IENDE Page 5

  They switched plates. Remmie’s salad was drenched in blue cheese dressing and littered with bacon.

  Kyle bit into his burrito and grimaced. “This isn’t a breakfast burrito. It’s just beans and cheese.”

  “And Blake is jockrot.”

  Remmie began picking blue cheese and bacon off of her salad. “I like your odds angle. And I think the odds are best if we go to the cops. Yeah, those guys are smart, and yeah, they probably have a plan if we go to the cops, but what if we don’t? Our only option would be to track the warehouse guy and Victor down and kill them or something.”

  “Kill them?”

  “Sorry, Kyle, I didn’t mean to freak you out. But it’s true, that we should go to the cops that is.”

  “Then we’re going to the cops.”

  After picking away at their meals, Kyle pulled out his wallet and a crisp twenty-dollar bill. “I’ll take care of this.”

  “I’ll get the next one then.” Remmie was pleasantly surprised, but then her eyes narrowed. “But it’ll be at the Green Veggie.”

  Kyle’s face flushed.

  Yeah, Kyle was into her. She always knew when she had tripped a guy’s trigger.

  Kyle dropped the twenty on the table and they left the restaurant.

  “How much was it, anyway?” Remmie said.

  “It was nineteen ninety. Blake can keep the change.”

  “You know, you’re not such a bad guy. I have to admit I thought you were pretty lame at first.”

  Kyle’s grin melted away, his upper lip pulling back to reveal a flag of cilantro planted between his front teeth.

  “Hey, I didn’t mean that in a bad way.”

  When they reached the parking lot, Victor’s Caddy was parked next to the Trans Am.

  She and Kyle shared a stupefied look and then turned around to find Victor. His broad shoulders and towering stature were an impassible barrier crowned with savage eyes.

  ELEVEN

  REELING FROM THE emotional chaos of the day, something instinctual activated in Kyle. He threw himself into Victor’s chest.

  And bounced back like he’d hit the side of a bull, tiny bolts of lightning floating in his peripheral vision. Victor seemed unfazed.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” Victor said, his hands out. “I just want to talk.”

  “I’ll scream,” Remmie said.

  Victor looked around, nervous.

  “You and your friend were taking photos of us!” Remmie said. “Come on, Kyle, both of us can take him.”

  Remmie’s audacity gave Kyle additional courage. He was doing this for her. They shouldered into Victor and rattled him back, an inch, but he threw them forward.

  Victor whispered loudly, “I’m not with the guy from the warehouse. He’s been tracking me, too. Please . . .”

  Remmie shrieked like an old-school Zeppelin groupie. Kyle wondered how that would help. She didn’t even say “Help.”

  “Please,” Victor whispered. “I’m trying to help you. Just hear me out.”

  “I’m going to the cops,” Remmie said.

  “Ah, it’s not worth it.” Victor stepped aside, head down, shoulders dangling. “Just go. It doesn’t matter what I have to say. Leave, but know that if you go home you’ll be taken, and if you’re taken, I won’t be able to help you. Maybe humanity isn’t worth saving anyhow.”

  Kyle hesitated. It all sounded plausible.

  “Let’s go,” Remmie said. “Are you believing this guy?”

  Kyle felt sympathy for Victor, who seemed dejected, a feeling Kyle knew all too well. He still wondered if Victor was telling the truth, or if he believed what he was saying. But he didn’t seem at all like the guy with the shotgun, who had felt like a vicious animal waiting for the right moment. And Kyle had a sheltered life sort of curiosity. This sort of thing never happened to him, and he had thought it never would. He wanted to see where it went.

  “It’s about the odds,” Kyle said. “If we hear him out—”

  “Are you in on this, Kyle?” Remmie said.

  “You know I’m not. Maybe there’s something to what he has to say. That guy at the warehouse . . . if he was following us, he could have followed Victor as well. And Victor said the cops were coming and they did.”

  “They’re probably all in on his pervert game.”

  “I’m sorry about what happened with that guy,” Victor said. “I didn’t figure they would discover the warehouse. Look, you both were sick a lot as kids, right? Stuff your doctor couldn’t figure out?”

  How could Victor know about that? Kyle felt like he was looking over the edge of a steep cliff, numb ankles, but couldn’t take his eyes away.

  “How do you know that?” Remmie said. “I’m going to scream again.” She did.

  Blake walked up behind Victor. Kyle was actually glad to see him.

  “Stop loitering and making noise, you cheap assholes,” Blake said. “You’re gonna run off customers. Get out of here!” He affectionately slapped Victor’s shoulder and gave him a stern, massaging squeeze. “Hey, Vick. These losers bothering you? You want me to toss them?”

  “No, Blake . . . I’m good,” Victor said, with an embarrassed smile.

  “Half off cornbread for you. Tell them Blake said so.” Blake gave Victor another brotherly pat, scowled at Kyle and Remmie, and walked away.

  “That’s it, I’m out of here,” Remmie said. “Everybody’s in on this conspiracy. I hope you choke on your cornbread.”

  “Please don’t go,” Victor said. “Blake’s not in on anything. I’ve just eaten here a couple of times. The food’s cheap, and it’s near the warehouse. Look, we need to get moving. You have a choice: hear me out or leave. If you leave, I won’t bother you again, but you won’t survive another day. Not because of me, but because of them.”

  Victor lowered his voice back to a whisper. “I know why you were sick. I have the same condition. I experienced the pressure in my head, weak immune system, fatigue, unnaturally high frequency of déjà vu, seeing plaid in the corner of my eye.”

  Kyle felt a full spectrum of needles trickle from his scalp to his toes. He had never told anyone about seeing plaid, or his déjà vu. He thought it was too weird to mention.

  “We can go over there and talk.” Victor pointed to a park a block up the street. “You can meet me there. I promise I won’t harm you, and once you’ve heard me out, if you say the word, I’ll never bother you again.”

  Victor returned to the Caddy and headed toward the park.

  Remmie ran her forearm across her sniffling nose. With his thumb, Kyle wiped a tear from under her eye.

  “I don’t know what’s happening,” he said. “But I feel like we should go to the park. I’ll let you decide. If you say it, I’ll drive us straight to the police station right now.”

  “It was tough growing up sick.” Remmie’s voice became a dry crackle. “I mean that’s part of why I don’t eat crap food. I haven’t been sick much the last couple of years. I’m scared. I don’t understand what’s going on, but I’m curious. How could Victor know?”

  “You had the plaid thing, too?”

  “Let’s go to the park. Will you drive? I don’t think I can. I’m not worried about the Trans Am.” Remmie smiled, grimly. “I’ve already screwed it up anyways.”

  She handed the keys to Kyle.

  TWELVE

  REMMIE SQUEEZED HER puddled hands together as Kyle turned into the parking lot of Roundown Park and pulled up next to the Caddy. The lot was freshly resurfaced and the pungent smell of tar permeated the car. Brown grass stretched into the distance, bordered by a hollow winter wall of deciduous trees standing guard over a narrow stream. Picnic tables were scattered about, each with a fixed grill, weathered, a white film of Saturday afternoon ash blanketing the surface. The park felt as bleak as the warehouse had, as if the whole of existence were restricted to the emptiness that lay within its boundaries. But curiosity kept her on the spot.

  Kyle struggled to wrench his backpack from
beneath the seat as Remmie scrunched her body against the door, afraid that she might smell like pee.

  He held up the backpack, the barrel of Victor’s gun pushing at the front pocket like a corpse with an erection. “Just in case?”

  “Good thinking.” The thought that Kyle had a gun comforted her as much as it soured her stomach.

  They stepped out from the car under Victor’s gaze, a gaze of pleasant surprise not unlike her dad’s after she would finish a batch of heavy chores.

  “You’ve made the right choice,” Victor said. “Let’s have a seat over there by the creek.” He pointed to a bench in the distance.

  The area where they were headed was barely visible from the road, but Remmie didn’t object. She was on autopilot at that stage and figured Kyle had reached the same state, maybe Victor too. They approached the table in silence. She pulled her arms to her body, feeling a chill on her skin.

  Kyle and Remmie sat opposite Victor. Kyle’s arm was stuffed in the backpack. The only sound was the gentle rattle of leaves in the breeze and the swash of water in the stream.

  “Look, I know you’ve got my gun in your hand, and that’s fine,” Victor said. “Maybe it’ll give you confidence to stay long enough to hear me out.”

  Remmie was starting to think that working at the Green and Natural Food People wasn’t so bad. But Kyle’s presence was comforting, and she felt sympathy for him, almost like she would for an injured pet. He was not at all threatening, but protective, with a good heart. She hoped.

  “Why were there pictures of us in the warehouse?” Remmie said. “What is all of this?”

  “You may have trouble believing what I’m about to tell you. I should have told you outright—that was a big mistake—and now I’ve put you both at risk.”

  Remmie glanced at Kyle. He looked fascinated, like he’d just stumbled into a nudist colony. But Remmie was wondering about Victor’s mental stability. If he had escaped the Twelve Virgins Sanitarium north of town and chosen his frail neighbor and the homely grocery store girl as his allies in a quest to save the world, it would look a lot like this.

  “My name is Doctor Victor Harris. I’m a scientist, and like you both, I’m an Anomaly.”

  And sound like that. “Anomaly, huh? Okay, Doctor Victor. May I call you doctor?”

  “PhD from Stanford, so, sure. Why don’t I just spell it out.” Victor looked away, contemplative. “I don’t know how else to say this. The three of us are part of a small fraction of the population that is not under control.” He rested his hands on the table and looked at Remmie. “I discovered how my condition made me different from other people. Once I realized that my—our—condition rendered me free from control, I began a search for others like myself. I was lucky to find two of you so close. And it wasn’t easy.”

  “How’d you know about the plaid?” Kyle said.

  Victor held up his hands. “I want you to understand how I found you. I want to convince you, so you’ll be willing to . . . well, we’ll talk about that once you’re convinced.” Victor’s eyes shuffled between Remmie and Kyle. “I’d planned to prove things to you at the warehouse. I’d planned to take my time in all of this, but that guy you encountered . . . I had a run-in with him myself—surprised him actually. It must’ve been right after you two left. I had to coldcock him. He said they knew about me, and the two of you, and that we might as well give ourselves up because—”

  “Who?” Kyle said. “Who knew about us?”

  “That’s when I coldcocked him and ran scared.” Victor appeared ashamed. “But that guy? He didn’t seem like what I would have expected, but then, aliens probably aren’t predictable. They probably want their operatives to blend in.” Victor let out a suppressed laugh. “Hell, they could’ve sent a Girl Scout as easy as a creeper like that guy.”

  Aliens? Girl Scouts? Yeah, he was from Twelve Virgins. Remmie stood and jutted her face forward. “You said we were in some kind of crazy hurry, for our lives, Doctor Victor, and now you’re joking around about Girl Scouts?” She felt the urge to punch Victor in the face. “Aliens? Really? I’m done!”

  Kyle gently grabbed her wrist. “Please, Remmie.”

  She stared at him, hesitant, then yanked her arm away. His gaze pleaded with her, his demeanor all naïve innocence. Then she thought about what Kyle had said at the warehouse, about this being a joke. Maybe she had been included in that, somehow, by accident.

  What did she have to lose? It could be a joke. And if it wasn’t and this guy really believed what he was saying, she could placate him and call the cops.

  She sat back down. “You get two more minutes, Doctor.”

  “Thank you,” Victor said. “Reginald Lincoln is an alias I’ve been using. I hope my revelation of my true identity helps you believe I’m sincere.”

  “They’re both just names, Vick,” Remmie said. “And your buddy Blake called you Victor. Could be lies all around.”

  “Yeah, I guess.” Victor rubbed his eyes. “It was back when I was a kid that my parents figured out I have Malclenersy syndrome. That’s the name of the rare disease we all share. It causes degeneration of the same area of the brain that they are using to gain control. There are epidemiological estimates of how many of us there are . . . that’s probably a big word—”

  “Study of how diseases spread,” Remmie said. “We’re not stupid.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that. Just because you don’t know the meaning of a specialized word—most people don’t know a fraction of all the vocabulary of the English language, particularly when you consider specialized fields. I mean, please ask if you need clarification. It doesn’t mean you’re—”

  “Okay, we get it. Just finish what you have to say.”

  “So, Malclenersy, it’s extremely rare, and rarer still to be diagnosed. But there are certain telltale signs of the disorder. Your bouts of illness are among those symptoms, but there are others. I searched medical databases for evidence of cases in the area. There were no individuals with a record of the disorder, or at least a history that would suggest it, in the entire state of Colorado—but then, there are still a lot of paper records being used. But I figured out a way to zero in on individuals who might have the disorder—candidates—using social media and probability. Most people use social media, so I knew some with Malclenersy were bound to be online. Then I hacked into some geospatial networks and implanted a little—”

  “You’re a hacker. That’s awesome.” Kyle seemed fascinated by every word spilling out of Victor’s mouth. “And you’re an older guy. I mean, I always pictured hackers as virgin teenagers who spend a lot of time eating cheese puffs and jacking when they’re not hacking.”

  Remmie was sure Kyle was a virgin who sat eating cheese puffs on the couch playing with himself to reruns of Baywatch.

  “Look, we don’t have time for this,” Victor said. “I was hoping—”

  “Hoping for what?” Kyle said.

  “For a little more common sense?”

  “Are you referring to us?” Remmie said.

  “Not like that. Just hear me out.” Victor tapped his palm on his forehead.

  Remmie was sure she had just been insulted, but she wanted to hear Victor out. Then she would let him have it, even if it made him snap. “Please continue.”

  “I used some basic machine learning algorithms, searching for patterns of behavior on social media data. Then I took the most probable candidates—there were seventeen of you in the state with a statistically significant probability of having the condition, nine in the city. I figured out who you were and where you were.” Victor turned to Kyle. “SexNSudsOnTheSkwaks3 on SkwakMe? Yeah, I know your handle, and with your cell phone location shared it was easy to track you down.”

  Kyle’s face flushed cherry-slush red.

  Victor said to Remmie, “dontbother99? Yeah. Once I had whittled it down to nine, I traced you to a location using your phones. From there, determining your identities was easy. Then I only had nine paper medical re
cords to review. Only the two of you panned out—your bouts of illness, the symptoms. Then I only needed to be in your physical presence, close, to know for sure. You had no mention of seeing plaid in your records, but that’s a symptom. Remmie’s record did mention it.”

  Victor’s description of how he tracked them down, but more so his foray into their illness, pulled an austere melancholy to Remmie’s emotional surface. “It always scared me when it would happen. I thought I was starting to go blind the first time, but it only lasted a few minutes, and it only happened every so often. The doctor said it was nothing to worry about. And the déjà vu. I thought I was going crazy. I never told anybody about that.”

  “Why’d you need the algorithm?” Kyle said. “Wouldn’t they already have a device or test kit at the drugstore for this? Why didn’t—”

  “No,” Victor snickered with a bless-your-naïve-little-heart smile. “Then I’d have to test people individually—walk the streets until I just ran into somebody with the disease. To do that on an individual basis would have been ridiculous. And I said Malclenersy was extremely rare. Why would a company or an institution of higher learning waste time on an extremely rare disease? Test kits? There’s no money in it. But we digress.”

  “How did you figure out where we were from our cell phones?”

  “Everybody can be traced with their phone. As for social media, somebody with Malclenersy repeats a unique pattern, a pattern that can be identified in your behavior on social media.”

  Remmie looked at her hand, which was tapping a pattern on her knee. She chewed in a pattern, put her clothes on in a recurring order, brushed her teeth in a complex sequence of strokes—she realized that every activity followed the same pattern that she was tapping out right now. Victor’s insane story started seeming more real.

  “What sort of pattern?” she said. “How does this relate to . . . aliens?”

  “The pattern is complicated, a code of sorts, but it’s always the same. It’s part of a complex sequential series of numbers, defined by a formula, but we only tap out bits of the pattern: the more energetic terms would be a way to describe it. One-two-one-two-five with an occasional three between two and one, or a rare seven instead of the five.” Victor paused, his eyes studying their reactions. “And it was easy to analyze SqwakMe data. After all, it’s just out there, right? I didn’t even have to hack into anything for that. I assigned probabilities to SqwakMe handles. You and Kyle were the top two of the seventeen significant probabilities. I figured out who you were pretty quick from there and was able to go after your medical records. Then, after I moved into the apartment, I passed Kyle in the hall and that was enough. I needed to move to somewhere, so why not above one my candidates. I knew he had Malclenersy as soon as I got close to him. Same thing with Remmie, at the Green and Natural Food People.”