Ten minutes later, his head was drenched in sweat, his body spent, and the weld was just as solid as it had been when he’d started.

He sat down against the wall, panting. He picked up the rock and turned it in his fingers. Without thinking, he turned to the dark wood and scratched the words: Desmond Hughes was here. He sat back on the dirt floor, studying his own name carved in jagged white letters on the wall. He leaned forward and added a second line: I’m innocent.

He had written the line without even really considering it. He wondered if it was true. In his memories, he had seen himself in a warehouse where people were being treated in makeshift hospital cells. But treated for what? He knew there was an outbreak in Africa—possibly of Ebola—and that Peyton Shaw was there. Peyton, the woman he, or someone else, had instructed him to warn.

Had he known this outbreak was coming?

Someone did. In another memory, he had seen a man with a badly scarred face, standing before a group, telling them the world would soon change.

Desmond lay on his back in the cell, his mind wandering. Wherever he was, it was hot and arid, easily seventy-five degrees in the dead of night. He was in the tropics, in a very dry region: Africa, or maybe an island in the Caribbean. No, an island was unlikely—he didn’t smell the salt of the sea. In fact, there was no breeze at all blowing through the open central lane of the barn.

He began assembling an escape plan. He knew his adversaries were pros. They had taken him alive for a reason. That meant they wanted to keep him alive.

The sweat covering his face might work in his favor. He spat on the jagged rock and wiped it on his pants, attempting to clean it. Then he lifted his shirt and scratched the rock against his side, just enough to break the skin and bring blood to the surface. He spread the blood around, then held his shirt to the wound, letting the dark red soak through.

The sound of boots marching down the corridor focused him. He lay on his bad side and slowed his breathing, trying to look more vulnerable. His best chance was to lure the visitor into his cell. If he couldn’t do that, he’d have to attack the man through the bars and hope he could reach for the key. Perhaps he could throw the rock. With his hands bound together, it would be difficult to throw very hard, but if he could make the man stumble closer to the bars, Desmond might be able to reach through and get his hands on him.

The soldier stopped square in front of his stall. He wore full body armor, including a black helmet with a visor.