Chimera: A Jim Chapel Mission (Jim Chapel #1)

Chimera: A Jim Chapel Mission (Jim Chapel #1) Page 27

"Angel," Chapel said, "I didn't know."

"No, Chapel, of course you didn't. None of us did. We never stopped to ask where the chimeras came from."

Chapel had imagined they must have been grown in vats somewhere, fetuses floating in glass tubes in some dark laboratory. When he thought about it now, that seemed ridiculous. That kind of technology didn't even exist. Whereas even in 1984 it would have been child's play for a scientist like William Taggart to implant embryos in unsuspecting women all over the country.

The thought made him gag a little.

"I suppose we can assume Olivia Nguyen and Christina Smollett underwent the same . . . procedure," Chapel said. He stopped talking then. He wanted to ask more questions, but with CPO Andrews lying next to him it felt like it would be in bad taste to continue his line of thought. "Maybe we should talk about this later," he said.

CPO Andrews turned to face him again. Her mouth was set in a hard line. "No," she said. "No. This is inexcusable. You're a man, and I don't expect you to understand the level of violation we're talking about."

"I guess you're right about that," Chapel admitted.

"But even worse," Andrews said, and she pressed her lips tightly closed for a moment as if she couldn't bear to speak, but then went on, "even worse than what the government did-would be to just keep it secret. To not do something."

Chapel nodded slowly. "This isn't about hunting down the chimeras anymore. Not for me. It's about finding out what was done back in 1984 and 1985, and finding out who's responsible."

"Good. You find them. And you make them pay," Andrews told him. "Go on. Talk to Angel. Work this case. I insist."

He watched her eyes for a second. Then he said, "Angel, there were two hundred chimeras born in 1985. Why do we only have three names on our list?"

"I've been wondering that myself," Angel said, over the speakerphone. "I don't have a concrete answer. My best guess is that only these three women represented a threat to the project's secrecy."

"I don't follow," Chapel said.

"It's ugly to think about, but it makes sense why the CIA chose these women to be the mothers of the chimeras. The project was always top secret, but they needed two hundred women of the appropriate age and relative health. That's a huge security risk. They picked women with emotional problems because they were less likely to understand what was happening to them, or to talk about it afterward-and even if they did, nobody would believe them. Christina Smollett, for instance, or maybe her father figured out some of it and sued the CIA. The case was thrown out because the judge assumed she was just . . . crazy. That she'd hallucinated the whole thing, or whatever. The secret was safe, but still, it meant she was enough of a threat to get on the list. Marcia Kennedy is a relatively lucid woman. She guessed what was done to her, and maybe I wasn't the first person she talked to about it. So that gets her on the list, too. As for Olivia Nguyen, I looked up her records and she suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. She has long stretches where she appears to be perfectly healthy-that's common with her diagnosis-but she has a habit of keeping knives under her mattress, and sometimes she thinks the songs she hears on the radio are a government plot to drive her crazy."

"A government plot-"

"Yeah," Angel said. "I don't think she's aware of what was done to her, or who did it. But she writes a lot of letters to the editor of the local newspaper talking about the government. A few of them even get printed. They're quite well written, and it takes a while before you realize they're the product of a disordered mind. They never contain anything specific enough to endanger the secrecy of the chimera project but maybe the CIA doesn't want to take the chance that someday she'll get more focused, more coherent."

"So they want her dead just in case," Chapel said. "Even though she's never done anything to hurt them. So she's on the list."

"Chapel, there's one thing I don't understand. Why the chimeras?"

"You mean, why were they created, or-"

"No," Angel said. "I mean, why send the chimeras to kill their own mothers?"

Chapel hadn't even considered that before. "Because they know the chimeras will do it," he said, at last. "The people who are running this plot, they don't care about who gave birth to who. They just know how to manipulate the chimeras. They know the chimeras hate the people who created them, and then abandoned them. It wouldn't take much to convince a chimera to kill his biological mother. Even if she never knew he existed. They can't think through their emotions."

"But why even take that chance? Why not just send Laughing Boy to kill these women?"

Chapel frowned. "Plausible deniability," he said. "There's always the risk somebody will see Laughing Boy shoot the people on the kill list. Some chance someone will put two and two together and realize the government is assassinating its own citizens. But if it's just some big, obviously crazy guy who kills these people, well, the world knows that happens sometimes. No one will investigate too deeply."

"I don't want to think about this. I don't want to know these things," Angel said. "Chapel-what's your next move?"

"I don't know yet," he told her. "Let me think about it."

SUPERIOR, COLORADO: APRIL 15, T+72:14

Eventually Julia decided that the transfusion had gone on long enough. Chapel was still short on blood, but CPO Andrews could only donate so much before her own health was at risk. Julia came back into the motel room and removed the needles from their arms. CPO Andrews got up slowly from the bed and then excused herself to go in the bathroom and wash her face.

Julia checked Chapel's pulse and looked into his eyes, checking the response of his pupils. She rubbed his arm down with an antibacterial solution and then put a small adhesive bandage over the puncture. "How do you feel?" she asked.

"Better. A lot better, thanks to you."

Julia nodded and looked away. He reached over and took her hand.

"You saved my life. Again."

"I had a lot of help." She started to pull away.

"Julia," he said, "just talk to me for a second. Okay?"

She made an irritated noise and pulled her hand away. But she didn't move away from him. "What is there to talk about?" she asked.

"I need to know if you're okay," he told her.

"No one shot me and left me to bleed out. I'm fine."

"Physically, sure. But you've learned a lot of things recently that I'm sure you didn't want to know." He leaned over and put his arm around her. She didn't push him away. "I know about emotional trauma. A lot of the guys I served with in Afghanistan came back suffering from PTSD. They couldn't just return to their normal lives, not with what they'd become over there. They couldn't sleep. They couldn't talk to their wives or children without getting angry, without blowing up. Some of them just shut down, stopped talking or stopped getting out of bed."

"I'm not-I'm handling this as best I can," Julia said. "Chapel, this was my family doing all these things. My mom and my dad forcibly impregnated all those women. They raised the chimeras like their own children, and then they locked them up and threw away the key."

Chapel pulled her closer. She laid her head on his shoulder.

"When I was a teenager, sitting in my room listening to Nirvana on my headphones and wondering which boys at school liked me, they were . . . they were out at that camp. They were there looking after their other kids, their two hundred sons. Training a whole generation of psychotic killers. I don't . . ."

She stopped because tears had crowded up in her eyes and she couldn't seem to speak until they'd all squirted down her cheeks.

"It's like my entire life was a lie. A cover story. I was their cover story. Their alibi. That was the whole reason I existed." She rubbed at her eyes with the balls of her thumbs. "I don't understand it! I don't understand any of it! I don't know who I am anymore. Last week I was a veterinarian in New York City, with a crummy little apartment and an OkCupid profile I checked every once in a while and a standing date to have lunch with my mother every week. Who am I now?"

"You're the same person," Chapel said.

"I shot a man's foot half off! I killed one of my brothers. My mom is gone, and my dad is probably going to die, and honestly-honestly, Chapel, and it bothers me, absolutely disgusts me to say this, but I think maybe he deserves it. I kind of want him to die to pay for what he did. How can I feel that way about my father? This isn't Julia Taggart, DVM! This isn't me!"

Chapel held her for a long time without saying a word. She was done with tears, but she rocked back and forth slowly, clutching her hands together in front of her. Clearly she'd needed this, needed to vent like this, for a long time. He'd been too busy chasing his mad quest to give her the chance.

Eventually she slowed her rocking and she just leaned into him, crowded up against him until they fell back on the bed and just lay there together. He stroked her hair, and she just breathed, breathed and did nothing else.

"I know how you feel," he told her.

"Come on," she whispered.

"Every soldier knows how you feel."

"I'm no soldier," she moaned.

"No. But listen. When you enlist in the military, you're just some kid. You grew up, went to high school, maybe you got in some trouble or maybe you just didn't know what else to do with your life, maybe you wanted to serve your country but frankly, a lot of soldiers I know just were looking for something to do. So they go to boot camp and everything about you is broken down. Everything you think you know about yourself is challenged and tested and evaluated. Then you get shipped overseas right into a war zone. People are trying to kill you all the time. Sometimes you have to try to kill other people. Everything you ever learned in church or in school or from your friends has to be put aside, put on hold, just so you can survive through another day. You give up every shred of who you were, who you thought you were, so you can be something else. Something that can fight, and will fight. Something that will survive no matter what."

"Jesus," Julia said. "Why would anyone choose that?"

"It's hard to explain, but . . . you're surrounded by other people just like you. People going through the same thing. They watch your back and keep you alive. You do the same for them because there's nobody else who can. You get through every day because if you fail, if you lower your guard even for a moment, your friends might die. Friends isn't even the right word. They're more than that. There's no good term at all for what your buddies become. But that's the compensation. It's the consolation for all the horror you face. You get these people in your life, these people who mean everything to you, and you know they feel exactly the same way about you. You'd never say it. They would tease the hell out of you if you did. But you love them."

"You . . . do?" Julia asked. Maybe because she understood what he was trying to say to her.

"Believe it," he told her. "Believe it. When you're a soldier, you're not alone. You are never alone."

She pressed her face against his chest, and he just held her, held her close, because he knew that was exactly what she needed.

SUPERIOR, COLORADO: APRIL 15, T+73:21

After she'd rested for a bit, CPO Andrews went out and got some food and other supplies-some antibiotic cream for Chapel's various wounds, new clothes for both Chapel and Julia, some toiletries for all of them and three disposable cell phones so that they could all stay in touch with Angel. Andrews and Julia both had their own phones, but they were afraid to use them. None of them were sure what was going to happen to them, whether CIA agents were hunting them down even then.

"Laughing Boy could be coming here, right now," Julia pointed out.

"I'm actually more worried about Hollingshead," Chapel told her.

CPO Andrews found the idea shocking-that was her boss he was talking about-but she'd worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency long enough to know it wasn't impossible.

"He sent me to Denver," Chapel explained, "and I'm sure he knew what was waiting there for me. I pushed him too hard when I investigated Camp Putnam. I wasn't supposed to see that place. Now I'm a liability. Angel," he said, because she was always listening via the speakerphone, "I don't know how you left things with him-"

"I told him you're dead," she answered.

"Oh," Chapel said.

"Judge Hayes had announced as much in his press conference. He claimed he had your body and was going to turn it over to the Denver county coroner. Director Hollingshead sounded pretty upset when I confirmed it."

"I'll just bet he did," Chapel said, frowning. Hollingshead was an excellent spymaster, and that meant he had to be an excellent actor, sometimes.

CPO Andrews shook her head. "I don't get it. Why would he want you dead? He chose you to track down the chimeras. There's still one at large. Why would he want you dead now?"

"Because while I was so busy digging up CIA secrets-which suited him just fine, since he's at war with Director Banks over there-I accidentally turned up one of his." Chapel sat down on the bed and reached for a plastic container full of roasted chicken. He was starving. Blood loss could do that to you, he knew. "Rupert Hollingshead was in on the chimera project from the beginning. I'm pretty sure he ran the whole thing."

No one spoke. The two women in the motel room stared at him. He was sure Angel was listening intently, too.

Chapel took a bite, chewed, swallowed. Wiped his hands on a napkin. "In 1990, Ellie Pechowski was recruited to teach the chimeras. She was recruited by a captain in the navy. It's funny how ranks work-I'm a captain in the army, but that's not the same rank. In the navy-"

"Captain is O-6, one rank below O-7, a one-star rear admiral," CPO Andrews said. "You're talking about my branch, now."

Chapel nodded. "Captain Hollingshead was the one who recruited Pechowski. When we talked about her, he called her Ellie Pechowski, not Eleanor. Only people who know her call her Ellie." He took another bite. "I can't prove it. But I think he probably recruited William Taggart and Helen Bryant as well. I think he was the commanding officer at Camp Putnam. I think the chimera project wasn't a CIA project at all. I think it was a Department of Defense project all along."

"That's-that's-" CPO Andrews couldn't seem to accept it.

"It makes sense. It makes a lot of sense," Angel said. "It explains why Camp Putnam is a DoD facility, and why Hollingshead was the one who captured you when you went there, not Banks."

Chapel nodded. He didn't like this much. He wished it weren't true. But the evidence kept mounting. "I think he's been lying to me-to us-all along. For one thing, I don't think there even is a virus."

"What?" Julia asked, laughing as if the idea was ludicrous.

"Think about it," Chapel said. "Ellie Pechowski and your parents had constant exposure to the chimeras for years. But nobody ever treated them like Typhoid Mary. They were never quarantined, and until now nobody tried to kill them."

"No virus," Julia said, staring at her hands. "But . . . Laughing Boy . . ."

"They claim he's tracking down anyone who might be exposed. That's a great cover story. It lets him kill anyone who might be a witness-there won't be any serious oversight if Banks can claim that Laughing Boy is just controlling the outbreak of a weaponized virus. Even the president would sign off on that. But it also means Laughing Boy can kill anyone who even saw a chimera. Hollingshead and the DoD started this thing. Banks is trying to erase it from history. That's what this has all been about. I understand the kill list now. I know why those people were chosen to die. They're the only ones who know what happened. The only people who could bear witness to what Hollingshead did."

"Which means," Angel pointed out, "that everyone in this room is on that list-and I am, too."

"They want to kill us," Julia said.

"Yes," Chapel told her.

"Okay. How do we stop them?"

SUPERIOR, COLORADO: APRIL 15, T+74:22

Chapel gave her a warm smile. "I have an idea about that. It means getting your father-alive-to someone who'll listen. Congress, maybe. Or the media if that's not an option. We make this thing part of the public record. Expose the secret. Tell the world what they did to those two hundred women."

Julia and CPO Andrews both seemed to like the idea. Chapel wasn't as crazy about it, himself. It was treason. It was breaking every rule he'd ever learned as a spy. But it was the only way out of this.

"We have one advantage," Chapel said. He reached for the new shirt Andrews had bought him and started pulling it on. "They think I'm dead. Angel, what did you tell Hollingshead about Julia?"

"He thinks she's on a train headed back to New York City. I considered telling him that CPO Andrews was taking her back on the jet, but it would be too easy for him to track that. She has to file a flight plan every time she moves to a new location."

"If you're headed for Alaska, I'll take you, of course," Andrews said. "But by that same reasoning he'll know right away that you're alive, as soon as he checks the flight records. There would be no other reason for me to take the plane to Alaska."

"We'll just have to risk it. Hope that he's preoccupied and doesn't check those records, at least not until we've got Taggart. It puts even more time pressure on us, but I don't see any other way to get there in a hurry. How soon can you have the jet ready?"

"Hold on," Julia said.

Chapel stopped buttoning his shirt to face her.

"You lost nearly half your entire blood volume," she said.

"And got it back, from the transfusion. I feel fine," he insisted.

"I'm sure you feel great. People always do after getting new blood. You're still weak, regardless of how you feel. You were shot, Chapel. You have a gunshot wound. You shouldn't be going anywhere except a hospital."

"We don't have time," he told her.

"Believe me, I get it. All our lives are at stake. And I hear what you're saying, that we have to move quickly before they come for us. But if your wound reopens in the middle of a firefight, or you just collapse from anemia . . . I don't know how I'll feel about that. I can't just let you kill yourself, Chapel."

" 'First do no harm,' right? That's the oath they made you swear?"

"I'm not a people doctor. My oath said something about only using my skills for the benefit of society. Whatever. I'm not saying this as your veterinarian. I'm saying it as your . . . buddy."

Chapel reached out and put his hand on her arm. She didn't shy away.

For a long moment they just stared into each other's eyes.

"Angel," CPO Andrews said, "can you book these two a room? Another room, I mean?"

Julia and Chapel turned to face her as one. "What?" they both asked.

The CPO just smiled knowingly.

"Are you going to try to stop me from going to Alaska?" Chapel asked Julia.

"I guess not. Just consider it to be against medical advice." Julia turned around and started gathering up her things. "It'll be cold in Alaska. It's probably still winter there. Angel, can you order us some parkas? And maybe some nice, warm boots."

"I'll have them sent to the plane," the speakerphone told her.

IN TRANSIT: APRIL 15, T+75:37

There were no mandarin oranges or goat cheese salads left on the jet-the tiny galley had never been meant to be used so often. Besides, it felt wrong to ask CPO Andrews to act like a stewardess now that she was part of their conspiracy. The three of them waited for takeoff together and ate cold chicken, the remains of the meal Andrews had gathered in Boulder.

On the table between the jet's seats lay a cell phone, a cheap disposable flip phone that they left open so Angel could join their conversation. There was no need for hands-free sets now, since Chapel wanted Julia and Andrews to hear everything that was said.

"It's five and a half hours in the air to reach Fairbanks International," CPO Andrews told them. "That's the closest airport to the address we have for William Taggart. Probably another hour in ground transport. That probably means snowmobiles, of all things. My weather data says it's still very much winter up there-the snowpack won't melt until May-and there are drifts five feet deep in the surrounding areas."

"Snowmachines," Chapel said. "In Alaska, they have snowmachines, not snowmobiles."

"What's the difference?" Julia asked.

"In Alaska, they're called snowmachines. Everywhere else they're called snowmobiles."

Julia stuck her tongue out at him and he laughed. It was good to see her smiling again. He'd worried that the trauma she'd endured might have broken her spirit. Of course, every time he'd thought the woman must surely be at the end of her rope, she'd surprised him by coming back stronger. He should have expected no less.

"Angel," Chapel said, "assuming Ian was traveling by train, how long would it take him to reach Fairbanks?"

"It's hard to say. There's no direct rail service-Amtrak only takes you as far as Vancouver," Angel answered. Chapel could hear her clacking away at her keyboard. "If he was driving a car, it would take three days and nine hours, but of course, he won't know how to drive. So it has to be longer than that, given the weird ground transportation options he's looking at. How much longer I can only estimate. Say, a minimum of three and a half days."

Chapel checked his watch. "So we'll still arrive before him. It'll be close, but we'll make it."

Everyone sighed a deep breath of relief.

"What about Laughing Boy?" Chapel asked. "Have you had any luck tracking him?"

Angel sounded apologetic. "No. He checked himself out of the hospital in Atlanta shortly after you left Stone Mountain. Since then he's been a ghost. I did find out one thing you're not going to like. There was a fire at the visitors' center on Stone Mountain. A bunch of park rangers died. I think we can assume that was no accident."

Chapel leaned forward in his seat. "What about Jeremy Funt?"

"Still in a hospital in Georgia. Still under armed guard-guards sent there by Director Hollingshead," Angel pointed out. "Banks may very well want him dead, but Hollingshead is protecting him."

Chapel nodded. He had a sudden hunch. "What about Ellie Pechowski? Have you been in touch with her at all?"

"She's very much alive, if that's what you're asking. Do you want me to go down the list? Ellie, Marcia Kennedy, Olivia Nguyen, and Christina Smollett are all fine; there's no sign they've been visited by the CIA or anybody else who might wish them harm. I got a phone call from Marcia Kennedy just an hour ago, asking if it was still dangerous for her to go outside. I told her yes, but I think you were right, that Laughing Boy needs to have proof someone's been exposed to the virus before he can kill them. I think they're safe, as long as Ian doesn't come to see them."

"That's what we're going to try to stop, now," Chapel told her. "I almost hate to ask, but what about Franklin Hayes?"

"Perfectly healthy," Angel told him, "and giving nonstop press conferences. He's still reporting that you're dead, that you died saving him from Quinn."

"Wishful thinking," Chapel said. "He's probably assuming Laughing Boy will kill me before I can prove him wrong."

"In the press conferences, whenever he talks about the 'assassin,' he always uses the term 'domestic terrorist.' There's been no release of information concerning Quinn's identity-or the fact that he wasn't quite human. The media's going crazy with the story, though, trying to link Quinn to everyone from Timothy McVeigh to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front. Both sides, Democrats and Republicans, have been quick to blame the lunatic fringe of the other party. I'm guessing that Franklin Hayes won't be getting any tricky questions at his confirmation hearing when he goes before the Senate. If they stop short of giving him a Bronze Star, I'll be surprised."

"Civilians aren't eligible for that medal. You can only earn it during wartime."

Angel laughed. "Honey, they're already calling him a frontline veteran of the culture wars."

Chapel fumed, but he had worse enemies to face yet. Maybe someday, when the case was broken wide open, he'd have a chance to tell the real story and take Franklin Hayes down a peg.

Maybe.

IN TRANSIT: APRIL 15, T+76:06

Once they were in the air, CPO Andrews brought a bottle of Scotch and three tumblers out of the galley and they all shared a drink. "This is good stuff. Sorry you can't join in, Angel," Chapel said, as he sipped at the brown liquor.

"I've got a Red Bull here and some leftover Chinese food," Angel told him over the phone that lay on the table. "Works for me."

Chapel exhaled deeply and lay back in his seat. "We should all try to get some sleep," he said, and the women agreed. CPO Andrews helped them recline the seats so they became full, comfortable beds. She dimmed the cabin lights and then headed back toward her galley.

"You're not going to sleep in one of these things?" Julia asked.

"I have a bunk back there and a little TV set," Andrews said, shrugging. Chapel thought she might have winked at Julia, but he couldn't be sure. "I'll be fine."

Before she left, Chapel had one question for her. He glanced toward the front of the cabin, toward the jet's cockpit. "I've never seen the pilot of this plane," he said.

"No, and you won't," Andrews told him. "He has his own exit from the cockpit, and he never needs to come back here. Hollingshead wanted it that way-he holds all kinds of meetings in this jet, and the things he has to say aren't for everyone's ears. Don't worry about the pilot. He has no idea what we're up to, and he doesn't want to know. He's cleared to receive my orders about where we fly to and that's it. If we need to communicate with him or vice versa, there's an intercom system, but it's only used in emergencies."

Chapel nodded. It was for the best, of course. CPO Andrews had probably wrecked her career already by conspiring with him and Julia. There was no need for the pilot to be implicated.

"Good night," Andrews said, and she headed aft.

"Good night," he told her. He lay down in his seat-turned-bed and grabbed a blanket. Before he could pull it over himself, though, Julia came and lay down next to him, spooning up against him in the seat. He didn't ask why. Frankly, he was glad for her warmth lying against him.

Julia said nothing. She pulled a pillow around to support her head, pulled the blanket up over their shoulders, and was probably out like a light. Maybe she was learning a few things, like how to sleep anywhere and whenever she was given the chance.

He regretted that she'd had to learn that. Or what it felt like to kill a man. But he was grateful she'd been there-grateful that she'd saved his life so many times, but also just grateful that he'd gotten a chance to know her. To be with her.

For a long while he just lay next to her, watching her red hair stir in front of his face, blowing this way and that with his breath. Eventually he lifted his arm and gently placed it around her waist.

"Mrmph," she muttered, and snuggled back against him some more. The smell of her, the presence of her, filled his senses. It was like they were alone, floating on a cloud high over the mountains, high above the world.

He couldn't help it. He leaned forward and kissed the back of her neck. In response she brought her hand down and placed it over his. He kissed her neck again and she shivered, then laced her fingers through his.