‘because we have company, and my mama taught me it was rude to use your computer in front of company unless you’ve got enough for everybody.’ ”
“You’re a bloody bad liar, Shaun Mason. Your mother didn’t teach you anything of the sort.”
“Maybe not, but she should have. Why do you need me online?”
“Guys?” Dave again, a little more insistent this time.
“Turn on the news and see for yourself. I’m blocking the live feeds out of the office and claiming site issues. You can thank me for it later.”
Mahir hung up.
Mahir
never
hung up on me like that.
Frowning, I lowered the phone. “Dave? What are you trying to tell us?”
“I was looking for CDC-related reports from the last few days, to see if I could figure out why we have company, and there’s a report from this morning of a break-in at the Memphis CDC.”
“So?”
“So they’re saying one of the doctors died.”
I didn’t need to ask which one. The answer was in Kelly’s sudden pallor, and the way her eyes darted from side to side, like she was looking for an escape route from the apartment. There wasn’t one. With the entire resident staff inside, the door had automatically sealed itself, and it wasn’t going to open for anyone who didn’t have a key.
Or couldn’t pass a blood test.
I wasn’t the only person who’d put two and two together. Alaric took two quick steps backward, nearly tripping over a beanbag chair someone had abandoned in the middle of the floor. Becks stayed where she was, tucking her hands behind herself. She always kept a firearm of some sort in a holster at the small of her back, where it wouldn’t necessarily be spotted. I knewfrom field trials that she could have it out and aimed in under a second.
Take charge of this situation, or it’s going to get messy.
George sounded worried. That worried me, in a “less important than the possibly infected CDC doctor in our apartment” sort of a way. If my inner George was becoming more nuanced, did that mean I was getting more crazy? And if I was, did I mind?
“What do you want me to do here?” I asked, forgetting the whole “don’t talk to George in front of strangers” rule in the face of a bigger problem.
You trained Becks and Dave. That means they’ll shoot first and ask questions later. Alaric might have been helpful if this had happened yesterday, but hes sudo wound up from the field to think clearly right now. You need to settle them down.
Great. It wasn’t enough that my sister was dead and living inside my head; now she was giving me orders. “It never stops,” I muttered, and looked back toward Kelly. “If you died, want to tell us how it is you’re standing here and not trying to eat us?” I paused, then added, “That wasn’t actually a request.”
“If you listen to the report, it doesn’t say I died. It just says they found my body,” she said, in a careful tone that I recognized from way too many press conferences. It was the voice people use when they aren’t saying something.
The silence in the room for the next few seconds was almost palpable, as all four of us struggled with that statement. Dave spoke first, asking, “So you’re listed as dead because you’ve started amplification?”
“No,” Kelly said emphatically. “I’m not infected. I’m willing to submit to as many blood tests as you need in order to prove that.”
She was technically lying: We’re all infected. Anyoneborn after the Rising was infected in the womb, since Kellis-Amberlee is totally untroubled by the placental barrier. It’s just that in most of us, the virus is sleeping peacefully, rather than taking over our bodies and turning us into something from a horror show. That’s what the blood tests look for. Not infection; amplification. Which raised another question: amplification takes minutes, not hours. If Kelly was exposed to the live virus in Memphis, how could she possibly have traveled all the way to Oakland without fully
“You’re a bloody bad liar, Shaun Mason. Your mother didn’t teach you anything of the sort.”
“Maybe not, but she should have. Why do you need me online?”
“Guys?” Dave again, a little more insistent this time.
“Turn on the news and see for yourself. I’m blocking the live feeds out of the office and claiming site issues. You can thank me for it later.”
Mahir hung up.
Mahir
never
hung up on me like that.
Frowning, I lowered the phone. “Dave? What are you trying to tell us?”
“I was looking for CDC-related reports from the last few days, to see if I could figure out why we have company, and there’s a report from this morning of a break-in at the Memphis CDC.”
“So?”
“So they’re saying one of the doctors died.”
I didn’t need to ask which one. The answer was in Kelly’s sudden pallor, and the way her eyes darted from side to side, like she was looking for an escape route from the apartment. There wasn’t one. With the entire resident staff inside, the door had automatically sealed itself, and it wasn’t going to open for anyone who didn’t have a key.
Or couldn’t pass a blood test.
I wasn’t the only person who’d put two and two together. Alaric took two quick steps backward, nearly tripping over a beanbag chair someone had abandoned in the middle of the floor. Becks stayed where she was, tucking her hands behind herself. She always kept a firearm of some sort in a holster at the small of her back, where it wouldn’t necessarily be spotted. I knewfrom field trials that she could have it out and aimed in under a second.
Take charge of this situation, or it’s going to get messy.
George sounded worried. That worried me, in a “less important than the possibly infected CDC doctor in our apartment” sort of a way. If my inner George was becoming more nuanced, did that mean I was getting more crazy? And if I was, did I mind?
“What do you want me to do here?” I asked, forgetting the whole “don’t talk to George in front of strangers” rule in the face of a bigger problem.
You trained Becks and Dave. That means they’ll shoot first and ask questions later. Alaric might have been helpful if this had happened yesterday, but hes sudo wound up from the field to think clearly right now. You need to settle them down.
Great. It wasn’t enough that my sister was dead and living inside my head; now she was giving me orders. “It never stops,” I muttered, and looked back toward Kelly. “If you died, want to tell us how it is you’re standing here and not trying to eat us?” I paused, then added, “That wasn’t actually a request.”
“If you listen to the report, it doesn’t say I died. It just says they found my body,” she said, in a careful tone that I recognized from way too many press conferences. It was the voice people use when they aren’t saying something.
The silence in the room for the next few seconds was almost palpable, as all four of us struggled with that statement. Dave spoke first, asking, “So you’re listed as dead because you’ve started amplification?”
“No,” Kelly said emphatically. “I’m not infected. I’m willing to submit to as many blood tests as you need in order to prove that.”
She was technically lying: We’re all infected. Anyoneborn after the Rising was infected in the womb, since Kellis-Amberlee is totally untroubled by the placental barrier. It’s just that in most of us, the virus is sleeping peacefully, rather than taking over our bodies and turning us into something from a horror show. That’s what the blood tests look for. Not infection; amplification. Which raised another question: amplification takes minutes, not hours. If Kelly was exposed to the live virus in Memphis, how could she possibly have traveled all the way to Oakland without fully
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