Part 3 (1/2)

I didn't like the way this was heading. Searching for evidence of vampires in the USA was a major reason I'd been allowed out. Take it away and there would be an argument for returning me to the base and all that went with that.

”I understood it would take time,” I said. I was their only detector, and what I used wasn't high tech or reliable. As the vampires had closed in on my squad in the jungle, I'd found I could sense them, in two ways. There was a feeling, like something you knew you'd forgotten as you were about to leave the house, or like the feeling you got when you just knew someone had snuck up and was standing right behind you.

The scientists had rolled their eyes at that. The second way was more to their liking; I could smell vampires. They gave off a sweet, coppery scent. Very few others thought they could smell it-and most of those changed their minds when challenged-but the scientists had been able to measure electrical patterns in my brain when I got a sniff of vampire. They'd used the bodies to provide the smell. They'd been less happy when whatever was causing the smell decayed away and disappeared, but at least they'd managed to verify their results. It was official; I could smell the vampires that had attacked and killed my team.

Smell and spidey-sense had to be the two least reliable methods of detection in a city full of people and its own smells. And I had to support myself with a job; I couldn't spend all my time wandering around sniffing b.u.t.ts. So we'd applied some more a.s.sumptions to narrow down the search. People believed vampires didn't exist, so vampires must be very secretive. But if they needed blood, they had to come out sometimes. Clubs and raves and fringe society seemed to be the likeliest places. So here I was, the only person in the world being ordered by the army to live it up in Denver's nightlife. Yay me.

Now, I had my first possible report to make. But my sense of smell had been overwhelmed by the trash, and the rest was inconclusive. I needed more before I raised it with the colonel.

What if I was wrong? Or worse, what if I was right? What would happen once I'd found them their vampires? Would my usefulness be over? Or would I be hauled back to the lab for comparison studies? Either way, I held off.

Instead, he had me go back over my routine reports for the last couple of weeks, just in case there was anything we'd missed. Then he surprised me again.

”I've taken on board some help for you,” said the colonel. ”An internet specialist is searching the web for places or people in Denver that need to be looked into, so we can become more focused.” He pulled a slip of paper out of the folder and handed it to me. ”This place seems to check a lot of boxes on our profile, and there's a special event going on tonight.”

The paper was a printout from a website for Club Agonia. I'd heard of it, and the images confirmed everything. Whips. Chains. Leather. Handcuffs. Things that I didn't even want to know the use of. I couldn't keep the reaction off my face.

”Uh, Colonel-”

”I'm not asking you to join in, Sergeant. Just have a look at the place, and the owner.” He handed me another sheet. ”The club is common knowledge; the ident.i.ty of this person isn't.”

The owner was apparently called Domine. There was a blurry image that could have been anybody, and just the one name, with someone's scrawled instructions on p.r.o.nunciation-Dom-in-ay.

To h.e.l.l with the boss. She was hardly likely to be trawling the floor of her club. My problem was with the club itself, and what went on there. How did he expect me to blend in? If he thought I was going to stride in there with a riding crop and a leather bustier, he had another think coming.

I tried again. ”Colonel, this is a clique club. You get in by invitation. You get an invitation by joining in.”

”Tonight may be different,” he said. ”There's an event called the Blood Orchid Market. It has a vampire theme.” He had to have been laughing inside at this. He pa.s.sed me another printout, with emailed invitations to the event that his specialist had managed to copy. ”There'll be a lot of ordinary people dressed up, but from what we've seen, we think this is worth a visit. I have absolute faith in your ability to get in and have a look. And get out, without getting caught up in whatever's going on. Simple, for a person of your capabilities.”

He finished by handing me a slim file, including schematics of the club's layout inside.

Simple. Right.

My night off had just evaporated. At least I hadn't planned anything.

Outside, the colonel made a call and a couple of minutes later, a black car pulled up. He opened the door for me.

”I'm having a van converted for our future meetings. It'll make it more convenient to talk and run the tests,” he said as he joined me in the back seat. ”Where would you like to be dropped off?”

I gave the address where I'd left my car.

In the meantime, the colonel had done his commanding officer voodoo on me.

Don't give me excuses, just get on with it.

My concerns were not important.

I started planning. Success in this kind of op was all a matter of retaining the initiative. However, from his simple requirement, I'd picked up a slew of ch.o.r.es. I'd just have to get around all of them. There wasn't any slack. But at least being busy would stop me from worrying about Club Agonia.

He pressed a b.u.t.ton and a security screen slid up between us and the driver.

From a case at his feet, he took out a small box with straps.

My heart rate spiked. c.r.a.p. I'd known it was coming, but still, c.r.a.p. I took it, strapped it on my arm and pressed the b.u.t.ton.

The colonel had asked the scientists' questions and I had given answers. I didn't know if the scientists even bothered to look at my answers. This, I knew, they paid attention to.

They had found chemicals in my body after my recovery: strings of proteins, which they called prions, for want of a better name. Prion was a name for proteins that caused devastating brain diseases. The prions they found in me hadn't done that, and the working concept was that the prions actually caused vampirism or were an indicator of it. The box measured the level of prions in my blood. If the readout was too high, I wouldn't be getting back out of this car until we reached the base.

The little readout showed 0.40. Higher than the last one. I stopped breathing.

The colonel took the unit back and carefully jotted down the reading.

”Within acceptable variance,” he murmured.

I kept my face calm, let my breath out silently, and started to carefully relax some of the muscles that had tensed up.

Keep it all hidden.

The colonel packed the unit away as we arrived beside my car.

”Sergeant, the Observation team has no idea whether there is a psychological or biological trigger for finally becoming a vampire.” He sighed. ”You're here in Denver for a reason. Don't breach the terms, and so long as the reason remains valid, I'm not going to haul you back in for having nightmares or feeling stressed.”

”Thanks, Colonel.” Nice sentiments. I gave a small smile and let my guard down. Like h.e.l.l.

”You really don't think about 4-10?” he said.

”I think about the good times, sometimes.”

Another lie. Ops 4-10 was my life for over a third of it. My friends and colleagues, all torn away from me as if they'd all died that night in the jungle. I thought of them a lot.

He looked almost disappointed, but he nodded and I got out. I watched as they drove off.

I hadn't told him how I really felt. I hadn't told him my suspicions about yesterday's murder. Whatever supportive things he said about good reasons, I couldn't afford for him to start thinking I was going flaky, or that the PTSD was out of hand and my paranoia was taking over. I wasn't going to give him any reason to take me back.

As for the murder, time enough to alert him if I found proof.

'You're here in Denver for a reason.' He hadn't been explicit about the catch in that. He'd even sounded sort of supportive, but he had to know I'd thought this through. The army needed me to find vampires. Once I'd found vampires, what else would they need me for? Certainly nothing that left me here in Denver. I could think of lots of things they might want from me, but they all involved being back under observation.

As for the colonel, we'd gotten along well in Ops 4-10. He was in overall command of the unit, and that meant he was where the buck stopped when I'd messed up, gotten my squad killed and gotten myself bitten. He'd lost the Ops 4-10 position and ended up running the small medical Observations team which was investigating me, Obs for short. I could hardly be surprised he wasn't my best friend forever, that he seemed to radiate disappointment in me.

His car turned the corner. I eased the tension out of my shoulders and closed my eyes. This morning had felt too close. I hoped tonight would turn up something that would take the colonel's attention off me.

I should have been more careful what I wished for.

Chapter 4.