27 The Austrian

 

International District, Old Seattle. Jul 30. 2033

47°35'57.8"N 122°20'15.3"W

 

Jun took the pot of jasmine tea from the woman and carried it over to a table near the entrance, dumping his bag onto an empty chair. Setting his tablet in front of him, he slumped over the table with his face near the monitor. Reaching for the pot while he scrolled through the sites onscreen. As Jun absentmindedly poured the tea into his cup, he squinted at a news article.

La Balise was not one of his regularly viewed sites—he preferred to go digging through the deep web for independent stories rather than use the aggregates. But lately the French site had posted some interesting articles about his uncle’s former employer, Huang Biotechnologies. Jun scrolled down the page, frowning as he read. The recent coverage focused on the death of La Balise’s managing editor, found murdered in the agency’s Paris office. Jun recognized the victim’s name as the author of several posts about Huang’s “secret laboratory” and the mysterious fire that engulfed the building’s top floor two months back. “This smells like HSA.” Jun mumbled. He rummaged through his bag and produced his latest burner, texting a brief message to Douglas, then set the device next to the teapot. Returning his attention to the tablet, Jun brought up various sites for the other journalist mentioned in the La Balise article. “Garance Beauchene” appeared in several search engines, but all his contact inquiries produced dead-ends. He entered Garance’s name into his burner, pushed “send” and continued with his search. Numerous posts by the journalist appeared; the most recent ones related to mysterious lung cancer deaths in remote locations. Jun pulled up her most recent post: “Inexplicable Disease causes Massive Death Toll in the Marshall Islands.” The article was accompanied by photographs of the Kwajalein Atoll and Ebeye Island. Enlarged photographs showed hundreds of bodies stacked in rows along curbsides; some partially covered, others left exposed. Graphic images of the deceased bore a gruesome similarity: A pinkish foam excreting from the noses and mouths of the victims. The article linked to other posts by the same journalist—most of them from a refugee camp in Eritrea, Africa. The manifestation of the disease was identical in both countries. Jun sat back in his chair and sipped his tea, mulling over the articles. He remembered the last time he saw Mamma’s brother—two Christmas’s ago. He recalled a vague reference to gene manipulation and the passionate way his uncle described a DNA-modifying enzyme he’d tagged onto a virus that could reproduce more rapidly in his patients’ lungs. His uncle referred to it as “a long-awaited cure” which might earn him a Nobel Prize. “This is all very hush-hush, of course,” Uncle Kim said. Jun never held much interest in all that science mumbo-jumbo at the time, but now he began to wonder about the secretive project that Uncle Kim had worked on for all those years—in his lab that just coincidentally burned down—before he vanished into thin air. Damn. I really need to locate this French reporter somehow. He entered “human genome editing” into his search engine and clicked on several links, scanning them for any mention of his uncle or Huang Biotechnologies. There were several references to modifications on CRISPR-Cas/9 sequencing by Dr. Kim Chen, but nothing dated after the year 2028 and nothing that included Huang’s laboratory. Well, this is weird…

Jun’s burner vibrated and he snatched it off the table. The message came in from Sithlord07 and read, “La Balise is tango-uniform. G. Beauchene is off the rez. Suggest sending a msg. through deep channels—like ‘Balrog-deep.’”

Jun smirked as he read aloud the cryptic message from Douglas. “’Balrog’… only you would use that reference, you mega-geek.” Jun texted a reply, “Send this into the deep places: ‘K. Chen, gene drive: CRISPR-Cas/9’ Then attach this image to post. Be wary of HSA.” Jun included an old photograph of his Uncle Kim. It wasn’t much to go on, but if this woman journalist was as thorough as she seemed to be, he figured that she’d surface eventually.

Jun poured the last of the tea into his cup and drank it down then, scooping his electronics together, he stuffed them into his bag. What have you been up to, Uncle Kim? Slinging the bag over his shoulder, he felt the burner vibrate. Jun walked outside and swiped the screen. Two images appeared—the first was of an attractive Asian woman wearing a white lab coat with “HBT. Inc.” on the front pocket. The second was of the same woman’s corpse on a coroner’s table. Her torso was covered by a white sheet—bruises and burns were visible on her face. The caption beneath read, “J. Lui. Former coworker of K. Chen. CRISPR-Cas/9 researcher. Didn’t end well for her. Care to talk?”

“Holy shit!” Jun froze in front of the bustling fish market. How in the hell did someone find me? He moved to the edge of the sidewalk and snapped his burner in half, tossing the pieces into a tank of sable fish. Jun looked furtively around as he hurried back to the flat. Shit, I need to contact Douglas. He ducked into several doorways as a ruse before returning to his own building. Whoever this is, they’ve got some serious skills—scary skills. He bounded up the stairwell to the sixth-floor apartment. Sliding his card across the keypad he looked over his shoulder before slipping through the door. Jun upturned his bag on the sofa and rifled through its contents. He picked out a different tablet—an older model—and set it up on the table. He rushed to the back room, knelt by the futon and pulled a box of new burners from underneath the cot. After assembling his new device, Jun entered the contact for Douglas and sent an urgent message. “Are you made? Ditch burner. I’m hot.”

Within minutes a new text came through. The contact number was different, but the phrasing was classic Douglas. “Dude, they got me too. Not HSA—too subtle. I bow to this sensei’s skills. Traced it to Austria. Still searching for source. Meanwhile, check this link.”

The link went to a community website in Sitka, Alaska. The page was amateurish and most of the articles revolved around weather forecasts and bear sightings. However, the specific page that Douglas routed featured a story from three weeks ago—about the sinking of a Russian trawler. “Locals witnessed an explosion at sea which completely destroyed the fishing vessel leaving no survivors.” The report continued by stating that authorities had blamed the strike on a naval aircraft practice gone awry—however, the US Navy denied knowledge of a missile test in that region. The article mentioned that the trawler had departed Hong Kong Harbor on June 1^st and had been fishing offshore of Sitka for two weeks prior to the attack.

“Where’d you find this?” Jun texted.

“Our mysterious friend.”

“My uncle’s last scan came from H. K. Harbor. June 1st.”

“Dude. I know.”

“Send a new message: ‘Let’s talk.’ Include this photo. Thx.” Jun attached the most recent photo of his parents and Nai-nai. Since arriving in the International District, his search had produced nothing but dead-ends. Biyu was growing desperate for any news and Jun had begun to lose hope that he would ever locate his family. Perhaps this mysterious source could uncover some information—he, or she, seemed to be unstoppable as far as tracking down Jun and Douglas—no slackers themselves when it came to cracking computers. God, I hope Douglas is right about these guys not being from the HSA—otherwise I’m in a heap of trouble.

 

 

Herrengasse, Vienna Austria. Jul 30. 2033

48°12'43.9"N 16°21'49.9"E

 

Christoph’s condominium encompassed the top two floors of what had once been Austria’s modernist museum. Located in the center of the Herrengasse district, the view from all sides of Christoph’s residence offered a stunning panorama of classic Viennese architecture and historical attractions such as the opulent Palais Niederösterreich.

Veronique stood at the kitchen window—a plush robe tied loosely around her waist—transfixed by the shadows that the setting sun cast across the baroque buildings along the street. A metallic timer-bell on the broiler startled her out of contemplation. Pausing to refill her coffee cup, she padded out of the kitchen with a plate of toast and marmalade. Veronique settled down next to Christoph and watched him work. For a man in his early-40’s who spent most of his time in front of a computers, she found him incredibly fit and handsome. His prematurely greying hair and sharp features gave him a mysterious and sophisticated quality, in stark contrast to the androgynous young men she used to call her classmates at Institut Européen de Journalisme à Marseille.

Veronique pushed a piece of toast toward Christoph and nudged his thigh with her bare foot. He glanced over and gave a lopsided grin. “Good evening, sleepyhead.” Turning back to his monitors, he continued tapping, his eyes moving rapidly between them. Veronique nibbled on the crust of her bread, Garance was accurate in her description of Christoph—he’s one of the best hackers in the world, she dunked the last piece of toast into her coffee and smiled. What Garance failed to mention, is that he’s got to be one of the best lovers as well. The thought of the unsociable Garance, giving any consideration to a man’s—or a woman’s, libido, made Veronique chuckle. Christoph shot her a look out of the corner of his eye. “What’s made you so jovial all of a sudden?”

“Mmm, a funny thought about Garance, that’s all.”

Without slowing his rapid-fire computing, Christoph dead-panned, “Garance is many things, but ‘funny’ has never been a quality that comes to mind.”

“Forget it, you wouldn’t understand,” Veronique replied. She stretched her legs underneath Christoph’s chair and watched him work. Eventually she asked, “Who are you cracking now?”

“A hacker in Canada—well, they’re officially in the United States territory inside Canada. I admit, this guy’s quite adept—I’ve had to reroute through several IP locations to track him down.” He sat back and folded his arms across his chest, waiting several seconds for something on his monitor to appear. He smiled and leaned forward with renewed interest. “Ah hah! I found you.”

“Does this have to do with Garance’s investigation?”

“It might, ja.” He bent over the screen, his eyes darted back and forth as he and scratched the bridge of his nose. “Hmmm… I think that Garance is onto something quite serious.” Veronique scooted her chair closer to Christoph’s monitor. “Look right here,” he pointed to a photograph that was attached to an encrypted message. “Now… compare it to this photograph right over here…” Christoph reached for his tablet and opened up a third screen. He flicked through some files and produced a photograph of Dr. Kim Chen’s ID badge. “It’s the same man, correct?”

“Oui.”

“Garance’s hunch about your boss discovering HighTower’s dirty secret now sounds more plausible. Because, this scientist right here…” Christoph pointed to the photo of Kim. “Has been missing since the fire that Callum investigated before his murder.”

“Perhaps he was killed in the fire?”

“They found no bodies—at least none in the laboratory.” He pulled up another page on the large monitor. “These are internal memos between Huang Bio Tech’s upper management. They’ve searched everywhere for the guy… And, per these documents, Chen is the one who set the fire. The last time his transponder chip hit the scanners was at the port in Hong Kong’s harbor—the same night of the fire. There was only one ship at the dock near where his chip was pinged. A Russian ship that left later that night.”

“Has it turned up anywhere?”

“You might say so,” he brought up an image of the Tryoshnikov’s debris field. “That isn’t all of it.” Christoph handed Veronique his tablet and pointed to several other images. She flipped through them one by one, shaking her head. He nodded at the device in her lap and said, “Those bodies were, at one time, Huang’s top scientists—they worked in the same lab as our missing scientist. Obviously these two are no longer among the living. And I had to dig pretty deep to find the photographs.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that there is no record of Jiang Liu or Zhao Xu: No official record of their employment at Huang and definitely no record of these post mortems.” He pulled up another screen with the death certificates and coroner’s reports—all written in Chinese characters, translated into German.

“Does this all relate to the stories that Garance was investigating—the scientist… Did he steal some sort of chemical agent or biological weapon?”

Christoph looked back at the screen and pursed his lips as he considered how best to address her question. “Do you know anything about genome editing, Veronique?”

“Only a little. When I was at university, I did a research project on a story that was leaked from China. An experimental technology that altered the CRISPR enzyme and... well, in a sense, ‘put it on steroids’—that is, they attempted to make a fast-acting enzyme to recode specific DNA in rats.” She tapped the table as she tried to remember the details. “You know, it was impossible to find any sources that could verify it, but I did uncover a report of trials being readied for human genome sequencing. I couldn’t use the report in my project, because it was unsubstantiated… I recall that I did receive an excellent grade for that paper.”

“Do you still have your work?”

“No. All my documents for university and my research for La Balise was abandoned when… when we were forced into hiding.” Veronique swallowed as she thought about Callum. “Why do you ask about this technology? It’s not yet possible to recode human DNA—especially not on such a scale as we’ve seen in the Wad Sherife camp… or is it? Christoph, what do you know?”

“I’m beginning to think that it might be very possible. And I think that those three scientists in Huang’s lab were working on a precision drive—one which can somehow impact an exclusive population.” Christoph bit on his thumbnail for a brief moment as he read a message on his second screen. “Christ,” he muttered to himself, shaking his head as he scanned the documents—then, aware that Veronique was waiting for him to finish his explanation, he continued, “I’d prefer not to go into too much detail about how or where I got this information; you’ll be better off not knowing, in case things turn out badly. But HighTower is at the center of it and they are trying to locate this scientist. My guess is he probably still has whatever gene-drive mutations they were manufacturing and they want it back.”

Veronique nodded her head and slid the tablet back onto the table. “If I can help in any way—you know, research or legwork that won’t set off any alarms… Well, I’d like to participate.”

“I will take you up on that right now.” He stood up and ruffled her hair. “You’ll find a burner in the cabinet over the sink. Call your colleague and give her this encryption.” He handed Veronique a crumpled piece of paper with several numbers scrawled across it. “It’s safe to assume that HighTower has a surveillance system set up in Europe. They’ll be screening for any trigger words that relate to this matter, so don’t talk for long—then again, it’s not like Garance is too chatty anyways.”

 

Christoph was still immersed in his work when Veronique returned. He looked up as she entered the room and paused typing as he saw the expression on her face. “What’s wrong?”

“Garance told me to look into a recent incident in Galapagos. She couldn’t say too much, but she referred to hundreds of refugees being killed by a missile strike. “

“Ja, it’s been on the international news for several days now; all signs point to more HighTower nastiness. Why does she ask you to dig deeper?”

“She mentioned that some of the survivors spoke of trying to escape a deadly sickness—many people dying with a bloody lather coming from their nose and mouths. It corroborates the evidence that I found just before Callum was killed. Evidence that has since ceased to exist.”

“Nein, not all of it. Look here.”

Veronique leaned over Christoph’s shoulder and gasped. “Where did you find this? I searched for days after it was taken down—I couldn’t find a trace, not even a reference to Ebeye Island!”

“Does a magician ever give away all of his tricks?”

“You really are the best, it’s true.”

“You’re too kind.” Christoph waved her away with feigned modesty. “Listen, I have a task for you if you’re still interested.” Veronique nodded and took a seat. “There are three members of the Chinese scientist’s family that went missing 12 days ago. Here are their names and address. Can you start digging around? Garance tells me that you are an ace researcher.”

She smiled and picked up her computer. “I’m not so bad.”