No Immunity

knew the answer. “Oh no. Germ warfare. This is a secret germ-warfare lab. You’re creating-“
    “We are not! Terrorists all around the world are creating viruses that can wipe out a city. At B-CADS we’re not creating, we are defending.”
    She had read about these installations in newspapers and magazines. “You’re running experiments to identify these deadly germs—”
    “Something wrong with that?” He twisted sharply right, glaring over his shoulder. The car jerked right and he had to yank the wheel to pull out of it. “You want us to sit on our hands till some nut sets off sarin in our subways like they did in Tokyo?”
    “I want you to be up-front about what you’re doing and not blame the virus you caused on illegal aliens.”
    “Right, and... Forget it. You’ll have plenty of time to think your radical thoughts. This the kind of stuff you and Tremaine bitched about out there in San Francisco?” He let a moment pass before saying, so softly she had to strain to hear, “In your kind of work I’ll bet you could be gone a long time before anyone worried.”
    “Fox,” she said just as softly, “do you get a medal for bringing them two live cases of hemorrhagic fever to dissect?”
    Her fingers were in the mesh, her mouth inches from his ear. She could have screamed till his ears rang, and she would have felt better doing it. And the boys would still be dying. Dying for the greater glory of research, where guinea pigs were more valued than human beings with no commercial value. She hadn’t seen the boys, but she understood isolation and alienness, she who had spent most of her life apart from those around her. She had never had hest friends. Her lovers had shared turbulent passions, Tchernak, and when all this was over, he could be dead. If these boys had each other, she envied them.
    And if Fox and his crew let them die? Or worse yet, let one of them die...?
    “Goddamn you!” she screamed.
    Fox tensed. “Sit back and shut up!” he screamed back.
    His reaction wasn’t enough. Nothing he could do would be enough. Even if he produced the boys in perfect health, it wouldn’t make up for the arrogant servants of the people who used the people in the name of research, justified it in the name of the greater good, and denied any of it ever existed. She could have smacked him all the way to Vegas and it wouldn’t have been enough.
    Kiernan stared at the distant sky as stripes of morning gold faded to yellow, to beige, and into pale blue. It all looked so normal.
    To the east she spotted green, intense green. It had to be the park Grady and Irene and the boys had been headed to last week.
    “What’s that?”
    Fox kept his eyes straight ahead.
    “To the right, that green area? It’s what, about two city blocks wide? Is it some secret R and R spot for the Great Sand Admirals? Bunch of palm trees, some hibiscus, breadfruit, a big blue pool for the landlocked admirals to float around in with—what—battleships carrying rum drinks with umbrellas? Is that where the taxpayers’ money is going?”
    A laugh so spontaneous bubbled out of Fox that Kiernan shivered. “Ah, so it’s ridiculous to even think of picnicking there? Why is that, Fox?”
    This time he was better controlled.
    Kiernan shifted forward to the edge of the seat. Fingers in the mesh, mouth inches from Fox’s ear, she said, “Don’t bother to answer, Fox, I’ll do your part.
    “Me: ‘What is that park? Not a good spot for a country picnic ground.’
    “You: ‘No, ma’am, I reckon it’s not.’ You don’t mind talking like a sheriff, do you, Fox? ‘It’d be much too dangerous out there this close to the germ-warfare detection facility.’
    “ ‘Why, Fox? What do they do here?’
    “ ‘Just what it says, little lady. They run tests to see if they can detect viral and bacterial agents.’
    “ ‘What kind of tests? Specifically what kind would affect that park?’
    “ ‘Ah, very perceptive question.’
    “ ‘Thank you, Fox. So you mean they do aerial testing? They shoot dangerous, potentially deadly bacteria into the air and then detect...? See if they can detect it?’
    “ ‘Very—’ ”
    She stared out at the green square of park and thought of the farmers half a century earlier walking around on their land many miles to the east of here, milking their cows, unaware that they were downwind of a nuclear testing ground, drinking the milk and dying. But open air testing was a thing of the past—or so