Free The Dragon Factory by Jonathan Maberry Page B

get gone most riki-tik.”
    He hung up.
    Bunny, who had leaned close to eavesdrop, stepped back and looked at Top. “What the fuck is going on here?”
    “I don’t know, Farmboy, but the man said to get our asses into the wind, so let’s boogie.”
    Bunny lingered for one moment longer, first looking at the bodies sprawled in the motel room and then turning to gaze at the smears of blood where Big Bob had gone down.
    “Son of a bitch must pay,” Bunny said.
    Top nodded. “Hooah.”
    Then they were gone.

Chapter Fourteen
    Cotonou, Benin
    Six days ago
    Dr. Arjeta Hlasek sat back in her chair, her pointed chin resting on the tips of steepled fingers. Her expression was a patchwork of doubt, concern, and alarm. The two doctors who sat on the other side of her desk looked road worn and deeply stressed, their eyes hollow with exhaustion. Both of them sat straight in their chairs, their hands fidgeting on the stacks of test results and lab reports they each had on their laps.
    “I . . . don’t know what to say,” began Dr. Hlasek. “This is disturbing to say the least, but what you’re describing . . . Well, I don’t know.”
    The younger of her visitors, Dr. Rina Panjay, leaned forward, her voice low and urgent. “Dr. Hlasek . . . we’ve done the tests. We’ve had blind verification from two separate labs, and they verify what our own tests show.”
    “She’s right, Arjeta,” agreed Thomas Smithwick. “And I can understand your hesitation. I didn’t believe it, either, when Rina first told me. I ran every kind of test I could think of—most of them several times. The lab work doesn’t even vary; it’s not like there’s a margin for error here.”
    “But,” Dr. Hlasek said, half-smiling, “a genetic disease that has mysteriously mutated into a waterborne pathogen? There’s no precedent for something like this.”
    Smithwick paused, then said, “There wouldn’t be . . . not outside of a biological warfare facility.”
    “You think that’s what you’ve found? A new bioweapon thatsomehow escaped quarantine and has gotten into the water supply in Ouémé? That’s a lot to swallow, Thomas. Who would do such a thing? Moreover, who would fund research of that kind? It’s absurd; it’s fantasy.”
    “Haven’t you been listening? We have over three hundred infected people right now,” snapped Dr. Panjay, and then suddenly regretted her tone of voice. Dr. Arjeta Hlasek was the Regional Director for the World Health Organization and a major political force in the United Nations. She was one of Switzerland’s most celebrated doctors and had three times been part of teams nominated for the Nobel Prize. Hlasek was not, however, a patient or tolerant person, and she wilted Panjay with a blast from her ice blue eyes.
    Dr. Panjay dropped her eyes and stammered a quick apology.
    “Arjeta,” said Smithwick in a mollifying tone, “my young friend here is exhausted. She’s been in the thick of this, caring for dozens of patients at her clinic and doing fieldwork to collect samples and helping to bury the dead. She’s running on fumes right now.”
    “I appreciate the diligence and dedication,” said Dr. Hlasek with asperity. “Still . . . I find this rather a lot to swallow. Our organization is built on veracity. We’ve had bad calls in the past that have weakened public trust, and weakened financial support.”
    Smithwick shook his head, his own patience beginning to erode. “This isn’t like the cock-up with the Ebola scare last year. This is a real crisis backed by irrefutable evidence.” He took his entire stack of notes and thumped them down on Hlasek’s desk. “This is immediate and it requires immediate action.”
    The Swiss doctor blew out her cheeks and studied the papers and then the two doctors.
    “Understand me, Thomas . . . and Dr. Panjay,” she began in a measured tone. “I
will
act. But this needs to be handled with the greatest of care. What you’ve just put on my