Hush (The Infected: Ripped to Shreds Book 1) (21 page)

"
Christian
. No one
wants to read the mind of poor Becky, do they? I swear, you die once and no one
even gives you a Christmas card." She looked around and winked.
"That's a hint, by the way. Presents won't do much for me, but cards
really show where the love is, right?"

Cindy looked at her, read for a
bit and then nodded. This girl, and she
was
young, dead or not, really
needed that kind of validation.

"Got it. Send cards, or
you'll haunt us." Then she stopped, forced a fake grin, and shook her
head. "Or is that send cards and you
will
haunt us? I should have
gotten you to hand out candy for Halloween. Not that anyone would have gotten
it." She was too solid looking, but the red haired girl nodded, her face
serious.

"I know, right? Who doesn't
love a good apparition? Anyway, Chris sent me along to hang with you all for a
bit. I think she's kind of annoyed with me to be honest. Her mode makes her
kind of insular, and here I am underfoot, in her own head, all the time now.
Things are getting stressed. She knows that she should do Burrow's treatment,
but..." She stopped, and it was vague enough that a lot of people in the
room didn't know what she meant. That was important since human experiments
weren't legal, even on Infected people.

Doctor Burrow's however wasn't
just a normal M.D. The woman was, from what those around the table were able to
tell her, both a slightly vixen-ish cutie, and a true medical genius. One that
might possibly be Infected, though no one knew if that was the real case or
not. At least none of the people, or ghosts, that were there who were easy to
read. Without waiting to be prodded, she did her own work and found the right
set of information.

It was fascinating. The woman
wasn't Infected at all.

No, she was just kind of insane.
As in full out mad scientist. One with a wicked sense of humor and very little
regard for laws, or the rules of men. Smart too, which was how she'd managed to
get away with what she was doing so far, which had broken about fifty different
laws.

Becky had kept speaking, so she
honed in on that, knowing that missing what was being said that way really
might not help.

"No women have gone yet,
since Kiko loves to play with men that way. Chris doesn't want to risk
it."

Cindy sighed, and shrugged,
knowing it was her job to play the little furry pig that way.

"I think that's going to be
me. I... Really, I don't know if that's my first mode though. I mean, I didn't
kill before, or feel pushed to it, but it could be that I'm just a psychopath.
I think... maybe that's always been the truth? I know that I never cared all
that much about the feeling or needs of others. Oh, sure, if it serves me at
the moment, but not otherwise." She spoke honestly, which had everyone
looking at her.

It was Ron that said something
about it however.

"You seem pretty open right
now. Is that, I don't know, just you..." He didn't know how to politely
ask what he was mulling in his head, which took nearly a page of reading to
work out.

When she got it after a long
silence, she smiled.

"No, I'm not really faking
this. It's... Look, I can tell that my best game plan right now is to be
honest. There are too many mind readers around for me to
lie
to anyone.
Besides, I don't care about how you feel, in regards to what I say, most of the
time. I guess I kind of understand it. From before? I wasn't always like this,
I don't think. Not totally. So I
remember
feeling things, even if it
wasn't the same as what regular people have all the time. I also know that if I
don't play the game set out, I die. Everyone is making that really clear."
They were, if not verbally. Not one of them denied that either, and Bridget, as
if she were trying to be cute about it, took a big bite of a berry cream pie
thing.

Cindy wasn't hungry anymore, but
it really did smell good.

The tiny powerhouse swallowed
first then spoke, looking at her directly.

"Yeah. Things change fast
like that. Don't let it get to you too much. We'll make sure you don't kill the
wrong people or anything from now on, regardless of the treatments. I know you
don't
want
that, but it has to be a thing. Besides, you kind of sucked
as a serial killer." She said that last bit like it was simply true and
both Brian, and oddly, Scott, nodded about it.

Prime looked at his daughter and
then her, casually.

"True. You always left the
bodies, which alerted the police every time you killed. Plus your signature,
leaving the knife in their throat... You always cleaned off the prints, but
that meant it wasn't a mugging gone wrong or anything like that. It still threw
everyone off a bit, that men were being killed. The profilers suggested that
had to mean a big, powerful, person doing the killing. They all said men,
right?" He looked at Brian then, as if he were the go to person on the
idea.

"That's true. I wouldn't
have guessed short woman on that either, and
I
know that anyone can kill
in the right circumstances. I was almost taken out by a midget woman once, so
there's no excuse for me. It was really sloppy though, over all. The second
time it happened we started seeing reports about it. No one thought it would
take the cops here that long to pick up on it, or that they'd let us come look
into it after eight people were dead. Why did you pick them? The men?"

Everyone was looking at her, and
it felt private suddenly. She was about to lie, or try to, when Brie shrugged,
which was fluid, and called attention to her breasts, which got all the men
except Ron to look. From the words over his head he'd noticed, but was being
polite and not taking the bait. Cin glanced at him and nodded. It seemed there
was more going on inside of him than the surface ever showed.

Trivia waved her fork, just a
bit, and explained. The thing there was that
what
she said was different
than what Cindy had thought the truth of the matter was.

"Her fixation is on men that
are like her third grade teacher. Mr. McAvoy. The man was
fine
by the
way. He really loved working with kids and was a good teacher. Nothing weird
about it or anything. He just looked a lot like her father, so Cindy's
subconscious mind made her think that it was all about her dad this whole time.
It really
is
part of the Infection, too, Cin. You're just a complex and
interesting person."

The thing was, as soon as the
name was said, she could feel it. She burned with pure hatred, near rage, for
the man. Oh, he'd been a good enough teacher, but she'd never liked him for
some reason. One that, apparently, had very little to do with him. A sudden
desire to go and kill him came to her then. Still, the way that Brie had spoken
on the subject indicated that he was dead, and when she tried to call up a page
for him, nothing showed up. Not at first. When she started to look back in time
there were words, but everything was old. She dropped it, feeling enraged by
the contact, after only a few seconds.

The effort got Trivia to nod, and
then reach over to pat her arm.

"He passed away a few years
ago of a sudden heart attack. This isn't a rational thing. He really was, as
far as I can tell, always a good man. Not even unpleasant or creepy to anyone.
No more than anyone else is. This is
all
you. So bury that rage you're
feeling about him, and..." She looked around and then shrugged. "I
was going to ask for the room, but for once it doesn't really matter. The press
is gearing up to come visit, so we don't have a lot of time to get to things, but...
Ron, Lyn, you need to keep this quiet for now. Not that anyone will hurt you
over it, but it's best not to tempt anyone."

It was, Cindy realized, time for
the big disclosure of info. A dump of it that might just catch one or two
people by surprise.

The brown haired and light
skinned woman looked around, and locked eyes with each and everyone one of them
in turn, without making it seem like she was trying to do that at all. When she
finally spoke, everyone riveted, the woman took a meaningfully deep breath, and
dove right in.

"There is, I guess the best
term for it is actually a coup attempt, going on in the IPB. That's why Rachel
and I are here, uninvited. Most of it is coming from the Agent's side of
things, but there are Infected involved too. Some of our own people have been
brought over. The thing there is... Well, not everyone in the government is
exactly pleased with Impulse. They think she's too powerful, and dangerous for
them to control. They think, and they aren't wrong about it, that the current
power structure of the IPB will back
her
up, and not let anyone try to
take her out. In order to do that, they're going to have to take out at least
ten key people."

Bridget moaned. It was the kind
of thing that spoke of not wanting to clean your room, or do the dishes, rather
than hearing that people hated you so much they were willing to kill others for
the chance at taking you out.

"Seriously? I do all that
work holding the government together, and this is my thanks? What do I have to
do, sew a flag to my butt?" Her voice, high and piping sounded truly
annoyed about it all. Not
worried
, but then, she really wasn't. Anyone
coming for her would have problems doing it, which was the point of the people
planning things.

Coming for her friends
might
work, but even that would mean going after some of the most powerful people on
the planet. It wasn't going to be easy or anything. If these people were Agent
side, then they'd be smart enough to think that one through. In fact, it
occurred to her to wonder why they hadn't just come to her and ask how she felt
about things, rather than moving directly into a fight that they probably
wouldn't win.

That one got an answer, without
being asked. Brie reached out and put a hand on Cindy's back, which was odd,
but when she looked over, wondering if it was the woman signaling that Cin
needed to do something, she turned and noticed that the woman was just, on a
subconscious level, trying to come on to her. Instead of making an issue of it,
given the topic, she let the woman speak, and didn't bring that bit up.

"They know all of that, and
think they have some things arranged to really do it. No one is even imagining
they can take you in a fight, which is unfortunate. If they were, then this
wouldn't be a real problem. They're layering plans about twenty levels thick
instead, gearing traps for each person that are designed to remove them from
either their position or the world. If they can. This isn't
just
a
fight, or we'd win. There are politics involved here, and PR campaigns..."
She looked at Charlotte and then shook her head.

The sharp looking woman, who was
well made up, even if her lipstick was a bit too red for her, nearly glared
from across the table.

"So, everything we've ever
done is about to be leaked to the press?" She wasn't happy about that, but
the words above her were planning out how to defend them, if it came to it.

Brie however shook her head.

"
Noooo
. That would be
too easy. We're all about to be hit with a combination of truth and lies that
we can't defend against. With a lot of us that won't make too much difference.
Everyone knows that Bridgie is a killer after all. They've seen it, and know
they can't stop her. She's too young, and female, to be considered a pedophile,
either. So no one will even try to bother with her that way. Oh, maybe a bit to
keep things interesting, but that's all. A lot of things are about to drop
about other people however. Like Marcia supposedly ordering her people to
cannibalize corpses after a fight." She turned and looked at Brian then.

For his part he smiled. It was a
cold thing, that was nearly brutal to look at.

"Which, of course, they have
real footage of her saying. It was a hypothetical, and not meant for the real
world, or for us at the IPB really. She suggested once that soldiers could do
that to save on resources and to scare the enemy. I think it was a joke. I
think
."

That got a nod from Prime.

"I see. So anything that
we've said, for the last twenty years, will be brought back to haunt us? Out of
context too, I bet. Every word uttered by team two about not liking normal
people, or any hint of us trying to get out of doing what the government wanted
will be taken as us being against them. That kind of thing? Then ridiculous
things like that, except a lot of them. Anyone against the Infected will be
able to pour through it and find something to go on about? Like with those
climate scientists and their emails?"

He was pointed at by a single
finger from the attractive brunette next to Cindy.

"It's just one of the many
phases of this too. So get ready for your names to all be soiled beyond
redemption. On the great side I know who most of the major players are already.
On the bad side, there's no way to undo this now. If we cull them, it will look
like we have something to hide. At the same time, we need to protect the
targets that can be taken out with assassinations. Brian, President Lawrence,
Charlotte, and Doug."