Counselor Jenovia stared down at the bruised terrorist, who went by the name of Jordan and had just revealed to her a shocking truth about their intentions at the hospital. “A vaccine? For what?” she demanded of him.
“I need it for my family. My wife has already been infected with a deadly unknown virus for which there is no cure.” He spoke with a nervous stutter, and Jenovia could feel the man’s pain as the words came out from his mouth. “She is in the late stages, and she desperately needs something to help her. But first I need the vaccine to protect my children.”
“What can you tell us about the infection?”
“I know very little…only that my wife is suffering greatly. We were informed that there were stockpiles of a completed vaccine being held in secret facilities across the continent, this hospital being one of them. But I am also told that the vaccine is in very limited supply. I sympathize with everyone in this hospital, and everyone on this planet, but it’s every man for himself. I must protect my family first. Thousands of our people are infected, and we need something soon.”
Thorn looked at the medical administrator, who only gave a look of bafflement. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what to tell you…there isn’t any such vaccine here,” he said. “I would know, I overlook everything that happens in this hospital.”
“What did your sources tell you about where it is?” Thorn asked Jordan.
“I was told that the stockpile was secretly being held in a laboratory in the basement of this hospital. It connects through this room via those stairs over there.”
“Tell your men to stop, and we will help you find your vaccine. The violence has to end now,” Thorn ordered.
“But Jerad…if he takes us in, he will have us all put away for good, with no hope for our loved ones.”
“He doesn’t have to know.”
The man reluctantly nodded. He pulled out his communicator, and instructed the near hundred armed men to stand down. Though no one could see it through his metallic mask, Thorn stood a little more relieved.
“At least that’s one problem solved,” he told Jenovia.
***
“Our sources told us that the vaccine would be in the laboratory beyond that door,” Jordan told them. They tried to enter through the door, but it was locked from the inside.
“There is nothing there,” the administrator said pleadingly. “It’s just a…”
“Quiet,” Thorn ordered. He moved to the front, and studied the door intently. It was a fairly primitive locking mechanism reinforced by some heavy chains, but nothing that a little phaser fire couldn’t take care of. He fired at it with his hand-phaser, and the lock exploded. Then with a powerful kick, the door busted open. But nothing could prepare them for what they were about to see. For one thing, it was not a laboratory. It was just a large storage room, full of dusty boxes. There was no laboratory or any medications of any kind.
“Is this the right room?”
“According to our sources, yes.”
Jordan walked in complete disbelief, his jaw hanging open as his eyes slowly scanned the room from one end to the other. His heart sank as he realized that this meant that his hope for his own children had vanished. “How…is this possible? Our sources were reliable!…Our sources were…”
“They must have lied to us,” another one of the men said.
“Or Jerad intentionally fed us falsified information,” another suggested.
“All of our planning, all of our efforts…There is no vaccine.”
Thorn was getting thoroughly annoyed for being taken on a wild-goose chase. He stared down at Jordan once more, and firmly grabbed him by the collar. Although Jordan could not see his eyes, he could feel his intensity staring down at him. “You need to tell me everything you know,” Thorn said. He turned to the Counselor and to the administrator, “I take it Jerad hasn’t exactly been completely forthcoming about the entire story. To any of us.”
