by Megan Crewe
When I turned back to the gate, Michael’s face was its usual impassive mask. “Do you really think Samantha will ever be safe if you’re the one guy making the decisions about the vaccine?” I said to him. “How many people do you know who are already itching for the chance to take that power from you?
“And how much vaccine could you make in a day, or a week?” I asked Dr. Guzman. “How many people do you have who could distribute it? Michael has doctors and scientists working for him—he’s got a network of people all the way up to Canada. The faster we get everyone vaccinated, the sooner the virus is gone for good. All you have to do is cooperate with each other.”
They both stared at me in stony silence. I lifted the two-way from my hip.
“What do you think? Can I make this call? Or would you rather just fight it out? Seriously, if you can’t even manage to try, then one of you might as well shoot me, because I don’t want to live in whatever world you’re going to make.”
In the crowd beyond the fence, I heard the click of a safety switched off. One of the soldiers tensed his finger on the trigger of his rifle. Michael shifted toward the gate, just a few inches from the bars. Dr. Guzman hesitated, and then came to meet him, matching his glare.
My breath stuck in my throat. I braced myself for one of them, or one of the others, to make some move that would dissolve all of this into a hail of bullets. But then Michael’s lips formed a thin smile, and he stuck his hand between the bars.
“To a partnership beneficial to the both of us,” he said.
“Sheryl,” the other doctor protested, but Dr. Guzman ignored him. She accepted Michael’s hand and shook it once.
“We’ll be watching you closely,” she said.
“Believe me, we’ll be keeping an eye on you too,” he retorted.
As he pulled back, his gaze flicked to me. “I hope you didn’t think I was going to thank you.”
“Not for a second,” I said. “But I think you should.”
He didn’t answer, but his smile widened, just fractionally. And right then I believed that this might all work out the way I’d imagined.
I brought the two-way to my mouth. “Leo,” I said, “we’re good to go.”
I half expected Dr. Guzman and her colleagues to run us out of the complex after Leo arrived, to make us join the criminals we’d shared our loyalty with. I might not have blamed them. But when Michael had inspected the cold box and passed the sheaf of notes to a fidgety woman from one of the cars, he waved Leo toward the gate, and the soldier who’d escorted me in opened it once more. Michael gathered his troops and sent them all packing. He gave me a brief, cryptic nod before heading to his police car. The soldiers guarding the gate gaped as the entire crowd dispersed, leaving the street outside quiet and empty.
“Well, hell,” one said, with a startled laugh.
Leo had come straight to me after he’d hurried inside. He wrapped his arm around my waist, and I slumped against him. I felt as though I’d spent the last ten minutes sprinting at full speed rather than just talking. Dr. Guzman dashed forward to grab the cooler. Justin sidled over to us and said under his breath, “You kicked ass.” And a grin broke through my exhaustion.
It might not be enough. Tomorrow the CDC could be at war with the Wardens, and I wouldn’t be able to stop it. I’d done all I could do, and now I had to hope that the world I’d caught glimpses of in the last couple months, a world that was more about living than dying, would appeal to everyone else enough to keep them cooperating.
As Dr. Guzman and the other woman disappeared into one of the buildings, I turned to the man in the lab coat. “Justin was shot in the leg a few days ago,” I said. “We’ve done our best to look after it, but he should really have it seen by a doctor.”
“Fine,” the man said. “He can come with me. I suppose you can take these two to your living area,” he added to the sergeant, and then stalked off with Justin limping after him.
The sergeant sighed and motioned for us to come with him. He led us into the building across the lane and down to the basement, where his unit had set up a sort of dormitory. “This one’s been empty, so you can have it to yourselves,” he said briskly outside a room full of cots. “And the washroom’s down here. The docs say the water’s still drinkable.”
I could have cried at the sight of the clear water gushing from the tap. Leo and I showered in turn and then crashed on the cots. The lumpy pillow felt like heaven.
When I woke, having caught up on a little of my lost sleep, a dim light that could have been mid-evening or early morning was streaking through the narrow windows. Justin was sprawled on one of the other cots, looking dead to the world. A set of crutches leaned against the wall nearby, and the bottom of a fresh bandage poked from beneath the cuff of his pant leg.
I crept out, and immediately took another shower. For the first time in weeks, I felt completely clean. I’d just slipped back into the room when Dr. Guzman appeared in the doorway. Leo was sitting up, stretching his back. He nudged Justin with his toes.
“I thought it might have been a while since you’ve had anything to eat,” Dr. Guzman said. “Join us in the cafeteria?”
“Hell yes!” Justin said, springing upright.
As we followed Dr. Guzman up the stairs, I wondered if I should broach the topic of how I’d handled the vaccine. But she started to chatter as if it didn’t matter anyway, so I decided to let it rest for now.
“We’ve done all right for food and practicalities,” she said. “We received quite a large shipment of canned and dry goods before the emergency proceedings completely fell apart. The only thing we’re low on is medical supplies, but we’ve been strict about quarantining. No one here has gotten sick in the last month.”
“You have what you need to make more of the vaccine, don’t you?” I said with a flash of panic.
“Oh!” she said. “Plenty. We stockpiled the standard materials before the first vaccine was even finished, so we’d be ready if we needed to help with production. They’ve just been sitting there waiting for us. Bernice and Todd are working on cloning the proteins right now.”
We stepped into what looked like an office kitchen. The other woman doctor who’d come outside yesterday was seated at one of the three small tables with a young man I hadn’t seen before, discussing something between bites of their meal. A rich spicy smell wafted through the room, setting my stomach gurgling.
“Chili is one of our standbys,” Dr. Guzman said, going to a large pot on the stove. “The spices help cover the not-entirely-pleasant taste of the canned turkey.”
We all filled bowls and sat around one of the other tables. I had some idea of being polite, but as soon as the food was in front of me, I was scooping it into my mouth so quickly I didn’t realize I’d reached the bottom until my spoon was scraping it. When I glanced up, wondering if it’d be rude to ask for seconds, the young man at the other table stood and came over.
“You must be Kaelyn Weber,” he said, beaming at me as he offered his hand.
I hadn’t expected anyone to give us a friendly reception after the way we’d arrived. “I—Yes,” I said.
“I spoke with your father a few times,” he said. “In the early stages of the pandemic. I was always impressed by his insight. Naturally he was the one to solve the vaccine problem in the end. I’ve read the notes you gave us—really quite brilliant. I assume the part the other fellow’s got is too.”
“Why hadn’t you guys figured it out by now?” Justin demanded. “I thought you were supposed to be the experts.”
The man’s cheeks turned pink. “Well, yes,” he said. “Believe me, we tried. There are only five of us still working here, and, well…” He looked away, rubbing his chin. “It seems we had the means all along and simply didn’t know it. The original virus, before its deadly mutation—we received a sample via Halifax nearly two years back. We have it in storage. But with all the different channels of communication between different agencies and different people at
them, it was never made totally clear to us that that virus was connected to the one we were fighting.”
I remembered Dad’s constant frustration, his complaints about dealing with all the strangers dropping in and out of the hospital with their conflicting agendas, and couldn’t find it in me to be surprised. So it’d been the same story from the beginning: everyone so focused on what they wanted for themselves that they weren’t really collaborating. How much sooner would we have had a vaccine if making one had been more of a priority than controlling information and following their conflicting policies?
“At least we have a vaccine now,” I said.
“Yes,” he agreed, his smile returning. “Yes, we do.”
“Ed,” Dr. Guzman said, “you should probably take a look at both of these young men. Todd neglected to give Justin a blood test yesterday, to make sure he hasn’t been exposed, and I understand Leo was vaccinated…how long ago?”
“About a month,” I said.
“Yes,” she went on. “So an examination to ensure there’ve been no undetected ill effects would be worthwhile.” She looked at me. “And Kaelyn, I was hoping you would take a walk with me.”
I tensed, but all I said was, “Okay.” I managed not to take too many longing glances at the chili pot while I washed my bowl and spoon.
The young doctor took the guys down the hall in one direction, and Dr. Guzman set off in the other. I meandered along beside her, looking out the broad windows onto the road below. Soldiers were still staked out by the gates, and a few were patrolling the line of the fence in the deepening evening shadows.
“You’ve had to defend this place a lot?” I asked to break the silence.
“I don’t know if it’s been worse than any other medical facility,” she said, and then paused. “No, I suppose it would have been. We were on the news a lot, down here at least. Some people were convinced that if they showed up they’d be first to get a cure. And then they got violent when they realized we didn’t have one. But that subsided. Over time.”
As most of those people died.
“Most recently we’ve been dealing with more organized groups,” she went on. “I suppose mainly people sent by this Michael. A few will yell and bang on the walls, but many just cruise around and watch and wait, and pry at the barricades until the soldiers catch them and scare them off. Which is actually more unnerving than the yelling and banging. But we’ve been fine as long as we stayed inside the walls.”
“It’s even more unnerving when you don’t have that option,” I said, my mind dredging up every close call, every moment crouched in hiding, praying the Wardens would pass us by. That really was over, wasn’t it—the running, the fear of being caught? After so many days on constant high alert, I found it hard to accept that I’d finally made it through.
“You say that, and yet you wanted them to be a part of this,” she said. She stopped abruptly. “Did I sound that horrible, Kaelyn, when we talked over the radio? You can see why I would have hesitated to share anything with them that might help them, can’t you? If there was someone specific you were worried wouldn’t get the vaccine, you could have just told me. I don’t understand why all this was necessary.”
“It’s not about just one person,” I said. Now that she’d brought up the subject, a floodgate seemed to open inside me, and everything I’d been thinking over the last day poured out. “I know so many people who’ve done things that you might think makes them too dangerous to get the vaccine. Even me and my friends. I mean, we’ve all been terrified, and desperate, and I don’t see how we can assume that even the people who’ve done the worst things would have done them if they’d seen a better way. The people who are really messed up”—Nathan’s sneer floated through my thoughts—“we should have other ways of dealing with them, don’t you think? Won’t they just get crazier, even more dangerous, if they’re the only ones left who still have to be afraid of the virus?”
“Maybe,” Dr. Guzman allowed.
“I get it,” I said. “I was so angry at everyone who’s gotten in our way.…Everyone who’s hurt us. But somebody’s got to stop being angry sometime, if we’re going to get out of this, right? I saw a direction that looked better than the one we seemed to be headed in. So I took it.”
My throat was closing up. I swallowed hard. Dr. Guzman touched my elbow. “Well, I hope you’re right.”
“If Michael breaks his word, if he tries to take over the production of the vaccine, I can make sure you get all the information you need to produce it here on your own,” I said. “And I’ll do the same thing for Michael, if the CDC stops working with him. No matter what happens, someone will be making the vaccine.”
“That’s one thing I do agree with,” Dr. Guzman said. She started to walk again, and I followed. “Having a vaccine at all is more important than who’s making it.”
As we approached a bend in the hall, I noticed a cluster of photographs and notes tacked to the wall over a small pile of random objects: a teacup, a pair of loafers, a lacy scarf. Beside the photos, a list of words formed a line down the wall. When we reached the corner, I realized they were names. Dozens of them.
“A memorial?” I asked.
“Yes,” Dr. Guzman said. “All of those people worked here. Most of them died here.”
Another reminder of how many lives we’d lost to the virus. How many people had died trying to save the rest of us from it. My throat tightened again.
“Could I…Could I add to the list?”
Dr. Guzman looked startled. Then her expression softened. “I think that would be all right.”
She disappeared down the hall, and returned with a permanent marker. I bent down over the pile of mementos and wrote four names at the bottom of the second column.
Gordon Weber. Gavriel Reilly. Tobias Rawls. Anika.
I didn’t even know Anika’s last name. By the time we’d met her, last names had hardly seemed important. But I knew her well enough now to see she deserved to be included here, in this list of heroes.
“We wouldn’t have the vaccine at all, if it wasn’t for them,” I said.
Dr. Guzman lowered her head. “I’m sorry.”
We wandered back the way we’d come in silence, and I guessed the whole purpose of the walk had been for Dr. Guzman to hear my explanation. “I have work to do,” she said as we arrived at the staircase that led down to the dormitory area. “Please know that the three of you can stay as long as you want. Help yourself to food from the kitchen. And let me know if you need anything else, and I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Downstairs, our dormitory room was dark. I lay down on my cot, but I was nowhere near drifting off when Leo and Justin came back in. I got up, grasping Leo’s hand when he joined me.
“Everything’s okay?”
“From what they could tell so far, yes,” he said. “Some of the tests take a while.”
“And you?” I asked Justin.
“One hundred percent healthy, except for this stupid leg,” he said, sinking onto his cot. “And even the leg, the guy yesterday said it should heal completely in a few weeks.”
“Good,” I said. So I’d done all right by him, at least.
“So what are you two going to do now?” Justin said. “Are you staying here?”
Right. Because we could think about the future beyond delivering the vaccine now. The answer came to me as soon as I reached for one. “I have to go back to the colony to get Meredith,” I said. “She’s probably worried to death now that we’ve been gone so long. And then, I guess, back to the island.”
Leo nodded. “Sounds good to me. I’d like to be home again. Or at least somewhere we can make ‘home.’ Here’s definitely not it.”
“We could all head north together,” I said to Justin. “You could see your mom. Dr. Guzman might be able to find us a vehicle we can use, and we should be able to drive away from here now without the Wardens swarming us.”
But then, if we all lef
t, no one would be around to recover Dad’s notebooks from their hiding place if one group defected.
Before I could even express that worry, Justin solved the problem for me. He straightened up, gripping one of his crutches, and said, “I was thinking.…I don’t know if I’m ready to go back yet. Maybe I could stick around here, help keep an eye on the Wardens. It seems like this place could use someone who knows what they’re all about. And after everything Michael did—I’d like to make sure he stays in line.”
“You’d be okay here?” I said. “Dr. Guzman and that one doctor seem all right, but no one else has been very welcoming.”
He shrugged. “I don’t need them to be friendly. I just want to keep helping. That’s enough to keep me going.”
I couldn’t argue with that. “Okay,” I said. “Is there something you’d want me to tell your mom?”
“Tell her the stuff I’ve done so far,” he said. “All of it. Well, all the awesome stuff anyway.”
He cracked a grin, and for the first time in what felt like ages, all three of us started laughing.
Leo and I waited five days, while the first batches of the vaccine were made. Both sides in my forced compromise remained cautious—first they exchanged ten batches, then twenty—but there was no bloodshed or backstabbing. On the fourth day, when the young doctor I’d talked to in the kitchen was getting ready to go out to offer vaccinations to the local survivors, I asked if I could join him.
“I won’t get in the way of anything,” I said. I just wanted to see.
Michael had promised that the Wardens wouldn’t interfere with the CDC’s efforts as long as they didn’t try to hinder his operations. No one stood in our way when we drove out in a military-painted Range Rover, one soldier in the front passenger seat and the other beside me in the back. And I saw plenty. I saw an elderly woman weep when we caught up with her outside one of the vacant stores. I saw a middle-aged man question Ed from behind his porch railing until he was convinced he could trust him, and call his little son outside to be vaccinated too. I saw a young woman peer cautiously from an upstairs window and then slip out the door, her face glowing at the news.
