Brian O'Grady - Hybrid

“So we are finally off to Costa Rica,” Pushkin said while drifting to the front seat. “Are you going to complete the mission now, or wait? There may not be a better opportunity.”

“You know that it is not due for another forty-four hours.”

“There are a lot of people out here, and some of them are bound to be looking for you. Anticipate complications Klaus.”

Reisch paused at the mention of his given name. “Sending it now will effect containment.”

“In the end, your little bag here,” Pushkin playfully spun the black satchel, “makes containment rather moot.”

“We have to get to the end first, before we can talk about what is moot.” Reisch scored a rare debate point.

“You’re a little selective in your trust of Professor Avanti. You trust his estimates for spread of the first virus but not his estimates for containment of the second. You do remember that everything he told Jeser was a lie.”

Reisch still hadn’t made up his mind about Avanti. He first met the Ukrainian in Libya in the early nineties. Klaus had been without steady work since the collapse of the Soviets, and Pushkin had arranged for the two to meet. At first they were rather leery of one another; Reisch was uncomfortable with the Ukrainian’s reputation of radical Islamic beliefs, and for his part, Avanti was unnerved by Reisch’s reputation of violent instability. To complicate matters, Avanti was part of a nascent organization that was forming around Osama bin Laden, the Saudi hero of the Afghan resistance.

“When you introduced us, did you know that Avanti worked with bin Laden?” Reisch asked his former boss, temporarily changing the subject.

“I knew that you had been assigned to kill bin Laden and failed.”

“The failure was not mine. Your glorious Red Army packed it in before I could even make it to Pakistan.”

Despite the irony, both Reisch and Avanti came to accept the fact that a former Soviet operative would provide security for a Jihadists camp that had ties with bin Laden. Years later, when Avanti split from Al-Qaeda, all conflicts of interest had been resolved, and the two men developed a mutual respect. With a free hand, and an endless stream of money supplied by the Saudis, Avanti expanded the hidden laboratory beneath the camp, assembled a world-class team of virologists and microbiologists, and Jeser was born. Much smaller, and more secretive than Al-Qaeda, they shared similar goals; at least that’s what their financiers believed. Reisch knew that Avanti was no more an Islamist than he was. The Ukrainian was hardly a Muslim at all; he drank daily and frequented brothels at every opportunity. He often joked with Reisch about how the good and pious Saudi money was paying for his life of decadence. His goal was not the dissemination of the Islamic faith or the global institution of Islamic law; his goal was not nearly so noble; he simply wanted to ensure the survival of humanity by destroying the majority of humans.

“I think Avanti is correct. I don’t see the Hybrid virus being contained.” It was a rare declarative statement from Pushkin.

“In many ways you two were very similar.” Reisch said with a reminiscent undertone. “You both lived a life of excess, but never allowed it to interfere with your responsibilities. You both were well educated and at times quite profound, and you both managed to save my life.”

The Hybrid virus was born an accidental death. Even Avanti was never exactly certain how the disparate components combined to create the most lethal pathogen ever seen. It was a perfect weapon with only one flaw: it mutated as fast as any virus before it. To maintain full potency, the vials had to be kept in tissue cultures or freeze-dried, procedures that demanded expertise. On the morning of Reisch’s contamination, a lab technician accidentally shattered a vial of the agent and the desert wind did the rest. Within three days everyone in the remote camp was dead, except Reisch. Avanti had been in Tripoli debauching his way through Jeser’s funding when the sick and confused German managed to reach him by cell phone. Two days later, the German was in a Saudi isolation unit. The only thing that remained of ten years of work was three small vials of freeze-dried virus and the large tissue culture known as Klaus Reisch.

“Great minds: tragically there are so few of us,” Pushkin said and then was gone again.

Klaus pulled onto the nearly deserted highway; the GPS told him that the only way to reach New Mexico without using the interstate or state highways was to turn back east towards Colorado Springs. He followed the circuitous route of farm roads for almost an hour before he came to the small town of Mescali. He drove passed the obligatory Walmart and was noting that there was not a single car in the large parking lot when one of Mescali’s four traffic lights changed in front of him. He stood on the brakes and the Mercedes skidded a little along the slick pavement, ending up only inches from a large military truck that started to rumble through the intersection. His momentum lost, the driver glared at Reisch as he downshifted, rocking the squad of National Guardsmen in the back. In a cloud of black diesel smoke, they drove past him; after another moment, the light changed.

Reisch drove a little more slowly and carefully, using both eyes to drive. The road twisted left, and he found a second group of National Guardsmen busy erecting concrete barricades directly in his path. Behind them were two armored personnel carriers, their cannons pointed directly at Reisch. He had only an instant to react, and he wasted it staring into one of the barrels. Three armed men started waving their arms from behind the nearest barricade, signaling him to stop. It was cold, and they were wearing their winter gear, which disguised their insignias, but Reisch knew that the middle one was the man in charge. He was the youngest, most fit, and most dangerous. His mind darkened the instant he saw Reisch; it was nothing specific, more instinct. Reisch stopped twenty feet short of the barricade and glanced at his rearview mirror as the large green truck, with the sneering driver and twenty National Guardsmen, pulled up behind him.

Lieutenant John Fessner tapped on the driver’s side window as Reisch assessed the situation. His mind was uncharacteristically slow and ponderous, and with a burst of anger, he realized that he had Amanda to thank for that. He turned and found the soldier’s face just inches from him. Concentrate , he told himself. There were thirty-one minds focusing on him right now, and he was having trouble prioritizing them. Fessner tapped again, despite the fact that Reisch was staring at him in the eye.

Fessner was not a man to be trifled with. A combat veteran with two tours in Iraq under his belt before the age of thirty, he recognized danger when he saw it. “Can you lower your window, sir?” he shouted, his breath fogging the window, with the last word added only out habit.

Reisch searched for the switch, but it wasn’t where he thought it should be. The armrest on the door had two switches, and neither lowered the window. Instead, he accidentally hit the switch that locked the doors, and Fessner jumped back and half raised his weapon. The sudden movement of the lieutenant alerted the platoon sergeant, who eased himself and three other soldiers around the vehicle. The sergeant didn’t know what was happening, but he trusted Fessner.

Reisch found the window switches on the center armrest and finally lowered the window. “I’m sorry, officer, but you guys surprised me. I didn’t expect the army to be. . Hey, what are you guys doing here, anyways?” Reisch spoke like a native Midwesterner; he feigned embarrassment, and then curiosity, to keep Fessner off balance.

“The road is closed, sir.” Fessner wasn’t off balance. “Can I see some ID?” He was polite, but his weapon was still poised.