Cal shoved something into her hand. Celia’s phone. “Take this.” And then he ran off.
Take the phone. Take care of everything. Alone and abandoned.
“Irene?” she asked.
“I’m here.”
“I’m so sorry. I tried to take care of her.” Maybe that was another lie, like I’m well, I’m here, I’m going to live. She’d been exposed to the cold every single minute since it started. Everyone didn’t die, did they? If not of the cold, would she die in the fire?
“I have to go,” she said, and ended the call. She laid Celia down gently, stood up, and found her way through the haze to the door out of the pen.
She turned toward the rear entrance—she was pretty sure she knew the right way. The light from tiny windows high in the walls had disappeared behind thickening smoke that stung her throat. She needed to crawl below the smoke—she’d learned that somewhere, because the air closest to the ground would be the cleanest.
She dropped to her hands and knees, and she felt cold, dirty concrete. She lowered her head. The air seemed clearer, but she tried to breathe as little as possible. Her eyes watered so much she shut them. The alarm kept blaring. She had to get out fast, and crawling was slow, too slow, and the smoke seemed to keep getting worse. Well, she always knew she might die. That didn’t mean she wanted to. She resisted the urge to get up and run, and held her breath.
Noise came from ahead: voices shouting, some sort of banging, and she opened her eyes. Through the smoke there seemed to be a red light shining that might be an exit sign.
A wide patch of light suddenly opened ahead, bright even through the smoke, and an amplified voice announced, “Clear the building.” I already knew I should do that.
Her hands touched wet pavement, a puddle, and the light kept getting brighter. Someone ran to her and picked her up and carried her out—
Past a smoking doorway lit by floodlights, out to a dark parking lot and into air, fresh air. She took a deep breath. Safe! She was being carried by a firefighter in heavy gear, who set her down. Another firefighter joined them.
“We can take you to help.” A gloved hand gently took her arm, so gently that her shoulder didn’t hurt. “Can you walk?”
She looked around. Behind her hoses were showering water on the building, but flames rose like monsters, and she was sure only that she needed to get away, get safe. She took another breath. She should let the firefighters lead her. They’d know where to go. She could trust them—she hoped.
They took her to an area where people were waiting behind a yellow ribbon strung between light posts. A man in an orange vest, wearing a face mask and gloves, hurried over.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
She didn’t know how to answer. Being all right suddenly seemed like a complicated idea.
“Can you breathe? Breathe for me,” he said. He held a circular sensor to the bare skin at her collarbone. It felt cold in a refreshing way.
She took a deep breath. Air had never felt better. But she coughed.
He looked at the readings on a box in his other hand. “What’s your name?” he said.
“Avril. Avril Stenmark.”
“How old are you?”
That seemed like a weird question, but she answered. “Eighteen.”
“Where were you born?”
“Chicago.” Not exactly, but close enough.
“You’re okay,” he said, “but barely. Smoke can cause problems later. If you have a cough or feel faint or confused, get help, okay? If you can, get checked again tomorrow morning for smoke inhalation. And if you develop a fever or cold symptoms, get help right away, too.”
She nodded.
“You can go over there for now. You’ll get water and care there.” He pointed at a tent where a lot of people stood.
Water. She needed some water more than anything else. There was Enos, too, near the tent. He saw her and waved with both hands as she approached.
“You made it out. We were worried.”
“Yeah, I got out.” She’d left behind a beloved corpse. She ought to call Irene. No, she ought to call her own mother. No, her father.
“There’s water over there,” Enos said, pointing.
She knew that, didn’t she? If she felt confused, the man said … Yes, maybe she was confused. She started to walk—No, wait, I’m dizzy, take another deep breath—and when she could, she followed Enos, who was watching her and waiting. He led her to a table with paper cups of water. She drank: it was cold, and the first swallow stung her throat. The second swallow felt cleaner, better, and she drained the glass.
“We’ll be here for a while,” he said. “Everything’s confused and busy.”
I, Peng, designer of life, was searching for agents to mimic a specific virus-associated protein, and I had identified two promising drugs that already sat on shelves. They might interfere with the ability of a virus to enter a human cell and begin to reproduce. And if those drugs didn’t work, would a placebo effect for the human host be enough to allow those cells to intimidate a virus and chase it away? No, it was a foolish thought, brought on by the advanced stimulants provided by the Army’s research institute, which seemed to have caused a side effect of giddy humor.
I paused until I felt appropriately anxious rather than giddy, solemnly passed on the information, sniffled, and rose to take a walk around the facility. I pondered the situation as I walked. Idiocy had bred disaster as surely as if it were etched into each of our haploid chromosomes. Could it be designed out? Darwinian selection hadn’t accomplished the feat so far.
My phone rang: one of my children. Alive—and, I could only hope—well.
Noah had been blended from seven East African genotypes, a young man of exceptionally robust heritage. By training he was a master of business. By character (something I couldn’t control as much as people believed)
