The Cure (40 page)

As Drake shot the last of his three former associates, he dropped the gun and turned to face Erin, now free. A stream of bright red blood was running along her wrist and splattering on the glossy floor.

The Hive-controlled alien shook his head, as if disgusted by Erin’s pathetic attempt at resistance. “Take one step toward me and I’ll do the same thing to you as I did to them,” he warned.

Erin didn’t respond, but she remained where she was.

“So let me clear some things up for you, Kyle” said Drake, never taking his eyes from Erin Palmer. “What Erin meant when she alluded to having some tricks up her sleeve is that she gave me the wrong combination for the cure.”

Hansen glanced over at Erin, whose eyes widened in shock.

“That’s right, Erin. I know all about that. Why do you think I suspected you in the first place? When you gave me the wrong combination, I knew something was wrong. So I had Gibb scan you for bugs while you were napping.”

“How could you know I gave you the wrong information?” mumbled Erin in dismay.

“There was no guarantee you would survive and make it here. So I decided I needed a backup, in case you didn’t. I waited until Fuller pulled surveillance from your apartment and broke in, being careful not to disturb anything so no one would know I had been there. But I did pay a visit to your desktop computer. And I got the correct combination from your files. I had what I needed five hours before I spoke to you.”

“So why didn’t you put Max to work on this immediately?” asked Erin.

“I decided to wait for you to give me the information, since I had already told Kyle you were the key, and I didn’t want to have to explain to him further. I have to say, I was very surprised when you fed me misinformation.” He shook his head. “But make no mistake. Your pathetic attempt at deception gained you nothing. I gave Burghardt the correct information immediately after you left the call. So the virus I released will do
exactly
what it’s supposed to do.”

Hansen found himself unable to speak. Erin’s ace in the hole had been countered effortlessly.

Erin’s expression changed from nauseated to calm indifference, as if not wanting to give the Hive the satisfaction of seeing her beaten. She shrugged. “So what? I won’t be around in thirty thousand years when you sweep through here anyway. In the meanwhile, by curing psychopathy, you’ll have saved us a lot of trouble. So you outsmarted me. I couldn’t care any less.”

“Oh, I’m not done yet,” said Drake. “Now that I’ve successfully completed my primary mission and I’ve been discovered, I have nothing to lose by using this host to wipe out as many of you as I can. This is my chance to see how good Fuller and the Wraps here really are. And I have to say, given this operation, I’m not impressed. They planted you as a mole and now they’re blindly following an empty van. Perhaps I overestimated the potential of your species. Not that it matters now, since you’ve been neutered. But I’m willing to bet I can kill at least half of you in the next few years before my host is killed.” He glared at Erin. “So do you care
now
? Is this imminent enough for you? Personal enough?”

“But why?” asked Erin. It was a question she had asked of the counselor who had carried her out of her father’s veterinary clinic many years before. “Why must you obliterate all other intelligent life?”

“Because only
I
matter. Everything that isn’t me or doesn’t directly serve as fuel is an
abomination
. A pale imitation of true life. Of true intelligence. I will ultimately fill the entire galaxy. And in billions or trillions of years, the entire universe.”

As Drake had been speaking, Erin had gradually inched her way toward the nearest fallen mercenary.

“I need to be going now,” the alien said to Erin. “But I wanted you to know before you died just how profoundly you had been beaten. And that your failure will result in the deaths of billions of your fellow humans in the near term, and extinction when I come through to finish the job.” He shook his head in disappointment. “I only regret having to kill Kyle Hansen so soon,” he added. “He could have continued to be a useful pawn.” Drake shrugged. “Oh well.”

Once again Drake’s expression didn’t change, but Hansen’s brain was flooded with pain signals that threatened to melt his body. It was as if a flamethrower were being used on the inside of his skull. As if millions of fire ants were tearing every cell of his body to pieces.

He screamed and fell to the floor like those before him, in more agony than he had imagined it was possible to feel. And fear. A deep, seeping, paralyzing fear to go along with the pain. He found himself praying for death. For anything that would end the overwhelming agony. Finally, his mind cooperated and he blacked out, falling the rest of the way to the smooth floor.

At the same time, Erin fell to her knees as well. Her eyes filled with tears from the excruciating pain. It was greater than any she had ever experienced. But not the fear. The fear she felt was immense, but she had been initiated into the realm of absolute fear before she had reached puberty.

She fought to retain consciousness. And although she succeeded, the Hive continued to exert pressure on the fear center of her brain, paralyzing her. When the Hive realized she was not yet unconscious she felt another burst of pain, even greater than the first. She saw Drake though nearly closed eyes walk over to the now-unconscious Kyle Hansen and pick up the gun he had used to finish the other three men.

Erin willed herself to move, but could not. The fear and the pain were too great.

Memories of her parents and her beautiful little sister, Anna, rushed to the surface, and Erin knew from experience that no pain, no fear, could possibly be as debilitating as those losses had been. Or as debilitating as losing Kyle Hansen would be now. She could not allow history to repeat itself.
Not this time
.

Drake raised the gun and rested it against Hansen’s forehead.

With a final burst of will, Erin broke through the fear-induced paralysis and dived on the ground, coming out of a roll with Gibb’s gun in her hand and the trigger fully depressed. She emptied the entire magazine into the alien until he was hamburger, blown from his spot over Hansen, the gun that he had been holding falling harmlessly to the floor.

“
Never again,
” she whispered with her last reserve of strength.

And with that, Erin Palmer collapsed onto the cold garage floor, unconscious.

49

KYLE HANSEN’S EYES
fluttered open and the world gradually came into focus. He realized he was lying on a bed—he had no idea where. Erin Palmer was sitting in a chair above him, reading a book on a small electronic tablet. He turned his head slightly and she caught the motion, launching herself at him and hugging him for all she was worth, albeit gently.

She separated and kissed him warmly on the lips. “Welcome back,” she said happily. “How do you feel?”

“How long have I been out?”

She checked her watch. She had bandages around her wrist, but she looked great otherwise. Freshly scrubbed and alert. “Twenty hours,” she replied.

Hansen glanced around. “Are we safe?”

“Couldn’t be any safer.”

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and pushed himself into a seated position facing Erin. “I feel like I’m having déjà vu,” he said. “How many times will I pass out, sure I’m dead, only to wake up to you?”

“Well,” she replied, a wide grin spreading over her face, “I’ve gotta believe that twice in a lifetime is already pushing it. Don’t you think?”

Hansen laughed. “Okay, tell me how you got us out of that one,” he said. “And just for a change of pace, tell me the truth this time. I don’t want you to think that whenever I’m unconscious for an extended period, that means you can lie to me.”

Erin nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind. What happened is that I picked up Gibb’s gun from the floor and I shot the alien bastard. Not Drake, but the Hive. You know.”

“But how? Gibb and Zalinsky, two hardened mercenaries, couldn’t fight through that level of fear and pain. And Burghardt and I collapsed like a house of cards. How could one woman be so extraordinary in so many ways?”

“Well,” said Erin with a sly smile. “As much as I’d like you to think I’m superwoman, I do have a more pedestrian explanation.”

He stared at her in anticipation.

“I cheated.”

“Come again?”

“I cheated. I told you that I had to edit out parts of my meeting with Fuller. So Drake wouldn’t hear. Let me fill you in. Fuller had expressed surprise that the Hive hadn’t tried to pry the combination from my mind. The Hive knew it couldn’t control humans, but Fuller was surprised that it hadn’t taken a shot at slipping in just to get that little snippet of information. A far simpler task than trying to take control.” Erin paused. “That’s when it hit me.”

Hansen just blinked and waited for her to continue.

“It
had
tried. The night in the motel I woke up screaming. The pain was enormous. That must have been the Hive. Trying and failing.”

Hansen nodded slowly. “It makes a horrible kind of sense,” he said. “That was the most intense scream of pain I’ve ever heard. And you did say you didn’t remember having any kind of a nightmare.”

“Exactly. Fuller told me they suspected that when the Hive tries to enter a human mind, our minds automatically block it, but the attempt hits the fear and pain centers of our brains pretty hard. That’s how Drake escaped in Yuma. Four of Fuller’s best men experienced such a high level of pain they all passed out.”

Hansen sighed. “Funny,” he said. “I suddenly have no trouble imagining what that might be like.” He paused. “Okay, so you were forewarned. I still don’t see how that helped you.”

“Forewarned is forearmed,” said Erin. “You didn’t think that injection was really glucagon, did you? Do you really think if I was diabetic I’d keep that such a big secret?”

“Come to think of it,” said Hansen. “I did find that strange. So you faked the diabetic thing?”

“Right. We were screwed. Big-time. When Drake realized I’d given him the wrong recipe, and then discovered the bug and homing devices, the situation turned pretty ugly. I was really counting on Fuller and his team to come to the rescue if I needed them. And then Gibb frisked me and removed the syringe Fuller had given me in case of an emergency.”

“What was in it?” asked Hansen.

Erin grinned. “A potent dose of morphine.
Very
potent,” she added. “I
told you
I cheated. And even with enough morphine on board to choke a herd of buffalo, the pain was still more intense than any I’d ever experienced. I can’t even imagine what it was like for you. Even with morphine on board, I still barely managed to fight through the pain and fear to shoot Drake.”

Hansen nodded appreciatively. He had wondered how she could have been so stoic when she was purposely cutting into her wrist and tearing skin to free herself. And now he knew. Morphine.

“Amazing,” he said. “But that doesn’t make you any less extraordinary, Erin. When the morphine was taken from you, and knowing Drake was listening in, you had to come up with the idea of faking diabetes to get me to ensure you received the injection. In fact, using your wits to survive is more remarkable than just happening to have a high pain threshold.”

“Thanks. I knew there was a reason I liked you so much,” she said, and then leaned forward and kissed him again.

“Don’t get me wrong,” said Hansen. “I’m thrilled to be alive. And I plan to take you up on your promise to rock my world later on. But we
lost
. Humanity has been defanged. I know it won’t affect us or our children or our grandchildren. But the Hive will end up the big winner in the galaxy without our more mature, but still relentless descendents around to lead the Seventeen against them.”

Erin smiled broadly, and she looked so happy Hansen thought she might float off the ground. “No. I’m afraid
we
won,” she said. “We won
huge
.”

Hansen stared at her. “Okay. What did I miss this time?”

“Fuller knew no plan survived engagement with the enemy. And the stakes were too high not to cover every base twice. So he made sure there was redundancy. If Drake somehow did what he ended up doing, learning I had given him the wrong instructions for the cure, there was a backup plan. Any guesses?”

Hansen pursed his lips in thought for an extended period, but came up empty. He shook his head.

“I sabotaged his DNA synthesizer,” said Erin happily. “After a few hours of brainstorming with Fuller and his team, we came up with the idea. I’d always planned to check the virus before Drake released it. You and I discussed it. And you explained how you had personally inspected the device they would use for this job, the Seq-Magic Ultra. And obviously, to give the virus a clean bill of health, I’d have to go online.”

Hansen’s eyes widened in wonder. “Brilliant,” he said. “So while you were checking out Drake’s
biological
virus online, you were exposing his DNA synthesizer to a
computer
virus.”

“Pretty cool, huh? While you and I were being flown back to Tucson so we could end up under a bridge, and while we were driving through the night to Colorado, Fuller’s people were busy. They awoke the engineer who wrote the software for the Seq-Magic Ultra from a sound sleep. National security and all that. He helped them navigate around his own safeguards and modify his software. They designed a bogus site for me to visit to—presumably—vet the virus. But while the site was pretending to check for pathogenic matches to a biological virus, it was sabotaging the synthesizer. So that it would put in wrong bases as it built DNA strands, but indicate the correct ones had been inserted when the sequences were double-checked.”

“Incredible,” said Hansen. “But if you were going to sabotage the synthesizer anyway, why give Drake false information?”

“Redundancy. What if the computer virus failed to work for some reason? Or if Max insisted we download the sequence to another computer and go online from there, rather from the Seq-Magic Ultra itself? Fuller called it a ‘belt and suspenders’ strategy.”