69: A Short Novel of Cosmic Horror Read online

  “Good,” she said, working her lips into a semblance of a smile. “Then let's get to work.”

  2

  “Dropped the saliva samples off at the lab,” Barnes said, entering the little makeshift office Amanda had set up in the small conference room to the left of the main lobby. “Should have the results later this afternoon.”

  “Excellent.” She was on the facility's laptop going through the security footage from earlier that morning. Toggling between different camera angles, Amanda stopped and focused on a woman in the corner of the lobby. She was reading a book, a Louis L'Amour paperback, and holding it extremely close to her face. Her glasses, unnecessarily giant, magnified her eyes. At exactly seven a.m., the women jerked her head to the left, as if someone had whispered something into her ear. She appeared confused, pondering a response. Then she went rigid, her back straightening and arching back. Her mouth opened in a scream, as if someone was driving a knife into her stomach, in and out, over and over again, and then her body began to spasm. The paperback tumbled to the floor. The convulsions lasted about sixty seconds. She gripped the armchair for support the entire time, riding out the seizure. Then the woman froze, her face fixed in that eternal pose, that moment of terrible realization, that crippling instant of abject horror.

  “Shit,” Barnes said, looking over Amanda's shoulder.

  She turned in her seat and Barnes stepped back. “I've watched almost every one of them, the ones that were caught on camera.”

  “That's some freaky shit.”

  “You're not kidding. It all happened at exactly the same time. All seven of them went into this weird seizure. Then, they ended up exactly like that.” She pointed at the screen with her pen.

  “Still thinking brain-eating parasite?”

  Amanda shrugged and rotated back to the screen. “I don't know. Impossible to tell without the lab results. I swear...” She zoomed in on the woman's face. That look. The awful way the muscles were posed, the strained cords of her neck so clearly pronounced despite hiding behind the grainy filter of the raw footage. Her jaw appeared to have come unhinged during the attack (that was what she called it now), stuck open as if she were at the dentist. “...it's almost like they became possessed. Like something took them over.”

  “Possessed?” Barnes snorted. “Come on. You can't be serious.”

  “I'm not saying that's what it is, silly. It's just like... come on, Barnes. You've seen The Exorcist, right?”

  Barnes rolled his eyes. “Yes, I've seen it. When I was eight. Couldn't sleep for two weeks after.”

  “Watching this footage reminds me of that movie.” She chewed on her nails absentmindedly. She rewound the footage and watched it again, clicking on different angles.

  “Well, you're gonna have trouble sleeping if you don't turn it off.” Barnes took the mouse from her and x'ed out of the browser. “Come on. Let's grab coffee. The lab should have the results soon.”

  Amanda added a creamer and three sugar packets to her coffee and blew on it before taking her first sip. It was her sixth cup of the day, and even though she'd promised her doctor she'd cut down on the caffeine, she couldn't help it. She was running on three hours of sleep, plus the video footage had left her head a little rattled, filled with images of the sixty-niners, their terrified looks and wooden postures.

  She hadn't smoked a cigarette in ten years, but once she had browsed through all the available film, the craving had hit her like a tsunami. Caffeine and nicotine had always been her go-tos in times of great stress, and since the latter was much more harmful to her long-term existence, she'd opted to quit the cigs instead of giving up the joe.

  “Lab results are back,” Barnes said, rushing over to the break room's coffee bar. “And you're not gonna believe it.”

  “What?” she asked, putting down the paper coffee cup. A splash jumped over the rim and ran over the top of her knuckles, burning her. “Ah, shit.”

  Barnes helped her with a handful of napkins. She took them and patted the spot dry, and then waved her hand in the air, cooling it off.

  “Fuck.” She ignored the slight burn and grabbed the papers off the counter. Flipping through them, she felt her brow ascend her forehead. “What?”

  “I know,” Barnes said, leaning against the counter and folding his arms. “Not a single trace of bacteria or foreign antibodies. The levels are normal, and—”

  “They're the same.” She continued skimming each page, reading over the results, glancing over the numbers. The names atop the pages were different but the numbers below were identical, which didn't seem plausible. It was possible they could read similarly, even share results on a few lines, but that wasn't the case. Each attribute was exactly the same. “There must be some mistake,” she added, examining the last few results. Everything from the subject's glucose levels to their white cell counts matched, one hundred percent. And, furthermore, they were all impeccably acceptable levels. Not only were their results all in range, they were ideal. Each one represented the epitome of healthy. If this were a math quiz, every single patient would have scored a one hundred, plus bonus points.

  “It's wild, that's for sure,” Barnes said, picking a random sheet from Amanda's hand. “I mean, I expected the cell counts to vary, be off the mark, considering we could be dealing with an infection of sorts—but no, they're spot on. Unbelievable.”

  Amanda put the results on the table. “Get me someone in the lab, the person who ran the tests. I want a word with them. There has to be some mistake.”

  “Phelps already went down that road. She said the lab ran them three times because they'd never seen anything like it either.”

  Amanda retrieved her cell from her pocket and began tapping away at the numbers.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “Atlanta.”

  “For what?”

  She put the phone to her ear. “Whatever is happening here is going to require a little more than a simple investigation.”

  “Reinforcements?”

  She nodded, then walked to the other end of the room, abandoning that sixth cup of coffee.

  3

  Kim Charon seemed like a snooty woman, someone Amanda normally wouldn't engage in a public social setting, but today she had no choice in the matter. Anything that happened within the confines of this facility, anything they discovered, any progress made, she'd have to report to Kim, keep her updated throughout the entire investigation. It was the professional thing to do, the right thing to do, and Amanda prided herself on her ability to keep things appropriate even in sticky situations such as this. Though, that hadn’t always been the case and she knew it. She'd come a long way, though. Right now, the important thing was keeping her relationship with Kim amicable, especially since she would need favors, things—important things—completed, and fast. Especially since she needed help evacuating everyone from Spring Lakes.

  “What do you mean evacuate?” The woman trembled when she spoke. Clearly someone who wore her emotions on her pantsuit, Kim Charon was exactly the kind of person Amanda Guerrero loved to deal with. Uptight, difficult assholes were her specialty.

  “I mean exactly what it sounds like. We need everyone to leave the building at once. Workers and anyone who isn't... frozen in place.”

  “You just told me to call people into work.”

  “Now I'm telling you to send them home. The game has changed. I don't want to risk anyone else's health.”

  “Our health is in danger now? So this is what? Some deadly disease?”

  Barnes was happy to chime in. “We don't know yet, not exactly.”

  “Well,” the woman said, growing red, “isn't that your job? To know exactly what the hell is happening here? I mean, I can't just kick out one-hundred and fifty of my guests and my entire staff, several of whom I called in on your recommendation. Where am I supposed to put all of them? Send them to the Holiday Inn? And we're not paying our employees to stay home. You must be out of your minds.”

  Amanda si
ghed. She understood the woman's frustration, especially since this wouldn't be an easy task, but she didn't need to act like an insolent child either. “Ma'am, we have options. I suggest you start calling their relatives to see if they wouldn’t mind taking in their loved ones until we figure out this thing. If not, we have three local hospitals, all within a reasonable driving distance. Now, my people have already made a few phone calls to St. Augustine and St. Clara and both are willing and able and are expecting to take some extra traffic this afternoon. As far as paying your staff, that's just business. I'll make sure you're reimbursed for the extra help I told you to call in, and I'm sure your insurance company will be happy to assist you with any other financial damages this situation might cause.” The woman scoffed at that. “So, as I said—you might want to start making some phone calls, seeing what you can do to alleviate their discomfort and confusion. Because, right now, I bet all one-hundred and forty-three of your guests are probably very frightened. And honestly, this isn't the best place for them anyway, not with everything going on.”

  “This is unacceptable. People are paying for their loved ones to be here. Under our care. They expect a problem-free environment.”

  “I'll repeat, you can file a claim through your insurance company for any financial setbacks you might incur. We also have access to some government funds for situations like this, which I'd be more than happy to help you file for, so no worries there. But what I would worry about is your clients. Your guests, as you call them—because... aren't they the most important thing?”

  The red woman didn't have a response for that. If she did, she didn't share. Instead, she pulled on the bottom of her suit jacket, raised her chin, and said, “Fine. I'll get working at once.”

  “I appreciate your cooperation,” Amanda told her, a faux smile accompanying the words.

  After the woman disappeared around the corner, with her lawyers in tow, Amanda turned back to Barnes. “That went a lot better than expected.”

  “Thought you were going to lose your cool.”

  “Almost did.”

  “Would have liked to see it.”

  “I bet.”

  “Phelps and I had a wager.”

  “Oh?”

  “Lunch.”

  “What side were you on?”

  Barnes laughed, ran his hand through his hair. “Not sure if I should tell you.”

  “If you're worried about my feelings, don't be.”

  “Okay, I had you blowing up. At least cursing her out, telling her to fuck her own face-hole.”

  “Come on, man. I'm a little more professional than that.”

  Her track record didn't exactly support that theory. Last year, while investigating a peculiar flu strain at an elementary school in Buffalo, she had gotten into an altercation with the principal. The two ended up shouting in each other's faces, nose-to-nose, and Amanda had put a hand on her. On her chest. Pushed her a few steps back. That was as far as it had gone, but, if Barnes hadn't been there to drag her away, who knew what would have happened.

  You were gonna slug her, Barnes had said.

  No, she'd said stubbornly, despite knowing it wasn't far from the truth. There had been a part of her that knew she was capable—more than capable—and, if the scuffle had gone on just a little bit longer, well, hell, she might have decked the intolerable woman.

  “Well, maybe just a little more professional than that,” she said, having a laugh about it even though it was hardly funny. She could have been fired for laying a hand on the woman, and again, Barnes had gone to bat for her, smoothed things over with the school's administrators, convinced them not to report the incident.

  “I was thinking we were in Buffalo all over again.”

  “Hm. Buffalo. My favorite place.” She jabbed his arm. “Come on, Barnes. Give me an ounce of credit. I've behaved myself lately.”

  “Okay, okay. Just an ounce. Nothing more.”

  Silence claimed the next fifteen seconds.

  Barnes scanned the empty conference room. “So... what's next?”

  “Well,” Amanda said, picking up the paperwork, shuffling through it and glancing over the identical numbers the lab had reported, hoping to discover something she had missed. But there was nothing except the same results printed over and over again. The names changed, but the blood work stayed the same down to the smallest fraction.

  She considered their options. “Let's monitor their vitals while we wait for direction from Atlanta.” Blood work and saliva samples were all they could really do right now, unless they cracked one of the sixty-niners' heads open and took a tissue sample of their brain—but they were nowhere near that stage yet, nor would they be unless one of them died. And, so far, every single one of the infected was still alive, even if their appearance suggested otherwise. Science proved them to be alive. All seven of them. Healthy as could be. Dead on the outside. Alive within.

  “Okay,” Barnes said, then squinted as if fighting off the onset of a killer headache. “Hey, did Kim tell you one of the guards tried to move one of them?”

  She looked up from the papers. “No? Why would he do that?”

  “Said he wanted to lay her on a bed or something. I don't know all the details, but he went for it. And you know what?”

  She waited.

  “Guy said the elderly woman didn't budge. He couldn't move her. And I quote, 'Sir, I weigh two-seventy and played defensive tackle in college. I could move a wall if I needed to. That woman didn't budge from her seat, not a millimeter.' She couldn't have weighed more than a hundred pounds.”

  “Interesting.”

  “More than interesting. Impossible. He said it was like she'd been filled with concrete.”

  Amanda recalled how hard the man with the cane had felt to the touch. He'd felt solid, and so cold, cold and hard like a block of ice. His flesh had not rebelled against her touch and, as weird as she had thought that was at the time, it was even stranger after hearing the guard's experience.

  What the hell is happening here?

  “I have to admit, Amanda,” Barnes said, all traces of his humor erased, “I don't like the vibes I'm getting from this place.”

  “Oh Christ. Not this again.”

  “I'm serious this time.”

  “You and your vibes.”

  “You don't think it's weird?”

  “Of course, I think it's weird. But there's a rational, scientific explanation for all of this, and we'll dig to the bottom of it. Don't worry. We always do.”

  “Okay. Fine. Whatever you say. I'm just saying, you were the one who brought up The Exorcist earlier.”

  She twisted her lips. “That's just what the footage reminded me of. Never claimed these people were possessed by Pazuzu.”

  “Yeah, you're right. I don't believe in that shit anyway. However... if this does turn out to be some kind of demonic possession case, you owe me a beer. Or twelve.”

  “Joe, we both know you don't drink. Not anymore.”

  He pinched her cheek. “Ten years sober tomorrow, actually.”

  “Congrats, kid.”

  “Oh, I'm a kid now, am I? Thought I was at least six years older than you.”

  “Yeah, but I'm your boss. So, it's like you're my kid.”

  “Not sure how to take that, honestly.”

  She slapped his shoulder with the file. “Take it however you want. We got work to do. Let's split up. I want you to record pulses, heart rates, and noticeable changes in complexion or...” She almost said behavior, but that was dumb because there was no behavior. These people were statues. Dead to the world, though, not really. “...or, any noticeable differences from before.”

  The door to the conference room swung inward, and Kim Charon appeared with her squad drifting in behind her. She seemed out of breath and hunched over once she crossed the threshold. The two lawyers had their hands on her back and kept whispering “Are you okay, Kim?” into her ear, over and over again, until she told them how fine she was.

  “
What's the matter?” Amanda asked, pangs of nervous panic hammering away at her chest.

  Kim stood up, catching her breath. “One of them... one of them moved.”

  4

  As soon as she stepped inside Manuel Renteria's dorm, Amanda smelled the sticky-sweet scent of pipe-smoke and cheap cologne, and was instantly transported back to another time, another place. That time was twenty-seven years ago when she was six years old, and that place was her grandfather's home just outside of El Paso, Texas, about five miles from the Mexican border. The odor alone almost caused her to exit the room prematurely, but once she saw the face of the frozen man, got a good glimpse at the mustache clinging to his upper lip, she literally leaped back over the threshold and into the hallway. An inward cry escaped her mouth. She bumped into the wall, and Barnes rushed over to her side, his eyes enlarged, his forehead creased with concern.

  “What the hell, Amanda?” he asked her quietly, not making a big production out of it. “Are you okay?”

  Neither Kim nor her lawyers paid much attention to her reaction. They were filing into the room, their eyes glued on the stiff in the corner. Manuel's eyes were bulging, staring into some foreign world beyond this one, his mouth stretched wide as if he'd meant to fill it with a hoagie. Once everyone had made their initial observation, they turned to Amanda, waiting for her to finally enter the room and give the old man a quick visual examination, for whatever that was worth.

  Not much, she thought, bouncing off the wall. “I'm fine,” she told Barnes in a whisper, and then crossed the threshold, entered the room, and walked over to her newest patient.

  The man in question, Manuel Renteria, looked oddly like her grandfather. The eerie resemblance had knocked her off balance, both mentally and physically. A cluster of memories had come rushing back to her, none of them inspiring. A cold sweat had broken out beneath her hairline. Her nerves stirred, causing her bones to rattle, and tingle with the onset of fear-induced numbness. She heard her teeth chattering and wondered if anyone else in the room heard it too. She wasn't prepared to answer the questions they were sure to ask if they caught her behaving this way.