His wife wore an expression that clearly stated she suspected there was more to the story than met the eye.
“Hey, Jenny. Thanks so much for meeting us,” Joe smiled as the woman approached.
He opened up his arms and embraced her. She accepted the hug warmly, and returned the gesture, wrapping her lithe arms around him.
“It’s good to see you, Mac.” She smiled wide as she let go of Joe, revealing the brightest teeth Helen had ever seen.
“This is my wife, Helen.”
Dr. Solomon extended a hand, which Helen shook firmly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Doctor.”
“Please, call me Jenny.” Her smile extended almost all the way to her brown eyes. “So, Sean says you have something I need to take a look at?”
Joe took the vial out of his pocket and placed it in the palm of her hand. She held the tube up in the sunlight, carefully inspecting it. The clear liquid shimmered in the light.
“Sean didn’t say much. But I’m under the impression he believes this is some kind of virus.” Her last comment sounded more like a question.
“That’s what he said,” Joe responded. “We did a little digging around after he called me and discovered a huge shipment was due to leave the Biosure facility.”
Helen cut in. “The strange thing was that there were no shipping dates. It was as if all the shipments were on hold, waiting for something.”
Dr. Solomon gazed at the liquid for a few more seconds before lowering it out of the sunshine. She then slipped the vial into one of her lower lab coat pockets.
“That’s odd,” her eyes went back and forth between Joe and his wife. “Usually, those kinds of things don’t just sit around for very long. The pharm companies are all about profit. And the sooner they can get a product to market, the more money they’ll make.”
Joe and Helen exchanged a confirming glance.
“Biosure is a huge corporation,” the doctor explained. “They have holdings in the billions, from what I understand. Their network is huge. I’ve only met a few people from there, no one high ranking. But even the lower level employees reek of something slimy.”
“What do you mean?” Joe crossed his arms, interested in what Dr. Solomon had to say.
“I don’t know, exactly. It’s hard to put my finger on it. But I get this weird feeling like they run that business like it’s a cult or something. Everyone I spoke to from there seemed like they had been brainwashed. It was really weird.”
The married couple shared another suspicious expression.
“How long do you think it will take before you know something about that vaccine,” Joe pointed at Dr. Solomon’s pocket.
“I can do an analysis on it today. It will probably be a few hours. I’ll need to run a few other tests to confirm whatever it is. But if it is as serious as Sean implicated, I want to get it done as quickly as possible.”
Helen seemed concerned. “Joe and I speculated on that. But we aren’t medical people. Just how dangerous would some kind of super virus be?”
“It’s hard to say,” the doctor took on a grave demeanor. “We’ve been on the lookout for this sort of thing for a long time. The Spanish flu was a superbug that killed nearly one hundred million people in 1918. The strange thing was that the people it killed were usually the stronger, healthier individuals. Their immune systems reacted to the flu virus by going into a sort of hyper mode, and ended up killing the people by causing too much damage to their organs and tissue.”
“Any idea what caused it?” Joe cocked his head to the side and raised an eyebrow.
“Not really,” she shook her head. “It was during World War I, so all the troops being in such close quarters didn’t help. Plus they were constantly moving around from place to place, so that aided in the spread of the epidemic. No one really knows for sure, though, where ground zero was.”
Joe pondered what she’d said for a moment before speaking again. “I remember reading about the Spanish flu as well as some other biological catastrophes that occurred in history. The plague was another such instance. No one was sure about the origin, but how it was spread was easy to identify.”
“Correct.”
“There was something else,” he continued, “I remember reading about those epidemics that are still somewhat of a mystery.”
Helen looked surprised as she turned to listen.
“Eyewitnesses in both accounts, with the plague and with the Spanish Flu, claimed to have seen dark figures outside their villages and towns before the illnesses struck. I don’t know what that means. It could be nothing.”
“Are you talking about extraterrestrials, Joe?” Helen made it sound like she was disappointed in him.
“Not necessarily. The accounts merely suggest that someone or something was behind the outbreak, that’s all.”
Dr. Solomon felt the pocket to make sure the vial was still there. “Well, I better get inside and check this out. If it is something like what happened in 1918, the implications would be far worse now. The world is so interconnected, a bug like that would have catastrophic effects on the population. Literally, billions could be at risk.”
“Thanks for helping us with this, Jenny,” Joe said and gave her a last, quick hug. “Call me when you know something.”
He and Helen were getting in the car as Dr. Solomon walked away when she stopped and turned around. “By the way, Mac.” He stopped just inside the passenger’s side door. “Be careful. I’ve heard some strange things about people who tried to cross paths with Biosure. Nothing was ever proven, just stories. But when you hear something more than once, it makes you think.”
“Will do,” he assured. “Thanks again.”
Helen started up the car as Joe slipped into the seat. “Looks like we ought to sleep with the light on tonight,” She said and steered the car back out onto the road.
“Yeah,” he agreed. “And with a bullet in the chamber.”
Chapter 42
Armenian Mountains
DeGard had overstayed his welcome with Lindsey. But the annoying Frenchman didn’t seem to take the hint. Will and Kaba had finished cleaning their weapons and had prepared a simple meal over a few small camping stoves.
“You really did come prepared,” DeGard gazed at the supper with wide eyes.
Lindsey slurped some hot soup peered over his glasses at the archaeologist. “We were ready to set up a dig site. Don’t you normally have things like this for an excavation?” He enjoyed seeing the epiphany smack DeGard in the face.
“Of course. I had not really thought of it that way. So you were ready to be here for a few weeks, non?”
“That is correct.”
DeGard waited for Will and Kaba to get their soup from the small pot before helping himself to a bowl that had been set out on a makeshift table. He poured the rest of the steaming liquid into the bowl and grabbed a spoon from nearby.
“I suppose this isn’t the kind of fare you’re accustomed to, eh?” He dug the spoon into the noodles and broth, heaping it into his mouth like it was a shovel.
“Not at all,” Lindsey disagreed. “When I was young, I was part of a boys group that went on many camping expeditions. And this,” he motioned to the tent around them, “is much more luxurious than what we used to sleep in. And these mattresses are far better than sleeping on the hard ground like we did in those days.”
“Ah,” DeGard swallowed the soup, surprised at how hot it was and at the interesting back story to his employer’s life.
Unexpectedly, Lindsey’s cell phone began to ring on the cargo box next to him. He frowned for a moment, wondering who was calling him. Will was in the same room, and only a few people had his personal number.
“How do you get service out here?” the Frenchman interrupted the internal line of questioning.
“Satellite phone,” Will answered for his boss.
Lindsey reached over and picked up the device then glanced at the number after re-adjusting his spectacles. It was an Atlanta ar
ea code. Biosure headquarters.
The people in charge of the pharmaceutical company had been ordered not to try and contact him unless it was an emergency. The vice presidents he had appointed were both members of his council, so he knew they could be trusted, especially after what had happened to his two adepts a few weeks before in Utah.
He hit the green button on the screen and put the device to his ear. “This is Lindsey, what’s the problem.”
“Sir, we have a problem,” the man’s voice on the other end reported.
“Well, what is it?”
“We had a security breach in our Atlanta facility. Somehow, the database was hacked. We believe it happened earlier today.”
“They didn’t wreck the system did they?” Lindsey asked in an almost dismissive tone.
“No, sir. Nothing was touched in the database.”
Lindsey appeared wary. “Then what is the emergency?”
“It seems whoever hacked into the system created security codes and then broke into our facility. It happened about an hour ago. We still aren’t sure how they got past our additional security protocols, but we are investigating every possible lead.”
The old man’s face turned even more ashen than was natural. “Who was it?” his voice carried a tone of righteous anger.
“We have a positive ID on the suspects and have a team en route to their location now.” The voice seemed confident, but to Lindsey it felt like the man was leaving something out.
“What did they do?”
There was a momentary pause for a few seconds before the man answered. “It seems they broke into the warehouse and took a sample of the flu vaccine.”
Lindsey said nothing at first. His face continued to lose color even though his blood boiled. Will and Kaba stared at him, concern filling their faces. DeGard seemed unaffected, continuing to slurp soup into his mouth.
When the old man spoke, his voice was gravely, carrying a sinister tone. “Kill whoever is responsible for this. And see to it that the sample is recovered or destroyed. We cannot let this get into the wrong hands.”
“Yes, sir.”
Lindsey hit the red button to end the call and laid the device back down on the makeshift table.
“Problems?” DeGard asked with half-full mouth of broth and noodles.
Old, tired eyes peered through the Frenchman’s soul. “Everything is fine,” he lied. “I have it all under control. At sun up, we need to continue the search. If we have to go back for more fuel, we will. We will do whatever it takes.”
Chapter 43
Ararat, Armenia
Sean stared at his phone. His feet were propped up on the church pew’s worn cushions while his back was leaning against the armrest on the end of the seat. He figured his casual treatment of the sanctuary’s facilities and furniture wouldn’t do any harm. After all, it wasn’t a church anymore. No one had probably held a ceremony in the room in the better part of three years.
His eyes were fixed on a picture of him and Tommy. It was a day the two boys had been dressed in their little league baseball uniforms. Their parents had thought it would be cool to take a few pictures. It was hard to remember a time when Tommy wasn’t around.
He wondered when he would get another report from his friend, but that would drive him crazy. Sean had to put it in the back of his mind for the time being. Tommy was in good hands, he assumed. And he would be fine. But there was something else that kept nagging at Sean.
With all the talk about retiring and leaving IAA, he had started to feel somewhat guilty about the whole idea. A big part of him kept saying it was his responsibility to protect his friend and take care of him. Why, he had no idea. Even though he and Tommy had been great friends for much of their lives, they were both grown adults. Each could take care of themselves. Or so Sean believed.
The fact was, Sean had always watched out for Tommy for most of their lives. When his parents had been mysteriously killed, Sean and his family took him in, making the boys more like brothers than ever before. Sean had always treated his friend like a little brother and done all he could to protect him.
Several people were confused by the dynamic of their relationship. They had been the modern day Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. Sean laughed quietly to himself at the thought, trying not to disturb anyone else in the room. A memory of a prank they’d pulled in high school rang in his mind.
It had been their senior year, and everyone in the class was racking their brains to figure out what prank they should play on the school. It had to be better than the ones from the past, but it couldn’t be the same idea. And it couldn’t be anything that would get them expelled. So, no permanent defacement of property or anything like that.
Sean and Tommy had come up with the idea of breaking into the school and unlocking the huge indoor swimming pool then letting all the seniors into the building for some midnight swimming. Neither one of them knew how to pick locks, though. Well, at least not at that point in their lives. So, the only solution they could come up with was to stay in the building late one night, and remain hidden somewhere until the school had been locked up.
At the end of the school day, they had hung around for some of the extracurricular activities that were going on at the time, trying to look inconspicuous. About thirty minutes before the custodial staff was to go around and begin their locking procedures, Sean and Tommy hoisted themselves up into the ceiling by way of a bookshelf in the counseling office. The ceiling tiles were easy enough to remove, and as their intel had belied, there were floors everywhere just above them. Sean had observed some maintenance workers climbing up into the space once before and had asked how they moved around. The unsuspecting man had explained that there was basically an entire floor hidden above the ceiling, from which all the inner workings of the school could be accessed.
The boys had replaced the tiles and sat impatiently, frequently checking their watches to see when the school would be locked up for the evening.
Sean smiled again in the church pew, thinking about how nervous he had felt while waiting for the custodians to leave the building. He and Tommy had told all the other students in their class to give it an hour before showing up to the school. They wanted to make sure it was dark and everyone was clear of the facility. Kids showing up in the parking lot while someone was leaving would have thrown up a huge red flag.
While they sat there in the dark silence of the school’s underworld, Sean and Tommy didn’t say much. They had been afraid someone would catch them. There was a little bit of whispered banter between the two of them about how epic the prank was going to be, and that no one in administration would even have to be the wiser. It could be something that went down in history with their class and became the stuff of legend.
Tommy had checked his watch for the thirtieth time, finally deciding they had waited long enough. The boys climbed down from the ceiling and made their way through the cavernous high school halls, the cafeteria, gym, and to the doors where they could unlock the pool.
Sean shook his head thinking about their surprise when they realized all the doors leading into the pool were locked. Through the door window, could see the first few students starting to arrive outside of the pool windows.
“What should we do?” Sean had asked. “We don’t know how to unlock the doors. And if we go out, we’ll be locked out there with the rest of them.”
Tommy looked around for a minute and then realized the solution. “You think there’s another space above those ceiling tiles?” He pointed up to the ceiling ten feet over their heads.
Sean followed his friend’s eyes as he realized what Tommy was thinking. He was staring at the ceiling tiles that extended out over the pool, all the way to the far wall of the facility. The drop from the ceiling to the pool was easily thirty to forty feet, certainly a dangerous proposition.
“No way, man,” Sean had said. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”
Tommy had turned his head, spotting a ladder that just ha
ppened to be leaning against the wall not far from where they were standing. “Dude, the class is counting on us. This is our chance to do something amazing that no one else has ever done or will get to do again.”
Sean stared at the image on his phone. His friend had been right. It was a mantra Tommy lived by. He based his life on treating everything like it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
As a result, the boys had climbed up into the ceiling and crawled on a narrow catwalk out over the pool. Once they had gone what they figured to be about half way, Tommy reached down and removed one of the ceiling tiles. Below them, the chlorinated water rippled in the darkness of the facility, lit only by a few orange outdoor lights just beyond the wall’s windows.
Tommy had looked over at him with a grin on his face, dangling his feet over the edge.
Sean thought better of the idea, letting doubts swirl around in his head. “I don’t think we should do this, Tommy. We could get hurt.”
There would be no convincing him. Tommy patted Sean on the shoulder. “It’s gonna be fine, buddy. It’s only water.” Those were the last words he said before shoving himself through the hole in the ceiling and plummeting into the water below.
His body disappeared for a few seconds before his head popped up in the dark water fairly close to where he’d gone in. He let out a yell, pumping a fist in the air.
“You okay?” Sean shouted down.
Tommy nodded as he dogpaddled in the middle of the pool. “I’m great, man! Come on down!”
Sean hung his feet over the edge for a few seconds. A familiar pain snuck back into his stomach, and his head swirled. He had been afraid of heights since he could remember. He was pretty sure something had happened when he was a child to cause the inexplicable phobia, but nothing concrete ever presented itself. The only remotely plausible explanation was that his mother had pushed him out of a swing when he was three, landing Sean on his head but unhurt, for the most part.
Sean took in a deep breath of the musty church air, remember how nervous he had been at the thought of jumping. In the end, he never took the plunge. He couldn’t do it. Fear had overcome him, paralyzing him from taking any action.
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