Patient Z (31 page)

“I want it.” Mitch’s face was sincere, his voice steady, eyes fixed on Cal. None of that meant anything for someone who was a practiced liar like Cal. But it did coming from Mitch. An honest man—a rare thing in Cal’s experience.

He reached to the nightstand for the lube and the condoms. Mitch took the box of condoms from him, and Cal thought he was going to put it on Cal himself. But he didn’t. He chucked it aside. It skittered away over the floor.

“Mitch—”

“Cal, tomorrow the doctor is going to give me the vaccine, and it works. Even if there was the remotest possibility you could infect me, which I don’t believe, then it won’t matter.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure. Do it.”

He wanted to face Cal this time, he said. Not easy to get into a good position for that for a bulky guy like Mitch, and he ended up with his knees drawn almost up to his chest, which Cal doubted he’d be able to sustain for long, so Cal got on with it fast. He slipped lubed fingers into Mitch, preparing him efficiently, enjoying Mitch’s little sighs of pleasure. With his other hand he stroked lube onto himself, slowly, trying not to pump his cock, not wanting to bring himself off too soon.

“I’ve never barebacked with anyone but you, top or bottom,” he said to Mitch, whose eyes widened. Cal had learned very early to always be safe and insist on a condom for penetration every time. He’d never stayed with anyone long enough to reach the point of trusting each other enough not to use one. “I guess you have…” He cut himself off before he invoked Dex’s name. Speaking of boner killers. He saw a flash of pain on Mitch’s face, quickly gone. “Thanks for letting me,” Cal said. Mitch smiled, rested a hand on Cal’s.

“Thank you for trusting me to be the first. I…I’m ready now.”

So was Cal, more than ready. Mitch’s body yielded more easily to him this time. Relaxed, trusting him, knowing him. Cal sank in deep. A new intimacy. If he was honest with himself, it didn’t feel a whole lot different, physically. But knowing there was no barrier between them, nothing but his skin and Mitch’s body taut around him, embracing him, that did something to his mind, a new feeling, a feeling only for Mitch. That tricky L word. The one he’d said too easily to others and couldn’t say to Mitch.

“I love you, Cal.” Mitch said it for him, reaching up to put his arms around Cal’s neck, pulling him close. His cock pressed into Cal’s stomach, hot, tipped with wetness. “Fuck me.”

Cal eased back and forward slowly a few times, until Mitch was rising to meet him on each stroke, thrusting his hips up off the bed. His cock thumped into Cal’s belly each time, until Cal took it in hand and started to pump it, trying to keep up the same rhythm as his hips. Not easy. His brain was whirling, all the blood from it diverted into the fireball in his groin. His thrusts grew faster, harder, making Mitch thrash and howl under him. Something others were doubtless hearing through the air vents three decks away.

It didn’t matter. Cal couldn’t have stopped for the world. He didn’t stop as the cot rocked too hard, and Mitch cried “Shit!” The cot’s legs folded up, and the whole thing collapsed. The bed of the cot hit the floor with a crash, jarring them into a stop. Mitch stared up at Cal.

“We broke the bed,” he said.

“You come yet?” Cal asked.

“No.”

“Me neither. We’ll fix it later.” And he resumed his thrusts as Mitch dissolved into laughter, interspersed with groans of pleasure. Cal wasn’t going to let a little thing like a collapsed cot stop him. Mitch quickly stopped laughing as Cal thrust into him harder. His back arched off the mattress.

“Cal!” One word, one shout and he came, spurting onto Cal’s chest, the hot, musky scent filling Cal’s senses and sending him over the edge. He tensed up, feeling like a bomb the instant before the explosion. Mitch’s climax had detonated him. Then he was coming, body shuddering in final, involuntary movements, tension pouring out of him, concentrating into his cock, blasting from it in an explosion of white light.

He hit the mattress as his bones melted and wouldn’t support him anymore, pushing himself to the side to keep from landing on Mitch, pulling out quick enough to make Mitch groan out a protest. He rolled onto his back and let his arm flop over the edge of the mattress, and it took him by surprise when his knuckles rapped the cold metal floor.

Oh yeah. They’d broken the bed.

“I guess it had to happen one day,” Mitch said, looking down at the cot. Cal gave way at last to the laughter. They lay together on their broken bed, chilled by the cold air, warmed by each other’s bodies, and laughed from pure joy.

* * * *

Mitch held out his arm, and Phyllis raised the needle.

“Are you sure about this?” she asked.

“Do it,” Mitch said. He smiled. “Does that count as informed consent?”

“Closest we’re going to get to it,” she said. “Here we go.”

Mitch turned away as the needle went in. His gaze fell on Cal, watching from the other end of the infirmary. Concerned, maybe? Or did he not want to share his title of king of the zombies? Mitch smiled in a reassuring way, and Cal smiled back, but he didn’t look any less worried.

“Done.” Phyllis stepped away and discarded the needle in a sharps bin. The nurse gave Mitch a piece of cotton wool to press against the needle puncture.

“Now me.” Bren stepped forward, her sleeve already rolled up, her arm held out. Inez was at her side. Phyllis shook her head.

“Hold your water, girl. Let’s just wait a few minutes.” Bren scowled, then glared at Mitch. Phyllis watched Mitch with interest. “You feel okay?”

“Fine.”

“Don’t feel like you’re about to have convulsions?”

“How would I know what that felt like?” Mitch said. “I’m a little hungry, but I was before I came in.” He hadn’t had breakfast yet. The doc had wanted them to wait until after the injection to eat. To be on the safe side, she said.

“Come on, Doc,” Bren insisted. “His head didn’t explode or anything. Let me have it.”

“In a minute.”

Bren groused for a full ten minutes before she got her turn. Then she groused about being stuck with damn needles. Within a few minutes, both of them had had their blood pressure and heart rate checked and bandages applied to the needle wounds and were dismissed from the infirmary.

“I want you back here in twelve hours,” Phyllis said. “Or before then if you feel anything strange. Cal, stay with Mitch and watch him like a hawk. Inez, you do the same with Bren.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Cal and Inez said at the same time. They looked at each other, and Cal grinned. Inez smiled more shyly.

Phyllis chuckled at their keen response. “I know, what a chore, eh? After that you’ll have daily checkups for a week.”

“And after a week?” Bren addressed this to Mitch, who glanced at Cal, who was frowning again.

“Then we see if it worked.”

* * * *

Mitch tricked Cal. Cal knew Mitch and Bren were planning to go ashore a week after they got the vaccine—especially after the doctor’s tests showed they both had antibodies in their blood that matched Cal’s. He’d wanted to go too, determined to be the backup for whatever damn fool plan they had in mind. But Mitch slipped out of bed quietly in the night and left the rig with Bren and a small squad, Cal finding this out from Tanya after he woke up alone.

He stomped around for several hours in an almighty huff, until at dusk, the radio room reported the boat was on its way back. Cal had asked to be told, and he raced off to the winch head, where the boat would be pulled up to the level of the deck. He shouldn’t have raced, because they were still fifteen minutes away, and so he paced like a tiger for ten minutes before a few other people began showing up—Tanya, the doc, a couple of council members. They’d kept this whole thing quiet from the rest of the group to avoid possible disappointment, and would only announce it when they were sure it worked. But rumors had spread, and Cal felt eyes on him everywhere he went.

King of the zombies.

He’d be glad when he no longer had the title.

The small group was tense until the boat arrived and there was something to do getting it winched up, getting the people off. People who were all wearing large grins.

“It worked,” Bren said, with no preliminaries, no need to explain. “The zombies weren’t interested in me or Mitch. It’s like we were invisible or just rocks or something.”

“Congratulations, Phyllis,” Mitch said. “I’d say you just won a Nobel Prize.”

“Much good it does me now,” she said. “Best thing, really. I have no formal clothes.” But then she broke down and gave a disconcertingly girlish giggle. “Well, well, still got it, eh? Still got it.”

Much handshaking and backslapping later, Cal pulled Mitch away from the others. Bren was holding court about what they’d done ashore. The four soldiers who’d gone with them were trying to set up appointments to get the vaccine too.

“Why did you sneak off without me?” Cal asked, taking Mitch out of earshot of the others.

“I wanted a sort of lab-conditions test,” Mitch said. “We already know you’re invisible to them. I didn’t want that to interfere with the observations in any way.”

“Mitch, I don’t give off a general zombie-repelling field twenty feet away.”

“I know. But I wanted to be sure.”

“And you are now?”

“Yes. It was incredible. We were close enough to touch. The urge to shoot them or run was almost overwhelming. But they ignored us—me and Bren—and only went after the others.”

“So it is the vaccine. It’s not me—not natural immunity, I mean. It’s nothing to do with me having been bitten. It’s the vaccine.” He grinned, suddenly delighted not to be special. “Fucking A.”

“It’s partly you,” Mitch said. “Phyllis used your antibodies to refine the vaccine.”

“Whatever. The point is, it works on everyone.”

“It looks that way. The doctor says there’s still work to do to refine it. And she needs to test it in more people, in case there are some it doesn’t work on or who have a reaction to it. But yes, it looks good. And it changes everything. We have to have a council meeting. I’ve got a plan I’ve been thinking about for the last week, depending on if the vaccine worked. Now that I know it does, it’s time to take the plan to the council.”

“I knew you’d been cooking something up,” Cal said. “Want to give me a sneak preview?”

“No. I’m still getting things worked out in my head.”

“How about if I seduce the details out of you?”

Mitch grinned. “You’ll fail, but feel free to try. After dinner.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

The council assembled, along with almost all the rest of the group, crammed into the mess hall. Only the children, and the adults taking care of them, were absent.

Mitch leaned over to Cal and spoke as the room filled up. “I’m a bit nervous. I didn’t expect
everyone
to show.”

“You’ll fight zombies and bandits, but you’re frightened of addressing a room full of women?”

“Public speaking was never my favorite thing.”

“You were a cop!”

“It’s not the same thing.” Mitch grimaced. “I did have to go talk to school groups sometimes. That was the worst.”

“Well, this lot probably aren’t going to flick spitballs at you.” He took Mitch’s hand, down between the seats, out of sight, a gesture just for the two of them, gave it a gentle squeeze. “It’s your time, Mitch. Don’t be shy. I know you’ve got something amazing to say, even if you won’t tell me exactly what it is. So let’s hear it.”

Kathy banged her gavel then and convened the meeting. It took a moment for the room to come to order. When people stilled, she turned to Mitch, who sat at the end of a long table, Cal at his right-hand side.

“Mitch has something to talk to the whole group about, a proposal he wishes to make.” Kathy frowned a bit, apparently not happy that he hadn’t brought it to the council first. But Cal trusted Mitch’s judgment. Whatever he had to say, it was something the whole group had to decide on. “Mitch, you have the floor.”

“Thank you.” Mitch stood, his hand slipping out of Cal’s. Cal shoved his chair back so he could see Mitch’s face without getting a crick in his neck. Mitch was blushing, shy of the scrutiny of so many eyes on him. He didn’t need to be. This group loved him.

“Just over a week ago, Bren and I watched Cal walk untouched through a crowd of zombies. You all know he was given the vaccine. It not only prevented him from dying and turning, it’s made him somehow…invisible to the zombies.”

There was a stir among the crowd, though all had heard the story by now. Cal attempted to look cool when most eyes turned to him.

“Seven days ago, Bren and I were given the vaccine. Yesterday we went ashore and tracked down some zombies. They ignored us.”

The room exploded into a burst of chatter. “Please,” Mitch called. “Let me continue. I’m sure you all realize what this means. We can all take the vaccine and go ashore safe from the zombies. But I think it also means we have a duty to get this vaccine distributed not only to our group, but more widely. I’ve spoken to the doctor about it, and she says it can be produced on a large scale, with the right equipment.

“We don’t have that equipment here, so we need to go ashore and set up a vaccine distribution center, somewhere with lab facilities. Try to find other doctors and scientists who can help. We need to train as many of the group as possible to manufacture the vaccine. And later, to train others to do so. And as well as that base where people can come to get the vaccine, we must start to get out and distribute it. Make contact with other groups of survivors and get it out across the country. Perhaps one day, across the world.”

He had to stop as the hubbub rose. Cal’s head was almost spinning. Seeing Cal walk through the crowd of zombies had put this world-changing plan into Mitch’s head. His immunity was the key. Cal had been pleased the vaccine worked, because it meant Mitch and the rest of his friends could be safe. But Mitch thought much, much bigger.

“I know, it’s an audacious plan!” Mitch’s voice rose over the crowd, and they started to quiet down. “And we have a lot of work ahead of us. But we’ll only take the first steps alone. Once we get out there, we’ll start connecting with other survivors—even those who currently appear hostile. We’ll negotiate with them and begin to build this network. Imagine how much more effective zombie hunters will be when they don’t have to worry about being bitten. How much more quickly we’ll be able to clear the land and make it habitable.”