At least one of those sacks they had seen growing on the tree had disgorged its contents. She thought back to the similar tree she had seen in the forest outside Valhalla and the slowly rotating shadow she had seen hidden within the orb’s pink-liquid-filled interior. Whatever had been inside, it was now out and roaming the area. The knowledge that she might not be alone had turned the surrounding woods and deep shadows from a pleasant distraction to a potential ambush, and she found herself jogging along the path, the shotgun off her shoulder and held tightly in both hands.
If she had brought the phone with her, she would not have risked coming back to the house and would have abandoned her supplies, but it was her only means of contact with Jacob and his team, and she would be damned if she was going to leave it behind.
The muffled electronic call of the sat-phone greeted Emily like a long-lost friend as she pushed open the door to the Jeffersons’ home and stepped inside.
She raced upstairs and jogged into the living room. Pulling the case holding the phone from the backpack, she quickly opened it, pulled out the phone, and flipped up the antenna, simultaneously hitting the Talk button.
“Hello,” she said, breathless. “Jacob?”
“Emily. Thank God. I’ve been trying for hours to get in touch with you. Are you okay?” Jacob’s concern was obvious, but Emily had no idea why he would be worried in the first place.
“Yes. Of course. Why?” she finally answered.
“Listen, I have some news that I need—”
Emily cut him off. “I have better news, so I get to go first. I found more survivors.”
Emily heard Jacob’s sharp intake of breath. “What? Where? How many?”
“They’re a family, a father, son, so damn cute, and a daughter. I found them yesterday.”
“That’s astonishing. Amazing,” Jacob stuttered. “Wait? Are they immune to the effects of the red rain, too?”
Emily realized that she hadn’t actually given any thought to the possibility that Simon and his little family might not be immune to the red rain. She had simply made the assumption that they were, for whatever reason, resistant like her. They’d had zero exposure to the event thanks to the quirky weather system of their little valley. But what if they were not immune? What if once they stepped outside of the hill’s border the virus—or whatever the rain actually was—was still active, and what if it killed them?
No! She was convinced that once the original red rain had turned to dust, its ability to infect human life had become negated, but there was no way to find out if her theory was correct without risking the lives of Simon and the kids.
“I don’t know,” she answered Jacob eventually. “Maybe they are immune, but I think they were probably just lucky.” She took a couple of minutes to explain what Simon had told her about the valley’s microclimate and how it had shielded them from the red rain. “There are even ducks here, too,” she blurted out excitedly, resisting the urge to add a comic quack to emphasize the point.
“Fascinating. Just fascinating. This makes my news even more important.” She heard Jacob’s voice grow fainter as if he was holding the phone at arm’s length. “I’m going to send you some images that you need to look at,” he continued, raising his voice to ensure he was heard while he apparently fiddled with some controls on his sat-phone. “You’ll need to share them with your new friends as quickly as possible. You’ll need to convince them to get out of there.”
The sat-phone gave a beep, and Emily glanced at the little LCD screen; it read, “Downloading Files…1 of 4.”
Emily waited for all of the files to download. The resolution on the screen was not optimal for viewing the kind of detail she was looking at, but as she scanned through each of the images while Jacob explained what she was looking at, she felt a growing discomfort in the pit of her stomach.
“You can see what you’re facing, Emily. It’s imperative that you get yourself and the family out of there as soon as possible. If you don’t there’s no way—”
Emily stopped him midsentence. “I need to get back to the other house. You’ll need to explain this to Simon, or I don’t think there’s any way he’s going to believe me. He’s already skeptical of what I’ve told him. Without proof from you, he’ll think I’m out of my mind. Can you give me half an hour to get to them and then I’ll call you back?”
“Make it fast, Em.,” Jacob said. “I’ll be waiting by the phone.” Emily heard the click of Jacob hanging up and immediately began to collect the remainder of her belongings. She shoved them into the backpack and swung it over her shoulder and called for Thor to come with her.
Making her way through the house to the garage, she found her bike on the side of the house and walked it around to the back path. Once she was down the steps and back on the dirt trail, she began pedaling toward the house on the opposite side of the valley.
She barely felt any of the bumps of the rough trail as she and Thor raced back to Simon and the kids. The implications of what Jacob had shown her flooded her mind with questions, and it was all she could do to keep her pounding heart from exploding out of her chest.
“What exactly is going on?” Simon asked as he followed Emily into her room.
“Do you have a computer? One that’s charged,” she asked.
“What? Why do you need a computer?”
Emily dropped the backpack onto the bed and turned to face Simon. “Please, Simon,” she said. “Do you have a computer?”
Simon stared at her for a moment, then disappeared. When he came back, he was carrying a laptop computer under one arm. Emily pulled the sat-phone from the backpack, pulled the computer from under Simon’s arm, and walked into the living room.
“Jesus, Emily. Are you going to tell me what the hell is going on?”
“I don’t know what’s going on,” she replied as she set the equipment down on the coffee table and attached a USB cable from the laptop to the phone. She pressed the On button of both machines and, once a connection had been established, hit Redial on the phone. “But I think I know someone who might be able to explain it to both of us.”
She pressed the Speakerphone button and listened to the ringing phone. It chirruped a couple of times before Jacob answered. “Emily. Are your new friends there?”
“It’s just me and Simon,” she answered, keeping her voice as low as possible in case the kids overheard her. “I didn’t think this was something we should discuss with the children around.” Emily glanced up from the phone at Simon, and she realized by the surprised look on his face that he hadn’t believed a word she had told him when she had tried to explain about Jacob and his crew of scientists. “Simon, meet Jacob. Jacob…Simon.” The two men exchanged greetings before Jacob took control of the conversation again.
“I don’t know how much Emily has explained to you about what we think is actually going on here, Simon, but I have someone else that I want to introduce to the both of you who I think will be able to clear up any doubts you might have about the threat you are all facing. Hold on a second while I bring them in…” There was a sharp beep followed by a short burst of electronic tones. A few seconds later, a woman’s voice filled the room.
“Hello all, can you hear me okay?” There was a slight static buzz behind the transmission, as though the stranger was speaking from a great distance. The woman’s voice was accented, certainly not American. British maybe?
“We hear you,” said Emily and Jacob almost simultaneously.
Jacob’s voice broke in to the conversation. “Everyone, this is Fiona Mulligan. She’s the commander of the International Space Station.”