Free the Devil's Workshop (1999) by Stephen Cannell Page A

bio-gear, almost impossible under attack time frames. Also, mosquitoes were territorial and didn't migrate to new areas. Most important, they had short life spans and died in about three days, clearing the area of dangerous infestation. Despite the logic of this, Dr. Lack continued to object, saying mosquitoes were cumbersome and hard to deliver, and could be swept to new areas by strong winds.
    Dr. Lack finished his adjustments to the video equipment, then two M . P. S moved up and stood behind each camera. Dr. DeMille picked up the "Governor's phone" nearby.
    "Can you see that okay, Admiral?" he said.
    "Yes. Go ahead." Admiral James G. Zoll's rough voice came through the line from the communications room at Company A, First SATCOM Battalion Headquarters at Fort Detrick.
    Now Troy Lee was on his feet, screaming silently at them through the soundproof glass. His too-white skin was turning red with the effort.
    Dexter DeMille walked over to the two boxes affixed to brackets on the side of the gas chamber. He removed the canvas covers, revealing the newly hatched, swarming female mosquitoes.
    Then he pulled up the air lock on each of the boxes, allowing the x-ray-sterilized and Prion-primed female mosquitoes to fly through a small one-way filter valve into the gas chamber. First one, then three, then fifty entered the enclosure. In a few moments, most of the deadly insects were in the gas chamber.
    Quickly both Sylvester and Troy Lee had dozens of mosquitoes on them. They danced around in the gas chamber, trying to get them off, slapping at them with their hands, rubbing against the sides of the glass chamber, smearing specks of blood on the chamber walls.
    Dexter waited until he was sure both Sylvester and Troy Lee had been thoroughly bitten, then he released an insect spray into the chamber. It flowed from newly installed valves in the ceiling, and quickly a fine toxic mist settled over Troy Lee and Sylvester, turning their shoulders wet and shiny.
    One by one, the mosquitoes in the gas chamber died, falling off the two prisoners and off the walls where they clung. Hundreds landed dead in black clusters on the floor. Then one of the white - helmeted M . P. S turned on an overhead shower nozzle that drenched the chamber with water. The dead mosquitoes were washed from Troy Lee and Sylvester, rinsed off the glass walls and floor. Finally, they all disappeared down a drain, into a bio-container that was affixed under the scaffolding.
    Dr. DeMille picked up the second intercom phone and dialed three digits. "Okay," he said softly.
    The door opened downstairs and four M . P. S in full HEPA gear climbed the metal steps. The soldiers left their cameras, and everybody exited the tower for their own protection. The M . P. S in HEPA gear moved to the gas chamber door. They looked like visitors from the space program in their canvas suits and oxygen helmets.
    They opened the air-locked door and dragged the confused prisoners out of the gas chamber.
    Dexter DeMille went back to his quarters to begin what he assumed would be a three - to four-hour wait.
    It began at 1156 A . M .
    Suddenly, without warning, Troy Lee Williams got up off his bunk on the fifth tier and hurled himself at a passing guard, crashing headfirst against the steel bars of his prison cell, splitting his forehead open. The M . P . had passed too close to the cell, and Troy Lee managed to grab his hand, jerking it through the bars. In a homicidal rage, he clamped his mouth over the guard's hand, biting hard, snarling and tearing the soldier's flesh.
    "Get the fuck off me!" the soldier screamed, as he snatched out his side arm and fired into the cell, hitting Troy Lee in the leg, throwing him back. Then the startled M . P . pulled his bleeding hand back through the bars and looked at the wound in horror. Troy Lee, with his own blood from the bullet flowing down his leg and the guard's blood running from his chin, stood in the center of the cell, screaming and drooling