Bliss (16 page)

“I’ll follow you,” Lindsey said.

Katherine nodded. She skirted the empty receptionist’s desk and started down the darkened main corridor, passing the animal room, which now stood empty after all the animals had died. Katherine’s destination was the freight elevator, and they made it without encountering anyone. The only sound was their own breathing and soft footfalls.

Both heaved a sigh once inside the elevator. It felt safe in there out of the open hallway, but when the elevator came to a stop three floors down, the relief was short lived. “No lights!” Lindsey said, as they stepped out.

Katherine pulled the large chrome flashlight from her pocket and switched it on. “Good thing we’re prepared.”

“This place is starting to give me the creeps, Lindsey said, entering a breezeway. “We probably shouldn’t be talking. Who knows what else is involved in the security system. If he can watch you in your own bedroom, he can sure as hell find us here.”

Katherine shined the light into the immense basement underneath them, and gasp.

“What’s wrong?” Lindsey asked.

“Look... down there.” Katherine pointed the flashlight below them.

Lindsey shuddered. “Oh my God.”

Cursing under his breath, Romwell
jumped out of the security van and sprinted to the still rolling vehicle. He clambered inside and slammed the gear lever into park. The BMW stopped instantly. “Godammit.” He rubbed his shin, having smacked it on the bottom of the car’s door. He stood, holding onto the driver’s window and looking in every direction. The two women had vanished.

Vetter is going to kill me if I don’t find them.

He struggled to get his cell phone out of his pocket. As quickly as he could, he used the phone’s internal directory to find the security-room number. The moment it popped onto the screen he pushed the dial button.

He heard the phone ringing through static. “Come on, come on!”

Finally a voice came on the line. “Security, Briggs.”

“Briggs, this is Romwell. Listen. Two women just went in the south entrance. They have an access card, but Vetter doesn’t want them anywhere near here. If he finds out, they got past; he’ll have my neck. Did you see anything?”

There was a pause. “No, but I can rerun the tape and double check.”

“If you see them, detain them at any cost. You understand. I’m on my way in now.”

Detective Dan Warren had some
questions for Stephen Vetter. After the last death in Indian Springs, Warren felt a familiar ping in his stomach. Something told him everything was not what it seemed at Imec Pharmaceuticals. Although it was past 11 p.m., Warren decided to go to Imec and look around, maybe talk to security there.

Pulling into the Imec complex, he immediately sensed something wrong. A black BMW sedan was sitting halfway through the ten-foot high chain-link fence that surrounded the place. Warren pulled his unmarked cruiser just outside the security gate and turned off the engine. He drew his service revolver and climbed out.

The first curiosity.

Where was the security guard? The entrance was unguarded and Warren walked through unhindered toward the building.

“Hold it right there, mister,” a voice behind him said.

Warren put his hands out and held his revolver over his head. “I’m a police officer.”

“Drop that gun and hit the deck,” the voice said.

Warren’s voice rose. “I’m telling you I’m a police officer.”

“Good, then you know the drill, now hit the deck.”

Warren dropped his gun and knelt with his hands behind his head. “My front jacket pocket, you’ll find my badge.”

The security guard came up behind Warren. “Hands behind you.”

Warren complied and the guard cuffed him. He reached into Warren’s jacket pocket.

There was a long silence.

“Well, Detective Dan Warren, looks like I owe you an apology.”

“Great, can you get these cuffs off now?”

Warren was uncuffed and he stood up and looked at the guard. “What’s with the car through the fence?”

“It’s a long story.”

“What’s your name?” Warren asked.

“Romwell, Romwell Cartwright.”

“Okay, Romwell, I’ve got all night. So let’s hear it.”

Romwell took in a lungfull
of air and gave his explanation. His involvement, he assured Warren, was purely out of fear. Following his explanation, which he admitted was supposition, he went on to say that Imec Pharmaceuticals was definitely involved in even more unethical and illegal conduct than what he’d just described. He explained that the company was administering, without consent, a new drug the company was set to market in a few days. How they were administering that drug, Romwell had no idea, but it took place in the highly secretive production facility below ground. Finally, Romwell said that they had murdered at least three people, and several had died under mysterious circumstances.

Warren’s mouth had slowly dropped open during Romwell’s monologue. When Romwell finished, Warren slumped back, the color gone from his face.

“How did you learn all this?” Warren asked. “Surely Vetter keeps this highly secretive?” His throat had gone dry. “You have anything to drink in here?” he asked Romwell.

“I have some sodas in the fridge. Coke all right?”

“Anything.”

Romwell grabbed two Cokes from a small refrigerator and handed one to Warren.

“This explains a lot,” Warren said. “All these strange deaths around here.” In his shock at Romwell’s story, Warren had almost forgotten about the two women. “What about the two women?” he asked Romwell. “We need to find them. Fast.”

Just then, Romwell glanced up at the security camera. “Look! There they are, headed down to the basement. We can intercept them if we take the back steps.”

For several minutes, Lindsey stood
transfixed at what lie below them. A large room, at least 100 feet long by 50 feet wide. In it, steel cages, approximately six feet long by four feet wide, and seven feet tall, stood along the far wall. Inside each cage sat a person.

Or what was once a person.

Emaciated and pale, with thin hair that hung in thin, unhealthy strands, they looked as though they’d survived a nuclear holocaust.

Katherine put her hand over her mouth. “Lindsey, I think I know who these people are... or were. Dr. Meyer made reference to an original control group in his initial study. In his notes he said they had abandoned the trial due to ‘Side Effect,’ concerns. Then they reconfigured Bliss, that’s when I came on board. Now I know why Vetter forbids me from coming down here.”

Lindsey stood transfixed at the spectacle. She turned to Katherine. “This is Vetter’s motive for killing Meyer. Meyer was about to blow the whistle on the project,” Katherine said.

“Is there anything we can do to help these people?” Lindsey asked.

Katherine hesitated. “No, according to Meyer’s profile, the drug induces rapid aging of all the organ systems. A Progeria-like illness.”

“That would explain the changes in Teresa Hagen,” Lindsey said.

Thinking over the events of the last several days, Lindsey wondered if these changes were occurring on a nightly basis. If so, more people in the compound were going to succumb to the side effects of Bliss. In horror, Lindsey realized everyone in Indian Springs was doomed.

She shuddered in revulsion. It was plainly obvious to her that Bliss was the ultimate cause for everything that had happened in or around Imec. By putting it in the water supply, everyone had become afflicted.

“We’ve got to get to that production facility now,” Lindsey said.

They heard the door rattle and the shuffling of feet.

“You ladies all right?” Detective Dan Warren asked as he burst through the door.

Despite the fact that Lindsey
was a major executive at Imec; she’d never seen the inside of the production facility.

Vetter had kept it off limits except to a handful of workers. Now after tonight’s devastating developments, she had learned the truth about why he had kept it so secret.

As the elevator descended to the bottom floor, she felt she was treading into unchartered waters.

If Stephen Vetter almost single handedly fooled the FDA and the rest of the world, what makes you think you can do anything?

Fear, Lindsey told herself, having almost fallen victim to him. She had a plan. After a protracted discussion with Katherine and Detective Warren, they’d decided they would go after Vetter. Lindsey would try to get into the production line and shut it down before the distribution trucks pulled in at five A.M., and took Bliss all over the country. She also had to figure out how Vetter was getting the liquid compound into Indian Spring’s water supply.

After finding an airlock to the production wing, she looked around and saw that a side door was ajar, leading downstairs to the bowels of the facility. Inside the door, a small metal ladder led to another landing. A maze of pipes, valves and temperature control units surrounded it. It was warm, and very noisy. She started down the ladder and had only gone two steps, when she heard a loud hum.

Then everything went black.

She grabbed the rungs of the ladder tight, but the moisture was causing her hands to slip. Everything below her looked like a dark abyss. She had no idea what was down there or if she was even in the production wing. A loud crash to her right startled her, and Lindsey lost her grip.

She fell into the hole and hit hard, flat on her back. Gasping in the dark, she swallowed water and scrambled to her feet. The darkness that surrounded Lindsey Walsh was absolute. She stood dead still for a minute, trying to see, trying to get her bearings, acutely aware of the growing sense of panic gripping her body. She was at the bottom of what seemed to be a well. Despite her effort to fight off a growing sense of dread, fear swept across her and took control.

A foot of water rose from around her ankles; disoriented in the pitch-blackness, she groped forward with arms extended, and tried to picture the space. She felt the cinder block sides, built in a tall square against the buildings north side–she couldn’t see the top. The fall had bruised her back and legs, but nothing seemed to be broken. As she stumbled around the small, enclosed space, she tripped on a pipe–stepping over it, feeling ahead, she searched for a way out.

Her head spun from hitting the ground. Reaching with her fingers, she felt along the large-diameter pipe. Suddenly about six feet ahead, she touched metal. Cold and wet, it gave a half-inch or so and a scalpel of light shot through in the darkness. Feeling around, she realized the metal had the dimensions of a door.
What would a door be doing in a pit?
It would rust, and seal shut in all the water.

Lindsey thought for a moment. If she had something to stand on... it would be easier to work on opening it. She crouched down and felt for the pipe.

There she froze.

Oh my God!
Instead of a pipe, it was a human hand–
cold and stiff.
She resisted the urge to scream and left it in her throat. Feeling around with her foot for the rest of the body, she carefully tapped her way down the corpse with the tip of her shoe.

It was a large body, she could tell that. Her foot hit something hard, and suddenly a light came on. It was a security guard. His flashlight had come on when her shoe had touched it. She recognized the body as one of the guards she’d seen around Imec. He had a perfect round hole right between his eyes and he was staring up with a look of utter horror on his face.

In a rising panic, Lindsey reached overhead and tried to push open the door latch. It wouldn’t budge. Her hands were bloodied, skinned at the palms, as she started to bang at the door. She couldn’t hear any sound, the hum and clang of machines she had heard earlier. And that silence actually gave her hope–because if that sound was that close--she should be able to reach the production wing from down here. But what if she couldn’t open the door and climb out?

And then she remembered:
the security guard’s gun.

She paused, then turned and made her way back to the body. She shined the flashlight on the grotesque remains and reached down. It was half submerged in the water and she fumbled around till she found his holster. Unsnapping it, she tugged the gun free and stood up. Hand trembling with cold and fear, she dropped the gun into the water, heard it clank, then had to feel around, locate it with freezing fingers.

“Oh, God,” she cried, lifting the gun toward the latch on the door. “Please, please work...

Her hand wavered ever so slightly and she took a step back and fired. The sound was deafening and her ears screamed as the bullet ricocheted off the door.

The heavy latch fell into the water.

She dropped the gun and stepped forward. Heaving with all her might, Lindsey scraped the door open inch by inch. She hauled and scrambled her way through a maze of pipes and wires, pulling herself through the opening. Scraping her side on the sharp edges, she climbed forward and stopped, catching her breath, waiting for her eyes to get used to this new dark.

She thought about going back for the flashlight, but it was already growing dim on the other side of the door. Over here there seemed to be no light at all. She knelt on all fours, feeling in all directions. The space was narrow; reaching from side to side, inching forward slowly; she realized she was in a tunnel, about six feet wide. A sharp chemical smell choked her and grew stronger the farther she crawled from the door.

Her heart pounded harder with each inch. She knew she was in the bowels of Imec Pharmaceuticals, and she prayed–passionately–that Katherine would be looking for her. She had to get out of here, but she had no idea where she needed to go. In fact, she had lost her bearings and wasn’t sure if she was moving toward or away from the sounds she’d heard.

The darkness was total. Advancing on blind faith, she walked smack into another block wall.
The end of the tunnel?

Now, still feeling her way, she realized that a set of wrought iron stairs stood to the right. She grabbed the handrail and started up. Her foot slipped on the first rung and sheared the top off her shin.
Damn that hurt!
Ignoring the pain, she grabbed the next rung and preceded ahead. The stairs were slippery and Lindsey wrapped her arm around every rung as she went.