by A. G. Riddle
“We just got through speaking with them,” Dr. Anderson said. “Their chief science officer confirmed that they do have a team researching memory manipulation. And that project is still active. Or was, until very recently.”
Conner sensed bad news coming.
“The project is called Rapture Aurora. They conducted their research following Looking Glass protocols: compartmentalization, need-to-know access. The team working on the memory therapy was a completely independent cell, with its own budget and facilities. For the sake of the larger Looking Glass project, contact was limited. Rapture hasn’t heard from the cell in three weeks.”
“They must have had a case manager,” Conner said. Realization dawned on him the moment he said the words. “Wait. Let me guess. The Aurora project was based in Germany. And the case manager was Gunter Thorne.”
“Correct.”
Conner shook his head. “What about Thorne’s records? Protocol is for a secure backup in case he was compromised.”
“Rapture has been looking since he turned up dead in Desmond Hughes’s hotel room. They haven’t found it. They’re assuming Hughes hid the files or destroyed them.”
Conner paced for a moment, then turned to the scientists. “Okay, let’s back up, review what we know, and try to put together a working theory here. Fact: two weeks ago, Desmond Hughes hides Rendition. Every scientist working on the project goes missing. All the files are gone. Hughes turns up in Berlin, where he contacts a journalist at Der Spiegel—Garin Meyer. Hughes is going to expose us and the entire Looking Glass project.”
Dr. Anderson spoke up. “Rapture Aurora—and his memory loss—must have been his backup plan.”
“Right. Des would have known about Aurora. Icarus Capital was an investor in Rapture Therapeutics—in fact, we used Icarus to fund most of the Looking Glass projects operating out of Rapture.”
“So,” Anderson said, “Hughes contacts the Aurora project team, gets them to administer their memory alteration technology on him, then either kills or hides the team. He somehow figures out where Gunter Thorne is keeping the project files and destroys or hides those as well, wiping out any chance of us figuring out exactly how Aurora works.”
“Very clever, Des,” Conner mumbled.
“But somehow,” Anderson continued, “Gunter Thorne figured out what Hughes was up to. Maybe he noticed the files were gone, or perhaps he has some intrusion detection system Hughes was unaware of. He tracks Hughes back to the Concord Hotel, confronts him. A struggle ensues. Desmond comes out on top. He assumes Thorne had already alerted us. He activates Aurora, wiping his memories.”
Conner shook his head. “What a mess.”
“In a sense, it’s brilliant,” Anderson said. “We can’t torture the answers out of him—the memories are blocked no matter how much pain he endures. And without the Rapture Aurora research, we can’t possibly unblock them.”
Conner nodded. “He’s brilliant, no question about it.” Conner sat down and tapped his fingers on the table, thinking. “Is Aurora a core piece of the Rapture component? Could the loss of the Aurora research derail the Looking Glass?”
“No. Rapture is still intact. The memory piece was completed years ago. This additional Aurora research, using implants, seems to be a continuation beyond what was needed for Rapture.”
“Okay. Options?”
“We see only one predictable path,” the white-haired scientist said. “A brain biopsy.”
Conner disliked the idea instantly. However, he simply asked, “How?”
“I wouldn’t recommend we do it on board the Kentaro Maru. Our facilities are advanced, but given the risks, I would strongly advocate conducting it in a hospital that specializes in neurosurgery. Mayo Clinic and Johns Hopkins would be my top choices. New York-Presbyterian, Mass General, and Cleveland Clinic would also be appropriate. The problem is, very soon the pandemic will consume every hospital in the world, as well as the physicians we’d need for a biopsy.”
“Assuming we could solve those problems, what would a biopsy tell us?”
“We could get a better look at the implant and sample the substance in his hippocampus. We try to identify the substance, run tests on it to see if we can dissolve it without harming the underlying neurons.”
“I’m guessing that’s not a three-day turnaround.”
“No, it’s not.”
“How long?”
“It’s impossible—”
“Guess.”
“Two months? Who knows. I should also add that any brain biopsy carries risk to the patient. In this particular case, there could be risks we don’t appreciate.”
“Such as?”
“A failsafe. If the implant and memory blockage are part of a purposeful plan on Hughes’s part, or perhaps someone manipulating him, they might have programmed a failsafe. A foreign object entering his brain, in the region of the implant, might trigger some defense mechanism. Maybe it destroys the memories completely or even kills the subject. There’s no way to know.”
“It’s all moot. We don’t have two months.” Conner rubbed his temple. He felt a headache coming on. “We have Rook and Rapture, but he has Rendition. Without it, we can’t complete the Looking Glass. Two thousand years of work will go down the drain, and the entire human race with it.”
The older scientist leaned back in his chair. “We could cut him loose and allow this to play out.”
“Play out?”
Anderson nodded. “Hughes clearly has some sort of backup plan. It’s tied to specific events or locations, or some signal that will activate his memories via the implant. So, what if we let him recover those memories? Then we collect him.”
“That’s a lot of assumptions, Doctor. The biggest being that we can simply ‘collect’ him when we’re ready. Bagging him in the first place wasn’t a walk in the park. When he recovers his memories—when he realizes what he’s capable of—it’ll be nearly impossible.”
“Then I’m afraid that leaves us with no options.”
“On the contrary. We have a very good option, gentlemen. And I’m going to take it.”
Chapter 41
The soldiers were rough when they jerked Peyton and Hannah out of the back of the SUV. Hannah’s screams didn’t slow them one bit. They placed black bags over their heads, bound their hands, and marched them to a helicopter, where their feet were bound as well. In the darkness, the drone of the engines and rotors was deafening. The helicopter landed some time later, and they were dragged out, lifted up, and tossed onto the flat metal bed of a truck.
The drive was brutal. The truck bounced along ruts in the road, slamming them into the bed. And with their hands and feet bound, there was nothing they could do to protect themselves. It was like being blindfolded and left to tumble in a drying machine on an endless cycle. Hannah sobbed periodically.
Peyton lost all sense of time. The pain ebbed after a while; perhaps the nerves in her body simply stopped responding to the pounding. She wondered if any permanent damage was being done.
At last the truck came to a stop, and she heard canvas flapping. A ray of sunlight beamed across the black bag, only partially seeping through.
Someone gripped Peyton’s feet, pulled her out of the truck, and caught her as she hit the ground. Her legs were weak, wobbly. Hands moved across her body, grabbing in places they had no right to. Peyton twisted, turned her shoulders quickly, trying in vain to fight them off. The action sparked loud voices, speaking in what she thought was Swahili. Laughs erupted.
She heard Hannah scream as they dragged her out.
“Don’t touch her!” Peyton yelled. “She needs medical attention. A doctor.”
A man responded in African-accented English. “She won’t be needin’ nothin’ soon. Take them.”
Hands reached under Peyton’s arms, lifted at her armpits, and pulled her forward. Her bound feet dragged across the dry, rocky ground. To her surprise, her captors removed the bag before tossing her down. The light was blinding. Sh
e heard metal slamming into metal and the turn of a key.
When her eyes adjusted, Peyton took stock of her surroundings.
Her abductors had put her in a stall in a barn. Metal rods reinforced the slat wood walls. She turned—and froze.
Two sentences were carved into the nearby planks:
Desmond Hughes was here
I’m innocent
Peyton stared in shock. Desmond was here? Why?
She heard clothes ripping and Hannah’s labored breaths. The young physician was close—perhaps in the next cell.
“Hannah,” Peyton called.
“Yeah.” Her voice was weak.
“How’re you doing?”
Hannah spoke slowly, quietly. “Got the bleeding stopped.” She paused to catch her breath. “Tied my shoulder up. Bullet went through. I think.” She drew another breath. “Lost a lot of blood. Cold.”
“Hang in there, Hannah. We’re going to get out of here, okay? Some very brave Americans are going to come for us. Save your strength and be ready for anything. You understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
At that moment something changed within Peyton Shaw. She had always lived a purpose-driven life, but it had been a life lived with a cold, clinical sort of passion. She never let her emotions master her. She was never out of control. She’d gotten that from her mother, she thought. Lin Shaw was always composed. And Peyton loved her for it. That same composure had served Peyton well during her professional life.
At work, keeping her emotions in check was imperative. Emotions clouded judgment, changed how a person looked at things. Becoming emotionally attached during an outbreak was a risk; she might be too focused on a particular patient or location, might miss the big picture, or a detail, a crucial contact or piece of information that could save lives. Her emotional detachment had saved lives, and had saved her a lot of grief over the years.
Now, however, in this makeshift cell, as she lay on the dirt floor, the wall of detachment Peyton Shaw had carefully built up over so many years fell. Her emotions broke through in a wave. They took the form of raw, unbridled rage. Rage against the people who had killed Jonas—her friend, her colleague, and someone who might have been much more. Rage against the people who had started the outbreak in Kenya that had killed Lucas Turner and thousands of others. She would find these people. She would stop them. And she would make them pay—even if it was the last thing she did.
Chapter 42
Millen Thomas heard the camp come alive outside his tent. Boots pounded the hard-packed Kenyan ground. Doors slammed. Body bags were tossed onto the bed of a truck.
He rose from his cot, threw the tent flap back, and walked out. The Kenyan army detail that had rescued him from the cave was scouring the village for their belongings—and for their fallen comrades who had died during the night raid on the camp.
Millen had known they would leave, but he hadn’t expected it to be so soon. Last night, the CDC and WHO had evacuated all their personnel from Kenya. A flight with the field teams had left from Mandera; another from Nairobi evacuated the support personnel. Millen had been ordered to be on the flight that left Mandera, but he had refused. Evacuating meant leaving Hannah and Dr. Shaw behind. He had decided to disobey orders—to stay, wait, and hope there was something he could do here.
And now, when the troops left, he would be alone in the village.
Kito approached him.
“We’re pulling out, Dr. Thomas. Orders.”
“Where?”
“Nairobi. The government has declared a nationwide state of emergency. Martial law. They’re setting up containment camps in every major city.”
Millen nodded.
“Come with us,” Kito said.
“No. I need to wait for my people.”
“If they’re rescued, they won’t return here.”
Millen had been thinking the same thing.
“Where will they take them?” he asked.
“I’m not sure.”
“What’s common in kidnap and ransom—after the rescue?”
Kito considered the question a moment. “Depends on the rescuers. If they’re operating from a ship, they’ll be taken back there—somewhere in the Indian Ocean. Or perhaps to the closest airport. Mandera, likely.”
Mandera—it was his best shot.
Kito read his reaction. “A word of advice, Doctor.”
“What’s that?”
“Set out at daybreak. It will be safer.”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
“We’ll leave you a four-wheel drive, water, and rations.” Kito paused. “And a gun.”
“I won’t need it.”
“We’ll leave it just in case. You have a solar charger for your phone?”
Millen nodded.
“Very good. Best of luck to you, Dr. Thomas.”
“You too, Kito.”
As the Kenyan was walking away, Millen yelled to him. “Kito!”
When he turned, Millen said, “Thanks again for getting me out of that cave.”
“It was the least I could do. You came here to help us. We won’t forget it.”
When the cloud of red dust settled from the convoy’s departure, Millen returned to his tent, ripped open an MRE, and ate in silence, surveying Hannah’s neatly ordered side of their shared domicile.
He had met her six months ago during EIS orientation. At first, he had thought she was neurotic and uptight. But as he’d gotten to know her, he’d realized the truth: she cared. Being prepared and doing a good job were important to her. She had a kind heart, and it had led her to medicine. She cared about patients like he cared about animals. He had suggested they bunk together in camp during the deployment, to compare notes from the medical and veterinary side of the investigation. Who knows, he had added, in our off-hours we could find the breakthrough to stop the pandemic. But he had been hoping for a different kind of breakthrough.
When the food was gone, he drew out his phone. The Audible app appeared with The Nightingale’s book cover, ready to resume the story where he and Hannah had left off. He needed a distraction, something to take his mind off the waiting and worrying. He wanted to press play, to listen to the story as he drifted off to sleep, but he decided what he wanted even more was to finish it with Hannah, when she returned, safe and unharmed.
He set the phone down and closed his eyes. Dr. Shaw was right: thinking was the enemy of sleep.
Chapter 43
Elim Kibet drifted in and out of consciousness. Day turned into night and back again, like a light being flipped on and off. The fever flowed like the tide, surging, overwhelming him, roasting his body from the inside, then withdrawing, leaving him to think it would never return.
His symptoms grew worse each day. He found it harder to think. His hope of recovery faded. Dread took its place. Only when he had lost that last bit of hope did he realize how much he had truly held on to.
The bonfire outside his window grew larger each night. At first they tossed only the suits and contaminated material onto the blaze. Then came the bodies.
And then the night arrived when no fire was lit—and Elim knew that he was not the only one in danger. The entire place was in trouble. He waited for the news he knew would come soon.
The door opened, and Nia Okeke entered once again. The official with the Kenyan Ministry of Health had given him ZMapp and insisted he take the room the American had stayed in. Now she wheeled in a cart piled high with bottles of ORS, clean buckets for bodily fluids, and boxes of antibiotics and painkillers. She parked the cart within his reach and sat on the bed, just beside his chest.
“We’re leaving, Elim.”
“You can’t.”
“We must.”
He looked down, his fever-ridden mind searching for an argument to keep them here for the sake of his patients.
She seemed to read his mind. “There’s nothing you can say. There simply aren’t enough patients left here.”
“How many?”
“Two, including you. The other young man will likely pass before we leave.”
Elim exhaled and nodded. “Where will you go?”
“Dadaab. Then Nairobi. We’re setting up camps with military and health workers.”
In his mind, Elim could already see what would happen if they couldn’t contain the outbreak. The government would fail. Warlords would emerge. A new civil war would start, sparking an endless fight over land and resources. Bandits would rule the roads. This plague would set Kenya back a hundred years. And it had started here, in Mandera, in this very room.
“Before you came,” he said in labored breaths, “I was wondering how long I’d be able to keep this place open. I never imagined it would end this way. That I would be the last patient to die here. That it would die with me.”
“Have faith, Elim. It’s the best medicine. And you’ll need it even more if the medicine doesn’t work.”
Chapter 44
In his study in Atlanta, Elliott Shapiro was growing increasingly frustrated.
“This is no time for politics. These are people’s lives we’re talking about here. Have you found them? Tell me. Please.”
He listened, then interrupted. “I don’t care what your orders are, listen to me—Hello? Hello?”
He set the phone down and rubbed his eyebrows. With each passing hour, he knew the possibility of recovering Peyton and her team was slipping away. It was like watching a family member die in slow motion. It was torture.
He hadn’t slept a wink last night. Neither had Rose. He had sat in the den, scanning news channels and websites, waiting for any news while he listened to Rose sneezing and coughing. He had brought her water and food from the kitchen periodically, sat by the bed, and asked her how her book was. Her symptoms had stabilized, but he was still terrified that the virus she and so many others had contracted was in fact the same virus that had already killed thousands in Kenya.