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Tim prepared the yeast culture for Clarence. Sure, that had to be done; it only made sense to get it to Black Manitou. Maybe someone could re-create his work from data alone, maybe not — sometimes getting that first engineered organism to produce was more art than science. He’d spent years perfecting his skills and techniques. Douchebag Cheng might f.u.c.k it up if he had to re-create from scratch, so sending him an already successful culture, yeah, that was the right thing to do.

But test the yeast that remained on a bunch of poor f.u.c.kers who were already infected, instead of just taking it themselves? Crazy. Margaret was willing to sacrifice her own safety for a shot at helping those guys. Maybe Tim had been wrong about her — maybe she and Mr. Flag Waver really did belong together, living happily ever after in the Land of Idealism & Plat.i.tudes. He sealed up the fist-sized canister for Clarence. Inside was enough living yeast to start a hundred new colonies.

That left the remainder to be divided four ways: one quarter to continue the base colony, and one quarter each for Nagy, Austin and Chappas.

Tim stopped. Why didn’t Margaret want to use some on Clark, the man who was already showing triangle growth? Clark was a lot farther gone than anyone else. Maybe she was going to drain the hydras from Edmund, put those in Clark.

He eye-tracked through his visor menu, called up the surveillance feed from Clark’s cell. One look showed it wouldn’t be long now. Six bluish triangles with inch-long sides were clearly visible under his skin, a slit near each point running toward the center.

Four days into Clark’s infection. The timeline seemed to vary slightly with every victim — every host’s body responded differently — but if the general track record held true, those triangles would hatch today. Clark’s containment cell would be home to six hatchlings, their inch-high triangular bodies supported by long, black tentacle-legs.

Then what? Someone would have to go in there, put the hatchlings into smaller cages. Those cages would be s.h.i.+pped to Black Manitou. Cheng’s group would study them, look for weaknesses.

And Clark? He’d just be dead.

Tim licked his lips. He had an overpowering urge to get off this s.h.i.+p. But if he did, what then? If the infection somehow reached the mainland, then Tim was f.u.c.ked anyway. Everyone was f.u.c.ked.

He looked at his yeast, the result of years of work combined with the dumb luck of Candice Walker’s bizarre immunity. His yeast secreted the killer cellulose that slipped through the gut barrier to enter directly into the bloodstream. Theoretically, anyway — Saccharomyces feely had yet to be tested.

A human trial. That’s what was needed. An uninfected human trial.

He again focused on the video feed of Clark. Tim didn’t want to end up like that, with things growing inside of him, things that would rip out of his body, tear him to pieces.

Tim eye-tracked the menus, zoomed the camera in on the triangle embedded in Clark’s right shoulder. A gnarled, nasty thing. A living, blackish-blue cancer just beneath the skin.

And then, the slits vibrated … they opened.

Three eyes, black as polished coal, seemed to stare right into the camera, seemed to look right at Tim. Alien eyes, demonic eyes, eyes filled with murder.

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