Chapter 17 - The Boy Who Carries the Cure
Adrenaline stripped away every ounce of hesitation in my soul.
I didn't reach for a brake.
I slammed the SUV into drive, pinned the accelerator to the floorboard, and steered straight at the catwalk support beam.
The three-ton SUV struck the steel scaffolding at forty miles an hour.
The iron beams collapsed in a cascade of twisted metal, raining heavy scaffolding down directly onto the two contractors.
The rifle fire ceased instantly, buried beneath half a ton of industrial steel.
Our SUV shuddered violently, the radiator hissing a cloud of blinding white steam as the front bumper crumpled into the bulkhead.
The ferry slammed into the Seattle terminal dock with a monstrous metallic shudder, the emergency docking cables snapping with gunshot-like cracks.
Civilian sirens began to wail from the city streets above.
Vance kicked her crumpled door open, stumbling out onto the deck with her firearm raised.
"Clear!" she yelled through the rain. "They're neutralized!"
I threw myself into the back seat.
Gertrude was kneeling on the floor, her arm covered in blood where a bullet fragment had grazed her forearm, but she was holding Leo securely in her lap.
Leo was awake.
His eyes were crystal clear.
The terrifying pupil dilation had vanished completely.
He looked up at me, his small hand reaching out to touch my wet, soot-streaked face.
"Mommy... the fire is gone," he whispered softly. "I don't hurt anymore."
Gertrude looked down at him, her hands trembling as she checked his pulse at the carotid artery.
"His heart rate is sixty-eight," Gertrude whispered, tears cutting through the grime on her cheeks.
"The antibody cascade... it completed."
"What does that mean?" I sobbed, pulling both of them into my arms.
"It means his body has fully synthesized the cure," Gertrude explained, her voice thick with wonder.
"The synthetic viral vector didn't destroy him."
"His juvenile genetics mutated the pathogen into a permanent, self-healing cellular shield."
"He is immune to *AET-49*."
"He is immune to every neuro-inhibitor Julian Holloway ever manufactured."
"And the data on that drive proves that this immunity can be replicated through blood plasma without ever harming Leo."
The upper gates of the ferry ramp crashed open.
A dozen federal agents in windbreakers marked *FBI*, led by Assistant US Attorney Marcus Hayes, poured onto the car deck with assault rifles raised.
"Federal agents! Drop your weapons!" Hayes bellowed through a megaphone.
Vance lowered her badge and held up her empty hands.
"Detective Vance, Seattle PD!" she identified herself, pointing to the encrypted flash drive in my hand.
"We have the evidence on Julian Holloway."
"We have the internal video logs, the biological weapons contracts, and the identities of every corrupt federal official on his payroll."
Marcus Hayes hurried down the ramp, his face hardening as he looked at the wreckage of our vehicle and the fallen corporate contractors.
"Julian Holloway’s private jet just entered Washington airspace," Hayes said, extending his hand to take the drive.
"He landed twenty minutes ago at Boeing Field."
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"He thinks he’s coming to claim his prize."
"He’s coming to his own execution," I said, stepping out of the crushed SUV with Leo held tight against my chest.
