The Dark Hour (32 page)

“Witnesses to what?”

“To them lowering that AUV down to the world’s deepest hydrothermal vent . . .” She was scanning each document, excited, talking more to herself than him. “This makes perfect sense. If one wanted to search for new, as of yet undiscovered viruses, perhaps to genetically alter current viruses, one would want to look where life first formed.”

“The primordial soup theory?”

“Not quite. The new theory is that life
began
at hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor. To put it simply, a chemical reaction which produces a form of energy that can be harnessed by other processes,” she said, even though he had no idea what she was talking about. “They’re taking viruses emerging from the mouth of the vent where temperatures exceed six hundred degrees Fahrenheit . . .”

“With an AUV? How does it survive temps that high?”

“They don’t need to get that close. They follow the vent stream up. The very fact the viruses can exist in such extreme temperature changes as it leaves the vent, then cools . . .” She folded the set of documents, handed them to him, then started digging through the desk again, this time reaching beneath the desktop, then inside the drawers, looking, undoubtedly, for something that might be hidden. “I think,” she said, getting down on her knees to peer into the drawers, “Fedorov was combining these with known weapons viruses to withstand heat, to better control them.”

And that he did understand. A virus that could survive extreme heat sources was far more effective as a bioweapon than any known virus that had been used for weaponization thus far. “Combining? How?”

“Fedorov’s specialty was chimera viruses,” she said, pushing aside several file folders, then shoving her hand beneath them. She found something and pulled it out. A small black book.

Mark peered over her shoulder as she opened it and saw its pages were filled with handwriting in both blue and black ink. He recognized a few Russian words, but wasn’t as fluent as Lisette. “Fedorov’s journal?”

“I believe so . . .” She turned the page. “I’m hoping to find his own notes on chimera viruses, something he may not have documented specifically in his research papers. I suspect it’s what killed the men on the
Zenobia
. Their outward symptoms appeared to be blackpox.”

“Like smallpox?”

“Only worse. Deadlier. A recombinant virus made from smallpox spliced with Ebola. Something the Vector scientists in Russia cooked up a couple decades ago.”

“I thought they killed that program? Too dangerous?”

“It is, which is why I’m trying to find more on what happened. No one, even Fedorov, would want to unleash something that deadly and uncontrollable onto the world. Not unless you had some safeguards built in, which, now that I think about it, our captors alluded to . . .” She paused to read further, turned several pages in rapid succession. “Apparently creating a deadlier strain wasn’t his intent. He hoped to harness the viruses found at the mouth of the vent where life began . . .” She ran her finger across one of the lines, narrowing her gaze, as though trying to translate the Russian. “Normally you’d make a DNA copy from the one, and graft it into the other. The RNA of the—”

“Remember who you’re talking to, here.”

“The virus from the vent is like a master key, with more than one place to insert genetic code, allowing him to manipulate the viruses in ways he couldn’t do if he was working with the originals, which would limit the amount of splicing. His goal was to create a virus that had its own shutoff switch, so that one could use it for a weapon, wait for the fallout, then move in safely without danger, like we did on the
Zenobia
. It was brilliant.”

“Was?”

“He decided to destroy it.”

That Marc didn’t expect.

She ran her gloved finger along the page, then looked up at him, before turning back to the book. “According to his notes, he was infected by his own virus . . . Dropped a beaker and cut his finger . . .” She paused, clearly absorbed in what she was reading. “Seventy-two hours until the onset of symptoms . . . He figured he had five days to destroy all of it before he . . . Oh my God . . . You
don’t
want to die this way.”

“I don’t want to die period. What about the virus?
Did
he destroy it?”

“All but three vials, which went missing right before his accident. Well, two, actually. One of those three was tested on the ship, which is part of what made him change his mind . . . The devastation . . .” Her voice faded as she apparently absorbed the enormity of what she was reading. “He said it wasn’t what he intended it for. He did not tell them he destroyed it. The pages run out. His notes, I mean. I assume because he died.”

“So how did he destroy it?”

She got up from the desk, walked over to the windows that gave them a view into the actual lab, then pointed to a massive work bench that had instruments mounted across the surface, as well as within a metal box. “He used that. A high-intensity, ultrashort pulse titanium-sapphire laser.”

He recognized that some of the instruments were used to direct laser beams. “Way too
Star Trek
for me,” he said, then stilled when he thought he heard a sound in the hall. He put his finger to his lips, handed her the papers she’d given him earlier, then stepped softly toward the door. Opening it slightly, he peeked out, saw nothing. “We should really get the hell out of here.”

She slipped Fedorov’s journal and the papers into the thigh pocket of her fatigues, gave one last look around, then stopped suddenly. “A telephone!”

He turned from the door, saw the phone on the wall. Something about its placement bothered him. A compound this far out in the jungle probably wasn’t going to have phone lines strung up somewhere. Anything beyond that would require a sat phone. He was an idiot to think they could march in here, pick up some extension on a desk, and call HQ. And the moment that thought crossed his mind, Lisette grabbed the receiver, put it to her ear, then slammed it home, recognition of what she’d done written on her face. “They answered the line,” she said.

“Time to leave.” Marc looked at the door to the hall. They were outmanned and outgunned, and he didn’t like the odds. The other door led straight to the lab, where countless vials and beakers reminded him of the men who had bled to death from some as of yet unknown hemorrhagic virus. He didn’t like those odds any better. He figured they might have a minute, maybe two. He pulled open the office door a slit, peered out, then quickly closed it. “We need to think of something and fast.”

Lisette checked the lab door, found it unlocked, then took a quick visual of the room. Marc glanced in, saw several UV light units mounted on the walls. Aside from the cryogenic freezer, and the workbench with the laser, there was a stainless steel worktable and on the wall above it, glass cabinets that held even more lab equipment. Lisette closed the door, saying, “You remember that operation we worked in Morocco?”

He looked up at the drop ceiling, the large acoustic tiles, then back at her. “The one where I broke my arm?”

“At least it was your left arm.”

Marc climbed up onto the desk, removed one of the tiles. “Couldn’t you think of an operation where I didn’t get hurt?”

No sooner had he gotten into position, the lab office door burst open, slammed into the wall, then bounced back into the side of the guard who entered first. He was quickly followed by three other men, all carrying M4s. They stopped, their guns swinging around as they checked the room. “There’s no one here,” the first guard said. Unlike the other guards Marc had overheard, this one spoke clear French, no Portuguese thrown in, making it easier for Marc to understand.

“Check the lab,” the second guard said.

The first guard walked over, glanced into the window. He did not open the door. “There’s no one there.”

“Someone picked up that phone.”

The first guard turned, looked at the phone, then noticed the desk, the papers that seemed askew. He looked up, saw one of the tiles displaced slightly, swung his gun upward. “There. In the ceiling.”

M
arc watched the guard push the tile aside with his gun, then pop his head in after. Classic mistake. Perfect opportunity to take a head shot—had Marc actually been up there. The guard ducked, then jumped off the desk. “They must have escaped through the ceiling.”

“Where does it go to?”

“The entire complex. Entrance could be made into any room.”

“Entrance? Escape, you mean. We check them all.”

“What about the lab? What about the virus?”

The first guard looked over. “Who would be stupid enough to go in there? If they did, it will kill them. Alvaro, you stand guard here in case they return. We’ll check the other rooms.”

Alvaro, the shortest of the three men looked around. “I don’t like this place. Too dangerous.”

“Then stand outside the door, you coward,” he said, then walked out with the other guard.

Marc crouched behind the closed lab door, watching the guards in the reflection of the glass enclosed cabinets over the laboratory worktable. Alvaro waited for the other two to leave, then turned, gave the room one last look, before following them out. He did not close the door completely. Marc stood for a better view, and saw the heel of the guard’s military boot just outside the office door, his position telling Marc that he was faced outward.

Marc waited several seconds, hearing nothing but the loud hum of the equipment in the lab, something he was grateful for, since it masked any movement they might have made. He motioned to Lisette, who was lying on the floor beneath the window that separated the lab from the office. Had any of them given the lab more than a cursory glance, they would’ve been caught. “They’re gone,” he whispered. “One’s standing guard in the hallway.”

She scooted up into a kneeling position, still keeping below the window. “I see your arm survived.”

“Only because they weren’t about to enter anywhere the virus might be.” His arm had been broken in Morocco when they’d used the drop ceiling ruse there and he’d hidden behind a door that was kicked open. That man had died the moment he stepped in the room.

“I don’t suppose you have any brilliant ideas?”

“Other than maybe coming in here to find a phone was not the best plan of action?”

She smiled. “I’ll deal with armed men over snakes any day.”

His return smile faded as he thought about their situation. “What we need is transportation out of here. And a bargaining chip to ensure our safety.”

“As far as they know, we have a freezer
full
of bargaining chips. The virus. They have no idea he destroyed it—”

“Neither do we—”

“It doesn’t do us any good if someone shoots us before we can assert our position . . .”

Marc looked over at her, then up at the glass cabinets, catching the reflection of the door where the guard stood sentinel. “Time to turn the tables,” Marc said.

Chapter 51

December 12

Network Compound

Brazil

M
arc and Lisette waited until the sounds of the other guards searching the rooms had faded enough to tell them they were not an immediate threat. Marc signaled to Lisette, then opened the lab door just enough to slip into the outer office. His Glock in hand, he moved toward the office’s hallway door, where the one guard stood just outside. Marc quickly sidled up to the wall, then behind the partially open office door. When he was in position, he nodded to Lisette, who was back in the lab watching him from the reflection of the glass cabinets. She tossed a pen, and it clattered across the floor. The guard shifted in the hall, but apparently didn’t hear it. Marc saw his shadow in the doorway, guessed he might be looking into the office. Hearing no other sounds, Marc signaled again, and this time Lisette knocked on the wall down low. As expected the guard stepped into the room to investigate, walking toward the lab, his M4 pointed at the closed lab door. The moment the guard passed him, Marc stepped out, shoved his gun in the man’s back, and said in French, “Don’t move or you die.”

T
he guard, undressed, gagged, and hands tied behind his back, was seated inside the lab, right below the window, his back to the wall. Lisette walked into the office area, while Marc, now dressed in the guard’s clothes, stood watch over the man, a gun pointed at his chest. Lisette returned a moment later, purple gloves on each hand. She took a small stainless steel container that resembled a narrow propane tank, put a rack of vials inside, then closed the top.

“What are you doing?” Marc asked.

“Getting an insurance policy.” Her back to them, she turned around, holding up an open vial filled with white powder. She tossed Marc a bio mask, then pulled one on herself. “Put your knees together,” she told the man in French.

He shook his head no, his brown eyes narrowing with hatred.

She waved the vial in front of his face. “Do you know what this is? The same virus that killed fifteen men on that ship, men who died the same bloody and painful death that killed Dr. Fedorov. I can pour it on your face and we solve the problem. Or you can cooperate and save yourself. Now put your knees together. If you move and the powder drops, you will breathe it in and die from the virus. Do you understand?” She moved the vial closer to his face. His eyes widened. He quickly brought his knees together, and she placed the vial between them. When she let go of the glass tube, he pressed his legs together even tighter. She and Marc left the room, closing the lab door behind them. Lisette pulled off her mask and tossed it on the desk. Marc pulled off his own mask, then peered into the lab’s window. The guard hadn’t moved, not even to see if they were gone. His knees, however, were starting to shake. Marc walked over to Lisette’s side and whispered, “You sure we won’t be exposed?”

She grabbed a vial from the box on the desk, the same vials he’d seen earlier. “This is what he’s holding. I took it from here. The powder you saw inside is preservative, as is the one he’s holding between his knees. If he drops it, he might hyperventilate from fear, but it’s completely inert. Everything else has been destroyed.”