Mind's Eye (26 page)

Hall detected only seven minds in Megan’s vicinity. He entered each of them until he found Altschuler. Megan had served her duty as spotter flawlessly.

“Find him?”
she asked.

“Yeah. Give me a few minutes to explore, and I’ll get back to you.”

Nick Hall entered Alex Altschuler’s mind once again and began to dig. His first impression was that the guy was largely harmless, and this was borne out after several additional minutes of perusing his memories. Hall read the memory of his recent call with Fyfe and his encounter with Gray. Altschuler was smart and ambitious, but he had actually wet himself during this encounter, although not enough to be detectible. This was a memory Hall felt bad about reading, and vowed to forget that he had.

Unbelievably, everything Altschuler had texted to Hall was one hundred percent accurate. The events had unfolded precisely the way he had said. Not even any white lies to make himself look better. And the stuff he had written about how sorry he was and how he wanted to do right by the victims’ families and society had been absolutely genuine. Hall had thought these were platitudes issued by a heartless executive performing damage control, but these Boy Scout utterances had been entirely sincere.

The man was excited, and nervous, about his upcoming elevation to CEO, and saw it as a huge opportunity. He also was excited about the progress Gray had made and how it would revolutionize the world.

But at the same time, he felt profoundly guilty for feeling this way, given the atrocities Gray had committed to achieve this progress. And guilty for not realizing what Gray had been up to earlier. His empathy and remorse were very deep, and very real, and Hall could not have been more astonished.

He relayed what he had learned to Megan, who was as surprised as he was by his findings.

“Let’s bring him to the house,”
suggested Hall telepathically.
“He’s harmless.”

Megan took a deep breath.
“You ever misread anyone before?”
she asked.

Hall couldn’t blame her for wanting to be sure. Everyone else who had been looking for them wanted them dead, but he reassured her that he was absolutely certain about this particular individual.

Megan approached the man in the glasses and pink visor, who was nervously hovering next to dozens of rows of egg cartons sitting on a low, refrigerated shelf, not exactly sure what to do with himself. He had such a worried expression on his face, and his eyes were shifting around the area so quickly, it looked to Megan as though he were expecting an entire team of commandos to descend from the ceiling.

“Alex Altschuler?” she said.

From his shocked look, he had been expecting many possibilities, but Megan Emerson wasn’t one of them. “Who are you?” he replied.

“Nick Hall sent me. He’s decided to trust you, after all.”

Altschuler eyed her suspiciously. “Really? Just like that?”

“Apparently so,” she replied with a shrug. “Follow me.”

“Where are we going?”

“I’m taking you to Nick,” she said, beginning to lead him out of the store. “He’s just a few miles from here.”

“No kidding?” said Altschuler in genuine surprise. “I would have bet my life he wasn’t in Bakersfield.”

Megan smiled. “Good thing you didn’t bet, then,” she said dryly.

“Oh, and by the way,” she added. “Feel free to take off that ridiculous visor.”

29

Megan turned the corner and pointed out their destination ahead, a truly impressive home.

“You two have been staying
there?
” said Altschuler incredulously.

“For two days now. The owners are on vacation.”

“How did you know they weren’t coming back yesterday or today?”

“We, um . . . overheard them.”

“And, what . . . did they forget to lock the door?” said Altschuler.

Megan shrugged. “Let’s just say we were fortunate and leave it at that.”

She pushed a button near the dash and the leftmost door on the Glandons’ four-car garage slid smoothly open. She pulled in and quickly closed the door behind them.

Megan opened the car door and exited. Altschuler followed suit, throwing the door open and narrowly missing Nick Hall, who had entered the garage to be a one-man welcoming party.

As Altschuler stood, Hall held out his hand. Altschuler shook the offered hand with a look of disbelief, obviously not expecting access to Nick Hall to have been this easy, especially after the text messages they had exchanged. Both men introduced themselves, even though this wasn’t necessary. Both knew full well whose hands they were shaking.

“Welcome to our hideout,” said Hall.

“Thanks,” said Altschuler. “But aren’t you worried that a neighbor just saw us pull in? In a car I presume belongs to the people who own this place? Someone could be calling the cops right now.”

Hall reappraised the man in front of him. He had known the man was a genius technically, but hadn’t expected him to be this savvy. Hall had been monitoring the neighborhood psionically and had broadcast to Megan when the coast was clear. But this wasn’t something he could tell Altschuler. “I set up cameras pointed at the houses on either side of us,” he lied. “With the feeds coming into my personal World Wide Web. No one saw you come in.”

“Impressive,” said Altschuler. And then, changing gears, added, “Thanks for bringing me here. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your trust.”  

They entered the main residence and Hall offered his guest a drink, which he refused.

“Did you bring the antidote?” asked Hall.

Altschuler pulled a small glass vial from his pocket, its lid screwed on tightly. “Drink this. Within thirty minutes to a few hours, your memory should return.” He grimaced. “If it’s ever going to return, that is. I can’t guarantee it.”

“For some reason, I thought it would need to be injected.”

“It’s a nasty, super-potent cousin of the date rape drug,” explained Altschuler. “The one that deviant assholes slip into girls’ drinks.”

“Got it,” said Hall. “Having to inject it would make it a little less . . . stealthy, wouldn’t it?”

Hall put out his hand and Altschuler gave him the vial, which he chugged down immediately.

Altschuler shook his head in amazement. “How did you decide to trust me so completely—so suddenly? I can’t believe you just took that without analyzing it first. I mean,” he hastened to add, “it is what I said it is. But still . . .”

“Megan is a great judge of character. And she decided you were trustworthy. That’s good enough for me.”

“Yeah?”
thought Megan wryly.
“I wouldn’t have trusted him as far as I could throw him.”

Hall suppressed a smile while they adjourned to the family room.

For the next forty-five minutes, Altschuler filled them in on the entire situation as thoroughly as he could, including Fyfe and Cowan’s roles. Hall had already read all of it from his mind, but this was helpful to Megan, and it was another great test of the bespectacled scientist’s veracity.

Once again, he told it straight. The only area in which he wasn’t totally honest involved his own feelings of guilt. They were stronger even than he let on, and he was beating himself up over not having caught on to what Gray was doing in time to save lives.

Hall found himself liking and admiring this man, and wondering if he could have been as  upstanding as Altschuler if their situations were reversed.

When Altschuler was finished revealing everything he knew, he couldn’t contain himself any longer. He had to know more about Hall’s implants. He asked questions for the next thirty minutes, and had Hall run through various diagnostic programs to assess the implants’ performance more precisely.

Altschuler was ecstatic over what he learned. The system worked better than he could have ever dared hope. Kelvin Gray may have been a man with no soul, he told them, but there was no denying he was a genius.

Finally, when he had run out of questions, at least temporarily, Altschuler said, “I came here with the goal of getting you to come back to Fresno with me. How about it? I won’t tell anyone you’re there.”

“Other than your friends Cameron Fyfe and Ed Cowan, correct?”

“Right. Those two, and the three of us, will form a crisis management team. We’ll spearhead the search for John Delamater. And go public with the atrocities committed by Kelvin Gray.”

“Where would we stay?” said Megan.

Altschuler smiled, pleased with himself for having thought far enough ahead to have a good answer. “At the Fresno Homestead Inn. Ed Cowan has already gotten you a suite there, under an alias. It’s an extended stay hotel, and the suites are really nice.”

“Extended stay hotel?” said Megan.

“Yes. You know, like the Residents Inn. Although I think the Homestead is even better. They cater to businesspeople on long assignments, people relocating, and so on. In fact, Theia houses our relocating employees there until they find permanent residence. They’re separate units, about seven hundred square feet. A few rooms, a small kitchen, free breakfast.” Seeing that Megan’s expression remained unchanged, Altschuler added, “You’ll love it. Pool, business center, weight room . . . .” Altschuler trailed off and rolled his eyes. “Why do I suddenly feel like I work for the hotel?”

Megan and Hall both laughed.

“We’re going with him to Fresno, aren’t we?”
broadcast Megan.

“It really is our best option. And I trust this guy implicitly.”

“And you really like him, also, don’t you?”

“A lot,”
he replied.
Hall locked his eyes on the thin scientist. “What the hell,” he said. “Let’s go to Fresno. We accept your proposal.”

Altschuler was delighted. “Fantastic!” he said.

“Naturally, we’ll want to take your car,” said Hall. “Give me a second and I’ll call a cab to get us back to the Vons parking lot. The local cab company lets you schedule a pickup online,” he explained.

“Let’s have it pick us up away from the house,” suggested Megan.

“Right. I’ll send it to Primrose, which my map program says is one street over.” He looked away for several seconds. “Okay. Done,” he announced. “A cab will pick us up in fifteen minutes. While we wait, let’s straighten up and put everything back the way we found it.”

To Megan, he added telepathically,
“When we leave, you two can go first, so I can reset the alarm and return the key to its hiding place.”

“You really think these people won’t know someone was in their home?” said Altschuler.

“They may notice some things out of place. Scratch their heads over some missing food. But trust me, they’ll eventually convince themselves they’re misremembering these details, since no other explanation could possibly make any sense.”

“Maybe they’ll think they had a poltergeist,” said Megan dryly.

The corners of Nick Hall’s mouth were beginning to turn up into a smile when they abruptly reversed course.

Hall gasped and sank to the ground.

He held his head in both hands, and his eyes appeared to bulge from their sockets.

The antidote had taken effect all at once. And like a wall of snow barreling down a mountain during an avalanche, his memories, his knowledge of himself and his past, came crashing down into his mind.

It was almost too much for him to handle, and he continued to reel from this terrible blow for several seconds.

“Nick?” said Megan worriedly.

Hall finally took a deep breath and picked himself up off the ground, rising to his full height. He had managed to absorb the blow and his mind had now righted itself.

His memories had returned! He didn’t even have the need to search them. He
knew
who he was.

“I’m back,” he whispered, and tears began to roll down his face.

He had been living a nightmare. Even
he
hadn’t realized how emotionally traumatic it had been to live without a past, without an identity, with his sense of self stripped totally away.

Megan gave him a warm hug. “I’m so thrilled for you, Nick,” she said, her eyes moistening as well.

“Thank God,” whispered Altschuler, and Hall could read in his mind how glad he was to be able to undo the damage suffered by at least one member of the
Explorer
expedition. “So it all came back? You remember everything?”

“Everything,” replied Hall happily.

But then a puzzled expression came over his face and he looked away. A few seconds later he looked back and said, “Well,
almost
everything.”

Nick Hall blew out a long breath. “There does seem to be this one little gap. . . ”