Hosts

by F. Paul Wilson

  "I know." She shrugged, her expression unhappy. "But I still feel like I'm abandoning him."

  "I promise to watch over him as if he were a member of my own family."

  This earned a smile. "Yes, I guess I can count on that, can't I." She sighed. "Okay. I'll take Vicky home. But you'll call me as soon as he comes out of this, won't you?"

  Kate sensed increased efforts in her head to make her stop Gia from leaving but she beat them back.

  "Of course."

  Gia started for the door, then stopped and turned. Keep going! Kate wanted to shout. She didn't know how long she could hold out.

  "Just one thing."

  "You really shouldn't stay here any longer."

  "I know, but I just want to warn you that Jack might not be too happy to find you here."

  "I don't understand."

  "It was my idea to call you over. When I told him he didn't respond, so I'm not sure it got through."

  "Why would that be a problem?"

  "He's a little quirky about this place. He… well, he doesn't like anyone to know where he lives. Hardly anyone does. And as for being here, Vicky and I are the only regulars. This is his sanctum."

  "But I'm his sister."

  "But you didn't know the address, right? I had to give it to you. See what I mean?"

  "I think so."

  "So if he's upset that you're here, don't take it personally."

  Kate glanced at the sprawled sleeping man. "Strange guy, my brother."

  Gia's lips said, " 'Unique' is more like it," but her eyes seemed to say, If you only knew.

  Minutes later, when the door had closed behind them, Kate felt the pressure ease. The Unity was still desperate to know how Jack was reacting to the virus, but must have realized it could only watch and wait right now.

  Was this what it had been like for Jeanette—fighting minute to minute, losing ground inch by inch? Maybe not. At least Kate knew she was in a war. Jeanette had probably had no idea. Most likely she wrote off any early alien feelings or thoughts as part of the healing process, a side effect of the tumor's shrinking. And when finally she'd realized that her mind was being usurped, it was too late.

  When will it be too late for me? Kate wondered.

  She thought of what was developing inside her head, the Unity virus running free through her brain, inserting its own genes into more and more of her brain's neurons until it had nibbled away everything that was her and replaced it with someone else, someone with viral ethics, another drone like Jeanette.

  That possibility pushed up a bubble of acid to the back of her throat. She had to find a way to stop it. And bring Jeanette back. But first she had to save herself.

  She looked at Jack. If his immune system truly was fighting the virus, it would be producing antibodies. If she could isolate those globulins and inject them into her own bloodstream…

  Her excitement died aborning. If-if-if… even if it were true, the process would be lengthy. She'd be a born-again member of the Unity by then.

  She'd have to find another way. Maybe Fielding would come up with something. Whatever happened, Kate sensed that Jack would be the key. But everything was stuck on hold until he pulled through this, if he did.

  She checked him again—still sleeping but less sweaty—then wandered into the dizzying clutter of his apartment's front room. She stopped when she saw something that looked like a gun on an end table. Dear Lord, it was a gun. She stepped closer. Did Jack own a gun? Obviously. Kate hated guns. Bad enough for her brother to own one, but she couldn't believe he'd be so careless as to leave it out like this with a child around. Gia's little girl could have—

  Wait. It had a red plastic handle and the rest of it looked made of tin. The knob of a power dial bulged from the side next to a pair of words framed by lightning bolts etched into the metal: Atomic Disintegrator. Kate smiled and shook her head. A toy raygun—no, a cap gun. Ancient, too.

  She did a slow turn. Look at this stuff. What did he do, go through flea markets and pick up everything that wasn't nailed down? And none of it seemed less than fifty years old. A Daddy Warbucks lamp, a Dick Tracy alarm clock—lots of clocks, all old, none working. Framed certificates and more clocks, their pendulums arrested in final swing, hid the walls. She stepped closer to check out the certificates—all from clubs and secret societies devoted to the Shadow, Captain Midnight, Doc Savage… what on earth did he see in this junk?

  The only thing she could find that belonged in the Twenty-first Century—or in the latter half of the twentieth, for that matter—was the computer monitor atop the oak rolltop desk. And a vaguely familiar-looking black object resting on the monitor. Kate leaned in for a closer look and stiffened when she recognized the timer clock from the bomb Jack had found yesterday. She knew it was the same clock by the four cut ends of the wires snaking out from its casing. The only difference now was that the display was lit, showing the time.

  And next to it were those silvery little AAA-battery-size things with the rest of the cut wires that had been attached to the clock. What had Jack called them? Blasting caps. But where was that clay-like explosive?

  She checked the rest of the desk top and hunted through the room but didn't see it. Must have hidden it away. She didn't like poking through Jack's desk drawers but she'd feel better if she knew the explosive was here too. She suspected that Jack had used it to blow up that car this morning, and she hated the thought.

  But the drawers in the old rolltop held nothing but papers and video catalogues. She made a point of not reading any of the papers and moved on to the equally old oak secretary. And there in the top drawer, next to what looked like another toy gun, she found it—still wrapped in cellophane, with the empty holes where the blasting caps had been inserted.

  What a relief. When he recovered, maybe Jack could explain how that car exploded, but at least now she could be sure this stuff hadn't been used. Meanwhile, she didn't want to have to look at that timer and the blasting caps whenever she was in this room, so she put them in the drawer with the explosive.

  As she wiggled the drawer to push it back in it slipped out of the desk. She stood there holding it, wondering why it was so shallow—only half as deep as the base of the secretary. She peered into the slot and saw what was obviously a false rear wall.

  Curious, Kate replaced the drawer and angled the secretary away from the wall. She felt around the weathered rear panel until she found a recessed catch. A gentle tug released the board; it fell toward her, revealing a hidden compartment with three shelves.

  And on those lay at least half a dozen pistols of varying shapes and sizes and finishes, extra clips, boxes of bullets, knives, blackjacks…

  A miniature armory.

  She stared for a dry-mouthed moment, then replaced the panel and pushed the secretary back against the wall. She opened the drawer again and took out the tiny pistol she'd seen before. Heavy… too heavy for a toy. She dropped it back in and shoved the door closed. Shaken, she retreated to the center of the room and stared around her.

  She had to face it: Jack was a gun nut or worse. Some sort of criminal. Had to be. What other reason could he have for owning all that weaponry?

  Who was her brother? What on earth had he become?

  She'd thought he was exaggerating when he'd said his closet was deeper and darker than hers. Now she knew he wasn't.

  And yet… he was still her brother. And despite all this damning evidence, she sensed a core of old-fashioned decency within him. A man you could trust, a man whose word meant something.

  Was that the key to all this pulp era junk? Memorabilia from a time before he existed, relics of an antiquated obsolescent code of honor to which he still hewed?

  Or was she reading too much into this? Not every idiosyncrasy had to have deep psychological overtones. How did the saying go? Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Maybe Jack simply thought this stuff was cool—or "neat," as he liked to say—and picked it up whenever he came across it.

  Kate
heard a sound from the bedroom and stepped back inside. Jack was tossing back and forth under the covers, moaning, mumbling, whining. He seemed frightened.

  She watched him closely, wondering what terrible sort of nightmare would scare a man like Jack…

  12

  … Jack looks up as the girl in the middle of the store checkout line coughs. He watches from the rear as people ahead and behind her back away.

  "Just a cold," the girl says, her voice slightly muffled by her surgical mask.

  Everyone in the store, including Jack, wears a surgical mask. Jack loves the style—not only keeps out germs but hides the face. And the store is packed. Rumor got out that the place managed to get in a shipment of produce and people are buying up as much as they can carry. Jack left Gia* and Vicky back at his apartment where they're safe from infection and ventured out alone. His cart—and it is truly his because he pushed it to the store from home—is loaded with corn and peaches and tomatoes that look like Jersey beefsteaks. He managed to snag some canned beans and a box of fusilli from the nearly naked shelves as well.

  Good haul, he thinks, happy with his finds. Food shipments are so sporadic these days, what with survivalist groups hijacking trucks for themselves, so you take what you can find. Looks like Italian on the menu tonight. Gia can whip of some of her famous red gravy and—

  "She's one of them!" cries a heavyset woman in a turquoise sari directly behind the girl with the cold, backing farther away from her. "I saw her pull out the bottom of her mask before she coughed!"

  "Just a cold." The girl has wide blue eyes and short black hair. "I swear it's just a cold."

  "I saw her too," says the black man behind the saried woman. "Pulled the mask halfway off her face!"

  Jack has a feeling he might have seen it too, but only out of the corner of his eye, so he doesn't say anything. The girl's been tagged twice. A third won't change her fate.

  Sensing where this could be going he angles his cart out of this particular line and backs it toward the rear of another. But he passes that and keeps on backing away, edging closer to the exit doors.

  The checkout girl is signaling to the deputy but he's heard the commotion and is already on his way over. He's a thin little guy, and in any other situation he might be hesitant, but he's wearing the tan uniform of a duly deputized NYC militiaman, he's got a testing kit, and he's armed. And his strut says I'm official so don't mess with me.

  "What's up?" His mouth is probably set in a grim line but the surgical mask hides it.

  The cashier points to the girl. "They say she coughed outside her mask. On purpose."

  "Is that so?" The deputy's eyes narrow as he reaches for the serology tester clipped to his belt. "Okay. Gonna need some of your blood."

  "Just a cold," the girl says, backing away.

  "If that's all it is, you can go on about your business—after the test."

  Jack, who by now has edged into a corner near the furthest checkout counter, notices how the deputy doesn't say what happens if it's not just a cold.

  "No!" The girl rips off her mask. "No blood test! We spit on your blood tests!"

  Then she charges into the crowd around the cash register and starts spitting—not on the blood test but on people. Terrified shoppers scream and try to flee but there's no room to run. The deputy has his pistol drawn but it's plain if he shoots he's going to crease a load of innocent bystanders.

  Suddenly Jack sees something flash in the girl's hand—an old-fashioned straight razor—and knows what's coming next. So does everybody else.

  "She's a kamikaze!" someone screams as panic takes charge.

  Jack watches the girl ram the point of the blade deep into her throat and rip it sideways. Then she throws her arms wide, tilts her head back, and begins to spin. There's a certain grace to her movements, and it might be a beautiful thing to watch except for the scarlet stream arcing from her throat in a spasming geyser that sprays everyone in a ten-foot circle.

  It's a brief dance. Her legs falter, her knees buckle, and she collapses to the floor, a crumpled waxen lump centered in a crimson spin painting.

  But though the dance is done, the audience is still reacting: the screamers trapped at the row of checkout counters keep pushing back, deeper into the store; those just entering do a quick about-face and rush back to the relative safety of the streets. Jack, positioned in the no-man's land between, opts for the street and rolls his laden cart though the swinging doors. He'll settle up with the store tomorrow. Could be an hour, maybe two, before the mess is cleaned up in there. He wants to get back home.

  Six months ago a scene like that would have blown him away. Now… he feels nothing. Had the dubious distinction of being on hand for two other kamikaze deaths before today's, but never this close. The Hive's MO is pretty much the same all over: find a crowded place and try to spread the infection surreptitiously—the cough, the sneeze, smearing a little saliva on vegetables—but if caught, go down in a glorious spray of body fluids. Pure pragmatism: sacrifice one of their number for the opportunity to infect dozens more.

  The Hive is relentlessly pragmatic. That's the key to its success.

  Half a block from the store he stops and unties his mask; he pulls off his windbreaker and drapes it over the cart. The November wind slices at him but his flannel shirt blunts its edge. He removes the Glock from the nylon small-of-the-back holster and positions it in plain sight atop the jacket. Then he starts moving again.

  This gray, sullen, blustery fall day matches the bleakness Jack feels. He wishes the sun were out—to warm his skin, and maybe even take some of this chill off his soul. But sunlight would bring out more people—maybe they think it's healthier, that the extra UV will kill germs—and Jack prefers the streets damn near deserted like this, especially when he's hauling a load of food. Even so, his senses are on full alert.

  Ahead he sees a familiar face, a nodding acquaintance coming his way.

  "Hey," the guy says with a grin, eyeing Jack's cart. No way he can miss the Glock. "Leave any for me?"

  "Plenty," Jack says. "But you might want to wait awhile. A kamikaze did her thing in there."

  "Shit!" the guy says. "They don't know when to quit, do they. They know we've got the vaccine. Why do they keep trying?"

  "Just because they've got lots of brains doesn't mean they're smart."

  The guy doesn't think this is funny. Neither does Jack, but it's better than talking about the rumor that the vaccine isn't what it was cracked up to be, that it's been failing all over the country. What's left of the U.S. government says these are lies spread by the infected to demoralize the uninfected, but no one knows who to believe.

  "Guess I'll just go down to the store and wait outside till they clean things up."

  Jack waves good-bye and watches him go. Once he's sure the guy's not going to do a spin and jump him from behind, he resumes his walk home. Knows he's always been a bit paranoid, but six months ago he'd have kept the Glock holstered and wouldn't be worried about being jumped for his food. As the saying goes, you're not paranoid if they're really out to get you. And they are. Oh yes, they are.

  As Jack walks along he can feel the threads of the social fabric tearing, parting one by one.

  Trust is gone, because anyone, your best and oldest friend, your dearest, closest relative, could be carrying the virus. Bad enough they're infected—that's not their fault—but less than a week after their inoculation they become someone else, someone dead set on infecting you.

  Compassion is a memory. Sure, feel sorry for the victims of the virus—after they're dead.

  Jack doesn't know about the rest of the country, but the tenuous sense of community that existed around the Upper West Side is atrophying. You'd think it would be the other way around, a community of the uninfected linking arms and closing ranks against the contaminated. But not when yesterday's uninfected ally could be today's infected enemy.

  Jack figures he can extrapolate the local to the national, even to the international,
and that means the whole world's going in the toilet—old social orders fragmenting while a new world order expands, relentlessly, irresistibly, geometrically, a rolling snowball of humanity with an unquestioned singleness of purpose.

  Strange mix of feelings roiling through him these days. He's spent most of his adult life hiding from the social order, rejecting it, damning it. But despite its toxicity, now that it's on the brink of ruin he finds himself rooting for it, hoping it will find a way to hang on. Because the Hive is even more toxic than the world order it hopes to replace.

  Not so much worried about himself—being a ghost in the Hive machine will be more of a challenge than his existence in the American social engine, but he'll manage it. His piercing concern is for Gia and Vicky and the jeopardy they face. They're not cut out to live in the cracks, and the Hive is too vast and pervasive for Jack ever to defeat on his own. Hates to admit it, but he needs help to protect the two people he cherishes. He knows he can't expect it from Democrats and Republicans, but maybe some genius in the medical establishment will come up with a killer app.

  And most daunting is that deterioration to the current state has taken a mere five months.

  First the virus mutated into an airborne form, then the original tiny nucleus of the Hive fanned out to all the New York travel hubs—LaGuardia and JFK airports, Penn and Grand Central Stations—to spread the virus. From there the bug raced across the country and around the world. Tens of millions were incorporated into the Hive before hardly anyone even realized it existed. Initially the two parties in Congress saw the Hive as a potential constituency and vied with each other to see who could grant it more special rights and entitlements. But after a majority of the politicians became infected, debate stopped.

  By the time most people began to appreciate the enormity of the threat, it was too late.

  The CDC's initial approach to containment was an influenza model, which proved ineffective. First off, folks with influenza know they're sick and so do the people around them; secondly, flu victims feel lousy and just want to get better. For Hive folk the infection's a party and the more the merrier.