James Rollins - Altar Of Eden

Jack clapped him on the shoulder in thanks and motioned him back toward the stairs. “What about word from the FBI agent? Any sign of Dr. Polk’s GPS signal?”

Mack’s demeanor darkened. “Not a blip or a ping out there, boss.”

Jack swore inwardly. If only he had more proof that Lorna was out there… not just for Paxton, but for himself, too. As he headed down the stairs doubt began to fray the edges of his resolve. What if she wasn’t even on the island? Or what if she was already dead? He swallowed back those fears. They would do him no good.

She had to be alive-and somehow he knew that to be true. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t in bad trouble. And unfortunately he felt that just as strongly, and that fear grew with every passing minute.

“We still bugging out of here in ten?” Mack asked.

Jack shook his head. “No. We’re out of here now.”

Lorna must have passed out. One minute she was heaving bile into a bucket beside the treatment table, and the next she was on her back on the same table. Smelling salts passed under her nose. The ammonia smell felt like a kick to the face. She batted away the technician’s hand.

What are they doing to me?

The ovary-stimulating drugs had been injected intravenously. Nausea swept through her even before the last needle had slipped out of her vein. She fought it for a full ten minutes, but eventually her stomach gave out. They must have expected that side effect and kept an emesis pan bedside. She filled it three times until she was left dry-heaving.

As the smelling salts brought her back around she struggled to sit up. The room spun.

“I’d lie down,” a voice said beside her.

She turned and recognized the broad-shouldered gentleman from the villa’s study. Seated next to her, he still wore the same hiking pants and khaki vest. This was Bryce Bennett, the man behind the operations here. Up close, he appeared even larger. His tanned face looked like fine-grained leather, his blue eyes like pale ice.

He waved the technician out of the room.

“I had chemotherapy for lymphoid cancer ten years ago,” Bryce said, leaning forward. “Got it from exposure during my years as a submariner. Back when soldiers were still watching atomic tests from the sidelines. So I know what you’re feeling right about now. But you’ll get your sea legs back in a few more minutes. At least the other women did.”

Lorna stared around. She was momentarily alone in the treatment room with the man. Not that she could do anything. She felt as weak as a newborn with pneumonia. But with each breath, she did feel her head clearing.

“What are you doing here?” she asked. She meant it to mean why had the big man bothered to come down here. But the single question encompassed so much more. Why were they putting her through this? What was the purpose of all of this?

He took her question literally. “I came here after speaking with Dr. Malik. Something you said intrigued me. I thought we could share a few minutes before they’re ready to continue the procedure.”

“What about?”

“About Eden.”

She didn’t know what to make of that and remained silent.

Bennett sighed and leaned back in his chair. She noted a silver crucifix pinned to his jacket’s lapel. It flashed as he shifted back into his seat.

“But let’s start at the beginning. I started this project because of a paper produced by the chief scientific advisers of the Pentagon, a group calling themselves the JASONs.”

He lifted an eyebrow at her to see if she’d heard of them.

She merely kept her face blank, giving him nothing.

“Ten years ago, the JASONs fiercely advocated for the military to invest greater resources into what they all called Human Performance Modification. They were concerned that our enemies were getting the upper hand. Foreign powers were already doing pharmaceutical research into performance enhancement. Such drugs could produce troops who were smarter, stronger, and better able to handle the rigors of war. You can imagine the alarm bells that raised among the Pentagon top brass.”

Bennett chuckled at the thought. “The advisers went on to warn the brass that the U.S. was falling way behind, and as a matter of national security, they recommended two things: to increase research funding and to monitor those foreign studies abroad. And believe me, following this report, money flowed-and it flowed in all directions. One of my competitors in the defense contracting business is already actively testing drugs as a way to improve memory and cognitive performance in troops.”

Lorna began to understand where this was headed. She pictured the brain scan back in Malik’s office. She also recalled the description Duncan had used for the project: bioweapon systems.

“Following those guidelines, money also went into monitoring other projects abroad. It was during a coordinated attempt to co-opt foreign researchers as moles that we were approached by Dr. Malik.”

A door opened behind Bennett. As if summoned by his name, Malik swept into the treatment room. At his heels followed the chief of security. Duncan was red in the face, making his scars stand out more prominently.

From their demeanors, it was plain they’d been arguing.

Bennett turned to them. “What’s wrong?”

Duncan spoke first. “We’ve lost one of the cameras in the compound.”

“It might just be a mechanical glitch,” Malik quickly added.

“Or it could be one of his creatures took out the camera. If they were smart enough to cut out the tracking device in order to sneak over here and kill one of my men, then they’re smart enough to knock out a camouflaged camera.”

“What about the other cameras?” Bennett asked. “What are they showing?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Malik insisted. “Their activity appears routine. No sign of any hyperaggression. I still say such outbursts are isolated aberrations and can be eradicated.”

“And I say we go in with assault rifles and purge the place.”

Bennett held up a hand. “That would set us years behind. Duncan, have the security doubled at the gate between the two islands and send an armed team to check on that camera. We’ll decide what to do from there.”

Lorna listened to this exchange in silence. Back in vet school, she’d learned that it was better to keep quiet and let the client do most of the talking. More information came out that way.

But Duncan didn’t fail to note her presence. He glared at her as if this were all her fault. “Sir, I also heard word from our computer tech. It looks like the New Orleans facility does indeed contract with Compu-Safe to back up their computers. There’s a good chance their data was saved to an outside server. We’re still tracking where that might be.”

“Keep looking,” Bennett growled. “We can’t risk losing our technological advantage.”

“Yes, sir.” Duncan headed away again.

Lorna was glad to see him go.

Bennett turned his attention to Malik. “Doctor, you’ve arrived at an opportune time. I was just going over how the Babylon Project got started, how you sensed the winds were changing and threw your hat on our side of the ring.”

“Yes. Such a change also allowed me to continue my research, only this time with sufficient funding.”

“We call that a win-win situation,” Bennett said.

“Indeed.”

Bennett faced Lorna. “Do you know why we call our work here the Babylon Project?”

She shook her head.

“Because it started in the biblical region of Babylon. Dr. Malik was already under way with his project twenty years ago, a secret weapons project hidden beneath the Baghdad Zoo. He was doing biowarfare research with a virus he discovered in a small Kurdish village in the mountains near Turkey. You may have heard of Saddam destroying Kurdish villages back in 1988. During that attack, he bombarded this village, too, and many others with mustard gas and Sarin nerve agent. He also bleached the local wells. All to cover up what they found there.”