Dr. Abbey, Alaric, and four of her technicians were in the hall, their faces covered by ventilator masks and eye protectors. “You made it,” she said, sounding unsurprised. “Are we secure?”
“Not quite. There are at least three shamblers on the ground floor, Mahir’s in the van, and Maggie’s locked in a storage room,” I replied. “Alaric? You okay, buddy?”
“Shaken, but intact,” he said.
“Good.” I looked to Dr. Abbey. “I’ve been exposed.”
“There’s a shocker.” She shook her head, shoulders slumping. She looked tired. That wasn’t normal. Not for Dr. Abbey. “Help with the cleanup, and I’ll get blood test kits for both of you. Shaun—”
“I know, I know,” I said. “I’ll be donating a few more vials to the cause of science.”
“We’re still leaving in the morning,” said Becks. I turned to blink at her. She shrugged. “There’s always something, isn’t there? We have to go. It’s never going to stop long enough for there to be a good time.”
“She’s right,” said Alaric. “Alisa can’t wait.”
“Well, then, I guess we’re leaving in the morning,” I said. “Let’s get this place cleaned up, and figure out what happened with the security. Oh, and can someone go let Maggie out before she kills us all?” I looked at the mess surrounding us, and sighed inwardly.
It was going to be a long night.
We lost over a dozen techs, Joey—people who’ve been working with me for years, people who trusted me to keep them safe. And for what? So I could learn some more things we already knew? This was my fault. Half the people who were bitten knew better than to engage the infected the way they did, but they believed the treatment I’ve been working on could protect them, and they weren’t careful enough. Looking into Laurie’s post-conversion eyes… it was enough to break my heart. Shaun Mason may hold the answer to this pandemic, but if he does, I haven’t found it yet.
I know you don’t think I should send them to Florida. I have to. We need to know what they used when they built those mosquitoes—and I need to know who built them. If I can pick apart their genetic structure, we may stand a chance in hell.
—Taken from an e-mail sent by Dr. Shannon Abbey to Dr. Joseph Shoji at the Kauai Institute of Virology, July 24, 2041.
I don’t know how much longer I can do this. I don’t know how much longer I can keep convincing my team that I can do this. I don’t know how much longer I can trust myself to keep them alive.
And I don’t know if I could live with myself if I didn’t keep trying.
We’ve been frozen here, just like we were frozen in Weed, back when the world seemed a lot less fucked up. It’s time to start moving again, and I’m terrified, and I’m so damn relieved. I don’t think I’ll be coming out of this alive. I’m going to go out there, find out what really happened to George, make sure the whole damn world knows what she died for, and then I’m going to come home, and I’m going to go to where she is. I don’t know how much longer I can do this, but that’s okay, because I’m not going to be doing it for much longer.
—From Adaptive Immunities, the blog of Shaun Mason, July 24, 2041. Unpublished.
Nine
Gregory motioned for silence as we left my room. I nodded, for once grateful for my lack of shoes. My socks didn’t squeak against the tile. Somehow, he managed to walk so that his shoes didn’t make any noise, and we passed through the darkened CDC building like ghosts.
The door at the end of the hall was open, the light above it glowing a steady amber. Alarm lanced through me. Green lights mean there’s no danger; red lights mean the danger is near. Amber lights mean something has gone wrong.
Gregory’s hand landed on my shoulder, stopping me before I could do more than stiffen. “It’s part of our window,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Come on. We’re almost there.”
“Where are we going?” I asked, taking his words as license to break my own silence. He led me through the door and into another hall, one I’d seen only in passing, when they were taking me from one lab to another.
“Someplace they’d rather you didn’t see,” he said. He didn’t need to tell me who “they” were. “They” were the people who’d brought me back from the dead, and who gave Dr. Thomas his marching orders. “They” were the people behind all of this.
“So it’s something that’s going to cause me some of that stress they’re so interested in minimizing,” I guessed, more for the comfort of speaking than out of any serious desire to have my thoughts validated.
“You could say that,” Gregory said. We reached a corner. He raised a hand, signaling me to stop, and stepped around it alone. “We’re clear. Come on.”