Seizure Read online

  Kent had paid the nurse a large sum of money to install Troy and the equipment in a hotel room somewhere in New York. Only the nurse and Troy knew the location of the hotel. In this way, Kent hoped to protect Troy from any further retaliation by Pluto for what he was about to do.

  The nurse had called Kent at a predetermined time, and had given Kent a number, then told him to subtract it. That meant the number was to be subtracted from Kent's old phone number in Chicago, which Kent had given to the nurse beforehand. The resulting number would be the phone number for Troy's hotel room.

  The nurse was obviously confused and worried by the amount of secrecy Kent displayed, but he had no way of explaining it to her. He could only hope that the money he paid her was enough to satisfy her curiosity.

  The line picked up. "Hello?"

  "It's me," Kent said.

  "Of course," the nurse said with obvious relief. "Is everything all right?"

  "I was about to ask you the same thing."

  "He's a little worn out from all the activity, but other than that, Troy's doing fine."

  Kent let out his breath, feeling some of the tension fade. "Good. Can I talk to him?"

  "Of course. Hold on."

  A few moments passed before Troy's weak voice responded. "Dad?"

  "Yeah, it's me."

  "What's going on? Somebody woke me up, told me to get dressed, next thing I know, I'm being wheeled into this hotel room in the middle of the night."

  "I just wanted to make sure you were safe," Kent said.

  "Dad...something's wrong, isn't there?"

  Kent closed his eyes, feeling his head swimming with emotion. "Yes. Something's wrong. But I'm gonna make it right."

  "Does it have anything to do with the seizure I had?" Troy asked.

  Kent had promised himself earlier that he wouldn't lie to Troy, no matter what. "Yes. It's pretty complicated. Enough to say that some people are angry at me and took it out on you. I just wanted to make sure it wouldn't happen again. Are you okay?"

  "Yeah," Troy sighed. "It's actually kinda cool, all this cloak and dagger stuff. I'm a little scared, though. Julie, my nurse...she says I won't have another seizure, but I'm not so sure."

  "Trust me, Troy, you won't ever have another seizure again. Not if I can help it."

  "Okay."

  Kent paused, then said, "Troy, you remember the day your mother died. The day I picked you up at school?"

  After a moment, Troy said, "Yeah."

  Kent found himself smiling, despite himself. "That was something. Sharon, she always picked you up. But that day, I had to do it. On top of everything else. I drove all over Brooklyn trying to find your school, had to stop and get directions, all the while cursing Sharon for not giving me directions to the school before, and...hating myself for blaming her. She couldn't have known this would happen. No one could have."

  "Dad," Troy started, "please, I--"

  Kent gripped the phone tightly in one hand. "No, please. I have to say this. You remember that? Remember standing out there on the front steps, waiting? And you climbed in, so...happy. You were so happy back then."

  "Yeah," Troy whispered. "I remember."

  Kent closed his eyes. "First thing you asked was 'Where's Mom?' Such a simple question, but I spent the last half-hour trying to figure out how to answer it. I couldn't think of anything. I could only hope you wouldn't hate me for what I was about to do. So I told you about the accident. And that she had died."

  There was silence on the other end of the line, the same silence that had filled the car on that sad day, the engine grumbling in the stillness that followed as Kent had waited for a reaction from Troy.

  "You remember what you said?" Kent asked.

  "Yeah," Troy whispered. "I...just said 'oh.'"

  "Yeah. And I said I was sorry. For not being there for your mother when she needed me most. For not being able to stop the car, for expecting her to be home all the time, taking her for granted, not going to that play when I had the chance...I was just so sorry...and I started crying until I had to pull over to the curb. I was so ashamed. I wanted to be strong for you, but...but then you put your hand on my shoulder and told me everything was going to be okay."

  Kent paused, listening to the light crackling noise on the phone line. "And I knew it would be. It was so weird. Me, a thirty-year-old man being comforted by his own little son. But it was true. Because we had each other. We'd get through it together. I knew that then, but I forgot it somehow. Well, last night I remembered. I remembered it all."

  "Troy," Kent continued, "I know it's a little late for this, but I just wanted you to know that I'm sorry for neglecting you all these years. I've been so wrapped up in myself that I never saw that I was pushing you away just when you needed me the most. But I swear to you that it'll be different from now on. We're gonna get through this together, and we're gonna be okay."

  "I know, Dad," Troy said in a hoarse whisper. "Thanks. I love you."

  Kent closed his eyes, feeling a warm rush of emotions that had been held back too long. "I love you, too, Troy. Now you get your rest, okay? I'll call you soon."

  "Wait...Dad?"

  "Yeah?"

  "Can you get the nurse to let me watch some TV? She says it's bad for me to be sitting up too much."

  Kent grinned, feeling such relief that he felt like crying. "Sorry, champ, but she's the boss. See if you can get her to get you some books or Scrabble or something. There's other forms of entertainment in the world besides TV, you know."

  "Blah. The least she could do is get me a computer. Oh, she wants to give me another shot. I gotta go. Bye, Dad."

  "Later, kiddo." Kent hung up, his smile so wide that it hurt. He had just had his first real conversation with his son in almost two years.

  Kent shook himself as he slipped the phone into his pocket. That was one thing settled. Now it was time to turn the hunter into the hunted.

  * * *

  Janet pulled on a T-shirt over her bare stomach as she opened the door. At the sight of Kent, her eyes widened.

  "What are you doing here?" she asked.

  "I need your help." Kent rushed past her into the living room.

  It was pretty much the same as he had left it, except for a few extra papers lying around. Kent took off the backpack he wore and tossed it onto a chair, then unzipped it.

  "Something incredible happened last night," Kent said.

  She walked into the room, running her fingers through her frazzled blonde hair. "I know. I saw it on the news."

  He stared at her. "It was on the news?"

  "Sure. Haven't you seen it?"

  Kent shook his head, then dragged a stack of paper out of his backpack. "I was too busy. Getting this. I downloaded it from chat archives."

  Janet dragged a chair closer to him, then dropped into it. "Kent, how can you be so calm?"

  "It's okay. Troy's in a private room, resting fine. Doctor's say he'll recover in no time."

  "What? Troy's in the hospital?"

  Kent ripped off the rubber band holding the papers together. "Yeah. He stopped breathing for a while, but he recovered. Didn't they mention that on the news?"

  Janet held up a hand. "Kent, I have a feeling we're not talking about the same thing here. Are you aware that you're wanted for murder?"

  Kent dropped his papers onto the floor, where they scattered into a heap. He looked up at Janet. "Murder? What murder?"

  "Oh, man," Janet said. "Uh, Kent. Wayne was killed last night."

  Kent tried to sit down in a chair, but missed it by a few inches. He landed on the floor with a jolt of pain in his tailbone, but barely felt it. The shock of Wayne's death hurt him deeper.

  It took a moment before he could blurt, "What?"

  Janet winced and reached out to take his hand. It warmed his chilled fingers. "I'm sorry. Wayne was killed last night. This morning, actually. Cyanide injected into his neck. And the police think you did it."

  "But that's impossible. Why would th
ey think that?"

  Janet sighed and lowered her head a fraction of an inch, deep in thought. "Well, cyanide kills by preventing the victim from absorbing oxygen. He goes into convulsions, then suffocates. You're his best friend, and a week ago, your other best friend died of suffocation after going into convulsions. And yesterday morning, your son was treated for the same thing after a mysterious seizure. Shortly afterward, you pulled Troy out of the hospital, and he hasn't been seen since. They made some connections."

  "They're saying I killed Wayne and Vic?" he asked. "But they said Vic wasn't poisoned."

  She nodded. "I know, but after last night, they're taking another look at him."

  Kent shook his head, feeling a little stronger. "No, that's...that's not enough to convict me of murder."

  "No, but the fact that they found a glass with your prints on it in Wayne's apartment is helping. The police claim they just want you for questioning, but it's obvious they're more than a little suspicious."

  He stared into empty space, his mind racing to grasp what he was hearing. "They framed me. They framed me for murder. How--"

  She leaned forward as she squeezed his hand a little tighter. "Who, Kent? Who framed you? What'd you find out?"

  He looked up at her, finally focusing on her concerned face. "Just answer one question. Are they sure Wayne was poisoned? Are they sure he didn't die of an 'accidental' seizure like Victor?"

  "This time, they're sure. Like I said before, cyanide turns blood and tissues red as a cherry. Their working theory is that you gave Morgan and your son a different, as yet undetected, poison. Then you killed Wayne with cyanide for unknown reasons."

  Kent let go of Janet's hand to cradle his head between his knees. His mind swam. "This is unbelievable. They think I killed my best friend."

  She leaned forward, her chair creaking under her. "Okay, now it's your turn. You said 'they' framed you. Who's they?"

  "I don't know. Not exactly. But last night, after I left here, I started thinking about the graphic you showed me. I'd seen it somewhere else, but I didn't remember it. Then it hit me. Troy's game of Odyssey."

  She jerked back as if she'd been struck. "Odyssey?"

  Kent nodded. "I saw him fighting that three-headed monster on Monday. So I ran to Troy's room in time to see him going into a seizure from a pattern on his computer. They got him, Janet. Somehow they got a copy of the Cerberus virus to him. Almost killed him. I saved him just in time."

  "Cerberus?" Janet shook her head as her brow knitted. "What's that?"

  He stared at her. "Jan, you played Odyssey. Don't you know?"

  Janet leaned back in her chair and folded her arms, trying to look casual. "Well, no, I haven't gotten past the first level. It's a tough game."

  "But it's in the manual, too."

  Jan shrugged. "I never read the manual. I like to be surprised when I play a game."

  Kent held up his hands. "Okay, short version, Cerberus is the name of a creature in Greek mythology. It was a three-headed dog said to guard the entrance to their underworld."

  "Cool. That explains why I never saw him. You don't reach the Underworld until Level Six."

  "But here's the thing. At the hospital, Troy told me Pluto gave him the virus. So I left a message all over the Internet for Pluto to contact me. I talked to him...or her...in VirtuaChat. Pluto told me Troy was given the Cerberus virus as a punishment for my investigation. Pluto said there were others involved in creating the virus, but didn't say how many. They know all about me. They've been following me. Somewhere out there, they're conspiring to kill millions of people, and we're the only ones who know about it."

  "Wow," Janet breathed. "This is huge. We gotta call the police."

  Kent shook his head. "No, I'm wanted for murder. I can't walk in there with some goofy story about a killer virus. They'll lock me up in a heartbeat. The conspiracy's made sure I've been silenced."

  Janet patted her chest. "That's no problem. I'll go."

  "We're friends, Jan. They won't believe you, either."

  Papers rustled all over Janet's desk as she dug through them and held up a handful. "But we have proof."

  "The virus is set to go off tomorrow at midnight, Jan. It'll take that long just to convince them to look at what we have, let alone get them to understand and believe it."

  "We could leave an anonymous tip. Drop off a package at the nearest station with all the evidence they need."

  "And you expect them to believe it? They'll probably think it's a bomb and blow it up, first."

  She buried her fingers in her hair as she growled in frustration. "So we can't tell the police that the virus is set to go off in two days? What're we gonna do?"

  He managed to find the strength to lift himself up into the chair opposite Janet. He took a deep breath. "There's only one thing we can do. We have to find Pluto ourselves."

  Janet carefully shook her head and raised her eyes to watch him. "No, that's...crazy, Kent. The police already tried to find him and couldn't."

  "But that was years ago. Things are different now. We have a lead on who he is."

  Janet pulled her hands out of her hair and shifted a little closer to him. "Oh, yeah? What's that?"

  He reached over to her computer table on which a cardboard box rested. He held it up, displaying the garish artwork on the cover. "This. Think you can break into the source code for Odyssey?"

  Janet grinned. "I already got a head-start. I was gonna reverse-engineer it, and put in some cheat features so I could finish the game."

  "Then take a look through it. My guess is that you'll find the Cerberus virus is smack-dab in the middle of it."

  Janet's mouth dropped open. She took the box from him, and turned it over in her hands, studying it as if the box itself held secrets written in code. "You're kidding. You think that's how the virus is being spread? In copies of Odyssey?"

  "Think about it. You said it yourself that one way to spread a virus quickly is to put it on something everyone wants. Odyssey is the perfect distribution channel. Millions of computers have a copy of the game on it, and those computers can infect the computers that don't. And it's available for both IBM PCs and Macs, just like the virus."

  Kent tossed the game's box on her desk. "I did some research last night. Victor had a copy of Odyssey on his computer. The Rio Salado High School had a copy of Odyssey on its system. Cindy Diamond didn't have a copy of Odyssey, but she got a DVD from a friend who did. That's the connection."

  "It's a Trojan horse," Janet murmured.

  "Trojan horse?"

  She looked up at him. "Yeah, you know the story of that guy who was invading the city of Troy, so he hid in a giant wooden horse? The Trojans hauled the horse into the city, thinking it was a gift, and the guy popped out and took the city. Well, that's what this program does. It attaches itself to another program to gain access to a computer system. Hides inside an electronic Trojan Horse. In this case, Odyssey."

  Janet rubbed her chin. "But that would mean--"

  "Exactly. Whoever created Odyssey created Cerberus."

  Her face broke into a wider grin. "Pluto."

  "Bingo," Kent said. "If we can find out who made Odyssey, we'll find Cerberus."

  Janet's grin faded. "That's a problem. I've been reading articles on it. The story goes that the game was created by a freelance programmer who released it for free online under the name Ulysses. A software company, MagiTronics, signed a contract with Ulysses to release Odyssey in stores. But the creator's identity is still a secret."

  "I know. I called them an hour ago, they refused to give his name. But they told me Ulysses goes online every Wednesday on Orion at nine o'clock to talk to fans. He's like a god to amateur programmers. You know, the lone indie programmer makes good kind-of-thing."

  Janet leaned back in her chair, studying the game's box again. "Yep, a regular Quentin Tarantino for the Net."

  Kent dragged over the stack of paper he had brought in with him. "I downloaded every transcript of Ulys
ses' Q-and-A sessions I could find. The way I see it, there have to be some clues in here somewhere about Ulysses' true identity. You and I are gonna go through them until we find some."

  "That'll take a while," Janet said. "Are you sure you can risk staying here?"

  "No. The police will be checking everyone who ever met me. We've only got a few hours at most. So we have to hurry."

  Janet nodded, and clapped her hands on her thighs as she edged forward on her seat in anticipation. "Okay, let's do it. I never could resist a good mystery."

  Kent peeled off half the stack for himself, then handed the rest to her. "Better put some coffee on. This could take a while."

  * * *

  The aroma of coffee hung thick in the air as Kent hunched over the pages spread before him on Janet's bed. He read a conversation between Ulysses and other users about some of the programming techniques used in the game like ray-tracing, bitmapped graphics, polygons. It was all Greek to him, but Ulysses's fans couldn't get enough.

  Janet sat at her computer, a mug of coffee in one hand. She nodded and tapped the screen with a finger where the game's source code was displayed. "You were right. I recognize this code. It's the Cerberus virus, smack-dab in the middle of it all. I wonder if MagiTronix knew it was on here when it was published?"

  "Good question. I'm not sure it matters, though. Maybe MagiTronix bought the program without knowing it was on it, but the people we're dealing with seem powerful enough to have put the virus on afterward. Or if we want to be paranoid, we could speculate that maybe they created the whole company just to release the virus."

  Janet nodded, then looked up at the ceiling. "You know, I've been thinking. Victor's copy was written specifically for him. So was Diamond's and the virus that got your son. In fact, Troy's was rewritten so the virus would activate when he started the game first, no lag-time. I think they all got their copies of the game from somewhere else. Still not sure where. Or why."

  Kent groaned and rubbed the back of his neck. His fingers rustled through his hair and unbuttoned collar. "One mystery at a time."

  "Gotcha." She swiveled her chair to face a chalkboard she had set up nearby. It was covered with words, notations, and numbers, all dealing with clues of the true identity of Ulysses, the game's creator.