HAYWIRE: A Pandemic Thriller (The F.A.S.T. Series Book 2) (55 page)

‘I found this among Elizabeth’s belongings in the hospital, Mom.’

His mother shielded her eyes. ‘What is it, Justin?’

‘It’s the acid drive that Christov was searching for. All Elizabeth’s research is on it.’

Everyone turned to stare at the small silver tube in Justin’s hand.

‘You’ve carried that since the hospital?’ asked Coleman.

‘In my pocket,’ explained Justin. ‘I had it when Christov took me prisoner.’

‘Oh, my God,’ said Justin’s mother. Obviously neither she nor any of the Marines knew Justin had been captured by Christov or what he’d been through.

‘You’re lucky to be alive,’ said Bryant emptily. ‘He murdered my wife looking for that.’

Coleman held out his hand. ‘Hand it to me, Justin.’

Justin didn’t move.

He met Coleman’s eyes.

A tenseness fell over the deck.

‘No,’ responded Justin, shaking his head. ‘I kept this safe on my own for a reason.’

Coleman looked at Craigson and Myers.

Craigson looked at the deck.

‘We lost him,’ admitted Myers. ‘The boy went through hell and back to get here. Probably more than any of us.’

Craigson nodded, although he glanced at Bryant.

Losing a loved one was a different kind of hell.

Coleman drew his hand back. He didn’t look angry.

‘What do you want to do, Justin?’

Justin remembered the moment when his mother had discovered the feeling returning to her legs. Her face had shone with astonishment and hope. Only his mother had experienced the true effect of the drug. She had experienced everything the drug could do, both good and bad. As far as Justin was concerned, she was the only person qualified to decide what should happen next with Elizabeth’s discovery.

‘It’s not up to me. I kept it for you to decide, Mom.’

He handed the drive to his mother.

She studied the drive. ‘What are these numbers?’

‘A countdown,’ explained Justin. ‘When the countdown reaches zero, acid will wipe all the data from the drive.’

‘That’s in just over two minutes,’ said his mother.

Justin looked across to Bryant. ‘Not necessarily.’

Bryant pulled the tool from his belt. It was the tool Christov had carried to reset the drive. Justin had spotted it when they’d picked up Bryant.

‘This can reset the timer,’ explained Bryant. ‘Is that what you want?’

Justin watched his mother turn the silver tube over in her fingers.

‘It could make you walk again,’ said Justin.

His mother nodded. She ran her thumb along the smooth steel for a few moments before looking up at Bryant.

‘On three?’ she asked.

Bryant nodded.

‘One.’

‘Two.’

‘Three.’

Neve and Bryant pitched the acid drive and Christov’s tool into the ocean.

Splash! Splash!

Justin breathed a sigh of relief, along with just about everybody else on the boat.

Not far from where the silver tube had broken the water, a huge brown head broke the surface.

Water sprayed from the animal’s huge nostrils.

An enormous eye studied everyone on board the lifeboat.

Craigson grabbed Myers by the arm and pointed into the water. ‘Look. You were right.’

‘He made it,’ pointed Myers. ‘I
knew
he was following us.’

Justin studied the huge turtle, glad it had survived. Hopefully most of the sea life in the ship’s aquarium had done likewise.

Myers smiled as the turtle took one last look before diving away.

Coleman turned his gaze out over the debris-covered water. He wasn’t smiling.

‘We’re still down three people. I hope they reached a lifeboat in time.’

Justin hoped so too. He stared at the approaching lifeboats. One lifeboat broke from the fleet.

‘Can I use those?’ he asked Ben.

Accepting the binoculars, Justin followed the trajectory of the lone boat.

‘I can see them,’ Justin said, handing Coleman the binoculars. ‘I can see Erin and King and Forest. They’re alive.’

Coleman lifted the binoculars. ‘Where? On the lifeboat?’

‘No,’ replied Justin, repositioning Coleman’s binoculars slightly. ‘They’re floating on that bright red sports car.’

Twenty-three seconds later, two slim vials of f
luorosulfuric acid
ruptured inside the rapidly sinking acid drive. Christov had designed them well. The super acid flooded over the drive’s circuitry, corroding the hardware and destroying the data within seconds.

Two hours later

The
First Lady of the Sea
sank elegantly.

For the first thousand meters she descended in much the same position she had submerged.

By slow degrees her hydrodynamic bow dropped lower than her stern. At the two thousand meter mark the ship pointed straight down, bow first.

At three thousand meters, the ship scraped the protruding edge of a continental ridge before continuing her plummet into the abyss.

Her final three thousand meters of travel passed in total darkness, total silence, witnessed only by the creatures of the deep.

At six thousand meters, the ship struck the vast abyssal plane like a three-hundred thousand ton spear stabbing into the seafloor.

For eight minutes her mighty structure stood completely vertical in the water column, like a building erected on the ocean’s floor.

No one witnessed this incredible event.

After eight minutes it was over.

Succumbing to currents, the
First Lady of the Sea
collapsed sideways like the building she resembled, settling her massive metal body into a blanket of silt that would bury her within the year.

Two weeks later

Washington DC, U.S.A

Memorial Ceremony for the 2106 people who perished on board the
First Lady of the Sea
disaster.

The President spoke in the park.

Coleman watched from the sidelines.

He’d paid his respects at the marble wall engraved with the names of the deceased. Thousands of names.

It felt surreal to see the names engraved in alphabetical order.

The memorial didn’t separate the sick from the healthy.

Hunters or hunted, psychotic or immune, they were all remembered on the wall.

They were all victims.

Everyone grieved.

This wasn’t the day for blame, although the same question returned to Coleman again and again. As he’d stood at the marble wall covered in the names of the deceased, the question pressed on his conscience.

Did I do enough?

The same thought plagued him after every mission, but never had he witnessed so many casualties.

‘Excuse me, sir.’

A small child had approached Coleman. She looked about seven years old.

Coleman knelt, glancing around for the girl’s parents. ‘Are you lost?’

The girl threw her arms around Coleman’s neck and hugged him. She hugged him fiercely.

Coleman rested his hand gently on her back.

David, his son, was the only other child to ever hug Coleman with such intensity.

Coleman patted her back and then awkwardly disengaged himself from the girl.

A man limped over and took the girl’s hand.

‘I’m sorry, Captain. This is my daughter, Amy. I told her what you did. She got away from me. I’m sorry.’

He began coaxing the girl away. Coleman noticed the man’s hand was bandaged. A nasty wound had been stitched along the hairline over his right eye.

‘Wait,’ said Coleman. ‘Do I know you?’

The man turned and straightened his suit.

‘You saved me on the ship,’ the man replied. ‘Me and about two hundred others who didn’t reach the lifeboats in time. I was with the people who jumped over the side.’

An image of hundreds of screaming and panicking people crammed against the ship’s railing flashed in Coleman’s mind. He pushed away the terrible image.

‘You saved yourselves,’ replied Coleman. ‘It was a brave thing to jump overboard and swim.’

The man shook his head. ‘You gave us that chance. I was in the stairwell. I saw what you did. You were holding them back. You spoke to me. You told me not to look back.’

More images flashed in Coleman’s mind. He remembered the last man fleeing from the sick passengers down the stairwell. The man had been blood-soaked and disoriented from a scalp wound.

Coleman suddenly remembered.

He pointed at the wounds on the man’s head and hand.

‘I remember you. You were the last person down the stairs.’

The man nodded. ‘You saved me and every person in front of me. You and the hotel manager.’

‘I wish we had saved more,’ admitted Coleman.

The man took his daughter’s hand and pointed toward the marble memorial wall. ‘Without you and your Marines there would be twice as many names on that wall. I was there to see what you did, and no one in the world could have asked for more.’

Neve watched the continuous procession of people leaving flowers and messages near the memorial. The line stretched back a long, long way.

Justin reappeared from the crowd. He looked grown up in his suit. He’d been gone some time. He sat beside her and plucked some grass off her wheel.

‘Did you find them?’

He nodded and pointed across the park, away from the memorial toward a fountain.

Neve felt relieved.

Justin had spoken little about what he’d been through on the ship. During the time they were separated - from being attacked in the hospital to being reunited on the lifeboat - he had told his mother almost nothing. Neve knew he’d been held captive by Christov, but Justin had provided only the barest details to allay her worst fears.

It was times like this she found it hardest to be a single parent. She had no one to truly share her concerns with. No one who truly cared for Justin as much as another parent would. All she could do was give Justin the space he obviously needed and wait.

So far his only persistent request was to see Myers and Craigson again. Her son had obviously bonded with the Marines.

Now that he had seen them again, Neve needed to know what he was thinking.

‘Did you talk with them?’

‘Yes. We went over to the fountain. Just the three of us. Sorry it took so long.’

‘What did you need to talk about?’

Justin looked from his mother down to his hands. ‘Stuff that happened.’

‘Things that happened when we were separated?’

Justin nodded.

‘Why can’t you talk to me about it?’

Justin tore the piece of grass into shreds. ‘I don’t know. But you don’t have to worry. I’m all right.’

Neve ran her hand over her son’s hair.

Justin looked where the bullets had torn through her calf and thigh.

‘How are your legs?’

‘Fine. I’ll take the bandages off tomorrow. As soon as I’m healed, we’re both going to get our scuba tickets.’

Justin looked at his mother. ‘I completely forgot about that. Don’t you want me to wait until I’m fifteen?’

‘No, Justin,’ he mom answered. ‘That just seems silly now. We both know you’re more than capable. A lot more.’

They sat quietly.

He stared at her legs.

‘Did we do the right thing, Mom?’

Neve knew what he meant. He was talking about the acid drive and the incredible information it had contained.

‘I’m positive we did the right thing,’ she answered.

Justin looked at the memorial wall and for a moment he was the image of his father.

‘I’ve never told you this,’ Neve began. ‘But the night you were born, your father described what kind of man he hoped you would become.’

‘Really?’

Neve nodded. ‘It’s like he already knew who you would be. You’re exactly who he described. He’d be as proud of you as I am.’

Justin smiled.

It was the first time she’d seen him smile in weeks.

Forest found it best to keep moving. The more he moved, the less he had to talk to people. He’d never felt comfortable in crowds, and even less so since what happened on the ship.

‘Excuse me,’ someone said, touching Forest’s arm.

Forest recognized the man’s face, but he didn’t have a name to go with it.

The older man reached out his hand.

‘You might not remember us.’

‘I remember you,’ said Forest, gripping the man’s hand and nodding to the young woman beside him. ‘You saved your granddaughter back on the ship. You’re a policeman, right?’

‘Retired,’ said the man. ‘My name is Burt. This is Amanda.’

Forest smiled at the young woman. She looked about Justin’s age.

 ‘We came today to thank you, Corporal Forest. To thank you for saving us.’

Forest shook his head. He was still coming to grips with the number of people who had perished. All the names on the memorial wall had overwhelmed him. The Captain had stood and read every name. Forest hadn’t even finished reading half the names before he needed to walk away.

‘I should have done more,’ Forest said.

Burt gripped Forest’s shoulder.

‘It always feels that way,’ he said. ‘Even at my age. It always feels like you should have done more.’

Burt placed his other hand on his granddaughter’s shoulder. ‘But this time you saved the most precious thing in the world to me. Trust me. That’s more than enough.’

Without saying more, Burt led his granddaughter away.

Forest watched them go thoughtfully.

After a moment he walked back over to the memorial wall to finish reading the names.