Chapter 47
My throat is shut, my lungs empty of air.
“Jane, what is it?” Sam is looking at me, then at the screen, then back at me. “What is this? I don’t understand this, Jane. What does this mean?”
After a moment, I take a breath. I turn to Sam, my eyes still on the screen. “This is bad, Sam. This is really, really bad.”
“Jane!”
“This strain produces a toxin.”
“What? Which toxin?”
I look at him, then say, “Beta-hemolysin.”
“What is that? What does it do?”
“This toxin destroys erythrocytes, the red blood cells, and it causes anemia. If left untreated, it’s lethal.”
Sam straightens up, nodding. “And with the speed these cells grow, there is no time for treatment. The anemia is instantaneous. It would kill a person within minutes.”
We stay silent for a few moments.
“But,” I start, “if the disease advances so fast in a human body, a broad epidemic would not be possible because it would kill the victims before they had a chance to spread it around, right? Don’t you think?”
“You’re exactly right. And that right there makes it perfect as a biological weapon, because you have a limited and clearly defined target area. It doesn’t go anywhere it’s not intended to.”
He picks up his cell phone. “I need to contact Sentinel. This is huge.” He gets up and heads to the kitchen counter.
“Sam, did you also hear them talk about New York?”
He turns around. “No. What about New York?”
“Well, the main guy said that they have three weeks until the deadline and by then they need to have an antidote. The antidote was the goal of our project—a treatment that stops the growth of Crazy Gro.”
“All right.” Sam puts the phone back into his pocket and sits next to me. “So what do they wanna do, did they say?”
“They want to detonate a bomb that contains Crazy Gro. In the center of New York.”
“F—” he starts but the word dies out. He takes a quick breath. “I knew there was a reason they put such pressure on the project. Damn terrorists!”
“Sam, I don’t think this is an ordinary terrorist attack.”
He frowns. “I . . . what do you mean? I don’t understand.”
“It’s a demonstration.”
“A demonstration?” He shakes his head. “What…?”
“If I understood them correctly, these people that have been chasing us are not actually regular terrorists.”
He arches an eyebrow at me. “What are they? Pacifists?”
I huff. “No. What I mean is that they are not your typical extremists or fundamentalists. They want to make a profit, they want to sell these bacteria to other terrorist groups.”
“Ah! I see now. And the explosion is the demonstration. A bomb explodes in the middle of New York and kills everyone within the blast radius. Then they wait for the bids to come in.”
I nod. “That’s how I understood it.”
“But what about the antidote then? Why were they using Rosenberg—using you—then? And”—he shakes his head—“why didn’t they just make an antidote on their own, if they already designed the hybrid?”
“They didn’t. They stole it.”
“They stole the Crazy Gro bacteria? From whom?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. But they didn’t make it themselves, which is why they couldn’t make the antidote either.”
“All right, all right. That makes sense. But why is the antidote so important? They already have the bacteria to make the trade.”
“Well, apparently, the antidote makes the whole package more attractive. That way, whichever terrorist group buys it would have the means to protect their own people. The man with the gun said they would get tens of millions more if they have the antidote as well.”
Sam’s face is serious, eyes narrowed, his mind racing. Then he nods. “Well, first thing’s first. Sentinel needs to know about this ASAP.” He stands up and takes out his cell phone again.
I’m about to turn back to the screen, but Sam turns around and smiles. Then he gently strokes my cheek, the skin of his palm rough but warm. “Thank you, Jane. This is . . . amazingly helpful.”
A smile bubbles up from within me. His praise fills me with pride more than any other time in my scientific career. These findings really can change the world.
“All of this is making me hungry. I’ll make one more round of food.” He heads for the kitchen. “Do you still want something?”
“No, thanks. I’m fine.”
He speed-dials and waits a few moments for a response. There is a muffled answer. He looks at the phone keyboard and presses a few more buttons, then puts the phone back to his ear and walks to the kitchen, putting the pan back onto the stove.
I don’t quite hear what he’s saying, but the sound of Sam preparing more food, cutting the veggies and meat, steady and rhythmic, calms me down.
I focus back on the screen. I want to check the images again. There is something that I’m missing, something important, but I just can’t put my finger on it.
I open a new folder with a set of images.
Frank ran several different experiments, but the ones that look most interesting are these two: the one where the cells grow under the treatment of antibiotic, and the other, the negative control, where they grow with no treatment.
I had briefly looked at both sets of images at the warehouse, but I take more time now. I scan dozens of them.
What am I missing?
I’m slowly shaking my head, thinking.
Something . . .
Then it dawns on me. I go back to the original folder and check the name.
“FDM_Schaefer_PC.” This is Crazy Gro stained for endospores: positive control, meaning no treatment.
And “FDM_Schaefer_Abs.” That one relates to Crazy Gro stained for endospores, but this time under the antibiotic treatment.
In both experiments, Crazy Gro was stained for endospores, but they are present only under the antibiotic treatment. That means that the cells definitely respond to the antibiotics, they definitely sense it in the media, but they don’t stop growing as other bacteria would.
Instead, they make endospores. And continue growing.
I close my eyes.
They make endospores and continue growing, resisting the antibiotic.
Wow! This finding is just as incredible as the fast-growing mutation.
I turn to Sam and try to grab his attention, but he’s talking on the phone. He’s trying to jam his cell phone between his head and shoulder as he’s chopping a leek, but the phone keeps slipping.
He then puts the knife to the side, takes the cell phone, puts the speaker on, and lays it next to the cutting board, then continues chopping.
I keep looking at him, thinking how amazing and wonderful and courageous and beautiful he is.
“. . . it’s even worse than expected,” a man on the phone says.
“You need to bring more people in. We need to destroy it.”
Sam peeks at me and sees me staring. Then he smiles and blows me a silent kiss.
I smile back.
“We already have quite a lot of information from the encrypted data you sent us. We know now where they store the material,” the person on the phone continues. “We are preparing a new strike team now. And I want you to get back to headquarters, Eleven. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir. But I wanna be on that team too.”
I look up at him, shaking my head. I don’t want him to go back. He’s done enough already. He might get hurt if he goes . . .
But he’s not looking at me.
“Sam, you did what you had to do. You got the information out of the girl; that was your assignment. But now you need to come home.”
Got the information out . . . what?
“The girl, Eleven. She knows about you, she knows about Sentinel, she knows about the bioweapon. She just knows too much. You know what you need to do.”
Sam stops chopping, his knife frozen in the air.
“Eleven, she needs to be eliminated.”