Operation (24 page)

Barkley handed Reese the photo. It was a clear picture of Dimitri.

“Damn,” Reese muttered.

“Damn is right,” agreed Barkley. “What the hell is going on, John? Dimitri is supposed to be dead. You said you activated the collars and killed them all that night they tried to escape. Didn’t you?”

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-E
IGHT

“Yes. I activated the collars,” answered Reese. It was not a lie. He had pressed the button on the remote control device; however, he had deactivated the remote control prior to using it. The only thing that still worked was the little light that lit when the button was pressed. It had lit that night and he had made sure that everyone on the bridge of the ship witnessed it.

“Then how could Dimitri still be alive?” asked Barkley.

“Malfunction?” said Reese.

“No way,” countered Barkley. “The collars and the elixir in them was my responsibility. I checked them thoroughly every day as well as the remotes.”

“Then the elixir must have not been potent? Maybe it lost its effect?”

“John you know better. I thoroughly tested the elixir. I knew down to the minute how long it would be effective. You knew all this. So why don’t we get to the truth here. What really happened that night?”

Reese hesitated for several moments as he tried to decide what he should tell Barkley. For the first time in the past several days, he didn’t know what to say. If he told him the truth, it would endanger his life. Barkley was a friend and now he risked all of that. The silence seemed to last forever and Reese knew that Barkley would surmise the truth from that silence.

“Christ, John, you let them go!” Barkley said. “Holy shit! How the hell could you do that?”

Barkley looked away from Reese and stared at the surroundings. He paced nervously. “Sam, I don’t think I should say anything. The less you know the better. I know this looks bad,” said Reese. “But believe me I thought about it very carefully. It had to be done.”

“You were too close to that damn creature, Dimitri,” Barkley scowled. “You let him and his philosophical bullshit about them having their own lives get to you. I saw it. You felt sorry for them and envied them at the same time.”

“Perhaps I did, Sam,” Reese agreed, “but there was more to it than that. You knew what General Stone had in mind all along. Christ, you saw it yourself.”

“Yes I did,” agreed Barkley.

“Are you going to tell me that you could sanction the killing and the slavery of the creatures?”

“We are the military, John. We follow orders,” said Barkley.

“Yes, Sam. We follow the orders, but only the legal ones. What we were involved in would not fall into any lawful order category.”

“Perhaps,” Sam muttered. “But that was something for the chain of command to decide, not you. I wish I had never gotten involved with the operation. Why did you get involved with the girls? Where did they come in?”

“General Stone. He never told me about it. I found out when they brought me back on duty to find them. I had no knowledge of what he had done. That was just as much a surprise to me as it was for you.”

“How did Dimitri find out?”

“I have no idea,” said Reese. “But it’s pretty evident that he has them.”

“What a mess,” Sam said, “and they probably think I’m in on this as well.”

“Nobody knows about Dimitri and the rest,” Reese said. “Just you,” he gestured at the photo. “Now.”

Barkley stared at Reese with a look of betrayal that hit Reese hard. “So what are you going to do, Sam?” asked Reese. He had to know where their friendship stood on the issue.

“I don’t know,” Barkley said, “what are you planning to do?”

“Well, before Dimitri stepped back into the picture, I didn’t have of a choice beyond finding the girls and turning them back over to General Morris. These people with the agency—well you’ve seen what they’re like. They won’t give up until they either get the girls back or have two dead bodies. But now if they find Dimitri, that blows my story about that night all the hell and I end up in Leavenworth. Or worse.”

“And because they know you and I have talked on several occasions, they will assume I know what happened as well. You’ll have a cell mate.”

“I’m sorry, Sam. There is a good chance that you’re right about that.”

Barkley turned from Reese and walked in a tight little circle deep in thought. After a few minutes he turned back, “It doesn’t look like it matters what I want. They’ll never believe me if they find out Dimitri is alive. I guess I’m in. So what now?”

“For now, we have to find Dimitri. We find him and we find the girls. One way or another, we end this.”

“But if he doesn’t want to be found,” Barkley began, “that may not be easy.”

“True, but if we don’t find him, that also means that nobody else will,” Reese said.

“That will only work for so long,” Barkley asserted, “if you don’t produce they’ll find someone who can find them. You know I’m right.”

“Maybe. Maybe not,” Reese mused. “It depends what they find out. Speaking of which, does anyone else know about the guy that made the antidote for the elixir?”

“No, of course not.”

“Where is he?”

“I have him in a room here at the compound,” answered Barkley.

“We need to get him out of here before someone gets curious. I have a few questions myself. Why don’t you go in and get him and bring him out here. I don’t think we want anyone to overhear this conversation.”

Minutes later, Barkley exited the building accompanied by a man whom Reese guessed was approximately 30-35 years old. He was tall, around six feet, and very thin. His facial features appeared sunken, he was missing several prominent teeth and he had gray smudges beneath his eyes.

“This is Mr. Holiday,” Barkley said. “Mr. Holiday, this is Commander Reese.” They shook hands briefly. Reese noticed that as well as a nervous twitch, there was no strength in his handshake.

“I just have a few questions for you, Mr. Holiday,” Reese began, “and then we will get you out of here.”

“All right,” Holiday agreed, “I will be paid of course,” he stated firmly.

“Of course,” Reese agreed. “Now, I’m curious, why did you record all of this?”

Holiday smiled. “Because I’m not a fool,” he said plainly.

“I don’t understand,” Reese said.

“The guy that wanted the stuff analyzed, he was weird.”

“How so?” asked Reese.

“Right from the beginning, he tried to hypnotize me or something. I could feel him trying to get me to forget things like who he was and what he wanted me to do. It was like he wanted me to be his slave or something.”

“But it didn’t work apparently,” Reese said, finding it quite interesting. Vampires had the power to make people forget things. They had used it on the guards that were subdued during the kidnapping of the girls. But he had not ever heard of it not working before.

“No,” answered Holiday.

Barkley also perked up at this response. “Do you have any idea why?” he asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe because I was high,” Holiday said as he shrugged his shoulders.

“That might be it,” Barkley agreed, “the drugs may have served as some form of block to the hypnotic attempt. Very interesting.”

“Yes it is,” agreed Reese. “We might want to do something with that later. Anyway,” he said returning his attention to Holiday, “So you made this antidote for him. How?”

“It’s not really an antidote, I’m not that smart. I just came up with something that would neutralize the active ingredients for a period of time.”

“And it worked?” Reese asked, although he knew the answer.

“In the lab it did.” Holiday said and shrugged.

“So this man paid you and that was it?”

“That’s it.”

“You don’t have any information of where he lived or worked?”

Holiday looked at Reese with a sarcastic smile on his lips. “Do you think I care? All I wanted was the money. I didn’t want to know the guy’s history. The less I knew the better especially when I saw what he was trying to do. I just played along with him and let him think what he was trying to pull on me worked.”

“I see,” said Reese, “and you must have been quite convincing.”

“Why do you say that?” asked Holiday.

“You’re still breathing,” Reese said plainly.

“Huh? What? You think he would have killed me?” asked Holiday.

Reese didn’t respond to the question. “Okay, I think we’re done. Barkley here will give you a lift off of the base.”

Holiday and Barkley turned to leave.

“Oh and one more thing,” Reese began, “I can’t hypnotize you, but I would strongly suggest you forget about all of this. There are others who’d like to clean up the loose ends. Those people won’t bother trying to hypnotize you, if you know what I mean.”

Holiday turned toward Reese as he said this. His eyes locked upon Reese’s face. Reese’s expression said he was not joking.

“Yeah, I get it,” Holiday said and turned back towards the building.

“Give me a second,” Barkley said to Holiday as he and Reese moved a few steps away from him.

“Nice touch,” Barkley said. “I think he shit his pants when you said that.”

“I hope so, because you know as well as I do, that’s not an empty threat. It’s more like the truth.”

“I know,” Barkley agreed. “What are you going to do now?”

“I’m going back to the office and see if any new leads have come up.”

“Okay, I’ll get our friend out of here,” Barkley said and turned to leave.

“Sam?” called Reese.

“Yeah,” Barkley said as he stopped and turned back.

“Be careful,” said Reese.

“It’s a little late for that, isn’t it, John?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” Reese agreed. “But be careful anyway.”

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY
-N
INE

Reese made his way back to the office, serenaded by his stomach growling from the breakfast and lunch he still hadn’t had—and here it was almost five o’clock. There just hadn’t been any time to eat and he was beginning to feel the effects of drinking too much coffee and not having any food to help absorb it. He stopped at the vending machines and perused the culinary selections available. He finally decided on a package of chocolate donuts and a Milky Way bar.

The coffee caught up with him and he stopped to make a head call before going into his office. He dropped his food on the foyer counter and headed toward the urinals. He began his business and heard the bathroom door open. Turning to look, he saw it was Commander Pattoon.

“Office visits?” asked Reese. “I thought you never left your command post?”

“We need to discuss something,” Pattoon said ignoring Reese’s comment.

“You have me at a disadvantage,” said Reese. “My hands are full.”

“Hurry it up then, this is important.”

Reese felt the chill of his response. He finished his business, flushed the urinal and stepped over to where Pattoon stood.

“I have some information you were looking for,” Pattoon said, and then corrected himself, “or perhaps I should say lack of information.”

“I don’t understand,” Reese said.

“The information you wanted about the disappearances of the teenagers and the cop in Suffolk.”

“Oh yeah,” Reese said remembering. His thoughts had been focused his meeting with Barkley and the new information they had received from Holiday, he had forgotten about the request he had given Pattoon earlier.

“I can’t tell you anything about it,” said Pattoon.

“Why not?” asked Reese. “Surely there must be…”

“Listen!” Pattoon interrupted, “I’m taking a risk by telling you anything.”

“Then why?” asked Reese. He wondered why Pattoon would go out on a limb for him.

“I don’t like you,” Pattoon said flatly. “The mission they gave you on the original op should have been mine. You’re a screw-up working in my world of special operations. You had the chance to work with these creatures and you fucked it up.”

“Well, at least you’re honest about something,” Reese said.

“Yeah well, these agency people scare the shit outta me. I don’t trust them. I think if they had their way, the military would be working for them. That is, if we aren’t already.”

“For once, I have to say I agree with you,” Reese said. “But what’s this all about? What are you trying to tell me?”

“The event in Suffolk has been hushed up. They’re going to suppress it with some bullshit story to cover it up.”

“Who is going to cover it up?”

“I already told you, the agency.”

“How the hell can they do that?” asked Reese. “It’s already happened and what’s more, why would they want to do that?”

“The how part is easy. They have a lot of influence over other agencies, such as the FBI and CIA. It appears that the agency has stated jurisdiction in the matter and taken full control of the investigation.”

“Why?” asked Reese.

“I don’t know,” Pattoon said. “But all the information is locked up. I tried to probe around and see what I could find out and the next thing I know is I get a phone call from General Morris ordering me to stay away from it.”

“Did he ask you why were you looking?”

“Of course, I told him that the event fit the search parameters and I was looking for more information on it.”

“And he said what?” asked Reese.

“That The Agency was taking care of it. End of discussion.”

“That’s interesting,” said Reese. “What would be so important to them? It appears to be a local concern.”

“I don’t know and I don’t want to know either. I’m done with this subject,” Pattoon said firmly and turned to leave.

“So why go out on a limb? Why are you telling me this?” asked Reese.

“I might not like you; but I hate them even more.”

Pattoon didn’t wait for Reese to answer. He opened the bathroom door and left.

Reese stood motionless for a few seconds, his thoughts a jumble of confusion. He tried to understand the reasoning why the agency had taken over the investigation since it had occurred before Dimitri’s escape. Further, why they had not mentioned it to him? None of it was adding up. He felt that something very important was missing; some piece of the puzzle that would bring it all together.