The Phoenix Variant: The Fifth Column 3

by Nathan M. Farrugia

  ‘Imagine it tenfold,’ DC said. ‘And it’s only one of three Pheonix viruses.’

  ‘Hold on a sec. This is the rock from Peru, isn't it?’ Nasira said.

  ‘No,’ DC said. ‘The Peru meteorite is—’

  ‘On its way here,’ Nasira said.

  Sophia turned to her. ‘How do you know about this?’

  ‘How do you think I got back so quick?’ Nasira said. ‘I came across the landing site in Peru, and the testing camp. I saw them take it. The Berets got there, thought I was in on it and brought me back for, um, torture, I guess.’

  ‘Them?’ Sophia said. ‘The Fifth Column took it? From the … Fifth Column?’

  ‘From the Fifth Column,’ DC said.

  ‘I’m confused,’ Jay said.

  ‘We know,’ Nasira said. ‘But is this some sort of rogue element stealing these rocks all over the joint?’

  ‘Yeah,’ DC said. ‘If you call Denton a rogue element.’

  ‘That was Denton’s men at the base in Peru? He took the meteorite and burned the rest of it to the ground?’ Nasira said.

  ‘He will have the sample soon. It’s in transit as we speak,’ DC said. ‘I already have confirmation that it contains another Phoenix virus.’

  ‘What does that one do?’ Sophia said, trying to stay calm.

  ‘Called the Detector,’ DC said. ‘The ability to detect and interpret pheromones.’

  Jay sniffed. ‘What, like body odor?’

  ‘A little more complex than that,’ DC said. ‘It’s a type of ectohormone produced through your skin.’

  ‘What the hell does that do?’ Jay said. ‘Warn you when someone stinks?’

  Nasira raised her hand. ‘I want that ability.’

  ‘They’re secreted when you trigger alarm, you’re sexually aroused, attracted, repelled by someone, warning them off, planning to attack them,’ DC said. ‘Early warning system. You interpret them through your vomeronasal organ in your nose, connected to the hypothalamus in your brain. It’s like an extension to your sense of smell.’

  ‘Sounds like what Lucia had,’ Nasira said.

  ‘More sensitive, more powerful, different function,’ DC said. ‘Even if someone washes away their pheromones and obscures them with deodorizing and scented products, you can still detect them. Pick up on their moods, their intentions, their attractions, their repulsions.’

  ‘And the third Phoenix virus?’ Sophia said, wondering anew just what had changed in her, seeing as DC had just described the second Phoenix virus as pretty much what she’d been doing all evening.

  DC pointed to the ground. ‘An old OSS—Fifth Column—base eight hundred feet below Grand Central terminal, disused since the eighties. Large enough to hide half of Manhattan’s population. Or a mislabeled sample of the third Phoenix virus.’

  ‘You know this for a fact?’ Sophia said.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘But Denton set up camp in Grand Central a few hours ago, which seems quite the coincidence.’

  ‘And this one?’ Sophia thumbed at the ruck slung over her own.

  ‘Reclassified just a few days ago,’ DC said. ‘Until now it was hiding in plain sight.’

  Sophia felt her throat tighten. ‘It was taken from the museum, wasn’t it?’

  ‘The American Museum of Natural History,’ DC said. ‘Blew up eight city blocks just to cover their tracks. I’m guessing you heard the explosion.’

  ‘I was there,’ Sophia said. ‘I did more than hear it.’

  ‘Shit,’ Jay said. ‘That’s a lot of collateral.’

  ‘Not for a psychopath,’ Sophia whispered, more to herself than the others. ‘Who’s doing this?’

  DC met her glare. ‘You already know the answer.’

  Sophia’s fingers squeezed around the pistol grip of her Glock. ‘Denton’s gunning for all three, isn’t he?’

  DC nodded.

  ‘So he’s on his own now?’

  ‘That’s a gray area,’ DC said.

  ‘Speak for yourself,’ Sophia said. ‘You’re still with the Fifth Column, far as I can see.’

  ‘It’s a temporary engagement, on my terms,’ he said.

  ‘That’s what they all say. Besides, we have no reason to believe anything you’ve told us,’ Sophia said.

  ‘We have common goals, you and I. To get this rock as far away from Denton as possible,’ DC said. ‘That firefight in the foyer as we were leaving; those were Denton’s operatives trying to steal it back. A lot of operatives. They think Denton is Jesus and that they’re still working for the … OK, “good guys” isn’t quite right, but you know what I mean. If they’d got to us it would’ve been over very quickly.’

  ‘No shit,’ Nasira said.

  Sophia heard the crunch on rocks as Damien and Jay swiveled to face their rear, half-expecting operatives to spring from nowhere.

  ‘You mean we have operatives on our tail?’ Damien said.

  ‘Bit of info you could’ve told us earlier,’ Jay said.

  DC shook his head. ‘They don’t know how to get here. Not yet.’

  ‘So he already has the other two meteorites?’ Sophia said. ‘Two Phoenix viruses?’

  ‘One, if they’ve found the sample in the old base downstairs. Which they probably have,’ DC said. ‘Two, if he gets that Peru meteorite in here before the hurricane hits. And plenty of time to extract and prepare the virus. Three, the one on your back.’

  ‘Prepare it for … his own bloodstream?’ Sophia said.

  ‘The Fifth Column are planning to intercept the Peru meteorite before it reaches Denton at Grand Central,’ DC said.

  She didn’t even want to ask how he knew that.

  ‘What’s so bad about him getting all three meteorites—all three viruses?’ Sophia said. ‘You seem a little worried about that.’

  DC reached into a pouch on his vest. ‘I’m not supposed to have a copy, but you know—’

  ‘Grey area.’ Sophia snatched the printout and shone her torch on it.

  It was a long printout, one long page, so she walked to the tunnel wall and pressed it flat to read, aware of Damien and Aviary breathing over each of her shoulders. She turned to Jay and Nasira, who were nudging closer behind them.

  ‘Can you watch our six?’ Sophia said.

  Nasira nodded and, bumping into Jay’s shoulder, walked back down the tunnel.

  The paper was titled Phönix and the top of the page was mostly an image of three circles. It took a moment for her to realize she was staring at an old drawing of comets.

  ‘China, 168 BC,’ DC said. ‘One of the first defectors from the Fifth Column was an assistant for Denton’s father. His name was Victor. Denton plucked him from a concentration camp during the second world war so he could help indentify the Pheonix viruses. By the time he made it to Akhana, he was an old man with many secrets.’

  Under each comet Sophia noticed a label in English.

  The Detector

  The Recognizer

  The Scryer

  In the center of the comets there was another label, with lines drawn from each comet. The label was for all three, somehow combined.

  The Controller.

  Sophia read from the top, aloud.

  ‘The Detector — a shaman with high sensitivity to the aroma of people; a fragrance or smoke that betrays words, mood, health and humanity.’

  It was the Phoenix virus DC had just described.

  ‘Why is it called the Phoenix?’ Sophia said. ‘This was two thousand years ago.’

  ‘Fenghuang,’ DC said. ‘It represents power sent from the heavens to the Empress.’

  ‘This is the one Denton snatched from Peru, right?’ Sophia said. ‘When was it discovered?’

  ‘Landed a couple of days ago,’ DC said. ‘Denton’s team got there before us.’

  Sophia looked at him. ‘So it’s new. Denton got lucky.’

  ‘Last year cometary impacts increased by twenty-six percent. They’ve been going up every year,’ DC said. ‘It’s a good time to b
e hunting meteors.’

  ‘And the meteorite sample in this base under Grand Central?’ she asked.

  ‘The Recognizer,’ DC said.

  She moved the torch beam down and read aloud.

  ‘The Recognizer — a seer of lies and truth, of men and serpent, of loyalty and betrayal,’ she said. ‘That would be helpful.’

  ‘It’s on your back, help yourself,’ DC said, ‘But you shouldn’t bother. You already have one.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Aviary said.

  No one but DC and Freeman knew Sophia had been born carrying a Phoenix virus. And with Freeman dead, she planned to keep it that way. At least until she figured out what this whole thing meant.

  She shone the torch in his face, on purpose. ‘You seem pretty sure.’

  ‘It’s just not—’ he shrugged in the red light ‘—in use right now.’

  ‘Sounds useless to me,’ Sophia said. ‘I was the only test subject in Project GATE without an ability.’

  ‘Latent ability,’ he said. ‘You had it. Denton disabled it. Training you would’ve been … a challenge.’

  ‘By training you mean programming,’ Sophia said.

  ‘What are you guys talking about?’ Damien said.

  ‘I’ll explain later,’ Sophia said. ‘When I understand it myself.’

  ‘We thought it might come back when you were deprogrammed,’ DC said. ‘But it didn’t. No one knows why.’

  ‘Well, you conveniently have all the other answers,’ Sophia said.

  ‘That’s because I was Owen Freeman’s right-hand man for years,’ DC said. ‘And before that, I was a test subject just like you.’

  ‘Without the Phoenix part,’ Sophia said.

  She turned back to the paper. There was one more.

  ‘The Scryer — the gift of tongue; to hear the words unspoken,’ she said.‘Hang on a second. To hear words not spoken.’ She turned to DC. ‘Thoughts. Hearing thoughts. That’s—’

  ‘Remotely reading electrical signals,’ DC said. ‘Like what DARPA did back in 2011 with their Silent Talk program. Denton kept a close eye on that one. Leagues behind his research teams, mind you. But I guess he likes to be sure. Project Genesis, GATE, Seraphim, Phoenix—all part of the Fifth Column’s Advanced Warfighter research.’

  ‘That’s synthetic telepathy,’ Aviary said, reading over Sophia’s shoulder. ‘I read the tests. I mean, I hacked into DARPA and had a sneak peek. You know, wasn’t … quite public knowledge.’

  ‘You did what?’ Sophia said.

  ‘And?’ Damien said.

  ‘They used a computer to transmit and receive electrical signals from a test subject’s brain,’ Aviary said. ‘Through electrodes.’

  ‘And this.’ Sophia ran her finger across The Scryer. ‘It’s the real deal. They actually pick up on the—’ she tapped her head ‘—signals in here.’

  ‘Yeah,’ DC said. ‘Think of it less as mind reading, more as eavesdropping. Denton believes the meteorite sample that contains The Scryer is hidden inside the base.’

  ‘Is he right?’ Sophia said.

  ‘Unfortunately,’ DC said.

  She slid the paper up the wall to read the bottom.

  ‘The Controller — a sorcerer who can enchant a legion with his spell; his desires become the desires of his followers,’ Sophia said. ‘So that’s the triple-threat version. Sounds bad.’ She turned to DC. ‘There’s no way any of this stuff is real. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of things in the last few years that I thought were science fiction but—’

  DC raised an eyebrow. ‘Like yourself?’

  ‘This isn’t science fiction. This is outright fantasy,’ she said. ‘A folktale from two thousand years ago.’

  ‘That’s what they’ll be saying about us in two thousand years,’ DC said.

  ‘I know, but I can’t believe Denton is deranged enough to believe it,’ she said.

  ‘He’s seen it for himself, many years ago. This is his fantasy now,’ DC said. ‘And he plans to make that fantasy real.’

  Aviary said, ‘He’s … wait, how old?’

  ‘Chimera vectors,’ Damien said. ‘And before that, a Nazi serum.’

  ‘Oh,’ Aviary said. ‘Guess I missed that meeting.’

  ‘If he finds a way to deliver all three Phoenix viruses,’ DC said, ‘there’s a very real chance he becomes the Controller.’

  ‘Combining specific viruses,’ Sophia said. ‘Into a new virus. There’re so many variables there: has it been proven to work?’

  ‘Actually, yeah,’ Aviary said. ‘Not with the Phoenix, but with similar viruses.’

  ‘You’re the virus expert now?’ Damien said.

  ‘I read a lot,’ Aviary said. ‘In places I shouldn’t.’

  ‘You’ve been hacking into the Fifth Column for more than just that operative map, haven’t you?’ Sophia tried to give Aviary her best disapproving glance but knew it was pointles. ‘DARPA and who knows where else.’

  ‘I deny everything,’ Aviary said. ‘Except this though, because it’s really weird. The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology resurrected the Spanish Flu / Tunguska virus all the way from 1918. The virus had been preserved in the frozen soil of Alaska.’

  ‘That’s how the Phoenix virus survives as well,’ DC said. ‘If it thaws, it disintegrates. If it’s preserved by a meteorite, like the one on your back, it can last a lot longer.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Aviary said, ‘so these scientist dudes discovered a new virus that combined with the Tunguska virus. It exchanged and recombined genes, creating a hybrid virus. More deadly, more pathogenic. So yeah, it can be done. You can combine viruses for sure.’

  ‘Great,’ Damien said. ‘I feel better now.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Aviary said. ‘I’m glad we had this talk too.’

  ‘But has anyone specifically tested the Phoenix subtype?’ Sophia said. ‘When all three mix together?’

  ‘No one has. At least not in modern history,’ DC said. ‘There are just tales.’

  ‘Fairytales,’ Sophia said. ‘But this Phoenix combo sounds like—’

  ‘A sort of psychic mind control,’ Aviary said.

  ‘Orders would leap instantly into the soldier’s brain,’ DC said.

  ‘You’d be a walking Seraphim transmitter,’ Damien said.

  ‘So you can understand why we can’t let this happen,’ DC said. ‘We need to stop Denton from possessing the viruses in any of these meteorites — even this one. But there’s a problem.’

  She almost didn’t want to ask. ‘Which is?’

  ‘Denton has already stolen this one,’ DC said. ‘Or at least his operative, Czarina, did. Which means he’ll be tracking it, possibly even underground.’

  ‘How?’ Damien said, his voice pitched higher than usual.

  ‘Bioreactive taggant,’ DC said. ‘The rock now contains deposits of it so he can track it from within a certain distance. We need to get the rock off this island and then destroy it. Completely. Not even a particle can remain.’

  ‘We?’ Sophia said.

  ‘That’s going to need something burning real hot,’ Aviary said. ‘I’ll need some serious ingredients.’

  ‘That will have to wait,’ Sophia said. ‘We need some distance first.’

  ‘Drop it in the ocean,’ Damien said. ‘Somewhere deep.’

  DC shook his head. ‘That won’t stop Denton from finding it. Hell, you could drop it on the moon and he’d get it back.’

  ‘A volcano!’ Aviary said.

  ‘Do you know any local?’ Sophia said.

  ‘Well, there’s … Ecuador,’ Aviary said.

  ‘A little out of our way,’ DC said.

  ‘Are you working for the Fifth Column?’ Sophia said, hand resting on her holstered Glock.

  DC swallowed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Were you working for Cecilia?’ she asked.

  ‘She thought I was,’ he said.

  ‘I should shoot you right now and keep walking,’ Sophia said.

  ‘But you won
’t.’ He looked at her Glock.

  ‘I haven’t decided yet,’ she said.

  ‘This isn’t your fight,’ DC said. ‘Right now, we have half the Central Detachment in New York. Sixty-two Blue Berets sourced from Delta, USAISA, SOAR, DEVGRU, Twenty-Fourth, JTF2. The best soldiers in the world.’

  ‘I'm more concerned about the operatives.’ Sophia said. ‘Denton has them all?’

  ‘We don’t know how many are sympathetic to his cause,’ DC said. ‘Until we know for sure, they’re supposed to be inactive.’

  ‘Aw, they’re grounded,’ Aviary said.

  ‘This must be pretty important to the Fifth Column,’ Sophia said. ‘Why are you stealing it, DC? You’ve already intercepted it from Denton’s operative. And I can’t help but notice you somehow managed to lose your Blue Berets.’

  ‘Because I don’t think anyone should have it. Not even the Fifth Column,’ DC said.

  ‘Thinking for yourself now?’ Sophia said. ‘So you’re just walking out with it? Shoplifting from the secret world government?’

  ‘Not anymore.’ DC flashed a smile for the first time. ‘You’re shoplifting, I tried to stop you but you got away.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I’m flattered.’

  She considered her options. As usual, there weren’t many. She handed DC the paper.

  ‘I want to trust you, I really do, but I can’t,’ she said. ‘If these are anywhere near as powerful as that scribble of paper says—because I’m hoping that like a lot of ancient writing it’s been grossly exaggerated—then Denton can’t go anywhere near this. And neither can the Fifth Column. On that, we agree.’

  ‘The Fifth Column have enough special forces soldiers to handle this,’ DC said. ‘We stole this meteorite, after all.’

  ‘Yeah sure, if you want the Fifth Column to have it after all,’ Sophia said. ‘And anyway I stole it from them. And hey, I’m just one operative. How are you going to go with eight of Denton’s pet superhumans on your tail? Actually, nine—I’m sure that one you had back there has escaped by now, or been rescued by Denton.’

  DC glared at her, but said nothing. She had a point, and he knew it. ‘If you’re keeping the meteor,’ he said, ‘then I hope you intend to move it very far from here, very fast.’