Endemic Rise of the Plague (14 page)

“We should think about settling in, here, for the night and wait until daylight before we do anything. What do you think? The police might have all that craziness under control by then.”

Walker pulled the bloody towel around his hand tighter, from within the Expedition as it sped along the winding street within the perimeter of Angora.

“It won't stop bleeding man,” Walker said huffing, repositioning himself restlessly in his seat.

“
Suck it up wuss. It’s only your hand. Be thankful he didn’t go all vampire on you and bite your neck. We're almost to the dock,” Boots said. “That was some crazy shit back there. What do you think was up with those people? You think that it had anything to do with the target?”

“
Who knows, man?” Walker sighed, feeling hot—extraordinarily hot, and lightheaded.

“Listen, you have no idea what was going on at that carnival. You’re lucky to still have your arm,” Boots said as he slowed the vehicle.

The SUV pulled up to the loading dock, located on the back side of Angora. Two other Expeditions were already parked ahead of them. After having changed back into their security uniforms, Rhino and Junior stood out on the dock along with Randy and Shotgun, watching as Boots killed the engine.

“
Buzz and Doyle aren't back yet?” Walker asked, noticing a team missing, he found it difficult to believe that they weren’t the last to arrive. “Wasn't their target right over by Randy & Shotgun's?”

“
Yeah, only a few blocks away, they radioed that they were backed up in traffic, but it shouldn’t have taken that long. Maybe they ran into trouble too. Let’s go get you to the doc, before you bleed to death. I’ll find out about Buzz and Doyle,” Boots joked as they exited the truck.

“
What the hell’s going on out there? A bunch of maniacs are running the streets. One of them bit my hand, man,” Walker shouted, holding up his hand to the others as he and Boots approached.

All four uniformed men on the dock drew their weapons, taking aim at Walker. Shotgun gripped his phone with his left hand, near his mouth as though speaking to someone.

“What the...” Walker paused mid step. He began to smile, thinking that they were joking for a second, but the look on their faces told a different story.

“
Stay where you are Walker. Boots, have you been bitten?” Randy asked in a cold, flat tone.

“
No…I haven't. What’s going on Boss?” Boots stepped out in front of Walker, obstructing their aim.

“
Get away from him Boots,” Randy ordered. “We need to get him to quarantine.”

“
Boss, he's fine, it's just a scratch, on the hand,” Boots pleaded.

“
No, it's a bite. He said it, himself. The bites are how the infection spreads. Boots, move out of the way, this is your last warning,” Randy's forceful voice echoed off the dock.

Taking a heavy sigh, and exchanging a sympathetic look with Walker, Boots reluctantly stepped away.

Walker’s eyes fell to each of his team members, as their doubt in him exuded from their very stances. These men, having known Walker for years, aimed their guns at him as though he were a target. As his eyes fell from face to face, their intense glares sent a clear message to him, that they would shoot him. His mind reeled in shock.
How is this happening? They can’t honestly believe that the bite from some lunatic rioter could lead to something that warrants this kind of treatment.

“
Look guys, take it easy. Yes, I was bitten, but it’s not that bad. I just can't get it to stop bleeding,” Walker pleaded.

The men stood fast in their positions.

“I’m sure the doc can get me stitched up just fine. Maybe even give me a rabies shot or something,” Walker quipped bearing a weak smile.

His team remained silent with their guns held out toward him. Walker’s flesh felt as if it were on fire. Depleted and unsteady, knowing that he needed a doctor right away, rage surged through his body.

I will get to the doctor, or I’ll make them shoot me.

“
Put down the goddamn guns! I am core…one of you!” Walker yelled, stepping forward.

Mara emerged from the dock door, her black pumps clacking on the concrete as she strode near the edge of the dock platform. Surveying the situation, she assessed Walker from a distance. Her kind eyes and warm expression began to ease Walker’s frustration.

“Gentlemen, let’s make Mr. Walker feel a little more comfortable and holster the weapons. How long ago were you bitten?” Her eyes fell to the hand, wrapped in a blood soaked towel.

“
Like fifteen minutes ago,” he said, catching his breath.

The men did as they were asked, holstering their weapons, their stances seemed to relax ever so slightly. Their eyes remained fixed on Walker and their hands near their holsters.

“Come on inside, we need to get you to quarantine and treat you,” she announced. Pulling her hands from the pockets of her white lab coat, she waved him over.

“
Yeah, okay Mara. You'll fix me up right?” He said moving toward her.

“
Mr. Walker, I will do everything in my power to help you,” she said reassuringly.

As they walked down the hallway, Walker and Mara were trailed by Randy, with the rest of the core security team only steps behind.

“
Shotgun, what's going on and where are Buzz and Doyle?” Boots whispered impatiently.

“
We haven’t heard back from Buzz and Doyle. You saw those...people,” Shotgun shrugged, “The ones that bit Walker, right? They’re infected with a disease, and it's spreading out there like nothing you’d believe. The bites are what spread the infection. Once bitten, you’ll turn into one of those things, and depending on how bad the bite is—it could take hours or minutes. The problem is, they
want
to bite the uninfected. You wouldn’t believe the scene Randy and I, walked into. Rhino and Junior saw it firsthand too, in their truck. So far, there is no cure or vaccine for this infection.”

“
So what’s going to happen to Walker? How is the doc going to treat him?” Boots asked in urgency, seizing Shotgun’s shoulder.

“
Shhh! Not so loud. Look, we don't want Walker to flip out. We have to get him to quarantine,” Shotgun whispered, pulling from the hold and advancing down the hall. “The doc is working on some vaccine ideas. She thinks that she might have come up with something that slows the infection, a retro-virus, until she can come up with something to stop it. She’s not sure if there is anything that can be done for the ones who’ve already changed. But maybe she can stop the infection before it turns people into those things, before it turns Walker.”

The men followed Mara down the maintenance hall to a door in the hallway
, slightly ajar.

“
Okay, Mr. Walker, please step into this room. There is a two way glass all along the far wall, so that we will be able to see each other. There is an intercom on the wall, over there. I want you have a seat and just relax. Give me a few moments to evaluate you before I administer an injection to slow the infection,” Mara said escorting him into the room.

The remainder of the core team continued walking down the hallway toward the elevators. Mara closed the door behind Walker as he entered the room. Striding to a counter on the east wall, she retrieved her instruments from the top drawer. The
plain and mostly bare room had been an empty observation room, only moments before. When Shotgun had radioed in from the dock that a member of his team had been bitten, Mara asked her lab techs to bring in an exam table and place a few instruments in the drawers.

Walker sighed exhaustedly, looking around the room.
Squinting his eyes in the brightly lit room, he plopped down on the bed, the wax paper beneath him crunching with his every motion.

Sensing his discomfort, Mara remembered that the subjects from her testing and in Edward’s video were sensitive to bright light. The subjects would get highly agitated and try to escape whenever a flashlight was pointed in their eyes.

Mara asked, “Is it too bright in here for you?”

“
Yeah, the lights are hurting my eyes. Can we cut them off?” He held his head as if he were in pain.

“
Sure. Let me take a look at your hand first,” she pulled out a pair of blue latex gloves from a box in the top drawer and slid them on her hands. “Is this your only wound?”

“
Yeah, all this, for a bite on the hand. If I could get a hold of that piece of work that did this, he'd be paying for it, big time,” he fumed.

“
Take it easy,” she said gently. “I know it’s difficult, but I need you to try to stay calm. The more hyped up you are, the faster your blood pumps and the faster the infection spreads. I am going to unwrap your hand in a moment, so if you are squeamish about the wound you may want to look the other way.”

“Oh, man,” Walker slammed his head back, turning it in the other direction, a look of disgust upon his face.

Mara placed several gauze pads and strips of medical tape on the bed beside Walker. Placing a digital thermometer in his ear, a reading of 104.6 displayed. She smiled at Walker, ejecting and discarding the applicator, before dropping the thermometer back in her pocket. Gently unwrapping the bloody towel around his hand, she recoiled at the sight of the wound beneath. His swollen hand had become a mound of bright-red flesh surrounding the wound with blood surging from the laceration. She held his hand up, toward the glass on the far wall for just a moment. Then she quickly began to cover the wound with the gauze and secured his hand with the medical tape. Walker kept his head turned the other way, so as not to catch a glimpse of any of the blood.

“
Give me a few minutes and I will be back in to give you the injection. The dressing should stop the bleeding. I’ll dim the lights to make you more comfortable,” Mara said quickly, disposing of the bloody towel and excess gauze pads in a red bio-hazard container atop the counter. Then pulling off her gloves and depositing them, as she hurried toward the door.

“
Thanks Mara,” Walker said over his shoulder.

Mara switched off the lights to half of the room, before shutting the door behind her and swinging closed a newly installed latch on the outside of the door. Feeding the arm of a padlock through the latch, she inserted it into the base and squeezed it closed.

James waited in an adjacent room. She made brief eye contact with him, before approaching a sink and scrubbing her hands vigorously. He remained silent while watching Mara wash her hands for two minutes, and keeping her eye on the clock the entire time. It seemed like a lifetime to her, as she could feel James’ stare piercing a hole through the back of her skull. When finished, she dried her hands with a paper towel, and looked at him with a grim expression. Walking over to the glass wall, standing next to a video camera aimed at the room, she looked at Walker lying on the bed.

“
The preliminary inoculation that I have created from Edward’s email will not work for Mr. Walker,” she said with a sigh. “The infection is too advanced. His temperature is one oh-four point six. The area around the wound is massively infected. To be honest, it would be a waste of the inoculation. I would say from his pigmentation changes, temperature and heart rate that he is going to turn in less than thirty minutes.”

“
Dr. Brandenburg, you really do not think that it will work at all?” James said clearing his throat and straightening his tie, while eyeing his reflection in the glass.

“
No. It will only have a
chance
of working, if the wound is fresh and not too severe. His hand is missing a sizable piece of tissue. The infected saliva went straight into the blood stream through a relatively large area. That, combined with the fact that adrenaline flooded his body, and his heart pumped vigorously—only helped the infection to spread.”

Mara looked
through the glass at Walker lying on the bed. He laid with his head still tilted away from the bandaged hand. As he adjusted his head, small patches of his dark hair detached from his head. A portion of it dusted down to his shoulder while the rest clung to the table paper beneath him. He thumped one of his blue sneakers against the end of the bed, the orange laces swaying as he shook his foot.

“
Do you think he may be of value for you and your research? Should we keep him inside this room?” James asked.

“
Are you suggesting that,” stunned, she furrowed her brow, searching for the right words. “That is unethical. We cannot keep him contained to study. We have to call the authorities, and contact his family.”

“I am not quizzing you on ethics here. I am simply asking you, could you gain valuable knowledge for your research, by keeping him locked in this room?
”

She looked d
own and began to nod her head, “Yes, we could benefit by observing him, but—”

“Very good then, since there is nothing that the authorities can do at this point to save his life, I think it would be a wasted call. We will keep him under quarantine until further notice. I will take care of contacting his family. Do we have an understanding Mara?” James raised an eyebrow.

Mara felt torn at the idea behind James’ words. While, of course, it would be valuable to study Walker, it would be unethical. The CDC should be in here examining him and his family should be at his side. That is the right thing to do—the humane thing to do. But bringing in the CDC to this would raise many questions—questions that could put an end to not only her career and possibly her freedom, but to Edward’s as well. And all of that is aside from the ramifications that could sink the entire Angora Corporation.

“We do,” Mara confirmed, with a weighted sigh, “What about the Bishops and the Swicks? What are we doing with their remains? I’d like to examine them
. Have we contacted their families?”

“I’ve involved the ninth floor on this. Their bodies have been moved up there, they are performing autopsies as we speak and will include you on the results. You simply do not have the manpower to do four autopsies and to continue your current research. It is the most efficient way to handle this situation. I have explained to them that your team is conducting research to create a cure and that is all that they need to know at this point. And you needn’t concern yourself about contacting any families. I have everything in order,” James said with authority.

Mara nodded, it would be futile to argue with him about it now, after already involving others. The ninth floor is a restricted access floor. Even she did not have clearance to the ninth floor. It’s a biogenetics floor. No one, including herself has any idea what goes on up there, except James and the scientists up there. An element of relief fell over Mara, as she knew that their findings would stay within Angora and remain confidential. Her thoughts went to Edward and how out of control this whole thing had become.