Infected

51.

Margaret, Amos and Clarence Otto stared at the photomural. Clarence had had the painting blown up to three times the original size, so that Nguyen’s nightmarish vision took up an entire wall.

They’d all caught a few hours of sleep from around 2:00 A.M. to 5:00 A.M., then it was back to work. After two hours of staring at the mural, staring and thinking, Margaret still felt groggy despite five cups of nasty hospital coffee. Amos, as usual, looked none the worse for wear. Neither did Otto. Margaret hated them both.

Amos stood right in front of the photomural, his nose just inches from the wall. “How did Nguyen know these people?” he asked.

Margaret stared and thought hard about the question. “I don’t think he knew these people at all,” she finally said.

Amos looked at her and crossed his arms. “What, you’re saying that the kid was a psychic or something?”

Margaret shook her head slowly, but kept her eyes fixed on the painting photo. “No, I don’t think so. Not psychic, but something like psychic. Something beyond the science we know.”

Where she could identify and match, she had taped the life-size pictures of the infestation victims’ faces next to their life-size spot on the painting.

Blaine Tanarive.

Charlotte Wilson.

Gary Leeland.

Judy Washington.

Martin Brewbaker.

Kiet Nguyen.

There was an indefinable horror in seeing the real faces taped next to Nguyen’s ghastly, painted renditions. Horror, yes, but that horror paled in comparison to the math.

Those six faces, she knew.

There were eleven other faces that she did not.

So there were more. At least eleven more. And who knew how many beyond that? The thing made of those bodies seemed to expand far beyond the frame. How many other faces would be on the rest of the…the…what was it? An arch? No, there were multiple arches.

The construct.

Why was she focusing on that? Why did she feel the need to name it? Was it significant?

Margaret slowly walked backward, taking in the painting. Her eyes traced the arch, trying to imagine where the other end of it would logically fall.

The construct would be huge. The two arches alone would be at least twenty-feet high.

Arches. Made out of human parts.

“Clarence,” Margaret said quietly, “get me Dew on the phone. Now .”