by Nick Thacker
Ben grabbed Stephens under the chin and hoisted him up straight. He delivered another blow to the man’s side. “It’s not just that you were suspicious to me from the beginning,” he said. “You came in here, somehow finding the road without, apparently, outside help. These back roads aren’t on any map, and we’ve specifically removed them from GPS data feeds to make sure wandering tourists don’t end up finding a back entrance to the park.”
Julie watched the exchange, mouth agape.
“I — it was the IT… Randall. He got me here. He helped me find —”
“That’s not true,” Julie said. Ben looked at her, surprised. “Randy didn’t even know we were coming here. I didn’t tell him where we were going, and even if he tried to track me through my phone somehow, he wouldn’t be able to do in time to send you our coordinates until we were here. You showed up minutes after we arrived, Stephens.”
Stephens’ eyes grew wide. “Seriously? You don’t think —”
“Explain how you know so much about this virus,” Ben said. “You’re a research assistant, right? You collect research and deliver it to Julie?”
Stephens’ nostrils flared, and he gritted his teeth.
“And I saw the way you looked at Dr. Fischer when you mentioned ‘immunization.’ How did you know that he was immune?”
“I didn’t!”
“You did. I saw it in your eyes. You knew exactly who he was the moment you walked in here, didn’t you? You’ve seen him before!”
Stephens’ eyes darted back and forth from Julie to Ben to Malcolm. Ben grabbed him again and started to swing his arm back. A slight smile escaped the side of Stephens’ mouth, and just as quickly, it vanished.
Ben stopped, shocked. “You do know something, don’t you?”
A look of anger washed over Stephens’ face. He spat.
Ben punched him in the jaw, sending the man’s head hurtling backward as it absorbed the blow. Ben winced in pain, opening and closing his fist.
Stephens didn’t react. He stared coldly back at Ben.
Ben hit him again. Julie ran forward and grabbed his arm, trying to stop the attack.
When Stephens’ head came back up this time, Julie saw a trickle blood dripping just next to his mouth.
His smiling mouth.
Stephens spat out a mouthful of blood, then spoke. “You just couldn’t figure it out, could you?”
Julie was stunned. “What are you talking about?”
He laughed. A chuckle, slowly rolling out of his bleeding mouth. “It’s too late anyway. Too late.”
Ben looked at Julie, silently asking her what to do. She shook her head, and Ben dropped his hand.
“It’s too late. Too late —”
“Too late for what?” she yelled at Stephens.
“You can’t save them. Couldn’t save them. Diana Torres, Charlie Furmann, David Livingston. And the others. You can’t save them now.”
Ben took a step back. Stephens. It was him — the man who’d killed them. And Diana.
His mother.
44
Julie couldn’t believe what she was hearing. There was Stephens’ confession, but mainly the unbelievable scope of what Stephens claimed he’d done. Following Julie’s threads of evidence and research to Diana Torres’ door, then to Charlie Furmann and Livingston. Anyone who’d gotten in his way had paid the ultimate price.
Not to mention however many others they didn’t know about.
Julie was beside herself. She’d worked with Stephens long enough to trust him, to even grow fond of him. He was a smart kid, and he worked hard.
But he’d betrayed her.
He’d betrayed them all.
She didn’t know how to respond. Malcolm was also shocked, still recovering from Ben’s attack on Stephens. He slumped in the corner, leaning on the table Julie had been using as a lab table.
Ben, however, did know how to respond. Julie watched as Ben laid into Stephens, landing punches as fast as his arms would allow. They weren’t targeted well, and many brushed Stephens’ head and shoulders. Ben lacked control, and he wasn’t putting much force into the blows. It was an emotional reaction, one Julie and Malcolm were both astonished to see.
But it made sense.
The man in front of her had killed Ben’s mother. He had been the cause of her infection and eventual death, all while Stephens led them through a dead-end maze.
But why?
The question nagged at her. She hadn’t noticed it the first time, focused instead on overcoming the initial shock of Ben’s accusation, and the subsequent revelation that he’d been right.
Still, the question was there, and she had to know the answer.
“Why?” she asked, softly. Then again, louder. “Why, Stephens?”
He looked up at her, and Ben stopped swinging.
“Why?”
Ben stepped back, his breathing labored from the exertion, and also looked at Julie.
Waiting for the answer.
But Stephens only laughed, gurgling blood that had filled his mouth. He spat, a wry smile on his face. “It’s too late,” he said.
“You mentioned that already. But I’ll make that decision for myself,” Ben said. “Where’s the bomb, Stephens? I know it’s in the park somewhere. In the caves, like you said on the phone?”
“You’ll never find it,” he replied.
“Stephens, please,” Julie said. Stephens just shook his head.
“Like I said,” Stephens said, looking at each of them in turn. “It’s too late. America isn’t united enough to save itself.”
Julie cocked her head. Where had she heard that before?
“This country values freedom, but you and I both know that ‘freedom’ is a joke. We’re somewhere between a third-world country with a corrupt government and an overbearing corporation on the scale of how free we really are. Americans now hold on to every scrap of ‘freedom’ they can find, including their own individuality —”
Ben stepped forward and punched Stephens again. “Where is the bomb?” he yelled.
Stephens staggered backward, nearly losing his balance. He seemed dizzy, but remained standing. Then he looked up sharply. He started to laugh as he withdrew something from his coat pocket.
The small glass cylinder was filled with a liquid of some sort, and a large hypodermic needle glinted in the fluorescent light of the lab room.
Without warning, Stephens shoved the syringe into his arm.
His eyes fell backwards into his head, but rolled forward again a few seconds later. He sniffed, then spoke. “As I said, Harvey, it’s too late. America is not united enough to save itself. It doesn’t matter now, whether you find your bomb or not.” Suddenly his mouth began to leak saliva, foaming around the edges. “I would leave, if I were you,” he continued. “This is a highly concentrated specimen of the strain, and I estimate there is less than a minute before I become contagious.”
Julie winced as the virus visibly tore through the man’s body, ripping it apart from the inside out. She also winced at the meaning behind the man’s words.
Highly concentrated specimen.
Ben lunged forward, throwing Stephens’ body back against the far wall. Even with the virus destroying the man’s body, he still didn’t fall.
“We’re immune, Stephens,” Ben said. “Remember?” He pulled the sleeve of his left arm up and held it up to Stephens’ face. “You took too long. The virus has already died out of our systems, and we’re now immunized to it. And Dr. Fischer —” Ben nodded toward the professor. “He’s been immune, but you already knew that, didn’t you?”
Julie watched the exchange, piecing everything together. She thought through Stephens’ explanations; she considered the specific words he’d used.
“Ben…” she tried to coax him backward, but Ben wasn’t listening.
“You led us here, to our deaths, for what? For your amusement?”
Stephens was smiling again, and he reached back into his pocket. “No,�
�� he whispered.
Ben frowned.
“It was an experiment. My experiment. I told them no one would be able to figure it out, and that it was an embarrassment on our part to accomplish something so miraculous and not have the satisfaction of watching it unfold. Up close.”
“So you let us figure it out?” Ben asked.
“There will be nothing left,” he said. “America will be a barren wasteland, Harvey. The end is justified, but what about the means? What about my reward, knowing that my role has been fulfilled?” The man’s voice began rising, his face showing more and more emotion. “I was groomed — born — for this role,” he continued. “And I must get the satisfaction of knowing it was foolproof. I had to finish it here, to watch you die, just like the rest will.”
Julie’s eyes widened as Stephens’ hand came out of his coat.
“And no one is immune from death,” Stephens said, holding a gun up to Ben’s chest. He flicked off the safety, staring into Ben’s eyes the entire time. “You’ve performed your role admirably, Mr. Bennett. Now let me perform mine.”
He pulled the trigger.
Julie felt her body being pushed aside as a dark form rushed past her. She stared, helpless, as Ben’s body flew sideways toward the tables in the center of the room. She screamed, sprinting at Stephens as he aimed the second shot directly at her.
She collided with Stephens headfirst, sending her forehead into the man’s sternum. She felt his lungs expand rapidly, involuntarily gasping for air. She kept moving forward, now back on her feet. She ran full-speed through the man’s slender body, lifting it off the floor and smashing it into the wall. Glass vials and beakers, along with a stack of neatly filed papers, exploded from their location along the back table and down onto the hard floor. The sound of breaking glass and chaos almost blocked out the sound of her own screaming.
Almost.
She reared back with her fists and pummeled Stephens, who was lying haphazardly across the table. She aimed for the same spot Ben had hit him earlier — just below his eye where a gaping wound was forming. She punched, again and again, and he eventually stopped moving.
She took a step back, breathing heavily. Julie noticed that her coworker’s skin had begun to rise, as if he’d been filled with water like a balloon. She knew that the virus had moved completely through his body, but she was astonished at how quickly he’d reacted to it.
There must have been a very heavy concentration of the virus inside that vial. The realization terrified her.
Purplish welts had formed on his exposed skin, both from the virus and the bruising he’d received from Julie and Ben. She watched as his skin changed hue from a purplish tint to a lighter red, and finally noticed that his breathing had stopped. She waited another few moments and then checked his vitals.
Dead.
45
Ben heard Julie say his name from somewhere behind him.
“Ben…” it was forceful, yet hesitant. A warning.
Still, he moved forward. He hadn’t felt emotions like these for over a decade, ever since his dad had been taken.
“You led us here, to our deaths, for what? For your amusement?” he asked the questions pointedly, as if he already knew the answer. Did he?
Stephens smiled. “No. It was an experiment. My experiment. I told them no one would be able to figure it out, and that it was an embarrassment on our part to accomplish something so miraculous and not have the satisfaction of watching it unfold. Up close.”
Ben asked the next question carefully. He wanted to get closer, to try to subdue Stephens. “So you let us figure it out?” He took a step forward. Careful. He treated the situation like his many encounters with wild animals. Don’t approach directly when possible, but don’t move too quickly.
Another step.
Stephens kept talking, but Ben had already tuned him out. He was focusing on the hunt, trying to sneak his way into Stephens’ personal space. He knew Stephens wasn’t an animal, but that was to Ben’s benefit. Stephens was acting emotionally, based not on animal instinct but human perception. Ben could rely on a slower reaction time from him because of that.
But as he planned his move, he caught sight of Stephens’ arm. It swung upward, cradling a weapon.
“You’ve performed your role admirably, Mr. Bennett,” he heard Stephens say. “Now let me perform mine.”
Ben tried to lunge forward, but he couldn’t get his mind to form the directions to send out to his body. It was happening slowly, as if he were watching a movie in slow motion. He felt his feet move, slowly at first, then more quickly.
But not quickly enough.
He’d never make it to Stephens in time. The gun rose a little more, now pointing at Ben’s chest.
He thought he saw the muzzle of the pistol flash, a small bristle of fire lancing from its barrel, but his vision suddenly went white. He felt something, too, a crashing pain that hit him from his side, knocking him off of his feet.
He was flying. Blinded and in pain, but he knew the sensation of vertigo. He tried to reach his arms out to stop the fall, but he had no idea if his arms had registered the order or not.
Then he heard the explosion from the gun. It was louder than he thought it would be — he’d always been on the sending end of a gun barrel. It deafened him.
Blind, in pain, and now deaf.
And still falling.
When he hit the ground, he felt another pain similar to the first. It started on his arm and shoulder, then his hip and leg.
This can’t be right.
It was a point-blank shot — how could Stephens have missed? He should have felt something in his chest.
Right?
He tried to blink, trying to convince his senses to return.
Nothing but pain.
Still, it was a dull pain — throbbing, but manageable. What happened?
He breathed, now realizing he’d been holding his breath. His lungs struggled with the weight, trying to push it off of him.
Why was there a weight on top of him?
He began to see. First the lights of the lab creeped into his vision, then a darker shadow.
A man’s face.
Malcolm Fischer’s face.
He gasped, pushing upward with his throbbing hands. The weight was the man’s body, and Ben used all his might to heave it up and off of him. He struggled for a few seconds until Malcolm fell to the side, freeing Ben.
Ben sat up, blinking.
When his vision fully returned, he saw Malcolm’s body lying next to his, upside down, in a crimson pool of blood.
No…
He reached out and felt behind the professor’s neck.
Come on, he willed. Wake up.
But then he saw the professor’s brown coat, wrapped around the older man. A small hole was leaking blood, almost dead-center in the man’s back.
The exit wound.
He heard sobbing and looked up. Julie was standing over him, tears falling from her face.
“B — Ben,” she muttered. “I thought you…”
Her voice trailed off as she finally saw Malcolm lying next to him.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “He — he saved you.”
Ben just nodded. “Where’s Stephens?” Anger flashed behind his eyes, and he stood. He saw the man immediately, lying across a table against the wall, unmoving.
She pointed to her coworker’s body. “I — I attacked him, but I think the virus had already done its job.”
Again, Ben nodded. He gently stepped over Malcolm’s body and reached Julie, pulling her close. She began to sob, trying to talk. He wrapped a hand around the back of her head and slowly pushed her face forward, onto his shoulder. He stroked her hair, letting her cry.
46
The truck bounced over another pothole in the dirt road. Julie was again in the passenger seat, staring out the window. Every few seconds, she sniffed, holding back tears that she knew would eventually come.
They’d left the lab a
mess — two dead bodies, one extremely contagious, and both bleeding onto the white tiled floor. Ben had held her for a minute, slowly rocking her as they both waited in silence.
Waited for nothing.
No help would come, and she now felt the true realization of Stephens’ double-crossing.
It had hit her hard, that first moment she understood.
They were alone.
As they stood there, she thought about the mess of it all. But as chaotic as it was, it was flawless. The execution of it, from the initial blast to the spreading virus, down to Stephens’ own arrogant desire to watch it unfold from a front-row seat.
He’d told them everything. It was cryptic and difficult to understand, at best, but it was complete.
He’d wanted it that way — to watch them suffer through the pain of searching, only to see their helpless eyes as he unleashed his weapon.
His final move.
Checkmate.
She looked at Ben as he drove. “I can’t believe he knew, Ben. The whole time.”
Ben nodded slowly. She saw his knuckles turn white as he gripped the wheel. “I know,” he said softly. “But there’s still something I don’t understand. The syringe — why’d he do it? I mean, inject himself with the stuff? He could have just shot us.”
“No, that’s just it.” She frowned. “I figured it out right before he tried to shoot you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Ben — he’s the endgame. He’s the final piece.”
“I know. He orchestrated the whole thing, and —”
“No, Ben — he is part of the bomb.”
Ben frowned, but quickly his eyes grew wide. “He’s…”
“Stephens had to make sure he was in the park because he is supposed to be the final piece of the puzzle. Remember what happened when the first bomb went off? It sent a payload of the virus into the air, which contaminated a lot of the area. But this second bomb can’t carry that payload — it’ll be too big. And if it’s going to go off anywhere around that caldera —”
“Then the eruption from the volcano beneath us will more than eradicate the strain.”
