Nuevo Gerona,
Eight Days before the Pandemic
Pavel was sitting on a thinly padded
bench seat in the tugboat as it approached the black sand beach of the island ahead.
He studied the natural features of the wild region which showed several small
mountain ranges cloaked in palm trees. These formed the backdrop that lay
beyond the aqua-blue lagoon near the boat dock which was flanked on either side
by crude beachside huts made of bark sheets.
He looked back at the boat’s other occupants.
Besides himself and Viktor there were two agency operators sitting at the rear.
Jack, the tallest man, had a shaved head and pock-marked face. Martin was the
second man, who bore low-cropped black hair and a wispy goatee that made him
look like a pirate. While both lithe figures were dressed as tourists, they
bore the expression of two perched hawks. Viktor said they were security
contractors that would handle logistics and ensure their safety. Their icy
demeanor reminded Pavel of Spetsnaz soldiers from the old regime he had left
behind.
The portly captain of the boat was a
local who kept his attention solely fixed upon the ocean and never glanced back
at the rest of them. He had a deep tan and his rotund figure resembled a
bowling pin with legs.
Though the circumstances were unlike
anything Pavel had done before with NATO, there was a certain odd comfort in
working with Viktor again. They had labored alongside each other in the
bioweapons research facility north of Kiev what seemed like a lifetime ago when
Field Marshal Sergei Mirinov lorded over the program. When the Soviet Union
collapsed in ’91, Pavel defected to Germany while Viktor fled to the United
States. With his square jaw and flattened nose, Viktor looked more like a pit-bull
in a Hawaiian shirt than a cutting-edge scientist working for the CIA.
They had both sworn that if they could
ever escape from the clutches of the Soviet facility, they would turn their
skills towards doing something to help humanity instead of trying to expose its
weak spots. He had heard rumors that Viktor was acquired by an American agency
but never knew to what extent he was involved. All Pavel cared about now was
eliminating this one last threat associated with a darker time. Maybe it would
allow him to finally sleep through the night and not awaken with memories from
his tortured past.
With the fumes from the boat’s engine
shifting, Pavel got up and moved to the other side of the deck across from his
old colleague, who was staring out at a massive freighter situated at a port in
the distance. “Wishing you were on that boat instead of this one?” Pavel said.
“No, thanks. I’m right where I need to
be. Besides, that frigate is headed back to the United States in a few days along
with a dozen others to their respective countries—a nice political gesture of
goodwill to the residents of the region after that last hurricane destroyed the
mainland.”
“So tell me again how this is going to
work,” Pavel said. “We’re just going to go in, collect any existing brain
tissue samples, incinerate the bodies, and then we’re done?”
“Exactly. The agency doesn’t want any
footprints of our presence here or on the books back home. Our primary
objective is to establish the nature of the pathogen and confirm that it is
indeed KAD97, then torch the site. This whole thing shouldn’t take more than a
day or two. These gentlemen here,” Viktor said, pointing to the two wiry
operators, “will take care of everything else not related to our research.
Stick close to them if anything happens and you’ll be fine.”
“And how are we going to blend in
walking around the site wearing orange biohazard suits?”
“This island has a small population to
begin with and the location is way, way out there in a remote strip of jungle
only used by a handful of smugglers. They were the ones who found it in the
first place when they were expanding their underground network of
Eight Days before the Pandemic
Pavel was sitting on a thinly padded
bench seat in the tugboat as it approached the black sand beach of the island ahead.
He studied the natural features of the wild region which showed several small
mountain ranges cloaked in palm trees. These formed the backdrop that lay
beyond the aqua-blue lagoon near the boat dock which was flanked on either side
by crude beachside huts made of bark sheets.
He looked back at the boat’s other occupants.
Besides himself and Viktor there were two agency operators sitting at the rear.
Jack, the tallest man, had a shaved head and pock-marked face. Martin was the
second man, who bore low-cropped black hair and a wispy goatee that made him
look like a pirate. While both lithe figures were dressed as tourists, they
bore the expression of two perched hawks. Viktor said they were security
contractors that would handle logistics and ensure their safety. Their icy
demeanor reminded Pavel of Spetsnaz soldiers from the old regime he had left
behind.
The portly captain of the boat was a
local who kept his attention solely fixed upon the ocean and never glanced back
at the rest of them. He had a deep tan and his rotund figure resembled a
bowling pin with legs.
Though the circumstances were unlike
anything Pavel had done before with NATO, there was a certain odd comfort in
working with Viktor again. They had labored alongside each other in the
bioweapons research facility north of Kiev what seemed like a lifetime ago when
Field Marshal Sergei Mirinov lorded over the program. When the Soviet Union
collapsed in ’91, Pavel defected to Germany while Viktor fled to the United
States. With his square jaw and flattened nose, Viktor looked more like a pit-bull
in a Hawaiian shirt than a cutting-edge scientist working for the CIA.
They had both sworn that if they could
ever escape from the clutches of the Soviet facility, they would turn their
skills towards doing something to help humanity instead of trying to expose its
weak spots. He had heard rumors that Viktor was acquired by an American agency
but never knew to what extent he was involved. All Pavel cared about now was
eliminating this one last threat associated with a darker time. Maybe it would
allow him to finally sleep through the night and not awaken with memories from
his tortured past.
With the fumes from the boat’s engine
shifting, Pavel got up and moved to the other side of the deck across from his
old colleague, who was staring out at a massive freighter situated at a port in
the distance. “Wishing you were on that boat instead of this one?” Pavel said.
“No, thanks. I’m right where I need to
be. Besides, that frigate is headed back to the United States in a few days along
with a dozen others to their respective countries—a nice political gesture of
goodwill to the residents of the region after that last hurricane destroyed the
mainland.”
“So tell me again how this is going to
work,” Pavel said. “We’re just going to go in, collect any existing brain
tissue samples, incinerate the bodies, and then we’re done?”
“Exactly. The agency doesn’t want any
footprints of our presence here or on the books back home. Our primary
objective is to establish the nature of the pathogen and confirm that it is
indeed KAD97, then torch the site. This whole thing shouldn’t take more than a
day or two. These gentlemen here,” Viktor said, pointing to the two wiry
operators, “will take care of everything else not related to our research.
Stick close to them if anything happens and you’ll be fine.”
“And how are we going to blend in
walking around the site wearing orange biohazard suits?”
“This island has a small population to
begin with and the location is way, way out there in a remote strip of jungle
only used by a handful of smugglers. They were the ones who found it in the
first place when they were expanding their underground network of
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