Pandora's Succession (8 page)

He stormed away a few paces and then doubled back. Fox knew he was not being fair to her, but it made him feel better to act as though it was her fault.
How could she be so close to such a stomach-turning sight and be unaffected? She didn’t even flinch. Maybe it was an act.

“I must admit that I haven’t seen anything like this since 1987,” said Marx. “I was just starting out with the CDC when I accompanied my colleagues to Northern Canada where the first outbreak occurred in a small Inuit community. There weren’t too many deaths, since Pandora is less effective in the cold. We were able to contain the outbreak and also keep the incident out of the papers to prevent a widespread panic. But when our research revealed exactly how dangerous Pandora was, our government at the time thought they had found an alternative to the nuclear bomb. The Department of Defense had contracts with the CDC for R and D funding.”

Fox glanced at all of the body bags. “Looks to me that it didn’t need either more research or development. After what’s happened here, I’d say it accomplished what it was supposed to.”

“Only too well. You see, there was fear that if we were to release it on the enemy that it might find its way back to us because we had limited control over it when it was airborne.”

“What do you mean?”

“Once released, wind currents, for example, can blow Pandora almost anywhere. We could potentially harm a friendly nation. You’ve seen how easily it spreads.”

“Therefore, Pandora can’t be controlled once it’s released.”

“That’s exactly what all the critics said about the project. The best my colleagues and I were able to do, was to freeze its replication by immersing Pandora in liquid nitrogen. That’s how it’s stored. Before it was released, it would be fed with small doses of a protein supplement which would give it longevity before it came in contact with a potential host.”

“So it
does
have a weakness—starvation. That’s why none of it was found by the time we arrived, because it starved to death.”

“Correct. That’s why it was so important for us to choose this location to set up this compound, far away from any populated areas. Other than starvation, Pandora’s virtually indestructible. Unlike a regular missile, shooting down a missile containing Pandora won’t do anything but release it into the atmosphere where it will inevitably drop to earth.”

“If you were to feed it a large amount of its supplement, how would that affect its reproduction rate versus feeding it a smaller amount of the same supplement?”

“An increase in supplement is directly proportional to its reproductive rate. The more food it ingests, the more offspring it produces.” Marx then motioned in the direction of the door. “Judging from the distance between here and where the helicopter was, whomever used this weapon must have fed Pandora with a fair amount of the protein supplement in order for it increase in such numbers that it would’ve reached it so quickly.”

“But wouldn’t the force of the helicopter’s propellers be strong enough to fan away the microbes?”

“Not necessarily. As I mentioned earlier, the reproductive rate of a single Pandora microbe is directly correlated with the amount of food it ingests. If a large enough quantity of the complex protein supplement were fed to it, it would not only reproduce so extremely rapidly as to appear as a green-colored explosion.”

“Which is probably what happened here,” said Fox.

“No doubt,” Marx nodded. “And the wonderful thing about Pandora is that energy from the parent is transferred to its clones, only gradually decreasing in each generation.”

“I don’t know which school of thought you come from, but I don’t find anything
wonderful
about Pandora.”

Marx gasped at the comment. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say it that way. I was only speaking from a scientific point of view.”

Fox followed her out of the isolation chamber as she continued with the conversation. She put her hands into her pockets. “A few years ago there was a second outbreak, again up in Northern Canada, near the north pole, when two university scientists accidentally exhumed a Pandora-infected prehistoric man, buried under the ice for what could’ve been a few millennia. Their SOS was intercepted by the National Security Agency’s Echelon system. You could imagine the horror I felt when my phone rang soon after.”

Echelon was the National Security Agency’s computer program that automatically intercepted keywords in regular conversation, either on a regular phone or through cyberspace, used to track potential terrorist threats. The system had been updated to include references to Pandora.

“I flew up there with a team and fortunately arrived on time to contain the outbreak. I thought that was the last we’d see of Pandora, until now,” said Marx.

Fox ran a finger over his left eyebrow. “Pandora wasn’t created, after all.”

“Most definitely not. The ice man’s discovery suggests that Pandora is a microbe that existed in prehistoric times. It managed to survive over time by lying dormant in the ice man. My guess is that at the time that he and members of his community were infected, he either fell through a frozen lake or was buried under an avalanche while the rest were wiped out.”

They reached the doorway to the dome and exited where Walsh was.

Fox walked up to Walsh. “You all right? You’ve lost some color in your face.”

“I’ll live, and I tan easily,” Walsh replied. “What I still can’t figure out is how Ares managed to get their hands on Pandora.”

“Ares has spies everywhere, unless they discovered it on their own.” But Fox felt that the latter explanation was the least likely.

“No matter how they discovered it, whoever’s responsible for this disaster went far enough to kill everyone to cover their tracks,” said Walsh.

Dr. Marx turned when she heard a cleanup-crew member shout out to her. “Dr. Marx, we found another victim.”

“I’ll be right there,” she replied. She turned to Fox and Walsh. “I have to go. I’ll send you my results when I’m done.”

“Sure thing, Doc,” replied Walsh.

Fox nodded to her. He was about to walk away when Marx called back to him. “Oh, Fox, watch your back. You never know what or who may turn up.”

“I’ll make sure of that.” Fox checked the ground to make sure he didn’t step in anything gelatinous as both he and Walsh walked back to their transport helicopter that was outside the compound.

With no survivors or any retrievable data so far, the trail was about to run cold. And those responsible wanted it that way. Fox knew he would go sleepless for several nights knowing that a surprise attack was imminent.

Chapter 8

West Tokyo

Hideaki Hashimoto usually read the morning news from his laptop computer at 6:00 AM while he sipped on a cup of hot tea. He preferred sitting outside at the gazebo in the garden when it was sunny and warm. But this morning was different. It was 5:35 AM, and he was inside his office tearing through webpage after webpage on his laptop as his tea sat untouched on his desk. Three hours ago, a telephone call woke him up, alerting him of the incident in Uganda.

He must have checked the same news pages several times over, convinced he had missed something. CNN.com, BBC.co.uk—they had nothing. Maybe news on the Pandora outbreak in southern Uganda would only break later that morning, unless the officials wanted to keep the incident under tight wrap to avoid a worldwide panic.

There was a knock at the door.

“Enter,” Hashimoto said in Japanese. His personal secretary walked in holding an envelope and an agenda. She then closed the door behind her. “Come in, Ms. Miyake.” His eyes never left the monitor.

Ms. Miyake removed her heels at the door as she crossed the Kars rug on her way to her boss’s desk and handed him a manila envelope. “Good morning, sir.”

Hashimoto placed the envelope on the edge of his desk. “Any news worth telling me about?”

“Yes, sir. The approval of Hexagon’s recent purchase of Warner-Parke Pharmaceuticals in the US has yielded great results. Shares have shot up from $820 US to $1027 US per share.”

“Anything else?”

“There’s another testing of Project Clarity this morning.”

“At nine o’clock?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Make sure my driver knows I want to be there at least half an hour early. I personally want to meet the two test subjects.”

“I’ll see that he gets the message,” said Ms Miyake as she scribbled notes into her agenda. “There’s also your scheduled teleconference with a Nick Archer from
Financial Planet Magazine
at—”

“Cancel that meeting. I’ll conveniently be busy during that hour.”

“I’ll email him the message right away, sir.” More notes were scribbled into the agenda.

The desk phone rang and Hashimoto snatched it. “Moshi moshi?”

“I’ve arrived a few moments ago with the package. I couldn’t contact you sooner for security reasons,” said a Russian-accented voice in English. Hashimoto covered the ear piece and gave a head signal to his secretary to leave. She quickly obliged, understanding his need for privacy.

“That’s understandable,” Hashimoto replied in the same language, recognizing Valerik’s voice.

“Not too much trouble, I expect.”

“Of course not. I know these people. It was a piece of cake, as the Americans say. Nothing complicated. I only wish the two men you assigned to accompany me would relax a bit. A shot of Vodka to celebrate wouldn’t hurt.”

“My men were not trained to drink, but to obey. The Undertaker would be very disappointed to hear you talk like that, after everything she’s done for us. I trust they’ve done everything you’ve asked?”

“Yes, and all too well. They were both a bit more passionate than I was. Anyhow, I’ll see you later this morning after I get sleep. It was a long flight.”

“Excellent work. Your brothers and sisters have much to be grateful for. By the way, I was notified not too long ago of a certain incident. Our friends are searching for two men.”
Men that don’t exist, of course.
Hashimoto was careful to avoid using words such as
Americans
,
manhunt
or
Uganda
in the same sentence. “Do you have any concerns?”

“My former comrades will also be kept so busy running from our friends that they won’t have time to come look for me.”

“Don’t be too sure of that.”

“I know.”

Hashimoto hung up the phone, more assuaged than when he had answered it. Pandora was finally in his possession, the online news could wait. He knew his tea would be cold by now. That was nothing to stress over, he would send for another cup later.

Hashimoto was a handsome man, standing five-foot-seven inches and he was relatively fit for sixty-four. He had a doctorate certificate in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Tokyo. That and his numerous awards took up an entire wall. The other side was covered with awards and framed newspaper articles related to Hexagon Pharmaceuticals, of which he had been the CEO for the past twenty-three years. He was one of the youngest CEOs to have ever been given that title in the history of the company dating back to 1860.

Hashimoto’s association with Valerik went back as far as the early 1980’s, when the Soviets had recruited him based on his unique knowledge of brainwashing techniques. Hashimoto’s human experiments during the Soviet-Afghan war would’ve had him arrested for war crimes several years ago had the secret gotten out. In addition to the handsome salary the Soviets gave him, they facilitated his climb up the corporate ladder to become CEO of Hexagon Pharmaceuticals.

This was all threatened the day Dr. Tabitha Marx—otherwise known as the Undertaker—paid him a visit. She told him that she knew everything about him and Valerik after she rummaged through her late mother’s belongings. Blackmailing him was easy. Her making him trick Valerik into visiting his office only to have the Clarity drug used on him in order to brainwash him into becoming a double agent for Dr. Marx was pure genius.

Hashimoto accepted that he, himself, was tricked by Marx into taking Clarity, it was the best thing that ever happened to him. Since that day, Hashimoto was able to see that religion and politics were the root of all of the world’s problems. The world only needed one belief system, and that’s why she told him that he should establish his own cult, The Promise, and use Clarity to help recruit members. Hexagon was the perfect front.

Hashimoto wasn’t surprised that Dr. Marx hadn’t called him yet. She was on an American Military base—she’d be crazy to think that her phone call was secure. Valerik should’ve text-messaged a code to her that would’ve passed under the Intelligence community’s radar, illustrating his success in acquiring Pandora. This would in turn let her know that it was all right to disperse of what she had obtained. Framing Ares for it was a bonus.

Stealing Pandora from the weapons consortium, known as the Arms of Ares, would be a serious blow to that organization. Valerik was a professional. He’d proven himself several times before and wouldn’t be so careless as to lead a trail to either him or Hexagon Pharmaceuticals.