Cameron always knew where Derek was, not because she could hear him or see him, but because she sensed him, sensed the life moving behind her among the trees, the life for which she was responsible. If something happened to Derek, she sometimes thought, it would be almost as upsetting as if something happened to her own husband. That made his recent behavior all the more alarming.
Since they weren't humping gear, they didn't stop to rehydrate every hour as they normally would. Cameron's movements became almost hypnotic-the rise of her feet, the sink of her boots into the thick mud, the pattern of her steps. One, two, three, and a crossing side step to dodge a tree trunk. Her breathing was slow and even, her face damp with the heat. She felt sweat stinging her eyes.
About halfway to the forest's peak, a small clearing opened among the trunks of the trees, a break of a few square yards matted with decaying leaves and dead ferns. Vines twisted their way along the ground, winding themselves through the low brush and darting up the trees around the clearing. The Scalesias stretched overhead, growing together in a living tapestry. Some of the larger trees faded away, their trunks reaching up and up until they were lost in the canopy.
The forest felt suddenly alive to Cameron. Like it was watching her.
She held up a hand, stopping Derek in his tracks. Her grip on the spike tightened. Derek sidestepped quickly behind a trunk, leaning against the white spotted bark.
The forest was moving all around her, leaves, fronds, and branches swaying in the wind. The slow, hypnotic motions reminded her of a mating dance. The air was musky with the scents of mud, hidden creatures, fresh and rotting fruit.
She scanned the area but saw only green and brown, vines dripping from branches like stalactites, foliage vibrating in the breeze. For a moment, she closed her eyes and listened. The buzz of insects, the flap-ping of a bird, the creek of bending trees. She opened her eyes again and saw nothing, though she still felt the eyes of the forest on her.
A length of vine by her foot hissed and slid away, rustling in the dark-ness. Between the trunks, the forest stretched on forever, a dim under-world.
Moving slowly to her right, stepping sideways foot over foot so that she could remain facing forward, Cameron headed out of the clearing. She counted off fifteen paces before Derek followed her. They disap-peared into the shadows ahead.
A spiderweb broke across Cameron's face, but she didn't flinch. She wiped it away using the back of her hand that held the spike. The spider fell to the ground, scurrying clumsily for cover, and she crushed it underfoot. A triad of birds left a tree in a burst of noise, darting through the branches and calling to one another.
Cameron raised her hand and snapped her fingers. Derek froze and they stood perfectly still, Cameron resisting the urge to swipe away the last strands of the spiderweb stubbornly clinging to the bridge of her nose. Finally, she signaled him forward with two fingers and pointed to the ground, where a gnawed head lay, about the size of a medicine ball- the male's head that the female had chewed off during mating.
Cameron stepped forward and picked up the head carefully, as if con-cerned it would spring to life. The shell of the head was intact, but much of the insides had been eaten by ants. She tilted it in a shaft of light fil-tering through the treetops, admiring the hard, jagged line of the mandibles.
'Looks like it's just us and the larvae now,' she said.
Chapter 50
Samantha nearly fell out of bed when she heard the loud banging at the slammer window. She jolted upright, eyes swollen with sleep, her hands immediately dancing along the countertop beside her bed in search of her glasses. She found them and pushed them onto her head at an angle. Her scrubs were twisted around her hips and she loosened them and pulled them straight.
Tom was at the window, his face animated with excitement. 'It's the same virus!'
'What?' Samantha said. 'Who?'
'In the thermoproteaceae living in the deep sea cores they pulled off the coast of Sangre de Dios. They must've been released from the crust by the drilling and entered the ocean, where they infected the species of dinoflagellates. Since the dinos were pushed toward the ocean's surface by quakes, they were made susceptible by UV exposure, and the virus must have bridged that structural gap. And get this-just like Dr. Den-ton noticed that the dinos were altered, somehow, genetically, the ther-moproteaceae are all fucked up. Each one has a different genetic profile than the next.'
'How is that…'
Tom shrugged. 'Rajit's been playing with it in lab, trying to nail its eti-ology and pathogenicity, and make sense of the PCR test. The virus seems to contain a massive range of DNA code-blueprints for pro-teins from all kinds of species. The guys have already nicknamed it: the Darwin virus.'
Samantha scratched her head. 'Just don't name it after a location- the last thing we need right now is an outraged Chamber of Commerce somewhere.'
'What's been happening with the rabbits?' Tom asked.
'Not a thing as of last night,' Samantha said. 'Cytopathic effect is what I'm thinking. We might have to bleed them, get the serum under a scope.'
'Have you checked on them this morning?' he asked. She shook her head. 'Well, you'd better hurry and take a peek before they shitcan you and ship you home in a bubble.'
Still rubbing her eyes, Samantha trudged over to the crash door and pushed through into the next room. Tom waited for her at the window rather than walking around to the observation post. When she reap-peared, she was ghost white.
'You'd better suit up and get in here,' she said, her voice trembling. 'You need to see this.'
Several tables were set up outside the slammer window, a team of virolo-gists and high-ranking officers gathered around them. Phones, faxes, and computers were running simultaneously, blinking, beeping, and ringing. Still clad only in medical scrubs, Samantha pulled a chair up to the glass and sat watching the others. Though her viral count was contin-uing to decrease, it was not yet zero; she would not be cleared from quar-antine until she'd been held the requisite seven days. A stack of micrographs sat in her lap.
Colonel Douglas Strickland strode up the hallway behind the makeshift workstation, his polished shoes clicking on the tile. The work-ers froze.
He pulled to a halt, facing Samantha through the window. 'Dr. Everett,' he said.
She smiled and nodded. 'Yes, darling?'
He grimaced. 'I've been informed we have something of a crisis on our hands.'
'You could say that.'
Strickland removed his beret and shuttled it through his hands. 'If you continue to lend us your professional expertise in contending with this problem, I'm quite certain that such efforts will counterbalance the charges that have been leveled against you for your prior indiscretions. Assuming, of course, that you express remorse to the JAG officer.'
Samantha stood up. 'The only thing I'm remorseful about is that I placed myself in a position where my medical judgment was subject to military review.'
'I would hardly-'
'Don't panic, Doug. I'll help you, but not for that reason. I'll help you because I'm actually still foolish enough to give a shit. So here's question number one for you: Is this something you've been working on behind the fence?'
Strickland's face drained of color. 'You're implying that we devel-oped this killer virus here on the premises for the sake of biological war-fare?'
'We don't have time for implying-I'm asking outright. Is this virus out of the BW facility or not?'
Strickland stepped forward until his nose was almost touching the glass. His face was almost comically red, his jaw clenched. 'Look at my face, Dr. Everett. Do you think I'd be exhibiting this level of concern if I had any idea with what we are contending?'
Samantha looked at him. Believed him.
