Hush (The Infected: Ripped to Shreds Book 1) (30 page)

As con's went it was a pretty
good one, more or less.

"I have a plan. You'll have
the drugs today, from another source... Only... Let's have Clinton keep giving
them to you for now, too? That way he won't know what's going on. We need to
get with Turner on this." It was hard not to call the woman a bitch, but
she was in charge, and that kind of thing got back to people.

Really, that reminded her that
she needed to call Glenda at work, her old job, and quit. Then she had to do
all the rest of the things to end her old life. Cancel the phone and all that.

Everyone was watching her,
silently, except Denis, who was still looking at Kerry, though the girl wasn't
planning
anything really. As long as she had her drugs, it was going to be good with
her. That she might be in trouble for betraying the government was a
consideration, but not one that seemed real to her. Then, so far she really
hadn't done anything. Taking drugs that were, in the end, legal, wasn't a
crime. She'd thought it was one, and that she was acting like a crack head, but
it wasn't the actual case.

Bridget stood up, walked away and
made a call, which had Turner there at a run, it seemed. A thing which didn't
take her long. Three minutes later she was standing by the big table, with
Brian not far behind, coming through the door. The only difference was that he
was a bit out of breath from his sprint. Marcia wasn't.

It was, interestingly, Tobin that
explained the situation. He wanted to defend his girlfriend, but didn't do
anything except repeat what Cindy had said. The words got her glared at by
Director Turner, which was nearly funny, but Brian interjected almost
instantly.

"That's right. If you need
something, for pain, or to control your mode, you can get it. It just has to be
controlled. I think... We should go with Cin's plan for now. Keep this under
wraps." Then he looked around, at the fifty or so people in the room with
them. It was most of Team Two, and a bit of Team One, though most hadn't heard
them talking, since they weren't screaming about the whole thing.

Those that had were all on their
side.

That she
had
a side was
just common sense. The people in on the coup weren't going to help
her
out. They couldn't, really. They'd probably just kill her, given a chance. She
would have.

She waved around.

"The people that heard are
with us. You should have a meeting. Maybe five or ten at a time? Then I can go
over everyone. Bridget has a plan for that? With Olga?" They'd been
talking about it, and Marcia smiled, being happy that her people were stepping up
to defend them. It wasn't totally expected. A lot of people in the IPB just
sort of marked their time, not having anyplace else to go.

"
Niiice
. Good. Keep
me informed on this. Is this your team for it?" She waved at the room, as
if that made sense. Then again, it kind of
did
.

They had people there, and if
they were in with the IPB, then there was no need not to use them. Bridget
smiled too, and so did Brian. Olga started trying to think about how to really
go over everyone there, since it would be needed.

Her plan was to lock the doors,
and do it right then, but that wouldn't work, since people would need food that
weren't there yet. What they really needed was for the people that understood
what was happening to come and talk to them first, close up. In case Cindy had
a limited range.

She really didn't, or so it
seemed. Still, the easy thing to do was wave people over, even if she didn't
know them.

"Hey! If you can hear this,
come on down!" She whispered the words, which got about seven bodies to
move toward them. Olga laughed.

"Ha! Good plan. Yes,
come."

It took a minute and two of them
had to be waved over, given they didn't want to get involved. Cin didn't blame
them, but they were able to finish eating, and then, at the end of the meal,
Olga led them all into a little conference space that was hidden off to the
right.

Then, without saying anything,
feeling embarrassed, she waved at Bridget, who turned and looked at Cindy.
Marcia and Brian were still there, but weren't saying anything. The goal wasn't
about letting, or making, the new girl do all the work. Impulse just wanted to
ensure that she was ready to go.

Nodding, she started reading. It
was a lot of people, but having just the one theme it wasn't too hard to go
over it all again, searching for any kind of gap, or loophole that might let a
person escape notice.

Kerry wasn't in the room with
them, having stayed with Tobin and her brother.

She was a bad guy though, so it
made some sense to everyone that she not be in on the planning.

Bridget smiled at them all,
twitching a bit.

"There's a coup coming. Some
of our own people are in on it. They, whoever they are, can't take me down, so
they're going after the leadership here. We probably won't like who they put in
after that, so... Are you in with us or not? If you aren't, let me know now. We
can keep you out of the cool planning sessions." There was no real threat,
but if anyone had said they weren't with them, Bridget was planning to kill
them.

Luckily that didn't come up. It
would have made a mess, after all.

The place was really tidy
otherwise, so it would be noticed.

That no one died left her feeling
a little sad, but Cin knew that she'd get over it. Eventually.

It was a lot harder to get
through everyone on the base than it seemed like it should have been to start
with. They had about five hundred people there in all, but a lot of the IPB
members were actually off at remote bases around the country. That part had
been Brian's brilliant idea to keep them from all being killed at one time.
Which, Cin had to admit, was probably a good one, even if it made her life
harder at the moment.

Worse, everyone agreed that not
telling everyone all about what she was doing was the right plan. That kind of
made sense, because pissing off people with powers couldn't end well all the
time. That meant she was being led around by Bridget, who was introducing her
to everyone, one person at a time.

Not that the announcement on
television wasn't a known thing. They weren't all stupid or anything, so they
knew about the coup, and how they were all about to have their lives smeared
across the news. Not one of them thought that it wasn't going to happen either,
so no one was all that shocked when, at about three in the afternoon, the news
broke. It was all over the place, and told tales about a whole lot of the IPB.
Things that a lot of them really wouldn't have loved to have known.

Even the ones that no one knew
about were being smeared.

She, luckily, was pretty safe
that way, being too new to have records of her wrong doings.

So the stories all shifted on a
dime, from being sort of interested to meet the new woman, into dark things
that promised death and destruction on whoever was hurting them. That seemed
fair to her, so while she and Bridget talked to people, they were both able to
nod sympathetically while she read about who was in on it or not.

She did, slowly, work out that
seven of the people there were, indeed, part of the problem. Dr. Clinton was
easy, but the person that had gotten him into the whole mess was much harder to
find, since they'd never met. It had all been done over the phone, and as far
as he knew, wasn't even a person that he'd ever met. Interestingly, the man was
both ethical internally, and smart enough to work out that she was stripping
him of his information, even with no more than a casual meeting. That was due
to his reading her file, which Dr. Burrows had put together.

Bridget was on top of it though,
so when the man tried to stab at Cindy with a needle or something deadly,
trying to stop her from breaking the plan, it didn't happen. Instead the gray
haired man hit Impulse, who knocked him out with a single slap to the face.

Cindy looked at the needle on the
floor, and shook her head.

"Now
that
wasn't nice
of him, was it? His goal was to try and keep me from finding the others. The
thing there is that he doesn't know who they might be. Just Kerry, since he was
responsible for getting her into things. We should take him to..." Cindy
realized that she didn't know that kind of thing, and older than the girl or
not, it was the red head that was in charge, so she shut up and waved at him.

They didn't really have police
there, though they had guards, who were more than willing to grab the man up
and toss him into a cell. From the mental description of it, the regular man
wasn't going to be easily breaking out. The walls of the place were six inches
of hardened steel. At the weak points. The two men in black that came were both
ex-military special forces, and not in on anything in particular. Then, most of
the people on the base wouldn't be.

It was all about the same reason
that she hadn't wanted to go there in the first place herself. There were too
many fucking telepaths. How the doctor and Kerry had gotten away with it for so
long, she didn't know, really. Only, given the mess of minds and stories on the
base, she kind of had a clue.

They only had three telepaths
that were worth their salt in the IPB, and two of them actively resisted being
around people.
Especially
their minds. Chris Pours was really strong
that way, able to do about what Cindy could, it seemed. It was different for
her, and a bit faster, at a guess, but the rough level wasn't too far off. The
big difference was that Christian's first mode had her trying to stay away from
people, since she found them annoying really fast.

Lister, the military super
soldier, Greg Lister, wasn't really all that great at being a telepath, when
you got down to it. He could read surface level thoughts, and get some pictures
from people's heads, but for him it was a bit muddled all the time. To fool him
all a person had to do was not think about a given topic too clearly while he
was around. Counting in your head worked pretty well. Day dreaming did it, too.

The counter trick there was that
the man had figured out what was going on, by reading Bridget as they moved
around the base. Then he warned all of the other military men. Not because he
knew they were in on this particular takeover attempt, but it was clear to him,
and all the military guys and gals, that they were
supposed
to be.
They'd been told to lay low, and get ready to spend years for the big event,
but this could be what they were all briefed on.

So for all they were walking all
over the place, about a third of the people were virtually invisible. Cindy
didn't really need to meet them however. Not after she was able to find the
book that contained Greg Lester's notes. From there she worked out, even as
Bridget took her around, to find that none of the special military officers
were really in on anything in particular. They really
were
supposed to
be getting ready for that kind of thing.

That wasn't too hard for her to
work out, and it was pretty clear that Turner suspected the same thing. Then,
she suspected everyone that way. Including Cin, which was a bit insulting,
since she was the one doing all the work at the moment. Worse, half the people
were going to hate her when they understood who was ratting their fellows out
to the man.

It wasn't until they got to the
rec facility that things sort of broke open for them however. The place was
large, and designed for people to relax and have fun, more or less. Mainly, at
the moment, that meant people were busily watching soap operas on a very big
screen television. Her blue friend from earlier was there, but so were fifteen
other people from Team Two. A few of them were even people that Cindy sort of
recognized, once she thought about it.

For instance, the large black and
brown suit of armor was a figure that had been in the news over the years. Bug.
Except, as she read the sad tale that came off of the being, Cindy learned a
whole lot that she hadn't really understood. The manly looking, super strong
and fast, creature was a woman. One trapped forever, locked into a cage of her
own devising.

Lauren.

Life had always left her afraid,
of almost everything, so she'd hidden away behind a wall of impenetrable shell
in her thoughts. That had left her strong, inside, but when the Infection hit
her, it had translated into what she was now. Worse, she knew that it had been
her own weakness that had done it. Her first mode, loneliness, ripped from
every word of each page.

So it had made sense to her to go
along with Agent Burkes, when the attractive, powerful, man had started to pay
attention to her. The woman wasn't stupid, for instance she
knew
when
she was being used, but she couldn't really help but be flattered by the
attention.

Cindy got part of what was going
on there too. Her mind was so warped by her first mode that Chris Pours
wouldn't touch her mind on purpose, leaving her thoughts pretty much her own.

Smiling she touched Bridget on
the arm.

"Two of them? Lauren and
Agent Burkes?" She murmured the words, softly enough that only one person
there would be able to hear them.

The girls eyes went wide, and she
took a deep breath.

"Fuck. Okay. Can you make
sure of that? We need a second point of confirmation." The words were
spoken out loud, and to the whole room at one time. Everyone turned to look at
them, most of the people having worked out that something was going on
involving the new lady.

Bridget had a plan, if one that
slapped together in her mind suddenly, and it was put into motion without
hesitation.

"Lauren, come with us.
You're a traitor, and treason is
kind
of a big deal." The thing
there, one that Cindy didn't have a lot of time to try and work out, was that
the little red headed pixie-like being was planning to kill the large suit of
armor, if she could.

Why wasn't clear, since a fight
started, complete with what sounded like explosions where they hit each other.

David, the blue man, reached out
as he scurried away, pulling Cin close to him as he tried to move. He couldn't
get his mechanical voice to explain over the din, but she read the
instructions, and started to move with him. He had a force field, and while it
wasn't going to stop energy blasts, it might well prevent a building from
falling on them. Without asking, Cindy started to pull people in as they
passed. They were used to working with him, and each other, so understood the
idea instantly.

Moving slowly, taking little
steps, the powerful field stopped things from hitting them several times as
about half of them worked toward the main doors. Just as they got there, the
building's front was blown open, by a giant brown and black missile.

That let things quiet down a lot,
and everyone that had been inside, about twenty or thirty people, all ran out.

The blue man took a deep, sharp
breath and let it out, shaking. His voice really did sound like a computer when
the words came. There were three of them too, like a group of people trying to
say the same words at one time.

"I... Don't know what's
going on. I mean, Bridget and Lauren don't get along, but they don't do
this
."

A bunch of people were coming at
them all, running fast and hard. The first ones there were a slightly golden
colored man that Cin didn't know yet, and Director Turner. They were followed
by Proxy, who had a gun out, as if that was going to help, and a very nice
looking, very muscular, tall white man.

It was her turn to take a deep
breath, since the man, Darryl Lancaster, was
perfect
. His hair was a bit
too light, and he was a little too muscular, perhaps. Still he called to her on
a level that few others had in her entire life.

She wanted to kill him, so badly
it hurt for a few seconds. Not that it was time for that. She'd have to wait.
More to the point, as she read all about him, distracted from everything else,
including the potentially lethal fight going on about a hundred meters away
from them, Cindy realized that she wasn't going to be taking this particular
target down.

He was far too much for her. Infected,
and powerful that way, but even without that he was too big, strong, and tough
for her. Not that her desire to murder him didn't sting her mind anyway. She
had to stop herself from staring, which went unnoticed, thankfully. There was a
handy distraction at the moment, thank goodness.

Turner came over to her,
immediately, and slapped at her arm. It hurt, but wasn't meant too. She was
just trying to get her attention, thinking that she was in shock from the
sudden violence. Rather than lie about it, Cindy realized it was a good time to
win the woman over with her honesty.

"My first mode triggered.
Darryl there. I want to kill him
so
bad. Um, anyway, Bridget and I found
that Lauren is working with an Agent Burkes? As part of the coup thing. I
didn't get a chance to find out what he knows, since this started right on top
of me mentioning it. Uh..." She didn't know how to explain the rest of it,
but a scared looking red haired woman who'd been watching television did.

"Bridget said that Lauren
was a traitor, and she attacked.
Lauren
did, I mean." The words
weren't happy in the slightest, but they weren't hesitant either. It was clear
from the print above her that this woman knew that it meant Lauren, her friend,
was actually guilty.

There was a nod from Turner, and
a pointed finger. Then she looked around and waved at the television watching
woman, and Tobin, who had come running up with Hobbs.

"Goblin, LG, take them both
down. We need Lauren alive. Lancaster, we need to find Burkes and whoever he's
working with. For the time being you're in charge of the Agents' Section.
Impulse is going to try and kill Level here, clearly, but that won't get us any
information.
Go
!" She nearly screamed the last words, wondering if
just rushing in and fighting with Bridget herself would work better.

It made more sense to use the
others however, if she didn't want people and her new base, to be damaged any
more than it was. The woman, in her tan fatigues, wasn't really afraid for
herself, even given the massive power being shown in front of them as the two
powerhouses battled. They slammed each other into the ground, over and over.
Both were fast, too. Lauren was harder to hurt it seemed, though it was hard to
tell really, since Bridget recovered from everything so quickly. For her part
the blows from the little girl were harder, and shook the world more. They
landed more frequently too.