Part 25 (1/2)
He grew serious. ”There's ricin on board.”
She nodded. ”I know. I was supposed to have a kit to identify it. But Banner's contact was unable to throw it to me on the ladder. I only hope he and Stark got away.”
Sumner straightened. ”Who's Stark?”
”Richard Stark. The CEO of Price Pharmaceuticals.”
Sumner got a strange look on his face.
”What? What's wrong?” Emma said.
He grabbed her by the hand. ”Come with me.”
Sumner steered her into the bowels of the s.h.i.+p. When he came to a door with a keypad, he tapped in a code. The door swung open. He led her to a large crate with the word PRICE stamped all over it.
”What's this?”
He took a deep breath. ”This is where the ricin is.”
Emma felt her heart plunge.
”Could he be involved?” Sumner said.
She thought about Stark. Ran the events of the past days over in her mind. ”Oh, yeah, he could definitely be involved.” Still, she didn't want to believe it.
Sumner seemed to catch her reluctance. ”What's he like?”
Emma thought about Stark. ”Driven. Smart. Tough.”
”Ruthless?”
She nodded. ”In business? He has that reputation. He told me he'd do anything to ensure that Price stayed viable.”
”And personally? Ruthless there as well?”
Emma wasn't sure. ”He lives to work. Nothing else seems to matter, but he does have a daughter.”
”What do you think of him?”
The question was a good one. She had no real answer for it.
”I don't trust him, but I can't tell you why. He's never done anything to hurt me that I know of.”
A plump man with a dour face, wearing a white uniform, stepped into the cargo area. He ran his eyes over Emma.
”This the chemist?” he said.
”Nathan Janklow, meet Emma Caldridge.”
Janklow shook her hand. ”What do you think of our little problem?”
”The ricin?”
”The pirates. Without them we'd quietly sail into some port and have the experts remove the ricin just as quietly.”
Emma turned her attention back to the crate. ”Do we know who claimed that ricin is in there?”
”Banner informed us,” Sumner said.
That solved that. Emma wasn't about to question anything Banner said. Ricin protocol required a whole host of cautious steps and protective equipment that was currently back on the little speedboat floating somewhere on the ocean. Emma could only hope that Ha.s.sim and Stark were alive and still able to drive the boat.
”Normally I'd follow hazmat procedures, but in this case I think we just cover up as much as possible and get to it. We don't have a lot of time.”
”What are normal procedures? s.p.a.ce suits?” Janklow said.
”Protective clothing, of course. But ricin isn't readily absorbed into the skin, so we can proceed with something less and still survive the encounter. It's inhalation that I'm worried about. I don't suppose that you have anything like respirator masks?”
Janklow thought a minute. ”We have temporary fire masks. I say *temporary' because they consist of a simple plastic hood that goes over one's head and contains a respirator filled with enough air for forty-five minutes. They're not meant to be a full-fledged mask but instead are designed to buy a person time to get out of a smoky area.”
Emma gazed at the crate. It was wooden, with an outer layer of plastic shrink wrap. There was a risk just opening it, but the danger rose exponentially with each layer they unpeeled.
”Any protective clothing?” she asked.
”Will work coveralls do? We have some in the mechanical room.”
”Gloves?”
”Rubber or cloth? I might also be able to dig up some surgical gloves in the infirmary.”
”Surgical with a heavy workman's glove over it would be great. We'll use the combination during the crate's initial breakdown, and I'll strip mine off to the surgical layer during the testing phase, when I'll need some dexterity. I suggest we save the masks for after we get through the first layers. Maybe a simple face mask from the infirmary will help.”
”Can the ricin particles infiltrate a standard face mask?” Sumner asked.
Emma wasn't sure, but she thought it could. ”Probably, but it doesn't hurt to wear them anyhow.”
”Let's get to it,” Janklow said.
Forty-five minutes later, Emma, Sumner, Janklow, and a man named Clutch were dressed in heavy mechanics' jumpsuits and work gloves. Emma had rolled her suit at the sleeves and the pant legs to allow her to use her hands and to walk unhindered. She watched while Janklow and Clutch used crowbars to pry off the crate's vertical slats. Once those were removed, the only thing standing between Emma and the vaccine vials was another layer of shrink wrap and the individual cardboard boxes that housed the vaccines. The second layer of plastic was off in no time. They were down to the boxes.
Emma couldn't see inside them, but if the vaccines were packaged like other vials she'd seen, each large box would contain four smaller ones that in turn would contain twelve vials. There were thirty-six large boxes, which meant they had 1,728 vials to a.n.a.lyze. Something told Emma that they'd never get through them all before the pirates regrouped. She needed a strategy to both physically arrange the vials and check each as rapidly as was feasible.
”Lay them out on the floor. Don't put the mask on until the last possible minute. Only wear it while you look through each small container.”
Sumner grabbed a large box and lowered it to the floor. He used a razor knife to slice open the top, then removed each smaller carton and began lining them up. Janklow joined him. They worked with a quiet efficiency. Emma helped, all the while trying to dredge up facts about ricin from her memory.
”You said it doesn't easily penetrate the skin. Does that mean that if it gets under our gloves or clothing, we won't die?” Janklow asked the question while moving boxes back and forth.