by Matt Ryan
THE NEXT MORNING AFTER HER trip to Preston, Samantha slammed her finger on the remote button and the TV clicked off. It was too depressing seeing the way people were suffering. Samantha felt the tears welling up in her eyes. She wanted to rush the cure out to the world and fix them. No one needed to suffer. Maybe she should visit the factory herself and see what the holdup was with the production line. They needed to make it faster.
Even as they bought four flu vaccine plants this week, it would take another few weeks to get the materials in to get them up and running. She made more calls and pushed more people than she thought was ever possible to speed it up. People’s lives were in her hands now. She owed it to them.
She felt a hand glide over her shoulder. “You okay?” Zach asked.
“Yeah, just want to get this cure out to the world. Have you seen what’s going on in LA?”
“Yes, it’s tearing me apart. And from what I heard this morning, Mexico City is in total collapse.”
“Zach,” Samantha turned and gave him her best strong but stern face. “I don’t think the world has a couple weeks, there might not be a couple days. We need to act now.”
“I hate seeing you like this.” He gave her the puppy dog eyes and adjusted his tie. She smiled and looked away, it was such a stupid look, but it still made her giddy every time. “What if I can get another city a cure? A major city. You choose.” He sat on the edge of her desk.
“You have some ready to go?”
“I was leaving it as a surprise for you.”
“You know I hate surprises.”
“I know, that’s why it’s fun.”
She felt heat flooding her stomach. Zach had started to make her feel things she thought she might never feel again. Just being in the room with him made the old feelings fade to black. Sucking in a breath, she held it. One city . . . how could she choose? “Do we have enough for LA?”
“Yes.”
“I think we should do a highly populated city. New York doesn’t seem as bad.”
“Yet,” Zach added.
“LA then.”
“Done.” He tapped his fingers on the desk.
“What else have you been keeping from me?” Samantha’s coy smile spread across her face and she took a step closer to Zach.
He rose from the desk. “Did I tell you I like the color purple? It’s like, my favorite color.”
“I pegged you as a fan of blue.”
“Mix in some red...”
“And you’ve got purple.”
“Exactly.” He moved closer to her.
The magnetic pull of him sucked her in. Samantha’s hands shook and her heart beat fast. They were in her office, windows all around. Anyone could be watching them. Oh God, they’d all think she’d slept with the boss and that’s why she got promoted to VP.
Who cares? Let them think what they want. She moved closer, taking a quick glance at those perfect lips before closing her eyes. She wanted to feel a connection again with a man. Maybe it would help her forget.
Two knocks sounded on her glass door. “Miss Samantha?” Her secretary, Ashley, stood there with a stack of papers in hand. “Sorry if I interrupted anything.”
Samantha took a step back and felt part of Zach’s favorite color heating her cheeks. She cleared her throat. What was wrong with her? It was her boss and he was older. How old though? She had to find out the exact age. Twenty-nine would be the cut off. Okay, maybe thirty. But that was it. Why wasn’t he looking away? Why wouldn’t Ashley get the heck out of the office?
Zach cleared his throat. “Why don’t we finish discussing this later?”
“Sounds good. And I expect an immediate delivery of the promised . . . delivery.” She winced at her stupid words. Ashley stood in the room looking as if she made a huge mistake entering.
“Of course. I’ll see to it personally.” Zach gave her a grin and left the room.
Samantha dropped into her chair and slid behind her desk. Her heart still raced and thoughts of Zach’s lips floated around in her head. She breathed through her nose, trying to calm herself down.
Ashley approached the desk with a raised eyebrow. She was probably twenty-two and full of experience with men. She wouldn’t be reacting this way if a man moved within inches of her. Ashley kept a smirk on her face and Samantha tried to stare it away.
“Just set them on my desk,” Samantha said with a straight back. “I don’t need any more reports for now.”
“He’s cute,” Ashley said, hugging the papers against her chest. She obviously wasn’t going to let it go.
Samantha pursed her lips and tried to find a way to diffuse the stupid look on Ashley’s face, like she had a secret. A secret she could spread around the office, if she so chose. “I hadn’t noticed.”
“You were intimately close.” Ashley placed the pile of papers on her desk. “It’s not like the other girls around here haven’t tried. Most thought he was gay or something.” She sped up her words. “I mean, it’s just that they’ve done almost everything to get his attention, yet he doesn’t even look . . . I mean, they wear stuff. . . .”
“I think I get what you mean.” Samantha found it fascinating that Zach didn’t look at the other women. He’d always done the standard glance down with her. She didn’t mind it, it was just something all men did, but if she was the only one he was doing it to, should she feel special?
“Let me know if you need anything else, Miss Samantha.”
She hated the name at first and hated herself more for getting used to it. They just wouldn’t stop saying it. Who started it anyway?
Ashley stood at the desk, rocking back and forth on her heels. Her strained face appeared as if she was struggling to keep back words.
“Is there something else?”
“I heard you picked a city. Can I know what it is? I mean, my family lives in the Napa Valley area. I was talking to my mom last night and she said Dad was starting to cough, she tries to tell me it’s just a cold, but I can hear him coughing in the background. I know it’s the Cough.”
The Cough wasn’t the scientific name, but slang Americans adopted. Kind of like Swine Flu, or Spanish Flu, the plagues often went by simple names everyone could follow. Samantha and the rest of ZRB had taken the vaccine, but it wasn’t available for families yet.
She hated this part of the job. “I’m afraid I can’t say.”
“Please, Miss Samantha.”
“If I send it to Napa Valley, will you call me Samantha?”
Her eyes went wide with fear, mouth opening and closing. Finally she nodded her head.
“The whole world will be getting cured as fast as we can make it. I’d tell your family to stay inside and avoid other people.”
Ashley’s features slumped, she knew when she was getting the shove off. She turned and left Samantha’s office.
Samantha plopped her hand on the pile of papers and tapped her fingers. The papers were reports and estimates on production schedules. She could look at all the papers and search for inefficiencies, but it made more sense to go straight to the source. Zach seemingly had endless amounts of money, they could pay the factory workers to work double shifts for triple pay or something—anything to get the product out faster. She stood up and decided to take a field trip.
THE SPARSE ROADS HELD FEW cars and even fewer people. Some hugged the sidewalks, looking lost, while other staggered, coughing into their sleeves. One man lay on the edge of the road with his eyes open, staring at something in the distance. She knew him to be dead and stepped on the gas to get by him, keeping her attention straight forward. It made her think of Ryjack. The idea of Earth resembling anything like that horrifying planet terrified her. She kept a heavy foot and got there in under an hour.
She drove into the parking lot filled with cars. The cars looked uniformly parked and all had a thin layer of dust coating them, as if they were in a lazy man’s car dealership. Maybe Zach was pushing the workers to the extreme. She admired the employee’s dedication
to stay at the factory for who knows how long.
Not finding a parking spot, she pulled next to the front door, adjacent to the sidewalk. The large single-story building looked like a distribution center; no windows and only a few truck doors lining one side. She left her car and walked to the front door. It had a closed sign on it. She tapped her knuckle on the glass and held her hand up to shield her eyes, trying to find movement inside. A man in all white walked to the door.
He spoke through the glass. “This is a restricted building.”
“I’m the VP of ZRB, Samantha Roslin. I’m here to see Scott Fuller.”
The man’s eyes narrowed and he looked her up and down. “Stay here.”
After a few minutes, she spotted another man with the first. He opened the door wide and smiled. “Samantha, what brings you here?”
“I wanted to check on production.”
“I’m afraid that can’t happen right now. There’s been a leak and we had to shut down most of the building.”
Samantha studied the man’s face. Did he think she was stupid? “Are you Scott?”
“Yes.”
“Then step aside and let me into my factory.”
“I’m sorry but I can’t allow that . . . protocol.”
“Do you want to keep this job? Do you want to get a cure for your family, your town?” Samantha fought to get the words out. It felt wrong to say, but the look on his face said her threats were working.
“You wouldn’t.”
“Do you think Zach would listen to his VP or some factory worker?” She hated herself for talking to the man like that, but the world depended on getting the cure out as fast as possible. His feelings may have to get hurt.
“Fine, but you’ll have to go to our quarantine room first. We can’t have any foreign contaminants introduced.” Scott led her into the building and past a metal detector and a machine that puffed air over her body. Then Scott took her to a small room near the detectors.
“We just need to have you in this room for a bit while the air scrubs you down.”
“Is this really necessary?”
“I’m sorry, Samantha, but it is.”
At least he wasn’t calling her Miss Samantha. “Fine, but I want to discuss all the questions I’ve been emailing you.”
“As soon as you’re scrubbed down, we can sit at my desk and go over everything.” Scott left the room and closed the door.
Samantha huffed and took in the room around her, a blank room with four walls and a door. The door contained the only window in the room. It faced the adjacent wall of the hallway. She’d expected some kind of machine to turn on, or puffs of air to shoot over her body. Maybe the ordinary fluorescent light on the ceiling was purifying the air around her?
After half an hour she began to be suspicious and pace.
An hour after that, she pounded on the locked door and yelled Scott’s name. How dare they lock her up! She had turned from guest to prisoner and if she ever got out, she’d make sure they were all fired and criminally charged for imprisonment. They couldn’t just hold her in a room like this. Didn’t they know she was the Vice President of the company?
The bottoms of her hands hurt, but she slammed them against the door harder. No one came. In fact, no one had moved by the door since they left her in there. She was about to hit the door again when she heard a voice. Someone distant and angry—a person yelling. Relief then flooded her as she spotted her salvation.
Zach stomped to the door and flung it open. His face was red with anger and his normally perfect hair looked tossed and turned like he’d just toweled it from a shower. “Are you hurt?”
“No.” She rushed into his chest and wrapped him in a hug. His arms pulled her in tighter, pushing some of the air from her. She held back tears and talked into his chest. “They imprisoned me. I want them fired.”
“They thought they were doing the right thing. We’ve had . . . attempts to infiltrate our stocks. But you don’t ever have to worry about Scott again. He’s been taken care of.” Zach spit out the words and wiped his hair back with his hand. “Let’s get you out of here.” He took her hand and led her down the hallway.
Even with the horribleness of being trapped in the room for over an hour, Zach’s hand energized her. The skin on skin contact sent a warm sensation up her arm. She pulled him back. “Wait, I came here to check on production.”
Zach stopped and turned to face her at the front door of the building. “We can’t, there’s been a chemical leak and they had to shut down for the day.”
“But what about the cars—”
“I have a job for you, actually. I would love for you to cut the ribbon at the distribution of the cure in LA tomorrow. I have two-hundred trucks and teams set up, but I want you to launch truck one. The mayor will be there as well.”
“That’s great news. Are you coming with me?” She crossed her fingers.
“Sorry, I’d love to, but I’ll be on international calls all day trying to get the cure distributed to other countries.”
“Okay.” She followed him to the parking lot and next to her car.
Zach grinned. “You want to travel in a bit more style?”
“What do you have in mind?”
A large black helicopter flew over their head and landed in the road. “One benefit of no one leaving their houses . . . open roads.”
“What about my car?”
“I’ll have someone grab it and bring it back. Leave the keys in it.”
She bounced with excitement. She loved riding in the helicopter. Up in the sky, the world seemed normal again, she couldn’t see people coughing or dead in the road. She frowned at the thoughts of distancing herself from it all.
Shaking it off, she reminded herself that tomorrow she would get to deliver the cure to a large population who needed it. Millions would be saved. She wouldn’t be watching it from over a man’s shoulder, or cowering at someone’s feet. She’d be the hero this time. She hoped they would be watching.
Rushing to the helicopter, Zach held her hand the whole way. Once inside, Samantha gawked at the opulence. This one made her military grade helicopter look like a jerk. Cream leather couches, carpeted floor with white leather walls, and a ceiling with wood inlays. It felt huge inside with only a few seats.
“This is a bit nicer than the one I took to Preston.”
Zach slammed the door and they got their seatbelts on. The room was quiet enough to talk with out headphones. “I’m glad you like it. I’ll make sure to get you one.”
Samantha laughed, sometimes he made the silliest comments. Like she would ever have a helicopter, let alone some fancy one. “Only if it comes with a white tiger to match the interior and I have to be able to hang my Lamborghini from the bottom. I don’t want to arrive to a rental car.”
“Of course, and let’s make sure it’s gold-plated with diamond ceilings.”
“How about the floors?”
“Hundred dollar bills . . . they’re so much plusher than twenties.”
Samantha laughed and clapped. The helicopter lifted and she almost fell from her seat. Zach put his hand on her as the seat belt tightened around her waist. She laughed harder at her almost-fall and Zach joined in. Hearing him laugh made her heart beat faster.
The city view shrunk as the helicopter soared into the sky. The skyline of San Francisco appeared in the distance—such a beautiful city. Her heart sank thinking of its people suffering. “Zach, when are we going to go global with this cure?”
“Have I told you how glad I am to have you working with me?”
“Don’t dodge the question.”
“I’m not, I’m answering it.” Zach took off his seatbelt and got closer. She held her breath as he took her hand in his. He’d become comfortable with casually touching her, and she didn’t mind a bit. “This is just the start of creating a better world to live in. We cure this and something else will pop up, another problem, another war. As long as we’re divided by borders and currency, th
e world will never see peace. I’m trying to use this horrible pandemic to bring the world together. One united society, a stronger world.”
Samantha thought of all the wars and scandals she’d seen on the news. “But that will never happen. All these countries will never give up their borders.”
“And they don’t have to. I’m simply trying to get them to see that there should be a system in place for the whole world to follow—a single set of laws. We could end the wars. Don’t you want that too?”
“Just seems like an impossibility.”
“Normally, yes, but the Cough puts our foot in the door. Only at times of great suffering is there potential for great unity.”
Samantha loved his vision of the world. How could such a young man have such ambitions? If only the world would come together and fight a common enemy like the Cough. “And who would rule this new world?” she asked.
“I would of course.” He smiled and raised an eyebrow. “You can rule as my Vice President.”
“Okay, I’ll take Switzerland.”
“How about all of Europe? I’ll take the Americas.”
Samantha enjoyed the easy, playful banter. It kept her mind from racing to the horrors surrounding her. The Cough, the Preston Six, Joey and Poly . . . every moment she spent with Zach, she left a bit of her old life behind and looked forward to this new life. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Of course.”
“How old are you?”
He laughed again. A soft laugh, pleasing to the ears. “How old do you think I am?”
She wanted to find out more about Zach and what made him laugh. “Mid-twenties?”
“I’m twenty-seven.”
He barely made her cut off at eight years her senior. Not that it would have mattered what his age was, she felt an attraction to the man, not the years behind him. She scooted closer to Zach squeezing his hand and pulling him a bit closer to her face, intent on finishing what they started in her office.
“Sir, we have a problem at headquarters,” a voice warbled out from speakers above them. “There appears to be an attack in progress.”
Zach bounded to the window and gazed below.