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Juan went back down the stairs and over to Raven, who was standing by the lockers. One of them was secured with a combination padlock.
“There’s something valuable in here.”
“Let’s take a look.”
Juan retrieved the portable bolt cutter that Eddie carried. It took several tries to cut through the heavy lock, but it finally came loose.
The locker opened, revealing that it was full from top to bottom with five large aluminum boxes.
Juan removed one of them and unlatched its clasp. It was crammed with smaller packs of plastic containers. He lifted the lid on one.
The pack contained a dozen vials like those used in hospitals for dispensing intravenous drugs. Each vial was carefully snugged in a protective c
ushion.
He plucked one of the vials from the container. It held ten cc’s of a clear liquid. The vial was marked “Serum NVL.” Juan remembered the same letters from the Roman amphora he tried to recover from the buried Salacia. Nux viridi lucus was the cure they had discovered for their own paralytic agent two thousand years ago.
“The antidote,” Raven said. She turned to Eddie. “We got it.”
He gave her a thumbs-up.
“Looks like we did,” Juan said. “We’ll need about sixty of these packs.”
“These boxes are too bulky to carry.”
“Let’s start loading them into the duffels. With the cushioning, they should be able to survive some jostling.”
Juan keyed his mic.
“Max, do you read?”
“Here,” Max said. “Time’s getting short. Thirteen minutes left. Do you have good news?”
“We do indeed,” Juan replied with a smile. “Tell Murph that we’ve got his cure.”
His good spirits were short-lived, however. A single word came through on his earpiece. It was Sylvia’s voice.
“Gas.”
SIXTY-NINE
The attempt to pick the lock on the rocket launch controller had been going nowhere. Sylvia, looking around the room for a possible hiding place for the key, had suggested that the mercenaries they’d killed on the bridge might have had it in his pocket the whole time. Eric seemed convinced Polk would be the one who had it, but she thought she might as well give it a shot and search the dead man.
While Linc stood behind Eric watching all of the entrances to the bridge, and Eric stayed focused on the control panel, Sylvia had gone to the other side of the bridge where the mercenary had been dragged out of the way.
She was going through his pockets when the door on the other side of the bridge cracked open, and a canister was tossed through. It popped open and started spewing white smoke.
“Gas!” she yelled.
Linc didn’t have time to react. The gas grenade had landed between his feet. He keeled over onto the floor like a cedar tree that had been chopped down.
Eric, who’d been crouched over the control panel, turned his head and then passed out, slumping across the console.
Sylvia watched all this happen with her breath held. She realized she couldn’t inhale again or she’d suffer the same fate.
She snatched the dual-canister mask that was attached to the dead man’s belt and pressed it against her face. When it was sealed against her skin, she used the remaining breath in her lungs to blow out forcefully, clearing the mask of any residual air and gas that had gotten trapped inside.
She finally inhaled, expecting her world to go dark. There was no wooziness, so she must have acted in time. She drew the straps over her hair, ripping off her headset as she tightened the mask.
