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Gutsy stared at him. Stunned. Gutted.
Into the awful silence, Morton said, “We need to abandon the town. Tonight or first thing in the morning. Do you know if any wild men followed you? Are they already coming here?”
Gutsy shook her head numbly. “No. We were going so fast. I kept looking back, but I didn’t see any the last few miles.”
Morton frowned. “Maybe they wandered off. There are plenty of reanimates out there to distract them. Even so, we need to evacuate the town and head for Site B.”
“Which is where, exactly?” asked Flores. “You said you weren’t sure. Captain Ledger and Mr. Imura could be out on a wild-goose chase.”
“No,” said Gutsy quickly, “the lab technician who drove me here—Holly—says she knows exactly where it is, and from what she said, it’s one of the spots you told Ledger and Sam about.”
“Excellent!” Morton cried. “Then we need to evacuate New Alamo and get there. With the materials and equipment in that lab, we can mass-produce Dòmi. Mind you, we’d still need a stabilizer of some kind. Something moist enough for the Dòmi to bond with, but heavy enough to be usefully directed once we come up with a delivery system.”
Gutsy stood there, staring hard at the doctor. “At the base,” she said slowly, “the staff there were infected by Wodewose that was in the air from the blast. Wouldn’t Dòmi spread, too?”
“As I said, Gabriella,” said Morton impatiently, “it could spread everywhere in time. We can’t rely on chance. Wind patterns are unpredictable. Bioweapons, and event counteragents, have to be directed.”
Gutsy stabbed a finger toward the west. “Then we need to figure something out. I saw a whole swarm of los muertos being infected by wild men. That swarm could be on its way here right now. Thousands of wild men.”
Morton paled. “Save my soul! Listen to me: the Dòmi will work, but we don’t want to be around when the wild men collide with the Night Army. Dòmi is a superquick-onset counteragent. The original plan had been to lure swarms of reanimates into remote areas and then deliver the paracide, via airburst. That would take over the reanimate hosts, and by the time the wild men found their way to any populated area, the more extreme symptoms—the shrieking and murderous rage—would have worn off. The older reanimates would simply collapse, and the new ones would likely starve to death. In either case, that plan won’t work if this town becomes ground zero for the Dòmi release. We’d be caught between the monsters. New Alamo is built to defend against the unthinking dead, and it can barely do that. The wild men would overrun our defenses and sweep through the town.”
“What choice do we have, though?” Flores begged. “The wild men are bringing Wodewose with them. Believe me when I say that we do not want to be here when that happens.”
“Site B is our fallback,” said Morton.
“Okay, okay,” said Flores, “but what if Captain Collins is still at Site B? She’ll never let us in.”
“Captain Ledger and Sam Imura might already be there,” said Gutsy. “They might have gotten in and stopped her.”
“Sure, and the wild men will all suddenly become our friends and we’ll sit around and sing ‘Kumbaya,’?” mocked Morton. “You’re insane, girl.”
“The world’s insane,” she replied. “At least we have hope.”
66
GUTSY RAN BACK TO THE gate and found the Chess Players there, grilling Holly. Alethea and Spider seemed to be referees, but the mood of the crowd had turned ugly again.
“Stop it,” snapped Gutsy, stepping between Holly and the others. She pointed the way she’d come. “We don’t have time for this crap. The Night Army is coming, and so are the wild men. We’re about to get crushed between them. We have to get ready to fight.” Before anyone could speak, she added, “And we need to think about going back to the base.”
“Back?” said Karen. “Are you out of your mind?”
“Didn’t you hear what I said before? There are other vehicles back there.” She thumped the Humvee’s hood. “More trucks like this one. All sorts of stuff.”
“And weapons,” added Holly, trying to sell her own usefulness. “We have more guns than you’ll ever need—small arms, automatic rifles, rocket launchers, grenades, even flame throwers. We have a whole stock of weapons. Probably a couple million rounds of ammunition, too. All of it’s in the armory, which is right next to the garage.”
Alethea said, “And how exactly do we get all that stuff without catching every disease known to man?”
“We have more hazmat suits at the hospital.”
“Five more,” said a nurse in the crowd. “Six, including that one you stole.”
“Borrowed,” Gutsy corrected. “And Holly has one. Which means six people can go with her back to the base and bring back seven vehicles, and a lot of weapons.”
“There are hazmat suits at the base, too,” said Holly. “In the garage. They were for people coming into the facility during a biohazard lockdown. They won’t be contaminated.”
That kicked off a buzz of excited conversation, during which Karen, the Chess Players, and Gutsy’s friends closed around her.
“Even with a lot of guns,” said Karen quietly, “we can’t stop all of those wild men and shamblers.”
