by Ryk Brown
Three tones sounded, with the last one lasting longer than the other two.
Hanna waited several seconds, her eyes fixed on the small orb floating just behind and left of Doctor Benarro’s head. “I’m Hanna Bohl, and I’m in the office of Doctor Gabriel Benarro, a leading epidemiologist, former chairman of the Global Disease Control Organization, and current head of the Boston Center for the study of communicable diseases. The good doctor has agreed to tell us something about the Klaria virus that has been appearing in various places around the world over the last year.” Hanna shifted her eyes from the camera to the doctor. “Doctor Benarro, thank you for taking the time to speak with us today.”
“It my pleasure, Miss Bohl,” Doctor Benarro replied.
“For those who might not have heard much about Klaria, please, give us a bit of background on the virus?”
“Of course,” the doctor began. “The virus first appeared more than thirteen months ago, in the village of Klaria. Since then, there have been at least three hundred outbreaks at varying locations around the world, resulting in more than twelve thousand deaths. In addition, there are at least fifty additional outbreaks, and eleven hundred deaths, in which the diagnosis of Klaria was unconfirmed.”
A list of questions, all provided by the client, appeared in Hanna’s personal visual space, fed to her by Arielle.
“What is it about the Klaria virus that is most troubling?” Hanna asked, selecting the first question in the order suggested.
“The biggest problems with the Klaria virus are its mortality rate, and the fact that we have been unable to understand how it is transmitted.”
“How high is the mortality rate?”
“About ninety percent, thus far, although that number could increase if the survivors of the unconfirmed cases are proven to not be the Klaria virus.”
“Originally, Klaria was thought to be blood borne, was it not?”
“Originally, yes. This was based on the fact that during the original outbreak, several people who were accidentally exposed to the blood of patients infected with the Klaria virus also became infected. However, later outbreaks disproved this assumption, as cases that had not been exposed to the blood of infected patients themselves still became infected. In that case, it was determined that the most likely cause was the droplets of moisture spread into the air when we cough. In other words, Klaria was then thought to be airborne.”
Hanna nodded. “I see, but that too turned out to be inaccurate?”
“Yes, it did,” Doctor Benarro confirmed. “To date, we have had solid evidence that the Klaria virus was transmitted by air, bodily fluids, and even by mosquitoes at one point. However, the transmission method is rarely the same. If fact, in a few of the outbreaks, they were unable to discover the mode of transmission. This led us to believe that Klaria was capable of surprisingly rapid mutation, more rapid than any pathogen ever encountered, even more so than the Trans-Hatari virus back in the twenty-second century.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, Doctor Benarro, but if the virus is mutating, then the differences would be obvious, wouldn’t they?”
“Correct. Normally, when a virus mutates, it leaves a sort of trail, a series of indicators that help us determine how the virus is likely to mutate in the future. Unfortunately, the Klaria virus mutations appear to occur randomly, sometimes even mutating back to one of its previous states.”
“Really?” Hanna seemed genuinely surprised.
Doctor Benarro pressed a button on the remote on his desk, causing the wallpaper pattern on the viewer behind him to fade away to black. “These images of the virus clearly demonstrate the mutation patterns…” Doctor Benarro stopped mid sentence as he glanced over his shoulder and noticed that the images had not appeared on the viewer. He pressed the remote again. A series of error messages appeared on the viewer. “I’m terribly sorry,” he apologized, becoming somewhat flustered. “The images were supposed to be…” He looked at Hanna, and then at Graham. “Maybe we should stop?”
From; Arielle: Keep going, we’ll fix it in post.
“That’s all right, Doctor,” Hanna assured him, “we can cut this part out in editing. Don’t worry.”
Doctor Benarro pressed a button on his desk, causing the view screen to go dark and his desktop display to come to life. Hovering over his desk was a pale blue, transparent display, with the same error messages flashing in and out of view. The doctor slid the messages out of the way with a swipe of his hand as he pulled a command console out of the left side of the display with his left hand. He rapidly touched transparent buttons floating in the air over his desk as he spoke. “This same thing happened last week,” he explained as he struggled to resolve the glitch. “IT said it was the Twister virus, but they promised they had cleared it from our systems. They even had to reboot all our systems from an earlier backup. We had to go back to an image from a month earlier before we found a clean one. Lost an entire month’s worth of work.”
The image of the world map, with all its red, green and yellow dots flashed into Hanna’s memory. She called the map up again in her personal visual space. The dot over Boston was yellow, and it was dated a week ago.
From Arielle: What are you doing, Hanna?
“Doctor Benarro, is it true that the majority of the outbreaks of the Klaria virus have coincided in both time and location with reported outbreaks of the Twister virus?”
“Excuse me?”
Graham looked at Hanna, then at Arielle. Message; Arielle: What the hell is she talking about?
“The Twister virus, Doctor,” Hanna explained.
Reply: Don’t ask, Arielle’s answer appeared in Graham’s visual space. We’re not connected to any local systems, are we?
“Is it possible that the two viruses are somehow related?” Hanna continued.
Message: Of course not. My gear is self-contained, Graham assured her. Hell, I don’t even do direct uploads. I do everything by data cards. Reformatted after each connection with the net. Why do you ask?
“That would be quite impossible,” Doctor Benarro said, dismissing the thought with a wave of his hand.
Reply: Just checking, Arielle messaged. We didn’t get a chance to talk about procedures yet. The doc’s problems made me think of it.
“Why?” Hanna asked, continuing to press the idea. A message flashed in her visual space. From Arielle: Don’t go there, Hanna.
“Well, for one, Klaria is a biological virus, and Twister is digital.” The tone in the doctor’s voice was becoming somewhat condescending.
“I understand that,” Hanna assured him, “however, one cannot help but notice that the majority of the outbreaks of both viruses have been simultaneous.”
From Arielle: Don’t do it!
“Mere coincidence,” Doctor Benarro insisted, becoming more agitated. He looked at Arielle. “I was told that this interview was for a legitimate news agency…”
“It is, Doctor, I assure you,” Arielle replied. “Miss Bohl is just exploring all possibilities…”
“I don’t see how there is anything wrong with asking a few questions, Doctor Benarro,” Hanna interrupted. “That’s how we learn, right? By asking questions?”
From Arielle: You can’t badger this one, Hanna, Arielle’s message flashed across Hanna’s visual space, and batting your eyelashes and playing coy isn’t going to work either! Just drop it and move on!
“Are we still recording?” Doctor Benarro demanded to know. “Stop recording, please. I insist.”
Graham looked at Arielle, who nodded. “As you wish,” he replied. He pressed a button on his controller, and the little red lights on all the orbs changed from red to flashing orange. “Recording is paused.”
Doctor Benarro looked at Hanna, his expression turning more serious. “This line of questioning was not agreed upo
n…”
“I was told that you would answer all questions regarding the Klaria virus,” Hanna responded, cutting him off.
“All reasonable questions,” the doctor replied.
Hanna noticed that Arielle was no longer sending her messages to stop, which meant that her friend knew there was no turning back, and that if she continued the line of questioning Hanna might be able to work her way out of the corner she had just painted herself into. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time. “All questions that help to clarify the nature of a deadly virus that has killed thousands of people should be considered reasonable,” Hanna insisted. “After all, the public has access to the same information that I do, and I’m sure many of them have come to the same conclusions and are wondering the same thing. Is it possible that Klaria and Twister are somehow related?”
“I’m not going to respond to conspiracy theories from the lunatic fringes of society,” the doctor warned.
“I’m not asking you to do so, Doctor,” Hanna explained as diplomatically as possible. “I’m only asking you to explain why such a connection is possible, or impossible.” Message; Arielle: Why is this guy getting so unhinged?
Arielle’s answer was immediate. Reply: Because it’s a stupid, and potentially irresponsible question, and you know it. You’re just going for a ratings grab, and it’s going to end up costing us a paycheck!
“Such theories only feed public panic,” Doctor Benarro insisted. “They waste the time of those of us who are seeking truths, as you should be. They are unfounded claims, reckless theories… nothing more. Furthermore, both the Global Disease Control Organization and the International Center for Network Security looked into the possibility of a link between the two…”
“Then my question is not so unreasonable, is it?” Hanna interrupted.
“It is in that the theory has already been disproven beyond a shadow of a doubt, Miss Bohl. Attempting to bring it into public attention again is nothing more than a reckless, irresponsible attempt to stir up controversy, I suspect for your own gain, and I will not be a party to it.” Doctor Benarro rose from his seat. “This interview is over,” he said firmly, after which he headed for the exit. “Pack up you gear and get out,” he added as he left.
Arielle sighed in frustration. “Are you happy now, Hanna?”
* * *
“You do realize we aren’t going to get paid?” Arielle said as she stormed across the spacious lobby on their way to the main entrance of the medical building.
“You don’t know that,” Hanna replied as she followed her friend out the doors.
“I do know that, Hanna. I’m the producer. I’m the business manager. Standard contracts clearly state that if we don’t produce usable material, we don’t get paid.”
“Well, who defines usable?”
“The client, of course! Jesus, Hanna! Are you really going to argue with me about this?”
“It was a reasonable question, Ari.”
“It was sensationalism, Hanna, and you know it.”
“I was looking for clarification. If anything, I was hoping to assure people that there was not a connection between Klaria and Twister. You yourself said that the idea was already ruled out by the GDCO, so the idea wasn’t crazy. You also said that if I could make the connection then most likely anyone could. Anyone includes our viewers.”
Arielle stopped as she reached the bottom of the steps, turning back to Hanna and Graham. “The facts are, Hanna, that we were hired by the client to ask a specific line of questions. You knew what those questions were, but you chose to go off on a tangent in the hopes of stirring something up, something that might boost your numbers so that you could land your dream job before you’re too old to be considered.”
“I thought it was our dream job,” Hanna reminded her.
“I’m starting to think they aren’t the same thing.”
“What do you mean, Ari?”
“I mean you’ve pulled this kind of stunt three times now in the last two months…”
“And you didn’t get this mad the other times…”
“That’s because we were chasing our own leads at the time, not working for a client. It still didn’t make it right, but at least you weren’t damaging our reputation with the booking agent and costing us money!”
“We have savings…”
“For crying out loud, Hanna, it isn’t about the money!” Arielle exclaimed, throwing her hands up in the air. “It’s about our integrity! It’s about our reputation with the booking agents. It takes both to land a job with one of the major networks, but you just don’t seem to get that, and I’m not going to let you ruin it for me.”
“It’s easier for you, Ari,” Hanna reminded her. “You’re not on camera. Your employable life span is longer. I’ve only got another ten years or so left to make my nest egg. If I don’t reach critical mass by then, I’ll either be stuck living in the lower levels for the rest of my life or, worse yet, have to move to one of those ag-towns.”
“Then stop sabotaging our reputation with your wild stunts!” Arielle insisted.
“I would if you’d get us something more interesting than interviews with disease docs and computer geeks!” Hanna defended.
“After today, that may not be possible, Hanna. It will take months of taking every assignment that comes our way, no matter how boring, to repair the damage you just did in five minutes!” Arielle took a deep breath, pausing to regain her composure, then stepped closer and looked Hanna in the eyes. “I’m only saying this one time, Hanna. Pull something like that again, and I’m gone.”
Hanna was shocked. “You don’t mean that…”
“Try me.”
Hanna’s eyes were locked on Arielle’s for what seemed an eternity. Finally, she acquiesced. “All right.”
“All right what?”
“I promise not to pull another stunt like that.”
Arielle relaxed, breaking her gaze with Hanna. “Thank you.”
“Uh, might I suggest that we upload the footage that we have?” Graham suggested. “There might be something the client can use.”
“Good idea,” Arielle agreed. “At least we might get partial payment.”
“I can maybe even make it look like the doc had limited time… Maybe even edit out that last bit?”
“No, the contract was for raw footage,” Arielle explained. “They get to edit.”
“Huh. I didn’t know anyone still took those types of assignments,” Graham said.
Arielle sighed. “We do, when we have to.”
“Do you have the client’s upload codes?”
“They didn’t give us any,” Arielle replied. “Just send it over the public net.”
“Are you sure? Pub-net means any snot-nosed wannabe hacker can intercept the data stream, you know.”
“It’s a boring interview with a disease doc that nobody knows and nobody cares about,” Hanna chimed in.
Arielle flashed a disdainful glance toward Hanna as she spoke. “Client’s choice. Send it through the pub-net.”
“You got it,” Graham said. “I’ll head back to my hotel and make it happen. Any idea where we’re headed next?”
“I didn’t get a chance to book anything yet,” Arielle replied. “I’ll let you know,” she added as she departed by herself.
Both Hanna and Graham stood there, watching Arielle walk away angry.
“Well, she’s right about one thing,” Graham said. “That was a pretty wild tangent you went off on.” Graham looked at Hanna. “Mind telling me why you did it?”
“I don’t know,” Hanna admitted. “When his viewer didn’t work, and then he started talking about Twister… I guess my mind just ran with it.” She looked at Graham. “Isn’t that what a reporter is supposed to do? Follow hun
ches?”
“Yes, if you’re investigating something. But Ari was right. You were doing an interview for a client. Wrong time to play investigative reporter. She’s also right about it taking both numbers and rep to make it to the major networks. Part of your rep has to be that you can always be trusted to do your job, even when that job is to interview some stuffed shirt in a fancy office about something you don’t care about. It’s called being professional.”
Hanna looked at Graham. “But what if I had been right?”
“Then you’d have your big story, that’s for sure.” Graham turned and started walking toward the escalator to the monorail platform. “Of course, we’d all be dead.”
* * *
Message; Arielle: I found it. Hanna took her seat in the middle of the press room. There were more than fifty reporters gathered at the Montreal office of the Global Disease Control Organization for the press conference, where they expected confirmation that the recent outbreak in nearby Sorel was indeed the Klaria virus.
Hanna looked about the room, spotting several familiar faces. As usual, indies such as herself sat in the back half of the room, while reporters working for the major news networks sat in the front half.
Reply: Looks like all the usuals are here, even your favorite, Constance Gerard.
Hanna frowned. Message: I hate that bitch.
Reply: You hate all of them.
Hanna straightened her blazer and fluffed her short, black hair, just as she always did before the cameras lit up. Message: Not all of them. Just the ones that have the job I want.