The yellow police tape no longer intimidated her. Christina ripped it from the door of her lab. River and Mickey followed her in.
“I’ll leave the samples for Trinley here in the lab, where they’ll be safe,” she said as she opened the specimen box and removed a dozen tiny tubes from it. “I’m keeping six, just in case.”
“You’d better,” River said. “Mickey and I both think this Trinley guy won’t change his stripes, no matter what trick you’ve got up your sleeve.”
“We’ll see,” she replied. “Would you mind carrying these?”
She handed each of them a red plastic fuel jug and took a moment to rummage through a drawer of small tools. After finding a hammer, she led them out of the lab toward the stairs.
They climbed the stairs quickly, passing the top floor of the building and continuing to the roof. She unlocked the door and they stepped out into the night. The moon was bright and cast the strange scientific apparatus in a mystical green glow.
“This is what Trinley killed for,” she said. “A solar bioreactor with photosynthetic E. coli inside. During daylight, the bugs crank out isobutanol, the fuel that will make him rich.”
She unscrewed the caps on the jugs and attached the first one to a flexible metal mesh hose. “Fill ‘er up,” she said as she cranked open a valve and fuel flowed into the jug.
The first jug filled with isobutanol, then the other. Mickey raised one in a mock toast and said, “To the X-car!”
“One more thing before we go,” she said.
Mesmerizing patterns of green liquid swirled through the bioreactor’s long glass tubes as the tubes gently rocked back and forth. She flipped a switch to stop the rocking, and stood quietly beside the machine watching its hypnotic flow sputter to a halt. Giving the bioreactor an affectionate pat, she whispered, “I’m sorry.”
“Stand back,” she ordered River and Mickey.
The hammer in her hand rose, and with a squeal of exertion and regret she brought it down with all the force she could muster. The first reactor tube exploded, spilling warm, stinky green liquid on the gravelly roof. The second tube cracked and a thin spray of the same bacteria-laden fluid squirted out under pressure. Another blow from the hammer shattered more tubes and a puddle formed at her feet. Her clothing splattered with the remnants of her Ph.D. thesis project, Christina continued until all the vessels on the bioreactor were destroyed.
Mickey and River stared at her, wide-eyed with amazement.
“What are you doing?” River asked in a low voice.
“Buying an insurance policy,” Christina said as she turned away from the demolished machine. “Once I collect a few tubes from the lab, I will control the last stock of Trinley’s miracle bugs.”
“Doesn’t Bactofuels have some of the bacteria at their facility?” Mickey said.
“They don’t, at least not any with the recent genetic modifications I made. This solar bioreactor is a one-of-a-kind prototype and we keep all the bacterial cultures on campus. Bactofuels routinely analyzes samples of the fuel we produce, but they don’t have any of the cultures. Trinley will do anything to get these back.”
“So that’s your plan,” River said. “You’re holding his stuff hostage.”
Together they left the roof and lugged the heavy fuel containers down the stairs.
“If Trinley won’t play ball—or if I go to jail—his millionaire dreams will literally go down the toilet,” Christina said while making a flushing gesture with her free hand.
Back at the lab, she scurried about from refrigerator to freezer to sink, emptying small tubes and flasks of Bactofuels’ photosynthetic E. coli into a dirty beaker of bleach. She double-checked the storage areas to be certain she hadn’t missed any. She spared five tubes from destruction, and carefully packed these hostages into the specimen transport box along with her antibiotic samples. Then she arranged the tubes she was leaving for Trinley on a piece of neon yellow scratch paper on her desk. Using a red Sharpie marker, she wrote “For Jeff Trinley” in large letters.
“I’ll be ready to leave in ten,” she announced to River and Mickey, who were speaking to each other in hushed whispers. Her companions embraced, long and hard. Christina was surprised to see a tear on River’s cheek.
“I’m staying,” Mickey said.
Chistina halted with her hand on a refrigerator door. “Staying? Why?”
“Neil called me. I have to see him.”
Her jaw dropped. “Neil? You mean, the Neil? The tank-bombing eco-terrorist?”
Mickey nodded.
“I thought you didn’t have any contact with him,” Christina accused, stunned that the man responsible for all this had reappeared on the stage.
“I didn’t. I told you the truth, Chrissy. I only met him a couple of times. He never even gave me his phone number.”
“But he had yours.”
“Yeah,” Mickey said, his expression grave. “I think he’s done something awful.”
“You mean more awful than starting the petroplague?”
“Yes. It sounds like somehow he transported plague-contaminated gasoline out of California.”
“No,” Christina said, looking up toward heaven. “Please, no. We need more time.”
Mickey ran his hands over his face. “Neil said he needed your help to prevent a catastrophe. He sounded pretty freaked out but he definitely said ‘prevent.’ So maybe he hasn’t done it yet.”
“My help? Oh, that’s rich.”
“I’m not going to involve you. He told me to meet him at his house and he’d explain.”
“Tell the police to get over there.”
“I’d like to do that, and to beat the crap out of him. But he won’t talk to cops. I have to find out what he’s up to.”
“And stop it if we can,” River said.
“We agreed to stick together. We all go,” Christina said.
“No,” Mickey said vehemently. “You especially need to stay as far away from this guy as possible. My connection with him has already gotten you into trouble. I want you and River to take the X-car and get out of L.A.”
River nodded in agreement. As much as she hated being separated, Christina knew they were right.
“You have to keep your cell phone off,” Mickey said, “but River will turn hers on once an hour, on the hour, to give me a chance to contact you. If I learn anything from Neil I’ll pass it along. And I’ll catch up with you in San Diego.”
He took the girls’ hands and grasped them tightly. Christina hugged him and marveled at his transformation. The shiftless youth had become a man.
“You finish here,” Mickey said. “River and I will fuel up the car, and I’ll get my stuff out.”
“Good luck, Mickey. Be careful.”
Their departure left Christina feeling empty. Thank God River was traveling with her. She couldn’t handle the pressure alone. That the petroplague had escaped the local quarantine, she knew. Ultimately she expected there would be no way to contain it, which meant the antibiotic was their only hope. But even with Trinley’s cooperation, it would take time to isolate, manufacture, and distribute enough of it to prevent collapse. If Neil really had spread the plague further afield, the antibiotic would be too little, too late. She prayed that Mickey could convince the madman to abort his plan.
Packing tape stuck to her latex gloves as she sealed her specimen box. The box was marked with biohazard symbols, a distinctive pattern of bright orange interlocking rings. The box contained the potential cure for the petroplague as well as her leverage against Trinley: the last of the Bactofuels E. coli. After she and River were safely away, she planned to tell Trinley that he’d never lay hands on those E. coli again unless he turned over the antibiotic specimens to scientists who knew how to use them.
Carrying the only remaining samples of the bacteria that manufactured isobutanol was risky. What if the box got lost or damaged? What if she couldn’t return the bacteria to Bactofuels when they were needed? She decided to leave a tube hidden at the lab and marked with a secret code. Trinley wouldn’t know.
The tube was in her hand when she heard the door to the lab open and close.
River’s back, she thought.
“I’m almost ready,” Christina said, but she got no reply. “River?”
The only sound was a soft rustling followed by a click.
“River?”
Christina came around the lab bench toward the door. Jeff Trinley stood there with a gun in his hand.
“I told you not to come back,” he said. His face was red and his hand trembled slightly.
“What are you doing here?” she said, wondering what the heck a guy like Trinley was doing with a handgun. He probably didn’t even know how it worked.
“I don’t need to ask you that question,” Trinley said. “I’ve been on the roof. I saw what you did. I came to collect my property before anything happened to it but it seems I’m too late. Fortunately I’m traveling with protection. The streets of L.A. aren’t safe at night.”
He gestured with the gun. Christina raised her hands. The test tube dangled from her fingers.
“Is this what you want?” she said. “The billion-dollar bugs?”
Trinley’s eyes widened. “Give it to me.”
“On one condition. You promise—“
“You’re in no position to make demands,” Trinley said. He moved forward to snatch the tube from her hand.
Christina jumped back and warned, “One more step and I drop it. The tube shatters, and you’re out of the biofuel business.”
“What do you want?”
“I want you to do the right thing. The isobutanol isn’t enough. Somebody has to develop the antibiotic, and they have to start working on it right away. I’ve got specimens for you, over there on my desk. Take them.”
“Sure. I’ll take them.”
Trinley picked up the tubes. Looking her straight in the eye, one by one he popped off the lids.
“What are you doing? They’ll get contaminated!”
Keeping the gun sort of pointed in Christina’s direction, Trinley stepped to the sink and dropped the tubes in a bucket. As she watched in horror, he poured bleach over them.
“Now, my dear, if you want to save the world, you’ll have to give me those E. coli.”
He was rotten, rotten to the core. He was so tempted by wealth he couldn’t see that his actions would be the ruin of them all. She hated him, hated his arrogance and greed, hated that the staggering responsibility for fighting the petroplague now fell on her shoulders alone. She pictured Dr. Chen’s smiling face and remembered his horrible death.
“Fuck you,” she said and let go of the tube.
The Pyrex cracked when it landed. She swiftly raised her foot and stomped on it. The precious golden liquid mixed with the dirt on the floor.
Trinley screamed and lunged at her. He struck her in the face with the gun; she put her arms up to protect herself but lost her balance and fell. He kicked her legs and her side. She felt dizzying pain and gasped for breath.
Then her attacker was knocked away. She wobbled to her feet, clutching her side. River was there. She wrapped her arms around Christina and pulled her toward the door. She saw Mickey pummeling Trinley and he shouted, “Run for it!”
“Can you walk?” River said.
“Yeah,” Christina replied. “Wait!”
She couldn’t leave without her specimens. Mickey and Trinley were grappling on the floor but she couldn’t see Trinley’s gun. She grabbed the box, took River’s hand, and fled.