The Darwin Variant

by Kenneth Johnson

  Courtesy GSP, Dr. Susan Perry

  And there were lots more numbers and words I didn’t understand. Hutch was saying, “This is one entry from the teams that investigated fragments across the debris field. They all found the same thing: the local vegetation in each area was altered spectacularly. As though its adaptive processes had actually been accelerated at warp speed.”

  “Just like at Ashton,” I said.

  Hutch nodded yes. “And they sealed off the areas claiming ‘radiation hazards.’”

  “Because they all got infected. And wanted to keep it secret.”

  “Sure.” Hutch leaned back in his chair with a tense sigh. “You saw what happened in your town, Katie. As soon as each person got a taste of the forbidden fruit, felt their minds expand, they were blown away by the possibilities. For leadership. For domination. In sports, sex, academics. And this could obviously go way beyond small-town conflicts.”

  “And,” I said, “they weren’t just smarter, they were really like devious. Mean. And violent. A couple girls got raped, my own sister tried to poison her best friend. And Darren was certain his brother, Tim, caused that school bus crash where those kids were killed.”

  Hutch’s expression was grim. “That’s exactly the kind of behavior I’m most worried about, Katie.” He clicked open a photo of a tough-looking military man. “This is a former military intelligence, black-ops guy, Bradford Mitchell. He’d been seen here a few times recently. Our colleague Prashant Sidana had suspicions—until he was killed in a lab accident.”

  My eyes got wider. “Was it an accident?”

  “I don’t think so. Lauren was in the lab with him when it happened, but there was no conclusive evidence. Anyway, Prashant’s research turned up that Mitchell had private security operations going here in the Southeast. He must’ve somehow gotten wind of the viral phenomenon and used his connections to clamp the security down tight.”

  “After he got infected himself,” I suggested.

  “Sure seems likely, Kate. And my guess is he brought some of the infected vegetation or fruit to Lauren Fletcher and allowed her to infect herself.”

  I frowned. “Why?”

  “Because he needed expert help. Lauren’s a brilliant biologist, and a dose of this virus would’ve clearly boosted her intelligence sky-high. I’ve been poring over the basic research she did for the last several months, and there’s definitely an amazing spike about six weeks back. The level and quality of her work suddenly took such a huge jump that I’m really straining to comprehend it.”

  I was all the more curious. “But what’d he want her to do?”

  “Replicate the virus. Standard protocol to have more study specimens. Susan and I started the same process, but from what I’ve seen, Lauren’s way ahead of us. It looks like she’s made quite a bit. And there’s another wrinkle that may be worse.” Hutch scanned the computer screen through Lauren’s file to a new section, full of numbers and complex chemical equations. He highlighted a section. “Lauren seems to be working on modifying the prime CAV into something she’s coded CAV-B. It may be some kind of secondary virus.”

  I blinked. “Oh my God. What does that do?”

  Hutch shook his head. “Haven’t had time to analyze it, Katie. Or even get a sample. Lauren’s notes indicate that she secretly—maybe illegally—moved her research to a chemical plant north of the city that has ties to the CDC. But Prashant found her special access code. I’m going up there.”

  “With the police?” The absolute right move, I thought.

  But Hutch threw up his hands questioningly. “Which police? This has obviously been spreading for months. We don’t know who may have become involved. I feel just like you did in Ashton, Katie.”

  I remembered Deputy “Sleazeball” Patton. Understood. “You don’t know who to trust.”

  “Right. I don’t even know who else within the CDC may be in cahoots with Lauren. Maybe even the director, Levering. I’ve gotta get the whole picture first.” Hutch stood up.

  So did I. “Let’s go!”

  “No, Katie.”

  “But—”

  “Listen, will you?” He put his hands on my shoulders. “This quarantine unit is the only place I can protect you. From your own mother. I’ve left word out front that you aren’t to have visitors. You have to stay in here. Okay?”

  No, it was definitely not okay, but I knew he was right.

  Security-Cam Archive ID: Exterior Atlanta, GA, Sector 186-H Date: 09/17/20 Time: 19:26:12

  Lens: Var/14mm Bearing: W/SW 252 degrees

  Transcript by: ATL PD-Op #52671

  Visual Descrpt: Cam shows small, leafy pocket park in recently gentrified neighborhood. Light from streetlamps through trees. Middle-aged cauc. female, med-blonde hair, in raincoat, sits alone on park bench. Seems calm. Middle-aged cauc. male, curly brown hair, tan windbreaker, stands near bench. Shifts weight foot to foot. Seems uneasy.

  Courtesy ATL PD, FBI

  Eileen McLane, 41, Katie’s mother. . .

  A bit of a breeze was increasingly disturbing the leaves in the park. Jason also seemed disturbed. He stood uncomfortably beside the bench where I was sitting. I looked up at the rustling branches. “There’s a storm coming, Jason,” I said. Then I let my hand rest on the bench seat, invitingly, as my thoughts drifted back to a better time. “Remember how we used to sit on the old bench in the Ashton town square and—”

  “Eileen. Please.” He was impatient. “If that’s why you asked me to meet you, I’m not staying here.”

  I looked up at him softly, speaking the truth, “I can’t help it if I miss you, Jase.”

  He sighed. I could see that he was trying to push back the guilt that still nagged him. “I’m sorry, Eileen. I really am. Look, I’d better get going.”

  I caught his sleeve. “You’re a very ambitious man, Jase.” I looked off in the direction of his house, where I knew Tina waited. “What if I could give you something she couldn’t.”

  “Eileen, we’ve been through all this. I just don’t want to—”

  He started to pull away, but I held his sleeve. “Wait. Just listen. What if I could promise you complete success. In everything. What if I could guarantee you extraordinary intelligence. Wealth. Power.”

  I could see he was thinking that I must be having another bout with alcohol. His voice was impatient. “What do you mean?”

  I reached into my purse and eased out a jar of Granny Wells’s homemade strawberry preserves. Then I looked at him with a penetrating expression I knew he’d never seen on my face before. He frowned. “Eileen, what are you talking about?”

  A hint of a smile crept onto my face. I knew my eyes were beaming as I said, “Us.”

  15

  QUARANTINE

  Dr. R.W. Hutcherson. . .

  The Everett Biochemical plant was in an industrial park on the north edge of Atlanta. It was a multifaceted division of parent company BioTeck Industries, which produced bulk chemicals for industrial use as well as pharmaceutical medications. Before coming to the plant, I’d left Lilly at her condo in the care of Susan’s friend Justinia Marquez.

  I’d seen plenty of biochem plants, but to an untrained eye, particularly at night, it’d seem like an impossible confusion of various-sized pipes running from one concrete building to the next. Steam was venting from some junction points.

  I had inched my old Durango pickup to a stop some distance from the security gate. I saw an administrator-businessman type, middle-aged black gentleman walk out the office entrance and toward the inner parking lot.

  Clarence Frederick. . .

  The pavement was damp from the misty rain that began a few minutes before I came out. I waved to the security guard. “’Night, Sam.”

  Sam smiled back. He was sixty and close to retirement. Like me, Sam was African American and was pleased that I’d risen to a prominent position as vice president and deputy plant manager. A fact I was proud of, but I tried to never put on airs. I’d also helped Sam’s daug
hter, and quite a few deserving folks of all colors, find entry-level positions with Everett. Sam called out as usual, “You have a good one, Mr. Frederick.”

  “You, too, Sam. And say hi to Mazie for me.”

  Dr. R.W. Hutcherson. . .

  My palms were sweating. I felt like the next calf waiting in line to get branded. I’d never been involved in anything remotely clandestine or even sneaky. I knew I was risking some kinda censure for nosing around here, but the startling events of recent days combined with the ominous discoveries that Katie, Susan, and I’d made—and that Prashant had likely died for—made it vital to investigate further.

  The plant administrator drove his Prius silently out through the gate and into the drizzly night. Then I drew a tense breath and eased the Durango up to the gate. I heard a baseball game on the guard’s radio, tried to sound casual as I handed him my ID. “Hiya, Sam.”

  The guard squinted. “Evening, sir, do I know you?”

  I yawned. “Hutcherson. CDC safety. Usually come during daytime.”

  As the guard scanned the ID, I watched tensely and waited. And waited.

  I finally broke the silence. “What inning?”

  “Bottom of the seventh. What’s your access code?”

  “AA one-oh-seven. Who’s winning?”

  The guard entered the code. “Damn Yankees.” His computer made a strange burping sound, and I clutched. But Sam handed back my ID. “Here y’go. Be sure y’avoid any restricted areas marked with yellow tape.”

  “Will do, Sam. Thanks.” I eased the pickup forward, trying to breathe normally.

  I drove past some new construction with several temporary office trailers. All were dark except one with a sign reading “Security.” Inside I saw two men uniformed like the gate guard, sitting at a table eating. A pair of gray-suit types were also in there. They didn’t notice me passing.

  I checked some notes on my phone, parked near the building I thought the likeliest suspect, and went in. Huge stainless steel pipes formed a dropped ceiling. I walked quickly through wafting steam along the concrete corridor. Rounding a corner, I heard someone call out, “Hey! Hang on there.” He was a plant custodian the size of an NFL center, wearing a yellow hard hat.

  I was turning inside out, but trying not to show it. Felt a drop of sweat from my armpit trace down my side.

  The plant worker grabbed a hard hat from a nearby rack and handed it to me with a smile. “Pain in the ass, man, but OSHA says we gotta wear ’em.”

  “Yeah, I know.” I nodded officiously, joking as I put it on. “Just hoping nobody’d catch me.”

  The worker smiled and moved off. I watched him with my nerves on edge. Then I checked my directions and walked on quickly past several doors with windows revealing chem labs on the other side. I figured the one Lauren was using would be down at the remote end. I knew if they’d started producing that secondary virus already, containers might be in a storage room along here, and I wanted some solid proof.

  The hallway opened out wider on one side, forming a dark room about thirty feet square. A floor-to-ceiling chain-link fence cordoned it off. About six feet in front of the fence was a ribbon of yellow tape printed with “Restricted Access—Stay Clear.” I ducked under the tape and skirted along the fence past its gate, which had a hefty keypad lock and a sign, “Security Clearance Required.” On the other side were stacked some four-foot-tall chemical canisters, all with that ugly biohazard warning symbol stenciled on them. One container was close enough to the fence that I could see its postcard-size label. I leaned closer, peering through the chain link, and saw that along with other data imprinted, was: “CAV-B.”

  I looked through the fence into the dark room. There were similar canisters stacked inside with what appeared to be nearly identical labels.

  I saw at least a dozen of them.

  Dr. Susan Perry. . .

  In downtown Atlanta the rain had begun in earnest. My Accord glided along the rain-slick street, which reflected neon signs, lamplights, and the red taillights of cars in front of me. I was talking into my Bluetooth, “My God, Hutch . . . why’ve they made so much? And what the hell is it?”

  “Good questions,” Hutch responded. I could hear his nervousness. “I’m gonna get some better photos of a label—”

  “And then get the hell out of there! We’ll go to the police or FBI and get a search warrant.”

  “No shit, Sherlock,” he said. “Where’re you?”

  “Courtland Street in Atlanta, couple blocks east of Peachtree.” I guided my car slowly around one that was parking. “I followed three buses of people from Ashton to the congregational church here.” I peered out through my windshield as the wipers swished the rain aside. I could see many people from Ashton moving toward the church, along with dozens from several other buses. “Some kind of gathering. Few hundred. All kinds of people. Heavy security, too.”

  I spotted numerous gray-suited people with those subtle, secret service–style earplugs, conferring, or speaking into their lapel mikes. They became focused and very attentive to a black SUV escorting a limousine that pulled up in front of the grand old church. Two gray-suits climbed out, one a bulldog of a man with an acne-scarred face and shaved head, then two people I knew.

  “Mitchell and Lauren just showed up with an entourage,” I told Hutch. I noticed the subservient body language of all the security people. “They’re being greeted like royalty by those security types. Something’s really up, Hutch.”

  “Watch yourself, Suse.”

  “You, too.”

  Everett Security—Surveillance Archive Stack 1177240AA

  Date: 09/17/20 Time: 20:12:54 Cam: 0127-17-6

  Area: 17—Restricted Entry Section 6

  Visual Desc: Unidentified cauc. male in hard hat inside yellow warning tape, by security-fenced holding area, using cell phone, then takes flash photos of canisters inside fence.

  Action: Duty Sec Ofc activates intrusion alarm. The man reacts. Runs.

  Courtesy Everett Biochem, FBI

  Katie McLane. . .

  The only hospital-type place I’d ever been in was our small one in Ashton. Once was to the ER when I broke my arm falling out of our oak tree and the other was visiting Darren after his appendicitis operation. Ashton Community had lots of warm earth colors, friendly artwork, and cushy furniture. But the small CDC Isolation Unit was obviously designed to maintain extreme cleanliness easy and fast. The only furniture in my room was a bed, a low stainless steel table, a plastic desk, and a plastic chair. It was all simple and made as comfortable as possible, but the surfaces were all hard so they could be wiped down with disinfectant at the drop of a germ.

  The pastel peach-colored walls were the only slight effort to make the place feel less cold and sterile. The lighting helped a little, too, particularly at night when the built-in fluorescents went off, but there were still pools of light from smaller units built into the ceiling. The bed sheet and pillows were covered in plastic. The thin blanket on top was shiny Mylar. There was a robe, hospital gown, and paper slippers, but I was still in my jeans and sweatshirt, hoping Hutch would come back soon and get me outta there. I looked for a magazine or something to distract myself from worrying about my friends. I was still ticked off at being caged up while Susan and Hutch were out on their missions.

  Looking out through the double-thick, biosafety glass window to the nurse’s station, I saw the outer door open and my dad enter, smiling thanks to the nurse. I thought I wasn’t supposed to have any visitors, but seeing Dad felt okay. If it’d been Mom, I definitely would’ve freaked.

  He smiled at me through the glass, giving me his little finger wave like always. Then he spoke with the nice nurse, Mariana, who’d tried to distract me earlier by telling me funny stories about her family in the Philippines. The intercom was off now, so I couldn’t hear their voices, but I saw that Dad was being friendly, gesturing toward me as he spoke. Seemed like he was asking to come into where I was. I walked closer to the glass, anxious to hear
what had happened between him and Mom after I’d been taken away.

  But Mariana politely shook her head as she spoke to Dad, apparently saying no, he couldn’t enter my quarantine area. She pointed to a wall phone near the window that communicated with one on my side of the glass. That didn’t satisfy Dad.

  I watched, sorta amused, as he tried to work his personal magic on the nurse. He could be a very persuasive salesman, but when she kept saying no and pointing to the phone, he slowly got impatient, more insistent. Mariana was sympathetic, but emphatic: he could not be allowed in. Dad’s smile grew darker in a way that suddenly made me nervous. I’d never seen him act like that. Then he glanced over at me, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. That cold, superior look was now in his eyes!

  My stomach dropped. I realized, Oh my God. Mom must’ve infected him!

  I gasped. Scared. I backed away from the glass as I watched Dad shout at the nurse, then finally slam his hand down on the counter between them. Mariana reached for her phone, but Dad leaned over the counter and grabbed her roughly. She struggled, but he pulled her up close and stuck her with something.

  CDC/ATL QIU-3NS Vol: 434368-QIU Date: 09/17/20 Time: 20:25:08

  Loc: ATL/Quarantine & Isolation Unit 3

  Transcript by: N/A

  QIU Nurse Ocampo, Mariana, receives electroshock from handheld stun gun device, falls to floor apparently unconscious. Male civilian repeatedly tries using keypad to open secure door to ISO chamber. Fails. He scans room. Sees sec cam QIU-3NS. Grabs stool from EEG/EKG monitoring area. Uses it to smash camera.

  END RECORDING

  Courtesy CDC, ATL PD, FBI

  Katie McLane. . .

  Then Dad came back to the air lock door to my isolation chamber. He tried again to open it, but I knew that without punching the correct daily code into the keypad, he wouldn’t be able to. Then he paused, chuckled, and smiled at me, very natural and friendly. He beckoned for me to open it from my side and come on out. I shook my head. I was frightened and didn’t know the code anyway. He was getting annoyed, but kept his cool and waved more insistently for me to come out. I couldn’t hear his words, but I could lip-read enough to know what he said was basically, “I’m your father, and I want you out here right now.”