Interrupt (Jeff Carlson) by Jeff Carlson

Author:Jeff Carlson
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Hard Science Fiction, General, Science Fiction, Technological, Thrillers, Fiction
ISBN: 1612183646
Publisher: 47North
Published: 2013-07-23T00:00:00+00:00

Emily went to the lists of known dead before searching for food. The emptiness inside her went beyond hunger. It seemed more important to write his name. Chase deserved their respect, and she was furious that he’d been dumped in the waiting room like garbage.

The third-floor nurses’ station was one of the many places she knew inside Silver Lake. Typically she met Chase at restaurants or didn’t see him until he came home, but a handful of times, she’d surprised him while he was on shift. Thanksgiving. Valentine’s Day. Chase worked many holidays, and Emily enjoyed rewarding him with fun things like flowers, two slices of pumpkin pie, or a peek inside her blouse. Once they’d made out in a stairwell.

Her memories faded as she blundered through a knot of police and medical staff.

“Watch it!” a cop said.

The third floor was being used for post-op recovery. At five in the morning, it was also a safe place for off-duty soldiers and cops to rest. The voices around her were low and tight except for one man shouting in a private room.

Everywhere, people slept in the halls.

At the nurses’ station, seven men and women filled a space meant for four. Two of them had functioning laptops. The rest were sorting handwritten notes, struggling to organize a deluge of new charts.

They glanced up as Emily stopped by the three clipboards pinned to the wall. One man seemed to recognize her. He reached for his phone. Emily ignored them. She was certain she was a mess, red-eyed and disheveled. Her outsides matched her soul.

First P.J., now Chase. What if Laura was gone, too?

The clipboards held the truth. Dozens of names had been scrawled on the white sheets with stark, irrefutable power. Adding his name would be like carving his tombstone. It might be the only testament Chase received.

Where would they bury him? Beneath the trees in the parking lot? Even if the flares stopped, no one had time to dig more than a few mass graves.

Emily took one breath and then another. Somehow she closed her hand on the magic marker tied to the first clipboard. She removed the cap. It was blue. Most of the handwriting on these pages was a well-practiced cursive, small and neat. She wrote his name in large block letters as masculine as possible.

Chase, Michael Coughlin, M.D.

“Miss Flint!” someone yelled. “Miss Flint!”

Mrs. Coughlin, she thought. But it would never be.

The yelling man was Captain Walsh. He’d brought two soldiers as an escort.

“Here,” Emily called.

Walsh jogged through the crowded hallway. “Colonel Bowen needs you in the command center,” he said. His men roused the sleeping cops and Guardsmen. The noise level increased as everyone grabbed their weapons.

“What’s wrong?” Emily asked.

“They’re back,” Walsh said.

“Is it the same group? My nephew?”

“We’re not sure yet. There are more of them.”

“That’s probably where they’ve been all night—looking for each other. How many?”

“Almost thirty.”

Emily hurried after Walsh into the milling soldiers. She glanced back at the clipboards, torn between her heartbreak and her sense of duty until she discerned something in Walsh’s stone face.

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