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Arriving in the helicopter caused the expected stir at the high school gym. Even better, Agent Gallagher and another member of the special task force were there to make sure we had full, private access to the gym. The medical personnel still got testy when we kicked them out, but at least we had authority on our side—for once.
I went up and down the rows, biting one patient after another—with a break between each one to rinse my mouth. Sponge baths simply didn’t cut it for sweating, slavering shamblers. By the time I bit the last patient, the first ones were coming around. But I didn’t relax until Bear’s people from the bowling alley were awake and coherent again.
After confirming the recoveries were proceeding as expected, Dr. Nikas gave the okay for the FBI agents to allow Dr. Bauer and her team back in. She was understandably pissed off at being removed, but forgot her annoyance as soon as she realized the outcome of our secret visit.
Dr. Nikas gave her his contact info and said to let him know if anyone didn’t fully recover, and then we headed to the hospital. We took a car rather than the chopper this time, with Brian driving and the FBI agents escorting.
“Aren’t people going to wonder about all of the bite marks?” I asked Dr. Nikas. “And won’t they be able to trace them back to me?”
“You were far too busy to notice, but by the time the patients regain their senses, the bites have healed. My formulation was designed to stimulate a healing burst from your parasite to repair bodily damage caused by LZ-1 and, fortuitously, the bite as well.”
I silently thanked my precious parasite once again. You rock! “I just realized something. Kristi was going to destroy all zombies with her anti-zombie serum.” I looked at him. “That’s why she thought you should leave the Tribe. Because she respects you. She didn’t want to destroy you as well.”
“And had I survived the destruction of all zombies, I would have focused my entire being on destroying her.” He gave me a smile. “Fortunately for us all, you have done so already.”
“Aw, shucks. I’m just a destroy-your-enemies kind of gal.”
That made him laugh, which warmed me to the toes.
At the hospital, I repeated my bite and spit routine with all twenty-two patients, ending with Bear’s survivalist buddy, Dreadlocks. Mr. August Lejeune.
His eyes fluttered open as soon as I pulled back from the bite.
“It’s . . . you,” he murmured. “You . . . were in my dreams.”
“Er, I was?”
“Singing. Strange song.” His eyes drifted shut again. “Ga . . . tors.”
“What the—”
Dr. Nikas pulled me aside. “I suspect the telepathic connection carried over somewhat with the LZ-1, though likely as little more than subconscious or dream fragments. Fascinating.”
I grinned. “You say fascinating. I say weird.”
Yet weird or not, August was the last on my to-bite list. With all infected patients treated, we collapsed into the car.
“Now we must return to NuQuesCor. We have more work to do there,” Dr. Nikas said.
“You mean the infected gators, right? Please tell me you don’t expect me to bite them.”
He laughed, happier and lighter than I’d seen him in . . . well, as long as I’d known him. “No, not only would that be awkward, your teeth couldn’t penetrate their hide. We will have to do it the hard way.”
• • •
The “hard way” involved me spitting and spitting and spitting into a flask. When I could spit no more, Dr. Nikas swirled the container and held it up to the light.
“Under normal circumstances, saliva without a bite would be inadequate to spread the parasite—or in this case, the parasite and its synthesized by-products, i.e. the cure.” He doctored the saliva with various substances. “But you have been biting today. A lot.”
“I get it. When I bite, it activates the parasite to come out and play?”
He chuckled. “Precisely.” He made a few more tests and adjustments then poured the mixture into a hypodermic gun.
In the gator room, Dr. Nikas opened a small bottle and waved it around. My nose tickled even though I couldn’t detect an odor.
Biggie and Tupac bellowed and splashed out of the pool toward the fence, the smaller ones racing after. But their attention was on Dr. Nikas, not me.
“What the hell is that?”
