“How would it get aboard?” said Blankenship. “Every experimental protocol is reviewed for safety. Every lab animal is healthy. We don’t send up biohazards.”
“That’s your agency line, of course. But you receive your experimental payloads from scientists all around the country. You screen their protocols, but you can’t examine every bacteria or culture as it arrives for launch. To keep biological materials alive, the payloads are loaded right onto the shuttle. What if one of those experiments was contaminated? Consider how easy it is to replace harmless culture with a dangerous organism like Marburg.”
“Are you saying this was a deliberate sabotage attempt on the station?” said Blankenship. “An act of bioterrorism?”
“That’s precisely what I’m saying. Let me describe what happens to you if you are infected with this particular virus. First your muscles begin to ache and you have a fever. The ache is so severe, agonizing, you can scarcely bear to be touched. An intramuscular injection makes you shriek in pain. Then your eyes turn red. Your belly begins to hurt, and you vomit, again and again. You begin to throw up blood. It comes up black at first, because of digestive processes. Then it comes faster and turns bright red, as rapid as gushing pump. Your liver swells, cracks. Your kidneys fail. internal organs are being destroyed, turning to foul, black mush. And suddenly, disastrously, your blood pressure crashes. And you’re dead.” Harrison paused. “That’s what we may be dealing with, gentlemen.”
“This is bullshit!” blurted Gordon Obie.
Every one at the table stared at him in astonishment. The Sphinx had spoken. On the rare occasions Obie did say anything at a meeting, it was usually in a monotone, his words used to convey data and information, not emotion. This outburst had shocked them all.
“May I ask who just spoke?” asked Colonel Harrison.
“I’m Gordon Obie, director of Flight Crew Operations.”
“Oh. The astronauts’ top dog.”
“You could call me that.”
“And why is this bullshit?”
“I don’t believe this is Marburg virus. I don’t know what it is, but I do know you’re not telling us the truth.” Colonel Harrison’s face froze into a rigid mask. He said nothing.
It was Jared Profitt who spoke. His voice sounded exactly as Gordon had expected, thin and reedy. He was not a bully like Harrison, but a man who preferred to appeal to one’s intellect and reason. “I understand your frustration, Mr. Obie,” Profitt said.
“There’s so much we’re unable to tell you because of security concerns. But Marburg is not something we can be careless about.”
“If you already know it’s Marburg, then why are you excluding our flight surgeons from the autopsy? Are you afraid we’ll learn the truth?”
“Gordon,” Cornell said quietly, “why don’t we discuss this in private?” Gordon ignored him and said to the screen, “What disease are we really talking about? An infection? A toxin? Something loaded on board the shuttle in a military payload, perhaps?”
There was a silence. Then Harrison blustered, “There’s that NASA paranoia! Your agency likes to blame the military for everything that goes wrong.”
“Why do you refuse to allow my flight surgeon into the autopsy?”
“Are we speaking of Dr. McCallum?” asked Profitt.
“Yes. McCallum has training in aviation trauma and pathology. He is a flight surgeon as well as a former member of the astronaut corps. The fact you refuse to let him or any of our doctors view autopsies makes me wonder what you don’t want NASA to see.” Colonel Harrison glanced sideways, as though to look at someone else in the room. When he gazed back at the camera, his face was flushed and angry.
“This is absurd. You people just crashed a shuttle! You screw up the landing, kill your own crew, and then point an accusing finger at the U.S. Army?”
“The entire astronaut corps is up in arms about this,” said Gordon. “We want to know what really happened to our colleagues. We insist you allow one of our doctors to view the bodies.”
Leroy Cornell again tried to intercede. “Gordon, you can’t make unreasonable demands like this,” he said quietly. “They know what they’re doing.”
“So do I.”
“I’m going to ask you to back down now.” Gordon looked Cornell in the eye. Cornell was NASA’s representative to the White House, NASA’s voice in Congress.
Provoking him was career suicide.
He did it anyway. “I speak for the astronauts,” he said. “My people.” He turned to the video screen, his gaze fixed on the face of Colonel Harrison. “And we’re not above taking our concerns to the press. We don’t consider this move lightly—exposing confidential NASA matters. The astronaut corps has always been discreet. But if we’re forced to, we will demand a public inquiry.”
Gretchen Liu’s jaw dropped. “Gordon,” she whispered, “what the hell are you doing?”
“What I have to do.” The silence at the table stretched to a full minute.
Then, to everyone’s astonishment, Ken Blankenship said, “I side with our astronauts.”
“So do I,” said another voice.
“Me too—”
“—and me.”
Gordon looked around the table at his colleagues. Most of these people were engineers and operational managers whose names seldom turned up in the press. More often than not, they were in conflict with the astronauts, whom they considered flyboys with big egos. The astronauts got all the glory, but these men women, who performed the unseen and unglamorous jobs that made spaceflight a reality, were the heart and soul of NASA. And they were now united behind Gordon.
Leroy Cornell looked stricken, the leader abandoned by his own troops.
He was a proud man, and this was a humiliatingly public blow. He cleared his throat and slowly squared his shoulders.
Then he faced the video image of Colonel Harrison. “I have no choice but to support my astronauts as well,” he said. “I insist one of our flight surgeons be allowed to view the autopsies.” Colonel Harrison said nothing. It was Jared Profitt who made the final decision—Jared Profitt who was obviously the real man in charge. He turned to confer with someone standing offscreen.
Then he looked at the camera and nodded.
Both screens went blank. The video conference had ended.
“Well, you certainly thumbed your nose at the U.S. Army,” said Gretchen. “Did you see how pissed-off Harrison looked?” No, thought Gordon, remembering Colonel Harrison’s expression just before the image went blank. That wasn’t anger I saw on his face. It was fear.
The bodies had not been taken to USAMRIID headquarters in Fort Detrick, Maryland, as Jack had expected. They’d been transported barely sixty miles away from the White Sands landing strip to a windowless concrete-block building, much like the dozens of other anonymous government buildings that had sprung up in that dry desert valley. But this one had a distinguishing feature, a series of ventilation pipes jutting up from the roofline. Barbed wire atop the perimeter fence. As they drove through the military checkpoint, Jack heard the hum of high-voltage wires.
Flanked by his armed escort, Jack approached the front entrance—the only entrance, he realized. On the door was a chillingly familiar symbol, the bright red biohazard blossom. What this facility doing in the middle of nowhere? he wondered. Then scanned the featureless horizon, and his question was answered.
The building was here precisely because it was in the middle of nowhere.
He was escorted through the door and into a series of stark corridors heading deeper into the heart of the building. He saw and women in Army uniforms, others in lab coats. All lighting was artificial, and the faces appeared bluish and sickly.
The guards stopped outside a door labeled
“Men’s Lockers.”
“Go in,” he was told. “Follow the written instructions to the letter. Then go through the next door. They’re waiting for you.