A/N — all the glitches on FFN are driving me crazy. As an fyi, I'm also on A03 under kals if the site goes down. xoxo — kals

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Chapter 14

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As the helicopter rose into the air, Sasha stood by the rail, her eyes fixed on Tom until the very last second. After two nights of actual sleep, courtesy of Tom's couch, her head felt clearer. Yet she couldn't shake the nagging feeling that she was missing something. After going over the paperwork from Jacob, as well as some additional information from Val, several more times yesterday, Sasha had memorized every word. But despite knowing that she knew every detail of the intel that was available, there were pieces of the puzzle hovering just beyond her reach. All she could hope was that Operation Finding Pablo, as Danny was now calling the plan, would fill in the missing pieces before anything else went to hell.

Rachel joined Sasha just as the helicopter disappeared into the horizon, the bird a tiny black spot against the explosive red of the sunrise. "Red in the morning, sailors take warning."

Sasha jerked, Rachel's words too close to her own thoughts for comfort. "What?"

"Oh, a Bible Verse that my mother used to recite," Rachel said, her voice tense. "Red in the morning, sailors take warning. Red at night, sailors delight. Matthew 16. I didn't remember it until just now."

Since Rachel's mother died when she was a child, Rachel's tension most likely came from her memories rather than concern over Tom's trip to Houston. Still, Sasha's unease lingered. "You just missed Captain Chandler. He left for Fort Sam Houston to coordinate with General William. Assuming all goes well, we leave for the Superdome at noon."

"I will be ready." Rachel replied, yet her frown remained.

Hesitating, Sasha finally asked. "Is everything all right, Rachel?"

"Yes, yes," Rachel rushed to assure her. "It's odd. I simply can't shake the feeling that something is terribly wrong."

xxxxx

Tom stood in the middle of the obstacle course, ten feet from where General Williams sat. The man was using a folding table as a desk, positioned underneath a pop-up tent clearly designed for use at Houston Texan games and not military operations. Tom knew that the distance between himself and the General — a distance which the General insisted on confirming was safe with Doctor Scott herself — was accurate because the General's assistant had measured and marked it, all while dressed in a full hazmat suit. The precautions were, in Tom's mind, unnecessary given that Tom had received the vaccine and couldn't be infected, but he respected General William for taking every precaution possible upon testing positive for the virus.

Of course, given the man's safety consciousness, Tom was unable to believe that an outbreak occurring on the same day that the team from the Nathan James arrived was a mere coincidence.

"Sir," Tom tried again, "I strongly recommend that you take the cure and begin medical treatment. The longer you wait after exposure, the more complications that are likely to arise."

"Not until every person on this base has been screened, vaccinated or received the cure," General Williams replied, once again, voice still calm. "I appreciate all you have done, Captain Chandler, to expedite that process. I was just informed that Brooke Army Medical Center's laboratory has begun production of the vaccine, which will hopefully relieve the pressure on Solace and allow them to focus on cure production."

"That's very good news, sir," Tom replied. Of course, what neither man said was that there were more than thirty thousand people stationed at Fort Sam Houston, all of whom were now potentially exposed. Even if the base hospital was able to produce sixty doses an hour, the amount Doctor Milowsky's estimated based on the hospital's current equipment, it would still be days before the base would be in a position to provide help either in the form of personnel or vaccines for the Superdome. And that assumed they had caught the outbreak quickly, keeping the number of infected in the hundreds as opposed to the thousands.

Unless Milowsky's team was able to find additional facilities like Doctor Hunter's laboratory that could be transitioned to full time vaccine and cure production, Solace could be stranded near New Orleans for weeks. And with Solace here, most likely, the Nathan James would remain here as well.

"I know you have better things to do than get updates from me, Captain," General Williams continued, "so tell me why you are still here." Tom glanced at William's assistant, who must be baking in that hazmat suit. Williams must have followed Tom's gaze, because his face hardened. "I trust Commander Steffes as much as you trust your team. You may speak freely before him."

Behind him, Tom was fairly certain that he heard Tex snort. "Doctor Scott has noticed some ... unusual patterns at some infection sites. Patterns that do not seem entirely natural."

General Williams was not slow. "You're worrying about deliberate infection."

"Yes." Although relieved that the General hadn't questioned the possibility, Tom didn't want to make it seem like he was too suspicious. There was a fine line between healthy suspicion and conspiracy theory. "Given what happened to the Nathan James in the Arctic, it seems prudent to remain open to the possibility that there are factions opposed to our mission to spread the cure to the virus. Can you think of how you might have been infected yourself? Anything unusual that happened over the past few days?"

"More unusual than anything else that's happened in the last three months?" General Williams asked wryly. He began to shake his head when Steffes interrupted.

"There was the incident at the armory, General."

Williams stopped, considered, then elaborated. "I can't say that it was suspicious, but it wasn't protocol either. There were several pistols reported missing from the armory. I went down personally to investigate as we have heard reports from other bases of personnel taking weapons."

Tom nodded, having heard the same from Hurtado. "Scared kids wanting to protect their families."

"That was my assumption," Williams confirmed. "Still, any missing weapon is a concern. We were in the middle of the investigation when one of the men collapsed and was determined to be infected."

Any lingering doubt Tom had about whether this was, in fact, a coincidence disappeared. The only reason to infect the base with the Nathan James on their way was distraction and delay, and the only question remaining was what Amy Granderson was planning to do while they were otherwise occupied. Tom nodded at General Williams. "Thank you, General. We will take our leave now but please contact the Nathan James immediately if there is any other assistance that we can provide."

"The best thing that you can do for me, Captain Chandler, is stop anyone else from dying of this thing." General Williams nodded. "Good luck and Godspeed."

xxxxx

The crowd was, if it was possible, bigger than the one they left behind in Florida. Sasha supposed that made sense given that, once the Nathan James headed west into the Gulf, New Orleans was an obvious stop. Unfortunately, knowing why the crowd was so large didn't negate the fact that they had far too few people to manage this size crow. With Fort Sam Houston locked down until the outbreak was under control, security at the Superdome was comprised of the Nathan James' crew — those not necessary to keep the ship or Solace running, or off with Tom — assisted by guards more used to checking tickets, playing usher, and directing traffic than quickly moving people in and out. Captain Hurtado was scrambling teams from Lejeune, but they were unlikely to arrive for several more hours and, either way, Sasha knew it would be enough. The only way to clear this congestion would be to get a second site operating.

Here, unlike in Florida, Sasha insisted on backing Rachel up against the back wall of the stadium where she could be easily evacuated to the waiting helicopter. Sasha also made the snap choice to continue her charade of being Doctor Scott even after their arrival and, somewhat surprisingly, Rachel hadn't protested. Perhaps even she was startled by the people screaming her name as the team arrived. Sasha did have to admit that seeing Rachel dressed in Navy blue, while Sasha herself wore civilian attire, felt slightly surreal.

"Doctor Scott! I'm here to check in," Frankie said loudly, dropping his voice upon reaching Sasha's side. "Conner said that the crowd at the front is getting restless. They're complaining that we're moving too slow."

The complaint was hardly surprising. Even after pulling in everyone from both Solace and the Nathan James capable of testing a swab and giving a shot, as well as a number of local medical professionals, they still had only two hundred people attempting to vaccinate a crowd of more than a hundred thousand. If, as Rachel calculated, they were able to vaccinate four thousand people an hour, they were still looking at more than a day — assuming nobody else arrived.

Sasha smiled at the woman she was vaccinating. "You're all set." Picking up a swab as the next person appeared, Sasha kept her voice low. "Should we evacuate her?"

"I already suggested it and she refused," Frankie admitted. Still, Sasha could hear his concern. Frankie was never serious. "Kara suggested that we find another laboratory where she could help set things up. Kind of like what we did with Doctor Hunter's lab. Then she might be willing to go."

Sasha nodded, liking the idea. She watched the swab in her hand turn blue, fighting to keep her face impassive. If anyone here hadn't already been exposed to the virus, they now were. Turning, Sasha waved to Rios. "Doc! I need you to help this gentleman."

A look of horror dawning on the man's face — it didn't take a genius to see that only people who were sick had been shuffled to the side. "But ... but I'm not sick."

"Of course not," Sasha gave him a bland smile. "If you could just wait over there?" She waited until Rios arrived to take the man's arm before she glanced at Frankie. "Loop Caroline Green in and figure out a way to get both Rachel and Kara out of here. Oh, and Benz?"

He was already moving. "Yeah?"

Sasha was already pulling out her next swab. "I don't want you more than a foot away from her until we're back on that helo. Understood? This place is a powder keg."

Frankie's lips firmed. "Yes, ma'am."

xxxxx

Tom stood, studying the position of the sun before checking his watch. Damn. He was off by thirty minutes. He turned to Green. "How long do you propose we wait?"

Green tossed his hacky sack again, seemingly unperturbed by the fact that they had been here for over an hour and the only sign of life was a half dozen snakes, a couple of owls, and one very scared rabbit. "He'll be here. Pablo is careful. That's why he isn't dead."

Tex snorted. "Course, you've got no proof that he's not dead, Green."

"Except for the fact that he's sitting about fifty feet to the north in that overgrown cypress tree deciding whether or not this is a trap," Green replied, continuing to toss the ball.

Tom barely stopped himself from turning to look. "He's here?"

"Damn," Tex said suddenly. "I knew there were no eastern screech owls in Texas. And that one sounded like it was dying."

"That's the signal," Danny confirmed.

"You're sure it's him? Not someone who followed him?" Tom asked. At Danny's nod, he demanded. "So what's he waiting for?"

Danny's face was impassive, but Tom strongly suspected that he was holding back an eyeroll. Thankfully Tex filled the awkward silence. "Given that the kid was expecting Ms. CIA and got herself a proper Navy captain, I figure that he might be a little spooked."

Tom conceded the point with a sharp nod. He couldn't explain, even to himself, why he was so impatient to get back to the James. True, their radios were off and there was no way for the ship to contact any of them until this Pablo got his act together and came down from the tree, but Mike was perfectly capable of managing the ship and Sasha wouldn't do anything to put Rachel at risk. Yet, Tom couldn't shake the feeling that something was about to happen — something that he wouldn't be there to stop. Maybe Sasha was right.

He should have sat this one out.

Sighing, Tom went back to staring at the sun and hoped that Pablo would make his move soon.

xxxxx

Wiping the sweat from her forehead with her sleeve, Sasha once again cursed the fact that she was outside in New Orleans in August. The mask she was wearing, more in the vein of disguise than protection, didn't help. Still, as Rachel pointed out earlier today, the Red Flu was unlikely to be the only contagious disease floating around this stadium and Sasha didn't want to get whooping cough or a stomach bug either. At least the direct sunlight would set soon, as the sun slid past the high walls of the stadium. Checking her watch, Sasha was surprised to realize that she had been at the Superdome for almost five hours. Crossing her fingers, Sasha hoped that Tom was back by now, hopefully with Pablo in tow. Although Mike had checked in regularly, the conversations had been routine, both of them well aware that others might be listening.

"Doctor Scott!"

Turning at the sound of Kara's voice, Sasha stepped back from the tables that separated them from the crowd. This was the first time that Sasha saw Kara in anything other than her jumpsuit or gym attire, and she was surprised to note how much more Kara's pregnancy showed in the more fitted pants and blouse she was wearing. "Yes, Kara?"

Kara waited until she was next to Sasha to speak, Walker hanging several feet back. Sasha suppressed a frown, wondering where Smith was. Kara spoke just loud enough for those around them to hear, as planned. "Children's Hospital has the necessary equipment, ma'am. We can get another laboratory up and running, but we need your expertise."

In fact, the laboratory was already up and running, thanks to Caroline Green and Doctor Milowsky, but that wasn't the point of this little charade. The point was to convince the crowd that Doctor Scott was leaving for another location where, presumably, the vaccine and cure would soon be available. Behind her, Sasha could hear the whispers surging through the crowd as Kara's words were relayed over and over again. Even if ten percent of the crowd took the bait and headed for Children's Hospital, where the emergency team Hurtado sent was setting up, that would be enough to reduce the tension that gripped the Superdome all day as people continuously fought their way through the doors. Frankie's plan might have taken hours longer than Sasha would like, but it had worked. A tiny bit of Sasha's tension relaxed.

"We should go..."

It was the look on Walker's face that told Sasha their luck had just run out. He lifted his weapon in a gesture that Sasha knew was pointless even before she heard the tumble of the table behind her. A tiny part of her brain prayed that none of the cure was lost in the chaos, even as she began shouting orders. "Evac now!"

Thank god that Frankie was with Rachel. She could see the two of them already moving through the emergency exit. As Frankie and Rachel disappeared, Sasha saw Smith running in their direction just before she heard an explosion of sound behind her, and Walker went down with a scream. Around them, the crowd was now panicking and rushing for the nearest exit, including the one at the back of the stadium, cutting off their own exit route. Realizing that she had been separated from Kara by the surging crowds, Sasha fought her way to Kara's side, planning to collect Kara before checking on Walker. She had just managed to grab Kara's wrist when an arm snaked around Kara's waist, pulling her back against a man with the coldest eyes that Sasha had ever seen. Slim, wiry, with a shock of black hair tied back in a ponytail, Sasha immediately recognized the man. Photographs did not do him justice. Any doubt Sasha had about Granderson's connection to the Sinolan cartel died an instant death.

"Doctor Scott," he drawled, apparently oblivious to the stampede around them. "Unless you want your assistant here to lose her baby, I suggest that you come quietly."

He thought that she was Rachel.

Processing that information in an instant, Sasha realized that their scheme had been her undoing — but might also have been the only thing that saved Rachel's life. López must have been here for hours, watching and waiting, convinced by everyone that she was the great Rachel Scott.

Catching Smith's eye, she shook her head incrementally. There was no way that Andrade, El Chapo's son, was here alone. There were likely dozens of his men surrounding them and all Smith would do was get himself killed. One problem dealt with, Sasha turned her attention back to Lopez. She put up her hands the way she imagined Rachel would do so, praying that Rachel was already on the helo. Now if she could just convince these men to let Kara go...

"I won't cause any trouble. Let my assistant go and I'll do whatever you want," she replied, forcing a tremble into her voice. After all, if these men didn't know Rachel well enough to have realized that Sasha was an imposter, they also wouldn't know how unlikely Rachel was to back down to anyone. Sasha had no doubt that she could give Andrade the slip. All she needed was for him to release Kara.

But Lopez wasn't that gullible. His smile was evil personified. "That's something to discuss once we've reached our destination."

With a wave, he pushed their small group towards a side wall, puzzling Sasha until a hidden door appeared. Sasha cursed under her breath. Without sufficient personnel, there had been no time for a thorough review of the stadium's blueprints. An oversight, she now realized, that might be deadly.

Moving through the door to the truck parked inside, Sasha managed to grasp Kara's arm, their eyes meeting. Kara nodded sharply, a message sent and received. The team would be coming for them.

They just needed to stay safe until then.