<em>Warning, hull break and fire detected in Sector 22. Please evacuate Sector 22 immediately.</em><br/><br/>The second blast made Rob drop his spoon into the stew. He cursed. He should have been out there! He should have been out there with his boys, back to back, fighting off whatever was coming for them, rounding up civilians, securing the area... But no. There was the procedures. He would have been out there, in the thick of it, if it was back on Earth before the Ferenzi outbreak.<br/><br/>The virus changed everything. It changed military procedures. If there's an outbreak, stay put. Secure the civilians around you. Set up a clean perimeter. Make sure the virus doesn't breach your perimeter. And then move on to the next area. Everything else was secondary - a clean perimeter always comes first. So many people had died foolishly back on Earth during the initial outbreak. Stupid scientists running back to their lab to secure their latest test results. Moms leaving their children to run back and grab the late hubby's photograph. The old grandma crawling behind the couch to save the fat cat. They had all died. So now the rule was loud and clear: if there's a virus outbreak, a clean and safe perimeter comes first. Don't save the cat. Don't save the papers. Don't rush out into the unknown to investigate or to save your friends, because you'll catch the virus and you'll get back into the clean perimeter a crazed killer and you'll put everything in danger.<br/><br/>So there was nothing Rob could do until the mess hall was clean and secure. He broke the procedures ones by going out to investigate the blast, and he lost Sunshine. He didn't know it was the virus then, but he should have suspected it. The signs were all there - the failing communications, the subtle feeling in his gut that something wasn't right, the concern in Dr Seris' voice on the intercom. He should have read those signs right. Both he and the doctor have been around the virus for far too long; their guts weren't lying. He should have known.<br/><br/>Now all sarge could do was stay put until the civilians in the room were secure. Until the virus was out and the area was locked up tight. Because as head of security, Rob's job was to go out there and see what's going on. Evaluate the situation and report. With no communications he had no one but Dr Seris to report to, but that didn't matter. He had to go out and evaluate.<br/><br/>So he had to make sure that once he goes out, he couldn't come back carrying the virus.<br/><br/>Not much he could do until the last person in the mess hall has been examined and all those who had the virus were taken out and the doors could be locked down. The mess hall's intercom unit was down since the first explosion and there was nobody to fix it, so he couldn't call the rest of the facility, either. All he could do was pick up his spoon and finish off his stew slowly while watching doc and the others at work. Some patients died. Others were taken out of the mess hall, scared and shattered. The impact-proof glass had survived the blasts so far, but Rob recalled the facility blueprints. Twenty-five levels, twenty-five monorails. And he couldn't get out of here and shut them down. Not unless he violated the procedures, and Sunshine's blood on the floor in the hallway was the cold dead proof that you should not break the procedures.<br/><br/>Two down, twenty-three to go. Rob wasn't religious but he prayed that somebody on the outside can put two and two together and make it to the control tower and shut down the monorails. Because Rob doubted that the facility itself or anyone in it would survive too many more blasts. Sarge was itching for action, he was scared and nervous and edgy and angry. The situation didn't look good. He stared at his gun, Glock FX 2 "Showstopper", special military edition, designed to be maximally effective against those infected by the virus: 9 mm semi-automatic with hollow-point bullets - a powerful weapon that virtually shredded the skull on impact and blasted the brain apart. A heavy pistol made of traditional chromed steel, almost impossible to block or break, usable when wet or in low temperatures... and good for bashing someone's face in with the handle when you're out of ammo. Rub nodded at the gun. He knew he was going to have to use it soon.<br/><br/>He moved his gaze back towards the cluster of injured people. "How are we doing, Doctor?" he called to Dr Seris.