Orders of Magnitude (The Genie and the Engineer Series Book 2) by Glenn Michaels Page B

want to try the avatar spell,” Capie quietly volunteered.
    “While you are doing that, I will check for more security guards,”
murmured Paul as he walked a few feet further up the corridor.
    Capie got busy, thinking of the spell she had seen Paul use
on John back at Yerkes Observatory.
    “In the name of Gandolph, Queen Elsa, and Tim the Enchanter
from Monty Python, may there be an avatar of this man to answer some
questions,” she pronounced firmly with a wave of one hand.
    In her goggles, she saw a ball of green smoke spring into
existence a few feet away. It swiftly grew into an exact image of one of the
two guards.
    And then she blinked.
    Well no, not quite a duplicate. This one was subtly
different.
    Even in the green lighting of the goggles, the face appeared
distorted, almost radiating evil. And the eyes were slanted and cruel.
    “Ugh!” Capie hissed. “Like a zombie! Not cool!”
    Waving both hands frantically back and forth, the figure
faded from sight.
    “Wow,” she said, breathing a sigh of relief and looking
again at the man she had cast the avatar from. “You, sir, are one total sicko. Talk
about ‘monsters from the ID!’” she said, quoting from Forbidden Planet .
“I guess I’d better try the other guard.”
    This time the spell worked as intended and a ‘normal-looking’
duplicate of the second guard appeared in the corridor.
    “Now,” Capie demanded sternly. “Where is my father?”
    • • • •
    “Paul! Paul !” clamored Capie as she dashed down the
corridor.
    As he stepped into her way, he hissed at her. “Not so loud !
What’s wrong?”
    “He’s not here! Dad is not here !” she shouted. “The
guard told me!”
    “Calm down! Where is he?”
    “The Bolling Clinic, he said! Paul, they brought him in
several hours ago! Two special agent types, the guard said. And then, an hour
after that, they had to take him to the Bolling Clinic. The guard I was talking
to didn’t know why, just that his condition was serious!”
    Paul nodded then realized that the gesture was pretty
pointless in the dark. “Those special agents were Oni, no doubt. Okay, let’s
get out of here and find the Bolling Clinic.”
    “I asked the guard already,” snapped Capie as she yanked frantically
on his arm. “It’s just north of the motor pool! Let’s go! Hurry !”

SEVEN
     
    579 th Medical Group (Bolling Clinic)
    238 Brookley Ave SW
    Washington, DC
    June
    Tuesday 4:01 a.m. EDT
     
    T he
Humvee raced up Mitscher Road, the tires squealing as it tore into the clinic’s
rear parking lot. Paul drove like a mad man, the vehicle screaming around the
building and up to the north end, where the emergency entrance was located.
Standing on the brakes, all four wheels locking, the tires squalling as they
burned rubber on the asphalt, Paul brought the Humvee to a jarring halt.
    Leaving the engine still running and its doors wide open, Paul
and Capie bolted across a narrow strip of pavement and through the double-wide metal
doors of the clinic, using a sleep spell on the four Normals (nurses and
orderlies) that got in their way. At the nurse’s station, they put two more
nurses to sleep and then used a spell to create an avatar of one of them.
    “Where is my father?!” demanded Capie hotly of the holographic
image.
    “Christopher Kingsley, the fifty three year old man they
brought in a few hours ago,” Paul added breathlessly.
    “Room 108, down that hall,” was the emotionless response.
    Capie didn’t hesitate but tore off in that direction. Paul
took a couple of seconds to dismiss the avatar spell.
    And then he too took off at a sprint down the hallway.
    He was just entering the doorway of Room 108 when Capie started
screaming at the top of her lungs.
    “ NNOOOO !”
    The shriek was so loud that it pierced Paul’s brain like ice
picks. He turned away, clapping his hands over his ears.
    Snapping back around, he saw that Capie was standing over a
gurney, her mouth wide open, her eyes filled with