Hybrid

by Brian O'Grady

  “Delivering a message,” Martin answered.

  “Demands really, and in different times I would view them as quite reasonable, but these are extraordinary times, and I have little concern for states and territories, or even for religions.”

  “You have me thoroughly confused,” Martin said.

  “The message I bring to your government is pure subterfuge. No matter what you do, the original Hybrid Virus will be released, and there is nothing you or anyone can do to stop it.”

  “Then why bother with demands; if you intend to kill us, why not just get on with it?” A single thought kept recycling through Nathan’s mind: this is not really happening; it’s just an academic exercise of a worst-case scenario.

  “From the point of view of the Islamists, it is quite reasonable; you see they believe that they, along with the rest of the world, will survive this attack. Their computer models are quite sophisticated and have convinced them that the outbreak can be confined to the United States.” Avanti’s smile had returned.

  “That’s preposterous! Even the mutation that you’ve already released poses a worldwide threat. There is no possible way a second attack could be contained.” Martin began to sweat. “How could you let them . . . ?” He cut himself off as realization exploded in his mind. “You let them believe that.”

  “No, I didn’t let them; I had to lead them to that conclusion, and it wasn‘t easy. They are not madmen, much as you Americans would like to believe. They are quite reasoned and some are very well educated. They have no desire to destroy the world; they simply want to remake it in their own image.” Avanti leaned back into the cushions of the chair, his face once again shrouded in shadow. “Dying is remarkably liberating; it allows one to think all the unthinkable thoughts.” He said his voice barely a whisper. “They may not wish to destroy the world, but I do, and they have provided me with a convenient vehicle to do just that.”

  “I don’t understand. Most of your life has been dedicated to the eradication of disease and suffering, and now you suddenly decide to create it on a global scale!”

  “Futility, utter and complete futility. What do we have to show for decades of hard work? Nothing—less than nothing. Things are far worse now than when we last met. You know the science, but you along with the rest of our ’best minds’ choose to ignore it, and now we are long since past the point of no return. We had a small chance back then,” Avanti motioned to the conference program in Martin’s hand. “But once again, we proved to be selfish, myopic people, poorly organized politically, socially, and economically, incapable of setting aside petty concerns and dealing with the obvious problems that are now out of control.”

  Martin reopened the program. “The ‘population bomb.’ That hasn’t been taken seriously in more than fifty years.”

  “Neither was global warming until the Arctic began to melt,” Avanti fired back, and Martin saw a glimpse of the old Jaime Avanti. “Twenty years ago, you yourself said that we were in retreat across every socioeconomic and environmental front. You even said it out loud: humans are the problem.”

  “When I said that my intent was only to stimulate discussion and ultimately action. Besides what I really meant was that human nature was the problem.”

  “Bullshit! At least give me the courtesy of the truth,” Avanti retorted. “I was there, I remember what you said, and we both know exactly what you meant, at least before you became a stooge for your government. I stood by what I said that day and I was stripped of everything.”

  Martin stared at the ruined face of the Ukrainian; he had heard of his dismissal, but really never gave it much thought. “So your plan is to eradicate the human species,” he said softly.

  “Not all of it. Just enough to restore a social and ecological balance. A world without borders, religions, or nationalities will emerge from the ashes of the old world. ”

  “You’re back to the problem of containing something that can’t be contained.”

  “Now we’ve come to why you are here.” Avanti reached for the small satchel. “Take this, open it.”

  Martin stood and crossed the floor that separated the two men. “What’s in here?” He asked tentatively taking the bag from Avanti.

  “A choice,” he answered cryptically.

  Martin pulled out a small sealed canister, biohazard stickers wrapped around the length of it.

  “It is all I could gather in secret. My coworkers watched that very closely. Please don’t break the seal, inside is a dehydrated form of the Hybrid Virus. This should help you in your work.”

  “What’s this smaller vial?” Martin held up a glass ampule that held fifty milliliters of an amber fluid.

  “Roughly one thousand doses of a vaccine that must be reformulated and administered within the next 48 hours. You see, Nathan, you are going to live, along with 999 other people of your choosing. I want you to reproduce this vaccine as rapidly as you can and distribute it worldwide. It is quite effective and should ultimately halt the spread of the infection.”

  “But not until after billions have died,” Martin said bitterly.

  “Approximately four point two billion; the computer estimates are accurate only if you begin work tomorrow.”

  Patton watched the pretty brunette from his office television. Great, now they want to pin the governor’s assassination on us. As if on cue, his phone began to ring. He stared at it for a moment, wondering if he had the energy to deal with it. It had to be the mayor. The chief was out sick, and they were the only two who would call him directly.

  “Good evening, Your Honor,” he said, but he didn’t mean it.

  “Rodney, I know you’ve had a tough day, but I’m afraid I’m about to make it a little tougher. I just took a call from the Lieutenant-Governor. He’s had a tough day as well, but he graciously made room in his busy schedule to rip me a new one. He’s got some asshole telling him that the governor’s murder is somehow connected to what’s been happening here.”

  Publicly, the mayor was a jovial, well-spoken man. Privately, he was something very different.

  “I just saw something about that on the television,” said Patton, massaging his forehead with one hand, wondering how he could have ended up so far from home, so far from where things made sense. “I hate to say it, Billy, but it’s possible.” A pregnant pause followed. “I haven’t got a clue as to what’s happening here. There’s no rational explanation, and if this Bilsky character was up here like they say, hell, I’m starting to believe that anything is possible.”

  “Anything may be possible, except this. I’m releasing a statement tonight that, in effect, says that there is no connection between Peter Bilsky and Colorado Springs, and I expect you to back that up. Ken Small died about an hour ago, and you just became interim chief of police.” The mayor spoke so rapidly that Patton wasn’t exactly sure that he had heard him correctly.

  “Ken’s dead? What happened?”

  “It’s not clear. He was at home with the flu and then he started having convulsions. He died at St. Mary’s. Sorry you had to hear about it this way, but life goes on, and we have a crisis to deal with.”

  Patton put the shock of a colleague’s sudden death aside for a moment and focused on the mayor’s other bombshell. “You skipped over three more senior officers, Billy,” he said, and he understood why. Each of them would be in the running to fill Ken Small’s post permanently, and the mayor wouldn’t want any of them to be tainted by this crisis.

  “My prerogative,” the mayor said simply. “Now, you have exactly thirty-six hours to come up with something I can take to the press that explains the violence. Don’t let me down, Rodney.” The line went dead.

  Patton started to massage his head with two hands when a soft knock at the door disturbed him. “Who is it?” he demanded out of frustration.

  “I’m sorry, sir.” It was one of the front desk officers. Patton tried to remember the man’s name but couldn’t, and the young man was so intimidated that he only poked his hea
d around the door, hiding his nametag. “Ah, the old . . . ah, detective is here and wants a word with you.”

  How about scram, he thought. “Who is the ‘old . . . ah detective’ you are referring to, Officer?” he said instead.

  “Greg Flynn,” he said.

  “Him, I will see.” Patton had met Flynn on several occasions and found that he liked and respected the retired detective. He would have been eaten alive in a real city, but he seemed to have a solid understanding of Colorado Springs and had become somewhat of a local legend before retiring and handing his responsibilities over to Patton.

  “Knock, knock,” Flynn said a moment later, walking in and looking around his old office. “Nothing’s changed.”

  Patton smiled, rounded his desk, and pumped Greg’s hand. “How are you, Greg?” He wished that he had thought of talking to Flynn a month ago. His pride had taken such a beating of late that he would have gladly accepted advice from a police cadet.

  Greg took a seat, and Patton leaned on the edge of the desk.

  “I know what’s going on here,” Greg said without preamble.

  “Thank God someone does,” said Patton. A wave of relief, or possibly exhaustion, passed over him.

  “Seven years ago, my daughter-in-law, Amanda, was infected by a virus,” Greg began. He gave Patton the abbreviated and sanitized version of the story, but it still took several minutes. Throughout it, Greg watched Patton closely. He didn’t really know the large black man, and the reports from his old squad weren’t exactly flattering.

  After Greg finished, Rodney walked slowly, thoughtfully, back to his chair.

  “Is this an indication you don’t believe me?” Greg motioned to the distance Patton had just put between them.

  Patton answered, “The Colorado Health Department is sure that there is no infectious cause for this. Two weeks ago, I asked them to look again. They checked the air, the water, even the food, and they still didn’t find anything. “

  “They’re wrong,” Greg said definitively. “They’ve been looking in the wrong places. This virus is passed by human contact. Someone is deliberately infecting the population.”

  Patton’s expression remained neutral.

  “Phil Rucker,” Greg pressed on, “the coroner, told me that about a month ago an unknown virus was found in a previously healthy man’s brain. He thinks that this virus could be damaging people’s brains and altering their behavior.”

  Patton winced at Phil’s name and slowly lowered himself into his chair. Ten minutes ago, he had been confessing that he didn’t have a clue as to what was happening here, and now all the answers had fallen into his lap.

  “Does the name Klaus Reisch mean anything to you?” he asked.

  After a moment Greg said: “No, I don’t think I’ve ever heard that name before.”

  It was now Patton’s turn to tell his story, and Greg listened with an expression questioning the relevance. “Yaeger told me that Reisch had tried to kill him, but he couldn’t because someone named Amanda had hurt him. He said that Reisch reached into his head and squeezed his brain. Now, ordinarily, I’m not really a believer in this X-Files shit, but I got a witness who saw the whole thing, and this guy says Reisch never touched my officer, he just stared at Yaeger, and then he went down. Phillip Rucker said almost the exact same thing about Mr. Van Der.”

  Greg was visibly shaken, despite his best efforts to hide it.

  “Now, Greg, you’re a good guy, everyone knows that, but everyone also knows about your daughter-in-law. Is it possible she is involved with this Reisch character, and they’re out there spreading this virus? This guy used to live in Russia, and they were into some really weird shit in the seventies and eighties. She could have met this guy in Honduras—”

  “No!” Greg didn’t mean to shout, but it did stop Patton. “I’m sorry,” he said after the echo died away. “You’ve got it all wrong. I’ve never heard about this Reisch before, and if Amanda ever had contact with him, she would have told me.”

  “I’m sure you know how that sounds, Greg, and how this all appears. The government held her against her will, you said that yourself, and then a few months later she kills a couple of guys, one of whom happens to be an FBI agent. Now years later, in her hometown, some strange virus that she survived resurfaces.”

  “She’s not a terrorist, and she would never knowingly infect anyone, and it’s not the same virus.”

  “Do you know where she is, Greg?” Patton’s voice had taken on a hard, formal tone.

  “I’m not going to lie to you. I have been in contact with her, and I know for a fact that she hasn’t been in Colorado Springs,” Greg said.

  Greg’s gaze was steady, and Patton accepted his half-answer. “All right,” he said, and then added, “for now. My brother-in-law is a senior analyst for the CIA. I called him earlier today, and he says that this Reisch character is a freelance killer. He supposedly worked for the Soviets for a while, so I’m guessing they’re somehow involved.”

  Scenarios started playing through each of their minds until there was another knock at Patton’s door.

  “Somebody better be dead!” Patton screamed out of habit. Normally, it was a funny joke for a homicide detective, but at this particular instant, he realized to his horror that it was more than a little inappropriate. “God, that was stupid,” he whispered to himself. “I’m sorry, Greg, but Ken Small passed away this evening.”

  Greg was stunned. He had known Ken for nearly thirty years. Ken had been there for Greg and Lisa when Michael and Jacob had died, and they had returned the act of kindness when Ken’s wife, Barbara, had died last September.

  “Somebody has,” said a voice, and the door swung open. Patton never really appreciated federal agents all that much, and Don Heller reminded him why. Tall, well-dressed, and armed with a swagger that could only have been perfected through countless hours of practice in front of a mirror, Heller walked in and immediately made himself at home in Patton’s office. “The governor and your chief of police. Congratulations on the promotion, Rodney.”

  “You’re a living, breathing stereotype, Heller, do you know that?” Patton growled, angry that Greg had now heard that he was taking over Ken Small’s job. “It’s only temporary,” he said to both of them. “What do you want, Special Agent?” Patton added a little extra emphasis on the man’s title.

  “Two things, actually. The first is to inform you that by executive order the entire state of Colorado has now been quarantined. Nothing comes in and nothing goes out. The National Guard and U.S. Army will be working together, but overall control will be federal. All local and state law enforcement agencies have come under the command of Homeland Security. That means you.” Heller paused for a reaction, but was disappointed.

  It was Greg who reacted first. “They know what’s going on,” he said to Patton. “There must be a different source of information.”

  “It couldn’t have been my brother-in-law. He didn’t know anything about the virus,” Patton answered while Heller watched the exchange.

  “There are people in the government, at least in the CDC, who know about the virus. I wonder if someone has put two and two together.”

  They continued their private conversation while Heller listened, slack-jawed.

  “No way they could act this fast,” said Patton. “I think you’re right, they’ve got another source. Michael said that people far above his pay grade had started asking about Reisch.” He stood, nervous energy coursing through him.

  “Who the fuck is Reisch?” Heller practically screamed.

  “Sorry, Don,” Greg said.

  Patton started to pace, amazed that Greg had the patience to tolerate fools like Heller. Maybe that’s the reason for his success—people skills, he thought.

  “Klaus Reich is a German,” said Flynn and turned towards Patton to confirm that he had pronounced the last name correctly. Rodney nodded. “We think that Reisch is purposely infecting people with a virus that damages the brain and caus
es people to become violent. It seems likely that this is a terrorist attack, and that someone in the government knows something about it. That’s why they ordered a quarantine.”

  “Okay,” Heller said, regaining some of his composure. “Fill me in. How do you know this?”

  “That’s not important,” Rodney said brusquely. “You need to tell your people in Washington that Reisch is here, or at least was this afternoon, and that he’s on the run. One of my officers may have wounded him, so I doubt he’s gotten far.”

  Patton had positioned himself directly in front of Heller and was using his more-than-four hundred-pound frame to intimidate the much smaller man into action.

  “Is this related to the officer-involved shooting at the hotel?” Heller asked, staring up at Patton.

  “Yes, and we have a pretty good eyewitness description. We’ve passed it on to the media.”

  “Excellent, excellent,” the FBI agent said. “I’ll pass this on. There is one more thing, and it involves you, Greg.”

  “Me?” Greg’s heart skipped a beat. There was only one reason the FBI would have an interest in him.

  “I need you to come with me and convince Amanda to turn herself in.” Heller’s tone had become almost sympathetic. “Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not using this situation as an excuse to close an open case. Privately, we all know what happened seven years ago. That’s not what this is about.”

  “Amanda is not spreading this virus,” Greg said, his anger rising to the surface.

  “Honestly, I didn’t know anything about a virus until I walked in here. What I do know is that more than a hundred agents have been flown into a quarantine area to find her. We know she’s here, and we will find her. I don’t want anyone hurt, and that includes Amanda.”