Steal the Lightning: A Field Ops Novel (Field Ops #3)(11)

“What?”

“You gotta amputate—from the neck down—”

She began to laugh and when that turned into choking she rolled on her side and I slapped her back again. She rolled back, sucking in air, gasping for it. She said my name again. I took her hand. Then I pulled out my handkerchief and wiped her brow.

I felt the heat right through the cloth. It was like the thing was cooking her, every system on overdrive.

“It hurts . . .”

“We’ll get you out of this. There’s someone coming. Help’s on the way. Special equipment. We’ll put things right. Don’t worry. Don’t . . .”

If only I’d had a pack with me. The flask, the cables . . . But you don’t expect to do a retrieval, just like that, do you? Here in New York City?

She tried to drink again. The liquid trickled down her chin, soaking her blouse front. Her lips moved, but when I leaned close, she made no sense. Random syllables, nonsense words. Glossolalia. Talking in tongues. There was a smell in the air, a taste in my throat like bad avocado.

Then her skin began to ripple.

I saw it in her face and hands, little movements, like a flickering of light. I hesitated before touching her again. Her skin was very soft, almost like velvet. It stilled where I touched it, but the movement went on all around, and continued when I took my hand away. It was like a breeze skimming across her. Her breathing was now very harsh. Her mouth was open. It sounded like the air was tearing out her throat.

I talked to her. I tried to calm her, soothe her.

I wasn’t very good at it.

Several centuries went by.

And then a buzzer sounded, and I looked up.

Someone was at the door.





Chapter 10

The Cable Guy




Paul Silverman was thirtyish, a stocky, unshaven white guy in an army shirt and jogging pants. He had two bulging plastic bags from D’Agostino’s. I hoped they weren’t both full of groceries.

He was sweating. He was red in the face. When he bent to put the bags down I could see the moisture shining in a kind of surf-mark, just under his hairline.

“I could have given you my shopping list,” I said.

I opened the bags. The first was full of cables, neatly coiled and tied. There was a console in there, too, a kind I hadn’t used since my apprentice days. In the other was the flask. Again, it was an old design—ten years, at least.

“Does this stuff work?”

He shrugged.

I said, “Got a screwdriver?”

He was dragging his bike in through the door but he paused, reached in his pocket and produced a wallet with a half a dozen little screwdrivers. The guy was prepped, at least.

“I don’t leave home without them.”

“Good. Take the plug off the TV, or anything else. Put it on this.” I showed him the power lead for the console.

Melody suddenly shuddered, gave a long, sobbing howl. Silverman stiffened. I don’t think he’d even realized she was there. “Jeez.” He went across to her. “Have you called 911? She’s hot, she needs ice, what’s wrong with her?”

“Hey,” I said. “Just fix the plug, OK?”

He looked at me, his face scrunched up, confused, scared, maybe even hostile.

I said, “Don’t touch her. Do exactly what I say. This is her only chance of getting through.”

He bit his lip, nodded quickly.

I said, “What department are you?”

“Department . . . ?”

“Registry, right?”

“What makes you think I’m Registry?”

My turn to frown. But I told him, “Come on. Let’s move.”

I started laying out the cables. There wasn’t much finesse in it. I had to tighten up a few connections. Everything seemed to be there, at least. I pushed the furniture aside. Melody was breathing now in little, tiny gasps. They sounded like hiccups. I talked while I worked. “I’m going to run a charge through the cables. I’m going to drive the god out. This is my job, this is what I do. I’ve done it loads of times. The god goes in the flask. I close the flask . . .” I knew she wasn’t following it. I hoped the sound of my voice was comforting to her. Or maybe I was trying to reassure myself. I don’t know which.

I wrapped her in the cables till she looked like a Christmas tree. I put the flask between her knees because I didn’t know where else to put it.

Like I said: no finesse.

Silverman had the plug on the power lead. Good. I started linking it all up: flask to cables, cables to console, console to mains.

“This thing’s a hundred years old. Jesus.”

Silverman, wisely, said nothing. But he was watching with an odd sort of intensity, like a lecher at a strip club. It really was an odd kind of a look.

The socket sparked when I plugged in. I went over to the console, switched on.

I’ll be honest: I was half expecting that the damn thing would be dead. But it wasn’t. The lights flashed on. A faint hum filled the room.

Business.

“You’re, um, you’re Field Ops, right?” said Silverman. There was a kind of frightened fascination in his eyes.

I nodded.

“You’ve done this before?”

He gave a tight smile.

“Not like this,” I said.