But so far, no word.
The waiting was growing interminable.
In the bed, Jessie scratched at the tape securing her catheter.
“Hon, leave it be,” Lauren said, moving the girl’s hand away.
Jessie sighed, sinking back into her pillows. “Where’s Mommy?” she asked for the thousandth time that day. “I want Mommy.”
“She’s coming, hon. But South America is a long way away. Why don’t you try to take a nap?”
Jessie frowned. “My mouth hurts.”
Lauren reached to the table and lifted a cup with a straw toward the girl, juice with an analgesic in it. “Sip this. It’ll make the ouchie go away.” Already the girl’s mouth had begun to erupt with fever blisters, raw ulcerations along the mucocutaneous margins of her lips. Their appearance was one of the distinct symptoms of the disease. There could now be no denying that Jessie had the plague.
The girl sipped at the cup, her face scrunching sourly, then sat back. “It tastes funny. It’s not like Mommy makes.”
“I know, honey, but it’ll make you feel better.”
“Tastes funny…” Jessie mumbled again, eyes drifting back to the video screen.
The two sat quietly. Somewhere down the row of beds, one of the children began to sob. In the background, the repetitious jingle of the dancing bear sounded tinny through her suit.
How many more? Lauren wondered. How many more would grow sick? How many more would die?
The sigh of a broken pressure seal sounded behind her. Lauren turned as the ward door swished open. A bulky figure in a quarantine suit bowed into the room, carrying his oxygen line. He turned, and through the plastic face shield, Lauren recognized her husband.
She was instantly on her feet. “Marshall…”
He waved her down and crossed to the wall to snap in his oxygen line to one of the air bibs. Once done, he strode to the girl’s bedside.
“Grandpa!” Jessie said, smiling faintly. The girl’s love for her grandfather, the only father figure in her life, was special. It was heartening to see her respond to him.
“How’s my little pumpkin?” he said, bending over to tousle her hair.
“I’m watching Bobo the Bear.”
“Are you? Is he funny?”
She nodded her head vigorously.
“I’ll watch it with you. Scoot over.”
This delighted Jessie. She shifted, making room for him to sit on the edge of the bed. He put an arm around her. She snuggled up against him, content to watch the screen.
Lauren met her husband’s gaze.
He gave his head a tiny shake.
Lauren frowned. What did that mean? Anxious to find out, she switched to the suit’s radios so they could speak in whispers without Jessie hearing.
“How’s Jessie doing?” Marshall asked.
Lauren sat straighter, leaning closer. “Her temperature is down to ninety-nine, but her labs are continuing to slide. White blood cell levels have been dropping, while bilirubin levels are rising.”
Marshall’s eyes closed with pain. “Stage Two?”
Lauren found her voice cracking. With so many cases studied across the nation, the disease progression was becoming predictable. Stage II was classified when the disease progressed from its benign febrile state into an anemic stage with bleeding and nausea.
“By tomorrow,” Lauren said. “Maybe the day after that at the latest.”
They both knew what would happen from there. With good support, Stage II could stretch for three to four days, followed by a single day of Stage III. Convulsions and brain hemorrhages. There was no Stage IV.
Lauren stared at the little girl in the bed as she cuddled against her grandfather. Less than a week. That’s all the time Jessie had left. “What of Kelly? Has she been picked up? Is she on her way back?”
Her suit radio remained silent. Lauren glanced back to Marshall.
He stared at her a moment more, then spoke. “There was no sign of them. The rescue helicopter searched the region where they were supposed to be according to their last GPS signal. But nothing was found.”
Lauren felt like a brick had been dropped in her gut. “How could that be?”
“I don’t know. We’ve been trying to raise them on the satellite link all day, but with no luck. Whatever problem they were having with their equipment yesterday must still be going on.”
“Are they continuing the air search?”
He shook his head. “The helicopter had to turn back. Limited fuel.”
“Marshall…” Her voice cracked.
He reached out to her and took her hand. “Once they’ve refueled, they’re sending it back out for a night flight. To see if they can spot campfires from the air using infrared scopes. Then tomorrow, another three helicopters are joining the search, including our own Comanche.” He squeezed her hand, tight. “We’ll find them.”
Lauren felt numb all over. All her children…all of them…
Jessie spoke up from the bed, pointing an arm that trailed an IV line toward the video. “Bobo’s funny!”
1:05 P.M.
AMAZON JUNGLE
Nate climbed down the fifty-foot ladder from the treetop dwelling. The three-story structure rested in the branches of a nightcap oak, a species from the Cretaceous period. Earlier, just after Kelly and the professor had left with Frank, a pair of Ban-ali women had appeared and led the party to the edge of the glade, gesturing and indicating that the dwelling above had been assigned to their group.
Sergeant Kostos had resisted at first, until Private Carrera had made an astute observation. “Up there, it’ll be more defensible. We’re sitting targets on the ground. If those giant cats should come up during the night—”
Kostos had cut her off, needing no more convincing. “Right, right. Let’s move our supplies up there, then set up a defensive perimeter.”
Nate thought such caution was unnecessary. Since arriving, the Indians had remained curious about them but kept a wary distance, peering from the jungle edges and windows. No hostility was shown. Still, Nate had a hard time balancing these quiet people with the murderous savages who had wiped out half their team by unleashing all manner of beasts upon them. But then again, such duality was the way of many indigenous tribes: hostile and brutal by outside appearances, but once you were accepted, they were found to be a peaceful and open people.
Still, so many of their teammates had died horribly at the indirect hands of this tribe. A burning seed of anger smoldered in Nate’s chest. And then there were Clark and maybe others of his father’s group, held hostage for all these years. At the moment, Nate found it hard to achieve professional detachment. As an anthropologist, he could understand these strange people, but as a son, resentment and fury colored all he saw.