Deadline

“So there’s apple juice, water, beer, and something unlabeled that’s either a protein shake or algae.” Dr. Abbey looked up. “Who wants what?”

“I want to know how you managed to induce a reservoir condition,” volunteered Kelly, the need for knowledge apparently overwhelming her reluctance to work with unsanctioned researchers.

Dr. Abbey fixed her with a flat stare. “That’s not a beverage. I want to know how you managed to justify violating a couple dozen international laws when you used a clone for personal benefit. Don’t they train you out of that at the CDC? I thought that was their job. That, and restricting research to party-line channels while people were dying.”

“I’ll take an apple juice,” I said.

“Nothing for me, thanks,” said Alaric. He was looking at Dr. Abbey with the same sort of intent focus that Joe was turning on the rest of us, eyes slightly narrowed.

“Uh, water,” said Maggie.

Becks said nothing. She was too busy watching the millipede.

“Got it.” Dr. Abbey straightened, passing a ble of water to Maggie and a bottle of apple juice to me before sitting in the chair next to her dog. “So you’re finally here about the reservoir conditions. Damn. I’ve had a bet going with Dr. Shoji in Oahu for years now. He’s been swearing you’d come someday. I thought you’d just keep treading water until we were all completely fucked.”

“Shoji?” asked Alaric, eyes narrowing further. “Would that refer to Joseph Shoji, the director of the Kauai Institute of Virology?”

“Why are you asking me questions you know the answers to already? Nobody here needs the exposition.” Dr. Abbey picked up her own drink, sipping calmly before she said, “If you think you can sell me to your government, think again. They already know who I’m in contact with, how often, how we communicate, basically everything but how often I change my underwear. If they wanted to take me, they’d take me. They just don’t want to risk it.”

“Actually, I sort of need the exposition, since I have no clue what you people are talking about,” I said. “Why doesn’t the government want to risk it? I mean, no offense, but it’s not like you’re sitting on a nuke here or anything.”

“Oh, but I am.” Dr. Abbey’s gaze went to Kelly, and stayed there, guileless and steady as she continued: “See, the CDC knows damn well and good that something’s wrong. I don’t know how many of the people working there know what it is, but you can’t have half a brain, work in the medical field, and not realize that something’s not right.”

“That’s not fair,” protested Kelly. “The research—”

Dr. Abbey cut her off: “That’s an excuse.”

“You’re talking about the reservoir conditions,” said Becks. It was a relief to have her join the conversation. Her training was a lot more analytical than mine. I didn’t know what questions to ask. She and Alaric did, and that could save our asses.

“Exactly.” Dr. Abbey kept looking at Kelly. “What do you know?”

“I don’t know who Dr. Shoji is,” I volunteered. “But I know that people with reservoir conditions are dying faster than they should be, and I know that my sister was one of those statistics, so we’re here because we need you to tell us what the CDC doesn’t want to say.”

Kelly shot me a look. “Control of sensitive information is a key duty of all government organizations,” she said. “Given your own need for information security, I would have thought—”

“Drop the party line, Doc,” I said pleasantly. “I still don’t have a problem with hitting girls.”

Her mouth snapped shut with an audible click.

Dr. Abbey studied me for a moment before looking toward Alaric, nodding in my direction, and asking, “Is he for real?”

“He’s for real,” said Alaric. “Infuriating, impossible, and probably insane, but for real.”

“Huh.” Dr. Abbey took another sip of her drink. “Jos five fully developed reservoir conditions. Retinal, cerebro-spinal, cardiac, testicular, and my personal favorite, thyroid. He’s the first documented case of a canine thyroid reservoir condition, aren’t you, Joe?” Joe turned his massive head toward her, tongue lolling as he drooled agreement with her words.

“You said you induced them?” said Becks.

“That’s impossible,” said Kelly. “The virus doesn’t behave that way.”

“It’s not impossible. It’s just hard,” said Dr. Abbey. “I started injecting him with the live-state virus when he was six weeks old. That gave his body time to learn to deal with it before he got big enough to amplify. The first two conditions developed on their own, as a consequence of the inoculations. The others took more doing, since they had to be induced after adulthood.”

“I just don’t understand,” said Kelly. “I mean, the risk of amplification alone—”

“Who says he didn’t amplify?”

We all turned toward Maggie—I’d almost forgotten she was there, I was so busy trying to understand what the hell was going on—who was looking at Dr. Abbey with wide, solemn eyes.

“What?” asked Kelly.

“Who says he didn’t amplify?” repeated Maggie. She picked up her water, took a thoughtful drink, and continued: “I mean, if you can induce reservoir conditions… You said he’d never amplify fully. It seems like there’s only one way you could know, and that’s by testing it. I’m not sure how you’d do it; it’s not like I’m a doctor, but it seems… possible.”

“Doesn’t it?” asked Dr. Abbey. “Gold star for you.”

A slow, horrifying picture was beginning to come together in my head, a picture that I didn’t want to see. George was silent, making it even harder to ignore the conclusions my mind was drawing. Whatever those conclusions were, she was drawing them, too, and she didn’t like them any more than I did. My mouth was suddenly desert-dry, as parched as the ground outside of Memphis, where snipers opened fire on our convoy, where Buffy died… where the CDC took us in for the very first time.

“Dr. Abbey?” I asked. She looked toward me, expression that of a teacher who wanted to encourage a favorite student to come up with the right answer before the final bell. “What do the reservoir conditions really do? Do you know?”

“Of course I do.” She smiled, setting her drink aside as she stood. “Come on. I think it’s time I took you for a tour of the lab. You need to understand what we’re doing here.”

“I’ve always liked a good perversion of science,” said Becks. At least one of us was remembering to keep things light. “Let’s take the tour.”

Yes, said George, sounding oddly subdued. Let’s.

Kelly didn’t say anything. Maybe that was for the best.

We left ourdrinks behind and followed Dr. Abbey from her cramped cubicle to the main floor of the lab. Joe padded along at the rear of the group, claws making an unnerving clacking sound against the bare linoleum. It was impossible to forget that he was there, or that he was—all protests aside—more than large enough to undergo full amplification. He could kill us all before anyone had a chance to reach for a weapon.

But he won’t, said George, picking up on the thought. I don’t think Dr. Abbey’s quite that crazy.

“Says the one with the least to lose,” I muttered.

Dr. Abbey looked back at me, brows raised. “What was that?”

I offered her a sunny smile. “Just talking to my dead sister. She lives inside my head now. She says you’re not crazy enough to let your dog go zombie and eat us all.”

“She’s right,” Dr. Abbey agreed, seemingly unperturbed by the fact that I was talking about carrying on conversations with a dead person. It was weirdly jarring. “Even if Joe could amplify— which he can’t, after all the work we’ve done—I wouldn’t let him do it outside a sealed room. There’s too much here that he could damage.”

“Like these?” Alaric stopped, frowning at a tank that contained about a dozen things that looked like guinea pigs with too many legs. Becks followed his gaze and let out a shriek, jumping backward.

“Goliath tarantulas,” said Dr. Abbey. “Average weight of the specimens in that tank is between four and six ounces. It’s taken generations to breed them up that large.”

“Why would you want to?” demanded Becks. “They’re horrible.”