Zombie Patrol by Elizabeth Basque, J. R. Rain Page B

Badly.
    I never thought cold instant coffee would taste good, but it gave me the boost I needed. The caffeine cleared my head. Jared wolfed down his second serving of cold spaghetti.
    Anna eyed me suspiciously. “You saw them, didn’t you?”
    I nodded, too weak to lie.
    “Well, h ow are they?”
    I ran a hand over my face. “About the same. They didn’t see me. I was thinking they might be looking a little better, but...”
    “But what?”
    “Nothing.” I decided not to mention the odd way they had just been standing there quietly.
    Mercifully, she let it go. “Better, r eally?”
    “Somewhat. But I don’t want to get your hopes up.”
    “ But according to the information we found, yes, some of the infected are getting better!”
    The last few days had aged my Anna, but she still had the optimistic innocence of a hopeful teen. “Why don’t we just wait and see, honey?”
    “ Can I go down to see him?”
    “ No.”
    “ Why not? We can all go together.”
    “Absolutely not .” I didn’t want her to see her uncle like that.
    She opened her mouth to protest, but I jumped in. “We’re all tired, baby. We need to get some rest. In the morning, we can decide what to do next.”
    Jared asked, “Do you want us to set up a watch?”
    “ Good idea. You two sleep first. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”
    I gave them separate blankets. They both knew better than to sleep too close together in my presence. Still, Jared held Anna’s hand as they eventually drifted off.
    I kept watch over them, fighting a flu bug, and trying to not grow angrier and angrier at the young man holding my daughter’s hand. How dare he touch my innocent daughter? And how dare she grow up…

Chapter Twenty-one
    The Agent in Black was sitting on a comfortable sofa in his office. Granted, the place now looked more like a hospital room than an agent’s field office, complete with a bed and monitoring equipment. Dr. Robert Kaplan, the unfortunate soul assigned to care for him, took his vital signs.
    “ How do you feel, Agent Cole? It’s now been eight hours,” said the doctor, using the Agent in Black’s real name. He’d ordered Dr. Kaplan to call him by his name. Use of Stetson’s real name had been one of the few stimuli that the infected scientist had responded to. The Agent didn’t want to lose his mind, not like the others. He would use whatever responses they had, and whatever knowledge they had gleaned, to fight this.
    “ I’m tired but not tired.”
    “ Would you like something to eat? Perhaps to drink? Some water?”
    Cole knew that he was being studied like some parasite under the lens of a microscope. He understood that he was now a “case.” A confidential case. He understood the logic of this, but he was starting not to care—it was all starting to piss him the fuck off.
    “ No, thank you. I’m not thirsty,” said the Agent. “How are my vitals?”
    Dr. Kaplan hesitated. “Everything is slowing, just a little. Your pulse is now fifty-six. BP is one-hundred over sixty.”
    “M y temperature?”
    A pause. “ Ninety-five point seven.”
    Cole absorbed the information grimly. The body temperature was especially foreboding. He stood and looked out his window into the night. He locked his hands behind him as if standing at military ease. Dr. Kaplan’s cell phone rang and he answered it. Cole couldn’t hear whomever the doctor was talking with, and this irritated him further.
    Dr. Kaplan ended the brief call.
    “ Well?” asked Cole.
    “ It was about Stetson.”
    Cole’s head ached but he kept his stance. “Is he dead yet?”
    “ He was euthanized, as ordered, but...”
    “But what?”
    “He’s still alive, sir.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “We don’t either.”
    “Then d o it again, goddammit!” growled the Agent in Black, now putting a hand to his bandaged neck. “Cut his fucking head off! I don’t care how you do it.”
    Agent Cole did not know there were two guards outside and out of sight.