Tom Clancy - Executive Orders

"The kids started arriving this afternoon. Second-generation cases. That one in there must have got it from his father. His name is Timothy. He's in the third grade. His dad's on the next floor up."

"Rest of the family?"

"His mom tested positive. They're admitting her now. He has a big sister. She's clean so far. We have her sitting over in the outpatient building. They set up a holding area there for people who've been exposed but don't test out. Come on. I'll show you around the floor." A minute later they were in Room 1, temporary home of the Index Case.

Ryan thought he must be imagining the smell. There was a dark stain on the bedclothes which two people— nurses, doctors, he couldn't tell—were struggling to change. The man was semiconscious, and fighting the restraints that held his arms to the bed bars. That had the two medics concerned, but they had to change the sheets first. Those went into a plastic bag.

"They'll get burned," Cathy said, pressing her helmet against her husband's. "We've really dialed up the safety precautions."

"How bad?"

She pointed back to the door and followed Jack into the corridor. Once there, with the door closed behind them, she poked an angry finger into his chest.

"Jack, you never, ever discuss a patient's prognosis in front of them, unless you know it's good. Never!" She paused, and went on without an apology for the outburst: "He's three days into frank symptoms."

"Any chance?" Her head shook inside the helmet. They walked back up the corridor, stopping in some more rooms where the story was dismally the same.

"Cathy?" It was the dean's voice. "You're off duty. Move," he commanded.

"Where's Alexandre?" Jack asked on the way to the former physicians' lounge.

"He's got the floor upstairs. Dave has taken this one himself. We hoped Ralph Forster would get back and help out, but there aren't any flights." Then she saw the cameras. "What the hell are they doing here?"

"Come on." Ryan led his wife into the changing room. The clothing he'd worn to the hospital was bagged somewhere. He put on scrubs, in front of three women and a man who didn't seem all that interested in ogling any of the females. Leaving the room, he headed for the elevator.

"Stop!" a female voice called. "There's a case coming up from ER! Use the stairs." And obediently, the Secret Service Detail did just that. Ryan led his wife down to the main floor, and from there out front, still wearing masks.

"How are you holding up?"

Before she could answer, a voice screamed, "Mr. President!" Two Guardsmen got in the way of the reporter and cameraman, but Ryan waved them off. The pair approached under armed scrutiny, uniformed and plain-clothes.

"Yes, what is it?" Ryan asked, pulling his mask down. The reporter held the microphone at full arm's length. It would have been comical under other circumstances. Everybody was spooked.

"What are you doing here, sir?"

"Well, I guess it's part of my job to see what's going on, and also I wanted to see how Cathy is doing."

"We know the First Lady is working upstairs. Are you trying to make a statement to the nation—"

"I'm a doctor!" Cathy snapped. "We're all taking turns up there. It's my job."

"Is it bad?"

Ryan spoke before she could explode at them. "Look, I know you have to ask that question, but you know the answer. These people are extremely ill, and the docs here, and everyplace else, are doing their best. It's hard on Cathy and her colleagues. It's really hard on the patients and their families."

"Dr. Ryan, is Ebola really as deadly as everyone has been saying?"

She nodded. "It's pretty awful, yes. But we're giving these people the best we got."

"Some have suggested that since the hope for the patients is so bleak, and since their pain is so extreme—"

"What are you saying? Kill them?"

"Well, if they're really suffering as much as everyone reports—"

"I'm not that kind of doctor," she replied, her face flushed. "We're going to save some of these people. From those we save, maybe we can learn to save more, and you don't learn anything by giving up. That's why real doctors don't kill patients! What is the matter with you? Those are people in there, and my job is fighting for their lives—and don't you dare tell me how to do it!" She stopped when her husband's arm squeezed her shoulder. "Sorry. It's a little tough in there."

"Could you excuse us for a few minutes?" Ryan asked. "We haven't talked since yesterday. You know, we are husband and wife, just like real people."

"Yes, sir." They pulled back, but the camera stayed on them.

"Come here, babe." Jack embraced her for the first time in more than a day.

"We're going to lose them all, Jack. Every one, starting tomorrow or the next day," she whispered. Then she started crying.

"Yeah." He lowered his head on hers. "You know, you're allowed to be human, too, Doctor."

"How do they think we learned anything? Oh, we can't fix it, so let 'em all die with dignity. Give up. That's not what they taught me here."

"I know."

She sniffed and wiped her eyes on his shirt. "Okay, back under control now. I'm off duty for eight hours."

"Where are you sleeping?"

A deep breath. A shudder. "Maumenee. They have some cots set up. Bernie's up in New York, helping out at Columbia. They have a couple hundred cases there."

"You're pretty tough, Doctor." He smiled down at his wife.

"Jack, if you find out who did this to us…"

"Working on it," POTUS said.

"KNOW ANY OF these people?" The station chief handed over some photos he'd shot himself. He handed over a flashlight, too.

"That's Saleh! Who was he, exactly? He didn't say and I never found out."

"These are all Iraqis. When the government came down, they flew here. I have a bunch of photos. You're sure of this one?"

"Quite sure, I treated him for over a week. The poor chap died." MacGregor went through some more. "And that looks like Sohaila. She survived, thank God. Lovely child—and that's her father."

"What the hell?" Chavez asked. "Nobody told us that."

"We were at the Farm then, weren't we?"

"Back to being a training officer, John?" Frank Clayton grinned. "Well, I got the word, and so I went out to shoot the pictures. They came in first class, by God, a big ol' G. Here, see?"

Clark looked at it and grunted—it was almost a twin to the one they were using for their round-the-world jaunt. "Nice shots."

"Thank you, sir."

"Let me see that." Chavez took the photo. He held the light right up against it. "Ninja," he whispered. "Fucking ninja…"

"What?"

"John, read those letters off the tail," Ding said quietly.

"HX-NJA… my God."

"Clayton," Chavez said, "is that cellular phone secure?"

The station chief turned it on and punched in three digits. "It is now. Where do you want to call?"

"Langley."

"MR. PRESIDENT, CAN we talk to you now?"

Jack nodded. "Yeah, sure, come on." He needed to walk some, and waved for them to follow. "Maybe I should apologize for Cathy. She's not like that. She's a good doc," SWORDSMAN said tiredly. "They're all pretty stressed out up there. The first thing they teach 'em here, I think it goes pnmum non nocere, 'First of all, do no harm. It's a pretty good rule. Anyway, my wife's had a couple of hard days in there. But so have all of us."

"It is possible that this was a deliberate act, sir?"

"We're not sure, and I can't talk about that until I have good information one way or the other."

"You've had a busy time, Mr. President." The reporter was local, not part of the Washington scene. He didn't know how to talk to a President, or so others might think. Regardless, this one was going out live on NEC, though even the reporter didn't know that.

"Yeah, I guess I have."