The men who'd pursued him up the stairs seized him and slammed him hard against the wall, so that Seth saw sparks behind his eyes. They wrenched his hands behind him and bound them with some kind of hard plastic zip ties. Then they slammed his face into the wall again.
“What did I say to you?” one of them asked over his radio. “I said don't move. That means you don't fucking move.” They pulled Seth back, then slammed him into the wall a third time. Seth felt his nose pop, and tasted a hot stream of blood that spilled over his lips.
They hauled him downstairs to the library, where his mother was already seated in one of the old wingback chairs, her hands bound in front of her with one of the industrial-strength plastic zip ties. She gasped when she saw Seth's face.
“What did you do to him?” she demanded.
“He resisted.” They threw Seth onto the rug in front of the fireplace, and then pointed the snout of a machine gun at his head.
“I want to call my attorney,” Seth's mother said.
“Afraid not,” one of the masked Homeland Security guys replied. “We're not here under a search warrant. We're here under a national security letter. That means you can't call anybody, and you can't tell anybody we were here.”
“That's crazy!” she replied.
“It's the law.”
Three of the masked men stayed with them, their guns pointed at Seth and his mother, while the others joined the mob searching through the house. Seth heard glass breaking and the loud thuds of furniture being overturned.
“What do you want?” Seth asked.
“I think you know who we're looking for,” the federal cop said. “Tell us where she is.”
“I don't know!” Seth said.
“Seth, what in the world is he talking about?” Seth's mom asked.
“I don't know,” Seth repeated, more quietly this time.
They spent an hour searching the house and grounds while the three men watched Seth and his mother in the library. Finally, a small group of the Homeland Security officers returned to the library, and one of them peeled off his gas mask, revealing a middle-aged man with graying hair.
“Okay, we're getting tired of this,” he said to Seth. “Tell me where she is.”
“I don't know where she is,” Seth said.
“Who?” Seth's mom asked.
“Jennifer Morton,” the older man replied. “Where is she?”
“The Morton kid?” Seth's mom asked. “That's what all this is about?”
“Tell us where to find her.”
“If you let me look in my husband's office, I can probably find her address. Her father does some repair work for us now and then—”
“We've already been to the Mortons' hovel out in the woods,” the man said. “Nobody home. We believe she is attempting to evade custody.”
“What did she do?” Seth's mom asked.
“That's not relevant,” he replied.
“You broke into my house and assaulted my son,” she said. “I think I deserve to know why.”
The gray-haired Homeland Security man sighed. “I want to interrogate them separately. Move the kid out of here.”
Two of the masked men grabbed Seth up and stood him on his feet, then marched him from the room.
“Where are you taking him? Bring him back!” Seth's mom shouted.
“Ma'am, you're going to have to shut the hell up,” the older Homeland Security man said.
“We're going to bury you in the biggest lawsuit you've ever seen before this is through,” she told him. “We'll get you fired.”
“Good luck with that.” The Homeland Security man followed Seth and his armed escorts down the hall. They opened the double doors to the dining room and dragged Seth inside.
A woman was already sitting at the center of the long table, dressed in a yellow hazmat suit with the CDC logo printed on it. She'd removed her hood and gloves, as if they'd determined there was no threat here, and she was typing at a laptop. She looked up when they entered the room.
Seth recognized her—she was the CDC doctor who'd come to Jenny's house during the quarantine, and left with samples of Seth and Jenny's hair and blood. Seth wondered what she'd found.
“What's up, Doc?” Seth asked her.
“Sit down,” the gray-haired Homeland Security man said, and the two masked men pushed Seth into the chair across from Heather.
“You remember me, Seth?” the doctor asked.
“Dr. Reynard,” he said. “You're an epidemicist.”
“Epidemiologist,” she corrected. “I apologize for the wreck they made of your house. I wanted a much more subtle approach, but who listens to me? How are you feeling? It looks like they got you pretty bad. I should check you for trauma—”