Read Online Son of Cerberus (The Unusual Operations Division Book 2) by Jacob Hammes - Free Book Online Page B

comfortable though. If you can’t come up with some special magic potion that lets you get aboard that ship, it’s going to go bye bye.”
    “Thanks for the warning, big guy.” Brenda didn’t skip a beat as she started pulling boxes out of the trunk and setting them down forcefully near the agents feet. “Now run along, grumpy puss; we don’t have all day.”
    The woman who came to greet them was wrapped in white. Her hair was tied up in a tight bun and tucked beneath a net that reminded Marcus of a cook’s hairnet. She was mildly overweight with a ruddy face and big red nose, yet the fiery intensity that decorated her brown eyes was nothing to brush off. She walked with a determined manner toward the group, though admittedly a bit awkwardly because of the bulky hazmat suit. Within seconds, the gruff FBI agent was replaced by the stone-faced CDC agent.
    “Hi, kids,” she said, taking a tough stance with her arms crossed. Her voice belonged to someone who had smoked for thirty years. “My name is Patricia Banks. Just call me Trish, or lady, or agent, or hey-you.”
    “I think we can remember Trish.” Marcus tried humor as he extended his hand in greeting again. She stared at it for a moment before regarding him with her very serious demeanor. The same look crossed her eyes as had crossed the FBI agent’s.
    “You really want to shake hands with someone in a hazmat suit from the Center for Disease Control?”
    “Guess not,” Marcus said sheepishly. “Do you really think there’s something biological out here?”
    “Maybe,” she answered honestly. “Maybe not. The symptoms go away after you cross that yellow tape out there which leads me to believe it’s not biological. We can’t rule it out, however, since we can’t get close enough. We also have to factor in the multiple dead bodies aboard the ship and how they got that way.”
    “Looked like murder to me.” David should have kept his mouth shut. “Because of all the blood, that is.”
    “Have you ever seen hemorrhagic fever?” she asked seriously.
    “What about the little girl?” Marcus asked.
    “She’s in infectious disease quarantine in Philly until we get this whole thing straightened out. She would be cleared if she hadn’t collapsed like that after coming off the yacht.”
    “Thanks for setting us up,” Brenda said, popping the top of one of the hefty laptops open. Beside the ten or fifteen different antennas sticking out of it, the machine seemed fairly basic. Brenda smirked at the slack-jawed bemusement of the CDC agent.
    “Thank you for being so thorough, too,” Brenda continued. “Until we get down to the source of all this madness, we can never be too careful.”
    “Okay,” Trish muttered. “What’s all this crap you have here?”
    “Spectrum analyzer, EMF detector, Geiger counter, and a few other monitoring devices.” Phillip spouted the terms off systematically. “We’re going to be checking for all different types of radiation. There’s a very strong possibility what we’re dealing with here doesn’t have anything to do with biology, virology, botany, or any of those subsets.”
    “That’s looking more obvious every second,” Trish said with just a hint of sarcasm. “No matter what type of suit we wear, we end up turning back. No one has been able to get close enough to that ship to figure anything out. Now you’re saying we might have all been exposed to some sort of radioactive substance?”
    Brenda and Phillip looked sideways at each other. David wasn’t paying any attention and more than likely would not have been able to comment on the matter anyway. He was rubbing his stomach like he was ready to eat—or vomit. Marcus took the opportunity to educate Trish on what they were looking for before either of the brain-children attacked her.
    “Radioactive infers that there is a material present that is unstable, thus releasing isotopes which may be entering people and not leaving. People might be exhibiting