12. 12 #2
A loud crack echoed throughout the room, every head turning in unison toward the source. It was like a wrecking ball had slammed into the side of the building. Elias jumped out of his seat and sprinted across the room. The world had frozen except for him.
He jumped onto a table under the window, pressing his face to the glass to look out. Left and right he turned his head, pausing as he identified the source of the noise. Turning his head, he met my gaze and jerked his head toward the window.
I stood, not nearly as quick as Elias, and I jogged to where he was perched. I felt every eye in the room on me as I moved.
He held out a hand, not looking back at me, and I took it to pull myself up, stepping first on the bench, then the table. Elias wordlessly pressed a finger to the window, pointing out the danger. My eyes followed, and I nearly fell backward as I saw what he did.
A man, infected with NT02, clear as day. He hadn’t been infected long, but patches of him had already been transformed into the dull metal I’d come to be familiar with.
“Misha,” called Elias. “Tell everyone to barricade themselves into their rooms. Grab weapons if they have them.”
He sat at a table with a few other scientists, his face pale. He didn’t speak.
“Do it now, please,” said Elias.
Misha complied this time, speaking slowly in Russian.
The crowd began to speak quietly amongst themselves, but didn’t move from their seats.
In their minds, there was no reason to hide.
Not only had they not seen what the Novikov-Taylor viruses could do to the human body, they likely weren’t aware of their existence.
On top of it all, two gun toting Americans were in the room with them.
If a polar bear tried to break into the building, we could stop it.
“If anyone wants to know why they need to hide, they can come look out this window.”
Misha repeated the instructions to the group, and chaos followed a brief period of confusion. They looked, and they ran, footsteps drowning out every other sound until they had emptied the dining hall. Misha stayed behind.
“He wanted me to bring you to him last night,” he said. “I was going to keep you with me until he came.”
“I thought you were trying to come on to me!” This couldn’t have been my fault. If the information was so pressing, he should have just come out and said it directly.
He pointed a finger at Elias. “No. He frightens me.”
“What did he want?” Elias asked, cutting to the chase.
“He did not say. Dr. Novikov was acting differently yesterday. Before you left with him, he was giving me instructions on how to care for Dr. Petrova.” He stood from the table and approached us. “He was telling me things about the virus.”
“Telling you what?”
“What it does.”
He hadn’t known, he’d only known it was dangerous, judging by our first interaction in the lab when he’d been afraid to shake my hand.
“And what is that?” Elias asked.
“I think you saw it,” he said. “Out there.”
“I did.” Elias and I both had seen it. More than enough. “Have you?”
Misha paused for a moment before nodding his head toward me. “I think he was going to infect her.”
Even though I thought he was coming onto me, the feeling in my gut was right.
Going with Misha last night would’ve been bad.
It would have been the last thing I ever did.
Novikov had been so open with me, sharing information about his wife and her sickness.
I thought he wanted me to help her. I hadn’t imagined that infecting himself, then me, was a part of a plan.
It was a terrible plan and another example of why I should be included in the decision making process.
I preferred my flesh the way it was, and my brain intact.
It was impossible to tell if it was Novikov by the sight of him, but it couldn’t be anyone else. His hair was gone, half bald skin, half steel. Nearly out of sight, I stared as he stumbled away from the window along the side of the building, rounding the corner at the end. “He’s gone.”
“You have any weapons around here, Misha?” Elias asked.
“No.”
“Great,” Elias muttered. He walked to the edge of the room and entered the kitchen.
Misha and I watched him through the service window as he picked up a fire extinguisher and used it to smash a pane of glass.
Clearing the shards of glass away with the extinguisher, he dropped it on the ground, and pulled a bright red handled axe from the wall.
“I’m not giving you my gun, and I’m sure as hell not taking the gun from Cassie,” Elias said as he walked back into the dining area. He held out the axe for Misha to take. “You get the axe.”
Misha hesitated, staring at Elias rather than taking the weapon from his hands.
“Misha,” I said. “You should really take that.”
“Why are you making me fight with you? I want to hide with the others.”
Elias began to pace around the room. “You’re the only one here besides us that has any fucking idea of what’s going on. You’ve been working on the virus with Cassie, and you know what it can do. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
“Elias.” His head whipped around at the sound of my voice. “We need to go to our room, gather ammunition, and call for extraction.”
Depending on how NT02 had progressed, what parts were impenetrable, the guns might work. If there was a nice supple spot left between the eyes, then I had a good idea of where to point my weapon.
“You’re right.” He unzipped his jacket and grabbed his gun. He pointed a finger from his free hand at Misha. “You’re coming with us.”
I held my own gun at the ready, and gestured for Misha to follow Elias. I stayed behind him, ensuring he wouldn’t take off. Not that I thought he would, of course, he was scared of Elias.
The halls were barren as we walked, and I nearly jumped out of my skin as I heard furniture skid across the floor. Someone was in a room nearby, blocking off the door. Misha flinched ahead of me too, but Elias paid it no mind.
When we reached our room, Elias stepped to the side, guiding Misha and I in, locking the door behind us. He was at the desk immediately, packing up his equipment, the satellite phone at his ear.
I took it upon myself to grab the box of ammunition Elias had brought. We didn’t have any spare magazines that I knew about, and I didn’t have any belts or pouches for storage. I’d have to carry loose bullets in my pocket. I grabbed a handful and filled the pocket on my right thigh.
As Elias rambled on to Jordan, I shoved our clothes and belongings back into our bags. I listened carefully for any movement by Misha, waiting to hear the lock click on the door, but he remained in the room, leaning against the wall.
“It will be okay, Misha,” I said, looking up at him from my place on the floor. “We’ll get out.”
“Everyone else?” He asked.
I put Elias’s MP3 player and my phone into my pants, filling my left pocket. I wasn’t sure why I grabbed the Walkman, if it was lost Elias would have no trouble getting another, but I felt like I needed to.
“They should be okay if they stay in their rooms.” If they were quiet, maybe, but we couldn’t corral them, shepherd over them like they were farm animals.
Whoever was infected with NT02, and I was positive that it was Novikov, would have no trouble breaking through whatever barricades they’d erected if he came inside.
Elias joined me near our luggage and began to dig through his bags.
“What are you looking for?”
He held up a thumb drive. “This.”
We’d be taking as much information as possible from this place, it seemed.
“Russian Military will be here in an hour to evacuate civilians,” Elias looked at Misha.
“That includes you, if I don’t decide to bring you with us.
” He put a hand on my arm when he spoke to me.
“We’re getting a helicopter to a secure location where we will wait for the Americans to take us the rest of the way. ”
“What’s the timeline on that?” I asked.
“Less than three hours. They’re coming from a NATO base in Norway. Then we get to wait for the big man to take us home.”
“What does that mean?”
“We get to ride home with the President.”
My mouth fell open.
“He’s in Europe, it’s not that far-fetched,” he clarified. He stacked our luggage against the wall, his equipment safely packed away. “He wants the information we have. Immediately.”
I swallowed hard. “I have to meet the President?”
“Don’t get starstruck, he’s a dick.”