Part 19 (2/2)

When it was over I sat on the floor, shaking, trying desperately to get my breath back.

Imorkal turned to Fielding. 'They know little. They are here by accident?

They are immune because they were given the serum. They are telling the truth. They are not terrorists? They are innocent.'

'Is there any more serum?' 'They are not aware of any.'

'And the hypo was empty.' Fielding thought for a moment. 'All right. Thanks, Imorkal. And look - I'm really sorry about Liz. You know we'll save her if we can.'

Imorkal nodded? There seemed to be a significance to the exchange which I couldn't fathom. But then I was going to have difficulty working anything out for a while after the going over I'd just had.

Fielding issued a few more orders. A number of orderlies came in and helped us on to the beds. One of them was quite pretty. I was beginning to feel better already; attention from a pretty orderly couldn't help but speed up the process?

When we were settled, Fielding said, 'All right. Sony to have been so harsh on you. We've made a mistake here. We need to sort a few things out.' He seemed to make a decision. 'All right. Answers then. But first, I'm sure you want something to eat? Orderly, I'd like tea and some food brought to OpCon. Oh, and will you please remove that vomit before we have to fumigate the place? It smells like something crawled in here and died.'

OpCon was located on the upper deck and comprised one room filling what must have been fully a third of the available s.p.a.ce in that deck. Here the vehicle's motion was exaggerated. The front part of the room looked very much like the inside of a s.p.a.cecraft: consoles, operators, the quiet hum of machinery and the odd curse as someone spilt their coffee. The rear section, part.i.tioned by movable screens took the form of a cla.s.sroom, with half a dozen small desk-chair combos facing a bank of monitor screens and, incongruously, a blackboard mounted on a wooden easel.

Fielding led us through the forward section, getting reports as he went.

'- ground stable. Reaction negative -'

'- proceeding north north east. Rate three KPH -' '- ground stable. Reaction negative -'

'- sensor sweeps indicate biological infection total = '- human life signs negative. Terrestrial life signs negative - '- ground sensors on red one. Reaction positive A sudden flurry of activity?

'- elevated sulphur levels? Elevated carbon monoxide levels -'

'- me the d.a.m.n coordinates = '- ground reaction accelerating by ma.s.s '- where the h.e.l.l is it -'

'- all around us. It's everyd.a.m.nwhere it's - '- going to - '- deploy belly s.h.i.+elding - '- reaction off the scale -'

'- the h.e.l.l out of here - '- gonna have to ride -'

'- it's going to blow it's going to -'

There was a tremendous explosion somewhere off to one side? The ground shuddered and the HQ shuddered with it. Fielding ignored the shaking, motioned us through to the rear section.

The shaking subsided, the ground stopped swaying and HQ plodded on forward.

'Was that the Iraqis or the Iranians?' I asked, feeling stupid and scared.

Fielding frowned. 'Neither. It was Agent Yellow.'

'Agent Yellow as in James Bond Agent Yellow?'

Fielding did not respond to my sarcasm. Just as well. I didn't feel like a sparring match.

Chris said slowly, That was a ground effect. An earthquake. Explosions that small don't cause earthquakes.'

I shuddered. 'Explosions that small?'

Fielding looked grim. 'If our graphs are correct that was just a baby.'

I felt like grabbing someone and shaking them, felt like screaming or running out of there and never stopping. I managed to control the reaction with an effort, but it took me a while. In that time, Fielding went to the blackboard, picked up a piece of chalk and wrote: 2CaSO4 --> 2Ca20 + 2S + 203 X.

He underlined the X heavily.

'Listen up. School's in? Anyone understand this?'

Chris looked puzzled. I shook my head.

'What about this?' Fielding wiped some yellow dust from the blackboard beneath the original equation and wrote: 2CaCO3 --> 2Ca20 + 2CO X.

Chris said, '2CO' That's carbon monoxide?'

'Correct. These equations describe a reaction taking place in the local rock strata. Both reactions are impossible under normal conditions.' He tapped the board by the underlined X. 'Mister X here is a by-product of Agent Yellow. It catalyses an otherwise impossible reaction. The result is that sulphur is liberated from the local rock in crystal form. Lots of sulphur.'

'And the rock?'

'Becomes extremely unstable?' Fielding tapped the part of the equation that seemed to be composed of a worrying amount of oxygen symbols. A tiny puff of yellow powder leapt into the air; he waved it away. 'Explosive, in fact.'

Chris let out a breath: 'What about Mister X?. Where's it coming from?'

Fielding shrugged. 'As far as we can tell Mister X itself is one by-product of another impossible reaction. This one taking place within local biological matter.'

I went cold. 'You mean people?'

'People. Sheep. Plants. Anything biological. Anything with terrestrial DNA is being changed.'

I felt close to panic. 'I don't understand? We just came here to look for Noah's Ark. What are you trying to tell us?' Chris told me to shut up. 'I told you this was serious.' He switched his attention back to Fielding. 'You say terrestrial DNA is being changed. Into what?'

Fielding shrugged? 'We don't know. Think of the Ebola virus: seven molecules, three of them unknown. Millions of possible combinations.

Thousands of strains? Here we're dealing with thousands of molecules, only a few of them familiar to us. And the whole lot's changing - h.e.l.l, evolving - at a rate science tells us is impossible?'

I thought back to South Africa, to the hospital in Mulobizi. All those people bleeding out, becoming brain-dead sacks of infectious matter, becoming the actual virus itself. The woman we had found was bleeding out too - only she was bleeding acid.

'Well, where does this Agent Yellow come from? How do we stop it?'

Fielding wiped the blackboard with a rubber, erasing both equations with a single stroke, allowing another cloud of yellow dust into the air.

'The answer to both questions is: I have no idea. The only person who does is currently in isolation. Dying.'

The lab was located one level down, in a box-shaped structure held between the rear traction units? We walked down a narrow observation corridor until we came to a window. I stared through the thick gla.s.s into the isolation lab. The woman we had found lay on a metal table. She was still alive. The walls of the unit didn't quite block her screams.

With her in the lab were a number of suited technicians - one of them Imorkal. Their suits were connected by flexible plastic tunnels to the outside. The lab had its own environment - they were obviously taking no chances with contamination.

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