Talbot looked rather surprised for a moment, but he didn’t let that distract him from the business at hand. “Well, Betty, how about I pick you up here, say, six?”
“All right,” she said. “No point in dismissing new concepts out of hand, I suppose. Right, Bruce?”
He nodded, his expression as stony as ever. And not for the first time, Bruce had the eerie feeling that someone or something else was rooting around just behind his eyeballs, growling in annoyance at the way things were progressing.
He found it oddly disconcerting, and, even more oddly, comforting.
hints of jealousy
The steady squeaking of the wheels on the janitor’s cart would have been enough to get on the nerves of just about any other person. But the janitor, unperturbed, pushed his cart steadily down the hallway of the Lawrence Berkeley lab facility, looking neither right nor left. People passed him by and didn’t even glance at him, which suited him just fine. He had nothing to say to them, and certainly they had nothing to say to him. As a janitor, he was one of the invisible people. At most someone might nod vaguely in his general direction and then instantly forget they’d seen him at all. That also suited him.
He kept his head down, focusing his attention on the floor and his cart. Every so often he’d raise his head enough to look around, his eyes burning with a frightening intensity. Had anyone looked him square in the eyes, they would have been taken aback, perhaps even frightened. Fortunately, no one did.
He brought his cart to a halt and removed a bucket of water and a mop. He used the same bucket to both soap the mop and also to clean it, so the water within had turned an unpleasant shade of gray. He wasn’t doing the floor any favors by running his mop over it, but that didn’t seem to matter to him.
More people were coming, and he adopted a carefully neutral, distant, and bored look as he began slathering the floor with the dirty water. Several staff members were heading in his direction, but when they saw what he was up to, they headed off down another hallway to keep clear of him.
That was exactly what he wanted. It facilitated his being able to hear the conversations he wanted to hear. Looking apathetic and nonchalant, he ran the mop across the floor as he sidled over to the lab that he knew Bruce Krenzler frequented.
“Excuse me.” The female voice so startled him that he almost dropped the mop. He stepped back, keeping his gaze lowered, as that woman—that Dr. Ross—stepped carefully around the wet areas. She had her coat on, and a shoulder bag crammed with reports and such slung over her shoulder.
The janitor kept his gaze fixedly on the floor. He grunted. He didn’t like this situation at all. She was noticing him, and it wasn’t to his advantage to be noticed. She paused a moment more, and he briefly considered beating her to death with the mop. But he decided that might be a bit of an overreaction.
A fortunate thing he came to that conclusion, too, because she then pulled open the door of the lab and stepped through. It swung shut behind her, obscuring her from view. Obscuring her, but not her voice, nor his.
His . . .
“Mine,” muttered the janitor, and he smiled, and his smile was a terrible thing to see.
There had been a little trill of warning in the back of Betty’s head when she passed the janitor—as if her subconscious had been reacting to something—but then she just assumed she was, quite properly, being cautious about slipping, and gave it no more thought.
Instead she focused her attention on Bruce, who hadn’t even heard her enter. He was working in the imaging room, and things didn’t seem to be going well.
She adjusted the bag on her shoulder. She couldn’t make up her mind about whether she should feel guilty for going out to dinner with Talbot, or feel foolish for doing so, or feel annoyed with Bruce because she’d agreed to go out with Glen mostly just to try to get some sort of damned reaction out of Bruce . . . and had, once again, failed.
She sighed inwardly, and resigned herself to the fact that things simply were what they were, and there was no use getting herself worked up about it.
“Hey,” said Betty, “I’m off.”
Bruce nodded. He barely glanced in her direction.
Her shoulders sagged. “You’re angry,” she said.
“No, I’m not,” he told her. He couldn’t have been more noncommittal.
“Oh, right,” said Betty. “I forgot. You never get angry. Look, Glen may be a jerk, but you may want to think about it. More resources and equipment, less red tape.”
“Please,” Bruce told her. “I just want to stay focused. On the work. Not profits, military applications, politics. Just the work.”
There was no way for her to discern whether he was talking in general terms about the direction of his career, or whether he just wanted her to shut up and get out of the lab so he could pay exclusive attention to what he was working on. But she realized that, either way, it had absolutely nothing to do with any feelings he might have about her going to dinner with Glen Talbot—provided he had any at all. Which, if he was to be believed, he didn’t.
She sighed and muttered, “It’s stupid,” without really realizing that she was speaking loud enough for Bruce to hear her.
“What?” said Bruce, but his response was purely automatic.
“I just wish you’d show even the slightest hint of jealousy,” said Betty. Naturally he didn’t react. He likely hadn’t even heard her. Frustrated, she moved to leave, and then paused. She went over to him and stroked his hair.
“You need a haircut,” she said.
For the first time, Bruce actually focused on her. He looked at her hair clinically, as if studying a cell sample. “So do you,” he announced. Then he must have realized how somber and serious-minded he sounded, because he actually smiled. Betty smiled back.
“Good night.”
He nodded in response to her. She turned and headed for the door, and then she turned back to say something else to him.
He was already gone, deep into his own world. He probably didn’t know if she’d left or not . . .
. . . and probably didn’t care.
Shaking her head, she walked out of the imaging room, pushing through the door, taking care to do it slowly so as not to collide with the janitor.
She stopped. His back was to her, but something suddenly clicked in her mind. If she hadn’t been so preoccupied with thoughts of Bruce, it would have occurred to her earlier. Addressing the custodian’s back, she asked, “Hey, um, what happened to Benny? Is he still working the night shift?”
There was a pause, a heavy exhaling of breath, as if forming the words was a vast hardship that the janitor was embarking upon solely to keep her happy. “Benny’s dead. I’m the new guy,” he said in a voice so distant that he would have rivaled Bruce Krenzler for conveying information with the purest dispassion.
The news about Benny threw her. He had seemed healthy the last time she’d encountered him, always whistling some cheerful tune or other. And just like that, he was gone? “Oh,” was all she was able to get out. Then, feeling something else should be said, she added, “Glad to meet you.”
“Same.”
She might have imagined it, but there was something in his voice that seemed faintly mocking. But she put it out of her mind as she headed out, thinking sad thoughts about Benny and dwelling on the fact that one never knew when one’s time would suddenly be up . . .
. . . not realizing that her own time had nearly come up far sooner than she knew.
As the night shadows stretched their fingers across the length and breadth of Bruce’s private office, he put down the book that bore strings of results and DNA recombinants that he was certain held the key to wherever they were going wrong. He leaned back in his chair, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. Fatigue was beginning to play upon his mind, and he was starting to think that even if the answer to his frustrations was directly in front of him, he still likely would be too blind to see it.
He let his mind wan
der, which he was normally loathe to do. In this case, though, it wasn’t as if he was using the damned thing for anything especially important. He thought about Betty, about her going out with Talbot, and he found it . . .
Annoying. Yes, that was it. He turned the emotion around, upside down and sideways, studying it from every conceivable angle, and yes, by God, it was annoyance.
Betty would probably have been ecstatic.
But thoughts of Betty in the present drew him, moth to flame, to thoughts of Betty in the past. In spite of himself, he reached into his desk drawer and pulled out the photo of them that the camera on the automatic timer had clicked, back in the cabin.
He stared at the photo, his mind flying back to that ill-advised weekend. They had rushed things, that was all. Tried to push a relationship through when it wasn’t quite ready.
And when would it have been ready? When would you have been ready?
The thoughts moved unwanted across his mind. Unwanted because there was nothing that could be done about it, in retrospect. Unwanted because he couldn’t help but think he could have done more about it at the time. There was no point in second-guessing his actions or feelings on the matter. They were what they were.
Still, her words came back to him. You’re breaking my heart. The phrasing bothered him. It seemed to him she was making him out to be some sort of . . . of monster.
He stared long and hard at the photo, the image of two people caught forever on the cusp of a relationship that should have gone in a different direction, but hadn’t.
No. No, he wasn’t a monster. But maybe, he thought ruefully, he was an idiot.
Bruce put down the photo, picked up his bag, and left his office. He walked into the main hallway. It was deserted, a few lights on, some evening light drifting in. The soles of his shoes squeaked on the newly cleaned floor. He almost slipped at one point, but righted himself at the last moment.
Then he heard a whimper from around a corner. Puzzled, Bruce walked toward the sound and heard more whimpering. He turned the corner. A small, mangy poodle sat in the middle of the hallway, alone. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen something quite that pathetic-looking.
Bruce walked toward the creature slowly, hand out. “Hey there,” he said softly, encouragingly, “who are you?” He glanced around, trying to see if there was an owner anywhere nearby. No one came to his attention.
The dog, meantime, continued to stare up at him, its tail was wagging, although Bruce was having trouble remembering whether that meant a dog was friendly or tense. He’d read articles that went both ways. Its tongue was hanging out, its eyes bright.
He reached toward the poodle to pet it. Suddenly, it bared its teeth, growling and snapping. The teeth were rotting in the creature’s head, and Bruce jumped back, yanking his hand away before it wound up snagged in that deteriorating jaw.
“Okay, okay!” he said, backing away. Once more he looked around, hoping to catch a glimpse of whoever might own this miniature hound of the Baskervilles, but still no one was showing up to claim the thing. He continued to back away, returning his gaze to the animal, concerned that it was going to follow him, maybe try to take a piece out of his leg. But the dog just stood there, growling at him warningly, and Bruce couldn’t help but feel that he’d just had a very close call.
He emerged from the building. The sky was cloudless, the full moon hanging there like a great unblinking eye. He wondered if perhaps that didn’t explain it; there was a werepoodle wandering the premises. It certainly made as much sense as anything else. Suddenly the thought occurred to him that perhaps there was some sort of pack of wild dogs wandering the area. It had to be a pack, didn’t it? That was how they always traveled.
Quickly Bruce made his way over to the bike rack, keeping a watchful eye on the shadows of the buildings surrounding him. Despite the light from the moon, the darkness seemed to distend all around . . . and for no reason that he could really fathom, or at least for no reason that he wanted to, that distending brought with it associations that chilled him. He pushed them away from him as he saw a burly security guard entering the building. Between the presence of the guard and the proximity of his bicycle, now only a few feet away, he felt a swell of relief.
“Hey,” he called, “there’s a poodle in there . . .” and immediately realized exactly how asinine that sounded.
Obviously it wasn’t lost on the guard, who gave him a look that seemed to say, God save me from these oddball scientists. As if addressing a child, or a moron, or a moron child, the guard replied, “A poodle. Sure. Yeah, we’ll look into it.”
Feeling like an utter moron—not an easy feat for someone with an IQ of 187—Bruce Krenzler climbed aboard his bike and sped off for home.
The janitor smiled as he slid the all-purpose skeleton key into the lock, and turned it with a satisfying click. As he did so, he imagined the key being a knife, and the lock being the bosom of one Dr. Betty Ross.
He could have strangled her. He had planned it so carefully, so very carefully. Benny the janitor had hardly been a twin for him, but there had been a casual enough resemblance that the janitor had been able to exploit it. A dyeing of his hair, some artful makeup had been sufficient. A casual glance between his face and his photo ID—the ID of the late Benny Goodman—would attract no attention.
Thus far it had worked. The guard at the front hadn’t given him a second glance as the ID with the magnetic strip had gotten him into the facility. Once inside, he’d gone straight to the custodial closet, gotten the equipment, and proceeded to do his job. Again he had done so and garnered no notice. Why should he? He was just a janitor, a lowly worker, whose face didn’t register on anyone.
And then there had been that damned Ross woman.
Bitch.
He should have snapped her neck when he’d had the chance.
Expect her to know the name of the custodian. Expect her to be paying attention. His presence was due entirely to the fact that no one knew Benny was dead. If Ross started poking around, asking questions, things could get ugly. He hoped it didn’t come to that. If it did come to that, he hoped he’d have the opportunity to make her pay for inconveniencing him.
Perhaps a knife right into her, as he was imagining now. Or . . . something more creative. That was also an option. And the thing to remember was that she obviously cared about people; if she hadn’t, she’d never have noticed that Benny wasn’t pushing a mop around. She hadn’t spotted it the first time around, but the second time . . .
Well. Just a matter of trying to put the right spin on the situation. Rather than concerning himself with being discovered, the janitor instead decided to file away his knowledge of Ross’s obvious concern for people in general and, obviously, for Bruce Krenzler in particular. That could be of great use later on, if it came down to it.
And speaking of things of use . . .
Like a passing shade, the janitor entered Bruce’s office. At first he was going to leave it dark, but then he realized there was no point in doing so. He was, after all, supposed to be there. If he was cleaning up in blackness that was illuminated only by moonlight, that might attract attention. He reached over and flicked on the light, squinting slightly against the brightness.
He looked around quickly, not wasting any time. He picked up the wastebasket, examined it, grunted in annoyance, and emptied it into his cart. Then he continued to survey the office, his eyes narrowing, as direct and piercing as a laser. It didn’t take him long at all to spot what he was looking for. Carefully, delicately, he ran his hand along the office chair, found a hair, and picked it up, holding it up to the light.
He smiled. He didn’t do it often, and it wasn’t a pretty sight.
Bruce wasn’t around to see the janitor and assess his smile one way or the other. Instead he was speeding along on his bicycle, zipping down one of the Berkeley hills, a brisk breeze blowing in his face and whipping his hair back. He completed the angle down the hill and rode the momentum, going up as muc
h as he could before he started putting muscle into it. It wasn’t long before the strain started taking a toll on him, however. As he huffed and puffed his way up the hill toward his home, he started to wonder whether his hope for building up muscle and endurance was a pipe dream. Perhaps he was just one of those people who, no matter what they did, were never able to build themselves up. He might just be genetically doomed to a life of being puny Krenzler.
said of old soldiers
Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross was starting to feel his age.
It annoyed the hell out of him. No one had a more demanding, more rigorous schedule of physical fitness than he. Jogging, weights, martial arts. He did so much to maintain his condition that he’d almost come to believe that he was entitled to some sort of immunity against the stresses of age, out of sheer consideration for his efforts.
God in heaven, however, didn’t seem to agree.
That was doubtless the reason why he felt his eyes starting to ache as he worked into the early evening. Not only that, but he had to stand every so often and stretch his legs, because he could feel them cramping up on him. Leg cramps, aching eyes. He was starting to get genuinely angry with his body, feeling it was betraying him and not working in his best interests. He sat back in his chair, stretched his legs again, and wondered if he could have his body court-martialed for dereliction of duty.
One of his aides, Lieber, entered with a folder. Lieber had on a grim expression, which instantly caught Ross’s attention, because Lieber had a fairly good sense of what was and wasn’t going to irritate Ross on any given day. He definitely had his “Ross is going to be pissed off” face on.
Ross promptly leaned back in his chair, his face a question mark. “General,” said the aide, “Talbot wanted you to see this. It’s about a lab Atheon is targeting for acquisition and removal to Desert Base.”
“Why isn’t he going through NSC?” asked Ross.