“Yes, you have an ace,” Klaus began. “But we can still help you…”
“Klaus wasn’t judging your men, or your approach,” Michelle interjected. Sometimes Klaus could be a little too direct. Barbara was a past master at smoothing those times out, and Michelle wished she were here. “We just need to know where everything stands at the moment. From the outside, things are very confusing.”
That seemed to mollify Nabiyev, and when Michelle glanced over at Klaus, he didn’t seem annoyed with the interruption. The last thing they needed was getting into a tangle with the military—or each other.
“We sent one platoon in,” Nabiyev said with a heavy sigh. “Most of them didn’t come back. And the few that did, well, you can see them in the infirmary. The injured civilians coming out are in the Red Crescent compound. And on top of everything else, we have every major media outlet camped just outside our position.”
Klaus frowned. “Before we head out, we should get a better idea of what we’re dealing with,” he said. “Michelle and Ana, you go check on the civilians who’ve come out of the city and see if the doctors have any idea what’s happening to them.
“Aero, you and Angel go talk to the soldiers who were in the zone. Maybe they’ll have some insight into what’s going on.”
He motioned to the rest of the aces. “Doktor, Tinker, Recycler, get as close to the perimeter of the fog as you can. Get some more recent pictures and video.”
There was a gleam in Klaus’s eye. Michelle knew that expression. He got that look whenever he was about to jump into the fray.
Representative Temir Bondarenko of Kazakhstan was a thin, tall man, who looked as if he might break in half if he fell down. That impression was enhanced by the drawn and sallow face; Bondarenko looked as if he hadn’t slept in days. Barbara figured that might actually be a correct assessment. Evidently, Ink felt the same way as she ushered the man into the meeting room where Barbara and Jayewardene were waiting. “Coffee?” she asked. The tattoos on her right arm swirled: a pot pouring dark liquid into a mug.
“Ah! Yes, please,” Bondarenko answered. “I would … like.” Barbara rose from her chair, as did Jayewardene. The man’s handshake was firm but not overmuch so, and he sank quickly into the seat that Barbara offered him. His accent was strong, and it was obvious that his English was limited.
“Would you be more comfortable speaking in your own language?” Barbara asked. “I can make it so we can all understand each other.”
Bondarenko nodded, and Babel closed her eyes momentarily, letting her wild card ability fill the room, encompassing all three of them. “I know your ability, Ms. Baden. Secretary-General Jayewardene has told me of it. Thank you.” He clasped his hands together on the table. “This situation is awful,” he said. “Nothing less. I appreciate having the opportunity to meet with you, and to hear that Lohengrin and other aces are already on their way to help. I wish you to know that my country is grateful.” He paused as Ink entered with a tray holding a pot of coffee and three mugs. She set it down near Bondarenko, shaking her head covertly to Barbara: nothing new from Lohengrin. “And I am personally grateful as well,” Bondarenko finished.
“Your family is in Talas?” Barbara knew from Ink’s background material that this was the case, and Bondarenko verified it with a quick nod as he poured himself coffee.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ve not heard from them in two days now. I hope they left before…” He didn’t finish the sentence. He took a sip of the coffee. “Your aces will be there…?”
“They’ve already landed. Thank you for arranging for them to land at your airbase and having your people meet them. That will be a great help.”
A nod. “I have photographs of Talas that you should already have in both of your e-mails—aerial photos of Talas taken over the last two weeks. It’s possible by looking at the sequence to determine where this disturbance began: in the hospital on Appasovoy Street in the city. You can see fog spread out from there. That must be the center: that hospital. I am certain that someone, or something, there has caused this.”
Barbara glanced at Jayewardene. The Secretary-General said nothing, but his lips pressed together tightly. “Thank you, Representative Bondarenko. That will be an immense help to all of us. I’ll have Ink relay that information to Lohengrin and the aces via satellite phone, along with the photos.”
“And I will let Brussels know so that the UN is aware as well,” Jayewardene added. “As Ms. Baden said, this is excellent information. If there’s anything else that you find out…”
“Then I will tell you immediately,” Bondarenko said. “That I promise. This horror that has been unleashed on my country has to be stopped. Too many, far too many, have already died.” The sadness in his eyes, the exhaustion on his face, all pulled at Barbara.
“Representative,” she said. “Your family. Do you have pictures of them?”
The trace of a smile slid across his face, and he pulled out his wallet, sliding out a snapshot from a pocket there. Barbara looked at them: a woman holding three children and smiling at the camera. She could see Bondarenko’s features echoed there, especially in the eldest, a daughter. “You have a beautiful family,” she told him. “And you must be terribly worried about them.”
His eyes shimmered at that, and he took a long breath. “Very much so,” he said. “They’d gone back to visit family, then this thing happened. I don’t know…” He stopped, giving Barbara a wan smile. He started to reach for the photo, but Barbara tapped a finger on it.
“May I have my assistant scan this? I want to send the photo to Lohengrin and the aces—that way, if they see your family, they can send word back here immediately.”
Bondarenko blinked hard. “Yes,” he said. “That is kind of you, Ms. Baden. Yes. Thank you.”
She smiled at him. “There’s no need for thanks,” she told him. “We both want the same thing, Representative Bondarenko. We want this carnage ended, and we want those we love and care about back safely with us.”
Olena was alive, that much was certain, but it was all they knew. She lay on her back on a low cot in one of the villagers’ humble homes. Sleeping. Marcus sat beside her, his tail coiled and bulky in the small room. The verdict was still out on everything: if Nurassyl’s power had overcome the poison, if she’d wake up, what she’d say if she did, and what the villagers were going to do with him. They let him be alone with her, but only after a lively debate, not a word of which he could follow. As far as he could understand, they were giving him the benefit of the doubt for the time being, waiting for Olena to recover so they could hear what she had to say.
Marcus wore an oversized sweater one of the jokers had given him to replace his tattered, blood- and filth-smeared shirt. Nurassyl had healed Marcus as well, much against his protests. Marcus had refused treatment at first, a sort of punishment to himself. But Nurassyl was insistent, in his quiet, gentle way.
Now, Marcus watched Olena breathe, following each slow rise and fall of her chest. He could almost see the air flowing in and out of her thin lips. She looked marvelously peaceful, but his mind reeled. She looked calm—and Nurassyl’s power had obviously saved her from his poison—but had the boy been able to save her mind? Was she still Olena? If so, would she understand why he’d done what he did? Would she even wake up sane? For all he knew, she might still be that bloody-faced, raging, barely recognizable terror. And if she was all right, what then?
Jyrgal’s wife, Aliya, made Marcus a pot of tea and set it on a table beside him, with some small, sweet-looking cakes. She was a quiet woman, a nat, it seemed like, slim and plain and, Marcus thought, perfectly lovely. Of course she was. Wife to Jyrgal and mother to Nurassyl; how could she not be a lovely person? Marcus was famished, but it was a dull hunger and he didn’t yet want to feed it.
Alone after Aliya left, Marcus wondered if he should try praying. He hadn’t done that since back in his old life, when he was still a nat and his family loved him—or claimed to. He let the only praye
r he knew by heart start to form in his mind. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name … That’s as far as he went with it. The words didn’t feel right anymore. It was a prayer from his old life, and that had never felt farther away or completely unattainable. It was a life that had nothing to do with him anymore. Why pray to a god who allowed the things that happened last night? Who had allowed the wild card virus? Who never once proved that he gave a crap about the people he was supposed to have created in his image?
Marcus whispered, “Do you hate us so much?”
Father Squid would’ve said just the opposite. Marcus couldn’t understand how the priest had managed to find God after all the misery he’d seen. He’d been able to pray, to believe, to love, even in the midst of Jokertown’s squalor. He always said that God loved jokers most of all. Those challenged by the virus had a harder lot in life, but they’d be rewarded for it in heaven. Marcus thought that maybe he could pray to that God. He bent his head, closed his eyes, and started again.
“Dear God—God of jokers, I mean—I don’t know if you’ve noticed me. If you have, you probably don’t think much of me. I’ve done a lot of things I’m not proud of. But it’s hard, being like me. People make it hard, you know? I try to do the right things. If you know everything, you know that. God, I just want one thing. Save Olena. I love her. I love her like I’ve never loved anybody. And she’s a good person. You can see that, right? The world needs good people, right? And I don’t mean just live. Let her be all right. If you do that, I’ll do whatever you ask of me. I swear it. Whatever you ask, I’ll do it. Just let me know what.”
He paused, unsure what to say next. That was it, he guessed, and it felt just as hollow as he figured it would. He exhaled a weary breath, opened his eyes, and found Olena awake and watching him. He stared at her, pinned to the moment, unsure which Olena she was, not wanting to say or do the wrong thing.
“I didn’t know you were religious,” she said. “It’s sweet of you to want to ‘save’ me, but that’s not for me.” She grinned suggestively. “I’m too much of a sinner.”
Marcus still found it impossible to speak. She was awake. She was talking with him, smiling, joking even. So she wasn’t insane, and she didn’t hate him. She’d even said he was sweet. It was too much. He didn’t have the words. So instead he kissed her. Softly at first, and then with more passion. She returned it, making sounds low in her throat. He loved the feel of her lips and her arms, her skin so soft and warm. Her hands slid under the sweater, moving over his torso as she pulled him closer, as hungry for him as he was for her. He was so flooded with relief and filled with desire that he didn’t question the instant passion. He let it become everything, all the horrors forgotten. He squirmed on to the bed, twisting her with him so that she broke the kiss to laugh. She straddled him, legs wrapping around his smooth, scaled lower torso. He felt the pressure of an erection pressing against his scales, starting to emerge. It would have, except that she grinned and exclaimed, “You’re crying!” She wiped tears that Marcus hadn’t known were there from his cheek. “Silly boy. Why do you cry? You are being strange.”
“I just can’t believe you’re all right.”
She leaned in and kissed the moisture away from one cheek. Lips wet on his skin, she asked, “Why wouldn’t I be?”
As aroused as he was, he put a hand to her chest and gently pushed her up so he could see her face. “With all the stuff we saw … The way things got so crazy … Olena, I’m sorry for what I did, but it was all I could think to do to save you. You were so close to…”
His words dribbled away as the expression on her face morphed from amusement to bewilderment, and then to something darker. She sat up and swiped her hair from her face, shoving it behind an ear. “What are you talking about?” She looked around the room, taking it in. “What did we see that was crazy? And where are we? I don’t know this room.”
Marcus asked, “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“I…” The rest of the sentence got caught in the wrinkles of her forehead, or lost in the glazed look in her eyes. “I’m not sure. My father … did he come here?” Marcus nodded. “Yes, I remember that. We made a deal with him to go back to Talas. In the helicopter, we flew there.” She stopped. Backtracked. “We flew toward there. We saw the soldiers and the city approaching.” She fixed him with her blue eyes. “That’s all. Did something happen? Did we crash?” And then, after a pause, “Why don’t I remember?”
He chose to answer the third question instead of the ones that preceded it. “Nurassyl healed you. Maybe that meant taking away the memories of what happened.”
“Healed me from what?” she asked. When he didn’t answer immediately, she asked again, with an edge to her voice this time. “Marcus, healed me from what?” She stared at him, waiting, patient in her impatience.
Someone pulled aside the curtain that hung in the doorway. The Handsmith looked in. Seeing Olena, he grinned. He called something over his shoulder in Russian and then addressed Olena. She responded in kind. They fell into conversation. Her face grew graver as they talked. The Handsmith was calm, gentle as always, but there was a tension in him Marcus hadn’t seen before.
Olena finally looked at her lover. “Jyrgal says that Nurassyl healed me from poison. From your poison, he thinks. He asked me if this was true, and for you to explain. Also, though, he wants to know what is happening in Talas. Something very strange, he says. He asked me about all these things, but I cannot answer. Only you can.”
And just like that, the reprieve was over. It all crashed down on him again. All the things he’d seen. All the things he knew were still out there. With Olena back, he had a voice again. He knew he had to use it. He said, “Ask him to call the whole village together. I’ve things to say that everyone needs to hear.”
One of the soldiers escorted Michelle and Ana to the Red Crescent command tent to meet Dr. Asil Bahar, the man in charge of the Red Crescent rescue effort.
He wore a lab coat over hospital scrubs. His dark hair was tied back into a short ponytail. There were several stacks of medical charts on his desk along with a couple of cell phones.
He made no bones about how busy his people were and how much he didn’t appreciate being interrupted. “You do know we are independent from the military here? General Nabiyev has no authority over me. And I certainly have no obligation to the Committee. I don’t have time to play tour guide.” He had a beautiful upper-class British accent. Scorn dripped from it.
“I realize there’s something extraordinary happening here,” Michelle said, using her very best I’m-here-to-help voice. “If the Committee is going to go into Talas, we need to have some idea of what we’re up against. We need to be prepared. We will do everything we can to make our visit as short as possible, but we need to know what you think is happening so we can decide what to do.”
Bahar snorted and then gave a slightly hysterical laugh. “You want to know what you’re up against, Miss Pond? Please, allow me to show you.”
He turned and walked out of the tent without bothering to see if they were following. Ana gave Michelle a what-the-hell-was-that-all-about expression. Michelle shrugged, and then they followed Bahar out.
He led them past a row of medical tents to three others set apart. As they got closer, a wave of putrid air hit them. Ana gagged. Michelle knew that smell. It smelled like the charnel pit from which she’d pulled Adesina.
“Jesus,” Ana said, lifting the hem of her denim shirt to cover her mouth and nose. “What the hell?”
Bahar smiled grimly, pulled disposable hospital masks out of his coat pocket, and handed one to each of them. Then he put one on himself. “We’ve been using these three tents for the ones who died from whatever is happening inside Talas. You won’t need this mask for contagion, but it will help some with the smell. This is what has been coming out of Talas. Please come in and see.”
Michelle and Ana hesitated, then put on their masks. Bahar stood holding the flap, obviously wait
ing for them to go in first. Michelle stepped through the opening. A narrow path ran through the center of the tent. Corpses were stacked up on tarps along the walls. In the bleak light from the overhead bulb, they saw the carnage coming from inside Talas.
Some of the bodies were no longer human. They were shapeless sacks of flesh with blood seeping out of mysterious orifices and what appeared to be bite marks and other kinds of wounds. One body, if you could call it that, stood out to Michelle. A small blob wearing OshKosh B’gosh overalls covered in blood and what looked like brain tissue. When she was a child, Michelle had been the face of the OshKosh B’gosh brand for girls. Gorge suddenly rose in her throat, and she barely made it out of the tent before ripping off her mask and spewing out the turkey sandwich she’d eaten on the plane.
She wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. Then she put her mask on and went back inside.
“You okay?” Ana asked. She was pale and her voice trembled. Michelle felt the same as Ana looked.
Michelle nodded. Dr. Bahar didn’t speak. He just took a wet wipe from his pocket and handed it to her. She used it to clean off her hands.
“Is this how everyone looks when they come out?” Michelle asked. She could smell her own pukey breath, but it was better than the smell of putrefaction in the room.
“No, some of them come out almost normal. Most of them who come out alive are … well, let me show you.”
They followed him to another hospital tent. This one was bigger than the tents with the corpses. “You won’t need your masks in here,” he said. “Far as we can tell, none of them are contagious. We’ve been isolating the patients as they come out of the zone. Once we’re sure they’re clear, we put them in tents like this.”
Inside the tent, there were rows of cots. At the far end, a woman was examining one of the patients. She looked up and nodded at Bahar.