Page 74 of Soul on Fire
In one hand he held a backpack, hunched over by its weight and almost dragging it on the floor.
Majambu raised a pistol in his other hand and fired, straight at Ikolo.
Ikolo shoved Elliot away as the punch of the bullet slammed into his shoulder. He went down hard, his head flying back and cracking the linoleum hard as he hit the deck. The world spun, lights and sounds bouncing off each other, someone shouting, no, a hundred people shouting. More gunshots, and he flinched, waited for the impact—
Everything went dark.
* * *
Zombie.
It’s the only thing Elliot’s panicked brain could comprehend.This is a motherfucking zombie.
Majambu could barely walk. He leaned hard against the wall, the weight from the backpack almost pulling him down. Blood was everywhere, coating him from head to toe. He looked like he’d opened his mouth and gallons of blood had poured out. If he opened his mouth again, more would come, he knew it. Majambu’s skin was waxy and ashen, half his face loose and limp as if it was melting off.
He tried to raise his pistol again, aiming for Elliot.
Elliot pulled the Glock he’d taken from the CIA station and fired dead center into Majambu’s chest. Majambu stumbled back and dropped the backpack.
But he stayed standing. He raised his pistol again—
Behind Elliot, the doors to the CIC burst open, Admiral Kline, Admiral Mallory, and the rest of the staff crowding the hallway.
Admiral Mallory took one look at Ikolo on the ground and Majambu covered in blood and then moved to Elliot’s side. She raised her pistol.
Majambu lunged forward, screaming.
Mallory and Elliot fired together, emptying their magazines as Majambu kept coming, racing toward them with the last of his strength. Only after their slides locked back, bullets spent, did he fall to the floor in a wet skid.
His corpse finally came to a stop in a bloody pool close to Elliot and Mallory’s feet.
Mallory holstered her sidearm and held out her hand for Elliot’s. Dazed, Elliot handed it over.
Then he spun, shoved a lieutenant commander aside, and kneeled next to Ikolo. Admiral Ramirez was already down on the ground beside Ikolo and feeling for a pulse. “Careful, Doc,” Elliot breathed as he pushed his hands down over Ikolo’s bleeding shoulder wound. “He’s infected with Ebola.”
Ramirez turned her dismayed gaze to Elliot and stared. Her dark skin lost its warmth as the blood rushed from her face, ebony turning to ash as Elliot’s words sank in.
“Everyone,” Mallory said, her big voice booming down the hall. “Clear the deck! Get me the closest CBRN team, a biological HAZMAT team, and all the corpsman you can call in the next ten minutes!”
Kline kneeled beside Elliot, unbuttoning his khaki uniform shirt and shucking it for Elliot to use on Ikolo’s gunshot. Blood pooled beneath Ikolo, a slow sludge of it that haloed his shoulder.
“I got him, Elliot,” Kline murmured. “Let me put this on him.”
“Don’t touch him, Admiral,” Elliot breathed. “He’s got Ebola.”
“Then what the hell are you doing with your hands all over him? Back off!”
“Because I have it, too.”
Kline blanched.
A corpsman appeared, skidding to his knees beside Ramirez. “Gloves,” she barked. “Give us all gloves and masks!” Kline pulled his on with shaking hands as Elliot pressed Kline’s uniform shirt over Ikolo’s wound.
“Don’t touch his blood,” Ramirez ordered, speaking through her mask. “He’s infectious. Look at his eyes.” She pulled back Ikolo’s eyelid. Ikolo’s sclera was an angry, vivid red and filled with hemorrhaged blood, no white in his eyes left at all.
“Take care of him, Doc,” Elliot said softly. He ran his hand down Ikolo’s cheek and cupped his face, leaned forward, and kissed his lips. Beside him, Kline inhaled sharply, but when Elliot pulled back, Kline’s face was a stone mask, no emotion showing at all.
Elliot stood and marched to Majambu’s corpse. Mallory had set a perimeter on both ends of the hallway, keeping everyone clear of his corpse by ten feet. That perimeter was behind Ikolo, and Elliot had an unobstructed path to what remained of Majambu.
