Emergence: Infection

by JT Sawyer

  Selene sighed and folded her arms, trying to ignore the fact that she wanted to scream at Tso over his apparent involvement with the CIA or whoever had pulled his strings to help Reisner. Only she knew Tso was a rather meek individual who would probably shut down and walk away, putting more distance between them. She needed his help and valued his friendship, but also had to find out where his loyalties lay.

  She looked over her shoulder at him and then cleared her throat. “Say, Victor, do you think you could give me your feedback on these new images of the parasite?”

  He eagerly walked over and stood beside her, studying the monitor while giving her the occasional sideways glance.

  “Definitely not your standard Bertiella tapeworm.” He waved his index finger at the antenna, which resembled a miniscule eyelash under the enhanced imagery. “And that appendage is interesting—perhaps used for communication with others or for extending its sensory range?” He shook his head. “You’re the expert on creepy-crawlies, though. What’s your take?”

  “I was thinking along similar lines, but need to get some more samples of the parasites from a cross-section of different victims to see if there is a correlation in how they respond and why they are attaching themselves to the cerebellum.”

  Tso gave a series of long nods. She could tell he was trying to gauge her expression with his flitting glances at her. He fluttered out a loud exhale.

  “Look, I worked very, very briefly as a medical advisor for the CIA three years ago. It’s when the Ebola outbreak was happening in Sierra Leone. I was approached by a section chief who headed up the Southeast Asian office. He knew I had worked previously on an outbreak a decade earlier and he said they needed someone they could contact for advice on epidemiology if any of their operatives were ever exposed or if a bioweapon was released.” He shrugged his shoulders as the tension drained out of his face. “I only fielded a handful of phone calls and hadn’t heard from my handler in four months. I wish I’d never signed on, to be honest, but they were very persuasive.”

  Selene turned and looked at her colleague, her eyes widening. “I’m grateful you told me. I wasn’t sure what was going on after Reisner and his people showed up.”

  “I got a call earlier from a man named Jonas Runa. He claimed to be Reisner’s superior and had the requisite password and clearance codes. He said that Reisner and his team needed help after being exposed to something on a research vessel.”

  “Where—where did this happen?”

  “That I don’t know. Runa was pretty vague about it all but he sounded shook up—and those guys don’t get rattled about anything.”

  Selene looked back at the image of the parasite again. “Then maybe patient zero isn’t the man in your morgue. This is all the more reason for Reisner to show us the information he got off that ship.”

  “Not sure how easy it will be to convince him of that.”

  “He looked as surprised as we did at the graphic news footage from around the world. He may just be a foot soldier following orders and out of the loop on what he has in his possession, especially since we’re talking about the CIA.”

  “I just hope you can forgive me, Selene, for leaving you with an impression that you couldn’t trust me.”

  “You’ve always been like family to me, Victor.” She patted him on the shoulder. “And even family have some issues from time to time.” Selene moved back a few inches and looked him over, seeing his nearly balding head and thick glasses which seemed to occupy most of his face. “Besides, you don’t come across as a very convincing CIA guy.”

  He laughed and bowed deeply. “Thank you. That alone means a lot.” Tso moved to the door. “If you will excuse me, I want to check on my wife and children, then I have to finish my tissue samplings in the lab.”

  A few minutes after he left, Selene was busy hashing through the last email she had received from Weaver at the CDC. Her mind was hazy from the lack of sleep and she walked to the corner desk and poured some cold coffee from the pitcher, then added in a copious amount of sugar. Sipping the tepid fluid, she heard someone shout in agony from the hallway.

  Chapter 27

  Reisner stepped back into the room before the men spotted him. He didn’t think they were a part of the remaining staff at the facility, and their gear looked too high-end for security.

  He thought back to the Atropos and the dead agents. If they had surveillance on the vessel then they could have easily tracked us back here. Reisner looked around the room for any weapons, but only found a metal fork on a dinner tray by Tso’s desk. He grabbed it, placing the fork in a reverse grip to hide its presence, then stepped into the hallway. The two men were moving in his direction and he walked by them, giving them a nod. Neither of them responded but kept moving with determination while glancing down at an image on their phones.

  Reisner spun around. “Excuse me, I’m new here, can you guys tell me where the infirmary is at?”

  The two men stopped and slowly turned. The taller figure on the right with a faint mustache acted like he was processing the information while his partner with the shaved head responded with a finger to the ceiling. “Upstairs.”

  Reisner moved closer. “Hmm, I thought it would be downstairs. Are you sure?”

  The taller man’s eyes darted along the ground then over to his partner. Reisner clutched the fork firmly in his hand, then took another step forward as he noticed the bald man rolling his tongue around his lower lip. These guys aren’t friggin’ security. As the bald man slid his cellphone into his vest pocket, he made out Selene’s face on the screen.

  He saw the tall man’s shoulder relax as his HK SP5K rifle began to slide down. Reisner bolted forward, driving the fork into the eye of the bald man, which sent him backwards, clutching his face. Reisner immediately pivoted to his left and slammed his right forearm into the tall man’s neck. As the figure was sent back into the wall, he stomped his boot down on his right knee at an oblique angle, causing it to snap. The wounded man with the fork was screaming, but managed to rush forward, shoving Reisner into the door of Tso’s office. It swung open, sending both of them to the floor. Reisner spun around and clutched the thrashing man’s ankle and violently wrenched it to the side, tearing the ligaments, then he sent his foot forward into his assailant’s face. The man went limp and Reisner leapt to his feet as the bald man in the hallway was groaning while attempting to lift the barrel of his rifle. Reisner trotted forward and kicked the man in the throat, causing the trachea cartilage to crumple like cardboard.

  He caught movement to his right and raised his fist just as Selene came around the corner. She stared down at the dead men, her face growing pale.

  “Glad you weren’t here a few minutes ago,” he said, bending down and removing the HK, pistol, knife, and extra mags off the dead man.

  “I heard someone scream and thought they were hurt. Why—why did you kill these men?”

  He removed the phone from the bald man’s vest and clicked it on, then tossed it up to Selene. “You’re on someone’s radar for some reason. Any idea why these men were sent for you?”

  She looked at her photograph. It resembled one she had taken for the CDC’s website. “No—no one knows I’m even here except some of my colleagues in Atlanta and Doctor Tso.”

  He retrieved the other weapons and then grabbed Selene by the arm. “Well, I’d say that the Chinese Intelligence Services also know, and we need to get you out of here. They’ve obviously bypassed the security codes to breach this place. These guys are probably connected with some others I ran into earlier before we arrived here.”

  She looked at the goopy fork sticking out of the bald man’s eye. “Men from the ship you were on? Are they dead too?”

  “Yeah, but not by my hands.”

  They both trotted down the hallway, with Reisner sweeping the HK around each corner they passed. “Shit,” he muttered to himself as he came to an abrupt halt.

  “What?”

  “I left the laptop and flash dri
ves in Tso’s office. And trust me, you’re gonna want to see what’s on them.”

  “So, now we’re best friends, just like that? Did you just hear from your boss and he eased up on your leash a little?”

  Reisner gave her a hard stare, reflecting on Runa’s fate. “Ms. Munroe, my boss may have died relaying vital information to me—information that I need your help deciphering.” He nodded for her to follow him back to Tso’s office. “So if you can ease up loosing your venom on me, that’d be a big help.”

  “I’m sorry. If I can—”

  “You can tell me where Tso is at, that’s what you can do. I need to locate a route out of here that doesn’t involve sprinting through a gauntlet of cannibals or Chinese spies.”

  “He’s in the main lab one floor down.”

  As they stepped over the dead men and back into Tso’s office, he saw her glancing at the pistols tucked into his belt. “And I’d like one of those.”

  “You have some experience with firearms?”

  “Grew up on a farm in Nebraska. Used to go deer hunting with my dad.”

  “And you’ve used a semi-auto pistol before and done malfunction drills?” He grabbed the laptop and flash drives.

  “Well, no.”

  He handed her a fixed blade in a sheath as he walked by. “Then take this for now. I don’t need anyone at my back who could be a danger to me or themselves. If I come across some lever-action 30/30s then you’ll be the first to get one.”

  She blew a strand of hair off her nose and tucked the sheath into her waist with irritation.

  “You don’t have to like it, you just have to do it,” he said, stepping back into the hallway and scanning in either direction.

  “I’m not one of your soldiers, so don’t talk to me like I just walked into a recruiting office.”

  He bit his lip, wishing she were more compliant. “Yes, ma’am.”

  As he retraced his steps through the hall, he removed his phone and dialed up the code Runa had provided for Admiral McKenzie with PAC-COM. He wished he was still back in the Virginia countryside, sitting on his porch and listening to the wind rustle through the pines. Instead, he and the others were about to enter into another race for their lives.

  As they trotted along the hallway, he wasn’t even sure what he’d be returning to in the U.S., but once the voice of McKenzie came over the phone, he felt a ray of hope that they would soon be on their way to more friendly shores.

  Chapter 28

  Nash was busy reassembling the last Tavor and sliding a fresh magazine in when Santos came up and handed him a cup of black coffee.

  “Thanks, amigo.” He placed the weapon down and sipped on the steaming beverage, then let out a contented sigh. “I tell ya—the simple things in life are what you appreciate at times like this.”

  “Doesn’t take much to please you then,” said Connelly, who was inspecting the chamber of a Glock. Though she had only been with the team for just over a month, she felt an instant camaraderie with them, and their banter reminded her of her three older brothers. She wondered where they were and if they were safe, though she hoped things weren’t as bad in the U.S. as the grisly reports were indicating. Maybe they all got back home to Dad’s house? I have to get a hold of them somehow.

  “A good drink and good company can get you through the toughest of times,” said Nash. “That’s what Runa always used to say.”

  “So, do you know him well?” said Connelly.

  “We’d shoot the breeze at Will’s place in the country after a deployment sometimes. Runa’s the kind of guy you want watchin’ yer six when you’re knee-deep in shit. He’s one of us—or used to be before he moved up to his present position.”

  “I thought Will had a townhouse in the city, near Langley?” said Connelly.

  “Once in a while he’d stay there. His house in the sticks suited him more—all broken down and isolated,” Porter chimed in with a chuckle.

  “I think his townhome had too many painful memories for him,” Nash said. “He used to spend weeks on end there alone when he was visiting his dad in the hospital towards the end. The chemo really took its toll on him the last three months. Will’s house in the country is more of a retreat from the world.” Nash tilted his head up. “And if you stay in this business long enough, you’ll need to have something similar to keep you sane—like Porter and his brothel in Thailand.”

  “Hey, don’t knock it. That’s a classy place and the ladies there have become friends of mine, even outside of the work they do.”

  “I think that’s because they see you as a big stack of Benjamins walkin’ in the door,” said Nash.

  “Nah, some of ’em are almost like sisters to me.”

  “That’s messed up,” said Connelly. “Like Deep South messed up.”

  Nash let out a boisterous laugh. “Now, that’s funny. Especially since I’m from Tennessee.”

  “That ain’t the Deep South,” said Porter. “She’s talking about them inbred motherfuckers from Alabama and Mississippi, though with those cross-eyes of yours, you could fit the bill.”

  “Yeah, well if Byrne were here, he’d be saying…” Nash stopped talking and looked around as if he expected the hulking figure to walk through the door. “Dammit, brother.”

  Porter rested the butt of his Tavor on the table and let out a long sigh. “He oughta be here right now. He’d be firing back with some country-boy expression of his.”

  “He was a good man,” said Connelly. She thought of the brief time she spent on assignment with him. Byrne showed her the ropes when she arrived in Damascus, and Connelly was grateful to the burly operator for taking her under his wing. All of the men welcomed her aboard, though Reisner always seemed aloof despite what she had felt was some obvious chemistry between them during the last few days holed up together in a safehouse in Syria.

  Mostly, she couldn’t tell if he was too busy or if he didn’t approve of her being on the team since Runa hadn’t given him any choice in the matter. She knew Reisner was devastated by the loss of Byrne and Dominguez, but his demeanor never revealed his feelings. Most of the people she had met at the CIA were complex individuals to say the least, but with Reisner, she just couldn’t get a fix on him and it both intrigued and unnerved her. She had found herself drawn to older men, but she was interested in Reisner for his experience in the field and his considerable tactical abilities. At least that’s what she had been telling herself the past few weeks.

  “Reisner will make sure Byrne gets the official recognition he deserves when we get Stateside,” said Nash. “Assuming there’s a United States to return to,” he mumbled under his breath.

  “Where is Reisner anyway?” said Santos as he rubbed the whiskers on his brown cheeks.

  “Probably duking it out with that feisty woman lab rat,” said Nash.

  “She’s got my vote for sultry scientist of the year. Betcha the boss is thinking the same thing,” said Porter with a grin.

  Connelly rolled her eyes. The woman seemed relatively competent in her earlier discussion, but acted like she had a steel rod jammed up her ass. Plus, she looked like the type who allocated Saturday afternoons for a pedicure. Connelly forcefully inserted a magazine into her Glock. How could she possibly be Reisner’s type?

  Nash moved away from the others and came up alongside Connelly. He continued to finish reassembling his rifle while whispering to her over his shoulder. “For what it’s worth, the boss doesn’t get involved with anyone from the Agency, especially other field agents.”

  Connelly half-tilted her head, giving him an irritated look. “OK—not sure why you’re telling me this.”

  Nash frowned. “Just good info to know, I figure, with you being still relatively new to his team and all.”

  Her eyes kept darting from the table back up to him. “He seems extremely sound with his reasoning and he’s treated me well, so I got no complaints.”

  Despite her best efforts at appearing stone-faced, she was sure she was slightly bl
ushing when Nash gave her a sideways glance.

  “Years ago, just after I joined the Agency, Runa assigned a female agent, Mira, to his team. It was Will’s first time leading.” He shook his head, working the slide on his rifle. “To say she and Will became tight was an understatement. After a year, it got to the point where Will eventually asked Runa to move her to another division to keep her out of harm’s way.” He cleared his throat, resting his hand on the stock of his rifle. “Our last mission together didn’t end well—as in, she was KIA on a botched mission in Eastern Europe. Afterwards, Will almost left the Agency for good. He wasn’t the same for a long time.” He put his Tavor down on the table and looked at Connelly. “I guess I’m telling you all this because you remind me of her and you’d do best if you remembered that this line of work doesn’t allow us the luxury of having personal attachments that can cloud judgement on the battlefield.”

  She finished cleaning her Glock and fervently slid in a fresh magazine. “I get where you’re coming from and appreciate the candor, but what the hell’s the point of going out on the battlefield in the first place if not to fight for the personal attachments that make life worth living?”

  Nash let out a slow grin then grabbed his rifle. “You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, Connelly.” He patted the area over his heart with his fist. “Just make sure you use it to keep this in check.”

  The door to her rear swung open and Reisner’s stolid face appeared in the entrance, his shirt collar dappled with blood. He had a submachine gun in his hand and another slung over his shoulder. Munroe was standing close to him, her pale complexion making Connelly wonder if she was going to faint.

  “Grab all the gear. We’ve got company and it ain’t any of those things from outside—two Chinese agents somehow breached this facility. Pacific Command is on the way but their ETA is sixty minutes out. We need to get the intel from the ship and get Doctor Munroe out of here.”