Chapter 2

Betelgeuse Installs Some Anti-Virus Software

I
(Four hours prior)

Robin opened her eyes, but could barely see anything. Her head was pounding. Eventually, she realized she was hanging upside-down, suspended by her seatbelt.

She tried to lift her left arm to dislodge it and immediately felt a sharp jolt of pain – it must have been broken. She lifted her right arm – without incident – and pushed the button to remove the belt. Immediately, she fell into the steering wheel, landing hard on her head and sending searing pain across her left side.

Struggling to stay conscious, Robin probed for the door with her good arm. She found the window had been shattered open and, while cutting up the forearm with broken glass, she deduced that enough space was open for her to pull herself through.

Slowly, painfully, she managed to get out from the wreckage. She laid in the snow, pain radiating throughout the left side of her body, the icy air and glass-covered ground only making it worse.

Eventually, she resolved to get up. Frostbite or hypothermia could set in if she didn't. More importantly, her cover could be blown if someone found her with a person whom she and Jason had just kidnapped….

Wait, how were the others?

On her feet, Robin hobbled over to the other side of the car, trying to keep her left arm still to suppress further torturous pain. Her vision had partially cleared; she noticed the driver's-side back door was open. Inside: no Julia.

Examining the snow around her, she noticed footsteps coming toward and away from Julia's door, but was too disoriented at the moment to confirm whether the ones coming to the door were all hers.

Robin looked up toward the driver's door. No footsteps. The door was closed. She bent down to peer through the broken window. Jason was still there. Eyes closed.

There was a bullet in his head.

Robin was taken aback by the sight. She looked up to examine the area, then realized how vulnerable she was and ducked behind the overturned car.

She took a few deep breaths and clutched her winter coat tightly with her free arm.

Her vision had cleared sufficiently by then to help her figure out where she was: in a field a few yards west of Iowa Highway 9, on which the car had been driving south. The shooter must have been on the other side of that highway to get the shot they did… an exceptional shot indeed.

Speaking of the highway: she had to get out of there. It was still the middle of the night – who knows how late – but the moment someone passed by and noticed the crash, her cover would be at risk. Maybe the government could take care of her, but even if so, her career would surely be over the moment she arrived at Langley without Julia.

But how was she going to find Julia in the first place?

First thing's first: get out of there before someone drives by. She struggled back up (though reckless, she surmised the shooter probably didn't want her dead – at least at the moment), and searched for somewhere to go. Then she saw it: a blinking red light in the distance, across the highway. A peculiar such light, not blinking at a constant beat, nor flickering manically like one barely getting enough current to survive. It was alternating fast and slow blinks.

She remembered her basic training and realized it was spelling an SOS in Morse code.

Was this some strange hint? Or maybe a trap? No time: might as well investigate it, at least to get away from the wreckage. Besides, if whoever sniped Jason wanted Robin dead too, why was she still alive?

Robin nearly leapt across the highway – fortuitously empty – and ran through snowy, fallow farmland to reach the source of the blinking light. In the dead of night, it took her a while to realize she was approaching a small copse. The light source was inside; she ducked behind the trees for cover, in case someone discovered the mess she left behind while she was investigating.

Exhausted, she took a moment to rest against one of the trees, breathing heavily. Robin realized how much pain she was in: the adrenaline was wearing off, and her arm was in horrible shape. Her bruises might heal, and the cuts over her body had already clotted in the frosty air, but if she didn't get medical attention for her broken forearm soon, who knows what could happen. She thought about trying to fashion a makeshift cast, but the only material she could use was her coat, and it was simply too cold to take off. She had to get out of there as quickly as she could.

Robin reached to pull out her phone – though she didn't have the Director's number, perhaps she could find an agency number online and call for backup?

No good; it was shattered from the crash.

Robin took a deep breath and kept searching for the light source. It happened to be only a hundred feet or so further: a programmed pen light positioned precisely toward the crash site. She picked it up to turn it off, in case anyone else would notice it, and realized it was taped to an envelope. She couldn't see well in the dark, but could clearly feel a key fob inside with her free hand. She rubbed her thumb around to try to press a button – ended up mashing all of them multiple times – but never heard any lock/unlock noises nearby.

Robin rested her head against a tree to think. This key… assume the sniper left it. Don't seem to want her dead; what do they want… she cringed as more pain sprung from her arm. Doesn't matter what they want doesn't matter… Find the car. Car: warmth, mobility, safety. Okay. Sniper wants her to find the car… it's not within range of the RFID…. Either… either it's a wild goose chase for some random car in the…

More pain. Okay okay okay. Assume for the sake of getting the hell out of here that this car is relevant to me….

Julia's car?

Robin, desperate, took the first lead she had and traveled north, back toward the Waukon house from which she had just abducted Julia.

II
(Present time)

"Beetle Juice? What kind of name is—"

"Betelgeuse, you know, B-E-T-E-L…" Betelgeuse exasperated. "It's a star! Didn't you take 'Ay 20' last quarter?"

"Why am I – wait, how do you know what classes I took?"

"I… don't worry about it. And to answer your other question," Betelgeuse proceeded, seemingly reading Julia's mind, "you're handcuffed so you don't try to escape."

Julia sighed. Surprisingly, she found herself more annoyed than afraid at this point. "Well then, Mister Betelgeuse," she snarked, "what exactly do you plan to accomplish by kidnapping me?"

"I… it's hard to explain. I can do a better job when we stop, but for now: the government wants you for a really dangerous experiment. It's called the Intersect Project." Betelgeuse spoke in a peculiar manner: he would rush a few words, then pause or stammer mid-sentence, as if unsure how to proceed, then continue.

"The project," he continued, "they claim it's meant to help prepare field agents, but…. I used to be part of it, many years ago, and… and that's what it was for back then, but… then these people realized the potential. If ordinary people can be given the Intersect…." Betelgeuse went silent; his voice had been shaky throughout.

Finally, Julia spoke up. "So… this experiment thing. You gonna stuff me down some deep dark hole for the rest of my life for 'safety'? Because those CIA people sounded pretty sure they could track me down if I escaped. And frankly, if I had to choose, I think I'd rather take my chances with them."

Betelgeuse sighed. "I've already tried keeping people underground. It's miserable. It's no way for my family to live. And it's not enough, either. We have to attack at the source, it's the only way. We need to stop this… once and for all." His voice trailed off.

The car screeched to a halt. They had reached their destination: Middle of Nowhere, Wisconsin. Or at least, it might as well be called that: it was nothing more than a stretch of highway cutting across snow-covered forest.

Betelgeuse got out of the car, put on a ski mask (he told Julia he couldn't let her see his face for some reason), and pulled his captive out from the back seat. "Follow me. I have to keep you in cuffs, I'm sorry. But I promise you, this will be over soon." He led Julia across the icy highway, into deep forest. They walked for a short stretch before stopping at a snow-covered tree stump in a small clearing.

It was no warmer in Northern Wisconsin than the night before in Waukon. In fact, Julia wondered if it was even worse. Betelgeuse noticed her rapid shivering, took his heavy coat off, and wrapped it around her. "This should keep you warm enough. One of your handlers is…" he checked a small electronic device in his pocket. "She should be no more than forty minutes behind us, so we have to work quickly." Betelgeuse pulled a pair of sunglasses out of his back pocket. "I'm going to put these on you; they'll help you understand everything."

Julia was confused, but reluctantly assented. Betelgeuse sat her down on the stump, and then he put the glasses on her.

It all happened in a flash: The sunglasses lit up and flickered a small jumble of images onto the inner side of the lenses. Julia saw them all.

Betelgeuse promptly removed the glasses and returned them to his pocket. He watched Julia blink a number of times. "Uhh…" she finally spoke, "cool specs?"

Betelgeuse knelt: "Julia, I'm going to ask you a question. Don't be alarmed when you unexpectedly know the answer." Julia stared back at the dead eyes behind the ski mask, oblivious.

"Julia, can you tell me what the Intersect is?"

She felt a rush of memories she shouldn't have had. Images flickered in her mind's eye, telling a peculiar decades-old story.

The rush took Julia's breath away. She started breathing fast, her heart racing. Finally, she calmed down, looked at Betelgeuse, and answered his question in an almost robotic tone: "The intersect is a top-secret government project started post-9/11 by a joint NSA-CIA task force to marry an Intelligence Neural Network with hyper-advanced image-based encoding technology. It was discovered in 2007 that this technology could allow the proliferation of encoded images into…" she paused for a moment, bewildered by what she was about to say. "It allowed these images to embed into certain human brains… and these humans would then know and act as living conduits for this Neural Network.

"What the hell… that… what the hell?

"Did…" her mind raced, "did you just give me an Intersect?"

Betelgeuse put his hand up to calm her. "Not… not exactly. I just gave you a very small dose. I'll explain more, but let me first tell you why you're here:

"The Intersect Project was – it was 'officially'," Betelgeuse air-quoted the word, "disbanded in 2012. It had a ton of initial flaws: for one, only a few individuals could harness the power of that Neural Network without overloading the – the long-term memory in their brains. Even worse, clandestine organizations learned about the technology; the government found themselves mired in a decade-long war against many different factions who wanted the technology for their own… their own nefarious needs. It just… it became a mess the government couldn't justify maintaining

"Unfortunately, that was actually just the story they told Congress. The reality is, certain government figures realized, if… if more people could download this machine, they could be used for… for some very messed up things.

"Mind control," Betelgeuse added, gravely. "That's the threat. That's why I tried to disappear my own family: The CIA realized there was a genetic component to one's ability to handle this machine. It's an extremely rare genetic mutation in people – Intersects – like me, and my family.

"And your family, Julia. You have this mutation. It's why you could handle those glasses. It's why the government's been after you. And it's why I need you to stop them."

"So… how am I going to do that?"

"The government needs you – well, someone with this mutation; just your luck that that's you – to figure out how to modify their Intersect machine to work in the minds of the general public. I mentioned before, I… I tried keeping people underground, but it just won't work. That's why I want you to convince them that their Intersect is a bust. If they upload it… if they upload it into your head, and you don't start flashing, they might convince themselves that genetics aren't enough. They might find themselves back at square one; I believe – I hope – that will be enough to convince them to abandon their project. They've probably spent upwards of a trillion dollars on this by now. I just… I have to believe they'll draw a line somewhere."

"So did that 'dose', did those images somehow give me the ability to reject the CIA's Intersect?"

"That's a reasonable way to put it, I suppose. Technically, it's more of a self-destruct function; don't be alarmed: Once you start downloading their intersect, the program will activate, erasing everything as it's ingested ingested. Except—" Betelgeuse pulled a pen from his pocket: "except for one thing." He put the pen in Julia's left pocket.

"That pen: if you're ever in distress – the intersect images you downloaded from those glasses have one other flash in them – if you're in distress, just draw the pen: you'll flash, and be able to use it to get out of your predicament. It sounds strange, I know. But trust me."

She wasn't exactly sure she trusted him (and for good reason, for that pen had another purpose, one which she would not discover until much later); but, as with everything else in the past sixteen hours or so, it's not like she had a choice.

"So… what happens now?"

"Your handler – the woman – she should be here in about half an hour. I've been tracking your car – I gave her the means to use it, and this location. Just… just cooperate with her, and hopefully… hopefully you'll be out of the woods (uh… pun not intended), soon enough.

"I'm gonna leave now: I can't be discovered: if… if they find me, then they'll realize I tampered with their experiment. The plan would be ruined. So… please – just pretend you've been knocked out this whole time… or something."

Betelgeuse backed away and, with one last look at Julia, hobbled out of the woods to his car.

III

Robin had been, in fact, just thirty minutes out by the time Betelgeuse left. Julia's car's GPS had led her to an address scribbled on the same envelope containing the keys – 10700 WI Highway 70 – and Robin, left arm wrapped in a poorly-made makeshift cast from some of Julia's belongings, pulled up to the destination right on time.

She left the car idle as she surveyed the area, keeping the heat on high as she prepared to step out into the biting cold Midwestern morning air. She tried to find any clues to Julia's whereabouts, but she was just on the curb of an empty highway in the middle of nowhere. There was a gravel path to her right, maybe she was supposed to go there?

Robin exited the car, bracing for the bite. She walked briskly toward the path, surveying the area to make sure she wasn't being watched: though unlikely considering the sniper's actions last night, Robin couldn't abandon the possibility that this was some sort of trap.

As she took an incidental glance to her left, opposite the gravel path, she spied another blinking light. Bingo. Crossing the highway to follow it, Robin trudged into the woods. It was only a couple hundred feet before she entered the clearing in which she found her target sitting on a stump, heavy coat around her, face slumped over, pen light in lap.

"Julia?" No answer. Robin approached, checking her pulse, and nearly jumped back when Julia took a deep breath and looked up.

"Are… what happened to you?"

Julia didn't respond.

"Okay, I'm going to take you to the car, you can warm up in there. Can you walk?"

Slowly, Julia, with Robin's help, stood up, and the pair walked with difficulty out of the woods.

Robin placed Julia in the passenger's seat of the car – leaving the cuffs on for now – and quickly ran over to the other side, got in, and melted with a relaxed sigh in the blast of the radiator when she turned the car back on. They sat in the idle car for a few moments.

"Do you remember anything about what happened?"

Julia, slowly, shook her head.

"We were in a car crash last night. My partner was shot – with impressive precision by the way – and we swerved off the road." Julia hadn't realized this detail, and sat with it in growing unease. That man… Betelgeuse – he's a killer….

"I myself got a little banged up," Robin gestured to her broken arm (are those my jeans? Julia thought at the sight of the "cast"), accidentally flexing it and causing a short burst of pain. She winced, then resumed. "I can't imagine you fared much better. Do you feel any pain?"

Julia shook her head. She hadn't realized until then, but the pain she had felt earlier mostly wore off. Or perhaps she was just numb to it by now.

"Well," Robin proceeded, "you look pretty banged up to me. Unfortunately, with Jason dead and my phone shattered, I can't exactly call this in. We're just gonna have to drive back to Langley and hope we don't screw ourselves up any worse.

"Hey," she looked at Julia, speaking in a warmer tone, "I know Jason said some things… I just want you to know, the U.S. Government isn't going to do something stupid like hurt you or anything. I promise."

Julia faked a slight smile. Though Betelgeuse had said the same thing, the project for which the CIA wanted her sounded anything but harmless, and this combat-pen-thingy only heightened her concern.

"If I uncuff you, you won't try to run, will you?" Julia, honestly this time, shook her head, and Robin picked the lock on her cuffs.

"Alright," Robin sighed, "we have a long drive ahead of us. Why don't we find some food?"

IV

Betelgeuse was miles away from Robin and Julia by now, driving to a hideout he had up in Minnesota.

He thought about the shooting last night. It was his first in years. Betelgeuse had never liked weapons, but after everything that happened in 2012, his pacifistic attitude had permanently shattered. Still, the faces of everyone he'd killed, who they were, who they could've been, their families… it would always haunt him.

He shuddered, shook his head, gave a few hard blinks, and tried to focus on the road.

Betelgeuse pulled up to a stoplight. As at every light before, he compulsively checked his glovebox, making sure his precious cargo had not somehow been lost.

It was still there: a sealed, clear plastic bag containing a single strand of Julia's hair.