Warehouse 13: A Touch of Fever (17 page)

Not when he was so close.

How long had this endless quest been going on? For years, really. Born to wealth, his body had always been his enemy. Weak and sickly, he had spent much of his childhood in bed or at doctors’ offices. While the rest of the world went about its business, enjoying life, he had been lucky to be able to function at all. Migraines. Ulcers. Allergies. Insomnia. His so-called life was a never-ending litany of discomfort and affliction. An intolerable situation, to say the least.

He had even been too sick to attend his parents’ funeral after that car accident. Not that he had been too broken up about their untimely passing. It was their damn genes that were responsible for his misery. A three-car pileup on the highway served them right.

Besides, he had his own problems to worry about.

Modern medicine had always let him down, so over time he had been forced to look elsewhere. Over the years, he had squandered much of his inheritance acquiring rare objects and talismans reputed to possess miraculous healing properties. Imported water from Lourdes. A silver grail that had supposedly once belonged to Prester John. Potions derived from bits and pieces of dozens of endangered species. Even a scrap from Florence Nightingale’s handkerchief.

But nothing had worked. They had all been fakes or disappointments.

Until one of his suppliers got a line on Clara Barton’s glove. It had cost him a fortune, but he still remembered the surge of excitement he had felt when he had first slipped the glove onto his left hand. A tingling sensation had raced like blood poisoning from his fingers to his brain. The smell of black powder had tantalized his nostrils while the echoes of bygone cannons had reverberated in his ears. He had known at once that it was the real thing.

It was only later that he’d realized that it was the
wrong
glove.

He had been searching for the good glove, the healing glove, ever since. It had been a long, exhausting search, but at last he knew where it was. That stupid girl had it.

But not for long . . .

His hand itched and he scratched at it irritably. He was stiff and sore from driving all day. A vein throbbed behind his ear. He could feel another sick headache coming on. Waylaying that federal agent at the high school had only eased his pain for a brief spell. If only there had been time to infect those other people as well. Maybe he should have tried to sicken the whole lot of them, cops and firefighters as well. Or would that have been too risky?

He frowned at the memory. Worry aggravated his ulcer, causing acid to eat away at his stomach lining. He searched his pocket for some Tums.

Where had those gun-toting agents come from anyway? Running into them outside the gymnasium, where they had apparently been trying to take custody of the glove, had been an unpleasant surprise. Who else was after Clara Barton’s glove? Granted, he had already taken care of the man, but that female agent was still out there, along with whomever she worked for.

That complicated matters. He didn’t like having competition.

The mounting pressure on his skull made it hard to think. Bile curdled at the back of his throat. He was already getting nauseous.

Time for another rest stop.

A community park offered the perfect solution. Dozens of people were crowded into the bleachers of an open-air football stadium, cheering on the local team. They rose to their feet, bellowing like baboons, as some disgustingly fit small-town hero scored another touchdown. Their full-throated cheers could be heard even through the rolled-up windows of the Lincoln. Worrall admired their spirit.

Too bad it couldn’t last. . . .

WAREHOUSE 13

The shrunken head awoke with a ravenous hunger. The blood dripping down on it from Elizabeth Báthory’s tub was not enough. Beady crimson eyes fixed on an electrical cable affixed to one of the shelves’ sturdy vertical supports. Jaws snapping, it scooted across the shelf and started gnawing on the insulated cable. A warning label posted next to the cord read
DANGER
.
HIGH
VOLTAGE
.

Sadly, English was not the head’s native tongue.

Razor-sharp fangs sliced through the rubber insulation. Sparks erupted between the head’s clenched jaws. Its wild black mane stood up straight. Its red eyes rolled in their sockets. Smoke rose from its shriveled scalp. Its bloody lips sizzled and flaked off. An aroma not unlike fried bacon mixed with the smell of burnt hair. The shrunken head vibrated like a jumping bean.

A final jolt of electricity flung the charred head across the room. It knocked over Groucho Marx’s honorary Oscar before crashing to the floor several shelves below. Blackened and smoking, it landed at the foot of a tall metal vault. The head twitched a few more times, then stopped moving. It was scorched inside and out. All the blood in the world couldn’t reactivate it now.

But the damage had already been done. The chewed-up wire sputtered and short-circuited. The aisle lights flickered on and off. A digital display on the steel vault blinked out and its locking mechanism disengaged. Rusty gears squeaked loudly as the vault door swung open, releasing a gust of stale air. Erratic lighting exposed the contents of the vault.

A Native American totem pole faced the aisle. Over twenty feet tall, the pole consisted of three carved wooden beasts stacked on top of each other. A grizzly bear, poised upon its hind legs, formed the base of the pole. A mountain lion, with chiseled fangs and claws, rested atop the bear, while a fierce-looking thunderbird crowned the pole, which had been painted according to tradition. Large black eyes gazed out from the vault. Bright red mouths and a jagged beak added splashes of color to the weathered timber pole, as did the streaked black and red feathers on the thunderbird’s wings. The entire pole had been carved from a single huge log. At least two thousand pounds, it filled the entire vault.

At first, the pole stood still and silent, like every other totem pole on display throughout the country. But then the flickering overhead lights seemed to create the illusion of animation, as though the timber limbs and jaws were gradually stirring. Any visitor observing the pole could be forgiven for assuming that its apparent movements were just a trick of the light.

But they would be wrong.

The bear growled.

The lion gnashed its fangs.

The thunderbird spread its wings. . . .

13

FAIRFIELD

Pete felt like crap.

His body was burning up. Hot and sweaty, he kicked off his covers in a vain attempt to cool down. The sudden movement proved to be a mistake. A pounding headache was dialed up to eleven. Excruciating cramps twisted his guts. He coughed violently, the jarring convulsions just torturing him more. He fell back against his pillow, gasping.

“Take it easy there.” Vanessa Calder hurried over to straighten out his blankets. She gently probed his distended abdomen with her fingers. “How does that feel?”

A pained wince was all the answer she needed. “The herbal treatments don’t seem to be working,” She fiddled with the IV. “I’m increasing the dosage on the painkillers. That should give you a little relief.”

At least for a while. He appreciated her bedside manner, but he could tell from her worried expression that she was fighting a losing battle. He hadn’t felt this bad since the time that Saracen scorpion thingie attached itself to his spine. That had nearly fried his entire nervous system before Myka figured out a way to get it off him. He could only hope she and the others were hot on the trail of another last-minute save.

“Crap!” His fist clenched in frustration. He hated being helpless like this, especially with so much at stake. He had always prided himself on being an active, take-charge kind of guy. Being stuck in bed, unable to fight for his own life, was killing him.

In more ways than one.

“Hey, look what I found.” Myka entered the room, bearing an armload of comic books. She joined the doctor at his bedside. “Something to help you pass the time.”

Grimacing, he pulled himself up to a sitting position. Vanessa helped by elevating the bed behind him, but the effort left him breathless and panting. Shaky hands accepted the comics, which turned out to be multiple back issues of
The Iron Shadow.

His favorite.

“You’ve probably read most of them before,” Myka said apologetically, “but I didn’t know what else to get you.”

“Don’t matter,” he croaked hoarsely. Despite the IV, his mouth felt as dry as the desert over Warehouse 2. He flipped through the brightly colored comics, getting a nostalgic charge from the familiar covers. There was even a copy of the classic summer annual featuring the return of the Iron Shadow’s archnemesis, the Oxidizer. He remembered reading it at summer camp when he was a kid. “These are great. Thanks.”

She bit her lip, visibly struggling to hold it together. “Who knew there was a comics shop just a few blocks away?” She nibbled on a piece of red licorice from a vending machine. Pete knew her sweet tooth acted up whenever she was stressed out. “Well, okay, Claudia knew. She found it on the Internet.”

“That’s our Claudia,” he said, forcing a smile. “Have Google, will travel.”

Myka looked anxiously at Vanessa. “How’s he doing?”

“Let’s talk outside,” the doctor suggested, clearly reluctant to discuss his chances right in front of him. “So Pete can enjoy his new reading material in peace.”

Taking Myka by the arm, she guided her out into the hall, where the two women conferred in hushed tones. Pete observed them discreetly. He couldn’t make out everything they were saying, but he caught phrases like “already in stage two,” “enlarged spleen,” “high fever,” and “distinct possibility of delirium.” And what the heck were “bronchial rhonchi”?

Myka fretfully tied her licorice stick into knots. “But there must be something you can do.”

“I’ve tried everything,” Vanessa said. “All I can do is treat his symptoms now.”

She placed a comforting hand on Myka’s shoulder, then headed off to check on the latest test results. Myka took a moment to compose herself before rejoining Pete in the room. Her eyes were damp. “So, the Iron Shadow save the world yet?”

He knew she was just trying to keep his spirits up, but there was no reason she had to shoulder this burden alone. “You do remember that I can read lips, right?”

“Oh my God.” Aghast, she looked back over her shoulder at the hall where she and Vanessa had just been talking. “How much did you . . . ?”

“I got the gist of it.”

His sister was deaf. He had learned to read lips ages ago, in support of her. It came in handy sometimes.

“It’s okay,” he assured Myka. “I’m a big boy. I can handle the truth.”

She sat down beside him and took his hand. “I’m so sorry, Pete. We’re working around the clock to find Nadia’s glove, but Vanessa says your condition is progressing even faster than expected. We’re running low on time.”

He valued her honesty. “Thanks for being straight for me.” He flipped through one of the comics. “And for actually setting foot in a comic-book shop again. I know that’s not exactly your comfort zone.”

“Hey, don’t forget: I was a superhero myself once, for about ten minutes in Detroit that one time.”

A vivid flashback, of Myka blasting energy bolts from a pair of high-tech gauntlets while wearing a skintight latex suit, drew a chuckle from his lips. “Trust me, that’s burned into my memory forever.”

“I’ll bet.” Her wry tone gave way to a more somber expression. “Pete,” she said tentatively, as though uncomfortable with what she was about say. She twirled a lock of her hair, a nervous habit he often teased her about. “Speaking of reading lips, do you want me to call your sister? I’m sure Artie and Mrs. Frederic can arrange to bring her here. Just in case.”