For the rest, though…
The spark of humanity was still there. Flickering in a dark wind, but there nonetheless.
McReady still stood unmoving.
Then Lilah crossed to her in two quick strides, spun the woman, and slapped her across the face with shocking force. “Do something. Test the drug. Show me that it works before I give it to my town boy. Show me now or I’ll feed you to them.”
It was a vicious threat, and Benny had no doubts at all that Lilah meant it. Joe took a step toward the doctor, and Benny and Nix moved in the same instant and put the tips of their swords against his chest.
“Don’t,” warned Benny.
Joe gently pushed the sword blades aside. “And don’t you forget who your friends are.” To McReady he said, “Lilah gave you an order, Monica — not a request.”
McReady glared hot death at him, but then she snatched the backpack from Nix and hurried over to the bed of a woman who still had the spark of humanity.
“Help me,” said McReady, and Lilah was right there. “Hold her head steady, yes, just like that. I need her mouth open. Good…”
As Lilah followed the directions, McReady took two capsules from the bag and unscrewed them.
“Normally we’d let her swallow the capsules and wait for digestion and absorption through the stomach mucosa… but we don’t have that time. Hold her — she’ll buck. The first dose is painful. The parasites in the body will fight it.”
Lilah’s muscles bunched and flexed, and the woman’s head did not budge at all. McReady poured the powder into the gaping mouth.
“Water,” she called, and Nix was there with a canteen. She dribbled some of the water into the woman’s mouth and then directed Lilah to force the jaws shut.
Immediately the woman began thrashing ten times more frantically than before. Her muscles went rigid as iron, and her body arched and bucked with such force that Lilah had to lie across her to keep her from breaking her own bones. The screams were terrible, the worst Benny had ever heard. High, plaintive, piercing.
“It’s not working,” said Nix. “God, it’s not…”
Suddenly the woman went limp.
It was as quick as a heartbeat. Her body flopped back against the bed and she lay there, staring blindly at the ceiling, her chest rising and falling with alarming rapidity as air puffed in and out between gritted teeth.
They gathered around her bed, fists balled in tension, held breath burning in their chests.
“Come on,” McReady muttered. “Come on… come on…”
Then someone said, “God…”
They all stared.
The voice spoke again.
“God… help me…”
It was the woman.
Wasted, drenched with sweat, covered with her own filth, ragged, and worn to a skeletal thinness.
But it was a person who spoke.
Not a monster.
Joe snapped, “Everyone — two teams. Go.”
It was impossible. It was a task assigned in hell. It was the hardest thing Benny had ever done. But as Joe went through the room and quieted those whose life spark had burned out, the rest of them worked in pairs — Lilah holding patients for McReady, Benny holding for Nix.
It took forever.
Forever… And with every second Benny thought about Chong.
But they got two capsules into the mouths of every remaining person in the room.
Soldiers.
Scientists.
Support staff.
Flight crew.
One hundred and sixty-two people.
It took forever.
But they did it. Lilah kept saying to herself, It works. We can save my town boy. Over and over.
By the time they were finished, Benny could hardly stand. Nix was weeping openly. So were many of the patients.
Archangel was a miracle drug, they all knew that; but Benny had read too many science fiction novels where miraculous cures are instantaneous. He willed the infected to all suddenly snap out of it, for their eyes to clear, and for the thing that dwelled inside them to flee. Not all of them did. For some it was fast, for others amazingly slow. Reality is often harsher than fiction. Slower, and far less satisfying.
For most of the infected the Archangel pills triggered shrieks and convulsions, and it filled their eyes with screaming madness.
“You’re killing them!” Benny yelled.
“Shut up,” said McReady. “It’s the parasites — they are programmed to defend themselves.”
A few of the patients sagged back into panting semiconsciousness. Some turned aside and wept into their pillows, as if ashamed of the dark thoughts that had set up court in their heads. Some stared fixedly at the ceiling as if frozen in time.
Some died.
Benny began to untie one of the treated patients, but McReady stopped him, warning that a relapse, though unlikely, was possible. Observation for several hours would be needed.
They gathered around the bed of one of the worst cases. A soldier who screamed and thrashed and finally collapsed back, his eyes and mouth open, his chest suddenly silent. McReady snatched up a medical chart that hung on a hook at the end of his bed. “This soldier was bitten on patrol. Looks like he was already pretty far gone when they gave him the metabolic stabilizer.”
“Is he dead?” asked Lilah in a frightened voice.
“Yes.”
“We killed him,” breathed Nix.
McReady looked sad. “He had almost transitioned to a reanimate. All the parasitic eggs in his system must have hatched. The strain… it was simply too much for him, and his heart gave out.”
She examined the other fatalities.
“This one had a preexisting heart condition,” she said, reading another chart. “And this one looks like she had a stroke.”
Lilah said, “What about Chong? Will this… I mean will Archangel…?”
The doctor shook her head. “There’s no way to tell. It’s going to be different for every infected person. There will always be a risk.”
She sighed and rubbed her tired eyes.
“I’m exhausted,” she said. “I need to sit down and—”
“No!” growled Lilah as she grabbed a bag of capsules and glared at McReady. “We have to find my town boy. Right now.”
CHAPTER 81
Brother Peter entered a long, dismal chamber lined on both sides with iron-barred cells. All the cells were empty save one. The thing in the cage glared out at him from behind strings of matted black hair. His eyes were dark and bottomless. Pale lips curled back to reveal wet teeth.
“Hello, little brother,” he said. “Why do they have you in here? What sin have you committed that they’ve locked you away like an animal?”
The thing in the cage growled. It was an animal sound with no trace of humanity. There were gnawed bones on the floor, and its metal water dish was battered and twisted.
“Looks like he’s about to cross over,” observed one of the Red Brothers. “You want to leave him or let him go?”
The creature in the cage murmured a single word. “Hungry…”
“Still alive,” said the Red Brother.
“Then he’s still a sinner,” said Brother Peter as he turned to leave. “Send him into the darkness. Do it quickly, then bring the rest of the Red Brothers. I want to make sure that the sinners in the medical center have been dealt with.”
The reaper nodded and bowed as Brother Peter left.
There was a ring of keys on the wall, and the reaper fetched them and tried several before finding the one that unlocked the right cell. He drew a long knife and opened the cell door.
“Best to just let it happen, little brother,” said the reaper. “All your pain will be over soon.”