But even as she told herself this, she found herself looking toward the foot at the end of her right leg. Strange how she’d never realized before. How could she have lived so many years without noticing the mistake? That foot wasn’t hers. It was hot and dull, as if infected. In fact, she could even feel the pathogens crawling up the blood vessels like tiny insects, attempting to make their way into her otherwise healthy body…
No, she told herself.
She tried to summon her thoughts, but she couldn’t focus. Try as she might, her old memories and her sense of control were being overwhelmed by that alien lump. She examined it closely, trying to detect exactly what was wrong, unable to look away. It was like driving past a car accident, where you didn’t really want to see, but you couldn’t help staring.
They had done something. Replaced her foot, grafted something on there. Something that felt—in an awful way she had no words to describe—too much. Her body didn’t need it. Her body didn’t want it. She…
“NO!” This time, she yelled aloud. She glanced up at the clock: more than an hour had passed.
They were watching, the sick bastards. She wasn’t going to give them the show they wanted. She tried to take deep breaths, empty her mind of the fear and revulsion.
Don’t do it. Don’t do it. Don’t do it.
Even as she repeated this to herself, she realized she was still staring at the foot.
DON’T DO IT. DON’T DO IT. DON’T DO IT…
Without her knowing it, the parang was now back in her hand. She gave a shriek and scrambled back, but somehow it remained in a grip she was unable to loosen. But when that right foot hit the ground, the soft revulsive sensation overwhelmed her with nausea.
It’s just the drug, she told herself. That’s your real foot. It’s normal, not some infected piece of meat.
She had to move her focus away from it. With an immense force of will, she went back to a game she had played in her childhood. She’d been tall for her age in grade school, and gangly, and people made fun of her. But she could escape the humiliation by tuning that out and retreating into a private garden of her imagination: a Technicolor glade where the grass was a bright green, the foliage lush and particolored, and in which she herself was a white horse with a flowing mane, running free and wild.
It had worked when she was young, and as she concentrated it worked again now—she was able to slow the breath that escaped in gasps, open her hand, and drop the weapon. It fell to the tile floor with a loud ringing sound. Taking a step back, she closed her eyes tight against the brightness, the maddeningly regular rows of tile. She was able to control her breathing. She opened her eyes again and looked up at that mirrored window behind which the general watched as if she were a mouse in a cage. “Fuck you,” she said out loud. “It’s not working.”
No answer, no reaction. Well, no matter. She could resist this. She was going to win. She’d sit down in a corner of the lab, the parang in hand, wait there until someone came back, and then she’d overpower them and escape. She’d use the parang on them instead of herself.
The parang was at hand—she picked it up, stood, and walked toward the corner. But this fresh effort at walking was pure horror, every step like squeezing a bag of poison into her body. She staggered and, unable to balance, abruptly sat down on the tile floor.
DON’T DO IT. DON’T DO IT. DON’T DO IT. DON’T DO IT…
She was gasping again, sweat beading her brow, slicking her palms as she slowly, deliberately, held up the blade and turned it in the light. Another wave of nausea swept over her, and she choked and doubled over in pain. There was poison in that foot and it was going to kill her—it was killing her.
DON’T. DON’T. DON’T…
With a supreme effort of will, she tried to recall the white horse again, the enchanted garden of her childhood. But all that came was a white and green fog of confusion, into which a rotting horse staggered, oozing fluids from its eyes. Her entire consciousness, every particle of energy, was fixated on that disgusting thing attached to her. She drew it up toward her thigh, horrified at the thought that others might see it. Oh God, if only she were free of it…
Free.
She looked at it, breathing even faster now. She could see where the parasitic thing had attached itself. She could see the very spot: just an inch or so above her ankle.
Free yourself. Free yourself. Free yourself…
It was incredible that she could have missed it. She could actually see, feel, like an invisible line across her skin, the precise area where the pores and freckles became no longer hers. Abhorrence rose in her like a tidal wave. It was unbearable.
She heard, in her mind, the rotting horse pause, issue a scream of fear.
FREE YOURSELF. FREE YOURSELF. FREE YOURSELF…
A terrible anger rose in her as she looked at the foot. The parang was in her hand, the long, sharp edge glittering in the light, a thing of beauty. It wasn’t a weapon. It was an instrument—an instrument of freedom.
FREE YOURSELF. FREE YOURSELF. FREE YOURSELF…
She brought it over, laid its blade on the skin of her calf. It felt cool. It felt empowering. Now she lifted it and slid it gently along the spot where the alien foot had attached itself to her body. She repeated the motion, drawing the edge across with just a little more pressure. A thin line of red appeared, and she felt a flood of relief. It hadn’t hurt at all. The sense of freedom was enormous, overwhelming. This was the solution, she now realized. Having the leg drawn up like this made things easier. Best to excise the parasite quickly. She steeled herself. She knew she could do it. In times of crisis, she’d always acted decisively.
She took a deep breath, then raised the parang above her head. She felt the muscles of her hand tighten around the handle. She could save herself from this. It was all a matter of self-determination and control. Everything depends on keeping control…
She took in another long, shuddering breath. And then, as she brought the blade down with all her strength, an image flickered briefly across her mind’s eye: a beautiful white horse, restored to health and vigor once again, running through a verdant garden, proud and free—and then, abruptly, stumbling as its fragile front legs cracked like brittle sticks, the animal screaming in pain as it fell into a cloud of dark, miasmic dust.
64
SITTING IN THE wheelchair, bound and immobile, Pendergast watched Pamela Gladstone through the observation window. He saw her move away from the wheelchair, back up against the wall. The intercom amplified the sound of her gasping, her terrified breathing.
“No,” he heard her suddenly cry out in a voice full of anguish and frustration. “No, no, no…!”
It would have been easy for him to tune this out; to use his arsenal of meditative techniques to retreat from the reality of the present moment. But he would not allow himself to do that; he would not allow himself that escape.
He watched as she made her way to the other side of the lab, searching the medical cabinets for—he surmised—some kind of tool or improvised weapon. Finding none, she retreated to her corner. He noticed her begin to limp.
He would not allow himself that escape because he felt the terrible weight of responsibility for what was happening to her. He had brought Gladstone and Lam into his investigation. Naturally, he had not known the true nature of the conspiracy they unearthed or the extent of the danger they were in. But even in the final days, when it became increasingly clear there was a mole in the commander’s inner circle, he had taken insufficient precautions. After Quarles’s death he had arranged for the safe house and taken certain private measures to protect Constance—but he had not realized he was up against such a powerful and tentacled enemy.