Erin Moynahan

By Brian George

WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU MAKES YOU STRONGER

Dealing with mean girls, bullies and the elusive boy next door can play havoc with anyone’s self-esteem. But as graduation approaches, Ottawa high school senior Erin Moynahan faces a few unique challenges.

Eleven years ago, brain tumors threatened Erin’s life. Her neurologist mother created a powerful new serum to help her survive. Erin did more than survive.

Now, the serum is enhancing her physical and intellectual abilities at an alarming rate. Can she learn to control these abilities before they threaten her sanity? And, can she harness her powers to thwart an imminent danger ~ the ghosts of her father’s military past ~ lurking just beyond the horizon?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brian George
• Release date: May 13, 2014
• ISBN: 9780991907700

Book preview

PREFACE

I’d like to dedicate this novel to my parents, James and Eleanor George, who reside together forever in heaven. Since this story came to me from out of the blue, I’d like to think that perhaps my parents planted the seed of this story in my mind. I guess I’ll never know for sure, but it’s a nice thought.

There are many people who helped me during this frustrating, aggravating, terrifying, but extremely satisfying journey. However, I’d like to mention two in particular — Norm Ackland (the real Midnight Elvis) and Catherine McDonald. Both of them have been there for me right from the beginning. They’ve both shown an abundance of passion and enthusiasm with regards to the story. They’ve also been very generous with their time and effort.

For many years I’ve enjoyed action-adventure stories such as Indiana Jones, the Bourne series, Strike Back, and the various comic book heroes from both Marvel and DC. Therefore it’s not surprising that the story that came to me would fall into this genre.

In all these great stories there is a common thread. We care about the hero. On a certain level we somehow relate to them. The great heroes have to overcome self-doubt, inner conflict, morality issues, and other adversities. Perhaps their triumph gives us hope. Maybe they can inspire us to overcome our adversities as well.

I feel that this story falls into its own unique niche. Chances are the book would probably be found in the YA section of the bookstore. However, it’s not typical of what you’d find in that section nowadays. There are no vampires, werewolves, witches, costumed crime fighters, or dystopian future worlds anywhere in sight. (There are some great authors who can bring those stories to life much better than I.) My story is set in the real world and involves a young girl who is given a gift. How she uses it will determine her fate and the fate of those she loves.

I invite you to visit my website, www.erinmoynahan.com. Please feel free to contact me at [e-mail]. Your comments and feedback are greatly appreciated.

Regards

Brian George

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author would like to thank the following people for their help and support:

Norman W. Ackland

Catherine McDonald

Steven George

Dolly George

Hayley Maree George

Michelle Dumont

Steve Dumont

Francine Ackland

John Earley

Marsha Parker

Fred Elder

Mick Revell

Danielle Farquhar

Darren Morrison

Jamie Williams

Chico Martin

Chapter 1

Deep underwater, she floats, drifting in the blue light.

Whales hover nearby, their presence soft and calm. They’re standing by; swimming long, slow circles all around her.

She doesn’t see or feel herself, but she is everywhere. She is the water. This dark deep place is her, this element is her. She’s silent, capable only of silence.

She hears the sound of age-old music. In the dream, she doesn’t understand music the same way she sometimes does in her other life — here, not really notes or melodies, or anything you could pick out. If there are voices, they aren’t saying words. Just a kind of oceanic music, deep and healing, full of love, and beautiful.

What’s her name? Erin Moynahan . . .

The whales nearby keep her safe. The ocean is always a safe place, even though she senses the presence of danger. She is being looked out for, and someday she will grow up to look out for herself and maybe others.

Suddenly she’s no longer Erin Moynahan, and down she goes. Deep, deep down, below the light . . .

Down she goes into dreamless sleep, and she’s gone.

//

Canterbury, England

April 23, 2003

9:45 PM

When do you have to leave? Tessa Moynahan asked her husband.

Twenty minutes, love, Steven whispered. He stroked her dark brown hair and pulled her close on the wide chair they’d placed at the foot of Erin’s bed. These last few months they’d spent many evenings like this, watching over her together.

Where was it you’re going? Hawaii is it this time?

He returned her smile. Her eyes looked so tired. That she was able to make a joke right now showed her strength, and he loved her for it. Hawaii’s much too unsafe, he said. "The Regiment would never take the risk of going in there. We’re flying into Hollywood, California, where we’ll have a secret rendezvous with a local agent, and then we’ll be hiking through forty miles of pavement and sunshine to insert ourselves at an undisclosed location somewhere in Disneyland.

I didn’t tell you this, but we’ve been asked to take out the Pirates of the Caribbean. Apparently they’re smuggling scimitars to the locals.

They looked at each other. Steven wasn’t exactly prone to fear or self-doubt, but in these moments before he left for a mission, being with Tessa was almost unbearable. What if something happened? What if this was the last time they’d ever see each other? No philosophy would bring him peace. He knew Tessa felt the same way. And with all that was going on around Erin, it made leaving that much harder.

Tessa gazed at their daughter and wept quietly. The little girl breathed shallowly, her skin was pale, and her sandy hair fell thinly around her drawn face. She hadn’t opened her eyes in ten days.

The tealight candle on Erin’s bedside table had already sputtered out. The glow of the streetlamps lit up the top half of the room when car headlights flashed by outside in the rain.

Steven had been home for the last three months, but had been called back to the field by his superior for a rare collaborative mission involving MI6, SAS, and Delta Force. The war in Iraq was five weeks old, and extraordinary demands were being placed on everyone in his office.

He and Tessa looked down at their child. Now seven years old, she looked younger.

You’ll be home early for Mum’s birthday? This was code, of course. Tessa knew better than to push for direct information, even here at home. They both knew they could never be too safe in terms of discretion.

Early for Mum’s birthday was code for early in May. M as in Mum as in May. He nodded. I hope so. As far as I know.

Even using codes, he still must never disclose locations. It was Romania, this time. They’d be briefed in London and then fly out to Dobrogea where they’d be staged and outfitted, then he and seven others (altogether four from SAS and four from Delta Force) would be dropped somewhere in the Danube Delta. At this point he didn’t know more than that.

They both returned their gaze to Erin. I’ll take care of her for you, Tessa said.

I know you will.

They cuddled in silence for a few minutes more, then Steven gave Tessa a last, long kiss and walked quickly downstairs.

Chapter 2

MI6 Headquarters

London, England

April 24, 2003

7:30 AM

While the other men filed into the briefing room and sat down, Steven leaned back against the whiteboard and bit into an excellent butter scone with dates. Despite the supposedly Post-Modernist outward appearance of the MI6 building, the small but handsome room was outfitted in elegant traditional style. Once you made it up the ranks to the Special Air Service, they treated you at least a little bit like royalty.

Why don’t I take care of introductions while you gentlemen take a moment to sip your coffee and get settled? Steven said. The three men going with him on this mission sat facing him.

First off, he said, we have a new SAS recruit with us. I’d like to introduce Corporal Mike Scott.

From his seat in the front row, the smartly dressed young officer nodded to the others while they briefly applauded him. Steven continued. "Young Mr. Scott passed through SAS selection with flying colors, after seven years of being the best shot in his platoon. His former superior describes him as ‘unbreakable,’ which is always nice to hear.

This won’t be an easy first mission, Steven said, but Scott’s been selected because of his own area of expertise. Maybe he can tell us a bit about that himself, before we get on with the mission. Scott?

Yes, Sir, Mike said, and rose to face the others. Well, I completed my PhD from the Defense and Security department at Cranfield University eighteen months ago, focusing on infiltration theory; the basis of my research was rodent infestations. Since then I’ve been consulting for MI6 on rooting out criminal syndicates and establishing intelligence networks.

The lad is obviously going places, Steven said. Thank you, Scott. Mike sat down.

Let’s introduce you to your team, Steven continued. In lead position we have Sergeant Dunston Highbury, affectionately known around these parts as Hedgehog.

Can you guess why? Ronny Hostiss boomed from the back row, playfully accentuating his Scottish accent.

It’s because of the exquisite roundness of my skull, Hedgehog said, turning to smile at Mike.

And the fact that it’s completely covered with hair, Steven said.

Fluffy bastard, Ronny said.

Hedgehog grinned over his shoulder at him. Ah, but think of what you’ve gained in wisdom, old man.

Steven continued. For this mission I relinquish my usual role as lead, and somewhat hesitantly I might add — he smiled at Hedgehog — "because of Highbury’s excellent command of the Romanian language. He’ll be wired with a surveillance earpiece which should allow him to hear the goings-on inside the farmhouse, if our scouts are able to install their bugs.

I’ll be next in line, Steven said, as we advance toward our target, followed by Mr. Scott; and Warrant Officer Ronny Hostiss will be our ‘tail-end Charlie.’

At thirty-nine, Ronny was almost as old as Steven, and he’d been with the Regiment for many years. Ronny had saved Steven’s life a number of times, most recently in Kosovo in 1999, where he dragged him out of a warehouse fire after Steven’s left knee was shattered by flying shrapnel from a booby-trap explosion.

As you’ll see in the field, Steven said, Hostiss here is brilliant at surveying battle situations. Don’t be thrown off by his . . . irreverent sense of humor.

When you’re as competent as I am, Ronny said, you just move through the world that much easier. Hedgehog snorted.

Steven projected a satellite image of the target location onto the wall, and the men peered at it.

This mission is a joint operation, he said, between the US, Great Britain and Russia. Several nuclear missiles have been stolen from a Russian base. MI6 has been keeping tabs on the Antonescu gang for several years, and a trusted MI6 mole in Romania has verified that the intelligence linking the gang to the theft is good.

The way Steven felt about combat had changed drastically these last few years. Before, he’d always been running away; he wanted to get lost in some action for a while. Now, he had a real home to go back to. He acknowledged a certain resentment at having to be gone now, when things were so dicey with Erin’s health. Couldn’t these people have chosen some other time to smuggle nuclear arms?

He went on. Our strike in Romania this week to recover the detonators will be coordinated with a Russian strike, somewhere in Turkey, to recover the actual missiles. We’re also trying to apprehend the old man himself, Constantin Antonescu, one of the richest and most dangerous men in Romanian organized crime.

What are all those black squiggles? Hedgehog asked.

Vineyards, Steven said. You’re not going through them — Antonescu has placed surveillance cameras all around there. He zoomed in on the lower left corner of the image. Over here, on the west side of the estate, it looks like forest, but it’s actually peat bog. Scott, I hope they put you through some heavy-duty bog-initiation training.

Yes, Sir, Mike said, they had us dog-paddling through three miles of brackish water with our twenty-eight-day kits on our backs. I literally almost drowned. And then it rained for fourteen straight days when we were camping in the moors.

Pansies, Ronny laughed. Did you have anything amputated?

Mike turned around and smiled at him. Afraid not. Pretty serious fungal infection, though.

A picnic! Ronny scoffed. Don’t worry son, we’ll take good care of you.

As you all know, Steven said, it’s difficult to pass through deep water without making a lot of noise, but there’s no other way to proceed. Given the family’s profile, it’s also likely the area will be well booby-trapped, so you’ll be outfitted with detectors.

Finally, he said, the Danube Delta has several species of poisonous snakes, so watch out for those. Otherwise, the terrain is nothing most of us haven’t seen before — it might be something like we saw in the highlands of the Congo a couple of years ago.

He pointed again at the map. Now, here is where I expect to emerge from the bog. At this point we’re two hundred yards from the farmhouse. The barn’s a hundred yards behind that. There’s little tree cover between here and the target, so no voices, no flashlights.

New moon that night, Hedgehog said.

Yes, as luck would have it, Steven said, so let’s hope the skies are clear enough for the stars to give us some light.

He advanced the slide to a close-up of the site’s buildings. Delta Force’s attack on the barn will synchronize with our attack on the house. We’ll deliver the tear gas at close range because we want to catch them at peak confusion. We know the site infrastructure’s riddled with escape passages. Scott? You have some calculations for us?

Well, Mike said, based on incomplete intel about the specific layout of the passages, I’d say it wouldn’t take more than half a minute for twenty or thirty buyers or sellers to flee underground, and once they’re down there it’s basically Afghanistan. We’ve lost them.

Steven nodded. Scott and I will wait until we’re right on top of the target before we toss the cans through the windows.

Mike chimed in again. We hope the Antonescus haven’t built up sufficient trust with the buyers that they can rule out a betrayal.

Meaning what? Ronny said.

Meaning that when Delta Force commence their attack on the barn, we begin taking out sentries in the vicinity of the house — and presumably all hell breaks loose.

Right, Hedgehog said. Neither the Antonescus nor the buyers will be able to establish with any certainty who’s doing the attacking.

Ronny nodded. Whether the operation’s being stung from the outside, or whether their partners in the transaction have turned on them.

Correct, Steven said. So there should be a rapid breakdown of order as soon as the firefight opens up. Our goal is to establish chaos and move quickly.

Everyone will likely be a little tipsy, Hedgehog added.

Not to mention, Steven said, that there should be a fair bit of adrenaline already, simply from the sheer magnitude of this deal, and that’s the kind of situation we can capitalize on. Any questions?

Sir, Mike said, are the Romanians aware of our plans, and will they be offering any tactical support?

Steven shook his head. Only the top level of their government and military is aware of our mission, he said. They’re afraid if lower levels were in the know, word would get back to the gang and put us in a vulnerable position. Tactical support is out of the question for the very same reason. He shrugged. We’re on our own.

Mike nodded, and the others kept silent. We’ll have more time to go over it at the in-country briefing, Steven said, wrapping up. For now, why don’t you all get prepped; we fly out at 1400 hours.

Chapter 3

Canterbury

April 27, 2003

3:00 AM

Tessa was upstairs, working, at three in the morning; she barely slept anymore. Steven had been gone for several days.

She heard Maria padding around down the hall. Soon the nurse would change over Erin’s IV. This happened at eight-hour intervals, day in and day out.

Erin’s cancer had devoured portions of her brain and made it impossible for her to function normally. Despite an exhaustive series of treatment protocols, the cancer showed no signs of slowing, and no one on her treatment team, including Tessa, a neurologist, was optimistic about the future.

Not that this slowed any of them down at all. Tessa herself was putting in sixty hours a week, doing extra research, trying new techniques to halt the growth of cancer cells in brain tissue, and investigating ways to restore lost connections and stimulate Erin’s brain to somehow regenerate what had been lost.

Neither Tessa nor Steven was ready to face the almost certain outcome — their daughter’s death before the age of eight.

It had been two weeks since Erin opened her eyes, longer since she’d been lucid and able to speak. Only two years ago, Erin had been a normal kid — better than normal. She’d started kindergarten three days a week; she liked to play outside, ride her bike, sing, and play hospital with her dolls. To Tessa, she symbolized the joyfulness of youth and the promise of a whole life ahead of her.

Tessa watched the thin flask of clear pinkish-gray solution on her desk, then checked the brass clock on the windowsill. Thirty-seven minutes and still no change. She’d fed six milliliters of a carefully prepared reagent into the quantity of dilute synthetic protein in the flask, and hoped — no, more like ached — to see a particular response. She’d added a drop of cholesterol oxidase, a color-changing enzyme, which she hoped would reveal the presence of a particular reaction product. It wasn’t working. She had tried dozens of possible approaches and knew that time was running out.

Her only child was dying of brain cancer. The tumor, now the size of a plum, compromised Erin’s ability to remember, as well as her motor skills. First it was her balance, and that made it difficult to walk or run or stand unsupported. She lost the ability to draw, then the ability to feed herself. Her compromised respiratory system left her short of breath and susceptible to colds and other infections.

At best, Erin’s doctors gave her six months to live. The cancer would take her involuntary motor function next, and her body would shut down forever.

For Tessa, it was the cruelest possible irony to have chosen neurology as her life’s work, only to be handed a neurology riddle that no one in science could solve. She took the flask to the sink and dumped the contents.

She was experimenting with a line of enzymes whose potential application to brain cancer had been noted in a recent issue of the journal Nature. The point of the discovery was that the enzyme would facilitate a biochemical reaction associated with the body’s natural immune response that would slow the development of cancer cells and give the living body cells time to regenerate.

While Erin was wasting away, so now was Tessa. The heartbreak of feeling her child slip away was too much to deal with.

The sparkle in Erin’s brown eyes, the brightness in her voice . . . It wasn’t fair that they’d been suppressed for weeks now. What was Tessa supposed to do? Pray? Do yoga? It was impossible. There was no appropriate course of action, no rationalizing any of it, and no end to the sadness.

She was thankful to be a scientist in a field with a direct connection to Erin’s situation, because it gave her something semi-rational to do during all those sleepless nights.

If only she could be some sort of super genius, or this was a movie or a book. Everything would be bloody solvable then, wouldn’t it? She works her butt off and months later, thanks to her hard work and brilliance, the little girl pulls through. Hurray! She took off her reading glasses and rested her forehead on her hand. Her desk was cluttered with reference texts, printouts from medical journals, old apple cores and Starbucks takeout cups, and slides from the electron microscope at the lab at the university. Ugh. The domestic life she’d imagined for herself as a mother wasn’t materializing, was it? The place was such a mess. It wasn’t Maria’s job to clean up, but she was the one who ended up doing most of it, along with Steven when he wasn’t working. Tessa never was a neat freak, but this was really getting out of hand.

She went to check on Erin and sat down on the edge of her bed. The girl’s breathing was labored. Her left arm, so thin, protruded from the comforter, the IV taped to her forearm.

Tessa longed to hold her. She hadn’t seen the girl’s eyes alert for such a long time.

She walked around to the other side of the bed and slipped under the covers beside Erin. She stroked the young girl’s hair, touched her cheek and felt the warmth of her skin. The child was weak, but she was still alive, dammit. They hadn’t taken Erin from her yet. Tessa’s eyes stung with tears and her gut burned with rage. She would not let Erin die. She would fight this, if it was the last thing she did.

When she looked out the window it was as if she could see the glow of the night sky far away over London. Steven would be in another country by now, somewhere east of here. Maybe there the sun would be already coming up. She lay there beside the fragile body of her daughter.

Why couldn’t her enzyme trials have worked? She had exhausted all of her conventional treatment options. The only things left to try were risky, untested, highly experimental.

She got up from the single bed and headed for the den, then paused. No, she thought. No point. She knew what she had to do.

In the foyer she grabbed her purse and her keys, then slipped on a pair of soft-soled shoes. There was something she needed to get from the lab, and once day broke she’d have missed her chance.

//

The dream again. Even in the depths of her morphine-aided sleep, Erin is aware she’s dreaming. Her parents are nearby, but out of sight. The deep blue of the deep sea surrounds her. Coral waves in the current, but it isn’t coral, they’re trees — full-sized trees, oak and chestnut; the kind that grow in the park near the museum.

Waking up is impossible, just as swimming up to reach the surface is impossible. She is far below the surface of her normal life.

Below the waving summer trees lie rolling sand. Shadowy gray buildings rise here and there from the dunes. Is this England? No. This is underneath the water. The Canterbury Cathedral is to her left — she saw it yesterday while she was swimming — but these square buildings are not England. They’re desert buildings. Or buildings in a place where there is war.

Where’s Daddy? He’s far away again, but she can feel his eyes watching over her. Mummy too. The sea all around Erin is lit up by a bright daytime light, but not from the sun. The light is from her parents’ love; her dream-self knows that. Why has she been asleep for so long?

Last night a whale came and swam around her. The whale was kind, and it had her mother’s eyes. Erin could feel the beating of its whale-sized heart pulsing through the water. The whale stayed for a long time, and Erin fell asleep beside it. She pictured her human body glowing orange in the deep sea daylight with her eyes closed, while the huge whale hovered by her side, watching, listening. When she woke up the whale was gone.

Sometimes other creatures come. Sometimes the daylight isn’t so strong, and sometimes the water doesn’t feel safe. Sometimes her parents’ love seems too far away to help.

It’s not as if she’s a diver surrounded by hungry sharks like she saw once on TV, but still, her body has a sense of danger during those times. She can feel it start again. Cold. The water shadowy and dark. She feels like a soft-bodied ghost. There’s nothing to protect her, just her belief that somehow she will be okay — nothing more than that.

Floating in the endless water, drifting in and out of consciousness, Erin’s body waits.

Chapter 4

Outside Tulcea, Romania

May 1, 2003

9:40 PM

Ecaterina Antonescu plucked a heavy gold-tipped dart from her father’s dartboard in the downstairs party room, then took fifteen paces back and swiftly flung the dart. The tip smacked against the metal behind the bull’s-eye. She could hit the triple-twenty with her eyes closed. Her brothers had taught her how to play back when she was seven, still living in their modern house in Bucharest. She had quickly got so good that she could beat them all easily. You had to learn to be tough when you were a girl and your only siblings were three older brothers. Especially when all of you had ties to organized crime.

Her father was getting old. He was too traditional, too tied to the old ways. He still remembered when the family ran a vineyard. He grew up tending those vines with his grandparents, their extended family, and the villagers they employed. Wine had been their business for two hundred years. Of course all that went to hell during the Cold War.

When Kat was seventeen, she witnessed her first violent death. At eighteen, she was caught up in a gang war behind a bar her uncle owned. A thug her age from the Funar family got her in a headlock and tried to crack her skull open against a brick wall. She took it as a badge of honor that he didn’t try to rape her — he must have seen her as one of the boys. She managed to reach for her knife and plunge it deep into his bicep, then stood back and watched the blood pour from the gash. She’d put him in the hospital. That was seven years ago, and since then she’d killed eleven men — but only when necessary or when family pride depended on it.

She threw another dart. It skimmed the first one. Ecaterina was able to throw with enough spin and velocity to nestle two darts together in the bull’s-eye. It made a nifty parlor trick. Not that the Antonescu family did much entertaining these days. Things here had gotten so bloody, so relentlessly hostile. Everyone was fighting so hard for what was left of the little money to be had in the underground economy — hell, in the whole economy. The GDP in Romania the year before was seven thousand dollars per person. A big score didn’t come along often, so she wasn’t the only one excited about tonight’s encounter. To be honest, they had to thank George W. Bush for bringing this flood of new money their way. All the American fat cats were ponying up to finance a new war, and Kat knew her family would get their piece of the pie. She took a sip of her wine — the Feteasca Neagra was fantastic that year. Even though they sold little wine these days except as a financial front, she had to admit they still did it rather well. This one was velvety and red. You could almost taste the summer sun.

Ecaterina waited for things to get interesting. She enjoyed high-pressure deals and she enjoyed dangerous people. And she certainly enjoyed fifty-million-dollar transactions. But the one thing she could never understand was all the bullshit politics and posturing that came with working alongside men. Groups of macho, powerful men. Old-school family politics, racist insecurities. Why couldn’t they just grow up?

She was the only woman in a houseful of fourteen men. Six belonged to her own family and eight were buyers from Turkey. And while she waited here, throwing bull’s-eye after bull’s-eye at the dartboard, listening in on the men’s conversation — in both Romanian and Turkish, translated back and forth by a pair of interpreters, one brought by each group — she swore to herself quietly in Romanian.

She loved her family, and she loved her country, but there had to be something better than this. It was a delicious, big-money, black market deal that would have a bearing on how the world’s national borders aligned themselves for the next millennium, and listen to these assholes! Her father, God love him, was going off about the vintage of his brandy, and the Turks kept guffawing while they insulted their own wives.

She hurled another dart. Triple-nineteen. Triple-eighteen. One more for good measure: triple-seventeen. The meeting had run for almost an hour and a half now. When were they going to get down to brass tacks? They had a case of detonators to unload.

They had a worldwide empire to expand. This would put their people on the map and end all the regional infighting that had killed so many