Regenesis (Book 1): Impact (13 page)

“But
she didn’t–”

“Olivia
never accepted me at all,” Jason cut her off. “She believed I should have
applied myself and been a doctor or dentist or whatever the hell her youngest
son turned out to be.” He let out a breath and told her how disappointed she
was to have an accountant in a family of doctors, dentists, and illustrious
sorts.
Even my father was someone of some importance. He was a major general
I believe…played an important role in the Sudan nearly twelve years ago…I
really should have paid more attention to his war stories.

Audrey
looked away from him and muttered more apologies for the way she acted. He saw
her eyes and knew she felt unheard and alone.
Come now Audrey. Please just
try and enjoy your time here. Ignore him and be happy. That’s what your mother
wants to see.

Jason
took a few steps away from her and examined the spread of food throughout the
kitchen until he came upon a pot roast near the countertop stove.
Alan’s
work, no doubt. Perfectly sliced and arranged, not to mention the seasoning and
garnish…I would have settled for a pie, but they’re still in the oven and I
really would like to avoid burning myself. But…this is all for her anyway.
He took the dish off the counter and flipped the platter and its contents onto
the countertop.

“Jason!”
Audrey called out.

The
meat fell out all across the counter and floor while the juices flew across the
room and onto his shirt and pants. The vegetables followed suit and luckily for
him the dish didn’t slip from his hand and shatter on the wood floor. Luckily
the commotion garnered the precise reaction from Alan that he wanted.

“What
on earth is–” Alan began as he rushed into the kitchen, but he stopped
horrorstruck upon the sight of Jason caught red-handed holding the spilt roast,
plate, and vegetables in his hands and all across the counter. For a moment
Alan seemed as if he couldn’t breathe, as his expression crossed from anger to
sorrow and despair to frustration. Audrey’s stepfather spent the following
fifteen minutes chastising her husband on his etiquette, manners, clumsiness,
carelessness, and so many other errors and imperfections that he couldn’t think
or spare a single word of critique or judgment for her.

---*---

7:13 PM

Paris, France

Lauren
readied herself for the evening as she whispered her assurance to David over
her cell phone, “”

“your parents find out about last night?>” the boy on the other end asked.

“I faked a fever and nausea all day and they bought it,>” she told him.
“”

“you want to meet me at the usual corner in a half hour?>”

She
smiled, “”

Lauren
hung up, grabbed her purse and a sweater, and left her parents home via her
bedroom window. She landed on an uninhabited part of the sidewalk outside her
room and quietly closed the window. She crossed the Pont Neuf and headed north
from there.

She
followed the road seven blocks from her house. Lauren walked through the
streets and knew that there was still another twelve blocks before she reached
her friend’s party, but only four blocks until she met up with David.

The
evening was young and there was still a good deal of people, both tourists and
locals on the streets. Lauren never enjoyed walking alone through the city,
even though she’d lived there her whole life. She always liked the thought of
walking alongside some young man with whom she shared a special bond, and
though it might have made her seem weak, she wasn’t against the romantic idea
behind it.

Cafés,
restaurants, shops, clubs, and groceries littered the sides of the streets, and
even though a majority of them were closed or closing for the night, the few
that remained open breathed a new life into the city. Lauren watched the line
of people all dressed to impress at one of the nightclubs across the street
from where she was; the men looked as if they spent their last scraps of
earnings getting there and the women seemed as though they expected each and
every man there to buy their drinks. (Lauren did note how biased she was and
felt as though she could have been entirely wrong about the whole lot of them,
but her impression stuck and she felt no need to adjust it).

She
passed by a small terrace outside of an Italian café and overheard bits of
conversations between various couples; some talked about their days, others
mentioned current events, and one couple simply smiled and laughed with one
another. Lauren hardly made it to the end of the walkway when a young man with
curly brown hair jumped out from behind the edge of the building and startled
her. David laughed at her slight shout right before she hit him in the arm and
playfully called him a name.

They
walked close beside one another and talked about how their days were, which
were both filled with sleeping in until nearly four in the afternoon, chatting
with friends, and planning their evening with one another.

“do you think happened to that girl?>” she suddenly asked David.

He
shrugged and said he didn’t know. “and planned to get her home or something. I mean, if she was a terrorist or
something we would have heard about it by now.>”

“gave them false names though.>”

“but I’d bet it’d be all over the news.>”

Lauren
admitted he had a point and tried to put the matter behind them.

“you think Reine’s going to be high tonight?”> David asked her. “stand her when she’s like that.>”

Lauren
said she probably would be. “you?>” she joked.

David
told her how he wasn’t overly fond of her in the first place and that her drug
habits only irritated him more. “Rebecca are drunk or stoned, because they’re funny, but Reine’s just a
bitch.>”

“why do we keep going to her parties?>”

He
said it was because everyone they knew was there. “free beer or two in it.>”

“with whatever else we want once she’s lit.>”

He
sighed and agreed with her.

They
walked a bit further before David frowned and slightly glanced behind them
before he muttered, “”

Lauren
glanced backward for herself but failed to notice anyone. “sure?>”

David
nodded and paused a moment before he told her to act as if nothing was wrong.
“are.>”

“if we can’t though?>”

He
smirked and assured her that they could handle whoever crossed paths with them.

Lauren
stuck close to him so they wouldn’t lose track of one another, though she truly
felt the need to bask in his confidence and hoped it would rub off on her. They
barely made it to the end of the street before an Asian man in a trench coat
stepped out of an alleyway and caught them. Lauren’s heart raced at their capture,
but David was entirely calm. The man retrieved a badge from out of his coat,
flashed it, and proceeded to introduce himself as Detective Hiroshi Mizuno as
he retrieved a small notepad from his coat.

“two are Chantal Lecocq and Rousset Beaudoin, right?>” he asked them.

“”
Lauren said with a fake smile, “”

She
tried to leave but the man stopped her, “are going by Lauren Facet and David Sinclair again?>” His eyes gleamed
briefly and a smirk caught his lips. “effort; just tell me the truth.>”

David
let out a breath and asked what the detective wanted.

Mizuno
simply said he and his associates had a few questions about the young woman
they dropped off earlier in the day. “unfortunately she’s vanished again.>”

“”

The
detective nodded and asked them if they happened upon her after a blinding
light appeared out of nowhere. “how we lost her, in a blinding flash of light.>”

Lauren
said she couldn’t recall anything of the sort, but David confirmed Detective
Mizuno’s query before she had the opportunity to finish. “happened to her?>”

The
man only told them he couldn’t be certain. “returned to her homeland in the Gaza Strip, but it’s only a theory at this
point. She could honestly be anywhere, seeing as she seems to have quite the
knack for disappearing and reappearing within a moment’s notice.>”

“you looking for her?>”

Mizuno
shrugged and said he wouldn’t mind meeting with her once more to finish
questioning her, but said he had other matters that superseded finding a lost
Palestinian girl. He jotted down a few notes in silence before he flipped the
cover back over the pad, stowed it in his coat, and thanked them both for their
time.

The
detective only took a step before he turned back and asked if they knew a young
woman named Reine Forestier. 

Lauren
nodded and said they did. “”

Mizuno
simply told her a little bird mentioned it and asked whether they were on their
way to a party of hers. “are not going to end well for the people there this evening.>”

“do you mean?>” David asked.

The
detective told them the Prefecture of Police were alerted to the presence of
illicit drugs at the site of the party. “than an hour and all users, possessors, and quite frankly anyone there will be
arrested and prosecuted. So, I suggest you don’t find yourselves there
tonight.>”

He
turned to leave but Lauren asked why he gave them the forewarning. Mizuno
simply said, without turning back, that he felt obligated to mention it since
they helped Afifa. “” he
added, “”

David
and Lauren watched as the man disappeared into the bustling crowd ahead of
them.

“I guess we need to change plans,>” David said after a moment of silence
between the two of them.

Lauren
only nodded and agreed as they started walking in the same direction as the
detective.

“ideas?>” David asked her.

Lauren
shrugged and asked if he was hungry. “interested.>”

He
said it sounded like a good idea to him. After another second he smiled and
mentioned how they should find a place near Reine’s to watch the event unfold.

---*---

Chapter
5

August
17
^th
, 2029

1:21
PM

Baltimore,
Maryland

Detectives
Sage and Felton returned to the station from speaking with secretaries at
Caroline Reynolds’ summer school and learned about the intern-substitute that
Caroline Reynolds mentioned in her diary. Angela Walsh was a twenty-six year
old intern of the Baltimore City Public School System, attended the University
of Maryland, and was only her internship away from completing her degree.
Neither of the detectives cared too much for the excess information, but the
phone number and address they received from the secretaries was worth the
effort.

Sage
returned to his office and made the call to Angela Walsh while Felton went to
get something to drink. The line rang twice before someone answered, “Hello?”

“Hello,
this is Detective Ryan Sage with the Baltimore Police Department. Is this
Angela Walsh?” he asked.

“Yeah,
what can I do for you?” she asked.

“I
just have a few questions for you. First off, you are a substitute in the
Baltimore City Public School System right?”

“Yes.”

“Alright,
next, within the last week or so, did you meet a young girl named Caroline
Reynolds? She may have been in one of the classes you subbed in?”

“Yeah,
I do. I heard she was killed.”

“And
that is partially why I’m calling.”

“Am
I a suspect?” she asked, alarmed.

Detective
Sage assured her she was not. “We’re hoping to connect a few dots on our end
and I wanted to ask if you remember anything strange about Caroline prior to
her death.”

Angela
took a moment to think but confessed that nothing stood out about her.
“Caroline was a normal young woman, at least from what I could tell.” Angela
apologized and told the detective she wasn’t sure of what he hoped she might
recall.

Sage
told her it was fine and continued. “Let me ask you this, and this might sound
strange, bizarre even, but please just give it some thought. Over the last few
days, have you noticed anything odd around you? Like certain objects that were
broken, that are fixed later, without your doing or knowledge? Or have you had
any wounds that were suddenly healed? Anything like that?” he asked.

There
was a pause over the line for nearly fifteen seconds before Angela continued,
“What are you asking? What kind of question is this?”

“I’m
aware of how unusual this sounds, but I just need to know if you’ve noticed
anything peculiar happen in the past few days.”

Angela
left another pause, “There has been something…” Sage sat up in his chair and
grabbed a pen as soon as he could and asked her to continue, “Well…it’s only
happened once so it’s probably just a random fluke or something…But this
morning I was in a hurry to get out of my house, I was running late again, but
I rushed around and I picked up my coffee and ran out the door.” Angela spoke
quickly, “So I get in my car and realize that I’ve forgotten the book that I’m
reading,
This Side of Paradise
,” she added, “So I race back inside to
grab the book and as I’m leaving again there’s another cup of my coffee sitting
on my counter, right where I had picked the other one up. So naturally I
thought that I might have just forgotten it, so I grabbed that one and took it
out with me,” she continued, almost without taking a breath, “And when I got
back in my car I found the first one still there! I mean, what is that about?
And I know I didn’t buy two, I don’t think I could actually drink two…Is this
kinda what you’re talking about?”

Sage
sat there. He hadn’t written a word since she started. And after he took a
breath, he answered, “Yes actually, that sort of sounds like something we’re
looking for…but it still sounds like it could be a misunderstanding. I’m going
to give you my personal number, call me if you find this event happening
again.”

“Sure,”
Sage gave her the number, “Alright I’ve got it. Is that everything?” she asked.

“Yes,
have a good day…” he said and he hung up.

Sage
leaned back in his chair and let out a deep sigh as he ran his fingers through
his hair. He swiveled around and faced the wall behind him. On the wall were
pictures of each of the victims with bits of information tacked beside a
photograph of each one of them. It began on the left side of his wall, next to
his map of the city, and ended with a good deal of space between where Caroline
Reynolds’ information was and his bookshelf. Beneath Caroline’s photograph was
a yellow sticky note with a circled question mark on it.

Aside
from his new project on the wall of his office, he expanded the information
within the ‘Cladis Investigation’ file. It included information about any
occupations the victims held, brief mentioning about their families, friends,
known hobbies, and notes he and Felton had taken from their brief conversations
with people in their lives, which returned them to the friends and family of those
nine victims. Sage hoped to add in medical details for each of them, but
awaited clearance for those documents.

A
knock at his door was followed by the entry of his partner, who took a seat in
front of his desk. Felton asked, “Did you talk to her?”

“I
did, but I’m unsure whether she is our tenth or not. Her story was…well it was
hard to follow and it sounded almost like it was just a coincidence.”

“What
do you mean?”

“She
claims she grabbed her coffee and came back within a minute or two and found a
second cup in the same place as the first.”

“So
it’s like she duplicated the drink.”

“That’s
what it sounded like, however she seemed disorganized and forgetful that she
may have just had two cups.”

“That’s
possible,” Chuck added.

Chief
Johnson joined the two of them and immediately asked, “Either of you two heard
of something called REFOIA?” They both shook their heads, “Neither had I until
today. I gather you’ve been adding case notes and details into our system right
Sage?”

“Of
course.”

He
nodded, “Well whoever’s behind this REFOIA managed to crack our system
security, read all about your case, and now it’s posted on their website for
the whole world to see.”

“What?”
Felton looked at him, “How can someone do that? Why haven’t they been shut down
or arrested or anything?”

“Apparently
REFOIA’s sites are shut down periodically throughout each day, but whoever’s
behind it continues to spawn more by the hour,” Johnson informed them. “From
what I know the fed’s have been trying to figure out who’s running the whole thing
but I guess they don’t have a clue. Whoever’s responsible for this is extremely
good at what they’re doing and unfortunately now we’re dealing with the
repercussions.”

“What
do you mean?”

“Within
the past two hours we’ve received dozens of calls asking about this case,” he
told the detectives, “And that’s not including the reaction we’re going to
receive once Mayor Reynolds and his wife learn about this.” Johnson rubbed his
temples and shut his eyes, “This is all going to blow up in our faces if this keeps
up…”

Felton
shook his head, “No, it won’t.”

Sage
agreed, “Even if it did, eventually someone else would come across the same
facts and they’d realize we were actually onto something.”

Johnson
looked at him, and asked, “How many people would die between now and then
though? I mean,” he stirred a bit, “Is there even a chance of this guy, this
Cladis, relenting?” He looked at Detective Sage’s wall and murmured, “We’re
losing our grip on this city, aren’t we?”

“More
or less,” Felton admitted.

Sage
however bitterly denied it. “We’re still doing our jobs, and to the public that
should prove that we’re containing this massive situation. All we need to do is
deny whatever REFOIA’s telling them until we have a better understanding on how
we’ll apprehend Cladis. And until then I’ll keep what I can off the computers
and make hard copies only.”

“How
are we supposed to notarize this investigation though?” asked Felton.

Sage
made a face and regretfully theorized, “We could either handwrite everything or
resort to typewriters if we have to.”

Johnson
rolled his eyes. “This case continues to spin out of control…”

“Hey,”
Sage locked eyes with him, “We’re going to get this under control, don’t worry
about it.”

“How
the hell am I supposed to keep calm when we’ve got a damned serial killer
running amok and I’ve got both the commissioner and the mayor breathing down my
neck?” he asked the detective.

Sage
couldn’t answer him. He only told him they were going to handle it, and
although both he and Detective Felton knew it didn’t ease their chief’s mind,
Johnson left and the detectives tried to make plans, changes, and headway in
their case.

---*---

10:36
PM

Bothell,
Washington

Jordan
and Rachel sat facing one another in a booth with a window to the streets. The
diner was quaint, as Rachel called it the first time they ate there. Jordan
challenged her definition of the word when he pointed out the worn and bubbled
red and black tiled linoleum floor and the scratched tabletops. Rachel in turn
brought attention to the black and white photographs of the city of Bothell
some decades earlier along with the quiet atmosphere, despite the traffic
outside.

The
diner was a few blocks from The Calming Wake, where Rachel worked as a barista.
She had a shift later in the day and as such she wore her crimson polo shirt,
nametag included. Her black apron she kept stashed in her black backpack which
she kept guarded between her feet on the black and red tiled linoleum floor.
She also wore a silver bracelet that had an emerald in the center of the band.
It was well worn, as it was, from her understanding, an heirloom from her
great-grandmother.

Jordan
set his hand around his drink and slid it across the table from one hand to
another, which left a wet trail from the condensation that had settled at the
base of his glass. He took a quick sip and apologized to Rachel. “It really did
slip my mind. I would have been there at the park if I’d remembered.”

She
offered up a forced half-smile and reminded him that remembering was half the
battle. “Don’t worry about it. Just be there and remember me next time we make
plans, alright?”

Jordan
slouched a bit and nodded in his understanding. He wiped the table off with his
sleeve before he asked, “You didn’t get stuck in that storm, did you?”

Rachel
shook her head. “I would have if I hadn’t made a new friend while I waited for
you.”

“What?”

She
took the glass of water that she’d left untouched so far and helped herself
while Jordan stewed. “I met this exchange student from Romania. He was a bit
weird, but it might just be his culture that I don’t understand.”

“Wait,
you met him at the park and he what? Gave you an umbrella?”

She
nodded. “Exactly.”

Jordan
let out a strained sigh and asked if she got his number as well. “You seem to
be pretty chummy for two people who just met. I mean, do you have another get
together planned already?”

Rachel
scowled at him, “Jealous, are we? Just so you know, I wouldn’t have met him if
you’d actually remembered to show up and hang out with me, your girlfriend,
rather than drive all the way to the other end of the state for your damn weed.
So don’t get all bitchy just because I made a friend with some random exchange
student, okay Jordan?”

He
looked away and pursed his lips.

Rachel
set her glass down and told him she didn’t even know his name. “I never asked
and he never told me it. He doesn’t know who I am either, and as for the
umbrella, he was just being a decent guy. Chivalrous, he was being chivalrous
Jordan.”

“Okay,
I’ve got it,” he told her. “Can we just drop it now?”

Their
food arrived and ended the discussion. They both ordered the same entrée which
consisted of a small stack of pancakes, bacon, and scrambled eggs. The two ate
in silence; Jordan ate without pause, while Rachel quietly stared out the
window at the dark sky and watched the mountainous body of clouds slowly float
away. Jordan poured amber syrup across his entire plate and covered everything,
going so far as to use the fork he clutched in his left hand to evenly
distribute the gooey substance. He promptly resumed eating afterward.

The
diner was all theirs for the most part, with the exception of two other men at
the counter. One was as far back as he could sit, with a newspaper, and coffee.
He looked to be in his late sixties and sported a brown overcoat and glasses.
The other man seemed to be nearly twenty and sat near the entrance. He wore a
tight-fitting warm gray tee-shirt with one vertical stripe on the right side of
his shirt that crossed a red star over his heart. A pair of black and red
shorts completed his outfit. This man drank some fruit smoothie concoction and
chatted politely with the waitress.