Patient Zero

Chapter Eighty-Three

Sebastian Gault / Over Afghani Airspace / Thursday, July 2

“IT’ S A REAL honor to have Mr. Gault make this visit,” said Nan Yadreen, the Red Cross liaison for Afghanistan. “And a bit of a surprise. If we’d had more notice we would have prepared a better reception.”

Toys forced a smile. “Not necessary, Doctor. This is just a visit, not an inspection.”

The helicopter’s roar made conversation difficult, for which he was grateful. The preening doctor had to shout to be heard. Gault sat across from him, pretending to be asleep but Toys knew better.

The doctor nodded. “I understand. And I suppose advertising it in advance is bad for security.”

“Indeed.”

“Good thinking, sir,” said the doctor.

Too bloody right it’s good thinking, Toys mused darkly. Last thing they needed was Amirah knowing that they were on the way. The only people expecting their arrival in Afghanistan was a crack team of mercenaries from Global Security led by one of Toys’s favorite people, the ruthless South African, Captain Zeller. Toys had called to make arrangements, explaining what they intended. Zeller didn’t bat an eye when Toys told him that this was going to be a wet operation. Wet works were their specialty and they loved the bonuses he’d promised for their pay packets.

The chopper flew on toward the Red Cross field hospital. Gault had pulled himself together on the drive to the heliport, but Toys was cautious. Nothing was ever certain in matters of the heart. He was glad that he didn’t have one.

Chapter Eighty-Four

Crisfield, Maryland / Thursday, July 2; 8:30 P.M.

“HERE’ S THE PROBLEM,” I said. “In one way or another over the last couple of days I’ve said that I’ve found it hard to buy the scenario that we’ve been fed: that this is a group of terrorists who have the smarts, the funding, and the technology to create several new diseases, to pioneer new fields of science in order to manipulate and weaponize those diseases, to locate and hold hostage the families of key scientists, and to manage those scientists through the use of not one but two control diseases. And all of it off the radar of all of the world’s top intelligence networks?”

“When you put it that way,” Dietrich said, shifting uncomfortably.

“From the beginning I was bothered by the control disease because it’s way too sophisticated. Who here thinks that a bunch of terrorists really thought that up? Show of hands.”

When no one raised a hand, Dietrich said, “But we know that this is the case.”

Instead of answering I said, “The next thing to consider is the crab plant itself. As Jerry pointed out it was a trap from the beginning, no doubt about it. The staff inside, to all intents and purposes, were suicide fighters. Either they knew they weren’t getting out of there alive, or they were duped into thinking that they were playing a stronger hand than they were.”

“I doubt the scientists were in on it,” Grace said.

“At least one was,” I said, and reminded them about the one with the detonator. “He said that it was already too late. I’m not sure what he meant by that, though it’s pretty clear that we’d know if the Seif al Din pathogen had been released into the public.”

“We’re still looking for additional cells,” Church said. “This is clearly not over, and directly after this meeting I’ll make a conference call to the CDC and the White House.”

“Good. Now getting back to my theory. I’m no science geek but from what Rudy and Hu have said, everything we’ve seen is absolutely cutting edge; stuff that would be science fiction if we hadn’t actually experienced it firsthand.”

“What’s your point?” asked Dietrich. “We know these assholes are smart.”

I shook my head. “Yeah, well, ‘smart’ is a relative term. You can have real geniuses act like idiots sometimes.” I tried hard not to look at Hu when I said this, but out of the corner of my eye I saw him shift in his seat. “You see, these guys have done stuff that’s needlessly sophisticated. The control diseases, the fancy explosives. Whoever’s behind this seems to think that expensive toys work better, but all they really do is send up red flags. He’s drawing attention to his own attempts at being slick. Doc,” I said to Hu, “correct me if I’m wrong but the compound from the treatment recovered from the warehouse, once removed from the aspirin coating, was able to dissolve in ordinary saline, correct?”

“Yes,” he agreed. “It’s a very small amount of material, a few chemicals that are all soluble in water or saline. Barely clouded the fluid.”

“How easily could it be detected?”

“In food, you mean? Probably not at all. They’re mostly vegetable based; organic stuff. None of the compounds would significantly affect the taste or smell of most foods.”

“So it could have been dissolved into something strong tasting, say orange juice, without anyone being the wiser?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then why wasn’t it?”

The others stared, and I could see them catch on, one by one. “Son of a bitch,” growled Dietrich.

Grace said, “You’re right. The process of hiding it in the aspirin is too clever a step. Impressive, but unnecessary.” She was with me on this now, step by step.

“That’s one point,” I said. “Now the second is their intent. We can presume that they did know they were under surveillance the whole time, which means they could have released the walkers, taken suicide pills, blown the place up. Why wait until we infiltrate?”

Rudy snapped his fingers. “They wanted you to find a functional lab and have a heroic fight. They wanted you to believe that you fought for and obtained the evidence, damaged and partial though it is.”

“Right,” I said. “Our bad guy wanted to stage a big, scary event that would scare the hell out of us.”

“Which it effing well did,” Grace said bitterly.

“After Aldin died, it seemed pretty clear that the terrorists were trying to make us afraid of the possibility of an epidemic. That it might be the new threat, a new kind of warfare that would force the U.S. to divert funding away from tanks and missiles and into preventive medicine. That’s probably going to happen, at least in part, because we know that this disease actually exists and that terrorists have it. But before we decide that we know the shape of things, let me ask this: if we do start scrambling for new treatments and cures, who stands to benefit?”

“ Dios mio! A lot of people will get rich,” Rudy said. “Pharmaceutical companies, drugstores, health organizations, hospitals pretty much the entire medical profession.”

I sat back and stared at him, and then at each person at the table.

“So why are we so damn sure that terrorists are the only ones behind this thing?”