The loss of the satellites’ sight and protection is like the loss of a sense for all of the surviving Agents. In China and Russia, the suddenly isolated Agents Pei Leong-Lam and Mikhail Kovalenko reach out to each other via phone. They know they have been discovered, that much could not be clearer, and like Lana they suspect that Agent John Hunt is the Mobiliei’s Judas. The discovery of the antigen just before the satellites were destroyed indicates that the humans were somewhat prepared for that branch of their attack as well, and they must assume the coming viral attack will only kill that small slice of the world’s population that is not already inoculated against it.

Deciding that John must surely have also revealed their own identities, they conclude correctly that their own discovery is probably imminent. So the two Agents agree upon a remote meeting place in the mountains of eastern Russia and close their brief call. Without ceremony or hesitation, they gather their remaining equipment and vanish, fleeing the backlash they know must find them in a matter of days, maybe even hours.

In a naval base in Singapore, the now awake and disgraced crew of the HMS Dauntless is still unaware of the vital role they have played in Earth’s defense. Furious and humiliated, their captain turns a blind eye to the beating that his crew is giving the prisoner deep in the ship’s hold. For his part, John Hunt takes the blows, ignores the mental abuse, and blanks his mind while his former shipmates and friends urinate and defecate on him as he lies in chains in the ship’s brig. He hopes that at some point soon, Neal or the colonel will reach out to the British government and secure his release, but until that time he will not fight his captors. He has abused their trust, and though he knows that he did it all for their own good, they cannot be aware of that yet, and he does not begrudge them their revenge.

All around the globe, the final weapon of the now destroyed satellites floats down through the upper atmosphere. The small pods contain the worst virus the world has ever known, and while the antigen has already reached the vast majority of the world’s population, several large bands remain unprotected. The desperate efforts of Major Toranssen and his now dead friend Dr. Martin Sobleski have saved millions in the most exposed zone of all, but the mission has cost Martin his life, and many more will also die before the antigen stops the spread of the synthetic plague that now falls, unseen, upon the ignorant and innocent.