31

“She who, Neil?” Kendra asked, though she had the sinking feeling that she knew exactly to whom he referred.

“Doctor Xenopoulos.  Why didn’t you go to work for American Missile?  They’re the best employers in the country.  You wouldn’t have had to worry about anything the rest of your life.”

Kendra just shook her head.  If Matt and Xenopoulos hadn’t overplayed their hand, she very likely would have gone to work for American Missile.  She almost wished that she were still as naive as Neil seemed to be.  Neil--Kendra studied his boney frame while she thought what to do with him.  She might be able to knock him out, but she couldn’t hide over six-feet of PhD candidate in her lab, and no matter how thin he was, she wouldn’t be able to haul him out of the building.  If only she had a spare fob, then she could send him back to the nearest ice age.

She sighed, and pulled her costume out of Neil’s grasp.  “What now?” she asked.

“Now,” said a nasty familiar voice from the doorway, “you come with us.”

“Doctor Xenopoulos!” Neil sounded like the happy host of a dinner party.  “How nice to see you, but how did you know?  I haven’t called you yet.”

Xenopoulos entered the lab with two unfamiliar goons.  She looked at Neil as if he were dung.  “You were a fail-safe measure, and not a very efficient one.”

Neil looked crestfallen. 

There goes some naiveté.

“Miss Tanagawa,” said Xenopoulos, and Kendra reluctantly turned her attention to the spy.  “You will accompany me to American Missile, where we will recreate your lab.  You are now on the payroll.”

“I can’t just disappear,” Kendra objected, grasping at straws.  “I’ve sent my dissertation to my advisor.  Stamford will expect me at the hooding ceremony, and I’m scheduled to deliver a paper at the astrophysics symposium next week.”

“You will meet those obligations with an escort.  Matt,” she called out the door.  Matt came into Kendra’s lab.  He looked older.  Shaggy no more, he’d been to a barber and wore an impressive navy pinstriped suit.  He smiled at Kendra, and put his arm around Xenopoulos’ waist.  The spy kissed him on the cheek.  Kendra despised them both, completely.

“Matt will be with you at the conference and at your graduation.  He’ll also walk you off campus this afternoon, in broad daylight.  People will think you’ve gone to dinner with a recruiter.  Put this on.”  Xenopoulos took a very nice dress suit from one of the goons, and held it out toward Kendra.

Certain that they were very prepared that time for any physical resistance she might offer, Kendra took the suit, and walked to the far side of her lab bench to change.  Maybe if she pretended to cooperate, she could find out what American Missile was up to that required time travel and involved the vampires.  First order of investigation—keep Xenopoulos talking.

“If Neil was a back-up alarm, what was your main system?” she asked

As if she were checking for dust, Xenopoulos drew her finger down the seam across the top of Kendra’s computer monitor, and held up what looked like a couple of long, stiff, white hairs.  “This is our first system for the detection of time travel,” she said as proudly as if she’d invented it.  Kendra thought it likely that she had.

“When you return from a jump into the past,” Xenopoulos went on, “you drag some electrons with you.”

“Ah,” said Kendra, “and they have anachronistic uncertainties, very clever.”

“Exactly.”  The spy smiled nastily.

Kendra shucked her jeans, stepped into the suit skirt, and zipped it.  “You picked the lock to my lab, of course.”

“Only once,” said Matt.  “I made a copy of your key during that long kiss at Carlisle’s.”

Absurdly, his comment stung.  Kendra couldn’t help but stare at him for a moment.  “I didn’t feel a thing,” she admitted coldly.  “You have a subtle touch.”

Xenopoulos kissed Matt’s cheek again.  “Oh, he’s a very brilliant, very bad boy.”  The two rubbed noses.

Gross.  What a cliché.  Kendra snorted with laughter.

“Finish dressing,” Xenopoulos ordered.

Kendra did as instructed, and came around the bench.  “What about shoes and nylons?”

“Wear your flats,” said Xenopoulos.  “You’re a graduate student.  Nobody expects you to have complete ensembles yet.  That suit is over the top, but I don’t buy off the rack.”  The spy smirked at Kendra, who ignored her and slid her feet into her scuffed flats.

Matt slipped what seemed to be a slim silver bracelet around her wrist.  He drew the leather thong from around Kendra’s neck.

“No,” she protested, and grabbed at the fob.

“Think about it, Tanagawa,” drawled Xenopoulos.  “If we have all of your equipment, the fob does you no good anyway.”

Matt wrapped the thong around the fob and handed it to Xenopoulos, who placed it in a lockbox one of the goons handed to her.  Matt replaced Kendra’s fob with a necklace that matched the bracelet, then showed her a remote.

“I think a demonstration now, while we’re out of sight, would be wise,” said Xenopoulos as she squinted at Kendra.  “She’s awfully headstrong.”

Matt smiled.  “The weakest setting,” he said and pressed a button.

Kendra howled.  It felt as if a hot knife severed her hand from her wrist.  Her hand twitched uselessly against the torrent of pain. 

Matt lifted his thumb.  The horrible pain stopped.  Kendra glanced at Neil, expecting to see some sign of horror on his face.  Instead he studied Xenopoulos, who looked at Kendra with a creepy sort of hunger.

“If I press this button,” Matt gestured to the one above the button he had pressed.

“Don’t!” Kendra cried, her voice rough.

“You’ll have the same pain in your neck--”

Xenopoulos snorted.  “How appropriate.”

Matt grinned at her, then went on.  “--but you won’t be able to make a sound.  The necklace controls all motor and autonomic neural paths to the face and head.  You’ll be in agony, but no one will know.”  He wore a pleased expression as he looked at Kendra, as if he expected her to be impressed.

She was sure then of two things:  that Matt had invented the sadistic jewelry, and that he and Xenopoulos were psychotic.   Maybe she could appeal to Matt’s vanity since he seemed to need praise.

“You know, you really are good with math.  I found the application of the logistic difference equation you used to project the vampire population.  What is the extinction force you show on the second projection of the curve?  I haven’t been able to identify it.”

“She should never have seen that data!” Xenopoulos snarled at Matt.