Patient Zero

Chapter One Hundred Twelve

Grace / The Bell Chamber / Saturday, July 4; 12:05 P.M.

ONE MOMENT GRACE was speaking to Joe via commlink and then next the air around her was whining with bullets. A reporter was blasted backward as a bullet punched through his chest and he knocked Grace back and down. As she fell she saw three men separate themselves from the crowd. Each of them had guns and she recognized the weapons as the high-density plastic handguns that terrorists used to sneak through airport metal detectors. Probably firing ceramic rounds. No metal at all, she thought as she pushed the dead reporter off her and drew her weapon.

The foremost of the three gunmen saw her and raised his weapon but Grace gave him a double tap-chest and head-and flung him back against the wall. She swung her gun to the second killer just as two figures came suddenly in from the killers’ blind side. Gus Dietrich took the left-hand gunman out with three quick shots: two to the middle of his back and one to the back of his head. Next to him, Bunny appeared, no weapon in his hand, but he didn’t need one for the other killer: he chopped down on the man’s wrist with a balled fist, knocking the gun to the floor, then grabbed him by throat and crotch and slammed him into a corner of the Liberty Bell display case. He stepped back to let the broken body drop.

Then a fourth man stepped out of the crowd of tourists and pointed a polymer pistol at the back of Bunny’s head. Grace didn’t bother to call a warning; she put two rounds in the man and he spun away trailing blood. Bunny threw her a grim nod and scooped up the man’s plastic pistol.

Then the rest of the Secret Service agents were there.

“There are still hostiles in the crowd,” Grace yelled. “Search everyone.”

The agents moved very fast, and they plowed into the crowd, gruffly shoving congressmen and tourists alike. They found one final hostile, a trembling young man dressed like a Japanese tourist. He managed to get his pistol into his mouth before the agents could tackle him. The blast took off the top of his head.

Rudy pushed his way through the crowd toward Grace.

“Are you all right-?” she began, but he interrupted.

“Grace some of these people are getting sick. It’s happening already faster than before. We have to do something. We have to separate them before this becomes another St. Michael’s.”

As he spoke one of the reporters staggered forward and dropped to his knees and vomited. He looked up at them with a fevered face and eyes that were already becoming glassy. The man reached out a desperate claw of a hand toward them. “Help me ”