Brian O'Grady - Hybrid

“Okay,” Heller said, regaining some of his composure. “Fill me in. How do you know this?”

“That’s not important,” Rodney said brusquely. “You need to tell your people in Washington that Reisch is here, or at least was this afternoon, and that he’s on the run. One of my officers may have wounded him, so I doubt he’s gotten far.”

Patton had positioned himself directly in front of Heller and was using his more-than-four hundred-pound frame to intimidate the much smaller man into action.

“Is this related to the officer-involved shooting at the hotel?” Heller asked, staring up at Patton.

“Yes, and we have a pretty good eyewitness description. We’ve passed it on to the media.”

“Excellent, excellent,” the FBI agent said. “I’ll pass this on. There is one more thing, and it involves you, Greg.”

“Me?” Greg’s heart skipped a beat. There was only one reason the FBI would have an interest in him.

“I need you to come with me and convince Amanda to turn herself in.” Heller’s tone had become almost sympathetic. “Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not using this situation as an excuse to close an open case. Privately, we all know what happened seven years ago. That’s not what this is about.”

“Amanda is not spreading this virus,” Greg said, his anger rising to the surface.

“Honestly, I didn’t know anything about a virus until I walked in here. What I do know is that more than a hundred agents have been flown into a quarantine area to find her. We know she’s here, and we will find her. I don’t want anyone hurt, and that includes Amanda.”

“Why the sudden concern for her welfare?” Greg saw no point in arguing that he didn’t know where she was.

“Because I have been ordered by the President of the United States to bring her in alive, and if possible, unharmed. We will find her, even if it takes a hundred more agents, or even a thousand more. We both know what happened the last time someone tried to bring her in, and I don’t want a repeat of that.” Patton saw a new side of Heller; the man genuinely did not want Amanda hurt.

“You said that Amanda was the only person to survive the original virus, Greg,” Patton said, unexpectedly aligning himself with Heller. “It stands to reason that if there is an outbreak of one of this virus’s babies, she could be very helpful.”

“I know that, and I don’t want to see anyone hurt either, but this is my daughter in law, my son’s wife, and the mother of my grandson.” He stared into Patton’s dark eyes and nearly jumped out of his chair when Heller’s cell phone went off.

“Jesus Christ, turn that thing down,” Patton said as Heller answered the phone.

The call lasted less than ten seconds. “I see. Keep me posted,” said Heller, and hung up. Then he announced, “Amanda is driving a Jeep Cherokee, Colorado license GNM 529. It is currently parked at an office complex about three miles from here. There is a white female inside that fits the description of Amanda Flynn.” He spoke without emotion. “What do I do, Greg?”

Greg struggled with himself. It wasn’t a question of right or wrong. That was easy. Amanda could save countless lives, and because of that, he knew that in the end he would do what was right. It was a question of betrayal, and losing his adopted daughter, and with her, the connection he had with his dead son and grandson. That alone would be tragic, but he knew that if the bond that held Amanda to Greg and Lisa was broken, she would be lost to the evil that had almost consumed her six years ago.

“Tell your people to stand down, now,” Greg said.

“You know I can’t do that, Greg,” Heller said gently.

“If you don’t, she will kill them all,” Greg said, his voice rising. “Every one of them.”

“That’s not possible Greg, we—”

“Tell them to back off now! If they can see her, then she knows where they are. If you back her into a corner, people are going to die.” Greg’s face was turning red.

Patton finally connected the dots between Reisch and Amanda. “Do it, Heller. Do it now! We already have one man down, we don’t need others.”

“Not until someone tells me what’s really going on here. How can she kill people she can’t see?”

“With a single goddamn thought, you arrogant son of a bitch!” Greg screamed and yanked the cell phone from the FBI agent’s hand. He punched a few buttons while Patton blocked Heller’s attempts to retrieve his phone. “This is Detective Greg Flynn. I’m with Special Agent Heller. Do not under any circumstances approach that Jeep. Terminate all surveillance now!” He repeated the message, but no one responded.

The on-again, off-again flurries were back on again, but it wasn’t snowing hard enough to obscure their view of her, even with dusk approaching. There were five of them now, and more on the way. She had sensed the lone FBI agent as soon as she had left Oliver and the church. He followed her Jeep discreetly while calling for backup, and Amanda drove aimlessly through a residential neighborhood just to make his job a little more difficult. He was reasonably competent, and only twice did she glimpse his gray Ford. She led him to a small office complex just outside of downtown and then parked. He pulled into an adjacent supermarket and watched her, waiting for backup. He had enough experience to put his ego in check and do things correctly, which disappointed Amanda. She had half hoped that he would see her as an unaware 130-pound woman who would offer no resistance to his sudden appearance, badge and weapon drawn. But no, he wasn’t going to confront her until everyone was in place. Five minutes after he had parked, four more agents arrived and quickly fanned out to cover any possible escape routes. Then, everyone just sat and waited for orders.

She searched the mind of the nearest agent and found nothing of interest. He had no idea who or what Amanda was beyond being a fugitive. She hopped from mind to mind until one of their phones rang, and Greg’s face suddenly filled her mind. He was irate and full of fear, his emotions pulling her across dozens of city blocks. “With a single goddamn thought—” she heard him say, and understanding blossomed in the minds of the two men that stood next to her father-in-law. Greg had finally told someone what she had become. Her secret was out. She was surprised that it didn’t much matter to her; maybe it was because there were others now. Reisch and Oliver would certainly be less circumspect with their abilities, and there were probably going to be many more soon. There really was no secret left to protect.

The agents were becoming antsy; worried that she would leave the trap they were ready to spring. Escaping them would be child’s play. With only five minds to control, she could quite easily walk over to the supermarket, find a car she liked, and simply drive away as they continued to watch her empty Jeep. Or, with even less effort, she could kill them all, right where they sat. Mittens got a small thrill from that thought, but it was short-lived. She wasn’t going to kill anyone today, except maybe Reisch, and Mittens knew it. She felt for the German, but he was still lost in the mist of a hundred thousand other minds.

The agents were ordered to move in closer, giving Amanda only a few minutes before they swarmed her Jeep. She needed to disable them, not kill them, and make it absolutely clear that she was beyond their reach. A tiny thrill made her heart beat a little faster. Cruelty had never been part of her before the Change, but it certainly was afterwards. It was a powerful and wonderfully self-indulgent emotion, which pulled at her relentlessly.

The sedan behind her was feeding live images to a Command Center in Denver. She tried to follow the feed back to the other end but couldn’t quite reach without a discrete human consciousness directing her. It didn’t matter; whoever was at the other end would be suitably shocked as she calmly went to each of the fallen agents and relieved them of their weapons and identification. It would be a clear message to leave her alone.