KARA’S HAND found the cold steel. She’d never felt such an intense sense of relief. She wrapped her fingers around the gun.
But her relief was premature. She was on her stomach, face planted in the carpet, useless. She twisted and rolled to her back. The gun clanged against the metal bedframe. A thunderous roar ripped through the cramped space.
She’d discharged the gun! Had she hit anyone? Put a hole in the wall or window? Maybe she’d hit Carlos. Or Thomas.
She twisted and saw that Thomas still lay on his back by the far wall. No bullet holes that she could see.
Something bounced on the bed. Carlos.
She fired into the mattress, wincing with the explosion. Again. Boom, boom.
She watched Carlos’s feet land on the floor. Two long strides and he was into the hall.
Kara jerked the trigger and sent another shot in his general direction.
Carlos vanished toward the adjoining suite at the end of the hall. The door banged.
What if he hadn’t really left? What if he was hiding around the wall, waiting for her to stand up and put the gun down before he rushed in and cut her throat?
She scooted into daylight, keeping the gun trained on the doorway as best she could considering all her nervous energy. She carefully stood, edged to the door, and circled to her left in a wide arc until she could see through the door into the hall.
No Carlos.
The door at the end of the hall was open. This man hadn’t acted alone. Someone in the hotel had helped him access their suite through the one next to it.
“Thomas?”
Kara ran around the bed and knelt beside him. “Thomas!” She slapped his cheek lightly.
Someone was banging on the front door. They’d heard the shots. Carlos had fled because he knew they would hear the shots. Her accidental discharge may very well have saved both of their lives.
“Thomas, wake up, honey.”
He groaned and slowly opened his eyes.
Thomas and Kara sat on the sofa in Merton Gains’s suite, waiting for the deputy secretary of state to end a string of calls. He’d greeted them briefly, noted the details of the attack on Thomas, ordered more security for his own suite, and then excused himself for a few minutes. The world was unraveling behind closed doors, he said.
They could hear the secretary’s muffled voice down the hall behind them. Kara spoke quietly, nearly a whisper.
“Fifteen? Fifteen years? You’re sure?”
“Yes. I’m quite sure.”
“How’s that possible? You’re not fifteen years older, are you?”
“My body isn’t, nay—”
“Nay?”
“Sorry.”
“Nay,” she said. “Sounds . . . old.”
“As I was saying, I’m about forty there. Honestly I feel forty here as well.”
Amazing.
“So these wounds of yours are a definite change in the rules between these two realities,” she said, indicating Thomas’s arm. “Knowledge and skills have always been transferable both ways, but before the colored forest turned black, your injuries in that world didn’t cross over here; only injuries from this world crossed over there. Now it goes both ways?”
“Evidently. But it’s blood that transfers, not merely injuries. Blood has to do with life. Actually, blood defiles the lakes, the boy said. It’s one of our cardinal rules. In any case, it’s going both ways now.”
“But when you first hit your head—when this whole thing first started—it bled in both worlds.”
“Maybe I really did wound it in both worlds at the same time. Maybe that’s what opened this gateway.” He sighed. “I don’t know, sounds crazy. We’ll assume that knowledge, skills, and blood are transferable. Nothing else.”
“And that you’re the only gateway. We’re talking about your knowledge, your skills, your blood.”
“Correct.”
“It would explain why you haven’t aged here,” Kara said. “You get cut there and you get cut here, but you don’t age the same, or gain weight the same, or sweat the same. Only specific events tied to the spilling of blood show up in both realities.” She paused. “And you’re a general over there?”
“Commander of the Forest Guard, General Thomas of Hunter,” he said without batting an eye.
“How did that happen?” she asked. “Not that I don’t think you couldn’t be Alexander the Great himself, you understand. It’s just a lot to digest. A little detail would help.”
“Must sound pretty crazy, huh?” A grin played on his lips. This was the Thomas she knew.
He squeezed the leather cushion by his side. “This is all so . . . so strange. So real.”
“That’s because it is real. Please tell me you’re not going to attempt another leap off the balcony.”
He released the pillow. “Okay. Obviously both places are real. At least we’re still assuming so, right? But you have to understand that after fifteen years in another world, this one here feels more like the dream. Forgive me if I behave rather oddly now and then.”
She smiled and shook her head. He was half “rather oddly” and half the old Thomas.
“It’s funny?” he asked.
“No. But just listen to you. ‘Forgive me if I behave rather oddly now and then.’ No offense, brother, but you sound a bit conflicted. Tell me more.”
“After the Shataiki spread their poison through the colored forest, a terrible disease overtook the population. It makes the skin flake on the surface and crack underneath. It’s very painful. The eyes turn gray and the body smells, like sulfur or rotten eggs. But Elyon made a way for us to live without the effects of this disease. Seven forests—regular forests, not colored ones—still stand, and in each forest is a lake. If we bathe in the lake each day, the disease remains in remission. The only condition we have for living in the forest is that we bathe regularly and keep the lakes from being defiled with blood.”
She just looked at him.
“Unfortunately, I’m in a battle with the Horde at this very moment that may end it all.”
“What about the prophecy?”
“That Elyon will bring down the Horde with one blow? Maybe dynamite is Elyon’s answer.” He stood, eager to move forward with this plan. “I have to figure out how to make dynamite before I go back.”
“So I take it you’re still dreaming,” Gains said behind them.
Kara stood with her brother. Hearing the conviction in his voice and seeing the light in his eyes when he talked, she was tempted to think that the real drama was unfolding in a different reality, that the Raison Strain was only a story and the war in Thomas’s desert was the real deal.
Gains brought her back to earth.
“Good,” he said, rounding the sofa. “I have a feeling we’re going to need these dreams of yours. Never imagined I would ever say something like that, but then again, I never imagined we would ever face such a monster either. Can I get either of you a drink?”
Neither responded.
“Again, the lack of security for your suite was my oversight. I hate to admit it, but we’ve underestimated you from the beginning, Thomas. I can guarantee you that has just changed.”
Thomas said nothing.
Gains eyed him. “You sure you’re okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Okay.” He glanced at Kara, then back. “We need you on this, son.”
“I’m not sure I can help anymore. Things have changed.”
Gains stepped forward, took Thomas’s arm, and guided him toward the window. “I’m not sure you realize the full extent of what’s going on, but it’s not looking good, Thomas. Raison Pharmaceutical has just concluded the examination of a jacket that was left on a coatrack in the Bangkok International Airport. A man reportedly harassed several flight attendants before walking to the first-aid station, hanging his coat on the rack, and leaving. Any guesses as to what’s on the coat?”
“The virus,” Kara said.
“Correct. The Raison Strain. As promised by Valborg Svensson. As predicted by none other than Thomas Hunter, which makes you a very, very important man, Thomas. And yes, the virus is airborne. Which means that if the three of us aren’t already infected, we will be before we leave for D.C. Half of Thailand will be infected by week’s end.”
“Leaving for D.C.?” Thomas asked. “Why?”
“The president has suggested that you tell a committee he’s pulling together what you know.”
“I’m not sure I have anything to add to what you know.”
Gains smiled nervously. “I know this hasn’t been the easiest week for you, Thomas, but I’m not sure you’re seeing the picture clearly here. We have a serious situation on our hands, and we don’t have the first idea how to effectively deal with it. But you predicted the situation, and you seem to know more about it than anyone else at the moment. That makes you a guest of the president of the United States. Now. By force if necessary.”
Thomas blinked. He glanced at Kara.
“Makes sense to me,” she said.
“Any word on Monique?” Thomas asked.
“No.”
“But you do understand what’s happening now,” Thomas said. “Svensson may not have the antivirus yet, but with her help, he will. When that happens, we’re finished.”
This was more like her old brother.
“I don’t know what we are. At this point it’s been taken out of my hands—”
“You see? I tell you something and you start in with the doubt. Why should I think that Washington will be any different?”
“I’m not doubting you! I’m just saying that the president has taken this over. I’m not the one who needs persuading; he is.”
“Okay. I’ll go. But I need your help too. I have to figure out how to create an explosion large enough to knock down a cliff before I fall sleep again.”
Gains sighed.
Thomas stepped up, took Gains by the arm in almost the same fashion that Gains had taken his, and walked him slowly toward the same window.
“I’m not sure you realize the full extent of what’s going on, but it’s not looking good, Merton,” he mimicked. “Let me help you. As we speak I am leading what remains of my army, the Forest Guard, in a terrible battle against the Horde. We number fewer than five thousand now. They number a hundred thousand. If I don’t find a way to bring the cliff down on top of them, they’ll overrun us and slaughter our women and children. That may be so much hogwash to you, fine. But there’s another problem. If I die there, I die here. And if I’m dead here, I won’t be of much help to you.”
“Isn’t that a bit of a stretch?”
Thomas thrust out his arm and pulled up his sleeve. “This bandage on my forearm covers a wound I received in battle today. My sheets upstairs are covered with blood. Carlos didn’t cut me while I was sleeping. Who did? My temples are throbbing from a rock I took in the head. Believe me, the other reality is as real as this one. If I die there, I can guarantee you I die here.”
And the opposite was true as well, Kara thought. If he died here, then he would die in the forest.
He pulled down his sleeve. “Now I’ll do everything in my power to help you, if you’ll help me stay alive. I would say that’s an even exchange. Wouldn’t you?”
An unsure grin crawled across the secretary’s face. “Agreed. I’ll see what I can do, on the condition that you won’t talk about these kinds of details in front of the media or the establishment in Washington. I’m not sure they will understand.”
Thomas nodded. “I see your point. Maybe, Kara, you could do some research for me while the secretary fills me in.”
“You want me to figure out how to make explosives?” Her brow arched.
“I’m sure Gains can put a call in to the right people. We’re in canyon lands. Lots of rock, rich in copper and tin ores. We make bronze weapons now. Even if we withdraw, we’ll only have a few hours to find whatever ingredients you come up with and make explosives. It has to be strong enough to knock down canyon walls along a natural fault.”
“Black powder,” Gains said.
Thomas faced him. “Not dynamite?”
“I doubt it. Black powder was first made by combining several common elements. That’s your best bet.” He shook his head. “God help us. We’re casually discussing which explosive will best blow up this ‘Horde’ while breathing in the world’s deadliest virus.”
“Who can help me?” Kara asked Gains.
He flipped open his cell phone, walked into the kitchen, punched up a number, spoke briefly in soft tones, and ended the call.
“You met Phil Grant last night. Director of the CIA. He’s next door, and he’ll put as many people as you need on it.”
“Now?”
“Yes, now. If black powder can be found and made in a matter of hours, the CIA will find the people who can tell you how.”
“Perfect.” Thomas said.
Kara liked the new Thomas. She winked at him and left.
Thomas turned to Gains. “Okay now, where were you?”
It was all coming back to Thomas. Not that he’d forgotten any of the details, but he’d felt a bit disoriented thus far. He could only be spread so thin. With each passing minute in this world, his sense of its immediate crisis swelled, matching the crisis that depended on him in the other world.
“Washington.”
Thomas ran a hand through his hair. “I can’t imagine a group of politicians listening to anyone as forthright as me. They’ll think I’m insane.”
“The world’s about to go ballistic, Thomas. The French, the British, the Chinese, Russia . . . every country in which Svensson has released this monster is reeling already. They want answers, and you may be the only person other than those complicit in this plot to give them answers. We don’t have time to debate your sanity.”
“Well said.”
“You made a believer out of me. I’ve gone out on a limb for you. Don’t back out on me, not now.”
“Where has Svensson released the virus?”
“Come with me.”
There was a sense of déjà vu to the meeting. Same conference room, same faces. But there were also some significant differences. Three new attendees had joined through video conference links. Health Secretary Barbara Kingsley, a high-ranking officer of the World Health Organization, and the secretary of defense, although he excused himself after only ten minutes. Something was odd about his early departure, Thomas thought.
Eyes flittered about the room on high-strung nerves. The confident glares of last night were gone. Most of them had trouble meeting his stare.
They spent thirty minutes rehashing the reports they’d received. Gains had been right. Russia, England, China, India, South Africa, Australia, France—all of the countries that had been directly threatened this far were demanding answers from the State Department. But there were none, at least none that offered the slightest sliver of hope. And by end of day, the number of infected cities was promised to double.
Raison Pharmaceutical’s report on the jacket left in the Bangkok airport took up fifteen minutes of speculation and conjecture, most of it led by Theresa Sumner from CDC. If, and it was a big if, she insisted, every city Svensson claimed to have infected actually had been infected, and if— again it was a big if—the virus did indeed act as the computer models showed it would, then the virus was already too widespread to stop.
None of them could quite grasp such a cataclysmic scenario.
“How in the name of heaven could anything like this have possibly happened?” Kingsley demanded. She was a heavy-boned woman with dark hair, and her question was greeted with silence.
This same simple question would be asked a hundred thousand times in as many clever ways as possible in the next week alone, Thomas thought.
“Mr. Raison, maybe you can give me an explanation that I would feel comfortable passing on to the president.”
“It’s a virus, madam. What explanation would you like?”
“I know it’s a virus. The question is how is this possible? Millions of years of evolution or however we got here, and just like that a bug comes out of nowhere to kill us all off? These aren’t the Dark Ages, for crying out loud!”
“No, in the Dark Ages the human race didn’t have the technology to create anything this nasty.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t see this coming.”
It was as close to an accusation as one could make, and it silenced the room.
“Anyone who understands the true potential of superbugs could have seen something like this coming,” Jacques de Raison said. “The balance of nature is a delicate matter. There is no way to predict mutations of this kind. Please explain that to your president.”
They looked at each other as if at any moment one of them would surely say something that would set this terrible mistake straight.
April fools!
But it wasn’t April and no one was fooling.
They rallied around Sumner’s repeated announcement that the virus had only been verified in Bangkok. No one else knew quite what to look for, although the CDC was working feverishly to get the right information into the right hands.
“Don’t we have a plane to catch?” Thomas finally asked.
They looked at him as if his statement should require some examination. Everything Thomas Hunter said was now worthy of examination.
“The car will take us in thirty minutes,” Gains’s assistant offered.
“Good. I’m not sure we’re doing any good here.”
Silence.
“How so?” someone finally asked.
“For starters, I’ve already told you all of this. And all the talk in the world won’t change the fact that we’re facing an airborne virus that will infect the world’s entire population within two weeks. There’s only one way to deal with the virus, and that is to find an antivirus. For that I believe we’ll need Monique de Raison. The fate of the world rests on finding her.”
He pushed back his chair and stood.
“But we can’t speak of finding Monique de Raison here, because in doing so we’ll probably tip our hand to Svensson. I believe he has someone on the inside.”
Gains cleared his throat. “You’re suggesting there’s a mole? Here?”
“How else did Carlos know exactly where to find me? How else did he gain access to my suite through the adjoining room? How else did he know I was sleeping when he entered?”
“I have to agree,” Phil Grant said. Thomas wondered if the man’s trust of his colleagues had kept his own suspicions at bay until now. “There are other ways he could have gained access, but Thomas makes a good point.”
“Then I must say that the French government would like custody of Thomas Hunter,” Louis Dutêtre said.
All eyes turned to the French intelligence officer.
“Paris has come under attack. Mr. Hunter knew of that attack before it occurred. This places him under suspicion.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Gains said. “They tried to kill him this morning.”
“Who did? Who saw this mysterious intruder? As far as we know, Thomas is the mole. Isn’t that a possibility? My country insists on the opportunity to interrogate—”
“Enough!” Gains stood. “This meeting is adjourned. Mr. Dutêtre, you may inform your people that Thomas Hunter is in the protective custody of the United States of America. If your president has a problem with that, please advise him to call the White House. Let’s go.”
“I object!” Dutêtre jumped to his feet. “We are all affected; we should all participate.”
“Then find Svensson,” Gains said.
“For all you know, this man is Svensson!”
Now there was an interesting idea.
Gains walked from the room without a backward glance. Thomas followed.
The small jet winged westward over Thailand, bound for Washington, D.C., six hours after the first fax to the White House informed the world that everything had just changed for Homo sapiens. The CDC had now verified the virus in two new cities: New York and Atlanta. They started with the airports, following indications in Bangkok, and they hadn’t needed to go any farther.
Svensson was using the airports.
Had used the airports.
The first critical decision was now upon the world leaders. Should they shut down the airports and by so doing slow the spread of the virus? Or should they avert public panic by withholding information until they had something more concrete?
According to Raison Pharmaceutical, closing the airports wouldn’t slow the virus enough to make a difference—it was too widespread already. And panic wasn’t a prospect any of the affected governments were willing to deal with yet. For now, the airports would remain open.
Thomas had been awake for only four hours, but now he was eager to fall asleep. He held the thin manila folder in his hands and read the contents for the fifth time.
Kara frowned. “It might not have the kind of power you need—it’s pretty slow burning—but Gains was right. Black powder is the only explosive you have any chance of pulling together in the middle of nowhere.”
“How am I going to find this stuff?”
“They tell me the kind of firepower you need isn’t impossible. The Chinese figured it out nearly two thousand years ago by accident. You can be nearly 50 percent off on the combination of ingredients and still get a decent bang. And the three ingredients you’ll need are very common. You just have to know what you’re looking for, which you now do. Do you have sugar there?”
“Some, yes. From sugarcane, just like here.”
“If you can’t get to the charcoal quickly enough, sugar will work as a fuel as well. Here’s a list of more substitutes. The ratios are all there. Stall the Horde, and stall them hard. Deploy a thousand soldiers to find what you need.”
“A little research and you’re ready to start commanding armies?” He grinned. “You’d be good there, Kara. You really would be.”
“You like it better there than here?”
He hadn’t considered the comparison. “I’m not sure there is a ‘there’ that’s not also ‘here.’ Hard to explain and it’s just a hunch, but both realities are actually very similar.”
“Hmm. Well if you ever figure out how to take others with you, promise to take me first.”
“I will.”
She sighed. “I know this isn’t exactly the best time to bring this up, but do you remember the last thing I told you before you disappeared for fifteen years last night?”
“Remind me.”
“It was only twelve hours ago. I suggested that you become someone who could deal with the situation here. Now you’ve come back a general. It just makes me wonder.”
“Interesting thought.”
“You really have changed, Thomas. And I hate to break it to you, but I really think you’ve changed for the sake of this world, not that one.”
“Maybe.”
“We’re running out of time. You’ve got to start figuring things out. Get past all this noncommittal ‘maybe’ and ‘interesting thought’ stuff. If you don’t, we just may be toast.”
“Maybe.” He grinned and closed the folder. “But unless I can figure out how to survive as General Hunter there, I won’t be around here to figure anything out. Like I said, if I die there, I think I die here.”
“And if you die here?” she asked. “What happens if the virus kills us all?”
He hadn’t connected the dots in that way, and her suggestion alarmed him. But it only made sense that if he died here along with the rest, he would die in the forest.
“Let’s just hope this black powder of yours works, sis.”
“Sis?”
“I’ve always called you that.”
She shrugged. “Sounds odd now.”
“I am odd, sis. I am very, very odd.” He sighed, leaned his head back, and closed his eyes. “Time to get back into the ring. I’m almost tempted to ask you to rub my shoulders down. Fourteenth round and I’m dead on my feet.”
“Not funny. You have everything you need?”
He tapped his head. “I’ve read the material a dozen times. Let’s hope I can remember it. Let’s hope I can find what I need.”
“Elyon’s strength,” she said.
He cracked one eye and looked at her. “Elyon’s strength.”