“When this is over, Corporal, the newspapers and TV shows are going to figure out why so many people died. They’ll identify turning points, when people in critical roles made the wrong calls—moments when someone could have made a decision that would have changed the course of the outbreak and saved millions, possibly billions of lives. This is one of those moments. This is the moment when you can simply connect me to that research team or someone at the CDC. It will only take a few seconds. You can save a lot of people—right now.”

“Sorry, ma’am, I don’t even have their number.”

Peyton paused, thinking.

“Ma’am?”

“I’m still here.”

“Your number was blocked; I’m going to need a good callback number.”

Peyton opened the phone’s settings and read the number out. Travers thanked her, and Peyton said, “Corporal?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“How many messages are in this… queue?”

“Three hundred and sixteen, ma’am.”

She shook her head. “One last thing, Corporal. I’m the CDC’s leading epidemiologist. I’m the one they sent to Kenya when we first found out about the outbreak. Maybe that’s in your files, or maybe you can see my employment history. I’m close to this investigation. Whoever is seeing these messages will know who I am. They’ll call me first. You need to move my message to the top of the list. Do you understand?”

“Do you require further assistance, ma’am?”

She leaned her head back and groaned.

After she’d ended the call, she activated the phone’s web browser. If she could get in touch with the WHO, maybe they could connect her to the CDC. But she didn’t know the WHO’s number. The thought reminded her of Jonas, and seeing his number pop up on her phone a week ago in her condo. If they had split up in Kenya, would he still be alive? Had being near her put him in harm’s way? She tried to focus.

The WHO web address redirected to a site called EuroShield. The page prompted her to enter her information so she could receive the address of a local “EuroCordon center.” The site asked questions nearly identical to those asked by the American operator. Europe apparently had a similar pandemic disaster protocol.

She tried navigating to several more web sites, but the only sites that ever came up were BioShield in America, EuroShield in Europe, and similar sites in Asia and Russia.

Clearly whatever had happened in America had also occurred around the world—almost simultaneously. Phones and internet had been routed, contained. Peyton wondered if it was the dawn of a new dark age, or perhaps something even worse.

She found Desmond outside the cafeteria, staring at a smartphone, leaning against the wall.

“Did you find it?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said, lost in thought.