“Just barely.” Randy said with a sigh. “I’m pretty sure we’re close to dehydration. And we smell like roadkill.”
“Yeah, but we did some good today, brother.” Jenny pulled the soft hair tie out of her hair and let her sweaty, red locks fall past her shoulders. “Sheriff Stans was grateful, and those officers will have a tough enough time keeping the jail locked down without having to fetch their own supplies.”
“That’s true,” Randy agreed. “We definitely don’t want criminals running around town.”
They cleaned their masks with the disinfectant solution and met at the basement door. “And Mrs. Brody at the library. They didn’t have any food or water until we got there.”
It had taken them most of the day to gather supplies from the nearby stores, dispersing what they found between the Sheriff’s group, seven people at the library, and another group of twenty at the Kentland Community Center. The twins had done everything possible to ensure everyone had the basic necessities.
“These coveralls will work great,” Randy said, picking up two of the packages they’d brought in from the truck. “Aren’t you glad we stopped by the hardware store?”
“We can bleach them and reuse them,” Jenny agreed. She pulled open the basement door and descended the stairs with Randy following right behind her.
The basement was half finished, complete with a family room, a small kitchenette, a spare bedroom, a full bathroom, and a storage room. Another newer model HEPA unit ran on high in the center of the room.
They left the Tyvek coveralls in their plastic on the stairs and put the packages of canned ravioli they’d scavenged on some shelves in the storage room. They went to the college-sized refrigerator in the small kitchenette and each took a bottled water out.
“Go ahead and shower,” Randy said. “I’ll make us some food.”
Jenny took her water along with her pajamas and a towel and retreated to the bathroom.
Randy uncapped his bottle and tilted it up. The second the cool water hit the back of his throat, a ravishing thirst kicked up, and he drained the entire thing. He got another one out and drank that one slower. Thirst quenched, Randy put on a pair of old athletic shorts and heated himself a bowl of ravioli in the microwave.
He took the entire can down in five minutes and heated up another when Jenny came out of the bathroom rosy-cheeked and wrapped in a towel. Her red hair hung down in wet strands, and the water bottle in her hand was empty.
“Your food is heating,” Randy said, heading for the bathroom. Jenny had left him plenty of hot water, and Randy luxuriated in the heat as almost two days’ worth of sweat and grime washed down the drain.
Fifteen minutes later, he and Jenny sat on the couch with their bellies full and the news playing on a television hanging from the wall. The reports out of Indianapolis were dire.
A lady news anchor stared into the camera from behind a cluttered desk. Locks of black hair had fallen from her bun, and her face was devoid of makeup. “This is Nancy Collins from WIND News,” she said, looking around. “It’s just myself and a skeleton crew this evening. I don’t know how long the power will remain on, but we’ll keep reporting as long as there’s someone out there listening. I have confirmation that my family...” Nancy paused and swallowed. “My family is dead, rest in peace Peter, Emily, and John.” Tears ran down her cheeks. “And God bless my camera man, Eddie, for sticking around.”
A large, dumpy-looking man with an Indianapolis Colts hat came around the camera and approached the desk. He placed a box of tissue on the desk in front of Nancy, and she plucked one out and dabbed at her eyes. “Thanks, Eddie.”
She sat up straighter, sniffled, and focused her attention on the camera. “Here’s the news. FEMA teams, along with the military, had set up a small camp on the south side of Indianapolis. They had begun housing survivors when the facility was compromised by infected persons who appeared to have been carriers of the infection. That runs counter to initial reports that the infection was instantly lethal.”
“The guy that attacked you,” Jenny said. “He was a carrier.”
Randy nodded, remembering the crunch of the man’s arm beneath the weight of his crowbar. “It makes sense since the BD seems to have slowed down some. I guess some people die fast, others die slow.”
Nancy Collins continued. “Remaining FEMA teams and military personnel have moved the camp west to the Indianapolis International Airport. There aren’t many survivors filtering in, so FEMA has asked us here at WIND news to direct everyone there. Of course, after securing sufficient respiratory protection. If you can’t find an air filtration mask, the CDC has provided some instructions on how to improvise.
“We could do that,” Jenny said as the reporter ran down the instructions.
“Yeah, we should start a YouTube channel,” Randy said with a cynical chuckle. “How to survive the apocalypse on a budget.”
Jenny laughed.
Nancy continued. “The CDC confirmed the infection stems from a fungal mutation brought about by the spraying of chemical antifungals on infected crops.”
“I could have told them that, too.” Randy frowned.
“So, they’re not telling us anything we don’t already know,” Jenny said. She tried some different channels, yet all she found was static, station logos, and no content. She raised the remote and turned the television off, letting her hands fall into her lap.
“Looks like this is it, sis,” Randy said. “The end of the world.”
“Yeah, it sure looks that way,” she said in a quivering voice. And while his sister was resilient and even defiant in the face of any challenge, her emotions were being pushed to the limit.
He slid over to her, wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and squeezed. “Hey sis. It’s going to be fine.”
“Oh, don’t give me that,” she sobbed. “The world means nothing. Mom and Dad are gone, and no one else in the family has answered their phones.”
“That’s true,” Randy said. His heart was heavy enough, and it was worse knowing Jenny was suffering. “But that doesn’t mean they’re dead.”
Jenny raised her eyes and fixed him with a bloodshot stare.
“Okay, they might be gone.” Randy winced inwardly. “But there’s still some people out there. FEMA has a camp down in Indy, so we can go there if we need to. And we’ve got each other. We’re not doing so bad, right?”
“Not too bad,” Jenny nodded in agreement.
“And, like you said, we’re helping many people.”
Randy rocked his sister back and forth. He’d always been protective of Jenny, but comforting her wasn’t a position he’d often found himself in. Jenny was her own woman, despite being his twin, and she hardly ever needed help from anyone.
“We need to stick together now that Mom and Dad are gone,” Randy said. “We’re all we’ve got.”
Jenny nodded and leaned her head on Randy’s shoulder just as the lights in the house flickered and died, dousing them in darkness.
Chapter 29
Kim Shields, Washington, D.C.
A day after Burke and his crew arrived, Kim sat going over the Harvest Guard data. She wasn’t a chemist, so she stuck to the high-level documents outlining the company’s strategy to create and deploy Harvest Guard around the world. She needed to know how their product attacked the fungus.
For all Burke’s corporate smugness, or perhaps because of it, he hadn’t left out a thing in his report. Kim read how the Durant-Monroe chemists had formulated a solution that protected plants on three levels: the contact, the translaminar, and the systemic. In fungicide terms, it meant that Harvest Guard would protect the plant on contact and then distribute itself to every surface of the plant over a few hours. It made for quite an impregnable defense against harmful fungi.
“No wonder so many farmers wanted to get their hands on this stuff,” Kim murmured as she finished the last swallow of her coffee. “Especially since most fungicides only focus on one level of protection.�
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Yet, to create an ultimate solution, something had gone wrong. The makers of Harvest Guard hadn’t counted on such a violent and coordinated fungal mutation.
Kim leaned away from her computer screen and closed her eyes. They were bleary and bloodshot from staring at her computer screen all night. The only good news was that she had some ideas about how they might one-up the Durant-Monroe chemists and create something Asphyxia couldn’t fight. She typed a quick email and sent it over to Tom in the control center and Alison and Nancy in Atlanta.
That was one thing out of the way. The next was to check in on the field unit Kim had pulled out of New York to hunt down the little miracle girl. She pulled up the link to the field units and clicked the connection to Lieutenant Richards.
After a brief pause, the computer monitor filled with the inside of a helicopter’s crew area, and the high whine of the aircraft’s engine penetrated her earphones.
“This is Lieutenant Richards,” the man said in a raised voice.
“Lieutenant Richards. This is Kim Shields from the CDC. Have you found Fiona yet?”
“Negative, ma’am. We’ve been in the air for several hours now trying to locate the chopper. The pilot either ran into a spore cloud and took an alternate route or they crashed.”
The camera view moved to the open door, and Kim looked down over a rolling landscape of once green fields and forests. Entire swaths of woods were overcome with Asphyxia, and the tree branches and leaves bent beneath the weight of the fungus. What looked like an enormous city burned in the distance.
“Where are you now, lieutenant?” Kim asked, making sure she enunciated so the lieutenant heard her over the helicopter engine.
“We’re just outside Philadelphia,” Richards said.
“Is that Philadelphia burning?”
“Yes, it is, ma’am,” Richards said, sending a chill of dread up Kim’s spine.
She stared at the screen for several long moments before she shook her head. “I’ll let you get back to it, lieutenant. Please alert me as soon as you find something out.”
“Will do, ma’am.”
Losing the little girl was not good. Who knew how long it would be until they found another person resistant to the fungus?
Her last problem was trying to reach her husband, Bishop. Standard cellular and intranet services were down, and there could be a thousand reasons, none of which the military had time to investigate. The CDC facility had access to satellite communications, but Bishop didn’t have a Satellite phone.
Kim closed her laptop, grabbed it and her empty coffee cup, and strode out into the commons area. She heard Burke before she saw him, and her stomach sank at the thought of having to deal with him just before her meeting with Tom and the Atlanta CDC.
As she walked into the commons room, Kim spared a glance on her way to the coffee brewer. Burke sat at one of the plain, white tables with one of his guards and his assistant, Pauline. They wore black coveralls with the Durant-Monroe Company corporate logo emblazoned on their breast pockets.
She placed her coffee cup under the dispenser and started brewing herself a fresh cup. If she was lucky, Burke wouldn’t try to engage her, although she doubted it since the man never seemed to shut up. He wasn’t brilliant like all the magazines said he was, yet there was a craftiness about him that unsettled Kim’s stomach.
“Hello, Mrs. Shields,” Burke said with a high, pleasant note. “Has my data been helpful?”
“It has, Mr. Birkenhoff,” Kim replied with a glance up. Then she reached to a bowl of fruit and picked out a banana for herself.
“That’s wonderful,” Burke said. “If anything, I hope it proves my company had nothing to do with the fungal outbreak.”
Remembering what Tom had told her about provoking the man, Kim turned and allowed a pleasant smile to lift the corners of her mouth. “I haven’t found anything definitive, yet. When I do, you’ll be the first to know.”
“I can tell by your strained smile that you’re not interested in proving Durant-Monroe’s innocence.”
“Let’s just say there’s a lot more data to go through,” Kim said. “I’m more concerned about helping the doctors find a solution for the outbreak. We’ll worry about culpability later.”
“Ah, that’s a very smart approach,” Burke nodded.
Kim’s eyes moved to Pauline, who quietly watched the exchange between the two. Her fingers remained poised above a thin laptop keyboard and a coffee cup at her side. The woman was thin with blue eyes and light blonde hair. Her classic high cheek bones reminded Kim of an old-time actress.
The guard gave off the opposite impression. He wore a surly expression as he regarded Kim. He wasn’t a man she’d care to meet in a dark alley. The only consolation was that she’d convinced Burke to make his guards leave their weapons in their assigned rooms. It would have been impossible for Kim to work otherwise.
“Have I introduced you to my team leader?” Burke said, gesturing to the man.
“No offense,” Kim said, unable to hide her cynical expression. “I don’t want to know him.”
“Now, that’s not very nice.” Burke looked offended.
“Well, he doesn’t look very nice,” Kim shot back.
Burke’s smile spread like oil on water. “I understand. He’s in a dark mood more often than not, focused as he is on protecting me. In any case, this is Josh Richtman. Josh, this is Kim. Can you please show her a little more pleasantness? We’ve talked about this before.”
Josh’s frown lifted into a smile that looked painted on, shark-like, yet his eyes held their wicked expression. The grin made Kim think of murder. She gave a disgruntled sigh, picked up her coffee and fruit, ready to leave the commons room, with her laptop tucked under her arm.
“Oh, one more thing,” Burke said. “I haven’t been able to contact General Miller. I’d been hoping to check in with him so he doesn’t...how did he put it...’drone strike my ass into oblivion?’”
“I’ll talk to Dr. Flannery about that,” Kim replied over her shoulder as she strode away.
Kim took a left at the next intersection, hurried down the long hallway, and swiped in to the control center. It wasn’t until she was inside and had shut the door behind her that Kim realized how scared she was.
“Are you okay, Kim?”
Kim looked up to see Tom sitting at a desk where he’d been peering into a microscope.
She waved him off. “It’s just Burke and his goons.”
“You can move inside the control center,” Tom said plainly. “It wouldn’t be too difficult to set you up in here. You can even sleep in the huddle room.”
“They’re just trying to intimidate me. It makes me want to carry one of those handguns around with me.”
“I’ll train you on them soon.” Tom gave her a definitive nod. “You won’t be able to practice shooting, but just getting familiar with the weapons might be useful.”
“I’d like that. In the meantime, I thought I’d join you for the meeting with Atlanta.”
“Already?” Tom looked at his watch with a shake of his head. “I was doing some last-minute checks on these solutions and lost track of time.”
“Will they be ready soon?”
Dr. Flannery nodded to a piece of equipment next to him that thrummed and shook gently. “We should have several vials of each within the next few hours, and Alison should finish up running the simulations against the Asphyxia model. We want to know the safest, best first approach.” Tom grabbed his laptop off the desk and directed Kim to a side room labeled HUDDLE ROOM.
“Ready?”
“Yes, let’s go,” Kim said.
A moment later, they were sitting at a small conference table with their laptops open and their reports ready to go. Tom hit a button and made the connection to the Atlanta CDC. Alison, Bob, and Nancy looked back at them through the remote camera.
“You two look terrible,” Nancy said in her gravel voice with the barest hint of amusement on her lips.
>
“Not half as bad as you people,” Tom quipped.
There were a few tired chuckles before they got down to business.
“Before we get started,” Nancy said. “I want you to know that the president is listening in and would like to be part of our discussions from now on.”
Kim sat up straighter in her chair and stared at Tom with wide eyes.
“Oh, hello Jill,” Tom said, somewhat uncomfortably. “It’s been awhile since we—”
“This is President Steven Christensen,” a man’s hard tone came over the line. “President Jill Fitch passed away early yesterday evening from Asphyxia. A spore cloud caught her while she was playing with her grandchildren on her estate outside the capital. I’ve assumed her role as president.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that, Mr. President.” Tom said, and his eyes held the weight of genuine anguish as they fell to the table.
“I just want you folks to know that we appreciate all you’re doing,” President Christensen said. “And we understand you are working hard on a solution. If there’s anything else we can do for you, please let us know. We’ll do everything we can to help. It’s absolutely critical we get something on the table in the next couple of days if we’re going to beat this thing.”
“We need General Miller’s troops here,” Kim spoke up. “A small contingent should have been here already. Burke Birkenhoff and his guards brought their guns with them.”
“I wanted to bring that up,” Tom nodded at Kim.
“Do you think Burke might compromise the facility?” the president asked.
“I would hope not,” Tom said. “But they do have a menacing aspect to them. It would ease our minds if we had some of our own boys and girls looking out for us.”
“I understand,” the president said. “I’d like to put Burke and his entire company out in the middle of a spore field and let them fend for themselves. Unfortunately, we’ll need him to help us mass produce any solution you folks create. I’ll find out where those troops are and get them to swing in.”
“Thanks, Mr. President.”
Spore Series (Book 1): Spore Page 17
