SECOND SIGHT YOU CAN'T ALWAYS SEE
An acclaimed investigative journalist, Marlie Kaplan was
headed for stardom until a story she was working on undercover went terribly wrong,
leaving her blind. But with experimental surgery, she miraculously gets back partial
vision—and something more. Now she can also see unexplainable things, things
beyond the naked eye... WHAT'S IN FRONT OF YOUR EYES
Eager to jump-start her career, Marlie lands an exclusive
interview with a charming yet enigmatic politician. Then the unthinkable happens: A
colleague is murdered and Marlie's the only witness. What began as a promising new
start suddenly dissolves into a terrifying web of deception and death, a nightmare from
which there is only one escape—if Marlie can see it in time.
It looks just like the Haber Crematorium, thought
Marlie Kaplan as she stepped from the Jeep. The resemblance was uncanny. Though the
building before her now was larger and sported a row of scratched and dirtied windows
beneath its roof, it was, in all other regards, a dead ringer. The same square brick
construction. The same air of abandonment. The same tapered smoke stack rising from one
corner, its inner walls lined with the smoke and ash of an untold number of lives.
Even the setting was eerily similar: the bordering woods,
the colorless light of a full moon, a smattering of weeds growing up through cracks in the
concrete lot. Marlie could almost hear the whispered taunts of her childhood friends,
daring her to move closer. She remembered the pulse-pounding excitement that had coursed
through her veins as she took the dare one step further by not just approaching the
crematorium, but entering it. The memory was so vivid, her nose wrinkled in remembrance of
the odd, acrid odor that had hung in the air, still strong years after the last body had
been burned there.
The building she faced now wasn’t the Haber
Crematorium, but rather an abandoned warehouse that had recently served as a meat
processing plant. And this was the far end of a suburban Virginia industrial park, not an
isolated backwoods section of upstate New York. Yet the feeling of anticipation, the
knowledge that she was about to be tested, was the same.
Her fearless entrance into the crematorium had been a
turning point for her some thirty years ago. From that night on her friends had treated
her with awe and respect. It was a heady feeling, one she grew to not only like, but need.
Perhaps this feeling of deja vu she had tonight was a premonition. Maybe this building
would prove to be equally fortuitous, another turning point in her life, the stepping
stone to the story that would finally make her colleagues stand up and take notice.
She approached the chain link fence surrounding the
property, her dark hair, combined with the black slacks and sweater she wore, making her
little more than a shadow in the night. Her hand hoisted the broken padlock that hung from
the gate; then she let it drop and gazed at the building across the lot, still feeling as
if she were caught up in some sort of time rift. She was seized by a momentary and vague
sense of dread, a feeling that something wasn’t quite right, but she shook it off,
chalking it up to a mere case of nerves brought on by the resemblance of the building
before her to the one from her childhood.
Turning, she waved her hand in a come-on gesture at the
Jeep. The passenger door opened and Chris Young extracted his lanky body from within.
Though he, too, was dressed in dark clothing, the knit cap he’d brought along was
clutched in one hand and his blonde hair shone like a beacon under the moonlight.
"The lock is broken," Marlie said when he
reached her. "At least we won’t have to climb the fence."
Chris reached over, cupping the padlock in his hand and
twisting it in the moonlight. "Look how shiny this metal is near the hasp," he
said. "Whoever broke this, did it recently."
Marlie gave him a distracted nod, her gaze roving the
property. "Why don’t you hide the Jeep over there," she said, pointing
toward the trees to their left. "I’m going to head for that door near the far
end of the building and see if our luck holds out. If it’s locked, I’ll scout
around the outside and see if there’s another way in, or if we can find some place to
hide." Without waiting for Chris to answer, she pushed the gate open a foot or so,
squeezed her way through the gap and headed across the lot.
The door to the building wasn’t locked and Marlie
pulled it open, propping her shoulder against its weight as it tried to close again. A
narrow band of moonlight splashed across the floor, stretching and thinning her shadow
until it resembled that of an extraterrestrial creature. She pulled a small flashlight
from her pocket and aimed it straight ahead. A narrow beam of light shot forth, looking
meager and pathetic as it cut a path through the interior gloom.
Ahead of her, the room was littered with the detritus of
the plant’s closure: partially dismantled machinery, scraps of metal and wire,
emptied steel bins, and an assortment of chains and gears that either hung from the walls
and ceiling, or snaked along the floor where they’d been dropped. Trash lay
everywhere: empty soda cans, chunks of cardboard, dozens of papers, and a smattering of
Styrofoam cups, one of which rocked slowly on its side not ten feet away, stirred by the
faint breeze coming through the open door.
Off to her left were two large propane tanks, and she
traced the pipes that ran from them—up the wall and across the ceiling—until
they disappeared into the building’s gloomy depths. Straight ahead, a series of long
metal tracks hung suspended from the ceiling, the closest one sporting a thick dangling
chain with a nasty-looking hook at its end. Dark stains mottled the floor beneath the
tracks, and Marlie wrinkled her nose at the faint scents of blood, death, and fear still
lingering in the air.
A hand clamped down on her shoulder, and Marlie whirled
around, slapping one hand over her chest. "Jesus Christ, Chris!" she hissed.
"You scared the shit out of me!"
"A little tense, are we?" His cap was now in
place, obscuring most of his hair. A renegade cloud passed in front of the moon, casting
his face in a mix of light and shadow and giving his head a skull-like appearance. He
peered over Marlie’s shoulder into the gloom, then gestured toward the video camera
in his hand. "It’s pretty dark in here. If someone does show up, I hope to hell
there’s a light source inside, or I’m not going to catch much. I’m willing
to bet they didn’t leave the power on when they left this place."
Marlie ran her flashlight down the wall beside the door
until she found a light switch. She gave it a quick flick, but nothing happened.
"Don’t worry about it," she said. "Film would be great, of course, but
I can get by without it." She patted the tape recorder tucked into the waistband of
her pants. "Worse case scenario—we play the audio tape on air with some sort of
picture montage."
Chris grimaced and wrinkled his nose. "Man, this
place stinks."
"Get used to it. We’re going to be here a
while. Let’s find some place to set up. We’ve got a little less than an
hour." She handed the weight of the door off to Chris and stepped inside.
Shining her light to the right, Marlie saw several
abandoned offices. An old metal desk sat in one, its surface littered with papers and
dust. In the doorway of another, a metal filing cabinet lay on its side, two of its
drawers missing. "We might be able to hide in those offices," she suggested,
gesturing with the flashlight.
She then aimed the light to her left, peering into a
seemingly endless expanse of darkness. "I can’t imagine anyone venturing any
deeper into this place than they have to," she said. "But just to be thorough,
we should scout out that end of the building."
"I can’t believe anyone would venture anywhere
in this building," Chris said with distaste. "If I was a dirty cop, I’d
sure as hell find someplace nicer than this to conduct my business. I still think your
caller is sending you on a wild goose chase."
Marlie shot him a look of exasperation; she was rapidly
tiring of this argument. "I think I’ve been doing this long enough to know the
difference between a crank call and a serious one, Chris. This guy was for real."
"Then why doesn’t he just go to Internal
Affairs? Why all this subterfuge?"
Marlie rolled her eyes, her irritation showing. "You
know how tight the brotherhood can be. Turn in a fellow cop and you’re a pariah on
the force. Doesn’t matter what the dirty cop was doing. It’s an unwritten rule.
Breaking the code of silence can be fatal. Next thing you know, the whistleblower ends up
dead, supposedly the victim of a bust gone bad. Tipping us to the situation was a smart
move. We investigate, the dirty cops are exposed on the evening news for all to see, and
the whistleblower remains anonymous and protected."
"And you get the story that will give you the career
boost you’ve always wanted, right?" Chris said with a strong hint of sarcasm.
"And what’s wrong with that?" Marlie
asked, whipping her hand around so that the flashlight shone directly into his eyes. He
reached out and gently pushed it aside.
"I just think you go too far sometimes," he
said, his words carefully measured. "You take too many risks."
"I didn’t get where I am today by playing it
safe, Chris."
"There’s a lot of space between playing it safe
and acting recklessly. Even Granger thinks you go too far, and he’s always eager to
sniff out a good story. I’ll bet he doesn’t even know we’re out here, does
he?"
Marlie’s expression gave him all the answer he
needed.
Chris sighed and shook his head. "He’s going to
be pissed," he said.
"He’ll get over it. He always does, once I
deliver the goods."
Chris studied her face a moment. "What about you?
Will you get over it?"
"What’s that supposed to mean?"
"It means there’s more to life than this
career, or a slot on a national network, Marlie. Hell, this blind ambition of yours has
already cost you your marriage. How much more are you willing to lose while you search for
the perfect story?"
Marlie’s eyes narrowed in anger. "My marriage
is none of your business, Chris," she said, her teeth clenched. "And this is
hardly the time or place for this discussion. I’ve got a story to sniff out here, and
that’s what I’m going to do. Either you’re with me or you’re
not." She whirled away from him and pushed off into the darkness to their left,
waving her flashlight back and forth to avoid all the junk littering the floor. When she
heard Chris ease the door closed and fall into step behind her, she smiled.
The mess of tracks, tables and dismantled machinery
trailed endlessly into the gloom. With each step, the smell worsened and the dark became
more cloying. Marlie swung the beam of light up and down, back and forth, creating a
ghostly dance of shifting shadows as they picked their way through the debris.
Her legs were straddling a wide wooden beam when she
heard a sound from high up and to her right—a small, scraping noise. She paused and
turned her light in the general direction of the sound, seeing nothing within the twenty
or so feet illuminated by the light’s path. In the shadows beyond, she could just
make out a set of wooden stairs, leading to what appeared to be some sort of loft or
catwalk. She stared into the darkness above, her eyes searching for anything that looked
out of place.
"Did you hear something?" she whispered to
Chris.
"Probably just a rat," Chris suggested, as if
it were some sort of consolation.
Marlie played her light over the catwalk and thought she
saw one of the shadows shift. Unsure if it was a trick of light, she froze the beam in
that general direction but it barely penetrated the distant gloom. Her heart skipped a
beat, then picked up its tempo, thundering through her ears like river rapids. Her eyes
darted back and forth as she tried to watch the shadows from the periphery of her vision;
staring straight at them made them blend into invisibility.
She opened her mouth to tell Chris to turn the camera on,
to be ready, just in case. But before she could get a word out, she heard a muffled pop,
like the cork in a champagne bottle. In the same instant, she saw a tiny flash of light
from the loft. The flashlight was ripped from her hand, its light instantly extinguished.
The wall behind her splintered in a miniature explosion of brick dust and debris. Darkness
fell like lead.
"Oh, shit," Chris hissed. From out of the
darkness, his hand found and gripped her arm. "Are you all right?"
Marlie was too stunned and confused to answer right away.
She became aware of a throbbing pain in her hand and felt a warm wetness running down her
fingers. The darkness bore down on her, smothering and heavy. Fear edged its way in. She
gulped in a mouthful of foul-tasting air. "Someone shot at us?" she said with a
mixture of disbelief and excitement.
Chris tugged at her arm. "Come on!" he
whispered, his voice hoarse with dread. "Let’s get the hell out of here."
It took a moment for Marlie’s stunned mind to
connect with her feet and start her moving. She had managed two tentative steps when she
heard a second pop, followed by a metallic thud. An odd hissing sound filled the air and,
seconds later, the smell of gas mingled with the aging stench.
Chris tugged even harder, dragging Marlie behind him,
stumbling over the junk that littered the floor. Marlie thought of the tape recorder
tucked in her pocket and fumbled with her good hand to get it out and flip it on. If she
was lucky, maybe she could catch something that might be usable. Then something snagged at
her foot and she fell, her arm yanking loose of Chris’s grip, the tape recorder
flying off into the air. Chris found her and again yanked on her arm, making Marlie wince
in pain. She struggled to her feet but resisted Chris’s pull for a moment, reluctant
to leave the recorder behind.
"Dammit, Marlie. Move!" Chris hissed through
his teeth.
The urgency and fear in his voice was unmistakable. A
shiver of pure terror raced down Marlie’s spine and kicked her legs into action. She
stumbled blindly ahead, now at Chris’s side. Her hand throbbed in time with the rapid
pounding of her heart and she knew the sticky wetness along her fingers was blood. She had
no idea how badly she was wounded and suddenly, staring death in the face, she didn’t
much care.
Aided by the tiny bit of moonlight that shone through the
windows above, Marlie saw the hanging meat hook just ahead and knew the exit was close.
Her eyes searched for the outline of the door and, when she found it, she felt a brief
burgeoning of hope. Then Chris stumbled and fell to the floor with a loud grunt, his
camera flying off to the side and smashing into several pieces.
Marlie whirled around, barely able to make out his shape
in the dim moonlight. "No!" she yelled, thinking he had been shot. Then she saw
his feet entwined in a pile of metal and wire. He kicked and thrashed at the entangling
mess, trying to get free.
"Get out!" he shouted. "Go for the door!
I’m right behind you."
Marlie hesitated only a second, until she was sure
Chris’s feet were free. Then she turned and ran the last few yards to the door,
shoving at it with her hands, wincing as agony ripped through her injured arm. With her
heart in her throat, she looked back toward Chris, to be sure he was following.
The next pop was louder than the first two, accompanied
by the twangy whine of metal on metal. Along one of the pipes that ran down the wall to
the propane tanks, Marlie saw the briefest flare of a spark—a millisecond before the
darkness gave way in an explosion of fiery white-and-orange light. A deafening whoosh
filled the air, and Marlie felt a searing rush of heat surge past her. She covered her
face with her arm, hiding from the blinding light and scorching heat.
Chris screamed.
Marlie dropped her arm and saw Chris writhing on the
floor, his body totally engulfed in flames, his hands clawing in frantic desperation at
his face and clothing. Marlie opened her mouth to mirror his scream with one of her own,
but a second explosion ripped the sound from her throat at the same time it ripped her
feet from the floor. Her arms pinwheeled through the air, fighting the horrible force that
pushed her as she tried to swim through the heat and fire toward Chris.
The last thing she saw before the blast blew her out the
door was Chris’s agonized face enveloped in flames, his hands reaching out to her,
his tortured body slumping to the floor. The last thing she thought was that she’d
been wrong all along—this was the crematorium.
And then there was nothing but darkness—a solid,
enduring darkness that moved in to stay.
SECOND SIGHT
