BioKill

by Handley, Stuart

  “And how were you so lucky to get to be my babysitter? Where does your skill set lie?”

  “Guess you’ll just have to wait and see.” Lilburn spun his paper cup around on the table with one finger. “At some point all the intelligence and speculation about what we’re dealing with will spill out from the ops room. If I have any strengths, then it’s out there in the big wide world. I much prefer it.”

  “Mmm.” Evangeline smiled. “I need more information. Shall we go back into the lion’s den and find out what your country really knows?”

  Reluctantly Lilburn agreed. Here he was going to have to take a back seat and let others take the lead. And that didn’t come easy.

  “Good, you’re back.” Director Hall saw them reappear in the ops room, and Lilburn knew he’d been waiting. “Matt, take Dr. Crawston to the meeting room over there, I’ll just grab Director Lopez and meet you inside. We need to get the doctor up to speed.”

  A closed door led to a small room, uncluttered except for a meeting table, chairs and conferencing technology. It wasn’t long before Hall and Lopez entered, shutting the door behind them. Evangeline and Lilburn were already seated.

  “Let’s get into it.” Hall took the lead. “Doctor, let me expand on what you will have already been told. A couple of days ago we received reports a virulent unnamed disease was going to be released somewhere within the States, which would cause significant disruption and damage to our economy. The information came from Israeli Intelligence; and at this stage we have no reason to doubt its veracity. We’ve since learned the disease is probably foot-and-mouth. As I speak, agents are crossing the border into Rafah, located in the Gaza Strip. Apparently they know the exact place where the virus is coming from. Don’t ask me how or why — that’s between the President of the United States and his Israeli counterpart. Any questions so far, Dr. Crawston?”

  “Is the virus in the States right now?” Evangeline had leaned forward slightly.

  “Don’t know, we just don’t damn well know!” The frustration was clear in the director’s voice. “We need you to start an immediate profile on the terrorists.”

  Evangeline nodded; she had already done some thinking on the flight. “We have a starting point. If we assume the intelligence is correct and the virus does indeed originate from the Gaza Strip, that fits what we already know, giving a high degree of possibility. Recently, with the Hamas takeover, veterinary work on control of the disease has deteriorated. The Gaza Strip has had numerous active outbreaks of the disease, which would make it relatively easy to find infected animals. The latest outbreak occurred in Rafah, which adds foundation to your intelligence. So we now need to know who or whom has an interest in seeing that disease in the States.”

  “Yes, yes. We know that, Dr. Crawston, you don’t need to tell us how to suck eggs,” Director Lopez interrupted.

  “Chrissake, Suzanna, ease up!” Hall knew his fellow director was extremely ambitious and in her eyes, Dr. Evangeline Crawston would be a potential threat.

  Herself no pushover, the good doctor countered with a measured smile. “Please, call me Evangeline… Suzanna.”

  Lilburn sat back, amused at the power play.

  Evangeline continued, her clipped British accent cool and professional. “Who or whom. It doesn’t necessarily mean this is the action of a hostile government. The threat could equally come from within. A United States citizen exercising what they deem to be a retaliatory attack on the system, or the manic fringe of an animal liberation group. Unleashing a disease like foot-and-mouth is in fact quite simple — and very cost effective. If we can eliminate that scenario then we’re one step closer to finding out what we’re up against.”

  “Good point.” Hall was impressed. “Go on.”

  “If the threat is internal, then start profiling citizens who have made threats to the government, ones with links to the Gaza Strip in particular but also broaden the field to countries with known foot-and-mouth enzootic…” Evangeline saw brows wrinkling. “It means prevalent to… countries in Asia, South America, the Middle East and Africa. If it is an organization, which in my opinion it may well be, then there are a number of groups you should be interested in — al-Qaeda for a start. Although being more of an ideological group, they may not be your top priority… the other extremist groups under its umbrella may be the ones to prioritize.”

  “What’s your gut feeling?” Hall was anxious to know.

  “As we can narrow it down, insofar as we believe the source is from the Gaza Strip, we have the likes of Hamas, the Army of Islam, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. I’d like to see some more intelligence.”

  “And what about here in the States…” The first signs of a crack in Lopez’s armor.

  “Have you started trawling the chat sites, social media, for key words and historical data on past threats?”

  “Done that, and the process is ongoing.”

  “Good.” Evangeline was decisive. “I would also suggest we ask the ever-so-cooperative Israelis to do the same. I would suspect it’s also in their interest not to see the States suffer the colossal financial implications of foot-and-mouth.”

  “We have research into those cost implications.” Hall tapped a pen on the table. “Do you concur with the estimates bandied about?”

  “Yes, I do, upwards of fifty billion dollars for a serious outbreak.”

  Hall grimaced, as if her answer had confirmed his darkest thoughts. “Border security provisions? Suggestions?”

  “Three scenarios. One: show your hand and let your border agents know of an impending threat; or two: take a more proactive approach to passengers and goods from those areas we know have ongoing infections, especially Gaza. Three: step up searches without telling border agents of the specific disease. If you decide on the former, you’ll be letting the commercial and political world know you may already have the virus — and that’ll be all it takes for competing nations to implement embargos. But if you don’t, then the chances of a successful border violation are even greater.”

  “Tell us about more about the disease. What can we expect?” Hall spoke in a monotone.

  “Foot-and-mouth is a highly contagious viral disease. It affects cattle, pigs, sheep and other cloven-hoof animals — also deer, elephants, giraffes, zebras — even hedgehogs. Transmission can be by a number of means: direct contact with infected animals, airborne, perhaps up to forty miles. Then you have contamination by animal feed, vehicles, human feet… the list goes on.”

  Director Lopez leaned back in her chair. “Can we inoculate for it, stop it in its tracks?”

  “You can — and you’ll have to if it’s found here — but that only works if you have plenty of time, which I would say you don’t. And if the world sees you inoculating, it knows you’re worried and then it’s too late. The dollar implications have already happened — the terrorists have done what they set out to do.”

  Hall had a question. “How will they get it in, if they haven’t already?”

  Evangeline had gone over this scenario many times in her career. “The virus can remain viable for different periods on different materials, for example, if it’s in fecal material it can last up to one hundred days. Getting it into the country is relatively easy — it just takes a few pieces of infected material to escape detection at the border, then be grown on to increase the virus. A school pupil could do it. Then it’s just a case of infecting animals. As simple as rubbing an infected piece of swab into an animal’s mouth, or perhaps making an aerosol and just spraying it on its nose.”

  There was a knock on the door. Hall called out for the person to enter and a piece of paper was handed to him. Placing his glasses on he quickly read the contents. “Well, that was goddam quick.” His glasses were taken off and placed on the table. “Got to hand it to the Israelis, when they act they act fast. Mossad picked up the farmer who supplied the original virus. Now we know it’s no longer a threat. It’s real.”

  “Pass it here, Allan.”

&
nbsp; Hall shuffled the note to Lopez. “Mossad extacted information from the farmer.”

  “Fingernail by fingernail, I imagine.” It was the first time Lilburn had spoken in the meeting.

  Hall looked at him sharply. “It appears this farmer has terrorist links. He peeled off pieces of infectious material from his animals and posted them to his contact.”

  “So we have an address, here in America. We need to act fast.”

  “Hold your horses, Doc. The virus wasn’t posted to the States. It went to Syria.”

  “Oh shit!”

  Lilburn was surprised — it was the first profanity he’d heard pass her elegant lips. Uh oh, he thought, this can’t be good.

  Lopez handed the note back to Hall. “This changes things.”

  Another knock on the door.

  “Enter.”

  A staffer appeared. “Sir, Ma’am. Mossad have supplied further info on the address in Syria. The house belongs to Mubarak Azrak — while he’s not known to us, his brother is.”

  “And?”

  “The brother’s name is Karam Azrak.” The staffer placed a file before Director Hall who, upon placing his glasses back on, read the first few pages. That, for the time being, was all he needed to see. Looking over the rim, Hall glanced at them. “Oh shit ain’t the half of it. Karam Azrak is one badass hardcore.”

  “How bad, sir?” inquired Lilburn.

  “Put it this way, if we had a pack of cards, like we did in Iraq, this man would be the wildcard,” Hall paused. “We can forget about this being an internal act. Azrak is Takfir wal-Hijra.”

  Lopez looked sick. “Damn.”

  “Dr. Crawston, I assume you’re familiar with this particular organization?”

  “Somewhat, but I only have a little knowledge of their structure.”

  “Takfir wal-Hijra is linked to al-Qaeda, it operates in several countries. To say they’re Islamic extremists does them a disservice — they’ll even kill other Muslims if they think they’re in the way. Martyrdom is their idea of greatness. These pricks like to keep a low profile. They’ll shave beards, drink alcohol, eat pork, whatever it takes to make themselves invisible in a Western country.” The director slammed his fist down on the table. “Hell, leastways we have a name; we now know the group behind it. Suzanna, get our teams looking to see who we have in the States right now with links to this group. Dr. Crawston, Lilburn, stay close. We may need you again shortly.”

  Director Hall removed his glasses, stood up and stormed out the room like a bear with a sore paw. Lopez immediately followed. The teams in the operations room didn’t know it yet, but they were about to have their immediate plans cancelled. Homeland Security was winding up the intensity.

  Inside the meeting room Lilburn could hear the two directors barking out commands to their respective subordinates. He’d seen the wheels of the intelligence service grinding over before; commanders demanding every stone be turned, every piece of the huge puzzle be studied, documented and peer reviewed. The information could take years to collate, and they didn’t have years. But it was the only way — intelligence from the field, no matter how seemingly insignificant, ultimately pieced together to make a picture. It had taken ten frustrating years to finally be able to pin down Osama bin Laden — this time they’d be lucky to have ten hours. Like a needle in a haystack, he thought.

  “Matt,” Evangeline broke in on Lilburn’s thoughts. “Mossad said the virus was posted to Syria?”

  “Correct.”

  “Cheap, easy and if the postage service is working, efficient. So why not use the same method to get it to the States… It would seem logical. Just post it.”

  “Surely border controls would pick up the infected material? The scanners… and those dogs pick up damn near everything that even looks like organic matter.”

  She nodded. “Right, but we’re talking about possibly a tiny amount. You could wipe a handkerchief on an infected animal’s nose then take that handkerchief, neatly folded, through customs and wipe it on the nose of a non-infected animal. That’s all it takes.”

  Lilburn didn’t waste any time. Swiftly rising from his chair, he left the meeting room.

  Chapter Five

  The two men rose from their prayer mat, their prayer completed, their fate in the hands of Allah. So far the plan had been carried out with perfection. The parcel from Al-Zabadani, northwest of Damascus, had arrived on time in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York. Yusuf al-Nasseri was anxious to complete the next part of their assignment. The recent intrusion of the two New York police officers to their apartment had shown just how susceptible they were to the hands of fate. But as his companion Bashir Zuabi told him, Allah was on their side. They had been told, many times.

  Both men were twenty-four years old and American citizens, raised from birth in New York. Their parents were proud, hardworking Syrians who had immigrated to the United States, hoping for a better life. The parents had kept their Muslim faith and did their best to instill the peaceful doctrines of Allah. Both couples, whose friendship started on American soil, felt immense pride when they heard George W. Bush proclaim Islam was a religion of peace. Their boys, Yusuf and Bashir, running together, found a darker, sinister path — one their parents had no idea they had taken.

  Three years earlier, full of youthful enthusiasm and exuberance, the young friends followed their hearts and made a pilgrimage back to Syria. With the blessing of their parents they spent a week traveling the country, immersing themselves in tradition and religion. While in the capital city, Damascus, they were introduced to Karam Azrak — and a totally new concept of Islam. Their lives were transformed. At first they thought Azrak was amusing — highly independent and attractively rebellious. Initially they were skeptical, and hesitated when he talked about what he saw as the right and proper path to religious freedom. But little by little the charismatic Azrak brought them around to his way of thinking and before they knew it, the two impressionable Americans had been smuggled into Afghanistan, and a Takfir wal-Hijra training camp. The young men were returned to Syria then back to the United States, their bodies strengthened and their minds galvanized into taking up the armed fight to restore the unity of the Islamic world order. Takfir wal-Hijra sleepers in the streets of Brooklyn, they longed to be awoken.

  While they waited, Yusuf and Bashir had involved themselves in the everyday life of typical young New Yorkers, nurturing as many friends as they could, preferably men or women with Christian backgrounds. They even attended Christian churches. They drank at the local bars, then drove the streets at night looking for one-night-stands, all the while reverting back to being good traditional Muslims when it came to visiting their parents. Karam Azrak and the training camp in Afghanistan had taught them well. When the package arrived from Al-Zabadani, with a traditional red and white checkered headscarf, they knew it had come from Azrak, and what they were required to do. Martyrdom was not far away.

  “Come on, time to finish our preparation.” Bashir followed Yusuf into the kitchen. The second layer of the brown wrapping paper had been stripped of the packing tape with the virus-infected scabs attached. Border control had missed the highly potent animal tissue, which had passed undetected into the domestic postal service. The live virus, a virtual time bomb, was now on American soil.

  The men had previously scraped off every small piece of scab they could find, then placed the tape into a jug of buffer solution with a pH between six and nine. Their training had told them anything outside this range would kill the virus.

  Bashir took the petri dishes from the kitchen windowsill and looked at the contents. He was pleased with the way the culture had grown in the agar solution he had bought at the local chemist shop. It had been so simple. Purchase the sterile liquid agar, heat it in the microwave and place it in the dishes to set. After the agar was ready, he and Yusuf had rubbed the scabs over the agar, placed on it on the petri dishes and waited until nature had grown the culture. Two days later they scraped off the culture and p
laced it into a dissolving solution to prepare it for transfer to the next stage. Now, it was time for the final stage — mixing the solution of infected liquid and buffer solution, minus the tape, into the empty deodorant cans. Initially they had thought it would be a problem, but the internet provided the answer. No problem at all.

  Yusuf al-Nasseri and Bashir Zuabi looked at the cans of foot-and-mouth virus, primed and ready to spray. Bashir placed his hand on his friend’s shoulder, grinned widely and said, “Boom! Allahu akbar.”

  Chapter Six

  Officer Ben Maitland had completed his eight-to-four shift for the day, tired and footsore. Preoccupied, he drove his 1969 Ford Fairlane to his brother’s house, where as usual Marcie, his sister-in-law, would have prepared a good wholesome meal to compensate for his bachelor lifestyle. His brother Joe could be counted on to supply the liquid refreshment and their eight-year-old son was sure to ask his Uncle Ben if he had killed any ‘baddies’ that day.

  Maitland pushed the accelerator down as the lights turned green. The red Fairlane with its raised bonnet air-intake spluttered across the busy intersection. The car might have been a classic but it was producing the classic signs of a vehicle needing some tender loving care; much like its owner. A vehicle immediately behind, its driver unimpressed with the Fairlane’s slow transition through the intersection, honked its horn loudly. “Alright already!” Maitland yelled abuse while looking in the rear-vision mirror. “Asshole.”

  Thirty minutes later, having negotiated increasingly heavy rush-hour traffic, Maitland pulled into his brother’s driveway. Along with staircases, the other thing he hated with a passion was traffic — especially other drivers who raised his blood pressure. One day, he swore to himself, he would leave New York. The red car came to a stop. Placing the shift lever in park and then applying the handbrake, he reached forward to turn off the ignition. His unruly beast had other ideas and stalled itself. “Jesus, you piece of shit!”