SIX

KEASLING SIGHED, TOOK off his hat, and wiped his arm across his forehead. He sat on the back of one of the nearby couches and said, “That’s the thing, Jack. There isn’t anyone to kill. Not yet, anyway.”

“Then what’s the deal?” King asked.

Keasling motioned to the woman, who was chewing on her lip and looking around the room. “She is.”

King turned to the woman. “And you are?”

The woman said nothing in return. She was still scanning the room with her deep brown eyes, absorbing every detail, sound, and color.

“Hello,” King said loudly. “Miss?”

The woman snapped out of her distracted state and met King’s eyes. For a moment her brown eyes fluttered, but not in some kind, flirtatious way. She looked more like an android recalling some bit of information. And it wasn’t far from the truth. Her mind had heard what her consciousness had missed and was quickly replaying the words for her. “Sorry,” she said, shaking King’s offered hand. “Sara Fogg. CDC.”

“The CDC?” King said.

“Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,” Sara added.

“I know what it stands for.” He hid his amusement with a serious voice. Fogg was beautiful, poised, and extremely distracted. Out of her element. Then again, he had no idea exactly what element she’d call home. She didn’t look like the rugged type—styled short hair, face made up—but her short fingernails held chipped polish and what appeared to be a layer of trapped dirt. She wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. “What I don’t understand is why you are here.”

“I’m a disease detective,” Sara said.

Rook raised an eyebrow.

Sara noticed his skepticism. “I’m sure you all think that you’re saving the world by killing terrorists. But statistically you’re only saving a few thousand lives every year. What I do saves millions of lives. Terrorists are not the real killers on planet Earth. Disease is.”

Keasling held up his hand, silencing her. “Let me explain. You’re making a bad first impression.”

King stayed silent. Most people shared Sara’s opinion about what they did. But disease couldn’t fire bullets and it didn’t plot the demise of civilization. Disease was a fact of life, not the enemy. Not an assassin. “Let’s get back to the president. How did he die?”

“Actually, he’s not dead,” Keasling said. “Died. The Secret Service with him at the time were able to bring him back. He’s resting comfortably in a hospital right now, though he’ll be under constant observation for the next few days. But, for thirty seconds yesterday, the president was dead.”

“And?” Knight asked.

“The president had a heart attack. He—”

“I thought the president was a health freak,” Queen said.

“He is,” Keasling replied.

“How does a health nut have his ticker stop?” Rook asked.

“Genetic defect?” Knight offered.

Keasling tried to respond, but Rook beat him to the punch. “A secret addiction to fast food?”

“Rook,” Queen said with the tone of a high school Latin teacher.

Rook shrugged. “Hey, the guy lived.”

Sara’s frustration built. This was going nowhere fast. She grunted and spoke. “It wasn’t a heart attack. The president died from a genetic disorder known as the Brugada syndrome. He’s perfectly healthy. His cholesterol is better than average. His heart rate is like a metronome. He’s in his forties but has the body of a thirty-year-old. And his heart is structurally normal.”

Sara found five sets of eyes on her. They were listening.

“But when he was given an electrocardiograph, a characteristic pattern emerged—one that belongs to people with Brugada. Sudden death is caused by fast polymorphic ventricular tachycardia or ventricular fibrillation. Either one of these arrhythmias can occur in an instant, with no warning at all. Sensations commonly warning of a heart attack—pain in the left arm, shortness of breath—do not occur with Brugada; your heart simply stops and you fall over dead. The president was conscious for only a few moments after his heart stopped. He felt a pain in his chest. Then a wave of nausea. That’s it. He doesn’t remember hitting the ground.

“There are no outward signs that any one person has the disease until they fall over dead, unless of course you think to test yourself, which is ridiculous because only point zero five percent of the world’s population has the gene and out of that number only a tiny fraction become active, mostly in men. It’s so rare that most doctors don’t even know about it.”

Sara finished and ran her fingers through her spiky black hair. “Questions?”

Rook gave a flick of his fingers, as though shooing a fly. “So the president was born with some kind of stealth disease. How does this involve us?”

“When a new president takes office, he’s given a gamut of physicals, screened for diseases and genetic disorders that might pose a risk. This includes an electrocardiograph. He was cleared of Brugada two weeks after he took office. The Brugada syndrome is a germ cell mutation, meaning it’s inherited from parents at birth. Tom Duncan did not have Brugada when he took office . . . he contracted the disease one week ago, when he was unknowingly exposed to a new strain of avian influenza—bird flu.”

King felt the hair on his arms rising. He sensed there was more news and that it was dire. Why else would you need the world’s most effective Delta team to deal with a disease? It’s not like you could shoot something microscopic.

Sara rolled her neck. She had explained this more than ten times in the past day, and it was getting old. She’d been shuttled from one facility to another as the backbone of a plan was formulated with her at its core. “Bird flu is not typically contagious to people, but there are cases of it jumping species, and this strain looks like nothing we’ve seen before. It’s mutated in a way that it is just as contagious as any other flu, but it also carries genes, which it adds to the host’s DNA.”

“The gene for Brugada,” King said.

Sara nodded. “Turning a typical nasty flu into a guaranteed killer, at least to men. It’s airborne, so a cough or sneeze will do the trick in spreading it to the people around you. It spreads like the common cold, but kills as surely as a bullet to the back of your head. What was once passed down through birth is now contagious and the whole world is at risk. Several of the president’s aides who came down with the flu have also tested positive for Brugada, as have the Secret Service men who revived him and the doctors who treated him. The White House is now under quarantine. No one comes or goes. But that’s just the beginning. We had to track down everyone who visited the White House, and everyone they came into close contact with for the past week. Hundreds of people have been quietly quarantined in their own homes until we can have everyone tested, but many are showing flulike symptoms already.”

Sara paused to make sure all eyes of the stone-faced team were on her, and then continued, “The president caught the disease from someone else, so we knew there was a source. We traced all of the president’s meetings over the past few weeks, backtracking the itineraries of anyone he came into contact with. We got a red flag one week back. Daniel Brentwood, owner of Elysian Games, met with the president after spending some time in Asia, incubator for most of the world’s emerging bird flus.”

“And Brugada,” King added.

“Yes.”

“So this is what? A new bioterror weapon?” Rook asked.

“That’s possible, but we have yet to determine a motive or goal and no one has claimed responsibility. But we know one thing for sure: if someone gave Brentwood Brugada, they took a huge risk. If this had gotten out in the open it would have been a pandemic that would make the Black Plague look a light shade of gray.”

“Was this created in a lab?” Queen asked.

“We don’t think so, but it seems likely someone is now weaponizing it.”

“Have you warned anyone?” Knight asked.

“Warning people would only complicate things at this point.”

“Are you saying,” King said, “that the majority of people in the United States . . . in the world, could contract this genetic-disease-carrying bird flu, which could kill them at any time, and you’re not telling anyone about it?”

“You need to understand that there is no cure for this. And we believe the new strain is contained for the time being. Telling people would be counterproductive. Picture a world where every person might just drop dead at any moment. Can you imagine what kind of chaos revealing this threat would create? We’d see more people being murdered than actually dying from the disease. There is no quick fix here. It’s more than a simple virus. The disease alters genetic code. Permanently.”

“I didn’t think that was possible,” Knight said.

“Under normal circumstances, it’s not. Most of us die with the genetic code we were born with, and if we’re not hit by a truck or struck by lightning, it’s the same genetic code that determines the time and method of our death. But mutations do occur. Overexposure to radiation, the sun, or ingestion of certain chemicals can alter our genetic code.”

“You’re talking about cancer,” Queen said.

Sara nodded. “That’s the typical manifestation, yes. When a mutation occurs in a cell and it’s not repaired, and the cell divides, that mutation will be carried on so that all cells duplicated from the one will contain the DNA change. This is an acquired mutation, and is generally not passed on to our children, but that doesn’t hold true with Brugada, which is typically passed down through generations.

“To find a cure, we need to find the source, or a person near the source with an immunity. Even then, our chances are slim, but if we don’t succeed, within a week, people—mostly men—are going to start dropping dead. The president’s aides, Secret Service agents, senators, most of the White House staff. They’re all going to die, very soon. Never mind the possibility that this has already been deployed in other parts of the world. Half the world could have contracted the disease and no one would be the wiser.”

“So the disease doesn’t affect women?” Knight asked.

Sara shook her head no. “It does, but not nearly as frequently. We’re not sure yet how this new strain will act, but we believe it will hold true. All that has changed from the original disease is the time frame in which it kills—the president and Brentwood both died within a week of contracting flu symptoms. Women, for the most part, are unaffected.”

“Which is why you need the Chess Team,” Queen said.

Keasling cleared his throat. “You’re the only woman in the Special Forces, Queen. If all these guys drop dead, you’ll still be around to finish the job.”

“But she won’t be alone,” King said, eyeing Sara. “Will she?”

“No,” Sara said. “I’m going with you.”

Rook frowned. “No offense, but I think that’s a really bad idea.”

That was just the kind of macho garbage Sara had expected. And she wasn’t going to take it. There was too much at stake. “Just because I’m not a soldier—”

“I’m not trying to bust your chops,” Rook said. “I just don’t like—”

Sara raised her voice. “I can watch out for myself.”

“But you don’t have to watch out for yourself,” King said. He looked back at Rook. “Because that’s our job.”

Rook shrugged and leaned back. “Just don’t want her getting hurt is all.”

“And you won’t let her get hurt,” Keasling said. “She’s your mission. Keep her alive long enough to complete her mission.”

“To find the cure,” King said.

“Yes,” Sara said.

Knight squinted his almond-shaped eyes. “But why just her? Why not a team of scientists?”

“The first reason,” Keasling started, “is that we need to keep as low a profile as possible. A whole team of scientists would be hard to miss. And Miss Fogg is—”

“Better than any team of scientists you’ll find. I have two doctorates. One in molecular biology. Another in genetics. And an under-grad in biochemistry. I’ve published on molecular evolution and analytical morphometry. When I got bored with the research labs I joined the CDC and pursued fieldwork. I’ve been in outbreak hot zones around the world. Kenya. Congo. India. I’ve handled cases of bluetongue, malaria, cholera, dengue fever, and leishmaniasis. And I’ve spent the last week studying Brugada, which is more time than anyone else physically capable of joining this mission.”

“Been shot at?” Rook asked.

Sara sucked in a quick breath. “No. But you won’t find anyone with my credentials who has been.”

“You’re probably right about that,” King said, then flashed an honest grin. “And what you deal with is more deadly than bullets, anyway, right?”

Sara’s lips curled in a slight smile. “Right.” She composed herself, stepped forward, and opened the top of her blouse, revealing her sternum and a small stitched-up incision. “If we’re just about finished with my interview, you all need to have some minor surgery. Each of you will have a cardioverter defibrillator implanted on your heart. Without getting technical, if your heart stops beating it will deliver a shock that should bring you back.”

“Should?” said Knight.

“Mortality rates in Brugada patients with cardioverters has been zero percent for the past ten years, but this new strain may affect the body in different ways. We haven’t had long to study it, so I can’t make any promises.”

Keasling stood. Time was short. “Wheels up in two hours. Get squared away and to the Pope airfield by . . .” Keasling checked his watch. “Thirteen hundred hours. We’ll debrief in detail there.”

“What about the surgery?” Queen asked.

Keasling smiled. “It’s a long flight.”

“Where are we headed?” King asked.

Keasling’s smile fell. “Brugada’s birthplace. Annamite Mountains . . . Vietnam.”