Resistant (6 page)

Before he vanished, the lab had been built to Kazimi’s exacting specifications. He had incubators, freezers, an electron microscope, biological safety cabinets, plus several computers. What he did not have—at least not yet—was a viable treatment for the Doomsday Germ.

“Have you received my transmission?” Pollack asked.

Kazimi thought he heard a slight phase shift in Pollack’s voice—the equivalent of a digital quaver. Perhaps it was just his ears playing tricks again. Fourteen hours working with few breaks in a basement lab, with no access to sunlight, and rare direct human contact, could do that to a man. Yes, it was just his ears playing tricks, he decided. The data Pollack sent came through the decryption program just fine.

“I’ve received it,” Kazimi said.

“You’ll see that my latest approach does appear to inhibit bacterial protein synthesis, and that I’m also inhibiting ribosomal translocation. The main problem continues to be speed—killing the little beasties fast enough to overwhelm their ability to mutate and gain resistance. If we can accomplish that, the very elements that have been working against us will be working for us.”

“Very good,” Kazimi responded. “Give me a minute to review the findings in more detail.”

He saw the problem in a matter of seconds. Another scientist may have needed a day or two to spot the glitch, like finding a needle in a haystack of data, but not Kazimi.

“The bacteriostatic agent you have been using is getting in the way,” he said.

“Perhaps … No, wait. I see what you mean. I see exactly what you mean. Let me test the drug with a different one.”

“And with none at all.”

Again Kazimi thought he heard something in Pollack’s transmission—an electronic shimmer that briefly distorted his voice.

Had they been compromised?

The architects of the Doomsday Germ were not to be underestimated. They had created an organism more sophisticated than anything he had ever seen. He would not have been all that surprised if they had somehow gained access to these secure transmissions. If so, it might result in an acceleration of the timetable they’d issued.

Kazimi shuddered at the thought and debated whether to include this new suspicion in his daily report. A false alarm could raise concerns about his mental state. He’s hearing things, they might say, becoming paranoid. Every person, even someone with his penchant for solitude, has a breaking point. He feared tipping the scales in a way that could risk his involvement with the project. He had come too far, given up too much, not to see this to the end.

“Nothing to be disappointed about,” he said, rubbing at the grit stinging his eyes. “You’ve done well, Dr. Pollack.”

“And how about the other players in the game?”

The game.

Again Kazimi felt a pang of guilt for the ongoing deception, but it was a necessary precaution. Nobody could know about the very real threat facing America. The only people, as far as he was aware, who knew the specifics of his research were the president, the vice president, and a few select members of the president’s cabinet. The CIA and FBI, each investigating things from different angles, had to have amassed vast amounts about One Hundred Neighbors, but the inner circle with full knowledge of the threat the terrorists were presenting was limited to the most essential personnel. Even the smallest leak about the threat facing the nation would likely cause panic on an epic scale.

“Do you have another piece of the problem for me to try, or would you prefer I keep working on this one?” Pollack went on.

“Yes, keep working. The others will have a look at these data as well. We’re doing great.”

Another lie. Kazimi had been dishing them out like Halloween candy ever since he gave up his life to go underground. The truth was they were fast running out of time.

“You know, I’m really enjoying this little exercise of ours,” Pollack said. “Much more so than I thought when you first approached me. I’m glad I decided to come aboard.”

There it was again—an audible phase shift in Pollack’s voice. Kazimi decided this was definitely something to go on his report. He might be wrong, but it was worth the risk. Even if it turned out to be nothing, NSA experts would probably have a new encryption program installed by morning.

Kazimi checked the time on the wall-mounted digital clock. Five-thirty. Soon he would need to recite the Isha, the fifth of the daily prayers offered by practicing Muslims. He always prayed alone in his bedroom upstairs, never in congregation, as was his communal obligation. It was, however, a forgivable offense given his unique situation.

After the Isha and dinner, and possibly a short nap, he would head back to the lab. Completely spent, and feeling almost ill with fatigue, Kazimi ambled up the spiral metal stairs to the lab’s only exit, his head bent, his arms dangling limply at his sides. He was a handsome, brown-skinned man in his late thirties, fit but not muscular, with slender shoulders and a narrow waist. But the stress of his work, coupled with the lack of sunlight and exercise, had aged him. Kazimi wondered if his former colleagues back at Stanford would even recognize him now.

At the top of the stairs, he pressed his forehead against the visor of the dual iris capture scanner. The red light on the wall-mounted keypad turned to green. From his pants pocket, he withdrew a small contraption, a code creator the size of a credit card. He pressed a button on the creator and the LED screen produced a one-time-only five-digit number, which he entered on the keypad. Almost immediately, he heard the titanium rods securing the door disengage. Getting out of the lab was just as tightly controlled as getting in.

Waiting for him on the other side were two men and a woman—three special agents from the FBI. In addition to his guards, the brownstone was secured with window and door alarms, along with motion-activated security cameras placed throughout. Kazimi never grew too close to his security detail. The agents tasked with his protection rotated every three weeks or so to keep them sharp and focused, and every three or four months they were replaced. It had to be dull protecting a man who toiled alone and worked almost continuously when he wasn’t sleeping or praying.

Kazimi had a remarkably facile memory. By the second time he met them, he knew the names of each agent detailed to him. They exchanged pleasantries and truncated conversations, but as far as he knew, none of the men or women knew about the work he was doing in his basement lab. Three guards was a typical number for his security detail. Some days there were two. On days when he went food or clothes shopping there might even be four. But he could not recall ever having been guarded by just a single person.

The agents were expecting him.

Each day he posted the times when he would be saying his prayers. Alexander Burke, fairly new to the team, led the way upstairs to Kazimi’s third-story bedroom. Burke was a lanky man, with corn-colored hair and gray eyes. He was followed by Maria Rodriguez, then Kazimi, and finally Timothy Vaill. Vaill and Rodriguez, always professional but likeable and open, were husband and wife. Mocha-skinned and kinetic, Rodriguez was a pert five foot two, which was to say a foot or so shorter than Vaill, a solidly built, laconic fellow, who was constantly squeezing handgrips or doing exercises using a set of adjustable dumbbells.

“Going back to work after you pray?” Burke asked as they climbed the narrow wooden staircase leading up to the top floor.

Vaill and Rodriguez grinned.

“Dr. Kaz always goes back to work,” Vaill said.

Burke smiled sheepishly. “Yeah, I should have figured that. Don’t you ever get out, Dr. Kaz?”

“My work is too crucial to leave it for any extended length of time,” Kazimi said.

“How about women? Do you ever want to—you know—date? I mean, you’ve been cooped up here for a long time now.”

Kazimi stopped climbing. His expression was hard.

“I am a Muslim first and an American second,” he said, allowing his withering look to linger. “My beliefs prohibit carnal pleasure outside of marriage. And Agent Burke, I would prefer if we keep our conversations professional.”

“The new boy’s learning,” Rodriguez said with a chuckle.

Burke held up his hands.

“My bad. Just getting the hang of things, I guess.” At the top of the stairs, he opened Kazimi’s bedroom door. “Just a quick check before we leave you alone, Dr. Kaz.”

“No need to explain. I’ve been through this so many times before, that it is routine.”

With the exception of a twin mattress, end table with a digital alarm clock, goose-neck lamp, copy of the Koran and several microbiology journals on it, and a prayer rug rolled up in a corner, the master bedroom was virtually bare. There were no pictures, no plants, nothing to warm the space. This was where Ahmed Kazimi slept and prayed and nothing more. It took only a minute for Burke to check the bathroom and closet, and beneath the bed, and to wave him up the final few stairs. Rodriguez and Vaill followed but stopped in the doorway.

Usually, as soon as the room was deemed safe, the detail retreated to the living area on the second floor. This time, though, Burke remained by the edge of the window, looking down below.

“Dr. Kaz,” he asked, “is that truck frequently parked in the alley?” Burke’s voice was tinged with concern.

Rodriguez and Vaill took several steps into the room.

Just as Kazimi reached Burke, and peered down below, the agent spun around impossibly quick, his weapon drawn. The gunshots—two of them—were deafening. Kazimi cried out and reflexively dropped to his knees, covering his ears. The stench of gunpowder filled the room and burned his nostrils. Just ten or so feet away, Maria Rodriguez’s head exploded as the bullet tore through the front of her skull.

Tim Vaill was reaching for his gun when Burke fired twice more. Kazimi was on the ground now, shaking violently, his hands still clutching his ears. He saw Vaill driven backward by a bullet to the front of his chest. His horrified expression at the sight of his wife would live in Kazimi’s mind as long as the terrible images of her corpse. Vaill was teetering on the top step when the second shot hit. His head snapped to the right, blood spurting from just above his left temple. He flew backward, tumbling down the stairs.

Kazimi was pulled to his feet by Burke and held there while the agent opened the window.

“It’s actually
our
dump truck parked in your alley,” Burke said. “Don’t worry, Doc, we put in plenty of padding.”

Before Kazimi could respond, he was falling. Three stories below, he landed softly in a pile of foam rubber. Before Kazimi could even move to get out of the bin, Burke landed beside him. The engine roared and the dump truck backed up onto the street. Kazimi felt a stinging jab at the base of his neck and saw Burke withdraw the syringe, then pin his arms to his sides.

In less than a minute, everything went dark.

CHAPTER 7

           What one should expect from unemployment benefits is added unemployment and nothing more.

        
—LANCASTER R. HILL,
100 Neighbors
, SAWYER RIVER BOOKS, 1939, P. 111

The conference officially began the day following Lou’s trip to the CDC. While Cap stayed over at his aunt’s house until late afternoon, Lou spent the day attending workshops and lectures dealing with changes in the board of registration policies in various states, research studies on the success rate of physician monitoring, medical ethics, addiction treatment, and sadly, suicide prevention. His work for the PWO may have been emotionally taxing and frustrating at times, but as long as Walter Filstrup kept his distance, it was always fascinating.

The keynote address, from the man Filstrup was hoping to replace, dealt with the question of whether a physician health program should limit itself solely to reporting that a suspended doc had adhered to the provisions of their monitoring agreement. At the other end of the spectrum was allowing the director to step up and offer the licensing board a thoughtful, subjective evaluation of the physician’s recovery, and the likelihood of relapse, reminding the board that no matter what or who or where, whether it was a doc or a teacher, a quarterback or an airline pilot, there was never any sure thing.

Never.

Fortunately, Lou’s therapist and the program head at Templeton Treatment Center had gone to bat for him, and the people at Eisenhower Memorial had listened. Otherwise, thousands of hours of studying and years of training would have been trashed.

By the time Cap returned to the hotel at nine, Lou was conferenced out, and grateful that the day to come would begin with another run through the mountains.

Cap had other ideas.

“Are you still thinking about a run tomorrow?” he asked as they headed to their room. “Before I left for my aunt’s I checked out the health club down in the basement. Pretty fine. We could go there and do some lifting instead of slogging out on the trail.”

“They have any punching bags?”

“Not that I saw.”

“Hotel gyms never have boxing stuff. I opt for the run. The concierge suggested a new trail for us to try. He said it’ll take us up even higher into the hills, with great views of the Chattahoochee.”

“You know, the weather report posted in the lobby said it’s going to be a misty, rainy morning tomorrow. I was thinking I might just sleep in. I did a lot of driving today.”

Lou was disappointed and, he realized, still somewhat embarrassed by his two tumbles the previous morning. The sooner he got back on the trail, the better he would be feeling about it.

“You know the rules of safe trail running,” he heard himself saying before he could swallow back the manipulative words. “Can’t go without a partner, partner. I’ve got a big speech to deliver tomorrow, and it’ll be flatter than roadkill if I don’t get in a run beforehand.”

“You said it was going to be flat no matter what you did.”

“Maybe so, but Filstrup is going to order a copy of the recording of the damn thing. No way he won’t believe I cost him the election if he loses.”

“Which you say he will.”