Lone Wolf (30 page)
“You can have all kinds of triggering conditions. Some are internal—the body’s immunological response to another infection can trigger a latent form of viral meningitis, very nasty. Some are external—like a certain chemical or combination of chemicals in the diet, for example.’" The doc’s voice trails off.
“And this bug has a triggering agent or condition?” Argent prompts quietly after a moment.
The shadow cutter nods. “Magic. A spell.’’
“Impossible,” Argent counters.
“Why?” I demand, and they both look at me. “There’s Awakened animals,” I explain hurriedly, “and insects, and
even fragging plants that are sensitive to magic, or resistant, or can use it—or all three. What do they call it?”
“Paranatural.” It’s Argent who answers.
“So why not viruses?” I finish.
Dicer looks at me, and her expression seems to hint she's decided I’m not a congenital idiot after all. She nods. “Why not?” she echoes. “Okay, granted, this isn’t quite MIT&M or Berkeley, and I’m not exactly Dr. Derek Maclean either.” (Who?
I
want to ask, but I keep my yap shut.) “But it certainly looks like there are several sections in the virus’ RNA almost directly analogous to the magic-sensitive introns in the DNA of Awakened species.”
“Which means?” Argent asks.
“Which implies,” she responds, “that this particular retrovirus is latent—no, more than that, totally inert—until it’s triggered by magic.”
The shadowrunner clenches his metal fists. This is worrying him a lot more than it is me, and I don’t understand why. Frag, at the moment I’m still dealing with the relief that I’m probably not going to kick off from VITAS 4. “How certain are you of this?”
“Not certain,” she replies, “not certain at all. I can’t be, based on one case, and with the limited resources at my disposal. But,” she emphasizes, “I’d definitely say it’s indicative. Strongly indicative.”
Argent nods soberly, and I remember he knows more about her background than I do. He seems to consider that as serious drek.
In contrast. I feel like I’ve missed the fragging meeting. “I don’t get it,” I blurt. “What’s so fragging important? It’s an Awakened virus, and its triggering condition is magical activity nearby, right?”
“Wrong.” The doc turns a cold and steady gaze on me. “The trigger isn’t just background magical activity or magic use in the vicinity.”
It hits me then. I glance at Argent, and he’s nodding again. He’s got it, too. “You said the trigger was magic,” I say slowly, “a spell. A spell. A specific spell.”
“A spell specifically tailored to the particular RNA subsequence of this particular retrovirus,” Dacia confirms. “Until the virus is in the area of effect of that specific spell, it’s totally inert.”
“But that’s impossible, isn’t it?” I say, and my words sound lame in my own ears.
“Evolutionarily speaking,” she amends, “I’d agree. This retrovirus couldn’t have evolved naturally. Which means ...”
“It was engineered.” It takes me a moment to realize the voice is mine.
Doc Dicer’s eyes are steady, Socked with mine. For a moment she doesn’t say anything or react in any way, like she’s trying to stare me down.
She’s the one who blinks first, then looks away a Sittle uncomfortably. “Maybe,” she says. “There’s a whole lot of ‘ifs’. If I’m right that the trigger is magical. If I’m right that it’s only a specific spell and not just generalized magical activity. If, if, if . . She tries to smile, but there’s no humor in it, the expression ending up more like a grimace. “If I had a real lab, with a trained staff, and all the bells and whistles ...” Her lips twist back from her teeth, and she spits, “Frag it!”
Argent and I both react. It’s the first time the doc has cursed, which adds immeasurably to the impact.
“But you said it was ‘strongly indicative,’ ” the shadowrunner points out, echoing her own words back to her.
She glares at him for an instant, then her hard expression softens. “I did say that, didn’t I?” She takes a deep breath, and I’m momentarily distracted by what that does to the lines of her white jumpsuit. “I stand by it, too. I could be wrong. But I don’t think so.”
Argent sits back down on the couch, and again he seems immune—or oblivious—to the grievous bodily harm it tried to inflict on me earlier. “Okay,” he says slowly, his voice
even more tired than it was when he first arrived at the
shadow clinic. “Let’s assume you’re right, Mary. The virus is geneticaliy engineered—whether from scratch or just tweaked doesn’t really matter at the moment—and only a single, specific spell will trigger it, presumably developed in tandem with the bug itself.” He glances at the doc, and she nods confirmation. “Then where does that lead us?”
Nobody speaks immediately, and the silence grows heavier and more tangible. Finally I have to say something just to break it. “It’s the perfect murder weapon, isn’t it?” I ask. “Unattributable. Silent. Fragging elegant, almost. The victim doesn’t even know he’s dead until later.”
“I don’t see it,” Argent says thoughtfully. “It’s a two-step process. You’ve got to get the bug into the victim’s system, then you’ve got to hit him with the spell. Too complicated, too much to go wrong.” This from someone who’s probably got some hands-on experience at assassination.
But I still think I’m right. “The first step’s easy, because you don’t have to worry about nailing collateral targets,” I insist. “Infect as many people as you like . . .”
“The entire Cutters gang?” he puts in.
“. . . a whole fragging city, if necessary,” I override him. “It doesn’t matter, they’re not going to get sick, are they? Then, as much later as you like, you nail the victim with the spell. He gets the bug, and keels over.”
The shadowrunner shakes his head firmly. “No good, Wolf. You’ve got to get a mage or a shaman within range of the target. And if you can do that, why not just cook him in his boots or turn him into a tree or something?”
“It’s a good way to keep your assassin alive,” I say doggedly. “No manhunt, ’cause there’s no murder . . . not one that's obvious at the moment.”
“Okay, point,” Argent concedes. “But it still doesn’t scan right. To trigger the bug, you’ve got to hit it with a spell, right?" Dicer nods. “Which means the spell’s got to get through any magical resistance or shielding or whatever the target’s got up. A serious target’s going to have that shielding—because if he didn’t, you could get the same effect by acquiring an astral link and slamming some nasty ritual sending into him from the other side of the world. And if the target's too inconsequential to have serious astral security, this is just way too much technological overkill. Just hit ’em with a power bolt. Or better yet, knife ’em in an elevator if you really want them gone.”
Which leaves me grinding my teeth. The fragger’s right, and that slots me right off. “Then how do you scan it?” I snap.
To my surprise, it's Doc Dicer who answers. “It seems to me it’s the perfect terrorist weapon,” she says quietly.
We both turn to look at her. "Why?” we say, almost at once.
For a moment it looks like she’s going to back down in the face of our scrutiny, but she visibly grabs some guts and soldiers on. “Several reasons.” She ticks them off on slender fingers. “One. Maximum impact, maximum penetration. Terrorists have tried bioweapons in the past, but they’ve never had full impact. Mainly because some people always come down with the bug before everyone’s been exposed to it, which cues the authorities to what’s going on, and leads to precautions to stop the spread. With something like this? Drop some into the water supply or wherever, and wait a few days—weeks or months, if you feel like it—until a large percentage of the target population’s been exposed.”
She shakes her head. “Hell, you could even wait years, couldn’t you? Then, when you’re ready, you hit the group with the spell—some area-effect thing, probably—and that’s it. Okay, sure, important people—the people who go around with serious astral security—aren’t going to get sick, because the spell won’t get to the bugs. But what percentage of the population is that? Pretty small, I’d say.
“Two.” Another finger. “It’s not a quick kill, which has all sorts of advantages from the terrorist’s point of view. First, there’s the hysteria. Panic, xenophobia, scapegoating of various groups—all the stuff you read about with every plague in history. You’ll probably end up with lots of casualties among people who weren’t even exposed to the bug or the spell, and much greater demands on a city’s or country’s infrastructure.
“And then there’s the medical load. Terrorists kill somebody, and he’s dead. Put him on ice until the ruckus is over, then incinerate him. But this way isn’t anywhere near that clean. This bug doesn’t kill people, it makes them very sick. They go to the hospital or to a clinic, where they tie up a bed, the time and energy of doctors and staff, and other resources, for as long as it takes them to get better or die.” She looks really sour, and I don’t blame her. “If the bug has a
high fatality rate, if there were an epidemic, the logical thing
to do would be triage—simply don’t treat bug victims, because they’re going to die anyway. But no society could do that. And if a society got to the point where it could, the terrorists have basically destroyed it anyway.”
She sighs, a deep, heartfelt sound. “And there are other advantages, too,” she goes on steadily—dully now, almost mechanically, as if suppressing her emotions. “Theoretically, you could spread the bug in advance, years before you even start your terror campaign, whatever it is. The society or government doesn’t know it’s in trouble, so its security is low. After you start your campaign, security's tightened up, but it doesn't matter—you’ve already infected the victims. Then, when the time is right, you trigger the bug. Hell, you could even withhold the epidemic if you get what you want by other means, and nobody would ever know about it.” She shudders. “You could bring down a government with this.” I exchange glances with Argent. Neither of us say anything—there’s not much that needs to be said. Doc Dicer’s right, her analysis makes perfect sense, and I can’t punch any holes in it. I find myself shuddering too. The perfect terrorist weapon is right. Except . . .
“Why’s Paco got it, then?” I ask. “And why the other Cutters? It’s not like it’s something you can pick up from a fragging toilet seat, is it? You’ve got to get the bug—ingest it, breathe it, whatever—and then get nailed by the spell. Why do that to the Cutters?”
“A rival gang?” Dicer asks tentatively, then she scowls and shakes her head. “Erase that. Too complex. Too high-tech for gang war, right?”
The shadowrunner and I nod. Then we exchange glances again, and I get the strong feeling he’s scanning it just the same way I am. And he doesn’t like it either.
It’s me who voices it first. “Field test?”
“Yeah,” Argent rumbles deep in his chest. “That tracks.” The street doc looks back and forth between the two of us. Obviously it doesn't track for her.
“You’re going to try out something like this before you base a whole terrorist campaign on it,” I explain. “Pick some limited social group that’s as parallel as possible to the society you’re eventually going after, then put the scheme through its paces. Work the bugs out early.” I shrug. “And why not a gang? It’s a tight-knit but socially heterogeneous group—the Cutters are, at least—and best of all, mainstream society's not going to pay much attention.”
“If they hear about it at all,” Dicer concludes quietly.
She’s obviously heard the news media’s attempts to downplay the “gang plague" too. “A field test, then?”
“Military and paramilitary organizations always test drek before they put any trust in it,” I say, and Argent nods agreement.
A new expression spreads across the doc’s face. “So do marketers,” she says, so quietly I can barely hear her.
* * *
I don’t know how Argent got to the clinic, but he’s happy enough to ride back to Renton with me in the Westwind. Being in close proximity to the shadowrunner still gives me the creeps, but I’ve got to admit I welcome the chance to bounce ideas off someone else, someone who knows more of the background than I figured was wise to tell Doc Dicer.
Maybe Argent is reading my mind. “How do you scan it?” he asks as we howl up the ramp onto Highway 5 southbound.
I shrug. “The doc’s probably right,” I say slowly. “A bug like that is the perfect terrorist weapon, but terrorists aren’t likely to be the ones to develop a bioweapon, right? Just like terrorists don’t make their own C9 plastique. They buy it from Ares Arms or whoever.”
“Or they steal it,” the runner puts in.
“Whatever. It’s the same thing. What they’re getting is a fully developed, fully tested product.”
“Frightening.”
“No fragging kidding!” I almost snarl back.
We drive on in silence for a couple of minutes. We’re wailing past the gray-black stained Kingdome when Argent speaks again. “So who?”
I shoot him a glance. His face is locked in a grim expression, the same kind of tight control you see on the faces of point-men in Desert Wars gun-cam footage—and again I know he’s thinking the same thing I am. Well, frag, somebody’s got to say it. “The fragging elves, who else? The Tir Taimgire contingent, including chummer Nemo. Too much of a coincidence otherwise.” I shrug again. “Anyway, they had the best opportunity to set it up. Two meets with Blake and the others—at least two—in a Cutters safe house. The
first meet to release the bug into the air, or get it into the
food, or whatever. The second to cast the triggering spell.” A new thought hits like a nine-mil hollow-point, and I feel suddenly very, very cold. “I was around for the first meet .. .”