“Three,” John said. “Remy, a security guard, and the girl. A dozen in the hospital, but no one worse off than you.”
Her father’s words struck a note of terror that Susan would not have believed possible. If she still worried for her life and her future, then she would survive her grief, would find some way to limp through the rest of her life without the man she had come to love so absolutely, so quickly. “Dad, am I going to be okay?”
John Calvin managed an actual smile. “You’re going to be just fine, kitten. Your hands are expected to heal fully. You have minor burns and bruises only. Nothing life threatening. They’re already talking discharge.”
Thanks to Remy. Pain seared Susan’s heart. If she had believed in a higher power, her faith would have died in that moment. No superior being worth worshiping would bring a man like Remington Hawthorn into her life, only to place him in a situation where he had to die to save her. If he hadn’t done what he did, we would both be dead. “And the people responsible? The ones who reprogrammed the nanorobots? Has anyone caught them?”
John Calvin turned Susan a wan smile, betrayed by the deep sigh he heaved at the same time. “We’re still sorting it all out, but we’re hopeful. The SFH has always been dangerous. Now, they’ve apparently managed to recruit accomplished scientists and experienced international terrorists. The men who made the physical switch worked for the delivery company. At least, they’re in custody, and we hope they’ll give up the others. Making the connection between them and the Society for Humanity will probably prove a lot more difficult.”
Susan nodded grimly.
“We won’t give up, though,” John promised.
Nor will they. Susan guessed the Society for Humanity would have all the tenacity of most extremists. No matter how worthy the cause, those people who took it to irrational lengths always ruined it for the true and sanely passionate believers. Such were antiabortion extremists who murdered doctors and misrepresented beloved stillborn infants as aborted embryos; environmental extremists who slaughtered scientists, blew up corporations, and stole credit cards to finance their radical agendas; extremists on both sides of the political aisle who threatened federal buildings and workers, vandalized property, and fomented lies when elections did not go their way; radical Islamists who daily fired rockets into Israel, demonized civilization, demoralized women, and declared war on every religion not their own.
The Society for Humanity would not give up the fight until certain branches of science disappeared from existence. Individual victories would never suffice. They would not rest until the things of which they disapproved wholly perished from the earth, and they did not care whom they damaged, whom they murdered, to achieve that goal.
History had proven only one way to handle terrorists, Susan believed, and that was to defeat them. In the past, when one side wanted only peace and the other would settle for nothing less than total annihilation of the other, the side wishing for peace was the one that had to survive, the one that deserved to triumph. When extremists won, they did not quietly disappear; they did not embrace peace. They simply turned their might onto a new target. First, kill all the Israelis. Then, kill all the Jews. Then, kill all the gays, the Christians, the Hindus, the Buddhists, the gypsies and, eventually, even the gentler practitioners of their own religion. This was not a matter of dueling philosophies; to the Society for Humanity, this was all-out war.
Gradually, Susan became aware of more presences waiting patiently at the open door to her room. She glanced past her father to see Kendall Stevens standing at the entryway, the bare hint of a smile creeping onto his battered face despite two black eyes and multiple bruises. Beside him stood a middle-aged man Susan did not recognize.
Releasing Susan, John Calvin also turned to see the newcomers. “Ah, there you are. Did you get my signal?” He tipped his head toward the Vox on his wrist, and Susan remembered he had tapped a button when he first came to her bedside.
“I did.” Kendall stepped fully into the room, gesturing for the other man to follow him.
Susan sat up in her bed. She knew she must look a fright. Besides having survived an explosion, she had spent what seemed like a lifetime crying. Her eyes felt swollen and sore. “Hi, Kendall. Hi . . .” She paused. Now that he stood closer, the man at Kendall’s side did look familiar. “I’m sorry. I’m still a bit muddled. I can’t remember your name.”
“Ronnie,” the man inserted in a cheerful voice. “Ronnie Bogart.”
The name cued an image of his back, his body curled into a fetal position. Susan had injected Ronnie Bogart with nanorobots, but he little resembled the pitiful man who had come to her in desperation after seventeen suicide attempts. He seemed to have grown several inches, and he projected an aura of confidence wholly lacking the first time she had met him. His hair was still thinning, but now it was neatly combed and tended. “Ronnie Bogart?” Susan repeated incredulously. “You . . . you . . .” She did not know how to say it without sounding offensive. “You look wonderful!”
“I feel wonderful,” Ronnie said, sounding wonderful. “After the docs analyzed the data from the nanorobots, they found an unusual chemical imbalance. I started on my new meds, and voilà!”
Susan could not help laughing. She turned her father a look that she hoped said, The nanorobots still collected useful data despite the reprogramming.
John Calvin pursed his lips and nodded.
Ronnie continued. “And you know that fellow, Fontaina? The one always on the unit whenever I got admitted? I used to sit and talk to him for hours, like I would a dog. I mean, he never spoke, never moved. Great sounding board, right?”
Susan wanted to rush him to the punch line. “Don’t tell me he’s walking around.”
“Not yet,” Ronnie admitted, “but he’s sitting up and looking at people.”
“The issues the nanorobots found are a bit more complicated,” Kendall explained, clearly trying to maintain whatever confidentiality remained to Neal Fontaina. “And it’s only been a couple of days.”
“I can’t remember the last time I had this much energy.” Ronnie scooted back into a normal position. “I can’t remember if I ever before felt . . . happy.”
“Congratulations,” Susan said. The nanorobots might just turn out to be the miracle treatment they had hoped for, at least for some refractory patients. She tried not to wonder if they might have helped Sharicka or if the Ansons were celebrating or mourning the loss of this particular child. Knowing them, she suspected they cried as hard as for her as Susan did for Remington. They truly had loved her, even after mental illness had turned their special child into something horrific and monstrous.
The conversations seemed to have come to a natural conclusion. Kendall scuffed his feet. “So, when do you think you’ll be back at work?”
Susan looked at her father.
“The doctors say her wounds will heal in a couple of weeks.” John Calvin made no real attempt to answer the question. They all knew shock and grief had more to do with her return than physical injuries.
“Sooner than later,” Susan promised. She was not the type to wallow in sadness. She harbored no illusions she would handle the loss of Remington any better than her father had her mother’s death. He had gone back to work, though, remained competent at it, resumed a mostly normal life with just a few quirks to prove he had become a different man. She suspected she would prefer leaping back into her residency rather than filling her days with nothing but thoughts of her loss and attempting to distract herself with inane movies and television shows. “I’ll be back in time for our next rotation.”