by Jami Gray
As I was driving home, all the random pieces kept swirling through my mind. Just before I got home, I checked the time, noting that it was just past six, and instructed my Bluetooth system to call Evan’s desk number. When I got his voicemail, I used the personal-favor card and left a message asking him to do a scan for reports on any unusual deaths in the area from Etched Chaos to North Tempe, specifically where ACRT had been called in. I also gave him the names of Jonas, Chloe, Neil, and Kerri to see what he could dig up.
It was a long shot, but it made me feel better to have someone I knew looking into things, especially a master electro mage like Evan. For me, he’d dig deep and fast and not just because he was sleeping with my best friend but because, like me, he regarded the Families with a jaundiced eye and wouldn’t want a member of the Guild twisting in the wind. I was sure the Arbiters would share, with Sabella watching them, but just in case they decided to hold something back for their Families, I didn’t want it to come back and bite me in the ass.
Chapter Seventeen
Zev pulled up to the safe house where Kerri was stashed with five minutes to spare. Actually, safe house wasn’t quite accurate. It was more like a safe apartment located in one of the older neighborhoods west of the university. The two-story complex was well maintained despite its apparent age, and small squares of green were broken by cement walkways. Tree-lined streets doubled as parking for the collection of economic rides characteristic of the college crowd. The shiny black SUV that belonged to the Trask security team stood out like a sore thumb.
Zev lifted his chin in the SUV’s direction as we followed a sidewalk to a three-quarter brick wall enclosing the nearest garden unit and its tiny backyard, which sat directly in the line of sight of the watchers. I caught a glimpse of the parking lot on the other side and realized we were coming in from the back of the complex. Strange, but all right.
I glanced around, noting how quiet it was and wondering why Trask had chosen this place to stash his remaining researcher. Safe houses required heightened security, and this, in my limited opinion, was far from secure.
Zev unlocked a wooden gate and held it open as I passed through. I eased my grip on my magic just enough to test for any wards and hit pay dirt, literally. A thick layer of magic lay under my feet, covering the small yard, which maybe measured twelve by eight feet at most. Two faded red plastic chairs sat on the cement slab of the porch shaded by the balcony from the unit above. Between the chairs, a round metal table held an empty vase covered in dust. It was not the most inviting spot in the world but was definitely protected.
Zev rapped his knuckles on the sliding glass door and waited. It didn’t take long before the long vinyl slats swayed, and the wan face of a woman appeared. She blinked up at Zev, her mouth forming a surprised “Oh.” Then she was unlocking the door. She opened it just a few inches as if that would keep Zev out. “Mr. Aslanov?”
“Good morning, Dr. Michaels.” Zev moved to the side and motioned to me. “My associate, Ms. Costas. Ms. Frost explained that you had time this morning to talk to us.”
“Yes, of course.” Kerri moved aside, disappearing into the shadowed interior as she kept a hand on the blinds to hold them out of the way. “Please come in.”
Zev waved me forward. I stepped inside and was met with cool air carrying a lingering floral scent. Recessed lighting illuminated a modest but utilitarian sofa facing a wall-mounted TV. A pillow and a throw blanket were tucked into one corner. The end table held a couple of remotes, a phone charger, a soda can, and a half-empty bag of pretzels. Papers, notebooks, a sleek laptop, and a compact printer sat on the bar counter that split the space between the living room and the galley kitchen. A two-person dinette set was up against the wall as if trying to stay out of the way. Its surface held a collection of neatly stacked files and notebooks next to a pizza box. Clearly, Kerri spent most of her time in this space.
I stood off to the side as Zev came in and pulled the patio door closed, letting the vinyl blinds fall back into place. Kerri paced to the middle of the room and wrung her hands, her nervousness obvious. She wore what I imagined a highly professional woman in a male-dominated field would wear. Her tailored slacks were mannish in style, but her blouse was all female, showing a hint of cleavage but nothing that would diminish her professionalism. Her sable hair was in a stylish, sleek short cut that emphasized her hazel eyes shaded in tones of gold and brown. A light smattering of freckles dusted the bridge of her nose and her cheeks, adding a youthful vibe to a woman I knew was in her late thirties.
“Um, please, grab a chair…” She blinked owlishly then turned and grabbed one of the spindle-backed chairs from the dinette set. “Here, sorry. Not a lot of options for company.”
I took the chair she offered and dragged it over. “Thank you.”
Zev nabbed the other chair, setting it a few feet from mine so we were both facing the couch. “Please, Dr. Michaels, have a seat, and take a breath. We just want to ask you some questions.”
“Right, right.” She finally sat on the edge of the couch and shot us an embarrassed half grin. “I swear, I’m not normally a mess, but things have been a bit nerve-racking lately.”
“Understandable,” Zev said in a mild tone I hadn’t heard from him before. “We don’t want to add to your stress, but we were hoping you might be able to give us some insight.”
She shifted a bit, rubbing her hands down her lap then back up. “On the project?”
“That and your working relationship with Jonas. We understand you’ve signed a confidentiality clause, and we will do our best to work around that restriction, but we’d like your perspective on this situation. Hopefully, your input will help us resolve your situation so you can return to your normal life.”
It was remarkable to watch the scientist grow visibly calm as he spoke. The repetitive rubbing of her hands stopped, and her posture slowly straightened until she was studying Zev with a disconcerting intensity. The drastic behavior change struck me as odd, but as Zev seemed unconcerned, maybe I was being overly critical.
“Yes, of course. As I told Ms. Frost, I’m more than happy to answer any questions you have.” She ducked her chin and tucked her hair behind an ear. “Well, any questions that I can legally answer.”
“Of course,” Zev murmured as he watched her. “It’s our understanding that you and your team were working on the Delphi project, correct?”
She bit her lip and gave a hesitant nod.
Zev’s friendly demeanor held steady. “After the death of Dr. Kaspar, it was just you and Jonas Gainer?”
“Yes. Losing Dr. Kaspar was quite the blow, but we were able to use her existing notes to move forward with our research. Jonas and I worked for months trying to piece together the information for a viable solution.”
“According to Stephen Trask, based on Dr. Kaspar’s research, Origin managed to create a working beta serum.” There was no judgment in Zev’s tone, no change in his expression, but he did pin her in place with an implacable gaze.
She gave a tentative half nod as if leery of her legal constraints, not that Zev was giving her any other option. “We did, yes.”
“It’s our understanding that your team tested that serum on animal subjects but encountered detrimental failure.” Again, there was no condemnation in his voice, just an unspoken demand for answers.
Yet color still swept up her cheeks, and her glance shifted away. “I’m not sure… I can’t…” She stumbled, her nerves rushing to the fore.
“Dr. Michaels,” I interrupted, her nervousness uncomfortable to witness. “Please understand, Mr. Trask already shared this information with us. We are simply verifying the facts at hand.”
She gulped then drew in a deep breath before straightening her shoulders and lifting her chin in a bid for composure. “Yes, we completed our first animal tests with mice during our pre-clinical-testing phase. However, it soon became clear that we were missing a critical component in the serum as the mice devolved rapidly and eventually
died. There were also indicators that some of the test subjects had the ability to infect others.”
My stomach bottomed out. “I’m sorry. The serum was infectious?”
Color came and went in her face as she all but wrung her hands. “For the most part, no. There was a single outlier in the initial tests—that’s all. It was taken into consideration when Jonas and I reengineered the formula.”
A single outlier was one too many in my opinion, but what did I know—I wasn’t a scientist.
Zev didn’t belabor the point. Instead, he asked, “And that reengineered formula… it worked?”
She met his gaze, and for the first time, her voice carried the hint of the steel that must have been required to hold her position. “That’s difficult to say, as we were preparing to run our in vitro tests when the initial batch of serum disappeared.”
“It disappeared or was stolen?” he pushed.
Frustration was evident on her face. “Whichever way you choose to label it, those vials were locked under maximum containment in the ABSL-4 lab the night prior, and the next morning, all three were gone.”
Unfamiliar with the lab designation, I asked, “ABSL-4?”
“Arcane biosafety level four, the highest level of containment for biological labs specializing in magical agents.” Her response was pure imperious instructor to peon student. “To bypass the security would require immense skill.”
I barely refrained from rolling my eyes. “So you don’t think Jonas took it?”
That earned me a fierce frown and a vehement, “Absolutely not, and it’s laughable anyone would consider such thing.”
“And why’s that?” Zev’s asked.
“Because he was the conscience of our research team.” After blurting that out, Dr. Michaels blinked and looked away, her hands resuming their restless movements in her lap.
Her wording struck me as curious. “How so?”
Her fingers stilled, clenched, and turned bloodless. “Jonas started with Origin as an intern, and when he graduated last spring, he was offered a full-time position on my… our research team.”
I hadn’t missed her pronoun slip on the research team, but she kept going before I could interrupt.
“Jonas was excited and focused on the project, willing to put in the long hours it required without complaint. He was the one who caught the discrepancies in Dr. Kaspar’s notes. He brought them to my attention and voiced his concerns. Once I was able to confirm his discoveries, I took them to Mr. Trask.” She lifted her head and met my gaze straight on. “Dr. Kaspar was brilliant and recklessly innovative, but she was ruthless in her determination to push the known boundaries of science. Jonas loved delving into the hows and whys of our projects, but he never lost sight of the human picture.”
Taking the opening she provided, I asked, “If Dr. Kaspar was the group’s trailblazer and Jonas was the heart, what were you?”
She gave a mocking smile. “The balance.”
Something about her, a subtle note I couldn’t pin down, bothered me. Before I could dig any further, Zev spoke up. “Are you aware of Mr. Trask’s suspicions about who’s behind the theft?”
Her expression turned carefully blank, and her voice was cautious. “Yes, I am.”
“Do you agree with his assumptions?” He watched her closely.
She held his gaze without flinching. “Mr. Trask has been faced with some alarming revelations in the aftermath of Dr. Kaspar’s death, and I believe it hinders him from seeing the wider possibilities.”
She’d sidestepped calling her boss paranoid with admirable ease.
Zev’s half smirk meant he noted it too. “What kind of possibilities?”
“The Delphi project has the potential to alter the Arcane world in ways we can only begin to guess. There are many groups, and even more individuals, who would give anything, do anything, to ensure that they are the ones controlling that potential. It would not surprise me if there was more than one interested party involved in the theft.”
Zev’s lips flattened into a tight line. “You sound sure of that.”
She looked toward the door, considering her response. When she turned back, it was clear she had something to share, something that made her uncomfortable. “Weeks ago, when LanTech officially announced it would be shutting down its lab, I was taking my lunch in a corner café near my office. A man sat down and asked me about my work. He claimed he’d been working on a similar project with LanTech, and he offered to share his notes with me for a price.” She grimaced. “I politely declined his offer, explaining I was not interested in risking my job, or reputation, by dealing with someone with obvious mental-health issues and questionable morals. Then I left.”
Hearing the condescension in her voice made it easy to picture her shutting down the man who’d approached her, but I couldn’t help but wonder if she was really that altruistic. She said it herself—more than one person wanted to get their hands on the project. I found it hard to believe a smart woman like her, who understood the true impact of the serum, would really walk away from information that would allow her to complete the project. Or am I just being overly cynical and paranoid?
Zev pulled out his phone and thumbed the screen. “Dr. Michaels, would this be the man who approached you?” He held his phone out to Kerri.
She took it and studied the photo, lines furrowing her forehead. “Yes. He wasn’t quite as put together as that, but that’s definitely him.” She handed the phone back to him. “Who is he?”
He took it. “He was one of the researchers at LanTech working with the information Dr. Kaspar provided.” He angled the screen so I could see the file photo of Neil Pasternak. “And since then?” he asked Kerri. “Has he tried approaching you again?”
“No.” She paused then asked, “Is he the one that’s missing?”
I looked up from Zev’s phone. “You heard about that?”
“Yes. We… Jonas and I knew LanTech had a research team working on a similar project and that Dr. Kaspar had sold proprietary information to them.”
I felt my eyebrows lift. “And that didn’t worry you?”
“Oh, we were worried initially. But it became clear we were further ahead than they were on the project, especially when Origin secured funding that LanTech lost. Funding is the lifeblood of research units, and as LanTech was crumbling, Jonas and I knew we’d have a clear field for the serum.” She worried her lip. “I remember hearing that shortly after LanTech announced it was closing, one of their researchers was killed walking home—a mugging or something. There were the expected whispers of conspiracy but nothing substantial.” She rubbed a hand over her knee. “Still, Jonas starting walking me out to my car and insisting I ask security to escort me if he wasn’t around. Both of us were bit jumpy.”
Studying her, I asked, “Did you think the mugging was connected to the project?”
She gave an uncomfortable shrug. “Not really, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious.”
“Understandable,” Zev murmured. “Did you or Jonas notice anything unusual or worrisome?”
“No, but Origin did tighten our security as a precaution.” She wrapped her arms protectively over her stomach, her shoulders curling forward as grief drifted over her face, leaving it more drawn. “It wasn’t until Jonas was killed that I started believing we were being targeted. It was a tremendous relief when Mr. Trask arranged for this”—she waved a hand at the apartment—“and additional security.”
“Just a couple more questions, Dr. Michaels, and then we’ll leave you to your day.” Zev brought his foot up and rested his ankle on his knee as he folded his hands over his stomach. “We’re aware that Dr. Kaspar was a highly regarded Fusor mage and was known for her microlevel expertise. Did Jonas have an Arcane specialty as well?”
Her brow furrowed. “No, he held a minor ability as an electro mage. In his words, it was great for turning lights on and off but not much else. It was his dedication in the lab that made him stand out from the other interns. H
e was meticulous in his research and testing, perhaps to the point of being overly cautious. Not that that’s a bad thing when it comes to science.”
“And you?” I asked.
She blinked as if the question took her by surprise. “Like Jonas, I’m more scientifically focused, but I do have a low-level ability in pattern recognition. I find it comes in handy during the research phase of my projects.”
Yeah, I can see that.
Zev gave her a polite smile. “I bet it does. One last question. You mentioned there were three vials taken?”
“Yes, it was enough to get through our in vitro testing, plus a control sample.”
“How many doses would that be?”
“It would depend on the size and mass of the test subjects. If you’re looking at lab mice, maybe five to six per vial.”
That meant roughly eighteen Frankenstein critters could be running around. Unfortunately, Neil wasn’t sticking to lab rats. “If it were to be used on something larger, say, humans…?” I asked.
She paled and gulped. “That’s not… that wouldn’t…” She took a moment to gather her composure. “Six to eight.”
While I made the mental calculations, Zev asked, “How difficult would it be for someone with the correct skills and knowledge to replicate the current version of the serum?”
His question threw me for a loop, but when I got it, dread bloomed. Without counting the weird lab experiments from the hotel and warehouse, if Neil had also infected Chloe, Jonas, the sleeper, and himself, he was down to maybe two human-sized dosages. So long as no new batches of the serum were created, these experiments Neil was conducting could end with him, but if he, or anyone else, found a way to make more… the possibilities were nightmarish.
Kerri didn’t rush to answer. Instead, she considered it for a long moment. “It would take months, possibly years, because they would have to reverse engineer the current serum in order to determine how to replicate it.”
The lines on Zev’s face grew more pronounced. “If they had access to project notes? Would that significantly speed up the process?”