The Devil's Pitchfork (13 page)

Ben Zataki stuck his head in. He looked as neat and put-together as before. “Ladies, I’ve scheduled a meeting for everybody in fifteen minutes. I’ve got to make a couple quick phone calls to Atlanta and D.C. and then we’ll be on our way.” His gaze met Liz’s. “You okay?”

“I’m fine. Ready to go.”

“Good. See you there.”

The team met in a second-floor conference room with no windows. The room was full and it was the first time Liz got a sense of unseen machinery at work, that the theft of Chimera M13 had set in motion forces that she could not stop.

Zataki gestured for everyone to sit, but remained standing. Even in green surgical scrubs he held a kind of dignified authority.

“Okay everyone. I’ve prepared our cultures including extras. I’ve set up an experimental procedure and assigned teams. Similar tests are currently being started at the U.S. Immunological Research facility and samples are being flown to the CDC. All of you will be assigned to monkeys and all but two will be inoculated with a high dose of Chimera M13. Four will be injected first with one of the weaker strains. The rest will receive doses at different intervals.”

Liz studied at the schedule that was handed around the room. She was paired with Sharon Jaxon. They were to assist in injecting the four monkeys with Chimera M1, 2, 3 and 4, and in injecting the rest of the animals with Chimera M13. Then, four hours later, they were to inject four of the monkeys with M1, M2, M3 and M4. Other scientists were assigned similar procedures with other monkeys at later increments: eight hours, twelve hours and twenty-four hours.

Liz wondered if they would have twenty-four hours. She wondered if the terrorists, whoever they were, would unleash Chimera on the public before twenty-four hours passed.

Everyone listened carefully as Zataki outlined their objectives, reminding everyone of safety issues. Liz saw that some of the people present seemed confused. Two of them were older men in military uniforms—Army, she thought. Two more were in navy blue three-piece suits. They looked like government agents of some sort, or lobbyists or politicians. Rigid, clean-cut, serious. They, in particular, seemed confused.

One of them said, “Will this work?”

Zataki shrugged. “Mr. O’Brien, right?”

O’Brien nodded.

Zataki said, “We don’t know. That’s what we’re trying to determine.”

“But you think it will?” O’Brien fidgeted with a gold pen, tapping it nervously on a leather-bound folder in his lap.

Zataki gazed at him. “If it doesn’t, Mr. O’Brien, we’re in serious trouble.”

“But what should I advise the President?”

Zataki said, “There isn’t much to advise, Mr. O’Brien. I’ve spoken with Anthony Pfeiffer at the CDC and he’ll be at the meeting. We won’t have anything useful or definitive before tomorrow night.”

“That’s not good enough,” O’Brien said, unable to keep a petulant whine out of his voice.

“Without a doubt,” Zataki said. “But it is, nonetheless, the best we can do. The best
anybody
can do.”

The second suit said, “If this works, and if these terrorists let this germ loose, will we have enough of the vaccine available to use on the public?” He was heavier set than his lean, younger partner, and spoke more slowly with fewer fidgets.

Zataki peered at him over his half-moon reading glasses. “Samples of all four of the weaker strains—”

”M1, M2, M3 and M4?”

“Yes. As well as a sample of M13, have been turned over to Sidney Alloway. She is the head of Geiger Pharmaceuticals. She runs both a vaccine manufacturing facility in New Jersey, and the means to mass produce a virus or bacterial agent. They will begin growing large amounts of M1, M2, M3 and M4 as soon as possible in case we’re able to use them as a vaccine.”

Liz’s stomach did a slow flip-flop.

Zataki continued. “They will also be growing M13 and attempting to develop a Salk vaccine for Chimera.” A Salk vaccine was a dead virus, treated with Formaldehyde.

All the color drained out of Liz’s face and she thought she was going to vomit. Sharon glanced at her, then grabbed her arm. “Are you okay?” she whispered.

“
You’re going to grow industrial lots of Chimera?
” Liz burst out.

Zataki turned. “Yes, Dr. Vargas.”

“That’s ... Chimera’s too dangerous. That’s crazy! It’s the most dangerous virus on the—”

”We’re well aware of the danger,” Zataki said, voice even. “But we don’t have a choice.” He paused, gaze piercing her. “Do we?”

She shook her head and collapsed back in her chair, realizing fully the Pandora’s box they had opened. She remember Derek Stillwater saying,
“When you steal the devil’s pitchfork, you become the devil
.”

O’Brien said, “And if these don’t work? What are we going to do if none of these versions of Chimera work? What will we do if we don’t have a workable vaccine and the terrorists release M13 somewhere on the public?”

Zataki frowned. “The standard procedure is rings of containment. In the case of a virus like Chimera, victims will be transported to isolation facilities—here at USAMRIID or at the CDC or various hospitals—and anybody who has come into contact with the victims will also be isolated, thus setting up rings of containment around the victims.”

“And if someone gets through the rings of containment?” O’Brien demanded. “If you miss somebody?”

Zataki said, “If the virus spreads faster than we can contain it? If the public panics and runs? If the public is noncompliant? That’s simple, Mr. O’Brien. Hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of people will die.”

In time the meeting was wrapped. The White House representatives headed back to Washington, D.C. to tell their boss that the only thing being done to deal with a possible biological attack was a wild-ass longshot that most of the scientists thought wouldn’t work. The military was preparing their troops, but more importantly, were setting up armed perimeters around U.S. Immuno and Geiger Pharmaceuticals.

Somewhere out there, Liz thought as she changed into scrubs, was a lone troubleshooter and an FBI team trying to track down the terrorists before they unleashed Chimera. She made a silent prayer to a god she didn’t really believe in that they would be successful.

Once dressed, the two women proceeded into the next level to tape rubber gloves to their scrubs and socks, then don their spacesuits.

“Looks like Frank and...” Acid flooded Liz’s throat. She swallowed it back, breath coming hard. “...and Jim based our hot level facility on yours.”

“There are only so many ways to do it,” Jaxon acknowledged. She took a close look at Liz. “You up to this? You look a little strained.”

“Yes. I’m up to this.”

“Good. There will be a bunch of observers this round. In the middle of the night it ought to thin out, but don’t get freaked by the number of spacesuits you see.”

“Sure.”

They moved into the spacesuit area and donned their blue suits. The one Liz Vargas wore was brand new and crinkled as she unfolded it. It had the distinctive “new suit” smell. She didn’t like the smell. For some reason it reminded her of her husband’s death, of the Medical Examiner’s Office, of the funeral home. It reminded her of saying goodbye. They suited up, checked each other’s suits for cracks or leaks, then proceeded into USAMRIID’s Biological Safety Level 4 facility.

Jaxon had been right. There were eight or nine people already in there, trying not to bump into each other. She didn’t like the crowd. They would be working with hypodermic needles contaminated with Chimera M13. One pinprick would mean certain death.

Chimera M13, within the limits of their testing, was fatal one hundred percent of the time. Marburg and Ebola were fatal about twenty-five to thirty-five percent of the time. That was largely because they were simian viruses that made the leap to
Homo sapiens
. They were not well-adapted to human beings.

Smallpox, which was perfectly adapted by nature to infect and kill human beings, was also fatal about a third of the time.

U.S. Immuno had improved on nature, if any sane person would consider it an improvement. Chimera M13 killed every subject it had been tested on. They believed, from a population point of view, that the real number would be somewhere in the ninety to ninety-five percentile range, that in a large human population there would be a small percentage of human beings with immune systems resistant to this disease.

Of course, Chimera had never actually been tested on human beings. It had been tested on cultures of human cells with spectacular success, and on monkeys as well. They had run it on a barrage of mice, rats, guinea pigs and rabbits. Fatal, fatal, fatal. On laboratory animals it was one hundred percent fatal. No human being had ever actually been infected.

The monkey room was at the far end of the hot zone, a large rectangular space. On top of counter tops were wall-to-wall monkey cages, each draped with plastic sheeting to prevent the spread of airborne disease. Liz and Sharon gestured for the crowd to stay along the walls, which they did, more or less. Like any crowd, it had a life of its own, shifting and drifting, people gesturing to each other with sign language, barely able to hear each other through their spacesuits even when shouting.

Jaxon picked up a metal tray containing syringes of M1, M2, M3 and M4. Together they proceeded to the four monkeys on the far left. At the first cage, Jaxon used a lever to bring the false rear wall of the cage forward until the monkey was pressed and immobile against the front of the cage. Jaxon took a syringe from a second tray and injected the monkey with the tranquilizer Telazol. She stepped back and waited. Within moments the monkey became unconscious.

With smooth, deliberate motions, Liz took the syringe labeled M1 and injected it into the first monkey.

Turning, she saw that the crowd of blue suits was pressing in toward her. They recoiled as a group at the sight of the syringe, moving back toward the far wall. She shuffled over to a red “sharps” container on the wall and dropped the syringe into it. She squirmed as a muscle spasm rippled along her back. Grimacing, she adjusted her posture. Her back ached from where the bullets had struck the Kevlar in the spacesuit. After a moment, the spasm passed.

Jaxon repeated her tranquilizing procedure with the second monkey and Liz injected it with M2. This proceeded through the first four monkeys. Each time she turned, the crowd had moved a little bit closer. Inside her suit she sighed, reflecting on Derek Stillwater’s comment about stage fright. No kidding. She felt like she was performing.

The next stage was trickier. They were going to inject all twenty monkeys with M13.

She stood back, sweat beading on her forehead, the blower loud in her ears. Another spasm assaulted her back. She gasped, twisted a bit, and it went away. Jaxon stood close to her, face shields touching. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

It was time-consuming and exhausting. The trick was to not rush. To work slowly and deliberately. To concentrate on what she was doing, not get into an automatic sequence.

But it was hard. It had been a long, exhausting day. Every few minutes her back seized up and she had to twist inside her spacesuit to relieve the pain. She knew she was tiring, knew that maybe she should take a break or turn this over to someone else. But she had something to prove. She had started this mess, had actually been one of the creators of Chimera, and she wanted to be one of the people to fix it.

By the time they hit monkey number twenty, a large thirty-pound male with gray tufted ears and yellowish brown fur, she just wanted to finish. The tidal ebb and flow of the crowd was getting to her. She wanted to get away from them. She wanted to get off her feet, out of the spacesuit and around a cup of coffee. Her back was complaining constantly now, a deep, uncomfortable ache split by the occasional spasm.

She moved in toward monkey number 20. The blue suits moved toward her, circling. Everyone wanting to mark this moment. As she stepped forward, the syringe in her hand, a jagged, searing pain raced through her back like an electrical current. With a cry she bent forward, the syringe jolting out of her grasp. Involuntarily she clutched at it, trying to catch it. She felt the jab of pain immediately, saw the tear in three layers of gloves, saw the drops of blood ooze through the hole.

She had been injected with Chimera M13!

16

Washington, D.C.

D
ETECTIVE
L
OU
M
ATTHEWS DOUBLE-PARKED
the Crown Victoria and followed his partner, Detective Chris Flemming, over to the crime scene. Flemming, who stood six-three and weighed nearly three hundred pounds, his coal-black shaved skull standing out like a beacon, headed over to talk to the patrol officers who had cordoned off the area near Jimmy’s Saloon. Matthews, who wasn’t as tall as his partner, and whose skin was more chocolate in tone, moved toward where the crime scene squad was doing their thing. Dressed in a navy blue pinstripe three-piece suit, Matthews brushed back his suit coat and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

“What’ve we got?”

The CSI was a skinny guy with fuzzy brown hair, his complexion red, making his high rounded cheekbones seem rouged. Matthews had worked with him a couple times before. Todd Fawkes, he remembered. Yeah. That was his name. Annoying little shit, but seemed to know his business.

“Large caliber bullet to the heart,” Fawkes said, not looking up from taking evidence. “Looks like a handful of shots. One or two hit the wall here, haven’t got them yet. Couple hit vehicles. Winston’s working on them.”

“Sniper?”

“Maybe.”

Matthews crouched down and took a hard look at the victim. Long blond hair. Reddish beard. He took in the green scrub shirt now caked with drying blood, the jeans and tennis shoes. “Got an ID?”

“Got gloves?”

Matthews took a pair of Latex gloves from his pocket and tugged them on. Fawkes handed him a bagged wallet from his evidence kit. Matthews took it out of the bag and examined it. Maryland driver’s license. Austin Davis. Age: 49. Matthews took another look at the victim. Davis looked younger than 49. There was a doctor tag on the license. He flipped through more of the information, jotting notes in his notebook. AMA card. ID for Walter Reed. The usual collection of credit cards and identification. No photographs. Shifting to the two pockets, he noted that Davis carried a fair amount of cash: six twenties, two tens, one five, three ones. In the other pocket of the wallet was a collection of receipts and what appeared to be notes. The receipts looked straightforward, one from a Starbucks this morning, one from the Walter Reed cafeteria at noon. The man kept track of his expenses. A little anal-retentive, but so what? He was a doctor, right? Attention to detail would be a pretty good quality in a doctor.