“I did it,” Thanh reported to Rhys, Schuyler, and McClosky in a clandestine meeting in Schuyler’s cell. Thanh and McClosky were in hermetic suits, as it hadn’t been safe to be near Schuyler without them for the past few days.
Rhys thought it said something about Schuyler that, as much as she resented civvies—and absolutely despised McClosky—she had still warned them against being there unprotected. She had intended to break Rhys and herself out of the research facility days ago, but she had decided to wait until the only danger of infecting someone came from the possibility of them shooting her, in which case it would be the person’s own fault. She’d asked Rhys to obtain plastic bags in which they could triple-wrap the bloodstained cloths she’d been using. When the meeting was over, Rhys would walk the rags to the incinerator himself.
“You rendered the virus inactive?” McClosky asked eagerly, and Thanh nodded.
“We can let people know they’re not infected now. I disposed of the remaining live virus from the sample Schuyler donated, so Littlewood can’t get hold of it.” Her voice sounded grimly satisfied. “As soon as I get back to the lab, I’ll work on finding a stable medium for the inactive virus, and then it will be ready for testing.”
Schuyler scowled. “That’s all well and good for you people, but what’s Littlewood going to do to Rhys once he knows he’s been had?”
Rhys grimaced. “Whatever he thinks he’s going to do, he’d better bring reinforcements because I’m not going to make it easy on him.” Schuyler gave him a dubious look, and Rhys narrowed his eyes at her. “I can take care of myself. I’ve been training with Titus and Xolani for two years. Unless he knocks me out or has his guards restrain me, he’s going to have to work for it.”
“In which case, he might not bother with you at all,” McClosky observed. “Stephen likes helpless victims, not those who put up a fight.”
Rhys nodded, conceding the point. He still cringed at the way Littlewood had tried to gentle him into compliance before springing his trap.
That just seemed to make Schuyler angrier. “You want to tell me why the fuck you never put a bullet between his eyes?” She looked back and forth between McClosky and Thanh. “You knew what he was doing. You were out here away from the Clean Zone where no one could say otherwise if you reported that he had an unfortunate accident.”
McClosky cleared his throat. “Rhys asked me much the same when he first got here. I will only say that I felt we had no choice, and that the alternatives were worse.”
Schuyler leveled a threatening finger at him. She leaned forward, dropping her voice to an almost-calm murmur. “When this is over, I’m going to deal with you personally. I don’t give a rat’s ass what your bullshit rationalizations are.”
He took his time responding, his voice as soft as hers. “Fair enough.”
They all stood there, caught up in the tense silence, until Schuyler broke it by waving them away. “Get the fuck out of here. Make your vaccine before I decide none of this is worth it and tear this place apart just for the satisfaction of it.”
Thanh and McClosky rose in unison. He shuffled toward the door, while she turned toward Rhys. “When you’re done here, I’m going to have the guard bring you to the lab. If I can spin down an antiserum from some of your blood, it would be a good thing to have in case— Well, nothing is sure in the testing phase. It might make a difference.”
Rhys froze, staring at her. “You’re going to test it on a living person?”
“Eventually. If the tests on the blood samples and lab animals are promising.” Thanh met his eyes squarely. “I promise you, we have a volunteer who knows the risk and is willing to accept it.”
“Who?”
“Me.” McClosky turned from the door. “I figure if someone should put themselves in danger of dying to test it, it should be me.”
Schuyler gave him a scathing look. “And you conveniently get to be the first person to have access to the vaccine if it works.”
“I could tell you that’s not why I volunteered, but you’re more than entitled to whatever you wish to believe.” McClosky bowed his head and ducked out of the room. After a moment’s hesitation, Thanh followed.
“You think he’s not sincere?” Rhys asked cautiously.
“I don’t give a shit if he is or not.” Schuyler flung herself onto her bunk. “That man is responsible for billions of deaths. If he feels bad about it, I don’t care. The fact that he’s escaped justice this long tells me he’s not willing to accept the consequences of what he did.”
“Maybe he’s just practical enough to realize his death won’t actually help undo anything and that there’s a better use for him.”
She grunted. “Whatever. Go. Get out of here. I’m not in the mood to deal with anyone else right now.”
She turned her back to him as Rhys knocked on the door to summon the guard. “Tell that to Hope,” he thought he heard Schuyler murmur as it closed behind him.
“If this is going to work, it needs to work soon,” Thanh muttered, looking into the lab from the window in the exam room where she’d taken Rhys’s blood. She was pulling on her hermetic suit—mandatory for anyone working in the lab—and getting ready to go do whatever she would need to do with his blood to make the antiserum.
“Why’s that?” He cocked his head curiously. “You’re all out of the woods since I don’t actually have Alpha. False alarm, right?”
Her mouth twisted. “You mean until your Jug friends get here? And don’t tell me Schuyler is planning on letting us keep her locked up indefinitely. She’s either staying put to give you time to do what you need to do or waiting for reinforcements, or both.”
“Well, just surrender calmly and hand us over when Darius gets here, and no one needs to bleed or be exposed to anyone’s blood.” He said it to be flippant, but he met her eyes squarely, hoping she’d take the advice.
“You forget that the guards don’t answer to me. That’s the problem.” She halted with her hood in her hands, then set it on the examination table and sighed. “You have to understand about Littlewood. He’s psychotic, but he’s always been very controlled. He’s a cold, calculating predator, not some rabid dog attacking indiscriminately. He knows how to bide his time, how to hide in plain sight, and how to cover his tracks.”
Rhys shuddered. “I noticed.”
“But he’s losing it.” The intensity in her voice made Rhys do a double take. “You’ve given him a scare, and you’ve done something he never expected. You’ve made him feel powerless.”
“He doesn’t seem all that powerless to me.” Rhys still went cold when he thought of how easily Littlewood had threatened to kill thousands of people in the Clean Zone just to have leverage over Rhys. Even if Rhys knew he wasn’t actually capable of carrying through on the threat, Littlewood hadn’t known it. And he hadn’t been bluffing.
Rhys had continued to indulge Littlewood’s false understanding of the situation to buy Thanh more time to work on her vaccine. After two days of masturbating every four hours, any amusement he’d enjoyed at Littlewood’s expense had definitely faded. His wrist was sore and his dick was chafed, with a raw band where the mouth of the suction collector thing wrapped around the shaft. His balls ached. Coming was more painful than pleasurable. Even his best memories of things he and Darius had done together were losing their ability to arouse him, and he wondered if he’d ever be able to enjoy a good handjob again. But as long as Littlewood was hiding away, trying to infect himself with Alpha, Thanh was free to operate as she needed to.
Thanh shook her head in disagreement. “Maybe you’d have to have known him before, but he’s desperate, and that makes him not only dangerous but unpredictable. We can’t count on his self-restraint anymore.”
“If he comes after me, I will kill him,” Rhys said with a steely look. Thanh’s eyes widened. “You think I won’t?”
“You don’t seem the type.”
“I’ve spent the past two years living with people who killed any of t
heir comrades who started talking about using the Alpha strain to mistreat uninfected people. They wouldn’t have dicked around with Littlewood; they would have put a bullet between his eyes and moved on.” Rhys rolled down his sleeve with jerky pulls. “No one is more aware of how dangerous the Alpha strain is than the Jugs. And a lot of them may hate civvies the way Schuyler does, because the civvies completely shit on them, but it doesn’t mean they’re going to act on it.”
After a moment, Thanh nodded and fastened her hood to her suit. “Do what you need to do. If I ever make it back to the Clean Zone, I’ll vouch that it was necessary.” She paused with her hand on the door. “It may be a bit before the guard returns to take you back to your cell. Go ahead and rest. At least Littlewood can’t push you for another semen sample while you’re out of your cell.”
Oh, thank God. After she was gone, Rhys realized just how tired he was. The constant stress of the last week, and the past two days in particular, playing his high-stakes game, was beginning to wear on him. Fuck it. He hopped off the examination table and crossed over to the control panel, turning down the lights until the cubicle was dark except for the illumination coming through the window into the lab across the room from him. He glanced at the smaller window in the door on his left to find the hallway bright but quiet. Then he curled up on the table, wrapped his arms around himself to ward off the slight chill of the climate-control system, and closed his eyes.
Something jerked him awake, a crash Rhys wasn’t certain had been in his dream or real. How long had he been asleep? From the grit in his eyes, the stiffness of his muscles, and the pressure in his bladder, it felt like hours.
He heard another crash, and then a shout. Furious and masculine and coming from the lab. Rhys scrambled off the table to peer through the window into the lab. Littlewood was storming around, flinging trays of instruments out of his path and leaving the orderly space in shambles. He was screaming at Dr. Thanh.
“Where is he?” he demanded. At first Rhys wondered how Littlewood had missed him. He would have walked right past the door to the room Rhys had been lying in to get to the lab. Littlewood must not have seen into the darkened cubicle from the brightly lit corridor and lab.
Even though Dr. Thanh was suited, Rhys thought he could see tension and fear in her posture. “If the Juggernaut troops are approaching, the best thing we can do is stand down and hand Rhys and Schuyler over peacefully,” he heard her say. “Anything else would be suicide.”
Darius!
Despite the anxiety of the moment, Rhys couldn’t contain the thrill of knowing Darius was coming for him. He’d never doubted it, of course, but he hadn’t realized it would be so soon. He’d half expected Schuyler to break them out of here and they’d meet the other Jugs on the road somewhere nearby before returning to end operations at the research facility permanently.
“I had the guards tase that Juggernaut bitch and chain her up. She’s not going anywhere. Now they’re arming up and heading for the rooftops. The Juggernauts will be dead the moment they get within firing range.” Littlewood stalked closer to her. “We’re not done here until I’ve gotten the Alpha strain.”
Thanh’s posture went rigid. “Were they in suits?” she demanded. “The guards who tased her. Were they in suits? Because if they weren’t, you’ve just risked their lives. You’ve got to get them in here. I’ll have an antiserum soon, and I even have a possible vaccine. It’s untested, but we have to hope for the best.”
“We’re all dying anyway!” Littlewood roared, sweeping his arm along a workbench. Instruments, beakers, and other equipment crashed to the floor in a shower of shattering glass.
“No, we aren’t!” Thanh shot back, and there was a taunting note of satisfaction in her tone. “You’ve been chasing after the Alpha strain for days when Rhys never had it to begin with. This was all a setup by one of your DPRP personnel in the Clean Zone to stop you from hurting more people.”
Littlewood stared at her in disbelief, and then Rhys saw his arm move. Saw him catch the heavy microscope by one of its arms and fling it at her as he screamed in rage. Saw the way it toppled end over end through the air until it connected with the side of her hooded head. Even through the thick glass separating him from the lab, he heard the sickening sound of it cracking against her skull.
Thanh dropped like a puppet whose strings had been cut, and Littlewood . . . Littlewood just stared down at her, his head tilted inquisitively, as if puzzled by her sudden motionlessness.
Rhys moved before he realized he’d even intended to, slamming out of the examination cubicle into the corridor, and then through the vestibule to the lab, which Littlewood had left carelessly open at both ends.
“Dr. Thanh!” he called, rushing toward her still body. Even from a few feet away, he could see the blood staining the inside of her mask. Littlewood snatched at him, but Rhys shoved him aside, kneeling to carefully remove Thanh’s hood.
There was swelling at her temple and blood matting her hair. This wasn’t good. He needed to get her to Xolani, and he needed to do it now.
“Are you happy now?” he snarled, springing to his feet and advancing on Littlewood, who began backing away with fear in his eyes. Yes, he was afraid of Rhys, and that gave Rhys far more pleasure than it should have. He actually felt the first small stirring of arousal tugging at his balls, but overriding all that was fury. “You may have just killed the only chance there was to create a vaccine for the plague.”
Despite the terror shadowing his hollowed eyes, Rhys’s words made Littlewood smile. “Why should I care?”
Rhys went wide, circled around Littlewood, getting between the secretary and the door. Littlewood pivoted to keep facing Rhys, walking backward to maintain a distance between them, but now his course took him deeper into the lab and farther away from escape.
“I’m going to beat the shit out of you,” Rhys promised. “I might not get my jollies from it the way you do from hurting people, but I’ll still enjoy it. And then I’m going to let the Jugs have you. Because they know just what to do with people who mishandle the Alpha strain, and because I want you to really see what it means to be a Jug before you die.”
He leaped for Littlewood, and Littlewood flung himself backward, tripping over Thanh’s body. He tried to scramble upright again, but Rhys already had him by the collar, yanking him into Rhys’s oncoming fist to add more momentum to the blow.
Littlewood’s nose shattered with a spray of snot and blood, followed by a burbling cry of pain. Rhys’s knuckles burned, but he hauled back his fist for another punch. Littlewood’s eye slammed shut and began to swell. Blood began trickling from his split lips with the next one.
It was euphoric. Rhys felt like he could have gone on forever, pummeling the man’s face to a pulp, and he enjoyed every moment of it. It didn’t matter that Littlewood was an old man nearly three times Rhys’s age and unable to defend himself. Rhys was going to inflict upon him every moment of suffering Littlewood had inflicted upon others . . . in triplicate.
Only a flash of yellow in his peripheral vision stopped him long enough to notice what was happening around them. Thanh’s suited arm dropped away, leaving something glittering sticking out of Littlewood’s quadriceps.
A hypodermic syringe.
Rhys released Littlewood and let him fall where he lay, whimpering and staring at the needle in his leg. Beyond him, Thanh’s bloody face was contorted into a gruesome grin, her death mask.
“Guess he won’t be infecting himself with Alpha now,” she gasped, and then her eyes went empty, gazing sightlessly at Rhys.
All desire to hurt Littlewood fled. His attention was transfixed by that syringe. The experimental vaccine Thanh had concocted. Maybe the only dose of vaccine anyone would ever be able to generate, and she’d used it to put a permanent end to Littlewood’s ambitions of acquiring the Alpha strain.
Rhys gently passed a bloody-knuckled hand over her eyes to shut them.
“You’re not worth killing,” he spat at Li
ttlewood, his eyes burning. Thanh would never be going back to her life in the Clean Zone, to the husband and children she’d been taken from. “I think I like the idea of you living for years, facing justice, knowing that even if you were to go free, it’d be impossible for you to ever become a Jug.”
Littlewood slumped to the floor and closed his eyes. Whether he was unconscious or he’d simply given up, Rhys didn’t know. And he didn’t really care.
Darius was out there, and Rhys was going to find him and make sure no one took a shot at him.
He went to Schuyler’s cell first, which was unguarded, but he didn’t have the keys. Looking at the monitors in the security station down the hallway, he could see that inside the situation was just as Littlewood had said it’d be. She’d been tased again and was lying unconscious on her bunk with shackles on her wrists and ankles. One suited guard was in there with her, equally unconscious—or perhaps dead. Given the fact that the guard’s comrades had left him lying there, Rhys was betting on the second option.
Schuyler hadn’t gone down without a fight.
Littlewood had said the guards were taking up posts on the roof, to fire at Darius and the others as they approached. Rhys focused on finding a way up. Except for his one trip to Littlewood’s quarters, Rhys’s familiarity with the facility was limited to the cells and the lab. The rest of the place may have been a labyrinth, and he wasted precious minutes trying to find the access ladder to a hatch on the roof.
McClosky had beaten him to the guards. “They’re Juggernauts, you idiots!” he shouted. “Put those guns down and surrender. They don’t want to hurt you; they just want their people.”
“We don’t take our orders from you!” one of the guards snapped back. He’d taken off the hood of his suit and was wiping his face, which was streaming with sweat. Other guards had done likewise. It was sweltering on the roof, the sun beating down on them mercilessly. Wearing those suits under it must be like wearing a portable oven.
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