Paul McEuen - Spiral

“You’re insane. Japan doesn’t even have a real army,” Jake said. “Your constitution forbids it.”

“ Your constitution,” Kitano said. “MacArthur wrote it. It has no authority over me . The armies of the east, of China and Japan, already equal in number those of the United States, and we can raise five times that number. Our military spending is doubling every five years. In a few short years, it will exceed America’s. China’s economic growth is outstripping yours by a stunning margin. You falter, China rises, with Japan leading her forward. You are not stupid, Mr. Sterling. You must know it. Soon we will dwarf you. China will be the body. And Japan the head.”

“China and Japan hate each other.”

“Waters ebb and flow. The nations of Europe were mortal enemies for centuries. The Chinese and Japanese similarly fought, struggling for the upper hand. But now we will join together.”

Jake felt an incredible heat coming off Kitano. The man was on fire. Jake heard a humming noise coming from far away. After a minute, he spotted it gliding over the water, too small to be an airplane.

It passed directly overhead, then banked and circled. Jake recognized it—an unmanned aerial vehicle, or UAV, maybe one of the old RQ-2 Pioneers the Navy had flown in the First Gulf War. Jake had seen them up close on a number of occasions: they were human-sized, a few feet tall, with a wingspan of maybe fifteen feet, primarily used for reconnaissance. This one was sleeker than the old RQ-2s, probably one of the newer RQ-7 Shadows. What the hell was an RQ-7 Shadow doing out here?

“Do you know the history of the kamikaze?” Kitano said, completely ignoring the UAV. “They are named for a pair of giant typhoons, the winds of God, that destroyed Kublai Khan’s Mongol fleets in 1274, and again in 1281. The Mongols came to invade Japan. They paid for their arrogance with their lives. Those not killed by the storm were slaughtered by the Japanese forces. For the next seven hundred years, no gaijin dared repeat that mistake. Not until the Americans, the bata-kusai , the latest incarnation of the rancid-butter men. When they are destroyed, when you are destroyed, no one will dare threaten Japan again.”

The air was cold and still. Snowflakes fell slowly. “Cut the bullshit,” Jake said. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Let me ask you a question. What if you Americans discovered the Chinese had the Uzumaki since the war? And told no one? What if they had built a billion-dollar facility whose mission was to develop a cure for the Uzumaki? And then what if an extremely high-ranking Chinese official was caught on tape describing a plan of attack, a plan to release the Uzumaki in the United States, killing millions and millions of your citizens. What would you think then? Would you do anything to stop them?”

“Quit playing games.”

“Answer me. Would you do anything to stop them?”

“Of course.”

“And if someone else stopped them, if someone else made them pay? Would that person, that nation, become your ally? Even if in the past they had been your enemy?”

“Tell me what is going on.”

“Hours ago, Orchid sent a series of encrypted files to the Japanese and Chinese embassies. In them are documents and audiotapes proving that the United States is preparing a biological attack against China. A secret, underhanded, despicable act. A plan to use the Uzumaki as a weapon to bring down the Chinese government. To kill thousands, perhaps millions, of innocent Chinese civilians.”

The words were like an electric shock. Suddenly Jake understood.

“You son of a bitch. You hired Orchid.”

A hundred connections appeared, images flooding his mind. Connor jumping off the bridge. Vlad shot in the head. Dylan alone in an isolation tank. All because of this man. “You’re paying Orchid to get you out of jail. You did all this to set yourself free.” Jake grabbed one of the oars, held it like a club. “Tell me where Maggie is.”

Kitano ignored the threat. “The United States kept the Uzumaki secret for over sixty years. It covered up Japan’s infamous Unit 731 to protect this precious secret. And now it is undertaking an aggressive countermeasures program that will allow it to use the Uzumaki as an offensive weapon. I have documents proving all of this.”

“That’s total bullshit. No one will believe you. Documents can be forged. You think China will love you after this? Be your friend just because you cook up some crazy conspiracy theory that the U.S. is going to attack China?”

“The Chinese will revere me for exacting revenge against the white devils.”

“Revenge? What the hell—”

Kitano cut him off. “You still do not understand, do you? It is over. The Uzumaki is already free. It is already spreading.”

DUNNE SLIPPED AWAY TO THE WOOD-PANELED ROOM THAT was his temporary office at Camp David, phone pressed to his ear, talking frantically to Paul Waller, his attaché. Reports had started coming in from the prison at Hazelton. “Seventeen guards called in sick,” Waller said. “The prisoners are agitated. They started a riot.”

“Why?”

“No one knows. Everyone is acting crazy. The warden said he’s never seen anything like it.”

“Find out why. ”

Dunne tossed the phone down on his desk, skin itching like fire. He tried to keep calm, but it was as if his thoughts shredded before he could understand them. Streaks of light shot across his line of vision.

He sat at the desk, poured a glass of water from the pitcher on the table. His hand shook as he tried to take a drink. “There’s something wrong with me,” he said aloud. Denying it was no longer possible. Now his thoughts were crawling everywhere, almost as if they were outside his head, like spiders on his scalp. One second he was Lawrence Dunne, sinew and substance, the deputy national security adviser for the most powerful nation in the world. The next second he was a loose collection of dust, water, and sand.

“Walking dead,” a voice said.

Dunne looked up, shocked. It took him a minute to realize that he had said it. He was sitting in a chair, at a desk, his BlackBerry on the desktop before him, but he was also standing across the room, watching himself sitting in the chair. I’m having some sort of breakdown .

The other Dunne watched him. The other Dunne was now a rotting corpse, bits of skin hanging down like peeled paint. The other Dunne spoke, his voice sounding as if it came from the bottom of a well. “Walking dead.”

Dunne closed his eyes. The other Dunne was still there, waiting in the blackness.

I’m cracking up .

A wave of nausea hit. He shook his head, saw streaks of lights like tracer bullets. The walls began to pulsate, as if the office were a giant, breathing animal.

The prison . Everyone at the prison was going crazy.

He flashed to Kitano, the old man on the floor of his prison cell, a drop of spittle on his lips.

His phone vibrated on his desk, wriggling like a living creature. Dunne forced himself to pick it up.

It was Waller again. He sounded panicked. “They tore apart Kitano’s cell. He had a phone. A goddamn cellphone—one of the guards admitted to smuggling it in for him. He’d been texting back and forth with someone. Lawrence, he knew . He knew everything that was coming. The demands, everything. But that’s not the worst. In one of the books he’d carved out a little space. Inside it they found a MicroCrawler. It was wrapped in a note. The note said, ‘The falcon strikes.’ ”