ViraVax (30 page)

Chapter 43

Rico Toledo woke up inside a bubble of Plexiglas. He had IV lines in both arms, a tube down his nose, several machines beeping out of sync and a body that felt like it was skinned. He could only see out of his left eye, and that one was blurry. Rico tried to lift his head to get a look at his body, but he was restrained. If pain was any indicator, all of his parts were still attached.

“Relax, Colonel,” a deep voice said. “We’ll be here a while.”

A black man in fatigues loomed into view, the name “Clyde, J.” stitched over his pocket. He wore SEAL and corpsman insignia on his fatigues.

“Where?”

“Joe Clyde Memorial Hospital,” the medic said with a chuckle. “We’re in the back end of a warehouse in beautiful La Libertad, Colonel. Pearl of the Pacific.”

“I’m not a colonel.”

“You’re reinstated, sir.”

“Harry? What about Harry?”

“I’ll ask the questions, Colonel, if you please.”

The voice came from a speaker above his head and was not the deep voice of Joe Clyde. This was the effete voice of a career bureaucrat.

Rico turned his head slowly and saw his jowly, damp-handed replacement at a console outside the glass. He wore a telephone operator’s headset and an expression of complete disgust.

“Okay, Colonel. Please tell us the last thing you remember doing today.”

“You tell me about Harry, and I’ll tell you whatever I damned well please whenever I damned well please. Clear?”

Something had taken the skin off the inside of Rico’s throat, and talking felt like hot sandpaper in his larynx.

“Your son’s okay,” Clyde said. “The girl, too.”

“Mr. Clyde,” the bureaucrat snapped, “I’ll speak to your superior about this.
I’m
conducting this interview. And I decide when, or whether, you get out of there.”

“No, you don’t, Major,” another voice said. “You’re relieved. Do not leave the building. I’ll speak to you when I’m through.”

Rico tried to remember that voice. So familiar, and his mind was so unwilling. . . .

“It’s Trenton Solaris, Colonel, do you remember me?”

Rico smiled in spite of his torn lips.

“Yes, sir. Vividly, sir.”

“Fine. Then I’ll brief you if you’ll brief me.”

“Fair.”

“Harry, Sonja and the Chang woman are safe. Grace and Nancy Bartlett are still at the embassy for precautions, but they have talked with Harry and Sonja by phone. You are all in quarantine. We don’t know what you may have picked up. How much do you remember?”

Images flashed through Rico’s mind, like a stack of transparencies dropped into a whirlpool. He could pick out a melting face here, a burning building there, but nothing made sense. Solaris must have guessed his dilemma.

“Okay, Colonel, what’s the last thing you remember clearly?”

“Cleaning out my desk,” Rico croaked. “Turning in my keys.”

“That was quite a while ago, Colonel. A lot has happened since then. You went on vacation. The embassy blew up, the Jaguar Mountain Dam blew up.”

“I remember the dam,” Rico said. “The water. . . I was smashed against the fence.”

“Do you remember which fence?”

“ViraVax,” he said, and the memories started flooding back.

“ViraVax, south fence,” he said. “I opened the access hatch covers to let the water in. That prick Garcia shot down Harry and Sonja.”

“Very good,” Solaris said, and his voice sounded relieved.

“Now, what did you see there at ViraVax? Anything unusual?”

Rico started to laugh, but it hurt too much.

“Unusual?” He coughed as gently as he could.
“Unusual?
People melting off their bones and burning up by themselves, charges shutting down every available entry and exit. Guerrillas blowing up the dam . . . ”

“It wasn’t the Peace and Freedom people,” Solaris interrupted. “The charges were planted and timers set before they got there. The squad leader says they tried to warn you, but you didn’t receive the message.”

Rico felt relieved. He remembered that moment of doubt before blackness, when he’d thought that El Indio and Yolanda had betrayed him.

“ViraVax, then,” Rico said. “Whoever went into shutdown.”

“Exactly. And the man who did it is the one who killed Red Bartlett. He also set up the incident at the embassy to turn our people against you. He kidnapped Harry and Sonja to lure you in. You were a loose end that needed tying up.”

“How do you know this?”

“Harry rescued a data block that Red Bartlett set up. It was full of product that the Chang woman couldn’t find. You should be proud of Harry. He could have fled and we would never know what we’re facing.”

Rico’s flickering memory focused on Harry, bent over him at ViraVax, helping him to his feet.

“I am
very
proud of Harry,” Rico said. “But I don’t understand why I’m so important to ViraVax. I was out of their hair. Why go to all this trouble over me?”

Solaris was silent for a moment.

“I’d rather get into that later, Colonel. Right now, it’s important that we find something that was shipped out of ViraVax to Mexico City, for distribution elsewhere. We need to know the locations of all Children of Eden clandestine operations in Mexico City. Do you have that information?”

Rico tried to remember, but nothing came up. He couldn’t tell whether he simply didn’t remember, or whether he had never known at all.

“I don’t remember. . . I don’t know,” he said.

“How about your contacts?” Solaris pressed. “This is something big, something that could take out every human on the planet. We don’t have the luxury of playing sides.”

“Try Mariposa,” Rico said. “She has several hundred people in Mexico City. It’s their job to keep track of everything and everybody related to this country. She could do it.”

“Who is Mariposa?” Solaris asked. “How do we find her?”

“Get on the webs and ask,” Rico said. “She’ll contact you.”

“We don’t have time for that.”

“Then get me a priest.” Rico said. “And get these restraints off me. It’s bad enough I have to be locked up, I don’t have to be tied up, too.”

Solaris must have okayed the request. Clyde unsnapped the restraints right away.

“Why a priest?” Solaris asked.

“Because I still don’t trust anybody,” Rico said. “Make it somebody from the Archbishop’s office, somebody I know. I’ll tell him how to find Mariposa.”

With Clyde’s help and a lot of pain, he scooted himself up to a sitting position. Rico’s mind, the string of images that made his mind, felt shuffled and misdealt. He did not want to give away someone as precious as Yolanda or El Indio because of a basic miscaution. His superior should understand that better than anyone.

“What are you doing out at ViraVax?” Rico asked. “Are you going to dig it out, find out what happened?”

More of a probe than a question. Rico didn’t want to take any chances on releasing whatever it was that holed itself up underground.

“Not a chance,” Solaris replied. “The Corps of Engineers has already diverted the stream. After what Dr. Chang revealed about their operations, we’re going to cement over the whole thing and see to it that nothing and no one ever gets out.”

Rico weighed this for a moment. He had never known Solaris to be anything but sincere and direct. He found that refreshing in a superior.

“Do we have a phone in here?” he asked Clyde.

“Phone, console, the works,” Clyde said. “Whatever you need, we’ve got.”

Rico addressed Solaris.

“If I get Mariposa for you, I want two things.”

“Name them, Colonel.”

“Amnesty for Mariposa. And I want to talk with my son.”

“Done. You know I’ve always been good for my word.”

“Yes,” Rico said. “I know. But before we do anything else, I want to talk with Harry.”

“There’s a lot to tell you both, Colonel.”

“It can wait,” Rico said. “This can’t. Put him on.”

The connection was made through a speakerphone, and Rico hated speakerphones. He preferred to hold something, it gave him a better sense of control. The screen cleared and Harry appeared, looking rested and unafraid.

He looks like me.

Rico had had this thought before, but this time the resemblance was more than striking, it was frightening.

“Hello, son,” he croaked. “Good job.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Harry said. “Same to you. Are you going to be okay?”

“I think so,” Rico said. “Feels like I’ve been skinned, but I think everything’s here.”

“Looks pretty rough,” Harry said.

Silence.

“Harry, I’m sorry about the shot. . . I had to do it; I couldn’t let you go back there.”

“I know, Dad,” Harry said. “If I’d had the gun, I’d have done the same thing. Chill.”

“Your mom’s okay, Nancy’s okay.”

“Yeah, we just talked to them. They both say thanks, too.”

“Colonel,” Solaris interrupted, “we have some pressing business.”

“Yes,” Rico said, “we do. I’ll talk with you soon, son.”

“Okay,” Harry said, “take care.”

The screen went blank as he added, “I love you, too.”

Chapter 44

Harry listened in stunned silence as Major Scholz and Marte Chang finished explaining the known pathways of his genetic past. The information did not frighten him; he had lived in his body and felt comfortable there. But the implications of a lifetime of imprisonment frightened him, imprisonment for someone else’s crime.

“The memory booster came out of Alzheimer’s research,” Marte was saying. “You and Sonja both have a subtle learning advantage, but it remains to be seen whether you keep it or not. Perhaps, with aging. . . ”

“You mean, this thing that you say boosted our memories might give us that old folks’ disease?”

“It’s an unknown,” Marte said. “Possible, but we can’t tell without further research. It hasn’t made you brilliant, you know. It simply gave you access to more detailed information within a beefed-up storage area.”

She quoted him figures on “glial cell production” and “collateral access.”

“Well, what does that mean?” Harry asked. “Is it congenital, like diabetes or something? Can we pass it on? Are we going to burn up like Red Bartlett?”

“Red was a whole different matter,” Major Scholz said. “And so were the rest of those people at ViraVax. They all died the same day they were infected.”

“You’re probably clear,” Marte said. “Our guerrilla friends intercepted the entire shipment in Mexico, so we’ll know by morning what our infection status is. We won’t be in isolation forever.”

“You
won’t be in isolation forever,” Harry said. “You aren’t one of the world’s only pair of living human clones. We got away from that dzee at ViraVax, but his accommodations weren’t any different than this. We’re still going to be freaks, locked up and poked at for the rest of our lives. I wish I’d died down there.”

The major stood and pressed her hand against the glass.

“I promise you that won’t happen,” she said.

“Sorry, Major,” Harry said. “I don’t think you have much say in the matter.”

“I promise you,” she repeated.

Harry inhaled deeply and let it out slowly.

“Chill,” he said. “We’ll take all the help we can get.”

“Do you have questions?” Marte asked. “Anything to do with the science?”

“We’re actually twins?” Harry asked. “Like, brothers?”

Marte’s figure on his screen nodded.

“Well, he’s your father, too,” she said. “That’s a role, a social position, as well as a biology. But genetically you’re actually identical twins, except for your memory boost. A generation apart, of course.”

“What about Sonja?” Harry asked. “How could she be cloned through her dad, when she’s a twin of her mom? I don’t get it.”

“Her dad’s sperm was the vector for the cloning agent,” she explained. “That’s how it was introduced into Nancy Bartlett. It is ingenious, I must say. It excluded all of Red Bartlett’s genetic material and triggered Nancy Bartlett’s ovum to duplicate its own nuclear material. The only material accepted from Sonja’s father was the memory enhancement. You are right, it would be most interesting to find out what each of you passes on, and whether the offspring of the two of you would be, as Mishwe must have thought, superhuman. Quite a lot to study, there. . . .”

“Whoa,” Harry said. “Enough. Nobody studies this lab rat anymore. Not until we get some rights sorted out.”

“I understand,” Marte said. “But you must admit, it’s very interesting. Surely you can see why Mishwe was tempted.”

“Tempted to watch? Yes. Tempted to kill off everyone in the goddamn world? Not really. What I can see is this—the more of you scientists that know about this, the slimmer my chances of walking out of here alive. And what about Sonja? And my dad?”

“Your father will never be as strong physically,” Major Scholz explained. “He has a lot of mind stuff to work out—most of it dealing with you and your mom, but plenty that doesn’t. Don’t give up on him. He thought he died a hero two days ago. Now he has to work out some old things before he can be on to a new life. Give him some time.”

The peel in Harry’s isolette cleared, and the superpale face of Trenton Solaris replaced the major.

“I see you have heard the news,” Solaris said.

“Fuck the news,” Harry said. “I want some sunshine.”

“And you’ll get it,” Solaris said. “Blood tests just came back, and none of you is infected with Mishwe’s Meltdown agent. You will be free to go within the hour. There is one condition.”

“What’s that?” Harry asked. “Sign myself into some secret Agency research farm?”

Solaris chuckled. “No, nothing like that,” he said. “Your anger at the violation you have experienced is normal, but it should not be ignored. You will all be given access to counseling for this most unusual situation, and I urge you to take advantage of it. You share your father’s genetics, but you make your own destiny. Dr. Chang has offered her services to rid him of the viral curse that Mishwe spun against him. Whatever you offer us for study, Harry, we will accept gratefully. If you want to disappear, we owe you that, too.”

“Does Sonja know?”

“I talked to her about an hour ago,” the major said. “She knows everything that we know.”

“And what did she say?”

“She said she wanted to see you. In person.”

“Me, too.”

“I don’t see why we can’t do that now,” Solaris said. “Both Grace Toledo and Nancy Bartlett are on their way. We have a surprise for Sonja that is not quite ready, so please bear with us.”

Major Scholz tapped out a sequence in her gloveware and released the seals in their isolettes. Harry met Sonja in front of the conference chamber and they hugged long and hard without speaking. For once, Harry didn’t care who was watching.