“You’ve been patched through to a special number, Dr. McKinley. It’s I who have to trust you.”
“Oh, really? Well I’m sorry, but if the Home Secretary is too busy to take this call himself right now I’m going to hang up.”
There was an audible sigh. “I’ll try his extension.”
Several seconds passed. Then: “Spalding.”
“This is Dr. McKinley.”
“Dr. McKinley, I don’t have a great deal of time at the moment, but rest assured Adrian is fully briefed and ready to deal with you. Now, there’s a Cabinet meeting tomorrow and I intend to report on what progress you’ve made. Please give your report to Adrian. I’ll pass you back to him. Please do be sure to update us regularly.”
The line buzzed. A flush of anger had risen to Terry’s cheeks.
“Adrian Spencer-Talbot.”
Was there a note of triumph in that voice? He took a deep breath. “All right, here’s the situation.”
He gave a brief account of the two meetings with Chris Walmesley. He and Dr. Ferris had been given facilities and were now in the process of strengthening the case in preparation for taking it to the President.
“That’s it, is it?”
Terry delivered the answer between clenched teeth.
“Yes, that’s it.”
“All right. I’ll pass that on to Mr. Spalding. And from now on, Dr. McKinley it would be helpful if you could report daily – ”
“Sorry, can’t hear you, connection’s breaking up.” Terry clicked off.
Maggie smirked. “Hanging up on the British government. Anarchy.”
“These people. For weeks we couldn’t beg them to listen to us and now we’re not talking to them enough.” He looked at the phone, then back at her. “Maybe I’ll get myself another mobile and next time we cross the Potomac accidentally drop this one over the side.”
Maggie laughed. “I’d better get to the lab. I’ll meet you back here this evening?”
“Sounds like a plan,” Terry answered. “I’m going to work from here today. No one to help me in the NSF building anyway.”
She smiled again and kissed him on the cheek before heading out.
CHAPTER 18
That afternoon Terry sat at the small desk in his hotel room, staring at the sheets containing the ammonia data he’d extracted from the NOAA records. Different flight paths and different sites to the NSF data but it was the same story all over again.
It seems to be rising everywhere.
There was a knock at the door. He went and opened it and saw one of the hotel porters standing there with a small brown parcel in his hand.
“Delivery, sir.”
“Thanks,” said Terry and took it from him. He started to open it when he noticed the porter was still standing there looking at him expectantly. He stared at him for a moment and the porter gave a little cough.
“Oh, right” said Terry quickly and pulled out some crimpled bills from his pocket. He selected a five dollar note and handed it to the man.
“Thank you, sir,” he said, and quickly turned and walked away.
Terry closed the door and opened the parcel. Inside were two disks. Both had NASA stickers on them and someone had scrawled “Software” on one and “Data” on the other with a spirit pen. This would be the spectroscopy data from the NASA satellites that would show the concentration of ammonia in the atmosphere and the software that would let him decode it and build up a visual picture.
He booted up his laptop and installed the software, then the data. His fingers moved rapidly over the keys and from time to time he’d mutter to himself: “So why can’t I…?” Eventually he got the hang of it. He paused for a moment.
Where and when to look first?
He glanced down at the papers on his desk and his eyes rested on one of his briefing documents outlining the evidence they’d collected from Bermuda.
As good a place as any. He pressed a key combination. A dialog box appeared and he typed in the coordinates for Bermuda. He paused, then entered the dates for April the year before, knowing there was a pocket of ammonia around there at that time. The screen displayed a fuzzy purple image.
Is that it?
This couldn’t be right. He didn’t expect very high resolution but what was on the screen in front of him was absolutely featureless.
The colour wasn’t a problem; it was just a way of displaying the level of ammonia. The colour purple would be assigned to the lowest concentration, blue to the next step up, and then through the spectrum to green, yellow, orange, red, and finally white, for the highest concentrations. But at these coordinates he expected to see at least some sign of the Islands, and what he was looking at was just a purple fog. He couldn’t get anything from this.
He clicked on an icon which switched the view to optical wavelengths, showing what it looked like in the visible spectrum.
The screen changed to a conventional satellite view of the Atlantic Ocean with a small streak of land in the middle. He zoomed in. The streak expanded and revealed itself as the Bermuda Islands. It looked sharp enough.
He slapped his forehead.
Idiot. By April last year the ammonia had already risen into the stratosphere. The satellite’s picking up a thin layer of atmospheric ammonia which is masking what’s going on underneath.
He switched the view to the ammonia spectrum again and started to tap an arrow key, stepping back through the data a month at a time. The picture remained fuzzy. He continued to tap. Then, when he’d gone back a further seventeen months, the screen cleared abruptly. The diffuse purple had gone, to be replaced by a clear purple and blue patch the shape of a tadpole, with a green centre to the body.
He returned to the optical view. At this altitude he could see the whole coastline of Bermuda. He switched back to the ammonia spectrum, then alternated between the two. He concentrated on the green circle. It appeared to be exactly where the weed mats had been. He paused again, looking at the tadpole’s tail.
What the hell?
It looked like it was moving westwards.
He frowned. It couldn’t be. The Gulf Stream flowed to the east. This didn’t make sense.
Just then there was another knock at his door. He went and opened it and saw Maggie standing in the corridor. She rushed in past him and sat down on the bed, her head lowered.
“Maggie? What’s wrong?”
She took a deep breath. “It’s spreading Terry, in the worst possible way. It’s plasmid transfer. There’s no doubt about it.”
They both sat in silence for some time on the large hotel bed. Terry was leaning up against the headboard. Maggie was still where she had sat when she first came in, but now had her knees drawn up to under her chin with her arms hugging her legs to her chest.
Finally she spoke.
“I spent all morning tracking down the stuff for a cell viability assay, then most of the afternoon using it on my cultures. Dead, the lot of them. I was a bit surprised none survived but then lab work can be like that; obviously I didn’t hit on the right growing conditions. Then I had a look at my indicator gels.”
She paused.
“There’s already a little red halo round each and every one. All those different organisms are producing ammonia. There’s no doubt about it any more, Terry. It’s plasmid transfer, all right.”
Terry grimaced. “The worst possible outcome.”
He stood up and fixed them both a drink from the mini-bar. They sat in silence again for a while, sipping their drinks, before Terry spoke.
“You’re a biologist. Tell me: how does Nature come to play such a lousy trick on us? It makes no sense. Those mutant organisms could wipe out all life on the planet.”
“But they won’t be wiped out themselves – and that’s the point, isn’t it? Organisms like this don’t know anything about planets; they’re looking after their own interests and they’re doing it brilliantly. You know how evolution works, Terry. Without chance mutations that give individuals an ed
ge, life wouldn’t have got as far as the dinosaurs, let alone us.”
“And the more favourable the mutation, the bigger the competitive advantage, so the quicker it spreads.”
“Exactly. It’s not the organism’s problem; it’s ours.” She drained her glass and got up to make another. “Any progress at your end?”
He looked at her for a moment, before realising what she was referring too. With her news he’d completely forgotten what he had been doing.
“Oh, yes. I did find something weird in the ammonia data NASA sent over.”
He showed her the laptop screen and explained what he had found.
“Maybe it’s coming from another patch of weed further to the west. You’d better take a look.”
He brought up the dialog box with the coordinates and tapped repeatedly, moving the image progressively to the west to see where the purple tadpole tail ended. The only sound in the room was the soft tapping of the keys as he tracked the tail further and further west. Then, to their surprise, it sent another branch up to the north and stopped.
“Now what?” said Terry. “Let’s see where we are.” He switched to the conventional satellite view. It displayed a coastline. “Just a minute, I’ll change to a wider view.” He typed a number in and the picture changed to display a much longer stretch of the coastline. Now it was unmistakable: the Eastern seaboard of the United States. Terry just stared at the screen.
“Jesus,” exclaimed Maggie. “It’s here?”
Suddenly she clutched his arm.
“Shit, Terry, why didn’t I think of it before? You remember what Max Gibson said about American eels? There’s a species of eel that migrates from the Eastern seaboard each year to spawn in the Sargasso Sea. They probably picked up strands of the stuff in their gills and took them back home.”
Terry stayed silent, still staring. “Unless…”
“Unless what?”
“Unless they were transporting the stuff in the opposite direction.”
She looked at him and blinked a couple of times. “I suppose that’s possible. But there’s no way of knowing that, is there?”
“Yes, there is. This picture is from last April. I can go further back in time and see which end it started from.”
He brought up the ammonia display again. On this scale they could see the purple branch extending north and the long tail ending in the patch at Bermuda. He selected the date dialog box and pressed the arrow key several times, stepping back one month, two months, three… At Bermuda the patch was changing: first the green disappeared, then the blue, then the purple tail retracted away from Bermuda altogether. He kept tapping. All that was left now were two shorter purple tails and these shrank and merged into a single patch which blossomed blue and green, then disappeared entirely. He looked up at her.
“We were totally wrong about Bermuda,” she said slowly. “It started in the States!”
He nodded. “The American eels picked it up there and took it to the Sargasso. It’s so rich in phytoplankton it was as good as an incubator! No wonder it looked like the problem came from there!”
Maggie nodded. “Well it did, for us. English eels spawn in the Sargasso too, so they carried phytoplankton with them when they migrated back across the ocean and up UK rivers. Now we know. Our organisms have succeeded in hitching a ride right across the Atlantic and they’re passing the mutation on wherever they go. No wonder atmospheric levels of ammonia are rising!”
He bit his lip. “Maggie, I’ve had a thought. The purple branch we saw going up to the north. Eels are only part of the story: this stuff will be carried on ocean currents, too. And they don’t just go eastwards towards Bermuda; they flow up the coast from Florida to Cape Cod. America has a lot more to worry about than hurricanes. This problem’s right on their doorstep!”
Terry’s phone rang.
“Terry? It’s Chris.”
“Chris. I was just about to call you. You won’t believe what we’ve found.”
“Well I hope it’s something helpful. You watching the news?”
“No.”
“Switch to CNN.”
Terry went over to the TV and switched it on. He grabbed the remote and scrolled till he found CNN. There was a view of high-rise buildings peeking out of the top of a continuous white cloud.
“…familiar view of downtown Pittsburgh, except there’s nothing familiar about it. Normally from here you’d have a clear view of the Golden Triangle, where the Monongahela and the Allegheny come together as the Ohio River. It’s somewhere under that white smog.” The reporter coughed. “Excuse me. The air’s pretty bad even up here on Mount Washington, but it’s a lot worse in town. A couple of hours ago we received this footage taken on cell phones.”
The blurry, unsteady pictures showed people hurrying down the streets coughing and trying to cover their mouths and noses. Another view showed an almost deserted Central Business District; a thin white veil covering cars, buildings, and roads. There followed an interview with a spokesman from the Allegheny General Hospital.
“We’re advising people to stay indoors right now. We’ve been admitting people all day and at this time there’s a Code Red in operation.”
“Does that mean you’re turning patients away?”
“It just means we have to direct them to other hospitals. But there’s pressure on services in the whole region so we ask that you don’t contact the hospital or the ambulance service unless it’s a genuine emergency.”
“Is this a return to the bad old days, Dave?”
“Well, Lee, we’re told this is a pretty freaky weather situation, and it should pass over soon. People haven’t seen smog like this here in Pittsburgh for sixty years or more. I wasn’t around back then, but of course in those days it was black smog from the steel mills. This stuff may be white but I’d say it’s every bit as choking. That’s why we’re advising people, particularly if you’re elderly, don’t go outside until this thing blows through. And keep young children indoors; they’re vulnerable, too.”
“Thanks, Dave. Back to you, Rick.”
The picture returned to the newscaster. “As yet there are no official casualty figures, but it’s estimated that at least six thousand people have been admitted to hospitals all over the city, and some of them are in a critical condition. As we said earlier, things appear to be just as bad in Baltimore and Cleveland…”
“Terry? You still there?” Walmesley’s voice jolted him back into the room.
“Yeah, Chris. I’m here.”
“The President’s called an emergency meeting tomorrow at the White House. He wants you both there.”
CHAPTER 19
They saw only one person in the outer office when they arrived at their meeting inside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the worlds’ most famous address. He was an avuncular looking man with ginger hair, whitening at the temples, a ruddy complexion, and a large moustache. He wore a fawn check suit. “That’s Robert Cabot, Director of National Intelligence. He’s one of the President’s closest advisers” Murmured Walmesley. “I’ll introduce you.”
“Dr. McKinley, Dr. Ferris,” Cabot said, as he shook hands with both of them. He had a deep, velvety voice. “I hear you’ve had first-hand experience of these white smogs.”
“Yes, sir,” said Terry, “we were summoned to London when it was hit by one a few weeks ago.”
“Terry predicted it but nobody believed us,” Maggie added quickly.
Cabot’s keen eyes searched her, before returning to Terry. “And you think the same thing is behind these unseasonal hurricanes?”
“It’s a distinct possibility.”
Cabot looked up as another man walked in. “Ah, here’s James. James, come and meet Dr. McKinley and Dr. Ferris. James Brierley is the Secretary for Homeland Security,” he added.
Brierley was tall and slim, almost delicate, but his hair was clipped close above the ears and neck, suggesting a military background. He took Maggie’s hand first with a slight bow and said, “Dr. Ferri
s.” As he moved to Terry he pointed and said to Cabot:
“Are these the scientists from – ?”
“They are.”
Maggie glanced at Terry. At least these people knew who they were.
Two more arrived: Richard Pevensey, the Secretary of Defense and Dr. Elaine Zanuck, the Director of the National Institutes of Health. Maggie was particularly interested to meet Elaine Zanuck. She turned out to be a heavily built, rather motherly-looking woman in her late fifties, wearing a well-cut trouser suit. She scanned the room with the air of someone who, Maggie surmised, allowed little to pass her by.
“It was very good of you to give me lab space, Dr. Zanuck,” Maggie said as they shook hands lightly.
Zanuck shot a quick glance at Walmesley and smiled. “No problem. You have everything you need?”
“For the moment, yes, thank you. People have been most helpful.”
“Good. You let me know if there’s anything more we can do.” Her gaze strayed. “Excuse me one moment.” She moved off to join Cabot and Brierley.
Maggie leaned towards Walmesley and Terry and said quietly: “High-powered gathering. Who suggested these people?”
“I did. It has to be at this level because of the confidentiality issue.” Walmesley scanned the room and checked his watch. “We’re all here now. I wanted the Director of NASA as well, but he’s out of the country right now. So’s the Vice-President. Kramer was asked but for some reason he’s not coming.”
The President’s Secretary appeared and the group followed her in.
Terry felt a sharp jolt of excitement as he passed through the doorway. This was it, the famous Oval Office. He felt diminished by the volume of the room and the opulence of the furnishings. This administration had chosen a decorative theme based on burgundy, cream and gold. Burgundy was the dominant colour of the elliptical rug, woven with the Presidential crest, and it was echoed in broad stripes on the chairs and soft furniture. His eyes wandered up to the high arch of the ceiling where the Presidential crest was repeated as an oval medallion. He had to suppress an urge to run around touching things: the famous ornately carved Resolute desk with the two tall flags behind it, the sumptuous golden drapes framing the floor-to-ceiling windows, the long-case clock, the Remington sculptures of horses and cowboys… As the others dispersed to their places he saw President Harry Kinghorn greeting each one by name, shaking hands, indicating the two four-seat sofas, arranged facing each other in the centre of the room. At the far end he expected to see the fireplace and the two high-backed chairs in which the President was often photographed with prominent visitors. Much of the fireplace was now obscured, however, by a large flat-screen monitor with a computer on a shelf below it. Clearly, Walmesley had requested this for the presentations.
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