Biowar (30 page)

“Cold? Hell, it’s got to be close to ninety,” said the Marine.

The wind from the helicopter felt good for a moment, but then the grass and grit formed into a kind of paste covering Karr’s face. He started to trot with the others, but by the time he reached the rear ramp of the big air-going bus, he had slowed considerably. His legs felt shaky.

The rotors whirled up, the helicopter shuddering. They did a slow orbit around the camp, then began angling back toward the border. Karr tried to think about the other camps he had to inspect, but he couldn’t focus.

“I think I’ll take a nap!” Karr shouted to Foster, who was sitting next to him on the long bench. “Wake me up when we’re home.”

As he turned to hear Foster’s reply, something exploded above him.

“Uh-oh,” said Karr, grabbing for the seat as the helicopter lurched sickeningly and began to rotate.

55

Lia twisted the washcloth in her hands, wringing the excess water into the basin. She went back to Dean’s bed and laid it over his forehead.

He seemed a bit cooler at least, and he’d stopped mumbling in his sleep.

Maybe she could leave him.

She would, if she had any idea where to go.

Back to New York, get into Kegan’s lab.

Karr had already been there. But really, what the hell did he know? God bless him, he was a great op, resourceful and all, but no genius. How he’d managed to sneak through RPI and get his college degree in three years was beyond her.

Legacy admission, obviously.

Lia took the electronic thermometer and placed it into Dean’s ear. He was down to ninety-nine degrees.

If she got out of here, could she get back to the States? The Art Room would be tracking her.

Maybe the thing to do was to go back to Crypto City—confront Rubens—confront the Director himself. Demand—

Demand what?

Lia put the thermometer back and walked from the room pensively, still not entirely sure what to do. She paced in the hall, then went to the door. She was about to open it and step into the vestibule when the outer door opened. A man carrying a large duffel bag and what looked like an old-fashioned doctor’s bag entered. He was the first person who’d come in without wearing a moon suit, and Lia stepped back, waiting to see if he’d come in.

He saw her at the glass door, waved, then pointed at the door.

“It’s not locked,” she said.

He didn’t hear. She scowled but opened it for him.

“Better stand back. I’m highly contagious,” she told him.

“Maybe,” said the man. “But probably not.”

His hair had started to gray, but he was fairly young, early thirties at most. Lia stepped back as he shut the door.

“Where’s the patient?”

“Other room.”

He nodded but then took a step toward her, peering at her eyes. “How do you feel?”

“Who the hell are you?”

“Lester. CDC. I’m a doctor.” He stuck his hand out to shake. Lia scowled at him without taking it. “Good idea,” he said. “A lot of germs are passed that way.”

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“I don’t know for sure. Stick out your arm and I’ll take some blood. Then we’ll have a look at the patient.”

Dean felt the knife jab his arm.

Needle, not a knife.

Thick needle, attached to a small vial.

“Damn!” he yelled, pulling himself upward.

“Sorry. I’m slightly out of practice,” said an apologetic voice next to him.

Still unsure where the border between sleep and consciousness was, Dean pulled himself upright.

“Grab this one,” said Kegan, holding out the test tube to Lia.

She took hold of it. It nearly slipped through her latex-clad fingers. The man at his side had slid another tube into the needle; blood was thumping into it.

“Mr. Dean, my name is Dr. Lester. I work for the CDC. I’m a disease expert. Well, that’s what my job description says. I kind of ended up a bit of a jack-of-all-trades.”

“What do I have?”

“We’re going to find out. For now I’d like to hear your symptoms.”

“Stomach feels like crap. Head’s light. I have—I had a fever.” Forgetting his other arm was attached to an IV, he started to raise it to his head. The bag jostled on its holder nearby and he stopped. “I think I have a fever.”

“Actually, we just took your temperature and you’re pretty close to normal.”

“Pretty close,” sneered Lia.

“Does this have to do with Kegan?” Dean asked.

“Let me finish taking the blood and then run the tests. We can talk when I’m done,” Lester said.

“How many days is that gonna take?”

“Just a few minutes. I’ll say one thing: your agency has some amazing resources.”

Dean grunted. Lia came over and propped a pillow beneath his head.

“No kissing,” warned Lester, his voice suddenly stem. “No body fluids.”

“He’s not much of a kisser anyway,” said Lia.

Dean laughed and realized he was feeling a lot better.

A half hour later, Lester came into the room with a grin on his face. He wasn’t wearing the gloves anymore. Lia, still scowling, curled her arms in front of her chest and fell into a metal chair nearby.

Did I infect her?
Dean thought to himself.

“Mr. Dean, tell me what you last had for dinner,” said the doctor, pulling over the other chair and sitting down.

“Some sort of beef thing with this white gloppy sauce,” said Dean.

“What else?”

Charlie recounted the meal he’d had after Lia picked him up. Potatoes, some horrid cabbage, beer, two pieces of chocolate ganache cake.

“You packed it away,” said Lester.

“I hadn’t eaten for a while.”

“Something you ate gave you clostridial food poisoning and gastroenteritis.”

“And the fever?”

“Part of it, I’m pretty sure,” said Lester. “Unusual, but part of it. I suppose it could be a generic virus, but in any event, I tested you for the synthetic rat-bite fever bacteria and you don’t have it. Neither does Lia.”

Lester explained a CDC team had isolated the bacteria that had sickened Gorman and the other confirmed case in New York. While they still had many more questions than answers, they could at least identify the bacteria by relatively simple tests—thanks to help from Desk Three and the NSA.

“So you can cure it then?” asked Dean.

“Not by a long shot, not yet. Gorman died a few hours ago.”

“How’d he get it?” asked Dean.

“I don’t know. That man you found in Dr. Kegan’s house—did you touch him?”

Dean shook his head.

“Touch the blood?”

“I know better than to mess up a crime scene,” said Dean.

“You could say the same for Gorman.”

“The guy was shot.”

“Yeah, but he had the disease. Or had had it. We’re not sure. There was definitely some of the organism in his blood.”

“He got better?” asked Lia.

Lester shook his head. “We don’t know. Maybe he’s just resistant somehow. It’s possible he got better. So far, the only people whom the disease has severely affected have died. That’s two. We have a bunch more very, very sick. I want to go back over what you found at the house again if you don’t mind,” he added. “Maybe we can figure it out together.”

“You don’t think Gorman just breathed it through the air?”

“Then you’d have it. And everyone who was in the house.”

“How do you get rat-bite fever?” asked Dean.

“Rat bites you.”

“Maybe you’d better check my blood again,” said Lia. “Everybody I work with is a rat, present company excepted.”

56

Johnny Bib waited as the small Bell helicopter hovered over the garage. The door on the left side opened and a bundle was lowered slowly by rope. When it hit the ground, Johnny ran forward, thinking he’d untie it. Instead, the man in the helicopter let go of the rope and it fell down on Johnny’s head as the chopper whirled away. ,

This would not have happened to him had he taken his mother’s advice and learned to play the piano when he was five, Johnny thought to himself. It was a mistake he’d paid for all his life.

The bundle proved to be a large duffel bag, so packed that Johnny had to drag it along the ground to get it inside. He found the encrypted phone at the top and dialed into the Art Room.

“It’s Johnny Bib,” he said. “I thought I was going home.”

“Johnny, we have a lot to do,” said Rubens, who was in the Art Room. “You’re already in the house and—”

“There’s no more information here.”

“I’m going to let Chris Farlekas talk to you,” said Rubens. “He may have some ideas.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hi, Johnny. How are you?” said the Art Room supervisor, coming on the line.

“Lousy.”

“Sick?”

“Just lousy.”

“Come now. We need you to be strong.”

Farlekas was fond of “Win One for the Gipper” crap. He didn’t understand mathematicians at all. He probably couldn’t even balance his checkbook.

“Forty-three dollars and seventeen cents.”

“What’s that, Johnny?” asked Farlekas.

“My checking account balance.”

“Uh, okay. Listen, I’m going to put Dr. Chaucer on-line. We had some ideas.”

The line clicked.

“Hello,” said Chaucer. “The line’s secure now, right?”

“In a manner of speaking. Technically, the encryption used in these phones is hardly tamper-proof. As was shown by the Dalton-Blitz paper of 2003, working—”

“Actually, I was wondering if we could turn our attention to the disease,” said Chaucer. “It would be helpful to understand the vector. If you could look through his papers for articles on disease, perhaps.”

The room seemed to light up. Finally the doctor had said something that made sense, thought Johnny Bib.

“What sort of vector?” asked Johnny.

“That’s exactly the question,” said Farlekas.

An odd sound behind him caused Johnny to jump. “A cat,” he said involuntarily. “I hate cats!”

“Dr. Kegan has a cat?”

“It’s right there,” said Johnny, pointing. The fur ball finally got the message and retreated.

“Don’t pet it. Don’t pet it at all,” said Chaucer.

“I don’t intend to.”

“Is that it?” asked Farlekas.

“It could be. We’re going to have to capture it.”

“Not me,” said Johnny Bib.

“Someone has to.”

“I’ll fly to the moon first.”

“That may be your next assignment,” said Rubens, breaking into the line. “If you don’t do what Dr. Chaucer and Mr. Farlekas tell you to do, precisely and expeditiously, you will be on the moon.”

Rubens agreed with Chaucer that having Johnny Bib handle the cat was too dangerous. Fortunately, the cat’s hunger and a can of tuna fish made luring him into a room where he could be quarantined relatively easy. One of the CDC teams was nearby, interviewing residents; they were detailed over to the house, along with a pair of state troopers, two animal control officers, and a special hazardous materials unit with contamination suits. In the meantime, Rubens had Farlekas contact Lester in Europe. Rather than the doctor, however, Lia came on the line.

“Why are we still in isolation?” she demanded.

“Miss DeFrancesca, always a pleasure. Put Dr. Lester on the line, please.”

“When the hell are we getting out of here?”

“Lia, we can work out your personal issues—”

“Personal issues?”

“Put Dr. Lester on the line,” he said.

“Quite a pistol,” said Lester when he finally took the phone.

“Quite. Would a cat be a potential host?”

“Possibly. At this point, I wouldn’t rule anything out.”

“Is Dean off the hook?”

“Probably just food poisoning. As I told you while I was en route, the fever was never that high. I can ask him about the cat.”

Rubens looked up. Farlekas was waving at him from the front of the Art Room.

“Excuse me, I have to speak to one of my people. Here’s Dr. Chaucer.” He clicked the line over to Chaucer, then went down to Farlekas.

“Tommy’s helicopter went down. We’re not sure what the hell’s going on over there.”

“You have a location?”

“They barely got off the ground. They’re a good fifty miles inside of Burma. There are three guerrilla camps close enough to throw rocks at them. One other thing,” added the Art Room supervisor. “Right before he got on the helicopter, he said he didn’t feel too good. He thought he had a fever. Somehow I don’t think we’d be lucky enough to have two cases of food poisoning on the same mission.”

57

By the time Karr’s head stopped spinning, he’d managed to crawl out of the helicopter, pulling Foster with him. Gidrey hunched a few yards ahead near the trunk of a tree, pistol out and pointed toward the jungle. The helicopter had pitched itself into a ravine and they were down next to a shallow pond, looking up at a slope that left them at a distinct disadvantage if attacked.

The Thai soldiers were struggling from the helicopter. Karr put his hand to his head as if to help his eyes focus as he tried to puzzle out where Sourin was.

“We gotta get out of here,” said Gidrey.

“Yeah.” Karr stood up, checking himself for wounds like a hiker might look for ticks. When he realized he wasn’t hearing the Art Room he reached to the back of his belt to hit the send unit; he pressed his fingers over the belt loop where the unit could be turned on and off by pressure, but nothing happened.

It was possible the battery, which was integrated into his belt, had drained. He started back for his knapsack in the helicopter, but Gidrey grabbed his shirt.

“I think it’s gonna blow,” he said.

“I need my gun,” Karr said.

“Come on,” insisted the Marine. “It’s on fire.”

An automatic rifle began blasting in the jungle maybe fifty yards away. Karr pushed Gidrey out of the way and went back to the chopper, ignoring the rifle shots. He picked his way past the twisted rotors and bent fuselage, looking for the crease he’d squeezed through. There were a dozen or more bodies inside. As Karr started to punch into the darkness, a mortar or rocket-propelled grenade exploded on the far side of the ravine. The wrecked helicopter shook all around him; he couldn’t see his backpack, or his A-2 for that matter. The spot where he’d been sitting had been pinched tight by the crash landing.