Thrice upon a Time

by James P. Hogan

  "How long have you known Mr. Walker?" Waring asked.

  "About six years. When I met him, we were both working for the Fusion Electric Corporation in California. That was in… 2004, I think. Yes… about six years."

  "And you've known him fairly closely ever since?"

  "Pretty much. We went into business together in 2006."

  "What kind of business?"

  "Technical consulting."

  "Did it involve any hazardous environments? Any time overseas?"

  "No, none that I can think of. We did all our work in the States."

  "He didn't go abroad at all during that time?"

  "To Mexico once, and Canada a couple of times… oh, and a vacation in Hawaii."

  "When was that?"

  "About three years ago."

  "I see. Do you know if Mr. Walker ever suffered from any major ailments or diseases during his early life?"

  "None that he ever mentioned, but he didn't talk much about that kind of thing. Certainly there was nothing disabling; he's always been pretty active."

  "In the time that you have known him, has he ever complained of minor visual disturbances—haziness, blurring, dimness of vision, temporary blind spots, anything like that?"

  "Never."

  "Has he ever shown any signs of susceptibility to fatigue, or complained of dizziness, unsteadiness of the legs, or problems with balance?"

  "Never… unless you count the last couple of days."

  "How about emotional abnormalities—things like inexplicable euphoria, apathy, inability to concentrate, sudden depression, or laughter for no reason? Ever anything like that?"

  Murdoch could only shake his head. "No, nothing like that at all, ever." He sighed. "He's always been the exact opposite: totally in control of himself physically and mentally for as long as I've known him. I've never known him to be sick before. It's a complete shock."

  "I see, Mr. Ross," Waring said. "Well, thank you very much for your help."

  "I don't really feel I've been much help at all," Murdoch said.

  "On the contrary, you've given us some valuable information," Waring told him. He turned to look at Fennimore. "Do you have anything to add, Sir Giles?"

  "Just one thing." Fennimore raised a pair of mild, gray eyes; Murdoch suddenly had the eerie feeling that they were looking in through his own, and reading the currents in his brain directly. "Was Mr. Walker in the California area around the time of August-September last year?"

  "Why, yes," Murdoch answered, slightly surprised by the question. "We lived there. We ran our office in Palo Alto."

  A flicker of concern passed momentarily across Fennimore's face. "Were you there at that time as well?" he asked, in a voice that had suddenly taken on a sharper tone.

  "No, I wasn't," Murdoch told him. "I moved to New York in late July. Lee was due to follow on after he'd cleared up a few outstanding things. Why?"

  "It's just something that we're curious about," Fennimore replied. His voice sounded more relaxed. He sat back in his chair in a manner that said that the matter was closed. Murdoch's suspicions of something strange going on behind it all increased. Before he could frame a question, the call-tone sounded from Waring's vi-set. Waring excused himself and tapped a pad to accept the call. It was the blue-eyed nurse.

  "The ambulance from Kingussie has just landed," she announced. "They're bringing Mr. Walker up now."

  "Thank you, nurse," Waring acknowledged. "We'll be through there straight away. Tell Anne we need to talk to her, and come and collect Mr. Ross, would you." He cut the screen and turned to face Murdoch. Fennimore was already getting up from his chair. "I'm afraid you'll have to excuse us, Mr. Ross," Waring said. "We have to begin a detailed examination at once. I really don't see that it would serve any purpose for you to wait here since we may be some time. I suggest that you go back to Glenmoroch. We will call you there as soon as there is anything definite to report. We will arrange for Mr. Walker's next of kin to be notified as a matter of routine. Thank you once again for your assistance."

  Waring rose to his feet and turned to follow Fennimore, who had already disappeared through a door at the rear of the office. At the same time the door leading out to the waiting room opened, and the nurse appeared, holding the door aside for Murdoch to leave. Still in a daze, Murdoch stumbled out of Waring's office and into the waiting room. The nurse hurried away through another door while he stopped for a moment to collect his wits. The sight of the room triggered off the recollection of Lee sprawling across one of the seats, thumbing casually through a magazine, on the day that Murdoch had hurt his arm. It seemed like only yesterday.

  Voices sounded from the corridor outside. Murdoch moved over to the door and looked out just in time to see a figure wrapped in bright red blankets being rushed by on a gurney from the direction of the elevators by two white-clad orderlies. Its features were glazed, waxlike, and bloodless; Murdoch almost failed to recognize them. He was still staring, paralyzed with shock, when the gurney was whisked out of sight through another door farther along the corridor.

  "Hello, Mr. Ross," a voice said quietly behind him. "I'm so sorry this has happened." Murdoch turned his head dazedly. It was Anne. She had been following a few paces behind the gurney, evidently after having met the ambulance on the landing pads outside. "Are you feeling all right?" she asked.

  Murdoch pulled himself together and shook his head to clear it. "I'm okay," he murmured. "It's all a bit… sudden, that's all."

  "Of course," she said. "Would you like to sit down for a minute? Maybe I could ask the nurse to get you a cup of tea or something." Murdoch shook his head.

  "There's no need. I'll have something when I get back." He paused, wondering how to phrase any of the questions that were tumbling through his mind. Before he could say anything, one of the waiting-room doors opened, and the nurse poked her head through.

  "Dr. Waring says he'd like to talk to you straight away," she said, looking at Anne.

  "Tell him I'm on my way," Anne replied. The nurse vanished. Anne looked back at Murdoch. "I'm sorry but I'll have to go. Try not to worry too much. There is a chance that it's not as serious as we think." She began moving away in the direction of the door through which the gurney had been taken.

  "I need to talk to you," Murdoch called after her on a sudden, uncontrollable impulse. Anne stopped, turned, and raised her eyebrows, giving the uncanny impression that she already knew what he was going to say although Murdoch wasn't quite sure himself. He gestured helplessly with his arms. "Look… all I've been doing in there is answering questions. I still don't know anything about this thing, or what it is, or… anything. You've seen this before. What the hell's going on around this place?"

  "I understand your situation," she said dubiously. "But I'm not sure I could really tell you any more than Dr. Waring already has."

  "He hasn't told me anything," Murdoch protested. "Look, that's my partner they just took through there. He's six thousand miles from home, and I'm the only person on this side of the Atlantic who's got anything to do with him. Surely I've got a right to know something."

  Anne hesitated for a moment; her expression softened. "I can't talk to you now," she said. "They're waiting for me. You heard the nurse."

  "I know," Murdoch said. "But later maybe, after work. We could have a coffee someplace. Thirty minutes."

  "We might be a while," Anne warned him.

  "I'll go back to the Reactor Building and stay on the same number you called me on earlier. I'll stay there until you're through here, okay?"

  Anne took a long breath, then nodded quickly. "Very well. I'll call you there as soon as I'm ready to leave. Don't expect too much though." With that she turned, walked away, and disappeared out of the corridor.

  Chapter 32

  He met her in the Burghead cafeteria at six-thirty. The place was fairly busy with technicians and engineers snatching a break and a meal before continuing the day's tests on into the evening. Murdoch and Anne found a quiet tab
le in a corner by a window looking out over the VTOL pads, away from the chattering groups of people.

  Waring and Fennimore, she told him, had confirmed that Lee was suffering from whatever had afflicted the other eight. She went on to summarize as much as she knew about the disease: It took the form of a rapid deterioration of the myelin insulating sheaths that encased the nerve fibers of the brain and spinal cord; it was caused by a virus that had been isolated, but that did not belong to any of the strains familiar to medical science; the origin of the virus had not been established; no method of halting the disease had been discovered so far. She also told Murdoch that Lee was being moved that night to a special section of the Intensive Care Unit at the Royal Infirmary in Glasgow, which had been set up to take care of the Burghead victims.

  "You asked me to be frank," she concluded, speaking in a low voice. "At present it doesn't look as if any of them has much of a chance of recovering. The symptoms are almost certainly terminal."

  "How long?" Murdoch asked stonily.

  "It's difficult to say… A few months at the most, perhaps."

  Murdoch stared at the top of the table for a long time without saying anything. He had often tried to imagine what it would be like to be alone with her and talk to her, but never had he dreamed it would be like this. "Why Burghead?" he asked at last. "What's the connection with this place? Has anybody found out?"

  Anne pursed her lips and toyed with the handle of her coffee cup for a while as if she were trying to decide something in her mind. Murdoch watched her in silence. At last she looked up.

  "I don't know why I should tell you this, but you seem to be a fairly level-headed kind of person. And besides, you'll know about it before very much longer anyway… " She paused to draw a long breath. "It doesn't have any connection with Burghead. The first few cases happen to have broken out here. As far as we can tell, that has nothing at all to do with the cause of the disease."

  "What?" Murdoch stared at her uncertainly. "What do you mean, 'first few cases'?"

  Anne nodded. "We're starting to get reports of other occurrences—from all over—people who have nothing to do with Burghead or any other kind of fusion establishment. The only thing that the victims seem to have in common is that they were all in the West Coast area of the U.S.A. at around August-September last year. The eight from the plant were there on an exchange program. We don't know why the symptoms appeared in them sooner than in people in other places. Presumably all the victims contracted the virus in August-September last year, and since then it's been gestating. Some local factor may have triggered it into an active state slightly earlier here—a dietary difference, maybe. It could have been anything."

  "That explains something, anyhow," Murdoch said slowly.

  "Oh, what?"

  "That guy Fennimore wanted to know if Lee had been in California at around that time. Now I know why. Lee was there right through to the end of December."

  "Were you there with him?" Anne asked, sounding suddenly alarmed.

  Murdoch shook his head. "No. I moved to New York in July. Fennimore asked that too."

  "Well, that's something anyway," Anne said, sounding relieved.

  "Who is Fennimore?" Murdoch asked. "What's he doing here? Okay, so some new kind of disease is breaking out in places. Why is it being hushed up?"

  "I can't tell you very much about him," Anne replied. "He's an adviser on some aspects of medical legislation to the Government. He visits Dr. Waring occasionally. I never really get to speak to him."

  "What kind of legislation?" Murdoch asked.

  "I really can't tell you any more than that."

  Murdoch eyed her suspiciously for a second or two. He had the distinct feeling that she was holding something back, but he realized that she had already said more than was necessary; he was hardly in a position to demand answers. He rubbed his chin thoughtfully for a while and reflected upon the things she had told him.

  "So what does it point to?" he asked at last. "This virus, wherever it came from, first showed up on the West Coast about nine months ago."

  "Yes."

  "And for most of that time it's been gestating. But in the last few weeks the first symptoms of it going into an active state have started to appear… all in people who were there at that time." Murdoch's eyes widened slowly as the full implication dawned on him. He looked up sharply, but Anne kept her eyes averted as if she knew already what he was going to say. "So what will happen when it starts there?" he said. "There are millions of people who live there. It's one of the most densely pop—"

  "It's already started," Anne said, looking straight at her cup and barely moving her mouth. "We've had data coming through via London all day. It's not being released for publication, but the media are bound to put it together for themselves before long."

  Murdoch gaped at her, horrified. "Where?" he gasped. "How many? How bad is it?"

  "Mainly in Northern California," she told him. "A lot in San Francisco; some in the Los Angeles area; a few in other parts of the world, but mainly other places in North America, primarily cities. In total about three thousand cases have been confirmed, but the rate of incidence is getting faster."

  "Three thousand!" Murdoch was stunned. "Jesus! And there's no way of stopping it yet? How fast will it spread?"

  "Once the virus activates, it becomes infectious," Anne said. "Now that it's started to appear in its active form, there's nothing except whatever natural immunity exists to stop it spreading through a whole population. We don't have any information on that yet." She looked up at last and met his eyes. Her face was grave. "All the signs point toward a major epidemic breaking loose, and not just in North America. How many places do you think it will have been carried to in the last nine months? It's probably in its gestating form already among the population of just about every city in the world."

  By early the next morning, news bulletins were carrying some mention of outbreaks of an unidentified disease that had occurred in various places, notably in the western United States; the details were evidently too sparse and too scattered for the media companies to have formed any global picture yet. A statement issued by the U.S. Health Department was couched in vague and reassuring terms, and little was reported in the way of public reaction.

  Murdoch called his father in Chicago to find out if there were any differences in the story being told nearer the scene. It turned out that Malcom wasn't even aware that any such story was being told at all and didn't seem overly interested in the subject. Murdoch had no overt reason to press the matter further, so he switched the conversation to family matters and let it go at that.

  After that, Murdoch called Lee's family in California, his second call to them since returning from Burghead the previous evening, to ask if they had received any further news on Lee. They had not. The general situation, however, was receiving more attention there than seemed to be the case in Chicago.

  The latest development that night—it was approaching midnight local time—had been an admission by the State Governor that there was a risk that the outbreak reported earlier in the day could grow to major proportions. The Governor had revealed in part of his statement that isolated cases of the disease had been appearing for some time, and that a crash program to develop a vaccine against it had been in operation for a while as a precaution against the situation that now appeared to be developing. The program had proved successful, and a plan had already been worked out with the Federal authorities for distribution of the vaccine to affected areas for mass inoculation. The plan had been set in motion, and hospitals and clinics throughout the state were being alerted to make suitable preparations. There was no cause for alarm. By 8:30 British time, the British news bulletins were already carrying extracts from the California State Governor's statement, and had taken on a more serious tone.

  Murdoch was somewhat puzzled by these announcements. According to Anne only the evening before, no hope for a cure was even remotely in sight. But the Governor of California had s
tated only hours later that a vaccine had been sufficiently developed for mass distribution to commence. Murdoch was convinced that if Anne had known of the vaccine, she would have mentioned it, even if only in general terms. The implication was, therefore, that she hadn't known about it. But if she was a doctor who worked at one of the places where interest in the disease seemed to be focused, why would she be kept in the dark about something like that? It didn't make sense.

  The other thing that puzzled Murdoch was the Governor's alleged statement that work on the vaccine had been going on "for some time." How long was some time? Anne had said that the Burghead victims were among the earliest reported; but the cases at Burghead had appeared only in the previous couple of weeks. Murdoch was not an immunologist, but he found it difficult to believe that a drug to combat a hitherto unknown strain of virus could be developed, tested, and put into volume manufacture in so short a time. Therefore "for some time" meant a lot more than merely a couple of weeks, which suggested that somebody, somewhere, had been expecting something like this to happen. Who? Where? What the hell was going on?

  But although Murdoch was concerned, his main fears were not for lots of potential victims, most of whom he didn't know, but for one particular already confirmed victim in an isolation unit in Glasgow. The more he brooded about it, the more the vague thought that had begun to form the evening before when he was driving back from Burghead took shape. Whatever had caused the disease was already fact; there was one possible way, however, by which that fact might be changed. Murdoch voiced it at last to Cartland after they had finished making calls and monitoring the news, and had sat down for breakfast. Charles had gone to Burghead early that morning and was not available to be consulted.

  "The machine?" Cartland repeated incredulously. "You want to use the machine to change it?"

  "Why not?" Murdoch demanded. "Even if they have come up with a vaccine, it can't fix the damage that's already been done. It can't help people like Lee. The only way to help them now is to go back and catch what started it. Only the machine can do that."