Immune (20 page)

Heather’s scream brought Anna McFarland out of bed and down the hall three steps ahead of her husband. Pushing open the door to Heather’s room, Anna’s hand flicked the wall switch to the on position, momentarily blinded by the brilliance of the illumination.

“What’s wrong?” Gil McFarland’s breathless question echoed the one that had been about to roll from her own lips.

Across the room, sitting upright in the middle of her bed, Heather’s open eyes had rolled back in her head, the look of horror on her young face so intense that both parents whirled to look back down the hallway. It was as empty as it had been a second ago, surreally illuminated in sharp shadows by the light shining out from Heather’s open doorway.

“Baby?” Anna McFarland moved to the bed.

As she reached out to touch her daughter’s face, something made her stop. Heather’s eyes were moving as if she were seeing things move before her, things that only she could see. The way emotions played across Heather’s face as those white eyes moved brought a chill to Anna’s neck, a ripple that ran up over her scalp and down along both arms. Heather didn’t even know she and Gil were there, her daughter’s open-eyed dream-state undisturbed even by the sudden bright light in her bedroom.

Anna reached out, gently cradling Heather’s cheeks between her shaking hands, turning Heather’s head so that she could see into those eyes. At first, there was no reaction, and then, ever so slowly, Heather’s eyes rolled forward, refocusing on Anna’s.

“Mom?”

“I’m right here, baby.”

Anna wrapped her daughter in her arms, letting Heather’s body collapse against her own. Almost immediately, Anna felt Gil’s strong arms wrap around them both.

Searching for anything to lift the dread that filled her, Anna glanced up. But instead of reassurance, what she saw in Gil’s face was a fear as great as her own.

Jennifer opened the door to let Heather in.

“You look tired.”

Heather shrugged as she settled down on the couch across from Mark. “I’m exhausted. Mom and Dad found me sitting up in bed about two a.m. Apparently, I was having some sort of nightmare, dreaming with my eyes open. It really freaked them out.”

Mark paused between bites into his cream cheese bagel. “Christ. That would freak me out too.”

Jennifer scowled at her brother.

“It’s okay, Jen,” Heather said, a sad look settling on her face. “That’s exactly what I thought.”

Mark looked like he’d been kicked in the stomach. “I’m sorry. I was trying to make you feel better, not worse.”

Heather’s smile was weak. “It’s not your fault. I’ve been feeling terrible since it happened.”

Jennifer moved onto the couch beside her friend, wrapping an arm around Heather’s shoulder. “So what happened next?”

“Nothing, at least not right away. But, this morning, I heard Mom and Dad talking quietly about setting up an appointment with a doctor.” Heather’s face tensed. “I’m afraid he’s going to order an electroencephalogram or a CT scan.”

Mark gasped. “But if they do that…”

“Exactly,” said Heather. “They’ll spot the difference in my brain activity. They’ll discover our secret.”

For several seconds complete silence reigned. Just then, Mrs. Smythe walked into the room. “What are you kids up to? I can’t believe Heather is over and you didn’t even tell me.”

“Sorry, Mom,” Mark and Jennifer’s voices merged into a single apology, something far from uncommon for the twins.

Linda Smythe laughed. “As if it was the first time. Can I get you kids something to eat?”

“No thanks.” This time the three voices merged as one.

For the barest instant, Linda Smythe looked hurt. Then a broad smile spread across her face. “Peanut butter sandwiches?”

Mark, Jen, and Heather exchanged glances.

“I guess we could go for that,” Mark said.

“Good.”

Mrs. Smythe disappeared into the kitchen. In what seemed like an incredibly short period of time she was back with a platter of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

“Thanks, Mom,” said Mark.”

“Yeah, Mrs. Smythe,” said Heather.

“My pleasure.” Seeing them all staring back at her, Mrs. Smythe straightened and turned away. “Okay, okay. I’ll leave you to your private discussions.”

Heather watched Mrs. Smythe depart before turning back to her two friends. “Sorry to bring you guys down with me. I just couldn’t deal with this on my own.”

Mark stood up. “Are you kidding me? Why wouldn’t you come to us? Haven’t we always been there for each other?”

“Of course we wanted to know,” Jennifer said. “My God, Heather. We’re all in this together.”

Heather smiled. “Thanks guys. You’re the greatest. But I’m really scared. It’s not just the doctor thing either. Last night’s dream wasn’t the first. I’ve been having them pretty often, usually when I’m awake.”

“What do you mean, when you’re awake?” Mark asked.

Heather sighed. “I don’t know. I’ll be doing something, and the next thing I know, it’s like a déjà vu moment, like a rewind. Only part of it wasn’t real, just a waking dream.”

Jennifer’s eyes narrowed. “And before the rewind, what do you see?”

Heather stood up and began pacing back and forth in front of the couch. “I’m not really sure.”

“You can’t remember?” Mark asked.

Heather stopped. “That’s not it. I remember just fine. It’s like I’m seeing the future or something, not the distant future but something that is about to happen very soon.”

“And does it come true?” Jennifer asked, leaning forward.

“Yes.” Heather’s chest felt as if it had been wrapped in chains. “Not exactly the same as my vision, but so close that it’s unreal. Close enough to scare the crap out of me.”

Mark chewed his lower lip. “Maybe it’s another side effect from the Second Ship. We’ve already experienced some amazing things.”

“Seeing the future?” Heather shook her head.

“I don’t think that’s what’s really happening,” Jennifer said. “Think about it. Each of us has had our brains turned on to the max. You already had savant mathematical abilities. Maybe this is just an extension of the mathematics.

“Three-dimensional computer games are done with math. What if your brain is just working out the probabilities of stuff happening and painting a 3D picture of the projected outcome for you?”

Heather started to answer but paused. Something about what Jennifer hypothesized had a ring of truth to it. After all, it had been weeks since mathematical equations had dominated her thinking. The thought that perhaps her brain had moved to the next stage of development had already occurred to her.

“I know what you are becoming.”

The thought of what the Rag Man had said in her dreams leaped, unbidden, into her mind. Heather shook her head to clear the thought.

“If that’s true, then how do I stop it?”

Jennifer shrugged. “I don’t know, but right now, that’s not our biggest problem. We can’t let the doctors discover your abnormal brain activity.”

Just then, Mark interrupted. “I have an idea. Do you remember when I tried the biofeedback meditation using the medical table on the ship?”

“You mean when you almost stopped your heart?” Heather asked.

“I didn’t almost stop it. I just slowed it way down. With the biofeedback I was getting from the medical table, I was able to adjust my body response.”

Heather sat down again. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying that if I could do that, we might be able to learn to relax our brain activity so that it appears normal.”

Jennifer clapped her hands. “Brilliant.”

Heather rolled the thought around in her mind. With superior biofeedback like they got on the medical table, it might just be possible to learn how to do that. More than possible, it felt probable. She stood up and headed toward the door.

“I’m going to tell Mom we’re going for a bike ride. I’ll meet you out front in ten minutes.”

Jennifer shook her head. “Better make it twenty. I want to look up some information on the Internet about what normal CT scans and EEG readouts look like.”

“Good idea.”

As the screen door slammed shut behind her, for the first time in days, Heather felt a glimmer of hope.

Heather had almost forgotten how good the alien headset felt on her temples. As soon as she entered the cave, climbed up into the ship, and slid the elastic metal band in place, a warm feeling engulfed her, almost like coming home.

She was the first to enter the room they called the medical lab, followed closely by Jennifer and then Mark, each wearing their own headset. Almost as if the ship knew what she was feeling, the colors in the room shifted to a softer shade, which highlighted the smoothly flowing elegance of each of the pedestals. Dear Lord, it was beautiful.

“I’ll go first,” Mark said.

Heather turned to face him. “Why you?”

Mark’s grin was ear to ear. “Because I’m the man.”

“Really?”

“Besides, I already know how to manipulate the biofeedback. It’s too bad we don’t have more than one of these tentacle tables or I could talk you through things as I’m doing it.”

As if in response to his wish, the door in the far wall dematerialized, the one through which they had never been able to gain entry.

Heather gasped, then rushed forward, as if any hesitation might close off the newly opened doorway before she could peer inside. Mark beat her to it, leaving only Jennifer hanging back. No shock there. Jennifer had always been the only one in the group with any sense.

The room was smaller than the medical lab, with a single large couch amidst a forest of the clear tentacle tubes they had experienced on the table in the medical lab. These were bigger, though, filled with moving lights, almost like soap bubbles moving through a viscous fluid. If she hadn’t been so excited by this new discovery, Heather could have just sat down and watched.

Mark stepped into the room, the clear tubes melting away from his path as he advanced toward the couch.

Heather reached for him. “Mark. Be careful.”

“Why?” He turned to face her. “This ship could have killed us a hundred times by now.”

“You make it sound like it is making a conscious choice not to. For all we know, if we press the wrong button or misuse a device, that could still be the ultimate outcome.”

Mark shook his head. “Maybe, but I’m not getting that feeling about this place.”

Heather concentrated, doing her best to send an intelligible query through the headset to the ship’s computer system. Although her head flooded with imagery, she failed to make sense of it. Mark was right about one thing, though. This new room just felt right.

She glanced back at Jennifer. But if she was expecting her friend to inject a word of caution, she was disappointed. Jennifer had moved into the room with an air of expectation on her face. If Heather hadn’t known better, she would have thought that Jennifer had seen it all before.

Seeing no further objections, Mark slid onto the couch and leaned back. The room’s response was startling. The tentacles swarmed over him, each one sprouting thousands of others, their supple, needle-sharp points each moving to establish its own connection to his skin. If it had not been for the feelings of relaxation she was getting from the alien headband, Heather doubted she could have kept herself from screaming. And even though the look on Mark’s face was one of complete relaxation, Heather had to concentrate to slow her own breathing.

As Heather’s attention focused itself on what was happening to Mark, unnoticed beside her, a slow, satisfied smile lit Jennifer’s delicate features.

Senator Conally stared over the microphones that lined the U-shaped table in the committee hearing room. Although the US Select Committee on Intelligence held daily closed meetings here in room 219 of the Hart Senate Office Building, this one held an electric air, the kind he remembered feeling upon the approach of the worst Midwestern storms.

The other members of the intelligence committee stared at the head of the Department of Energy's Office of Intelligence and Counter Intelligence, their faces displaying a wide range of emotions.

"So, Mr. Scott," Senator Conally began. "Let me get this straight. If I understand your opening statement correctly, it is your contention that the security around the Los Alamos Rho Project is adequate."

The blond man sitting across the meeting room pursed his lips, the effect narrowing the already thin line of his mouth, his blue-gray eyes flashing in the reflected light.

"That is correct, Senator."

"And would it also be your contention that the president's announced plan to release the details of the alien nanotechnology to the world constitutes no threat to national security?"

Adam Scott leaned closer to his microphone. "Senator, as you are aware, the president has only called for the release of the beneficial nanite technology, not the underlying details. That means we would be distributing the nanite serum but not the production details. Nothing is entirely without risk. However, in my judgment and in the judgment of the majority of the officials in my office, the benefits to national security outweigh the risks."