Part 2 (2/2)

”I'm fine.”

Lie.

I couldn't say anything else. Anything other than 'fine,' and the scientists would start to cover their a.s.ses, telling the colonel that I could go crazy and rampage through malls killing children. The colonel must have stuck his neck out to get me out of the cell in the first place, but he would have no choice but to put me back if the scientists got nervous. And once back, they'd never let me out again.

I handed him an envelope of expenses and written reports as a distraction. He slipped it in his folder and pa.s.sed me back an envelope which would contain a check for my last expenses.

I knew he wouldn't be happy with my answer. He tried the long silence way of getting me to talk, but I'd been there, done that. I'd walk silently through the whole museum and look at every exhibit until his time was up, if necessary.

”It's been a year,” he said eventually. ”And only a few months since the last job blew up on us. I'm not sure 'fine' quite covers it.”

A year. I knew that. I knew it in my bones, in the itch of my throat when I looked at it in the mirror, or in the panic of my nightmares. A year ago, I'd lost my squad, one by one, in the dark jungles of South America. I'd survived. They'd actually bagged me as a corpse-no one could have survived those injuries. Half my throat had been torn out. It must have looked as if there was more blood soaking the dirt around me than remaining in me. But I wasn't dead, and five days later you could hardly see the scars. I was raving and screaming, but I was alive and physically healed.

The army hadn't believed in vampires. And if you were talking Hollywood vampires, they still didn't. Vampires didn't turn to dust when you killed them-I was still clutching my attacker's severed head when they found me. Sunlight and religious artifacts had no effect. But they drank human blood all right, and the army wanted to know if I was going to.

I hadn't yet. I was stable. There were some physical changes: it was harder to injure me, and I healed quickly. My health, strength and stamina had improved. I saw better in the dark than the average person. The army was very, very interested. Or at least, the little part of the army I'd been involved in. No one else knew, and part of the conditions of my 'release' was that it had to stay that way. The drawbacks-the nightmares, the paranoia-those the army weren't so interested in. 'Just Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. You'll get over it. Oh, and you can't go talk to a head doctor, by the way. Security issues.'

”I'm getting along,” I said out loud. ”Police work is better than the accounting job.” My voice sounded creaky. ”I'm finding my feet, and I'm doing everything you asked as well.”

The colonel flipped his folder open. ”Well, as long as the medical team is happy with your answers, you won't need to come back in for another checkup yet.”

c.r.a.p. He had to remind me. I'd do pretty much anything to stay away from them, even answer their questions. I'd never been claustrophobic until they'd strapped me to a bed and left me in that tiny room. The only thing that had kept me from screaming and thras.h.i.+ng till I pa.s.sed out again was that they'd been watching me. Even when they weren't there in person, their cameras had focused cold, unblinking eyes on me, 24/7.

'The subject is distressed...'

One of them had actually said that. The sound of his voice floated out of the maelstrom of memories, cold and detached. I s.h.i.+vered.

I'd found a way to force the reactions back down inside, to show them nothing of what I was feeling. I used that again now, determined not to let the colonel see how rattled I was.

”Nightmares?” he asked abruptly, his pen hovering over a printed list.

”Fewer. The same ones. They're getting real old now,” I lied.

”Any other sleep problems?”

”No.” That was true. The nightmares didn't leave time for anything else.

”Anxiety, unexplained physiological changes, sensations of heat, cold, racing heart, arrhythmia?”

Like right now.

”None of them,” I said.

The colonel paused beside an exhibit.

”Outside of the nightmares,” he read from his list, ”do you repeatedly visualize or think about events in the army?”

”No,” I lied again. I tried to avoid it. I'd loved my life in Ops 4-10 and now I could never go back. Thinking about it was torturing myself. I had to break this habit. This was the new me. Out here, on my own. Standing strong. Not looking back.

”Blackouts?”

p.r.i.c.kles of cold ran down my back. We were heading off the PTSD track. The medical team had theorized that I would experience psychogenic blackouts if my 'condition' progressed.

”No.” Not yet. Not ever, I hoped. There would be no repeal if I turned. I'd spend the rest of my life in restraints, being studied by scientists who would dispa.s.sionately note down how distressed the subject looked.

The colonel folded the pad under his arm and gazed at the Western scene we'd stopped in front of. I wasn't fooled. There were more questions to answer.

”Are you still running, Sergeant?”

”Yeah. It's not as regular now because of my hours.”

”Have your fitness or stamina levels improved unexpectedly?”

”Not unexpectedly,” I hedged. ”I've been doing a lot of workouts at the police gym and I've also taken up Kung Fu training again. I found a Kwan here, with a good teacher.”

Colonel Laine raised an eyebrow. ”You're hardly in need of more martial arts training.”

”With respect, Colonel, I don't agree. And I'm careful with other students.”

He snorted, looked as if he was about to turn away, but came back suddenly, right in my face.

”Cognitive dissonance?” he asked, staring at my eyes. He didn't blink any more than a camera lens would have.

There it was: The Question. The medics had drummed it into me before I'd been allowed out. In order to be a vampire, I'd have to hold different beliefs. I'd have to be able, not just to do previously unthinkable things, like sucking blood, but to want to do them. And they theorized that the changeover would be relatively slow. There'd be a time when I'd be halfway, wanting to do something and not wanting to do it at the same time. Seriously screwed in my head. That was their warning flag. They'd have to imprison me. Once I turned completely, there was no knowing what I'd do or how it might end.

No way. Just not going to happen.

”No, sir. I'm stable,” I said.

We stayed like that, eyeball to eyeball, for a good minute before he broke away.

Relief flowed through me. I took it I'd pa.s.sed again and I was still free.

We walked into the next gallery.

”Your searches have all come up blank so far,” he said.

I'd been worrying they'd take the lack of progress as a sign I was hiding something from them. Now I was worrying that if I told them about the body in the dumpster and it turned out to be a false alarm, they'd think I was becoming unstable. That I was imagining things. That I needed to be back under observation.

”Yes, but it's a big city, there can't be many of them-”

”And they keep their heads down. We did draw up the projections together.” He frowned. ”Maybe the underlying a.s.sumptions were wrong. Maybe we're looking in the wrong place.”

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