CHAPTER 75
Isla de Alborán
Dorian saw the two thick columns of smoke long before the tiny island of Isla de Alborán came into view.
The pilot stopped Dorian’s lead helicopter to hover a half kilometer from the island, allowing everyone in the three-helicopter convoy to survey the outpost.
A massive yacht burned at the dock. A stone and concrete two-story building with an attached lighthouse also burned violently. Dorian hadn’t missed them by much. Maybe an hour.
“Sir,” the pilot said, “it looks like we missed the party.”
The man was clearly suffering from “compulsive state-the-obvious syndrome”—a situation Dorian felt had grown to epidemic proportions among the men surrounding him.
“Very perceptive. You should have been an analyst,” Dorian mumbled, pondering what to do.
“Bravo-leader, this is Bravo-three. Our fuel is down to forty percent. Request permission to put down and acquire fuel—”
“Negative, Bravo-three,” Dorian barked into the helmet.
“Sir?” The pilot in his own helicopter turned to face him. “We’re at less than fifty percent as well—”
“Bravo formation: maintain your distance from the outpost. Bravo-three, light up the closest helicopter.”
The adjacent helicopter launched a missile that decimated one of the two remaining helicopters on the island’s helipad. A split second after the impact, a second, more violent eruption spewed from the island.
“They booby-trapped the helicopters?” the pilot said.
“Yes. Hit the other one too,” Dorian said. “What’s our closest fuel source?”
“Marbella or Grenada. The invasion force reports both areas are secured—”
“They’re going east.”
“How do you—”
“Because they know we’re behind them, and they have nowhere else to go.” Dorian focused on Kosta, his assistant, who sat across from him. “Do we have a plague barge in the area—to the east?”
Kosta typed feverishly on his laptop. “Yes, but it’s almost to port in Cartagena.”
“Turn it around. Tell them to head south on an intercept course with us.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Any word from him?” Dorian asked. The last message had said Isla de Alborán. Hurry. Was he in danger?
“No, sir.” Kosta glanced out the window, down at the burning island. “He could be KIA—”
“Don’t ever say that to me, Kosta.”
Dr. Paul Brenner was sleeping on the couch in his office when the door burst open, slamming into the wall, practically scaring him to death.
Paul pushed up from the couch and fumbled for his glasses on the coffee table. He was groggy, disoriented. The hours of sleep were the best he had had in… quite some time.
“What—”
“You need to see this, sir.” The lab tech’s voice was shaky.
Excitement? Fear? By the time Paul got his glasses on, the man had fled the room.
Paul raced out after him, down the hall of the CDC bunker, to the infirmary. Rows of beds surrounded by plastic tents spread out before him. Paul could see only blurry glimpses of what lay inside each plastic box. What he didn’t see scared him most. No motion, no lights, no rhythmic “beep, beep, beep.”
He walked deeper into the room. He pulled the plastic back at the closest bed. The cardiac monitor was silent, dead, turned off. The patient that lay below it was still. Blood flowed from her mouth, staining the white sheets.
Paul slowly walked over to his sister’s bed. The same.
“Survival rate?” he asked the technician in a lifeless tone.
“Zero percent.”
Paul trudged out of the wing, dreading every step, forcing himself to go on. He was hollow, truly hopeless, for the first time since the outbreak had begun, since Martin Grey had invited him to Geneva twenty years ago and told him that he needed his help with a project that could save humanity in its darkest hour.
At the Orchid Ops room, the glass doors parted again. The screens that had displayed the Symphony algorithm result a few hours earlier had been replaced with a map of the world. It bled red with the casualty statistics from around the globe.
The faces around the room reflected the quiet horror of the image on the screen. Solemn stares greeted Paul as he stepped inside. There were fewer faces peering at him than there had been. Some members of the team were plague survivors, immune, just as Paul was. But for most, Orchid was their key to survival, and it had finally failed them. Those team members were in the infirmary. Or the morgue.
The remaining men and women, who usually hovered around the tables pacing and arguing, all sat silently now, dark black bags under their eyes. Full Styrofoam cups of coffee littered the tables.
The team leader stood and cleared his throat. He began speaking as Paul advanced into the room, but Paul didn’t hear a word. He focused on the map, as if in a trance, as if it were drawing him in.
Boston Orchid District: 22% of total population confirmed dead.
Chicago Orchid District: 18% of total population confirmed dead.
He scanned the statistics.
In the Mediterranean, just south of Italy, a single island glowed green, like a single pixel that had burned out or malfunctioned.
Paul pressed the interactive screen and the map zoomed.
Malta
Valletta Orchid District: 0% confirmed dead.
Victoria Orchid District: 0% confirmed dead.
“What is this?” Paul asked.
“A ruse,” one of the analysts shouted.
“We don’t know that!” another put in.
The standing team leader held his hands up. “We’re getting mounting casualty reports around the world, sir.”
“Malta hasn’t reported?” Paul asked.
“No. They have. They report no casualties.”
Another analyst spoke up. “The Knights of Malta have issued a statement saying they ‘provide shelter, care, and solace in this dark time of crisis and war as they have before.’”
Paul glanced back at the map, unsure what to say.
“We think,” the team leader began, “that they’re simply trying to perpetuate the myth of the Knights Hospitaller, or worse, to attract any able-bodied individuals to help them hold the island.”
“Interesting…” Paul mumbled.
“Everyone else is reporting anywhere from fifteen to thirty percent casualty rates at this point. We think the numbers in some places are a little off. The Vatican Orchid District is claiming twelve percent; Shanghai-Alpha District is thirty-four percent, while Shanghai-Beta is roughly half that…”
Paul wandered toward the door, his mind racing.
“Sir? Is there another therapy?”
Paul turned to the analyst. He wondered if the White House had put a man on the team, someone who could report back to his superiors with a firm up or down on the latest treatment, an informant that could tell Washington whether to proceed with the takeover of Continuity and then the Euthanasia Protocol.
“There is… something else,” Paul said. “Something I’m working on. It’s related to Malta. I want you to contact the directors of Victoria and Valletta Districts. Find out whatever you can.”
Paul’s assistant ran into the room. “Sir, the president’s on the line.”