His head drops. “I brought the virus back from the future.”
“You did what?” I ask. “We both agreed that was a bad idea!”
“I know. I know. And I felt really bad about it, but Vincent had already convinced me to do it.”
“Of course he did,” Zahra mutters.
Ken holds up his hands in surrender. “Just let me explain. Please.”
“We’re listening,” Adam says with a frown.
“When you told me about the zombie-like people you encountered in the future, the symptoms sounded a lot like an advanced case of Huntington’s disease. I began to wonder if the pandemic you said wiped out the world was actually caused by me. Not Adam. When the opportunity came to visit the future with Elena, I thought I might be able to find out the truth.” He rubs the back of his neck.
“Before you two arrived at Aether that day, Vincent pulled me aside. He said if I got the virus and brought it back, we could work on a way to stop it before it became a problem. We’d find a cure or a vaccine now, so that the pandemic never happens.”
“I waited for you in the car for almost thirty minutes,” I say, thinking back to our time in the future. My fists clench at my side. “You got the virus then.”
He nods. “It was easy. You knocked the guy out, and his backpack was right there. I grabbed the five canisters he had and brought them back to the present with me.”
“Are you crazy?” Paige asks. “You could have gotten yourself killed! Or spread the virus yourself! What were you thinking?”
“I thought I was doing the right thing. I only wanted to find out how the virus was created and then find a way to stop it. That’s all. I swear!”
I shake my head and turn away, too upset with him to even look at him anymore. His actions have jeopardized not just our lives, but the lives of everyone in the world. Maybe he did it with good intentions, but that doesn’t excuse what he did or how he betrayed us.
Adam stares at Ken over his glasses, his arms crossed. “Did you get a chance to study the virus?”
“Yes, but as you suspected, it’s a modified version of genicote,” Ken says. “It has nothing to do with Huntington’s disease after all. And as far as I can tell, there’s no way to stop it.”
“And now Vincent has it,” I practically growl.
Ken swallows. “Yes. I’m sorry.”
“What about the White Outs?” Paige asks. “Were they ever a real thing? Or was all of that another lie?”
“They’re real,” I say. “Or they will be in a few years. I saw lots of news articles on them when Ken and I were in the future. And Harrison Weiss was definitely one of them.”
Zahra frowns. “Assuming Vincent really is behind the virus, he probably used them to release the virus. He knew the media would be all over it.”
“And he knew we’d be in the future asking questions,” Adam says. “He knew we’d find out who released the virus and would try to stop them. The White Outs were the perfect cover.”
“We told Vincent too much about the virus and about the future,” I say with a sick feeling in my stomach. “We gave him everything he needed to prepare to destroy the world and then set himself up as a leader of it. This is all our fault. And now he has the virus a lot sooner than he did before.”
“But why would he want to release a virus that would wipe out most of the population?” Paige asks.
Adam tilts his head and frowns. “Money? Power? Revenge for his son’s death?”
“Maybe all of the above,” I mutter.
“We need to get the virus,” Zahra says. “And then dispose of it somehow.”
“I can get us into the other lab,” Ken says. “It should be empty now since it’s after midnight.”
I’m already heading for the door. “Let’s go.”
Paige sighs. “Guess we didn’t over-prepare after all.”
FRIDAY
The building Ken takes us to is generic, with white walls, tinted windows, and no signs except the street number. If you were driving by, you’d never think twice about it—which I’m sure is the point.
Ken uses a security badge to get inside the building. Two guards are waiting behind a desk inside the lobby. One of them stands as we walk in.
“Hey, Ken,” he says. His voice is warm, but he eyes us suspiciously. “Working late tonight?”
Ken flashes a casual smile. “Yep. Brought some other scientists to help me.”
The guard nods slowly. “They’ll have to sign in.”
“No problem.” Adam steps forward, but instead of reaching for a pen to sign in with, he tosses one of the smoke bombs he made with Ken. It hits the ground, and thick plumes of smoke immediately begin to hiss out of it, filling the lobby with a terrible stench.
The guards shout, but I’m already on the nearest one, jamming the chloroform against his mouth. Using her old gymnastic skills, Paige launches over the desk and lands on the guard behind it, then attacks him with her own chloroform.
As soon as the guards are down, Zahra takes care of the security system on their computer. I check the guards quickly, but they don’t have any guns on them. Dammit. Even though Ken insists this place isn’t heavily guarded, I want to be prepared for anything.
Ken swipes his badge to let us into the elevator. “This way.”
We follow him down a long, bland corridor until he comes to a door in the back, which his badge opens with a soft beep. Inside, we find a lab strangely similar to Adam’s with computers and equipment, except there’s a lot more of it. Low fluorescent lights buzz over us, but none of the computers are on. Rats scurry in cages along one wall. A door is open on the other side of the room.
“The canisters with the virus are in there,” Ken says, taking a step toward the door. “But it should be locked…”
Beyond the door is an antechamber with thick, see-through walls covered with biohazard signs and other warnings. Behind that is a room with half a dozen large stainless-steel refrigerators. Vincent, Nina, and Harrison stand in the middle of them, like they were in the middle of a discussion before we walked in.
Any doubts about Vincent being involved in the pandemic vanish at the sight of the three of them together. Especially when I see what they’re holding—the canisters full of the virus.
Ken rushes forward toward. “What are you doing here?”
Vincent turns toward us and raises his eyebrows. “This is my building. The better question is, what are you all doing here? Except I’m pretty sure I already know.” He jerks his chin at Nina, who points a gun at us.
“Move,” she says.
I glare at her, but without a gun of my own, there’s not much I can do. She shifts the five of us back into the main room of the lab, and Vincent and Harrison follow behind her. We’re forced to stand off to the side, while Nina trains the gun on all of us, her face expressionless. I debate whether I can get it away from her before she can shoot one of us, but it’s too risky. We’ll have to find another way out of this.
Adam steps forward, raising his hands. “Vincent, the virus is dangerous. Having it here in the present is too risky. We need to destroy it.”
“Oh, Adam. Always trying to save the world.” Vincent shakes his head. “I can’t let you destroy the virus. I have big plans for it.”
Dread settles in my stomach. “You’re the one behind the pandemic in the future, aren’t you?”
He gives me one of his charming smiles, like he’s pleased we finally figured it out. “I don’t know for certain, of course, but it’s in line with things I’ve been planning for months now.”
“But…why?” Paige asks. “Why would you do something like that? All those lives lost…”
“For profit, of course.” That charming smile turns sick, twisted, and downright evil. “The goal was to develop a virus along with the cure for it. We’d secretly release the virus when we were ready, and after a few weeks of it wiping out hundreds of thousands of people, the world would be desperate for a cure. We’d be saviors.
And a whole lot richer.”
My God. Rage courses through my body, and I’m tempted to leap forward and attack him, but the gun in my face holds me back. “I knew you were a jerk, but I had no idea you’d ever stoop to something so evil.”
Vincent laughs. “Elena, you were always my favorite. And I’m so grateful to you for telling me about what you saw in the future. It’s because of you that I realized I didn’t have to develop a virus from scratch, or even modify Adam’s cancer cure. I could simply have Ken steal it from the future for me.”
“But there’s no cure,” Ken says, his voice miserable. “I told you I didn’t think it was possible to make one.”
“No, there isn’t. Such a pity.”
“Is that why you destroyed my lab? Why you had me shot?” Adam asks. “So I couldn’t try to create a cure?”
“No, I had nothing to do with any of that. Although I did sabotage the accelerator to make sure none of you could go to the future again to try to stop me. Or rather, Nina did.” He flashes her a proud smile. “Like Elena said, she looks a lot like the woman in black who returned from the future with you.”
I knew it was her. But if she wasn’t responsible for the rest of it, who was?
“But without a cure, your plan won’t work,” Zahra says. “What do you stand to gain from the virus wiping everyone out?”
Vincent gazes at the canister in his hand. “Do you know why I started Aether Corporation originally? I was young and idealistic back then, like all of you. I truly wanted to make the world a better place. And many of the things Aether invented did exactly that. I founded Aceso Pharmaceuticals for a similar reason—to try to make diabetes easier to live with. Even when I started Project Chronos and had Dr. Walters create the accelerator, I had good intentions. Sure, profit was a large part of it, but I really did think that by bringing technology and information back from the future we could improve people’s lives.” His fingers tighten around the canister, and his eyes grow hard. “All of that changed when I watched my only son die.”
My hands clench into fists. “He tried to kill you!”
“We had a difficult relationship. I won’t deny that. But you were the one who murdered him.”
“I had to!”
His eyes narrow. “Did you? Or could you have stopped him some other way? I suppose we’ll never know.”
Guilt flickers through me. Did I have to kill Jeremy? If I could go back and redo that moment, would I make the same choice? I honestly don’t know.
Vincent closes his eyes, his face filled with grief. “Even with the power of time travel in my hands, I can’t do anything to save my family, the only people who ever meant anything to me.” His eyes snap open. “And after losing both my wife and my son, I realized I didn’t care about making the world better anymore. Now I just want to watch it fall.”
“And set yourself up to benefit from it in the future,” Zahra says, her voice disgusted.
“A bonus, for sure. Don’t tell me you were never tempted to do the same thing. I know you all looked into your own fates multiple times. You made changes to the timeline to make your lives better. I just did the same thing. On a larger scale.”
“That’s different,” I say. “We wanted to make sure we had a future. You want to destroy it.”
“Ah, but from what you told me it, it won’t be destroyed, not completely. Just reduced to a more manageable size. And I certainly like the sound of president.” He raises the canister. “So no, I don’t need a cure anymore. And now that Ken’s brought me these canisters, I don’t need to wait ten years to develop the virus either.”
Ken takes a step forward. “I won’t let you do this.”
“You don’t have much of a choice.” Vincent gestures at Nina. “Kill them all.” His eyes rest on me one more time before he walks out of the room with Harrison on his heels.
Nina raises her gun, pointing it at Paige. “Sorry, nothing personal.”
Ken charges forward with a roar, and Nina jerks her gun toward him. It goes off right as he tackles her. They go down together, and the gun clatters to the floor.
“No!” Paige cries.
Nina flings Ken off her, right as Paige grabs the gun. She fires without hesitation, her aim perfect, killing Nina instantly with a bullet between the eyes. Then Paige falls to her knees beside Ken with a wail. It all happens so quickly that the rest of us barely have time to react.
Ken reaches up and touches Paige’s face, his arm weak. “Paige.”
“Stay with me.” She kisses him softly on the lips, tears streaming from her eyes. “Please, Ken.”
Adam kneels beside Paige to inspect the wound, which is bleeding all over the floor. “We need to get him to a hospital.”
His eyes close. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for all of this.”
Overwhelming grief cripples me. I should be going after Vincent, but I can’t seem to move. I stare at Ken, but I can’t tell if he’s breathing anymore. My throat tightens. “Is he…?”
“Not yet,” Adam says, but the look on his face tells me it won’t be long now.
“I’ve called an ambulance,” Zahra says. While the rest of us were in shock, she was on her phone, somehow managing to stay calm. “They’ll be here in five minutes.”
Adam rips off his jacket and uses it to try to staunch the flow of blood. “That might not be soon enough. It’ll take them five minutes just to get into this room.”
I quickly scan the lab and find a long metal cart, then rush over to it. The wheels squeak loudly as I drag it over to Ken’s side. “We’ll put him on this and get him outside. That’ll give him a chance, at least.”
Working quickly, the four of us lift Ken, trying to jostle his body as little as possible. Blood soaks through Adam’s jacket from the bullet wound, and Ken moans as his back hits the cool metal tray. Adam and Paige begin wheeling him out, both of them speaking softly to him and telling him to hold on. Zahra and I follow behind them as they race down the long hallway. At the elevator, I dig through Ken’s pocket until I find his security badge, and then we crowd inside around the cart.
The elevator quickly gets us back to the lobby, where the security guards are still passed out. Adam and Paige push the cart out through the tinted glass doors, but Zahra pauses behind the security desk.
“Elena, wait,” she says as she stares at the computer screen.
I turn back and look over her shoulder. “What is it?”
On the screen, black-and-white camera images show Harrison and Vincent in a parking garage below the building. “They’re still here,” Zahra says.
I glance out the windows at Ken lying on the tray, covered in blood, with Paige and Adam beside him, and then back at the screen. There’s nothing I can do for Ken, and I don’t have time to worry about him. Vincent is getting away with the virus, and we have to stop him. This might be our last chance.
“We can’t let them get away,” I say. “I’m going to the garage, but I might not make it in time. In case I can’t stop them, get the car so you can follow them.”
“I will.” Zahra rests a hand on my arm briefly. “Good luck.”
“You too.”
I race back into the building until I find the stairs, then dash down them toward the parking garage. I don’t have a clue where Vincent might be taking the virus or what he’s planning to do with it, but it can’t be good.
As I bang through the door into the garage, Harrison is already getting into a black car, while Vincent approaches another. I run toward them, my shoes slapping hard against the concrete, but I’m not going to make it. As Harrison’s car peels out of the garage, I pray Zahra can follow him.
I make it to Vincent right as he’s opening his car door. I grab his shirt and spin him around, but he raises something to my face. One of the canisters.
A fine mist sprays over me. I slam my eyes shut and cough, backing away from him. “Oh my God. What have you done?”
“Looks like you’re patient zero,” Vincent says. “Fitting,
really.”
Oh God, oh God, oh God. I scrub my face with my hands, trying to wipe off the clear liquid, but it’s no use. “You idiot! You’ve infected both of us!”
“I haven’t, actually. When we tested the virus, we discovered certain people were immune. I’m one of them. Unfortunately, you’re not as lucky.” Vincent smirks, then shoves the inhaler in his pocket and gets in the car. “Good-bye, Elena.”
I’m powerless to stop him as he drives away. For a heartbeat, all I can do is stand there, staring at my hands. I can’t be infected. It’s not possible. I have so much more I need to do. Maybe the spray didn’t work. Maybe I’m immune too somehow. Maybe, maybe, maybe…
I draw in a shaky breath. But what if I am?
Oh God. I could be contagious right now. I have to go somewhere where I can’t infect anyone else. But where?
The lab. The room where they stored the virus should be safe. If I can make it there, I’ll wait out the rest of my time locked inside. No one else will die because of me.
I make it back to the lab, step through the antechamber, and then enter the room with the transparent walls. Inside, there’s a button to lock the door in the case of contamination, and I take a deep breath and hit it. Lights flash and the door locks with a puff of air, sealing me inside, protecting the outside world from the virus now slowly destroying my body.
I slump against the thick, see-through wall. It’s done. Now all I can do is wait.
Ten minutes later, Adam steps into the lab. His eyes widen when he sees me inside the contamination room, and he rushes into the antechamber. “Elena? What’s going on?”
I glance up at him, and my heart twists. I don’t know how to tell him that I’m dying and there’s nothing he can do about it. “What happened to Ken?”
“The ambulance took him to the hospital. Paige is with him. I came back to make sure you’re okay.” He tugs on the door, but it won’t open. Thank God. “How did you get locked in there? Hang on. I can get you out.”
“No, don’t!” My chest tightens. “You can’t come in here.”
“Why not?”
“Vincent infected me with the virus.”
Future Lost Page 18