Kenyon stared at the Russian. “The sophistication to produce a biological agent of this order is beyond our capabilities.”
“The key word is our,” Yakov said. “We haven’t built a ship capable of interstellar travel either.”
“Which do you think this thing is?” Turcotte pressed Kenyon. “How did it evolve?”
“I don’t know exactly,” Kenyon said. “To find that out I need patient zero.”
“Patient zero?”
“Patient zero is the disease’s human starting point. If we can backtrack and find patient zero, then backtrack patient zero’s steps, we can find what and where the disease jumped from to get to humans and we would be that much further on our way to understanding not only the disease itself, but how it started.
“A virus has to have a ‘reservoir’—a living organism that it resides in that it doesn’t kill — or at least kill as quickly as the filoviruses kill humans. Otherwise the parasite would destroy its own source of survival. If we can find the reservoir, we might find out how that organism held off the effects of the virus, and that might point in the direction of a vaccine or cure. It has to be the village that Harrison talked about.”
Turcotte stared at Kenyon in disbelief. “Are you nuts? We don’t have any time to be coming up with vaccinations!”
Kenyon returned the look in kind. “We’ve got to find where it came from or else this thing will burn and it will only stop burning until it kills everything and there are no more hosts for it to consume.”
“The satellite,” Yakov said.
“What satellite?” Kenyon demanded.
Turcotte explained about the satellite that came down west of their location.
“You think this came from a satellite?” Kenyon asked. “What is this Kourou place?”
“It’s the launch site for Ariane, the European Space Consortium,” Yakov said. “It’s located on the coast of French Guiana.”
“Why is the European Space Port located in South America?” Kenyon asked.
“Several reasons,” Yakov said. “First, it’s got a low population density. Second, it’s located near the equator, which is advantageous for a space launch. Third, it’s right on the ocean, so rockets can go up over water instead of land. And fourth, there’s little likelihood of hurricane or earthquake in that specific area.
“Even though it’s run by the European Space Consortium,” Yakov continued, “anyone with enough money can buy a rocket and a launch window from them. Many U.S. firms launch their commercial satellites from Kourou.”
“Do you have proof that this virus came off a satellite?” Kenyon demanded.
“We need to find exactly where Harrison and his crew picked up this thing from. That will help prove or disprove what Yakov says,” Turcotte said. “He said in the video that he went upriver, but there’s a lot of rivers here.”
“What do you suggest?” Norward asked.
Turcotte tapped the scientist on the chest. “You and I go to the boat, try to see if there’s a map or anything on board that shows where they found the dead village.”
Guide Parker stood on top of a dune, looking down at the encampment of the chosen. Only one hundred and forty had made the commitment to leave behind all they knew and follow him to the desert.
This was the place. They had left the last hard surface road at Alice Springs, the center of Australia, and followed an old mining track into the Gibson Desert. Even that had disappeared hours before, but the Guide Parker had kept his people moving through the desert, the sun beating down on the roofs of the four-wheel-drive vehicles that made up the makeshift convoy.
When he arrived at the right spot, he had just known. He’d ordered them to stop and set up camp. Then he had walked out of the camp and up this dune.
Parker looked around. He saw no sign of life other than the tents his people had pitched. He dropped to his knees, feeling the sand shift beneath them. He looked up to the sky.
“We are here,” he whispered to the clear night sky. “We are here. Come take us away.”
He didn’t notice the drops of blood coming out of his nose, falling to the sand and being absorbed immediately.
Duncan read the report from Major Quinn once more. The Mission was real and STAAR had been investigating it. That was important, but did little to help the situation right now. It did back up Yakov’s story about the existence of The Mission and that The Mission had obviously interfered with mankind in the past. She called Quinn and told him to get his computer experts working on finding the current location of The Mission and whether there was any connection between The Mission and the Black Death.
Duncan punched in another number on her SATPhone. The other end was picked up on the third ring.
“USAMRIID,” the voice pulled the letters into one word.
“Colonel Carmen, please,” Duncan said.
“Who is calling?”
Duncan paused — this was Carmen’s direct number. “I’d like to talk to Colonel Carmen.”
“I’m afraid that isn’t possible.”
“Why not?”
“Colonel Carmen had an accident.”
Duncan’s hand gripped the SATPhone tighter. “Is she all right?”
“I’m afraid the accident occurred on the Level Four containment facility. The entire base has been quarantined. Colonel Carmen is dead. There’s a Colonel Zenas here from the Pentagon, and he’s taken over. Would you like to speak to him?”
Duncan pushed the off button. She stood in the shadow of the space shuttle Endeavor for several minutes, waiting until she could stop her hand from shaking.
CHAPTER 15
Che Lu thought it quite ridiculous, two old people crawling around in the dark. She and Lo Fa were a kilometer from the base of Qian-Ling, edging ever closer. They were moving so slowly it had taken them an hour to go the past hundred meters, but Lo Fa was in no rush. He had told Che Lu before leaving the guerrilla camp that they would proceed very cautiously. He reminded her for the hundredth time of another reason he had lived to be an old man — his ability to move carefully when it was called for.
The rest of the camp had packed up their meager belongings and begun their trek west to the Kunlun Mountains. It was reported that large numbers of refugees were flooding into those hills, occasionally coming out to strike at the army. It had tugged at Che Lu’s heart to see the women and children pick up their satchels and fade away into the night. It seemed as if that was the story of China — the people always walking to escape one government while hoping for another.
“Hush!” Lo Fa hissed, even though Che Lu knew she had not made a noise. There was a quarter moon that threw down a feeble light. Even on the darkest night, it would be impossible to miss the looming bulk of the mountain tomb of Qian-Ling. Che Lu heard what it was that had halted her partner. A plane’s engine, very faint but getting louder. She peered into the night sky, searching.
Lo Fa grabbed her arm and pointed. “There.”
Che Lu looked, but she couldn’t see what he was pointing at. The plane had to have been blacked out, as there were no lights. The sound grew louder, then she spotted it, a black cross in the dark night.
It came in low over the mountain, then circled. As it did so, screams rang out in the night, emanating from the Chinese soldiers bivouacked all over the mountain.
“What is happening?” Che Lu asked.
“I don’t know, but we wait,” Lo Fa said.
On the second time over, white parachutes blossomed in the plane’s trail. Lo Fa stood. “Now!”
He scrambled across the creek, Che Lu following. He pushed aside a heavy overgrowth of vegetation and then they were in a narrow cut in the side of the mountain, less than three feet wide and six feet deep, almost completely overgrown across the top. Che Lu felt smooth stone under her feet and she remembered scrambling down these same stairs after splitting from Turcotte and Nabinger as they escaped from the tomb the previous week.