the car into a parking space.

It only takes us a few minutes to walk across campus to the Lawson Center.

We enter through the front door and decide to take the elevator instead of the stairs down to Dr. Tanbyrn's office on the lower level.

And as we wait for the doors to open, she asks me about my father.

2:34 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time
26 minutes until the fire

“So now that we know you can get cell reception,” Charlene begins, “maybe later—after we meet with Tanbyrn—you can get in touch with your dad.”

“I'm not sure that'd be the best thing to do.”

The elevator doors slide open and we step inside.

“What happened between you two, anyway? You never told me.”

I press the “L” button. “We didn't do so well together after my mom left. He changed, he . . .” Is there a good way to say this? Not really. Just the simple way, the blunt truth: “He became angry.”

There's so much more to explain, but it would be opening up a can of worms that I didn't think this was the right time or place for.

The doors close and we descend.

On the lower level, Charlene is quiet as the doors whisk open again. She remains quiet as we exit and head down the hallway toward Tanbyrn's office. Any blood that she or the assailant might've left behind last night on this level has been cleaned up, just as it was on the third floor.

“So, you're saying he wasn't just angry at her for leaving?” We're halfway down the hall. “Not just at her?”

“I suppose that's a good way to put it.”

As we approach the small reception area in front of Dr. Tanbyrn's office, I see a man sitting on one of the chairs reading a magazine. A daypack rests on the floor beside him.

He looks up as we join him.

“Do you know if Dr. Tanbyrn is in?” I ask him.

He shifts his gaze from me to Charlene before answering, and when he does he clears his throat slightly. “No. Not yet.”

A sweet feeling came over Glenn. A secret rush of quiet power.

He could tell that they didn't recognize his voice. Last night he'd tried to mask it, and apparently, it had worked. However, when he went on, he was somewhat tentative, testing the waters: “Do you know where he is?”

“I know he had a few things to take care of. We're scheduled to meet with him at 2:45.”

“2:45?” Yes. This was working. It really was. Still no glimmer of recognition on their faces.

“Yes.”

“Well”—Glenn nodded knowingly—“I'm in no hurry. I can wait until you're done.”

Charlene and I give him some space and sit on the other side of the room, a small footstool between us. I expect that now that we're no longer alone, she'll drop the subject of my father.

But she does not.

Instead she lowers her voice. “It's not your fault that your mother left.”

“I know.”

“It's . . .” She hesitates. “It would be good if you could try to fix things between the two of you. Between you and your dad.”

“I'm with you on that.”

Although the man across the room is still staring at his magazine, I can only imagine that he's also doing what anyone would be doing in his situation if they heard two people nearby talking in hushed tones—eavesdropping.

Just in case he is, I go with Charlene's assumed name. “Jennie, we've never been close.” I'm doing my best to not let the stranger hear me. “I don't want to call him because it would be uncomfortable for both of us, it wouldn't solve anything, it would just open up old wounds, and I think in the end one of us would probably say something he would regret.”

“How do you know it wouldn't solve anything?”

“Experience.”

A moment passes.

Where is Tanbyrn?

“You know my dad died, right?” Her voice is low but has an intensity to it. “When I was twenty-five, I told you about that? Right after my divorce?”

Charlene had been married for only a short time before her husband decided he preferred the eighteen-year-old girls taking his high school lit class to her. She rarely spoke about it, and now I'm a bit surprised she's even mentioned it.

“The car accident.”

She nods and it takes her awhile to respond. “I never had the chance to say goodbye to him. There were things between us that, well . . . should have been said. Things . . .” Her sentence trails off, and it's clear that she's deeply moved by the thoughts of the father she lost and the things she never told him. “Well, I think you understand what I mean.”

I'm not sure what to say. I do understand, and for her sake, as a way of showing that I empathize with her, I want to tell her that yes, I'll call
my dad and talk with him about all those things that accumulate over the years, but I already know he won't want to see me or talk to me.

“Let me think about it. I'm not brushing you off. I need to figure out what I might say.”

She accepts that and agrees that it's a good idea.

Then we're both quiet.

I check my watch.

Ten minutes to three. Dr. Tanbyrn is running late.

Charlene picks up a magazine that she is almost certainly not interested in.

I do the same.

Honestly, Glenn could not believe his luck.

Here they were, delivered straight to him, and if they were going to meet with the good doctor in his office, that meant that he could deal with all three of them at once.

But what about what you had in mind for the woman? About making the guy watch?

As tempting as all of that was, Glenn had to admit that it would be smarter to let them burn alive with the physicist. Simpler. Easier.

Wound for wound for wound.

A tidy, happy ending after all.

Then move on.

He kept his eyes trained on the magazine he was holding.

Despite himself, he felt his heart beginning to hammer.

Don't give anything away. Don't let them guess who you are.

He turned the page of the magazine he was not reading.

Eavesdropping is nice, listening in on people's secrets, peeking into their lives, but as Glenn had learned over the last couple years, there's an even deeper thrill you get from eavesdropping on the people you're about to kill.

There's something special when they have no clue, when they think
that life is just going to keep going on the way it always has. Status quo. Time in a bottle; nothing to worry about.

But when you know that's not the case, when you know that the person's death is imminent, only minutes away, the secret knowledge is like a drug. The feeling is rich and sweet and intoxicating, and there's nothing else like it. That's probably what drives serial killers to act out their urges so often. The sense of ultimate, godlike power over your helpless little prey.

Even though he wasn't able to concentrate at all on the words, Glenn dutifully kept pretending to read the magazine.

As soon as the doctor showed up.

As soon as all three of them were in the office.

Then he would act.

He realized that deep in his heart, he really did feel an obligation to something greater than just a paycheck—a calling to do this sort of thing. A duty, so to speak, to death.

His heart raced, his anticipation sharpened.

Yes, there really were moments of pleasure and satisfaction in this job.

Most days it wasn't like this, but today he had to admit that he could lose himself in this work if he wasn't careful, could become more than just a guy doing a job, could start to view himself as something he'd never before been able to admit to himself that he was.

An assassin.

The venom took effect.

The roach made no further effort to squirm or get away.

And it would make no further effort to escape. Not ever. Even when it was being burrowed into or eaten from the inside out by the wasp's young larva.

Sometimes the wasp that has stung the roach will break off one of the roach's antennae and drink some of its blood, which was what the wasp in Cyrus's office now chose to do.

Afterward, she waited until the roach had the use of its front legs again, then led it into the corner of the aquarium. She guided it by grabbing its one remaining antenna and directed it to the place where she was about to entomb it with bits of leaves and mud.

The process could take hours, but she would seal the helpless roach in her tomb and then lay her egg on its abdomen.

The roach would remain there, still alive but without trying to escape. After three days, the wasp larva would hatch and, a few days later, burrow into the roach and devour some of its internal organs to make enough room to form a cocoon.

Still it wouldn't try to crawl away, even as this was happening.

Six weeks after that, the young jewel wasp would emerge from the hollowed-out cockroach carcass, make her way out of the nest, and fly away.

Dr. Cyrus Arlington considered all of this and its symbolic connection with all that he was trying to accomplish with the twins, with how the predator controls the prey. More than simply a matter of national security, as Williamson believed, this project would help usher in the next step in human evolution.

A string of facts, of connections, only he was aware of.

As long as the twins did their job.

Adaptation.

Survival.

Adding twenty healthy years to the average life span of
Homo sapiens
.

Twenty years or more.

And he would be at the forefront, leading his species' foray into a bold and uncharted future.