Authors: Kyle Kirkland
More shots rang out. Reddy saw that someone else had also drawn a bead on the escaping man and had fired at roughly the same time. Maybe others had too. In the white light of the stabbing searchlights, Reddy saw the man stumble and collapse. He must have been hit five or six times; Reddy knew he
'd been hit at least twice, for both of Reddy's bullets found the mark.
Reddy leapt out of his stance and cautiously stepped forward, wary of any friendly fire still forthcoming. Overhead a menacing chopper hovered.
Unable to believe his eyes, Reddy saw the man jump up. Before Reddy could lift his weapon, the target disappeared down the frontage road and across the interstate highway.
Everyone began yelling at the same time. Reddy raced across the road, trying to follow the man. Searchlights swung wildly, their beams dancing around the ground, along hedges and ditches and into the scattered houses on the other side of the highway.
Over his speaker Reddy heard officers talking about dogs, helicopters, patrols. Reddy continued to be frightened of friendly fire but maintained his search.
Guys were also talking about Kevlar vests. The man must have been wearing some kind of bullet-proof protection.
Joining Reddy, dozens of troops scoured the neighborhood. But there were thousands of hiding places.
"
Did you see him?" someone asked Reddy. "Did you get a good look at him?"
The voice was hopeful. Reddy said,
"No." He had the impression of a big black man, but that was all. Reddy never got more than a fleeting glance at him.
A bad feeling came over Private Zunan. That dude was fast and knew what he was doing.
* * *
At a little past one o
'clock in the morning, Gary arrived home.
Some lights were on in the living room. Gary stepped into the room, unafraid. He saw two people, a woman he recognized and a man he didn
't. Both seemed to be asleep.
Then the woman opened her eyes and looked at him.
"I know why you're here," said Gary softly.
The woman gave him an appraising look.
"You're hurt."
Gary glanced at his shirt. Spots of blood showed on the front.
"It's not mine."
The woman rose. The man stirred, looked around.
"Gary," she said. "We have to talk."
Standing in front of her, Gary summarized the attack. The car, he told them, was totally destroyed and failed to breach the fence. His sister died for nothing.
After he finished, the man—standing now too—said, "We tried to stop it, Cecily. We tried our best."
Cecily kept looking at Gary.
"You're alone now, aren't you?"
"
Soon as I bury my mother and little brother." Gary glanced upstairs.
"
They've already been taken away," said Cecily gently.
"
Then, yeah. I'm alone."
Bethesda, Maryland / 7:00 a.m.
Cyan lights flashed and waves crashed against a reef in Kraig's office.
"
What do you mean," Micro's assistant director seethed, "there's been a delay?"
"
The escape," said the image displayed by Kraig's video communication software. Some general, three stars decorating his shoulders. "All our resources are tied up."
"
I'm well aware of the need to capture this man, much more aware than
you
are. But there are still people in the zone to be saved and we can do that now. And our people must have escorts when they go into the zone and deliver the treatment. Those are your orders."
"
The fact is, I don't have the manpower to hunt for the escapee and at the same time provide your escorts. I suggest you call the governor and request more support. I haven't had much luck—maybe he'll listen to you."
"
We don't have the time for this crap," said Kraig. "Just spare us anything. Cooks, pot washers, anybody. I don't care."
"
I'm sorry. I have nothing to give you. If we don't find this man...you already know what will happen."
"
I also know what's going to happen to the people left alive in the zone if we don't move now. I'm giving you fair warning, General. We're going in, with or without your permission."
The general gave Kraig an incredulous look.
"That would be a—"
Kraig cut him off.
A moment later the Micro-Investigation Unit's director appeared on Kraig's monitor. The white mustache was frazzled, as if just awoken from a nice dream.
"
So," said Chet, after Kraig explained what he wanted to do, "you wish to defy a lawful order."
"
What I wish to do is to save some lives. I don't know how many people, if any, are left in the zone and I don't trust the ticker any more, but assuming there's even one or two survivors, don't you think they deserve a chance?"
"
Certainly. But we have to be calm and reasonable—"
"
Chet." Kraig glared. "We can't wait. Not even an hour."
"
They're worried about more escapes. You can't really blame them, can you? If they open the gates and allow our people in and out, some of those on the inside may sneak across in the process."
Kraig shook his head in disbelief.
"But we're giving them treatment!"
"
The people in the containment zone don't know that. Or at least they won't necessarily believe it. As you said yourself, they no longer trust us. We have to be cautious."
A nasty thought worked its way into Kraig
's mind. "It's true. It's really true, isn't it?"
"
What's true?"
"
That's how they want to end it. They want everybody dead. They don't want any survivors in the containment zone, because that's the only sure way to eliminate protobiont."
The white must
ache twitched. "Spreading rumors like that is a dangerous thing, Kraig."
Kraig paused. Then his voice shook slightly as he said,
"I'm going to do more than that, Chet. I won't spread rumors—I'll spread fact."
"
You'll do no such thing. The only thing you will do is calm down and become rational."
Kraig mumbled something under his breath. He was surprised that the cyan lights and the sounds of the reef had gone.
"My computer is now compiling a list of media contacts. It's going to be a long list, a lot of names. Some of them would kill for a story like this."
"
What story, Kraig? I'm asking you to get hold of yourself."
"
Too late. I'm going to tell everybody."
Chet Vernolt stared at his assistant director.
"I can't believe you would behave so unprofessionally."
"
Wrong again, Chet." Kraig was pleased that the cyan lights and the reef sounds had not returned. He was calm now that he'd made his decision. It was a victory, of sorts—he had conquered his anger.
"
Think about what you're doing," said the director. "You will not only destroy your own career, but damage the reputations of countless others. And all so needlessly!"
"
You're running out of time." Kraig glanced at his screen. "The list is finished and I'll have the initial message done in a few minutes. What's it going to be, Chet? Do the treatment people go in, or does my message go out?"
Chet was silent for a moment.
"Kraig," he said finally, "think about the sacrifices that have already been made. None of those victims under quarantine asked to be there. It just happened."
"
But now we have a treatment."
"
An experimental treatment." The director shrugged. "Who says it'll work?"
"
You know it'll work. You've seen the test results. Don't quibble with me. At this stage there's one and only one reason to withhold treatment. You want to be 100 percent sure that protobiont is dead."
"
Is that so bad? Is that wrong?"
"
No. But I want people to know."
"
To know what?"
"
To know what you did." Kraig paused. "You're right when you said that nobody in the zone asked to be there, it just happened. But now we have a choice. We can save the ones who are left."
"
Maybe. Maybe we can save them. And at the same time, maybe we'll let this horrible bug loose on the world."
"
It's already got loose. Someone escaped."
"
Yes, maybe! But maybe this lunatic has already been caught. Maybe he'll drop dead before he spreads the pathogen. We can't give up hope and just go ahead and let the genie out of the bottle. Keeping this bug as contained as possible is worth the lives we'll lose."
"
They're being sacrificed. The people in the zone...you're willing to sacrifice them."
"
Yes. The president and I...look, it's a hard decision. A tough call, one that we agonized over for some time. But in the final analysis, we believe that all things considered...we're worried sick. One person is already loose, and then if there's another, and another, they'll be no hope of containment. If there's just a tiny chance that this pathogen could escape, we'll have to sacrifice the containment zone—and everyone in it."
"
At least I got you to admit it," said Kraig. "Okay, fine. That's your opinion and you're entitled to hold it. Perhaps you're right, perhaps the sacrifice would be worth it. But all I know is that I'm a physician as well as a physiologist and I took an oath to do everything in my power to save lives. Withholding treatment from patients is the same as killing them. Either that treatment starts moving into the zone, right this very minute, or I'm going to tell everybody who'll listen that those people remaining in the containment zone didn't just die, they were killed. Then the country and the voters will decide if you and the president made the right decision."
Medburg, Pennsylvania / 8:10 a.m.
Redford Zunan was groggy, sore, and irritable, but he reported for emergency duty as ordered.
No barricade booth this morning, though. Trucks pulled up to the gates and Reddy and the rest of the troops from off-duty shifts boarded them. Inside, medics scrambled to collect and prepare their supplies.
Nobody told the soldiers anything, so Reddy sat down on the truck's webbed netting beside a medic. Hazard suits hung from the sides of the compartment. "Are we going into the zone?" he asked.
The busy medic nodded without looking up.
For a minute Reddy's heart raced. A man had escaped; had the government ordered euthanasia for the rest of the people in the zone? Just to make sure no one else got out?
Suddenly Reddy was wide awake. He gripped his weapon, then put it on the floor. Maybe, he thought, it was time to retire from this business altogether.
"What are you going to do to those people?" he asked.
The medic didn
't answer.
Reddy reached out and grabbed an arm. He repeated the question.
Annoyed, the medic looked at him. "We have the cure...and if you'll let me go, I'll finish allotting the doses. We didn't have much time in the lab."
* * *
Moments later everyone had suited up and the trucks rumbled through the access gates of the zone.
Reddy had never been inside the containment zone
—he'd only seen it from a distance. To him the zone had been a zoo, where people gawked at the animals but never got to go inside the cages. Now the truck carried Reddy inside the cage and he got a first-hand view.
He didn
't like what he saw. Bodies everywhere.
Over his suit speaker Reddy heard someone whistle.
"Damn, looks like Sodom and Gomorrah."
"
More like the pictures I saw of what Hiroshima looked like in 1945," someone else said.
At each block they stopped. Collected bodies. Went inside houses. Found more bodies. And survivors, many of whom were dehydrated and hungry, or intoxicated and loony, or scared out of their wits. Most required sedation.
Reddy threw off his exhaustion and tackled the job with relish.
The word spread around
his Guard unit. "The fence is going down soon. We're going home."
Reddy wondered what he was going to say to his family.
* * *
He awoke when the hands grabbed him, shook him. Gary opened his eyes.
"Hold still, you're all right," said a soldier in a hazard suit.
They
've come to get me, thought Gary. For my part in the attack. I'll tell them everything they want to know.
He offered no resistance when two soldiers lifted him and placed him gently on a stretcher. They carried him outside. The sky shined a clear blue this morning, rare for April in Medburg.