Shadowfires

Eric went. Besides, that's a copy
of the Wildcard file in there on the living-room floor. All we have
to do is pick it up and get out of here, and we'll have all the proof we need.”
    He shook his head. “Having the file is important, maybe even
crucial, but I'm not so sure it's enough.”
    She paced agitatedly, the thirty-two pistol held with the muzzle
pointed at the ceiling rather than down, for an accidentally
triggered shot would ricochet off the concrete floor. “Listen, the
whole story's right there in black and white. We just give it to the press-”
    “For one thing,” Benny said, “the file is, I assume, a lot of
highly technical stuff-lab results, formulae-and no
reporter's going to understand it. He'll have to take it to a first-
rate geneticist for review, for translation.”
    “So?”
    “So maybe the geneticist will be incompetent or just conservative
in his assumption of
what's possible in his field, and in either case he might disbelieve the whole thing; he might tell the reporter it's
a fraud, a hoax.”
    “We can deal with that kind of setback. We can keep looking until
we find a geneticist who-”
    Interrupting, Benny said, “Worse: Maybe the reporter will take it
to a geneticist who does his own research for the government, for the
Pentagon. And isn't it logical that federal agents have contacted a lot of scientists specializing in recombinant DNA research, warning them that media types might be bringing them certain stolen files of a highly classified nature, seeking analysis of the contents?”
    “The feds can't know that's my intention.”
    “But if
they've got a file on you-and they do-then they know you well enough to suspect that'd
be your plan.”
    “All right, yes,” she admitted unhappily.
    “So any Pentagon-supported scientist is going to be real eager to
please the government and keep his own fat research grants, and
he's sure as hell going to alert them the moment such a file comes into his hands. Certainly he's
not going to risk losing his grants or being prosecuted for
compromising defense secrets, so at best
he'll tell the reporter to take his damn file and get lost, and he'll
keep his mouth shut. At best. Most likely
he'll give the reporter to the feds, and the reporter will give us to the feds. The file will be destroyed, and very likely we'll
be destroyed, too.”
    Rachael didn't want to believe what he said, but she knew there was truth in it.
    Out in the woods, the cicadas were singing again!
    “So what do we do now?” she asked.
    Evidently Benny had been thinking hard about that question as they
had gone through room after room of the cabin without finding Eric,
for his answer was well prepared. “With both Eric and the file in our
possession, we're in a lot stronger position. We wouldn't have just a
bunch of cryptic research papers that only a handful of people could
understand;
we'd also have a walking dead man, his skull staved in, and by God, that's dramatic enough to guarantee that virtually any newspaper or
television network will run an all-stops-pulled story before getting
expert opinions on the file itself. Then
there'll be no reason for the government or anyone else trying to shut us up. Once Eric's
seen on TV news, his
picture'll show up on the covers of Time and Newsweek, and the National Enquirer will have enough material for a decade, and David Letterman will be making zombie jokes every night, so silencing us won't
achieve anything.”
    He took a deep breath, and she had a hunch that he 'was going to propose something she would not like in the least.
    When he continued, he confirmed her hunch. “All right, like I
said, I need to search this place thoroughly to see if I can come up
with any clue that'll tell us where Eric's gone. But the authorities
may show up here soon. Now that
we've got a copy of the Wildcard file, we can't risk having it taken
away from us, so you've got to leave with the file while I-”
    “You mean, split up?” she said. “Oh, no.”
    “It's the only way, Rachael. We-”
    “No.”
    The thought of leaving him alone here was chilling.
    The thought of being alone herself was almost too much to bear,
and she realized with terrible poignancy how tight the bonds between
them had become in just the past twenty-four hours.
    She loved him. God, how she loved him.
    He fixed her with his gentle, reassuring brown eyes. In a voice
neither patronizing nor abrasively commanding but nevertheless full
of authority and reason,