Halfway to the neighborhood market, Noemi begins to realize fewer people than usual are walking along the paths, and only one or two cyclists zip by. Not as many children are playing outdoors. None of this is remarkable, but the quiet that surrounds her makes her feel cut off from the world.
In the market, she finds her way to the tea stall only to learn they’re out of ginger, as well as chamomile and peppermint—all the ones she’d turn to first for someone sick. As she takes up a packet of elderflower tea, a shopper nearby staggers to one side, then sits on the wooden floor heavily, the way people do when they’re sitting so they won’t faint.
“I’m sorry,” the man says, holding up a hand as if to wave off the woman behind the counter who’s hurrying to his side. “Running a fever this morning. Oughtn’t to have chanced it. If I rest for just a couple of minutes—”
Noemi doesn’t hear the rest. She can’t hear anything over the sudden rush of blood in her ears. Her breath catches as she stares at the man’s outstretched hand—and at the telltale white lines snaking across his skin.
“Impossible,” she whispers, but then she remembers the stars that hit Genesis, the ones meant to harm them in a way they couldn’t understand. She understands now.
Immediately she runs through the market, weaving between stalls and carts until she finds the area comm station. Her fingers shake as she inputs the code for Darius Akide’s offices. “Yes, hello, this is Lieutenant Noemi Vidal calling for Elder Akide.”
An image takes shape on the screen—not Akide’s usual assistant, but someone else filling in. He frowns at the young woman who somehow has the code for this inner chamber. “Elder Akide has many demands on his time—”
“Tell him it’s me, and tell him it’s an absolute emergency.” Noemi takes a deep breath. “Earth’s using biological weapons. They’ve infected Genesis with Cobweb.”
The Elder Council doesn’t question her, instead immediately going into action. Noemi might have been gratified by their trust if it had done a damn bit of good.
Reports of infection come in from all corners of Genesis. The areas with the most cases of Cobweb are those closest to where the stars made impact, but already people have fallen sick in more remote places. Public advisories go out, encouraging people to wear masks and gloves, to take care of themselves, to recognize the symptoms such as the white lines on the skin. But nobody can tell the citizens of Genesis what they need to know most: how to treat it.
“You described Cobweb as an infectious disease,” says one of the senior government doctors, speaking to Noemi the next day through the Gatsons’ comm unit. “But this level of virulence wasn’t indicated in your report.”
“I didn’t think it could’ve been this bad. When we were on Stronghold, they had quarantine protections in place, but still—it wasn’t like everyone on Stronghold got sick at once.” She rakes her hand through her chin-length black hair. “But maybe—maybe it was the amount of whatever they put in the stars?”
Her own ignorance makes her wince. It’s absurd to be advising senior government officials as a teenager with no medical training at all. They’ve called because Noemi’s the only person on Genesis with any firsthand knowledge of Cobweb. She’s seen it. She’s survived it. That doesn’t mean she has the answers.
“Earth may have manipulated the virus,” says the doctor. “Made it even more virulent.”
“It was man-made in the first place, so maybe so.” Not that anyone knows why Earth bioengineered the Cobweb virus, only that they did. If she’d been able to learn the reason—if Ephraim Dunaway had known it—maybe she could give them some clue about the virus that would actually help. But she’s powerless.
Looking across the room, she sees Mrs. Gatson huddled under a blanket, shivering. This is the only time she’s been out of bed today. The spiderweb rash across her skin barely shows against her pallor. Mr. Gatson hasn’t even tried to rise. Noemi can’t leave the house while they’re this sick, even though she doesn’t know what to do for them.
“When should someone go to the hospital?” she quietly asks the doctor. “How high a fever, or—”
“I’m not sure hospitals will be able to help,” the doctor replies. “They’re already overcrowded, and the situation’s going to worsen when the advisory goes out.”
“What advisory?”
The screen answers her as a brilliant orange border appears, the one the government usually uses when making significant announcements via personal comms. Noemi could read the full text at the bottom, but a single word jumps out, one that blots out everything else:
PANDEMIC.
That one word tells Noemi that Earth has done what it meant to do. It’s weakened their planet and made them vulnerable to attack.
Genesis has withstood thirty years of war, yet one virus may bring down this entire world.
4
ABEL HAD THOUGHT TO PUT IN FOR RESUPPLY ON Stronghold itself, but as soon as they enter the system, that plan collapses.
“Oh, bloody hell,” Zayan breathes as the operations console lights up with warning signals. “The entire system’s on lockdown. Is it another Remedy attack?”
“Unknown.” Abel’s sharp eyes are already looking for either Remedy fighters or security mechs in pursuit of them, but he sees nothing. No space traffic at all, actually. Maybe people have fled the scene of yet another terrorist incident.
Eight space stations and four transit vessels have been destroyed by Remedy since their first, most public strike against the Orchid Festival on Kismet. The death count from these attacks has risen to nearly ten thousand—and that’s if Earth is accurately reporting all the deaths, which Abel doubts. The radical wing of Remedy claims violence is justified to overcome the greater violence Earth visits on its colony worlds, but when he looks at this, all he sees is bloodshed.
He can’t condemn them entirely,
