Part 20 (1/2)

”I'm okay,” Sam said, but he wasn't okay. The news about Fargas felt like a kick in the chest, a crus.h.i.+ng, winding blow. Fargas's funeral was on Tuesday, and Jaggard had already said he could take time off work. He'd go. But he'd find it hard to look Mr. and Mrs. Fargas in the face. Was he responsible for what had happened?

”You look pale,” Dodge said.

”It's nothing,” Sam said. ”Let's get on with it.”

They spent most of the s.h.i.+ft digging around in the dark alleyways of the Internet, where the gamers, spammers, scammers, and phishers lived.

Places they expected to find full of seedy little servers and malformed code were empty. The dingy bars and backstreets were deserted.

It was as if the barnacles on the dark underbelly of the Internet had been sc.r.a.ped off.

What did it, who did it, how they did it, were questions without answers.

Fargas intruded constantly on his thoughts, and several times he found himself blinking back tears. Once, he caught Dodge looking at him strangely, but Dodge said nothing, which suited Sam just fine.

Sam kept an eye on his watch as the afternoon progressed, ever conscious of the time. Dodge was casual about it, but to break into the office of the Oversight rep was no laughing matter. If they were caught, he could end up back in Recton. Or worse.

He needn't have worried.

Just after 3:30, with the shadows from the windows starting to spread long gray fingers across the room, there was a paralyzing scream from the center of the room.

”What the...?” Dodge began.

The scream continued on and on, an ancient primordial sound that reeked of every kind of terror and black despair, then just as suddenly cut off.

”Get Jaggard,” Dodge said. ”That came from the swamp.” He was already running up the slope to the central octagonal office.

Sam pressed the Emergency Alert b.u.t.ton on his keyboard and ran after Dodge.

The door was locked, but before they could even think about finding someone with a keycard who would open it, the door opened by itself and something that used to be Swamp Witch staggered out.

She made just one tottering step before collapsing to her knees, then slumping over, twisting onto her back as she did so, half in and half out of the door.

Whatever it was inside her that had made that scream was gone, vanished from her body as if it had never existed. Her face was calm and still. She looked up at Sam and Dodge with the cherubic questioning innocence of a newborn baby.

27

THE PHANTOM

The paramedics took Swamp Witch out on a stretcher, her breathing shallow, her eyes empty. John Jaggard went with them, holding her hand as if she was his child.

The intense laser-beam stare was now just a soft wash of moonlight. The piercing intelligence had been replaced by the vacuous mind of an infant.

Sam had hardly known her and certainly wouldn't have been one to put his hand up and say that he liked her. But there was something about that happening to someone he knew, something about it happening right in front of him, that made it shocking in ways he couldn't fully comprehend. And coming right on the heels of the news about Fargas, it seemed almost too much to deal with.

”Well, I guess she wasn't the insider,” Dodge said in a vague attempt at humor.

The main doors closed behind the paramedic team, and after a moment or two, people around the room began to turn back to their screens. Getting back to their work, or just discussing what had happened.

”Come with me,” Dodge said, picking up the silver field kit that was still sitting under his desk.

Sam started to ask where he was going, but it was unnecessary. Dodge was heading for the swamp.

He rose on shaky legs and followed. By the time Sam got there, Dodge had already plugged in the kit and was cloning the data from the tall tower workstation beneath Swamp Witch's desk.

It smelled a bit dank in the swamp, Sam thought, or was that just his imagination? In the center was an L-shaped desk, where she worked. The big windows gave a perfect view of the entire control center, while a series of screens arranged in a circle on the outer circ.u.mference of the office showed what various members of the team were working on.

The first two screens he looked at showed the contents of his and Dodge's workstations, and he felt slightly uncomfortable, knowing that someone had been watching his every keystroke throughout the afternoon.

Swamp Witch was clearly the kind of person who liked to work in a mess. There were sc.r.a.ps of paper in piles everywhere, along with books, pens, and scattered Blu-rays.

”I've got her drive,” Dodge said very slowly. ”But it won't matter.”

”Why?” asked Sam.

”Because I can already tell you what's on it,” Dodge said. ”Absolutely bleedin' nothing. It's been wiped clean. Just like Chicago.”

Sam hardly heard. He was too busy looking at what he hadn't seen on his first glance around the office. On the floor, by her chair, half hanging by a cable from the desk, was a neuro-headset.

”Who could do this?” Sam asked, shaking his head. ”Inside this room. This is supposed to be a heavily guarded, top-secret government facility. But someone just reached inside and squeezed her brain like a grape.”

”Get back to the workstation,” Dodge said. ”I'll be there in a minute.”

Kiwi was just walking in as Sam returned to his own desk and was looking around, aware that something was going on.

”What just happened in here?” he asked.

”Swamp Witch,” Sam said. ”Some kind of seizure, or stroke, or something.”

What else could he say, really? What else did he know for sure?

”Oh.” Kiwi looked shocked and unsure what to say. He put on his headset and plugged in. After a moment, he said, as if it was somehow important, ”Vienna's on her way.”

When Dodge sat down at his desk, there was an edge to his jawline. He pulled his neuro-headset down over his biohazard tattoo and looked at Sam with narrowed eyes.

”What are you doing?” Sam asked.

”I'm going after them,” he said. ”Right now. Are you with me?”

”What do you mean?”

”I mean that whoever messed with Swamp Witch cannot have blasted their way into this room, through all our security, without leaving traces.”

”Dodge.” Sam looked down and spoke quietly. ”I don't think it's safe. Don't ask me how, but I think the neuro-headsets have something to do with it.”

”I'm sure of it,” Dodge agreed, ”and I'm just as sure that it's the only way we're going to be able to keep up with these guys. Now I'm going after them. Are you with me or not?”