Descended stairs at one end of the station, came to an air-lock door with a sign:
ATTENTION! LABORATORY ZONE
AUTHORIZED PERSONS ONLY
DO NOT ENTER UNLESS YOU WANT TO GET BURNED BLOWN UP
OR INFEKTED
“Beaker humor. Merritt can take you in there,” Graeter said.
Minutes later, they stood beneath the station in a rectangular tunnel, eight feet wide and twelve feet high. The floor and walls were smooth, white ice. Icicles and frost formations dangled from the ceiling. Round metal tubes, two feet in diameter, hung from one wall.
“Welcome to the Underground,” Graeter said. “A labyrinth carved out over the years. This main tunnel runs under the length of the station. Other tunnels branch off, and still others branch off them. Imagine a Scrabble board late in the game.”
“What is that smell?”
“Sewage and diesel fuel.”
They walked on. Graeter turned right down one secondary corridor, right again into another, and kept turning into new corridors for several minutes. “Know where you are?”
“Do you mean could I find my way back to the stairs? Maybe.”
“Maybe isn’t good enough at Pole,” Graeter said.
“Why did I know you were going to say that?” Hallie asked.
“That’s what you need to know about the Underground. Let’s go back.”
“What else is down here?” Hallie asked as they walked.
“Bulk food storage. Generators, primary and backups. Fuel reservoirs. NCS holdings more than anything else.”
“NCS?”
“Non–cold sensitive. Everything from old furniture to files.”
They passed a chamber whose entrance was blocked by a sheet of heavy black canvas. The other “rooms” she’d seen were open.
“What’s in there?” she asked.
“That’s the morgue. Lanahan and Montalban are in there, until we get them on a flight out.”
She stopped. “Is that where Emily stayed?”
“Yes.”
He looked at the black sheet, then back at her. Turned and kept going. She lingered for a few moments, feeling tears start to well up, pushed them back down. Rage came, hot and red. Then grief, and then, last of all, horror.
Something touched her shoulder and she started.
“Jesus!”
Graeter. He had come back without her hearing. “I told you about ghosts,” he said.
17
“ COFFEE, TEA, OR GLENFIDDICH? ” DON BARNARD ASKED AS WIL Bowman settled into a red leather chair. They were in Barnard’s office in the BARDA complex, outside Washington, D.C. It was ten A.M . on Tuesday.
“Nothing, thanks.”
They sat with a coffee table between them. Barnard brought a mug of coffee with him. “Thanks for making time on short notice.”
“When the director of BARDA calls, I answer. Especially when it has to do with Hallie.”
“It’s good to see you under happier circumstances. The last time was …” Barnard shook his head, unable to find the right word.
“Scary as hell,” Bowman said.
“Amen.”
It was at BARDA, thanks to Don Barnard, that Bowman had first met Hallie Leland, a year earlier. Barnard had assembled a team of scientists to search the world’s deepest cave for a natural antibiotic that might stave off a pandemic. He made no secret of the fact that people could die. When an uncomfortable silence extended—these were scientists, not SEALs—Hallie stalked to the front of the roomand declared that this was the opportunity of a lifetime: millions of lives might be saved. The rest of them might not go down into the cave, but she sure as hell would. Alone, if she had to. Bowman, in his government’s service, would go, of course. The others could choose. In the end, they all went, and Bowman had never forgotten how she’d galvanized that team.
Not many men outsized Don Barnard, but Bowman was one. Six feet four, 230 pounds of hard muscle. A natural mesomorph, big-shouldered and narrow-waisted, clean-shaven, with a straw-colored brush cut. His nose showed the effects of nonverbal conflict resolution, and a thin pink scar divided his right eyebrow into two short dashes. His
ATTENTION! LABORATORY ZONE
AUTHORIZED PERSONS ONLY
DO NOT ENTER UNLESS YOU WANT TO GET BURNED BLOWN UP
OR INFEKTED
“Beaker humor. Merritt can take you in there,” Graeter said.
Minutes later, they stood beneath the station in a rectangular tunnel, eight feet wide and twelve feet high. The floor and walls were smooth, white ice. Icicles and frost formations dangled from the ceiling. Round metal tubes, two feet in diameter, hung from one wall.
“Welcome to the Underground,” Graeter said. “A labyrinth carved out over the years. This main tunnel runs under the length of the station. Other tunnels branch off, and still others branch off them. Imagine a Scrabble board late in the game.”
“What is that smell?”
“Sewage and diesel fuel.”
They walked on. Graeter turned right down one secondary corridor, right again into another, and kept turning into new corridors for several minutes. “Know where you are?”
“Do you mean could I find my way back to the stairs? Maybe.”
“Maybe isn’t good enough at Pole,” Graeter said.
“Why did I know you were going to say that?” Hallie asked.
“That’s what you need to know about the Underground. Let’s go back.”
“What else is down here?” Hallie asked as they walked.
“Bulk food storage. Generators, primary and backups. Fuel reservoirs. NCS holdings more than anything else.”
“NCS?”
“Non–cold sensitive. Everything from old furniture to files.”
They passed a chamber whose entrance was blocked by a sheet of heavy black canvas. The other “rooms” she’d seen were open.
“What’s in there?” she asked.
“That’s the morgue. Lanahan and Montalban are in there, until we get them on a flight out.”
She stopped. “Is that where Emily stayed?”
“Yes.”
He looked at the black sheet, then back at her. Turned and kept going. She lingered for a few moments, feeling tears start to well up, pushed them back down. Rage came, hot and red. Then grief, and then, last of all, horror.
Something touched her shoulder and she started.
“Jesus!”
Graeter. He had come back without her hearing. “I told you about ghosts,” he said.
17
“ COFFEE, TEA, OR GLENFIDDICH? ” DON BARNARD ASKED AS WIL Bowman settled into a red leather chair. They were in Barnard’s office in the BARDA complex, outside Washington, D.C. It was ten A.M . on Tuesday.
“Nothing, thanks.”
They sat with a coffee table between them. Barnard brought a mug of coffee with him. “Thanks for making time on short notice.”
“When the director of BARDA calls, I answer. Especially when it has to do with Hallie.”
“It’s good to see you under happier circumstances. The last time was …” Barnard shook his head, unable to find the right word.
“Scary as hell,” Bowman said.
“Amen.”
It was at BARDA, thanks to Don Barnard, that Bowman had first met Hallie Leland, a year earlier. Barnard had assembled a team of scientists to search the world’s deepest cave for a natural antibiotic that might stave off a pandemic. He made no secret of the fact that people could die. When an uncomfortable silence extended—these were scientists, not SEALs—Hallie stalked to the front of the roomand declared that this was the opportunity of a lifetime: millions of lives might be saved. The rest of them might not go down into the cave, but she sure as hell would. Alone, if she had to. Bowman, in his government’s service, would go, of course. The others could choose. In the end, they all went, and Bowman had never forgotten how she’d galvanized that team.
Not many men outsized Don Barnard, but Bowman was one. Six feet four, 230 pounds of hard muscle. A natural mesomorph, big-shouldered and narrow-waisted, clean-shaven, with a straw-colored brush cut. His nose showed the effects of nonverbal conflict resolution, and a thin pink scar divided his right eyebrow into two short dashes. His
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