Caesar watched them leave, his heart hammering.
If Koba had killed the man…
He made his way over to where Rocket lay on a huge branch, the bonobo sitting beside him.
Rocket? he asked. Where bullet hit you?
Rocket looked a little embarrassed.
No bullet, he said. Surprised. Missed branch. He indicated his leg. Hurt, he said. Then his arm. Hurt.
Can you travel? Relief welled up in Caesar’s chest.
Not fast, Rocket replied.
Caesar glanced back up at the sky. He still couldn’t hear any helicopters.
We have to go, find new place, he said. They come back with more guns, more machines.
I’ll help him, Koba said.
No, Caesar said, Sam will help him. You lead his band now.
Koba’s eyes went wide.
You made the right choice, Caesar said. You chose Rocket. You chose ape. I am proud.
Koba supplicated.
Apes together, strong, he said.
Apes together, strong, Caesar repeated. Now go. Find thick forest beyond the mountain, away from humans.
Koba nodded. He glanced at Rocket’s band. They fidgeted, but with a look from Caesar they fell in line.
We go, Koba signed, and he moved to leave. The others followed. Soon they were out of sight. Wearily, Caesar went down to organize the move. They all thought they had just won an important victory, but he felt in his bones that they were in more danger than ever. This was only the start.
Phillips met them when they arrived back at the base. He didn’t look happy.
Corbin wasn’t happy either.
“What happened to the air support?” he demanded. “The nets, the traps, the guys who were supposed to put them down after we found them?”
“I’m sure you were informed when it was pulled,” Phillips said. “Plans were changed. We have to be flexible. I had every expectation that you had enough resources to succeed in your mission. To bring back at least one lousy ape.”
“You weren’t there,” Corbin said. “You didn’t see them. If you had let us take in our AR15s we might have had a chance. Or if you called in—”
“The goal is live capture,” Phillips said, interrupting him.
“They’re monsters!”
“They are not,” Clancy said. “They’re amazing.”
“It doesn’t matter what they are,” Phillips said. “For the moment, at least, we’re shut down.”
“Why?” Corbin demanded.
“You don’t need to know that,” Phillips said. “Just stand down and wait for further orders.”
This, Malakai realized, is where they kill us.
15
The streets were nearly empty as Talia drove toward the hospital. She felt as if she was in a demilitarized zone. Garbage was collecting on sidewalks and streets. Wrecked and abandoned cars littered the freeway. What people she did see were almost shadows, scurrying in the periphery of her vision.
Just for the hell of it, she decided to try a pharmacy. It would be quicker, and as a doctor she could order the meds right there. But when she pulled into to the nearest one, she saw that the windows had been smashed in, and the lights were off. Suddenly feeling in danger, she wheeled out of the parking lot and hurried on toward the hospital.
She found the National Guard turning cars back more than four blocks out. A soldier waved for her to stop, then walked over.
“I’m a doctor,” she told the man, and showed him her ID.
“You can’t drive in,” he said. “There’s a back entrance for doctors. I can walk you there.”
She found a place to park the car, and then walked back to the guardsman, wondering what the hell he meant by “a back entrance.” Soon enough, however, she understood.
The entire block surrounding the hospital had been cordoned off, and guardsmen were busy putting up chain-link fencing. A huge line of people was being herded through an entrance in the fence into a sort of tent city that had sprung up like magic in the seven hours since she had left. Outside, buses were pulling up, from which people disembarked. A lot of them didn’t seem to be doing so willingly, as the guards had to prod them—and in some cases drag them along.
“What’s going on?” she asked her escort, more or less rhetorically.
“We’re setting up a quarantine here,” he said.
He took her to the doctor’s entrance, which was guarded by two men with rifles. They were wearing hazmat gear.
Inside the hospital it was chaos, as every available space was being made ready for the sick. Waiting rooms, offices, the lunch room, the chapel—any place vacant. She felt like she was in a war movie, except almost everyone here had the same problem, and it wasn’t a human enemy.
It was the retrovirus.
However, those sick with the virus were no longer being routed to the lobby of the emergency room. That was packed with people, and a glance told her that most of them were in critical or near-critical condition. Gunshot wounds, stabbings, head trauma, broken bones—more than ever, she felt like she was in a MASH unit.
The impression was completed when a middle-aged African-American man in army scrubs gestured toward her. She noticed than that there were several other people she didn’t know, all of them wearing similar dress.
“You there,” he demanded. “Who are you?”
“I’m Dr. Kosar,” she said. “I belong here. Who are you?”
“Dr. Kosar,” he said, more quietly. “Sorry for the tone. Thank God you’re here. I’m Captain McWilliams. I’ve been put in the charge of this ER. I have my hands full, as you can see.”
“I’m not on shift until ten,” she said. “I…” She looked again at the dying all around her. David would be fine for an hour or two. Then she would slip off with a course of antibiotics.
“Yeah,” she said. “Never mind. Let me get scrubbed.”
The next couple of hours were a nightmare. Triage consisted of deciding who she could treat, and who was beyond help. She had thought herself hardened to this kind of thing, but this was a whole other level.
McWilliams didn’t seem fazed. He was a more-than-competent doctor but, more importantly, he knew how to command. She suspected that, as an army surgeon, he had worked in this sort of chaos before.
After a length of time she couldn’t even begin to measure, Talia found herself becoming weaker, more tired by the moment. She realized that she hadn’t had anything to eat or drink in hours, so she took a break and had an energy bar from one of the machines. It was the last one. She tried to drink some water, but after half a cup found she couldn’t get any more down.
Remembering David, she picked up some antibiotics. Their stores were nearly depleted, but there still was some cephalexin and ampicillin. She felt guilty for taking it, but David deserved treatment as much as anyone. She checked her phone and realized that it had been the better part of four hours since she had left him. That wasn’t good. If she had missed something—and there was a chance she had, given the tissue-damage in the vicinity of his gunshot wound—then he might be in trouble. She had patched him up in poor lighting, in her bathtub…
But there was nothing to do about it now. So she went to the lavatory and then splashed some water on her face.