Under My Skin - Part 14

Louis' legs flailed as he dropped from the esophagus to plop into a thigh high puddle of stomach acids. The stomach walls convulsed, sloshing the thick, foul smelling liquid around. The trip down left Louis shaking, short of breath. All he could see was a giant dark blank, not from the lack of light, but from the edge of his vision going dark from panic. Something vibrated in his ear. His lungs fluttered, panting, trying to shake off the ice crusting his veins. He had to get through this.

There was a strangled gulp from above and the chamber tilted, throwing Louis back into the acids. He scrambled to a wall, the shaking getting worse. Despite leaving his constricting tie, vest, and tux jacket with Will, it felt like he was choking. He needed to get out. He needed air.

The vibrating in his ear turned to a pattern. Words. Will speaking through the SkySprecht.

The black around Louis' vision faded away. He could see slick pink walls and could hear the frantic beat of a heart.

A minute later Massaru's battered body squeezed through the opening. Louis had to brace himself against a wall to hold the unconscious man above the liquid.

“You sure about this?” Reese asked warily, turning his com back on as did Will with his SkySprecht. Will had insisted they be turned off.

Will rummaged through the first aid kit, picking out two large plastic bags and some medical tape.

“It keeps them safe and I can secure the prototype until backup gets here,” said Will. “You just need to act calm and normal. And I need to keep out of sight.”

“I know. At least Beni will be back soon.” He saluted the safecracker. “Good luck.”

Reese did the same, but with much less enthusiasm. The two left the closet and Reese went directly to the elevator to reconvene with the party in the ballroom. Will looked at the trays left outside the rooms with half eaten food. He sighed. They would have to do. Picking out the items he needed from the trays, he noticed he hadn't heard a single complaint from Louis.

“I've said all I needed to say,” said Louis, in a tone reminding Will of stones grinding.

Two minutes passed before Louis broke the silence. “This sucks! And it's gross in here! And I'm sure as hell not going to get my deposit back on this damn tux.”

As the stomach swayed back and forth Louis gritted his teeth, readjusting his hold on Massaru as he turned his microphone to mute so he could get some peace.

Massaru shuddered in his arms, groaning. Still under the effects of his injuries and chemical influences, he murmured in a lilting language. His eyes cracked open but didn't focus. “Paro?”

“Yeah.” Louis had expected the doctor to freak out, and yet he was taking it well.

Louis frowned; he could see the glistening walls clearly. Was Massaru hit harder than he thought? “Nothing?”

“No,” said Massaru. “It's strange. I expected to hear my wife when I saw it was dark.”

“There were a lot of blackouts in India, especially where we lived. Sometimes there would be thefts, or murders in the dark. We couldn't tell if someone in the room was family or a stranger, so whenever the lights went out the first thing we did was find each other and stay together. Sometimes we'd hold hands for hours until the lights came back on.” Massaru braved a smile, coughing as he did. “That's how I met her, Parvati. I was in the university library in India when the lights died and suddenly her hand suddenly caught mine. We were strangers but she reached out to me. She had never been in a blackout before.”

Louis huffed and the two of them readjusted their grips on each other as the chamber moved.

“No,” said Massaru, beginning to pant, as if breathing was hard. Was it because of his injuries? Or could one body not breath enough for two occupants?

“But I remember waking up,” continued Massaru. “Louis, Retten was behind my abduction.”

A pint of hot rage was starting to boil in Louis' belly just at the mention of the man's name. “He was here?”

“He said he was fascinated by my code of ethics; willing spend time with people like him just to understand how his world works.”

“I agree. The rest was mostly taunting, him wanting to know what I thought about you and William.”

Massaru nodded, his eyes at half mast. His speech slurred. “Most likely. The physical abuse happened after I refused to answer his questions. Then an injection in my neck; most likely sodium pentothal. After that I blacked out.”

“Yes, I don't know why.” Massaru coughed again, shuddering against Louis in the dark. “I expect I'll end up chatting your ear off as the shot kicks in.”

“I have to listen to Fanboy all the time; I figure I'm nearly immune to normal chatter.” And better the doctor keep talking then go unconscious with his strained breathing. Louis looked around again, glaring at the foul pool of half digested food. His SkySprecht was still silent. “The crazy idiot.”

“For an idiot he was smart enough to deduce Doctor Palmer would try to visit his wife at the fundraiser.”

“In love, idiot, crazy, sometimes they are one and the same,” said Massaru. “There have been times I was tempted to abandon my work under Freewill to see my family. What makes me different from Palmer?”

Louis sighed; again he was in retrospect about deep things in a totally inappropriate place. He wanted out.

“But we need backup!” protested Cetz to the head of Watch Mission Control, the figure always in shadow on the screen. “We have a member of the Watch in need of transportation back to base and two of our agents have been compromised.”

Olivia and her assistant were still as statues in the eye of the video feet. The air was tense, like the anticipation of being shocked by a badly wired lamp. Rachel was standing by with two cups of coffee and Grant was keeping an ear on the conversation as he worked on the broken device.

“This mission falls under the jurisdiction of Martin Zachs,” reasoned WMS. “It was that way before your team got there, and it will remain so. Zachs has already been apprised of your situation and he is acting as backup for your team.”

“You are keeping him in charge when two of his subordinates are suspects in the abduction of Massaru?”

Cetz bit his lips to keep himself from cussing the man out. Did his predecessor ever have such a hard time talking sense into his superiors?

“You can keep tabs on your team, listening only, and call us again if the situation worsens.” The connection shut off.

Cetz growled and reached out for the coffee by Rachel. Before she could warn him, the liquid lava hit his throat.

Rachel hissed in sympathy and held out the other, much cooler cup. “That was my cup, this one is yours.”

Grant poked his head out of his workshop. “Rachel, can you come over here for a minute?”

On the stairs between the seventeenth and eighteenth floor of the Luvor hotel, there was a sharp ringing in Will's SkySprecht. As he was adjusting the range of sound he heard his name called from above. Before he registered who the voice belonged to, his gun was raised.

Even now the Head of Watch Security wore a suit. The jacket was open revealing shoulder holsters and a rumpled shirt, and he had a gun in his hand hanging at his side. He looked honestly stressed.

Will nodded, knowing Cetz would be able to hear him and would get the hint. “He's with Louis, safe and sound and out of the way. According to Cetz you're working with us?”

Will brushed back his hair, readjusting his Sprecht as he did so. His com was still ringing. “I'm trying to retrieve the BT prototype.”

“Then you can join me on the way up,” said Zachs, monotone as he turned to climb the stairs up.

“No.” Zachs looked over his shoulder to Will, his eyes narrowed and cold. “My own men betrayed me, William. They betrayed all that I've been working for. I'm checking all floors between here and the top. You can join me until we reach your twentieth floor.”

Will nodded and followed, a cold trill going down spine. Even Louis had never had such a cold look in his eyes. “I never thought you'd be so keen on vengeance.”

The ringing in Will's ear leveled out and then heightened in pitch. Will hissed and cupped his ear.

“Thank you, miss,” said the security guard as he handed Beni's purse back. “Sorry for the inconvenience.”

“Right,” snapped Beni as she took her purse and walked into the ballroom. “I've had boyfriends less thorough than that,” she muttered. Indignation burned in her, looking for an outlet like steam looks for the spout of a teakettle.

In the time she had been gone the party had deteriorated from its celebratory veneer. The alcohol still flowed, the music still played, and people still danced, but whenever a security guard came by the partygoers shifted away, glaring at them. Sharon, the decorator and party coordinator, was arguing with a security guard to the side of the room about the body searches, but was quickly loosing her imitation Martha Stewart demeanor. She hated the controlling woman on principal from earlier that day, but she was inclined to agree with her; security was a buzz kill.

She found Reese standing against a pillar, standing still with his hands in his pockets. He looked dejected and tense, his jaw clenched.

“What's going on?” she asked, slipping an arm under his. “I heard about Massaru while driving back in the van.”

“Kara retired early with her nurse,” said Reese in a clipped voice. “Will's little harem is deciding whether or not they should leave, and Will is on his way up to get the BT.”

“How informative of you,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Why are you standing here? You couldn't help Will?”

“I'm to stay down here until I'm called for or until backup shows up to take us back to base.”

Beni sneered, the steam finding an outlet. “Right, because your well being is so important right now.”

“So we're just going to stand here while Will is being hunted down by security guards and Louis takes care of Massaru?”

Beni took her arm away, disgust thickening her voice. “I never thought you were a damn coward—”

Reese suddenly grabbed Beni by the shoulder and walked her over to an alcove between the ballroom and the silent auction, far away from any bugged vases.

“Okay, you know that secret you've been bugging me about? It has to do with that.” Reese hissed and hunched his shoulders. “And I really didn't want to have to tell you like this.”

Beni lifted an eyebrow and her angry steam seemed to melt away at the frustration in her partner's voice. “What is it?”

Cetz entered the Head Comp Tech's workshop a moment later. “What do you got?” he asked his voice raw and tired.

“This isn't the device that was making it possible to move through Watch Two undetected, but it certainly helped…” Grant turned over one of the data panels. “I had Rachel look at this part, it's the same mother board used for processing Pulse Emitters.”

“Yes but it doesn't scan bodies, it scans machines.” Grant pointed to his screen were a composition of the device was listed. “It takes a 3D image of data drives and electrical currents, and in the right software decodes it. It can scan a computer hard drive through its casing and read the data off it like a picture book.”

Cetz frowned. Zachs said there was a BT-12 in the works. This must be the 11. And the scanning wands had been used in the BT lab.

Grant danced his hands on the keyboard, the scanners and motors whirring. “I only got a partial picture of the data captured; the rest has already been deleted.”

Grant clicked, and a black and blue image came up of a transparent human male torso, half of the file too corrupt to show the rest of the body in anything but color blocks. The file name appeared. BT-10/B-scan/BioTranscriber/2789.40024.5827_AutoFile/William_James_Rowe+L.P-02

“They scanned the BT,” whispered Cetz in horror. “Oh God, they know about Will and Louis.”

Grant frowned at the screen, seeing only a medical scan of a trusted friend. “What do they know?”

“Doesn't matter,” said Cetz shaking his head. “Can you tell me who deleted the data?”

“According to the log file it was connected to a computer. I'll check the IP, but it might take a while.”

“Do that.” Cetz paced from one end of the workshop table to the other, picking up a slinking and sloshing it back and forth as Grant typed away. The device had probably been hooked up to either Agent Ian's or Fuller's computers, and if he could find out which one then he could see if the information was sent anywhere. He needed to do damage control and fast.

At the twentieth floor Zachs followed Will closely, both with their guns drawn. Will led the way to the right, towards where Louis had said the BT was. It was still dark, and the cold sensation down his spine had returned. He took deep breaths, letting the wavering of the plastic sheeting become ambient movement to his eyes. He wished he had something more substantial in his jacket than a few matches, like a flashlight.

Zachs tapped his shoulder and pointed to a door half closed. Will nodded and stood to the side of it, taking a breath. Zachs stood at the other side, guarding his back. Will kicked the door open and led with his gun. Left, right, up… and down on the floor was the body of Agent Ian, the back of his head blown off.

On the screen flashed the number of the computer the device had connected to, and the name of the agent registered to it. The blood drained out of Cetz's face. He ran to the switchboard, switching on his SkySprecht headset as he did. “Guys! Get out of there!”

The barrel of a gun pressed against the back of Will's head and he froze. A hand reached over and plucked the SkySprecht, Cetz and Louis screaming through it, from his ear and tossed it into the dark.