“Negative,” he said.
The first guard handed Kate the backpack, and she was in a crowd again, on the other side of the technicians and machines. Kate stood there for a moment, wondering what to do. The crowd parted slightly, and she saw two familiar faces: the man and woman who had herded them in the tunnels—the Immari loyalists who had helped capture her and Martin.
Another person in the crowd, a pudgy middle-aged white man without even the hint of a tan stepped closer to her. “It’s okay. It’s over!” he said, his tone somewhere between nervousness and excitement. “You’re a survivor. We’re saved.”
Kate looked back at the technicians, then at her wrist and the burning red welt that surrounded the black bar code.
“How did you know—”
“That you’re a survivor? You didn’t have an Orchid ID—an implant.”
Implant? Martin had said nothing about an implant.
The nervous man seemed to read Kate’s confusion. “You don’t know about the implants?”
“I’ve been… out of the loop.”
“Oh my God. Let me guess, you were here on vacation and went into hiding after the plague? Me too!”
Kate nodded slowly. “Yeah, something like that.”
“Holy smokes! Where to start? I mean, let’s see. Well, you didn’t have an implant, so it means of course you were never captured, never made to endure the forced treatment.” He paused. “Oh, you wouldn’t know. You’re not going to believe it. After the outbreak, the Spanish government declared martial law. They took over everything and herded everyone—everyone left alive—into massive concentration camps. They made everyone take a drug, Orchid, that delayed the plague, but didn’t cure it. They gave everyone an implant, some kind of biotech device that could synthesize a cure from the body’s own amino acids or something. Or that’s what they said. Who knows what it does. But you didn’t have one, you’re definitely a survivor. We’re going to be okay now. The Immari have liberated Marbella. There are rumors this is happening all over southern Spain. They’re going to clean this place up and get the world back to normal.”
Kate surveyed the crowd again. There were two divisions, she saw it now. Her group was much smaller—the known survivors. The other group was larger. They must have been Orchid district residents that showed no signs of infection. The DNA samples, the barcodes… comprehension dawned on Kate. The Immari were cataloging everyone, conducting their own trials, out in the open, trying to isolate the endogenous retroviruses that controlled the Atlantis Gene. That was their goal—increasing their sample size. Liberation was a side effect. A cover. Or was there another outcome?
Martin’s words echoed in her mind: Promise me you will pledge. Kate wouldn’t. Not after what they had done. Were doing. What could she do if she did pledge? They would find her sooner or later. She couldn’t delay it. And she couldn’t see how she could save Martin. Given the choice, she’d rather die knowing she’d never taken a false pledge, never bowed to her enemy.
Behind Kate, a massive screen lit up. The soldiers had hung a series of white sheets together, making an outdoor screen like a drive-in movie theater. The scene that lit the screen was a rough wooden desk in front of an iron wall. The captain’s desk of a ship? A man walked past the camera, turned, and sat at the desk, his back rigid, his face hard and emotionless.
Kate felt herself tense up. Her mouth went dry.
“My name is Dorian Sloane.”
Slowly, the words faded away and Kate was alone with a single thought: if Dorian is alive, David is dead. The proof was there on the screen, ten feet tall, twenty feet wide, staring down lifelessly at the frightened crowd. If Dorian is alive, David is dead. Knowing for certain revealed just how much hope she had held out. Tears welled in her eyes, but Kate blinked them away. She inhaled and fought the urge to wipe her eyes. Around her, others were wiping away tears, but for a wholly different reason. Throughout the crowd, people were clapping, embracing each other, and cheering. Some faces were hard, like Kate’s, and many simply looked down or away from the screen. Through the cheers and somber stares, Dorian droned on, completely unaware.
“I come to you not as a liberator, not as a savior, not as your leader. I am a human being, a man trying to survive, a person trying to save as many lives as he can. I’m simply in a unique position. As the chairman of Immari International, I control the resources to make a difference. Immari has a security division, a private intelligence service, natural resources, communications companies, transport organizations, and perhaps most importantly, one of the most advanced global scientific research and development groups in the world. In short, we are in a position to do something to help in these difficult times. But our resources are limited. In a sense, we can only fight the battles we can win. But we won’t turn away from that fight or our responsibilities as humans. We will save the lives we can. Look at your lot. Look at what the governments of the world have given you.
“We face an unprecedented threat in the course of human evolution. A turning point. A flood. We stand waist deep in the blood of those who cannot survive in this new world. Governments have chained you to these people who can’t swim in this flood. They’ve left you to drown. We offer a way forward, an outstretched hand from a life raft. We offer a choice. Immari International has the courage to do what must be done, to save the lives we can and offer peace and closure to those we can’t. That’s what I come to offer you today: life, a new world, built by survivors. We ask nothing in return, save for your loyalty and your help in creating this new world. We will need all the help, all the able-bodied individuals we can find. The true challenge lies ahead. We seek only the opportunity to play our role in the coming cataclysm, and I ask you now: join us or abstain. If you abstain, we will not harm you. We will deliver you to those that disagree with us so that you may seek your own solutions. We have no desire for bloodshed; the world has enough blood on its hands.
“Our adversaries call us an empire. They spread lies in a desperate attempt to cling to their own power. Consider what they’ve done with that power—built a world with two classes of nations: the third world and the first world. And they’ve let capitalism trample the citizens of every nation—first and third world—segregating us according to our economic value. A person’s place in society determined by how much the world is willing to pay for whatever they can produce each day. This plague is simply the biological equivalent of the same programs they’ve used to divide us for centuries.