Hard Reboot Episode 01

Chapter 6

"Hello?" Brita squeaked. She cleared her throat as the man in the pen-striped suit shot up straight.

He turned around smoothing his salt-and-pepper gray hair against his scalp. He pulled his left hand from his coat pocket and rested it on the foot of the bed.

"Well, hello there." He straightened up, folding his arms across his chest. "And who might you be?"

"I'm her sister," Brita nodded at Bobbi lying in the bed beside him. "And who are you? You look familiar."

"I might be the Chief Surgeon of the Hospital," he said deadpan. He stepped forward, the light from the hall illuminating his face. A rumbling cough erupted from his throat.

Brita gasped, "Chief-Consul Quinn. What are you doing here?" She looked down, indicating the room as well as the hospital.

Quinn strode around her, sizing her up. "I've been told that your sister," he sniffed, "might play a significant part of the current predicament." He leaned back against the foot of the bed and crossed his ankles. "I came to find out if the account I've heard is true."

"What do you mean?" She walked to the side of the bed and held Bobbi's still hand. Her skin was still a shade warmer.

He turned around and placed both hands on the rail at the foot of the bed.

"It appears that your sister is the source of all these people getting sick." A wry grin lifted his cheeks. "Probably your mother as well."

"But," Brita looked at her sister, "she's been sick for a while. It doesn't make sense. Everyone else is getting sick faster."

He shrugged. "Happens that way sometimes. Patient Zero," he nodded at Bobbi, "gets stage one of an illness, spreads it to others in a mutated form, others present similar, but different symptoms."

He came around the bed to stand in front of her. She looked up into his eyes.

"My medical advisers tell me she will have to be quarantined, tested and observed. She must be isolated from anyone not already infected."

Brita looked down. She didn't want to say it. But she had to. It was ridiculous. She closed her eyes and sighed.

"She can't be the source of the illness." She regretted saying it as the words fell from her mouth. "I'm not sick, and I've been around her the entire time she's been sick."

Quinn's eyes widened at the news. His mouth fell open. He tapped his Halo.

"I've got an uninfected in Patient Zero's room." He stared hard at Brita. "I need her isolated. Now."

Brita's heart jumped, pounding hard in her chest. She gripped her sister's hand firmly. She looked down into her sleeping face: the sweep of her jaw line, the feathery quality of her eyelashes, the slight sweep of her eyebrows. Every aspect of her vulnerable sister made her want to stay and hold on to her. She ached to.

She placed her sister's hand on the bed beside her body, looked directly into Chief-Consul Quinn's eyes, and dashed out the door.

Turning right to head for the elevators, she froze. Two peace officers and an attendant strode towards Bobbi's room. No doubt looking for her. She spun around when they saw her, running past her sister's room, and the hopes of comforting herself and Bobbi. Her stomach flipped, fighting the flight response. If I stay, I'll just be taken away from her anyway.

She passed the attendant station on her right.

"No running," two attendants called after her. The injunction repeated as she turned left down another hall looking for another set of elevators. She felt a slight tingle in her right hip. She ignored it and turned left again.

The Hall ended in a solid steel door with just a single window at eye level. She turned the lever. Stairs. She took the stairs two at a time, jumping the last three, whipping around for the next flight down.

The tingling in her right hip intensified. She grabbed the spot, felt the slight bulge of the directional device the attendant gave her. She pulled it out, flipped it around. It vibrated in increasing intensity indicating she should turn around. As she passed the next door in the stairwell, it urged her to turn into the level she was on.

She stopped at the door leading onto the ground floor. Stretching up, she looked through the small window. She opened the door to an empty hallway. The sound of running feet around the next turn urged Brita to turn in the first room on the right.

A woman lay on an exam table facing away from the door, hacking, her knees up to her chest.

"Oh," Brita exclaimed. "I'm sorry. Are you OK?" She shook her head at the obvious answer.

Brita put the vibrating directional device on a chair, and went to the woman's side. She crouched down, looking into her tearful eyes.

"I'm Brita. My mom and sister are sick too."

The woman held a mask over her mouth, her eyes clenched tight. As the coughing eased, her hand fell away, exhausted. "Water?"

Brita pulled a paper cup from the dispenser on the wall, and filled it with water from the sink.

The woman sat up, clutched the cup close to her mouth taking small sips.

"Thanks. Lacey," she said as another bout of coughing began. Blood flecked spittle flew at Brita. "Sorry," she coughed into her mask.

"She's in here," a voice called through the door.

Brita ducked behind the exam table.

The sounds in the hall increased as the door opened and at least two people came in. Lacey lay back down away from Brita, coughing harder.

"Here," the previous voice said. "She was here. She tossed the Locater."

"Let's go," another voice said when Lacey started hacking again.

The door shut and footsteps led away.

"Are you OK?" Lacey asked through her mask, nodding at the two that just left.

Brita just shrugged heading to the door.

"Better give it a minute."

Brita nodded, listening at the door. After a moment, she cracked the door. An attendant walked past talking to his Halo, ignoring her. She nodded back to Lacey.

"Good luck," she called as Brita stepped out into the hall.

She crept further down the hall recognizing it as the exam rooms off the waiting room. She passed by David's room wondering if he was still in there. She came to Exam Room 3. Her Mom's room. She looked up and down the hall. No one seemed interested in her. She eased the door open, stepped inside, shut it.

"... last much longer." Brita stopped. It sounded like Doctor Bandon.

Two doctors stood over her mom. She stepped behind the privacy curtain surrounding the exam table. The dim lighting and curtain hid her effectively.

"Have you told either of her daughters?"

"No," it was Doctor Bandon. "The youngest is still unconscious. And we can't locate the oldest."

"Shame," the other doctor said, walking toward the door.

Brita sucked in her breath flattening herself against the wall.

After they left, Brita rushed to her mother's side.

"Mom? Can you hear me?"

Chandra stirred, but didn't wake. She looked pale, almost gaunt. She lost some hair in the intervening hours. Her brow furrowed in some restless dream.

"Mom?" Brita shook her arm.

"Take care of your sister," Chandra mumbled.

"Mom? Mom!" Tears streamed down Brita's cheeks. "You have to be OK." She rested her head on Chandra's arm.

"And yourself," Chandra said before fading out again.

"Mom."

The door opened.

"What are you doing in here?" an attendant said tapping her Halo.