A third drone, this one larger, came zooming over the trees at the end of the field, this one with what looked like modified small machine guns attached to the bottom. Nate gave it a considering look, but he still looked awfully relaxed.
“Shouldn’t we, maybe, answer?” I suggested.
A “pop” came from the drone, and a tuft of dust rose from where the single bullet hit the road ahead of me. Grumbling under my breath, I slowed the car down, but only enough so that I could still keep it on the road driving with just one hand. With the other I grabbed the detachable mic from above the radio and hit the “on” button.
“Silo actual, be a dear and call off your little watchdog there.”
The answer came almost as soon as I was done talking. “Unidentified vehicle, turn your transponder on, now.”
“Not gonna happen,” I replied, giving the drone one last nasty look before it disappeared from my view. “But I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t shoot us. Been there, done it, didn’t really like the experience.”
This time, there was a notable pause, likely as whoever was manning the radio debated with someone else how to proceed.
“Identify yourself,” he ordered as he came back on.
I hesitated, but there was no reason to play any games—and it wasn’t like I intended to just drop into their midst without giving them time to prepare. I wasn’t that keen on being shot on principle.
“Lucky Thirteen Alpha speaking,” I replied, then glanced at Nate, disengaging the mic. “Why don’t we add that ‘actual’ thing?”
He snorted. “How much more fancy of an address do you need?”
The following pause from the Silo tower was longer still. Then, incredulity lacing his voice, the radio guy came back on. “Bree?”
I knew—guessed?—that he couldn’t see it, but still had to grin. “In the flesh. Don’t sound so disappointed that I’m still around and kicking. That whole ‘you should be dead!’ spiel is getting tiresome.” I debated what more to say, but decided that it was the best plan of action to be candid. “We’re coming in hot. If you actually use that decontamination shed of yours for something, tell your guys to suit up. I’m afraid that no part of the front of the passenger cabin hasn’t been drenched in contaminated liquids.” That was one way of saying it. Nate still looked amused, even if the humor had left his eyes. I was tempted to bark a, “Too soon?” at him but decided to keep my trap shut.
“Copy, Thirteen Alpha,” the tower guy confirmed. “Just come on over to us. We’ll clear the way for you.”
I was still wondering if they’d cleared their mine fields as I got no further instructions, but that answered itself when I came around the next bend in the road that got us leaving the cover of the trees again. Last time we hadn’t approached from the north, but I still remembered the wide open, free space around the small tarmac field atop the Silo, with just a shed and the barn that concealed the ramp down underground from sight. Now, there was a ring of trenches there that cut straight across the meadow, with only the road we were going on left intact. Cars, three deep, were parked on it, oriented toward each other so that ramming into the first would just push them all together to create an unbreachable barrier, except for maybe a heavy tank. As we got closer, I saw that they were easing every second car back, creating a small, winding open space between them, just large enough that I could maneuver the Rover through. There was no one sitting behind the wheels of the cars—and, come to think of it, I didn’t hear any engines rumbling—so they must have been remotely operated somehow. Guess that’s what you got when you had too many geeks in one closed-off space.
Beyond the barrier the trenches continued, left and right of the road, leaving just enough space for two cars to pass each other. And beyond that, where there used to be nothing but grass and wildflowers, was a more or less orderly campground, with several wooden sheds in various stages of being built. It wasn’t as chaotic as Dispatch, but there were easily a hundred cars scattered across the former meadow, with tents and fire pits between them. Ahead, two more roads cut through the multicolored sea, converging on the familiar patch of tarmac ahead. A good section of the small forest we’d come through last time was gone now, obviously providing the wood for the new buildings.
There were no guards posted throughout the camp, but several armed men and women were walking around or chatting with each other, making me guess that Wilkes had set up the traders and scavengers who’d come here to police themselves. As we approached the tarmac, I saw that the gates of the barn were open, a steady stream of cars going up and down at barely more than walking speed. Over by the shed there was a small contingent of guards waiting for us, all in heavy gear. Wilkes’s petite aide was standing right next to them, somehow managing to still appear all put-together and proper in her riot gear. All of them had strips of red cloth tied around their left upper arms, and when I glanced over to the camp, I saw everyone else wear them, too. Nate noticed but didn’t comment on it, instead watching the guards watch us approach. I brought the Rover to a stop right in front of them and shut the engine off. Trading one last glance with Nate, I let myself relax into the seat, hoping that we weren’t about to kick off a colossal shitstorm.
Nate got out first. I followed, the light breeze on my sweaty skin downright balmy after baking inside the car for hours. All around us, sound ceased as people stared. Not because they knew who we were—or so I figured—but because neither I nor Nate were wearing full gear, or even jackets. The mostly healed scratches along the inside of my forearm gave a sudden twinge, making me feel even more exposed in my tank top. Realistically speaking, that far into a well-defended stronghold it was highly unlikely to get bitten by a zombie, but it was unheard of that anyone would be stupid enough not to be in full gear outside. Except for us, of course.
Nate left them all a few moments to stare at us, then turned to Wilkes’s aide. “Petty Officer Stanton, good to see you again.”
She gave a startled jerk, her eyes snapping from where she’d been staring at me over to him. She gave a curt nod of greeting. “Commander Wilkes sends his greetings. You are welcome to stay with us, but we…” She faltered for a moment, her eyes widening just a little as she glanced at me. “We cannot let you inside just yet, before we have made sure—“
“That I’m not going to infect the entire base,” I cut in, grinning when she had the grace to look slightly appalled at having to tell us that. “No worries. We didn’t expect to just waltz in here without anyone being curious at the very least. It’s not every day that someone comes right back from the dead and doesn’t go all ‘argh, brains!’” Maybe it wasn’t in my best interest to be quite so jovial about what had happened, but hopefully that dash of humor would keep the tension from skyrocketing.
“Right,” Stanton acknowledged. “If you will please follow us? You can leave the car right there. No one will get close to it.”
That wasn’t surprising, but I still ducked back inside to get something from the cargo hold. When I straightened, I realized that I’d just given half of the guards a good scare, several of them tense as hell. Moving slowly, I held out the repurposed travel mug and plastic bag in my hands, doing my very best not to set anyone off.
“Sorry. Just thought I’d make the sample collecting for your geek squad a little easier.”
The corner of Stanton’s mouth quirked up, and for a moment she looked hard-pressed not to laugh at her guys getting that jumpy over a literal bag full of shit. The guards stepped aside, letting us walk through their ranks to the shed, where one of them held the door for us. No one asked us to go in unarmed, so they couldn't have been that concerned.
From the outside, the shed might have looked like any rickety wooden structure, but that was only camouflage. Inside, it looked like a cross between a triage station and a sterile lab, with two bunks, several pieces of medical equipment, and every available surface covered in tools, containers, and bandages. There were two people in hazmat suits waiting for us—the no
n-pressurized kind, not the space suits they had downstairs by their main lab—a girl that I didn’t know, and Jon, one of the biochemists I’d had my academic differences with on our first stay here. The tension in here was way worse than outside, and mostly to break it, I held out my sample containers to them. “Who wants this?”
The two scientists traded glances. Jon was the one who picked up a tray and held it out for me to deposit the goods on. The door closed behind us, making me tense just a little. Stanton had joined us, together with two of the guards.
“If you don’t object, we would like you to stay under observation here until you’ve been cleared,” she explained. “Mako will check your vitals and draw your blood. She’s the best nurse we got here.”
“I’m also the only nurse here,” the woman objected, giving me a look that told me that she was already sick of Stanton. “Just sit down there and do what I tell you to.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I quipped back, smiling when she rolled her eyes at me. My guess was on her not taking bullshit from anyone. Stanton watched the proceedings for about a minute before she left, using the elevator at the back of the shed to go downstairs.
Mako clearly knew what she was doing—and also knew how to handle herself in a hazmat suit. She checked my heartbeat and blood pressure first, and hit the vein in my right elbow perfectly at the first try. I waited for her to show any signs of nervousness as she was switching the blood vials to fill all three of them, but she didn’t even flinch. She also didn’t put a bandage on the puncture mark but just told me to hold the cotton ball there until it stopped bleeding. Next, she checked my ears, swabbed the insides of my cheeks, and proceeded to almost blind me when she shone a light into my eyes. That caused somewhat of a stir, but she was quick to shut her flashlight off when she realized just how sensitive my eyes were. Jon remained hovering next to her, collecting the mounting heap of samples that she took. Rummaging around in one of the overflowing drawers, Mako returned to me with a different light, assuring me that this one wasn’t as bright as the other. It still made my eyes water, but didn’t feel quite like someone was trying to scramble my brain through my eyeballs. Whatever she saw made her compress her lips briefly, but she didn’t explain, just came back with another cup and told me to spit into it several times.
The door of the elevator opened, and Sunny stepped into the room. The Silo’s lead scientist looked a little frazzled, only belatedly pulling his face mask up over his mouth and nose. I couldn’t help but utter a low, somewhat derisive chuff. That I wasn’t the only one who was convinced that the hazmat suits were overkill was one thing, but if they insisted on going that extra mile, they should at least have done so uniformly. The way Sunny looked at me make my skin crawl with sudden unease. Not the alarmed kind of unease that might have made me go for my gun, but the awkward kind that stemmed from me being aware that he knew far too much. I hadn’t expected that to bother me, but it suddenly did. And unlike Mako and Jon—provided they were in the know—he did a really shit job hiding it.
“That’s it,” Mako told me when I handed her the cup, which she deposited on the tray after scrawling something on the side. “Now we just need some easily obtainable fluids from you,”—she looked at Nate—“and my work here is done.”
She got up, and when Nate made no attempt to sit down on the other cot, she took his blood standing. He got his own cup to spit into. Mako nodded at Jon to get the samples downstairs for analysis, and handed me a facemask. “Put this on. I’m sweating like a pig in this, and we all know that this is just precaution. Whoever comes up in a couple hours to tell you the results shouldn’t have to go through this again.” She winked. “Likely me, so now you know where my concern stems from.”
I nodded. As stupid as it might seem sometimes, protocol was protocol.
“Wait, what samples did you take?” Sunny asked, finally tearing his eyes from me. He critically eyed the tray before glancing my way again. “We, ah, really should do a smear—“
That’s about as far as he got before Nate stepped into his direct line of sight, arms crossed over his chest. “Sunny? Shut up,” he warned. His voice was low and held a rough edge, making me wonder if he was just reacting to my obvious unease, or had his own share of trepidation rising.
“But—“ Sunny tried again, yet at Nate’s scowl he fell silent.
I should probably have kept my mouth shut, but apprehension was making me stupid. “If you want a sperm sample from him, tell him to wank into a cup,” I advised. “Don’t come to me for that.” Maybe not everyone would have needed to know about what we’d done earlier—and it was a bluff, really, considering we had used a condom—but if I could maybe kill any further questions with that, all the better.
“I’ll better get to analyzing then,” Sunny offered, unable to look at me now. He joined Jon in the elevator, leaving us with our capable nurse.
Mako was still frowning after him when the elevator doors closed. She checked on Nate’s needle mark, then collected the bloody cotton balls from both of us, disposing of them in the same biohazard bag as the syringes had gone into. She hesitated, looking at Nate briefly, before she turned back to me. “If you, personally, feel like you want anything else checked up on, we can do that later, downstairs, in the infirmary. Just come find me.”
“Thanks,” I said, appreciating her offer, but not quite sure if I would take her up on it.
She nodded. “I, or someone else, will be up with the preliminary results as soon as we have them. It’s cooler in here with the A/C running, but feel free to wait in your car, if you prefer that. These two yahoos over there are under orders to go wherever you go, so if you want to get rid of them, just promise you’ll stay in here. We’ll lock the doors, and they’ll leave you alone. Need anything in the meantime? There’s a shower and toilet behind that curtain over there.”
I wondered if she added the last to stress how well-equipped the amenities were, or because I was stinking up a storm. I’d washed up at the lake, but not much since.
“Thanks. Cleaning up and catching some sleep sounds good,” I offered.
Nate cleared his throat behind Mako. “Something to eat would be nice, particularly if you might want some more stool samples in, say, the next week. We haven’t really had much to eat out there.”
Mako looked appalled at not having thought of that earlier.
“Of course. You okay if I just drop it in the elevator and send it back up to you?” We both nodded. “Great. We’ll lock you in here, but in case of emergency, you’ll get out or into the elevator by hitting ‘1111,’ but that only works when we set the system to high alert. Hasn’t happened yet, but the Commander makes us do drills every month. I’ll get your food now. Shouldn’t be long.”
On her way to the elevator she stopped by the door and typed a code into the pad there, making red lights flash above the frame once. The guards followed her to the elevator, leaving us to our own devices.
Nate slowly turned to me, watching me carefully. At first I wondered if he was going to ream me again for forgetting about the food, but when he stepped up to where I was still sitting on the cot, I realized that it was concern that had him act like he was walking on eggshells.
“What?” I asked, unable to keep a certain bite out of my tone.
“Nothing,” he replied. “You okay?”
“Why shouldn’t I be?” If that came out with challenge, it wasn't intentional.
Nate shrugged, taking my defiance for what it was. “Wanna hit the shower, or shall I go first?”
“Why don’t you join me?” I suggested, sliding off the cot. “I could use someone to wash my back.”
His lips quirked up into a smile. “You are aware that there’s a good chance that the shower’s also under video surveillance?” I’d noticed the cameras in the corner before but hadn’t really paid any attention to them.
“Well, like that has bothered us in the past,” I offered. “Besides, wouldn’t you prefer them to get a good look at your ass r
ather than my tits?”
“True,” he agreed, grabbed my hand, and pulled me toward that ominous curtain. “Let’s hope for them that they’re smart enough to turn down the volume.”
Chapter 10
We hadn’t brought any spare clothes, and with the door locked, that left us only two options—except going buck-ass naked—either wear our sweaty, grimy gear again, or grab some of the scrubs that were stored on a shelf next to the shower. I went for the scrubs without hesitation, not bothering with my sports bra after staring at the grayish sweat stains left on the black nylon. Nate only pulled on a pair of green scrubs pants, leaving his torso bare. There was too much definition to his muscles, most of the subcutaneous fat gone. But that wasn’t what made me do a double take when he turned away from me.
“What’s that?” I asked, scrutinizing the puckered scars maybe a hand span below where the scar the rebar had left was. “When did you get shot?”
He looked down at the scars, idly scratching them before he turned away. “At the factory. You weren’t the only one who found out that bulletproof vests don’t really work when someone shoots you below where they cover your vital organs.”
I wondered if I should have felt bad for only noticing that now. Why he hadn’t told me was beyond me. Likely because he'd figured I had something else to concern myself with, like dying. And after I’d gotten better, I hadn’t really seen him naked much. It still weirded me out a little. Yet just like the scratch on my arm, the scars looked months old, not less than four weeks.
The elevator arriving postponed any answer that I might have given. Mako had been true to her word. There were two wrapped sandwiches there, two steaming bowls of soup and a huge platter heaped with chicken wings and potato wedges, a mountain of fruit, and a pitcher with lemonade. I knew that just seeing all that food should have made me salivate, but my stomach didn’t even grumble. Nate pulled the small cart holding all that into the room, but hesitated before he picked up one of the chicken wings.
Resurgence: Green Fields book 5 Page 11
