The Devil_s Workshop

Chapter 20

It was already dark, and Buddy was still waiting for Gary Iverson in the overlit waiting room of the morgue. In the twilight afterglow, out the third-floor windows, he could just barely see the surf hitting the moonlit ribbon of beach south of the Santa Monica Pier. Paranoid thoughts still followed him, like refugees trailing a defeated army. He was fighting the urge to scoot down and retrieve his stash from the Porsche spare tire, which had a hole cut in the underside for easy access. He knew that would be a mistake. When he was snapping paranoid, cocaine put him in a despair so deep he would sometimes be blighted for days.

He began to think more seriously about rehab.

Only occasionally did his mind drift to his dead son lying in frosty silence somewhere in the overlit morgue.

The elevator doors opened, and Gary Iverson stepped off, his bloodshot eyes blinking rapidly in hollow sockets. He had a two-day stubble, and was wearing his Malibu chic grunge attire. He moved to Buddy, dragging visibly.

"You don't look like a doctor, you look like fucking afterbirth," Buddy complained.

"It's the nineties, man," Gary sighed. "I'm not okay, you're not okay, but that's okay. What's going on?"

"These guys are talking about doing an autopsy with some County Medical guy, some dipshit supervisor. They got Mike's body in bio-containment, whatever the fuck that is. Why would they do that?" Gary shrugged. "I want Mike's body released to Mount Sinai now/"

"God, why's my head killing me," Gary said, rubbing his eyes.

"Your head's killing you 'cause that whore Ginger hooked you to a G. H. B. ride. I told you not to shoot that stuff. Heidi promised me Ginger was off it." When Gary didn't answer, Buddy went on, "That shit's lethal. That's what gonked River Phoenix."

"Ginger's a whore?" Gary asked, dumbfounded. "She's one of Heidi's girls? You told me she was an actress."

"Whores are actresses," Buddy backtracked. "Listen, Gary, you gotta get down there and stop that autopsy. Somethin' ain't right," he said, paranoia driving suspicion.

"Ginger's a fucking whore?" Gary repeated. "All that time I thought she was enjoying it and getting off."

"Who gives a shit?" Buddy riled. "You don't pay whores to come, you pay them to leave. Now will ya please go find out why they got Mike in bio-containment. They won't let anybody but doctors in there."

In the second-floor autopsy section of the morgue, a heated argument was taking place between two M. E. S and Colonel Laurence Chittick, who had just flown in from Fort Detrick. All of them were in a sterile hallway that fronted four autopsy rooms.

"Excuse me," Iverson said softly as he approached, "I'm here to make arrangements to transport the body of Michael Brazil to the mortuary at Mount Sinai."

Nobody paid any attention to him, or maybe they hadn't heard him, because his voice was a low drugged whisper. Colonel Chittick was arguing loudly with Dr. Ernest Welsh, the Santa Monica Coroner, who was tall, with a hairline shaped like a laurel wreath.

"You don't seem to understand. I don't care who at Fort Detrick authorized it," Dr. Welsh said. "My chain of command is municipal. This body isn't leaving here without the correct authorization, period."

"I'm Dr. Iverson, the Brazil family physician," Gary stated more forcefully. They both turned.

His ripped-at-the-knee jeans, flip-flops, and fatigued appearance argued with this statement. "Sorry, I've been up forty-eight hours," he alibied, reading their disbelief. "Camping trip. Got here as soon as I could. I'd like to make arrangements to have Mike's body delivered to Mount Sinai-"

"He's not going to Mount Sinai. He's going air-express to the bio-containment facility at Fort Detrick," the Colonel said.

"Who are you?" Gary Iverson demanded.

"I'm Colonel Chittick, with the E. I. S. at the Centers for Disease Control."

"E. I. S.?" Gary asked.

"Epidemic Intelligence Service," Chittick said.

The Santa Monica M. E. turned back to Colonel Chittick.

"The only way to accomplish what you want is to supply me with the proper paperwork," he said. "I need a written request that states E. I. S.'s reasons why this body should be transported to Fort Detrick. Without that I can't let it go. My ass will get sued by his family." He turned to Iverson. "Right, Doctor?"

"Count on it," Gary said, with over-the-top conviction.

"Where will the body be kept?" Chittick asked.

"We'll keep it right here. The autopsy is scheduled for nine this evening. You should be able to get the correct paperwork to me by then. Have the EPS duty officer frame the request, then submit it with the C. D. C.'s recommendation and copy it to the State Health Department in Berkeley. Fax it to me and the body will be turned over to you. Otherwise we're going to do this procedure as scheduled."

Colonel Chittick nodded and moved out of the morgue, using the side elevator. He went down to a rented windowless van parked around the corner from the County Medical Building. Once inside, he turned to face Lieutenant Nino DeSilva. The Lieutenant was only twenty-two, but his dark Latino looks burned with a fierce intensity that made him seem older.

"They want a paper from E. I. S. or they won't turn the body loose."

"Then let's get the paper," DeSilva said.

"We go through channels on this and C. D. C. will demand delivery on the body," Chittick explained. "They're gonna find the brain disintegration and see the spongiform encephalitis. Once that happens, they're gonna run more tests, take some C. S. F., and eventually discover the Pale Horse Prion. They'll turn it over to the FBI, who will notify Congress, and we're fucked." He paused and rubbed his forehead. "We have to contain this ourselves. They are doing the autopsy at nine. We've got to stop it," Colonel Chittick said darkly.

"This was the original Bob's Big Boy," Wendell told Stacy and Cris as they pulled up in front. "I haven't been here in ages."

It was a large, old-fashioned fifties-style restaurant. The huge plate-glass windows looked out on Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena. Mr. and Mrs. Cunningham had gone directly home from Forest Lawn. Cris and Stacy got out of Wendell's station wagon. She leaned back in the passenger window and winked at the ever rumpled doctor, who was still seated behind the wheel.

"You sure this is okay? I could stick around," he said.

"It's better if you go over and witness the autopsy in Santa Monica. They did us a big favor by moving it up, and doing it on Sunday night." She looked at her wristwatch; it was eight-fifteen. "You'll just about make it. I'll catch a cab, drop Cris, and meet you at my place around eleven."

He hesitated, so she gave him a subtle head movement that said, "Get outta here." She wanted to talk to Cris Cunningham, and she thought she would get more out of him alone.

Wendell blew her a kiss and pulled the station wagon away from the curb, leaving them standing in front of the restaurant. They moved inside and were greeted by the chill of too-cold air-conditioning, and a hostess who led them to a table by a window overlooking the parking lot.

"Jesus, it's a fucking malt shop," Cris said. "Let's go someplace that at least has a bar."

"Order anything you want," Stacy said, ignoring that, as a waitress handed them menus and moved off. "You and Mike did a good job around that Dumpster," she smiled. "This is on me."

He took the menu and held it without opening it. "Why did you go to all the trouble of finding me?" His suspicious, feral eyes studied her, eyes that had lost their trust in humanity. "You wanna tell me what's really going on here?"

"You're right, I came a long way looking for you," she admitted, then dug into her purse and pulled out the rolls of developed pictures she had taken at Vanishing Lake. She slid them across the table toward him. "Do you recognize him?" she said, pointing to a shot of Fannon Kincaid taken moments after he had murdered the troops on the baseball diamond. "Most of the men with him had 'F. T. R. A.' tattooed on their arm."

Cris looked at the picture for a long time, weighing his jeopardy before answering. It was the same man he'd seen shoot the two soldiers. When she mentioned the tattoos, he suddenly knew who he was. He'd heard stories whispered over jungle campfires.

"F. T. R. A. stands for 'Freight Train Riders of America,' " Cris said. "I think his name is Fannon Kincaid. He runs some White supremacist church. Rides the rails to stay underground. He's killed hobos for just being on the same train. Legend says, if you see a crazy silver-haired fanatic that looks like the abolitionist John Brown, run like hell."

"Great," she said. "He's got Dexter DeMille. God only knows what that means."

"Who's Dexter DeMille?"

"He's the other reason I came looking for you. You need to go to the hospital," she said. "I'll set it up, but you need to get checked over immediately."

"Why?"

"Hollywood Mike didn't die from a crushed larynx." She watched as his eyes shifted slightly, then came back and found hers.

"Who said he had a crushed larynx?"

"You did. You told Roscoe Moss in Badwater."

"Christ, lady, you've been covering a lot of ground."

"Roscoe Moss sent the body to someplace called Government Camp, and they looked it over. The doc there said there was nothing wrong with Mike's throat. That's not what killed him."

Cris hesitated, then let out a long, slow breath. "I thought I'd killed him," he finally admitted.

"You didn't. Something else did."

When the waitress reappeared they both ordered full house Big Boy burgers and vanilla shakes. When she left, Cris looked back at Stacy.

"That still doesn't explain why you want me to go to a hospital."

Stacy looked across the table at Cris and decided that the best way to get him to cooperate was to level with him. Despite his scrawny, alcohol-ravaged state, he was still a college graduate and a Silver Star winner. She hoped the truth would motivate him.

"I think Mike died because of exposure to a new kind of bio-weapon designed by Dexter DeMille," she finally said. Then she filled him in on the bio-weapons program headquartered at Fort Detrick, Maryland, including Admiral Zoll and Dexter DeMille's work at Vanishing Lake Prison, and lastly describing the Prion illness. "He's designing killer proteins that attack the mood center, causing rage, then they destroy the midbrain, which controls swallowing and the other reflex actions. In the final stage there are violent seizures."

"That's what happened to Mike," Cris said softly.

"Mosquitoes were the delivery agents up there," she said. "I think Mike was bitten by escaped mosquitoes that got away from them at Vanishing Lake. It's possible you were bitten too."

"Wouldn't I have it by now? He's been dead two days."

"You may have antibodies in your system that are able to slow it down. You might be somehow immune, or you could become a carrier without exhibiting any of the symptoms yourself. If that's the case, your blood could be invaluable in helping us develop an antibody."

The hamburgers and shakes were delivered, and the waitress left. In the few seconds it took for this to happen, Cris seemed to change slightly. His posture straightened; his chin came up; anger now burned in his blue eyes. "My daughter, Kennidi, died from something I picked up in the Gulf, some chemical mix," he said. "I was a carrier. It didn't affect me at all, but Kennidi was born with her body full of…" He stopped, took a deep breath. "Tumors. She had hundreds of tumors. They grew everywhere inside her, until finally they killed her."

"I'm sorry," Stacy said gently. He nodded, and seemed momentarily overcome by the memory.

As Stacy waited for him to regain his composure, she suddenly remembered something Max had once told her about a strange incidence of Gulf War Syndrome. It defied all current explanation. "In Huntsville, Texas," she began slowly, "there was an outbreak of what looked like Gulf War Syndrome. Over twenty people were infected. There was a prison there, just like at Vanishing Lake, and there was also a science pod that was funded by Sam Houston University, just like at Vanishing Lake. According to the news articles that I read, the prison medical personnel were suddenly moved out, and doctors from Sam Houston University restaffed the prison overnight. These new doctors were all former military personnel. Apparently, some top-secret scientific tests were performed on the prisoners. All of this would have gone unreported except quite a few of the civilian workers at the prison started coming down with the same symptoms as the prisoners and had to be rushed to local hospitals. Several civilians died. The disease they all had tracked exactly like Gulf War Syndrome: muscle aches, vomiting, malaise, and fatigue. Some had horrible rashes and body sores. What makes this so strange is it happened in 1985, a full six years before the Gulf War."

"How could that be?" he asked.

"In 1985, Saddam Hussein was our ally. Iraq was at war with Iran, and Iran was holding our hostages. We know there were ex-military types in Iraq serving as 'advisors.' Maybe we also shipped chemical weapons to Saddam, for use against the Iranians. Six years later, he could've turned around and used them on us. At the very least, we know Pentagon higher-ups had our troops blowing up Iraqi bio-weapons depots at the end of the Gulf War, then claimed ignorance when they came home with Gulf War Syndrome."

He seemed to consider that for a moment. He had only eaten one bite of his hamburger, and now he put it down and pushed the plate away. "Let's get this food wrapped to go. I'm not really hungry," he said, wishing he could get a drink to calm his nerves.

She waved a waitress over, and the burgers were whisked off the table and back to the kitchen for packaging.

"So, who are you? You're obviously not just some little country girl flipping burgers in a mountain restaurant. You a government spy or something?"

"No," she smiled. "I was almost a doctor of microbiology." She held up her thumb and index finger. "I came that close."

"And didn't finish?" he said.

"Long story," she said curtly.

He didn't speak or pursue it. Instead, he sat in absolute stillness, a thousand-yard stare in his eyes. He was very far away. Suddenly, Stacy remembered Dr. Martin Due at Fort Detrick and the autopsy he was performing on the baby female chimp with the clusters of hemangiomic tumors. "We're testing pyridostigmine bromide with some of the Gulf War insect repellent we used. I think, by mistake, there was a bad chemical cocktail over there… It resembles a condition we're studying in children of Gulf War vets," he had told her.

The waitress returned with the wrapped hamburgers and put them down in front of them. Stacy paid the bill, and they stood.

"Let's go," she said. "We've got a lot to do."

Wendell arrived at the Santa Monica morgue at a little past nine.

He hurried to the elevator and took it to the third floor, exiting into a bland waiting room with picture windows overlooking the ocean. He had never been in this facility before, and he looked around for someone to tell him where he could get scrubbed. Because he had sounded the first alarm, he had been cleared by Dr. Welsh to observe the autopsy. He saw a tanned dark-haired man dressed in an Armani suit and T-shirt looking out the window at the ocean. The man didn't turn when he moved past.

It took Wendell Kinney ten minutes to get scrubbed, gowned, and gloved. A female lab assistant then led him down one flight of stairs to Autopsy Room C. He quickly entered and found the autopsy already in progress. The Y-cut had been made. Dr. Welsh was acting as the prosector, or lead physician. He was looking down and sawing the breastbones with a Stryker vacuum saw.

The vacuum saw was the right tool, Wendell thought as he approached. It sucked up the bone particles and tissue before they could accidentally fly around, possibly into the eyes of the assisting autopsy doctor, known as the diener. There was one other man in the room; he had new, angry-looking hair plugs, and his disposable smock was belted over torn blue jeans. They were all wearing plastic goggles and plain plastic nose masks instead of the correct full-face, filtered HEPA masks that Wendell had suggested.

"We should have maximum containment," Wendell said.

"How ya doing, Dr. Kinney," Welsh said. "We don't have a Level Three facility here. Grab a spot at the table. Don't worry, we're going slow and being very careful."

Dr. Welsh now started to remove the heart. They all watched as he put his rubber-gloved, scalpeled right hand into the open chest. Holding the heart with his chain-mail glove, which protected his left hand from an accidental knife cut, he began the procedure, severing the left subclavian artery at the aortic arch.

Wendell Kinney watched as Dr. Welsh carefully and methodically separated Michael Brazil's heart from the remaining ten coronary veins and arteries.

Nino DeSilva was already on the third floor when the autopsy began. It was Sunday night, which was not normally a working night at the morgue. Only emergency autopsies took place on weekends. This bio-hazard constituted such an emergency, but there were very few people on duty. DeSilva had divided his four-man squad: He kept Luke Peterson with him; Calvin Watts was already outside the autopsy room with Tommy Sparks. The hall was empty, so DeSilva quickly moved out of the stairwell and subdued the one nurse on duty in the nurses' room. Silently, he choked her out. Once she was unconscious, he gagged and tied her, using plastic riot cuffs, then DeSilva and Peterson moved down to the second floor.

Sergeant Watts had found a medical gurney, and they parked it outside the door of Autopsy Room C. All of the Torn Victor commandos were wearing HEPA masks, and now removed MP5 submachine pistols from their backpacks.

Nino DeSilva kicked the door open and moved into the autopsy room. The four men inside turned as one at the intrusion.

"What the hell…" Dr. Welsh sputtered through his surgical mask.

"Everything goes back in the body bag. Everything!" Nino demanded.

Dr. Welsh stood dumbfounded along with the others. "We're performing an autopsy here. What do you think you're after? This man is dead."

Wendell Kinney knew exactly what they were after.

Nino DeSilva walked toward Dr. Welsh and slammed the butt of his MP5 into Welsh's mouth. The doctor went down like cut lumber. Blood started to seep out from under his plastic nose mask.

For some reason that Gary Iverson would never understand, he was considering trying to grab the gun out of the hand of the man nearest him. Gary had never been in a fight in his life. He was the last one to try to be a hero, but the armed man standing directly in front of him was paying no attention. Gary saw the gun dangling from his right hand. It looked tantalizingly easy.

Without knowing why, or even debating the odds, he made a grab for the weapon. The commando sensed the motion behind him, and with lightning reflexes, he spun, grabbed Gary Iverson's arm, and hurled him across the room toward the autopsy table and the cut-open body of Michael Brazil. Gary threw his hands out in front of him to block his crash, but one of Michael's freshly sawn ribs went through the rubber glove on his right hand, puncturing him. He screamed in pain and scrambled away from the table. Four machine pistols were now trained on him. He was seconds from death. "I'm sorry, I'm sorryPlease," he whimpered. "I'm sorry, don't shoot me."

"Bag this body!" Nino yelled at the Torn Victor commandos.

They took Michael's heart, which was already safely inside a plastic container, and set it in the body bag. Then two of them put on heavy rubber gloves and slid Hollywood Mike into a double-zip bio-containment bag they had with them. They closed it up, carried him out of Autopsy Room C, and flopped the bag down on the rolling gurney.

Nino DeSilva pulled the phone out of the wall and turned to face them. "One of us is going to hold a position outside this door for five minutes. Anybody sticks his head out before then is gonna eat it." Then he backed out of the room and was gone.

Gary stood there, blood dripping from the puncture wound in his hand. Dr. Welsh was conscious, but still bleeding beneath his mask. They watched the clock on the wall, like obedient schoolchildren waiting for recess. Nobody said anything.

When three slow minutes had passed, Dr. Welsh grew impatient. He got off the autopsy room floor and exited the room. One by one, they all followed. Wendell Kinney was the last to leave the room. He looked around and saw Dr. Welsh's autopsy scalpel still lying on the table. Wendell reached over and got an organ bag, then carefully retrieved the bloodied instrument, dropped it in the bag, and sealed it. Then he slipped the bag into his pocket, and he too exited the room.

The hall outside was empty except for a lab assistant tied up behind the counter. Dr. Welsh cut the plastic cuffs and released her, then dialed the police.

Gary Iverson made his way up one level to where Buddy was waiting.

"Is it over?" Buddy asked. "Does he still look okay? 'Cause I wanna do this right. The rabbi says the body has to be buried within twenty-four hours."

"Let's get the fuck outta here," Gary hissed, entering the elevator.

"Did they find out what killed him? Do they know yet why he died?"

"Let's go," Gary said, and pulled Buddy into the elevator, stabbing at the button for the ground level.

As they rode down, Buddy saw the blood seeping from Gary's palm and dripping off the end of his fingers. "What the hell happened to your hand?" he asked.