This was more than sustained shock and guilt. Had the Chinese tortured her?
“Please.” Deborah brushed her good hand through her ash-darkened blond hair, perhaps to reinforce that she wasn’t Asian. Then she held her palm up to the woman above them. “Please, Kendra. Come with us.”
“We don’t have much time,” Cam said. “The Chinese will send more men—”
“I’ll kill them.”
“—and we don’t have much fuel.”
Freedman began to crouch, settling herself on the loose slats where she paused and stared. “We won’t have to go far,” she said. “I know it’s there.”
“Come down,” Deborah said. “Please.”
“No.”
“We can take you back to American lines,” Cam said with more certainty than he felt. They would need to refuel even if they weren’t blocked by Chinese aircraft.
And if they stop us, he thought, do I put a bullet in her head? Or do I let them have her because they’ve won and she might help them succeed in repopulating the planet?
My God. Is it better if we all die?
Who knows what she could build if the Chinese keep her locked up for the rest of her life. What will they do to us? If they improve the mind plague, they might be able to control everyone on the planet for thousands of years, breeding people like cows or dogs for strength and obedience. Beauty. Sex. It’s better to kill her, he realized, wondering if he could draw his pistol before she threw her nanotech.
“I won’t go,” Freedman said.
“You don’t understand,” Deborah said. Some of her old arrogance showed in her voice and posture, and Cam liked her for it. “A lot of good people died just to get us here,” she said. “We need you.”
“I need to see the other lab,” Freedman said. “They built the vaccine there.”
“We have the vaccine! You must have it, too,” Cam said, but Freedman didn’t move on her heap of rubble, squatting on her haunches. He was reminded of a child again. What would she do? Hold her breath?
Abruptly she shoved herself back to her feet, extending her fists to both sides as she looked over Cam’s head. Deborah wasn’t the only one losing patience. Colonel Alekseev had kept his distance, acting as a lookout, but now he picked his way through the ruins with his AK-47. “We must leave!” he called.
“I won’t go.”
“It doesn’t sound like you even know where this lab is,” Cam said, pleading with her, and Deborah said, “We can keep you safe in Colorado. We have some gear. There’s an MRFM and—”
“The lab is nearby. I know it’s there!”
Freedman’s passion reminded him again uncomfortably of Ruth. Maybe that was why he hesitated. They were so intent on getting her out of the Los Angeles sprawl, too tired and rushed to imagine any change in plans. What if it made more sense to stay?
“Why?” he asked, trying not to flinch from a gust of ash. The helicopter thundered closer in response to some signal from Alekseev, whipping the ruins with dust and shreds of paper, but Cam persisted. “Why do you want the vaccine?” he asked. Then: “We’ll take you there!”
The worst of the downdrafts shifted away from them as the helicopter landed, making it easier to hear — but Freedman cocked her hands on either side of her body, ready to fight.
Cam bent his body, too, reflexively dropping into a gun-slinger’s crouch. “We can move a lot faster in the sky,” he said.
Beside him, Deborah had also touched her sidearm. “Please!” she said. “Please, Kendra.”
“Andrew Dutchess released the archos tech,” Freedman said. “Not me. It was Dutchess.” Her voice was small again, and she fidgeted and blinked.
Jesus, Cam thought. Jesus Christ, I think she’s forgotten where she is.
He stepped toward her. His legs were stiff. Every movement was reluctant, even as his skin shivered with anticipation. Either he would force her to recognize her surroundings or he would tackle her. If he was lucky, he could disarm her. Her nanotech must be in glass or plastic vials exactly like Ruth had done.
“There’s a new plague,” he said. “The mind plague.”
Snap. Her eyes shifted to him, clear and afraid. “I can stop it,” she said.
“How?”
“There’s a marker in the vaccine. I helped them build it, but they did as much work as possible without me. I need key components and software if I’m going to design my cat’s paw ”
“Cat,” he said, not understanding.
“I know it’s there.”
“You saw the same man on the same day,” Deborah said, prompting her. She also distracted Freedman. Cam nearly scrambled up the broken wood slats — he could knock her feet out from under her if he lunged — but Freedman smiled and said, “Yes. The other lab is nearby.”
“How can you stop the mind plague?”
“I can alter the vaccine and make it a cat’s paw. A new kind of nanotech.” She was lucid now, speaking rapidly, as if from a memorized speech.
She must have recited those words to herself hundreds of times in captivity, but Cam wondered. Could they trust her? She seemed no more substantial than sunlight caught in a set of window blinds. Snap — open. Snap — closed.
“It will attack the new plague and its vaccine, too,” she said. “Anyone who’s currently infected will be freed from the plague and it will shut off the vaccine in everyone who’s been inoculated.”
“Jesus Christ,” Cam said.
If they could find the other lab — if Freedman could do what she said — they would turn the tables on the Chinese. Millions of people around the world would regain their intelligence even as China’s armies became vulnerable to the mind plague.
Deborah wasn’t buying it. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Why wouldn’t this thing just turn around and leave our side open to infection again, too?”
“Because I can give it the same self-governing markers we developed for the plague,” Freedman said. “My cat’s paw will know who’s immune and who isn‘t, and it will establish itself individually in everyone it finds.”
“Smart tech,” Cam said, looking for Deborah’s eyes. “Remember what a jump they’ve made. The mind plague and its vaccine aren’t just machines. On some level, they’re both able to think, even more so than the booster. They remember what they’ve done.”
“It still won’t work,” Deborah said. “None of us are sick. There’s nobody except us and the Chinese for hundreds of miles, and none of us are carrying the plague. Even if she can reverse who’s immune and who isn‘t, that doesn’t solve anything if the Chinese stop us. Don’t you see? They don’t even have to kill us. All they need to do is keep us contained.”
“We are carrying the plague,” Cam said. “Right? We came out of Colorado. We must have traces of it in our blood. Our lungs. Our skin.”
Freedman nodded. “Their vaccine is the only thing protecting you. My cat’s paw will attack the vaccine.”
“That’s how it’ll spread,” Cam said. He touched Deborah’s arm, trying to convey both tenderness and brutal resolve. “The mind plague will infect the Chinese. Everyone we left behind will wake up.”
“But this includes us,” Alekseev said behind him. “My men and us. What she wants to build will infect us, too, yes?”