But the One Percent was a sort of secret club of female Marines that could, would and did beat the men at their own game – that could outperform most of them. Marathonners, triathletes, gymnasts, distance swimmers, biathletes. Thus One Percent, because perhaps one in a hundred Marine women could do it – could perform at this Olympic level of physical fitness.

The cruise line had given her a private room on a middle-high deck, something she would have struggled to afford if she hadn’t been selected through their “Wounded Warrior” promotion that provided free cruises to the nation’s servicemembers. She was glad of it as she finished the hundred, hardly more winded at the end than at the start. She took that as a good sign, knocking out another fifty before stopping.

That was more than she’d ever done before at a stretch. It was true she had an advantage over the average Marine, male or female; she was at least twenty pounds lighter than normal. Missing everything below both knees put less strain on the cardiovascular system; absent lower legs didn’t need blood and oxygen.

Stay positive, stay focused. Ever since the mortar shell that took her feet, that’s what she told herself.

Dropping gently to the floor onto her buttocks, she maneuvered with wiry-muscled arms and leg stumps over to her prostheses. Sitting on the floor she strapped them on, fiddling and adjusting for a longer span than normal. Finally she got them to some semblance of stability, and wobbled to her artificial feet.

Repeth stared down at the legs and the metal-and-plastic structures. They didn’t feel right. Her good mood evaporated. Some days the damn things just didn’t sit well on her, and it looked like this would be one of these days. She wasn’t even going to turn on the microprocessor control and servos that helped her walk and run with a semblance of normalcy. She still hoped she could work up to running a marathon again. Maybe with those bladerunner things.

Sitting down on the bed and taking the prostheses off, she rubbed at the end of the stumps. They always itched a bit, but today they positively screamed to be scratched. She did so, vigorously, and then looked more closely at them. If she didn’t know better, she would swear that the stumps had lengthened slightly.

Maybe they were just swollen.

Repeth shrugged to herself. Rather than fight with the artificial legs, she phoned for a wheelchair pick-up. She’d come back after breakfast and fiddle with the things. She was starving.

Three decks above, in the crowded, well-lit breakfast cafeteria, nine-year-old Gennie Washington scooped spoonful after spoonful of yogurt into her mouth, finishing the bowl in record time. “More, please,” she requested.

Her father Rufous gently patted the colorful knit Rasta hat that covered her bald head. “Anything else?”

“Milk! And orange juice. And bacon.”

“Coming right up, punkin.” Ever since her mother died, he couldn’t refuse her anything, not that he wanted to. The chemo had been hard on her, and getting her to eat so well was a minor miracle. The cruise seemed to be good for her, to lift her spirits, and the oncologists all said that kids made good cancer patients, because they had the best attitudes. Attitude was everything, as his football coaches had all drummed into him so long ago.

He put a tray full of food down in front of his daughter and joyfully watched her eat. It was going to be a good day.

***

“Time to get off the boat,” Larry said to Spooky as they heard the disembarkation announcement for Cancun over the public address system. “Between this guy,” he hooked a thumb at the closet where the taped and frightened staffer had spent an uncomfortable night, “and the commander you knocked out, they’ll be onto us soon.”

“I’ll use his badge one more time to get off the ship,” Spooky said as he packed a shoulder bag. “We meet at El Gringo Loco.”

Larry raised his eyebrows at Spooky. Actually they weren’t going anywhere near that bar, but the man in the closet would certainly pass this tidbit on to the authorities. He raised his own bag to his shoulder and the two men made their escape from the ship, Spooky from the staff and crew exit, Nightingale with the usual crowd of tourists heading in to the bars in Cancun.

-23-

Infection Day Minus Two.

Binoculars brought the water treatment plant at Van Norman Lakes Reservoir into sharp focus. Daniel could see the enormous tubes of the termination of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. Beyond it were hundreds of miles of pipes that gathered and funneled waters from the Sierras down to the Los Angeles Basin. It was a marvel of engineering, completely gravity operated, even generating hydroelectric power on the way. The devastation that the diversion of water caused Mono Lake and Owens Valley and many other, smaller natural Edens of California was deemed a cheap price to pay for keeping the economic powerhouse of the West Coast going.

Daniel shifted his view to the trees planted between the Granada Hills Youth Recreation Center and the enormous structures that prepared millions of gallons of water a day for Los Angeles thirsty residents to use. The stiff breeze’s direction was important; he had to choose a place upwind to maximize his chance of success.

Not that he actually expected to succeed.

Daniel had spotted the car tailing him ten minutes ago; figured he had another ten minutes before Homeland Security pulled him over and checked him out. He opened and drank as many canned protein shakes as he could, choking down about seven.

Homeland Security. Such a wonderfully loaded phrase. Nobody could possibly object to some nice security for the homeland, right? But it gave birth to dysfunctional abominations like the Transportation Security Administration, stealing iPads, patting down toddlers and detaining old people with colostomy bags for fear of being politically incorrect while angry young underwear bombers were let through. It led to trading away constitutional rights and responsibilities to those in power, in return for the comforting illusion of protection that no amount of armed security forces or foreign interventions could provide.

He cut short his musings as he noted the wind direction was blowing just right for his ploy. Dialing a number on the disposable phone, he put in a code, and then tossed it out the window into a drainage ditch.

Shoving the surplus agricultural spray truck in gear, he drove down the slope of the hill and along Balboa Boulevard. It was the last mile of his journey across seven states, trusting to anonymity and the millions of vehicles on the road to get him to his goal. But it didn’t really matter where or if he was intercepted; the design had been put in motion the moment he left the Sosthenes Bunker. It would be great if he could deploy the Plague into the water; but with or without him, the plan was going forward.

The tail car started accelerating behind him, and he knew he was blown. They’d probably gotten a look at his face, despite his best efforts at concealment, and matched it against a biometric database. Daniel sped up, taking the turn into the recreational complex in a skidding screech. He was just five hundred yards from his target section of the fence.

Daniel floored it, then reached over and threw a large lever under the dashboard. The mechanism in back of the truck, normally used for spraying a fine mist of agricultural chemicals in orchards or fields, coughed to life. In a moment a pale white fog trailed behind him, the stiff Santa Anna wind carrying it almost due west.

Four hundred yards, he thought.

The heavy government sedan behind him gained on his anemic truck despite the best he could do; it wasn’t long before he heard the impact of bullets. But five thousand gallons of Eden-Plague-infused solution protected his person from harm.