“FREEZE!”
Schimmel didn’t freeze, and I didn’t fire; he was ten yards away and moving fast, and with the short-barreled AMT I’d just be wasting bullets. The quick glimpse I caught didn’t reveal if he had any weapons or not.
“Herb! Around back!”
I limped in pursuit. My ankle was swollen from the truck leap, but the pain was minimal compared to my resolve. I wasn’t going to let this guy get away.
He stopped in front of the greenhouse-a large glass structure that took up much of his backyard-and fussed with the door. I closed to within twenty feet and yelled, “Hands in the air!” He didn’t comply, and I fired twice, but he was moving fast and crouching down, and I missed both shots. He was inside his garden of death before I could adjust my aim.
Herb met me at the greenhouse entrance, told me to stand back, and pumped two beanbag rounds through the locked door, shattering the glass. I went in first, my weapon in a two-handed grip, and was enveloped by moist heat.
It was big, bigger than it seemed from the outside. About the size of a small house, with opaque plastic partitions serving as walls. All around me were plants, rows and rows of plants, some of them as high as the glass ceiling. Flowers, in every imaginable color, trees, vines, even a table covered with brownish moss. It smelled fragrant, tropical, and the sweat had already broken out on my brow.
There were plenty of places to hide. The safe thing to do would be to wait for backup. Or maybe burn the entire structure to the ground. The foliage looked harmless, but I knew better. Each lovely bit of flora promised a different, horrible death.
I moved slowly, keeping my elbows tucked in, trying not to touch anything. Herb lumbered in a few steps behind me, and he went left while I stayed right. We would work the perimeter first, moving in opposite concentric circles until we reached the center.
I crept past a bed of striking red flowers, but restrained myself from gathering up a bouquet. Beyond them was a large compost heap, a refrigerator, a workbench, a pallet of stacked brown boxes-
I froze, my feet growing roots.
“Oh, Jesus.”
Those weren’t boxes. They were beehives. And the bees noticed my arrival, several hundred of them swarming out of the box and over to me, to investigate the intruder.
I tried to remember everything I’d ever learned about bees, and I’d learned a lot since almost dying from that sting years ago. They were attracted to sugar, and perfume. They attacked the color black. They attacked when provoked. They hated sudden movements, or loud noises. After a bee stung you, its stinger pulled out and it died, but the stinger continued to pump poison into your body. Bees were attracted to CO2, to your breath. Each year, a hundred people in the United States were killed by bees, mostly because of allergies like mine. Once a bee stung you, it released a pheromone that made other bees sting in the same spot. But all the experts agreed that if you don’t bother them, they won’t bother you.
All of these things swirled through my head as the bees buzzed around me. One landed on my bare arm. Another flew into my face, bouncing off my nose. I held my breath, shut my eyes, and tried to stop trembling. I needed to back up, to get out of there, but my feet wouldn’t move. This was so much worse than the cockroaches. This was worse than anything I’d ever encountered. I was too scared to even speak.
Buzzing, so close to my ear that I flinched. Bees on my hands now, on my neck, on my face. Some of them crawling. Some of them content to just stay there and find the best place to sting.
“Afraid of bees, Lieutenant?”
I squinted, saw the Chemist standing next to the hive, about eight feet away from me. He had a jet injector in his hand. I raised my gun.
“If you shoot, they’ll sting you,” he said. “These are very ill-tempered bees. I don’t like keeping them around, but pure honey has quite a lot of botulism spores in it. It’s not the easiest bacteria to culture. Required a lot of trial and error. Years of it, in fact. I’ve been stung dozens of times. Painful. Normally I don’t come in here without my netting on. Why are you so frightened? Are you allergic?”
I was trying to aim at his center mass, but my arms were shaking too badly and I couldn’t steady the gun. I was completely, utterly helpless. A bee landed on my lip and tried to crawl up my nose. I flinched, and almost started to cry.
“Allergic, I bet. You look absolutely terrified. Quite a change from the tough cop on the phone. I tell you what-I’m going to do you a favor.”
He took a slow step toward me, and I felt my knees begin to buckle.
“This is loaded with ricin”-he held up the jet injector-“derived from the castor bean. It will kill you quickly. I can’t promise it will be painless, but it is a much better way to go than anaphylactic shock, gasping for breath.”
Another step closer. Now my knees actually did give out, and I fell onto my butt. The bees didn’t like the sudden movement, and their buzzing became louder.
“What did you do?” the Chemist asked me. He seemed oddly calm. “Did you drive the truck out of the festival, to the plant?”
I nodded, forcing myself to do something. I thought about bravery. I’d been afraid many times before, but never to the point where it had incapacitated me. Even while in the truck, facing certain death, I’d been able to function. Why should a few lousy bees turn me into an invalid?
“Where is the rest of your squad? I only saw the fat guy. Only two of you came for me?”
I said, “More are coming,” and surprised myself by how strong it came out.
“I’d better hurry then. I was thinking this was a final siege, an Alamo. But if it’s only you two, then I can kill you both and get away. Then I can start all over again.”
He raised the jet injector and took another cautious step forward. I brought up the AMT. My hand was no longer shaking. If I died, I died. Once I accepted that, a lot of the fear went away.
Schimmel paused, looking unsure.
“If you shoot me, they’ll sting you.”
“Fair trade,” I said, my teeth clenched.
“Jackie! Duck!”
I looked to my left, and saw McGlade standing a few yards away, holding a semiautomatic in his left hand. He fired six times. Predictably, all six shots missed Schimmel, the bullets burying themselves into the stacked wooden beehive.
The bees weren’t happy. Innately sensing their attacker, they swarmed on Harry.
I rolled backward just as Schimmel sprayed a cloud of ricin at the space I used to occupy. He jumped to the right, then scurried away to the rear of the greenhouse.
I continued to crab-walk backward, to get away from the bees, but they pretty much ignored me, focusing their wrath on McGlade. He ran past me, a cloud of bees around him, and then doubled back and went in the opposite direction, the whole time screaming, “THEY’RE BITING ME! THEY’RE BITING ME!”
A BOOM to my right, and a sharp cry. Beanbag rounds were used to induce what law enforcement officers called “pain compliance.” They weren’t lethal, but they hurt so badly you wished they were. I limped after the sound and saw Schimmel writhing around on the ground, next to a small aquarium. The jet injector lay a few feet away. Herb was standing over him.
“Where’d you hit him?” I asked.
“Stomach. Want me to peg him a few more times?”
“No need. I think he’s been subdued.”
Schimmel moaned, doubling up into the fetal position.
“You got cuffs?” Herb asked.
“No. You?”
“No. There’s probably something back in the chopper. I’ll-”
The Chemist rolled up to his knees and reached for the aquarium beside him, lifting. Before he had a chance to throw it at us, Herb fired another beanbag into his legs.
Schimmel fell, the aquarium crashing down on top of him, dumping water and rocks and brightly colored shells onto his body.
He gasped once.
And then he began to scream.