“So, do we have a deal?” Greene cut into our staring contest.
“I don't know, do we?” Nate asked me, still playing along.
“The hell you don't!” I shouted, not caring if every last soul in the building heard me. “You can't just give me away as a bargaining chip!”
Too late I realized that I'd inadvertently strengthened his base, sounding more like an offended lover than anything else. Greene's triumphant leer was making me sick.
Before I could put my foot even further into my mouth, Nate proved that he was still the real master manipulator of this game.
“Well, it seems like the lady doth protest, so maybe I can come up with an acceptable compromise? Whoever of the two of you tells me the most useful information gets what he or she wants. In your case…” he indicated Greene “…you get to do with her whatever you like. But if she outdoes you, you both go back into the cube to contemplate the senseless boredom of your existence.”
The plan was excellently executed, and I would have admired his plotting if it hadn't left me at such a disadvantage.
“How is that fair? I don't gain anything from you sticking to exactly what you promised all of us, and I still have to give you information?”
“That's the only deal you'll get. Take it or leave it.”
His hard gaze kept boring into me, and he didn't have to repeat what I already knew. I'd just have to agree to help them, and he'd instantly pluck me out of this situation.
I wanted to cry with frustration but couldn't let either of them see me that vulnerable. So I gave the barest of nods, then stared up at the list in front of me. That list that I really couldn't say anything about, even had I wanted to.
Of course Greene agreed as well—after all, he had nothing to lose and a lot to gain. With rising unease I listened to him prattle on about each project, naming the group leaders, group size, how many patents they'd already churned out, the net revenue the company gained from the different projects. That went on for three slides without me getting even a hint of a chance, and my stomach sank lower and lower. I couldn't judge how valuable that information was. I figured most of it a simple Google search might have revealed. Maybe it was published in the quarterly statements. Maybe it was exactly what the terrorists were after.
Greene looked more satisfied with each item he ticked off the list, and by the time he hit the last point of the third page, he was smirking outright.
“And what can you tell us about Project Destiny?”
It was a weird name for a project. The others sounded a lot more scientific and self-explanatory, yet Greene hit it in stride.
“Oh, that's a real cash cow. Not quite ready for milking, but I can tell you, it's big. Group leader's Dr. Thecla Soudekis. She's been working on this for the past six years. Small staff but high financial input because all the work is done down in the...” There he suddenly cut off, and when I looked at him, I saw him blanch visibly. His eyes went wide and his show of confidence wavered, but he caught himself almost instantly. “In the basement. No patents yet, but promising. What's next?”
Nate didn't react for a moment, which for him was a glaring tell. Looking closer, I realized that his posture had changed, too, but on a much more subtle level than Greene's. Suddenly there was tension in his shoulders and torso, and while he'd been tapping one foot idly on the floor before, he'd stopped now. His attention was focused razor sharp on Greene only, whereas before he'd glanced at me often, continuing his silent taunting.
Whatever Project Destiny was, it was more to him than the multi-million-dollar revenue deals Greene had summarized before.
A few seconds later, he eased up again, but some of that tension remained, even when he looked away and nodded at the techie once more. A few taps on the keyboard and the screen changed, now showing something I felt a lot more familiar with than the quarterly statement.
Out of some perverse curiosity I kept my mouth shut, although I knew that this was my moment to shine and hopefully talk myself out of the choice between becoming Greene's sex toy or an active asset of terrorists. Just peachy.
“Any of that ring a bell?” Nate asked, still focused on Greene. I wondered briefly if he was testing him.
Greene frowned, but his stumble from before was all but forgotten.
“Technical details. I recognize some of the numbers. Those are things we have patents for. Yes, definitely patents.”
I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing out loud. Nate looked over to me and offered me an almost nice, small smile.
“You know, if you do keep quiet, I might let him have a go at you simply out of spite. I told you before that I'm not dependent on your cooperation, and I certainly don't need you fully functional, either.”
That cut my mirth short rather quickly, while Greene continued to smirk. It was definitely about time that I put him in his place.
“Those aren't patent numbers or even patented material, technically. Those are cell lines. Every lab all around the world uses them. Green Fields Biotech might wish they'd be holding those patents because then they wouldn't need to do anything to earn millions every day, but they're older than the company, some by decades.”
The techie switched to the next slide, and I just kept on going, because it was just more of the same.
“Viral vectors, most of them from coronaviruses.”
The next slide made me blink, and I stared at Nate a moment before I went on.
“That's the first page of the materials section of my PhD thesis.”
He gave a noncommittal shrug as if to say that he could also play into my hands, not just against me.
It went on like that for several minutes. The information honed in on the research I had been doing, or had cooperated in—first the more recent projects, then some of what I'd been working on down in the hot labs. That made me uncomfortable but for different reasons than giving him what he wanted. I was sure that not a single word I said was news to him. He could have easily gotten all of that off the web or the company servers. I had no delusions that, by now, they'd hacked into those successfully. I hadn’t forgotten the techie’s comment about Thecla’s data.
All the while Greene wore a grim face. At first I thought it was simply because I was catching up, but when I realized that he had started to sweat, I wondered what that was all about. He couldn't have been that desperate for sexual gratification.
Then the screen changed again, and I stared at the diagrams for a full ten heartbeats before I turned to frown at Nate.
“Very funny. That's a fake. Something either of you copy pasted together in Photoshop and did a bad job labeling.”
He cocked his head to the side, his eyes never leaving my face.
“What would make you say that?”
“Because it's bullshit.”
Now I got a variation of the look Greene had received when he'd been talking about Project Destiny, and I felt a cold shiver ghost up my spine.
“Please explain anyway. Indulge me.”
I was getting a really bad feeling about this, but went on simply because this was ridiculous.
“This looks like some bad mashup of three different virions. It's even labeled there—from Coronavirus, Influenza A, and Ebola virus. Those do not even belong to the same order or class of viruses, so they could never be combined like that. Nidovirales have a positive sense RNA genome, the other two are negative sense—even if you completely ignore anything else, this cannot exist. I know that we crazy virologists like to draw diagrams where virions look like colored Lego pieces all randomly arranged to make up these pretty geometric forms, but there's a lot of biochemistry behind that. I repeat, this is bullshit. Did I pass that test? Can we move on?”
I was sure that I was the only one present who'd understood a word of what I'd said, and I had to admit, I'd likely simplified it way too much, but I couldn't fathom that it was important. As hoaxes went, this one wasn't even a good one.
And yet Nate kept staring at
my face as if he was reading and judging my every reaction. This was making me increasingly nervous on its own, and I hoped he wouldn't read that as something it really wasn't.
“Next slide, please.”
The screen changed to an equally fake electron microscopy image, likely approximating what the hoax virion sequence from before might look like structurally.
“Very funny. Next, please.”
Nate pushed off from the table and I had to steel my spine not to instinctively back away as he walked over to me and stopped so close that he just had to lean in and whisper into my ear.
“Just indulge me. Explain what you're seeing. I swear, it's not a Rorschach test, and the right answer isn't 'penis.'”
If there'd even been a hint of laughter in his voice, I might have relaxed, but he sounded so damn serious that it was suddenly hard to swallow.
“Well, if we went out on a really long limb—and I'm talking pure hypothesis here—the mashed-up virus from the previous slide might look like this under an electron microscope. No idea if it's a good approximation—I haven't done Influenza since undergrad, and Coronaviridae look nothing like that. They're like spheres with halos. That's what they were named after when they were first discovered. Like they had a corona surrounding them.”
His face remained impassive but there was something lurking behind his eyes, and I decided right then and there that I never wanted to find out what that was, let alone be on the receiving end of it.
“And you insist that this is fake. You've never seen anything like this, never heard anyone even joke about this?”
I immediately shook my head.
“I'm a hundred percent positive that I haven't. The only thing making less sense would be using a DNA virus or a reverse transcribing virus, but, yeah, I told you, it's bullshit.”
He pursed his lips, looking almost pensive, but the intensity of his gaze never lessened.
“And what would you say if I told you that this is real, and I have proof of that?”
My heart skipped a beat before it went into overdrive, fear closing my throat until all I could get out was a raspy, “That's not possible.”
Realistically, it wasn't, but then prior to 1981 the world hadn't known about HIV, either, and there were still conspiracy nuts out there who believed that it was an engineered virus rather than a clusterfuck resulting from hygienic misconduct. Yesterday I would have laughed such an idea off, but then it had seemed equally fantastic that a handful of terrorists would just walk in through the main entrance, blow up half the building, and let their perfectly planned mission ruin my entire life.
Then again, I still didn't know why they were doing this, and suddenly the knowledge that none of them were running around wearing hazmat suits and gas masks was incredibly reassuring.
“Where did you even find those pictures?” I asked, my voice shaking although I tried to keep it steady. I had the distinct feeling that I really didn't want to know the answer to that question.
Nate was only too happy to destroy my bubble of denial.
“Those, and a little video clip that I'm about to show you, were found in Mr. Greene's personal inbox. Apparently he didn't get the memo that if you are dealing with something that is highly confidential, you don't just leave it in your trash.”
The moment he stopped talking, the screen switched to a new view. Half of it was black, while the other was taken over by a video app that started playing a moment later. That was about when I held my breath, and I just knew that by the time I would let it out, my world wouldn't be the same any longer
On screen a woman appeared, most of her body obscured by the green suit she was wearing, complete with a respirator and face shield. It was the gear everyone was outfitted with down in the L3 labs—not quite as safe as the L4 positive pressure suits, but not that far removed. I recognized Thecla even before she started speaking.
“This is Dr. Thecla Soudekis, time course study number five. Both subjects were infected twenty-three hours and thirty minutes ago, progression is happening at an increased rate of approximately one point two, symptoms are consistent with previous studies.”
She used that same droning voice I was familiar with from hundreds of lab logs she'd recorded with me in the room, but something was different. Focusing on her surroundings, I couldn't help but wonder where she was standing. It looked like an observation lounge and must have been part of one of the L3 labs or else she wouldn't have been wearing full gear, but nowhere I'd ever been fit the surroundings. Something else I noticed was that she seemed stressed, downright harassed, and that was not something I'd ever associated with her. Even in moments of severe danger she had always been calm and collected, the perfect leader who knew at any second that it was that very collected calm that would get her and her people out of there safe and unharmed.
In an uncharacteristic, unnerved gesture she reached up as if to touch her face, almost knocking the face shield askew in the same motion. She glared at her own hand then, before she looked straight into the camera again. Now her gaze held challenge.
“Maybe if that Glover hag would get us subjects that were representative of any decent health standard we could go about this in a scientific, analytic manner. Half of the symptoms could be from withdrawal; last week we got one that was just coming down from a high. How do you expect me to do my work when I can't even get a decent blood panel?”
Nobody answered her, but then who would, in her personal log?
Another moment passed before she sighed, then droned on as if the outburst had never happened.
“Progression is slightly accelerated, likely due to the physical condition of the subjects, not a deviation in the viral vectors. I recommend another series of six tests to exclude the possibility of outliers before progressing to the next stage. Variation five shows absolutely no positive impact; if anything, it accelerates the deterioration.”
The screen went dark and air whooshed out of me, loud and shaky enough that I had no doubt that Nate was aware of it, close as he was still standing to me. As far as I could tell, he hadn't paid any attention to the video, his eyes remaining zeroed in on me.
I had no idea what Thecla had been talking about, but this didn't sound good. Not good at all. We had an animal BSL-4 lab down there where we worked on rodents sometimes, but even though I told myself that she must have meant that, it made no sense. Mice didn't have withdrawal, nor did they come down from a high. They were also not selected by the head of our human resources department.
But maybe there was an explanation for that. There had to be. Likely, Thecla had just been vexed and used things in conjuncture that had nothing whatsoever to do with each other.
I might have managed to talk myself into believing that if the video hadn't resumed a moment later.
Now it showed a graph—what I assumed was an image of the progression rate she had been talking about. Thecla's narration continued as a voice-over.
“Time course study number five-point-five has been terminated at the sixty-hour mark. Subject iota has expired at fifty-six hours and twenty-two minutes, subject kappa at fifty-nine hours and forty-five minutes. I have performed autopsies and the samples are waiting for analysis.”
She paused, and it sounded like she had to swallow convulsively before she forced herself to go on.
“This is a time lapse of the progression rate, taken in ten minute intervals. I recommend heavy sedation for time course study round six.”
The graph disappeared and was replaced by the full body images of two men, completely naked, who were secured to hospital beds by a number of thick leather straps. One of them looked about thirty, thin enough that individual ribs were clearly visible. The other was likely about sixty, but it was hard to tell from his matted hair and beard. He wasn't in much better physical condition than the younger man.
A display at the top of the images showed the time progression, starting at zero, increasing by ten every second as the images changed.
At firs
t, they both seemed to be sleeping, but soon the unsecured parts of their bodies started whizzing around between images as they'd moved in the ten-minute time frames between the shots. They started to look feverish around the nine-hour mark, and dark bruises started appearing at thirteen-twenty. At fifteen they were both clearly writhing in pain, which even translated into the stills. At twenty, they both started bleeding out of several orifices and open wounds.
I was violently sick all over the floor in front of me long before the time lapse images reached the high fifties and the screen turned black.
Chapter 14
For what felt like the millionth time, I checked my watch. I couldn't believe that only one hour had passed since I'd seen that video. It felt like a lifetime to me.
What had happened directly after I'd purged the meager contents of my stomach was still more a haze than anything else. I knew that Nate had asked me something, but I hadn't been in any state to offer a coherent reply, so he had me escorted back into the cube. Now I wondered if I'd suffered some short-term psychotic break, but the nasty voice at the back of my mind kept chanting that it was all just denial—making me both a coward and a drama queen.
The longer the night dragged on, the more I tended to agree.
I wanted to somehow rationalize away what I'd seen, but the events of the day had sapped enough of my strength to prevent me from putting any unnecessary effort into a lost battle.
Was the biotech company I had pretty much devoted my life to capable of conducting illegal experiments on unwitting patients? Absolutely. As much as I would have loved to let my idealism flag fly, if there was money to be made, they'd find a way.
More shocking was Thecla’s obvious involvement, but had I ever really known her? She'd been my supervisor, she'd let me handle the stuff that was beneath her, and like all good girls in the field I'd taken the bad with the good and hoped that one day in the future I would be in her position and able to shine while others got to shovel shit instead. I wanted to believe that she was a better person than the video made her out to be, but I hadn't really known her, and she hadn't been a close friend. People had a lot of reasons for what they did, and there was still a glimmer of hope out there that I just didn't know enough, but the sobering fact was that most scientists I knew were fatalists. Someone was going to do it, so it might as well be them if the money was right. The worst of them even justified their actions by saying that they'd be faster, more careful, humane.
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