In the Grey (15 page)

He appeared by her side in
the fog.

“
I’m so glad you’re my
friend,” she said. “Thank you.”

He opened his mouth to say
something. Before the words came out, he disappeared.

FF

“
Jesse?”

Alex opened her eyes and
she was lying on the floor of the Super Hercules. She had an IV in
her arm. Raz was sitting with her head in his lap.

“
She’s conscious, sir,” a
young man’s voice said.

Alex’s eyes flicked in the
direction of the voice. A young medic, probably a Marine, was
working on her. Raz leaned over to look in her face.

“
Lost you for a while,”
Raz said. “What happened?”

“
Hallucination,” Alex
said. “Dream. PTSD trance. Memory.”

She nodded in the
direction of the medic taking her vitals. He took her through the
usual questions – who she was, who was President, and what date it
was. When she answered adequately, he told Raz to encourage her to
rest and to call for him if she needed help. With a salute, the
young man was gone.

“
Aw, and he was so cute,”
Alex said.

Raz smiled.

“
I’m really all right,”
Alex moved to get up. Her head felt like it was going to break
open. She lay back.

“
Head hurts?” Raz
asked.

Alex nodded.

“
Where did you go?” Raz
asked.

“
S.E.R.E.,” Alex
said.

“
S.E.R.E.?” Raz squinted
with worry.

“
What do the mind control
subjects and I have in common?” Alex asked.

“
S.E.R.E.,” Raz said. “I
never thought of it.”

“
That would be me, Mattie,
Troy . . .”

“
I bet Trece was
experimented on when he was in prison,” Raz said.

“
The first time?” Alex
nodded.

“
They were doing mind
control tests on prisoners then,” Raz nodded. “Vince?”

“
Everyone, probably,” Alex
said. “We’d have to ask Leena. I don’t know what Mineman training
includes.”

“
White Boy,” Raz
said.

“
I have no idea what
training they’ve had,” Alex said. “All Air Force pilots have to go
through. So, everyone’s been through, except you.”

Raz blinked. She waited
for him to respond. He shook his head.

“
That would be true for
every elite team, though,” Alex said.

“
Maybe there’s something
special about when you went through,” Raz said.

“
Like what?” Alex
shrugged.

“
You were saying this
thing, uh, ‘Where is it?’ You used to say that in your sleep.
Eleazar said something like that when you first spoke with him.
‘Where is it?’ No, that’s not it.”

“
I want my property,” Alex
said.

“
Right,” Raz nodded.
“Almost the same thing.”

Alex nodded.

“
I thought you made it
through S.E.R.E. unscathed,” Raz said. “Freaked everyone
out.”

“
I thought so too,” Alex
said. “I was there for a few days. They used drugs and shocks
and . . . It wasn’t . . .
fun.”

“
I’ll bet,” Raz
said.

“
I was in the hospital for
a week afterwards,” Alex said. “My dad, Patrick, was in my room
when I woke up. I always wondered how he knew when I would wake
up.”

“
You mean something could
have happened at the hospital?”

“
Sure,” Alex said. “Or at
S.E.R.E.”

“
I wish we had your
record,” Raz said.

“
Record of
what?”

“
Your S.E.R.E file. It’s
missing,” Raz said. “I’ve been looking for it for
years.”

“
That’s nice of you,” Alex
said. “Why?”

“
After Paris, I wanted to
make sure it didn’t fall into the wrong hands,” Raz said. “I’ve
looked everywhere I can think of and . . . Wait a
minute, you don’t seem concerned that your file is
missing.”

“
Know anyone with admin
rights to the CIA computer
and
the Intelligence Center?” Alex asked.

Raz smiled and shook his
head. She smiled.

“
I should have known,” Raz
said. “When did you take it?”

“
Maybe ten minutes after
it was digitized,” Alex said.

“
And the original?” Raz
asked.

“
Shredded and burned in
the fireplace in Santa Monica,” Alex said. “Did you know that
videotape lights up in pretty colors when it burns?”

“
Why?” Raz
asked.

“
I don’t know,” Alex said.
“That’s a good question. Mostly, I was embarrassed. I had the
original because they wanted me to annotate my experience. How did
I manage to not flinch here? Why didn’t I break there? Stuff like
that. I told them I would do it, but I destroyed the file
instead.”

“
Do you think there’s a
copy?” Raz asked.

“
I think if there was a
copy, you would have found it,” Alex said.
“And . . . my time in the room would have been
different.”

“
How so?” Raz
asked.

“
I can tolerate days of
silence, but I can’t stand loud sound,” Alex said. “That’s in the
file. If they’d read the file, they would have blasted loathsome
pop music.”

“
Do you trust
me?”

“
Of course.”

“
I’d like to take a look
at the file,” Raz said. “Maybe there’s something in the file that
connects the dots.”

“
I’ll get you a copy,”
Alex said. “It’s just . . .
embarrassing.”

“
Why?”

“
Because they’re all –
‘she’s amazing’ – and whatever.”

“
I already know you’re
amazing and whatever,” Raz smiled. “Would you like to try to get
up?”

“
I should call Sue Ann,”
Alex said.

Raz helped her sit up. She
rubbed her head.

“
There was a guy,” Alex
said.

“
A guy?” Raz
asked.

“
At S.E.R.E. He kept
asking me that question, you know, ‘Where is it?’”

“
You don’t remember what
‘it’ is?” Raz asked.

“
No idea.”

“
And the guy?”

“
There’s something
familiar about him,” Alex said. “Connected to all of this
and . . . before, maybe basic training. I don’t
know.”

She rubbed her
forehead.

“
I wonder what ‘it’ is,”
Raz said.

“
I thought the whole thing
was part of the program,” Alex said. “You know they would try to
get me to give up information on where ‘it’ is, and I wouldn’t do
it. I wonder if everyone is asked the same question.”

“
You don’t know?” Raz
asked.

“
Jesse and Mattie were
with me, so their job was to not tell the interrogator where ‘it’
was, either,” Alex said. “I’ve never talked about it to anyone
other than Jesse and Mattie, not even Troy. What if the others
weren’t asked that question?”

“
I’ll follow up.” Raz
helped her to her feet. They walked back to their seats.

“
How long was I out?” Alex
asked.

“
Half hour or so.
Why?”

“
I can’t call Sue Ann,”
Alex said.

“
Why?”

“
It’s the middle of the
night there. I might be interrupting something good.”

Raz laughed.

“
How are Pete and Bill?”
Raz asked. Sergeant Peter Bailey and his Belgium Malinois, Master
Sergeant Bill Bailey, had interned with the Fey Team the previous
year.

“
Good,” Alex said.
“They’re training dogs to locate the nanodrones at puppy school on
Lackland Air Force Base. So far, two military dogs, both Belgian
Malinois like Bill, can identify them.”

“
That seems very good,”
Raz said.

Alex nodded.

“
How are Pete and Sue Ann
doing?” Raz asked.

“
Good,” Alex smiled. “They
seem happy, but who knows? Krystal told me there’s trouble in
paradise.”

Raz smiled.

“
Should we sleep for a
while?” Alex asked.

“
Probably,” Raz
said.

He put his arm around her,
and she leaned against his shoulder. In a few minutes, she was out.
He always marveled at how she could make herself sleep. He smiled.
She’d taught him to do the same thing. He closed his eyes and
joined her.

F

Saturday night

November 6 – 11:14 p.m.
PDT (12:14 a.m. MDT)

Pelican Bay Prison,
California

When Emanuel, Trece’s
cellmate, groaned and rolled onto his side, Trece hopped to his
feet.

“
You sign?” Trece used
American Sign Language.

Emanuel glowered at him.
When Trece sneered, Emanuel reviewed Trece’s face before raising
the middle finger of his right hand.

“
Nice,” Trece
signed.

Emanuel gave him a toothy
grin.

“
I’ve been thinking,”
Trece signed.

“
I thought that wasn’t
your strong point,” Emanuel signed.

Trece raised both of his
middle fingers and Emanuel chuckled.

“
I’m on the Fey Team,
asshole,” Trece signed.

Emanuel shifted his head
back and forth as if he was thinking. He nodded to indicate that he
got Trece’s point.

“
You’re looking for
bioweapons?” Trece signed.

Emanuel nodded.

“
Look around you,” Trece
said. “Listen.”

Trece pointed to his ears
and they listened for a while.

“
No one can get away with
shit in the general population,” Trece signed.

“
How do you know that?”
Emanuel asked in sign.

“
I spent seven of my
formative years in a cell just like this one during a time when no
one gave a crap what happened inside the cell,” Trece signed. “With
SHU right there, this place is locked down tight. No one’s getting
away with anything in here. Just listen. What do you
hear?”

“
Sleeping,” Emanuel shook
his head.

“
That’s what I mean,”
Trece signed.

“
Bioweapons
are
coming from this
facility,” Emanuel signed.

Trece nodded.

“
SHU,” Emanuel signed.
“They’re making them in solitary.”

“
Something to pass the
time,” Trece signed.

“
They videotape every
prisoner,” Emanuel signed.

Trece nodded.

“
Pay off someone. With
hundreds of prisoners . . .” Emanuel stopped signing
and looked away. “It would be easy to miss. I should have thought
of it.”

“
You don’t have enough
experience in hell,” Trece signed.

Emanuel gave Trece a
reassessing look.

“
You’ll work with me?”
Emanuel asked.

Trece nodded.

“
Ready?” Emanuel
asked.

“
No broken bones,” Trece
signed. “Infirmary before SHU?”

“
They can fake the records
in the infirmary,” Emanuel nodded.

“
Get the fuck off me,”
Trece yelled.

Emanuel attacked him.
Trained fighters, they worked to create visible damage. Emanuel
broke Trece’s nose with a back-handed punch. Trece returned the
favor with a quick palm punch. They battered each other with quick,
effective strikes. By the time the guards arrived, they were
bruised and bleeding profusely.

Trece allowed himself to
fall limp between the guards. They dragged him to the infirmary. He
reviewed his body with his mind. His tongue found all of his teeth.
He would be sore, swollen, and bruised, but, except for his nose,
nothing was broken. When they got near the infirmary, Trece shook
off the guards and went after Emanuel. Before he reached the man,
he was tasered into submission. A medic ran to him and injected him
with something.

“
You stupid motherfucker!
I own you!”

Trece looked up to see
Emanuel coming toward him. He reached out and jammed his thumb into
the side of Emanuel’s knee. Emanuel fell on top of him. Trece lost
consciousness.

Five hours later, he woke
up in a cell in the Secure Housing Unit. He had a cast on his
wrist, and his ribs were taped. His nose had been taped. He had an
ankle cast and a knee brace. He’d clearly been over patched up and
tossed in here. He heard the guards dragging someone into a cell
two down from him. Before he could wonder if that was Emanuel, he
fell into a sound sleep
.

FFFFFF
Sunday, early
morning