Ground Zero Part 48

"Past the halfway mark. And he's changed some more. Lots more."

"Interesting. Let's go."

A few seconds later, Drexler, cane in hand, stepped into the hallway and closed the door behind him. The pair walked off.

Well, that was an enlightening conversation. Who were they talking about?

As they walked away, Jack slipped from the bathroom and followed. They crossed the rear of the foyer and headed down a stairway that Jack knew led to the bas.e.m.e.nt.

He did a quick scan as he entered the foyer. Ansari was talking to someone, looking the other way, so Jack scooted past behind him and took the steps down. The doorway at the bottom was closed. He hesitated, baffled as to what he might find on the other side.

Past the halfway mark ...

So? Some guy halfway through a PowerPoint presentation? A brunch with the eggs Benedict half gone?

Yeah right.

He pressed his ear against the door and heard nothing. He decided to risk an entry by pretending to be looking for someone. Not Thompson. Someone just a little bit down the food chain.

Knocking as he turned the k.n.o.b, he said, "Darryl?"

The room was empty except for a couple of folding tables and maybe a dozen chairs. He looked around and spotted another door. When he reached it he listened. More silence. He shrugged and decided to try the same approach as before.

"Dar-?"

The k.n.o.b wouldn't turn. Locked. Jack checked the jamb and saw a quarter inch of exposed latch bolt. He fished out the notched credit card he kept in his wallet and stared at it a moment, thinking risky thoughts. One thing to barge into a room pretending to be clueless. Quite another to pop the latch beforehand.

He decided to knock first.

"Hey, anybody in there?"

After two tries and no answer, he worked the corner of the card into the s.p.a.ce. He hooked it into the receptacle in the striker plate and twisted, pus.h.i.+ng back the spring latch. The door popped open.

"Darryl?" he said as he palmed the card and stepped inside.

A smaller room, and empty as expected. But a closet door stood open, and in the floor of that closet, an open trapdoor.

Jack peeked over the edge and saw a circular stairway leading down. He listened and thought he heard voices but they were too faint to understand.

The idea of sneaking down rose but he tossed it. The wrought iron on the circular stair left nowhere to hide. Better to get out of here unseen while he could.

Locking the door behind him, he returned to the main bas.e.m.e.nt room and was almost to the exit when Ansari appeared.

"You again. What're you doin down here?"

"Looking for Darryl."

He sneered. "Darryl ain't here. He's gone."

"When's he due back?"

"He ain't, leastways not if any of us got something to say about it."

Here was something unexpected.

"Hey, I ain't been around since that Dormie thing on Monday"-nice to be able to mention that-"so I got no idea what you're talking about."

"You ain't heard? For a minute there I thought you might be one of his b.u.t.t buddies."

"What the-?"

"Guy's queer. Got the virus-AIDS. He's outta here. The boss gave him the boot Wednesday. Ain't seen him since." His eyes narrowed. "What you want with him?"

"Just checking in."

Ansari shoved Jack. He probably thought it was a surprise move, but Jack had seen him tense for it. He let it happen and bounced off the wall behind him.

"You are are one of his b.u.t.t buddies, ain't you!" one of his b.u.t.t buddies, ain't you!"

So what if I am? Jack felt like saying, but held back. He also held back from putting Ansari face-first on the floor-despite his presenting about half a dozen openings-because he didn't want an enemy in this place. Well, not another in addition to Thompson, who'd probably try to kill him if he recognized him.

"Hey-hey!" he said, raising open-palm hands and backing away with a cowed expression. "Dude, I just seen him around a lot, is all. Everyone knows Darryl."

"Yeah, well, not any more they don't. Better forget about him. Now get your a.s.s upstairs where it belongs."

"You got it," Jack said and ducked out the door. "You got it."

He hurried up the steps to the foyer, no doubt leaving Ansari feeling pretty tough. Good. If Jack had to go up against him in the future, the guy would be overconfident. n.o.body fell harder and faster than an overconfident bully.

The news about Darryl answered a few questions, especially why he'd been looking under the weather lately. Poor guy. Not a bad sort for a Kicker, and Jack had got the impression he was smarter than he looked. He'd wondered what he was doing at Mount Sinai Tuesday. Now he knew.

But bigger questions had replaced it.

Most immediately: What was Ernst Drexler doing here every day this week? The answer lay at the bottom of those winding steps. Some sort of lower level down there. Good bet it wasn't a wine cellar.

But more important: Was Drexler the man Goren had seen at Ground Zero? If so, it left little doubt that the Order had had something to do with the 9/11 attacks.

Jack balled his fists as he walked past the Order's sigil. His teenage impression of Drexler had been that he was strange and potentially dangerous. He'd never imagined him a monster.

4.

"Look at him, will you." Hank felt his gut clench as he leaned close to the Orsa and stared at Darryl. "I don't believe it."

When his daddy had visited him during his growing years, he'd filled his head with tales of Other G.o.ds wanting to come in from the outside, and how he was part of a special bloodline, and how his daddy could see things with his ruined left eye that people with two good eyes had no clue about.

Hank had listened and he'd believed all that weird s.h.i.+t because his daddy so obviously believed it. But all those years they'd been words, just words. He'd never seen seen anything to back them up. anything to back them up.

Until now.

Darryl was barely visible.

"It's like he isn't there."

"But he is," Drexler said beside him. "He is very much there."

Yesterday it had been just his skin. Today it was his whole body, through and through.

From a distance he looked like a s.h.i.+rt, jeans, a pair of shoes, and a clump of hair suspended in a block of Lucite-something some a.s.shole in a museum would call "art." But when you got closer you could start to make out details.

Yesterday just his skin had gone transparent. Now Hank could see right through him. He wasn't invisible. Still a faint outline of the scalp-easier because the hair was the same as ever-around an even fainter outline of the skull beneath, and a vague tracing of the irregular contours on the surface of the brain within.

"I think we might be nearing the end of the process." "

" 'Might be'? You're supposed to know."

"Well, none of this is on a strict timetable. It matters how sick he was. Maybe he had more illnesses than we knew, or even he knew. The Orsa is going to cure everything wrong with him."

Seemed to Hank like Drexler was trying to sound more certain of this than he really was.

"Yeah, well, he keeps sliding, though. He's past the halfway point now. Will it spit him out when he's cured?"

"Yes."

Hank wheeled on him. "You don't have a f.u.c.king clue, do you?"

"Of course I have. It's all been written down over the centuries, the millennia."

"But you said it's never been done before."

Drexler gave him a stony look. "He will will be cured when he emerges from the Orsa." be cured when he emerges from the Orsa."

"Yeah? But what else will he be? The invisible man? I think he might rather be dead."

"Then that will be his choice, won't it."

Again that urge to strangle Drexler. The guy must have sensed it because Hank noticed his knuckles whiten as he tightened his grip on the cane.

He forced himself to turn away.

"When do you think this will be over?"

"At the rate he's moving, tomorrow or the next day."

He stared at Darryl. You poor b.a.s.t.a.r.d. You went in a human being. What'll you be when you come out?

A Fhinntmanchca Fhinntmanchca?

What the h.e.l.l was a Fhinntmanchca Fhinntmanchca?

5.

"You're serious about this?" Eddie said as he positioned her on the treadmill.

Weezy nodded. "Deadly serious."

She'd made up her mind to get in shape-lose weight, gain tone. The first inkling had come as she'd watched Eddie eat high-protein, low-carb meals. It had solidified today when he'd told her he was going down to the bas.e.m.e.nt to work out. She'd followed him downstairs and found a treadmill and one of those Bowflex mini gyms she'd seen on TV.

She needed to do this. She'd let herself go too long. Time to take control. As much as she itched to push further through the Compendium, Compendium, this was important too. She could spare thirty minutes for herself. this was important too. She could spare thirty minutes for herself.

"Okay," he said once her feet were positioned to either side of the belt. "We'll start off slow and easy. As you get in better condition and more comfortable on the machine, we'll begin upping the speed and the incline."

"What about that?" she said with a nod toward the mini gym. "I could use some weight training too, I imagine. My muscles must be like Jell-O."

"Weight training is very important. Do fifteen minutes low and slow here, and then I'll walk you through a few exercises over there."

He turned a k.n.o.b and the belt began moving. Gripping the hand bars, Weezy stepped on and began walking.

"Too slow. Speed her up. This is like I'm eighty years old. I need to work up a sweat if I'm going to lose weight."

He gave her a puzzled look. "Why this sudden interest in getting in shape? I've been after you for years."

She shrugged. "Guess I'm finally listening."

A sly smile. "This wouldn't have anything to do with Jack, would it."

She felt herself redden. "Don't be ridiculous. I'm not getting any younger and I've let myself go long enough. Nothing more."

His smile held. "If you say so."

"I do say so."

Was it Jack? She found herself thinking about him a lot-mostly cringing at the memory of coming on to him the other night. What had she been thinking? Obviously she it Jack? She found herself thinking about him a lot-mostly cringing at the memory of coming on to him the other night. What had she been thinking? Obviously she hadn't hadn't been thinking. And that wasn't like her. been thinking. And that wasn't like her.

"h.e.l.lo?" Eddie said, waving a hand before her face. "Earth to Weezy."

She shook herself. "Sorry."