She set the phone into the cradle and offered Ava a tired smile. “He should be down soon. I’d ask you to take a seat, but we’re fresh out.”
“That’s okay,” Ava said. “We’ll wait for him here.”
She twisted to face the others, offering Alex a consoling smile. “You doing okay, Ace?”
He shifted his weight from foot to foot as he rubbed his neck. “I don’t know. I feel kind of achy. Should I feel achy? Is that like an early symptom or something.”
Kyle shook his head. “Dude, you couldn’t have gotten sick this fast. You’re fine.”
“I don’t know, Doc. Maybe The Board slipped it to me, too, because I definitely feel achy.”
“It’s nerves. You’ve probably been tense for the entire car ride.”
“Well, Shadow is the worst driver in the world,” Alex said with a shake of his head. “So, of course, I was.”
Sebastian scoffed. “I am not.”
“You are so. It’s like the speed limit signs are there for decoration. And on those bends?” Alex shook his head. “You were driving like a maniac.”
“Oh, I’m sorry I wanted to get here and prevent a world-wide catastrophe from occurring.”
“We could have done that if we got here five minutes later because you weren’t exceeding the speed limit by at least ten miles per hour.”
Ava wrapped an arm around Alex, rubbing his back. “Take it easy, Ace.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t do that in public. We’re supposed to be DHS.”
“I can be both DHS and his wife. We met on the job. Working a case, in fact. We fell in love,” Ava shot back.
“Aww, that’s a cute story, Avs,” Alex sad with a grin before it faded when someone across the room coughed. “Ugh, why doesn’t that doctor get down here so we can get away from all the infected people?”
A moment later, a man wearing a white coat, his features gaunt with dark circles under his eyes, hurried toward them.
“Hi, I’m Dr. Meade. Can I help you?”
Ava flipped her fake badge open again. “Rebecca Slate, DHS, this is my partner, Drew Givens. Dr. Nathan Brooks from the CDC, and my tech guru, Damien Slate. We need access to all your security feeds and patient information ASAP. We also need a space to work, and Dr. Brooks needs a staging area for decontamination. We’ll need to speak with your chief–”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Ms. Slate, just a second here. We are dealing with a situation–” He motioned to the patients in the waiting room.
“I’m well aware of the situation, and that is exactly why the DHS is here. This is a matter of national security. This town is a hot zone. It needs to be shut down immediately and anyone who has been exposed to this virus needs to be quarantined. Now, I can get the military up here in one phone call, but if you’d rather not have armed guardsroaming your streets, I would suggest you do what we say, when we say it.”
He shifted his weight, his features clouding with concern. ”Uhh–“
“Look, doctor, if I may,” Kyle said. “This is a conversation best had in private. Would it be possible to move to your office?”
“Right,” the doctor said with a bob of his head, motioning for them to follow him.
As they walked through the crowded ER, Kyle asked a few probing questions.
“When did you see the first case?” he asked.
“Less than forty-eight hours ago,” Dr. Meade answered with a shake of his head. “We thought it was just a really bad case of the flu, but then we just got a flood of cases. I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“Effective treatments?” Kyle asked.
Dr. Meade shrugged his shoulders, running a shaky hand through his graying hair. “Nothing so far. We’ve tried standard drugs, nothing is touching this. I don’t understand it. It looks like the flu, acts like the flu, but yet can’t get a handle on it.”
Kyle shot Ava a questioning glance, and she offered him a nod, giving him the green light to give the doctor enough information to frighten him into submission.
