The Nirvana Plague (43 page)

She was wearing a headset.

“I’ve been trying to reach you,” Marley said. “The comm was dead.”

“We had to pull out. IDD started breaking out in the crowd, and in the police, even our own people — people who’ve been working safely with IDD for weeks now. And you weren’t responsive.” She was apologizing. Sort of. “We had no choice.”

Marley nodded. “Delacourt has it,” he said. “There was nothing I could do.” He was apologizing too.

“OK,” she said. “Let’s get out of the rain and discuss the whole thing. There’s coffee. You look cold.”

They started up toward the island of light.

From the bridge Marley could see Coast Guard ships out in the channel, watching the city with silver searchlights.

“What happened to the power?” he said.

Benford ignored the question. “I’ve been in constant contact with General Harden,” she said, “and Secretary Pritzker. They’re going to want a report from you right away. The President may want to be there too.”

“The President of the United States?”

“Yes, that’s the one I mean,” she said without smiling.

An hour later they were back in the auditorium at Abrams. An enormously enlarged image of Secretary Pritzker glowered down from the middle of the big screen. General Harden was beside him, and several members of his staff were present off screen. Also various officials from Defense and the CDC were dialed in from multiple locations around the country. They appeared in smaller viewports orbiting round Pritzker’s.

“The President is unable to attend,” Pritzker said. “However, I can assure you he is staying abreast of the situation closely.” Pritzker frowned at his mallocution, and turned his giant gaze down on Marley. “Dr. Marley, I’ve been keeping one eye and one ear on your negotiations with your escaped patient all day long.”

He made it sound like Marley was personally responsible for Roger’s breakout.

Marley tried to return Pritzker’s look, but the secretary’s face was so large and so high up the wall he had to crane his neck back to meet his eyes.

“I’ve been updating the President hourly,” Pritzker continued. “I’ll be updating him again immediately after this meeting. He plans to address the nation on television at midnight tonight. Eastern time.”

Pritzker had been the President’s campaign manager when he won his first term in office.

Benford turned toward Marley. Time for him to start talking.

He spoke for ten minutes, presenting his report of the situation on the street.

When he was finished, Pritzker sat back in his chair and let out a long breath. “Jesus Christ Almighty! Now what?”

General Harden leaned in: “The situation on the ground remains unchanged. We have surveillance in place. The weather is keeping helicopters grounded, but we’ll have them back in the air as soon as it breaks. We have long-range infrared cameras set up at strategic positions all around the city perimeter. The mountains will give us excellent angles too — once the clouds clear. In any event, from what we can see at this time, the situation remains, as I said, essentially unchanged. The downtown area is full of people. There are no vehicles moving. However, it’s past nightfall and the temperature is dropping. We expect the weather will drive people indoors before long.”

“Half the people I saw,” Marley said, “weren’t even wearing jackets. And they were getting very wet. Hypothermia is a real danger.”

Pritzker looked from him back to Harden: “What’s the situation with the hospitals?”

Harden signaled someone off screen and a street map of Juneau came up in another viewport on the wall. A series of concentric circles extending as far as the airport marked out distances from a red dot at ground zero, the Purple Pony tavern.

“The main primary care facility is about a mile from city center, outside the effective radius of the outbreak.”

Harden made an X on the screen.

“However, we’ve cut off power throughout the area covered by this map. The hospital is running on their own generators at this point. The local electrical utilities are now operating under military command. We have them restoring power grid by grid, working in toward city center.”

“All right,” Pritzker said. “But no one is going in or out of the main city anyway, right?”

“Yes.”

Harden quickly scratched several more X’s across the main roads leading into the city.

“We’ve set up barricades here, here, and here. The city is isolated. No one goes in or out. The Coast Guard is patrolling the channel and will interdict all water traffic. They’re also providing surveillance. We have other ships en route to provide logistical support if necessary.”

“How did Dr. Marley get out?”

“Colonel Benford was on the bridge where Dr. Marley emerged on foot from the city. She confirmed that he had not succumbed to the disease and let him pass.”

Pritzker’s huge face looked down at Marley again.

“However, the other doctor, who was with you in the saloon today, did not escape?”

Marley was annoyed. Was it really necessary to cover this point again? “That’s what I said.”

“You were there at the very center of the outbreak,” Pritzker said. “How is it that you seem to be immune to IDD?”

“I have no idea.”

“Did you see anyone else who was unaffected?”

“No. But I assume they wouldn’t have been out on the street.”

“Interesting.”

“That’s one of the questions we’d like to have answers to,” Harden said.

Pritzker turned back to Harden. “Yes, I’d say we would.”

“We have an approximate idea of the area of effect,” Harden said. “But we have no idea what percentage of the population within that area have been infected.”

“So what are we going to do to get the situation back under control? Are we in touch with the Juneau city authorities?”

“No, sir. We were in contact with the mayor’s office and the local police up until shortly after the outbreak began. Nothing since. Not even on the civil emergency channels.”

“What about the state government?”

“Nothing. We lost contact with the governor’s office as well. No one is answering our hails on reserved channels. And, of course, we’ve blocked all non-reserved channels.”

“Then are we assuming that all police and governmental personnel in Juneau have succumbed to the disease along with the civilian population?”

“I think we have to assume that is the case. Or else that there has been some kind of coup.”

“Oh, come on,” Marley blurted.

Pritzker glanced at him, but did not respond. He turned back to Harden: “All right. What’s next? The president needs options.”

After the meeting, Benford led Marley to the glass-walled conference room in the control center. Tyminksi trailed after, but she told him to wait outside the room, and closed the door.

“Sit down. I’ve got something to show you,” she said.

Marley fell into the nearest seat.

Benford tapped some icons on the tabletop. The glass walls flashed down, opaque. They needed privacy for this.

“This is a recording from a Wisconsin highway patrol officer’s dashboard camera. They videotape all traffic stops. This one was made yesterday morning.”

The screen at the end of the room flicked on. The camera was following the tail end of a car on an interstate highway. The right turn signal was blinking. The car slowed and pulled off onto the shoulder. The camera followed it to a stop and rolled in closer.

The car was a Mercedes.

“She has it.”

That was the first thing he said after seeing the tape.

Benford stopped the playback. The last frame sat frozen on the screen. The rear of Marley’s Mercedes was small in the distance, speeding away down the highway.

“Yes, and she gave it to the patrolman.”

Marley leaned forward onto his elbows, his head in his hands.

“Are you all right?” Benford said.

“What are they doing in Wisconsin?”

“I assume they’re trying to get here.”

“Where are they now?”

“Unknown.”

He lifted his head now and looked at Benford. “How did you find out about this?”

“Wisconsin police ID’d your car and tracked you to here.”

“This was yesterday morning?”

“Yes.”

“When did you find out about it?”

“What difference does it make?”

“Did you know about it while I was in there talking to Roger?”

“Yes.”

“While I was trying to get him to call Karen?”

“Yes. I got a call from the military police liaison this morning, in the car on the way to your meeting.”

“You knew before I got out of the car?”

“Yes.”

“Well fuck you, colonel.”

“I didn’t tell you because there was nothing either of us could do about it. It would have distracted you from the job you had to do.”

“Fuck you. You didn’t just not tell me about it, you lied to me about it. You told me outside the Pony that you’d only just learned about Karen. And you didn’t say anything about Ally. You knew Ally was with Karen when Roger was trying to call her.”

“I understand you feel manipulated, perhaps betrayed. I had to do it. I’m sorry.”

“Spare me. You’re not sorry.”

“I didn’t tell you about Ally because it would have distracted you from the job you had to do. And I didn’t tell you about Karen because Roger would have smelled it on you. He would have known something was up. You wouldn’t have been able to hide it from him. We can’t hide anything from these people.”

“He knew anyway!”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yes, I do. It’s obvious now from the way he was acting with that ridiculous phone. What was that charade supposed to accomplish anyway?”

“It was supposed to accomplish what I told you. Give you something to bargain with.”

“Well, it didn’t. He knew he was being lied to. Why didn’t we just tell him the truth? That his wife is on the way here to pick him up. That might have been an attractive offer.”

“Because we’re not going to let her pick him up, of course. And he’d know that.”

“Then what’s the point of letting him call her? What if she had answered?”

“We could have traced the call and picked them up.”

“Oh for Christ’s sake, colonel! Why the hell do you care where those two women are or what they’re doing?”

Benford gestured toward the video screen down the table. “You just saw the reason, Dr. Marley. Your wife is actively spreading the disease.”

“Just what the hell did you think you were going to do about her? You saw what happened on the tape. Or were you planning to tranquilize her too?”

“I wasn’t planning anything. It’s out of my hands. She’s wanted by the police. I was cooperating.”

“Cooperating with a vengeance.”

Benford punched a finger on the tabletop and the video screen went black. “Dr. Marley, we don’t have time for petty grievances. I didn’t deceive you for personal reasons. Think about what you’ve seen today. An entire city has broken out with IDD in a single day. My little breach of your code of honor doesn’t amount to a hill of beans.”

Marley felt so weary and confused. Being around Roger made him feel muddleheaded. As the day wore on, the fog had seemed only to grow thicker. Yet getting away from him, talking to the frightened and powerful bureaucrats in Washington, talking to Benford now, had done nothing but deepen the confusion, the unreality of it all. Where did the bullshit stop? Did it ever stop? Could it? It was self-replicating. It was like a virus. A virtual virus. Infecting the mind. Making the mind think viral thoughts instead of real thoughts.