The Plagues of Pandora

CHAPTER TWELVE

Alicia Myles felt the oddest moment of uncertainty when Crouch cut their connection with the SPEAR team. More than longing, she felt certain that she should be with those guys, a part of the team that had essentially saved her, changed her outlook on life. It was okay running headlong down an ever-winding road, but what if the people you left behind were the people you were meant to be with?

She studied the faces around the jet’s enclosed cabin. Their boss, Michael Crouch, sat in deep thought, head in his hands as he studied a small laptop before him. The soldiers, Zack Healey and Rob Russo, sat behind Crouch, looking distinctly uncomfortable. Healey still looked fresh-faced and innocent — an appearance that invited many harsh ribbings — whereas Russo’s outer shell was as hard as a mountain and twice as craggy.

Nevertheless the two were good friends, a comradeship born in warfare, liberation and adversity. Healey had recently been rescued by Russo and Alicia from the hands of a barmy African crime lord after helping locate the long-lost golden treasure trove of the ancient Aztecs, a mission that had brought action and mayhem to Mexico, Las Vegas and Arizona. Alicia had bonded very well with the two soldiers, already sure they would guard her back in any future situation.

There should have been two more people aboard the plane. One was missing, an odd addition by any terms, Laid Back Lex, the misfit that had been a part of Alicia’s old biker gang and one of its only survivors, had been left out of this dangerous mission. With so much at stake, Lex’s inability to conform, and the lure of the motorcycling Nirvana around Vegas, Alicia had persuaded him to sit this one out.

The last was a young girl, Caitlyn Nash. Though sporting a colorful, dubious history — she had already burned out once whilst working for MI6 at the tender age of twenty one — Caitlyn had proved herself during the Aztec Gold mission under intense torture and by helping solve the clues along the way. It was she that had coined the phrase The Gold Team for the group. Alicia felt a little protective of the girl, but couldn’t help but tease both her and Healey when the two showed signs of a budding relationship.

And to Caitlyn’s credit, especially in Alicia’s book, she had started showing signs that she could not only take a good ribbing, but give it back too.

Alicia sat back and listened to the discussions. The first decision had been made a few minutes ago; that they would divert from their planned Rome heading and set a new course for Paris. Caitlyn and Crouch were discussing plague pits and how many there might be scattered around Paris.

“Several sites have been identified,” Caitlyn said, already tapping into surveillance feeds and analyzing the data — her prime function over at MI6. “Too many. And if we wait for the Pythians to strike, we’ll be too late to stop them. In addition to that, there may be other less famous sites. To pick up from where we were earlier, it is now widely believed by experts that not all the pits are full of the victims of the Black Death, Yersinia pestis, but that they also contain other diseases such as anthrax, leprosy, and something else that is particularly frightening — signs of extremely lethal and highly contagious viruses similar to the filoviruses that cause hemorrhagic fevers.”

Crouch turned a horrified gaze upon her. “Are you saying…?”

“Yes,” Caitlyn nodded, “Ebola.”

“These experts are saying Ebola could have been behind the Black Death epidemic?” Alicia asked with some skepticism.

“It has been suggested at levels higher than this.”

“We hear an awful lot about this Black Death,” Russo grunted. “The plague. But isn’t it just a disease that our ancestors didn’t have the technology to stamp out? Would it really be so damaging today?”

“Hard to say,” Caitlyn said. “Depends on the strain, the virulence, and if it’s weaponized or not. The Black Death itself killed the majority of the population and rushed across the continent. Yes, they may not have had any prior exposure to this strain of the disease which inevitably makes the infection worse. But the first ever recorded outbreak of bubonic plague was in AD 541–542, later called the Justinian Plague and known as the greatest pandemic in history. There was a third pandemic that began in China around 1855, killed over twelve million in that region alone, and was still considered active until 1959.”

Alicia let out a long breath. “Jesus.”

“Absolutely. But again, this only helps dispute the belief that the Black Death was caused by rats. A plague outbreak is always preceded by the presence of a great many dead rats, since they are also susceptible to the disease. Now, unlike in Asia, in Europe there are no plague-resistant rodents that could act as a breeding ground for the disease and a distinct lack of accounts mentioning dead rats in any medieval literature. Also, despite two outbreaks of plague in Iceland in the fifteenth century rats did not settle on the island until much later.”

“So if not rats…” Alicia said. “Humans?”

“And we’re back to Ebola,” Caitlyn said.

“What about all this talk of weaponization?” Healey interjected. “Is it even possible to weaponize an ancient disease?”

“We were just coming to that,” a familiar voice interrupted, causing Alicia’s heart to race.

“Jesus!” the Englishwoman said. “Have you been listening all along?”

“Of course,” Karin said. “Why, were you missing us?”

Alicia snorted. “Oh yeah, like I’d miss an ugly wart on my face. And speaking of that, how’s the Sprite?”

“Ummm… very quiet. But you’re on speakerphone now, guys, so let’s move on. Obviously a million different theories exist as to the weaponization of most diseases so let’s start at the top. In the case of any bioterrorist event involving plague, the healthcare system of a region will be easily overwhelmed. Yes, I said will. Especially if strict isolation is implemented indiscriminately for most patients. The Yersinia pestis virus can be destroyed with drying, heat and ultraviolet light, making weaponization a very tricky process. Would you believe that in World War II the Japanese bred infected fleas by the billions and released them over northern Chinese cities, initiating unspeakable epidemics? Plague has been prevalent in those areas ever since.”

Healey let out a long breath, fresh face screwed up. “How do these people get away with it?”

Crouch stared over at his young protégé. “Don’t ask stupid questions, Zack. You may not have been around the block as many times as, say Alicia, but you know how governments work.”

Alicia blinked in surprise. “Hey…”

But Karin was already continuing. “Initially the United States dismissed plague as a bioweapon threat, because the disease endures in the area, and would cause deaths on all sides long after the primary attack. But…” she paused.

Russo leaned over toward Alicia. “You gotta admit, you have been around a bit.”

“Just makes me more experienced.”

“Yeah, well, so long as that experience doesn’t come near me we’ll keep getting along just fine.”

“Oh, Rock-Face, are you sure? Just imagine all that sweet rock music we could make.”

Russo turned away, almost squirming. Alicia loved to embarrass the stand-offish, and — truth be told — rather prudish soldier, but then the same could be said of Healey for entirely different reasons. The younger man had fully intended to ask Caitlyn out on a date, meaning to woo her in the “proper and correct” manner before shagging her brains out, as Alicia had put it. Healey had mentioned the fact as Russo and she rescued him from a hell pit in Africa. But then Drake had called and the Pythians had struck, upsetting everyone’s plans.

Fucking megalomaniacs, she thought.

She now leaned over to whisper in Healey’s ear. “Do you think she looks hot, tapping away on that computer? I know I do.”

Healey squirmed away. That was two out of two. Alicia sat back, relaxing. Job done.

Karin’s dialogue went on unbroken, “… reports that the Soviets developed a dry, antibiotic-resistant, environmentally stable variety of the plague organism. This brings us up to date and to the American CDC, who have now categorized weaponized plague as a Category A agent.”

“Fucking boffins hiding away in their windowless labs and the soulless men that control them,” she heard Dahl say. “Wish I could get my hands on a couple of them.”

“Maybe we will,” Drake answered, sounding equally disgusted.

“Okay, well, according to this colonel the nastiest form of weaponized pneumonic plague was developed in Russia, employing canisters that released it in a powdered form from cruise missiles. Hard to detect.” Karin’s voice faltered as she spoke. “It’s… horrendous what the human race can concoct. In aerosol form pneumonic plague reaches its zenith, the most terrible, easy-to-deploy world killer out there, all down to the contagiousness of the disease, its resistance to dozens of antibiotics and, at least up to early 2000, no vaccine was available to combat the aerosolized form.”

“So now they’re creating diseases without a vaccine?” Crouch shook his head.

“Well, according to the CDC, plague has been used as a weapon since the Tartars catapulted infected corpses into the city of Kaffa in an effort to spread the disease. It is said…” Karin again wavered, “that the Soviets have fifteen hundred metric tons of the stuff.”

“And what’s the casualty rate?” Hayden asked.

Karin could be heard tapping away. “If fifty kilograms were released over a well-populated city in aerosol form, pneumonic plague would occur in roughly two hundred thousand people. And, Jesus, a footnote right here… no early warning system is in place.”

Crouch chose that moment to stand. “Well, we’re a good few hours out from Paris yet. I suggest we use these hours to get some rest.”

Alicia saw an opportunity for jest, but the last glut of information weighed heavy on her and she waived the pleasure. She met her boss’s eyes and nodded.

“We’re gonna need it,” she said.