Everett grimaced, but nodded. He pointed at the body.
“What you have here is a human being who’s essentially been reengineered by a very powerful infectious agent. He was hit with what appears to be a retrovirus that rebuilt him from the cell level up. And from what you tell me, onset of the change was nearly instantaneous after infection. Truly remarkable.”
“You’re sure it’s a virus?” Zach asked. “Cade has fought things like these before.”
Everett shook his head. “This is related to Innsmouth, but it’s not the same thing. The transformation in Innsmouth was triggered by years of interbreeding, as well as occult ritual and environmental factors. Basically, you had to live there and be related to the Marshes. A very shallow gene pool. Bin Laden was clearly infected with an earlier variant of this strain, but again, it wasn’t contagious, and probably required months of treatments in near-total isolation. Probably some ritual as well.”
Bell furrowed her brow. “I’m sorry, did you just say Bin Laden?”
Zach made a face. “One security breach at a time, okay?” He turned back to Everett. “So if this isn’t the same as the earlier outbreaks, what is it?”
“Someone has taken the Innsmouth DNA and turned it into a disease,” Everett said. “They’ve loaded it into a fast-spreading viral carrier that spreads in body fluids. It doesn’t require ritual, or any weakening of the usual barriers between our world and the next. It will infect people who’ve had no previous contact with the Other Side.”
“So, like demonic possession, but on a cellular level,” Bell said.
“Exactly right,” Everett said, as if he hadn’t heard the sarcasm in her voice. “Put simply, it appears that the virus is a carrier for a package of RNA that immediately transcribes itself into the host DNA of the cells. Each infected cell is then repurposed, and the host organism made into an optimal carrier for continued proliferation of the virus itself.”
Zach and Bell exchanged glances. She shrugged. “Try putting it a little more simply,” he said.
Everett shrugged. “The virus changes humans into the shape the virus wants.”
“How can a virus want something?”
Everett blinked at them. “A figure of speech. The virus has the goal of reproducing. That’s all it does. And this body is the best way for the virus to do that. It’s like someone decided to take humans all the way back down the evolutionary process and start again at the ground level.”
He looked at Bell and Zach, who stared back.
“Look,” Everett said impatiently, as he pointed at the corpse. “The skin. Transformed into scale-like layers. Denser and tougher, like a reptile’s. The cells receive a boost of keratin and osteopontin that’s leached from the bones, causing them to thicken and harden. At the same time, the skeleton becomes more flexible and resilient, like that of a fish or amphibian. It’s capable of taking much greater force without breakage. It flexes under pressure. Which is necessary, as the muscle tissues have also been augmented. The fibers of the skeletal muscle are replaced by fibers that are much closer to Type Two muscles—which contract faster, and with much greater strength. It also requires less oxygen and is capable of greater endurance in anaerobic conditions. And this, of course, is of direct benefit because of the blood.”
That caught Zach’s attention. “What about the blood?”
Everett was smiling now. “The blood cells have nuclei.”
Zach looked at him blankly. So did Bell.
Everett kept smiling. “Human red blood cells don’t have a nucleus,” he said. “But reptile blood cells do. Partially, this is because the lower metabolism of reptiles enables them to transfer blood without the same metabolic cost.”
Zach was starting to lose patience now. “Still not following you, Doctor.”
“Don’t you see? They are turned from warm-blooded to cold-blooded in a matter of minutes. That frees a massive amount of metabolic energy, which is all consumed by the change. This is the key factor—there’s no way the human body could undergo this transformation otherwise. It would burn out all the blood sugar available to the host in seconds. Their bodies would simply drop dead. But with this little tweak, the virus keeps them alive long enough to become self-sustaining engines for reproduction.”
Everett paused, and a troubled look flashed across his face. “Of course, they’d be spent. Even in a tropical environment, where you found this one, they would require an immediate infusion of energy to sustain themselves. They would need to feed very quickly. A lot of protein, fast.”
Then his smile returned. “But that, of course—oh, yes, that explains it.”
He went over to a wall where MRI screen shots were displayed. “The brain. The changes in the brain. This is why.”
Zach and Bell followed him. Everett pointed to a section of brain, outlined in high-contrast colors.
“The frontal lobe,” he said. “It’s shrunken. It’s a quarter of the size it should be. But the forebrain—especially the basal ganglia—has actually swelled. It’s as if the frontal lobe shed neurons, while the forebrain gained them. The frontal lobe controls our impulses. It’s where we reason and learn. The ganglia, however, are sometimes called the reptile brain. It’s the most primitive structure in our heads—the one that evolved before all the others. It controls motivation. It controls appetite.”
Zach got it now. “The human part shrinks, and the lizard part gets bigger.”
Everett smiled again. “And they have almost no capability to govern their needs. This maximizes selection of new infectious targets for the virus. They will attack and feed on whatever is warm and closest.”
“They wake up from the change hungry,” Zach said.
Bell nodded. She understood now, too. “And the virus spreads in the bites.”
“Yes. Exactly,” Everett said. “It is the quickest way to ensure the virus finds a new host.”
Zach noticed that Everett’s face was animated now. He was enjoying this. No, not just enjoying it. He was in awe. He had the same rapt look of attention that a nun might have in prayer. His voice quavered as he looked back at the reptilian corpse on the slab. “It truly is admirable.”
“Admirable?” Zach asked.
“This is an amazing accomplishment. Someone has created a hardier version of the basic humanoid form. It’s better equipped to survive on this planet than any previous version of Homo sapiens. This is a triumph.”
“They eat people? And you think it’s a triumph?” Bell asked. She didn’t look well. If anything, she looked even sicker.
But Zach couldn’t worry about that now. Something else bothered him. “I thought you just finished telling us how these things have no real brains.”
“Brains are overrated,” Everett said, with a wave of his hand. “Believe me. I’ve had the crap kicked out of me by muscular idiots all my life. When it comes to survival traits, you want to look to the reptile species. They require less food, less water, even less oxygen than mammals. They don’t have our need to maintain body heat, so most of their metabolic energy doesn’t go to waste just staying alive. Some reptiles have been found alive inside stones—did you know they can hibernate in mud so long it will actually petrify? And they go on living, just the same, once they are broken out. They’re much tougher than we are. They can regenerate lost limbs and heal from all but the most debilitating injuries. If not for the fluke of a meteor hitting this planet, the dinosaurs would still rule the Earth. You could even call these beings a way of correcting nature’s mistake.”
There was a long silence. Everett looked up. From the looks on their faces, he seemed to realize he might have gone too far.
“I don’t mean to imply that I approve of this,” he said quickly. “I’m speaking metaphorically, of course.”
“Right,” Zach said.
Everett turned back to the X-rays and other images on the wall. “There was one more thing I wanted you to know,” he said. “This specimen—when it was still human, I mean—had undergon
e reconstructive surgery. Steel pins were placed in the femur, just above the knee, to repair a fracture . . .”
“Zach,” Bell said. She looked pale. “The smell is really getting to me. I can’t—”
“As you can see from the X-ray here . . .”
Zach wasn’t paying attention. His focus was on Bell. She swallowed, and put out a hand to steady herself. Unfortunately, she gripped the side of the autopsy table. Her fingers dipped into something from the body with an audible squish.
That did it. Bell began gagging.
Zach interrupted the doctor. “Can you make a cure? Or a vaccine? Something to stop it or prevent it?”
Everett blinked, taken aback. “That’s not really my area. I gather the data, and then my findings—”
Bell gagged again, loudly.
“Great. Call me when you have a cure,” Zach said. He took Bell by the arm and hustled her to the door.
“But you really should see—”
“Send me an e-mail,” Zach snapped, and the door clicked shut behind them.
Everett shrugged. He never understood how some people could look at these things and react with disgust. Fear, yes. Everything he took apart in this lab was a threat, and he’d seen too many of them that could end all human life on earth if left unchecked.
But he’d never understand how other people could not see the intricacy, the design and the beauty of the strange wonders under his scalpel.
Everett looked at the body and marveled all over again. Whoever did this was an artist.
THIRTEEN
Facing the 2010 midterm elections, the president seemed distracted and distant. Many observers in the media, and even members of his own staff, said he didn’t seem to take his party’s imminent losses seriously. “He just sort of went through the motions, but you could tell he had something else on his mind. It was like he was waiting for some other shoe to drop,” said one staffer of his meetings with Curtis during this period. “I mean, what could be more important than the elections?”
—Bob Woodward, The Curtis Doctrine
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Prador was exhausted. He thought he’d worked long hours before he became chief of staff, but this verged on surreal. The president seemed like he’d been hit with some sort of curse; everything was going to shit on a daily basis. There was that goddamn oil spill all summer, then the tanking poll numbers, an economy that couldn’t get out of second gear, and the flying monkeys of the media, all ready to stick a fork in President Samuel Curtis and declare him done.
That’s why so much piled up on Prador now. He had to run the White House while the president rallied the troops for the midterm elections. The problem was, Curtis was the world’s greatest micromanager: everything had to go through him. It was like the man didn’t trust anyone.
All things considered, Prador supposed that wasn’t unreasonable.
Prador was so tired and preoccupied that he didn’t even notice the shadow on the wall inside his Georgetown condo. The one that stayed in place even after he’d turned on the lights.
He felt a cold breeze pass over him. It woke him enough to notice Book, standing in the living room.
“You look like hammered crap,” Book said.
Prador didn’t need this. Not now.
“What are you doing here? If someone saw you—”
“Nobody sees us until it’s too late,” Book said. “Wanted to check in. Had a little problem in Djibouti.”
“Yeah, no shit,” Prador said. “Thanks for the warning on the biggest terrorist attack in Africa since the embassy bombings.”
Book shrugged. “Couldn’t be helped. How’s the cover story holding?”
“It would hold a lot better if I knew about these things before they happened.”
Book exhaled heavily and punched Prador in the stomach. There was almost no swing behind his fist, but it hit with extraordinary force. Prador went to his knees and puked up coffee and bile.
Book waited calmly while Prador finished sputtering and coughing.
The dry heaves finally stopped. Prador shifted into a sitting position and began to get his color back.
“So,” Book said brightly. “How is that cover story holding?”
Prador glared at him, then decided not to waste the energy. He’d chosen this path, or had it chosen for him, all the way back at Yale. Maybe even before. Like his father and grandfather, he’d joined the Order. The perks were obvious—money, success, an outwardly charmed life. But nothing was free. And before he knew it, they owned him absolutely.
Sometimes, at the holidays, he’d see something like an apology in his father’s eyes after the old man had one too many drinks. No, not an apology, really. More like resignation. This was how their family had risen. Struggling against it was useless. When the time came, Prador knew he’d offer his own son, too.
Provided he lived that long.
“So far, we’ve had no reports of anything unusual,” he told Book. “As far as Curtis knows, this is just more proof the political gods hate him. He’s too wrapped up in the elections to ask for details now. But he will.”
“I’m sure you can deal with it,” Book said, starting to fidget. He always got bored easily. “Graves also wants you to revoke RED RUM.”
“Cade’s clearance? But that will—”
“Yes.” Book sighed. “We know. Do it.”
“How much longer will this go on? If Curtis doesn’t hear about some deep weirdness soon, he’ll start to wonder where Cade is. It’s already been too quiet. He’ll get suspicious.”
“Relax. A week. Maybe two at most. Then he’ll have more nightmares than he can handle.”
Book carefully stepped over Prador and his puddle of vomit and walked out of the condo, shutting the door behind him.
The shadow flexed and lengthened, and slid neatly out under the threshold, thinner than a sheet of paper.
Prador stayed on the floor for a long time after that.
BOOK WALKED THROUGH the double doors into the parking lot. Someone facing him would have noticed a striking resemblance to a police sketch released in the first panicked hours after the Oklahoma City bombing of a man known only as “John Doe #2.” Of course, the authorities later decided that John Doe #2 didn’t exist.
He got into the Humvee and waited for Reynolds.
Book was a remarkable find for the Shadow Company. He’d been through the best psychological tests devised, including some that would never see the light of day in the civilian world. The Company had trigger questions hidden in every entrance exam, ASVAB, police academy application and federal government aptitude test. It was a fine net stretched out across the country, and it caught every variety of sociopathic behavior. The Company reeled in the most promising candidates based on their scores, and then kept testing until they found the right spot for them.
Book had come to their attention when he’d tried to enlist in the military, straight out of high school. He also filled out applications for the CIA, the FBI and several police departments in Florida.
The evaluators, hidden in their anonymous office buildings in Iowa, ran Book’s scores through the computer twice. Then they tallied up the results by hand. They’d never seen anything like him before.
He couldn’t be called a sociopath, not by the traditional definition of someone lacking the usual ability to feel empathy and understand human emotion. Book felt emotion; he simply didn’t care. He knew the difference between right and wrong. He knew which of his actions were most likely to hurt other people.
Without fail, in every hypothetical, he chose to do the wrong thing. And it wasn’t even out of some twisted selfishness, or the thought of future gain, which is how most sociopaths were wired. He didn’t even get any pleasure out of another person’s pain, if the MMPI could be trusted.
Book was plucked from the selection process and brought directly into the Company. The tests continued. He was hooked up to a polygraph, an EEG and an MRI while he answered questions. He was ask
ed to imagine detailed scenarios.
The results were always the same.
He wasn’t a sadist. He just had an unerring instinct for malice. It was almost a talent, like a virtuoso who plays the violin beautifully the first time it’s placed in his hands. Book could find a person’s weakness within moments of meeting him, and would gouge away at it. He was blunt and he was crude, but the evaluators watched as he reduced several interviewers—including one longtime CIA interrogator—to tears.
“Oh, we have to put this kid to work,” one evaluator said. And Book’s career began.
After infiltrating the militia movement and white supremacist groups in the early ’90s, Book was sent to Seattle, where he joined up with anarchist protesters and antiglobalization groups. Some of the other members of the groups disappeared not long after the WTO riots. They were always surprised to find Book on the other side of the table from them in the interrogation rooms. He knew them inside and out. He broke them into pieces; some of them went back out into the world, filled with nothing but the desire to fulfill the agenda of the Company.
Book didn’t seem to take a lot of pleasure in this. He was a hollow man, nothing but surfaces. He existed only in his impact on the world around him.
He moved back to Florida in time for the 2000 elections. Then he was abruptly transferred to snip some loose ends related to 9/11. After that, Book was sent to Archer/Andrews to work with Graves.
He thought again about what Candle had said about Bell. Maybe she was running a game of her own. Anything was possible. That was the problem with being so deep inside like this. You never knew who was playing whom; if the person you thought was working with you was actually watching you for your boss, or for the other team, or maybe both.
Graves was the one who’d brought Bell into this. Which didn’t mean anything. Maybe it was just cover, a way to throw any observers off the track. Or maybe she really was one of them.
But if she wasn’t, then she’d have to be handled. And that sort of thing usually fell to Book, because he was good at it. You don’t keep LeBron James on the team without letting him play.
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