Triggers

She had a brief moment where she thought she should lie: letting them know that she sensed things had gotten her into this booby hatch in the first place. But, no, no, she had to tell them; she had to get this fixed.

“It’s you,” she said, looking at Eric. “I only know the things about Jurgen that you know.”

Susan Dawson spoke. “What has happened to you happened to several others. There’s been a linkage of minds. We’re going to try to find a way to break the links, but for now we must acknowledge that they exist.”

Eric nodded. “I’m affected, too, and so is Agent Dawson.”

Nikki felt a wave of relief—it wasn’t just her; as crazy as all this sounded, she wasn’t nuts. Suddenly, she was angry. “But if it was happening to you, too, why didn’t you speak up when you first saw me? Why’d you let them lock me up here?”

Eric spread his arms. “I’m so sorry, Nikki. I probably did become linked to the person I’m reading at the same moment you became linked to me. But nothing brought her memories to mind for me until I actually saw her, after I saw you—first, because I was exhausted and preoccupied with the president’s health, and, second, because we both work here, she and I; this building is mostly background noise for the two of us. But for you being in a hospital is unusual, and the sights and sounds of this place immediately brought my memories of it into your consciousness.”

“Oh,” said Nikki. “But—wait!—does that mean somebody can read my mind, too?”

“Your memories, yes,” said Agent Dawson.

“But my memories are private!” said Nikki.

“So are mine,” said Eric. “So, um, if you’d not share them with anyone else, please…”

“Of course,” said Nikki. “Of course. But how long is this going to last?”

“We don’t know,” Agent Dawson said.

“I want to meet the person that’s linked to me,” said Nikki.

Susan Dawson shook her head. “I don’t think that would be advisable. Some of those who are linked already knew each other, and there’s nothing we can do about that, but others are strangers, and I think it’s best we keep it that way. But of course we’ll get you out of the psychiatric ward. Do you have a cell phone with you?”

“Yes.”

“Give me the number so that I can find you easily later. You’re free to roam the hospital—there’s a cafeteria in the lobby—but we’re not letting anyone leave.”

“Leshia, it’s Darryl. Are you okay?”

“I’m…I’m fine. God, Darryl, are you all right?”

“Yes.”

“You heard about the White House? My God…”

“Awful. Just…awful.”

“They say no one was hurt, but…”

“But everyone was hurt.”

“I saw you on TV just now. They were showing what went down at the Lincoln Memorial. I’m so proud of you. Where are you now?”

“Still at LT.”

“How’s—how’s the president doing?”

“He’s stable, but Sue has locked the hospital down. Leshia, listen, something super-unusual is going on here. It’s happened to me, and it’s happened to other people. We’re—we’re reading each other’s memories somehow.”

“What?”

“I know it sounds crazy, baby. It is crazy. But it’s happening. So I need you to go online and change the PINs for our bank accounts and things like that.”

“But—”

“Just do it. Don’t you see? Somebody else knows them now; I don’t know who. But we’ve got to change them before they clear us out. Do it, and don’t pick anything I’d easily guess.”

“Darryl, um, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yes, I’m fine. I know it sounds insane, baby, but do it—do it right away. Okay, look, I gotta go. Love you!”

The cab dropped Secret Service agent Dirk Jenks at Reagan. He paid the fare in cash, didn’t wait for his change, and didn’t ask for a receipt. He checked the departures board and saw that there was a flight to LaGuardia in sixty-five minutes. In the wake of the explosion at the White House, FBI agents were already swarming the airport, but so far there’d been no sign that flights were going to be suspended as they had been back on 9/11.

There was a line at the Delta ticketing counter, but Jenks flashed his Secret Service ID at people and moved to the front.

“The next flight to LaGuardia, please,” he said.

“One-way or round-trip?” asked the woman behind the counter.

“One-way.”

Susan Dawson headed from the psychiatric ward to Professor Singh’s laboratory, which, she knew, was six doors down the third-floor corridor from his office. As she entered the lab for the first time, it was, as Yogi Berra had famously said, déjà vu all over again.

Singh was talking on his phone. He quickly finished his call.

“Who were you talking to?” Susan asked.

“My wife. Why?”

“Did you tell her about the memory linkages?”

“Of course. It’s fascinating.”

“I wish you hadn’t done that,” she said. “We should keep this quiet.”

He gestured at his computer monitor, which was showing Twitter.

“You tweeted about this?”

“No, no. I just searched Twitter for ‘Luther Terry’ while I was talking to my wife, and those came up.”