the Devil's Workshop (1999) Page 7

  The initial problem with his concoctions was that the total destruction of the midbrain took over two years--way too long for a bio-weapon. To accelerate the devastation, DeMille had finally mixed in a strain of human Epstein-Barr virus. E. B. virus proved a perfect accelerant. He continued to tinker and adjust, finding other ways to speed the result. His tests on primates were extensive, and finally he had a strain of Prion that ran its course in hours. He named his discovery the "Pale Horse Prion," PHpr, and it now had several unique characteristics that made it an excellent choice as a bio-weapon. One was stealth ... the Prion appeared to be just another "normal" protein. It was undetectable by ordinary lab tests, and it was impervious to sterilization. PHpr was a "Dr. Jekyll" protein that transformed into a vicious "Mr. Hyde" Prion when activated.

  He watched now in fascination as Troy Lee's hands clawed insanely at his own throat. His eyes were red-rimmed and resembled no eyes Dexter DeMille had ever seen.

  Then, as with Kuru and mad cow, the rages started to subside and Troy Lee began to lose his balance, each time falling on his right side. During the next hour came the onset of tremors and dementia.

  "The patient has gone into the severe ataxic stage," Dr. DeMille said into his tape recorder.

  Twenty minutes later, Troy Lee was on his back, gurgling fluids out of his mouth as occasional grand-mal seizures ravaged his trembling body.

  "It is four thirty-five," Dexter said softly into his tape recorder. "The subject now has badly impaired swallowing and has gone into status epilepticus."

  At five-fifteen, Troy Lee Williams was pronounced dead. He was put into a bio-containment bag and removed to the hospital for autopsy.

  The entire course of the disease, from infection to death, was less than six hours.

  Despite over twenty mosquito bites, Sylvester Swift was unchanged. His good health proved that Dexter DeMille had done something that had never been achieved before... he had successfully targeted a bio-weapon to a specific genetic group by hitting Troy Lee and not affecting Sylvester at all.

  Admiral Zoll called Dexter DeMille and congratulated him. "I'm very pleased," the sandpaper voice said. They both knew the weapon would devastate the enemy, first with the terrifying homicidal rages, then with the horrible death cycle.

  "Thank you," Dexter replied.

  Then the Admiral asked to speak to Dr. Lack. Dexter handed the phone reluctantly to his assistant, who asked softly, "What do we do with Sylvester Swift?"

  "He has to be collateralized," Zoll replied.

  Five minutes later a gunshot sounded in the empty corridor of the fifth tier of center block.

  Dexter DeMille didn't hear it. He had already returned to his quarters.

  He poured a strong drink of Scotch and sat on the edge of his bed. His hands shook, while his mind wandered. He had started studying Prions in New Guinea, trying to save lives, but after that there was almost no practical application. Nobody seemed to care about his discovery, except for Admiral Zoll. Somehow his once humanistic science had led him to Fort Detrick, and then to this gruesome new discovery.

  "Dear God, what am I doing?" he finally whispered to himself. Then he got off his bunk, walked into his bathroom, and threw up.

  Chapter 7

  HOBOS

  Hollywood Mike glowered. "My old man. What a prick!

  Know what the worst day of that asshole's life was?"

  "Whaaa?" Lucky slurred.

  "The day Heidi Fleiss got busted."

  Lucky took another pull on the half-empty bottle of Gallo Red Label.

  It was seven A. M. Sunday morning. They were both drunk, sprawled against the wooden slats of an empty boxcar coupled in the middle of a manifest freight--a train with many different types of cars--that was making a slow climb up the face of the Black Hills of East Texas. The train creaked and groaned as the scenery drifted lazily past the open door, strobing fingers of pale sunlight into the boxcar and across both of them.

  Somebody had recently done a job on Lucky. One of his front teeth had been knocked out; his lip was split and maybe needed stitches. He also had some open sun sores on his lips, caused by passing out in the park on a ninety-degree day. Most of the discoloration and swelling from the beating was hidden under his tangled blond beard. He was thirty-seven, but seemed ageless. Greasy, shoulder-length hair hung limp; his blue eyes were rimmed in red and remained unfocused as he rocked with the motion of the car.

  Lucky didn't know who had beaten him up, because he'd been passed out in a hobo encampment, known as a jungle, when it happened. He woke up just in time to be knocked unconscious again. He'd lost five dollars that he'd earned in Waco, Texas, chopping wood, but more important, he'd lost his torn Nikes to the vicious unseen jungle buzzard who'd attacked him. Now his feet were wrapped and tied in black plastic garbage bags that he'd stolen from containers behind the Salvation Army mission, known as a "sally." The mission director had thrown both him and Hollywood Mike out after a two-day visit, two days being the limit you could stay in one of those preachy "ear-bangs."

  They had gone to the switching yard in Waco and had "caught out" on this manifest train.

  Hollywood Mike, at twenty-two, was fifteen years younger than Lucky, and he still had his shoes, but aside from these two advantages, there was little difference between them. He was just as scruffy, and almost as drunk. His curly hair was plastered on his head with just as much road muck. His one wardrobe statement, which was responsible for his nickname, he wore under torn coveralls. It was a movie premiere T-shirt that read:

  ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER

  IS

  HOMEWRECKER

  HOLLYWOOD PREMIERE

  JULY 3, 1999

  "Heidi Fleiss, man, Heidi fuckin' Fleiss," Lucky said, in mindless reflection. Then he straightened up and took another hit from the bottle, being careful to pour the wine down the right side of his throat to avoid the open cut and festering sun blisters.

  "Gimme a hit off that," Mike demanded.

  Lucky leaned to pass the bottle and the two of them, drunk as they were, almost fumbled the prize. Both lunged to catch it. Finally Mike wiped the neck with his dirty palm, a concession to proper oral hygiene, then took a deep swallow. "Yeah, everything in that prick's fucked-up life is only about him. I might as wella been dead."

  "Selfish motherfucker," Lucky commiserated dully.

  "I only stayed with the prick one summer, but that was enough. Know what his drug bill is in one day? Just one lousy day?"

  "One fuckin' day?" Lucky repeated, his dull eyes locked on the bottle of Red Label.

  "Thirty-two thousand dollars."

  "Thirty-two..." Lucky stopped and looked up at his friend. "Huh?"

  "I'm not sayin' like every day he spent that." Mike took another hit from the bottle. "I'm sayin' I found this one bill like in the pool house, or some fuckin' place. I can't remember now where it was. Bill from a Malibu pharmacy, March tenth, thirty-two large. This shallow cocksucker is stickin' it up his nose, or in his arm, and then he has the balls to piss on me about one little misdemeanor pot bust. Fuck him." Mike took another swallow.

  "Fuck him!" Lucky repeated. "Gimme it back."

  Mike reluctantly handed the almost empty bottle to Lucky, who was now so gone he was lolling against the side of the empty boxcar, swaying with the rhythm of the rails, his lidded eyes half open.

  "Fuckin' guy has, whatta they call it... ? Acute mania," Mike went on. "No shit. From all the drugs. Acute fuckin' mania. He takes Thorazine every four hours, and Valium and Vicodin and lithium and fuckin' Xanax and Desyrel and fuckin' who knows what else? He's on more shit than the Russian weight-lifting team... and this doofiis gets all bogged down over my one crummy pot bust. Dear ol' Dad. Man, if I never see that shallow fuck again, it'll be two months too soon."

  The train was slowing for the summit now, and out the door they could hear footsteps running up the gravel embankment beside the track. Then four heads appeared alongside the train, running for all they were worth
.

  "Giddyap, motherfuckers!" Lucky yelled drunkenly.

  One of them dove into the boxcar, followed by two more. They then turned and grabbed the last guy, who was hanging by the door handle, skipping along just above the gravel. They finally got him in. The new arrivals were just as scruffy as Lucky and Hollywood Mike, but they weren't anywhere near as drunk.

  "Look't what's in here," one of them said, surveying the current occupants of the car. "Got us a coupla track tunas." He was fat and greasy, with long gray hair knotted in a ponytail. His accent was West Texan.

  "It's Miller time," a second hobo said, looking at the bottle of Red Label. He was short and muscular, and also had a Texas twang.

  Next to him was a thirty-something black man. The one who they'd just pulled in was a skinhead covered with homemade prison tattoos.

  "Gimme the bottle, asshole," the skinhead said.

  "You got it..." Lucky grinned, dully. He quickly drained the bottle and threw it out the door of the slow-moving car. "All gone," he slurred through his already busted lips.

  "Fuckin' Yankee," the black hobo growled when he heard Lucky's accent.

  "You're in my place," the short, muscular one said, moving toward Lucky.

  Lucky tried to get up, but before he could rise, the hobo kicked his legs out from under him and he landed back on his ass.

  "Where'd you get them great patent-leather shoes?" he said, leering at Lucky's garbage-bagged feet.

  Lucky and Mike were in deep shit and they knew it. One way or the other, they were about to get the crap kicked out of them for no reason at all. That was the way it went on the rails sometimes. It was an unforgiving life.

  The boxcar they were on was known as a "sleeper" car, and was favored by train-riders because it was a vacant car in the center of a loaded train that had been left on when the train had been assembled. It was sometimes easier for the switch crew to leave it engaged than to move lines of cars all over the yard in an attempt to drop it. Every train had one or two sleepers, and they were prized spots for hobos. This one, however, was about to change ownership.

  "Why don' we all jus' take it easy?" Lucky slurred, trying to get his senses to function correctly.

  "Fuckin' Yankees is just like hemorrhoids," the gray-haired hobo droned. "It's okay if they come down an' go right back up. But when they come down an' stay down they irritate the hell outta ya."

  " 'At's good," Lucky said, trying to grin, but feeling the scabs cracking around his mouth.

  "You two track tunas is 'bout ta be flyin' fish," the skinhead said, and without warning, the four Texans rushed the two Yankees.

  It wasn't much of a fight because Lucky and Mike were so out of it. After head-butting the short one, Lucky was grabbed by two others and thrown out of the moving train. His backpack followed. Lucky summoned what sobriety he could as he sailed high over the graded shoulder. The train was going only about fifteen miles an hour. At the last moment, Lucky ducked his head, rolled awkwardly down a slight grade, and finally came to a painful, bone-jarring halt. Moments later, he could see Mike also being hurled through the air with his back to the ground, struggling to get his body turned. He landed badly, with a loud thump and grunt, and no bone-saving roll. He didn't move once he hit.

  "Shit," Lucky mumbled. "That ain't how you do it, Mike."

  The train roared on. They could hear a diminishing rebel yell from the Faraway sleeper car and soon they were left in still mountain silence.

  Lucky stumbled to his feet and checked his scrapes and bruises. Then he moved drunkenly to Hollywood Mike, who was still on his back, unconscious. Lucky went hunting for his pack, then brought it back. He opened it and pulled out an old refilled Evian water bottle and a torn T-shirt. He poured some water onto the shirt, then put the compress on Mike's forehead. Mike groaned and his eyes finally opened. He looked up at Lucky. "Whaa happened?"

  "Bubbas threw us off the motherfuckin' train," Lucky slurred, and looked around. Off to the north he could see a deep meadow and lush green bushes. "Looks like water over there."

  Hollywood Mike tried to sit up. "Think some ribs are broken," he groaned.

  "Bubbas threw us off the motherfuckin' train," Lucky said again, trying to clear his vision.

  He helped Hollywood Mike to his feet. The twenty-two-year-old groaned and let out a sharp cry of pain.

  "Schwarzenegger is de 'Homewrecker,' " Lucky mused, looking at Mike's T-shirt, "but you an' me is de homeless wrecks."

  The greenery was located at the edge of a large lake. The water was cold and clear. Lucky stripped off his shirt and pants, unwrapped the garbage bags from his feet, and waded in. He scrubbed the grime out of his hair with his fingers and sluiced the grit off his body with his hands. He was careful not to open the sores on his mouth. The cold water and the half-mile walk had sobered him up some. "This life is sure gettin' old," he said, as he came out of the water and sat on a large rock in his underwear. "Maybe I should stop ridin' high iron an' go pick fruit in California, or maybe yer old man will give me a job, make me a movie star?"

  "You don't wanna work for him, he's an asshole," Hollywood Mike said softly through gritted teeth, still holding his ribs. "But sometimes I miss himI don't know whyI guess because ..."

  " 'Cause he's your only relative," Lucky finished. Mike had made this zigzag several times before... pure anger and hatred, followed by loneliness and longing. Mike desperately needed a father, a service the older 'bo was not prepared to perform. Lucky was mostly on a search for his next bottle. Surfing a cresting wave on a slippery board, he was always just a few hours in front of the D. T. S, those scary hallucinations caused by alcohol withdrawal and the destructive imaginings of his own brain. He had fallen into that snake pit twice before, once screaming so desperately that four hobos had hand-delivered him to the hospital ER in Wilmington, Delaware, while he slapped at hallucinatory snakes and bugs that crawled all over him, feasting mostly on his eyes.

  Lucky was now out of money and booze. He needed to start working on finding that next bottle before the dangerous curl on this alcohol-induced wave collapsed again, driving him under.

  Lucky looked out across the lake. A half-mile away there appeared to be a fishing village. Then he swung his gaze back in the other direction, where there was a mammoth stone prison.

  "The fuck is that over there?" Lucky said, pointing at the huge building. He could also see a small plume of dust from a fast-moving vehicle on a dirt road a mile or so away.

  "Looks like a prison," Mike said.

  They watched in growing panic as the vehicle now headed right at them. As it got closer they recognized it as a jeep painted military green. Lucky and Hollywood Mike quickly gathered up their things and started to retreat from the shore as it came nearer. They scrambled up into the tree line and crouched down in the ground cover of heavy, tangled forest growth. The jeep pulled up to where they had been standing. Two soldiers were in the back of the jeep and another one was driving. All were heavily armed.

  "They got rifles," Mike whispered.

  "Those're German MP5S," Lucky said. "Submachine guns."

  Then the soldier closest to them pulled up a bullhorn and pointed it in their general direction. "We aren't gonna chase you in there and flush you guys out, but this here is all military property. We saw you through field glasses. Here's the dealGet off this land. It's posted. Get back past the highway or over to Vanishing Lake Village. We see you in here again, you're both goin' in mummy sacks."

  The man with the bullhorn then nodded to the other man in the back of the jeep, who fired his machine gun into the high branches over their heads. The gun chattered nine-millimeter death. Bullet-riddled tree limbs rained down where Lucky and Hollywood Mike were hiding. Then the jeep pulled away, heading back the way it came.

  "How come if we're in Texas, the side of that jeep said 'Fort Detrick, Maryland'?" Lucky asked.

  "Who cares. Let's just get outta here."

  They picked up their tattered gear and, with Holly
wood Mike still holding his ribs, they moved off toward the fishing village, about a mile away.

  The town of Vanishing Lake was very small and very quiet. Crude log-cabin A-frames were the main architectural flavor. A hardware store, market, and gas station were lined up on both sides of the main street. There was a wharf, with rental boats, and next to it was a small bait shop and restaurant with a sign out front that read:

  BUCKET A' BAIT

  COFFEE SHOP

  As Lucky and Hollywood Mike moved slowly down the center of town, several people came out of the hardware store to look at the two unwelcome apparitions. Lucky's feet were back in the plastic bags; Mike was doubled over, holding his ribs.

  "Let's try over there," Lucky said, pointing to the coffee shop. "Lemme do the hee-haw. We need ta get money fer a bottle."

  They went around to the back, where they could smell breakfast being cooked in the kitchen.

  "Hey... hello in there," Lucky said, and banged his hand on the screen. In a minute, a very pretty blond woman came to the door. She was wearing an off-the-shoulder blouse and jeans. An order book was shoved in her waistband, a stubby pencil behind her ear.

  "Yes," she said.

  "Uh. Mama... good morning," Lucky smiled, beginning his panhandler shuffle. "Me and Mike are real hungry. Bein' it's Sunday mornin', and bein' as Sunday is a Christian time a' charity an' giving, we were wonderin' if we could work for some food? Or, better still, a little money for necessities? Shampoo, a razor, and the like. Anything ya could spare would be appreciated, ma'am." He smiled wider, showing the broken tooth and split lip.

  "I'll ask Barry--he runs the place. The raccoons got into the trash, so maybe you could clean that up. Wait a minute, I'll go ask," she said, disappearing. She reappeared a few seconds later with four large sugar doughnuts. She handed them to Lucky and Mike. "Wait over there," she said, pointing to a bench under a pine tree.