“He’s right,” Daniel said. “That means me and the INS people stay. And, nobody tells anyone else about the situation without everyone’s agreement.”
“Everyone? That’s cumbersome,” Zeke said.
Daniel responded, “Okay, then majority agreement? Right. I’ll start first. My dad lives a couple of hours from here. He has his own plane and some land. They will probably be watching him because of me, but we can agree in advance that he can be told and he will eventually come in, but only when we are sure it’s safe.”
Nods all around.
“And I know Zeke is waiting to say what he wants, so I’ll say it for him. His family. Wife and two kids. The longer we wait, the more likely they will connect him to me and the harder it will be to get them here. Zeke?”
“Yeah. What DJ said. I want them brought here. And my mom. She’s in a home with Alzheimer’s. She doesn’t even know me anymore. I don’t mean to sound cold-blooded but we might as well try the Eden Plague on her. She’s just in God’s waiting room right now anyway. It would be worth whatever side effects if her mind was restored, even for a couple of years.”
“Everyone okay with that?” Daniel asked.
Vinny said, “Why don’t we just all agree that any immediate family that will be brought here, and we trust, can come in. But don’t tell anyone that’s going to stay on the outside.”
“See, there’s policy. Agreed?” Daniel asked. Everyone did. “Is there anyone that plans to go back to their life and forget about all this?” Daniel looked in Skull, Spooky and Vinny’s direction. They were the big question marks.
“No way,” says Vinny. “This is the coolest thing since forever. I always wanted to live outside the law and hack into anything I wanted. My family is Uncle Tran’s, so I’m just speaking for myself.”
There were nods and quiet mumbles of approbation. Everyone looked at Spooky, expectantly.
“I cannot bring my own family. Too many friends, brothers, uncles, cousins, my people. Unless they all come. So I go back. I am the man on the outside. Maybe there is a time I will bring my people in. Or send in some of them. Agree?” Spooky looked around anxiously, an unusual emotion for him to show. Everyone nodded.
Zeke said, “Done. Skull?”
Skull sat impassively, his arms crossed like Daniel’s. “I have to think about it,” he said. Stares turned his direction, some hostile.
Daniel didn’t want the man to be driven away. He had to keep peace. “Just as long as you don’t give up our secrets, I’m okay with that,” he said.
The rest of the group followed his lead, accepting. Skull’s expression might have thawed a trifle.
Larry spoke up. “Well, I’m infected, so I ain’t goin’ back to live. But I’d like to go back home for a while, see who might be good candidates. And I got my eye on a honey but it ain’t a done deal yet. I got a sister and she got kids, and then there’s my mom and dad. All right?”
Nods all around.
Zeke clasped his hands together, rubbed them briskly. “That’s settled, then. Because they’re at the most risk, the first expedition is to get my family. Then we can get anyone else’s. Who’s coming with me?”
The discussion sorted itself into two parts. The A-team composed of Skull, Larry, Spooky, and Zeke would go get his family. Once they were secured and en route to the bunker, Larry and Spooky and maybe Skull would go get Larry’s relatives, and possibly some of Spooky’s. The rest would stay at the bunker, with Vinny doing the shopping trips, and get the place in order.
-18-
Right before the mini-A-team left, Elise sought out Zeke. She watched from the doorway for a minute as he suited up, before disturbing him. “Here. Protein bars. Stick ‘em in your pockets.”
“Thanks, doc.” He took them, stuffing them into various places in his clothing.
“I’m not a doctor.”
“Closest thing we got, right?”
“No, that would be Daniel. I’m just a scientist, I never practiced on anybody.”
“Except for injecting people with the Plague.” Zeke grinned. “Like the Swiss Army knife of combat medicine.”
“Funny you should say that. Take this too.” Elise handed him a zippered pouch.
“What is it?”
“Open it.”
“Syringes? See, you’re a doc. What’s in it?”
“Like you said, Eden Plague. From my saliva.”
“But I can just bite anyone I need to.”
“I think this will work faster. Bigger dose. And it might have its uses.”
He opened the pouch, looked at the two preloaded syringes wrapped in padding. “Okay.”
Elise took his hand. “Good luck, Zeke. I’m looking forward to seeing your wife and Ricky and…”
“Millie.”
“Right. “ She smiled crookedly. “Bring them back safe. I’m tired of being the only woman here.”
He hugged her like a father, like a brother. “Thanks, Elise. I will. Take care of DJ.”
***
Zeke and Larry took the Land Rover, Skull and Spooky the Cherokee, a natural division. On the way Zeke and Larry hardly stopped talking, reminiscing about missions and comrades, friends and golf games, women and bars.
The other two drove in relative silence, listening to the radio and making a few comments about the road. They all had their secure radios but kept them in push-to-talk mode.
Eight hours later the pair of SUVs pulled into a truck stop at the outskirts of Fayetteville, North Carolina, just after dark. They sent Spooky in for food.
Zeke opened up a disposable cell phone, activated it, and called a special set of digits. He entered a code and his home number. This process masked the call, routing it through an offshore international service, nearly impossible to trace.
“Hi, Cass, it’s me. How’re the kids?”
“Everything's green here, Mister J.”
Zeke’s blood chilled. “Okay, sweetheart. I’ll be gone for two more weeks.” He rambled on about family concerns couple of minutes before hanging up. Disposing of the phone, he switched his secure radio to voice-activated mode.
“They’re under surveillance. My wife gave me the code for ‘being watched.’ I told her to expect extraction at two a.m.”
“Damn, Sam, you got that girl well trained,” Larry chuckled.
“Actually, she got me trained. I never told you what she did before, did I?”
“Not really. State Department or something?”
“Well, I did meet her at the US Embassy in Moscow. I was there as a military attache. She was deputy station chief.”
“She was Agency?”
“Yup. In the ultimate tradecraft training ground city. She’ll be fine. We just have to make a plan to get them out and break contact. That means we have to locate the surveillance and shut them down.”
Skull chuckled. “Does that mean I’m weapons free now that DJ Do-Right is out of the picture?”
Zeke sighed, exasperated. “Alan, if we kill their people it will raise the stakes tenfold. Right now daddy Jenkins is trying to keep everything hush-hush. Dead Feds, or even contractors, will force him to fess up to his superiors and they’ll come after us like a pack of hounds.”
“Joking, boss, joking.”
“I hope so. If you have to shoot, wound them. One of us will bite them if we have to.”
“Why don’t you do that anyway? Won’t that screw them up? Get them fighting the disease instead of us?”
A long, thoughtful pause. “Interesting idea. Maybe when we get back we should start trying to weaponize this thing. Create a delivery system. Darts or something. See if it can be put in a water supply. So we can make good on our threats.”
“Hmm.”