One of the guards looked up and stared at Chapel. “Reinhard,” he said, “what’s he on about? Nobody told us about a virus.”
Reinhard scowled. “Shut up,” he said. “Williamson. Hand me that duct tape.”
Another of the guards tossed a roll of tape to Reinhard.
“Enough bullshit,” Reinhard said. Then he tore off a generous piece of tape and pressed it tight over Chapel’s mouth.
So much for talking his way out of this.
The guards went back to their game. The one who had spoken kept staring at Reinhard and at Chapel, but he didn’t get up from where he sat.
Chapel wondered how much longer it would take to bleed out.
BOULDER, COLORADO: APRIL 14, T+65:48
There was nothing but darkness outside the room’s little window.
Tools hung from hooks on the walls — saws, hammers, mattocks, and hedge clippers. A toolshed, then. Most likely Chapel had been taken to the judge’s wife’s place in the mountains above Boulder. The judge had said that was the undisclosed location, the safehouse where he would wait for Quinn.
There didn’t seem like a lot of point in figuring out his location, but he couldn’t just lie there and wait to die. He was an intelligence operative, so he spent the last of his time trying to gather information.
There were three guards in the shed, as well as Reinhard. The guards were named Williamson, Reynolds, and Hook. Hook kept winning whatever game they were playing. Apparently Reynolds owed him a fair amount of money. Chapel thought Hook might be cheating.
If he could talk, he could have tried to drive a wedge between Hook and Reynolds. Convince Reynolds he was being taken by a cheat. Get them to fight each other. It would make a great diversion.
Except he couldn’t talk. He couldn’t create the diversion. And even if he had a diversion, what then? He was handcuffed to a pipe. He still had some strength in his body — he hadn’t succumbed to anemia quite yet — but even at his strongest he would never have been able to break the pipe or pull his hand free of the cuffs. They were designed to hold stronger prisoners than him.
If Reinhard would leave the room, Chapel could try to catch Williamson’s attention somehow. Maybe he could convince the guard to remove his duct tape, convince him that Chapel had a cure for the virus, that he could save Williamson from Laughing Boy…
But Reinhard wouldn’t leave the shed. And as long as he remained, Williamson was more afraid of his boss than he was of the virus.
If he could…
If things were just slightly different…
If…
Reinhard’s walkie-talkie crackled with loud static that ramped up to a nasty whine of feedback. Looking annoyed, the chief guard grabbed the unit out of his jacket and switched it to a new channel. He started to put it back in his pocket, but it crackled to life again.
“… say again,” Chapel heard, “say again.”
“Movement… the trees,” a new voice said on the walkie-talkie.
“What the hell is this?” Reinhard asked.
Reynolds looked up from his game and shrugged. “Sounds like Praczek, kind of. Isn’t he out by the road?”
Reinhard grunted in frustration. He put the walkie-talkie to his ear. “Praczek, come in. Praczek, this is Reinhard. Report right now.”
Only static answered him. Reinhard set the walkie-talkie down on the table next to Chapel’s artificial arm.
“Sounded like something, maybe,” Hook said. “Sounded like there was somebody out in the trees. If Praczek saw something—”
“Shut up,” Reinhard said. “We hear something more, I’ll worry about it then. There’s nobody out there. Praczek was probably just jumping at shadows.” He grabbed the walkie-talkie again. “Praczek, report in. Everybody, report in.”
For long tense seconds all the guards stared at the walkie-talkie, but nothing but static came through. Reinhard repeated his request for reports, but still there was nothing.
“So there’s a fault in my set, that’s all,” Reinhard said, while his guards stared at him. “Maybe my battery is dying. Reynolds, give me yours.”
Reynolds took his own walkie-talkie out of his jacket pocket and handed it over. Reinhard played with it for a while, adjusting its various knobs and dials. Every time he switched it on, however, it got nothing but static.
“If there’s somebody out there, maybe they got to Praczek and Foster,” Hook said, rubbing at his chin.
“Maybe this Laughing Boy guy,” Williamson said.
“Shut up!” Reinhard shouted.
In Chapel’s head a little fantasy played out. He saw Army Rangers parachuting into the woods, scrambling to take up positions. He saw them moving in to take out the guards Reinhard had stationed around the house. He saw them breaching the door of the toolshed, bursting in with battering rams and flashbangs and M4 carbines at the ready. He saw them come to rescue him. To take him home.
It was a nice little fantasy. It was also bullshit.
Chapel was a silent warrior. He knew that Hollingshead wouldn’t send Rangers in to rescue him — if Hollingshead even knew he was still alive. If Hollingshead even wanted him to be alive, which Chapel had come to seriously doubt.
This was probably nothing. He hated to admit it, but Reinhard was probably right — it was most likely just a radio malfunction. Praczek’s original message, about movement in the trees, was probably about some animals he’d seen moving around.
“Praczek, damn it, report now,” Reinhard said into his walkie-talkie.
Static.
Suddenly red light flicked across the shed’s window. Just a glimmer. Then a moment later it came back, much stronger, bright red light illuminating the trees as if they’d caught fire.
Everyone in the toolshed jumped at the sight.
Reinhard’s eyes were wide. He visibly regained control of himself. Then he pointed at the others. “You three go check that out.”
“You want us to go out there?” Williamson asked.
“Yeah. Yeah, I do.” Reinhard drew his pistol. He didn’t point it at anybody, but the message was clear. “Go on, now.”
Hook and Reynolds headed for the door. Williamson held out a moment longer, but he must have known better than to anger his boss. Eventually he went, too.
Leaving Chapel alone with Reinhard.
Reinhard didn’t even look at Chapel. He sat down next to the table and started playing with his walkie-talkie again. He looked nervous and jumpy, but not nearly scared enough to do something stupid. As far as Chapel was concerned that was both good and bad. It meant Reinhard wasn’t going to go rushing out himself — leaving Chapel with a chance, no matter how slim, to escape. It also meant he wasn’t likely to shoot Chapel just because he was scared.
Chapel supposed you had to take the good with the bad.
He tried to listen for any sound coming from outside the shed. He could hear nothing, though. The static coming from Reinhard’s walkie-talkie was the only sound inside the shed.
Whatever was going on, it wouldn’t take long to resolve. Hook, Reynolds, and Williamson would go figure out what that light meant. Then they would come back and explain how it was all a false alarm. Maybe one of them would go and check on Foster and Praczek, and find out that sunspots or an electrical storm in the mountains or something else had caused the radio problem. Everything would be explained, and then the situation would return to normalcy, and Chapel would be right back where he’d been: bleeding to death on the toolshed floor, with no hope of escape.
This was the closest he was going to get to a diversion, he knew, and he couldn’t make any use of it.