“I’m talking about breaking in. You told me you went through that door over there, which led into the network operation center.” Lynn pointed to the single entrance. “I’ll do the same and start from there.”
“You’re not serious, are you? Tell me you are not!”
“If Carl gets transferred, I’m going in there. I’ve made up my mind. I think I could do it. My sense, from what you told me of your visit yesterday, is that their security is pretty lax. I mean, you said so yourself. They probably haven’t had a security episode for the whole eight years they have been in operation. I mean, who would want to sneak into a holding facility for brain-dead people, for God’s sake?”
“It might be true that they have become lax but...”
“It stands to reason.”
“The trouble is, it’s a big huge risk. To be honest, I don’t think we should do this,” Michael said, becoming serious.
“What do you me ‘we,’ white man?” Lynn said with cynical laugh, referring to the Ron Metzner joke involving the Lone Ranger that Michael had reminded her of yesterday. “I’m going to do it myself. When we got those texts today from the dean, I realized that you shouldn’t take a fall, if that is what happens. This is my battle because Carl was my squeeze. If there is a consequence, it should be mine.”
“As your twin, it’s my job to keep you out of trouble. Let me decide how much risk I want to take. But you know something? The more I think about it, the more I might be exaggerating the fallout of going in there. Maybe the worst-case scenario might only be a slap on the wrist for trespassing. I mean, it is part of this institution, and we are legit medical students. Hell, the way we have been violating HIPAA is worse than our going into an area of the hospital that’s supposed to be off limits.”
“If Carl gets sent in there, I’m going in. I’ve made up my mind.”
“All right, you made up your mind. But tell me how you think you are going to pull it off.”
“I will need your help,” Lynn admitted. “Because the key is going to be your newfound friend, Vladimir whatever his name is.”
“Vladimir Malaklov, my Russian programmer buddy! What can he do?”
“Get me one of the scrub suits like we’ve seen on the people that work there. I don’t want to stand out if I bump into anyone, which is probably a given. Since he works in there, like you said, he probably has one, just chooses not to wear it. There must be a source for them, like there is for regular scrubs in the main hospital.”
“How the fuck am I going to explain why I need a Shapiro suit?” Michael shook his head in disbelief.
“Be creative! Say you want it for a costume party. I don’t care. But tell him you need it in my size.”
“Shit, girl!” Michael complained. “Is that all?”
“No,” Lynn said. “I want you to give me Vladimir’s user name and password.”
Michael groaned out loud and then laughed sarcastically. “If I do that I think my friendship with my Russian buddy is going to be short-lived. Why do you need it?”
“Remember when we made our visit to the Shapiro, and they bragged that they had had only twenty-two deaths over six years? I’d like to find out what the causes of those deaths were. And how many people have died since our tour. And while I’m at it, I’d like to find out how many people woke up from their vegetative state and were discharged. In one of the articles I read last night, it says as many as ten percent of patients in a vegetative state from head trauma eventually achieve enough return to consciousness to go home. A few even completely recover. I wonder what that figure is for the Shapiro. They didn’t tell us that.”
“Please don’t tell me you are planning on trying to hack the Shapiro system from your laptop with Vladimir’s log-in! If you do that, they’d be onto you in a matter of hours, and you’ll be doing hard time in Bennettsville.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not that stupid. I’ll use a hospital terminal, preferably one in the IT Department. If Vladimir really has admin status, which he has to have to do what he’s doing, there wouldn’t be a red flag. And I also want to find out more about Ashanti Davis and how close her case matches Morrison’s and Carl’s.”
“Maybe we can find all this out using the access Dr. English said she would provide us.”
“Oh, please!” Lynn said mockingly. “She’s not going to give us access to Shapiro data. In fact, she probably will only be allowing us to look at data about infections and only in the main hospital. If I’m going to find out the kind of things I want to learn, I’ll need Vladimir’s log-in. I need carte blanche access.”
“You’re on a roll, girl. And I understand. You need to keep yourself busy, so I’m not going to say much. But tell me this: even if you’re sporting one of those Shapiro suits, how are you thinking of getting in?”
“You are going to help with that, too,” Lynn said.
Michael rolled his eyes. “Why did I bother asking?”
“You told me that the security of the door you went in has only a low-level, decade-old thumbprint touchscreen. That shouldn’t be much of a hurdle. You are going to get me Vladimir’s thumbprint. Do it when you invite him over to share your Jay-Z collection. I researched how to foil a generic fingerprint scanner with a bit of latex and wood glue. It’s amazing what you can get off the Internet. I already got the stuff I need.”
“My goodness!” Michael marveled with a shake of his head. He sat back against the bench, and, following Lynn’s line of sight, stared over at the Shapiro. “Okay! For the sake of argument, say this works. What’s the plan once you’re inside, just to wander around blindly and get fucking lost? The place is huge!”
“I’m working on that angle,” Lynn said.
“Lay it on me, girl!”
“Later,” Lynn said. “Right now I want to show you some other stuff that I discovered today when I was comparing the anesthesia records for all three cases. There are several disturbing points of similarity, and they are motivating me to up my efforts.”
“Like what?”
“I prefer to show you. The printouts are in my room. Come on!” Lynn grabbed Michael’s arm and pulled him to his feet.
29.
Tuesday, April 7, 5:37 P.M.
Despite suffering an emotionally exhausting bout of tears on top of her basic fatigue from having had only four hours of sleep over the last thirty-four, Lynn was now, according to Michael, “juiced.” Although she knew enough about psychology to guess that it represented another form of denial, she didn’t care. It gave her the feeling she was actively doing something rather than just passively being emotionally tortured.
Prior to her discussion with Michael about breaking into the Shapiro, the plan had been somewhat vague in her mind. Now she had a good idea of what she needed to do and what she needed Michael to do, and she was eager to get started. But before she did, she wanted to show Michael what had ignited her mounting unease about the whole situation. She thought it might motivate him to help her get what she needed from Vladimir. It had certainly motivated her.
Lynn keyed her door and pushed it open. Michael followed her inside but paused on the threshold. “Maybe I should get a hazmat suit,” he said, surveying the disarray. He was accustomed to her casual attitude toward domestic order, but this seemed beyond the pale. Computer printouts scattered on the floor, along with a number of textbooks, made it impossible to walk without stepping on them. More printouts cluttered most horizontal surfaces along with a mixture of soiled clothes and clean clothes with no readily apparent distinction. The bed was free of debris, although unmade.