Cannibal Reign (26 page)

Forty-One

T
he Halloween party, especially Forrest’s surprise box of candy, was a big hit with the children. The next day, however, the mothers were a little less than thrilled about the candy, the first sweets the kids had eaten since coming to live in the silo nearly five months earlier. They had gotten into it first thing that morning and were now so hyper that Andie found herself completely unable to hold their attention during class.

After forty minutes of fruitless effort, she released them all back into the care of their mothers and went to find Forrest, cornering him below the main facility outside the entrance to the electrical room.

“Do you know what you’ve done giving out all that candy at once?”

“Other than putting you mothers on the spot?” he said, wiping the sweat from his face and neck with a towel.

“Yeah, other than that. There are thirteen kids upstairs running around like little maniacs on a sugar high. I had to dismiss class already.”

He stood looking at her, struggling to keep the smile from his face.

“What do they get for Christmas? A bag of cocaine?”

He snickered. “Maybe. You’ll have to wait and see.”

“Did you give any thought at all to the fact those kids haven’t had any sugar to speak of in almost five months?”

“I don’t believe you’re down here chewing my ass because I gave the kids Halloween candy.” He flipped the towel over his shoulder. “What’s really got you in a twist?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she said, crossing her arms in an effort to disguise a sudden insecurity. “Don’t try to change the subject.”

“Well, to answer your question. Yes. I did give it some thought. In fact, the mummy and I had ourselves quite a laugh about it last night as we were passing it out.”

“Well, that was irresponsible as hell.”

“Yes, it was, wasn’t it?” he said with a grin. “And yet I’ve succeeded in adding a little bit of harmless drama to all of your otherwise monotonous lives. Even to my own, it turns out.”

She bit the inside of her cheek, failing to hide a smile as she recognized his deviousness. “You’re a manipulator, Jack Forrest.”

“I’m a goddamn wizard, is what I am. This little Halloween stunt of mine will be good for days’ worth of conversation and playful recrimination—just like we’re having right now. And when it finally wears off, God willing, I’ll find something else irresponsible to do in order to keep you women distracted and away from one another’s throats. That is unless you decide to go upstairs and blow my goddamn cover.”

She laughed, shaking her head in perplexity. “How does Veronica manage you?”

“She doesn’t.”

“I don’t know whether to envy her or to feel sorry for her.”

“Oh, yes, you do.”

Her eyebrows soared. “Egotistical much?”

“Lady, I goddamn well better be. I’m trying to pull off the coup of the century down here and I need all the juice I can get.”

Andie could tell from his body language that all she had to do to seduce him was say something, anything, to prompt him. Anything that would absolve him of responsibility for something happening between them, however flimsy. Her body ached for a man, her chest constricting. But she couldn’t bring herself to tell him how badly she needed him. Was it pride? Or fear of offending Veronica and losing her friendship? In the end it probably came down to both.

“Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me,” she said quietly, feeling suddenly deflated. “I didn’t mean any—”

“You didn’t give any. This has been the most excitement I’ve had in weeks. Feel free to make up a reason to berate me anytime.”

Her jaw dropped but she didn’t say anything, knowing she was busted and that to deny it would only make her look silly.

“Bring a friend if you like,” he added, by way of being a smartass.

“Maybe I will,” she said, playfully contemptuous. “You’re definitely the man for this job, Jack.”

“We all do what we’re called to do.”

“Oh, that’s such bullshit,” she said laughing. “You wouldn’t be anywhere else and you know it.”

H
e entered Launch Control later that day—after hearing about his questionable judgment of the night before from at least three other mothers—and sat down beside Kane for a look at the monitors, already bored.

“Snowing a little bit, finally.”

Kane looked up from his worn copy of
X-Box Magazine
for a glance at the monitor. “Was only a matter of time.”

“How many times can you read the same magazine? Christ, we’ve got a few hundred books downstairs.”

“I’m reading up for the tournament.”

“What tournament?”

“Football tournament. Me, Linus, Oscar, and a bunch of the kids. Winner gets to eat the others’ desserts for a week.”

“You’re going to take food from the kids . . . and the women think
I’m
bad.”

Kane laughed. “You should hear the smack those kids are talkin’, man.”

“Any of ’em any good?”

“Oscar Junior can beat his dad six games outta ten. Beats me about half the time. We’ll give the others a handicap. It ain’t like we’re stealin’.”

They sat in silence then, Kane reading his magazine, Forrest tapping a pen on the counter.

After a full minute of tapping, Kane said, “Man, I got this. You don’t have to be in here. And by the way, Wayne said to tell you there’s a big pile of dog shit in tunnel two.”

“I saw it,” Forrest said, tossing the pen aside. “Stepped right over, in fact. He’s right, it’s pretty big.”

Kane sat staring at him.

“What?”

“Go find somethin’ to do, man.”

“Hey, Thanksgiving’s just around the corner, you know? It’s going fast.”

“You haven’t said nothin’ about the turkeys to nobody, have you?”

Forrest shook his head. “Seen those kids running around out there today?” He laughed. “It’s a friggin zoo.”

“Yeah, and Tonya’s not your biggest fan right now.”

Veronica poked her head into the room.

“Either of you guys know where Sean is? Melissa’s got a bad headache and there’s no aspirin left in the common area.”

“He’s not in medical?”

“Nope.”

Forrest had a look at his watch. “I’ll come unlock the cabinet,” he said, getting up. “He and Taylor might be on an afternoon tryst. Care if I leave you alone a minute, Marcus?”

Kane took a semiexasperated look around the room. “Jack, man, it ain’t like we’re sittin’ on missiles down here. Get him out of here, Ronny. He’s makin’ me nervous.”

Forrest got some aspirin from the medicine cabinet in Medical, then he and Veronica went to see Melissa in the second common room. The children were still rough-housing, screaming and laughing as they burned off the sugar, and Laddie was jumping around with them, chasing his ball and barking with excitement. A trio of mothers sat about, watching to make sure no one got hurt, a couple of them giving Forrest a collective
you’re gonna get it
look as he crossed into the room.

He offered them an innocent smile in return. “What’s got these little rascals so wound up today?”

“Like you don’t know,” Jenny said.

Veronica slapped him on the shoulder. “You’re asking for it.”

He went to the corner and knelt beside Melissa, who lay back on her bedroll looking very tired. “Got a headache, kiddo?”

“Uh-huh.
Dolar en la cabesa,
” she said, recalling the words from one of Maria Vasquez’s Spanish classes.

“As I recall, you weren’t feeling so hot yesterday either.”

“She’s working too hard on that cipher,” Veronica said, kneeling and sitting back on her heels. “Why don’t you take a little break, honey? Go back to it with fresh eyes in a week or two.”

“I will,” she said, taking the aspirins from her and sitting up to swallow them with some water. “But I feel like maybe I’m onto something. I’ve been assigning different letters and words to the sequences. Nothing fits yet, but the more I experiment with it, the more I feel a pattern. I can’t explain it, but it’s in there.”

She lay back down, massaging her neck with her hand. “I’m stiff today too.”

“Well, get some rest,” Veronica said, kissing her on the forehead. “Let someone know if you need anything.”

“Okay. I just need some sleep.”

Veronica walked with Forrest down the hall back toward Launch Control. “Think she’s really close to breaking that code?”

“I don’t know,” he said, scratching his head. “The chances are millions to one, but Wayne says it’s probably not a complicated code. So who knows? I just wish she wasn’t so obsessed with it. That’s almost all she’s been doing for the past couple of months. I saw her playing with the kids a few days ago but that’s been it.”

Taylor and Dr. West came around the corner laughing and holding hands.

“Hey, you two,” Taylor said happily.

“Hey,” Forrest said, extending them the rare courtesy of not teasing them about where they were coming from. “Sean, would you have a look at Melissa? She’s got a bad headache. I’m worried she’s been driving herself too hard with that damn code.”

“She’s still got that headache?” West said, surprised.

“And a stiff neck.”

“Was her neck stiff before?”

“I don’t know,” Forrest said. “We’re going to have to keep her busy with something else for a couple weeks.”

“I’ll think of something,” Veronica said. “Maybe we can start making Christmas decorations.”

“Speaking of that,” Forrest said, opening the door to Launch Control, “I’ve got an artificial tree in the cargo bay. Don’t tell anyone else, but I was thinking to set it up the day after Thanksgiving. Get all the juice we can out of the holiday.”

“Good idea,” West said. “I’ll look in on Melissa.”

“Talk to you guys later,” Forrest said, giving Veronica a kiss. “I’m supposed to be on duty.”

“No!” Kane called from inside the room. “Ronny, man, don’t let him back in here!”

Forty-Two

D
r. West at first believed Melissa’s headache was a symptom of the flu, which had been troubling enough, but after she began to run a fever on the third day, her complaints of a stiff neck made him think it might be something much more serious. So he asked for her and Michael’s permission to perform a painful spinal tap so he might look at her cerebral spinal fluid under a microscope.

Having brought along as much in the way medical equipment as was humanly practical, he was able to run some basic tests, and though he was unable to diagnose Melissa’s affliction with absolute certainty, the elevated number of white blood cells in her CSF gave him cause to believe she was suffering from bacterial meningitis, and he could have named a hundred diagnoses he would have preferred.

He stepped out of Medical into the corridor to talk with Michael and Forrest, leaving Veronica inside with Melissa, who lay in bed covered with blankets.

“So what is it, Sean?” Forrest asked, seemingly even more concerned than Michael.

“I think it’s serious,” West said. “I’m not absolutely certain but I believe she has bacterial meningitis. And if so she needs intravenous antibiotics; penicillin or vancomycin, possibly even cefotaxime—none of which I’ve got.”

“Wait, you told me you brought every antibiotic you thought we could possibly need.”

“In capsule form.”

“Why won’t those work?”

“Because you can’t pick away at an infection this big,” West said. “You have to hit a hammer blow, and pills won’t do that. I’ve got her on a broad spectrum of oral antibiotics now to try and slow the infection, but that’s not likely to save her.”

“So she could die?” Michael asked.

“In all likelihood she will die, and I want you both to prepare for that.”

“Now hold on a second!” Forrest said. “Four days ago she was chasing the kids and the dog up and down the tunnels. And now she’s in there dying? How does that happen?”

“Some of the children have been passing ear infections back and forth for the past couple of weeks,” West explained. “It’s possible that Melissa picked up a streptococcus infection from one of them and it spread to her cerebral spinal fluid via the ear. Unfortunately, meningitis is most commonly seen in people between the ages of fifteen and twenty-four—which makes Melissa a prime candidate.”

“So are the children at risk or not?” Michael asked, worried about an epidemic.

“It’s possible, but they’ve all had their vaccinations, so we may get away with it. As a precaution, I’m going to put them all on penicillin for a week.”

“What’s she need?” Forrest said. “Write it all down exactly and I’ll go and get it.”

“What are you talking about?” Michael said. “You can’t go out there.”

“I can do any goddamn thing I want. Make me a list, Sean.”

“Jack, any intravenous antibiotics still out there aren’t likely to be any good by now. They need to be frozen in order to keep long-term, and even in that event they’re generally not kept longer than thirty days.”

“It’s twenty degrees out there,” Forrest said. “The whole world’s a freezer.”

“Jack . . .” West had known Forrest for a long time, and he knew the man just didn’t have any quit in him. “Even if you find some that are frozen, they may have thawed and refrozen by now. After five months it’s an extremely long shot you’re talking about.”

“Is it impossible, Sean? If I find some that are frozen, will you use them?”

“There would be very little to lose . . . so, yes, I would.”

Forrest and West went to Launch Control, where Vasquez was watching the monitors, and Forrest called for the rest of his men to join them there. After they gathered, West explained what he thought was wrong with Melissa and why. Forrest then told them that his intention was to go to the hospital in Lincoln to gather the items West needed to save her life.

“The entire run should take me less than twelve hours,” he concluded.

Not surprisingly, Ulrich was the first to speak out against the idea. “I think you need to consider this very seriously, Jack. As emotionally invested as you are—”

“I’m going, Wayne.”

Ulrich looked at the others, who, to his relief, didn’t seem overly keen on the idea of Forrest leaving the flock. “I think this is important enough that we need to take a vote,” he said regretfully. “There are too many other souls down here depending on you.”

Forrest stood looking at him. “You’re actually going to challenge me on this?”

“It’s not a challenge. This is the command structure we all agreed to. And you’re talking about doing exactly what we were all dead set against doing from the beginning.”

“You’re willing to let that girl die just to stand on fucking principle?”

“Oh, come on, Jack! Principle has nothing to do with this. Sean’s not even a hundred percent sure of the diagnosis, for Christ’s sake. And you want to go hunting for drugs that aren’t going to be any good anymore.”

“Then take your goddamn vote!”

“Hey, Jack,” Kane said gently. “We did all agree, man.”

Forrest looked at them, wanting badly to overrule them, but this was no longer the U.S. Army and he was no longer their captain. And he had agreed.

“So vote,” he said again.

“Before we do that,” Kane persisted, “we need to know if you’re gonna honor it. Or if you plan to take off in the middle of the night with our only Humvee.”

Forrest shook a cigarette from its pack and lit it right there in Launch Control, breaking his own rule. “You guys all know I’d never do that.”

“Okay,” Ulrich said. “What do you think, Oscar?”

“I think Wayne’s right,” Vasquez said. “I’m sorry, Jack. We haven’t even had to crack the hatch yet and you’re talking about lowering the lift elevator.”

“You should be more sympathetic than anyone,” Forrest argued, referring to Vasquez’s finite insulin supply.

“That’s not fair!” Ulrich said. “What about you, Linus? What’s your vote?”

“If there was a real chance of saving her, Captain”—for Danzig, old habits died hard—“I’d be with you, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to jeopardize the rest of the group. You’re too important down here.”

“Well, that’s it, then,” Ulrich said. “I’m sorry, Jack.”

“No, that’s not it. I want a show of hands. Who says I stay? Get ’em up!”

Three hands went up, but Kane’s remained in his pockets.

“Marcus?” Ulrich said.

Kane stood for a moment looking at the floor. “I’m going with him,” he said finally.

“What?!”

“This is a one-man mission, Marcus.”

“Either I go, Jack, or you don’t get my vote.” Only a 4 to 1 vote could override one of Forrest’s decisions.

“You’re both out of your goddamn minds!” Ulrich rapped, realizing he’d lost.

“The vote’s three to two,” Forrest said. “I win. I’m going into the bay to prep the Humvee. We’ll take two cases of MREs and plenty of water. Marcus, get us two M-4s, six bandoliers of ammo, and a pair of .45s out of the armory.”

Kane looked at Ulrich and shrugged. “It was a fair vote, Wayne, and the girl deserves a chance. You on board or not?”

“I think it’s a crazy fucking idea, but I don’t have a choice. Know this: if you two die out there, I’m gonna put my prosthetic foot up both your asses!”

“You’re always gonna do something to somebody’s ass when you get pissed,” Forrest said. “Why is that?”

“I had a fucked-up childhood. What’s your excuse?”

An hour later Veronica caught Forrest just as he was about to open the blast door into the cargo bay. “You were going to leave without even telling me?” she asked, very pissed.

“I’d planned on being back before you knew I was gone,” he said with a grin. “Who’s sitting with Melissa?”

“Michael’s with her. Which is where you should be too. She’s only asked for you half a dozen times.”

“Tell her I’m running to the pharmacy.”

“You’re not funny,” she said. “You can’t save her, Jack, but you can at least give her some comfort while she’s still conscious. How am I supposed to tell her that you’ve gone on a goddamn suicide mission?”

“It’s not a suicide mission, for Christ’s sake. You sound like Wayne.”

“Oh, yeah? Then why aren’t you taking Laddie with you?”

The door opened at the other end and Andie came into the tunnel. “Excuse me just a moment,” she said to Veronica, moving past her to kiss Forrest on the cheek. “Be careful please?”

“Of course,” he said with a smile.

Andie touched Veronica on the arm and left them alone.

Forrest waited until the door was sealed, then said, “See?
That’s
how you’re supposed to send a man off to battle.”

“You know, this is all just one big adventure for you, isn’t it?”

“At least I don’t look at it as one big social experiment. How’s the dichotomy working out for you these days?”

That hurt her feelings, and she turned away so he wouldn’t see the tears forming.

“I honestly don’t know how Monica did this. How many times did you leave her waiting to hear that you’d been killed?”

“Too many. She was even waiting when Daniel was killed. I can’t undo the past, Veronica. And I won’t hide down here and let that girl die when I
know
she can be saved. Now turn around and give me a kiss so I can go.”

She turned around without opening her eyes, reaching to put her arms around him. She kissed him on the lips and turned away again, going to the door and slipping out of the tunnel, absolutely certain that she had spoken to him for the last time.

People were eating one another out there.

Andie was waiting outside the door for her, and the two of them hugged and went to Launch Control to watch the monitors.

“I
’m ready when you are, Marcus,”
Kane heard Forrest announce in his earpiece.

“Roger that,” he said. “Opening blast door number two.”

Standing at the top of stairwell, dressed head-to-toe in his NBC suit, complete with gas mask, he turned the lever and opened the door, accessing the security vestibule for the first time since the impact. He went in and Vasquez sealed the door behind him as he made his way to blast door number one.

“Okay,” he said. “I’m cracking door number one.”

“Roger that.”

Kane turned the wheel and pulled the lever to open the door, keeping his .45 at the ready as he stepped from the vestibule into the basement of the house. He pulled the door closed behind him and told Vasquez that it was clear for him to come and seal it.

Vasquez opened door number two and ran down the vestibule, pulling the lever to seal blast door one tight behind Kane and spinning the big red wheel. Then he left the vestibule and resealed blast door two, restoring complete integrity to the silo. “LC, we’re a hundred percent again,” he announced over the net.

“Roger,” Ulrich replied from Launch Control. “Marcus, we’ve still got zero movement above. You’re clear to enter the house.”

“Roger.” Kane ascended the stairs and opened the door into the house. The first thing he noticed was that the floor was covered with a thin film of grayish black dust not visible on the monitors. “I’m in the hall,” he said.

“We’ve got visual.”

“There’s a lot of ash in here,” he remarked, moving into the living room, where everything looked filthy now and the dead body was mostly eaten away. Outside, the day was gray and overcast, with a dark layer of continuous cloud looming much lower over the ground than he had expected.

Stepping out the back door, Kane scanned the landscape through the scope of his M-4, seeing nothing alive, not even a bird. The only movement was the ash and dust blowing about. The mutilated corpse of the dead man by the grill was frozen and covered in filth. The outside of the house was scorched, the tan vinyl siding twisted and melted by the heat of the grass fires as they had passed. Nothing had regrown and there was no real color anywhere.

He scanned 360 degrees around the house to make sure there were no threats on the horizon, then took a rake from the back porch and went to the garden. “It’s all clear up here, Jack.”

“Roger. I’m lowering the lift.”

Kane saw the garden begin to drop into the earth and stepped back as the sound of the hydraulic lift pervaded the breezy silence. Dirt fell over the edges of the opening as the deck descended fifteen feet to the bottom of the cargo bay. Kane stood looking down as Forrest drove the Humvee up onto the garden-covered deck, which was just big enough to hold a single Army six-by-six truck. Forrest then jumped out of the Humvee and hit a button on the wall.

“Raising the lift,” he announced, and ran to jump back onto the lift as it began to rise. It stopped at the top, locking into place, and he drove the Humvee out of the garden and across the yard to the gravel drive. “Lift up and locked.”

Ulrich acknowledged the transmission as Kane went to work with the rake, quickly smoothing away the tire tracks in the dirt and raking away the square depression in the soil outlining the edges of the lift. In a few hours’ time the wind would do the rest.

Forrest got out of the Humvee and waited for Kane to put the rake away. “Have you tried the air?” he asked.

“No.”

Forrest took the Geiger counter from inside the vehicle. “Background radiation is a tad elevated but still in the green. I’m going to try the air.”

“That’s not a good idea, Jack,” Ulrich said over the net.

“I’m not wearing this mask if I don’t have to.” He pulled the mask from his head and drew a shallow breath, the air smelling to him more like a dirty fireplace than anything else. “There’s a lot of particulate matter but I don’t think it’s volcanic. It’s not hurting my lungs.”

The two loaded up. Kane got behind the wheel and took off his mask, tossing it into Forrest’s lap. “Ready?”

“Definitely. Wayne, we’re going off the net, but leave the receiver on until we get back.”

“Roger that. Good luck.”

“Back before you know it.”

Kane put the Humvee in gear, drove down the hill and out through the fence, stopping at the road. “This is some fucked-up shit here,” he said, leaning into the wheel and looking out. “It’s high noon and look how dark it is. This sky’s never gonna clear up before we run out of food, man.”