9.
Two days ago.

I was in bed when the report came in from the Star Chamber. First the DCS started
sniffing keywords texting out of the location. Then there was a beat cop report. We had
been at FP Con Charlie for Red Horse for months; within 30 seconds of listening to the
phone scans I knew what was happening.

I used the drill channel to the local cops and ordered them there at full speed, no sirens,
no radio, no warning of any kind. I told them to get there, use their tasers to drop
anyone leaving the building, and as soon as they could get into position, I said, they had
to lock the place down. Nobody in or out.

God have mercy on my soul.

I ran to my car and floored it, rocketing through the empty streets, wondering how we
were going to track down everyone who got out of the building before the cops could arrive.
I wasn’t sure which was worse: thinking about the people I had just condemned to death,
the ones who were going to tear each other to pieces—or thinking about the guy dropping his
subversive music down a storm drain as he hurried back to his dorm room, or the girl hiding
her tattoo as she snuck back to her parents’ house, not knowing they might be vectors for
biological terrorism on a scale we could barely imagine.

Two minutes before I arrived on scene, the night operator at The Office got a weather report
from Virginia in best Langley style: 100% accurate forecast of something that had already
happened.

The first cops were already on the scene. One of them had tasered someone coming through
a door and was looking sick about it. Padlocks were on and they were starting to string
yellow tape.

The sounds coming from inside were something out of your worst dream.

I stayed in the background, watching until everything was boarded up and locked down. When
I couldn’t stand the screaming any more I left. Instead of going home I went back to The
Office, sat down in my cubicle and watched the news crawlers for signs of an outbreak
somewhere else. Hour after hour.

No outbreak came.

By noon the next day we were beginning to smile. By six that evening there was another
commendation on my record.

It was a miracle.

10 -> made up of one of one, two of another and three of a third.

9.
Two days ago.

I was in bed when the report came in from the Star Chamber. First the DCS started
sniffing keywords texting out of the location. Then there was a beat cop report. We had
been at FP Con Charlie for Red Horse for months; within 30 seconds of listening to the
phone scans I knew what was happening.

I used the drill channel to the local cops and ordered them there at full speed, no sirens,
no radio, no warning of any kind. I told them to get there, use their tasers to drop
anyone leaving the building, and as soon as they could get into position, I said, they had
to lock the place down. Nobody in or out.

God have mercy on my soul.

I ran to my car and floored it, rocketing through the empty streets, wondering how we
were going to track down everyone who got out of the building before the cops could arrive.
I wasn’t sure which was worse: thinking about the people I had just condemned to death,
the ones who were going to tear each other to pieces—or thinking about the guy dropping his
subversive music down a storm drain as he hurried back to his dorm room, or the girl hiding
her tattoo as she snuck back to her parents’ house, not knowing they might be vectors for
biological terrorism on a scale we could barely imagine.

Two minutes before I arrived on scene, the night operator at The Office got a weather report
from Virginia in best Langley style: 100% accurate forecast of something that had already
happened.

The first cops were already on the scene. One of them had tasered someone coming through
a door and was looking sick about it. Padlocks were on and they were starting to string
yellow tape.

The sounds coming from inside were something out of your worst dream.

I stayed in the background, watching until everything was boarded up and locked down. When
I couldn’t stand the screaming any more I left. Instead of going home I went back to The
Office, sat down in my cubicle and watched the news crawlers for signs of an outbreak
somewhere else. Hour after hour.

No outbreak came.

By noon the next day we were beginning to smile. By six that evening there was another
commendation on my record.

It was a miracle.

10 -> made up of one of one, two of another and three of a third.