Jack DeVoe sat behind his desk staring at his computer monitor. He snagged a bottle of whiskey from a drawer and belted back a slug, but it didn’t make the news any more palatable. Russia and the U.S. were at it again, arguing over Ukraine like a pack of feral dogs battling each other for a juicy bone. The U.S. threatened to send troops, and the Russian president was screaming threats over network news. Unfortunately, Jack was fluent in Russian, and the barrage of words sounded like much more than posturing.
He’d been in Antarctica for years. Maybe now was a good time to go for early retirement—before World War III stranded him at this remote outpost. The more he thought about it, the better he liked the idea, especially in light of the two dead women who’d shown up in the micro lab the other night. Despite him harassing maintenance until they ran the other way every time they saw him, they hadn’t come up with a goddamned thing.
He straightened in his chair and rolled his shoulder blades to loosen the tension making his neck hurt. How in the fucking hell could two women die from carbon monoxide poisoning with no leaks? Not just two women, either. The young microbiologist would’ve been just as dead—but he got lucky. Jack ground his jaws until his teeth ached. He’d figure out what was killing his people. No matter what it took.
Then he’d leave Antarctica.
His phone buzzed and he picked it up, growling, “What?”
“Hey, boss. Micah here.” He hesitated. “Is this an okay time? You seem miffed about something.”
Nothing much. The world’s imploding and a mystery gas leak is on the loose.
“Nah, I’m fine, Greenwich. You still feeling all right? What do you need? It’s ten at night.”
Micah cleared his throat. “Thanks for asking, but I made a good recovery.” He paused a beat. “I suppose in a backhanded way, I owe my life to Britta and Marguerite. If it weren’t for them, I’d be dead too.”
“Get on with it.” Jack rolled his eyes. “You didn’t call to swap philosophies.”
“Right, sir. Sorry. I know it’s been a while since you did much with your biochem background, but I’d appreciate it if you could stop by the lab.”
“Now?” Jack straightened in his chair and screwed the top back on the liquor bottle. “Is the lab on fire or something?” He shoved too-long blond hair out of his face and listened intently.
Micah laughed, but it sounded strained. “I’ve been running tests on my single-celled samples, but I keep coming up with odd results.” He hesitated. “The other problem is a critical mass issue. Something bizarre happens when the colonies reach a certain size.”
Jack squeezed his eyes shut. “Bizarre, how? Did you run it past the other microbiologists?” When Micah didn’t answer, Jack prodded, “Well, did you?”
“Yeah. They’re so freaked out by this, they don’t want anything to do with it. They’d rather chalk it up to me being nuts.”
Jack clicked away from Yahoo! News. He couldn’t do a damned thing about bad decisions on either side of the political fence. Or dead staff, apparently. Focusing on the phone in his hand, he said, “I still don’t understand exactly why you need me,” and followed up with, “Can it wait until morning?”
“I really think you should come see this, sir. If you tell me I’ve spent too much time at this Godforsaken outpost, I’ll pick up my marbles, and no one will ever hear another word about my concerns.”
Breath hissed from between Jack’s teeth. “Fine. Be there in ten.”
He dropped the phone into its cradle before the other man said goodbye and pushed heavily to his feet. The cold and isolation of Antarctica did things to people’s minds. Maybe Micah had fallen prey to what Jack labeled the, “Aw shit, I’m stuck at the ass end of the world,” syndrome.
He flexed his fingers, stretching them after long hours at the keyboard. Maybe a side trip to the lab wasn’t a bad idea. He’d worked as a senior researcher in biochemistry at the National Institutes of Health before accepting the job running McMurdo, and he missed being in a lab teasing out thorny problems.
Besides, if he retreated to his quarters, he’d polish off the whiskey. A wry grin split his face. Compared with a lot of McMurdo residents, he was practically a teetotaler. The base went through buckets of booze, but it kept other problems at bay. He booted down his terminal, told the base operator he’d be on the sat phone if anyone needed him, and left his office.
The halls bustled with activity. Between the times when they had twenty-four hours of daylight, and the months of twenty-four hour darkness, no one kept much of a regular schedule. He nodded to a few folk as he passed them, clapping a shoulder here and punching an arm there as he made his way to the microbiology laboratories.
Located near the end of one of McMurdo’s many wings, the labs housed state of the art equipment for studying the rich array of unicellular life forms that inhabited the Antarctic. He pushed the door open and strode inside. Not seeing Micah in the outer room, he yelled, “Greenwich!”
“In here, boss.”
Following Micah’s voice, Jack walked into one of four smaller rooms that shot off from the main one like wagon spokes.
The other man straightened from where he’d been bent over a binocular microscope. Tall and lanky, he wore hazmat gloves. Blond hair stuck out at crazy angles around the mask perched over a full beard. Bright blue eyes regarded Jack. “Thanks for coming.”
Jack grunted and grabbed a mask and gloves of his own. “What’s got you so fired up, son? And why the major hand coverings?”
Micah shook his head and twisted his stool to face Jack. “Should I start at the beginning?”
“Just hit the high points and let me ask questions.” Jack hooked his foot around a stool and dropped into it.
Micah pulled his mask aside. “Okay. I’ve been here four months. Because I was youngest and new kid on the block, the others stuck me with archaea, you know the prokaryote colonies.”
Jack snorted. “Yeah, no one’s ever very interested in proks, probably because their structure’s so simple.” He narrowed his eyes. “You never answered me about the fancy hand coverings. Did the little bastards get away from you?”
Color stained Micah’s face above his beard. “Now that you mention it, yes. Things were fine until the colonies developed a certain mass, but then things shifted.”
“Are you talking about quorum sensing?” Jack asked, referring to a bacterial mechanism of population control based on density and several other factors.
“That’s exactly what I’m talking about.” Micah exhaled softly, fogging the lab glasses perched atop his nose. “Before we go further, come look at this.” He got to his feet and pulled a sample bin across the table. Beige plastic, it was about eighteen inches long and a foot wide.
Jack got to his feet, frowning. The bin was large for bacterial colonies, which grew just fine on agar plates. Micah removed the lid, and Jack’s mouth fell open when he stared at towers of cell colonies growing up the sides and along the bottom of the bin. Instead of the gray-green he’d expected, the colonies were violet, blue, red, and bright green.
“Holy crap!” He grabbed a sterile instrument off Micah’s tray, pulled the plastic protector off, and gently prodded the mass in the bin. The tower nearest the tip of his instrument recoiled and flowed into a nearby glob of cells.
“I wouldn’t get my hands too close,” Micah cautioned.
Jack dropped the spatula back on the tray and motioned for Micah to put the lid back on the colony bin. “So instead of limiting their growth in response to quorum sensing, they’re going nuts?” he asked.
“That’s what it seems like to me,” Micah replied. “But it gets worse. You asked about my gloves. I started feeling bad last week—a few days before I came in here and found Britta and Marguerite. Because of them, Dr. Stewart and Ariana caught my downhill slide in time to save me.” He shrugged sheepishly. “The symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning are subtle, and I’m a guy. I probably wouldn’t have ever thought to turn myself in to the medics.”
He shook his head. “During my stint in the infirmary, I had a lot of time to think, and I figured out what might’ve happened. It was pretty off-the-wall, though, and I needed to run some tests, first—”
“Cut to the chase. I’m all ears.” Jack sat back on his stool. His stomach tightened, and he wished he’d either laid off the booze—or finished it.
“This will sound farfetched—”
“You already said that. Skip the fucking caveats. Just spit whatever it is out.”
Micah inhaled sharply, exhaling in a rush before words tumbled past his lips. “You know how some proks have an affinity for iron?” At Jack’s nod, he continued, “My best guess is I got sloppy with my gloves, and the proks worked their way through my skin, latched onto my red blood cells, and displaced their ability to bond to oxygen. It’s the same mechanism carbon monoxide—and any other toxic gas—uses to kill you. Basically, you suffocate.”
Jack felt like someone had sucker punched him. Before he could stop himself, a long, low whistle escaped. “I can see why the other researchers would want to discredit your theory. Distance themselves.”
Micah colored again and studied his hands. “Sorry to bother you, sir. Like I said, you’ll never hear another word—”
“Shut up,” Jack snapped. “I didn’t say I didn’t believe you. Did you experiment with mice?”
The color mottling Micah’s face deepened. “Er, yes. I know I’m supposed to requisition—”
“I don’t give a flying fuck about that. What’d you find?”
Micah straightened his shoulders. “I introduced normal proks into a bin with two mice and these proks into a bin with two others. The mice with the normal proks are fine. The others are dead. When I examined their tissues, they died from oxygen starvation. Just like Britta and Marguerite.” He stared hard at Jack. “Since maintenance couldn’t find any gas leaks, my best guess is the women looked in the sample bins, were fascinated, and touched the colonies.”
Jack felt old when he got to his feet and went to look into the bin with the crazily growing bacterial colonies. Micah’s theory made a whole lot of sense. Plus it explained why maintenance had come up dry. After he replaced the lid, he gestured to the microscope. “What’s under there is stained samples from this bin?”
“Yes.”
“What’s unique about them?”
“It’s why I called you, sir. We finally made it to where I need your biochem background. These don’t exactly look like proks anymore.”
Jack strode to the microscope, adjusted it, and peered through the eyepieces. What he saw gave him pause. The prok structure was there, but these had more to them—lots more. He straightened slowly. “What happens if you separate the colonies?”
“Funny you should ask, since I already did. After a day or two, they revert to regular proks. My assumption is they’ll stay that way until they divide enough to reach whatever critical mass spurs them to shift into that.” He pointed at the sample bin.
“Mmph. Let’s limit access to this lab to just you and me. For now, keep the colonies small, even if you have to jettison some material.”
Micah shook his head. “I don’t think tossing anything is smart. These guys thrive in almost any environment including extreme cold and salt water, but I’ll do my best to keep the colonies under critical mass.”
“Douse the ones you want to get rid of with ethyl alcohol and see how they like it.” Jack stripped off his mask and gloves. “I’m going to call a friend of mine, Brynn McMichaels. He’s a microbiologist I worked with at NIH. Just so happens he’s stationed at South Georgia Island. Proks were a big interest of his.”
“What’s he doing with them?” Micah perked up, the flat, worried expression leaving his face.
“Building boutique antibiotics or some such thing. It’s been a while since we’ve talked, so I’m not totally certain. Anyway, his contract must be close to up. If he hasn’t signed on for another stint on South Georgia, maybe I can talk him into coming here. We might be onto something fascinating with these mutant proks.”
Micah smiled for the first time since Jack had entered the lab. “Thanks, sir. I appreciate it.”
“Hang onto your gratitude. Let’s see if we can get Brynn to come here, first. At the very least, I’m sure he’d be willing to bat ideas around on the phone or via email.”
Jack headed out the door before Micah could thank him again. He remembered what it was like to have ideas no one else endorsed. The scientific community could be pretty shitty to researchers they viewed as renegades.
As he walked McMurdo’s corridors, he rolled Micah’s idea around in his head. Whiskey sloshed in his belly, and for the first time in years, he wished he had a pack of cigarettes. To quell his craving for tobacco, he scrolled through the contacts list on his sat phone on the way to his quarters. He had no idea if Brynn would be up yet, but it was morning on South Georgia, so he punched the buttons to put the call through.
After three rings, a sleepy-sounding Brynn said, “Hello?”
“Hey, old buddy. Jack here.”
Sputtering blasted through the phone. “What the blazes are you doing calling at this hour? Must be the middle of the night there. Did McMurdo implode?”
“No, but the world might. Are you following the news?”
“Yeah, sure, but that’s not what you woke me up for. Or is it? Hang on.” Something clinked against the phone—probably a glass. “Damn. It’s past eight. Time for me to get up anyway. Back to why you called. You speak Russian. Do I need to beat a path home?”
Jack grunted. “I was actually considering that earlier tonight, but no one’s declared war—not yet, anyway. The reason I’m calling is we’ve got an unusual situation in the lab here with proks that’ve gone wild—”
“Aw, shit!” Brynn cut in. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Wish I were.” Jack pushed open the door to his small suite of rooms and kicked it shut behind him. Instincts working overtime, he asked, “You having the same problem?”
“Not exactly, but my colonies are acting oddly. Growing like mad. For some reason quorum sensing isn’t slowing them down one whit, and once the colonies get to be a certain size, they almost demonstrate a group intelligence.”
Air left Jack’s lungs in a whoosh. Brynn had always been the most level-headed of researchers. “Are you certain?”
“Of course I’m certain,” Brynn snapped. “What I haven’t figured out is what to do about it.”
“Be very careful while you’re figuring it out. It’s likely the proks here killed two women.”
“What?” Brynn screeched. “They’re single-celled life forms. How could they possibly harm a human?”
“This batch has an affinity for iron. Once they drill through the skin and get into the bloodstream, they have a heyday.” Jack paused. “I’ve read about that phenomenon, but never come across it before.”
Time dripped by before Brynn spoke again, still sounding agitated. “Maybe mine have a different problem. If they were going to get me, they’ve had lots of opportunity, and I feel fine.”
“When’s your contract with that Brit bio firm up?”
Brynn snorted. “Very soon. I already gave notice. I’ve had it with the southern ocean. Two years was plenty.”
“Would you consider coming here and bringing your colonies with you?” Jack forged on before Brynn could protest. “It’s good science to look at both mutating colonies side by side. Maybe we’ll learn something critical.”
A low rumble—maybe compressed frustration—preceded Brynn’s next words. “I don’t know, Jack. If I don’t charter a flight back to Argentina, I might be stuck here if the political mess heats further.”
“You could catch a plane from here to Christchurch,” Jack pointed out, not bothering to mention he’d be on it right along with Brynn.
“How would I get there? We’re heading into winter, and the weather’s unpredictable.”
“Does that mean you’ll come if I can figure out the logistics?” Jack pressed.
After a lengthy pause, Brynn said, “Yeah, I guess that’s what it means, but I’ll be damned if I know why I just said yes.”
“Because we go back a long way, buddy.”
“Yeah, we do. Keep me posted. If I don’t hear from you in a few days, I’ll make arrangements to get to Ushuaia or Buenos Aires.”
“Fair enough. One more small favor.”
“Hard to imagine it could be any bigger than what you just asked. What?”
“Can I give one of the microbiology staff your number? He’d love to have a blood brother to talk with, and the other three here have pretty much blown him off.”
“Sure, Jack. No problem. As long as he waits until a little later this morning to call.”
“I won’t even tell him how to reach you before tomorrow morning here—and I’ll remind him about the fifteen hour time difference. My admin staff will figure out how to transport you and your cultures to McMurdo. Stay tuned.”
“Gosh, guess I’ll make myself some breakfast now that you’ve given me something to look forward to. A reason to get out of bed and all that.”
“Spare the sarcasm. Talk to you soon.” Jack disconnected and booted up the computer in his quarters to check the weather window.
As his fingers flashed over the keys, he kept seeing the bacterial colony with its multi-hued towers of one-celled organisms. It seemed absurd, beyond the pale, that they’d attacked Micah and the two women. Regardless, Jack felt certain that if the young researcher hadn’t stumbled over the lab cleaning staff, he’d be just as dead as them—and the mice in his experiment.
An uncomfortable sensation tracked down Jack’s spine. It took a moment before he recognized it as fear. Thank Christ he’d warned Brynn.