DEAD IN BED By Bailey Simms: The Complete Second Book

PART 12, SECTION 7

Like everyone else, I turned to Chris. He was clutching his arms close to his chest, just like he'd been doing most of the time since we'd left the dwellings. This was because secured to his chest with loops of athletic tape, double-sealed within a pair of freezer bags, was the plastic container that held my dad's amygdalae. Not only had Chris needed to keep this precious cargo hidden and safe, he'd also needed to keep it close to his body, he'd explained, so that the honey-blood remained at body temperature until the parasites fled the amygdalae.

"Is it ready?" I asked.

Chris dropped his head. "Not yet. No. It'll be at least another 48 hours before the parasites can disperse out into the . . . um"—finally sensing Ian's caution, Chris was careful not say blood in front of the gathering crowd—"into the . . . um . . . honey."

"So we can't treat anyone yet," Ian whispered quietly enough that no one in the crowd could hear him.

Chris shook his head and whispered back, "No. Not yet."

"Then we need to get out of here. Fast." Ian started to roll up the window.

A disappointed murmur rippled through the crowd.

But hadn't we left the quarantine zone to do everything we could to propagate the TGVx strain? And, if not to cure the disease, exactly, at least to neutralize it?

"I'm Ashley Travis," I called out.

The crowd burst with a chorus of unexpected elation and feverish hope.

Ian sunk his face into his palm.

Someone called out, "It's Ashley Travis! She's in this pickup!"

Maybe a hundred people had gathered around the truck now. Again, the growing crowd pressed in more closely.

I reached into the medical bag at Chris's feet, pulled out a blood extraction kit, rolled up my sleeve, and plunged the butterfly needle into my arm.

Pale golden honey-blood spurted into the collection bag. The crowd pressed up against the pickup's windows with another cry of desperate hope.

Ian wouldn't let us unlock any of the doors, let alone open them.

While he watched uneasily, refusing to turn off the engine, keeping his hands at the steering wheel and his foot poised above the gas petal, I extracted two full pints of my honey-blood into a pair of collection bags.

It was enough to make my limbs tingle and my head spin. As the second collection bag filled to capacity, I knew I'd lost too much blood.

I was about to pass out.

Chris sat in the passenger seat with the window rolled down. He'd called out for anyone who was infected and wanted an "experimental treatment" to form a line. One by one, another positive plunged their forearm inside the pickup's cab, and Chris gave them a dose each of the TGVx-infused fluid that had been running in my veins.

I sat between Chris and Ian, woozily but politely saying hello while people gawked at me as if I were some combination of celebrity and mystical saint.

After an hour or so, though, Chris had squeezed the very last of my honey-blood from the second collection bag.

But the line of positives had only grown longer. It now trailed away down the roadway.

Ian drew in a deep a breath and put the pickup in gear. Chris glanced at me with apprehension.

"That's it," he meekly called out the window. "We don't have any more. Sorry, we're all done. That's all we can do."

A guy in a soiled suit and tie, third in line, stepped up to the window.

"I've been waiting here for like an hour," he snapped. "What do you mean you're out? Like you can't extract a few more milliliters? Give me a break. What is this? I'm sick here."

"We've already taken way too much blood from Ashley," Chris said firmly. "I'm really sorry. Seriously, bro. But we don't have enough for everybody. Ashley's given all that she can give."

The guy nodded, pensive and angry, obviously not accepting Chris's rationale. He pressed his hands down firmly on the window's glass rim as if he were prepared to prevent Chris from rolling it up.

"She can't give anymore?" he asked defiantly. "I haven't ever heard of this blood-sharing crap you've got going here." He looked me over, his eyes lingering on my breasts. "Everybody knows that if you screw Ashley Travis, you're cured. Everybody knows that. And I say she's got a lot more to give."

The guy quickly reached inside the cab to unlock the door.

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