Seizure Read online

  Kent ran across the room to a row of doors against a wall. He threw open the first door he reached, plunging into a black and hollow corridor. Kent slammed the door behind him, then kept going, groping along the walls to feel his way in the darkness.

  In a flash, torches lit up along the wall, making him realize he had been moving down a narrow passageway. He looked back to see the door opening. Roland stood silhouetted against the brighter light, raising his gun. There was another bang. Something hot rammed into his arm, the same arm on which his battered hand dangled. Kent reeled, tumbling to the floor as a sensation of ice trickled down his body. Only when he looked down at his bleeding arm he realized he had been shot. Again.

  Kent tried to get to his feet. But his legs suddenly felt as though they were made of rope. He collapsed. He forced himself to rise again. The wall to his left slid away, and Kent fell into an adjoining passageway. He hit the floor with a thud echoing down the halls. Kent stumbled to his feet and kept going, his hand pressed to the wound in his bicep.

  He could hear footsteps resounding through the hallway. Footsteps not his own. Kent ducked down another passageway, The next one he came to.

  Roland's voice came out of nowhere. "Welcome to the Labyrinth of Minos. It's just part of my fascination with mythology. Legend had it that the great King Minos ordered an inventor named Daedelus to create a maze to entrap his deformed son, the Minotaur."

  Kent pressed his hand tight against the gunshot, feeling blood oozing through his fingers. The combined loss of blood from two gunshot wounds were sending him into shock, but he had to keep going.

  "King Minos would throw prisoners into the Labyrinth," Roland continued, "where they would be hunted down and devoured by the Minotaur. Isn't that fascinating?"

  Kent had to stop. He had to rest. The pain in his arm and hand were gone, replaced by a bone-chilling cold flooding through his body. By the dancing light of the torches, he could see another passageway and reeled into it.

  "The Labyrinth was legendary," Roland said, "because it was said that no one could get out of it. Mine is not quite as complex, but will suffice for you."

  Kent listened to the footsteps growing ever closer, but he couldn't tell what direction they came from. He tore off the sleeve of his bleeding arm and began to twist it into a rope. Wrapping and pulling it tight around his arm above the wound made it into a crude tourniquet. That would prevent too much blood loss. It was all he could do.

  "How's your son, Reynolds?" Roland asked.

  Kent's face burned with anger. He wanted to keep silent so Roland couldn't track him down, but couldn't keep from yelling, "He's just fine! No thanks to you!"

  "Temper, temper. I disgust you, don't I?"

  Kent ran down the passageway he was in, hearing footsteps growing louder behind him. "Yes."

  "Well, here's an ironic twist. You disgust me as well. All of your kind disgusts me. Humanity disgusts me."

  Kent tried to orient himself. How many passageways had he gone down? Had he taken a right or a left back there, and what about the turn before that? It was impossible. Every corridor looked like every other corridor. The dim light of the torches wasn't much help either.

  "I've spent my whole life being mocked and ridiculed through no fault of my own," Roland said. "You looked at me with scorn and derision until one day I proved myself useful, then I became acceptable to you. You know I've received over three hundred marriage proposals from women around the world since the Vulcan Corporation broke the billion-dollar mark? You know how many I got before I became a billionaire? Zero. Girls wouldn't even allow themselves to be seen with me."

  Kent decided to keep going straight. He would either come to a dead end or find his way out. Either way was better than wandering aimlessly, getting himself more lost.

  "I'm not like that, Weaver," Kent yelled. "I know what it's like to be different."

  Roland's voice floated out of the shadows. "No, you don't. You could never know."

  Kent panted for breath, then yelled, "Yes, I do. I grew up in the inner city of Chicago. My father unloaded fish from a truck for most of his life until he died of a heart attack. I went to school with the same pair of sneakers for almost ten years, even when my toes bent in because they were so small. I was the poorest kid in school, and everyone laughed at me. I know what it's like."

  Kent felt his thoughts drift away from the pain and horror of his surroundings as he said, "I guess...maybe that's why I work so hard, because...I don't want to be poor again. And I don't want to be hurt again."

  "Is that supposed to endear me to you?" Roland asked. "Am I supposed to see the light now and welcome you like a brother? I don't care what you've gone through. I don't care about anyone, that's my secret. When I was a boy and I realized everyone I ever loved tried to hurt me, I decided that I would never love again. I shut off the part of my mind that cares, that feels. I can do anything, because I just...don't...care."

  Roland's voice drew closer. Kent could hear footsteps, and they definitely came from the corridor behind him. Kent needed a weapon. He tried to pull one of the torches on the wall loose. They were solidly built into the wall. Kent could hear the hiss of gas coming from the base. Fakes.

  "Don't you ever feel like that, Kent?" Roland asked. "Like caring for others is too much work? Maybe when your wife was killed? Didn't you just feel like giving up on everyone and everything, just concentrating on yourself?"

  Kent saw a light ahead, one steady and white. He began to run towards it, but his legs trembled so hard that he could barely walk. "I did...once. But in the last few days, I realized that when you stop caring about people, you stop being human. I realized I'd become like you."

  Roland's snort of disgust came from right behind him, just around a corner Kent had left behind. "You deserve to die. Take your precious ideals with you."

  Kent came to another corner. He turned it into a brilliant light again, the light from under the cracks of a door. Kent threw the door open to find himself in Roland's penthouse again. He was free.

  Roland's voice echoed out of the maze behind him. "Kent, I'm getting tired of this game. I have better things to do. You can't win, you know that."

  Kent tried to run, but his legs gave out. He fell to the hardwood floor so strongly that he knew his bruised ribs should have screamed with pain. But he felt nothing. That scared him more than the pain. He was going numb from shock. The blood trickled out of his arm slower, but it was still there. If he didn't get help soon, he would die.

  "Oh, there you are," Roland called out of the maze. "So you found the way out. Just as well. Now you have nowhere to hide."

  Kent felt so cold. The wind blew through the broken window so hard, chilling his already frozen body. The room spun around him, turning upside-down. He couldn't run anymore. He was going to lose consciousness. Then Roland would kill him.

  Kent looked through the haze closing over him at a room a few feet in front of him. Computers of all shapes and makes glowed brightly within it.

  And Kent remembered the disc in his pocket, the one with the Cerberus virus on it. Kent began to crawl. He clutched the wooden floor with his good hand to drag himself forward. He made his way into the computer room, and collapsed onto the floor.

  He worked his trembling hand into his coat pocket and managed to hold on long enough to draw out the USB drive. Kent jammed it into the USB port of a PC that used Windows, instead of Lightning. With the insertion of the USB drive, an icon for the game Odyssey popped up on the screen. Kent struggled to work the mouse. He clicked on the icon.

  He closed his eyes and let the blackness carry him away.

  * * *

  Roland enjoyed himself. He had always loved to play the game of life and death. He only wished Reynolds was a better adversary. Roland deserved someone as smart and deadly as himself.

  But the police would be here any moment. Time to end the game and kill Reynolds. Roland would tell them about the madman who attacked him with a gun, ranting about a k
iller virus. There was no way Bourne could shift the blame from the CLF to himself. The only one who could tie him to Cerberus was Sonya, but Roland could get rid of her just as easily.

  Roland emerged from the maze to see Reynolds' leg sticking out of the computer room. Apparently, he had crawled in there with his last ounce of strength. So pathetic. Roland aimed his gun as he approached the room.

  As more and more of Reynolds came into view, Roland became aware of something on one of his computer monitors. He looked up to see an image on its screen of a three-headed dog.

  It was Cerberus. It was so beautiful, so elegant, just as Roland had designed it to be. It strode towards the monitor, so powerful and strong, moving with grace and beauty. When it vanished, the flashing lights began.

  Roland realized what was happening, what Reynolds had done, and he wanted to look away, but it was so beautiful that he could only stand helplessly, entranced by the patterns that flickered before him, until the darkness claimed him, and for a brief moment, Roland was at one with the computer, his mind's electrical impulses echoing those on the screen, and he and the computer were one mind, one being, and in that brief moment, Roland felt more at peace than he had felt in his entire life.

  23.

  IT WAS a beautiful April morning in New York's Central Park, or at least Kent hoped it would be. He stood outside his townhouse, waiting by the back of a taxi when a loud horn blared behind him. It came from a Winnebago rumbling down the street to come to a halt in front of his home.

  Kent felt joy rush through him as he saw the crazed computer on the side of the RV. Janet had taken a trip to Florida to attend a programmer's convention for the last month, and it looked like she had returned. Since the incident at Vulcan, they had been dating regularly, and she seemed to grow closer each day.

  Janet climbed out of the driver's seat to circle the vehicle. She wore her broadest smile as she gave him a kiss. "Well, well, well. What have we here? Planning a little excursion?"

  He struggled to hug her with the cast on his arm, but he managed. "You could say that. Troy and I are gonna go see a movie, Infinite Punishment."

  Janet leaned against the side of his cab with her thumbs hooked in her pockets. "Sounds good. You two gettin' along pretty well now, huh?"

  Kent looked up at his home, watching the trees waving past the windows. "It's better. We're still working through some stuff, but there's progress. We're seeing Doctor Cohen twice a week and that helps. And I'm still attending meetings of that widowers' group she suggested. It's more helpful than I thought it would be."

  "Well, that's awesome, Kent. And I'm the bearer of glad tidings. I assume you heard that Sonya Hawke was sentenced this morning."

  "Yup. Sixteen counts of homicide, and three counts of attempted murder."

  "It's about time that psycho got put away. It's too bad Weaver couldn't stand trial, too."

  Kent tucked the cloth into the back of the car. "I guess. But I sometimes wonder if he would've gotten justice. A man like Weaver could buy his way out of any courtroom."

  "Yeah, guess you're right. But the good news is they just rounded up the other five members of the CLF. When the police found Roland's anti-viral program for Cerberus, they also found records of all the members and activities of the CLF with transcripts of their online meetings. Interpol just arrested the last of them in Germany."

  Kent nodded. "That's good news, all right."

  She leaned closer. "How do you feel?"

  He paused to think for a moment. "It's kind of strange. The conviction of Sharon's killer didn't do anything to fill the void in my heart, but the conviction of Sonya and the CLF does give me some satisfaction. Maybe because capturing Sharon's killer didn't achieve anything but revenge. Sharon was still dead. But arresting the CLF means something. We saved lives, and that feels good."

  Cerberus had been stopped in time. Except for a few casualties and deaths from people who never heard or ignored the warnings, Roland's dream had failed. All copies of the Cerberus virus had been tracked down and erased, thanks to his own vaccination program. For all practical purposes, Cerberus was destroyed.

  Troy walked down the stairs of the townhouse. "Ready to go, Dad?"

  "Sure am." Kent climbed behind the driver, paused, then leaned out to look at Janet. "Care to join us?"

  Janet grinned. "Thought you'd never ask. Want to take my RV?"

  "I don't think it would fit in the theater parking lot. Hop in."

  She gave a little skip as she headed around to climb into the backseat with them. When she buckled in, Kent patted the divider, and the cab set off for the movie theater.

  As they rode together in the backseat, Janet leaned against him. She didn't look at him, but Kent felt her hand close around his. He squeezed it, and she squeezed back. That made him smile to himself even more. He had achieved his dream. His family was whole again.

  AFTERWORD

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