Nelson sat in a jet-black Chevy, engine idling, watching the front door to the graystone. He’d dumped the rifle he used to kil Robles in Lake Michigan. Then he’d slipped onto Lake Shore Drive, where he’d mingled with the bewildered, the bloody, and the freshly dead before disappearing into the neighborhood.
Now he pul ed a long knife from a towel on his lap. His mind cast back to the day Robles told him about the black case and the lightbulbs. His dead friend had taken them because it was 1998 and it was just that easy. The army was giving him the shove, why not make them sweat a little? Robles didn’t know exactly what the bulbs contained, just that he’d been given the job of guarding them, four hours a day, for three months inside a bioweapons lab at Maryland’s Fort Detrick. That was enough for Nelson. He took the case from his friend. Then he did some digging, and turned up
“Terror 2000.”
Issued in 1998, the Pentagon’s classified report outlined potential terrorist threats to the United States. Prominent among them was something cal ed the “subway scenario”: an attack involving the introduction of lightbulbs fil ed with weaponized anthrax into a major urban subway system. The Pentagon was so concerned about such an attack, it authorized the lab at Fort Detrick to conduct experiments on its feasibility. The testing went on for five years, from 1993 through ’97. According to “Terror 2000,” some scientists loaded their lightbulbs with anthrax that had been genetical y modified to be harmless. Others, however, insisted on the real thing for their tests. Nelson wasn’t sure which brand of bulb his friend had lifted from the lab. He was rooting for the latter, but didn’t real y give a fuck. The lightbulbs were in place. When they fel, they fel. And Chicago would learn to live with the consequences.
Meanwhile, there were choices to be made and smal er, more personal bits of pain to inflict. A green and white Checker pul ed up to the graystone. There were two people in the back, but only one got out. It was Kel y’s judge. She had a bandage on her head and kept her gaze to the ground as she disappeared into her building. Nelson waited for the cab to pul away. Then he slipped the knife under his jacket, eased out of the car, and walked toward her front door.