I reasoned that the vitamin solution might be essential to continue boosting my brain’s newfound capabilities. At least, given the dire circumstances, I was willing to use every edge that I could lay my hands on.
Before I returned to the living room, I walked over to the sink for a cup of cold water. When I returned to the other room, Sanders gave me a peculiar frown.
“Needed a swig of water,” I said.
She rolled her eyes and squatted down next to the children to ask them questions in a low voice. Frankly, she looked quite at ease with Maria’s children, just as she had with Agent Burroughs’ daughters. I hadn’t thought to ask her if she had children of her own.
Another hour passed, but by the time we left, we knew little more than when we’d arrived. As we sat in the car together traveling across town, I tried to determine the best way to inject myself with one of the syringes of vitamins that I’d taken from Maria’s refrigerator.
I’d never been a fan of needles and never had a reason to bother with them, but the supplement was important and I needed every edge I could get for what may lay ahead.
“Where to now?” I asked.
“You do realize that you’re not my partner in all this, right?” she asked.
“Fair enough,” I said. “Then why don’t you drop me off at my hotel and I’ll be completely out of your hair.”
She gave me a hard look.
“Not on your life,” she emphatically stated. “You’re right at the center of everything and I can’t afford for
you
to disappear on me.”
I shrugged.
“Besides, something tells me that you’ll just go off like a loose cannon and end up getting into trouble or something,” she added.
At that moment, I found it hard to disagree with her assessment.
* * *
Back at the office, her first act was to pick up her desk phone as she rotated the USB memory drive between her fingers.
“Hey, this is Sanders. I need for you to come by and pick up a memory drive. I want it scanned and then have the data uploaded to the network.”
She paused.
“No, I haven’t entered a helpdesk request,” she said. “This is a matter of national security. Can’t you cut me some slack?” she asked irritably.
She sighed.
“Fine. I’ll enter the request and have it done by the time you get here. Just hurry,” she said.
After she hung up, I suggested, “You do realize that you could just plug this into your computer. I’m fairly confident your computers must have adequate virus protection installed.”
She appeared wholly annoyed by my observation.
“Yeah, well, they disabled the USB ports on all of our computers sometime last year.”
“I could always burn it to CD for you,” I suggested.
“They disabled our CD drives, too,” she added. “Hell, I can’t even get to Google mail to check my private emails anymore.”
I stared at her with incredulity. Leave it to the government to render state-of-the-art technology perfectly useless. Typical government bureaucracy.
Never mind that you’d think FBI agents might
actually
need legitimate access to such technology to conduct their jobs effectively.
She sat down at her desk and frantically typed away at what must’ve been the bureaucratic helpdesk request.
“Are you certain these guys won’t lose this drive?” I asked.
She looked up at me with an expression that might’ve chilled a volcano.
“Not exactly,” she muttered with fallen features. “Actually, they did lose a data CD that I gave them about six months ago to upload. Oh, they finally found it, but not until almost a month later. We nearly botched an investigation without it.”
“Ever hear of ‘cleaning house?’ “ I asked.
“I wish, but we can’t,” she said. “About two years ago, the government’s efficiency and budget streamlining committee approached the FBI. First, they laid off most of our office support staff. Then they let go of our in-house IT staff and hired a bunch of lowest-bidder civilian IT contractors who mostly punch a clock and collect a check. Can’t fire them; can’t threaten them. And we sure as hell can’t motivate them to work faster. It takes about three times longer to get anything done, and it’s rarely done correctly the first time around. And forget about it if you need help on weekends or holidays; their offices are unmanned.”
I shook my head in disgust. “Ah, but think of all the money the government’s saving.”
“Yeah,” she said with a sour expression. “Pretty soon, they’ll outsource us agents.”
That was a scary thought. Already I lived in a corporate-created city. What would happen when even the government itself became corporately outsourced?
“You know, after everything, there’s still one thing that the politicians and bureaucrats can’t seem to either outsource or downsize,” Sanders prompted.
I frowned. “Yeah? What’s that?”
“The bureaucracy,” she said.
I scowled. It reminded me of the military all over again.
“Sanders!” called Denton from the other side of the room. “My office. Now.”
Agent Sanders groaned as she quickly made her way to her supervisor’s office, pulling the glass door closed behind her as she entered.
I sat down in the guest chair at her desk and contemplated Maria’s abduction. I tried not to think about what her circumstance was at that moment, including and especially her possible demise.
Then I thought about her children and the helpless, lost expressions on their faces.
Maria just had to be alive. And I had to find some way to locate her. Fast.
I felt a tingling sensation course through my head, which made me shiver. Then I started
hearing
bits and pieces of conversation.
No, it was more like thoughts; just as I’d experienced last night, like disembodied voices.
…that damned Bringer over to protective custody
, someone thought.
He doesn’t understand. Do I tell him everything? Would he even believe me
, came Sanders’ thought.
Raised voices emitted from Denton’s closed office, and I noticed I wasn’t the only person in the room who’d turned to look in that direction.
I quickly rose from my chair and walked directly to the office’s glass door and knocked once before walking inside.
“What the hell are you doing in here?” Denton demanded. “I don’t believe that anyone requested your presence.”
Please don’t do anything stupid
, Sanders thought as she looked up at me wide-eyed.
What’s this guy’s problem
, Denton thought.
“My problem is that you’re not listening to your agent,” I challenged.
“What?” Denton demanded.
How did he know---
“What you were thinking?” I finished his internal query.
Denton’s mouth fell open.
“How in God’s name did you just do that?” he asked.
What the hell
, Sanders thought.
I tried to calm myself. Somehow, that seemed to allow me to pick up their thoughts easier.
“There’s a lot about this case that you need to understand,” I said. “Agent Sanders is your best chance of making heads or tails of this with me.”
Denton stared at Sanders. “What is this guy, some sort of freak-show-mind reader? I thought you said Bringer was just some mild-mannered tag agency clerk or something.”
“You said that?” I asked, staring down at Sanders.
She did a double-take at me, and stammered, “Well, sort of, but not exactly. I mean---”
“Never mind that,” Denton cut her off before turning his full attention on me. “Okay, Mr. Mind Reader, what am I thinking?”
I felt my anxiety rise. It wasn’t as if I fully understood how my abilities worked yet. Still, some things that Maria had told me seemed to be relatively accurate.
Maria.
I tried to force her from my mind and divert my full attention to Denton, who was staring at me with nearly bulging eyes.
“Go ahead, hot shot,” he challenged.
I stared directly at him and tried to calm myself.
Pink flamingos, pink flamingos
.
“Pink flamingos,” I said.
His eyes widened momentarily, but then he frowned again.
“Beginner’s luck,” he said. “Try again, Bringer.”
I stared at him and frowned. Somehow, I wasn’t sensing anything.
“You’re cheating. You’re not thinking anything.”
I hoped that I was actually correct and that my skill hadn’t suddenly short-circuited.
He merely grunted.
“Again.”
Oh, crap
, Sanders thought.
I don’t believe this.
I glared at her. “Hey, how about a little more confidence here?”
She gawked at me.
This guy’s a either a nutcase or he’s the real deal
, Denton thought.
How about 237 blueberry pies?
I looked at him incredulously.
He scowled. “Gotcha’, didn’t I, Bringer?”
I crossed my arms and casually leaned against the doorjamb with a smug expression.
“Tell me something, Denton,” I said. “Who in their right mind thinks about 237 blueberry pies?”
His expression immediately wilted.
“I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “Never in my life---”
“Oh, and Denton,” I interrupted. “I’ll admit that I’m trying my best to keep a lot of balls in the air all at once right now, and maybe I’m not the best at it. But I’m damn sure not a nutcase.”
He appeared stunned. “Uh, yeah. Sorry about that.”
Despite my bravado, I felt a wave of relief surge through me.
I’d actually done it!
Then I had to sit down because my legs suddenly felt like they were turning to Jell-O, and I half-fell into the spare guest chair before Denton’s desk.
Crap.
“Are you okay?” Sanders asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said. “But I think my blood sugar just tanked. I could use a Gatorade or something.”
Both Sanders and Denton practically launched out of their chairs.
* * *
By the time I’d finished consuming the sports drink that had been procured for me, Sanders had told Denton about everything she’d witnessed, including the bullets that had been intended for her on Friday night. In addition, I summarized information regarding my Nuclegene treatments and how my special abilities had developed as a result of my regimen.
“That explains the undamaged rounds we found on the front porch and in the back yard,” Denton said as he stared at me. “Forensics has been baffled over that.”
“We may want to leave them baffled a little while longer,” Sanders suggested meaningfully.
“Who else knows about this?” he asked.
“You and I,” Sanders replied.
“Burroughs knows, too,” I offered.
“He does?” Sanders asked.
I nodded. “Yeah, we discussed it at the hospital after his surgery. Oh, and Maria Edwards knows. In fact, she’s very important in multiple ways.”
I explained how she had researched Nuclegene’s databases, downloaded some of their records, and provided me key information about my treatments and condition, as well as helped me to understand my condition better.
“We need to find her,” I urged. “The sooner the better. If for nothing else, there are two children who need their mother back.”
“Agreed,” Denton said.
Sanders nodded.
“I’ll mobilize our team,” Denton said. “But, Bringer, the best place for you is---”
“Out in the field with Agent Sanders,” I interrupted. “Who else do you know who can read thoughts and potentially stop bullets as needed?”
Sanders appeared pleased at that.
Then I wondered if I’d actually be able to repeat those feats on demand.
“Yes, given the circumstances, I suppose that’s been helpful. You’ve already saved one of my agent’s lives,” Denton said. “But you’re also a principal in this case. You’re not even in law enforcement; you’re just a civilian.”
“Actually, I’m more of a consultant,” I challenged.
“Hardly. You’re a witness at the very least, though obviously a lot more,” he countered.
“Then I’m under the protective custody of Agent Sanders,” I said.
Denton appeared introspective.
“Agreed,” Sanders spoke up.
Denton sighed. “I could lose my ass over this.”
I nodded. “Yeah, or you could break one of the highest-profile cases in the country, and maybe save a mother’s life.”
Denton scowled. “True, I suppose.”
“However, there’s one more thing,” I said.
“Yeah?”
“The fire at my sister’s was no accident,” I said.
I explained the phone call that I’d received in conjunction with the timing of the fire.