Warren Murphy: Deadly Genes

"No," Remo said.

"Yes," Grautski stressed. "You can go instead of me. And take your damn soul-stealing clock with you."

The second convict sat up, swinging his legs over the side of his bunk. "Don't mind him," he said, waving dismissively at the Todd Grautski-shaped mound of blankets. "He don't like any o' that technology stuff. You realize that is the one and only Collablaster you talkin' to?"

A flicker of something dark and violent passed across Remo's stern features. "I was aware of that," he said icily.

The second prisoner nodded energetically. "They call him the Collablaster 'cause he mail all kinds of dumb-ass bombs to all kinds of college types. Twenty years an' he only killed three guys."

"Allegedly," the Grautski blanket squeaked.

"I did more than that in one day," the inmate boasted.

At first, Remo had been irritated by the man's interruption. But as the other convict continued to speak, something familiar about him tweaked the back of Remo's consciousness.

"Do I know you?" he asked, eyes narrowed.

"Kershaw Ferngard," the prisoner announced proudly. "I in here for shootin' up a railroad car full of white folks. Allegedly," he added quickly. He winked knowingly.

Remo nodded. It seemed like an eternity ago, but he remembered the images of Ferngard on TV. His lawyers had attempted to use a "black rage" defense, his racial anger thus excusing him for the six people he'd killed and the other nineteen he had injured in his shooting rampage on the Long Island Railroad. Like Todd Grautski, Ferngard had dismissed his lawyers, opting to represent himself.

"What are you doing here?" Remo asked. "This is supposed to be solitary confinement."

"They paintin' my cell. I didn't like the color. Damn racist prison overcrowding." Ferngard hopped to the floor. "If we gettin' outta here, I needs my toofbrush."

"I'm not going anywhere," Todd Grautski's muffled voice insisted.

"Don't listen to Mr. Anti-Technoholic," Ferngard instructed Remo. He was fumbling in the medicine chest. "He be afraid ever since I plug my clock in this mornin'. When I turn on my razor, it took two guards wit mop handles to pull him out from under his bunk."

Ferngard turned. A bright pink toothbrush was clamped in his mitt. The handle was shaped like Porky Pig. He clicked the business end between his molars. "Ready," he mumbled.

Remo looked from the eager face of Kershaw Ferngard to the quivering pile of wool that hid the infamous Collablaster. Remo was only here for Todd Grautski, but opportunities like this one rarely knocked.

Under the blanket, even though he was in his underwear, Grautski was beginning to sweat. It had gotten too quiet all of a sudden. He didn't like the sense of claustrophobia he got beneath the bedcovers. Solitary was one thing. He could handle that. He'd spent years alone in a cabin in rural Montana with nothing to keep him company save a battered secondhand bicycle and a vast stockpile of bombmaking paraphernalia. But this was too much.

Grautski was biding his time beneath the childhood safety of his covers when he felt a sudden coolness. As soon as the blanket was lifted, Kershaw Ferngard was dumped onto Grautski's prone form. Before they knew what was happening, both men were being knotted up like a bundle of rags inside the fuzzy prison-issue blanket.

"What you doing?" Ferngard demanded from inside the makeshift sack. "I drop my Porky Pig. Hey, get yo knee outta me eye," he snarled at Grautski.

"Shh," Remo whispered.

Beneath the 180-pound pile of wiggling Long Island Railroad Shooter, Todd Grautski tried to shove his hands out through the edge of the blanket. He encountered a tangle of thick knots. The intruder had used the four corners to tie them up inside the blanket.

Grautski suddenly heard a tiny ping of metal strike the concrete floor. "What was that?" he asked, panicked. "Was that an oven timer? I hate those."

"Shut up," Ferngard hissed from somewhere near Grautski's shins. He was straining to hear what was going on beyond the blanket. As he did so, the inmate had the abrupt sensation of rising into the air.

There was not a grunt from the man who was obviously carrying them. It was as if both men were no heavier than a duffel bag full of cotton laundry.

It took but a few steps for Kershaw Ferngard to know they'd gone too far to still be inside the solitary cell. By now they were gliding out through the open door to the small room.

"You really did break in," Ferngard said from the tangle of blanket, surprise and wonder in his muffled voice.

"Quiet," Remo replied in a whisper. "Try to act like a pair of smelly gym socks."

Ignoring the complaints that issued from the Collablaster, Kershaw Ferngard shifted inside the bundle. He jammed his fingers into one of the tangled knots. After a little jimmying, he managed to pry it open a few inches. He stuck one big eye up to the opening.

They were in the solitary-confinement corridor, slung over the stranger's shoulder like a hobo's bindle. Their combined weight was over three hundred pounds, yet the man moved with a confident glide through the deep shadows.

The place was eerily dark and silent. One wall was lined with closed metal doors. Beyond some of them, Ferngard could hear wet, muted snoring.

The concrete-walled corridor ended at a closed door. Beside it was a sheet of shatterproof Plexiglas. As they moved past the window, Ferngard saw a pair of guards beyond the thick pane. Both were sitting in chairs, heads back, mouths open. They weren't moving.

"You kill the guards?" the inmate asked, owl eyed. As he struggled to get a better look, Todd Grautski grunted.

"They're sleeping," Remo explained. "It's easier to break out that way." He held his finger to his lips for silence once more.

For the first time, Ferngard noticed how thick his wrists were. The man reached for the bolted door. "That'll set off the alarm," Kershaw warned.

"I hate alarms," Todd Grautski moaned. Quieter now, he seemed resigned to whatever fate this stranger had in store. "I should have said so in my Collablaster Declaration in the New York Times. They make a terrible electronic noise."

"Not if you treat them nicely," Remo said. Remo tapped a single finger around the locking mechanism for a tiny moment. Impossibly, the door popped obediently open. Just like that. The green light beside the panel didn't light up, nor did the loud buzzing noise that ordinarily accompanied the opening of the door echo through the hall. They were through the door and inside the narrow adjoining hallway in seconds.

"How'd you do that?" Ferngard asked, amazed.

"Like this," Remo said.

They were at the second security door to the solitary-confinement area. Repeating the motion, Remo sprang the second door as easily as the first.

"He didn't use any electronic gadget, did he?" the Collablaster asked worriedly.

"Yeah, he use a can opener," Ferngard replied, annoyed.

Ferngard felt the tension in Todd Grautski's legs. Mainly because they were wrapped around his neck. "Ack," Kershaw choked amid the knotted tangle of Collablaster limbs.

"Hey, Frick and Frack, keep it down," Remo whispered. "This is where it gets tricky."

As Ferngard fought to disentangle himself from Todd Grautski's extremities, they slipped out into the general prison area. Skirting the main cells, Remo carried his bundle past the metal-railed lower tier of cells around to the hallway leading up to the cafeteria.

At several strategic points along the way, Ferngard saw more sleeping guards. Others were still awake, however. He could see them patrolling distant sections of the prison as they made their way inside the cafeteria.

"That was amazing," Ferngard whispered as Remo closed the door to the dining hall. "How come they didn't see us?"