The Deadliest Strain

Chapter Eleven

They had nothing to say to each other, and yet Captain Adams never ceased with the effort to engage Fahimah in small talk.

Thinking about it, Fahimah decided that it would be a difficult transition for anyone, especially an army captain in charge of a facility like this, seeing a detainee moved from dangerous "enemy to America" status to "we-depend-on-you-to-save-our-country" status in the matter of an hour or so. But the new status was exactly that, and Fahimah was being treated accordingly. The pendulum had swung completely.

Being able to move about without shackles or handcuffs or blindfolds made her feel immediately that she'd rejoined a world she never thought she'd belong to again. Receiving a change of clothing was another positive step. But none of this compared with the change in her jailors' attitude. She was given choices in food and even in the clothing she wished to wear, to some extent. She'd been allowed to take a shower in a private stall. She'd even adjusted the temperature and decided on the length of time she wanted to stay under the warm, cleansing water. This had been the most luxurious, the most stunning, of all her newfound freedoms.

Fahimah knew all of these were part of the ploy, of course. Another chapter in her long record of captivity. They could snatch it away at any time. Still, she was willing to go along with it all, even if it made the future more unbearable than the past had been. It bought time. It would give her a chance to find her sister. It was the only chance they had, and a small key opens big doors.

"You have good weather to fly in," Captain Adams said to her, moving around her desk to the window, where a small air-conditioning unit was working overtime, blasting only slightly cooler air into the room. Fahimah looked past the captain's shoulder. Two days in a row, she was getting a glimpse of blue sky. The captain's office was on the second level of the old brick-making facility. Two small windows overlooked a partially paved road with a view of mountainous terrain in the distance. Until yesterday, Fahimah didn't know what kind of building they were keeping her in. She'd heard someone say something about being in Afghanistan weeks ago, but she still didn't know what part of the country she was in or how many other people were imprisoned here.

She glanced at the table next to her, toward the magazines they'd given her that morning. Long ago, she'd locked up her mind, sealed her thoughts in an impenetrable bubble, but last night she'd made the decision to unseal that part of her. As a result, for the first time in perhaps years, she'd found herself starved for news. There was so much that had been happening in the world, so much that she had missed.

The news of Saddam's hanging had been a surprise, but not a shock. She'd figured that was only matter of time, anyway. There had to be a great deal more important news. She'd asked about a few things, but the Americans were clearly a little hesitant about how much they should tell her. When she'd been captured, half the world had been searching for a devil named Osama bin Laden, and a few were still looking for him. Arabs were a difficult lot, she thought, and the Saudis were the worst. Always stirring the pot of misery, and simply to drive up the price of their oil a few bloody pennies.

The few magazines they'd given her had offered very little of what she was after. Celebrity marriages between people she'd never heard of were breaking up, and a movie star was adopting what appeared to be a fifth or sixth child, but overall the magazines offered no perspective of what was happening in the world. Still, she had read the magazines cover to cover in the matter of a couple of hours.

"Do you have a home, a place where you can go back to, once this… this business is all finished?"

Fahimah was surprised by the question. She looked up. Captain Adams had moved to the front of her desk, her hip resting on the corner of it. The woman was looking directly at her. Fahimah had to remind herself that she should carry no grudge against this person. Governments and policies she could blame, but individuals like this one were only pawns in a larger and more complicated game. The same thing applied to Rahaf and Fahimah herself. They'd lived in a country that was run by a butcher. That did not make them butchers. In fact, they were just the opposite.

Still, despite this logic and the conscious desire to put animosity aside, it was terribly difficult to warm to a former jailer. Abuses occurred here; individuals were being denied the so-called inalienable human right to a trial, and Captain Adams occupied the top position of authority in this prison. Fahimah could not pretend to be friendly with the person holding the key to the shackles. She would play along with this pretense of freedom, but she would not forget that there were many others still locked in the cells below. If they were here, she guessed, they were in the same situation as she. No trial, no jury, no idea of what was going to happen to them tomorrow or next week or next year.

"I don't know," Fahimah shrugged. "I don't know what is left of my country."

Adams nodded with understanding, crossing her arms over her chest. Her expression became pensive. 'This war has taken much longer than any of us thought it would. There are times I think the same thing about my own home and family."

Fahimah appreciated the candidness. From the horrible photographs she'd been shown by the agents, it appeared that people in the U.S. were under attack, too. Her thoughts immediately focused on what she'd promised Agent Newman. She hadn't lied. A remedy to the microbe existed. She'd seen Rahaf taking it. But if they were to find the remedy, then she would have to keep alive the hope that her sister was still living… and that Fahimah could find her. She rubbed the back of her neck. Thoughts of the plots she would need to hatch once they got to Erbil airport crowded her mind. There was so much that she still needed to figure out.

There was a knock on the door before the two American agents entered. She hadn't seen or spoken to either of them since last night. Each man gave her a long, hard look, as if he were seeing her for the first time.

Rather than a new pair of coveralls, Fahimah had borrowed some clothes from Captain Adams — camouflage fatigue pants, a white cotton shirt and plastic sandals. In spite of her very short hair, she didn't want to look like one of the soldiers. Of course, she thought, there weren't many American soldiers who looked half-starved. She'd been somewhat shocked this morning in the bathroom at how frail she looked.

"Captain Adams mentioned that you've been asking for some means of catching up on the news," the younger of the two agents told her.

Fahimah remembered that this man's name was Matt Sutton. From their interaction yesterday, she surmised that he had a lower rank than Agent Newman. Sutton was shorter by two or three inches, but with the exception of their height, the two men had the same athletic build. Both had short, dark hair, but that was where the similarities ended. Matt Sutton had boyish good looks. Newman's face, however, was too complicated to be summed up in a couple of words. Handsome and ugly did not really seem to apply. He had a nose that looked like it had been broken, piercing blue eyes and a moon-shaped scar on a strong chin. Already, Fahimah had been able to see that his moods had a great effect on his facial expression. That, she supposed, determined how he would come across to a new acquaintance. Yesterday, he'd sounded kind and understanding. That kindliness had been reflected in his face. Today, there was a dark cloud surrounding him that wiped out her first impressions of him. She turned her attention to the other agent as Sutton opened an oversize shoulder bag and took out a smaller leather case. Inside, there was a laptop.

"You're welcome to use this. I loaded a number of past issues of newspapers and magazines onto my laptop for the flight."

She stared at the proffered computer. It was a precious gem.

"The only thing is that everything loaded is in English. If you'd prefer some of the issues in Arabic…"

"No, English is fine," she said, reaching for the computer before he changed his mind. He handed her the leather storage case, too. She touched the piece of equipment, ran her fingers along the thin edge, already realizing that technology had changed a great deal since her capture. This machine weighed a tenth of the last laptop she'd handled.

"I guess you're ready to leave," Captain Adams commented, breaking a moment of silence.

"Do you have any personal belongings at all, Dr. Banaz?" Agent Newman asked, turning to her.

He was wearing sunglasses today, and that made his expression much more guarded. He looked older… and more threatening. She wondered if he still harbored the doubts he had expressed yesterday, or whether he had decided that she really was Rahaf. She also wanted to know if he'd shared that doubt with the people to whom he reported. If that were the case, then they were using her as a means of finding her sister.

No matter what happened, she wasn't going to lead the Americans to Rahaf, just to turn her over to them. The headache at the base of her skull was back. She would drive herself crazy thinking about all this. She looked up. He was waiting for an answer.

"No, nothing else." Fahimah shook her head. Her only belongings consisted of the clothing she was wearing and the new toothbrush that she'd rolled in tissues and wrapped inside a black Nike cap before stuffing it into the pocket of her pants. She'd refused the offer of more clothes. It might have been pride or stubbornness, but she refused to take anything more than was absolutely necessary. She put the laptop in the leather case and got to her feet.

"I'm ready," she said.

Captain Adams extended her hand. Fahimah decided against snubbing her and shook the other woman's hand. She stood a couple of inches taller than the captain. She gripped the woman's hand hard and kept her back straight.

"Perhaps we'll meet again," the captain said.

"I hope not," Fahimah said in all seriousness, not sure if they were talking about "meeting again" in the same context. But it didn't matter. She didn't care if she ever saw her again.

They ran into a soldier right outside of the captain's office. Fahimah thought the young woman might have been one of the guards who'd transferred her from one cell to the next, or slid a tray of food inside her door during her months here.

The soldier nodded to them. "Good luck, Dr. Banaz."

Fahimah was starting to hate this sudden civility. She didn't want these people to be her friends. Matt Sutton went ahead of her down the stairs. Fahimah kept a hand against the wall going down. She'd had a meal last night. Another small one this morning wasn't sitting in her stomach exactly as it should. She wasn't accustomed to eating, so there was very little her stomach accepted. At the same time, she wasn't used to moving around, to standing. She didn't want to fall on her face going down the stairs.

Stepping out into the brilliant sunshine, Fahimah shielded her eyes with one hand. The outside air threatened to suffocate her with heat and dust. Figures of men and women in uniform and three closed vehicles were all that Fahimah could see when she was able to force her eyes open against the bright sun.

Fahimah was surprised that they weren't blindfolding her as they left this facility, but she wasn't about to remind them of it. There was no wasting time outside. She was told to climb into the middle vehicle in the caravan. Agent Newman climbed in after her. Fahimah moved to the far left to give him plenty of room. The other agent sat in the front with the driver. The air-conditioning was already set on high. The smell of leather and dust and recycled air caused her stomach to churn. She took a deep breath, willing her stomach to settle. The closed windows of the Humvee were tinted so that you could only see out.

Outside, everyone moved quickly once she was settled into the vehicle. She noticed a group of soldiers moving around the cars. They all had their weapons drawn. They were constantly watching the terrain around them. Fahimah looked out the window. There was nothing, just barren land and serrated hills. Rock and dust, as far as the eye could see. Her sister, Rahaf, had traveled to this country once for work, but this was Fahimah's first view of Afghanistan.

The radio in the vehicle crackled to life. The driver started talking to someone through a transmitter. She heard the loud roar of a chopper move overhead. She pressed her face against the window and looked up at the sky to see. The helicopter seemed to be hovering right above the car.

"Move this way," Agent Newman ordered, a split second before the door on her side of the vehicle opened. A large, powerfully built soldier wearing a bulletproof vest nodded and climbed in.

Instantly, Fahimah found herself sandwiched between the bodies of two large Americans. She moved the laptop to her chest to protect it.

"Couldn't you spare another car?" she asked quietly.

"No," Agent Newman said in a clipped tone. "Let's go over the rules now."

"I should have known that there would be rules."

Her response obviously surprised both men in the backseat. The armed soldier shot her a quick, amused look before turning his attention back to what was going on outside. Agent Newman's gaze stayed on her much longer.

There was nothing improper in the look he was giving her, but Fahimah suddenly felt very uncomfortable sitting so close to the man. She tightened her hold on the computer case and looked ahead as the caravan of cars started down the road. From the noise of the helicopter circling above, she knew it was part of their escort.

"All right, Agent Newman. What are the rules?" she asked, encouraging him to say something.

"Dr. Banaz, we believe your life is in danger. We have taken st—"

"My life was in danger back in that prison." She motioned over her shoulder at the facility they were leaving behind.

"Let me finish," he said in a sharper tone.

She shrugged, looking ahead. The driver and Agent Sutton gave no indication that they could even hear the exchange in the backseat. As the landscape sped by, Fahimah thought the vehicles were driving far too fast. Only an occasional glint of the sun off the rear window of the vehicle ahead of them was visible through the storm of dust they were raising.

"You've agreed to cooperate," Newman started again. "We're operating with the belief that someone who you might know, perhaps someone who worked for you or with you, could be responsible for the release of this bacteria in the U.S."

She couldn't argue that point. Rahaf must have feared the possibility of the microbe being used against humans when she'd asked Fahimah to go to her lab and destroy the documents having to do with her research. Her sister had always given Fahimah the impression that the purpose of her research was to find cures to horrible diseases, including those caused by microbes that could be packaged for use as weapons. From personal experience, they both knew how terrible biochemical weapons could be.

Fahimah wondered now if her sister had heard anything about what was going on in that country. Unconsciously, she tapped her fingers on the computer in her arms, wondering how much information about the outbreaks was known at all. Newman had never mentioned whether or not this terror had been made public.

"We also know that as much as we try, information leaks out from our bases." Fahimah felt the soldier beside her stiffen, but Newman continued without a pause. "So if our enemies don't already know about your existence, it will probably be just a matter of hours before the news will surface."

Fahimah looked up to Agent Newman's face. He was going with the assumption that she was Rahaf. That meant everyone else out there believed that, too, including, perhaps, whoever was behind the attack. That is, of course, if the outbreaks were even the result of some terrorist effort.

"Why should that cause you to worry about me, Agent Newman?"

"Your offer to help could ruin the plans of Al Qaeda… or whoever is engineering all of this. They'll try to kill you so that you don't help us."

The words should have been an icy steel spike of fear in her gut. He'd intended them to be frightening, she was certain. But after all she'd been through over the past five years, the words did nothing. Death was seen as the end by many, but for Fahimah it was only another realm of existence, the next stage in this experience. She'd wished death would free her from prisons so many times over the years.

"This kind of escort might work in Afghanistan," she said, pointing at the roof of the Humvee just as the helicopter roared across their path. "But once we're in Iraq, I think it will be too much. In fact, it will only draw unnecessary attention to you. An escort such as this one will tell whoever these people are that you have arrived. It is an invitation to be attacked, Agent Newman. You might as well have someone waiting at the airport and carrying a sign with my name on it."

"We'll have different security arrangements once we land in Iraq," he replied. "Perhaps now that we're under way, you wouldn't mind telling me where we are headed from Erbil airport?"

"We have discussed that before. I will tell you once we arrive." She looked out the window. "We have a saying, 'Stairs are climbed step by step.'"

"Well, that's great, Dr. Banaz. But we're not talking about an afternoon jaunt in the countryside for two. There are a lot of people who need time to prepare for this."

"That is your problem and not mine, Agent Newman," she said flatly. "I do not trust you."

"And I thought we were past that," he said in a mock pained tone.

"Neither of us is past it, as you say," she said seriously. "I am not in shackles, but I am still your prisoner."

"We're guarding you, protecting you. This is different than being a prisoner. I thought you understood that."

"Call it what you want," she replied thinly. "I believe what you have shown me with those pictures. I believe what has happened to those innocent people in America. I'll try to help you, but your past treatment of me has taught me not to trust any of you."

"Dr. Banaz, I didn't do anything to you. I've been honest with you from the first moment we met."

"There is no I, Agent Newman. You are here representing your government. That says everything about who you are."

"I don't carry a gun. I'm not a soldier or a policeman," he told her impatiently. "I'm a scientist."

"The same thing has always been true of me. I was a civilian, a scientist. If anyone had cared to do any research, they would have found that I never participated in any of Saddam Hussein's programs to develop biological weapons. There has been a great deal of good that has come out of the research I have done," she reminded him, not caring that there were others who were listening to this conversation. "But I was kept and treated with fewer rights than a prisoner of war. I was forgotten, lost. The rules of the Geneva Convention do not apply to me, according to America. So do not remind me of how little I care for you and your country. Do not ask for more than I am willing to give. I told you that I will help. I will remain true to my promise. I will tell you where to go once we reach Erbil. Leave it at that."

Fahimah looked straight ahead, finished with the discussion. It was a relief when he didn't argue more. She felt her cheeks and ears burning. Emotions had become foreign to her over the years, but now anger heated her blood. It had been so long since she'd allowed herself to feel and speak this way.

No one said anything. The noise of the helicopter overhead competed with the sound of the road, providing the only disruption to the silence inside the Humvee. Even the two-way radio remained quiet. She hadn't let anger overwhelm her during the years of her imprisonment, but she'd reached her limit. Like the long-trapped magma of a sleeping volcano, feelings about the injustices she had endured were suddenly erupting through the surface. It had begun yesterday, when in her fury she'd ripped through the room where they had moved her. She wished there was some physical means of venting those feelings now, but she knew she wouldn't get far with the two large bodies pressing her on either side. She had to find other means of calming herself.

Fahimah closed her eyes. She placed the computer on her lap and loosened her hold on it. She focused on her breathing. In. Hold. Slowly out. In. Hold. Slowly out. As she breathed, she felt the flow into each limb, joint by joint, muscle by muscle.

The shoulders of the two men on either side rocked against her. She lost her focus, anger and frustration pushing back into her consciousness. She focused again on her breathing, taking in the good… holding it so that it might spread through her… breathing out the bad. She was trying to relax her limbs with each breath, but it was difficult. There were so many distractions. So much noise. She tried to focus only on the rhythm of her breaths, to become separate from the body. In and hold and out. Again. Again. Trying began to give way to allowing. Awareness began to fade.

A sudden jolt caused the computer to fly off her lap. She opened her eyes, grabbing for it desperately. Agent Newman was the one who caught it before it was thrown against the front seat. He handed it back to her.

"Thank you," she whispered, trying to avoid eye contact. She tucked the leather strap under it and placed it on her lap again.

There was another jolt. She was crushed between the two men as they shifted and tried to regain their seat.

"You might want to put your seat belt on," Agent Newman suggested, reaching for his. There wasn't much room for him to maneuver.

"Sorry, sir," the driver said apologetically. "We're not far from the base."

Fahimah looked out the window at the group of Afghani kids running after the cars. The guns didn't deter them. Their bare feet, dirty faces, hungry bellies were reminders of what she'd seen before. She could hear their voices through the glass and realized that the helicopter had left them.

"Naan… naan… naan…"

They were asking for bread. Fahimah stared at the tents set up past the faces. This reminded her of the refugee camps that had been set up all over the Iranian border after Saddam's troops had destroyed all of those Kurdish villages, after he had killed so many men. Young children and women had been left to fend for themselves then, too.

The cars were slowing down. Fahimah saw security checkpoints ahead. The Afghanis were forced to stay on this side of the barriers. The radio came to life again, issuing instructions about driving through. Just before they reached the barriers, however, something hard hit the right side window of the vehicle.

Fahimah found her face shoved forward onto her lap by the soldier sitting to her left. Her nose hit the laptop hard.

"Speed up!" the soldier growled.

"It was just a rock," the driver replied.

"They're waving you through," Newman said. "Go."

Fahimah felt the vehicle speed up again. With her face still pressed against the laptop, Fahimah felt blood trickling down her face. She brought her hand up to her nose. The smell of leather from the computer case turned her stomach again. She tasted bile in the back of her throat. She took another deep breath as the weight of the soldier eased from her.

"Are you okay?" Newman asked, taking her by the shoulders and pulling her into a sitting position again.

"I warned you before. Your people are the ones who're trying to kill me."

She didn't know where the tissue came from, but he started patting her upper lips, holding her head up. She took it away from him and wiped her nose herself.

"Sorry," the soldier on her left said gruffly. "We can't be too careful."

"It was nothing," she replied quietly. "The bleeding has already stopped." She accepted another tissue that was handed to her from the front seat and wiped a drop of blood from the leather case.

In another minute or two, the Humvees began to slow again. At this checkpoint, armed soldiers looked into the vehicle and under it before allowing them to pass. After weaving back and forth through concrete barriers like a ski slalom, the road straightened and took them into the base.

The roads inside the base were busy, filled with military vehicles and Americans in uniform. A few Afghani civilians were visible in their turbans or caps and dark vests and their simple long shirts over white pants and sandals. They stood out among the soldiers in camouflage khaki and gray and green. Most were young men and boys. They appeared to be laborers.

"We have fifteen minutes before the aircraft is ready to board," Matt Sutton said over his shoulder after talking on the phone.

"Take us as close to the plane as possible," Newman ordered the driver. "Somewhere in or near one of the hangars, if possible."

The driver spoke to someone on his phone. They were stopping at another security checkpoint as they moved from one section of the base to another. Beyond the barrier, she could see the airstrips. Huge military cargo planes lined the side of one runway. Each vehicle came to a complete stop, and the driver and Agent Sutton both opened their windows. The driver passed some paperwork out to a soldier as two others circled the vehicle, looking under the car as they had at each checkpoint with a mirror on the end of a thin metal pole.

Perhaps it was the combination of the hot breeze outside, tainted with the smell of petroleum and jet exhaust. Perhaps it was the blast of air-conditioning on her face. It could have been anything, but suddenly she felt sick to her stomach.

"Can you open your window?" she asked in panic.

Agent Newman did as he was told. "You look kind of green. Are you okay?"

It was too late.

"Let me out," she groaned, reaching over him hurriedly for the door handle.

Luckily, he was quick and Fahimah scrambled after him. She barely had both feet on the pavement when her stomach emptied violently. Immediately, she went down on her knees as another wave of sickness hit her, making her retch as she emptied everything that was left inside of her. Her stomach was knotted with painful cramping, and she continued with dry heaves.

The air felt like it was on fire. The bare skin of her neck and her head sizzled under the stunningly hot sun, but Fahimah started shivering uncontrollably. Agent Newman was saying something into her ear, but she could not understand him. She felt hands under her arms, lifting her and moving her to the side of the road where she knelt, her eyes closed. It took some time before she could control her nausea.

As Fahimah sat there, she heard the Humvee that she'd been riding in back around to the side of the road, putting her in shadow. She took short breaths through her mouth, fearful of any smell or taste that might make her sick again.

There were noises of people moving around her. Someone was asking about doctors, about directions to the infirmary.

"No… no," she whispered weakly, forcing her eyes open.

Agent Newman crouched down next to her, his sunglasses pushed on top of his head, his expression showing concern.

"We're going to take you to the infirmary," he told her gently.

She shook her head and sat back on the warm road surface. "No. I am fine."

"You don't look fine to me," he told her.

"I've had two meals in the past twelve hours. My stomach is not accustomed to it."

"It could be something else. Perhaps food poisoning? Or something even more serious."

"No. It is nothing," she said sternly. He didn't look convinced. "You get sick occasionally, Agent Newman. After you vomit, then you feel better. Isn't that so?"

"No, not me. I never get sick."

She snatched the bottle of water that he was holding out to her.

"Please just give me a minute or two and I will be back to normal." She took a mouthful of water, rinsed her mouth and spit it out. She repeated it a couple of times more, unwilling to chance swallowing any of the water yet.

"You're shivering. This could be more than just food disagreeing with you. I can't have you dehydrate while we're on the flight out. I certainly can't have you die on me."

Her water bottle was already empty. He handed her another and took the empty one away.

His persistent worry was actually comical. "I'm thirty-six years old. I know my body. I always shiver when I get sick to my stomach, Agent Newman."

Someone else passed her some tissues. Newman slowly pushed himself to his feet. It took Fahimah a couple of minutes more before she was sure she was strong enough to prove her argument. She rinsed her mouth with the water again and took her time to stand up. The sun was bright. Everything around her was in a haze. The shivering, however, was already subsiding.

There was no way that she was not getting on that plane.

"The infirmary isn't too far away," Agent Newman said one more time.

Fahimah waved him off impatiently and looked at the open door of the Humvee. She shook her head. "No."

The other vehicles had pulled to the side, as well. The soldiers escorting them were looking out of open doors or standing next to their vehicles.

"I am not getting in yet. I want to walk around a little."

Half a dozen soldiers created a shield a few feet away from her. She was protected from view of others on the base.

"That's where we're going." Sutton pointed to a huge corrugated steel building some five hundred feet past the barricades.

"I can walk there."

"I don't think that would be a good idea, sir," the soldier who had been seated next to her said to Newman.

"We are on an American base. If you do not trust your own people, then whom are you going to trust?" she asked before turning away. They were being so stubborn, she thought, raising her face to the sun. Now the heat actually felt good.

She didn't know what was said between them, but she must have won the battle, for the three cars drove around her, passed through the checkpoints and then continued slowly toward the building that Agent Sutton had pointed to. Giant doors on the side facing them were open, and on the runway next to it, a military aircraft was being fueled. She guessed this was the plane taking her back to Iraq.

Fahimah looked behind her. As she'd expected, Agent Newman and her protector, the burly soldier who'd given her a bloody nose earlier, had stayed behind.

"Ready to walk?" Newman asked.

She nodded, going around the cinder block barriers and toward the hangar where their caravan had headed.

Agent Newman fell in step beside her. The other man kept some ten feet away, walking behind them.

Getting rid of the food in her stomach actually made Fahimah feel much better than before. She didn't mind the heat and stretching her legs felt good. She hadn't walked this far outdoors in years.

"Fin glad we got one thing settled."

Fahimah glanced up at the agent. His sunglasses were again hiding his eyes.

"What have we settled?" she asked.

"Your name and your age. Dr. Fahimah Banaz, age thirty-six."

She stopped, looked up at him and snorted derisively.

He shook his head. "Don't waste my time denying it. I know the truth and you know the truth. That's enough."

She was now, more than ever, in their power. She knew that they could easily prove that she wasn't Rahaf. She tried not to panic, forcing her voice to remain steady. "What do you mean, That is enough'?"

He pushed the glasses down on the bridge of his nose, looking into her eyes. "You're taking us to your sister, to where we can get a remedy that will stop the microbe."

"I am helping you to get the remedy," she said, correcting him.

"Then you won't renege on your promise," he stressed.

"I will not go back on my word, if that is what you mean," she told him. "But I will not lead you to my sister." There was no longer any point in denying the truth.

"She might be behind the attacks."

"She is not." Fahimah said adamantly. "If you believe that, then you put our deal at risk."

"It doesn't matter what I believe. A court of law can determine her guilt or innocence."

She stopped and stared at him for a moment. Newman stopped, as well, but did not look at her.

"You have released me from my promise. My assistance ends now," she told him angrily. "I know my sister. I know what she went through to help people and to keep people from getting hurt. I'm telling you that she has nothing to do with this."

"I cannot change what my government might logically suspect. I know that they—"

"I have paid a thousand times over for your government's misplaced suspicion," she shot back hotly. "Go ahead and arrest me. Take me back to that prison. Shoot me if you want. I'm not taking another step to help you." She turned on her heel and started walking back toward the security gate.

Before she even reached their burly escort, a large hand caught Fahimah by the arm. Newman turned her around to face him.

"You have quite a temper, Dr. Banaz. I think you should consider doing a little more meditating."

Fahimah folded her arms across her chest, glaring up at him. "I have been in your prisons for five years, and I have never said a word, in order to protect my sister. I will gladly go back there for another fifty. I won't help you to hurt Rahaf."

"Look, I have no intention of hurting her or arresting her or prosecuting her. I'm looking for a way to stop people from dying. I can learn from her. The remedy might not be enough. If we can't stop who's behind the attacks, we'll be forever fighting against time. She might know the real people behind all of this. She knows so many people in this field. She could help us find them, stop them."

"But you believe she's behind these outbreaks."

"I was speaking honestly about what others might think," he said in obvious frustration. "When I came to offer you a deal, I had no idea that you might not be Rahaf Banaz. But now I need to find your sister. Innocent people are dying. I do not want anything to happen to her, and I will give you any guarantee you ask for that is within my power."

Fahimah knew that he would say anything. It was not the first time American agents had made offers in return for her cooperation. It was different this time, though. She had only one way to go, and that was forward. Now that they knew Rahaf was out there, the Americans would find her, with or without Fahimah's help. For the first time in five years, though, Fahimah was truly in a position to bargain. She would use it to save Rahaf.

"Let's go," she said quietly, starting again toward the hangar.

"Where are we going?" He fell into step with her.

"To Erbil."

"And from there?"

"I will tell you when we arrive."

"But what about your sister?"

"You have just asked me to trust you with the life and future of my only sister. I ask you to trust me. This is all I will say for now. It should be enough."

He fell silent and walked thoughtfully with her toward the plane.