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“We’re not sure,” Vogel said. “A staffer got a call out that they were under attack and that the amba.s.sador was dead, then the signal cut off. We’re unable to reach anyone at the emba.s.sy.”

Blackmon stood. “Attacked by who?”

“A mob of civilians,” Vogel said. “Enough to overpower the Chinese guards and our emba.s.sy security forces. That’s all the intel we have at the moment.”

Blackmon spread her hands, palms up: are you kidding me?

“Then get me more intel, Director Vogel,” she said. “I have to know what happened.”

Vogel took the cell phone off his shoulder, pressed it to his ear. He held up a finger to Blackmon — one moment — then spoke quietly. He nodded, put the cell phone in his pocket.

“I wanted to confirm it before I told you,” he said. “We can’t reach representatives of the Chinese government. And I mean we can’t reach anyone. China’s communications grid is offline. Broadcast, telecom, satellite — nothing is going in or coming out. They’ve even shut down their part of the Internet.”

Murray had lost his appet.i.te. The world’s only other nuclear-armed superpower had just gone dark. He waited for the president’s response.

“There has to be something,” Blackmon said. “I need to speak with them.”

Vogel nodded. “Of course, Madam President. The NSA is working on it, highest priority, but as of this moment, we have no way of communicating with the Chinese government.”

Blackmon sat back down. She picked up a french fry, stared at it. She took a bite. Everyone waited as she chewed and thought.

“Director Longworth,” she said, “tell me again where you think our patient zero traveled to when he left Chicago.”

Murray pushed his sandwich away. “a.n.a.lysis shows the carrier was likely in O’Hare four days ago. London is reporting an outbreak, which means the carrier probably stopped there. The itinerary that best fits the outbreak pattern is Delta Flight 305, which flew from O’Hare to LaGuardia, then to Heathrow, then to Beijing.”

Blackmon turned in her chair, stared at Vogel.

“You said no foreign power could get to the Los Angeles, Director. Yet here we are with an infection pattern that points straight to Beijing, and that government has just shut off all communication. If an operative got the artifact and took it back to China, and if he showed his new prize to high-level officials, then we could be looking at infected government leaders.”

Vogel started to sweat.

“Madam President, as I said, it would be virtually impossible for anyone to reach that artifact, let alone take it out of the country. A more likely scenario is that Chinese leaders.h.i.+p sees a spreading, global infection and they’re nailing their windows shut. They want to stop any other carriers from getting in, or make sure the world can’t watch how they choose to handle any localized infection. Probably both.”

Admiral Porter politely cleared his throat.