The other cadets and the guide came stumbling and clambering along the catwalk, leaning on each other and helping one another along. They climbed their fumbling way up the ladder and out onto the roof, where they finally collapsed, spread-eagled, taking the air into their lungs with deep, heaving gulps.

Damien suddenly remembered Pasarian. He looked around to make sure everyone was accounted for, and then he turned and ducked back down inside, where he moved swiftly but cautiously along the highest catwalk. He sped down some metal stairs to the level below.

Nothing. No Pasarian,. Just the green noxious gas swirling and billowing and filling up the room. An alarm had started to sound, and red lights were flashing everywhere.

Damien ran around to the other side and took another set of stairs down to the next level.

And there he saw Pasarian. But Pasarian didn't see him.

Pasarian lay near the broken valve, crumpled up on the floor, one hand outstretched in a last, pathetic effort to twist it shut. His face, bloated and blistered, was practically unrecognizable.

He was very dead.

Damien turned his head away, repelled, and ran as fast as he could back toward the ladder.

Up on the roof, Damien reemerged to find the others still in panic, pain, and confusion as they rolled around on the tarpaper, choking, gasping, wheezing, tears streaming from their eyes.

He picked his way through the writhing bodies and moved toward Mark to check his condition.

And on the way, Damien realized he was beginning to like who he was after all.

Chapter Nine

CHAPTER NINE

Richard Thorn wanted to know what the hell had happened, and he wanted to know immediately.

He and Ann had left Lakeside the instant they heard the news; they flew into O'Hare, grabbed the first cab they could find, and rushed over to the Children's Hospital where the cadets had been taken after the accident.

Thorn stood, pale, unshaven, and shaking with rage, in the old army jacket he always wore for walks in the woods at Lake Geneva; he was talking to Buher on the wall phone in the corridor outside the boys' hospital room.

‘They seem to be all right,' he said, 'but I haven't been able to talk to the doctor yet. I want a full report on what happened, and I want it on my desk in the morning!' He slammed down the phone and leaned heavily against the wall, exhausted.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a tall, handsome black doctor walk into the boys' room. Thorn quickly followed him in, anxious to hear the results of the preliminary tests.

Ann was sitting on a chair between the two beds. Mark looked pale and weak, and held onto his mother's hand. Damien, however, appeared to be fine.

The doctor walked over to her and introduced himself as Dr Kane. Thorn was right behind him.