She stretched her arms above her head and stood up from her chair, then walked with stiff legs to the glass wall of the pyramid. Outside all was inky black, although she could just see the stars peppering the clear sky above, and the thin silver slice that was the moon. Ahead of her, across the darkness of the campus, came the dull glow of the main gatehouse. She knew there were two guards in there, watching over the place on their CCTV monitors. She had accessed the central video computer and fed a film loop into the camera that watched over her. Now any guard checking her work area would see an empty, static office instead of the GENIUS IT director accessing one illegal database after another.
She walked back to the computer and retook her seat. Seeing Christ's hologram had terrified her, making her feel she had somehow summoned up his spirit against his wishes, like some necromancer of old. She had searched her soul the whole night and the better part of the next day after the Nazareth genes had been found. She hadn't known what to do--whether to tell Tom she wanted out of Cana, or to carry on with what promised to be something miraculous. Eventually, after no small amount of good old-fashioned praying, she'd decided that if these genes could help cure Holly, and mankind in general, then she had to follow the project through. And it was up to her to find a match now. Tom and Holly depended on her.
She rechecked her notes on all the databases she intended to visit. She had listed them in ascending order of difficulty and risk. It made sense to try to find a match the safest way possible, and only to take risks when they were necessary.
After all, getting caught and convicted wouldn't help any of them. Even so, Jasmine knew that the richest pickings tended to lie with the larger, better protected databases. The most impressive of these was a Paris-based system she had nicknamed the "Black Hole" because although it was vast--containing many millions of genomes, it was also protected by the new Version 3 Predator system. This made it as secure as her own IGOR system, which she regarded as virtually impregnable. Anyone who went into the Black Hole without the proper authorization or the requisite skill would be sucked in, and not allowed to log off--then the Predator system would lock on to the hacker's signal and quickly trace it. Razor Buzz would have found it irresistible, but the older, more experienced Dr. Jasmine Washington was more mindful of the real risks. She would consider entering the Black Hole only when and if she had to.
She moved the cursor on the screen to the next system on her list. Everyone even remotely connected with genetics knew of the Human Genome Diversity Database. It contained the fruits of the controversial project of the same name. Set up in the early nineties as the brainchild of two geneticists, Luigi Luca CavalliSforza at Stanford University and Kenneth Kidd at Yale, the Human Genome Diversity Project was an offshoot of the Human Genome Project. Its intention was to capture and preserve the DNA and potentially rare genes of over five hundred ethnic communities in remote areas of the world. Many, such as the Hadza of Tanzania, the Yukaghir of Siberia, and the Onge of the Andaman Islands of India, were on the verge of extinction.
The controversy arose because Western science was seen to be valuing the DNA of these vanishing peoples more highly than the people themselves. There were many notorious cases of the West, particularly the U. S. government, trying to patent rare genes that promised to combat certain diseases. These attempts were quashed, but if they had been allowed to take their course then all the considerable profits would have gone to the U. S. government and the drug companies, not to the indigenous "owners" of the genes.
The Genescope had made it possible for the project lead ers to lay down guidelines ensuring that all individuals who gave samples were identified, so if any rare gene line was discovered it could be traced back to the original person, family, or community. That person, family, or community would then benefit from any bounty that might ensue. Once these shared genetic mining rights were agreed on, the project went ahead more smoothly and all the genomes were stored for reference on the Human Genome Diversity Database.
Jazz clicked on the icon and watched the front-end panel flash its request for her password. She recognized the basic architecture of the system immediately: an advanced Kibuki 2000 relational database with built-in security features. As with all things Japanese, Jazz was impressed by the design of the system. The series of gates protecting access to the database were tightly programmed, well thought through, and strewn with a number of cleverly placed software alarms.
But she wasn't fazed. Razor Buzz may not have been as active as in the past, but Dr. Jasmine Washington had been keeping up on developments--indeed shaping them. In her experience, well-designed Japanese systems always had one tragic flaw. The very beauty and clarity of their design tended to be their Achilles' heel.
Her hand instinctively reached across and took a slice of cold pizza, and as she chewed, she thought. When finished, she absentmindedly wiped her lips with the back of her hand, and started tapping on the keyboard. One by one she undid each invisible stitch of programming the original designer had used to sew up the database. Each time, as she disabled one security gate after another, her guesses were proven right. That was the problem with this system. It was too well designed. Too predictable.
In less than forty minutes, like the Razor Buzz of old, she was inside, browsing the database, importing a copy of the Nazareth genes file and searching for an exact match of the genetic sequences contained within it.
She reached for the diet Coke, preparing for a short wait. Even with her powerful 100 terahertz machine the search through a database this size could take some time.
But the "Match Found" message blinked almost instantly.
So fast that she was taken off balance, spilling her drink over her T-shirt and jeans.
"Jeez."
Her fleeting annoyance swiftly changed to excitement when she saw the screen change and a scanned photograph appear with a body of text beside it. The image looked like a mug shot: a man's dark face framed with long gray hair looking straight at her. She liked the face; it was strong and dignified, even noble. The man looked old, but in excellent condition: His torso was bare and the muscle definition firm. She scrolled halfway down the text beside the picture. He was a Wayuu Indian from Carisal in Colombia. His surname was Puyiana, but his first name was given only as Al. Her heart jumped when she read the lines near the bottom of the screen.
"Accredited with powers of healing," read the text.
Al was a medicine man. Jasmine read how Al Puyiana, unlike other healers in the area, didn't use his knowledge of local herbs and plants to tend the sick but used the "laying on of hands." The scientists who compiled the record claimed not to understand how he did this, but stated that there was " strong evidence" he possessed a " genuine gift."
On the top of the screen she saw option icons offering more information on the man. The one she paid most heed to was the "genetic data" icon, which would confirm the match with the Nazareth genes--genes which the scientists before her no doubt missed because of their different stop and start codons. She was about to click on the icon when she noticed there were two dates under Al's name, not just his birth date. The second was a little over three months ago.
She went back to the body copy and scrolled down to the bottom of the text.
"Oh, no," she whispered. She felt a twinge of real sadness for this man she'd just met. Al Puyiana, with the strong face and healing hands, had died three months ago at the ripe old age of ninety-two.
She checked the genetic sequence match again. It was perfect. The dead man had the three Nazareth genes hidden within his genome, each one identical to the sequence found in the Christ sample. She copied his file and gene scan and exported it to the backup disk next to her PC. Even in death he might offer up other secrets.
"Shit." To learn they'd missed him by three months just wasn't fair. She considered calling Tom to tell him what had happened, but dismissed that when she looked at the time again. Almost one-thirty in the morning. She knew he was staying late tonight, but
doubted he was still here. Perhaps she should go home and get some sleep as well, but she felt too restless. She read the text on the Wayuu Indian from Carisal one more time. The words "accredited with powers of healing" seemed to project off the screen and taunt her.
With a deep sigh she double-checked that there were no more matches in the system, then methodically exited, ensuring she left no trace of her intrusion. Like all those times many years ago, she had once again stolen invisibly into a dark, seemingly impenetrable fortress and then crept back out, leaving the guards sleeping, unaware that their defenses had even been breached.
Perhaps it was frustration at having got so close that made her do what she did next. Or the fact that she was too revved up to sleep. Or possibly she was simply enjoying being the rebellious, antiestablishment Razor Buzz again. Whatever the reason, Dr. Jasmine Washington ignored the long list of DNA databases painstakingly compiled in order of ascending risk, and went straight to the final entry. It was time to see whether Razor Buzz really could still hack it. Whether the cyberlord could steal into the darkest fortress of them all--the Black Hole.
Half an hour later, the GENIUS security guards were changing shifts in the main gatehouse. The two new guards clattered through the door and exchanged a few obscene pleasantries with their outgoing colleagues. Gus Stransky had been with Shield, the private security firm that oversaw the GENIUS campus, for almost seven years. He was in his fifties and had been one of Boston's finest before being pensioned off early with a bullet-damaged right ankle. Despite the hours, he liked security work. It gave him a breather from his nag of a wife, Doris.
The GENIUS contract was a dream. The place had money and was equipped with the best technology. All he had to do was sit in the gatehouse and watch the CCTV screens for anything weird. And ever since Sweden, when Mrs. Carter had been shot, security had been doubled--so he even had company too. His partner tonight was new, a young dark-haired guy called Bart Johnson, tallish with a strong build. Bart had been drafted onto the GENIUS contract only a couple of days ago. Still, he seemed okay and Gus was used to being paired off with the rookies. His supervisor always said that he had a way with them.
In the gatehouse there were two banks of CCTV monitors. One showed views outside the main pyramid, covering most of the campus including the protein production sheds across to the right. The other bank looked inside the pyramid, including one screen that permanently displayed the atrium and the other two guards sitting there. One man could sit between both banks and cover them all, but tonight Gus took the external set and let the rookie have the interior shots.
Gus quickly checked all his CCTV screens and saw that everything appeared to be in order. He turned to his partner. "You married, Bart? Or are you happy?"
Bart smiled. "Happy, I guess."
Gus watched the younger guy scanning the screens in front of him. All showed empty offices. Only the ward and the Crick Laboratory appeared to be occupied. Dr. Carter was still at work in the Crick Lab. It was impossible to make out exactly what he was doing, but he seemed engrossed at his bench.
Bart punched a button, opening up the intercom to the guards in the atrium of the pyramid.
"How's it going in there?"
One of the guards on screen put up his right hand and raised a thumb. "Okay so far. That you, Bart?"
"Sure is, Georgie boy."
"Is old Gus there?"
Bart looked across and grinned at Gus's frown. "Yeah, old Gus is here. How you both doing?"
"It's very quiet," crackled back the voice on the intercom. "So quiet that I could do with some excitement."
Gus took out a stick of Doublemint gum and began chewing it. He offered some to Bart, but the younger man just shook his head. Gus put the gum away in his top breast pocket, sat back in his chair, and methodically flicked through his screens. The protein sheds were deserted inside and out; as were all the grounds. Nothing stirred.
Suddenly he felt his young partner stiffen beside him. Gus turned to see Bart staring at the screen that displayed the Crick Lab, where Dr. Carter was working.
"Anything wrong?" he asked wearily. Why were these young guys always so uptight, always seeing danger lurking in every shadow?
Bart's eyebrow creased. "Not sure." He stood up and vacated his seat. "Gus, come and take a closer look at this, and tell me what you see."
Gus sighed, but stood up. "Okay," he said unenthusiastically. If he had a dollar for every time a rookie asked him to pass his experienced eye over some stupid shadow or dirty smudge on the screen he wouldn't need to work. That was for sure.
The younger guard made way for him as he bent to check the monitor. "What's the problem?" Gus asked. "I don't see anything."
"Bottom right. It's small. Real small."
Gus leaned farther forward. But he saw nothing. Only Dr. Carter, scratching his head over a row of glass dishes. What the hell was Bart playing at? Then there was a quiet metallic click behind him. At first it didn't register; then like a note from a long-forgotten song he remembered what the sound was.
A gun being primed.
He turned, more angry than frightened. "What the fu--?"
He said no more as two hissed reports sent a searing heat into his chest. It was a strange feeling. Not so much pain as total breathlessness. Stunned, he reached down and touched his tunic. It was damp and sticky, and there were red splatters on the monitors ahead of him. Blood, he realized, with bemused calm: his blood. Shit, he'd been shot. He felt weak and giddy, so he sat down on the chair and tried to get his breath back--but it was gone--gone for good. He looked around and saw Bart watching him closely. It didn't make sense; his young partner was holding a gun, with a silencer attached to it. He felt a deep tiredness and lay back in the chair, trying to get more comfortable. All the time Bart kept staring at him.
As everything began to fade, only two thoughts remained to trouble his consciousness. One was the realization that he would never see his wife Doris again, which made him surprisingly sad. The other was why he'd never noticed before that one of Bart's eyes was blue, and the other brown.
Maria Benariac made sure Gus's lifeless body wouldn't fall from the chair before opening her bag. She put the gun inside it and checked the other tools she had brought along for tonight. It had taken her a whole day to find the nails. None of the hardware stores seemed to stock any which were long or strong enough. But she was confident the five she had eventually found in Charlestown would suffice. She only needed four but a spare might come in handy. And the mallet she'd found in Bart Johnson's apartment was heavy enough to drive in the nails.
Shooting Gus hadn't counted as a kill in the true sense of the word. Nor had killing Bart Johnson, the rookie guard from Shield security from whom she had borrowed the uniform, job, and identity. They had merely been irritating obstacles that stood in the way of completing her sacred mission.
For a fleeting moment she thought with sadness of the Father, and their recent argument. She hoped that once Dr. Carter and his project were finished the Father would see the wisdom of her actions, and welcome her back into the fold. But even if he didn't, she was convinced that she was following the Second Imperative correctly. Her God would tell her where to strike next, and she would have to do without the guiding intervention of the Father, or the comforting bosom of the Brotherhood.
So be it, she thought. She had been reborn once before. She would be again.
She flicked on the intercom switch and kept her trained voice low in tone. "Hey, guys. I'm coming over to deliver something. Okay?"
On the screen one of the guards in the atrium of the pyramid gave a small nod. "No problem. We'll open the door for you."
"Much obliged," she said, clicking off the switch. Then without even a backward glance at Gus's slumped body, she left the gatehouse.
She adjusted her cap as she crunched down the gravel driveway. Ahead of her the glass pyramid seemed to soar into the night sky like some futuristic temple. It would be right to kill the scienti
st in his lair. She had waited for this moment and allowed herself a whole week, but it had finally arrived. With every step she could feel her excitement build, and with every step she whispered a line of her creed:
"I am Nemesis. May my sword of justice be keen... May myarmor of righteousness be unblemished... And may my shieldof faith be strong."
With every crunch of her shoes on gravel she repeated the lines like an incantation into the cool night air.
The walk took less than five minutes and the main door opened for her just before she reached the DNA scanner. In the lit atrium beyond she could see the guards sitting behind their consoles grinning at her. Her eyes fell on the junction box behind the second guard: the box that controlled all the phone lines coming into and out of the building.
"Hey, buddy, welcome to our humble abode," greeted George, the man who had spoken to her on the intercom. "What have you got for us?"
She walked inside and with a smile patted her bag. "Just what you were looking for."
The guard's grin widened. "Oh, yeah? And what's that?"
She reached her hand into the bag and closed her fingers over the trusty Glock. "A little excitement."
the Miracle Strain (aka The Messiah Code) (1997) Page 23
