Tenacity Gene

iUniverse, Inc.

Chapter One

"Right here, Nellie, thank you."

Marine Lt. Colonel Theodore "Buzz" Striker's audio and video streamswere routed to the monitor in the kitchen. Buzz, who appeared to be inthe den at his condo on the DuPont Circle in Washington, DC, was nowa highly placed intelligence officer at an NSA office in the Pentagon. Hisfield of expertise was biological warfare, and the Chinese were his forte.

"Dwight, you remember my recommendations when Sandra and Iwere down there last month?" Navy Commander Dwight Hoggue didtake Buzz's recommendations to heart. They chilled him to the bone, thenand now.

Hoggue and Striker were highly disciplined, steely-nerved men,cut from the same genetic cloth. They had been forged, tempered, andannealed in a $2 billion nuclear submarine. The two men, who had stareddeath in the face and prevailed, seemed possessed during that last visit,obsessively talking about infectious diseases. Their intelligent wives wereentranced instead of bored by the dialogue, and they eagerly joined themacabre conversation.

Dwight's mind flashed on the many years ago he was in that airport inAlbany, New York, after visiting his mom. Hoggue was on furlough afterhis graduation from Annapolis. He was reading The Coming Plague byLaurie Garrett. From that book and many others since, Dwight Hogguelearned about Ebola, prions, mutated viruses of all kinds, more than a fewinfectious particles with and without nucleic acids, recombinant DNA,and gene therapy. The Coming Plague was scary stuff, until that lady in theshawl and the granny glasses read the cover and, in that rude, nasal NewYork tone said, "The Coming Plaque. So what are you? A dentist?"

Presently, Dwight was still in the navy but was now stationed atCentCom at MacDill AFB in Tampa, Florida. His command and Buzz'scommand interacted with each other often.

"Yeah, Buzz, how could I forget?"

Silence lasted several long, long seconds.

Dwight broke the silence. "No!"

"Yes," said Striker.

"An index case of the Big One?"

"Numerous index cases, so it has to be man-made," Striker said withoverwhelming sadness in his voice. "The Chinese say it's a highly mutated,highly aggressive H5N1 avian RNA virus, causing a cytokine storm inits victims in a matter of hours. The CDC received some samples fromour diplomatic staff in Beijing, and the CDC says that's bullshit. It's notnaturally occurring. They've never seen anything like it.

"Each particle has a lipoprotein capsule around two distinct nucleicacid molecules: number 1-coding genes that work in trans, which areheterologous plasmids; and number 2, cis-acting sequences to do somekind of transduction."

Hoggue was well aware that transduction was a dead-end infectionthat introduces functional genetic information into target cells.

Striker sadly, ominously continued. "Dwight, we believe this is anengineered infectious agent, like a synthetic nano-probe for gene therapy.And get this-the envelope has a terrifying resemblance to smallpox!"

"Smallpox, Buzz? Is there even a sample of that anywhere in theworld?

"Yes, Dwight, one in the United States and one in Russia. And Godhelp us, the coding genes and the cis-acting sequences are recombining intoproductive, viral-like particles. If this is gene therapy, that is not supposedto happen."

"Then what the hell is causing the plasmids and the cis-sequences toreconstitute?" Hoggue asked, disbelief in his voice.

"We ... don't ... know, dammit! It's worse than anything we couldhave imagined; if our intel is correct, there's a 100 percent lethality. Pointof infection is human body fluid of any kind, including any little cough,and the particles stay viable on surfaces such as shopping cart handles forhours and hours, thanks to that very sturdy lipoprotein envelope. Did youand Marty do like I said and get a mortgage on both houses?"

"Yes, Buzz. When you tell it to Marty and me like you did last month,we have to take it to the bank, and we did, literally. Between my son'sequity, Marty and me getting mortgages on both houses, cashing in myNorthwestern mutual accounts, and with Marty's inheritance, we had acool million dollars. I talked to that Reynolds guy in St. Petersburg and gotall million of it converted to Krugerrands. The 'rands were authenticatedby that jewelry appraiser in Altamonte Springs that you referred me to.The 'rands are in the safe at the house here in Tampa, but we're ready tomove to the cabin. Should we go now?"

"Absolutely, Dwight. Pack up your son and his family—and then you,Marty, your son, and his family skedaddle out of Orlando and go to yourcabin in the panhandle with lots of rifles, ammo, groceries, bottled water,and supplies. Get ready to stay isolated for three months, maybe longer.With a little luck, you can then return to Orlando. You take your pickuptruck. Tell your boy to drive his dualie and keep enough fuel in reservetanks to get back to Orlando, in case some Florida crackers siphon all thefuel from the trucks' tanks. Those Florida good ol' boys refer to eight feetof garden hose as a `Carolina credit card.'"

"Oh Christ, Buzz. That bad? You think this is `the Big One'?"

"Yes, I do, Dwight. I hope all of you are still alive when this is all over.I hope Sandra and I are alive as well, but be prepared for the worst. Andby that I mean losing some of your grandkids, your wife, your son, or yourdaughter-in-law, if you don't lose yourself as well. You can't do anythingabout your daughter and her family in Albuquerque, except immediatelywarn them and get them to her cabin in the Jemez Mountains. Did youprepare her like I suggested?"

"Yes, Buzz, and she's spent the past month stockpiling stuff at hercabin, thank God, as Marty and I have been stockpiling the cabin nearDefuniak Springs. I sent Heather enough money to buy everything sheneeded for lasting more than three months in the Jemez Mountains. Sheknows how to hunt; she'll be fine for weeks, even months, after that. Thankyou, Buzz. We owe you our lives. We didn't think it would be this soon."

"You can thank me when all this shit is over. It hasn't hit the fan yet,but it will in the next two weeks or so, when it spreads outside of China.Mark my words. Buy everything you can for a long siege; stock the cabinwell during the next week. After that, stay out of town and away fromeverybody. I mean it, Dwight. One week, then complete isolation. Gottago, Commander, lots more calls to make to family and loved ones."

Chapter Two

Thank God for the Grid, the laser fiber-optic network that was tenthousand times faster than the old Internet. It was the mature spin-offfrom CERN, near Geneva, Switzerland, the particle physics center thatcreated the World Wide Web. After they'd heard initial reports...